Special Guest Jason Staley

Count money, man.

Money back riches.

I'm trying to talk, trying to talk to my beast, but

What's up gang?

Welcome to the grind cast.

Stop it, area's here.

Get ready to do the new day.

What's up gang?

Welcome to another episode of the grind cast.

Get ready to do the new day.

And I got our college football teammate, our brother, our roommate.

Justin and I as roommates are pretty much our entire

college history and career at Mercyhurst in the house.

And we are going to have some fun and get uncomfortable today.

So I couldn't get blamed.

I was thinking let me swing it to Perne.

I'm going to have to be the interviewer today and pull it all out.

My friend, my friend.

My friend.

Listen, so question of the day is why would you live with Mr.

Areas and Justin when you were a little bit different?

Well, I mean, one, I wanted to live with Justin and first off,

I caught him from behind in a high school football game.

And so I wanted to see what his face looked like because I got him from behind

and tracked him down.

After we got the tape.

But no, I mean, honestly, we played against him in high school.

Unfortunately for us, fortunately for these guys, they beat my high school team.

Shout out Perry Pirates.

And we didn't just beat you guys.

I mean, was 14 to 7 and a half.

I mean, listen, if we could recruit all of like,

like I mean, good lord.

You know, it was, you know, I mean, okay, we're ever going to do that.

I suppose.

But yeah, so anyway, yes, we lost 40 to 7.

They put it on us.

They put it on us.

It was 14 to 7 and a half time.

Game of good run.

You know, but I think that, you know,

permed to be honest with you is just, you know, when you go to college,

you want to meet new people.

Yeah.

And I think that's important.

And just how you click with people in the way that like my parents raised me

was just kind of, you know, make your own friends, make your own way.

Right.

And I think we were, I think we were all at the back of the line, like a physical.

Like we're all kind of, we got, I think we got that kind of, like,

I remember it clearly.

I remember it.

We were getting ready.

Yeah.

Getting ready to get physicals.

But I, you know, I had already looked up.

Who got recruited and did I know anyone that was, come on.

There we go.

Send it down here.

Yeah.

Get you to Diet Coke.

Yes.

Thank you, Kate.

Great.

Shout out Kate.

Shout out Kate.

Great.

Thank you, Kate.

First Diet Coke.

Appreciate it.

For my dude, Staley.

But we were getting ready to get physicals.

But coming into it, I looked at who was recruited.

And I saw Staley.

And I knew that we played against them.

And I remember on the scouting report coming into the playoff game.

The main focus was you and your brother.

We thought they were black.

The twins.

You thought they were black.

Thought they were black.

Yeah.

You know what I was like in the playoffs.

I was just angry.

So I didn't know.

I didn't think that.

I just was pretty.

Just in the playoffs.

We're just, that's what we're going to.

We'll get there.

Okay.

Okay.

So they say like, so when you got to them, you were a little bit different.

So you say don't judge a book box cover.

So how did you guys end up even hanging out with stuff like this?

He was like a good influence on you.

On, on me.

I feel bad for both of them.

On the up front.

Because on the up front.

On the up front.

I was a bad influence on Justin.

Yes.

There was some bad influence on Staley.

Yes.

And they were both a good influence on me.

So you can see by the time I got out of college, I had gotten slightly better.

And they had gotten slightly worse.

Yeah.

But Staley was the president.

He was the vice president of the school.

Yeah.

And I got kicked off campus, which we can get back to.

Imagine that dynamic.

Vice president of school.

Bam.

And I got kicked off campus.

I literally think that, you know, you talk about having nine lives.

I think I had like nine lives.

And a lot of it, I think was just like the people love Staley.

So much.

So much.

They were like these, he can't be that bad if this guy loves him that much.

So I got a couple extra shots, you know, because of that stuff.

So, you know, having Staley as the vice president of the school definitely, definitely helps.

Yeah.

So listen, you got to tell us a little stuff about back then about y'all, like back in the

day.

Like what you guys got?

What was that?

Tell us a little stuff about you guys like back in the day.

Yeah.

I mean, I think the, you know, for me at least it was, we got along, you know, really well.

And I think that that's something that, you know, we all played, we all came in as defensive

as a coach.

You know, the coaches realized me really good playing zone, you know, when I see everything, you

ask me to turn and run with people.

Not good.

So my career as a, someone in the secondary was gone about two weeks into camp.

My, my ass was getting moved down the linebacker as soon as it was over.

But I think that we got along really well and then we're all kind of in the position group

together.

And that was, you know, really helpful.

Simon and I redshirted Justin didn't, you know, look at the shots.

Justin didn't.

Look at the guys.

Look at the guys.

That's right, sir.

You really think this guy's going to redshirt?

You know, this guy I wish I would have.

Now but not, did not.

Yeah, but I think that we just got along really well.

And it just kind of, it kind of happened over time where it was, you know, they, I was on

the first floor of McCulley Hall and you guys were on the third floor.

And I just, it was one of those things where, you know, I'd get down with class and I'd

always find myself up in, I think it was like 331, something, you know, I did the corner,

you know, back, back corner and you know, we, we hung out and we realized I think that

we all had more in common than, then, then I think that you would have thought if you,

just look at the people that are looking at us right now.

We had a lot more in common.

I think that was, it was really, really fun time for us.

You want to talk about like just super cool and non-judgmental, you know, on anything

because it was a big transition for me, you know, and Justin coming from Youngstown to

Mercyhurst.

Dude, Staley was just super cool, super in, in rolling with, with everything.

And I think we just started to learn off each other.

But, you know, one of the things that, that I could say amazed me about, I mean, Justin,

his work ethic in school, the, the, the study, the work that they put in was, was

amazing.

I barely went to, to, to, to, I played a couple of those accounting books.

Oh, yeah, accounting books, he's crazy.

Yes.

I mean, they're like, this is Justin.

Oh, Penny, Haynes.

Yeah, oh, yes.

And, and, and carrying them around like, I mean, Perm, it was like, he's carrying the football

around.

You should've seen the way he carried his accounting books.

Yeah.

His intermediate accounting book was like, it was thick.

Now, now that I remember, it was thick, but, but that's also something that my parents

has still to me.

Yeah.

You know, and now that I have three girls, I'm like, man, you know, I, I want to,

I want to do the same thing.

But grades were always, you know, at the, at the forefront of my dad and my mom, and they

made sure that I got good grades or I couldn't play sports.

Right.

And I had to basically get good grades in college, or he would have sent my butt back home.

So it all, I always had that fear, you know, in me.

And that's why I majored in the county, you know, because I like numbers.

And those books, so, man, we're unbelievable.

But, Staley, talking about you, you, you, you, you, you caught me from behind.

Yes.

You know, because you can't let it go.

I can't let that go.

You see me?

Because I think the listeners, we got to come back to the, the listeners need to know that

there's 11 people on the field, right?

And I juke, if you know what a juke is, you know what I mean?

I juke all 11 and was on my way to the end zone.

Uh-huh.

And after I juke like number 11, that's when Staley, Staley does not give up.

That's one thing that's great about him.

He does not give up.

He ran me down.

He did after I juke them.

Probably I like to 10 y'all.

Like you copy me back.

Real tall, Staley.

How fast was Justin real tall?

I mean, I think really, what one, he's really fast.

I think that the, the ability to, to get going was something that was different.

You know, they had three guys that could, they were all a little bit different.

And I think the, the way that Ursula was, they kind of like, would soften you up with

it.

It was like Delbert and Terrence.

I think those were the guys' names and that.

They don't have a son.

You're like, used to, to try and attack with these guys that big guys.

Big guys.

And I'm not necessarily going to run away from you.

The only thing that ticked those guys were great athletes.

I think both of them went and played Division I football, but they were, they were bigger.

They weren't necessarily going to run away from you.

And then you'd hand them off to, to Justin.

It was like this change of pace and you were just, it was like a blur.

A blur.

And, and I think, I mean, I would, I, I know that on that particular play, I mean, I,

I want to say that whenever Justin was in the game, you give yourself, you three or four

more yards, it kind of depth because you wanted to see kind of which way he was going to

score it out because if you didn't have an angle, like, if I didn't have an angle,

I wasn't catching, I mean, I'm not, I'm not catching him.

It's your party.

One of my favorite moments in high school with Justin talking about an angle is when

he smoked Marlon Jackson.

Yes.

You know, Marlon Jackson went on to play at Michigan.

I'm not angry that game.

He played in the NFL for a long time.

Want a Super Bowl.

You know, that was like one of the highlights for me watching Justin, like just straight

smoke.

Uh, Marlon Jackson is not tall, but no, with some speed.

All right.

Let's get back.

So we got you, you and him was red, sure that Jay was always on.

On top.

Yeah.

I'm not a lot.

So what this has a little bit about this, uh, this vest store that you guys got, some

of you taking a ride somewhere, I mean, I really, I wasn't, I wasn't there for it.

I heard it like secondhand.

I was coming back from, uh, I was coming back from like a class and someone was like,

Hey, did you, you know, Simon's wearing a bullet, professing the cafeteria and I just

like started laughing.

I was like, no, he's not.

And they're like, no, no, you really, you have to like, you know, go down there and I was

like, he's like, it's there.

I was wrong.

Yeah.

And I mean, I was just, I was there.

I was, I remember it because it was like navy blue, navy blue.

To be honest with you, it wasn't just the vest.

It was the time I didn't have a shirt underneath the vest.

So I mean, it was like, right, 50 cents a number of times.

He's like coming out like, just like, kind of like, rocked up with the bullet profess

on it.

And I was just sitting there and I'm, and I was just shaking my head and I'm like, what

I get my seat pretty much told everybody last week, you know, kind of some of the, some

of the extracurricular activities that I was involved in transitioning into college.

And so, you know, I was, I was out and about in the city of Erie back and forth in Youngstown,

you know, visiting folks in the projects, you know, in Erie.

And so I had a good reason to have the vest on.

But it didn't help that, you know, I was on 50 cent before he even became a thing.

Yeah.

Oh, yes.

When it was underground.

So that was like, he was like my mentor.

You know, which was, which was not a good thing.

But here's where the experience part comes in.

You know, I'm trying to think, man, this is a good thing, but I just want to avoid, I don't

want my kids to go through.

You know, this, but like, Staley, you know, the one time, I don't know if, you know, if

we're cool to tell the story or not, Staley.

But, you know, remember we were watching the news and I saw a friend of mine on the news.

And we had to go home.

Yeah.

You wrote with me to support me.

Yeah.

I mean, you know, when you were talking about, when you were talking about, when you were

talking about the, you know, coming together and, and I said like, you all wanted to be

around people that were different, correct.

And just kind of get new experiences, right?

I mean, that's one of the reason why you go to college or you, when you go to a job,

you know, you want to meet new people and obviously I can, in, in Perry, Ohio, it's, you

know, a great community, you know, pretty sleepy.

You know, the only thing that's getting shot or kind of, you know, deer, deer, you

know, and birds and stuff like that.

So, excuse me, you know, when Simon said, you know, one of his best friends had, you know,

been shot, you know, at first you're kind of sitting there and you're in shock.

I mean, he woke me up when he heard the news and I remember thinking to myself like, this

is like something out of a movie, right?

Right.

Right.

It's, you know, like, it's real.

And then he's like, we got to go to Youngstown and I can't drive.

And I said, okay, looks like we're driving a Youngstown and I'll never forget it.

We, you know, we, who started you take?

We took Simon's, I think we was the regal, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And we're driving, we're driving this, we're driving down to, to a hospital in, in downtown

Youngstown.

It really wasn't far from the football field.

I don't think.

And I remember, you know, Simon went right into, when, right into TCs, you know, his, his

hospital room.

And I just remember thinking myself, I was just sitting in the hospital lobby, permanent.

I didn't know what to think other than like heating, Simon didn't come right back out.

So I kind of knew that it wasn't very good.

Right.

And I ended up like falling asleep on those like hard, hard chairs.

Hard chairs.

And Simon, Simon came out at like six o'clock and if anybody's done the drive from Youngstown

to Eerie, like, it's a ride.

It's a ride.

And we had eight o'clock lifting.

Yeah.

And it was six o'clock.

Can't miss.

And he was doing his back dance.

So eight o'clock lifting.

Eight o'clock lifting, you know, mandatory and you know, so we just, I mean, it's a miracle.

One is a miracle that the Simon's friend survived.

Yep.

Cause he probably shouldn't have.

And then the second thing was it was a miracle that we got to eight a.m. lifting because

there was no, I should have got like seven speeding tickets.

You were flat.

I mean, run it, run it red lights.

So the point where like we just drove straight in and you're not really allowed to park

you know, right, right by what was that the, uh, uh, uh, right where we were the football

facilities.

You're not allowed to park there.

We just kind of just, you know, park there probably parked illegally and just kind of like,

just going to got down there and went to weightlifting.

And I remember thinking, thinking back on it, it was very scared.

Just in the end, you know, at the, at the, the, the first because you're kind of, uh, there

was a little, I guess a little apprehension because I was like, well, if I go to this hospital,

I can get shot.

Right.

Right.

You were just like, what's going on?

What am I doing?

I was like, kind of like, what, what am I doing?

But I think for, for me, logical thoughts.

I just, I just really didn't, I didn't want to let Simon down.

Right.

And, and so I think you talk about loyalty, man.

Right.

That was our, that was our, you know, now I got the shirts as a loyalty is rare.

We, we kind of lived by that in college of, of like loyalty over everything.

Loyalty of all.

Oh, yeah.

And for, for a group of young college cats, man, there, there was a lot of loyalty in, in,

in us and especially, especially our group.

Yeah.

And so, Staley really reconfirmed to me what loyalty, you know, really was, even if there

was differences and, and, and, you know, I was doing things a little bit different than

he was doing things.

He just always was all in and, and, and have my back, you know, and, and like I mentioned,

say, you know, probably eventually we did get, you know, I got kicked off campus and

they moved with me.

I mean, so, so, so, just, just, just, just, just, just, just, just, just, just, you're clear.

Simon got kicked off campus.

I got asked to leave the goody two shoes over here tonight.

Yeah.

Yeah.

If the only one that ever had any housing points, no, no, Simon, so, so, so, so, just, just

to get the zero.

No, no, no, no, Simon, or excuse me, Simon and I had no housing, negative housing points.

You see, had some housing points, he just got in trouble because, yeah.

was with us. You see there's something called a rule book. And in life a lot of people don't want

to follow that rule book because a lot of people get you know they get around the rule books and

people just give them paths on the shoulders and things like that. But Simon would always for some

reason. Usually he gets around it but for some reason he just kept getting in a little bit of trouble.

He just and finally they said you're not going to leave the school but we got to kick you off campus.

And because we were so loyal we said we're going with you. You know what I mean we're going with you.

And we didn't stay on campus. We all you know went in we got a house and we had some unbelievable.

They said it's worse. It's worse. You know what I mean at this house but we said we're going with you.

Y'all so because of him. It wasn't you guys actually it wasn't it wasn't it was a very much a group.

It was a good effort. It was a good effort. Simon and I ended up getting into trouble with the

resident's lifestyle. Yeah a little bit more than Justin because he was always I just

well not not that you know he's got let's let's just Simon. Simon likes to take the right back then

he used to like to take the right for things. Okay. Okay. Okay. Simon. Until I ran out then we started

off. Well no. When our tech fell it was me and Justin. Yeah. Because I had no more. That's how they had to take that

way. So how did the deck fell? Oh my okay so we were having a blowout party. It was it was it was

the good beginning of the Michigan. We just won. We won. You know I was at the front door. It was

it was you know I think that we had kind of really uh was the where we'd really come into our own

as a race to having a good time. And you know it was the first first game of the year. You know

I think you know a lot of people wanted to to to celebrate. You know we had this house off campus.

It was really nice. I had a deck on the outside and really like in retrospect it wasn't necessarily a

deck so much it was like a four by four. Yeah. Stuck in the ground. I think I'll put with like a

platform on it. So in I guess we probably should have monitored how many people were out on that

deck. But we were all very excited. Simon was getting an IV downstairs in this and it was better.

It was literally the only time that we ever got in trouble. Did you? That I never had to like

obscure what Simon was actually doing because he literally it was literally the truth.

I got this thing. It's like Simon was Simon was downstairs. I was dehydrated. Got like a full body cramp.

Yeah. I could move. I couldn't move. So I'm getting the drip. And so I was making sure I'm back.

I guess it was no. Y'all go get sure there was no underage. I'll be at the house. Okay. No. I'm

saying the front door. You know the reality is we did our best to make sure there were no

people under the age of 20. I think only one person came out with with an injury with a broken

leg. A bunch of people. Broken leg. I don't know. She broke her ankle. Broken ankle. Okay. God bless

that girl. I can't remember her name but she was loyal. Yes. She was nice. She was very loyal.

She could have blew us out. She could have blew us out. But what saved the day. Does anybody remember why

what's the day today. No. There's not a couch. So that there was a couch underneath it. Two

things. One we rolled all the kegs down the hill and our buddy picked them up. So by the time the

fifth you know the 14 or 15 you know earied patrolman came our house was completely empty.

And the only people left in there were over the age of 21. And so you know what I mean in all

series is we were very lucky. No one got hurt. Yeah for sure. We were not able to to really any

time we would turn. This is where it comes like. The tires.

Remember my entire I do remember the dinarley. We had the dinarley tires underneath the bed. And if

bounce they said if it wasn't for a bounce on the tires. Somebody that would have been gone. So

for everybody that was hating on me for the big ass spinning rims. We saved people's lives.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean. I don't know. I don't know. I saved a lot of the time. And shout out

you know Mike Ciccara who literally like surfed it down the house. So he was like up against it.

And if you looked at his back he had like aluminum siding marks. Wow. Cic was on that day.

Yeah. Slip right sliver down. Six got sick. Ciccras got nine lives though. So I mean you know. He

literally slid down and like we still talk about we. It was very funny. It was very fun.

Yeah. We had a really good time. Unfortunately for the people that came behind us at Mercyhurst.

The let's just say the residents life handbook has changed a lot. Yes. You know. With the three of us

having a very heavy hand and how that was changed. Oh yeah. Well so well that's crazy. So we're now

y'all being together. Right. You didn't had him ride around with you with a bulletproof vest

taking it down. Y'all still on to do some things. Jade and got kicked. There's things I can't

I'm that he wouldn't let me mention on this too. That that happened. And he still wrote it. There's some there's some there's some

there's some guard rails. Thank you Giovanni. Because he you know he he he's what's what's a company

you're with right now. Schneider down. Schneider down. Schneider down. It doesn't even matter to me. I just

this is where if anybody you know I'm big in the real estate. Yeah. If my money's not going into

this business it's going into real estate and anything after that any cash. This is the guy that got

the money. This is the investment guy at at at Schneider down. The only one that I would trust. Yes. So we

had to keep it semi you know what I mean. This is like the really the PG version of everything that

this poor man had everybody I'm mercy of his nose. So what have you learned now in business that

y'all have done all their stuff that you can share with Staley now knowing that John had a ball he didn't

got a lot of things. I'd like to hear it from Staley. I think they hear enough for me. Okay. You

know what what have you know Staley give us some some things you've learned in in business in

your journey. You know coming up as a financial you know financial advisor for high net worth clients.

You know I think in my backgrounds in research I was an intelligence uh studies major in Simon.

Blue that for you. When we talk we talk. I mean he said. He said. He said. He said. He said.

Blue that for me. And tell me that he couldn't pass the test. Remember. You remember that?

He said. I didn't pass the test. It's when I got polygraphed. I told the truth.

And then Rahm with that. So it's no. I'm glad we're passed. So I'm glad we're passed that.

So when they asked you to explain certain uh certain incidents that were in our residence life

file like our deck falling um you know there's there's there's some time they by the way like

you know looking back on it I want to give a 22 year old me a security clearance either.

I did I'm looking back on it. I don't know that I necessarily would have. And so

I would say that what I've learned more than anything is,

you wanna, there's a lot of,

we all went to school and we all learned a lot of things

at school and I think the,

one of the things that the most valuable lesson

that I've learned is that how you relate to people

and specifically the way that you treat people

and really, I think, Perm, you said it,

not judging a book by its cover,

I think that that gave me a life experience

that I don't think I necessarily would have

because I think that you could have gone to Mercyhurst

and not had the kind of experience that I had.

Or the experience that these guys had.

And I think that there's,

I think we're gonna get into it a little bit later,

but there were some shared life experiences

that Justin and I shared

and that actually Simon shared

that we ended up having more in common.

And I think for me, going through life

and having people that you can count on,

I'm just a cog, I didn't know anybody.

So calling these guys and trying to get through,

because I wanted to do something,

I wanted to go somewhere where I didn't know anybody

and see if I could handle it in a big city.

And I think the value of friendship,

and just when you have those experiences with people

and it's early on, before Simon, Justin,

and I kind of became who we are now,

we were all friends and we didn't know

that we were gonna end up in this place.

Like I certainly didn't know what I was gonna be doing.

And the success that these guys

to my left and to my right have had,

you know, we were able to,

I think that the experiences that we had when we were 18, 19, 20, and 21,

really were formative in that they propelled us

to where we are today,

but it's also comforting knowing that,

to the extent that you've obtained some amount of success in life,

that you're still really close with the people

that knew you before it happened because it's really easy to,

for me now I've worked in a family office.

I have been able to establish myself in my career

and I have really good friends,

but to go from A to A to Z,

not everybody was there for the middle part of it.

And I think that that's for me,

what has taught me is that when you're in your career,

especially when you're not having success,

because we've all three of us, it hasn't been a straight line.

Simon, it hasn't been a straight line for you,

Justin, you and I, we have changed careers.

Yeah, yeah.

And so it hasn't, it wasn't a straight line for us.

And I think, you think back to those times

when you're 18 and 19 and football's the focus

and you're not, you maybe not having the success that you want,

you kind of rely on these relationships.

And I think that, you know, I've leaned on them

when I moved to Pittsburgh,

I knew that I could count on these guys to help me kind of move back here

and get acquainted.

And it's just been really good to kind of get the band back together again,

but it's weird for us, because we don't really see each other,

because you know, Pittsburgh's like weird like that.

Like you live in the North Hills,

South Hills like Pittsburgh, they don't like to cross bridges.

Like that's a thing.

Like you cross two bridges and it's weird.

Like my wife born in the South,

South of the North, I don't even really,

but I'm in East too.

Like I was like, yeah, you know, you know,

Britt, I, you know, I went into my wife,

love you babe.

You know, we went out to, you know,

I'm like, yeah, I had to go out to Monroeville

and she's just, you know,

it might as well be a same group.

It might as well be like,

you gotta go there.

It might as well be like St. Louis.

So long.

Or like, you know, my, my goddaughter, Alia,

it's like we get the first birthday party.

It's like we're gonna go to Pine Township.

She's like, well, how far is that?

And I'm like, half, half hour.

So let's get back to 18 and 19

when you guys are all playing football.

Who?

Who was, how was the play with Justin in sandwich?

Hmm.

I mean, I think how good was,

I mean, how good were they?

Well, I mean, Justin, Justin kind of jumped out at you,

because he was really athletic.

He was just mad.

He was fast.

He's built like a brick.

You know, me, he was a couple inches tall.

He wouldn't have been playing him for years.

And I just think, yeah.

The sat reality of college recruiting.

Or if he decided to play baseball,

which, I don't know if we want to touch on that sense of

sensitive subject.

You know, on the box.

To play baseball, I'm not gonna talk about this.

So I think that, you know,

first and foremost, like Justin,

just being like physically able to keep up with guys

that were, you know, had been in the program for four years.

I mean, Justin was like physically ready.

I mean, Simon was started as a fresh star as a freshman.

I mean, Simon was like from a,

from a physical standpoint.

Simon was, but I think, you know, Simon, I think, had,

you know, was, was not as physically gifted as Justin.

From like a, from my, especially from like a speed perspective.

I mean, Justin was like a four or five guy,

you know, was, you know, ran track.

He, he Justin was physically ready to play scholarship football

as an 18 year old, day one.

Day one.

I think with, with, with Simon,

I thought I loved football.

And, and, and when you,

when you get next to someone like Simon,

who really loves football, like you kind of say like,

oh, my intensity level has to get to, to, to come up.

Made up.

If I'm, if I'm ever going to, to have any level of success

because if, if this is the, if this is the, you know,

if, if he is what I'm going to be judged against, you know,

I have to pick my game up.

And I don't know that I ever matched his intensity.

But I'd like to think that his positive work ethic

and intensity kind of rubbed off on me.

And as I went through kind of position changes,

I never played linebacker before.

And it kind of took me a while to kind of find myself

on the football field after the, after the position change.

But you know, Simon was always like very supportive

and his just intensity kind of, you know,

jumped out to the point where, I mean,

we kind of had, even as a freshman kind of had to tell him

to like, calm down.

Yeah.

The coach's like, hey, man, like,

he's got your friend, he's got to like play on Saturday.

Simon was literally trying to like take the head off

of like our starting receivers,

starting running backs like every wrap.

Like we would be in shells.

And Simon's out there like trying to like smoke people.

We're just like, relax, relax, man.

And then the thing about it is he never relax.

No, he was always ready.

And he was like always on.

Like, I mean, I think some people might watch this podcast

and especially if you don't work with him,

I mean, he's always on.

Yeah.

That's the thing.

You're always on.

And that was the thing.

And it was just like he attacked everything like that.

And I think when we, he talked about, you know,

maybe some of the things that he was doing when he was 18 and 19,

I think the intensity that he had on the football field

and the intensity that he had as a result, I think of a lot of the,

a lot of like how you grew up and kind of the trauma that you had.

I think you started to channel that into your business.

Yeah.

And that's where what you see in terms of the way that the drive

that he has, whether it's in his, you know, the primary insurance business

or in the consulting and the consulting vertical that you started with Marcus,

I think that level of intensity is something that's been there since,

I met him 18.

So, you know, we're 20 years later.

Still there.

It's the same thing.

And it's just sometimes I'll text him, I'm like, what the hell are you up at five o'clock

in the morning, you know, rolling around with, you know, a guy that's just knocked

somebody out in the bellotaur.

I'm like literally stopped trying to fight this guy.

It's like 70 pounds more than you.

And, you know, just knocked somebody out in the bellotaur.

And it's just like, I'm thinking to myself, I've been having this conversation with this guy

for 23 years.

And he still doesn't listen to me.

But I still, but I still, but I still, I still persist.

So now, how was it for you Simon and Jay?

How was it planned with Staley?

I think for, you know, for, for me, Staley was, was a super smart on the field and off the field.

So he was, he was the guy that would, you know, he was like,

and me and him were similar in a sense of how much work we would put into the film room.

Right.

And, and studying the other team and the other opponent.

And I played safety and he played linebacker.

So he was like the quarterback when he got on the field, you know, of the defense.

And, and, and I was the quarterback of the, of the secondary.

And so I think plan with Staley, he was, you know, he and I were both over achievers.

You know, we, we had to put in extra work, you know, then, then Justin, you know, me.

Look at this guy.

Look at this guy.

Yeah, but I was always there.

I was always there.

Put new work.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's why you were, cause you already were so good and talented.

And then you matched that.

Most people that gifted don't put.

put the work in and we saw what happened to those folks.

We had a lot of people come in that were super gifted

and didn't put the work in and their careers didn't even end up

as good as our careers, but I think playing with,

how many years did you start, Staley?

No, no.

I started one, I started our fifth year and I played a lot.

Played a couple years, I played every year.

I played every year, I mean I regularly come here.

Yeah, I played the last year but we're a captain also.

Yeah, I mean I, we were all captains at one point.

Yep.

And you know, I think the captains up here, come on.

Yeah, I played, especially like in like the nickel kind of,

when we went to an odd front I played, you know,

I played behind a really good guy, you know, Mike Cicero,

who's really talented and it took just took a while.

And I think, I honestly like at one point,

like I didn't want to come back and play.

Like I was kind of done, you know,

between Simon and my twin brother Brandon.

Like you're going to regret not playing your fifth year.

So it was just kind of like I was like kind of over it.

And I had I not come back and played that fifth year.

I think there would have been, you know,

you want to talk about 20 years later living with a great

amount of regret.

No, yeah, because I was able,

I was able to kind of accomplish a part of the,

something that I kind of set out to do in 2001.

And and I think that, you know, when Simon talks about,

you know, the film room, I think that's where like he and I

would would spend a lot of time.

We connected.

Now I just wish I would have followed him to the weight room

after.

I was like, you know, we're trying to get you in there.

Simon and Justin are going to go to the weight room after that.

And I maybe went to the bar, maybe to the bar,

maybe to the bar somewhere other than the weight room.

I mean, I remember you.

Can we talk about Frank?

Is that off to air?

Can we talk about Frank or tank or no?

I mean, I think I think you guys have already come.

But before that, you know, I mean,

I just remember you being so, so, so patient.

You know what I mean?

You said it took you so long to get on the field.

You know what I mean?

You were patient.

And this is a guy that was decorated in high school.

Like he was unbelievable.

Thank you, broken a lot of records at your, at your high school

for being a Y receiver, being a DB.

Wow.

And then you go to college and you take a back seat.

And never saw him.

Pout, never saw him complain.

Went through a lot of injuries as well.

But always was there in the film room always with there,

the football IQ was up there.

And I just learned so much tenacity from you.

and then I learned, you know, showing up.

I remember you going out, you know,

and drinking all night.

I believe they used to show it up.

That was a rare, a rare, a rare all the time.

You know, Simon's intensity was a rare quality.

My quality was, I never,

I believe you to drink and recover.

I mean, I would be there at like eight o'clock

because you want to talk about like your parents.

Like I knew if I was gonna have fun

and my mom, you know, God rest her soul,

she ever found me, if she ever found me not going to class.

Eight o'clock in the middle.

So I would just show up at all these like eight o'clock classes.

And, you know, and, and, and, and I think that that was,

it became a kind of a running joke

and that's kind of where I got the, the Frank Detankt nickname.

And he mentioned his mom, you know,

I had the, that's one thing they ended up sharing

is, you know, just as mom passed, you know,

when he was young, the breast cancer.

And then, Staley's mom passed while we were in college.

And a lot of times, you know, that can kind of end

the kids career, you know, in college.

And, not only did it not end his career somehow, you know,

and I mean, I could, I could see that he has a lot of her traits

because when I remember going to celebrate her life, you know,

at the funeral and, and it was like, you couldn't even get in.

You couldn't even pull up.

There was, there was like just people everywhere,

lines of people everywhere you could tell she was just loved,

you know, and that's, that's the way that, that Staley was also.

But he didn't let it kill him.

He found a way somehow, which is unbelievable,

found a way to come back from that

and continue to drive, continue to push forward, you know,

end up a captain and persevere, you know, ultimately.

So that's something that, that sticks out to me,

you know, about about Staley.

And for sure.

Yeah, and I think the, and that's kind of, you know,

when you talk about, it's easy to be friends with people when you're successful.

And, but when the people see you at their lowest moment,

you know, that's where you, that's like kind of what you remember.

And I think that's, you know, we all kind of shared that, you know,

in terms of kind of losing a parent.

Or, you know, having someone really close to you in the case of Simon,

you know, losing them when you were young.

Right.

And the kind of the trauma that's associated with that,

and, you know, these guys were there with me.

I remember, you know, you know, Justin, you and I,

remember we walked through, we saw a coach on the party.

Oh, yeah.

And, you know, I kind of, you know, Justin kind of walked with me

as I had to go tell the coaches, I'm like, Hey, I got to go.

And I'm not coming back because I'm not, you know,

I'm not going to be back until after she's gone.

And we have the funeral.

And you know, that's, that's a hard, hard message to deliver when you're 21.

And, you know, to have these guys, you know, who, who drove to my house,

you know, the day that she passed away.

And we're with me kind of holding my hand through, you know,

the, the dark is moment in my life.

And then kind of the, the backswing is, you know, when you're 21,

you know, your grieving process is a little bit different.

And I think that they gave me enough space to, to grieve the way that I wanted to.

And then when it was kind of when you're, when you're pushing up against a place

that it could go either way, where you're, you could, there was, there was,

there's always a fine line, right?

There's a thin line.

And I was coming up against that, you know, not doing the things that I was supposed

to, you definitely drinking too much.

And you're looking at, you're looking at, maybe the life goes a little bit,

a little bit different if you don't have, you know, those positive influences around you.

And, you know, Justin and Simon were able to say like, you need to step out of this.

Like it's been, it's been, it's been long enough.

Like you, you've done it your way, now kind of come back.

And, and that's where kind of the upswing comes.

You know, I got a internship with the Department of Defense that summer.

You know, we, we start, you know, then we, you know, Justin's Justin's fourth year.

We had a really good football team that year.

I played a lot more of that year.

I best, you know, stayed on campus, best shape of our lives.

We had a great summer together.

And that's where you kind of turn the tide and the momentum kind of changes in your life.

And, and for me, you know, that's, you know, the value of friendship.

And that's really the kind of like the merciless difference for me was, you, we,

we didn't judge a book by its cover.

We were there for each other when it really mattered.

And then, you know, it turns into this kind of wonderful friendship where,

I mean, I, I say the merciless, you know, I've said this, you know,

multiple times, you know, merciless to save my life.

And a big part of merciless saving my life was, you know, the guy on my left and the guy on my right.

Because if, if I'm anywhere else and I don't have those relationships and I don't

have these guys to lean on, shoulders to cry on, it goes different.

I'm, I'm convinced that my life is different.

So, you know, that's, I think at the end of the day, if you take anything away from

this is that, you know, the power of friendship in the, in the, in the,

in the saving, in the saving quality, we talk about the loyalty above all else.

I mean, I think that that's just these guys, you know, there were times where Simon and Justin didn't want to go out,

but they knew I was going to be out.

And especially during that time, it was like they just needed to make sure that I stayed on the rails.

Yes.

And so that's going out with you.

Yeah.

Just to make sure that you was all just to make sure I was good.

So sometimes it was just to see how many pictures you could drink.

So, so the, the, the three guys here for Mercyhurst, y'all,

been together for such a long time.

One of the things that you took from Mercyhurst that you can carry on in you,

you, uh, carry with you today.

You want us to just go down the road on the road.

I, I would say, you know, for me, you know, Staley mentioned, you know, the, the love of, you know, my love for football.

I don't, I don't even know if it was and I did love the game of football, but I don't even know if it was,

definitely he's trying to kill guys.

Go ahead.

As much of it.

And this is it.

This is the reason why.

Of, of, I didn't really, I don't even think I would give the credit to, to loving the game of football as much

as I hated the fact of, if I don't come with this intensity, I may not be a starter and I couldn't take it.

So it was hating to lose more than I love the win.

It was hating to lose more than I like playing the game of football was under a over, you know, here,

people say over my dead body.

Yeah.

It literally was like over my dead body dog.

I'm going to be a starter out here for the next four years.

If I got to kill you out here, it's going down.

That's what, that's, that's what's going to happen.

So I think that's something that, that I've been able to carry with me that I learned at Mercyhurst is,

is because I was last starting out, you know, my red shirt freshman year.

I remember seeing the depth chart.

Charter was like seven safeties and I was like six or seven.

You were so mad.

On the paper.

He was so mad.

I'm going to catch a body.

I'm going to kill somebody out here.

And so I think just gradually falling away to realize,

regardless of your size and circumstances, the power of, of work ethic and discipline and resilience,

what that can do for somebody I learned at Mercyhurst and I carried that on into, into business.

I would say for me when, when I, when I think about my time at Mercyhurst is that you,

you're in any given circumstance, there's a lot of opportunity, but you kind of have to go out there and take it.

Right.

And so for me, I wanted to, you know, try to play football at the highest level, right.

So kind of division two was as good as it was going to get for me.

I wanted to excel in school.

I wanted to be active in the student, uh, student by, I almost brought my green coat by the way.

Oh, yeah.

That would have been so, I was, I was an ambassador.

So I got to take, I got to take, uh, you know, take perspective students and their families around campus.

Like I want to follow you around and try to bust your balls.

You did knock me off again to the point where,

and while I was at my home, I was like, we're going to take a tangent, we're going to take a tangent or

this is the ice cream coat.

And they would, when they found out that I kind of had this like rhythm to the tours,

they would make sure that they were like somewhere on it and they would change it up every single time.

So it wasn't just like in, you know, one cafeteria or one part of campus.

And Simon would just, he would just say enough stuff until I started laughing.

But I, but I think for me, I think for me, thank God they didn't see you with a full of

professed. That would have been, I would have not have got them to, but I think the,

I think for me is that I took, I saw what Mercyhurst could, could be, and I just tried to maximize

every opportunity that I could.

So I mean, you know, I was a, you know, football player.

I was in a pretty difficult major.

I was vice president of the student body.

I was an ambassador and I had a lot of friends.

And it wasn't just friends on the football team.

I friends that didn't play football.

And, and I made friends, you know, with the administration, you know, people that were working

there. And to me, the, if you take one thing is that, you know, no matter where you are in life,

no matter what obstacles you have, there are a lot of opportunities.

But it's not new to make them.

If you, you can't just sit back like I look back in my football career and it's like, yeah,

I made the choice not to go to the way room.

And I look back at that and I say, you know what, you know, you got the career that you deserved.

Right.

You know, and for me, it was just trying to maximize those opportunities.

And really on the things that maybe it didn't go my way at Mercyhurst, I was like, you know,

what, I'm going to, I'm going to try to make it better.

And, and do better the next time I get that at bat.

And so just maximizing every opportunity that I could.

I mean, that's the one thing I took from Mercyhurst.

Love it. Love it.

Couple things I took. Number one was friendship, you know, that you can, you can put so many people

from different backgrounds, you know, at that time we were from Youngstown, Ohio.

We didn't know too many people outside of Youngstown, Ohio.

And for everybody to take us in and open arms with Simon, beaten up, you know, the, the,

the baseball player the first day before we even started.

That's what I played baseball.

Oh, that's why you know, but then we end up being friends, you know,

Simon's, you know, the godfather, one of my daughters, Staley is as well.

So just that friendship and camaraderie.

Um, I also learned that, you know, you, you, life isn't fair.

You know, when, when, when you look at life, you know, we had some very good teams and coming from

high school where we went 14 and one.

And then, you know, we go to college in our first year, I think we won one game.

Coach got fired, you know, bringing somebody else to games.

And, and understand it didn't matter how great some of our teams were.

Sometimes we didn't win the games we wanted to, but we, we kept fighting and we kept,

you know, trying to improve, kept trying to get better and that camaraderie helped us

at the end of the day.

And I think our best, best, best season was about five games.

So just that friendship that everybody had, we were a team.

People coming from New York, coming from Florida, and just that friendship that we had.

But also understanding that life isn't always going to, you know, go the way that you want to go.

But your response is what actually takes it, you know, where, where, where my best friend

lost his mother, you know, that isn't something that you want to happen.

But his response was something that was great.

And good things are always going to happen, but bad things are going to happen.

But what are you going to respond, you know, to those things whenever it happens,

just like me getting hurt, you know, my junior year.

Yeah, the, you know, I think the locker room too.

I mean, there's no, you know, there's no lies.

You know, there because, you know, you're, you're just one of

a hundred guys.

And, you know, when you go to watch film like the eye in the sky doesn't lie.

Amen.

And I think that that more than anything is that, you know, if you, if you have,

if you have gotten good reviews, bad reviews, or mediocre reviews,

and a football, and a football setting in front of your peers,

that's also something that sticks, that sticks with you.

So I mean, to the extent that you can avoid the negative reviews, because we all know, right?

Well, we've all been there where it hasn't, it hasn't gone right for us.

You want to avoid that.

And I think that that's the, the good thing about being in a locker room,

because I think that there's, in addition to that, perm, I think that the,

you know, not, not everybody that looks like me is exactly like me.

Not everybody that looks like the ability.

Right.

You gotta be able to adapt to the circumstances.

And so I think that there was, you know, even just within just the different personalities that you get.

Yeah.

I mean, I think that that's probably the reason that, you know, when you look at kind of,

you know, Simon and Justin's practice that they build here,

there's probably no two people that look alike.

And I think that that's not by accident.

I think that that, a lot of that has to do with them growing up in locker rooms,

where they were around a lot of people that didn't look like them.

Right.

And they're in person.

Yeah.

Well, not even mercerious, but the person was, you know, you know, you gotta really do it.

Oh yeah.

The person is.

The person is.

And even where you grew up in Campbell, I mean, you know, not everybody looked the same.

And I think that that's, you know, when you talk about caring things over,

I see a lot of stuff that carries over from, from our time in mercerious together.

And I,

Obviously, most importantly is the friendship with these guys.

Oh yeah.

So I just, we can go on for hours talking together.

This has been fun.

It's absolutely been fun.

We just cut out the last part.

So that's why everybody's laughing.

That one couldn't be shared.

That one was beyond rated arms.

That one's going to get over with the great.

We've taken that one to the great.

Yeah.

But man, it reminds me of like, where Simon?

I don't know.

He's here.

I don't know where he is.

Daily, let me just tell you what you guys missed and you'll never find out.

I was looking at Perm and, and Staley was grabbing me by the shoulders.

Right.

Did you see it?

And he was like, and I could feel his like hand.

He was like, no, like seriously, you got to stop.

You know what I mean?

Because he didn't realize Giovanni can cut it out.

Right.

So what's your boy, Dalton?

That was our triple.

That's your boy Dalton.

You wanted to, like, I was going to like, yeah, I wanted to check it out.

I know he wanted to.

I know he wanted to.

I know he wanted to.

Oh man.

Yeah.

You can cut that out.

For sure.

But the love is, the love is so real.

Cut it.

It's a legit 20 years.

20 years.

20 years man.

We're coming up on a legit 20 years in the summer.

Summer, yeah.

Some of you legit 20 years of the relationship being maintained, brother.

And I appreciate Justin as always.

I get to see you all the time.

I appreciate you.

But Staley, man, I appreciate you making the trip.

I appreciate your loyalty and most importantly, I appreciate you taking care of the bag.

Yeah.

I appreciate you taking care of the bag.

Take care of the bag.

Thanks for joining us on another episode of The Grind Cats.

Get ready as a new day.

Count money.

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