It was Christmas Eve in 2013 when Ricky Cobb first started the ‘Super 70’s Sports’ twitter handle. Life got in the way of him doing much with it at first, but on the first day of the new year in 2015, he decided it was time to at least see if he had anything.
“I just remember waking up and thinking, am I ever going to do anything with that Twitter account? And so, I started tweeting that day and I never have stopped,” Cobb told Barrett Media. “I haven’t taken a day off since January the 1st of 2015.”
What started out as literally an account about sports teams and players from the 1970’s has grown into somewhat of a sports and pop culture phenomenon, looking back on several eras of sports, and also movies, television and anything else that was popular when that group of people, including Cobb were growing up.
Cobb, a 52-year-old father of five daughters, had very little expectations when he started.
“If you would have told me when I created the account that I would ever have a thousand followers, I would have been like, ‘wow, that’d be really awesome’ and wouldn’t have had any aspirations to have anything more than that,” Cobb said. “You know, I think I was just looking for an outlet to be creative and maybe have an outlet for my natural tendency to want to joke around and try to find the things that are funny. So, I thought if I could create an account where I just sort of celebrated the athletes of my youth.”
Now, Super 70s Sports has over 770,000 followers on X, just launched a new daily show on OutKick called The Ricky Cobb Show and, after 21 years as a community college sociology professor, Cobb is now creating content full time.
As for the new show, which launched Monday August 12 and airs weekdays at 11 a.m. ET, Cobb said, “I’m so happy that I get the chance to do this and that people are interested and want to talk to me or want to put me on television because that in and of itself is a pretty insane thing to me for somebody that was a community college professor until, you know, about a week ago.”
In describing the show, Cobb says it is very similar to what you see every day when he posts on hist Super 70’s Sports account on X, “it’s sports, it’s culture, it’s comedy,” he said. “I want my audience to feel like they’ve pulled up a chair to the table at the bar where the best, the smartest, most clever conversation has taken place. That’s what I want it to feel like. I want it to feel like we’re talking about the things that you would be talking about with your buddies, that you would be texting about with your buddies.”
Cobb has done a podcast and was part of a 10-episode show produced by ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel, but this new show will allow Cobb to dive into various topics and also talk with special guests while having the OutKick platform behind him. He said he and OutKick SVP and Managing Editor Gary Schreier have been having conversations about collaborating since the spring of 2023.
After an initial discussion, Cobb said about Schreier, “He got back in touch with me and we had some really good exchanges about it and what he was envisioning and kind of my thoughts on the kind of show that I would want to do, and everything lined up. And so, I made the decision that this was where I wanted to be.”
Cobb said he received good feedback on the first few shows, which included an interview with one of Cobb’s favorite players to post about, former Atlanta Braves star Dale Murphy. Cobb is not alone on the show, he has his buddy, ‘Ronnie T-Shirts’ along for the ride.
In describing Ronnie, Cobb says, “I would say that Ronnie is the closest thing I have to an older brother. You have certain friends that you never have any little word between you. And then you have other friends where you could have friction sometimes with whatever. That’s why I say he’s like a brother because I love the guy, but man, we’ve had arguments. We’ve been through s*** together. You know, we laugh together.”
I never thought that Super 70s sports would take off like it did. That’s been the biggest, unexpected adventure of my life by far. And for it to have put me in a position where I could have been taken notice of to create this opportunity is just that much further beyond already feeling like I’m playing with house money. I feel like it’s so unlikely that any of this happens. I was a community college professor, dad of five girls, going into work and doing my job. I figured that I would put in my 30 or 35 years as a college professor, and I would retire, and I would draw my teachers’ pension. And, you know, that, that would be it.
“I never thought that I would change careers or that I would have the opportunity to work in this medium that I’m in here at OutKick. So, you know, I don’t want to put any limits on it.”
Dave Greene is the Chief Media Officer for Barrett Media. His background includes over 25 years in media and content creation. A former sports talk host and play-by-play broadcaster, Dave transitioned to station and sales management, co-founded and created a monthly sports publication and led an ownership group as the operating partner. He has managed stations and sales teams for Townsquare Media, Cumulus Media and Audacy. Upon leaving broadcast media he co-founded Podcast Heat, a sports and entertainment podcasting network specializing in pro wrestling nostalgia. To interact, find him on Twitter @mr_podcasting. You can also reach him by email at Dave@BarrettMedia.com.
