It’s a tough, emotional purple roller coaster this being a Baltimore Ravens fan and lifer PSL holder. Bill Cole and Nestor discuss the path and hefty price for local fans to go downtown and then onto The Strip for The Big Game next month if Lamar Jackson and this powerful team fulfills its destiny in the desert.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
tickets, week, lamar, ravens, year, team, super bowl, people, game, row, beat, quarterback, baltimore, win, niners, joe flacco, bills, browns, buffalo, dolphins
SPEAKERS
Bill Cole, Nestor J. Aparicio
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home, we are wn S T am 1570 TAs in Baltimore and is Festivus. For the rest of us around here. I even had my blunt person shirt on, you’re gonna find out how blunt I’ll be in the coming weeks, Baltimore positive is going to be presenting. You know, I dare I say the biggest thing we’ve ever done because curio and foreign daughters sponsor our 25th anniversary, we’re doing a thing on the web called 25 stories of glory. They are our 25 sort of greatest hits, the greatest things we’ve done here. All of them involve the community, all of them involve people. Some of them involve charities, many of them involve celebrities, some of them involve regular people, but we’re counting them down out of the front of Baltimore positive. And we’re going to sort of, I don’t know do bang the drums for one week. It’s we’ve done radio row all these years, many, many places all over the country. This year, we’re doing something called crab cake row. It’s gonna be brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery. I’m gonna have scratch offs leftover from the holidays, but there’s still winners in this batch. John Martin promised me that we’ll also have some fresh ones. The week of February the fifth come on out. It’s going to involve crabcakes it’s going to involve crab soup, and I’m not giving too much away because it is Super Bowl week. Bill Cole joins us now I have the royal farms coffee powering up into the coal roofing mug you’ve been you know incommunicado, where you’ve been man happy new year. First thing I think it’s the first time you’ve gotten together this year and Ravens have a by all as well with the world. Joe Flacco is in the playoffs. You know what I mean? We avoided the snowstorm over the week, things are you know, things are okay. It’s a good 2024 so far.
Bill Cole 01:33
Yeah. Happy New Year. Yeah, I don’t know if any of our conversations hit it. But I definitely was the guy who’s going around saying like, man, we’re gonna, we’re gonna get like the first seed or second seed. And then, you know, we’re going to take a week off. And then we’re going to run into one of these wildcard teams who’s hot, it’s going to come in and just spank us and everybody’s going to be depressed. And the only variation to that story that I’ll give is that, like, I think we might be the hot team. So the only question is, whether the time off just totally kills all of our mojo because I, we really progressively got better. And I don’t think the team could have had any more confidence than you know, after spanking the Niners and the dolphins like like, like holy cow, like you saw that comment. So I don’t know. The Curiosity is at its maximum, and we’ll see where it goes. But it should be fun.
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:33
This is where like the Michael Jackson meme was eating the popcorn and thriller. This is the point where you’re like, what’s Joe Flacco going to do the matt Stafford story is there and you know, these teams like the lions and the Browns that never win anything, and everyone that I’ve spoken to when I’m doing a ton of football this week. I mean, we’ve just had Solomon wilcots We have Hall of Fame voters, Mike Flynn, former ravens, Super Bowl champions. There’s gonna be a lot of stuff here next couple of weeks, it’s gonna be you’re gonna recognize old nasty Nester coming out of a show for a super Purple Rain three run here, but everybody just thinks the ravens and the 40 Niners are the best team. And I think it’s easy. Every year, just look at the one seed and especially since you said something about the to see getting a buy. No, that’s so 2019 You know, like that. This is now like a real benefit. It’s a real privilege. You’re the only team that gets it. Everybody else has to go play. And I’ve said this a lot and I’m gonna sound like a broken record, anybody that really listens to the station or listens to every segment and my pal John Keller just got back from Korea that watches everything we do. All along, and I think I’ve had these conversations with you. I’ve had him with everybody. I’m like, show me the January and then this is back in June and back in the summer after they signed Lamar, or even before they signed Lamar to say should they give him all this money? I had to ask myself a question. Could they be the bills in Buffalo Kansas City in Kansas City and let’s say Cincinnati and Cincinnati to get to a Super Bowl right? But could could they beat Joe burrow, Josh Allen and Patrick mahomes and I wouldn’t even put Trevor Lawrence in there because they were sort of coming along. You could put Deshaun Watson in there if you wish because he’s thought to be that caliber of quarterback Aaron Rodgers came over and the Jets were just going to win to a tongue of Allah was not certainly not a bad quarterbacks had a phenomenal year as well. So there’s all these quarterbacks and you’d say how how are the Ravens going to navigate beating three of them with Lamar but this is running Lamar not throwing Lamar This is injured Lamar, this is Pat on the ground Lamar This is not sit in the pocket Lamar the things that we’ve seen the last 810 weeks that had been promised that they said he was gonna it was gonna come that accuracy was gonna get better and the receivers were gonna get better and the defense was gonna get I mean everything they’ve done staying healthy other than Mark Andrews but they’ve liked he’s done a nice job. But I thought the navigation part of this would eat them up that it would be very hard for me to say Wow, are they gonna go to a Super Bowl? They gotta go to Kansas City and go to Buffalo. Like, Lamar has never won those games. I mean, really, they haven’t. They haven’t won those games you hate on Mike rabl Because what the Titans did a couple years ago he got fired. So I know you’re happy about that. I’m happy because he wore all that Euler stuff and more the Euler the bump Phillips hat. I’m like, Dude, don’t don’t rub salt in the wounds of old fans. I’m an old Cold fan. Don’t. I’ve been dealing with that for 41 years. So all these teams, all these navigating places, and now what we’re doing is watching everybody on TV this weekend. Next weekend, you get the worst of all of them might be Mason Rudolph might be Joe Flacco Oh guy might be CJ Stroud, who they beat up week one, right? So there’s no chance they get mahomes Next week, there’s no chance they get Josh Allen next week, right. So right off the bat. And it’s a home game. So it’s winnable game weather. I don’t know. We can’t put a roof on the thing. But we get a 22 degree snowy day sort of neutralizes whoever we play because I don’t think Lamar is gonna play great and bad weather. Now. Maybe you’ll go win an AFC Championship Game battle? No, but I would
Bill Cole 06:09
not. I would not say he can’t do anything at this point. Because all of the things that historically NFL teams have struggled with. This Raven team has just run right through those brick walls like, oh, you can’t go across the West Coast. Oh, you can’t go west coast, come back on a short week and play the other good team in the AFC and beat that net. We’ve we’ve done them all. I think it’d be interesting to see. Like, who thinks the Texans are going to be the browns, right? Like nobody, you know, that dolphins chiefs game is gonna be great, right?
Nestor J. Aparicio 06:41
Five degrees, it’s gonna be and the Dolphins are trying to throw the ball around. Right?
Bill Cole 06:46
How about the Steelers, you know, in some weird alternate unit
Nestor J. Aparicio 06:49
playing defense or seem to turn up hard to see the Steelers beat in the bills for me, because that would be about the bills throwing the ball around. And the Steelers taking advantage of that and not turning the ball over and beating them 19 to 17 with the field, you know, like that. If I had to pick a team this weekend that could still be alive, I would pick the Steelers because the bills have been so wildly. I mean, hell, they barely got the game at home. I mean, they almost had to go back on the you know, like, show the bills path when you talk about a team that could go to the Super Bowl here. The bills have an easier path. They have a fourth string quarterback coming in when Pittsburgh wasn’t a very good team to begin with. Right? So they have that going for them. They have their health, right, they they have a home game, then they have another home game. So mahomes wins. Now they get the game in Buffalo next week. Right? So the bills have a pathway here to say, we’ll take our chances with Lamar, we’ll go play Lamar in Buffalo weather in Baltimore on the 28th of January, right like so. But the ravens to me, everybody I talked to it’s like, how are they going to be they had a lead never again, their two minute warning, they weren’t behind by two scores until they weren’t trying playing their backups or backups almost won, like all of this plays into the day are the best team. Now they have to go out for three hours and be the best team and beat San Francisco again, without five turnovers in a Super Bowl. They have to win at home and whatever the weather conditions are the next two weeks against whomever it is, but it won’t be mahomes and Allen and burrow. I mean, like like their pathway if they don’t do it this year. I mean, that’s what I’ll be writing about next week saying, Dear Lamar, you know, like it ain’t ever gonna get better than this. I mean, your body looks like it feels pretty good. You look like you’re Spry as Bryce Joe Flacco looks right now, but that might change on Sunday. If somebody comes after him. He hits him in the head who knows right? It’s football. But when the Super Bowl I’m planning for them. I’m planning this crabcake row week that they’ve thrown me out St. Chad’s Do you throw him an email and ask him why wn st is not broadcasting live from the Super Bowl when they’re in it? Because everybody’s asking me I got people sending me emails, Billy, where are you going to be on radio row? What time you get to Vegas. I want to buy a drink. Your team is going to be there. This is the year your team is going to be there and they’re sending me Do you want this hall of famer or that Hall of Famer? Do you want this player? Do you want that player and I’m not going to be there this year. So that’s what I’m dealing with as I’m putting crabcake row together and navigating the tournament and watching the games on TV. I mean, this is a pleasurable weekend. Like the fact that they added the Monday night game and all that you’re like these these whores but this peacock the peacock know whether you’re not watching the cheese dolphins game unless you meet me at a bar somewhere I’m thinking about the Hollywood casino Saturday watching.
Bill Cole 09:39
Yeah, really? That that all bothers me a lot. What game was it a couple of weeks ago that was on peacock only and it was a good game.
Nestor J. Aparicio 09:47
Christmas Eve I
Bill Cole 09:48
think what it was it was one of them. Yeah. And like, we were sitting around and it’s like, I know out of spite. I am not buying another streaming service like like I really want to watch this game. But I’m not doing it. I’m just not doing it. So I don’t know. Look, I think you’re right. It is weird to be the hunted, not the hunter. And he does have that playoff pressure to do it. The pressure is not, you know, it’s not like this is his 15th year and he can’t get off the Schneid. So I don’t think there’s a soul Ken Lamar when the big one. That is not I mean, those they’ll talk about it, but it’s not a big deal. Yeah, the
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:32
issue isn’t is Ken Lamar, when the big one, it’s going the Ravens win the big one. And he’s got all the tools here, right. Like the defense, right? Is it’s and it’s and the matchups the day after they get eliminated or the day after they hold the trophy. This thing’s over with because Patrick queens go in here, they’re dead. They’re Pippins Trenton Simpson, he came out played last week. So he signed an autograph this week. Good for him. Um,
Bill Cole 10:59
I find it interesting as to what the story is. Knowing all the drama in the offseason, you know, he didn’t hire an agent, what an idiot. Never, you know, like the end of season last year, he didn’t go to the playoff game, like all that goofy stuff. And then he comes out, and he’s MVP. And then if you win the Super Bowl, like, I think most of the trends says that once they sign that big deal, they don’t produce. And here’s a guy who’s going to completely bucked that trend. And, like, I don’t know, they’re gonna all laugh because they’ll be like, Yeah, well, you know, we were worried we didn’t know, we didn’t even think we would be a 500 team. When we were all convinced that there was no way Lamar was coming back. Like, that’s how far this this this mind? Magic? Yeah, it’s been pretty insane to think about where we could have been and where we were going, and then to just see him perform. And then yeah, like, row Quan Smith and the defense and like, I mean, it’s it, they’re really fun to watch. To just beat the pants off of people, two weeks in a row where like, every commentator is telling you all of the reasons why. Well, it’s really not fair to even expect the ravens to win. You know, the 40 Niners throughout West Coast and foreigners are really good. That
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:32
spread went from four to six and a half. They just Yeah. And
Bill Cole 12:35
I mean, I don’t know, they got a little bit of a chip. You know, that
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:40
interceptions in the San Francisco game? Really? You know, how bad they threw the ball around change, not take that away from the Ravens defense, just saying, I think the next time around that, that it wouldn’t, it’ll be a better matchup and everybody has believed it. And I think people want to see it. You know, as much as you’d like to see the lions in the Super Bowl are the Eagles in the Super Bowl. They don’t they I mean, and I think that people like to see the bills in the Super Bowl that made the Browns would be interesting, especially with Flacco but I think the best game as America would see it would be the ravens and the 40 Niners I give
Bill Cole 13:15
the rematch, right i My only problem with that. The 40 Niners is like did we expose the real Brock party or because you know, he’s he isn’t supposed to be an MVP candidate. Like who thought he was going to be an MVP candidate like that
Nestor J. Aparicio 13:34
guy named Doug Farrar wrote a great piece right after that out in Seattle. He’s a writer F AR AR AR about the confusion factor of like MacDonald, confusing the line of scrimmage with in a different way for birdie that they did. The Ravens did things that night that they had never done that he had never seen on tape in regard to dropping safeties and personnel and where pressure and heat was coming in. All of it was the skies based. It was all just it was it was it was deceptive and worked, and whether it would work again or not. And that’s the game right? The game is deception. So
Bill Cole 14:09
even from a layman’s perspective, you’re watching that game and like George Kittel is thrashing us. And you’re like, why did they stop going to George Kittel and it’s like, oh, well, because we adjusted and we just dropped our linebackers a little bit deeper and all of a sudden George kills take it away. And Brock Purdy is not a mature enough quarterback yet. Or the OC isn’t able to make that adjustment or whatever it was right whatever it was right? Like you’re you’re 22 Chess steps down the road. In the second half of that football game. Your quarterback has this the confidence of an ant at that point, like he is afraid of every throw. Yeah, I don’t know. Like maybe Sure. Like, Lamar games. rebar makes people look stupid man. Oh, there’s nothing at the NFL level when the consistent, you know, like, consistently makes people look silly.
Nestor J. Aparicio 15:09
Yeah. And the defensive effort, I just think that their pathway to not have to go anywhere start with that not have to go anywhere that bodes well and to not have Buffalo and Kansas City did not have to beat both of them. I mean, they’re, I’ll say this, no matter how playoffs will ever set up again, even if they’re one seat again next year and that’s where they are. It won’t look like this. You know, Burr will be involved, Lawrence will be involved. Stroud will be better, you know, guys, all these guys are coming on. I mean, they really are. And but Lamar has surpassed all right, Lamar is the unquestioned MVP, but there’s still three hours of football left and that’s a lot of football bill calls here Call Roofing Gordian energy, he does things on roofs. For businesses it is it’s cold, it’s wet. I think of you when there’s snow in the bed, and especially the wind the other night was awful. On Tuesday night, you go on the game, because I’m I’m asking a lot of people I’m doing a lot of celebrity out of town stuff and football stuff here this week. But everywhere I go people are like the people that have PSL this is when you use your ticket usually, right? Like, this is like opening day like the reason you have your tickets, and you lose all this money having tickets and selling them for $3 to rams fans a couple of weeks ago. I mean, I can write at length about the benefit of Chad steel throwing me out that it’s been $8,000 I haven’t given the football team the last two years for season tickets, of which, what whether I would get $1,000 with a pleasure or not, I would always be it’s raining out. It’s awful out, my wife is sick, my wife’s out of town Do you want to go I’ll take John Allen with me and eat, you know, put it on the credit card in April. And then not really worry about being looking back in row six and seeing the two tickets that were my PSLs sitting empty week after week after week, while I put out on Facebook, does anybody want to buy him and nobody wants to buy them. And then I go on to StubHub and see that tickets are $5 A game time, which I have screenshots of all the games, there were three games this year where the ticket price held up. And I mean, held up not premium, just held up, just held up just where you could get your 75 bucks back, if you had a $75 ticket. There were three games, the you know the when the bills are, excuse me, when the dolphins came in here, they packed the place when the lions came in here. But most weeks, it the truth of the market is it’s a bloodletting and I buy a lot of tickets for a lot of things. Super Bowl tickets are going to be $10,000. And we have fans here that didn’t want to pay $10 to go see an 11 in three teams three weeks ago, like so. And they live here. So I don’t know what the temperature is. I’ve had two or three people ask me if I’m doing a trip to Vegas, and some of them relatively vapid people you don’t I mean, like add a loop as to like, what’s going on with me and the Ravens and Luke and all that. But I also said, You do know it’s going to be $10,000 This time, it’s not going to be $3,400 on a bus to New Orleans. It’s a $10,000 not a minimum. I mean, minimum eight, if so if you hit the lottery, and I told Raskin this the other day, because he’s got club level, you have club level seats, right. Tell me about your tickets.
Bill Cole 18:16
Yeah, corner endzone. Yeah. Club level.
Nestor J. Aparicio 18:19
Yeah. From the beginning. Yeah, yeah. How often do you go lately?
Bill Cole 18:23
I haven’t been in two years. Don’t tie. Well, mostly because of youth sports. So I’m either at a, you know, 12 year old soccer game, or 11 year old basketball game or, and that’ll be the conflict with whatever playoff game is like, I don’t know, we’re spoiled man. Like, like this, you think about the hype around an Oreo playoff game. You know, and it was like, you had to go you had to get tickets. The people had to go, you know, I mean, people don’t feel that most of the discussions I’ve had with people around whether they can make money on their tickets or being able to get you know, the tickets at the beginning for face value and then being able to sell them more like and then if they can’t, then they’ll just go. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 19:17
I had a buddy of mine and from Nags Head, North Carolina, who he’s been one raving game, his life. It was a playoff game. It might have been the Denver game 22 years ago, like I got him a ticket. He sat with me. He’s a childhood friend. We went to middle school. He’s one of my favorite people. He’s he has a bike company and a tech company down in Nags Head. He’s made a whole life down there with a bike shop. He’s a he had a mongoose when we were a one of my favorite people chip. His kids are you know grownups now they’re in their 20s He wants to bring his son up to go to a raven big Raven game. I reminded him Ray Lewis will not be dancing this change things. Oh, no. And he might you know what, you know what I that might make me go. Whether you know right dances, I’m there. Things change when he stopped dancing really did I mean the whole vibe of the building change when he stopped dancing and you know be writing Purple Rain three about that at some point but I told he was real nervous like he’s I really want to comment. I’m like dude, pipe down. Here’s how I got I got 350 A ticket. I’m like, Dude, if you want a big money away not I mean, go ahead, but you don’t have to spend that much to get in. Well, I want a good seat. I’m like, here’s the deal. And I’ll tell anybody this so this is I’m not a ticket broker, but I’ve done a lot of tickets. And I’ve seen a lot of this is my advice to anybody. If the Browns get in, it will be a $350 ticket because they will come and they will buy your cousin’s tickets and they will piss off Pete overcast is by buying his buddies tickets that had all Steelers fans in it last week because their fans are selling it and Pete had the same Dundalk bravado I had 20 years ago. I would rather die than still a Steeler fan. Steeler fans are not now after what they’ve done the open market baby everybody’s you know like like, I am not a raven. I am not on the Ravens team. I am the one holding them accountable for them trying to wreck my life, my career my business. So sell your tickets make make your papers it’s Katt Williams would say
Bill Cole 21:20
but I think the Browns I think people would want to go see Flacco so even even in Baltimore,
Nestor J. Aparicio 21:25
Baltimore fans don’t want to spend 300 Here’s where it is. This is this is where the the nut cut time. How much are our fans willing to spend and how much are their fans willing to spend and how much more important it’s how we got tickets in Pittsburgh? It’s how we took buses to New England, right like we were the invaders in January. Every year. I drank beer with you in Indianapolis dude, in Broad Ripple. We all went into their stadium where purple in their seats in there because we were willing to pay $175 and the Colts fans were like literally that’s where this is right?
Bill Cole 21:59
If buffalo comes for an AFC Championship Game $700
Nestor J. Aparicio 22:03
ticket. Yep, it’s good because their fans can’t afford to go to the Super Bowl. They’ll come down here and their Super Bowl will be hanging out at the Hyatt the Inner Harbor and they will have 25,000 of the tickets in the stadium if the bills come because they will pay your buddy to stay home.
Bill Cole 22:19
Yeah, the only the only games that people don’t make money on would be a Texans or a dolphins game. Every other game I think you make money on that ticket.
Nestor J. Aparicio 22:28
See your your he’s a businessman he’ll call scalars
Bill Cole 22:32
bills, browns, I think you make money on all those.
Nestor J. Aparicio 22:35
So well. I am rooting for as a journalist. I’m rooting for the best story. Right? Okay. That’s what I’ve said to all the journalists here. So the best story for my community will be for the Ravens won the Super Bowl right and how they win the Super Bowl, and the pathway that it happens and the fun we have. And the fireworks going off three weeks from now down after they beat the bills soundly and roundly to prove that there. Then we’ll have a party. Bill. I will catch up with you next week. I know you’re coming out for crabcake row. I’m sorry at times a little short this week, but now I’ll give you a purple oh snap lottery ticket here for the road. Good luck. All right. Thank you. Epic row settles in on February 5 bill calls a coal roofing and Gordion energy I had to do a little short time with him today because I have all sorts of football stuff happening. Luke’s in Owings Mills. I am here if you’re on our tech service, you’ll get the news first enjoy the games this week and happy new year. We are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore. We never stop talking Baltimore positive
