⚠️ Content Note: This episode includes discussion of sexual assault in the context of a jury trial. Listener discretion advised.

David picks up where his story left off: when the jury room door closes and twelve strangers must decide another human’s fate. David walks us through what it felt like to volunteer to be foreperson, not out of ambition, but because of silence, a silence he broke with a raised hand and three words that changed everything: “I’ll do it.”

What follows is a study in interpersonal communication, as David calmly and vulnerably guides a fractured room toward truth. What began as a 9–3 split ends with unanimous justice, and a transformation he never saw coming.

It’s a story about what happens when you raise your hand, even when your heart’s pounding. David stepped up when no one else would—and created something no one else could.

Theme music: Mr. Jukes and Barney Artist, “Blowin Steam (Open Up Your Mind)”

⚠️ Content Note: This episode includes discussion of sexual assault in the context of a jury trial. Listener discretion advised.

We start with football: the Lions taking down the Baltimore Ravens—and with them, the last shred of doubt about who this team really is. Touchdowns traded, gutsy fourth downs, Jared Goff dropping dimes into buckets…it was a game that reminded us why we love this team.

Then the episode shifts. Because if you listened last time, you know David was going through something heavy. Here, he begins to unpack it: he served as jury foreperson on a trial involving kidnapping and sexual assault.

We don’t finish the story here; we set the stage. We describe what the case is about, and get David’s impressions of the perpetrator and the victim. The miracle of what happened next—how David led a divided jury room through an extraordinary transformation—that’s for the next chapter.

It’s part one of a bigger story, but it’s already a testament to conviction, composure, and the unexpected ways friendship can prepare us for life’s hardest arenas.

Theme music: Mr. Jukes and Barney Artist, "… Steam (Open Up Your Mind)"

Note: David's traumatic experience in the pet store is chronicled in the episode "It's possible, yeah…but not likely" (August 19, 2023)

This episode’s different: David isn’t on the mic. He’s preoccupied with something heavy, something consuming. So Marshall does the show to him instead of with him.

It starts with joy: Marshall’s enduring memory from the Lions’ mauling of the Chicago Bears will not be trick plays, or even the many skill-player highlights. It will be the willpower moment: the inspiring third- and fourth-down stand that, to Marshall, defines real football.

Then (03:45) it shifts into something deeper: a message for David (and maybe for all of us) about stepping up when no one else will, holding the line on civility, and letting reason, not rage, be the guiding light.

It’s football. It’s friendship. It’s leadership. And it’s proof that sometimes the most important plays happen off the field.

Theme music: Mr. Jukes and Barney Artist, "Blowin Steam (Open Up Your Mind)"