Breakdowns
3/19/21
3 min min read
The Friday Five: Jay Glazer
Few NFL insiders are as well connected as Jay Glazer. In addition to his role with Fox Sports, Glazer trains many NFL players in mixed martial arts during the offseason. That’s just one of the reasons why players trust and confide in him.
We caught up with Glazer for this week’s “Friday Five” …
1. Who is your biggest mentor?
My biggest mentor was actually George Young, former GM of the New York Giants. For the first 10 years of my career, I didn’t have a full-time job. I was making like 9,400 bucks a year working for the New York Post and New York 1 TV, just trying to get a full-time gig. George validated me when I got my first big gig. I was at the NFL owners meetings and George, who never had a sip of alcohol in his life, would sit there at the bar with me – because I’m gonna sit at the bar all night – and he would validate me to other people in the league. He’d mess with me. He’d say, “He’s a little f@!#er, but he’s a good s@!t. You can trust him.” That meant so much to me, and through that kind of started my initial wave of relationships in NFL front offices. That validated me. Then I used to call him in his office. He liked to argue, so I’d call him and just start messing with him, just to pay back his friendship. He’d start screaming and yelling, hootin’ and hollerin’… then he’d finish up with, “Alright, thanks for calling.”
It’s probably the least expected answer anyone would expect, but it was George Young. I just learned so much from him. I’ve always been a relationship guy, and that’s one I’ve always honored.
2. What’s your top pet peeve?
When people go, “Yeah, but…” When people are trying to explain why they can’t do something, they go, “Yeah, but…” As in, “Yeah, but I can’t do this or that.” “Yeah, but” drives me nuts. For a guy like me who’s always going a million miles a minute, trying to reach my dreams, “Yeah, but” just kinda got in the way. I always look at everyone else and say, If I can do it, you can definitely do it. Because you’re more talented than I am. Way more educated than I am. So “Yeah, but…” drives me nuts.
3. What’s your favorite book?
Right now it’s probably The Energy Bus by Jon Gordon. It’s a self-help book. It’s about (dealing with) people who have negative energy – you’ve got to get them on your team or get ‘em, out. You’ve got to make sure you’re in a good spot all the time. You’ve got to take care of yourself, love yourself up, so you can go about your business. You’ve got to have people in your life who are going to support you and not bring you down.
4. If you could have dinner with any three people in history, who would they be?
I’ve already done this. I set up a freakin’ lunch at (Sylvester) Stallone’s house last year. And I brought Guy Fieri -- he cooked for us – and Stallone brought Al Pacino and Arnold Schwarzenegger. I brought (Michael) Strahan and Guy Fieri. And Sugar Ray Leonard was there … Just the fact that I was hanging out with Rocky and Rambo… Mom, how did this happen? That was the coolest freakin’ thing. We broke the Internet that day. We had Rocky, Rambo, the Godfather, the Terminator, Sugar Ray and Flavortown all together!
Now, if you’re asking me of all time, who I can invite to dinner… I’d love to meet Moses. I’d love to meet Martin Luther King. Oh, and probably Ali.
5. If you could go back in time, what advice would you give your teen self?
Learn to love yourself up. It’s a hard enough world when you don’t love yourself up. I would tell myself back then to give yourself a break, you’re not so bad. I would tell myself, you’re going to go through hard times, because you suffer from depression, anxiety, and you’re not going to know why you feel a certain way, but you’re not so bad. Figure out ways to learn to love yourself up, and it’ll be okay.
