Nick Schlemmer  0:00  
Welcome to the HR Happy Hour Network, sponsored by Workhuman. Business strategy is becoming less about what you do and more about who does it. Your people are your biggest differentiator–and Workhuman’s leading employee recognition platform is challenging leaders to rethink what they know about performance and what really drives value. The world’s first employee recognition AI harnesses daily appreciation flowing through your organization to see who’s really moving the needle. So orgs can find their next leaders, develop skills, and match talent to the projects that push humans and businesses forward.   Workhuman is unlocking the next era of workplace potential – and they invite you to join the movement at Workhuman.com. A proud supporter of the HR Happy Hour Network. 

Jack McFarlane  0:46  
Hi everyone and welcome to the HR Happy Hour Network. This is the Play by Play podcast hosted by myself, Jack McFarlane, Nick Schlemmer

Nick Schlemmer  1:05  
Hey guys, how's it going? 

Jack McFarlane  1:06  
And our special behind the scenes guest, so you guys never see but she's here every time. Carly McFarlane. 

Carleigh McFarlane  1:13  
Hi!

Nick Schlemmer  1:15  
Welcome back, Carleigh.

Jack McFarlane  1:17  
Yes, welcome, welcome back. Welcome to your first time? I think your first time on screen is that right? I don't know if you've done... have you done a game time?

Carleigh McFarlane  1:25  
I did the game time for our back to school episode. 

Jack McFarlane  1:29  
That's right. 

Carleigh McFarlane  1:29  
I believe that's right. So that was my first appearance.

Jack McFarlane  1:31  
That was your first appearance. Now we're throwing you in. You get a whole episode you're gonna do with us. As you guys might know, it's December, and that means it's the end of the year, and every year we do this, it's probably maybe the March Madness is a little higher for me, but this is at least second favorite episode. We're got our year-end review. So we're gonna be running through a bunch of different categories, and Carleigh's gonna join us and give her insight on her favorite things from the year as well. So I'm super excited for it, and let's jump right in. We've got a new category this year to start it off, and that's top stories. We haven't done this yet. The news can be a little want, want, you know, like a little sad at times. So we tried to stay away from a lot of the war and stuff like that. And we kind of narrowed it down to the five biggest, at least, stories in the US. Hard for us to say we're the biggest stories in the world when we live in the US. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna start us off here, guys, these are in order, but you can they're really no order for these ones. It's not like a statistic. So any order you want, use your imagination, everybody. So here we go. Biggest news stories from the year. We got five of them. We've got Trump taking office for the second time. That was all the way back in January. I actually forgot that even happened this year, him officially taking office. So obviously, new President, big story. The next big story was Pope Leo becoming the first American Pope. You know, he's from Chicago, and that kind of goes along with another story of Pope Francis passing away on Easter I kind of combine that so new pope, Pope passing away. That happens very rarely. The next one would be the US government shutdown just ended not too long ago. It lasted for 43 days, which is a record that was all over the news for about 50 days straight, because it was before leading up the week, we're going to shut down. Are we going to shut down, are we going to shut down? Are we going to shut down? Massive story to go along with that. A lot of government this year number four would be Liberation Day. That is when Trump laid out his plans for the tariffs on all the countries, the 10% the 15% to all of them. That was called Liberation Day, tariffs. If I had to sum up 2025 news in one word, it probably be tariffs. I agree guys might be the same that it's everywhere, and that's been all year. And then finally, I remember this. I have very funny story about it. Is TikTok going dark as the US banned it for 24 hours. I think it was offline, maybe less. A quick story about that. I just remember so funny, my beautiful fiance, Elissa, loves Tiktok, and was going through withdrawals when it was taken off for one night and everyone was freaking out. So had to include that. So funny. Nick, what kind of stands out to you? What is maybe when you think of news headlines, 2025 what was a big one you thought of?

Nick Schlemmer  4:21  
You know, the one that came straight to my head was January 29, so early on in the beginning of 2025, when the American Airlines plane and the army, or military helicopter collided in Washington, DC, over the river. I mean, that one, I feel like I kind of forgot about it until I started thinking about, you know what, what happened this year, thinking about it more, and it was the first major commercial plane crash since 2009. 

Jack McFarlane  4:53  
Wow, yeah. I mean, I feel like that kind of kick started a lot of plane crashes, especially in. You had a couple and then there was that not too long ago, like a month ago. Was it in India? What was the big one, where the where the FedEx plane crashed?

Nick Schlemmer  5:08  
Yeah, we had a UPS plane in Kentucky.

Jack McFarlane  5:12  
In Kentucky, why did I think it was India? What happened? I don't know, Carleigh, what sticks out to you when you think of news for this year?

Carleigh McFarlane  5:21  
I mean, a big story for me in terms of politics and the elections wasn't really the presidential election, but it was Zohran Mamdani winning the New York City mayoral election. I remember getting to hear a lot about that in the last few months. I think New York City being one of our most populated, it's, it's a big hot spot. And there was also some contention against Mamdani and President Trump, which I believe they've now met and kind of spoken about their differences. So that's on the upswing. But his running mates were the Republican candidate, Curtis Sliwa, and Andrew Cuomo as an independent candidate. Excuse me, with Mamdani being the Democratic candidate.

Jack McFarlane  5:56  
There you go. See, big into New York City over there, I see. You know, that was a big one. I've heard all about that. I remember watching, I'm sure we've all seen, a clip from a debate of the three of them, and it was like, Have you ever shopped or done marijuana? And he was like, he's like, laugh. He's like, Yes, I have bought it legally, which I thought it was so funny, because he was so chill about it. So that was, that's what I think of when you know the clip of the debates, and they're all just like, what that is the weirdest question ever.

Carleigh McFarlane  6:22  
I think a lot also came up around Sliwa, because he kept bringing up how he had been shot five times in the back of a cab in 1992.

Jack McFarlane  6:34  
Yeah. Oh, that was a big kind of a meme, yeah, him being shot. Everyone was like, whoa, okay. And, you know, it's kind of the first time that I can think of where a mayoral election was was this big, and in a town that I didn't live in, right? So that did that kind of stood out to me as well, that, I mean, I get it's New York City, but it really only affects New York City or New York you know, it's not like it really affects me out here in Utah, but I still heard all about it. So that's a good one for me. Is not a, not a political story, number one news story, I think of I remember, exactly what I was doing. I'm walking outside. You know, it was nice in February, for some reason, it's pretty warm in Utah. So I'm walking outside, I get an ESPN notification. Look down at my phone. It says, Luca Doncic has been traded to the Lakers. I said, No, that's not real. There is no way. Because for those who don't watch basketball, Luca is arguably the best player in the league. I think he's the best. He's in arguably top three in the league. Super young, super good. You would never trade the best player in the league ever. Right? He's a friend. Wrong player. Wrong. The Dallas Mavericks went ahead, traded him to the Lakers, and I'm still in shock about it, and here he is averaging 40 points for the Lakers a game in the first month of the year. I'm in disbelief, still, still from it. The Mavericks had just made the finals too. That's what makes it even crazier. Like they almost won it all, then they trade the best player in the league. So that's what stood out. Stood out to be news wise. It was like a Whoa. I remember exactly what I was doing in that moment.

Carleigh McFarlane  8:04  
It was devastating to their fan base. I mean, people are still upset, it's horrific.

Jack McFarlane  8:11  
Yeah, the guy that made the trade just got fired a couple weeks ago because of this trade.

Carleigh McFarlane  8:17  
And he came out saying that he had, quote, no idea how important Luca was to the fan base.

Jack McFarlane  8:22  
He was just not a good GM. Nico Harrison was already not very good. He got lucky that they got Luca in the first place in the draft, and he was just not good with personnel. I mean, so how could you not know Luca is important? I don't get it. Let's move on. We could talk about Luca all day. I could talk about Luca all day and how crazy this trade was. So because of that, we're gonna move on. Nick, you're gonna take us through the top albums of 2025. All this data for music is going to be from Spotify. It is late November when recording this these could change a little bit. We don't expect it to change much. So take it with a slight grain of salt. But take us through the albums. Nick, what were the most streamed albums of this year? 

Nick Schlemmer  9:02  
Again, we went with the top five most streamed albums. And, you know, starting off with the first one, the most stream Album of the Year. I just want to apologize in advance. I'm not fluent in Spanish, but the album is by Bad Bunny. You know, he's now the super he's performing at the Super Bowl, so I feel like it's only, it only was a matter of time before he was number one. Again. He's always on these lists, it feels like but for his album to be number one, I think it just fits right in. But his album is, and excuse me if I pronounce this incorrectly, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS. That is the number one album coming in with almost 7.8 billion streams. Number two was Lady Gaga, interesting to me with Mayhem, her album, Mayhem. Number three, we have some k pop coming in from it says various artists, but K Pop Demon Hunters. And then number four would be Cardi B. Am I the drama? I think she's the drama. I don't know about you guys. I think she's got some drama going on. And then coming in at number five, Alex Warren, You'll Be Alright, Kid, with a 3.8 billion streams, just under 3.8 billion streams, it went anywhere from 7.8 to 3.8 and bad Bunny was in the lead by over almost 3 billion.

Jack McFarlane  10:28  
Yeah, absolutely crazy. Nick, what sticks out to as Album of the year? Do you, I don't know if you have a favorite album or your most streamed album. What jumps out for you?

Nick Schlemmer  10:38  
Probably favorite album the year, and my most streamed album would be Morgan Wallen's latest album, I'm The Problem. You know, I got to see him in concert down in Miami. Miami is probably my favorite song on that album. I For me, I got to go with Morgan Wallen. Jack, what would yours be?

Jack McFarlane  10:57  
So this is two years in a row that my most streamed is going to be Sabrina Carpenter's album this year, it's Man's Best Friend. I would like to sit here and say, Oh, it's because of Elissa. It's because of Elissa. Last year, it definitely was this year, I got to be honest. Big fan, big fan. So it was my most dream to buy a lot.

Speaker 1  11:19  
I mean, hey, two years in a row.

Jack McFarlane  11:22  
I'm starting a fan club, I think. I mean, that's two years in a row.

Nick Schlemmer  11:26  
Carleigh, what's yours?

Speaker 1  11:28  
Sabrina Carpenter is a great performer. I can't even fault you for that. I mean, she's super entertaining, but mine is going to be Fancy That by Pink Pantheress. She has seen a huge surge in popularity. She's been in the scene for about 10 years or more as a producer, and she puts out some stuff independently. But because of Tiktok, I'd say, over the last five years, she's really gained some viral traction, and it just watching videos of her performing her tour now versus even three years ago, her stage presence is insane. I mean, this woman is a genius producer, and if you haven't listened to her stuff, I highly recommend it. You may recognize her name from, she had Ice Spice on one of her songs, Boy's a Liar. 

Jack McFarlane  12:10  
Oh okay, I know who this performer is. 

Carleigh McFarlane  12:12  
So she dropped an album called fancy that, and a lot of the songs from it have been all over Tiktok, like illegal, stateside, and tonight. So you may not actually recognize her name, but I'm sure you know her.

Nick Schlemmer  12:25  
Yeah, I didn't recognize until you mentioned the song. Tiktok might be the jump starter.

Carleigh McFarlane  12:31  
It is. It really is. It's a place to to find some success. 

Jack McFarlane  12:37  
I mean, I when, when looking up all the music information, whether it was album artists or song, it's all it's a majority because of Tiktok, right? Like Bad Bunny is the Super Bowl performer for 2025, right? And just very famous. But a lot of the songs, especially, are just, they were popular on Tiktok, boom. They got seven quadrillion streams because of that. And everyone knows a five second clip, but Right? Is there any 30 seconds, yeah, yeah. Before we move on to songs, is there anything on this list that jumps out to you, like, are you surprised to see anything? I know, for me, seeing Cardi B as the number four album that is very shocking, and K Pop Demon Hunters. I've not seen that movie. I've heard the one song Golden, but I didn't realize it was number three Album of the Year. That is, both those are shocking. I don't know Carleigh. I know you've seen the movie Carleigh. Is that shocking to see that up there that high?

Carleigh McFarlane  13:29  
It's shocking to not see it at two. Quite honestly, this was a movie that took the world by storm. I think it was marketed toward children initially, and it just blew up. I mean, Rumi, the main character. I think Spirit Halloween said that this was the first year a character other than Elsa has been like the most purchased costume, and Elsa's been around forever now, but, yeah, yeah, hugely popular. It was a fantastic movie. All the songs, incredible. I mean, they had real artists just performing this. And I would have, I would have expected to see it at number two, quite honestly.

Jack McFarlane  14:04  
What about you, Nick?Anything jump out in this list?

Nick Schlemmer  14:07  
I think the number two one stood out to me with Lady Gaga album. I, you know, I just think I hear Lady Gaga, and I think kind of not too far in the past, but, you know, five, six years ago, prime Lady Gaga. I haven't listened to a Lady Gaga song in quite a while. Maybe I need to hop back on the trend. She's obviously going in the right direction. Maybe it's time for me to start listening to her on Spotify again.

Jack McFarlane  14:32  
Okay, I got good recommendation. Lady Gaga, this old song. It's a hype song. It is fire, Love Game. Okay, that song, okay, will get you hype. It's a little inappropriate, but the beat, you know, it's like, oh my gosh, I love that song. So fire song, right there, you know? 

Carleigh McFarlane  14:49  
I think the reason that Lady Gaga's Mayhem album is up so high, even though it only came out a few months ago, was because she was featured on the newest season of Wednesday, and that brought a lot of people to her album.

Jack McFarlane  15:02  
Yes, honestly, I haven't seen season two of Wednesday, so I didn't know that. I know Abracadabra is a huge song off that album. And I like that song too. I think it's, it's, it's very unique. That's, that's also why she gets a lot of streams. She has a lot of unique, unique stuff. It's not like, it's not like one artist, Taylor Swift, who all her songs are the same about the same thing. So speaking of songs, guys, I think that's a great, great, great time to move on. Let's talk about songs. So we've got the five most streamed songs in the world according to Spotify. No Taylor Swift in the top five.

Nick Schlemmer  15:35  
Yes, no Taylor Swift.

Jack McFarlane  15:37  
First song shocked me. That's Alex Warren with Ordinary you know, I've heard it. I know it. I didn't realize 1.3 billion streams. That is very, very impressive, especially for someone who is fairly new in the scene, at least. You know, his album was up there. A lot of it thinks of this song, next song, Dad Bunny. Obviously, he's got the number one album. He's got the number two song, DTMF, at 1.1 billion streams. Then it's K Pop Demon Hunters with Huntrix. Am I saying that right, Carleigh? Huntrix?

Carleigh McFarlane  16:10  
Yep, it's Huntrix!

Jack McFarlane  16:11  
Look at me go, guys, look at me. Go. It's only gonna get harder. Trust me with. Number 2 is Golden, that song's been everywhere. Time for another Bad Bunny song, like Nick I don't speak Spanish. I'm gonna try my best with almost a billion streams. It's BAILE INoLVIDABLE. 

Nick Schlemmer  16:29  
That's perfect. 

Jack McFarlane  16:32  
I think I did pretty good there. I think I did pretty good there. And then at number five is from W Sound 05. This is another Spanish song, so please excuse me for one more time. La Plena, I believe how you say it, and that has 800 million streams. So we've seen over the fun part of doing the show of years, we kind of see the trends. The first time we did this Bad Bunny had one song on it. The next time there was two Bad Bunny songs, then there was last year, like four Spanish songs. And we used to do top 10, we're doing top five this year. Now, three of the top five are Spanish. So you can see the huge rise in popularity, especially in America, with Spanish speaking artists, which I think is interesting. So let's, let's, let's start with you, Carleigh, what was your either favorite or most stream song from this year?

Carleigh McFarlane  17:21  
You know, I'm always excited to see Spotify wrapped to come out, and I bet we're just a week or two away. So I don't know how accurate mine's going to be, because I feel like I will go through months of just listening to a song I like on repeat. So it's really hard to tell what's going to take the cake for most dreamed, but a song for me that I really have been pounding since even the summer is Von Dutch by Charlie XCX, featuring Addison Rae, that is probably one of the, one of her more fun ones off of the brat album, which got a lot of traction last year, and it saw more of a resurgence when she released a deluxe version with more featured artists earlier in the year.

Jack McFarlane  17:57  
What about you Nick? What jumps out to you, is as you if you had to guess, because you both use Spotify, is that? Is that correct? 

Nick Schlemmer  18:03  
Yep. 

Jack McFarlane  18:04  
So they have not got there wrapped yet, so it could change. I use Apple Music so I do know what my motion song is, but so what is your best guess?

Nick Schlemmer  18:13  
Nick best guess is probably Morgan Wallens Miami remix, the remix to his song Miami, with Lil Wayne and Rick Ross featured in it.

Jack McFarlane  18:22  
I mean, I'll need to listen. I haven't heard that one. I didn't know that

Nick Schlemmer  18:26  
I did a remix. Yeah,

Jack McFarlane  18:30  
my favorite Teletubbies. Rick Ross, only real ones who understand that joke. So, yeah, that's fantastic.

Carleigh McFarlane  18:37  
If you don't, you have to go look up the SNL Teletubbies Rick Ross skit.

Jack McFarlane  18:47  
Rick Ross! So for me, this song, most I can think of, I've been listening all year listen. It probably came out, and I'd have to look up around February. So it's a song that's been out for a long time. It was very popular on Tiktok I believe, and that's Timeless by The Weekend, featuring Playboy Cardi. There's something about the beat switches in it. I was just listening to it 30 minutes ago. Every time it comes on, I can't skip it. It's unskippable, and it was by far my most played song so and maybe my favorite song of the year. There's a lot that's kind of harder to say. I feel like favorite compared to most stream so Yeah, time that's two different timeless took the cake. So let's move on. Last music category that's going to be artists. And Nick, you're going to take us through artists. These are more of the usual suspects, I should say. So, take us through it.

Nick Schlemmer  19:47  
So top five artists worldwide. And you know, if I just went up and asked somebody, I bet they could guess the number one within three guesses, Jack, I bet would you. Would you think you would guess this if you didn't see this list already?

Jack McFarlane  20:03  
I don't know if three guesses. Maybe there's a possibility within five guesses, I think I could, yeah.

Nick Schlemmer  20:10  
Well, number one being Bruno Mars, with 150 million listeners monthly, that is substantial, and he's in the lead by quite a bit, because coming into number two with another, you know, big name like Jack mentioned with The Weekend 1125.8 million listeners. Number three was Lady Gaga, with 123 million listeners each month. Number four, Billie Eilish, number five, Coldplay and like, Jack mentioned, you know, somebody's not on this list again, that's usually on this list. I'm not gonna say her name.

Jack McFarlane  20:53  
I believe she was in the top 10. And if you're shocked to not hear Bad Bunny, he's also in the top 10. Like, we've like, we've like, you've noticed, like, we've said, we're only doing top five this year, but they are in the top 10, and there's a potential that they could both make it. I think they're number six and number seven respectively. No joke there. Please. No one ever make that joke again. Let's end the six seven joke. But with a month left in the year, they will probably crack four and five and replace Eilish and in Coldplay. If I had to guess so. Carleigh, we'll start with you favorite artists of the year or most-streamed artist.

Carleigh McFarlane  21:32  
It's tough, because, since I loved Pink Pantheress' album so much, I want to say her. But an artist that's really popped up for me, both my partner, Blake, and his roommate and our friend Jake, is Katseye. We have really been loving Katseye. There's a Netflix documentary out, and it's been out for a few months. And it was kind of like an elimination style survival show to create this girl group, this like global girl group. So like women from all over the world, we're applying to try and be in it. And it was really, a really entertaining show. I highly recommend watching it. It's kind of awful what they have to go through. But they've, they've been a band now for, I think, coming up on two years, and they're starting to get more Grammy nomination recognition and AMA recognition and such. They are really up and coming still.

Jack McFarlane  22:19  
Well, there you go. There you go. I remember you telling me about that when I was on Lincoln. So they it's an interesting like experiment, maybe, of doing it through a game show, but it seems to be working. So Nick, what? I think I could guess your snake just based on your favorite song and your favorite album. But let's get some confirmation here.

Nick Schlemmer  22:35  
What was I am continuing my trend of Morgan Wallen and for the year of 2025, I, like I said, I got to see him perform live for the first time, and I highly recommend if you have not seen his shows live. I know the tickets can be expensive, but it is 100% worth it. But mine's Morgan Wallen.

Jack McFarlane  22:55  
There you go. And for my artists, I wish this is someone you could see in person. You know, rest in peace a couple years ago. But Pop Smoke. I really started listening in 2020, and then for whatever reason, this year, I really got back into all of his music. And yeah, he's most streamed by far, whether that's, you know, from gym or driving, makes up 99% of my listening. So yeah, I need that. Need that hype, hype music, you know, so pop smoke. For me, it takes the cake.

Nick Schlemmer  23:27  
Now, Jack, I'm curious. You know, out of this list, out of the top five, who's your favorite in the top five?

Jack McFarlane  23:36  
Bruno Mars is good, and Lady Gaga has got a song I really like top 10 song, but I'd say The Weekend, I love The Weekend.

Nick Schlemmer  23:44  
That would be my choice. That would be my pick too, Carleigh? I want to say Carleigh's going to say Coldplay. Am I right? 

Jack McFarlane  23:50  
I'm gonna say Billy Eilish for Carleigh.

Carleigh McFarlane  23:52  
Actually, no. I mean, I've seen Coldplay. They're wonderful, but I'd probably go with Bruno Mars. 

Jack McFarlane  23:58  
He's good too. 

Carleigh McFarlane  23:59  
I can't remember the name of his album that 24k Magic was on, but that, yeah, I still find myself streaming it like that might creep its way into my top 100 a few songs. I really like that album.

Jack McFarlane  24:14  
That's a good album. I mean, Bruno Mars, so many, so many good songs, whether it's from that album, or, like, Locked Out of Heaven, or 777, I mean, there's so many good songs he has.

Carleigh McFarlane  24:27  
24k Magic is the name of the album, by the way. 

Jack McFarlane  24:30  
Is the name, okay? 

Carleigh McFarlane  24:31  
I just, I love that album still. I think it's timeless.

Jack McFarlane  24:34  
It is. I mean, most of his stuff is, it's so upbeat, and it's, it's different, you know, I think that's why he gets it's like Lady Gaga. Their songs are just different from even from each other and from any other artist. So, yeah, that Bruno Mars is fantastic, and hopefully he's out of debt. You know, that's another big story that we could have said this year with his debt.

Carleigh McFarlane  24:54  
Yeah, there's another headline.

Jack McFarlane  24:55  
Maybe in next year's show we could talk about it. Oh. Let's get out of music. We've had a lot of music. Let's move into movies. But as of right now, here are your top five movies. This is based on money. Number one, A Minecraft Movie. $423 million grossed in 2025, then we got Lilo and Stitch and number two, the live action. Number three would be the new Superman, which I know got a lot of hate and a lot of love. That one is, was a pretty divisive movie. Then Jurassic World Rebirth, and then Sinners, which is kind of interesting to see a horror movie that high up. That's not very common. Honestly, when you see it, it's usually Action, Adventure, and Comedy, you know, dominating the top spots. But Sinners coming up with with number five and and for number five, that was at about 280 million. So ranged from 280 to 423 million. Lot of money being made. Now I can start it off this time with my favorite movies. I picked two. Couldn't narrow it down to one, first one: Now You See Me Now You Don't; what a great movie. So many twists and turns, so fun. Highly recommended. I think it's still in theaters. And then number two would be Bad Guys 2. Amazing. Got to see it with my little nephew in the theater, so he was just on the edge of his seat, though he's two and a half years old, so he was just loving the cartoon style. It's hilarious. It's action packed. The music's fantastic. The animation is fantastic, so good. And then it's worth noting, Anaconda is a movie that I have been dying to see. It comes out in December, along with Zootopia 2. But I'm more excited for Anaconda that I have a feeling will be my favorite movie. But maybe it's horrible, I don't know. So as of right now, it's those two. Catch me next year, Anaconda might be number one. We'll see. What about you, Nick?

Nick Schlemmer  26:49  
So mine, you know, 2025, for me has been a year of watching movies from the past. You know, movies we watched growing up. So I've loved watching all like our older animation movies. So my movie that I'm picking actually hasn't come out yet, and it doesn't come out until December 19, but the new Avatar Fire and Ash movie that will be coming out, I'm just pre calling it. I've loved the last two, I think in the last episode, or in the last year in review, that was one of my choices for top movies, and that's going to be my pick for this year. And like Jack said, with the Zootopia 2 coming out, that's one I'm looking forward to as well.

Jack McFarlane  27:29  
So what about you, Carleigh? Did a movie, or a couple movies stick out to you?

Carleigh McFarlane  27:33  
See, there were two that I really loved. One of them made it on the top five. I was a big fan of Sinners. I went and saw that one in theaters. It was fantastic. Went home, bought it on Prime. It was great to watch around Halloween. Michael B Jordan did a fantastic job. Hailee Steinfeld  as well. I mean, it was really entertaining, and the music was great. I'm not typically a big fan of horror movies, but if you haven't seen it, highly recommend. And another one for me we kind of talked about earlier was Kpop Demon Hunters. I like kpop. And I kind of looked at the movie in the summer and was like, this is a kid's movie. You know, it's gonna be hit or miss. I watched it. I loved it. I made everybody around me watch it. I had our dad watching it. I had Blake watching it. All my friends watched it. They re-released it in theaters because it was a Netflix original. It got so popular, then a few months ago, they put it out at some Marcus Theaters, so we went and saw it again. It was... I really loved it. It was fantastic. I loved it. I could not recommend that movie more, especially if you're into animated films like it really is worth a try.

Carleigh McFarlane  28:19  
Okay, well, you know, that's fantastic, but you have a movie like that. It sounds like it's an all-timer for you. If you've seen it that many times already, absolutely, that's awesome. So yeah, are you excited for any of these movies coming out still? I mean, like Nick said, There's Avatar, Anaconda, Zootopia, and I'm sure there's a couple of Christmas movies coming out. Like last year, Jack Black had a Christmas movie come out in late December. I'm sure there's a couple more. Are there any that you're looking forward to in the next month?

Jack McFarlane  28:25  
I mean, I think Avatar Fire and Ash is going to be a really important one to see. It seems like that whole franchise just has a lot of steam behind it, and that momentum is not slowing down, and CGI and the special effects just keep getting better. So I I'm quite excited to see how that turns out.

Jack McFarlane  29:23  
That's great. That's awesome. So lot of stuff, at least, for movies to watch rest of the year. If you guys haven't seen any of the movies we mentioned, go see them. They are all fantastic. And I would even, you know, going back to the list, real quick, Minecraft Movie, I would watch it. It's it's not a movie... You can't go in thinking, Oh, this is gonna be some critically acclaimed movie. If you just want a fun sit down and really just enjoy yourself, watch the Minecraft Movie. It's actually so funny. It's very chill, fun fact, I got to watch it in the theater that started the trend of everybody going crazy. So that trend started in Provo, Utah at our theater. So when we went it was like midnight with packed full of college students. There was a guy in a chicken mask on someone's shoulders, throwing soda, throwing popcorn. It was crazy. It was like a sporting event. They knew the chance. They knew the lines. They knew this. It was unbelievable. So just a fun, Goofy Movie. If no one has seen it yet. That's a good one watch so, but you know, that was kind of like a sporting environment. It's kind of how I equated that movie. So let's jump over to sports. That's my crappy transition in our category. So Nick, you're going to take us away. Who were the big winners in the major sports in America this year?

Nick Schlemmer  30:40  
So starting off hot with the MLB, Los Angeles Dodgers, bringing it home again. You know, I know me and Jack. They're not our favorites by any means. Carleigh as well. I don't think they're her favorite either. But solid team always perform well, and probably will continue to do that into the future in 2026, 2027. In the NFL, the Eagles brought home the trophy. The Philadelphia Eagles did. In college football, Jack's team, Ohio State Buckeyes brought it home. I know Jack loved that. 

Jack McFarlane  31:12  
Yeah, that was a fun one. 

Nick Schlemmer  31:14  
And for NCAA, college basketball, the Men's Florida Gators. Then, the Women's team, a great team to watch, I hope you guys got to see them play at least once, the UConn Huskies.

Jack McFarlane  31:25  
Yeah, you know, quick note on NCAA Men's, at least, I've got a brag to myself and to the viewers, because my bracket was the greatest bracket I've ever made. It was top million in the world. I had Florida winning it. You guys remember on this show, on March Madness, I talked about Florida, talked about Walter Clayton Jr. They went on to win it, and then he got drafted by the Utah Jazz. I went and saw first game of the year. Got to see him scores first points in the NBA. So just had to interject, brag on myself. I was very excited about it. 

Nick Schlemmer  31:59  
It's a great full circle moment.

Jack McFarlane  32:02  
Full circle there on the on the podcast. And then, you know, I kind of cut Nick off. The NHL champion was the Florida Panthers. But let's jump into your favorite moments from the year. So, Nick, do you want to go first? What's your favorite? It could be watching it in person, watching it on TV. Favorite sports moment?

Nick Schlemmer  32:19  
You know, going to University of Nebraska-Lincoln, I love going to football games. I always will. I'm a forever fan now. So it would be I only got to go to one home game this year, and I got to watch them score 59 points and almost shut out Houston Christian. They scored once; they got seven points. I was very sad whenever they were able to get into the end zone. But that one like it has been a long time since Nebraska has put up numbers like this, and they did that multiple times with Akron and Houston Christian. So that was just amazing to see. That was my that was my top moment. I was just a true Nebraska fan.

Jack McFarlane  32:57  
Well, there you go. You know, it sucks. They got in the end zone and got those seven points, because 59 I mean, 59 to seven is still a great game, even against Houston Christian. I mean, that's a division one school. I'm with you Nick, you know, not with Nebraska, as you can see, as you guys know, I've got on my College Game Day shirt. I love going to the Utah football games. I didn't miss a single home game this year, and every home game except Texas Tech has been a blowout, just a thrashing. We beat Colorado like 55 to seven. We beat Cincinnati, 54 to 17. So going into our last game, K State wasn't thinking much of it. We were favored by 18 points, number 12 team in the nation. Seven minutes to go, we find ourselves down by 12 points, and they have 470 yards of rushing offense. So I'm thinking, Oh, this sucks. This is a horrible way to end the year, horrible way I'll never see another game as a student. I'm moving away from Utah, so I might, who knows, the next time I'll see a game in right cycle stadium, and then Utah puts on the best comeback I've ever seen in person, most fun game I've ever seen in person, greatest I'm still in shock at what happened. We had a pick, 200 yards on a two point conversion, then we got a touchdown with a contested catch in the end zone, then a 60 yard run with a minute left to set up a touchdown then an interception to win it. The whole place was rocking. It registered as an earthquake for the second home game in a row. Unbelievable. It takes my breath away. Takes my breath away. That was by far my favorite moment. You know, shout out, Devin Dampier. Shout out Byrd Flicklin, the freshmen, and I just got to say, Nick, if you want to see a team put up 50 points, we've done that three weeks in a row, four weeks in a row. So tune inand Go Utes, baby.

Nick Schlemmer  34:49  
I'm just curious if Nebraska, great fans, can we produce, you know, get it to queue up on the earthquake sensor.

Jack McFarlane  34:58  
I think, I think you could. Your stadium is like double the size of Utah's. I think you could. The only thing you need is a better team, you're just not good enough yet. Maybe, maybe one year, I don't know. Were you ranked? 25th?

Carleigh McFarlane  35:21  
We were andked for one week.

Jack McFarlane  35:24  
I doubt Nebraska has a seismograph, you know, in Lincoln, because I've been to that stadium. Obviously, I've seen it. It does get loud. So just have to give you guys some crap. You know, I used to go there. So go Utes, baby. darling Carleigh, take us away and save us from arguing!

Carleigh McFarlane  35:41  
All right. Well, I've got two, and we have to start with the Huskers, Go Big Red! I think a big moment we're missing here is the unbelievably dominant performance of our volleyball girls. They have destroyed the season so far. I mean, it's just sweep after sweep. No other team can come close to us.

Jack McFarlane  36:00  
Hey, Utah won one set!

Carleigh McFarlane  36:03  
And then they lost the match.

Jack McFarlane  36:04  
Yeah, then we lost the next two.

Carleigh McFarlane  36:05  
It has just been really great watching our girls. I mean, Andi Jackson, Bergen Riley, Harper Murray, all of them. They are just fantastic players. And it's going to be sad to see some of them go into the draft, which I believe happened yesterday. They'll go on and have great professional careers. I mean, women's professional volleyball is definitely a developing sport, but I'm excited to see how we perform in the postseason. It's not something that's gone great for the Huskers in the last few years. I mean, a sweep in the championship two years ago against Texas was probably the least ideal situation we could have; but with how our season's going so far, I'm looking forward to that.

Carleigh McFarlane  36:29  
They are still best in the nation. Yes, I don't think anyone can argue here. You guys have the best team in the nation when it comes to volleyball. 

Carleigh McFarlane  36:49  
Then in professional sports, I have to throw it to Formula 1. So the Drivers Championship has not been decided yet. It's we've got two more races, and a lot can happen two races, because seven races ago, Max Verstappen was out of contention, down by 104 points, and now he's tied for second place, with a gap to first at 24 points. It is insane. This is probably the craziest comeback in Formula 1 history. I mean, if any driver is going to do it, it's going to be Max, but it has been a mind boggling watching him fight his way up to these wins, and he's not even starting all of these races on pole. I mean, in Brazil, I think he started in 19th and got back up to second place. Like, if he can pull out and win this fifth championship in a row, it will probably be his most well deserved championship.

Jack McFarlane  37:43  
And he is your favorite driver, correct?

Carleigh McFarlane  37:45  
He is my favorite driver, yes!

Jack McFarlane  37:45  
That's what I thought. Just so the people know, that's her guy! you know, du du du du Max Verstappen. I'm not gonna sing. 

Carleigh McFarlane  37:56  
So keep your eyes peeled. There are two races left. A lot can happen. So Lando Norris is the driver in first, then Oscar Piastri And Max Verstappen are tied for second. They have the same amount of points in the standings.

Jack McFarlane  38:10  
So there you go. A lot, a lot of good sports. I mean, overall, sports were fantastic this year, and they will continue to be with the rivalry week is this week for college football. We are all in a huge fantasy football league. We've got, you know, the Super Bowl in February, NHL has started back up. Just so good, so good for sports this year. I think that was, if I had to pick a category that was the best music, movie, sports, sports, for sure this year. 

Nick Schlemmer  38:37  
And I got one more good thing for Carleigh. The NCAA Division 1 Volleyball Final Four, It's in Kansas City, not too far.

Jack McFarlane  38:47  
Are you guys going?

Carleigh McFarlane  38:48  
Oh, we're going! 

Jack McFarlane  38:50  
Okay, have fun. Have fun. You know, that's be expensive. It'd be worth it, though. So go, but make sure you pick a match that they're gonna win. Hopefully both, hopefully both. It's kind of going to be a home game. You know, that's not probably be a home game. It's like that, that Nebraska-Cincinatti game they played at Arrowhead is basically a home game. So, yeah, all right. So just like we started the show with a new category of the top news from the year, we're going to end it with a new category, with the top businesses from this year. And you might be thinking, that's kind of hard to rank. It's very subjective. Well, Time Magazine went ahead and set up kind of a test, not really a survey, but set up their own formula for what with, you know, What business did the best and things that they took into account, employee satisfaction, sustainability, revenue and industry, okay, they came up with a score to 100 Nick give us the top five according to Time Magazine. And what was their score?

Nick Schlemmer  39:52  
Yep, top five. Number one being Nvidia Corporation, a score of 97.62 there. High on that scale. So I'm curious to see what all that looks like. How are they with their, you know, employees and what their culture is that's very would be very interesting to see number two, right behind them, close second, Microsoft, another huge tech company, 95.9 number three, JP Morgan Chase, 95 it scored 95 Alphabet the score of 94 and Amazon with the score of 94 so all statistically speaking, seems like very great companies in all of those factors that they took into account that Jack mentioned to be an employee at and to work for, yeah.

Jack McFarlane  40:39  
So all major companies. For those that don't recognize Alphabet, I also didn't at first. You do know Alphabet. It is Google's parent company. They, I think, are a parent company for other things. This is how it is described. I've got the official definition here. Alphabet Inc is an American multinational technology conglomerate and holding company for Google. It was formed in 2015 so it's what Google pushes all of their things through. Okay, so think of alphabet as Google is the best way I can describe it. Yeah. So scored really well. Fun fact for you, Nick, you were wondering Nvidia, they scored 53rd overall in employee satisfaction. Okay, Microsoft was number one, alphabet was number two, Amazon was number three when it comes to employee satisfaction. I don't know Amazon, I do stuff, so that's interesting, but it takes into account everybody. So Jeff Bezos was probably very happy this year, so his score bumps him up. But for our favorites, we're going to give you kind of our favorite products from the year and the company that went along with it. I'll start it off. Mine is going to Google alphabet, whatever you want to say, and that is for Google Gemini. I can't remember life without Google, Gemini, it's bad. I use AI for everything every day, whether it's, you know, making a shopping list and planning out meals or helping with research or writing or editing anything, if you have any questions, literally about anything, don't go to Google. Go to AI. Go to Gemini. Go to chatGPT, go to something. AI is the best tool. I've used it every single day, and that so that, for me, is my favorite company and product of the year. Nick, what is yours?

Nick Schlemmer  42:30  
You know, very close second for me would be exactly what Jack said. I have started utilizing AI in all the ways that Jack mentioned. Because, you know, most times you just ask it a normal question, nothing too, you know, thought out or anything like that. But like Jack said, you can have it make up a business plan for you in a matter of a minute or less. You know, it's, I'm just excited to see what happens next for AI, but my company was the new Meta Ray-Bans and with the AI features that they can put into that. Now, I haven't gotten my hands on them yet. I would love to, and I know Jack's used them and said a lot of good things about them, but that that would be my standout for this year.

Jack McFarlane  43:14  
Yeah, I've used them at like, best find stuff. They're they're like, Tony Stark glasses. It's like, hey, Meta or, hey Google, I can't remember the name it'd be. It's like an Alexa right in your glass. It's got the camera, got the speakers, and you're like, hey google, show me the walking path to the Empire State Building, and it'll show you where to walk. Like or play your music, or take your calls, whatever. Translationally cool, yeah, translations, they look sick. I would love to really, really get to play around with them. You can only do so much in in the store. Super cool, super cool. So Carleigh, end us off here. 2025 is wrapping up. You got the final word when it comes to your favorite stuff, what is it.

Carleigh McFarlane  43:54  
I've got the final word? Well, I have to say, you know, Gemini has been a great product. I just last week went into Best Buy, put on the Met a glasses, had a lot of fun, like taking some pictures around, around the little area in the store. You could take them. But my top product is another AI, generative AI software, and it's Claude by Anthropic. Claude has been in my daily use, both work and school and personal life. I am constantly prompting Claude. I think one of my favorite features that really differentiates it from other systems out there is its ability to create projects so you can segment the work that you're doing and upload videos, transcripts, PDFs and give it like a base of knowledge. It has a lot of storage. Now this is the paid version. I originally learned about it back in spring. I was in a class in my College of Journalism at UNL called AI and the CO JMC, where the professor and maybe 10 of us, it was very small class. We really got to play around and learn about a lot of the different AI agents and options out on the market. And Claude was just by far my favorite. They've even introduced certain coding capabilities recently. I love seeing the way that it's advancing. I just feel like it has a lot to offer in terms of teaching you skills that may have previously felt unattainable.

Jack McFarlane  45:12  
Yeah, fantastic. AI. I mean, it's been a topic of of our 12 shows this year. We've talked about it probably 10 or 11 times, you know, maybe March Madness. We didn't talk about it, but AI huge in 2025 my guess will be even bigger i.n 2026. 

Nick Schlemmer  45:27  
It's finding its way into everything.

Jack McFarlane  45:29  
 Yeah, exactly. I mean, use it. I'm serious. Like, if you guys aren't using AI, it's not just like, oh, fill out this expense report or tell me the definition of this. It's use it in everyday life, even if you know the answer, just make it a habit of using it, because it is unbelievable. You can do anything, anything with it and invest in a paid version. Carleigh's got the paid Claude. I have the paid Gemini. It's worth the money. Now. I get it for free for a year with students, actually, thanks to Carleigh for showing that offer to me, but I, after this year, I will continue to pay for it. It is unreal. So we're going to take a quick break come back with one more quote of the show, the last one of the year, our last minute of 2025, so we'll be right back.

Nick Schlemmer  46:22  
Alrighty guys, we are back with the quote of the show. Like Jack said the last one of 2025 all that means is 2026 is right around the corner. So more to come. So that's exciting. But for today's quote, you know, we talked about 2025 and we have a new year to come. It's right around the corner. So this quote was by an author named Melody Beattie, and she said, "The New Year stands before us like a chapter in a book waiting to be written." Very simple, very straight to the point. But I wanted to end it off with a quote like that, 2026 is right around the corner. It's a whole new book with blank pages to be written on.

Jack McFarlane  47:04  
Yeah, and a lot to come next year, lot of exciting stuff. Graduation for all three of us. Real world for all three of us. I'll be getting married. We'll all be moving. I mean, an unbelievable amount of stuff to come. The podcast is gonna be back next year and better than ever. Better than ever. Okay, it's the best, it's the best. It's my Trump impression. We're the best. We'll be on the podcast list next year. We're gonna pull up that most played podcasts. You're gonna see us right here. We're comin for it next year. So I think that's gonna be my final word of the year. I mean, what do you guys have to say to the people?

Carleigh McFarlane  47:42  
I mean, this has been a fantastic year. I took over as producer for the show, and it's been a whole lot of fun watching you guys create this content. It's really informative and it's really entertaining. So I appreciate getting to be a part of it. So thank you to both Jack and Nick for hosting a great show. Thank you to everybody who's listening, and thank you to H3 HR Advisors for giving me the opportunity to work on a project like this. Yeah.

Nick Schlemmer  48:05  
I mean, we are me and Jack, are beyond excited to have Carleigh helping us produce these shows. And you know, 2025 for me, has been a year of learning more about this show, what we can do with it, new ways to make it better and more creative. I'm excited for 2026 and thank you to everybody who's tuned in for this whole year. Can't wait to see what the what the future holds for the play by play podcast.

Jack McFarlane  48:32  
Yeah, exactly like Nick said, I just wanted to say, I noticed I didn't actually thank the listeners, you guys. I need to say, thank you. I mean, you mean the world to us, whether you've listened to five minutes or you've listened to every single episode. I mean, you're the reason we do it. We love you guys. Thank you so so much. Can't wait till next year. 

Nick Schlemmer  48:50  
Thank you everybody, and bye for now.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai