Freeman Jones was a black, PhD-educated scientist in Jim Crow America, who was the lead of his team. However, when his company opened up the facility for tours for investors or the public, he was kindly asked by ownership to exit the facility and go wait in the yard with the other black employees, most of whom were part of the cleaning crew. 

Freeman would go onto marry Mada Myers, who had marched with Dr Martin Luther King in Mobile, Alabama, and was active in that legendary Civil Rights movement of the 1960s American South. She later taught English Literature for nearly 30 years. Freeman and Mada were married for 62 years.  

It’s not surprising that such people would go on to raise four lovely children – the youngest of whom they named: Cobi N’Gai Jones. As a young man, Cobi was very nervous when he approached his highly educated parents with his desire to put his education on hold to pursue a career in soccer, where there was no established league, hardly any professional players and very little money.  

Surprisingly to Cobi, it was his mother, the educator, who told her son, " Go chase this dream of yours, son, and see where it takes you.”

Cobi went on to have a legendary US soccer career; he is in the Guinness Book for most games played for the US National Team, and the most continuous years played with one MLS club – two records that will never be touched.

So, as he poignantly told me: in the end, he was glad his mother won the argument. 

Cobi was kind enough to host me at the LA Galaxy facility where he will soon join Landon Donovan and David Beckham in the form of a 10-foot-tall bronze statue - soon to be unveiled in the Legends Plaza at the Galaxy stadium entrance. 

It was a pleasure to sit with Cobi Jones and I hope you enjoy it was well. 

Gary Mabbutt is a real legend of that historic club – Tottenham Hotspur of North London – but Gary was quite lucky to get that far as he nearly died as a boy while at his youth club. 

He did not die of course, but was diagnosed with what was then a pretty unknown condition - that of type 1 diabetes – he was told by the doctor that his football career was over and he would have to take a lot of precautions and master his diet moving forward just to insure his life would not be cut short.  

He was 17 and his world was shattered, but given his nature he didn’t give up and with his father, he did what any stubborn teenage boy would do - he went looking for another doctor. 

It took 4 tries, but he found one that walked him through the care he had to take, explained to him the nature of blood sugar and insulin, and all the ins/outs of living with this condition – his pregame meal, his post game meal, his sleep and of course, what to do in case of emergency. 

He would go on to play nearly 500 times for Tottenham, over the course of 16 seasons – 11 as captain. He played with or against the likes of: Enzo Scifo, Dennis Bergkamp, Paul Gascoigne, Jurgen Klinsmann and Johan Cruyff. 

As an aside, the other three doctors that recommended retirement all spoke to Gary over the years – congratulated him on his success, marveled at what he was able to accomplish with his disease - and further that his career would provide a blueprint for all the diabetics that would came after him, something that Gary is very proud of. 

He is a true legend of White Hart Lane, an inspiration for those that share his ailment and a gentleman above all. 

Dean Windass was never really an elite player at the top flight of English football. He is a legend of Hull City – that Yorkshire club with great history - but Hull rarely find themselves in the top flight of English football. 

He had many great moments at Hull – some of the best in that clubs history – and when Dean retired, they offered to build a statue of him in front of the stadium, but he declined the offer saying, “I could not think of one working man who had a statue’ – its sounds fake I know, but it is true. 

Like many players of his era, he did not have an easy time upon leaving the game. He struggled with depression and turned to alcohol to anesthetize said depression which made him more depressed and round and round he went. 

There were dark times and after a failed suicide attempt, his friend (and great ex player) Chris Kamara got him into a rehab facility. It was a very hard time, but he was able to get sober, face his demons and turn his life around. 

He then began offering help to other players – help that he did not really see when he left the game. He began posting an inspirational twitter vid every morning - which went viral and garners quite the following to this day. He even gave a TED talk on his experiences and is so brutally honest and vulnerable about what he went through - I recommend you check it out. 

So, a bit of a different one this one, but if you give it a go – I hope you get something out of it. It is one of those episodes where I kind of wanna say, pretentious as it may sound, maybe forward it onto a friend who is not in the best of spots – it may help them….

So here we go - #22 Soccerpod – Dean Windass.

In 1984, John Fashanu, a black Englishman of Nigerian descent, signed with the British club: Millwall FC; an openly racist club at that time. The semi-official chant the supporters sing from the crowd is: ‘We are Millwall, No One Likes Us, No One Likes Us, We Don’t Care, We are Millwall, From the Den’. (The Den is the name of their home ground) 

The supporters hated him, they abused him, they threw bananas at him, they threatened his life if he dare stay. Somehow, as time progressed - they came to adore him. Impossibly, he became the most beloved player at the club. His passion, his skill and of course his goals just won them over, kind of like the Soviet crowd conversion in Rocky IV. 

In fact, they revered him so much that when he left the club, the ‘ultra’ supporters – a notorious group known as the F Troupe – were so distraught, that they took out a hit on his life, and he had to go into hiding. 

And this is just chapter 4 for John – It was such a good time to chat with him - Give us a listen to hear it all. 

In 1984, John Fashanu, a black Englishman of Nigerian descent, signed with the British club: Millwall FC; an openly racist club at that time. The semi-official chant the supporters sing from the crowd is: ‘We are Millwall, No One Likes Us, No One Likes Us, We Don’t Care, We are Millwall, From the Den’. (The Den is the name of their home ground) 

The supporters hated him, they abused him, they threw bananas at him, they threatened his life if he dare stay. Somehow, as time progressed - they came to adore him. Impossibly, he became the most beloved player at the club. His passion, his skill and of course his goals just won them over, kind of like the Soviet crowd conversion in Rocky IV. 

In fact, they revered him so much that when he left the club, the ‘ultra’ supporters – a notorious group known as the F Troupe – were so distraught, that they took out a hit on his life, and he had to go into hiding. 

And this is just chapter 4 for John – It was such a good time to chat with him - Give us a listen to hear it all. 

If you love sports and you love sports stories, then it is hard to do much better than Wes Morgan, and the absurd story of the 2015 Leicester City Silver Foxes.

They were 5000-1 odds against winning the title. But it may as well have been 5 million. It was not going to happen, no way, an impossibility. To bet 10 bucks on it, was to throw 10 bucks away.

They played Manchester City away late in that year. The cost for the starting 11 that Man City put on the field that day was: 477M (USD), the cost for the Leicester City starting 11 was 32M (USD). In fact, Man City had 6 players that cost more than the entire Leicester squad. Leicester won 3-1, comfortably.

It was the classic David and Goliath story, but with a twist that we can never see in American sports. In America, our titles are won with an end of season tournament – NFL playoffs, March Madness, etc – short term events where strange things can happen – a pitcher gets hot, a quarterback is injured, a boxer has the night of his life.

But, what are we to make of an upset that lasts 9 months? 38 weeks of ‘upsets’ until they lift the trophy as champions? I don’t know but upset seems the wrong word. It is what makes that campaign so strange, so special and so very unlikely to ever happen again.

The great Peter Drury, who was commentating that final day, put it like this - as the captain, Wes Morgan, lifted the trophy to the screaming home fans and as the fireworks went off behind him - ‘It is quite simply the greatest tale told in the history of football’

Even Wes cannot help but smile as he recalled some of the moments from that insane year. And this was but one chapter in his remarkable career that I was humbled to hear him lay out in a small room in a small hotel on a rainy day (of course) in his hometown of Nottingham.

Wes Morgan – Episode 18

If you love sports and you love sports stories, then it is hard to do much better than Wes Morgan, and the absurd story of the 2015 Leicester City Silver Foxes.

They were 5000-1 odds against winning the title. But it may as well have been 5 million. It was not going to happen, no way, an impossibility. To bet 10 bucks on it, was to throw 10 bucks away.

They played Manchester City away late in that year. The cost for the starting 11 that Man City put on the field that day was: 477M (USD), the cost for the Leicester City starting 11 was 32M (USD). In fact, Man City had 6 players that cost more than the entire Leicester squad. Leicester won 3-1, comfortably.

It was the classic David and Goliath story, but with a twist that we can never see in American sports. In America, our titles are won with an end of season tournament – NFL playoffs, March Madness, etc – short term events where strange things can happen – a pitcher gets hot, a quarterback is injured, a boxer has the night of his life.

But, what are we to make of an upset that lasts 9 months? 38 weeks of ‘upsets’ until they lift the trophy as champions? I don’t know but upset seems the wrong word. It is what makes that campaign so strange, so special and so very unlikely to ever happen again.

The great Peter Drury, who was commentating that final day, put it like this - as the captain, Wes Morgan, lifted the trophy to the screaming home fans and as the fireworks went off behind him - ‘It is quite simply the greatest tale told in the history of football’

Even Wes cannot help but smile as he recalled some of the moments from that insane year. And this was but one chapter in his remarkable career that I was humbled to hear him lay out in a small room in a small hotel on a rainy day (of course) in his hometown of Nottingham.

Wes Morgan – Episode 18