Nick Saban
Episode 208: POLARIZING Sports Figures? WE got ‘EM!!

Welcome to the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Bob Page and Denny McLain!
- “How to be Miserable on $39 Million a Year.” If that’s not the title of JAMES HARDEN’s book someday, it SHOULD be!
- The NBA’s chief malcontent engineers his own trade. Now he gets to play with K.D. AND the NBA’s chief knucklehead.
- So many games canceled, so many Draconian new rules leave one NBA player asking, “Why even bother?”
- COVID comes to Michigan sports as the Pistons miss out on another loss and MSU misses out on a likely butt-kicking!
- “Butt-kicking?” Is there a term that goes beyond that? If so, you’d use it to describe the U of M’s ROUT of Wisconsin.
- College football: The boys offer some thoughts on Monday night’s national title game in our first show since then.
- Get ready to clean up because Denny’s gonna make his NFL playoff predictions. YOU’LL bet the other way, of course!
- URBAN MEYER leaving his cushy broadcast gig and moving to the NFL? Bob has only one question: WHY?!
- The Wings finally have a formal team leader, yet ESPN says the more things change, the more they …
- A BIG change for former Red Wings coach MIKE BABCOCK, but can this career shift possibly end well for him?
- And on a show that NEVER pulls any punches, why should WE change now on GIBBY or on FRANK BECKMANN?
- Those stories, Bob with perhaps the strangest story in Detroit Tigers history, YOUR mailbag and more right here!
Episode 206: That’s DOCTOR Billy Taylor to YOU!

Welcome to No Filter Sports Podcast with Bob Page and Denny McLain!
- “Get Back Up!” The title of a book by BILLY TAYLOR and, boy, did he ever! The great U-M running back is our guest.
- For ONCE — and hopefully the last time ever needed here — the boys DO do politics on the show.
- The NFL Playoffs kick off this weekend. Our producer Brandon McAfee has a bold prediction for you!
- Meanwhile, Tom Brady had a bold — and stupid — challenge from one of the league’s top young stars.
- Did the Eagles actually tank that game against Washington Sunday? One thing’s sure: their players did not.
- Michigan basketball is ROLLIN’ and fun to watch — so what a bad time to have to SIT thanks to COVID.
- Of COURSE MSU alum Bob loves our former guest, Tom Izzo — but he still drives Bob nuts at times.
- Is there potentially big news for Michigan State football? MAYBE.
- The late, great Detroit sportscaster Al Ackerman was right: Detroit’s NBA team is indeed “The PP’s.”
- The Tigers have landed free agent Robbie Grossman! FYI: he is NOT Jewish. FYI: he is NOT the answer.
- And, desperate for revenue, can the Wings and the NHL be blamed much for what they’re about to do?
- Those stories, YOUR mailbag and much more right here!
Episode 205: Bear Bryant’s Last Captain: Steve Mott

Welcome to No Filter Sports Podcast with Bob Page, Denny McLain — and that’s IT!
- A new era for the show begins after Eli’s self-imposed “retirement.” WE hope he comes back to us.
- Meantime, ex-Lions center STEVE MOTT, one of the great players in Alabama history, joins us on THE Big Game and more.
- FREE BEER? This is what Lions fans are left with after ANOTHER disastrous year?! The FL’s are even messing THIS up!
- Is Matthew Stafford coming back? Who’s the new GM? The LATEST head coach? So MANY questions.
- And who speaks for YOU? A famous voice from Texas, through remarks intended for a different team.
- They’re partying in Columbus and the Bama game hasn’t even been played. WHY? Jim Harbaugh’s staying at Michigan!
- No Eli? Producer Brandon McFee may be just as opinionated! He and Bob tangle over a big issue in college football.
- After destroying the fleabag Duke’s Mayo Bowl, somewhere Mr. Z is smiling. The game came to a fitting — and hysterical — climax!
- How good is U-M basketball! How good is U-M freshman Hunter Dickinson?! Bob says enjoy him while you can.
- Dave DeBusschere must be rolling over after a WUSSY move by his once-proud alma mater.
- Dumped by a phony girlfriend — then rejected by the Pistons too! But guess who’s getting the last laugh?
- Those stories, Denny remembers MLB’s seven HOFers we lost in 2020, YOUR mailbag and much more — right here!
Episode 204: Good-bye, 2020: UGH! Good-bye, ELI?

It’s hard to separate sports from reality.
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Eli Zaret, Denny McLain and Bob Page.
- Happy New Year, everybody, as we ALL look ahead with hope for better days to come.
- Maybe COVID didn’t hit YOU or yours. Maybe YOU made big $$$ in the market. No matter, good riddance to 2020!
- It was a year that perhaps has triggered a major change in Eli’s very life as he’ll explain to you.
- Denny actually became LOOPY over Saturday’s Lions’ fiasco, a game SO ridiculous that one die-hard Lions fan even …!
- Then listen to Denny become MORE loopy when Eli reads him a quote from Tigers G.M. Al Avila.
- HOW many TD’s in ONE GAME?! Our producer Brandon McAfee relates a tale of woe from football’s fantasy leagues.
- Tom Gores takes heavy flak from Eli — again — as Denny reveals how HE suffered from Gore’s hand in PRISON!
- Remember the NFL’s CHICAGO Cardinals? Yes? The boys do, which means they — and likely YOU — are OLD!
- Still another baseball Hall of Famer has died. Denny recalls PHIL NIEKRO and Phil’s late brother Joe. He played with both.
- Those stories, Bob has another edition of YOUR mailbag — and much more right here!
Episode 202: Ah, What COULD Have Been for Chuck Long!

He had everything going for him.
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Eli Zaret, Denny McLain and Bob Page.
- One of the greatest QB’s in Big Ten history, CHUCK LONG, never lived up to that potential in Detroit. Chuck tells all!
- The Lions hire Chris Spielman, not to run the show, but only to assist in the hiring of a GM and coach. Bob: WTF?!
- If only ALL the Lions had the guts of center Frank Ragnow — playing an entire contest with a FRACTURED THROAT!
- The MNF matchup between the Browns and Ravens was a great game — but a COSTLY one for Denny and others.
- Jim Harbaugh says he’s IN. And what LOOKS like a good recruiting class just may keep him “in” — for a while.
- MSU’s Mel Tucker landed a couple quarterbacks on signing day, though the one he needs MIGHT already be in the fold.
- Congress continues to meddle in big-time college sports. Is this a good thing? Denny, Eli — and CHUCK debate.
- Miggy says he wants to play first base again. AJ Hinch: “Okay.” Denny: “Ridiculous!”
- In this P.C.-mad world MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred makes a controversial decision. Was it fair?
- Will MLB and the other pro sports REQUIRE all players take a COVID vaccine in order to play?
- Those stories, PLUS Bob rips the bogus Michigan Sports Hall of Fame, YOUR mailbag and MORE — right here.
Episode 198: Two-Sport Star — to Superstar COACH!

But we know him best as a running back for Bo.
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Bob Page, Denny McLain & Fred Heumann sitting in for Eli Zaret!
- One of the great athletes in Michigan high school history is now one of its great MENTORS: our guest, THOMAS WILCHER.
- OUTRAGEOUS! How DARE Herbie claim Harbaugh doesn’t want to play Ohio State! But, uh, DOES he? Really?
- A Wednesday afternoon NFL game? The boys agree: an abomination in damn near every sense.
- And now COVID-19 begins another reign of sports terror: the NBA says 48 players just got it!
- So you think nothing excites curmudgeonly Bob? Just ask him about Michigan State basketball this year.
- Denny’s excited about his beloved Bears’ “Polish kid” versus the Lions, then gets the word: Trubisky is NOT Polish.
- Dennis Dale McLain — JEWISH?! Oy, who knew?! He’s FULL of surprises today:
- Teddy Ballgame once said WHAT to him? Denny in a fistfight with a teammate in the Tigers’ locker room?
- A 27-year-old former World Series hero is on the open market “CHEAP.” Should the Tigers grab him?
- Fred knows whom HE wants to see the Tigers sign. Bob AND Denny: “Fuhgettaboutit!”
- Those stories, YOUR mailbag segment and much more — right here!
Episode 196: From Motown to NATIONAL NFL Expert!

A Pro Football Hall of Fame writer!
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Eli Zaret, Denny McLain & Bob Page!
- COVID even postponing the SUPER BOWL? Maybe, says one of America’s top NFL writers, guest RICK GOSSELIN.
- (yawn) Another Thanksgiving, another TURKEY from the Lions. Even Sheila Hamp Ford looked bored to tears!
- Ford Field may have been empty but the Dallas Cowboys did allow fans for their game later. Why’s that?
- What’s more, how do the woeful Lions and suddenly woeful Cowboys keep being awarded such a big showcase?
- Eli a RACIST?! If so, you’d better add Bob and Denny to that list over the boys’ agreement on an overblown NFL event.
- COVID SO ravaging sports now that one prominent SEC team has been driven to TOTAL desperation this weekend.
- And the biggest story now that college BASKETBALL is underway is already which teams AREN’T playing.
- Wins for both U-M and MSU to kick off the schedule but Bob’s much more impressed with #1 Gonzaga.
- If COVID can’t do it, here’s an event that SHOULD be canceled: Saturday night’s Tyson-Jones “pillow fight!”
- The WORLD may mourn Maradona but our AMERICAN boys mourn Paul Hornung with LOTSA good yarns!
- Those stories, Eli’s “This Day in Sports,” Bob with YOUR mailbag and much more right here.
Episode 192: SO Close at Augusta — Yet SO FAR!

Not to be!
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Bob Page, Denny McLain and Lary Sorensen filling in for Eli!
- It’s Masters week — in NOVEMBER! Ah, 2020. But we’ve got a GREAT guest to talk about it: Michigan’s own DAN POHL.
- Was Danny the best golfer the state ever produced? With The Mitten’s weather, the list sure ain’t long but we’ll take a look.
- Ohio State’s Urban Meyer as head coach of (gulp!) The University of MICHIGAN? Get outta here!
- The 0-9 laughing stock New York Jets in the playoffs? Get outta here! The LIONS could still make it too.
- Old pals Lary and Bob have a BIG, uh, “discussion” about MONEY in baseball.
- J.T. Realmuto, George Springer and DJ LeMahieu have all REJECTED $18.9 million for 2021. Could any land in Detroit?
- Chris Fetter HAS landed in Detroit as Tigers’ pitching coach. It’s Lary against his boyhood idol, Denny McLain, on THAT one.
- Could a student be admitted to the University of Michigan, let alone survive academically, without PERFECT English fluency?
- That issue is part of a red-hot battle that may soon turn U-M vs MSU basketball into the NEW Duke-Carolina.
- And a horrible tragedy in the sports world leads us to reexamine one of the wildest college bowl games ever played.
- We’ve got those stories, YOUR mailbag and much for you — right here!
Episode 191: DOWN from “Mt. Rushmore” and ONTO Our Show!

Congratulations on a career well lived.
It’s the latest No Filter Sports Podcast with Eli Zaret, Denny McLain, Bob Page AND Fred Heumann!
- The greatest hockey announcer EVER? Many say that about the personable MIKE “DOC” EMERICK, our guest today!
- But who’s interviewin’ whom? Michigan resident Doc has plenty of questions for Denny about the ’68 Tigers.
- Eli’s U-M sources report that it’s all over for Jim Harbaugh. The proverbial “mutual decision” to come at year’s end.
- After the humiliation at Iowa, Bob asks why, among hundreds of coaches, MSU was so bent on hiring Mel Tucker.
- State won’t get any help this week against Indiana — at least not from Eli, who’s jumpin’ on the Hoosier bandwagon!
- How much will new manager A.J. Hinch mean to the Tigers — and what about his coaching hires of the weekend?
- The Lions go belly-up again. Let the LATEST five-year rebuilding program begin! But with (gulp!) Sheila Hamp Ford guiding it?
- The Masters in NOVEMBER? It starts this week! Eli and Denny guarantee the biggest current name in golf will NOT win.
- And a Red Wings favorite says a classy good-bye with a thank-you note to Detroit and his home state.
- Those stories, Eli has his “This Day in Sports History,” Bob has YOUR mailbag and much more right here!