The Press Box - A Shocking Biden Poll, Bobby Knight Obits, and Weekend Audio

Episode Date: November 6, 2023

Bryan and David dissect the week's goings-on and a poll that could spell bad news for Joe Biden. Then they dive into the weekend audio, including Benny Hill as well as a college football coach's call-in radio show, and their thoughts on the NBA's new tournament (10:45). Then in the notebook dump, they weigh in on the Bobby Knight obits (26:30) And later, HBO has a message for its TV critics, one that folks really may not like. Plus, the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained-Pun Headline. Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker Senior Producer: Steve Ahlman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do if you got scammed? Would you suffer in silence, or would you do something about it? Well, I got scammed once, and this is the story of what I did. I'm Justin Sales, the host of the Wedding Scammer, a true crime podcast from The Ringer. And for seven episodes, we're hunting a comment. A guy with a lot of aliases, a guy who's ruined a lot of weddings. And with the help of some friends, I just might be able to catch him. Listen to The Wedding Scammer on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

David? Yes. We have a shock poll to use the term favored by British newspapers and Matt Drudge. New York Times and Sienna College report that Joe the Kobe Stopper Biden is now trailing Donald Trump in five swing states. Pretty gruesome numbers here for Biden. Michigan. We know any Democratic victory in a presidential campaign goes through Michigan. Biden trails by five points.

Ditto, Pennsylvania. Biden trails in this survey by four points. And only good news comes from Wisconsin where Biden has a narrow 47 to 45 percentage point lead over Donald Trump. What did you notice about the political media's reaction to this shock poll? I feel like somewhere in the background,

my old Kentucky home is playing. I can hear it ringing through the ether because the horse race is about to start, or I guess it's already started now, right? I mean, there is a, well, if you want to read, you know, the sort of most, like, cliched implications into all the media reactions. I'm sure there's some, you know, dread at the prospect of President Trump.

But also there's this real bloodlust, you know, this real thirst and hunger for, horse race coverage and for all the, you know, exciting kairons and bumpers that can spill forth from that. Almost a sense of relief, isn't it? Because we've gone three months, four months, maybe more without anything remotely horse-racey happening in this election? Sure.

I mean, from the assignment desk, it certainly does crystallize things, right? I mean, we can kind of stop paying attention to all the other Republican challengers, or at least stop treating them as legitimate potential forces. I mean, I guess all of their candidacies were sort of based on the, based on Trump somehow not being able to run. At least it did sort of dwindled to that point in all of their cases. But, you know, I mean, the organizing principle behind a lot of those campaigns, at least, least in recent months has been, you know, I can beat Biden and Trump can't. Trump has proven he can't beat Biden. Now this poll says, yes, Trump can beat Biden.

So at least hypothetically, according to this one shock poll, it's feasible. By the way, I had to open up the dredge report for the first time in probably a year to make sure that it still existed after you name checked it. Just a year? I think about once a year I say, wait a second, does the dred report still exist? And I go and I look at it like, oh, I'm just teleported back to 2004 or whatever. That was, you know, everybody's homepage. We got our shock polls back in the day.

It's funny that the Republican horse race never happened. Like one horse shot out of the gate and the other horses walked out and just sat down on the turf. I think you're giving the Trump horse too much credit. I think the Trump horse was already just hanging out like eating grass by the finish line. And the rest of the horses are just sort of like walking very slowly with no interest in actually rounding the turn. Yeah. They're like, is there a race? We're supposed to be running against that other horse over there?

Mm-hmm. Not just competing amongst ourselves. Yeah. They're like tripping one another, you know, and doing whatever nefarious things jockeys do. I can't remember where we left that horse race. I think it was Nikki Haley is surpassing Ron DeSantis in Iowa. But DeSantis just got the governor's endorsement,

which is unusual and significant, I guess. But the Democratic side, then people say, Okay, reporters said, okay, what if there's something over here? And we knew that in poll after poll, respondents would say, we're worried that Biden is too old to run again, too old to have another term. Which for a political reporter, that gives you a little bit of a peg to write about it. Then there was Dean Phillips, representative from Minnesota getting into the race. Okay.

Kind of a peg, you know, we're going to have a LBJ and 68 thing where there'll be some result early in the process and Biden says, uh-oh, I got to get out of here. I got to withdraw. They don't want me as a nominee. But now, I think this poll at least introduces into your copy the chance, however remote, that Biden won't be the nominee in 24, despite the lateness of the hour. I'm not saying that's going to happen. I kind of think that probably isn't going to happen. But if you're a political reporter doing horse race coverage, which is a lot of prognostication, right? Now you get to write the think piece that says, well, you know, is he going to look at these results and say, it's Gavin Newsom time, baby. It's Jay B.

I was going to say you left Gavin Newsom out of your count out of your, out of the Democratic campaign. He was out there, you know, just just brushing. If we're going to stick to them, equine metaphors. He was just brushing the white horse that he was hoping to ride in on in front of any camera that would take a picture hoping that someone would sound the horn and it didn't really

work. I mean, he made good show of himself or whatever, but I don't think anybody, nobody stopped to say, hey, maybe he should be our candidate. I don't know, I mean, listen, this is going to be the, this has long been, well, if this poll is now going to steer coverage for a while, I mean, the coverage up to this point, at least on the Biden side, has been driven by questions about his age.

And I guess, you know, by extension, his competence. It is, you know, if I were a political writer, I would probably be thinking in some galaxy brain way about, you know, how deep is the hole and how big could the comeback be, right? because we saw in the last campaign questions about Biden's mental felicity worked in his favor, I think, in large part. But could the whole be dug too deep, you know, could that be too ingrained into people's perception of him? And could that, obviously, you know, I don't know if it's going to affect people's opinions. It's going to make people switch candidates so much as it might just depress the vote.

And I think, you know, I mean, there was some really interesting. and borderline shocking numbers, you know, in that poll, a lot of, like, you know, minority voters were leaning towards Trump now that weren't before, which it just seems sort of implausible, but sure. And I think built into all of that is it just sort of shoulder shrug, you know, I mean, Biden is never going to be a candidate, like, you know, a. a mission candidate, you know, everybody get out of your bed, you know, leave your house, run out the door and vote for him sort of guy. That wasn't the plan for it, you know, four years ago.

And I guess the Biden campaign's hope is got to be that Trump animates people in the opposite direction, as well as in the positive direction. Also, it has to be said with the trials that he's in and everything else, Trump is a lot more present than our president to a lot of people. And that certainly, I think, affects the way a lot of people think about who they're going vote for. Absolutely. And you already saw it this weekend. Look, if the, if the concern is that Biden is too old, is it not up to another term, then as we've been saying on this podcast, there is one way to dispel those notions, put Biden in public, even more than he is already in public. You know,

more interviews, more out there, him demonstrating his ability to do the job, which is a time-honored political technique. I think if you write about the shock poll, the one data point, you need as a political reporter is unrest in the Democratic ranks. You can't just have the top line number. You need a prominent Democrat echoing those concerns. Well, David, you and I talked last week about how the dial-a-quote has been replaced by the quote tweet. Yes. Here comes David Axelrod, who we all know from helping get Barack Obama elected back in 2008, with a very, very quotable tweet. Only at Joe Biden can make this decision.

Axelrod tweets, and of course he's talking about whether Biden's going to run or not. If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party. What he needs to decide is whether that is wise, whether it's in his best interest or the countries. Problem solved. Yeah.

Now I got the top line number, and now I've got a Democratic-grateful, Andy, if you will, David Axelrod, echoing those concerns. Pieces written. Write me a kicker, quote a couple more tweets from concerned Democrats. Is Donna Brazil available? Let's get this baby filed. We got a horse race.

Coming up on today's pod, David, weekend audio takes us from the set of PTI to a college football coaches radio show. We ask when is the right time to criticize a college basketball coach after his death? And HBO has a message for TV critics from a phony Twitter account. All that much more on the press box.

A part of the ringer podcast network. Hello media consumers, Brian Curtis, David Shoemaker, and producer Steve Allman, who is sitting in for Erica here. David, let us do a little weekend audio. All right. To get this podcast started. I'm going to take you to do

Dateline Frankfurt, Germany, as a way to discuss the announcer generational pop culture divide. Rich Eisen of the NFL network was calling Chiefs Dolphins on Sunday morning. I guess there were some Madcap substitutions by the Chiefs.

And Eisen mentioned the Benny Hill show. Do you think his partner, Dan Orlovsky, knew what the Benny Hill show was. I know the answer to this, so I'll abstain. All right, Steve, the answer to the question is, Back here. Mike McDaniel, as you can see, has removed the shades. He came in with those shades.

Now he's just straight glasses. I guess that's what happens when the sun goes down. 20 minutes and no offense, no points. He's just up to look, rally cap. It's all business now, baby. What is the Benny Hill show, bud? Oh, it's something when you were not born, I guess. Dan O'Lonski, by the way, is 40 years old.

Yeah, he's in our demographic. I feel like you should know what the Benny Hill show is. Yeah. I guess the Benny Hill, it's a little bit self-selecting. I mean, some people have seen the Benny Hill show. Some people who maybe grew up without cable television, I'm extrapolating here. But maybe that was the, you know,

the only thing you could watch at a certain time of day. I certainly saw it on my television. But I feel like I saw it more in other shows making reference to the Benny Hill show, right? An episode of The Simpsons or something would have people running in and out of doors in a hallway with the music playing in the background, you know, with the madcap chase scene or whatever. You're talking about yakety sex? Yes. I think that's mostly what I know of the Benny Hill show. Yeah.

is the music and like a couple of minutes long glimpses at people in fast forward running around a park chasing each other and maybe somebody's pants falling down. Yeah. In the process, I want to bring Steve in here for further deep dive on this. Steve, do you, are you familiar with the Benny Hill show? Yes, I am. I am aware of that. And it's mainly what you what you mentioned before. I did the whole, you know, glimpses of it in pop culture and maybe the actual show once in a while. Yes, I recall somebody getting socked in the nose, and I think that's about it. Really a standby of British comedy. Wouldn't that be great if the Benny Hill show was actually just like a real thoughtful drama or something, and they just had those little bumpers on every other?

Like, we have a totally askew vision of what the Benny Hill show. I can't even say, by the way, I cannot say Benny Hill. clearly for fear that I'm going to say Benny Hinn, which was a totally different show that absorbed a lot of television time in our childhood. Was it a televangelist or just a healer? Was he? I'm not totally sure, but those are definitely two things you didn't necessarily want to see on television. No, those are both things that were on instead of the whatever, the full house rerun that you were hoping for. We'll see if Steve can clear the rights, but maybe we can play a little yakety sex in lieu of the,

normal theme song at the end of this podcast. Meantime, David, Dateline Clemson, South Carolina, where one of college football's most venerable forms was taking place. That is the coach's call-in

radio show. I kind of can't believe these are still happening. I can't either. In the era of social media. Somebody gets to call in and confront the highly paid coach of the football team. In this case, it was Clemson coach Dabo Swinney, whose tigers were four and four,

and a caller named Tyler from Spartanburg, South Carolina got in. Call was really long, and I mean really long, so I'm just going to give you a few choice bits here. As Tyler versus Dabo Swinney. I appreciate everything you said, Coach Swinney. It comes a whole lot like Tommy Balvin, and I'll tell you one thing, Tommy Ballon didn't make this. same amount of money. If you do, you make $11.5 million a year. So there's two things there for any fan of college football.

One is mention of less successful coach from the past. And then the second is the quoting the coach's salary. Yeah. Which never gets brought up when the coach is winning. Yeah. It's only when you start losing. Can you believe we're paying him this much money? By we, I mean some wealthy alum is paying him this much money.

Yeah, not we. It's not your tax dollars at work. Here's a little more from Tyler from Spartanburg. And a literary illusion, David, I think you might appreciate. I respect the fact that you're a man of faith. I'm curious, if you've ever read Proverbs 1618, which talks about pride coming for the fall. Oh, my God. You hear Dabo kind of grunting a few times during this call.

That was definitely one of them. Oh my goodness, what a call. I don't know if you've ever heard of this Bible verse. Lately, you and I have been enjoying coaches, excuse me, in post-game interviews, cutting a promo on a media member, whether that is Steve Smith or Lou Holtz. Here on his radio show, Dabo Swinney cut a promo on Tyler from Spartanburg. Yes. Plymouth a national championship for 35 years. We've won two in seven years.

and there's only two other teams that can say that. Georgia and Alabama, okay? Is this a bad year? Is this a, yeah, and it's my responsibility. Take 100% responsibility for it. But all this bull crap you're thinking, all these narratives you read, listen, man, you can have your opinion all you want,

and you can apply for the job, and good luck to you. You could apply for the job. Yeah. Another standby of the coach under fire. Here's a little bit more adabo. I'm sure you've never made any bad decisions. I'm sure you've lived a perfect life.

I'm sure you've led a bunch of people. I'm sure you do your job in front. So to answer your question, I started as the lowest paid coach in this freaking business. All right? And I'm where I am because I've worked my ass off every single day. And I ain't going to let some smart-ass kid get on this phone and create this stuff. Yes. What have you ever done, David Shoemaker?

It's a good question. We love to laugh at college football coaches when they bust out that performance heart that would have passed muster maybe at the Pascal High School drama club. But you know what? We've never said of a college football coach, even a successful one. You know, that guys are really subtle humorist. The whole goal of the job, is it not, is to be a big all ham. Yeah.

To choose scenery. Absolutely. Which helps you break through and get your message out to whoever needs to hear the message. I mean, we talked about it with these sideline interviews before, but you think Dabo Sweeney, now I'm not saying that that caller was fake, but do you think Dabo Sweeney was, like, you know, practiced the speech in the mirror a couple times before he got on the radio. He had to know something like this was coming, right? And this is part of the gig, like you said.

It's a great question because the speech he gave sounded really good. The case that it was not a plant is that those are things college football coaches say all the time. True. Stuff is top of mind for them. But as another piece of evidence, Clemson went out and upset Notre Dame on Saturday. Yeah. And that was something people needed to hear. It's true.

And if he'd practiced it, if he'd really taken the time to write it down, you probably could have gone back to another great text and said, you know, you say your prayers, you read your proverbs. Well, I got a verse for you. Anyway. Up next, Dateline, the set of pardon the interruption. Michael Wilbon was on the show with Philin host Frank Isola. And you'll never believe this.

Michael Wilbon, not a fan of the, NBA's in-season tournament. These aren't separate games. It's a game on the schedule. You're paying good money to see. Players are being paid to play these games. And now you're telling me, I'm going to assign something else. Speaking of our obsession with analytical junk.

So I'm going to assign something phony to it. Let the marketing people run my league. The marketing people are going to say to you, you know, go watch this game. We're going to assign it an extra value. so we can then give people orange slices and trophies at the end of it. A lot of entries on the bingo card filled up there now. Geez, Louise, I was not expecting. I've heard a lot of takes on the end season tournament,

a lot of not-so-positive ones. That was not one I was expecting. But didn't it remind you of just a kind of take that has disappeared from sports journalism over the last few years, which is the kind of crust. D columnist take that we grew up with? Oh, yeah. I mean, the nodded participation trophies, the swipe at analytics.

That just came out of left field. Yeah, no, it is a very, I mean, I guess it's become a little bit unfashionable to play the, you know, these guys are getting paid to do a job card in a lot of column writing and on, and television opining. but the in-season tournament is certainly given it, you know, giving us a good reason to bring it back, right? I mean, if you've been dying to make that case, this is a good one. Here's a smidge more of Wilbon on the end-season tourney.

Jordan was saying that anyway. He didn't need trophy and orange slices. He went in there and said, get the ice pack off you need because you're playing tonight and you're playing tonight and your plan. He didn't need a phony cup. He didn't need a theft from soccer. to satisfy all the under 40 soccer heads.

Love that we got soccer in there with the participation trophy and the analytics. I didn't know. Yeah, I had never heard it as like as it's about, heard that soccer take. Like we're just ripping off soccer because there's so many soccer fans now we're trying to appeal to. I think it's, that seems a little bit misdirected.

I say this with total sincerity, dude. I miss this kind of take. being a bigger part of the sports media universe. I think back to the days of old Deadspin where you had still the old guard of columnists writing for newspapers. And then you had the bratty Johnny Come Lately is that Old Deadspin going,

look at this moron with this opinion. Yeah. But I miss those opinions because I think sometimes those opinions are the necessary corrective to the media universe that we have developed, if that's the word, on sports Twitter? Go on?

Well, I just think sometimes you need somebody coming in strong just to yank things back the other way a little bit. Okay. We were all making fun of the courts Mm-hmm. Sure. At the beginning of the in-season tournament.

But there weren't that many takes in the universe we're like, this is a terrible idea. This is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And I'm not even saying that's right. I don't even think this is the stupidest thing the NBA's ever done. But I kind of like that because it writes the universe a little bit. It brings things into alignment. We can't get to the right answer unless we explore the polarities of possible responses here.

Yeah. I think I told you I missed this during the whole F1 boom, which may have come to an Man, I'm not sure where we are on F1 fandom among previous non-F-1 fans. Oh, God. But I just wanted somebody like this to come out and maybe I should have done it myself and just say, like, guys, this sport is incredibly boring. I'm sorry, one guy wins all the races. Sometimes he leads for every lap of the race.

This is boring. This is boring. It's okay to say it's boring. It's okay not to like this. You don't have to be, you don't have to follow everybody. else Pied Piper like an F1 fandom.

But nobody was available to say that at least that I heard. I miss these kind of takes. Yeah. Hey, Brian, if you want to write it,

feel free to apply for the job. Krusty old sports columnist of the ringer. There was a funny one where Michael Wilbon a couple years ago went on his show

and he called Lane Kiffin, who's the head coach now at Ole Miss, a clown. Mm-hmm. and college football Twitter just erupted. I mean, it was like, you are not following the sport. You don't understand how what a great job,

Lane Kiffin's done at Ole Miss. And then that weekend, I remember Lane did something funny with the sideline reporter before the Alabama game, like a little stunt, and then went out and just got destroyed by Alabama. Like, I'm not saying Michael Wilbon's right, but shouldn't this point be expressed somehow in the universe?

That's all I'm saying. Thanks too awful announcing for those clips. All right, David, coming up in 30 seconds, a basketball coach was complicated. He was controversial. When's the right time to say that? But first, let's do the overworked Twitter joke of the week where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious

that all of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time. Send your nominees to at the press box pod where they are always, always gratefully received. David, there was a Texas Tech TCU game last Thursday. Something amazing happened. A possum, or if you prefer an opossum,

appeared on the field in Lubbock before it was captured by tech officials. It was an overworked Twitter joke to write, wow, Connor Stallion's disguises are getting out of control. That's the guy that was flying from Michigan, allegedly. Thank you to Doug Newkirk, excuse me, and Zach Brooks for that one. If a Michigan alum in your life seems a little quieter than normal,

or perhaps a little more defiant than normal, congrats. You made the overwork Twitter joke of the week. All right, in the notebook dump, we got a note from nephew Kyle, who is David one of the most loyal episode-by-episode listeners of this podcast. Yes, he is. At least at the ringer. I always keep a little mental list of our ringer colleagues

who are listening to the show and the ones that aren't. Sadly, one list is a little longer than the other. I'm working on it. But nephew Kyle wanted us to weigh in on the Bobby Knight Obitz. Bobby Knight, of course, three-time national champion coach at Indiana. He was later at Texas Tech, the aforementioned Texas Tech. He died last week at the age of 83. Now, Bobby Knight is somebody, David, who has a mountain of success.

coaching college basketball. He's also got a mountain of stuff that you can bring up to talk about why Bobby Knight was not a good guy. What do you think the rule is? And related question, what should the rule be in terms of how soon is too soon to bring up the unsavory parts of Bobby Knight's legacy? How soon after he passes? Yes. That's tough.

I mean, listen, if there's a rule, it's do, don't speak all the dead, right? But, I mean, if you're actually engaging in journalism or, you know, obituary writing, whatever, I mean, I think you kind of have to do it immediately. You can try to take a measured view. I think, you know, to include all the information, but also to sort of take a panorama of, actually kind of engage with how the culture has felt with him at different points in time over the course of his life or career. I mean, I don't think it would be irresponsible

just to do a Bobby Knight hit piece if you felt convicted that that was the most accurate take on the man. But it does seem like there are layers to this, that layers to him as a person, and as a coach that, you know, you can address with some, if not tenderness and some sort of, you know, considered touch as you're writing it. I don't know. What do you think? I think what's interesting about the world we live in now is that the legacy considering takes place in tweets as much as it does in actual obituaries.

Yeah, that's a good point. So if you're doing the actual Bobby Knight obituary, and I bet if we just went and read every single one that was out there, they would deal with everything. And the only question would be, is this in the second paragraph, the third paragraph? Like, when do we get into stuff like Bobby Knight kicking his son on the sidelines of a game? That actually happened. You know, all the statements he made, the way he treated the press. We could go on and on here. But when it happens in tweets, that is a really, really strange manifestation of the kind of journalistic process.

you're describing. When I first saw the news, I think I saw it in the form of tweets from media organizations that were just like, Bobby Knight, legendary basketball coach has passed. I remember seeing one from Sports Illustrated where someone, and I don't know if they did this on their own or if this was a considered reaction, did just the news with the emoji thank you hands. I'm like Sports Illustrated, which published Frank DeFord on Bobby Knight a million years ago.

We were doing emoji thank you hands. Thank you. Bobby Knight. And then the rest of the day was more, I think, the kind of legendary coach using, you know, words like controversial or complicated. Yeah. And then really not even linking to anything. And then day two.

was where maybe late in day one was where you saw the kind of stories rev up a little bit that were more critical or at least more measured. And I don't know, maybe the lesson is just don't read Twitter after something like this happens because

not only is it not a great way to take stock of a person like this, but it's not even really trying to take stock of a person like this. Especially with just aggregating responses. I was drawn to to a couple of pieces. Jay Billis had a really interesting one. He worked through ESPN. Bob Knight

did commentary for ESPN for a long time. And he had a lot of just memories of Knight and was able to describe through personal experience. So I think some of these different parts of his character also had a lot of stories like Bob Knight just like to go have lunch at hole in the wall diners, even when they had a game to call on ESPN. And Billis is like calling the truck being like, Hey, he wants to sit down and have a full lunch right now. And I just don't know if we're going to actually be available to get to the game on time. I can't tell him. Like, he's not going to listen to me.

If I tell him, we got to go. Eam and Brendan also had a good piece comparing Bobby Knight to his dad, which really got to some interesting sort of depths there in terms of not only the behavior of someone like this, but why a lot of people love people like this. Yeah. Despite their behavior. Why they present this image of masculinity or, you know, fatherhood, either literal fatherhood or metaphorical fatherhood, I guess, in a case of a coach. That was interesting. And then I saw Jonathan Chate's piece on New York Magazine that was, this was the headline,

Bobby Knight was a misogynistic bully. The subhead was, I grew up hating the year. Indiana coach and I was right. Wow. You want something a little more straight to the point. Anyway, always fascinating to see how those obits roll out. I just found on Twitter a picture,

well, a video of him playing one on one with Dan Rather from a profile. There's some great just 80s video footage on Twitter and Bobby Knight. Yes. We need like a Twitter account. You know, we have like 80s news screens. It's just the local.

news, Kairons that are funny. We need like things famous people did with reporters who were doing a profile of them on them. Oh, yeah. Like you could do a whole category that's just we're walking down the street together talking.

To get us from one shot to it next. But then there's the stunt when like we played basketball. Didn't Obama do that for at least a couple of TV? Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Oh my God. There's also, there's also a video of him flipping out.

during a post game, a coaches show, which is very relevant to this episode. That's a really famous one too, with him like just yelling, damn it and storming off after trying to answer a question. Yeah, there's some good stuff. And by the way,

if you want just the guttural anti-Bob Knight post script, Charlie Pierce wrote it on Defector. There you go. Perfect writer. Perfect place to launch it. I was a sub, by the way. He was doing a press conference.

I think it was at the NCAA tournament where he decided he would grade all the reporters questions. So they would ask him something, and then he was sitting down there with a notepad and a pencil taking notes, being like C-minus to your question, because you're always grading me, so I'm going to grade you. Speaking of coaching performance art. All right, David, one more for you before we get out of here.

We always say in the world of media these days, critics of movies and TV shows don't have the same power they once did. But that doesn't mean they can't get under the skin of powerful people. There's a new story in Rolling Stone by Cheyenne Roundtree, talking about how Casey Blois, who is HBO's chairman and CEO, has been going at television critics. And the vehicle for this, David, was various Twitter aliases that were not Casey Blois' own.

Let me give you an example here. So Vultures Catherine Van Aeronkunk was tweeting about the show Perry Mason. I enjoyed some Perry Mason. I'm sad to see that guy canceled. Anyway, Van Aeronaut tweeted, Dear Prestige TV, please find some way to communicate male trauma

besides showing me a flashback to the hero's memories of trench warfare. According to Rolling Stone Blois, quote, sent Van Aeronog's tweet to Kathleen McCaffrey, HBO's senior vice president of drama programming. Quote, maybe a Twitter user should tweet that that's a pretty blithe response to what soldiers legitimately go through

on the battlefield he texted. Do you have a secret handle? Couldn't we say especially given that it's deed A to dismiss a soldier's experience like that seems pretty disrespectful? This must be answered. He added, quote, we just need a random to make the point and make her feel bad. Now, that tweet was never sent. But Cheyenne Roundtree and Rolling Stone did find some tweets that were said. there was one with Alan Sepinwall had pan the show The Nevers.

Mm-hmm. And a Twitter account of a person named Kelly Shepard replied to Sepin-Wall. Can I read you the bio of Kelly Shepard? Please. Mom, Texan, herbalist, aromatherapist, vegan. Kelly Shepard, do we know you from high school? No. Oh, she definitely lives in Austin.

Maybe Fort Worth. Maybe forward. I love how that must have been crafted just to be like I am an HBO. You know, just somebody like, there's something, there's something about that that gives you credibility with the critic of the HBO show. Absolutely. If you're not going to listen to an aromatherapist, who you're going to listen to. Same account went at the New York Times is James Panoazek. Anyway, there was also a whole bit of the story about getting into the deadline comments, which is a really funny thing to be.

taking issue with. It's funny to me because we've said a million times critics these days, it takes a miracle to be able to influence something like a television show, especially a big HBO show. I mean, doesn't going at critics just make it, make them and make their opinions bigger than if you just completely ignored it? Yeah. It does seem to sort of ambivalrys. But I guess to the point, it's a, as a boy said, it's a risk. It just pisses them off, right? Or just makes them either. Right.

It's not about no one's really going to notice the response except potentially the person who tweeted, you know, the reviewer who tweeted the original tweet. So stay with that for a second. If you got a tweet like that. Yeah. Especially like the one that wasn't saying, well, that's kind of a blithe response to on D-Day, say about the lives of American soldiers. Just would that put a thought in your head about how you tweet about the show and think about it?

Or would that just make you, would you just, you know, shake your head and be like, that's why I've been put on this earth to tweet things like that about HBO shows? I think that there is a, I think that there would probably be a certain tweet that would, that would register with me. That'd make me think twice about tweeting blithely about military service again. That's not the one. The one he pitched was not the right one. And maybe the one that there was one that, you know, got out there after it was workshopped at HBO a little bit.

But no, I mean, when you get something that seems not just like unnecessarily offended by whatever you tweeted, but like really specifically aggrieved in some direction, that generally just makes me chuckle and move on. You do get them sometimes and they just hit right where it counts. Yeah. their missile goes right into the Death Star ventilation shaft. Yes. And you're like, wow, that is exactly what I did. And I'm not proud of the fact that I did that. Like you've figured it out somehow.

No, I mean, the thing that everybody like us fears about Twitter is not taking, especially, I mean, but like us, I mean, people who are used to writing with like an editorial process or whatever is sort of firing something off without having considered it fully enough. Yes. And if that's what happens, and if someone points that out, that can really sting, right? Especially if they point out a way that you would not have foreseen to consider it further, right? But yeah, nothing hurts more than just like, you should have let that one simmer. And you're like, you're right, I should have. Anyway, boys would call this, boy, excuse me, would call this a very, very dumb idea.

And also said, I have progressed over the past couple of years to using DMs. I also want to add, if you're a media member and you don't like, like something here on this podcast. Please, and I am being serious, please reach out to David after this podcast. No.

Somolian journalism, David. John Walters points us to the word penned. As in wrote, someone penned a letter. One of these strangest... Pinned. Yeah.

Why in the world would anyone ever use the word penned, except for the fact that they read other journalists using penned? Steve Davis draws us to the only in journalism phrase much maligned. Oh, yeah. Especially when it applies to sports coach or player that is much maligned. I love that one.

Speaking of much maligned, it's time for David Shoemaker. Guess is the strained pun headline. Yeah. Last Monday's headline about a symphony concert for chickens was Beethoven's first symphony. And let me tell you something. every single press box listener. And these are the good, this is the good version of people that tweet at you

and tell you that you miss something. Yes. Every single one of them said, guys, the headline was easy. It was bach, bach, bach, bach. I tried to reply to everyone and you're like,

you're right. That's right. That is so good. We whiffed. You're smarter than us. That's why we love you. Today's headline comes from alert listener, David Reed. It's from the Metro UK newspaper, David.

Turns out that King Charles and you and I have something in common. King Charles is worried about artificial intelligence. Oh, good. That's, I thought you're going to tell me I had that hand gigantism disease. Charles made some remarks to that effect. I think that's all you need as you ponder what was Metro UK's strained pun headline. That's all I get. Artif, Charles

That's all you get. King AI AI Artificial What if we think about beloved musicals? The King and AI? The King and AI.

I didn't even have to sing Getting to Know You. Let me tell you, my patch will warmed up. Maybe next time. We've got to play the Biddy Hill theme first. He is David Shoemaker. I'm Pride Gerdas. Production Magic by Steve Allman.

Remember just the Monday press box until further notice, but Shoemaker and I will return next Monday with more lukewarm takes about the media. See you then, David. See you later, Brian.