Kendall Coyne Schofield became the first woman to compete in the NHL All-Stars Skills Competition this past week. She subbed in for Nathan MacKinnon who couldn’t compete because of a bruised foot.

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

It all began with a tweet. Colorado Avalanche Center Nathan MacKinnon was all set to compete in the National Hockey League’s All-Star Skills Competition, but he got a bruised foot. So he had to pull out. But McKinnon had another player in mind to fill in. And his team tweeted out an invitation to Kendall Coyne Schofield. She’s a forward for the U.S. women’s national team, which took the gold medal at last year’s Olympics. Her first thought, she said, was, I can do this. And so she did. In the fastest skater event, she posted a time of 14.346 seconds, which placed seventh among some of the NHL’s top players. And it made her the first woman to ever compete in the NHL All-Stars Skills Competition. Obviously, I was a little nervous, Coyne Schofield told ESPN. But she said, I knew it was a moment that was going to break a lot of barriers and a moment that would change the perception of our game.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Charles “Peanut” Tillman — a former cornerback for the Chicago Bears — is one of football’s greatest defensive backs. So we’ve invited him to play a game called “Now that’s what I call an offensive line” — three questions about offending people.

Click the audio link above to hear how he does

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

And now the game where people who’ve proved how good they are at their chosen profession find out how well they do with something they didn’t choose. It’s called Not My Job. Charles Tillman, known as Peanut, was one of the greatest defensive backs ever to play football. He was the winner of the Walter Payton Man Of The Year Award for his charitable and community work off the field. And he will be at the Super Bowl next week to help present it to the next winner. Charles Tillman, welcome to WAIT WAIT… DON’T TELL ME.

(APPLAUSE)

CHARLES TILLMAN: Appreciate you – appreciate you. Are those real people clapping or is it…

SAGAL: They are. Yeah. They’re real people.

TILLMAN: …You know, like the…

(CHEERING)

TILLMAN: Oh, OK – cool. Well, you know, I’m on the phone, and I can’t see y’all. So I do a lot of radio interviews. And they have, like, applause on cue where they hit a button…

SAGAL: Yeah.

TILLMAN: …And people just clap.

SAGAL: Yeah.

TILLMAN: If y’all are real people, say peanut on three. One, two, three.

UNIDENTIFIED AUDIENCE: Peanut.

TILLMAN: Damn.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: That’s pretty cool.

SAGAL: So you’re, of course, one of the great quarterbacks. You actually went to the Super Bowl with the Bears. Not a lot of people can say that, sadly.

TILLMAN: Yeah. Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: Yeah.

SAGAL: Well, you got there. That’s all I can say. So I got to ask because, you know, the Super Bowl is this big event that we all watch. What is it like to be a player involved in it? I mean, you’re preparing for a football game. And I understand that’s a pretty hard thing to do. Did all the distractions of, like, media week and the week leading up – did that get in the way?

TILLMAN: It didn’t get in the way. It was just pretty damn boring.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: I wish I could show y’all a picture. You say the same question over and over.

SAGAL: Yeah.

TILLMAN: With us, it was, you know, hey, talk about Peyton Manning. You know, I talked about Peyton Manning for five days straight. And someone took a picture of me with my head on the table like a bored 5-year-old…

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: …In kindergarten class getting ready to eat some glue.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: I was so sick of it. It was terrible.

SAGAL: Did you ever – it’s true. I hadn’t thought about that. You’re constantly getting the same boring questions. Did you ever, like, get fed up and just start making stuff up? Like, yeah, I saw Peyton Manning shoot a guy once.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: Yeah. So you make that up with the people from, like – the people who don’t really cover football…

SAGAL: Yeah.

TILLMAN: …You know, a couple Europeaners (ph)…

SAGAL: Sure, sure, sure.

TILLMAN: …Some people from Asia. And they’re just there because of the Super Bowl. So I give them real dumb answers.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: It was crazy.

SAGAL: Can you say…

BIM ADEWUNMI: Can I…

SAGAL: Can you remember a really good one?

TILLMAN: I got, like, a bunch of sex questions. So I just, like, made up a bunch of stuff. Like, I don’t know.

SAGAL: Wait a minute. You got sex questions? Like what? I hate to ask, but what kind of sex questions did you get?

TILLMAN: This lady was – I don’t know what exactly I said to the lady. I just made stuff up. I just – I lied. I was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I did that. Yeah. I did this, whatever…

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: …So she could get out of my way.

SAGAL: That’s great. I love it. So among other extraordinary achievements, you played against Tom Brady. And you’ve intercepted, I think, twice in one game.

TILLMAN: Oh, yeah, buddy.

SAGAL: Yeah.

(LAUGHTER, APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Tom Brady has such, like, a legend about him – greatest football quarterback who’s ever lived. I mean, do you guys find that, like, intimidating or, like, inspiring? Like, I’m going to go out and pick that guy off.

TILLMAN: I’m going to take option No. 2. I’m going to go out and pick that guy off. I think he is one of the greatest, if not, the greatest to play the game. But yeah. I don’t think anyone’s intimidated by him. I mean, there was a second-year player that went out damn near beat him. So…

SAGAL: Right.

TILLMAN: Yeah. I don’t think players are intimidated by him. I think he knows he has a target on his back. So guys are like, yo, if he’s the greatest, well, I want to go against the greatest to see how good I am.

SAGAL: We heard that you played a game when your wife was extremely pregnant, and she might have gone into labor at any moment.

TILLMAN: Yeah. So this was 2012. My wife was pregnant. I did an interview with Laurence Holmes. Laurence Holmes asked me the question, hey, what are you going to do if your wife goes into labor before the game? Well, I said, well, hell, I’m missing the game. I’m going to go see my daughter be born.

SAGAL: Right.

TILLMAN: A lot of players get ridiculed about how they’re not family men, and they’re just athletes. But I felt like I was attacked because I made the smart choice, the family choice, the more important choice to go be with my family and watch the birth of my daughter…

SAGAL: Right.

TILLMAN: …Because I know women – it’s hard. People think, aw, you just – you push and a baby comes out your vajayjay (ph). It ain’t like that, though.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: There are a lot of complications that can go wrong with it. You know, I wanted to make sure I was there for my baby.

SAGAL: All of a sudden, I’m really interested in what you told those reporters about sex.

(LAUGHTER)

ADAM BURKE: Also is there a cool nickname for that move?

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: What I read was that your wife…

TILLMAN: (Unintelligible) The doctor don’t catch it.

(LAUGHTER)

BURKE: Yeah because you intercepted it.

SAGAL: Exactly. There’s the doctor ready to catch…

TILLMAN: Yeah. My wife’s pretty good at it. She got…

SAGAL: …Your baby. And all of a sudden, you cut it in, intercept.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: My wife’s pretty good at it. So after – literally, after the game, my wife and I – we go home. She changes and everything, gets her bag. And we go straight to the hospital at, like, midnight, 12:30. And I had my daughter, literally, the next day. I had my daughter that night…

SAGAL: Well, that’s awesome, man.

TILLMAN: …Right after the game.

SAGAL: How she’s doing these days?

TILLMAN: Yeah. Come on, audience. That’s when y’all supposed to go, aw.

AMY DICKINSON: Yeah. We love it. Aw.

(LAUGHTER, APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: He knows what he’s doing. Well, Charles Tillman, it is an absolute joy to talk to you. But we have asked you here to play a game this time we’re calling…

BILL KURTIS: Now, That’s What I Call An Offensive Line.

UNIDENTIFIED AUDIENCE: Ooh.

TILLMAN: Ooh, OK.

SAGAL: You know a lot about defense. You were very good at that. But what do you know about offensive lines? That is things people said or did that offended people. We’re going to ask you about three offensive lines. Get two questions right, you’ll win a prize for one of our listeners. Bill, who is Charles Tillman playing for?

KURTIS: Diane Schultz of Austin, Texas.

SAGAL: All right – you ready to do this?

TILLMAN: All right – big Austin – is she on the phone or…

SAGAL: No, she’s not on the phone. She’s…

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: She’s presumably – she is presumably listening at home, though, so, you know.

TILLMAN: I sound real stupid right now talking.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: All right. Here’s your first question, Charles. During the early days of spaceflight, TV stations would often broadcast the astronauts live. And NASA was worried that one of their astronauts, in particular, would swear when the whole world was watching him. In order to prevent that, NASA did what? A, they told him that for safety’s sake he had to wear a gag so he wouldn’t, quote, “inhale space…”

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: …B, through a careful PSYOPS campaign, they convinced him that the most offensive swear he could possibly say was gadzooks; or C, they hypnotized him so he would hum any time he wanted to swear.

TILLMAN: I’m going to go with option Charlie. I’m going to go with option C.

SAGAL: Option C – you’re right. That’s what they did.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

DICKINSON: Wow.

SAGAL: NASA says – they admit they did this. They’ve never said what astronaut they did it to. But it is absolutely true that astronaut Pete Conrad, while he was on the moon in one of the Apollo missions, weirdly hummed all the time so…

DICKINSON: Oh, I remember that.

SAGAL: …We have our suspicions.

DICKINSON: Yeah.

SAGAL: All right, Charles, second question – BBC Radio goes to great lengths to keep its listeners safe from offensive content. They even put a decade-long ban on what song because they thought it was offensive? Was it, A, Madonna’s “Like A Virgin,” B, Ice-T’s “Cop Killer,” or C, Bobby Pickett’s “The Monster Mash?”

TILLMAN: I’m going to have to go with my guy Ice-T.

SAGAL: You’d think that. It was “The Monster Mash.”

(LAUGHTER)

DICKINSON: No.

TILLMAN: Oh.

SAGAL: They said – this was back in the ’60s when the song came out. They did not play it for 10 years because they thought it was, quote, “too morbid.”

DICKINSON: Well, it was a graveyard smash.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: It was, but you – all right. This is fine.

TILLMAN: (Inaudible).

SAGAL: Game’s going back and forth, back and forth. The final play you can win. Here we go. Last question – even professional wrestling is not immune to worrying about giving offense. At one time, the World Championship Wrestling organization had to make what sweeping change? A, each wrestler required to say I’m just kidding before trash-talking their opponent; B, instead of heels, wrestling villains were to be called sensible flats…

DICKINSON: (Laughter).

SAGAL: Or C, they were told to stop calling chairs, guitars and ladders brought into the ring to hit people foreign objects and instead call them international objects.

TILLMAN: Based off of the audience and them laughing, I’m going to go with the last one. I’m going to go with C.

SAGAL: You’re all right. That’s what happened.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

DICKINSON: Yeah.

TILLMAN: Boom.

SAGAL: Bill, how did Charles “Peanut” Tillman do on our quiz?

KURTIS: We just saw why the Peanut is Chicago’s champion.

SAGAL: Congratulations.

KURTIS: You won.

ADEWUNMI: Yay.

(LAUGHTER)

TILLMAN: You have, like, the sweetest voice, man. You know that? You could read me bedtime stories any minute.

DICKINSON: Aw.

ADEWUNMI: Aw.

KURTIS: I’ll be there.

(LAUGHTER)

DICKINSON: Sweet – sweet.

SAGAL: Charles “Peanut” Tillman is a former cornerback for the Chicago Bears and Carolina Panthers. He’s a recipient of the Walter Payton Man Of The Year Award, which is presented by Nationwide. Information about his charity, The Charles Tillman Cornerstone Foundation, can be found online. Charles “Peanut” Tillman, thank you so much for joining us on WAIT WAIT… DON’T TELL ME.

(APPLAUSE)

TILLMAN: Hey. Thank you, guys. Thanks, audience.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SAGAL: In just a minute, curl up with a blanket. I mean, really curl up with it in our Listener Limerick Challenge game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to join us on the air. We’ll be back in a minute with more of WAIT WAIT… DON’T TELL ME from NPR.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

NPR’s Scott Simon talks with ESPN’s Howard Bryant about the Australian Open and the upcoming Super Bowl match between the New England Patriots and the Los Angeles Rams.

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Now it’s time for sports.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SIMON: Spoiler alert – this is a news show. We’re going to have the results of the Australian Open. Naomi Osaka of Japan has won the women’s title at the Australian Open, defeating Petra Kvitova. And rumor has it there’s a big football game of some sort next week in the United States. Howard Bryant of ESPN The Magazine and espn.com joins us. Howard, thanks so much for being with us.

HOWARD BRYANT, BYLINE: Good morning, Scott. What do you mean you need a spoiler alert? You didn’t – you weren’t up at 3:30 in the morning to watch the women’s championship of the Australian Open…

SIMON: I was up at 4:30. And, you know…

BRYANT: (Laughter).

SIMON: …There are people who complain when we put the results of a sports event in – you know, on the news. So…

BRYANT: In real time.

SIMON: Yeah, exactly. Well, you know, it’s news, not a novel.

BRYANT: (Laughter).

SIMON: In any event, Naomi Osaka has followed her victory in the U.S. Open with this Grand Slam title. Makes her No. 1 in the world right now, doesn’t it?

BRYANT: First Asian woman to be named No. 1 in the world ever, amazing follow-up to winning her first major back in September at the U.S. Open over Serena Williams, first woman since 2001 – Jennifer Capriati – to win the next major following her first – so to go consecutively – an incredible match. It wasn’t easy for her at all, considering the fact that she was up a set and serving 5-3 – I’m sorry – receiving 5-3 for the match and ended up having three match points, lost them all, ended up losing four straight games. And she showed a lot of heart for a 21-year-old to…

SIMON: Yeah.

BRYANT: …Not finish off the match the way she did. And to really come back in the third set and claim this championship was remarkable and tough for Petra Kvitova as well. This was a match that I really had no – you didn’t want to see anybody lose…

SIMON: Yeah.

BRYANT: Coming back from the knife attack that the – Petra suffered in the Czech Republic in 2016, she didn’t think she was ever going to play tennis again. And it was just an amazing match between…

SIMON: Yeah.

BRYANT: …Two champions.

SIMON: We got to note to a particular significance in Japan. Naomi Osaka has become a national symbol there. She has a mixed racial background. That’s unusual in Japan…

BRYANT: Her Haitian father, Leonard, who we never see. We hear of him. We know he exists, but he never sits in her box because he is so nervous to watch the match, to see his daughter play that he sort of roams the stadium. He’s never on camera, but he’s always with her. And it’s a fantastic story.

SIMON: Aw, God bless him.

BRYANT: (Laughter) It’s a fantastic story, considering that this is one of the things that you look at with tennis, that at 20 years old, 18 years old, people have been talking about her being a great player. And now she’s really backed it up. And it’s also in this tournament, as well, that Serena Williams had a 5-1 lead against Pliskova in the quarterfinals to have a rematch with Osaka. And Serena ended up losing that match. She injured her ankle and lost the next six games and lost the match. That’s the beauty of tennis. It’s the reason why I love tennis so much. It’s the reason why I love baseball. You can’t run out the clock in this sport, Scott. You’ve got to get that – you’ve got to win the final point. You have to get the final out. Otherwise, things can happen.

SIMON: Let’s turn a little bit to that football game just a week away. The Rams are back in LA again, against the Patriots with what seems like their annual appearance in the Super Bowl. A lot of people, though, still aren’t over that controversial no-call of pass interference by officials.

BRYANT: In the NFC Championship game between the Rams and the Saints and then, also, the officiating between – in the Patriots game with the phantom roughing-the-passer call against – with Tom Brady in the Chiefs-Patriots game. It’s a really interesting thing, Scott, because you want to look at football and say that the sport is obviously in trouble for all the problems that it has. Aesthetically, of course, it has problems. You can’t tell what a catch is, you know, arguing about the rules and the referees getting involved. But, at the same time, when you look at the revenue, when you look at the excitement, when you look at the interest, it’s hard to say that the sport has a problem. But, at the same time, how do you look at a championship game – every year, we have these questions or these controversies. At some point, maybe you’re going to start reviewing even pass interference calls. I can’t imagine more conferences during a football game.

SIMON: Do you love or hate the Patriots?

BRYANT: I’m from Boston. I can’t answer that.

SIMON: Oh.

BRYANT: (Laughter).

SIMON: You can’t answer it, which suggests you don’t have, well – I – you got to respect Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and that dynasty headed back for their ninth Super Bowl.

BRYANT: Phenomenal accomplishment what that team has done.

SIMON: Howard Bryant of ESPN The Magazine and espn.com. Thanks very much, Howard. Talk to you soon.

BRYANT: My pleasure.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Dee Ford was getting angry tweets when the Kansas City Chiefs’ player drew a late penalty against the Patriots and his team lost. A woman named Dee Ford is on Twitter, she gets tweets meant for him.

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Good morning. I’m Rachel Martin. Last weekend, NFL player Dee Ford of the Kansas City Chiefs was getting all kinds of angry tweets. He was hit with a late penalty, and his team lost to the Patriots. The thing is Dee Ford is not on Twitter, but a 47-year-old English woman also named Dee Ford is, so she’s the one who got the Twitter rage. It’s been happening for years, so the two Dee Fords have become friends. British Dee Ford said some of the tweets are quite nasty, and she is glad football Dee Ford doesn’t have to see them.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Louisiana’s governor sent the NFL Commissioner a letter complaining about a missed penalty that New Orleans Saints fans say cost their team a chance to play in the Super Bowl.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

There has been a controversy raging in the NFL since Sunday that has now turned political. Louisiana’s governor, John Bel Edwards, has sent a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell complaining about a missed penalty that New Orleans Saints fans say cost their team a chance to play in the Super Bowl. This letter follows lawsuits, a petition and just general rage about this now infamous no call by referees in the NFC championship game. And let’s talk about this with NPR sports correspondent Tom Goldman. Hi, Tom.

TOM GOLDMAN, BYLINE: Hi there, David.

GREENE: OK. So for people who were not watching that game, remind us what happened and what is causing all this.

GOLDMAN: Only one of the most obvious cases of pass interference you’ll ever see, and it wasn’t penalized. It happened late in the game between the Saints and the LA Rams. A Rams defender blasted a New Orleans receiver before a pass reached the receiver, and there was no flag. And after the game, the Rams defender acknowledged he interfered. The NFL head of officials admitted they blew the call, which, under NFL rules, wasn’t reviewable, so they couldn’t check replays and see what everyone else in the world saw.

Now, as a result, the Saints lost a chance to run down the clock and kick a short field goal for the win in the final seconds. Instead, they were forced to kick a tiebreaking field goal with over a minute and a half left. That gave the Rams lots of time to get the ball back, drive down the field, kick the tying field goal, which they did, and then they won in overtime.

GREENE: So Saints fans are going to want you to answer yes to this question, but I’m going to ask it. Would they have definitely won the game if this penalty had been called?

GOLDMAN: (Laughter) Highly likely, Saints fans, but not certain, David Greene. This is just between you and me. Even if the Saints had run down the game clock and attempted that very short field goal for the win, the kicker could have missed or it might have been blocked. Even with the botched call, the Saints could have won. Yes, the Rams got the ball with lots of time after the Saints went ahead, but, hey, what about that great Saints defense? They could have stopped the Rams from driving down the field, kicking the tying field goal. And then in overtime, the Saints had the ball first and had a chance to win.

So now that all Saints fans hate me, I will say, yes, the odds were pretty good that had the penalty been called, the Saints would be playing New England in the Super Bowl February 3.

GREENE: All right. Well, sports fans like me, we just suffer and deal with a bad call. It sounds like in Louisiana I guess you could do lots of things like file lawsuits and get your governor involved. So what – tell us – tell me more about the response here.

GOLDMAN: The governor sent that letter to Commissioner Goodell to make rule changes that allow for expanding use of replay. Otherwise, he said, the integrity of the game will be called into question. Edwards also said Louisiana football fans will move on but will not forget. There are these lawsuits by fans. One of them alleges damages of mental anguish and loss of enjoyment of life. I know you’ve felt that as a Pittsburgh Steelers fan.

GREENE: Thanks.

GOLDMAN: (Laughter) Saints fan Matt Bowers has rented billboards in Atlanta, the host city for the Super Bowl, with messages like Saints got robbed. And there’s an online petition asking for a rematch this Sunday. As of early this morning, David, the petition had over 680,000 signatures.

GREENE: OK. There’s not going to be a rematch. I’m going to predict that right now. But what is the NFL going to do here going forward?

GOLDMAN: What should happen and probably will is replay needs to be expanded. That play should have been reviewed and the call corrected. The league has said subjective penalties like pass interference cannot be reviewed. The NFL, you know, worries that too much replay will slow down games. But if you watch the other conference championship game between New England and Kansas City, which I’m sure you did, there were a bunch of replays during a thrilling fourth quarter, and it didn’t take away the excitement at all.

GREENE: NPR sports correspondent Tom Goldman. Thank you, Tom.

GOLDMAN: A pleasure, David.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Many in New Orleans believe their Saints lost a trip to the Super Bowl because a referee missed a pass interference penalty Sunday. The Saints lost that game to the Los Angeles Rams.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Good morning, I’m David Greene. An eye doctor in Louisiana is offering free eye exams – well, to a select group – NFL referees. Many in New Orleans believe their Saints lost a trip to the Super Bowl because of a missed pass interference penalty on Sunday. Louisiana Family Eyecare posted their offer on Facebook saying they don’t want other fans to feel their pain. The Saints lost that game to the LA Rams. And listen to sports talk here in LA, and you’d think the ref’s eyesight was just fine. It’s MORNING EDITION.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.