SPORTS MEDIA: FIVE WHO GET IT, FIVE WHO DON’T
SPORTS MEDIA: FIVE WHO GET IT, FIVE WHO DON’T
A weekly analysis of the best and worst in sports media from a multimedia content prince — thousands of columns, TV debates, radio shows, podcasts — who is vaccinated but not going anywhere near an N
THEY GET IT
Those Who Didn’t Stick To Sports — As church bells tolled in Minneapolis, near the courthouse where a killer cop was convicted, I thought of media professionals who broke free from traditional job descriptions and challenged systemic racism. Colin Kaepernick would kneel and LeBron James would tweet — and perspective quickly followed in the words of Michael Wilbon, Jerry Brewer, Stephen A. Smith, Maria Taylor, LZ Granderson and numerous sports journalists who used platforms to protest and educate. They were slammed as overly woke — at times, the commentary bordered on activism — but, in their own way, they contributed to the jury conviction of Derek Chauvin on all three counts. They can’t bring back Floyd. They won’t stop racism. But they’ve elevated an industry too consumed these days with the legal gambling craze, no-conscience traffic clicks and survivalist desperation. Said Wilbon, the ESPN commentator: ``I’m grateful to the men and women who’ve used their voices in the arena, in and around sports, to use their leverage. We talk about shining a light on something — I am relieved. This is the only just verdict, the only just outcome. I’m relieved, but I am not hopeful. Yet. Sorry.’’
Sam Amico, Outkick — Is The Athletic, the purported last-gasp savior of sportswriting, about to free-fall into a spiral of mass layoffs and dramatic strategy changes? While Outkick kingpin Clay Travis has much to gain from publishing the story, we have no reason to doubt the reporting of the reputable Amico, who quotes unidentified Athletic investors who say the pay site is ``on shaky ground’’ with ``subscriptions plummeting and renewal rates suffering.’’ From the start — and I was there in 2016, lunching repeatedly with founders Alex Mather and Adam Hansmann during San Francisco job discussions at the Four Seasons — The Athletic has underestimated the industry and overshot its wad, so to speak, forgoing my suggestion to hire a compact collection of well-known, high-traffic opinionists in markets with major pro and college sports. Instead, the duo blew megamillions — what happened to the $140 million in seed money? — while believing they could hire hundreds of analysts and beat writers for every conceivable league and team in a sports journalism takeover, with Mather infamously telling the New York Times in 2017, ``We will wait every local paper out and let them continuously bleed until we are the last ones standing. We will suck them dry of their best talent at every moment. We will make business extremely difficult for them.” Instead, The Athletic joined every other newspaper site and sports digital project — beyond ESPN — in a jungle where no one thrives and many won’t survive long-term. Mather misread the willingness of readers to spend $59 a year on subscriptions, which became a no-go for many during a pandemic that pummeled finances and lessened the priority of sports. Having never pursued advertising revenue, the site inevitably was going to bleed, despite the eager investments of Quicken Loans chairman/Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert and venture capitalists. Mather and Hansmann came from the Silicon Valley world and didn’t understand why the American sports empire and sports media coverage must be separated. For every powerful investigative story and timely scoop, The Athletic infuriates me with content (see below) straight out of a team’s public-relations department. Not that ESPN doesn’t have similar conflict-of-interest issues with leagues, but the sheer girth of coverage on its free and paid streaming sites — breaking news, live games, analysis, TV shows, documentaries — blows away The Athletic at the same price point. If, as Amico reports, Plan B is to downsize into a national-only site and dump most local content providers, Mather and Hansmann will have done more damage to sports journalism than good. Just think: hundreds of capable writers left on the street in a dried-up industry.
Joe Davis, Dodgers broadcaster — Vin who? OK, I’m not ridiculous enough to go there, but four years after assuming the most daunting assignment in the history of sportscasting — replacing the god of all play-by-play gods — Davis has settled into a comfortable, entertaining mode in which L.A. audiences somehow don’t yearn for the legendary Vin Scully. Considering few gave him a chance to succeed, it’s a staggering accomplishment for Davis, who now mixes fun, knowledgeable banter with partner Orel Hershiser and produced his best work during a gripping Dodgers-Padres series. He even tells stories, as Scully did, and those only will enrich through time. From his small-town Michigan upbringing to the way he was discovered in his mid-20s by ESPN — working a handful of games for the Montgomery Biscuits in Double-A ball — Davis has a charming tale that suggests impending greatness. Just 33, he’s positioned to be the next commanding sports voice of his generation. And he has reached this level by following the advice of Scully, who told the Los Angeles Times in 2017: ``My prayer for him, for anyone, is maybe the hardest thing — be yourself. For the 100 years he might be there, the big thing is to be yourself.” Davis won’t be there 100 years, but Dodgers fans have accepted him enough that 40 years is a possibility in the booth. Unless …
Joe Buck, ``Jeopardy!’’ host — Like Aaron Rodgers, Anderson Cooper, Katie Couric and half the free world, Buck has harbored a lifelong dream of hosting the game show. He’ll get his chance this summer, reports the New York Post. Given his entertainment chops and prominence in TV, the permanent gig might be his if he wants it. If so, Buck could remain in his primary roles as Fox’s lead NFL and Major League Baseball game-caller; as Rodgers recently pointed out in stumping for the job, ``They film 46 days a year. I worked about six months out of the year this last year. I worked 187 days this year in Green Bay, which gives me another 178 or 179 days to film 46 episodes.’’ An NFL quarterback couldn’t make the logistics work, but Buck could if he gave up some duties in what has been a monstrously elaborate Fox schedule. See what I’m thinking here? Davis inherits those duties and slowly is groomed by the network as the next Buck, as Buck becomes the next Alex Trebek. Remember, Buck has had vocal cord issues and shouldn’t be overdoing his workload in his 50s. If you think this is me being crazy, check back at a future date.
Marc Silverman, ESPN Chicago — My former radio partner returned to the WMVP studios last week for the first time in 370 days. To no one’s surprise, knowing his positive grasp of life, he has taken the lead in an ongoing battle against a form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Our uncommon talk-show pairing — he’s a passionate fan of Chicago sports; I’m a hard-core commentator who covers sports as an industry worth hundreds of billions — produced some of the station’s best ratings of the last two decades. The hope, Silverman told the Chicago Tribune, is that ``in five years, I’ll be `cured.’ ‘’ A lot of people in that city are rooting for Silvy, just as he’ll keep rooting for the Cubs … and torching them when they stage a painful fire sale this summer.
Dan Dakich, realist — This item is worthy of bonus coverage. If he must be a misogynist and woke-basher, at least Dakich remains loyal to his personal life code. He knows ESPN will be dumping him as a college basketball analyst after an unfortunate Twitter beef with a female professor, but he’s not whining or protesting. Actually, he doesn’t care. Paraphrasing gonzo author Hunter S. Thompson, who once worked for ESPN.com and was allowed to write what he wanted, Dakich told the Indianapolis Star: ``Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming `Wow! What a Ride!’ Continuing, he said, ``Stand up. Stand up and stand out. If you have no enemies, you never stood for ... I've got a ton of enemies and I love it.’’ He still has his afternoon show on an Indianapolis radio station … for now.
THEY DON’T GET IT
ESPN — So much for the perception — among fans, anyway — that insiders such as Adrian Wojnarowski and Adam Schefter are 24/7 gumshoe attack dogs, working and hyperventilating to make calls and break stories. Do you realize how many calls and texts come to them by design? Woodward and Bernstein, they are not. As industry people know, exclusives often are the result of wink-wink agreements between high-profile reporters and player agents, league/team executives and local beat-writing servants who pass along what they hear. ESPN blew its cover by voicing disappointment to a business partner, baseball analyst Alex Rodriguez, that he didn’t hand-deliver Wojnarowski a major scoop first reported by The Athletic: A-Rod and e-commerce titan Marc Lore have a tentative, $1.5-billion agreement to purchase the NBA’s Minnesota Timberwolves. After Rodriguez was informed of the network’s dismay before a ``Sunday Night Baseball’’ assignment, his representative sent a group e-mail to the A-Rod team, according to the New York Post: ``Hi guys — we should save something for ESPN (instead of giving it to The) Athletic. ESPN mentioned to AR they wish Woj had the story — obviously not our call but next round it should be.” So, moving forward, The Athletic, the Minnesota media and other outlets have no chance when Team A-Rod persists in, say, quickly funneling the story to Wojnarowski when the sale is finalized. I’ll be impressed if The Athletic’s Jon Krawczynski, who cracked the original story via his own sources, cuts through the Weasel Curtain and breaks more news on this topic. How petty of anyone at ESPN to whine through political channels instead of calling its stud NBA reporter with the truth: You got beat, Woj.
Shaquille O’Neal, TNT — If society is officiating inappropriate behavior in the 21st century, the rules should apply to all. What had been a heartwarming segment on ``Inside the NBA’’ — an interview with WNBA hopeful DiDi Richards, who returned to basketball after suffering temporary paralysis in a collision with a Baylor teammate — spilled into a senseless interlude starring O’Neal in his own ``Shaqtin’ a Fool’’ farce. When Richards’ mother, Ungeanetta, slipped behind her daughter to smile on camera, Shaq said, ``I’ve got a new website called, `Damn yo mama fine.’ ‘’ If this was uttered in an office by a baseball executive, he’d be fired on the spot … yet O’Neal is allowed to hit on Richards’ mother on live TV amid laughter and no repercussions. Consider it another double standard in an ex-jock world.
The Athletic — In its precarious state, the site cannot afford journalistic lapses. As reporters Katie Strang and Brittany Ghiroli expose new layers of sexual harassment sins in Major League Baseball — specifically, within the management ranks of the New York Mets — the culture of the Chicago Cubs continues to be ignored. Again, is the site protecting The Great Theo Epstein? Strang and Ghiroli have framed since-dismissed general manager Jared Porter as part of the Mets debacle, but his transgression took place while working for the Cubs in 2016, when he sent lewd photographs to a female reporter. If The Athletic insists on scrutinizing Mets executive Sandy Alderson, new owner Steve Cohen and former owners Fred and Jeff Wilpon, why not Epstein? Same goes for the Cleveland Indians — if the site is probing executive Chris Antonelli and owner Larry Dolan about harassment allegations targeting ex-pitching coach Mickey Callaway, who eventully became manager of the Mets, why bypass Epstein and Cubs owner Tom Ricketts? Is The Athletic intimidated by Epstein’s ample influence in baseball circles, where he could be headed to franchise ownership or the future commissionership? Is he being protected as the sacred cow who ended longstanding curses in Wrigleyville and Boston? I ask because Jon Greenberg, the site’s editor-in-chief and columnist in Chicago, recently wrote a lengthy piece about Epstein and his charity. If he was able to quote Epstein extensively, couldn’t he have asked about Porter and what Epstein knew about the missteps of a protege who’d followed him from Fenway Park to Wrigley Field? Why the selective investigations at The Athletic? And if a probe of the Cubs, past and present, found nothing more than one rogue employee five years ago, then report those findings. The Athletic does too much good work to leave itself half-ass exposed.
Tim Bontemps, ESPN — I’ve dealt with colleagues who were — how do I put this politely? — a little nutty. Every morning before our ESPN show taping, a Chicago Sun-Times news columnist, Neil Steinberg, would swing by the sports-office studio just to be annoying, which required the editor-in-chief to come by one day and lead him away. Then there was my radio producer, Cliff Saunders, who kept wanting to put an obscure baseball executive on our show — and would get upset when I said no, to the point he pulled a fire extinguisher off the hallway wall. Bontemps joins this select club after losing his cool with teammate Brian Windhorst on ESPN’s ``Hoop Collective’’ podcast. We all know Windhorst is a LeBron James honk from way back — their Akron days, actually. So when he continued to support James’ MVP candidacy, despite an ankle injury that has sidelined him for weeks, Bontemps should have shrugged it off as one man’s biased opinion. Instead, he grew very agitated, having recently polled more than 100 media members who favored Nikola Jokic because James and Joel Embiid have been injured. After Windhorst declined Bontemps’ suggestion to conduct the poll in the future, Bontemps snapped back, ``OK, well, then maybe you should actually listen to people because you’re being a jackass.’’ A global pandemic continues to rage. Racial tensions still run deep amid the Minneapolis guilty verdict. The homeless struggle to survive. And Bontemps is calling Windhorst ``a jackass’’ about an MVP poll. As I’ve always said, the media business is great. It’s some of the people in it who suck.
Gary Sheffield, slacker — Consider this a warning to media companies that assume athletes are essential to sports broadcasts. The former major-league slugger, whose time as a TNT studio analyst ended last year, admits now that he never followed baseball’s regular seasons and didn’t pay attention until his postseason duties kicked in. Seems Sheffield has hated the sport for a long time. ``I'll tell the secret now: I never watched the games during the season. I would get educated on it when I got there,’’ he told CBS Sports Radio. ``It's not something that I could watch … because I’d be a complainer. This is the first time I've ever said that out loud, but I'm just truly disappointed with what I watch." Meaning, he withheld his disgust for the game so he could draw a paycheck. That’s known as stealing money. Nice hire, Turner Sports.
Peyton Manning, booth-averse TV guy — In his latest project that does not involve ``Monday Night Football,’’ Manning will host the revived quiz show ``College Bowl’’ this summer on NBC. That’s great, but I’m confused. He’s willing to host the new show and his own ESPN series, ``Peyton’s Places,’’ while goofing off with Brad Paisley on numerous insurance commercials — but he keeps rejecting ESPN’s advances to join a MNF booth that craves his starpower and charisma. It can’t be money — DIsney engaged CBS in a bidding war for Tony Romo that resulted in a $180 million deal for an ex-quarterback never on Manning’s level. It can’t be workload — he merrily has taken on countless TV ventures when an MNF commitment would be once a week in the fall and early winter, with a few days of at-home preparation. So what’s the holdup? Disney/ESPN, as a new member of the NFL’s premium broadcasting club, was awarded future Super Bowls for the first time. Would that interest Manning? Probably not. Yes, yes. I know, I know. This is a Sixth Who Doesn’t Get It, but I just can’t help myself, like a bettor on a DraftKings app or Dave Portnoy looking for his next booty call.
Jay Mariotti, called ``the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ is the host of ``Unmuted,’’ a frequent podcast about sports and life (Apple, Spotify, etc.). He’s an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and radio host. As a Los Angeles resident, he gravitated by osmosis to movie projects. Compensation for this column is donated to the Chicago Sun-Times Charity Trust.