💪Finkel's Fast Five 117 - April 24, 2020

Welcome to Finkel's Fast Five #117. Thanks for reading and subscribing! Congrats to Blake C. for winning last week's "Forward the FF5 to Friends" raffle. A copy of Drive by Larry Bird is on its way!   A lot of people participated so let's run it back with a new sports book giveaway this week. All you have to do is forward this FF5 issue to two (2) friends who you think would like it and you'll enter a raffle to get a copy of When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi by David Maraniss (one of the best sports biographies ever). FORWARD TO A FRIEND HERE. Good luck! - Jon

 ONE

PODCASTS - In the absence of live sports, my fan experience mostly consists of rewatching classic games on ESPN, having epic battles against my son in NBA2k and going deep down YouTube wormholes (there's more than you think on Bo Jackson) and the grandaddy of them all, The Last Dance documentary about Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls. But did you know...  ...that the footage used has been the white whale of documentary directors and sports producers for twenty years? Did you also know that when the NBA agreed to let a film crew follow around that team, the head of NBA Entertainment (and now commissioner) Adam Silver, came up with a deal that basically said until we (the NBA) and you (the producers) agree how and when to use it, it will never be seen? Do you know the documentary that Jordan saw that made him agree to participate? If you're looking for a great behind-the-scenes podcast about the making of what is about to become the most-watched sports documentary of all time, listen to Last Dance producer Mike Tollin on the Bill Simmons podcast here. (The interview starts with about 34 minutes left).

TWO

 GRILLING - Right around the time I was ditching my grill to make the perfect steak in a skillet, which I touched on in last week's FF5, my buddy Darren Carter, owner of Carter's BBQ in Cleveland (and a guest on my Lunch Break Live FB Show w/ Art Eddy) began posting some mouth-watering videos of him grilling breakfast - yeah, breakfast.  The video I'm talking about is just like other videos of people grilling on their decks, except instead of burgers or hot dogs, my man Darren was grilling pancakes, bacon and sausage. He was using a flat iron set-up and I'm going to have to get my hands on one of these ASAP. I mean... grilling pancakes outside??? Genius. Check it out.

THREE

 COMEDY - Don Rickles is one of the funniest men of all time. Frank Sinatra can be funny, too. So when they both appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in November of 1976, there was a good chance the appearance would have a few laughs.  But little did the audience know they were about to be treated to one of the all-time celebrity flex moves ever pulled off to impress a girl...and of course Rickles is the one who pulled it off and Sinatra tells the story perfectly. Just a tremendous 45 seconds of comedy here. And a great find from the Super 70s Sports account on Twitter.

FOUR

BOOKS - Breaking news: I am not an economist. I do like to casually say "in this economy" during conversations sometimes to make it seem like i know more about the economy than I actually do, so sorry if you're one of the people I misled into thinking I'm an economic wizard over the years. My bad. Here's the truth: I really don't know shit. But since we're in "unprecedented times" (and I'm putting that in quotes because it's a widely overused and meaningless phrase) I thought I'd educate myself a bit on the topic.  After thoroughly researching where an econ moron like myself would be best served to start reading, I settled on the age of the Tycoons with this book, appropriately called, Tycoons: How Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and J.P. Morgan invented the American Supereconomy. One of the most incredible things I've learned so far is just how dominant and cutthroat these men were. They knew they were not just building empires and industries for their time...but for all time. And they were RUTHLESS. Highly recommend it.

 FIVE

 A great quote about how to be a rational person:  “These are the characteristics of the rational soul: self-awareness, self-examination, and self-determination.”  – Marcus Aurelius  SUPER IMPORTANT NOTE: To make sure you keep getting the FF5, please add [email protected] to your address book or whitelist us.  WAS THIS E-MAIL FORWARDED TO YOU? SIGN-UP HERE

BONUS

Many of you enjoyed my Meathead Movie Home Workouts. I combined all four of them into this really cool e-book PDF that you can download for free right here.

Share the FF5 and get TREMENDOUS STUFF:  1 SHARE = Enters you into a raffle to win a free copy of one of the books I mention here in the FF5. I'll do a drawing every 10 issues, but you have to forward the FF5 to a friend to enter.  3 SHARES = 1 Abe Lincoln as Tyler Durden Fight Club Sticker - perfect for your laptop, office, fridge or on your squat rack like Tommy John  10 SHARES = 1 Official Finkel's Fast Five Coffee Mug like this one that my man Marlin won last year  25 SHARES = If you share Finkel's Fast Five with 25 friends who you think would like it, I will take you to the movies... (well, not literally) ...but I will Venmo you money for a ticket to your next movie, on me. We'll cap this at 4 people for now.  FORWARD TO A FRIEND RIGHT HERE  DID SOMEONE FORWARD YOU THIS E-MAIL? GET MY FREE STARTER LIBRARY HERE  FYI: The sharing of the FF5 is cumulative... You don't have to share this e-mail 10 times if you don't want to. It can be 10 issues over 10 weeks or 10 months, whatever... The point is, please share it. We've grown from less than a hundred to a few hundred to a few thousand readers in under two years... Let's see how fast we can get to 10,000! - Jon

And if you haven't yet, you can buy my new book, Jocks in Chief, which ranks every president athletically, right here.