The Press Box - How Sports Ate TV. Plus: Journalism’s Triumphant Return!

Episode Date: May 19, 2025

Hello, media consumers! On this Press Box Monday edition, Bryan and David discuss Journalism, the official horse of The Press Box, winning the Preakness (1:00) before discussing the end of TNT’s era of broadcasting the NBA and what they’ll miss most about it (6:00). Then, they discuss the career of legendary WWE announcer Jim Ross after learning about his colon cancer diagnosis (18:00) before digging into some recently published data about TV ratings and the ways in which sports have completely consumed them (23:00). Plus, the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week, Media Piss Test, and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained-Pun Headline. Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Folks, it's Jay Kyle Mann from The Ringer, and as always, basketball is so freaking, freaking good. It's so good, in fact, that the Ringer's NBA draft show is finally back just in time for a ramp up to June. We've got you covered every week as we take an in-depth look at who's got next for the NBA's future. We'll talk the rising and falling stocks of the best and the brightest prospects in the 2025 NBA draft class. From Cooper Flag to Dylan Harper, the BJ Edgecom, and more. tap in with me on the Ringer NBA Draft Show every Wednesday and make sure that you follow, subscribe, and hit us with those five-star ratings.

David? Yes. What a weekend for those of us who love journalism. I wondered how you were going to phrase that. I'm glad he got that out of the way. Yes, it was a great one. That little son of a gun did it, didn't he? He did.

He won the preakness by half a length. Despite being bumped, or I guess this is the only in horse racing term, jostled by goal-oriented. Yeah. That was one of the most exciting television moments. I've had in a very long time, which probably says something about how the Cowboys and the Democrats have done recently.

But, man, I was genuinely out of my seat jumping up and down, hugging my kids. I was excited for journalism. Yeah, well, good reason. Journalism's had a rough go of it lately. journalism has. For more excitement, I want you to listen to the call from Larry Kalmus. Larry Kalmas is the horse racing announcer with NBC. Listen to how he rendered the end of the preakness.

His last line there, I love, a performance like you read about. Do we think that was pre-written by Mr. Kalmas before the race started? Oh, that's a good question. Yeah, maybe, maybe. It doesn't really matter. I mean, I only think as you get older, you realize that most of these things were pre-written to some extent. Yeah, hell, I'm staring at the press box script right now. Let's see where I'm going next year. I was enchanted that Larry Kalmas, so they published the audio or excuse me, the video of the announcer in the booth.

And I had never really watched a horse race announcer do his thing before, notably because no horse name journalism was running in a race I cared about. Yeah. But Larry Colmus is calling this race, David, using binoculars, using the monitor in front of him and then his eyes. Yeah. And whirling between the three. Mm-hmm. Mike Dorico was telling us the other day that, like, horse racing is the hardest sport

to call. Harder than hockey. That's the line here. Harder than hockey game. Wow. And somehow Larry Calmus rendered that perfectly and realized that journalist. that journalism had won by half a length. Here's my question for you.

Are you going to be redoing the new press box buttons? Yeah, I guess we have to. Press box, what is it? I mean, it was the year that journalism came in second. That's limited edition now. That's like what the t-shirt of the team that lost the Super Bowl that gets shipped overseas. Yeah. Well, I mean, they say journalism still came in second in the Kentucky Derby,

which is the one most people really point to. But there's nothing. nothing, I mean, the prequeness is nothing to shrug at. So we'll have to figure out the exact wording here. Journalism came in first. Yeah. Journalism finally got a W. I'm going to leave this to you.

Yeah, we'll figure it out. Other only in pregnus word that I really latched on to Saturday was cupola. The announcers love throwing it back to the cupola. And the cupola was where journalism and his trainer, Michael McCarthy and his jockey. Umberto Rospoli were accepting congratulations. And everyone was getting their jokes out. Maryland Governor West Moore, who's probably going to be a presidential candidate here in 2028, said, we are excited to say that here and now that journalism is alive and well.

Thank you, Governor Moore, for giving us an early favorite for our overworked Twitter joke of the week. Also cool was atop the aforementioned cupola. There's a weather vein. And atop this weather vein, there's a horse and a rider. And when a horse-like journalism wins the preakness, someone goes up on a cherry-picker and paints the colors of the silks on the horse on the weather vane, which was an awesomely analog sports tradition that I was not aware of until journalism brought it home on Saturday.

Yeah, horse racing has got probably more of those old analog traditions than just about any sport. And I want to stress, if Gosgers colors have been painted on the cupola, I would not have been interested. Yeah, you would not have even retained that information. I would not have retained that at all. Also might get a journalism sovereignty rematch at the Belmont in three weeks. Yeah, well, finally. We're going to wait for this trilogy. I bet we'll have some more jokes, possibly even from Pete Hegesith.

Pressbox listeners, please stay tuned. All right, David, coming up on the podcast, we are going to say farewell to the Turner Sports NBA era. What's the thing we'll miss most after the next Pacer series? Plus, how sports ate television. We talk about Joe Biden's recent diagnosis and the Bible for sports announcers. I have it, and I will read it to you. All that and much more on the press. Press box. A part of the ringer.

Podcast Network. Oh, media consumers, Brian Curtis. David Shoemaker and producer Bobby Wagner here. David, the Eastern Conference Finals kicks off on Wednesday. It's Nick's Pacers. And this is the moment when we get to wave a hanky and say farewell to Turner Sports. At least the part of Turner Sports that covers the NBA.

Because as we know, from several press box segments. Turner Sports lost a bidding war to both NBC and Amazon. So they will not have the NBA starting this fall. Turner Sports David has been showing NBA games since the 1989-90 season. TNT only became a channel in 1988. And if young David remembers, it was a place where Ted Turner dumped movies.

of course that he had bought from MGM. If you wanted to see Gone with the Wind on a Tuesday, TNT was the network for you. Inside the NBA started that first season and then two years later, Barclay decides to go to Turner instead of going to NBC. Yep. And away we go. So my first point here is, and I know you will remember this, in the 90s, before Hoops Hype, before the Ringer NBA show, before league pass, if you were a sicko NBA fan, the way you showed that was by watching NBA games on weeknights on Turner.

Oh, yeah. Instead of just the NBC game on the weekends. Yes, absolutely. I know people don't remember this. And it gets really old and tiresome to hear old people like us talk about it. But like, you know, those cable channels, you had to look for them. You know, if it wasn't, if you weren't into watching classic movies, you had to go, you know, pull today's paper out of the trash and open up the arts and leisure section

and go through the grid to remember what channel T&T was on. What, like, numerical channel you had to then program your television to go to. And by program, you mean flipping past all the other numbers. Yes. Because you often could not enter the number. but please continue. The significance of the NBC games, I think, is the flip side of that, which is just like, you just turned on your TV half the time on a Sunday,

and like, you know, John Stark's highlights were playing. You know, I mean, it was just, it was just right there in front of you. You hardly had to look because NBC was like Channel 2 or, you know, Channel 5. I'm going to the various places I've lived. Fox always seemed to be 4. No, ABC was 4. Anyway, but, yeah, it was, to watch those TNT games in the early days was, yeah,

as a badge of honor, badge of courage, secret handshake. Let's go with that one. I like where you ended up there. I was thinking about what's actually ending with the end of Turner's NBA coverage. I mean, we know we're going to have inside the NBA next year on ESPN. And the only question is,

will it be able to sail into the night the way it is on Turner? Because ESPN always seems very eager to get us to the, SVP Sports Center. Yeah. Which, by the way, credit to him is probably the second best postgame show on television behind inside the NBA. Oh, yeah. I love SEP show.

So, but inside the NBA, as we've said on here many times, part of the magic is that it has no end. Oh, yes. It just keeps going until seemingly everyone gets tired and Charles Barkley falls asleep on the set. So we may lose that. the production of Turner Basketball I've always found, or at least in recent years I've found, to be better than the production

of ESPN's NBA coverage. I like that theme music, going to commercials. I'm not going to ride my hobby horse around the corral one more time about ESPN playing Mr. Big Stuff and other oldies or showing us pictures

of the Knicks playing the Celtics in 1973 during a close game in the fourth quarter. I'm not going to ride that hobby horse. No, you're going to let that one go. I'm going to let that go. But Turner to me always just feels more in the game, locked in, especially in the playoffs. Reggie Miller has been a mainstay of Turner as a color analyst.

He's going to be going to NBC as their number one analyst. So we're not losing him. By the way, lots of complaints about Reggie. Yeah, I've noticed. Particularly among Knicks fans, perhaps. And just wait until the Easter conference finals and you will hear more. Yep. When everybody complains about Reggie Miller, I'm like, okay, I hear you, who would you rather have in that slot? Yeah, that's always the question. Give me the alternative. Who's

the NBA announcer who needs a bump? And what Stan Van in that slot? We're ready with D-Wade. We're all ready to go there to the number one team. Mm-hmm. Ion Eagle. It's been a mainstay of Turner Sports. He's going to Amazon, the aforementioned Stan van. He's going to Amazon. So here's the thing I settled on is the thing I am going to miss about Turner's NBA coverage. The four-year run in which Kevin Harlan was a number one announcer. That's the number one thing you're going to miss? Well, a lot of it is going to be preserved. Right.

We'll still have Eagle. We still have Reggie. We'll still have inside the NBA. Yes. Before, okay. Do you want me, do you want to do you want to do you want to do you want to do Kevin Harlan before I continue? Please continue. I want to hear your thoughts first.

No, I think what the point you're making is exactly right. It's that just that we're, we're eulogizing the end of an era less than we are like the loss of any specific thing. I think the vast, vast, vast majority of people would point it, you know, inside the NBA as the thing that we thought

we were losing and now we're not and now we're just sort of left holding the bag and having to feel I mean, this is, again, all the points that you made were correct. Their production is incredible. I think that the average fan who goes online to complain about Reggie Miller or whoever else probably doesn't have that big, strong of a take on the competing production values of the various NBA broadcasts in terms of just like in terms of just like what goes on in the control room.

Yeah, I think it's mostly just we thought we were losing inside the NBA and now we're not, but we're still sort of losing the comfort, the stability and again, the sort of end of an era of what that run came to mean. Yeah, and when you think of like network stuff, you think of sounds, theme songs, the colors of graphics. Yeah. There's a lot of comfort food. And as you say, a lot of stuff that you maybe don't even think about or tweet about. Yeah.

But you've been with so long, in this case, 35 years. Yeah. That it just is familiar. And we're a couple years away from somebody just tweeting out the Turner theme song like they do round ball rock all the time, being like, Dude, those were the days. Yep. Remember when we had the Turner Sports NBA theme song. So here's my take on Harlan or my case for why Kevin Harlan is the number one guy is the thing that we will miss.

I don't think that guy doing that job would have happened at any other network. Case in point, Iron Eagle is going to be the number one guy at Amazon. Yeah. And you and I have talked about what being a number one announcer is. Yes. It's money. It's big games. There aren't many number one jobs out in the world, so it has a certain Supreme Court justice feel to it.

Absolutely. And also a sense that you made it in your career. Harlan got that job when he was 61 years old. It's a guy who had been announcing NBA games since he was 21. He got his first job, and this is one of my favorite facts about him, when he was a senior at the University of Kansas. And the Kansas City Kings called him. him to tell him he was their new play-by-play announcer and left a message on the machine at his frat house. That's a real story about Kevin Harlan. That's incredible. The thing about him is

there aren't too many announcers whose sound is that big and that different that get number one jobs. True. I think of like Joe Tess on Monday Night Football, Gus Johnson still number one guy at Fox Sports, but it's a pretty short list. And if you go back and remember just how Harlan got the job, that too is interesting. 2018, there is a New York Post report

from Andrew Marshan that said Turner was ready to give the legendary announcer Marv Albert the heave Ho before his contract had expired. And Andrew in that story said that Turner's number one choice, or at least the way they were leaning, was Brian Anderson,

not Kevin Harlan, not Iron Eagle, Brian Anderson, which I found confusing and later learned that people who work for Turner Sports also found confusing. As it turned out, Marf hung in there all the way through 2021. He gets his big sendoff from Reggie Miller, if memory serves. And it's not until 2022, or at least the 2022 playoffs, Mavericks Warriors in the Western Conference Finals, that we see who Turner's.

number one guy was going to be. And it was Kevin Harlan. And I remember being like, oh, wow, they gave it to Harlan. That's kind of surprising. And I also have a memory from that year of talking to someone to Turner Sports and they said, you know what, we're doing things differently here the networks usually do. And we regard the number one job as kind of a year long thing, not an into perpetuity thing, which turned out never to come up again or at least never to come up.

up to my ears again. But that was kind of a weird way to get the number one job. But it was Harlan. And he held it down for four years. And you and I know being a number one announcer, it's about taste. It's about having an executive being willing to point at you. But at some point, you have to be able to do the job plausibly. And Kevin Harlan, please step in here if you disagree, did the job very well for four years.

Oh, I thought Kevin Harlan's fantastic. I think it's particularly fantastic on that NBA beat like it kind of at that exact moment in time I think that is that you know following Marv maybe one of the most difficult

follows in all of sports announcing Harlan had a little bit of that Marv in him enough to make you you know realize you were watching basketball but you know watching the NBA but he had his own style too and he brought a little bit more, man, I don't even know what the word he uses here.

Because everything sounds like every adjective you could apply to Marv in some just sort of halfway sarcastic way. But Kevin, I mean, he brought a little bit more intellect to it, a little bit more circumspection. You know, I mean, he was, he's a, he was a great segue out of the Marv era. And I don't mean that to diminish his contributions on their, you know, on their own at all. Just an interesting four-year period. Yeah. And like I said, I'm not sure it happens anywhere except Turner. sports. Speaking of announcers with big sounds, I'm sure you saw the news last Thursday that

Jim Ross has been diagnosed with colon cancer. It did, of course. You and I don't do a lot of prayers up on this podcast, but do you want to say a few words about Jim Ross and what he meant to professional wrestling? Jim Ross, maybe more so, maybe more undeservedly so than Marve Albert. Is this kind of, is the example of the announcer that becomes a meme at some point in life, just becomes a repository, becomes a soundboard? board. Now to be used in like Twitter highlights, which J.R. once told me when I was talking to him that he was kind of constantly aggrieved that he didn't get any residuals from that usage.

He should be. Yeah. Back in our day, back in the pre-social media days, they weren't, you know, meme soundboards. It was just people doing impressions, which, you know, I think still is the case for Jim Ross. but Jim Ross was separate from the well-known catchphrases, separate from the calls of crazy matches, like, or notable matches like The Undertaker versus McFoly,

hell in a cell match. He was an incredible just play-by-play announcer. One of these guys that, you know, he grew up, I mean, he didn't grow up in the business. He came up in the business. He started out sweeping floors

and driving wrestlers from town to town, picking people up at the airport, that kind of stuff. And then, you know, kind of got promoted eventually into the announcer's role, which he, where he just found his real gift. And, and,

and, but not coming up, coming up as a wrestling guy and not necessarily a journalism guy. It was, he's funny, you know, he never wanted to know the outcome of matches because he wanted to really express his,

you know, be in shock and disbelief at the big turns and this, you know, and also that raises the degree of difficulty to not have your, you know, cheat sheet of everything that's about to happen in front of you when you're calling a match.

But yeah, and he also worked backstage, you know, talent relations various times. He's done a lot of stuff. But I think really was just the voice of a generation. And, you know, in the WWF during his WWF tenure, really, like, had to, like, fight for that job. He got to take it away numerous times, you know, reputed supposedly because Vince McMahon just didn't like having a southern accent as the voice of the WWE. WWF. It was very regional for that company. But he was perfect for it, you know.

And he went on and obviously is a part of AEW now and does good work for them there too. I mean, I think more most more notably than that, though, was this sort of his sort of semi-retirement period, his last act in WWE where he was off TV, but would get brought back for like WrestleMania main events when like the when the undeniable, you know, wrestlers involved insisted that Jim Ross come back to call those matches. You know, I mean, he would come back to Carl the Undertaker versus Triple H or Sean Michaels or whatever because they would just be like, no, no, when this match appears on a DVD, which is a funny thing to think of, but like a DVD box set in 100 years, I want Jim Ross's voice on there. And, you know, I think that shows just how significant he is. Outside of wrestling, he's had just a string of heartbreak of hard times, probably, I mean,

a lot of health stuff, but most significantly is his wife, Jan, who I had the pleasure of knowing just a little bit, but who I love to death, died in a really tragic accident. And she was, like, riding her bike out by their home in Oklahoma. And I was struck by a car, I believe. Pardon me if I got some of the details wrong there. But, you know, that was, it's, you know, I don't mean to be, like, cloying or whatever. But, like, they were one of those couples that when you saw them together, you could tell that it was just, like, they were each other's everything.

And not in, like, an overly affectionate way. they just sort of completed each other in a very matter-of-fact way. And yeah, he's had a lot, he's had a tough go of it the past couple of decades. And, and yeah, this is just another one. So anyway, I hope that, I mean, we can, we can all hope for the best. His contributions to pro wrestling and to just broadcasting, really immeasurable. That's what I think. I mean, I get the nostalgic feels when I think of his voice of you and I sitting on our

couch in the Lower East Side watching wrestling. But I also think any fair discussion of the best play-by-play announcers of the 90s has to include Jim Ross. Yeah. It just does. Somebody sound who matched the action on the screen and exceeded it and took you places you never thought you could go. Yep.

That's him. Yeah, it's true. I mean, and just like, I mean, I don't know, we could probably put together a list of like the top 10 announcer catchphrases that have infiltrated pop culture. But I swear I hear like, by God, that's, you know, Nicole Yokic's music more than I hear just about any other announcer call be referenced in from the world of real, quote unquote, real sports. Was Simmons channeling Jim Ross and then like 10 million people channeling Simmons channeling Jim

Ross? Yeah. Very, very funny. All right, David, we got some news from the upfronts. I know you were monitoring the TV. up front this last week. I always do, yeah. I got two takeaways for you. Number one is sports has officially eaten television. Yeah. This isn't even a think piece. This is something people at the upfront were making jokes about. At NBC's upfront, Jimmy Fallon said, it's great to be at the NBA

front. I mean the NBC up front because NBC is going to replace Sunday night football when the season ends with Sunday night basketball. Matt Bellany in his puck newsletter notes this. Fox has slimmed all the way down to just four hours of scripted programming in the fall, including just two hours of non-animation scripted programming. And I was looking at the highest rated shows on Fox because maybe like you, I couldn't quite remember what was on Fox that was not football games or baseball games or other stuff I wanted to watch.

This is according to TV line. Number one, the OT. That's the post-game show for the NFL. Number two, highest-rated show on Fox 911 Lone Star, followed by the Mass Singer, Rescue Highsurf, the Floor, which is a Roblo game show, murder in a small town, which the site notes is broadcasts least-wise,

watch new non-CW drama. Non-CW drama. Where are they catching strays here? And then Hell's Kitchen, which is Gordon Ramsey's reality show, or one of Gordon Ramsey's reality shows. So it's not just that sports is edged out comedies and dramas.

It's that Fox is not really even trying for comedies and dramas anymore. No, no, no. Hell's Kitchen is sort of a reality. I mean, sort of a sports show, right? Yeah. And that's a way. It's definitely the one thing I'd watch that's on that list.

It's not a football game. All right. So that's takeaway number one. Takeaway number two is we've learned a little bit more, or at least had information confirmed, excuse me, about ESPN streaming app. John Iran reports this in Puck. The pricing is $29.99 per month or $35.99 per month for a bundle that includes Disney Plus and Hulu.

Streaming is coming sometime this fall. So I ask you, $30 a month, all a cart for ESPN. $360 a year, am I doing my math correctly? Who is the customer that wants that? Who's the customer that wants streaming ESPN? That wants just streaming ESPN in this form. So this is the new app. The flagship app, which we learned last week is going to be called ESPN, thank God,

not Versant or something like that. Yeah. That's going to have all of ESPN program. It's not ESPN Plus. It's going to have all the games, all, you know, Monday Night Football, Football National Championship,

all that cool stuff on ESPN. But who wants it as a streaming app as opposed to a broadcast television service? As opposed to part of a package like YouTube TV where you get other games on other networks. Yeah, I mean, it's just like anything in this space,

it's a little bit of a bet on the future about when people are going to be fully, you know, the cord, but I do think that there's, that ESPN has got to be one of the, one of the anchors it is keeping people on broadcast television, you know, cable TV, which, and I, in that I include, obviously, YouTube TV and slang and whatever else, you know, in the same category. Obviously, you can't walk away from that stuff if you're a sports completest. Um, but I think to have, I mean, and I, and now if you, if you subscribe to one of those, you can still get most of the ESPN stuff on your phone or

other mobile device. But so I, but I think, you know, I think the bundle is going to be a, is going to be a big, I'm sure, point of promotion.

3599 a month is not nothing, obviously. But it's, it's, you know, hopefully, I mean, I think it's going to be targeted at people who are just like,

you know, we're getting Disney. And they're like, wait, I want sports too. And you just sort of plunk down that credit card. but I think there's a lot of people

that watch sports on their phones watch sports on their mobile devices on their computers on whatever else it's just a matter of I mean I don't think that there's a I don't think that there is a clear answer to the question only because you can't leave behind all of broadcast TV

if you're like I said if you're a sports completist but I do think it goes to solving the problem where I think that most people would rather be cutting the court at some point now as much as they can. And maybe this really starts, eventually starts hurting the broadcast partners, you know,

really starts hurting the major networks that don't have their own streaming platforms. Bellany sounded the same note on Puck. He said, I had breakfast with one analyst who noted the long-awaited ESPN service is not expected to generate more than a couple million new subscribers

in the first few years. And most of them will likely be bundlers and cordevers, which is consistent with the current thinking in the TV business. people still paying for the cable bundle at this point are unlikely to be nudged out by the availability of a particular programming on streaming. It's a different audience and the challenge is to capture each demo where they are while gently nudging them toward the streamers and their direct relationship with the consumer. So as you say, it's a bet on the future.

And if you're ESPN, you'd much rather have people buying directly from you at some point than buying your stuff. through YouTube TV. Yes. Through some intermediary. But it is just interesting to me to think about. And I'm one that's absolutely, this is ESPN has to do this. This has been the single most important thing that's happened at the network in a decade, maybe, maybe longer. But for right now, I'm just interested in the sports fan who's like, ESPN, yes, that's great.

I don't need everything else or everything else will be an add on in addition to that. 30 bucks is a lot of money. Yeah, it is. Now, if you tack it on to Disney Plus, I tell Leonard's to, hey, five more dollars and I get ESPN. Okay. I can imagine some casual sports fan and things. Like, that's pretty fun. And I get so much great stuff on ESPN.

No. That will mostly satisfy me. But I do wonder when you have Chiefs bills, you're like, oh, do I get that game? I, listen, I'm a, I'm sure I will be one of the ESPN subscribers at some point. I'm currently, I pay Hulu a lot of money every month. I don't think we, I don't get over, I don't get hell of it. regular TV through them anymore. But my biggest thing now is that I'm on the Disney plus yearly plan where I give them a chunk of money every December for like 12 months. And so I can't like,

maybe, I'm sure there's some way that I haven't figured out. But every time I see one of those offers like, bundle these three things together, I try. And I'm like, no, I'm actually already locked in to this Disney thing that I can't figure out to extricate myself from, which is great. It's a good deal. I watch it nonstop. My kids watch a lot of Disney. Very important to have the Disney app. Oh my gosh. Especially if you want to watch, if you want your kids to watch something that like you can tolerate. You know, I think that's like the, if that wasn't the organizing thesis behind Pixar, it should have been. That was a brilliant accident otherwise. It's like, it's just like, can I watch TV? And if you're sitting in there on your laptop, you're like,

yes, but it has to be up. Your, your options are these five, this limited selection of Pixar movies because anything else is going to drive me insane right now. A couple news stories to touch on quickly here. You saw the news that former president Joe Biden announced that he has prostate cancer. Yes. An aggressive prostate cancer that has spread to his bones according to the announcement. Man, what a content stew got boiled up after that announcement. Yeah, I mean, I was taking my mom's an appointment this morning, spent a lot of time,

the better part of, you know, five hours starting early, early, early, the morning. listening to NPR and there was just wall-to-wall coverage not just about the former president but also about just prostate cancer explainers and and and you know doctors on when to get tested and everything else i saw some of that briefly on the tv news too in the waiting room um so yeah i mean that's obviously some beneficial thing it's very strange uh coming on the heels of a conversation about Biden last week. You know, I mean, all of this is going to be framed around his legacy at some point. And I've already seen some people on social media who are, you know, framing it that way,

mostly in the negative light, you know, casting it a negative, his legacy in a negative light at this point. But it does just like, as much as we were just sort of shrugging our shoulders, his media appearances last week, it does just kind of throw that into, you shrug even harder. Right? It's like, God, all that was just, just felt so empty at the time. And in the perspective that we have now, just so, so utterly meaningless. I totally agree. I mean, it just makes, it just makes everything feel very, very strange. And I will just say a couple of things. One is that I've seen a lot of the conspiracy theories online. You know, he's doing this two days ahead of the Jake Tapper, Alex Thompson book that comes out, original sin, because he's trying to deflect attention or the her tapes that were, they came out in Axios on Friday. I'm just like, if Joe Biden, by the way, has had lots of things to deflect attention from

over the last six months of American life. Like other than a couple of weeks when Nico Harrison was holding the title, Joe Biden has been America's softest target as declared by this podcast. There's a whole bit about losing the election, which seems worse than a book coming out. So if we're really going to do the conspiracy theory, maybe just talk it all the way through to tell us why this is the moment in particular that he would want to change the subject and not the whole part about Donald Trump

resuming power that was not the moment to change the subject just want to put that out there I also see people talk asking questions about look did Joe Biden take a PSA test when he was president how did this not come up in the various there's a lot of that on NPR for sure I hope we are consistent in saying that we need to learn more about our elected officials whatever party they are, whoever they are about their health, about their ability to do the job. So asking questions about Joe Biden's

medical tests, all that stuff, that is the stuff of reporting. Yeah, I mean, is the implication there, or this kind of second level implication there, that he was avoiding medical testing because of his mental situation and so didn't get fully tested,

or just that he was getting bad medical attention? I don't know. I don't know, because I don't know why that would have to do with screening for prostate cancer. I don't either, but it does seem to be that there's like something that's going unsaid there. Yes. I also want to note that this whole story, whether it comes from the her tapes or the upcoming book or Biden's, even Biden's medical news,

it's all to me so, I guess, fascinating is the word, because you hear what politicians all the time when they don't want to answer the question. Look, we've asked, that's been asked an answer. We're moving on. We're not revisiting the past. But the thing is, until last July, Joe Biden was saying that he wanted to be president of the United States right now. So anything that happens now, then retroactively gets looked at through that lens.

He was saying he wanted to and was able to be president for another four years from now. So it becomes this sort of endless story where everything is part of that question. And I think probably rightfully so. other big piece of media news right before we came online. David, CBS has forced out, these are the words being used by the New York Times, their president of news, Wendy McMahon. This is yet more fallout to use the only in journalism term from the 60 Minutes lawsuit. This is where I always feel we need to repeat this. Donald Trump is suing CBS or Paramount, the parent company, for 20.

billion dollars because when Kamala Harris appeared on 60 Minutes and he didn't, CBS released two different parts of one Kamala Harris answer about the war in Gaza. And Donald Trump's understanding that was election interference. So we've already seen that the CBS, excuse me, the 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens resigned last month. Part of the reporting there was he did not want to apologize as part of some settlement between Paramount and Trump because he didn't think he had anything to apologize for. Now Wendy McMahon, who was cited as one of CBS's night protectors in the executive suite, she's gone. So the worst story in the world continues to add new chapters.

What a strange, strange deal. All right, David, coming up in 30 seconds, some selections. from the Bible of sports announcers. 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 on Twitter or Blue Sky,

where they will always be gratefully received. This week's winner, David, jokes about journalism. I'll give you one from Sam Stein that I think will stand in for everyone, and Sam Stein, of course, of the bulwark. If there is symbolism in journalism's Preakness, win, it's that the horse looked lost, stumbled, couldn't quite find the lane,

struggled to get a lead down, L-E-D-E, and then it all sort of came together right before deadline. Yeah, that's good. Very nice. If you made a joke about journalism, congrats. You made the overworked Twitter joke of the week. All right, David, in the notebook dump tomorrow,

Tuesday, May 20th is the sports Emmys. And you may ask, Brian, are you like fantasy when the Oscars come around? You're wearing a tux. You get ready for some content or lock our TV people when the real Emmys come around. Is that how you treat the sports Emmys? No, it isn't.

Not at all. Because I'm like, wait a second. I know we could say this about the Oscars, the regular Emmys, but how can we tell if Joe Buck or Mike Tarika was the best play-by-play announcer? You just tell me what you're basing that on. Yeah, you just know in your heart somewhere.

Yeah. Or maybe Kevin Harlan knows. I will say one subplot, and I'm kind of negating everything I just said about the sports Emmys, but Troy Aikman, I've heard, is somewhat, I'll say, credulous about how he has never won a sports Emmy.

Oh, yeah? For best announcer. A little salty about that? Best color analyst. I don't know if salty, but just kind of openly wandering. This could be the year that Troyickman finally gets that

elusive sports Emmy. Oh, wow. That could be the one. I want to talk to you about the sports Emmys because they are giving a lifetime achievement award to a man named David Hill.

Hilly, as he is known because he is Australian and Australians have cool nicknames for people. Hillie is the founding father of Fox Sports. Came to that network in 93 and 94

with tons of ideas. Let's put a score bug on the screen so that you can see the score of the game and the time remaining. They've been tried before, but never quite as forcefully as Fox did it with NFL football. He was in favor of an hour-long NFL pregame show, a glowing hockey puck, more microphones, so you got better sound, better and bolder graphics. I think if we look at the executive level, the David Hill and Dick Ebersol created sports television, at least in the modern era. Now, David Hill had lots of ideas for announcers as well.

And at some point, David Hill decided to print a booklet, which he called the commentator's notes handbook that is functionally a Bible for announcing. If you remember Fox Sports in the early years, they were hiring very young Joe Buck, very young Kenny Albert, very young Kevin Harlan, for that matter. people who had had a lot of reps. So David Hill said, why don't I just put all this wisdom in one book? It will be printed.

It will be updated. So I would like to read you a few selections. Oh, great. About how to be a great sports announcer. This is number one under his heading the basics. There are four subjects which are simply no-win deals. Sex, religion, politics, race. There is no such thing as an innocent remark when dealing with these

subjects. That's one thing. That's good advice. Under the heading, Never Assume. He tells this to announcers. Don't assume the audience has been watching from the beginning of the game and hanging on to every word. Don't assume they know a player is injured or has been ejected or a remarkable

play put one team ahead. Don't be afraid to recap. Assumption is the greatest trap we can fall into. This one really resonated with me. Double check any pronunciation of which you're unsure. mispronounce the name of a player and every viewer from his, her town has a right to question how much you really know.

Is there anything that shakes your faith in an announcer or a podcaster more than a mispronunciation? No, absolutely not. And I know you and I do it all the time and every time it just makes me hurt inside. Yes. I'm like, I couldn't look this up and get the pronunciation right. No, yeah. I don't think anybody, yeah, you definitely spend more time on pronunciations, just about what, every other episode. of the show before we hit record begins with you reviewing the pronunciation of someone's name.

David Hill's guide contains information about the posture an announcer should assume during a game. Oh, okay. You must be sitting at 90 degrees, David. Because if you're not, you might not have enough air in your lungs when the big call arrives. I see you kind of leaning forward there on the press box. I just got to say, I need to straighten my, I'm going to go out of camera range here, but I can certainly straighten my spine. That's probably good advice. This is maybe my favorite thing in here.

Hill writes, the vast percentage of the male population of this country. And for that matter, every other country is deluding itself. The delusion is that because you're a guy, you know just about everything there is to know about sports. By the way, very true in my case. Because I watched TV, I know everything about football. And I get to something. My son goes, hey, what's the deal with that? I'm like, one sec.

Well, David Hill has. as a solution. He says the simplest way to preface a teaching educational remark is, hey, great example there for our young viewers. Or, hey, that's something you don't see too often. And you see what you're doing there? You're not insulting the viewer. You say, look, I'm just speaking to the younger children in the audience. But, you know, everybody gets the knowledge. Doing it very gently. This is the final word here from Hill. He says, you can sum up the art of great commentary very simply. If the viewer has the impression that a really good friend is sitting next to him or her and explaining what's going on in simple, enthusiastic terms, you've done it.

Always talk to our viewers, never at them. A friend will always explain the why and never have to be prompted. Achieve that and you've connected with the viewers, and that is a beautiful thing. Yeah. That is. That's great stuff. Who is the David Hill of podcasting? Does Bobby Wagner have a pamphlet in him? Bobby Wagner has a lot of pamphlets in him. I'm a pamphlet guy, although my favorite podcast is the press box with Brian Curtis and David Schumacher. I love that show. I appreciate that.

Do you have a spine angle opinion before we move on? Is 90 degrees? Is that your number two? I do think that is technically right, although I've seen some great work done by podcaster standing up, namely Chris Ryan doing his impression of a noted ESPN podcaster who will go unnamed. Good stuff. I'm nodding.

All right, David, a couple quick ones for you here. Media piss test. Oh, yeah. This is where we catalog reporters calling something like something else but on steroids. This comes from Mike Catalana, the sports director at WHAM in Rochester, New York. great friend of this podcast. He points to a Los Angeles Times review of Jake Tapper and Alex

Thompson's new book, Original Sin, which says it reads like a Shakespearean drama on steroids. Now, wait a second. Can there really be such a thing as Shakespeare on steroids? You don't think so?

Isn't that kind of Shakespeare? Yeah. Full stop. I think it's kind of missing the point of Shakespeare, yes. it's like Hamlet, but it's on steroids. So what is that? Yeah. What is the play that's awesomer than Hamlet?

One last thing too here. Jason Tatum, very sad injury news. We had a lot of now they tell us about his additional injury news, the torn meniscus. As we're counting down, I was worried that you hadn't seen the memo that we got about having to include the Celtics in our podcast today. Go ahead. I also noticed the Wall Street Journal was writing about original sin and they used the first. This is the editorial board. Now they tell us.

Thank you for joining the Now They Tell Us Movement, Wall Street Journal editorial board. We also had an only in journalism buffet from the athletic. Only in journalism. These are words you always read in news articles, but never hear in human speech.

I'm just going to read a couple sentences for you. Tatum's entry sends a seismic wave through the Celtics organization, but the aftershocks will be felt throughout the NBA. It's rare that this caliber of players suffers this devastating an injury at this catastrophic

a time of year in this seminal a moment for a marquee franchise. Well, that does it. Just let that wash over you. Because it is time for a segment that always washes over the audience. It's time for David Shoemaker.

Guesses the strain pun headline. Yeah. Last Monday's headline about Trump's bad news about dolls this Christmas was skimp on the Barbie. Today's headline comes to us from listener Molly Smith, who has qualified for a brand new press box button. The headline comes to us, David, from campaign trails, which is the substack of historian Kevin Cruz.

Okay. It's the story about Donald Trump accepting a $400 million luxury jet from Qatar. I want you to think of a John Denver classic, as you ponder. what was campaign trails strained pun headline? I mean, he's saying leaving on a jet plane, right? Is that where we're going with this? Yeah, we're going. Leaving on a...

Even is the word you're going to want to play with here. Yeah, and I'm going to beving. I'm taking something that's not mine. leaving on a jet plane. Leaving on a jet plane. Yes, very good. He is David Shoemaker. I'm Brian Curtis.

Productions magic by Bobby Wagner. Coming up next Thursday, Joel Anderson. And you Shoemaker, we got Memorial Day coming up. So I'll meet you back here Tuesday with more lukewarm takes about the media. See you then, David. See you later, Brian.