WEBVTT

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You're listening to the downbeat on ninety
seven to one the Freak. How about

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color five? Right now? You'll
want a pair of tickets to see Steve

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Bye and Joe Satriani at the Music
Call at fair Park. Call it five

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May fourth, Yeah, Color one, Yeah, color three, I'm changing

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it. It's officially caller number three. Boy Kevin doesn't like his games challenge,

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does he? Oh, he puts
a lot into him. He's protective

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of his little games. Interested in
fact, there's a good point to that

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to what what collar number? It
doesn't matter. I mean, I'm just

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wondering if there's actually five people,
yes, out there that dude, it's

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the guys, Joe and Steve.
Yeah, but it's also not nineteen eighty

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seven anymore either. Do they just
both wail on guitars? Is that what

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the whole show? Oh? Yeah? Are there any lyrics? They'll take

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turns, cutting heads, they'll solosh
old story, the story with their guitars.

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Yeah, and take you on a
journey. We'll speak with their music.

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You can be there, Caller three. If you're the first, third

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or fifth caller third. We have
to be clear. We'll get in trouble.

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Yeah, there's a lot of rules
one on this right now. We

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got to abide by the promotional rules. I know one pair of tickets today

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caller three, yep, pair Park
of Music Hall. Good place to see

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a show. Oh. In the
break we're talking about movies. Ben and

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skin Show will be doing mcgroober at
the Alamo Draft House. Oh yes,

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and they're going to do the Denton
one KFBR three nine two. Can I

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make an admission? Never saw macgoober, never saw mcgroober, and I have

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been told to see it by Ben
Rogers and my friend Kent for a long

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time. They're I gotta see it
soon. If you saw my vanity plate

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that I had for a year,
which was KFBR three nine two, you

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would not know what you were seeing
Hunt. Neither we do wouldn't know.

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I haven't seen the movie either.
Gods, you guys have never seen Really

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you should go? Are you gonna
go? I love the sketch or the

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skit on SNHL. It's funny.
I mean, is that sketch continued for

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an hour and a half. It's
just a bumbling mcguiver. Yeah, And

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I don't know that I see it
now that I look at it, I

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don't know that I see it on
the website, so maybe I shouldn't have

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announced that. But I don't know
if it's official or not. I don't

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know anything. But Caller three gets
to go see Steve Vay and Joe Satrianna

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and listen to Ben and Skin today
because they have a big surprise announcement that

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they were excited to make. I
think it did. I sort of got

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heart. It's gonna be huge.
It's gonna be a really cool announcement.

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I sort of got I saw some
some some artwork about it on something.

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This is the problem though, with
having too many apps and too many things

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that we're supposed to be like control
of. It's so hard to know what

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that's what anymore sounds to me like
your mouth throw to check that your ass

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can't cash. Yeah, huh is
that how it goes? Yes, Tiger

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Woods is live on the range at
Augusta. We have collegs live from the

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range. Cat Well, he's just
holding a wedge. He's got to make

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the cut here, Danny, and
he is about to swing and give a

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review. He's in position and he
has hit the golf ball all right,

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he's not wincing in pain. Good
you taking Tiger to win it all.

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No, I'm not taking Tiger to
win it all. To make the cut,

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though, Okay, maybe that'll be
our He's playing for something this week,

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to set the record of twenty four
made cuts. But I don't know

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if our guest cares about that.
He might. He does. Has written

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two golf books. Absolutely it is
ESPN senior writer New York Times best selling

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author Don Van, not a junior. How are you doing, Don?

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It's not even Nata I almost probably
I didn't answer you. Yeah, Hey,

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Donald, we got you. Nope, So there we are. How

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you doing doing great? Guys?
How you doing? We're doing awesome?

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Man? All right, only because
we just talked about it. Tiger woods

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make the cut, not make the
cut this week, Augusta National. Uh,

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you can't bet against Tiger. He'll
make it. He'll be what it'll

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be twenty five, I think,
right, twenty four, twenty four to

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twenty five. I know it's the
record twenty five. He's tied twenty three

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record couples and write twenty four.
Gary, so you think, yes,

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I guess he is at the max
level experience, But good god, he

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just doesn't play withdraws. When he
does play and he's so beat up.

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Man, I hope you're right.
Well, we'll all be rooting for him

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for sure. So you're writing this
book, this Jerry Jones book, and

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I guess I've got a million questions
about this. My first question is how

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do you write a book about Jerry
Jones and keep it under ten thousand pages?

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That is going to be a challenge, for sure. You got to

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keep the book, you know,
probably one hundred to one hundred and twenty

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thousand words. That's about a four
hundred page book. Can't go longer than

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that. It'll just look intimidating to
people. That is definitely a challenge.

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Jerry has lived a very full life, as we all know, and he's

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eighty one years old and hasn't slowed
down. So I'll do the best I

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can to tell his story and tell
people new things. That's the big challenge,

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guys, is to I'm an investigative
reporter by trade, and one of

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the great challenges of this book,
besides the length, is to try to

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reveal new things about Jerry, things
that nobody knows about. And so that's

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what I'm setting out to do.
Well, I've got a million questions as

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well, don Okay, So how
would you describe what this book is?

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Is this a by a full biography
of the life of Jerry? Is it

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a portion of his life? And
is this also an authorized biography by Jerry

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Jones. It's a full biography.
So I'm going to go back to Jerry's

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childhood, and his years in high
school and in college at Arkansas, and

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you know, and and his years
you know, in the oil and gas

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industry when he when he made a
lot of money and then lost almost all

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of it and then made another fortune
back enough money to buy the Cowboys.

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So I'm going to go back into
that past of Jerry. It is an

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unauthorized biography. Jerry is not somebody
who I think he's going to cooperate with

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me. In fact, I feel
pretty certain he'll cooperate with me in the

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sense that he'll sit down with me
and give me time. But it is

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an unauthorized biography. It's not the
same as the Netflix doc that Jerry is

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doing. That's an authorized documentary that
Jerry is doing with Netflix, that docuseries.

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This is going to be a little
bit different from that. Okay.

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That makes me very happy to hear, because I find that in most cases,

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the authorized biography tends to have the
narrative controlled by the subject. And

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I love that you, being such
a great investigative reporter and researcher, that

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you're going to have, I think, a more honest take on the overall

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trajectory of his life. Now he
is going to cooperate with you. I

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have no doubt. Does that kind
of present a slippery slope? I guess

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I'm kind of asking what's your relationship
with Jerry? Because historically you have been

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at the forefront of a lot of
unearthing some things that may not put Jerry

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in his you know, a family
in a most favorable light. What's your

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relationship with him when it comes to
stuff like this, considering the history of

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the things that you've written about him
and the Cowboys. Well, ten years

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ago, actually ten years ago this
summer, I spent the summer pretty much

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with Jerry Jones and doing a in
depth profile of him for ESPN. It

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was a TV piece as well as
a lengthy long form piece entitled Jerry Football

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that a lot of people around our
business believe was the best portrait of him

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and uh and since then, we
have a we have a pretty good relationship.

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He certainly is not like some of
the more recent stories I've done about

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him. But I think that if
you ask Jerry what he thought of thought

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about my work and thinks of me, I think he'd probably say that I'm

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I'm tough but fair and that I'm
down the middle, and uh that you

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know, that's what I'm going to
do with this book. Uh. If

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Jerry cooperates and I agree with you, I expect that he will and give

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me time and sit down with me, h and answer my questions probably more

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than once. You know, I'm
He's not the only person I'm going to

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talk to. I'm going to do, already done dozens of interviews and we'll

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do more than a hundred when it's
all said and done. And I'm going

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to try to do the best,
most honest portrait of Jerry Jones that has

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ever been written. That was the
goal I set for myself when I did

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that profile ten years ago. And
if you go back and read that,

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there were things in that profile that
Jerry didn't love that I reported on.

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So you know, my goal is
to just do the best book, the

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most honest book, the most down
the middle book about Jerry Jones again,

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as Danny said, you're one of
the most in depth writers on some of

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the things he's done. Do you
get blowback just through third parties or through

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the media, or does Jerry himself
or some associate or henchman for lack of

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a better word, or lawyer contact
you when you release one of your expose

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as oh, I hear it from
everybody, including Jerry. I've heard directly

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from Jerry on certain things, but
certainly the people around him, his communications

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people, lawyers, you know,
I will hear from them. But for

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the most part, even the tough
stories. I did a story just a

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couple of years ago about the cheerleader's
voyeurism scandal involving Rich Dalrymple. That was

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a story, certainly that was not
beloved at the Star. And yet what

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the feedback I heard is that people
there, you know, thought it was

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fair. It was a down the
middle portrait of a two point four million

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dollar settlement made to four young women
who claimed that they were spied on by

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the former top communications guy who'd been
with Jerry since nineteen ninety, Rich Dalrymple,

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who retired just a week before my
story was published. And so I

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think that readers can expect that kind
of coverage from this book. You know,

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I've been doing this thirty five years. I've been at ESPN since twenty

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twelve. And the book about Jerry
is it's about Jerry Jones's life, but

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it's also about Jerry Jones's influence with
the National Football League. One of the

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big motivating factors for me and telling
and writing this book is telling that story.

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Jerry has played an outsize role in
the astonishing success of the NFL through

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his vision and through his business acumen. And at the same time, I'm

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going to weigh out against nearly thirty
years of futility as general manager of the

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Cowboys, not even making it to
the title the championship by the conference championship

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game since nineteen ninety five, so
that will also be measured. That's a

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story that of course is very familiar
to everybody in Dallas, but that will

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also obviously be part of the book
because that's part of Jerry's story. Best

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Selling author Don Van Atta joining us
here on ninety seven to one too.

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I want to expound a little bit
on what Mikey just asked you. When

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you do hear blowback, when you
do get feedback from you, said Jerry

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himself, What is the nature of
the feedback if it is maybe negative?

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Is it is it them challenging the
facts that you presented, or is it

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essentially an emotional response lots of don
what are you doing writing this stuff about

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us? Man? Yeah, I
mean, I'm just kind of curious of

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what that dynamic might look like when
when you hear back from the Jones camp.

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I don't think a single fact I've
ever written has been challenged by Jerry

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directly. I think it's much more
in the second part of your question of

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hey, what are you doing?
Did you have to go there? Did

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you have to do that? It's
it's more like that, you know,

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Jerry generally has pretty favorable coverage or
he's used to it. Certainly he gets

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a lot of criticism, but that's
commentary. But it's more in that second

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camp of man, did you have
to go did you have to go that

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far? Did you have to do
that? And I was like, well,

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yeah, Jerry, that's that's what
the facts are. That's sort of

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what my response is, which I
think he accepts, and I mean I

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have a sense from Jerry that he
respects what I do, and even though

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this is an unauthorized biography that you
know, I don't think that. I

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think the expectation that I have is
that Jerry will spend time with me,

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and already I have spent so much
time with him and have talked with him

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about every aspect of his life,
going all the way back to his childhood

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and his mom and dad, and
growing up in North Little Rock and playing

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high school football, and his college
experiences, his vision for the NFL,

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you know, almost buying the San
Diego charters and being talked out of it

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by his dad. A lot of
that stuff's familiar, but Jerry and I

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have gone very in depth in these
different moments in his life, and so

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I'm excited. I think that I
think that the book, my hope for

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the book, my ambition for the
book is quite large. I wanted to

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tell a lot of new things about
Jerry's life, but also a lot about

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the making of the National Football League
and how this guy who you know,

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he had a dream in the eighties
to actually it started when he was in

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college in the sixties, to eventually
own a National Football League franchise, and

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to finally do it, and to
do it on his terms is a fascinating

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American story that I'm really excited to
tell. I would say, I mean,

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to me, it seems like you
have as much access or are as

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close as you as anybody without being
in his inner circle or family would have

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access to a lot of information about
him in your conversations. Would you say

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that there are any details anything that
he has told you that he says,

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Look, don I know what you're
doing. This is not to be written

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about. Is there information that you
have that you are literally not willing to

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go there, whether it be because
out of an ethical connection or because Jerry

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has specifically told you, hey,
this is off the record. Well off

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the record, I mean, you're
have to be two different questions. One

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is whatever I find out, and
if it's truthful and it's accurate, I'm

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going to report. I think that
Jerry and the people around him know that.

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Certainly, if a source says off
the record to me, it means

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off the record, and I respect
that. And there have been times in

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my relationship with Jerry, like a
lot of sources around the National Football League

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or beyond, we'll say off the
record, and that means off the record.

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But there's no area that is sort
of off limits. There's no agreement

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like that. That's the nature of
an unauthorized book. If I were doing

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an authorized book, then the answer
would probably be very different that, yes,

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this is authorized, we can't go
into this aspect or that aspect.

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That's the agreement we have. There's
no agreement like that, Jerry. I

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think is as I say, my
expectation is sit down with me, hopefully

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multiple times as I'm as I'm reporting
and as I'm gathering facts to talk about

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various moments and and and and and. Yeah, there's there's no agreement like

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that that there's some area that I
can't go into. This is Don Van

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Natta, junior of Well ESPN,
Senior writer, New York Times best selling

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author and one of the best,
most incredible writers and authors of our time.

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I know, it's always fascinating.
I mean, you're the guy who

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who taught us that Jerry likes Johnny
Walker Blue, you know, is a

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great fun fact that is stuck around
from ten years from that piece up.

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My question is you're talking about your
book and keeping it four hundred pages so

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it's not too big and not intimidating
from a sales standpoint. When you're writing.

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This is almost like editing a movie, Like you could have six hundred,

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seven hundred pages and you gotta chop
something out or how does that even

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work? It is? It is, it is. Uh, there's a

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lot of choices to make about you
know, how I want to write the

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book and what moments and what aspects
of Jerry's life that I want to focus

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on. And you know, I
have a I have a pretty good outline.

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I mean, obviously it could change
as I'm doing the reporting and I've

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begun writing, and I have a
pretty good vision for the arc of how

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I want to tell the story.
But it is like that, it's impossible

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with somebody who's been on the planet
for eighty one years to get into every

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single moment, every single season,
every single choice that Jerry has made.

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So I have to make choices in
the narrative about how to try to tell

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that story. But as I said, you guys, I want to focus

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a lot on Jerry as owner of
the team and as visionary as one of

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the owners of the thirty two who
helped build the NFL into what it is,

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but also you know Jerry's other businesses
that he's been in that intrigues me.

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Legends the hospitality and stadium company.
You know, Jerry is involved and

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still involved in the oil and gas
industry with Comstock Resources. So you know,

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Jerry's life today beyond the Cowboys and
how he conducts business is something that

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intrigues me that you don't see a
lot and about, and you know,

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and how he built his fortune is
something that I'm very very interested in and

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going back and tracing that and explaining
to people how he had the money to

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buy the team from bum Bright in
nineteen eighty nine fo one hundred and fifty

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million dollars than a record and it's
kind of mind boggling that the team is

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now worth probably you know, nine
and a half ten billion is the estimate,

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but Jerry could probably get fifteen billion
dollars for the Cowboys today if he

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were to sell it. And that's
just an astonishing success story. What makes

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Jerry tick, you know how he's
always obsessed with making the Cowboys relevant.

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You know, back in twenty fourteen
when I did that profile, he wanted

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to draft you guys will remember Johnny
Manziel. He thought Johnny Manziel would guarantee

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the Cowboys relevance for a decade,
and we all know what happened to Johnny

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Manziel, what a bust he turned
out to be and would have been for

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the Cowboys, and maybe one of
the most embarrassing picks Jerry ever would have

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made his general manager if he hadn't
been talked out of that pick in real

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time. And so is the way
he's constantly focused on making sure the Cowboys

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are relevant despite the fact the America's
team they get the best ratings of any

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team no matter what they do on
the field. Is just a remarkable story.

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And how he has made that happen
is something I really want to try

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to explain, delve into and explain. Yeah, Don Van Natt, I

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can't think of anybody better to write
that story. And it's certainly worthy because

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you're right, the positives are pretty
incredible too. But around here, you

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know, we hear a lot of
the strange negative so we are obviously curious

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about those, but whenever it comes
out, it will fly off the shelves

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here in DFW. While we have
you on, I have to ask you.

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I'm a Miami native too. I
know you used to work for the

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Miami Herald and Don Van Natta.
You've probably told the story thousands of times,

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but I've never heard it. He
was sent by Harold editors to cover

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Hurricane Andrew, stayed in a comfort
in that was destroyed by one hundred and

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sixty five on our wins while you
were there, nearly lost your life.

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If you could and in a minute
or two, as dumb as that is,

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tell us that story. Please.
Yeah. We was fit the kid

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reporter as a young reporter to Miami
Herald was my first job, and the

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Herald sent reporters all over then Dade
County, Miami to cover the storm.

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We didn't know where the storm was
going to hit back then in nineteen ninety

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two, and Hurricane Andrew was this
monster category five storm, and I went

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to a comfort in motel with my
then girlfriend Lizette Alvarez, who was a

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Herald reporter who's now my wife of
nearly thirty years, and a photographer named

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Carlos Guerrero. And the comfort in
motel off of us one literally got torn

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apart by these winds. We were
running from room to room as the roof

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got torn off of various hotel rooms. It was the three of us and

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six other guests and a motel manager
who knew once the eye of the storm

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was over the motel for us to
move on the other side. He had

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been through a hurricane in New Warrant. I knew the winds were going to

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shift, and I think it saved
our life because we moved to the other

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side when the wind shifted, and
all of the rooms on the side that

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we're in were all torn apart.
The roof was torn off of the entire

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side of the motel. There were
only a few rooms left and we were

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in one of them. And there
was one point where myself and another guests

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were holding up felt like we were
holding up the bathroom with our bare hands.

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So it was extremely scary. And
then when it was over, though,

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it was a journalist dream because I
was asked by the Herald to write

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a first person's story of surviving that
storm that appeared on the front page of

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the Miami Herald, and I wrote
it on one of those little trash eighty

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computers, literally in the husk of
that motel. And it was a good

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thing for my career because just a
couple of years after that, the New

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York Times called and hired both myself
and my wife at the age of thirty

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to go up to the New York
Times for sixteen years before I joined ESPN.

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But it was a very scary moment. I appreciate you asking me about

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it. I haven't told that story
in a while, but it was.

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It's pretty amazing. Yeah, no, that is fascinating. All right,

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don van Natta. We'll let you
go. Man. We can do this

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for hours on end, just on
Jerry alone. But hell, all your

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other books incredible successes, and we
know this one will be a success as

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well. Is it called The Star? Is that what we're going with.

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Yes, that's what we're going with
right now. That's the working title,

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and I think it works, I
hope. So anyway, what do you

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guys think of it? I loved
it right when I heard it, and

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I told these guys and they're like, oh, is that the title?

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And then yes, it fits on
multiple all levels. I think, yeah,

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for sure. Yeah, this thing
is going to soar off of shelves.

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Man, you're you're going to have
another hit on your hands, no

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doubt. Well, thank you,
guys. I appreciate the support and I

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look forward to talking with you guys
when it comes out. Yea, sir,

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there he goes, Don Van Natta
Junior man, thanks for your time.

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Cool, thanks guys, you good
dude. There you go. Yep,

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if he read something, if you
know that he wrote it, you

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immediately go okay, gotta make time
and read this. It's cool that it

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seems like last how many years,
it's turned into that where it's like,

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oh, something came out about Jerry
Jones. Oh really, so what is

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it Tuesday? Wait? No,
Don Van Natta's got a story dropping.

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Yeah, oh you know it's gonna
be deeper and yeah, good get man.

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That's a cool, good stuff for
sure. Cool. Yeah, and

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we'll compound it with Dusty Sleigh tomorrow. Yeah, Danny Danger's Morning News.

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Well, let's follow up some award
winning winning journalism with some more award winning

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00:23:18.519 --> 00:23:23.039
journalism with this tease, did Ricky
Martin get a pant full of bone at

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00:23:23.079 --> 00:23:26.400
a Madonna concert? Stick around and
find out