The son and the father sit in the kitchen, talking sports and life in general.
The son is a newspaper columnist, a professional wiseacre. The dad is old school, miles from wiseacre.
Yet there is an abiding bond. Aside from looking remarkably alike, there is a deep love permeating the room, going back and forth from the old man to the son and back through laughs and lean-ins and back slaps.
Dan Lebatard is lucky. He still has his beloved dad, Gonzalo, the man he calls Papi, who is his co-host on ESPN 2’s “Dan Lebatard is Highly Questionable.”
There are plenty of sports chat shows on the exponential number of ESPN networks. I’m a fan of some of those shows, particularly “Pardon the Interruption,” on which Dan Lebatard became nationally famous as a substitute host/muckraker/goofball/”Bam!” shouter.
Lebatard, who also is a sports columnist for the Miami Herald and hosts a radio program in Florida, was granted his own television show a few months ago and brought Papi on as his co-host.
Sometimes it takes a while for co-hosts to click. It is obvious, though, that these two have been clicking since the son emerged onto the planet.
And that’s what makes this show wonderful to watch. There are plenty of, probably too many, sports talk shows on television, but there aren’t any like this, so full of love between a father and son. The two laugh together, talk about family matters together and otherwise revel in each other’s company, all on a set made out to look like a humble home kitchen.
The honest truth is the always-smiling Papi, who often wears gaudy guayaberas and emigrated from Cuba to this country in his late teens, speaks in an accent so thick it is sometimes difficult to understand him. But his son understands him even when we don’t, in every way. The honest truth is Papi doesn’t always know that much about certain sports and often pronounces names wrong, but that seems to make his son, and your correspondent, love him even more.
The best part of the program is called “Si or No,” a segment focusing on whether dad or son will watch certain games and other upcoming programs on television. Father and son revel in most segments of the show, but in this one they can hardly contain their mutual glee.
One episode I watched was hardly at all about sports and all about how Papi ended up coming to the United States in his late teens to avoid having to serve in Castro’s army. He came to this country not speaking a word of English and settled in Florida, yet ended up earning a master’s degree, becoming an industrial manager, having a long, loving marriage and raising two sons.
Now in his late 60s and retired, Papi Lebatard, of all people, is on national television every weekday with his son, even though he is speaking, and sometimes mutilating, his second language. It’s a beautiful thing, really, and says a lot about the greatness of our country. Papi no doubt would agree.
Maybe this program warms my heart so because I lost my own dad 16 years ago and have never fully recovered. Pop and I had a similar relationship to what Papi and Dan have, and my own father had a similar gusto for sports and life. And like Papi, Pop had an unabashed love for his wisecracking son, even when he didn’t particularly like him or his idiotic opinions.
You don’t have to love sports to love “Dan Lebatard Is Highly Questionable.” You just have to love your dad.
Bret Kofford teaches writing at San Diego State University-Imperial Valley campus. His opinions don’t necessarily reflect those of SDSU or its employees or those of the Imperial Valley Press and its staff.
Kofford can be reached at Kofford@roadrunner.com
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