Son of a Boy Dad – "Steak Night Special" | Boy Dad #362 ft. WAR MODE, Dustin & Tommy

Date: December 23, 2025
Host: Barstool Sports
Guests: WAR MODE (Billy & Spud), Dustin, Tommy Smokes

Overview

This "Steak Night Special" marks the show’s inaugural Steak Night dinner, featuring a lively roundtable of hosts and friends, including Lil Sasquatch, Rone, Francis, Sass, and guests Billy and Spud from the WAR MODE podcast, golf buddy Dustin, and Tommy Smokes. The theme for the night is camaraderie, celebration, and a tongue-in-cheek attempt at masculine rites of passage. Over steaks, drinks, and side dishes, each participant brings a toast, a tale, a joke, and a riddle—delivered with heavy doses of Barstool-style roasting, offbeat stories, irreverent humor, and the occasional rapid swerve into the absurd.

Key Discussion Points & Highlights

The Setup: Steak Night Rituals [00:46–05:10]

• Rone explains that Steak Night will feature everyone offering "a toast, a tale, a joke, and a riddle."
• Guests are introduced, with playful banter and humblebrags (recent engagements, newborns, notorious golf games).
• Notable banter: Francis shares how earlier in the day he physically intervened to help an old man in a street altercation, only to discover the perpetrator was his own fan.
  • Francis (on the altercation): "The bad guy was also a fan of me. I was in a weird spot—you’re beating up people but also loving my Instagram." [02:00]

Steak Night Dress Code Chaos [07:48–09:47]

• The tuxedo dress code goes sideways: only Francis and Dustin actually show up in tuxes, others improvise or are caught off-guard.
  • Tommy: "Sass texted me about an hour ago and said, I think you're supposed to dress nice. Maybe a button down." [08:21]
• Discussion of tux sources (Suit Supply vs. Shein) leads to mockery of cheap online wares.

Childhoods, Family, and Theme Parks [14:04–16:42]

• Tommy recounts visiting Universal Studios with young cousins—praises the E.T. ride, laments the cost of FastPasses, and riffs on "FastPass frauds."
• Light social commentary emerges around Orlando’s poverty rate and the contrast between tourist-gloss and city reality.
• Okeechobee trivia: a running joke on odd facts and the deep Floridian swamps. [16:42]

Steakhouse Banter, Health, and Cheese Opinions [18:44–27:00]

• Order placed: wings, slab bacon, lobster mac and cheese, porterhouses for all.
• Toasts begin:
  • Rone's Toast (Jadakiss-style): "May our life be like Italian bread. Long, with a lot of dough in the middle...may your only ups and downs be between the sheets." [18:57]
  • Tommy’s heartfelt roast and tribute to the show's growth (with a cheeky, unfinished punchline): "Here's to glory. Here's to honor. If you can't come in—" [20:06]
• Nursing home shenanigans: boozing, boyfriend/girlfriend drama, and musings on elderly sexuality—a favorite Barstool recurring topic.

Food, Microbiomes, and Alternate Theories [26:39–49:40]

• Kimchi and blue cheese spark debate ("Are you into stinky cheeses or just all pungents are foul to you?").
• Spud shares that fermented foods are anti-cancerous, leading into a riff on gut health and random dietary theories.
• Billy launches into a book he read, positing that COVID-19 might be related to snake venom in Chinese water supplies, paralleling “long COVID” symptoms to snakebites:
  • Billy: "Would it make more sense if maybe they synthesized snake venom from the krait snake in China and the king cobra...then that got into the waters and then people started actually getting venom in them?" [45:47]
  • Group openly questions the theory’s logic, with Dustin deadpanning about his family recipes.

Golf Clubhouse Legends & Catfish [29:25–33:17]

• Dustin’s golf chops are outed (played for Notre Dame, roomed with Golden Tate). Nostalgia for old football and wild stories about catfishing and online personas.
• Francis and Dustin warmly reminisce on shared golf outings and their mutual trolling.

Haunted Hotels & Cultural Faux Pas [36:33–60:21]

• Stories about haunted hotels (Boston’s Parker Omni)—doors opening at night and ghostly experiences.
• Rone tells a humiliating Ethiopian wedding story: dressing in full traditional garb under bad advice, only to arrive and realize they’re the only ones not in Western attire. [58:22–60:21]

Political Mishaps – Tiananmen Square and Steve Bannon [39:40–64:43]

• Francis describes getting detained in Tiananmen Square after unfurling a "Saturdays Are For The Boys" flag; rooms were searched, and the seriousness of Chinese state surveillance hits.
• Later, Francis shares a mundane yet surreal encounter with Steve Bannon in a NYC fast-casual spot, moments before Bannon’s jail time (ordering Mediterranean food, unconcerned). [64:18]

Personal Habits and Life Oddities [50:53–54:00]

• A detailed breakdown of everyone's “nicotine journey” (patches, Lucy pouches, the science or myth of nicotine’s health benefits), and out-there medical claims.

Riddles & Jokes Lightning Round [71:23–81:43]

• Classic jokes (What's black, white, and red all over?—A newspaper), and more elaborate riddles.
• Tommy delivers a riddle: "It's 17th century England. One night, a king, a queen, and a sailor get on a boat...all die, but one survives—who is it?" (The 'knight.' A pun.)
• The group’s delivery and banter:
  • Tommy (proudly): “Watch back the tape...I said, yeah, 'One knight, a king, a queen, and a sailor.' It’s all in delivery.” [74:40]
• Several racy or purposely bad jokes delivered, often intentionally awkward or toeing the line of taste.

Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Rone, setting the theme:
  "As we always do with Steak Night, everyone will be telling a toast, a tail, a joke, and a riddle. Have you boys prepared?" [00:46]
• Francis, on tackling a street fight:
  "Felt like we were doing our part against racism. Together. But... the bad guy was also a fan of me." [02:01]
• Billy, serious-yet-absurd book take:
  "Would it make more sense if maybe they synthesized snake venom from the krait snake in China and the king cobra...then that got into the waters?" [45:47]
• Tommy, meta awareness:
  "Now that I see what this is, you should feel pathetic. Do nobody else in your life but me?" [05:50]
• Francis, after a riddle is solved: "There's a man who has a normal job...one night he goes to bed, makes a change, turns off the light, and 200 people die. What happened? —He works at a lighthouse. That's it. He's a lighthouse operator." [72:15–72:19]
• Rone, epic wedding tale punchline:
  "Not only did we wear the wrong clothes, but it was the wrong ethnic sect within Ethiopia." [60:20]
• On haunted hotels:
  "I don't believe in any haunting—but someone opened my door in the middle of the night...and I woke up screaming: 'who the f*** is there?'" [37:14]
• Billy, on unpleasant jokes:
  "What's Brown and sits up in the attic? — Diarrhea Van Prank." [76:46]

Timestamps for Major Segments

• [00:46 – 05:10]: Steak Night concept introduced, guests arrive; introductory banter
• [07:48 – 09:47]: Dress code chaos, tuxedo stories
• [14:04 – 16:42]: Family vacations, Universal Studios, Orlando poverty discussion
• [18:44 – 27:00]: Toasts, blue cheese, aging, nursing home lifestyles
• [26:39 – 49:40]: Alternate health/food theories, COVID-19 conspiracy, nicotine, bookworm boasts
• [29:25 – 33:17]: Golf stories, college tales, Golden Tate
• [36:33 – 37:46]: Haunted hotel experiences
• [39:40 – 41:17]: Tiananmen Square Barstool flag drama
• [58:22 – 60:21]: Wedding in Ethiopia: cultural clothing mix-up tale
• [71:23 – 81:43]: Riddles, jokes, “dangerous” jokes, show closes

Tone and Style

Unapologetically brash, casual, and sometimes chaotic, the Son of a Boy Dad Steak Night Special is equal parts dinner party, roast, locker room, and late-night sleepover. Banter flows freely, stories veer from the personal to the bizarre, and nothing is truly off-limits, though all is filtered through the playful, self-deprecating Barstool ethos. Even the deepest or filthiest jokes are delivered with a hint of self-parody—“I don’t think he knew he was punking us, but...”

Final Thoughts

This episode is a classic Barstool holiday event: rowdy, communal, sometimes poignant, and always ready to detour into conspiracy, trivia, nostalgia, and testosterone-laced absurdity. The "toast-tale-joke-riddle" format brings structure to the rampant chaos, with everyone getting roasted, praised, or gently mocked in turn. Whether dissecting the science of sous vide, musing on the problems of old age, riffing on conspiracy theories, or just failing at math riddles, the crew is at peak reckless charm.

Best for: Listeners who want to feel like they’re at a rowdy steak dinner with friends—lots of laughs, “did they really just say that?” moments, and surprisingly genuine group chemistry.