There are a lot of myths surrounding Ben Rodgers and Jeff Wade — better known to fans as Ben and Skin — who just this week took over hosting mornings on iHeartMedia Classic Rock KZPZ/Dallas. First, the easiest myth to dispel is that they keep getting canned because they’ve worked at several stations in the market.
“The reality is we’ve never been fired from a radio job, which is really remarkable considering we’ve been doing it full time since 2008,” Ben says. “But we have chased opportunities because we’ve always believed in ourselves.”
For context, they have worked at numerous radio stations over the years. After starting at legendary sports talk station The Ticket (KTCK-AM), they have been heard at Live 105.3 (KLLI), ESPN Radio 103.3 (KESN), 105.3 The Fan (KRLD), and 97.1 The Eagle (KEGL-FM) — which was also known as The Freak during their tenure.
Myth Two: They’re Just Sports Guys
Another unfounded belief is that because they came up in Sports Talk, that’s all they can do. Yet now they are anchoring mornings at a Classic Rock station. The main reason for the switch is that, in their experience, many Sports Talk shows are based on conflict. Importantly, that’s not the type of show they prefer. “It’s not really in our DNA to tear one another down,” Skin says. “Our DNA is to build one another up. We come at our show from a different perspective.”
Ben adds that he really doesn’t want to argue with Skin because he’d lose. “If we were doing that old school style show where we had to debate every day, I would have killed Skin by now because I cannot beat him in a debate. If I walk outside and the sky is blue, he could beat me in a debate about whether or not the sky was blue. And I would lose very badly.”
Instead, they prefer to focus on companionship. “The goal is to create an environment or a vibe where people are comfortable listening to us because they know who we are,” Skin says. “There’s a lot of ways to garner that dedication from a listener, but we believe the number one thing is to make people laugh.”
Their show includes bits, skits, pranks, and conversations about everyday life that lend themselves to humor. And to be clear, they still discuss some sports — but differently. “We’re not going to talk about a salary cap on Lone Star. It’s basically: did the Cowboys win? Why or why not? Now we move on,” explains Skin.
However, they will poke fun at their old format. “We like to make fun of tropes like Sports Talk shows that pair two guys from two different cities together. We exaggerate the characters so one is some meathead who played sports but doesn’t know what he’s doing and the other is super announcer-y.”
Myth Three: They’re Not Sports Guys
Ben and Skin will set up an interview with an unsuspecting sports blogger but perform the call as a fake team. For example, there is Nigel and Whippy. Nigel is in his late eighties, while Whippy is in his twenties with no respect for his elders. “Meanwhile, the guest we booked is being held hostage in an improv comedy sketch they think is real,” Skin explains.
While it’s their names on the marquee, the show is truly an ensemble with two other talented people. They are Newshound Kevin “K.T.” Turner and Producer Krystina “K-Ray” Ray. K.T. has been with the guys since 2013. Ben says he can do anything: “he’s an incredible hard worker and he just makes doing radio easy. He gets nowhere near enough credit.”
Christina went to college with K.T. and adds a unique perspective. “She brings a good feminine vibe, but she also can totally hang with us,” Ben says. “We played Fortnite together and she cussed more than anyone I’ve heard in my life. Honestly, our audience probably likes her more than they like the other three of us.”
While they say their partnership with iHeartRadio and their show on Lone Star is their number one priority, they haven’t completely walked away from sports-related content. Earlier this year, they launched The Haymaker Network — a local sports talk network that exists on YouTube.
Myth Four: They’re Just Content Creators
Still in its infancy, the network already offers several shows. These include The House of Haymaker, which features a cast of creators talking sports; Haymaker Presents, which showcases sports stars in longform interviews; and Star Time, a Dallas Cowboys focused show.
Future plans for the network include more sports-related content. Additionally, they’re stepping into pop culture with The Haymaker Lounge. “For example, it will have a show called Tastemakers, where we find the best burgers, best tacos, best music, best movies,” Ben explains. “It’s a pop-culture show on steroids where we can talk about whatever we want that is not sports.”
While this is a passion project for Ben and Skin, they also know their limitations. Rather than trying to build a podcast network infrastructure on their own, they hired Jeff Czizek — who had worked for the Dallas Mavericks at their Studio 41 video streaming operation — as Chief Content Officer. “We think everybody is rushing to do podcasts on video but not everyone knows how to make them look good,” Ben says. “We think that’s a big separator so we went out and hired the best guy we could possibly find to make our stuff look incredible.”
Haymaker Studio is not the pair’s only non-radio venture. Notably, they’re also partners in a brewery called Rollertown Beer Works. They explain that while the obvious choice would have been to name the brewery after themselves, it didn’t seem appropriate because they weren’t actually making the beer.
Instead, much like with Haymaker, they respected their limitations. “We’ve learned from radio that we don’t like it when people come in and tell us how to do our show,” Ben says. “So we don’t want to tell somebody how to make beer. Instead, we went out and found the most talented brew master we could and just stay out of his way.”
Their Superpower
That left them in need of a name. Because they desired to honor the area where their brewery would be located, they settled on a reference to the Frisco Railway. “When the railway came through, they just laid out where they were going and didn’t care if it ruined towns that weren’t on the line,” Ben explains. “So the most resilient towns put their buildings on rollers and used steam engines to roll the town to the railroad in order to survive. We think it’s a great metaphor. If the life you want is over there, you got to be willing to go get it. If you want to pursue a dream, get up off your ass and go do it.”
So far, the venture has been successful. Not only have they already moved to a bigger location, but their beer is also distributed in bars, restaurants, stadiums, and grocery stores. Their biggest seller is The Big German — which was created to honor Dallas Mavericks’ great Dirk Nowitzki. The slogan for the beer, which Ben credits to Skin, is “minimal hops with a smooth finish.” This aptly describes both the beer and the player.
Friends since they were twelve years old, Ben and Skin have always been adventurous. They almost had a career as rappers. However, it didn’t work out. But the failure taught Ben a valuable lesson. “When the music dream crashed and burned, I was devastated. I thought that was my whole identity, which was foolish,” he says. “But once you chase a dream and you don’t catch it, you have this like bulletproof protection to chase another one. You realize ‘I survived failure. It’s not the end of the world.'”
It was that feeling that led to the two working their way into radio on The Ticket. For two people with minimal experience, starting at an extraordinarily successful station in Dallas might have seemed unlikely. But not to Ben: “The idea of it being a long shot to work our way into one of the greatest sports talk radio stations in the country never registered with me. It was more like, ‘sure, why wouldn’t we try that.'”
And it’s that attitude that Skin credits for their success. “Ben’s unwavering belief that we can do anything has been a huge catalyst for all this,” he says. Ben prefers to think of it as the team’s hidden superpower. “I am foolish enough to believe that we can do some crazy shit, and Skin is foolish enough to believe in me.”
But perhaps the best way to sum up their philosophy can be found on the Rollertown Beerworks website. They have posted a manifesto created with help from Ben’s brother. You can see the whole proclamation here, but the first two paragraphs give a good indication of how the guys think:
We are not ones to sit by and let life happen to us. We are not here to be passive recipients or to live in someone else’s vision of the world. We believe the world is what you make of it. We believe that with imagination and hard work anything is possible. We believe in ourselves.
To Ben, the manifesto underscores the energy they use to approach everything. “It fuels our belief that we could host a morning show on Lone Star, that we could start a brewery, that we could create our own podcast network. We are swinging for the fences, chasing dreams.”
But he also knows the road isn’t always smooth. “It doesn’t mean our dreams are all going to happen. Our journey started off by failing a million times and we’ll fail a million more. But what gets us excited about life is when you don’t know how successful something is going to be. That is more interesting and fulfilling than just taking a paycheck doing something you don’t like.”
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Mike Stern is a Classic Rock columnist and Features writer for Barrett Media. He has been with Jacobs Media consulting stations in the Classic Rock, Rock, Alternative and AAA world for more than a decade. Prior to that he programmed stations in Chicago, Detroit, Denver Las Vegas and other markets. He also worked as News/Talk Editor for Radio and Records, wrote about Top 40 Radio for Billboard Magazine and had his own radio talent coaching business called Talent Mechanic.