#457 Jon Marks

March 24, 2021Scott Benner

Sports talk show host with type 1 diabetes

Jon Marks is an adult living with type 1 diabetes who is also the host of WIPs afternoon drive show that he co-hosts with Ike Reese.

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Scott Benner 0:00
Hello everyone and welcome to Episode 457 of the Juicebox Podcast.

On today's show, we'll be talking to john marks john is an adult living with Type One Diabetes. He was diagnosed in his 20s. Today's men talk about his early management things, he figured out where he is now and he's gonna tell us a little bit about his job. And that job is pretty cool. JOHN is a sports radio host in Philadelphia, he works on the station that I grew up listening to sports talk radio on, john, we're gonna talk about diabetes for a while, we're gonna add been to some sports, but then he's got a really important message on the back end, and I don't want you to miss. So if you get into the sports stuff, and you're like, oh, he stopped talking about diabetes. Hang on. Just one more second for me. Please remember, while you're listening that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, please always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan for becoming bold with insulin. During this hour, I'm going to mention the diabetes pro tip episodes to john if you'd like to listen to them, they start back in Episode 210, where you can find them at diabetes pro tip.com. They're also available at Juicebox Podcast calm.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the dexcom g six continuous glucose monitor get the CGM that my daughter and john Marks wears at dexcom.com/juicebox. And you can take the Omni pod for a test drive, go to my Omni pod comm Ford slash juicebox. Find out if you're eligible for a free 30 day trial of the Omni pod dash. That's actually you using it for 30 days. Or you can ask for a free no obligation demo of the Omni pod. And if you get that they'll send you out a pod that you can wear and try on it doesn't work. But it will give you the feeling of what it will be like to wear the on the pod. So whether you're going to look for that free 30 day trial, the dash or just try to get that free, no obligation demo, everything you want is at myOmnipod.com/juicebox. Last thing before we start check out the T one D exchange at T1dexchange.org/juicebox. Are you in the studio right now? Like are you going to do this then work?

Jon Marks 2:35
Yes, I came in at about 1030 to get it like an hour's worth of work done. And then I'm going to do this with you. And then I'm going to bounce out and then finish up my prep and get ready to go on the air. Oh, that's

Scott Benner 2:46
very cool. So we're recording already. This is very, very laid back.

Jon Marks 2:51
I listened to a couple of a couple of recent podcasts over the last week or so to get a feel for what it was. So I got a pretty good idea. You do a good job with it.

Scott Benner 2:58
Thank you. I listened to your show yesterday. I thought so anyway, go ahead Introduce yourself.

Jon Marks 3:06
My name is john Marx. I work for 94 Wy pm I am a talk sports talk radio host. You can listen to me every Monday through Friday from two to six. If you get the radio.com app and Scott, thanks for having me on the show man what's going on?

Scott Benner 3:23
I Well, I'm gonna have to go back probably to when you started in Philly, and I I grew up in Bucks County. So we listened to sports talk constantly. I like my earliest memories are walking around like a baseball card shop and hearing like Glen Mac now talk about like sports. And I love the like what I think what you do is is incredibly difficult to make look easy, you know to have these like very short conversations that are cogent. And somehow they're there unto themselves but then they build along the hours that you're on the on the on the radio, I think it's it's a really cool skill to have. And so I love listening when I get a chance I love listening to people talk I don't put on as much music as I even want to because of that. And I felt like one day I heard you offhandedly say to your co host that you had diabetes and it never really came back up into my head again. And then what was it now maybe a month or so ago? I was listening to the radio and I could hear your Dexcom beeping and I thought How come I've never asked john to come on the podcast. So here you are.

Jon Marks 4:30
You know it's funny how many diabetics are out there listening and know what that Dexcom alarm sounds like because between the tweets your I guess you emailed me or I don't know if your direct message me on twitter but between the DMS and the emails and must have got a dozen people saying hey, I'm on the Dexcom two or

Unknown Speaker 4:47
Hey,

Jon Marks 4:48
my daughter's on the desktop so it was not something I expected when that when the damn alarm goes off because you know you can't silence it right away because it puts the volume all the way up. Yeah, so everybody can hear it but it is It's funny how it works out sometimes. Isn't

Scott Benner 5:02
it interesting that you get that money responses? I immediately thought, you know, so seriously, I dropped my daughter off at a salon. She was having her nails done. And I was waiting outside listening to your show. And I heard the beeping and my brain thought that's not right. Arden's not low. I know she isn't. And then I was like, wait a minute, it was muffled like that wouldn't have sounded like that. And then it occurred to me, I was like, I remember this guy saying he had diabetes a couple years ago, this is what this is. So that day, I i were you trying to you adjusted your diet? Right?

Jon Marks 5:37
I'm that particular day.

Scott Benner 5:38
Yes. That what was going on and you were trying to eat right? Or something like that? I heard you saying,

Jon Marks 5:42
Well, I mean, I have ever since the pandemic started. So we're going on a year now I really decided that I was going to take advantage of not being able to do anything and really start exercising and eating better. I would say my diet was was usually you know, pretty good for being a diabetic but I really kind of took charge of it. I don't remember exactly what it was that day. You know what it was it since it was about a month ago, Scott that you know, my basil rates were probably a little bit off because of the the temperature change. Yeah. And what it does to me, but I mean, honestly, like, it's not it's not unusual for me to get a little bit low during the show and because I have an Apple Watch, which is amazing because I can get the Dexcom reading right on my watch. It's like it's you know, it's a it's amazing for any diabetics out there. You see going down and I know that I'm in a commercial break so what am I doing I'm trying to eat a granola bar during the commercial break, but doesn't work right away. So sometimes something like that will happen and you know, that's not a common with me, Scott, I mean, you know, we all have our highs and we all have our lows and we're just trying to try to manage them as best we can.

Scott Benner 6:50
So you feel a little when the weather warms up you need a little less you know what it's it's

Jon Marks 6:55
yes, I do it's um it's weird because weather warms up for a couple days and I switch it and then you know the Northeast in in spring and late winter then it gets that's 30 degrees 20 degrees again, so then you know, sometimes it it backfires on you. So yeah, yeah, for me when it gets warm, I need less when it gets when it gets cold, I need more and I think it's like that with a lot of people kind of pumped to us. I have an omni pod. I don't have the I don't have the dash I inquired about it and my insurance was telling me that I'm not eligible for it. And I had to go through the appeals process which I guess I'm currently going through they said it could take about three months but I'm an omni pod insulin pump user

Scott Benner 7:39
three months April May June I'll tell you what, if you wait that long, I assume their algorithm is going to be out so they on the pod five will come out and then your Dexcom and your on the pod will talk to each other and it'll adjust your basal insulin and things like that automatically. So I should just wait you maybe you should that's presents pretty trust me that's pretty great technology. My daughter's using an algorithm right now and it's fascinating to watch it work amazing. Yeah. might stop some of those lows for you. I'm wondering when you're talking does it You said you get you can get lower while you're talking so I think of your show is like I think of you as the driver and as like is the like the color a little bit sometimes. And so you're so you're you're talking a little more than he is and your pace like your your quick talker like I am that does that actually burn carbs for you? Do you get low just from that do you have to eat during the show? I guess is my question.

Jon Marks 8:32
I do I have a routine at are actually we just changed our clocks. So our break schedules are a little bit different now but I used to before we would go we would have a commercial free segment that would go from about 440 until 520 save about 40 minutes so during that break, I'm starting to get hungry anyway because lunch had been you know three or four hours before so that's when I would typically eat one of my protein bars that I have. So now that it's a little bit different but yeah, I mean it does it does it is it Scott when I have when I feel like I have a good show. When I get done in off the air. I just like mentally I'm just exhausted. Like oh yeah, nanny now I have to drive 55 minutes home and have two little kids is running and screaming and try to eat dinner and then get them in bed and everything else. So it goes quick.

Scott Benner 9:23
Yeah, does I have to tell you I it's not too similarly if I if I do this for an hour for 90 minutes for there's a span of time afterwards, your brain is scrambled like from listening and talking and trying to say the right thing and not say the wrong thing. And you know and all the things that you want to get out and everything it is exhausting talking like this. I just didn't realize it would it would affect blood sugar. Like that's kind of interesting.

Unknown Speaker 9:49
I think you can

Jon Marks 9:50
for people out there that are listening that are familiar with sports radio, and I'll just say like the Northeast which is Philly, New York and Boston, people not only take their sport It's serious, but they take their sports radio serious. I mean, it really is. It's a way of life and now heated conversations talking about quarterbacks and things like that. Looking at your mentions on Twitter, and people wanting you fired or threatening you or things like that. It gets it gets very interesting. So I don't know if my my my mean mentions take away from my blood sugar, but I think a long show sometimes.

Scott Benner 10:23
It's amazing. How old were you when you were diagnosed?

Unknown Speaker 10:27
So it was

Jon Marks 10:28
August 7 2002. So I would have been 24 turning 25 I was working. I was in between. I was in between jobs. I had left a an office job that I was working at and Center City, Philadelphia. I was working at a restaurant part time. And then I was working in another restaurant part time. So a two part time restaurant jobs. The one restaurant it was it opened like was a new restaurant, it opened and it did poorly from the start. So it turned into one part time job that I had. And I remember I was at my read, I was at my other job and I went across the street to a convenience store. And I bought two of the biggest jugs not like the 32 ounce jugs of Gatorade, but like the superduper big family size jugs of Gatorade because I was so thirsty. And I I couldn't quench my thirst. And I just remember chugging these two things of Gatorade. And the guy that I worked with looked at me and said, What the hell is wrong with you? Yeah, like, dude, you got to go to a doctor. And I'm like, I know I do. I think I have diabetes that was on. That was on August 6. The next day, I took a train went up because I didn't have a car I was living in the city took a train up to my parents house in suburban Philly, got her car and drove to the doctor. And that's where the that's where my my family doctor that I had since I was a baby was very upset because my blood sugar was 720. And he realized what what that I was diabetic at that point. That was August 7 2002. How did

Scott Benner 11:59
you know? Is it in the family? Are there any other endo issues in your family? No, I'm

Jon Marks 12:03
the first I don't even have anybody type two in my family. So I was the first it was just that, like the just not being able to quench my thirst. And I just got just what I thought it was, well, nothing else made sense. And probably two weeks before that I had a low. Again, it was on a train. And I remember calling my mom and saying I feel really sick. Can you come pick me up at the train station, I'm not going to be able to walk and she brought a Gatorade with me. And I drank the Gatorade and I felt much better. But what I didn't know was my sugar was probably 50 because I had ran to the train because I almost always missed the train. And I was hypoglycemic. So my sugar was low. So then it all kind of made sense at once. It was like if you watch the if you watch what's the what's the movie with with Kevin Costner where he's it? Anyway, he's, he's like limping and walking. Usual Suspects. Okay, you realize in the last scene in the movie, where Kevin Costner's character goes from doing this limp to where he's just walking space. And it's like, oh, my God, like, that's the guy. And like it was at that moment where I'm like, Oh, my God, I

Scott Benner 13:09
think I've diabetes just like that. You know, like, I'm Kaiser. So say, Kaiser shows. And I have diabetes.

Jon Marks 13:17
He's not very Yeah, I wasn't verbal. Kim. I was actually Yes. I'm just kind of. Yeah,

Scott Benner 13:21
so that's so that really, without any background? Did you use the internet or just the thirst thing drove you to diabetes in your mind?

Jon Marks 13:28
I mean, this was 2002. So I didn't, I probably had a flip phone at the time, right? So I just like and I remember saying it to my mom, when I got up there. And she goes, you don't have diabetes stop. And I'm like, Well, what the hell's going on? And but she looked at me, she said, You look like a drug addict. You really shouldn't waste probably six or 700 for, you know, three, four or five days. Yeah. So you know, went to the doctor Bang 720 you got to go to the hospital.

Scott Benner 13:54
So you're about two years prior to my daughter who was diagnosed in August 2000 excuse me four years 2006 when she was two years old. So you were just slightly ahead of the curve of technology too. Right. So what did you start with to manage?

Jon Marks 14:10
So here's the here's the kicker when I said I had two part time jobs, and then I one part time job, I had no health insurance. So just going to the hospital and then putting me in intensive care, because they were worried that there was probably going to be problems with my organs because my blood sugar was so high. So I don't have insurance in there. And you know, that's like staring down the barrel of a shotgun where it's like, oh, my God, what am I going to do? And luckily, you know, my parents aren't wealthy by it by any stretch, but I grew up in a middle class neighborhood. I was living on my own and I had an apartment of my own, but I knew at least that they could give me some some support as I needed. I started off with a vibe with a vial of long lasting in a vial is short lasting in needles, and in a one and a one touch a little meter. A meter. Yeah. And that's how I and that's how I did it.

Scott Benner 15:00
I try to explain to the people who listen to the show I'm like you they gave me a vile and a handful of needles and this little meter that look like it came out of a bubblegum machine and like you're gonna take care of your kid. And you know compared to now it's it's barbaric. And compared to even 10 years prior to that, it was the most amazing thing that ever existed. So it's interesting how it leaps forward so much. So you find on the pod when

Jon Marks 15:25
I'm so been married six years, seven years ago, and and you know, what's it like? I don't, I don't know why. I didn't get on a pump. I had I lived in Hawaii for a couple of years. I had, you know, gave started my radio career and my diabetes was not managed. Well. I didn't test my sugar. Well, I didn't test it often. I I wasn't a big sweets eater. So it's not like that I was eating cakes and cookies and all that stuff right there. But if you're not testing your sugar multiple times a day, you're never going to be regulated properly. Right. So I had for a number of years. That's that's how I lived I had multiple times where I bottomed out and I woke up in the back of an ambulance. You know, I I just always felt like especially when you first get diabetes, you feel like because you're still in the honeymoon phase. You always feel like that you're going to be able to go to get something right like you feel low. I can I'll be able to go to get to the store and get an arm Vegas. Yeah. Until the first time where it doesn't happen. And then happened in Center City, Philadelphia, I was going to deposit my my check from my job, and boom, straight down, right. And I woke up in the back of an ambulance. And the first thing I remember him saying, I didn't know if you're gonna make it or not. Wow. Yeah, so it's scary. But I mean, that's how I look for a long time. So

Scott Benner 16:42
I don't want to put words in your mouth. But I've heard adults. So you're in a really interesting space. I've talked to so many people, like, diagnosed as an adult, but not a real adult, if you know what I mean. Like, you know, just right and, and just try to ignore it. Like, it'll be okay. But do you have? Do you have any idea how many people tell me in that age range, they meet someone where they it ends up being they take better care of themselves? Because of someone else? Or for someone else? Did you have that? Like, like, were you doing it for you? Or did you do it because you met a woman? Or do you know what I mean?

Unknown Speaker 17:14
Um,

Jon Marks 17:15
I think I just I realized that doing what I was going to do, what I was doing, how he was managing my diabetes wasn't going to work. And I think it was when I went back to this, this was when it was I went back to seeing seeing an endocrinologist on a regular basis, right? When a couple of years where I would go, and then I wouldn't go for a year. And then when I needed prescriptions refilled. And they're like, you can't get your prescriptions refilled, unless we see you in the office. And I would have to go again, I think it was when I finally started getting regular a one C and it and I saw what, how how I was managing my diabetes, which was, you know, Not good, not terrible. I was trying. But it's very difficult when you're just using a meter. And you're just using a bile and a needle. It's very difficult. So that's when the doctor because I hadn't been a regular, bad, anything good. I think on a doctor on a regular basis. They said, Well, what about the pump? And I said, Sure, let's do it. But it really was the Dexcom that saved me. I could take injections right now. The Dexcom is the lifesaver. I mean, this is what's totally changed my life is being able to see what my blood sugar is at any moment and see what food does to my blood sugar so I can learn from that.

Scott Benner 18:32
Right so that's been the game changer fine tuning issues, then you can do with it. So it's it's interesting. I was talking to somebody yesterday. And he said that pump used to be this thing where if you were just really not on top of things at all, they slap a pump on you thinking well at least you're getting basil and so on we can we can know that's happening. And maybe you'll push some buttons once in a while when you eat and we'll get lucky and you'll Bolus once in a while, which makes it all nice not to get poked and all that stuff's great. It's great to be able to adjust you know Temp Basal rates and extended bonuses and things like that. But you're right once you can see the data in real time, it's eye opening in a way that's it's impossible to describe if you've done it to somebody who's never seen it before.

Jon Marks 19:11
Yeah, and you can't without seeing that you don't really know you you can test your sugar after an hour and you know what it is but you don't know how long it took to get to there and that was another thing with me was the taking too much insulin too soon, eating something that has carbs but they're slow acting carbs and then not realizing that's not going to hit me for two and a half or three hours and then I'm low and then I'm eating to solve that low but then my sugars getting high so then I'm waking up with a 350 you know, so the Dexcom for anybody out there that doesn't have a Dexcom get a Dexcom or get something like a Dexcom because it is is a life changer.

Scott Benner 19:48
I would tell you that I'm absolutely Arden. Like we love Omnipod we really do. Arden's had it since she was four, maybe, but you're right. If you made me choose, I'd have to take Seeing the data over the ease of pumping. If you made me pick just one like that, you know, it's a false choice for us. But that would be the way to go. I have a question about prior to all that you're bouncing around a lot. So were you the kind of person who was low so much that it counterbalanced the highest so you're a once he looked like it was reasonably okay in the sevens or were you more of I'm trying my best. Like I'm more in like the mid eights.

I don't know if I can say it better than it's been said already today. But the Dexcom je six continuous glucose monitor is an absolute must in your life with insulin. If you have type one or type two diabetes, you need to see what your insulin is doing, what impact it's having on your blood sugar, and how is the food you're eating, impacting all of it. Think about that, think about being able to see food, go into your mouth, go to your blood sugar and cause a rise. But you can see it happen in real time. And allows you to make a decision for next time, right? I Pre-Bolus my meal this time I did 15 minutes. But I started to get a rise before the insulin really kicked in. Maybe if I just adjusted my Pre-Bolus a little bit. I could stop that rise. Maybe I just need a little more insulin a little less, a little sooner, a little later. How do you figure that out? You figure that out with the information that comes back from the Dexcom g six continuous glucose monitor dexcom.com forward slash juice box links in your show notes. Links at Juicebox Podcast comm Get yourself a Dexcom g six, find out what your blood sugar's doing. Do you ever go to sleep with a blood sugar of 95 and wake up with a blood sugar of 250? Can you imagine if you could see exactly what happened overnight? When does your blood sugar start to rise overnight? When does it stop? Imagine now that you just set some basil rates that impact those rises. So you go to sleep at your 95 blood sugar, the rise is going to happen at 2am. But you're ahead of it. And you've changed your basal rate at 1am to get ready for that rise it to the rise never happens. And you wake up with that same blood sugar that you went to sleep with. Would that be cool? You can do it dexcom.com forward slash juicebox. I'm not even bothering to tell you that you can share your data with up to 10 followers if you want. That means your wife, your sister, your school nurse, anybody could see what your blood sugar's doing, if you want them to. Alright, while you're on the internet looking for that Dexcom Don't forget to get yourself a demo of the Omni pod or a trial you can get a trial or a demo two different things. So you can get a free no obligation demo of a non working on the pod just so you can wear it to see what you think you'd like banging around the house with it. And so you know, John's gonna say later he wears it on his arm. You can see if that works for you. Or you can dive in a little farther and get yourself if you're eligible for a free 30 day trial of the Omnipod dash use the dash for 30 days for the freeze. You could do that. If you're eligible. Go find out at my Omni pod comm forward slash juice box we're talking about insulin pumping. We're talking about having control over your basil, your Temp Basal, your boluses you can extend your boluses there's all sorts of things you can do and I haven't even told you yet that it's tubeless so you're not connected to a device means you can jump in the shower without taking you off your pump. I just literally five minutes ago saw a story online. Someone tried to figure out why getting into a tub made their blood sugar come up. And after all this consternation and talking you know what the answer was they took off their tube insulin pump to get into the water, taking away their insulin and allowing their blood sugar to rise. But then on the pod. You can jump in the water and keep on that on the potty. It is tubeless it is waterproof. And it is wonderful. My on the pod.com forward slash juice box dexcom.com forward slash juice box of course don't forget the T one D exchange T one d exchange.org Ford slash juice box. Check them out support the show hit the links. Thank you back to john.

Jon Marks 24:34
Definitely highs and lows highs and lows highs and lows. eights. Yeah,

Scott Benner 24:38
yeah, definitely. But you passed out. You passed out a number of times though.

Jon Marks 24:42
Christmas. Christmas morning. When I guess though this was back when I was I was definitely living in my parents house. So I lived on my own for a while and then when you know coming back from living in Hawaii, I was there for a year or two and then I moved out but I remember it was Christmas. This morning the insulin that I was using you would have to take a half hour before eating and I took the shot of what we were going to have for for Christmas morning and then I fell back asleep and I guess breakfast got delayed I came downstairs only thing I remember is waking up on the floor with with with an ambulance in my neighborhood on Christmas morning which made all of my neighbors and people that I know in the area wonder what happened. So yeah, that was one of my times.

Scott Benner 25:28
Wow. And now you said you have a couple of kids do you know about trial net? Have you wondered if they've got like antibodies that marker type one or do you not think about that too

Jon Marks 25:39
much? I honestly don't think I not that you don't think about it? Because I mean obviously you do and it's something you worry about. I have I have baby number three coming. God willing in in July. But thank you but but I haven't No, I haven't looked into it. And I'd be more interested in I'd be more interested in information.

Scott Benner 25:59
Yeah, there's a woman named Carla Greenbaum was on recently she runs trial net, they'll send you out a kit for free you do a little thing at home send it back to them they'll tell you if you have any the antibody markers. And actually there was a gentleman on just the other day, who's just about ready to have his company's about to have a drug come out of trials with the FDA and they're seeing that if you have the markers they give you this drug it's an infusion. I think you get it. Got I hope I'm remembering this right maybe like once a day for like 12 days in a row and then you're done and it can hold off the onset for years. Wow, really fascinating stuff. So yeah, it's called trial that when we're done, I'll send you the information so you can you can have it. Hey, do you know um, you know, Sam fold has type one.

Jon Marks 26:44
Yes, it is. Um, he's a he's a he's a coach for the or he's in the front office for the Phillies. Now

Scott Benner 26:51
he's I guess well, Dombroski is, is Dombrowski, not the GM? I think he

Jon Marks 26:57
is like he's I think he's like the president of baseball operations. And then they bring somebody else in who has the general manager title.

Scott Benner 27:05
And that's Sam. Right? Yeah, yeah, Sam's got that Sam's got the GM has actually been on the show a couple of times. He's really just a delightfully nice guy just then if you ever bump into him, he's got like this great camp he does for kids with type one every year, and he's just a really, genuinely decent person. So I just figured you might bump into him at some point or another. Okay, so I have to ask you, I'm a huge howard stern fan. I have been all my life. And I always imagine that Howard would make up fights with other disc jockeys just to make on air stuff, but fights with sports, radio disc jockeys is real, isn't it? Well, Scott,

Jon Marks 27:43
I like you grew up on howard stern from man from middle school when I knew I was shouldn't be listening to him because I wasn't old enough for that type of content, right? All the way up through. I don't have I don't subscribe to Sirius anymore. But whenever I get like, my wife just got a new car. So she's got the one year subscription. So I every time every time I need to go somewhere, I take her car so I can listen to the stern stuff. Um, I mean, so in Philly, there's two sports radio stations. Where I am a Wi Fi, which is the leader in in sports radio for forever. And then the other station, which is 97 five, the fanatic. That is where I started and where I worked up until, I guess it was 2017. I guess now Yeah. 2017. So I was very much the enemy or I considered Wi Fi enemy for a long time. And then I switched and I came over here for I mean, for the most part, we I get along with everybody. There. I still consider most of the people over there, my friends. Everybody's been great to me here. But I would say some of the older generation of sports talkers in this town, they have a that's kind of what's kind of what they grew up with, which was just hating everybody and each other the fighting. Yeah.

Scott Benner 29:01
Well, you know, it really is that idea that back then there was a finite amount of radio stations that were talking about the thing you did, and if somebody else was succeeding, you were failing. Now there's outlets for everything. You know, you can get your get your voice anywhere, almost amazing. And I think and I think stern kind of kind of set the bar for just a radio war, right?

Jon Marks 29:21
Like no matter who he was, who was trying to go up against them. It was first john dibella in Philly, who had the morning zoo, he had the top rated station or star top rated show here in the mornings. And when Howard got syndicated, the wy SP was like, Okay, he's the guy to beat. Yeah, we're gonna beat them and then that like that's just was was was what he was gonna do. He was gonna stop at nothing to beat whoever was in his way. You had man cow who was out in out in Chicago and you had some other people across the country across the country. But yeah, I mean, that was radio wars. That's what you did. And you saw a lot of people. Even up until recently, there was a there was a sports radio host here. Not too long ago that was applying to Howard Stern. And method of you know, radio war stop at nothing to win. And, you know, it's time to kind of change that stuff to do the Howard Stern stuff anymore

Scott Benner 30:07
doesn't work. Yeah, do you know I went to that dibella funeral, I must be much older than you. I just realized. We took the day off, and we went down and it's the down there. And I think it was on Market Street. And it was hilarious.

Jon Marks 30:22
You and a lot of other people. It's, it's amazing. It's amazing. Like, obviously, I'm constantly looking at ratings and everything else with with with our show and other shows or whatever. But the ratings that howard stern did, you'd more or less have 25% of the city, listening to Howard Stern, you'll never see ratings like that, again, I was gonna make one in four cars. This

Scott Benner 30:43
is an amazing statistic. It really is. And do you feel that like, I look, I have a podcast, I'm not on the radio. And I feel it constantly, like, make this good. Make it better make it interesting. Don't let there be lols. You know, like, do you have all those feelings? Like you have that reserve voice in your head? That's like cut this call off?

Jon Marks 31:04
I had that I have anxiety every day when I wake up? Because it it is what am I going to talk about today? Right? When you do a radio show, if you if you're doing a lot of interviews, then you can do a lot of interviews. And that's kind of like the preponderance of what you're doing on a show. That's not what we do. We do mostly talk of interviews. But for the most part, it's, we're talking we're discussing, we're debating. So it's been I mean, honestly, it's even when we've had great writing success, like, hey, you're the number one show for the last six months in Philadelphia, it's difficult to enjoy because I have to, we have to answer the bell every morning of you know, like, or in the afternoon. But that's what I'm thinking about. When I wake up. The first thing I think about when I wake up is what the hell am I going to talk about today?

Scott Benner 31:50
I think if you put two average people in front of a microphone, they could maybe go for two and a half minutes and then they wouldn't be able to go anymore.

Jon Marks 31:59
Well, I mean, it's gone. I think it's just like I knew from a very young age, like you were talking about being a Howard Stern Show, I started off in I used to tape howard stern on a cassette and then I would listen to it when I got home I would tape the dude back then was the WP morning show with with with with Angelo and Tony Bruno and more Gani. I would tape radio because I would have to go to school and I wanted to listen to it. So for me, I think it's just one of those things where I just like, it's what I've always wanted to do. And kind of it's cool being on on here right now. Because I didn't get involved in radio, I didn't really get my act together in life. Until I became diabetic. And I had no insurance, I had a part time job. I was just kind of like, living right, like, what am I doing with my life? And it really, it kicked my butt into being like, you know, what, what are you doing, dude, go out there and do something with your life. And that's what I mean. And that's what I've done since then.

Scott Benner 32:57
No kidding. I'll tell you the amount of people who tell me and I see it with my daughter as well, that being a witness having to be aware of your health is gives you a lot of clarity, and that some of the healthiest people I meet have type one diabetes, because they're so in tune with what's going on with their with them, their self inside, it's it's a view that most people don't have of themselves. And it feels like you saw it, and it wasn't going right. And at some point, you're like, I gotta fix this. And then that led you to pulling everything else. That's incredibly interesting.

Jon Marks 33:30
Yeah, it was like I always say that, that people that people that are trying to manage their diabetes, right, you really have to want it. You have to want it you have to be diligent, it's it gets tiring to do it. You can't do it five days a week and then take the weekends off. It's seven days a week 24 hours a day. Whether it's with me myself Scott with with you have in your daughter, just the the burden that that must put on your mind because a turn right, like I couldn't imagine that I would much rather deal with it myself. Because I know that I can deal with it myself. But I have a I have a friend whose dad is he's not type one. He's type two. And he's he's in his 60s. And he, we were swimming. I was over somebody's house. He was there. We were swimming. And he's asking me about the Dexcom because I actually keep them on. I keep the pump and the Dexcom on my arm. Because that's the best best place for me is on the back of my arm, upper arm. Yeah. Otherwise they tear him off or whatever, right? So that's where I have them. So I'm swimming. He's asking me about him. And I'm asking him about his diabetes. And he's, you know, he never doesn't ever test his blood sugars and everything else. And I told him, I said, Listen, if you get the Dexcom, like, you will know what your blood sugars are at all times. And you can adjust it. If he didn't, I gave him the information. He never did anything with it because he's just like, Oh, I'm fine. Don't worry about it. Well, like you can't have that you can't feel like that. I'm fine. Everything's gonna be fine. So it kind of when it's done. For me in life, which is that like to be in radio and to have, you know, moderate success and to be doing this on a local level and, and having some success here in Philadelphia, like I've, I've been kicked. So many times I've been told I can't do this so many times I've really, really, really had to watch it and work for it. And it's the same thing with with with keeping your sugar's down. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 35:23
I mean, it is,

Scott Benner 35:25
well after you after you decide to do something like that you do recognize that other things are not as difficult as you think they are. Like, I find diabetes to be a major source of perspective for me, I there are things that prior to my daughter's diabetes, I would have thought were trouble or a problem or hard and now I don't look at those things the same way. It just I would I would be able to say to myself, I want to get something accomplished. I'll go do it. Nothing's as bad as my daughter's blood sugar being higher low to me. So I just

Jon Marks 35:54
felt like I heard you. I heard you say in a in a recent episode that that if your daughter's blood sugar's over 145 after you eat, you're like, inside, like, what did I do wrong? Did I not do this? Do not do that. And it's it's, um, I thought about it. And I said, well, man, like, if it's me, it's just like, Alright, well, I got to do better, but you wanted for your daughter. It's like you're, you're in charge. You're the one that it's trying to help her. It's,

Scott Benner 36:19
it does feel

Jon Marks 36:20
it really, it really puts life in perspective. And I'll tell you this, that that diabetic me is is a much more healthier person than non diabetic me.

Scott Benner 36:28
That's certainly something. Is your Does your wife have any involvement in your care? Or is that something you keep kind of separate?

Unknown Speaker 36:35
Um,

Unknown Speaker 36:37
I mean, No, she

Jon Marks 36:38
doesn't. She doesn't have it on her. She doesn't have it on her phone or anything like that. She She knows that I'm taking pretty, you know, pretty good care of myself now. But she's the one that pushed me before. She's the one that pushed me when I didn't have a pumper or a Dexcom. She pushed me saying like, well, how your sugars on my sugars are fine. Like how do you know? And she she was holding me accountable? Because they had it? I know if they were fine. I wasn't testing my sugar. Oh, no, they're fine. They're fine. Don't worry about it. I was just low, like, an hour ago, and I ate a granola bar. So I'm fine. Right? Yeah. So she was and she read before we got we got married to where it was like, I'd like to have this on before we get married. So like, so. We've been married almost seven years now. So that's

Scott Benner 37:21
how long it's been so fine to you was not passing out. Like I have a granola bar. I'm fine. Which meant I'm not gonna wake up in an ambulance.

Unknown Speaker 37:30
I yes. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 37:32
Yes, that's

Jon Marks 37:33
that was fine with me. were like, Alright, maybe I'm a little bit high. But whatever.

Unknown Speaker 37:36
I mean, it Yeah,

Scott Benner 37:37
yeah, you're right. But you're in a completely different space now.

Unknown Speaker 37:40
Oh, absolutely.

Unknown Speaker 37:41
Yeah, absolutely

Jon Marks 37:42
my biggest my biggest issue right now with my blood sugar, because so I get off the air at six o'clock. Depending on traffic, it could be anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour getting home. So by the time I get out to the studio gets on my car, so I'm getting home, usually between seven and 715, we try to have the kids in bed by eight o'clock. So I am rushing home so I can eat and some stuffing my face eating trying to put the kids asleep. And I'm exhausted. So what I what now the biggest problem is because then I'm asleep by nine o'clock, my blood sugar's are still getting a little bit higher, whatever. So it's, it's, that's my biggest problem spot right now is I will I will wake up at like 11 o'clock to use the bathroom and my sugars will be higher than they should be.

Scott Benner 38:29
Okay. And you'll What will you do? Will you adjust basil rates for that? Or do you think your meal ratio in the evening is like, are you but like, how are we into this? Are you like do you do you know if I said to you, that if you have something with a lot of fat in it, that you'll see a rise from the fat a couple of hours later or that protein can make you you're into all that.

Unknown Speaker 38:50
Yeah, yeah, I

Jon Marks 38:50
mean, a lot of time. A lot of times it's it's just it's it's not properly doing extended Bolus. It's it's not taking enough because I worried like the classic me taking too much insulin because I don't want to be high and then I get low. And then I eat to make up for it. But it's two months at a meeting. So then the sugars back up. Well, let

Scott Benner 39:14
me pitch something to you go back to Episode 210 and start the diabetes pro tip series. It's with me and a friend of mine who also happens to have type one for she's coming up on 33 years now and she's a CD. And we talk through all of the management ideas. Like one one, there might be like 20 episodes of it at this point. And I'll tell you people listen to that and tell me boom they're a once he's come back in the fives in the low sixes no trouble. Yeah, just management ideas and just talk through simply so if you if Jesus, if you can get help from that, I think that would be amazing. Going back to earlier I have to tell you that I don't really say it on here very much. But that pressure about doing it every time I start talking to somebody and you know because You're doing it with me. I don't want anybody's notes. I don't like knowing what we're going to talk about. First, I tell people Introduce yourself, I'll ask you a question, we'll start talking. And for the first 20 minutes, I feel an incredible pressure to build a narrative that will be interesting and want you to, it will make you want to listen till the end. And once I hit those 20 minutes, I can hear a voice in my head, that's just like, don't, don't ask this up now. Like, now you did it like, now pull it through to the end, you know, like, make it work. And I don't I love doing this, I really do, I have to tell you, I am very much in the same area as you. I mean, we used to put 90 minute cassette tapes in like, and tape the stern show, and then run home 90 minutes later and put in another tape and do it again. And then you'd listen to the whole show later. And I think it's an amazing skill to be able to have conversations that are interactive, without you being with people and hold people's attention. I find it to be an incredible, kind of a magical thing to be able to do. So I got,

Jon Marks 41:04
yeah, it's cool. It's cool. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. Be honest.

Scott Benner 41:08
And I seriously like, so people come on, like there's all levels like people call in. And some people are terrific, right? They have a little bit of an agenda. They know how to get to it and everything. How do you stop yourself? When somebody kind of hymns at halls? They mean, how do you stop yourself from like, going to get to it? Like how do you?

Jon Marks 41:24
Well, it's actually it's a, it's a great question, because I don't, I listened to a lot of audio, just from around the country, I listened to some stations up in Boston, because I feel like it's a it's a similar market with a similar style of way that they're doing things. And there's one particular show where the guy literally will give you 10 seconds. And if you're not good after 10 seconds, bam, you're gone. And he comes off as a jerk, because that's kind of his personality. And, you know, especially when I started this show, which was back into the end of 2017. I was running phone callers a lot, a lot sooner than I do right now. That there's a there's a thought in the business that if you allow a color on for more than two minutes, you're going to have people tuning out. So I'd say that that two minutes is is kind of what you're shooting for. And if they're good, leave them on for a little bit longer. But I mean, you're right, if you knew what you were getting with every caller, then it'd be easy. But unfortunately, some callers are much better than others. So if you get the bad call, or that's kind of maybe had a little bit to drink that day, which we'll get from time to time, or somebody that's just not very good on the air. You got to try it you got to it's it's I feel like it's one thing that I can definitely be better at is command over your show and command over the calls to where someone stutters for a second, you don't want to come off as being a jerk. Right? You also can't let him just continue to sound bad

Scott Benner 42:55
because they that car radio and you're talking are you talking mostly to people in cars? Is that the vibe?

Jon Marks 43:00
Um, you know, it's crazy, because you and I started listening to Sports Radio when there wasn't cell phones. So people were actually calling from landline phones. Yeah. I'd say that, that you probably get about 60% of people that are that are in the car driving tour.

Scott Benner 43:15
I think it's the whole thing is amazing. When would you spend the last couple of minutes talking a little bit of sports with me? Sure. All right. I What? I don't understand. Carson Wentz wanted out? Is that what ended up being the truth.

Jon Marks 43:31
Yeah, yeah. So I guess after he was benched, he decided that Nope, I'm out. And from that point on, he was like, one of those things where like, you know, when you're done, and maybe other people don't realize, you know, where you're done, but whatever, for whatever reason, at that moment, he decided he wanted out. So

Scott Benner 43:51
that's so then a lot of what you hear then through the media is just people saving face or trying to set things up in their favor going forward. It's what you do paying attention to sports a occurred to me while I was thinking about yesterday, that it's so similar to political conversation, in that, like, there's the truth. For one side, there's the truth for the other side. And there's somebody trying to figure out what it is like, there's what the team says it's what the players say, it's what the business says. And then there's sports and then you got to have to sift through it. And what's actually true, right

Jon Marks 44:23
because, because it just because a sports team leaks information to a media member or an agent for a player leaks information to a media member, if they're not given a lie detector test before they give that information to the to the media. So you're right, you're doing a lot of I think you're you're you're looking at the available information, you're deciding, okay, why is that being put out there and then you're trying to figure out what's true and what's not. And I think it's pretty safe to say that that last year was a really crappy year for the Philadelphia Eagles and that Carson Wentz for whatever reason. It was better for him to play elsewhere. Right?

Scott Benner 45:02
So is your is the content of the day for your show? Is it driven by you trying to get to the bottom of something or you knowing what the listeners want to talk about what the callers want to bring up?

Unknown Speaker 45:15
Um, alright, so

Jon Marks 45:16
So today is a Today's a Tuesday and normally this time of year, we are in spring training, down in Clearwater, Florida. We were actually down there last year, right? When, like, everything kind of hit the fan. Yeah, where we were there. We were down there. And they're like, okay, you can't interview players anymore. So it's like, oh, well, okay. So we, we, we were able to like tape a couple interviews, but we had to be a certain amount of time away, or feet away. Nobody had masks or anything. I think that people just started using hand sanitizer. You know, like, and it was all sold out. So I couldn't get in these hand sanitizer to take down there. We actually had my partner bought a bottle of rubbing alcohol, and he was pouring rubbing alcohol in his hands to sanitize. But so like, that's what we're doing today. We're not going down to Florida. But we're almost pretending we're in Florida today. And we're having a bunch of Phillies guests that are on. So like, I have to decide and we have to decide is the show. What is the jumping off point? If you tune in at two o'clock? What can we say? What can we do that's going to say cool, or it's going to be like Wow, good opinion, or it's going to get your attention to continue to, to remain tuning in. So you're more or less throwing your fastball, you're throwing your best pitch to try to catch people you're deciding what is the most important topic of the day? What is most interesting. So we're going to do a Phillies topic today. And I think it's going to be is this play off for bus like did the Phillies, the fourth highest payroll in baseball? Do we expect them to make the playoffs? Because I don't think a lot of people do. Normally it could be an Eagles conversation. But really, it's kind of reading the room, which is your audience, which is sports fans and deciding what is most meaningful and interesting to them at two o'clock.

Unknown Speaker 47:02
And it's you know, it's

Jon Marks 47:03
different. I've got I've worked. I've worked mornings. I've worked mid days. I've worked afternoon drive. I've worked nights, and each different time slot or day part is different. When you come in on at six o'clock in the morning. You're starting the day for the station. Right by two o'clock. What a topic. They may have been hot at six o'clock could be picked over two o'clock. Yeah. So I mean, it's interesting, but I think I think you get what you're what you're trying to do. Right trying to well done. Interesting, but

Scott Benner 47:30
it's not. It's interesting. It's work. I would say it's problematic for you. Because if the morning eats up that that topic, but it's still a reverent a relevant topic of the day, but then you almost have to kind of gloss over it and find the next thing that's most interesting and make it interesting,

Jon Marks 47:47
right? No, you're right. And, and it's, I mean, honestly, afternoon drives my least favorite day parts that I've worked just because I'm not getting home to a little bit later. And I'm not like I'm not a sleeping guy. I'm up early, and I'm ready to go early in the morning. But like it can be picked over sometimes. But like you said, sometimes you can take an idea, refine it and make it better. Yeah. I mean, it just it depends every day is different.

Scott Benner 48:13
Do you think that what you do has impact on players and teams? Like do you think you're not that you have sway over them? But do you think that they listen and that they make decisions based off what they think of is as how people feel?

Jon Marks 48:29
Me personally? No, the radio station and the sports culture in general. Absolutely. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 48:35
absolutely. There

Jon Marks 48:36
was a Barrett Brooks, who was an Eagles player back in the 90s alignment offensive lineman offensive lineman now does a he does a radio show that's, that's it's on an am station and it's national on a national network. He he had told a story, I guess it's two weeks ago now where they used to talk about in the locker room that the my station Wi Fi, that the Eagles used to listen to Wi Fi. And they would make decisions based on what the hosts and what the callers were saying. So I mean, if nothing else, it puts pressure on the teams to do things and like if Wi Fi wasn't around, and if this city didn't have it as an outlet. I don't know if Carson Wentz is gone. I don't know if he feels the pressure and the stress and the heat that he otherwise probably wouldn't have felt in a different market

Scott Benner 49:26
because they have they don't have the ability to do what the rest of us in the world have to do. Like we live in our lives you don't like right now if my neighbor hates me, he's 60 feet away from me talking crap about me. I have no idea I would never know. There'd be no way for him to like for me to have any impact from that law. But when you can hear people talking 24 hours a day about the decisions you make. I bet you it does really weigh on you and it is different around here right like if you if you picked up and went and did that sports talk and you know in the middle of the country somewhere you wouldn't want to have The same vibe and then it wouldn't have the same impact on the players.

Jon Marks 50:03
Yeah, and you can't do it right, I'll listen to we have a we have a station out in San Diego, I'll listen to their their morning show that I can get driving in because of the time difference. And they're very funny. There. You're not doing the same kind of sports talk in San Diego or in Los Angeles or in St. Louis, or in Texas that you're doing in the northeast, because we're I mean, we're,

Unknown Speaker 50:25
we're crazy. Yeah.

Scott Benner 50:26
mahomes isn't worried that somebody is going to bad mouth him on the radio after he throws a ball on the ground. Now, there's

Jon Marks 50:31
not going to be a host that's going to decide that he's he's really not a good player, and we're all crazy, probably not.

Scott Benner 50:37
So just your opinion, was once a good quarterback. And the injury just shut him off.

Jon Marks 50:43
I think that he has he gets in his own head. And last year when the offensive line was was poor, that instead of looking down the field, he was constantly worried about the rush. And that was his biggest problem. He just wasn't seeing the field Well, next year with a with a different with a different team and a better team and a better offensive line. I think he's going to be good. But I also believe that at some point he will get back in his head again. And that's something that you're always going to be able to deal with, you're going to have to deal with if you of course and mentally, he can be weak sometimes

Scott Benner 51:15
I was amazed for a size how well he could escape and then when he lost that tool, then he just suddenly started looking like please don't hit me. Like Yeah, I don't want to get run over back here over and over which I can't blame him for but and so Okay, so let me ask you if someone asked you Philly's question I'll let you go because I know you've a big day. Would you draft up would you draft a quarterback this year? The Eagles Yes, I

Jon Marks 51:40
knew it was coming okay. I'm like it's it's a difficult difficult question to answer because we're not evaluating the quarterbacks right like I'm not a I'm a football fan. I'm not I'm not an expert right now. I'm afraid that the Eagles they're not experts either. That's been part of their problem. But if they see a quarterback and they say because here's what I think the Eagles think about the Eagles current quarterback Jalen hertz, I think they like them but they realize he has limitations. And Can he really be a good enough quarterback to win a Super Bowl? I don't know if he can. So if there's an obvious upgrade and you see a quarterback and you're like damn this guy's good then I think he dropped them

Scott Benner 52:16
is there one out there in your mind?

Jon Marks 52:18
I here's the here's the problem. The top four quarterbacks might go to top four in the draft so if the Eagles are drafting at six they may not get together you're now you're looking at the fifth best quarterback and there's a big drop off. So the odds are Unless Unless they're able to trade up and get a guy that there won't be a guy there that they like

Scott Benner 52:33
so then you take the tight end

Unknown Speaker 52:36
you could he might be gone

Jon Marks 52:40
in going fifth in the most recent mock draft Okay, so now you're looking at a wide receiver or an offensive lineman it's very fluid it'll be it's it's it'll be fascinating to see what happens when the draft actually so this

Scott Benner 52:51
is a rebuild for the Eagles then.

Jon Marks 52:54
You know what, Scott? I don't think it is no, I don't I don't I don't think that they view it as a rebuild. I think they're they're viewing it as we need to make sure we get a quarterback. And if it's not this year, then you're gonna find out how good Jalen hertz really is.

Scott Benner 53:07
I don't know. It seems like I don't I I'm so accustomed to the football that I grew up with, which was there were 11 men on defense who were going to try to kill you and the 11 men on offense, we're going to try to kick to field goals and we were going to win sex. Like that's changed a little bit since then I tried to explain to my son I was like, there was a game it was a Monday night game, the Oilers were playing the Eagles, and by halftime, the oiler stop sending receivers over the middle of the field because they were running out of them. House a pain gate was the main one West Hopkins broke a man's nose I think Ernest Givens knows. And I just said nobody, like football just doesn't occur that way anymore. And my son's 21 he like he doesn't he just thinks it's a lot of really rich guys at score like 50 points by having a catch so

Jon Marks 53:55
well. And back then you could hit people in the head. Right? You can hit them late. You're playing on concrete most of the time and with astroturf. Yeah. I mean, it's it's safer now, which is better, but it's man football was different. back then.

Scott Benner 54:08
One time Andre waters tackled Emmitt Smith by running at the line diving on the ground, sliding across the astroturf and hitting them in the ankles. It's ridiculous. Yeah, they're playing on a concrete slip and slide. Okay. So the Phillies, and I'm gonna let you go after that. I were huge baseball fans. My son plays in college like there's baseball's been going around by house forever and ever. Is it the pitching is it just is it just the kingery didn't come along right like because bombs find on the corner. You find yourself looking at Hoskins wishing you had the guy that they like go to the Indians instead. Like it's just I gregorious is is great, is great for his age and he might be great. Not for his age. like where's the disconnect?

Jon Marks 54:58
I think I think what you have With this team is you have you remember that before the Phillies got really good and Kyla came in and Howard and Rollins and chase Utley and victory know before that team came about you had a bunch of good teams that weren't good enough, right? Well, I want 86 games two years in a row the way teams and he was the GM. Yeah, good, but they weren't good enough. And I worry that this team is good, but not good enough. And they're spending a lot of money. So it's not like you say, well spend, spend, spend, spend spend. I just don't like I just don't think they have enough good young players up right now. Right. like boom is raised a real deal. I love both, but who else? I don't want that. What happened with Calgary?

Scott Benner 55:43
Yeah, right. No.

Jon Marks 55:44
And you're hearing you're hearing sports, right? You're hearing Sports Radio Phillies fan talking right now? Because it's so frustrating because they had an opportunity. I just don't think they have enough good young players to supplement the roster. You needed like out Aaron Nolan. We're actually going to have him on our show today. Aaron, Noah is really good. I don't think he's good enough to be an ace. Right? You're missing a starting pitcher. Can Spencer Howard be that guy was kind of disappointing last year, right? They just need better younger players,

Scott Benner 56:09
right? There's somebody that people have to pop at the right time. It can't just be one of them. It has to be more than one pour. I have to tell you like just being the father of a baseball player. I watched Kangri walk out of the batter's box the other day, and I would have hugged him if I was near him. Like he I just he's had a look on his face like I don't understand like why I don't see the ball. Like it just you're heartbroken because he Scott all you mean, these guys appear to have all the tools and and that really brings me to my last question, right? Which is, How hard is it to be critical of people who are the best 3000 people in the world at something? Does that never seem ridiculous to you? Like Scott kingery is one of the best baseball players on the planet. He's just not in the top half a percent. You know what I mean? Like that's a weird. I don't know does Does that ever occur to you? I don't want to mess you up. Maybe you'll be like, Yeah, why are we picking on?

Jon Marks 57:01
it? No, it No, it never occurs to me. What's crazy is and you said your your son plays college baseball. To make it to double A in baseball is such a huge accomplishment. Right? It's a double A, it's something you have to be so good at baseball, even to be a double A player not not to mention a major leaguer in Scott kingery was a second round draft pick. So but honestly, it doesn't ever occur to me, like I to do this job and to be successful in this job. At least in this city. You can't, you can't worry about criticizing somebody, right? Like, if Scott kingery can't play and I don't think he can play then I'm gonna have to say I don't think Scott kingery can play right like with Jalen hertz, the Eagles quarterback yesterday I'd said I just don't think he's going to be good enough to really count and the matter, right. And these, I think these players today, they're wired so differently. They don't listen to sports radio, and they'd be crazy. If they did. They're looking at social media. And that's where they're getting their information from. I've never even thought, here's here's, I've been doing a radio show with the Eagles defensive end, Brandon Graham on Monday nights for an hour since the Superbowl year, right. And he's the one guy that I won't criticize, because we have a personal relationship. And that's, that's really

Unknown Speaker 58:20
about it. You know,

Jon Marks 58:21
I try to keep my distance from people normally. So not to worry about things like that.

Scott Benner 58:24
Brandon's got an old school vibe about him. I used to tell my son that I thought that if he wanted to Reggie white could have gotten to the quarterback on every play, but he knew when he didn't have to. And right Brandon knows when to when it has to happen. And does it like come hell or high water? It's um, it's really fascinating even as he gets older, like, it's, you know, it's not every game but my God, like when you need that guy to to disrupt what's happening. He's doing it. It's, it's like he I always felt like he understood the game on a different level.

Jon Marks 58:55
And with him, because like, me being a dad and having two young kids he has, he has two young children as well. On a personal level. That's where it that's where it gets me I mean, I see people online on social media that are listeners and the people that that I connect the most with our young parents like me. So when it's on a personal level, Scott it's difficult not to feel the personal

Scott Benner 59:20
relation so you can't get to know these guys because it'll just it'll mess you up.

Unknown Speaker 59:24
Yeah, I

Jon Marks 59:25
mean, if you're doing a different type of show, like like in Philly, you have the precedent Steve show, which is in the mornings, which is the closest thing to Howard that Howard that they've had since howard stern as far as kind of like a ratings juggernaut. Like they're on a rock radio station so they that they want the personal relationships with the players right like that's they want that those people come in and it's difficult to do in my position. Yeah,

Scott Benner 59:46
no kidding. That's a very it's a it's amazing. I think of it as a as a real art form. Honestly, it's a it's fascinating to see somebody take a two minute conversation, like I said, make it cogent. Make it interesting. Move into Something else. And somehow when you get to the end of the hour, you feel like the hour was about the thing. And it wasn't these small and then you guys just very effortlessly go off into, you know, some conversation of your own and bringing in your own opinions, you do a terrific job. So if anybody's local I, and like you said radio.com that people get to listen anywhere, right?

Jon Marks 1:00:19
Anywhere. Yes, the radio.com app, it's Wi Fi in Philadelphia, but you can listen to so many stations from not just entercom stations, but also some other stations as well. So you can listen to whatever you want, wherever you want. I use it to listen to people all over the country as well. So that's really amazing.

Scott Benner 1:00:35
Listen, when I was growing up people you didn't like teams that weren't within 50 miles of your house. So I i I'm even fascinated by that. That there are people in Texas listen to the Eagles talk radios, as

Jon Marks 1:00:46
I let you know when I I love to listen to after the Cowboys have a a bad loss. I love to listen to the cowboy station The next morning, to hear them melt down in anger. It's amazing. It just makes you happy. So as a guy that grew

Unknown Speaker 1:01:01
up in Philly, though, I would imagine

Unknown Speaker 1:01:04
getting this guy if I can mention one of the things

Jon Marks 1:01:06
before we wrap this up. And since we talked a lot a lot about me being on the radio. I recently so we're we're our studio is we're looking out on the school river in downtown Philadelphia, right by 30th Street station where you can you know, it's like kind of the hub of getting the New York or going down to DC in the on the transit line and track and whatever else. And probably a couple months ago now, we had somebody that jumped off the bridge here down into the school committed suicide. Wow. And it there had been another one a week or so before that. And I knew at that time because I I had been feeling some anxiety of kind of being bottled up with the pandemic and not being able to go anywhere. And very innocently, I had said on the air. I said, Listen, you know, I'm feeling it, too. I'm feeling the depression. I know that it's difficult out there right now with losing jobs and everything else. So please, before you do something like that, email me, direct messaged me on on on Instagram and Twitter, like reach out to a family member called the suicide hotline like, don't do that. I understand. Like, I've dealt with depression before. And Scott, you wouldn't believe how many people reached out to me just to say thank you. You talk about impact. And it's what made me think about it. And it gets me emotional. Yeah. But the the impact that I had, just by saying that a couple of people reached out to me that were in really, really bad, bad places. One was homeless, living out of his car, listening to the station. But like that, to me, that meant more to me than anything I've ever said about sports on the air and the almost 20 years that I've been doing this. So the little things you don't realize the impact that you can make, just by letting people know like, Hey, listen, I'm there to, we're all there. And it's okay. Right.

Scott Benner 1:03:03
Now, I appreciate that. I've, I've had similar experiences with the podcast, and you really can't, you can't undervalue how much just knowing someone else is feeling the same is it can can, can bolster someone, and then giving them the opportunity just to have some sort of a connection is is a huge difference maker. Good for you. That's really something is that something you think you might get more involved in?

Jon Marks 1:03:28
Um, you know, it's there's so many different things that I want to get involved with. And it's like, with my show, right now, we really need to like I would like to have kind of a cause that we raise money for every year. And I had a I had a friend that that committed suicide, right before the Eagles won the Super Bowl, so 2017, because I remember his girlfriend and some friends went to his grave and put his Eagles jersey on the grave. And it's one of those things where you're like, I should like not that you blame yourself. But in hindsight, you're like, I can see that he was really, he was a really, you know, like, emotional and upset person.

Scott Benner 1:04:09
Yeah, you don't realize it in the moment or you don't stop the look, I guess is the bigger point like it, it feels like, especially now whenever, I mean, I've had these feelings where I work out of my house, and my family's here and everything. And there are times I'm just like, oh my god, I'm just staring at a wall. Like I there's like there's nothing else to do. I've done everything I'm supposed to do today. And there's still five hours left. You don't mean like it's a very strange feeling. Now, man, that's really That's lovely. Obviously, I hopefully you guys can can lean into that because it sounds like you had a big a big impact. Just saying it one time.

Jon Marks 1:04:43
Yep. Now, yes, absolutely. So my way it would be it'd be a good cause to kind of get behind because I think everybody can relate and people so many people have been touched or have went through whether it's they've dealt with somebody in their family with suicide or just, we don't talk enough about mental illness. No, we don't. We don't We should we should talk more about it. Absolutely.

Scott Benner 1:05:01
JOHN, thank you so much for doing this.

Huge thanks to john. Don't forget to check him out on that radio.com app or at 94 WIP if you're in the Philadelphia area. Thanks also to Dexcom and Omni pod for sponsoring this episode of the Juicebox Podcast. Find out more about that Dexcom G6 continuous glucose monitor at dexcom.com/juicebox and check out those trials and those demos of the Omnipod at myOmnipod.com/juicebox you may be eligible for a 30 day free trial of the Omni pod dash. And of course, adding your information to the T one D exchange helps everyone living with Type One Diabetes. If you or someone you love has type one diabetes, and you're a US citizen head to T one d exchange.org. forward slash juicebox. JOHN caught me by surprise there at the end, but I want to add the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline to this episode. Help is available call 1-800-273-8255 or go to suicide preventionlifeline.org