We’ve been doing radio shows at Greenmount Station in Hampstead for almost 15 years with our pal Chris Richards. This time for the Maryland Crab Cake Tour, Tim Lohrfink from the sports wagering side of the OTB in Carroll County comes aboard to provide some sports wagering realities now that the mobile side has become easier and more mature in Maryland.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Maryland crab cake tour, Green Mountain Station, sports wagering, mobile betting, retail sports book, gambling addiction, in-game betting, baseball betting, crab cake recipe, restaurant staffing, inflation impact, community events, family nights, local sponsorship, responsible gambling
SPEAKERS
Nestor Aparicio, Chris Richards, Tim Lohrfink
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
Welcome home. We are W, N, S, T am 1570 towns in Baltimore. We are doing the Maryland crab cake tour. We’re up here at beautiful green mountain station. We’re in Hampton. I say beautiful because it’s Christmas season. They got all the decorations out on the main street here. It’s all brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery of Raven scratch offs to give away. We’re going to be doing the Maryland crab cake tour in various places. In December, gonna started off in Cocos on the fourth, we’re gonna be at the BMA. Gertrudes on the fifth, Costas on the 18th. Let’s see 17th, we’re gonna be at amicis and the 12th. I know I mix the dates up there. The 12th, we’re gonna be at fadelies. Excuse me, downtown. All they brought to you by the Maryland lottery. I’m choking here. Had two crab cakes. I had a broiled, I had a fried I still prefer the fried, although Chris, Chris Richard here from Green Mountain station is with Tim Lor Fink, and we’re ot being we’re North Carol room. Been a little while since I’ve been up here. Been, like, a year and a half, has it really? Well, I did the show earlier this year with David Richardson, who was supposed to be here, couldn’t be with us today over at his bowling alley. And for anybody, it’s from this area, you sort of know, the north side of amstead, there’s a bowling alleys green mount station. Two of my guests that were here earlier, Tim Watson, Karen Fauci, both live here in Hampstead. But for folks that don’t know, you get a really unique gig here with this bowling alley, this institution that you’ve created here of last quarter of a century, and then the OTB, where you can now gamble. And you were literally the first regular guy. I used to say that got in early to do sports wagering. It you. You are the sports book, manager, manager,
Tim Lohrfink 01:35
the manager. Teller, yeah.
Nestor Aparicio 01:36
So you take the bets, is what we said, right? Yeah. I don’t even know where to begin with you with this, because I haven’t talked a lot about the modernization of all of this, and I think you wondered how this was all going to go. I had John Martin on last week and that maybe if you’d have known this, you would have thought twice. But I think we all thought of gambling as a thing. You go to a casino and do right in see a guy like you and say, I want 10 on the Chargers this week or 10 on the Ravens. And what’s the point spread? Or whatever? I think it is, spawn to be so much different and bigger than probably you thought when you invested in a license. Am I correct in saying that? Yeah,
Chris Richards 02:15
the I guess the overall is bigger than what anybody in the state thought it was going to be, but the majority of it is coming from mobile, not from retail. But having said that, since we opened the retail sports book in October of 2022 we’ve definitely increased our handle over that time, but it’s still mobile is the way to go. And in all these states, I mean, probably 90 plus percent of the money that’s wagered is done on your phone. It’s
Nestor Aparicio 02:41
bigger than that. When John Martin executive director of Maryland lottery, we partner with the lottery here, one of the reasons, I think they wanted to work with me was sports book coming online, and John’s front facing on all this. He likes to be accountable, show the numbers, answer the questions. When I talk to him and everyone in the industry three, four years ago, they thought, well, 85% will be mobile. You know, maybe as much as 85% and 15% still going to be you’re going to, if you live in Hampstead, you’re going to drive over here. You’re going to gamble. If you live near the airport, you’ll go to lie. You know, if you live up in in Harford County, you go up to Perryville, to Hollywood, or whatever, and you’ll place your bets. And it was that way for about a month. And then the mobile side of this, and the comfort level, I was sitting at Cooper’s North last my wife having a tuna sandwich, tuna wrap, and everybody at the bar was betting on things, and I’m like, it’s a Towson George Washington women’s basketball. Like you’re getting action on this, you know. And meanwhile, as a was it Dayton played, or some god Toledo, some god awful Mac game was going on, and these guys are betting on and I’m thinking to myself, as a hobby as five bucks, 10 bucks to keep me interested. Like, if you’re in a casino and you’re playing blackjack, you’re not addicted, you’re just playing band, you know, I think sports wagering, from a mobile perspective, that’s what it’s become. Tim, am I wrong in saying that? Am I right saying that?
Tim Lohrfink 04:06
I would say it’s accurate. I mean, people have different amounts when it comes to like betting, like how much they’re going to spend, or how much they’re going to wager, but I think a lot of people just like the action and they just want to get involved in some if they see a TV playing the game, they’re gonna want to get involved in it somehow, some way. I
Nestor Aparicio 04:22
thought this for the first time last night, because I’ve been thinking a little bit about this, and I know I want to talk to you guys about it as well. I’m in there and I’m thinking, all right, if I liked gambling and I were and I never gambled, because they would have taken my press pass. Funny, how that worked out, huh? You know, because if I was in there shaving points with Joe Flacco 10 years ago. Hey, Joe, how’s the hip doing? Oh, it’s purple, huh? Maybe I should take Indianapolis this week in the playoff game. So there would have been a lot of insider information that I could have made myself no and insider traded. I mean, I had information that i. I had access to information that might have you can’t. You can’t know anything in gambling, though, right? Just when you think you know something, come telling you guys. I mean, one 800 gambler, if you have a problem, by the way, please stop. But I wonder if it’s a problem, or if it’s an augmentation, or if it was even me last night in a bar on a was Wednesday night. I’m up at Cooper’s north and timoni, there’s five TVs, three of them had this. Chris pico was the executive producer of the game on ESPN. I was texting. I’m like, Dude, are you in Toledo? He’s like, as a matter of fact, I am. We’re on ESPN too. And I’m like, I just told Jen, I bet this is your game, because it was a Wednesday night game. And I’m thinking, people are wagering on this, and I saw the women’s game, and I thought, could you get action on it right now? And the women’s game was like, 5349 with like six minutes left. And I thought, well, if I’m just sitting here and I’m having a tuna wrap, and I just was if I was playing a lottery ticket, I think nothing of playing Kino, or spending five bucks. Or, you know what they do at Costas, or they do anywhere there’s Kino or anywhere that’s been a sports bar that’s been there 100 years where they play games, instant lottery, the horse racing game, all that stuff. I’m thinking, All right, so if I looked at this and I thought I liked Towson in this with six minutes left to go, I’ll put 10 bucks just on my app and do it. I thought, That’s not like, it’s not in my it’s not what I’m used to. None of us are used to this notice was available before, but I’m thinking, all right, there could, you know, I mean, it’d be something to do on a Wednesday, from out to dinner with my wife. We just wanted to root for something, you know, just to give us a, just give you give us something that the root for, like rooting for a horse or something. I don’t look at it as dirty or as taboo. I mean, I promote cannabis and alcohol and all sorts of ills and taboos here, but I do look at it as so new and so stigmatized, right, like cannabis or like anything, just stigmatized like alcohol, was probably when prohibition ended. I couldn’t do that before. Now I can do that. Is that a good idea? Is it a bad idea? When you do it responsibly, it’s fine. But I think from your perspective, people are having more fun with sports in that way, in a way that I don’t love sports. I admitted this to Tim, I don’t love sports the way I loved it, which is why I don’t talk about it all day. One reason I don’t love it is it’s not civic minded anymore. It’s more about being something you want to gamble on and pick a player or fantasy or any of these things that take us out of I love the Ravens because they’re from Ballmer and I’m my team and I Pittsburgh. No, you know. I like Lamar. I like his jersey. I like the color purple. I want to gamble on it. But the gambling part was never available on the up and up, right until, not only up and up, and I think there’s an up and up part of a safety measure that you’re not a bookie. You’re not, you know, nine fingers, Louis, gonna break their thumbs if they don’t. But, I mean, come on. I mean the underside of gambling with guns and violence and people getting in, going back to Pete Rosen shoes, Joe, there was a stigma about it that you never had a problem with with OTB, that you saw as this is going to be a nice, clean place next to my established business, where older gentlemen are going to be able to come and bet horse racing, where they didn’t have to go to Laurel 10 years ago, 15 years ago. But the sports part of this has become really ubiquitous, really quickly, really quickly click cannabis the same thing, like it’s accepted now. It’s not stigmatized in the way it was. And there’s nothing dirty about sitting at the bar here Cooper’s anywhere, and putting 10 bucks on or against the Steelers tonight. And you see the culture of a chain. I’m sure your sports bar, you’ve seen it, right? Yeah. I
Chris Richards 08:36
mean, there’s a lot of people that betting, and because we have the restaurant right next door to the sports book. We have more people that walk over from over there and maybe not just bet on their phone, but they’ll bet at the window, just because it’s right here. I mean, if they weren’t at this specific Bar Restaurant, they’d probably pull out their phone and do it, but because they’re here, they can just walk over and place a bed, plus some guys. I mean, Tim will tell you there’s someone’s even though we have the four kiosk over there, they’d rather go to the window and talk to him and place her wager with him, instead of doing it on the machine. So the
Nestor Aparicio 09:06
only thing I’ve really ever bet on in my life, other than Blackjack, you know, in exio horse racing, and I was always the guy that wanted to talk to the teller, you know, I mean, you know, I mean, it was a guy named Seymour that used to be the guy behind the cage at Pimlico back when I was a kid. And, you know, they can’t give me two on a box on now, am I doing this the right way? You know what I mean, because there’s a little bit of do I do? Am I doing this the right way? The kiosk can be a little bit like, intimidating, yeah, maybe even for me. I mean, I’m, you know, I’m an old fart. You know that so many
Tim Lohrfink 09:35
options you can literally bet on every aspect of the game, first quarter, first half. But just like player props, it’s like endless opportunities you can well,
Nestor Aparicio 09:44
that’s a thing for me that makes it more interesting for me. I’m not a gambler. I bet on three football games in my life, 15 years ago in Vegas on a bye weekend. And just to give me something to do, I just I played pool cards with my dad when I was a kid. You know, you. Four winners. Dude, never an inducement to wager. Of course. You know, to my dad, worked at the point, so I’m not that kind of gambler, but I have thought recently, even this weekend, ravens are playing Steelers. It’s halftime. How you feeling about you’ve seen them now, they’re out there. Do you feel like they got to come back in? And you feel like they’re gonna, they’re gonna lose? And I know the points changed everything. To me, that’s a much more thoughtful way to wager then, who’s hurt? What’s the injury? All this ravens gets to spread since 1972 on nights when they’re playing on the turf and like some Bucha, you know what I mean? Like at halftime, I’m looking at it and I’m like, that’s where you get the gut feeling. You’re like, defense that look good. Roquan got hurt. You know, you you can play, you can edge it. To me do that or, I mean, because to me, if I were, but my real money, if I were serious about winning. And there’s no other reason to, you know, played it for fun, sure, but you want to win. I mean, especially if you’re playing sports, you feel like you know something, you have an edge, or you’re, you’re, you’re more, you’re more engaged in it. I would think in game gambling, as stupid as it sounded to me to two years ago, I would have said to you, who would do that now, thinking to myself, Well, I see a team going in one direction or another direction. That’s a way better bet. To me the in Clem Florio, My dearly departed friend who was a horse racing institution. I see him out at the racetrack. He would never bet on a horse until they came out and paraded. He would get he would get his binoculars. He he’d say, Nestor the horse is sweating. He wants to run baby doll. He wants to run. He wants to ride. So he would look, and that would, you know, he would want to look at the horse, get the vibe. And it feels to me like halftime betting or in game betting would be interesting. And I don’t mean gunners gonna hit a home run in this at bat. He’s eight to one, like, put five. I mean, that’s more baseball like outfield, we’re all gonna take a player for $1 like games we used to play like that. But if you’re serious about winning, I would think that that would be an interesting way to edge it a little bit. If you know something 100%
Tim Lohrfink 12:11
Yeah, you try to get, like, feel the momentum shifting. You can kind of see a team getting better or whatnot. And especially if, like, I used to be a referee, like, high school basketball referee, and I just feel like I’ve one thing I’ve noticed is, like, when the game’s going on and a ref makes like, a 5050, call, it might have went the other way back in their mind. They know they made that mistake, and they’re gonna, I think they’re gonna, like, make up for that mistake and give it to the other team. And I’ve just seen that so much with football, basketball, especially, and I can pick up on that makeup, call the makeup call, yeah, that’s what you mean by live betting. I That’s something I’ve done when I do my betting sometimes, is see that, see that. Like going on, why
Nestor Aparicio 12:57
talk John about people with problems? And I’ve known we might even have mutual friends who were gambling nuts when it was illegal, you know? I mean, when it was just sort of like nobody talked about it, and they only talk about when they win, when they lose, you know? I mean all the usual things. And I’ve known some people in my life who have addiction issues in general, and they’ve gambled with I had employees, I’m like, It’s not good. And the fact that it got legal made it very clear to me very quickly that people were gonna have some problems early on. You know, people that couldn’t control themselves. This is a gateway to some bad stuff. And I know you guys have all sorts of things built into apps to slow you down, tips, all the things we talk about with John here and all that give me a real you know, you’re in here with real players every day. What? What do you say and feel in regard to the amount of action you see?
Chris Richards 13:52
I’ll let Tim tell you, but I would say 90 plus percent of the people that come in here, they’re your 510, 1520, maybe $50 betters they seem to have everything under control. And I would actually compare that to probably same way you look at people who drink, you know. I mean, not everybody that comes to the bar every day has an alcohol problem. You know, you come in, get a beer, get a burger, or whatever it is, but then, you know, you do have people that probably, you know, they push the limit. You got to cut them off. You got to, you got to tell them that, you know, they’ve had too much. And I think that’s the way it is with betting. I mean, you have some people who it’s never gonna be a problem for them. Then you have other people that, like you said, they just, they, you know, they’re gonna anything
Nestor Aparicio 14:29
could be your food could be a problem. We all get you’re heavier. You know, we can all do detrimental things by over indulging in whatever we love, right? And I think the gambling thing, it was a little bit like cannabis or one of these things. It was really completely restricted and illegal. And then once, it’s like, oh, I can go to the store and get it. I can, I can get the action right here, right now, my God, used to have to get on a plane, plan a weekend, fly to Vegas, or find an illegal bookie. And then one. Under and then there’s VIG and this and that, am I getting paid all of that, right? Am I getting paid? How do I find Louie, you know, all of that kind of stuff. They made named a salad after him, you know, down at sabatinos, you know, so and my other thought on gambling, because I love talking you guys about this. By the way, it’s snowing in in Cleveland. This game’s crazy. I’m just looking up on the TV here baseball. And I think I said this to you silly two years ago. Tell me the baseball part of gambling. I thought I’ve been doing sports radio 33 years. We’ve always had a baseball team. We didn’t have a football team first five years, right? And those first five years, I talked I had a Friday show called The Friday football frenzy. Every week we picked I had the USA Today, and I pick against the spreads. Every week I keep my numbers. We did a pigskin pick them on fax machines. Guy named John the dole. He used to grade them every morning, we would give a $50 gift card to green mount station for the weekly winner. We’d have a gift back or whatever. So like picking games, picking winners, football, football, football, and then March Madness and the Super Bowl and horse racing. That’s gambling, right? That’s gambling as we would know it here. Even the people that had Louis the bookmaker, they didn’t bet on baseball. Nobody knew how to bet on baseball. I go to Vegas and I know it beat seven and a half pitcher starting pit with, how do I even bet on this? You know? And I said no one, no one’s gonna bet on baseball. No one’s gonna bet on baseball, like, who I’ve never met, anybody that’s bet on baseball. People bet on baseball. And I’d never thought that that was gonna happen. Yeah,
Tim Lohrfink 16:35
baseball is actually pretty popular, especially when the Orioles are doing well, I feel like it gets more people wanting to bet on them or maybe against them. But baseball is cool because every day you can bet every day or just game every day, I
Nestor Aparicio 16:47
find the bet on a player to hit a home run tonight, like that kind of stuff. Those are fun. That’s fun. You know what? I mean. That to me, reminds me of being on the on the wheel, at the with craps and saying, Hey, I’m just gonna put a five on a Hard Eight and see, you know, hits I get 40 bucks, you know, whatever, right? I I never looked at baseball, and I never spoke of baseball. No one ever called me in 1997 say nasty. Who do you like tonight? You like Scott Erickson like it was. It’s never been spoken about that way, and that’s why I want to ask you guys on the baseball side, what have you seen since the Orioles have come into this? People bet Win, lose tonight? Or are they betting weird or things? Because with baseball, I would bet weirder things. I would just order five runs that, whatever, that kind of thing that would make it that would be more my action than starting pitching. God, starters don’t even pitch, especially in the playoffs, right? I mean, so you can’t even bet on a starting
Tim Lohrfink 17:49
pitcher, correct? Yeah, baseball, I feel like a lot of people bet the like you said the home run props, like gunner is such a popular player, a lot of people like betting on him. Santander, they just like in that way. You know, when he’s coming to play, you’re gonna watch that for sure, because baseball can be a long nine, you know, nine innings long, sometimes three hours game. So they like to just pick a player, hope you get to home run and they win. I
Nestor Aparicio 18:13
never bet college basketball. And I thought was silly, because I thought some guys gonna throw up a chunk three at the end and crush my lie. I mean, like, all the time, and I to meet better on red or black and his play, we even a better college like, that’s how I feel about it. And I feel like it is being a sports guy and being an expert and all that I should have some edge. I don’t know, even though what that edge is, I’m trying to figure out the momentum different things like that, because the edges aren’t history injury to me, starting pitching, those aren’t reasons to wait, not that you need a reason, but if you want to win, to get an advantage, I would think that there’s so much information out there that’s like, it’s like reading a racing form. It can be blinding right? 100%
Tim Lohrfink 18:55
Yeah. I mean, you’ve seen millions of games. I mean, I’m sure you maybe pick up on some like coaching tendencies, like some of the how the coaches
Nestor Aparicio 19:03
can I bet on whether horrible waste of time out? Can I wish,
Tim Lohrfink 19:07
I wish we could do that? If I could take a number on that clean down. Chris
Chris Richards 19:10
and Tim were here. We’re up at Green Mountain
Nestor Aparicio 19:13
station. I’ve already had two delicious crab cakes. I’m not gonna eat one right here. It’s all brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery, in conjunction with, if you lose multi care, give me a little handstand primer and your business and all things going on. David can be here talking about bowling, but, um, post pandemic, I’ve been, I was here during the plague, after the plague. Man, I pulled up the pictures today from all the people we’ve had here. Barry trot, Steve Smith, I just went through, Oh, and did. I just was going Marshall young, that we had all the favors over here. And I think about the community itself and COVID, and what you’ve tried to do here with, first with an OTB full, excuse me, full on gambling and the expansion your places, it’s grown down the way here, and then the bowling, Allen your partnership, I would think this is like gotten a little more. Normalized other than inflation, just in a general sense, right?
Chris Richards 20:03
I think so. I think I heard you mentioned earlier, you’re 33 years in the business. Next year, next April, will be 30 years for us to celebrate with the restaurant. Yeah, we’re going to have to celebrate something. But, uh, yeah, I think that now we are back to a normalcy after the pandemic. Like you said, prices are, I think I just read something with the Restaurant Association. Basically, if you’re, if your menu, prices haven’t increased 26% since 2020 then you’re losing money. Because that’s how much, like food costs, labor, everything, there’s a big chunk, you know, everything has gone up. But um, so
Nestor Aparicio 20:39
the crab cake, crab cakes, bad because, like, crabs so volatile in the pricing. But let’s say a $20 steak or $20 meal, then should now be 26 bucks, 2526 bucks. Okay? And that feels like that’s what it is. Everywhere I go, I mean, I go out, you’re not the only restaurant I eat at or do business with. It feels like that’s kind of and it feels like it happened quickly, but it feels like it’s stabilized a little
Chris Richards 21:04
bit. It has stabilized. But it’s just funny, because, like, for somebody like me, I’m thinking back to the 90s, and I’m like, dude, a burger was five bucks, and a beer was, you know, unhappy, I was a buck, you know. So I remember the first $10
Nestor Aparicio 21:15
burger I saw, I thought, what? 59 cents at McDonald’s, you know, 29 cents a McDonald’s crazy. It’s crazy. But cheese, 19 without cheese, you know,
Chris Richards 21:27
people are getting used to those prices now, so it makes it a little bit better. And I don’t know, the staffing issues have gone away. We, you know, we’re almost fully staffed right now. And I bet two years ago, everybody, every restaurant, was looking for help, whether, whether you had you, whether you were open the same hours, different hours, and it didn’t matter, you just needed help. Well, I
Nestor Aparicio 21:48
don’t get political in the Trump thing, because, you know where I where I stand on this I stand a little different than Hampstead does in general. But we had unemployment 4% at the election two weeks. I don’t how many elections we’ve had in the history of this country where one employment. It’s a natural number. There’s always, there’s always 4% of people who don’t want to work. So that’s kind of an amazing thing, because I do remember everywhere I went two years ago, one Carol can anywhere help. Wanted help. Wanted help. Nobody could get correct. A lot of people didn’t want jobs at that point, right? Literally, that’s
Chris Richards 22:18
the thing too. Like, for me, you know, I’m not going to say where I stand on the politics, but I just wish that both sides could agree on the numbers, because regardless of what side is in, each side complains about the numbers. These aren’t the true numbers. They don’t represent the people who are actually, you know, gave up on looking for help, or they’re they’re still looking for help, or they only have part time help, or these are government jobs, or whatever. So my thing is, here, I could tell. I guess it was probably February of this year. I started getting emails, I started getting phone calls, I started getting walk ins. People wanted work, asking for a job, asking, and that to me, that’s the first time since pre 2020 that that’s happened, which tells me, You know, I don’t know what it tells me, other than the fact that I don’t have to worry as much about help like I did for the last three years. We really busted our butts. You know, working a lot of hours that, you know, we’re working overtime just just every I work seven days a week, shorthanded was the theme forever, yes, literally. And it drives you crazy because you see other people that don’t seem to worry about working, you know, and now it seems like so. I think maybe part of it too is that those COVID benefits that everybody was getting, I think getting, I think some of that ran out and like, now people are like, Okay, now with inflation, so you’re paying more, so you got to make a decision, am I going to am I going to stop spending or am I going to just get a part time job and and pay for the different things that I want to get? And I think that it’s working out better for us. I don’t have I feel a lot more hopeful after seeing the amount of people that we’ve had come in for jobs this year. Well,
Nestor Aparicio 23:44
I’ve known you for almost 20 years now, and coming up here and being a part of this and doing the show, people ask me about crab cakes all the time, and you know, because I eat them everywhere now. And you were part of the inspiration. I remember the night I met you at the stadium and Boys and Girls Club, Paul the Bragg, and I was making a Venezuelan Dundalk, Puerto Rican Venezuelan tacos, pork tacos, and you were making crab cakes. You ran out of your crab cakes pretty quickly that night, as I remember. And I’m like, That’s a good word. Hampstead, Hampton, hey, ham Where, where care what. And then the next thing I know, I’m up here and and people ask me about crab cakes all time, and I’m and I’ll say to them like, love me a fates crab cake. It’s not like yours. It’s mustardy. Love me a cost is crab cake east side. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s an East Side crab cake. It’s saltier, it’s more. Obey I said the Angelina’s crab cake was my childhood crab cake, and that was out on Bel Air road. That was hoochie Gucci from Dundalk. And we had to get on the car drive out Parkville was upscale for Dundalk, and we would go out there and had these. And I never had that crab cake anywhere else, and it’s a very sweet sort of crab cake that you make here. And I know you’ve told the story, I want you to tell it because you haven’t told it in a couple years, because you haven’t been here. But this was like a family recipe. Is your grandfather’s favorite recipe. My
Chris Richards 24:58
Dad, dad, my dad used to Andrew. Lena is, and that was one of his favorites. He also liked Michaels and timoniums, a similar crab cake. And so that’s how we just started experimenting. And he was also friends with the the Dulles family. And I remember going down to meet Marcella, Michaels mother, and gave us some some pointers. And basically, without telling you the whole recipe, in the secret it’s all about the quality of crab meat that you use, and using jumbo, or using all jumbo lump, as opposed to some people mix. And we talked about a little bit before the show, how to philosophies. Some people have the bigger and there’s a little bit more in there than just crab meat. And then other places have, like, a more pure crab cake. Well,
Nestor Aparicio 25:37
it’s a slurry, or some people would say it’s good filler in it. It’s good filler. And I’m like the fillers, the flavor in some kit, you know, like I I don’t have a favorite. I have ones that I prefer. Because I could say, well, I love your crab cake, but I wouldn’t want to eat it 10 times in a row, because I do like me a mustardy crab cake or a wetter. I mean, they’re all interesting and different. My personal side is toward your crab cake, because I grew up and I loved it, so it’s familiar to me. And I would say, man, I’ve eaten hundreds of crab cakes. It’s the last time I had your crab cake. I don’t knows a lot of places where yours is close. Coco’s is a little bit sort of similar, but not big and different, but I don’t know a lot of places that do what you do, and I think of you as Angelina’s. And everybody makes it different. That’s the crab cake. That’s the beauty of it. Every crab cakes difference. And yours really consistent. I mean, over the 20 years of coming, like I got it today, and it’s taste that’s what you want. You want to always taste the same. It
Chris Richards 26:39
is 100% and we, I always tell people, because I’m pissed, a part of like, wanting somebody to say that ours is the best. There’s people that say it’s the best, and then there’s people I like others I just want to be in the ballpark. Like, if somebody has our crab cake and they’re disappointed, that’s a disappointment to me. And I wanted, there’s got to be something wrong, you know? I mean, most people, they beautiful thing.
Nestor Aparicio 26:58
You just said that I’m gonna steal that you just gave me a gift. If you get the fate Lee crab cake, you’re not going to be disappointed. If you come here, you’re not going to you go to cost you get me. Great. You’re going to love it, but you’re going to say that’s a little different, that’s a little saltier, that’s a little more obey that’s a little sweeter. Hey, that’s got some slurry. Don’t say filler that that insults to me. That’s an insult to Pappas to say theirs is wetter. It just has a different flavor and a different texture. But I think they’re all delicious. And I think every place I’ve been has done a, well, there’s one place I went I didn’t tell you about this. Oh god, it came from your restaurant association. Marilyn pal, who has done the show here with us, and I love him, but I was doing 30 crab cakes in 30 days. This was three summers ago, first time I did it. And I was adamant about doing one in every county. Part of my Maryland lottery sponsorship, I told John Martin, 2423 counties in the city, 24 municipalities, 30 crabkes. I went about 38 crab cakes in 30 days. I had couple. I moved around a little bit. Did the show Ocean City, Western Maryland, Deep Creek. I went everywhere. I went everywhere. In the state, there’s a county, Kent County, really tough to get a crab cake there. There’s only one town in the whole county, over in Eastern Shore. I mean, there’s only one town, and you have to find a crab cake in that because there’s nowhere. So montgomery county, I got recommended a place. And I’m not going to give this place away, because it’s just, it’s not worth all that. It’s not right, neither was this crab cake. So my wife and I that night, we were going to see sticks and Def Leppard, I think down at the Jiffy Lube live down in Manassas. So I’m like, That’s the night we’re gonna get the montgomery county critics in August. We did the tour. So went down, I went to this place, and this was, um, it was a bit of a deli, really upscale. I mean, I’m talking Potomac, Gucci, Gucci, Richie Rich. I’m gonna talk in passing ten million houses get into this place. Okay, so this is montgomery county, right at the state line by Virginia, below rockville, almost by the bridge, and went to this place. Went in nice Deli. I mean, all sorts of pre prepared foods, all Gucci, all high end. And they say we ship crab cakes. We have crab cakes. And I’m like, That’s why I came, you know, so me two crab cakes in the bag. I think I took some coleslaw. This that we were tailgating, put it all in a bag in the backseat. We’re gonna eat him. We get down to the Jiffy Lube. Jiffy Lube, well, it was Nissan, that probably jiffy, Jiffy Lubbock. We get down there. My wife gets out. We get some music going. We got tailgate, got the chairs out, got the beer, you know, and I’d eat a crab cake. This is, like, day 25 crap. I mean, I’d eat crab cakes every day. So I’m like, All right, you know, we’ll see what this one’s about. I pulled it out, took a bite of it, and I got a crunch. No, I looked at it. I’m like, It’s. Story had celery in it, some another bite, chewing it. I’m like, this is a weirdest effing crab cake. I said, boy. I looked at it and I poked around because I was doing that all the good looking for the orange row in there. See if there’s female they took, I’m not kidding you, a chicken salad recipe. And just put crab in it. It was chicken salad
Chris Richards 30:27
with crab meat. Crab salad. Interesting. I
Nestor Aparicio 30:32
mean, there’s silence here because I don’t, I need to work this out. And I got there, and I’m like, I took a picture of it, and I didn’t really finish it, just, it wasn’t bad crab meat. It just was freaking weird, man. I mean, it wasn’t a crab cake. I don’t know what it was. I mean, this is what these people in DC are doing. They don’t do that up here in Carroll County, and what they’re doing up
Chris Richards 30:55
here, well, that’s what you get sometimes, when you go out of state and you ever order a crab cake, you’ll get never the person will say, Oh, these are really, really good. And then you, I mean, I made that mistake once I was in South Carolina. I think no, ordered one. And I’m like, don’t do it, guys. It says Maryland crab cakes. You know, you’re thinking, Oh, they must have somebody here from Maryland that knows what they’re doing. And that was the first and only time, you
Nestor Aparicio 31:15
know, Dami at fade Lee’s tells me the story. She told me that three summers ago she found out that there was a place down in South Carolina, Hilton Head, maybe that was serving on their menu. The Fates crab cake didn’t say Maryland. Crab cake had their name on it. She knew about this. She went and ordered it, and when it came
Chris Richards 31:35
it was no, no
Nestor Aparicio 31:37
worse than that. They were using her name. That is worse, really worse, but she called the managers over, and she’s like, look, yeah, I got lawyers. I’m not getting lawyers. You’re taking my name off this crappy and I don’t know who told you you could use our name, but like, you know, Maryland is bad enough. You know it’s gonna suck. Don’t put green out. Still put Angelina’s name on that. You know? I mean, I’m using Angelina’s name here, and I never knew Angelina, but you’re doing her right here. Chris is here, where Tim is here. We’re at Green Mountain station. We’re part of the OTB, the bowling alleys next there, next door, the bar is here. The Maryland crab cake tour comes here anytime we get a chance to talk crab cakes and have fun. I had montgomery county executive on Mark Eldridge. He’s become a friend of mine, actually, big rock and roll guy. I told him I’m like, I’m never having a crab cake in montgomery county. You guys are done. Your DC to me, man, you’re out. All the crab cakes are literally. What else you got going on up here? You still doing the clowns and the parties and the kids. Oh yeah,
Chris Richards 32:41
every Monday night or a family place you really are, yeah, the balloon guy, balloon artists on Monday nights, five to seven. We got a magician house magician here every Wednesday from six to eight. That’s Dave film, and he’s a local magician, but he is pretty popular in the whole state and really in the region. But, uh, yeah. I mean, we have Wednesday night or Thursday nights are our wine night. Have price bottles of wine, happy hour every day, even on the weekends. So there’s a lot, see. I
Nestor Aparicio 33:10
said this is for kids, but this is when we take his picture. This is from july 11, 2012 this is, this is me wearing my my balloon hat. They made a balloon Raven hat for me here at Green mount station. So there I am, right there in front of the sign from 2011 13 and a half years ago. This picture was taken. I’m here with you.
Chris Richards 33:32
Yeah. And when did you, I think? When did we start with the Dennis Pitta show 2007
Nestor Aparicio 33:38
or eight? Eight was Pitta. So, yeah, I guess I’ve been coming in here 60. Here 16 years.
Chris Richards 33:43
Yeah, wow. And there were you brought you were saying you brought a lot of guys in here, the late Jacoby Jones. You brought him in. I shared
Nestor Aparicio 33:50
that picture. Has this great picture in front of my sign. We did that show over in the actual the next room. Oh, yeah, two rooms over. But I shared pictures today of Owen, Daniels, Dennis, pitta, Zach or got swabbed here, the current defensive coordinator, yeah, was a player and K I have a picture him getting swabbed here. Absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah. Steve Smith was here. I have a picture Steve and CJ Mosley together. I put that picture up. Marshall young that got swabbed here at the picture him getting swabbed, and then Sam Cook was our last guest here before they took my press pass. I kind of feel bad about that, because we brought Sam out it snowed sideways. It was in January’s week of the playoff game, and it was the playoff game we were like, supposed to win. It was like, would that have been 19? Is before the plague. So it was 19. It was the year we that we were really good, right? Was that? Tennessee? We’re 13, three. We lost that awful game. About that game? Yeah, yeah. We did the last show we did here did not have a happy ending for anybody, but the Sam Cooke still lives in the community. Here’s
Chris Richards 34:57
a good man does? He was Mr. Absolutely. He
Nestor Aparicio 34:59
does a good crab. K. But I had the same argument with all these guys that have happened having with you fried or broiled, fried or broiled, everybody’s broiled, broil broiled. I did order one and one, and I ate the broiled one first, and I must admit, it was pretty damn good. I never order broil one here, so I can’t tell you like that. They’re better or worse. I just don’t get them. I actually got one today, and it’s pretty good. I mean, the broiled crab cake, as much as I like the fried the world’s really good.
Chris Richards 35:24
80 to 90% is the order of that over fried. We got a health
Nestor Aparicio 35:29
movement out here. I mean, what’s going on out here?
Tim Lohrfink 35:31
I prefer the fried some on your side. Oh, listen
Chris Richards 35:34
to that. That’s the first person I’ve ever heard say,
Nestor Aparicio 35:37
you and me down and dirty, we’re gonna fry it. We’re gonna bet on it, we’re gonna drink it all the vices will bring out here side of French fries. Chris Tim, I appreciate you guys. Thanks for your sponsorship and your love of my business and keeping us in business. Appreciate you wagering tips or anything like that. People. What do you offer to people? When people come up to you and and as a guy that does this professionally, what would you like to say to people out there about wagering now that it’s on the up and up as they say,
Tim Lohrfink 36:10
oh, man, you just got to control the best you can. I know it’s the day by day thing. You know, you got to do your research. You can’t if you really want to make it big, you got to do research and check people out on Twitter, see what the notes are saying. It’s not easy, but know
Nestor Aparicio 36:25
what you’re betting on is what we’re saying. Right? A lot of people say the same thing. All these are odds based. This is a $20,000 competition, $10 tickets or more 200,000 know the odds, know the numbers. But when it comes to sports, know what you’re doing. Just know what you’re doing. Know what you’re getting into, that’s all. And
Chris Richards 36:42
the other thing, I would say, bet sides or totals, one one, don’t bet. It’s hard enough to win one bet. When you place these parlays, and some of these guys bet 510, 12 leg parlays, and they’ll hit 10 out of 12, and they’re like, Oh, it’s so close. And it’s like, why didn’t you just bet, yeah, you still lose. So, I mean, you made 10 bets, you’d be way ahead. But the difference is, you can bet $5 to win 500 if you’re betting all these legs. So they don’t want to win just five bucks, they want to win 500 so, but my point would be, if you want to win one or maybe two plays, is going to be a lot more chance at winning than when you’re putting all these big, long parlays together. So that’s, yeah,
Nestor Aparicio 37:23
I’ve had a couple of degenerates in my life, horse racing guys, and every year I bring them on Preakness week, and I always say, Look, man, you’re on a back stretch. You know, every jockey you know, every you know, you read the form like the back you like a Bible. Are you ahead? Are you behind lifetime? You know, that’s what I need to know. And Gerardi said to me, I’m ahead. He said, I’ve, you know, I’ve hit some but, but, but I’ve had a couple of people say, No, I’m not ahead. I’m like, 50 years you’ve been studying horse racing and you can’t win. What chance do I have at being any good at this? You know what? I mean, yeah, you
Chris Richards 37:55
got to do it for fun. Honestly, you do it for more than fun. It’s just tough. I
Nestor Aparicio 37:59
will leave you with this story of my dear friend Marvin Lewis, back in 1996 Marvin and Jim Schwartz, who beat us two weeks ago with the the browns. He’s
Tim Lohrfink 38:08
a Mount St Joe. That’s where I went to school. That’s where he’s from. That’s why you went to
Nestor Aparicio 38:12
school, too. You and Tim watts, both Molly, you mount St Joe mafia hanging out to share all you guys. Right? So I lost my train of thought. Oh, God, I just lost my train of thought. Jim Schwartz. Jim Schwartz and Marvin. Marvin used to have a little red dot and I would bag lunch and sit in their office and watch film. Practice would end 1145 locker room was open, and I would go up to Marvin’s office, right up the steps, little office, me him and Schwartz, and he had a Blackboard, and we would watch last week’s defense, which in 1996 was really bad. You know, more. I mean, there was a lot of defense to watch because they were giving up a lot of points or a lot of broken plays. And there was some play that happened. It’s a 96 ravens or four and 12 was like this slapstick, you know, it’s like football, follies, balls, jumping around, guys diving, can’t fall on it, whatever. I remember Marvin early on. He looked at me. He’s like, Man, I can’t believe people bet on this. He’s like, I’m in here, and I’m coaching these guys. I have no idea which way this ball. I know everything about football. I’m the expert. I have no idea if we’re gonna win or lose or how they’re gonna perform. He’s, I can’t believe people bet on this. So that’s, that was what he told me 1996 and I thought, well, if you can’t figure it out, and if Dick Girardi can’t figure out the ponies after 50 years, what chance do? I’m just gonna put a five run gun, or Henderson to hit a home run. He’s got Lane pitching in a short fence. What are you gonna do this? They moving the fence back in, right? I
Tim Lohrfink 39:46
heard that. I saw that. Yep, couple, you don’t have to pay the bets
Nestor Aparicio 39:49
from last year for the ones short right. Sam and Chris are up here. Dave’s next door over the green mount bowl as well. He was a gracious host and doing all things with the Maryland. Hockey Club and horse racing. So we’re hoping that goes online in early January. So I’ll get Dave back on. We’ll talk about the ponies I’ve had learned so much. I did the show over there in May with him. Oh my god, talk about the whole industry learning horse racing, you know, learning how this thing’s gonna change. So I’m looking forward to that with Dave. Been a great group of folks up here today. Tim Watts came by my long time, our producer and I found old pictures from the 1990s with him, also Karen Faulkner came up from a Fauci leadership advisor. She lives in the community up here with her beautiful daughters. We were talking about the the joys of Hampstead during the holidays. Come on up. Have a crab cake. Have some ribs. Get a burger. Have some beer. Bet the games responsibly, of course. And they can also find you on the on the mobile app to you want to plug that, but that that parks, yeah,
Tim Lohrfink 40:43
bet parks, mobile app state specific. So you just on your app store. You just search bed parks, choose the state that you obviously live in. And you can do bed parks, Maryland. Bed parks Pennsylvania, if you’re back and forth and don’t
Nestor Aparicio 40:59
give the money to these out of town clowns, these Draft Kings, big pop. Yeah, this guy owns a license take care of the people here locally. Is that good? That’s the truth, right? Yeah, absolutely.
Chris Richards 41:07
And I’ll tell you what, if you put in Jamie Fox, don’t need your money. You put in the promo code GMs, and you can get a $75 green mount gift card. So if you’re coming up this way, stop in. You can get yourself. Yeah, there you go. Gotta take advantage of that free meal. Yeah. So anyway, we’ll be more than happy to help you at the counter. If you need help, sign up for the app. But free food,
Nestor Aparicio 41:29
cold booze, gambling, we got everything here. Balloon hats for the kids. We’re doing it all sounds good and great. Member Bill, you’re around here as well. I am Nestor, we’re signing off from remount station. All of it brought to you by friends at the Maryland lottery. You get a ticket if a ticket. I feel like Oprah, you get a ticket. You get a ticket. Everybody gets chance to win here, absolutely. Also our friends at Jiffy Lube, multi care. Luke is on his way back and forth from Owings Mills. Couldn’t be here today because he’s covering football. We have music classic going. And I want to wish everyone really happy, safe, awesome. Thanksgiving. What pie you haven’t
Tim Lohrfink 42:01
pumpkin pie, pie,
Chris Richards 42:03
maybe apple pie. Mince meat. I’m
Nestor Aparicio 42:05
going mince meat with that, oh, that fruit in there, and the dates and the good stuff keeps me regular. I’m back for more. We are Baltimore, positive.com. Stay with us.
