William Scott Goldberg was born into a Reform Jewish family[11] in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on December 27, 1966,[2] the son of classical violinist Ethel and OB-GYN Jed Goldberg. He is of Russian-Jewish and Romanian-Jewish descent, with his Romanian-born great-grandfather having relocated to the U.S. from Bucharest through Ellis Island.[12] His father was a graduate of both Harvard and Johns Hopkins University. His parents later divorced, and his father died in late 2006.[13] His mother breeds flowers and created an award-winning hybrid orchid in 2000, which she named after Goldberg.[14] He has two brothers.[15] Goldberg had his Bar Mitzvah at a Reform synagogue, Temple Israel, in his hometown.[16] He attended Tulsa Edison High School.[17] He acquired a love for football early in his life and, due to his large stature, began working as a nightclub bouncer at the age of 16.[18]
