KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) -- They sit across a wide table from each other in a glass-walled conference room, the two men with graying hair trading barbs just as breezily as they trade praise.
''We're sort of an 'Odd Couple' kind of thing,'' Joe Spear muses during a break in the banter, scratching at his goatee. ''But we do think surprisingly alike.''
''Scary thought,'' replies Earl Santee, leaning back in his chair.
Over nearly three decades, the two men have built Kansas City-based Populous from an offshoot of design firm HOK into the pre-eminent sports architecture company in the country.