The Press Box - How to Interview Wemby and the Clipping Nightmare. Plus: Stephen Colbert’s Last Stand, With Jason Zinoman.

Episode Date: May 20, 2026

Today on The Press Box, Bryan and David react to a wild Game 1 of the Western Conference finals between the Spurs and Thunder, and they talk about how to revamp postgame interviews. Then they talk about another Bari Weiss story at CBS (15:28), the decline in “dad books” (22:01), a breakfast taco controversy (36:16), and much more. Then Bryan is joined by New York Times critic Jason Zinoman to discuss the end of Stephen Colbert’s late-night show (59:31). Plus, the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week, and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained-Pun Headline! Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David ShoemakerGuest: Jason ZinomanProducers: Isaiah Blakely, Jaime Yukich, and Jon Roemer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Damn it! Yes. We got to start by talking about Thunder versus Spurs. Game one of the Western Conference Finals because it was amazing. Oh, you got that memo from Bill too. Okay, great. I did. Lead with basketball.

Yeah. Victor Wemba Nama, Wembe, do his friends. Vic, apparently to his friends. Just listening to Chris Paul on Pat McAvey Show. He calls him Vic. Vic. Vic had 41 points, 24 rebounds, and three blocks. It's hard to have a moment in sports now that seems like genuine history.

By way of example, did you know there was a game seven in the NHL last night that was going on at the same time the basketball game was going on? Only from, again, watching today's Pat McAfee show. Did you know that game went into OTA? It was incredibly exciting as well. But that felt like that felt like genuine history. with a signature moment, Wemby or Vic pulling up from 30 feet, 28 feet, to tie the game with 27 seconds left in the first OT. It felt like one of those, where were you moments? And the only thing I could find in our lifetimes that felt the same way was

when Shaq really started blowing up in the postseason for the first time. and there was this collective sense of, oh my God, how will anybody ever stop this guy? Yeah. He will never lose another game. Yeah, he was just twice as big as the other guys, except for like Pat Ewing. You know, like he was so much bigger than everybody else.

And so much stronger. And with Wembe, it's like he's even taller. Yeah. He can dribble the ball up the court. He can pull up from 28 feet. Apparently. And just watching the game on, night. I just texted somebody. I was like, that just felt like history. Yeah.

That game felt important. It was a great game on its own. Anything that goes into O.O.T. like that has amazing performances. We'll take it. But that just felt like that will be significant when we talk about NBA history someday. I mean, it's hard to imagine, I mean, and listen, the sky's the limit, but it's hard to imagine when being having a better game than that in this series. I guess he could easily have some comparable games. But if they go on to win this game and there's not a bigger game. game, then this one certainly fits the bill, right? When you look back at these playoffs, this could certainly be the game you remember. Although, you know, when the Spurs beat the, beat the Thunder

two times earlier in the season, it felt like that too, right? And we kind of forget about it. But it did, but this is certainly, like, I think that the most, aside from winning the championship, and if he wins the championship, then all of a sudden, like, as much as I hate the championship watch, the ring watch, you know, whole thing. Yeah. As much as I'm just going to bored by that, that will just have to be the organizing narrative of the NBA

for the next 20 years. If Wimby wins one this year, right? Just like watching him try to catch up to the grades in terms of ring count. But yeah, I mean, and it's just, you know, he wasn't really in the MVP conversation this year.

What a game like last night does is like just institute him. Like he'll be the, he's automatically like the points leader for MVP next season because you announce your you know you announce your arrival by like demolishing and play a team like okayc with the current MVP in the playoffs and he's very aware of that he was asked about that after the game in his press conference somebody said you know sGA won the MVP and you're playing against him you didn't win are you very aware of that and his response was everything you just said yeah that was great what a great answer. I acknowledge that thought. Yeah. Kind of an annoying tick that has crept into announcing over the last few years.

Wemby pulls up from 28 feet. He hits a shot and the color analyst goes, Oh. Look, I understand. I almost forgive it in a moment that's so amazing like that. But folks, we are not at a Buffalo Wild Wings. We're calling a game. You could barely hear Mike Tariko after that play.

This is where we just lay out. We think about Chris Collins, where it's other partner after Caleb Williams hit that crazy pass in the playoffs and he just was silent and then you just heard him cackling a few seconds later. Yeah. Sometimes the best move

is just quiet. Underplay it. It's so amazing that we underplay. I was thinking I think you moved to Fort Worth after this guy was a bit of. big figure in town, but there was a guy who used to be the Mavericks PA man named

Kevin McCarthy. Yes. I think I know this story. Tell me, though. He was like the Frazier Crane of Dallas Fort Worth Radio. Very mellow host. Very down here. Which made him different than all the other

PA men in the league. We're like, you're in Dallas Mavericks. Whoa. But whenever like a huge star would come to, Dallas and would do something amazing. He would just have this great PA man monotone where he'd go, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant.

And I found myself doing that during the game last night. Every time Wembe hit a shot, Victor Wemann Yama. Victor Wemann Yama. Not a trace of excitement in my voice. A weird moment. Thunder claw back to tie the game in regulation. Yeah.

They'd been behind almost all night. Alex Caruso was the hero. So regulation ends, and the NBC cameraman follows Caruso back to the Thunder bench and he pushes away the camera like he's a 90-ce celebrity being hounded by the paparazzi. Yeah. Like, sir, this game is on television. It's kind of part of the deal. They weren't even making secret plans on the whiteboard.

You just, I don't want that camera around me. And then someone else from the Thunder pushed it away too after that. Like, what was going on there? The NBC broadcast, I think we have to start with the fact that the sound was trash last night for huge parts of the game, which is a huge downgrade. I look forward to understanding the technical explanation there. I kept looking up and being like, what is wrong with my television? And then I looked at Twitter and something was wrong with everybody's television. Yeah.

Beyond that, I loved how clean and crisp that broadcast is. Yep. We don't have photos of NBA teams from 1972 going into break. We just got some good music. We're going to commercial. Don't give them any ideas, Brian. No, I don't think they will. That game is produced by a guy named Frank DeGrease,

who was Ian Eagle's producer on Nets games at Yes. Oh. and also shares a comic sensibility with Ion Eagle. So you notice the moment when, I forget which Spurs player it was, goes crashing into the front row, and the guy's holding a Corona, the fan. And he's kind of squeezing the corona

and beers going everywhere. And Torrico goes, oh, is that spillage? Let's get a replay. That's the DeGrease Eagle School of Broadcast Comedy. Yeah. We're going to take a replay of the spillage. But then we're right back on task.

Yeah. Because producing is essentially having an intuitive understanding of what people want to see, what they need to see, and just go in there. And that game last night, a few exceptions here and there. There were a couple of replays. I was like, I don't know. I didn't want to see that replay again. But by and large was very, very good at that. Just, just it felt like everybody was on point.

I did want to ask you about Jamal Crawford. who's the third man and the three-man team. Yes. What do we make of him as an announcer so far? Yeah, I mean, I understand why it's a question. He's the, in some ways, like the polar opposite of the Troy Aikman model, or just like he feels like, it feels like a football game and Troy's on there, right? There's nothing really conventional about Crawford's delivery.

but his insights, I think, are really good. And I kind of like the fact. I like that he brings a sort of totally different vibe to the game. I will say, like, every game that I've heard him call, it jumps out almost immediately. You're just like, wait, who is that? Oh, that must be Jamalcroft. But I think, I kind of think he's good.

He's in the just-talking phase of announcerdom. Yeah. When guys get off the quarter off the field, they don't know how to do announcer speak, so they actually just talk. Yeah. And say insightful things, and it's really interesting. Mm-hmm. My worry with him is how much of a chance he's going to get to talk. Yeah.

Because Reggie is a volume shooter as an announcer. Mike Toriko's a volume shooter. For sure. Because he wants to get to facts and research and stuff that other announcers won't get to. So he's going to do a lot of analysis himself. Yeah, I mean, Tariko's almost, Torrico's like the quintessential one-man booth guy. Like, he would be totally happy just to be doing this on radio with nobody else there.

And you could actually hear him when Wemby pulls up from 28 feet. Exactly. Because nobody goes, oh, we did have some jaw-droppingly bad questions for Wembe after the game. I know we were going here. Oh, my goodness. This gentleman has just had the game of his life. the game of the season, and we ask him,

how did you continue to show up and make the right play? What would be an interesting answer to that question? What's the best possible answer to a question like that? Yeah, I have known. And it got me thinking, David, it got me thinking that I know how to fix this. I know how to fix the post-game interview. Call this the Curtis maneuver.

let's say that you are a sideline reporter. Here's what you do. You walk out of the court. You bring a portable monitor. You use that portable monitor to show Wemby. You're selling this, like bringing a portable monitor is a feat. Like it's very straightforward now. Just like, here's my iPad.

Yeah. You can bring an iPad. But it monitors what they use in football. Go by Radio Shack, buy some kind of device. Yeah. You walk out and you use this portable monitor to show Wemby the play of the game. Yeah. And then you ask him, what were you thinking when this happened?

Yeah. It's a terrible question. But guess what? It's interesting. Yeah. Because everything he says in response will be news. Yes. It will be used to tell the story of the game.

And more importantly, it pulls us out of the game. the world of how big was this win? Yeah. Questions that no player has any idea how to deal with and brings us down to practical things. Yes, totally agree. And Wembe got asked about that in the post game,

and he was like, you know what was going through my mind? I was like, slow down. He was thinking about process. Slow down. Don't just jack this up. Go through your motions. Shoot it like you'd shoot it. And dead. It worked. Mm-hmm.

You would just at least get something. Yeah. Because the post game is, so hard it has botched so many times. I just want information about the most interesting thing that happened during the game. I agree. It's not unimportant. I mean, I don't think the sideline reporters are going to go away, but you talk about this a lot, and it's not nothing, because this is the sort of thing that, like, I'm sure when they have the absolutely inane conversations about banning reporters from locker rooms or whatever,

like, this is like, and also, why do we have to answer their stupid questions after every game? Nobody cares about that, you know? Like, it's a, it's a, drop in the bucket, but it's real. Yeah, I totally agree. I mean, unless they lied, you know, but even that would be good content of Wemby was like, dude, coach called the old barn door, I waved him off, you know, whenever, you know. I would want to hear that lie. Yeah, exactly.

But yeah, I think that's a fantastic idea. It's such a better use of that time than the junk they do now. Totally. And when he gets into the post game, the writers are going to ask those kind of questions. So if I have Wemby exclusively on my air, I want to ask him right now. Yeah. Let's just ask those questions right now. Get them out of the way.

Do you think it factors in when you're in, if you were there on the sideline, you're the new sideline reporter for Peacock. And they're like, we're throwing it to Brian Curtis with Victor Wembe Yamah after the game. Do you think you would be put off by the height difference? I'd be like, I got to ask a simple question because he's not going to be able to get it. When you can't hear me from down here at 5, 10 and change? Yeah. You think that's part of the calculus?

Like, I'm going to ask the dumbest and most benign question possible because otherwise it might just get lost in the vast airspace between us. And related question, I'm not sure it would help, but wouldn't it be a hilarious gimmick if they had a 7-5 sideline reporter specifically to talk to Wimby? How many people out there could you find? Forget their training as television professionals, But how many people could you find that are that tall?

I don't know. But even if it was a talentless 7-5 person, just to have them walk up, maybe 7-3 in lifts. You know, you can make it work. Yeah. That would be just incredibly funny. What a great bit that would be? What if the 7-foot-3 guy's holding a monitor

and says, what was going through your mind when you took this shot? Exactly. I'm with it. I'm with it. He could just be wearing the monitor at that size. That's great. All right. Coming up on the press box,

the reigning in of Barry Weiss. Dad books are dying. Is that clip you're watching on social media real? We'll talk controversies about Sharm Sharania and Breakfast Tacos. The best story you'll read this week about Star Wars. Plus, the New York Times is Jason Ziniman joins me to talk about Stephen Colbert's last show,

late nights last rights, and what's happening to comedy in the age of streaming? All that on the press box. A part of the ringer! Podcast Network. Hello media consumers Brian Curtis David Shoemaker Producer is Isaiah Blakely

and John Romer with you David we've got another Barry Wise story It wouldn't be an episode of the press box without it Let's go Should I do my Oops All Berry joke again

And hope that you No sell the hell out of it Like last week It's part of the gimmick now yeah This is from Dylan Byers in Puck Sources with knowledge Of the conversations That's inside CBS and Paramount

said that Barry Weiss would likely see day-to-day control over the evening news, CBS mornings, and 60 minutes, to a more experience as yet unnamed executive, shifting her focus to the news division's digital growth, while maintaining broad editorial influence across all the company's platforms. So essentially, he's reporting that there have at least been conversations about bringing somebody else in to do day-to-day TV that she has so far shown herself unable to manage. Well, basically to do her job, right? I mean, certainly web traffic was part of the job before,

but not what she was tasked with really bothering with. Yeah, it is pretty bizarre. It's pretty shocking that the leash was this short. not that I disagree with it at all and I mean just kind of surprising in general and also that they're basically replacing her and certainly I mean yes I'm sure she'll have some level of influence beyond

what this new person has but replacing her on the TV projects without somebody named like it seems like that's a pretty big part of the equation you know like is it's going to be is it going to have to be someone that's like sympathico with her or is this going to be the most qualified person from the CBS News Division

that will forever be budding heads potentially with Barry Weiss? I mean, it's, it makes it feel rash, right? That they announced it without a replacement, without a higher name. I agree. Maybe they're just trying to, maybe they're just trying to insulate the new hire from whatever backlash might come their way. One name Dylan floats in his column, which I encourage you to read a puck, as CNN CEO Mark Thompson,

a guy who was marked for elimination as soon as Paramount acquired CNN. It's like, oh, he's not going to last. But what if he does and you bring him over to do the TV stuff? Yeah. And Barry can do as yet unspecified editorial things. Steer the ship. It's fascinating.

And to your reason of why, the conversations I'm told, and this is Byers writing, reflect Paramount Leadership's newfound acceptance that Barry was given too broad a mandate for someone without previous experience in television, as well as some irritation with the ceaseless barrage of negative press. I find that last part interesting. Yeah.

Because I always, when you hire Barry Weiss, you're essentially sticking your middle finger up at the media establishment. Yep. So you're expecting the media establishment to be, mad to be angry, to find things to get pissed off about that she does, right? To put every decision of hers under the microscope. Sure. But I'm always like at some point, everybody being mad all the time has to matter.

Like publicity is not nothing for CBS News. You know, this is not some... Well, I mean, listen, she's a particular, a very specific case. Obviously, the timing, the geopolitical situation at the time, the just the and certainly the politics of it were all i mean it was a very it was fraught in any number of ways but like almost anybody who has a name you would recognize put into that position would be getting this much attention you know and probably getting relatively i mean i don't know the same degree of negativity in the news stories are not slanted pieces it's just covering the bad stuff but like

dude we don't know who the news directors are by and large at news networks if they put if they put, you know, I'm just trying to think if they, I mean, like, who's just a person in the news that you would recognize, you know, I mean, if they elevated Jesse Waters to the news director, you know, whatever, then like he would become a person of interest even if he was never on TV, you know, or if they, or if they just, you know, a random other celebrity, you know, you're like a writer, like, whatever the Barry Weiss, like that person would get a lot of attention and would probably be something of a headache to the bosses because it's not attention they'd be getting otherwise.

but the idea that they were unprepared for it, which certainly makes more sense than the, you know, I'm a billionaire flipping the double bird to the world in some sense. But it's pretty stunning, you know? I mean, this is the, this is the, with the, with the conservative, just always tar the liberals with, you know,

like get out of your, get out of your, like, you know, silo your bubble. Northeastern bubble, yeah. Your ivory tower. Yeah, exactly. This is exactly what that is. Imagine being in a bubble such that you think that Barry Weiss is universally beloved. Yeah, or a bubble where you think the free press took over the world.

That's a great point, yeah. And I think that's part. It just comes back to this idea of like, I billionaire enjoy the free press. This flatters my point of view. Therefore, I think everybody enjoys the free press. And that the person who created the free press will know how to fix CBS News. news. Yes. By the way, it's probably not accidental. I mean, everybody that he knows probably does read the free press, either by choice or because they realize their billionaire friend slash boss is reading it every day. You know, I mean, it's pretty easy to get that misconception when you're that sort of person. But yeah, that's exactly it. Like, oh, I know a person in news media who is, you know, seems to be getting everything right, very wise. Yeah. And that's, it's not like he has any experience. that would lead him to understand that the job might be too big for her at the time.

But it is weird that nobody thought about that on the way in. Interesting story from Ben Mullen in the New York Times I wanted to get in here. I'll read you his lead. The author of a nonfiction book about the effects of artificial intelligence on truth acknowledged on Monday that he had included numerous made-up or misattributed quotes concocted by AI. So the book is about the effects of AI on truth.

The book included made up or misattributed quotes concocted by AI. The author Stephen Rosenbaum, whose book, The Future of Truth, was released this month to great fanfare. Incorporated more than a half dozen misattributed or fake quotes

in sections of the book reviewed by the New York Times. This is not Werner Herzog's the future of truth, which just came out two years ago, weirdly. That was his book? Yeah. He had a book. I would like to examine the future of truth.

Yeah. Talk about Hulk Hogan now. Yes. I was just searching for it to see who published this book. I try to get some claim. I have a guess, but no idea what that is. Let me give you another book story while you think about that. Dad books are dying.

Oh, no. Are they? They are, at least according to the Wall Street Journal's Pamela Paul, there's the name I haven't heard in a while, and Jeffrey A. Tractenberg. Uh-huh. Dad books in this case refers to serious nonfiction, the authors, right? Such as a little-known chapter of World War II, the sweeping narrative of a shipwreck, perhaps the latest presidential biography. I love how we've identified all the go-toes there. Little-known chapter of World War II

That's Ben McIntyre Sweeping narrative of a shipwreck That's David Grand A latest presidential biography That's Ron Cher now Can I get that right? The only one you're missing is golf There is a sort of universality

To golf memoirs That even more so When I was working in bookstores Than football or basketball or anything It was just like those were on the Father's Day tables very prominently. Remember my theory of golf books? Yeah. The Father's Day gift or the dad you hardly know?

Yeah, I think that's right. But I think that ties into the bigger issue here in a certain way too. But you continue because we'll circle back. Sales of nonfiction print titles, the journal notes, were down nearly 8% through May 9th this year. And sales of books about politics and current affairs were down 19%. The trend couldn't be clear. said Jonathan Carp long time book executive

this is a sea change and people should wake up and realize we're living in a new world so who do you think is to blame for people not reading serious nonfiction slash dad books well in so much as it relates to the dads because I don't want to get out over my skis here skiing books not as big for dads

as it relates to the dads I think the point that you made is actually not, it's actually insufficient. I think books in general are the presence that you get for the dad you don't know. Certainly there are a lot of dads who ask for specific books. My whole childhood, it was just like, you know, I got the name of a book every Christmas and birthday, you know, and I went out and found it for him. Or I would buy them books I didn't know, you know, I just, just guesses as I got older.

But I think, I think by and large now, there's just a giant market of shit online. line for presence for people who you don't know. It's just like the entire internet is like today you will be, you will see if you keep your eyes open five ads that would be the perfect thing to buy for a father you don't see very often. You know, I mean it's just a and those and so there's no reason to go to the bookstores anymore. Also going to the bookstores is obviously less of a thing than it was where you would go and see a giant table at Barnes & Noble that was that had father's day at the top and you would be like oh my dad must want one of these you know um so yeah i think that's a problem but also i think in general to go to the specifics of the kinds of books you were

talking about me you're talking about politics and current events uh that to me is not i mean yes i think those those subjects probably skew male but like those are subjects that should just be that should that you would assume would have bottomed out already right i mean it's one thing to talk if we're talking about military history, you know, but if we're talking about literally like a current events book, like, who buys those except to, like, review them or because you're a fan of the politician, you know,

or like whatever, you know, it's, that stuff has been totally swallowed by 24-hour news and the internet. And, and yeah, I mean, like I said, I mean, there's a huge market for the fan bases of TV show hosts and stuff like that, but I think just in general,

when you look at a lot of the subjects that we talk about here military history and there listen there are some incredible military historians out there but i worked at places where they would just literally like put spotlight a book buy a book about fucking aircraft carriers or whatever submarines submarines were a huge one uh kind of like with it wasn't attached to a big author that like, you know, that wouldn't necessarily be a huge book, but like they did it to fill a slot for Father's Day, you know, whatever,

and they made it out to be a big book. And I think that there's a lot of that with sports, I mean, listen, we know one or two great sports editors in the book world, you know, like whatever, but it's not like that's where all the great sports thinking and editing comes from. I think a lot of sports books, military books, a lot of the stuff that falls into this category

or like they almost became wrote in the publishing world. Like you would publish them without, regardless of whether or not you had a great passion for it, for the project or the subject, because you wanted to get those dad buys. And I think that that's just, you know, there's no room for bad bets anymore. You know, I just think the publishing world

is contracting too much. What you're saying almost sounds like a movie studio. We need an action movie to come out on this week in the summer. and we need a rom-com or a family comedy to come out on this week later in the fall. It doesn't really matter what they are. It just needs to happen. It would be great if your thriller was written by James Patterson, but if it's not, there's a bunch of thrillers out on submission right now.

Let's pick one. The journal also blames podcasts, which I understand are everybody's villain, but especially think about nonfiction for a while. You know, the kinds of things that you would turn to and say, oh, I'm going to read a 300-page book. to have a nice satisfying read about this particular subject, maybe you turn to a history podcast that pick the bones of that of such books clean. Yeah.

And you listen to it while you're doing your dishes and going on a run. Or maybe just hear the author of the book talk for 45 minutes. Yeah, watch a YouTube video. And you're like, I'm all good. I feel like I learned a lot of it. You're right. That's about it. I was just thinking this the other day, totally separate from this, because Spotify has,

has, um, audiobooks and, uh, and, you know, I was never a big audio books guy until, you know, podcasts sort of led me back in. And I listened to a good number of books, you know, I know a lot of people that listen to books, but it, it can seem just sort of exhausting before you even hit play, you know, it's just like, it's not a podcast, it's not going to be antic, it's not going to be anything unexpected. It's just going to be, you know, 16 hours of me listening to this very talented reader read this book. And I wondered, I'm sure there's some incredible, like, copyright, just general, like, IP issues that would make this impossible. But why don't they do,

like, why don't they bring back Readers Digest just for the audio format? Like, wouldn't you much rather listen to the, the, you know, four-hour version of Patrick Raggin' Kaves and new book than the complete version if you were going to go audio wait so we're we're moving away from the physical book to the audio book and then we're judging that to also be inconvenient so we're shortening it or or actually do it as a podcast series right just my my new book is a eight episode series from the ringer you know but it's but just the but you're right that a lot of these books are getting crowded out by by alternatives and a lot of that has to do with I mean you said podcast, but it has to do with just media converging, right? A podcast is a TV show, is a movie,

is a whatever. And it's not, like, there's no degree of difficulty. There's no extra ask to go from, like, if you're looking at the book, if you're looking at the book on Amazon on your phone, you can just like in two seconds flip to that interview that you were talking about or that podcast. It's all right there. There's no reason to do this. And what people, it's free. Yeah. I'm having to pay 15 bucks or 30 bucks. This is, like all the people that never read a book review like coming home to roost like if if if if people that had access to book reviews as you know long form book reviews they'd be like all right I'm good I'm good on this how many times did you or I read the New York review of each other's books review and you're just

like I think that's all I need to see you know or or the New Yorker review where they spend three quarters of a piece not admitting that it's not original work you know or they're just like restating the content to the book before they mention the book those things are great you oh, we love those pieces. And part of the great thing is you're like, great, I don't have to read that book, you know? You read the books of the authors who you truly love. But it's just like a, as a means

of of conveying information, it does seem like there's a lot of alternatives outside of the exhaustive book. Can I tell you how anti-audio book I am? Yes, please. I just, it's been

forever since I've even tried to listen to one, but when I did, I found I was passively listening like I listen to every podcast. And you were missing important stuff? I just half paying attention. I just not paying attention to it at all. And I read, I've read, now my youngest child is older than your youngest child. Sure.

Which is the answer to have you read a book lately? Mm-hmm. Like, that is a key, key piece of information. You're talking about parenting advice books, I assume, right? No. I'd raise a couple of well-rounded kids. No, I think it was the grifters. was the last book I read on paper last week.

But I just... Not to your son. No. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Hey, kid. Want to know about an interesting relationship with a parent? No, but I just like...

What is the one with the dude's eyes staring at you? What is the Jim Thompson? It's not population 1280. There's one of them that's just like so off the rails, like gruesome and misogynistic. And I almost handed it to my wife a while back. Because she really got into one of the griff. or one of his books. And I was like, oh, you'll look, well, not that one. Here's some other ones. You know, like, but yeah. Glad. Don't read, don't read that to your son.

Yeah, I just, I only, I only want to read on paper. And I will, I will read on, I will read on my phone sometimes, you know, at night, especially at night if it's like, I need to read something that I'm not really paying attention to for like 20 more minutes so I fall asleep. Yeah, yeah. I just don't, I don't like audio books at all. Yeah, I mean, listen, I never like the digital book idea. I think, I'm sure it started when I was doing research for something and you just, you're like, oh, I can get this book immediately on my iPad, and you start reading it in about 20 minutes in, you're like, oh, I'm doing that thing that people talk about. I'm reading a digital book, an electronic book, if you will. An e-book, say.

Listen, I agree. I don't love audiobooks either, and more so because I think that there's other audio forms that are preferable. But there's certain audiobooks that are just perfect, that are just great. If you get a good, I mean, the readers are a huge part of it. If you find an interesting book, some of that, like David, a David Grand book, the David Grand's new book you haven't read, read by a pro that matches the book, and you have a cross-country road trip ahead of you? Like, it's a great, it's a perfect thing to do.

See, the group aspect of it is interesting to me. Yeah. We're all in the car. My daughter listens to more audiobooks than any human being who has ever walked to face desserts because you listen to Harry Potter books over and over again. That's like the soundtrack of our house. Oh, okay. If we were listening to something in the car together, that would be interesting to me.

Yeah. That'd be interesting. Maybe hard to hit all four of you with the same book, but if you can at least get the adults on the same page. Maybe the grifters. We'll try next to. What is that? Who do you think reads the grifters? Do you think it's a celebrity?

Probably. I'm guessing an actor. Yeah. There's a lot of, like, actor you heard of 25 years ago. That is a person doing audiobooks now. Yeah. Let's see. Now, narrated by Barbara Rosenblatt.

I'm not familiar with her work. I swear the Fudge books are read by somebody semi-famous. Yeah, a lot of the children's books are for sure. And I'm always like, why do I know that voice? And then it turns out to be an actor. Yeah. Well, that's Susan Sarandon reading Good Night Moon. Yeah.

That'd be interesting. That's real. What? If you find a narrated version of Good Night Moon on YouTube, that's Susan Sarandon's the one doing that. Oh, God. A couple of controversies to hit with you. James Tala Rico, Senate candidate, who just got a giant gift from Donald Trump who endorsed Ken Pax to the day. He was in Austin with Barack Obama and they went to get some breakfast tacos.

And Tala Rico had what was apparently a controversial order, potato egg and cheese. Now, as Texans, do we consider that to be a controversial taco order? First, can I ask a question? Because I literally don't know this. From where you were situated, was this an actual, he doesn't know how to eat a pizza style, like issue? Or was it just the disingenuous provocateurs that were bringing it up? Well, one was Greg Abbott, so I'm going to go with disingenuous provocateur. there's a thing about

Tala Rico being a vegetarian Oh yeah, I saw that There's a rumor that he's secretly a vegetarian But the New York Times nodded at So maybe that's part of it Yeah, okay I wanted to order, I wanted to know Whether it was flour or corn

By the way, that was more important to me Well, that's certainly the biggest take That's the biggest decision That is the most That is the most interesting decision You will make at the taco stand Unless you're ordering goat Or you know, like something that's

And even that, I think that would be less memorable than someone going real hard for corn or flour tortillas for that matter. Most taco places that I go to don't have the option. My experience with having places with both, it's like chain Mexican restaurants, not so much like taco

spots, but there weren't a bunch of taco spots like there aren't now when we were kids. No, this was not an industry. Breakfast tacos existed, but it was not a breakfast taco infrastructure like you had to go to fucking Waterburger to get a breakfast taco when we were going on. But anyway, to answer

your question. I am not, I am not a gatekeeper on this shit. Like if you want your, if you, you can have whatever you want on there if they sell it. And hell, if you grew up in, if you're a real Texan, and you would know it doesn't even matter if they sell it because you know you have like a ranch dressing bottle in your bag, right, that you bring into every restaurant. Like somewhere in every full restaurant, someone has imported ranch dressing. I guarantee it. Uh, so it doesn't, like it hardly, I really found a hard time getting worked up. about it. But I must say, I am a huge breakfast taco fan. And I agree with what I believe was the New York, the last quote in the New York Times piece, which was, who doesn't love breakfast for lunch

or breakfast for dinner? It's such a fucking treat. It's so good. Now, listen, if you said, I want you to show me the best tacos in Austin, I guarantee I would not take you for breakfast tacos, because I would assume that the expectation was different than that. But if you go, like we do, go to a pink's taco or whatever, you go to like a big taco spot, and it's your first time there, and you're experiencing it. I mean, dude, I'm going to,

you know, we're going to get like 12 different tacos, and one of them is 100% going to be a potato taco. You know, when you see a potato taco in the menu, you're like, oh, they must know something, because that's a, because, you know, because, you know,

whatever, but, like, you just assume if they have it up there, it's going to be great. I don't know. And I think, I mean, what is the argument? That's not a real taco? Like, are we talking about Mexican or Tex-Mex? Or what is it like, what are we, what scale are like the, or is Greg Abbott judging this on? Well, if I may gate keep for a second, the scale is that doesn't taste like anything.

Egg cheese and potatoes. Now, are you just covering that baby drenching it in salsa? That's an interesting question. Every burrito, I mean, burrito, every taco that I eat, every, well, burritos too. Everything that I eat is generally an excuse. It's generally a vehicle to get salsa or whatever cream, you know, whatever guacamole cream sauce into my mouth. I agree. But I kind of want to know that because if you're not drenching it in salsa, then bacon, egg, and cheese is standard taco.

Can I make another point, by the way? Just a suggestion. If I were a politician, now, and this is maybe my, maybe the tacos that I got would be subject to, if I thought they were subject to ridicule, that would change my order. But in a vacuum, potato egg and cheese is like the least stomach problematic taco order you could possibly have. And assuming, and since you're like hanging out with an ex-president and presumably have 10 more things on the agenda for today, probably the safest bet. Yeah, that's a good point because you don't want to eat something super rich. Yeah. Also, potatoes and breakfast burritos or tacos, unless they're like hash browns are really tasty, I don't eat it.

It's just filler. Get out of here. Just have it just eggs and cheese. Let's go. Oh, no. The potatoes are important. The Shams MVP controversy. Sunday, ESPN Shams Sharani broke the news that Shay Gilgis Alexander, SGA to his friends, or Vic, if you prefer, won the MVP.

The thing is, that news was going to be announced Sunday night by Amazon, which, like ESPN as a partner of the NBA. Amazon got scooped on what it thought was. its own special announcement. Here is Blake Griffin on the Amazon studio show weighing in. All right now just to be clear, the official announcement is happening here. Dirk and Steve, you all both won MVP's, but I don't remember Shams spoiling it way back then. Hmm. I don't think he was a wrong. He was a baby then. What are we doing, man? It's like it's Sunday, Shams. Go to brunch, you nerd. Come on. The hearty off-camera laugh. There's nothing better. There's nothing better than the, yeah.

Ben Kew of awful announcing makes a good point. He said, would Shams have been chasing this announcement if it was going to be unveiled on ESPN later that night? Rather than Amazon or NBC? I think that's a pretty good question. Like, do you get to scoop your own network? Well, sure. And you probably, but also you're probably more familiar with the chain of command, too, where you're like, I wonder if this would be a problem if I scoop my bosses.

I know who to ask my boss. You know, like, it's a little bit different than... Asking Jeff Bezos? Yeah. Like, does anybody have Bezos's number? Um... I don't know. I mean, the reaction to this was such that by the time I was watching that studio show,

like, I had seen so much, like, just response. I mean, so many people commenting on it. It was sort of shocking. Like, I guess to me... Maybe the most interesting thing part about the whole thing isn't that Choms scooped Amazon. It's that Amazon didn't do it. I feel like every network in the history of time would have done and just proceed as if it hadn't been announced. You know, to go along and do it and don't mention it and do your reveal and do the whole thing.

The fact that they're sort of self-aware, or at least part of the broader fabric of, you know, the sports industrial complex is actually really interesting. I don't think, I mean, Blake Griffin's thing got passed around like crazy. Yeah, and he was, let's just say this, he was kidding. Yes, of course. He's not mad. He's not mad. He's not mad. He's not more than 30 seconds listening to Blake Griffin understands that he would talk to

his friends that way. Oh my God. There's so much of like, I can't believe that person I watched in a clip was really pissed off. And I'm like, friends, 95% of the people you see in clips aren't pissed off. They're not really mad at anything. And who, and who outside of like somebody that worked at Amazon would actually be mad about this. Like you're like, I wish that scoop had been preserved for Amazon.

Like, nobody freaking cares. No. Nobody actually is upset. At least of all, Blake Griffin. He's the most like, no. Like, terminally sarcastic person in the world. And that was the right response, too. Yes, it was. Go to brunch, go get brunch nerd.

Sure. Like, that's, it's just so, I mean, that was a beautiful response. Kudos to Blake. But yeah, I mean, it's just, it's a, it's a very strange thing. would he be pursuing this news were at ESPN? Who cares? It's news. He reported it. You know, like, it's just, I don't understand. Like, it seems like such a bizarre controversy to me.

Like, I found, like, he wasn't, like, definitively, Shams wasn't, you know, trading favors to get news. This doesn't help him politically. So now we're mad at him. You know, like, after all of the other shit to me gets? You know, it's just so bizarre. A couple more quick things. Have you been watching any clips on social?

social media lately. Yes. It was a trenchant question, wasn't it? Well, there is a new article in Vulture this week. Actually, I felt like I read three or four articles about this very topic this week. Yes.

But let's go with the Vulture piece. I literally had the experience of skimming the piece and then finding my way back to it a day and a half later and feeling like I wasn't sure if it was the same piece. It seemed so, okay. Isn't that kind of a comment on the whole phenomenon we're about to talk about?

Yes. The piece is by Lane Brown and Vulture. Mm-hmm. And it is about this thing called clipping. Yeah. Clipping. He talks about this. This is what happens when, let's say, you have a podcast or a movie trailer, a political speech, or Justin Bieber's performance at Coachella.

Mm-hmm. More and more, Brown reports. people are paid to post clips of those things. Yes. And they are paid not too much to post clips of those things. $1 for a thousand views. So let's say you have a video podcast that really needs a bigger audience.

And you want to generate that audience. Well, you give them the raw materials and you say, I want you to post this all over the place. Many accounts as you can. Try all kinds of different clients. clips with the hopes that one of those things goes viral. And if it does, you'll earn a lot of money. And if it doesn't, you'll earn a few bucks.

But we're going to do this. And the reason behind this, well, there's actually two reasons. One is, Brown writes, if enough of these clips rack up enough views fast enough, credulous social media algorithms interpret the spike as an authentic surge of interest and push the videos to real users who sometimes generate real and engagement, prompting the algorithm to push those videos even further. Yeah. So you fooled the algorithm.

The second thing you're trying to fool is real people. Fool the humans. Yeah. Because you and I, I'm sure both do this all the time. If you see clips enough on Twitter, you eventually assume that something is kind of big. Yes. I mean, I think of all the measures now, I'm like, I feel like I've seen that guy a lot lately. Yeah.

I'm seeing clips from his video podcast. And then you just assume that that person's big and then what happens? A profile gets assigned in the New York Times. You and I start talking about the person on a podcast. And whether they're big or not, they sort of become big by default, or at least more present by default. There's an interesting example in this piece where one of the founders, co-founders of an agency that Brown writes about says, the second S&L drops at midnight, you should post a hundred times saying

that was the best performance, meaning musical performance of the year. Yeah. All these tweets. So now we are swimming in this world where very little of what you see is an authentic sentiment that was not bought or paid for.

Yes. And we navigate. The only original sentiments left are the ones that are vague that you don't know what it's in response to. Someone's just like, my God, and then, you know, you have to check the responses to see what they're talking about. Even that's probably pretty fake, too.

But yeah, nothing's really real. I mean, the media response to the story, and you've probably been more aware of it than me, has been pretty interesting because I feel like no one quite knows where to come down on this. One of the names that I kept saying floating around in response to it, I think it's in, I think it's in the piece, but is clavicular, who is the sort of like looks maxing fellow that, was everywhere last month. I saw tons of clavicular clips before they started writing about him. You know, like it was all in the same span that I'm sure all of the writers and editors

involved did too. And it seemed like all of a sudden this guy was everywhere. And it made sense, you know, that the New York Times would do a profile of them or whatever else. But at the same, but I guess the question that it begs is, is the New York Times victim to this same, you know, fake? fake popularity campaign

that users are or is the New York Times would the New York Times do their service regardless because no matter how it got in front of everybody it's in front of everybody right now so it deserves comment I thought that was a pretty

it's an interesting question that I don't think there's a clear answer to it's a really interesting question I think the Times probably does a better job than most outlets at fending this off but this is what happens when they've spent you know the decades and decades like feigning disinterest in in mass

movements right so they're so they've got they've got the vocabulary down so be like some people find this thing intriguing you know but but but yes you're right there's a lot of 30,000 foot analysis yeah but i was just i was just going to say like this is what happens when instead of going out and finding things that you think are interesting and important you program your website, your podcast, whatever it is with, here are things I saw on Twitter. You're inviting the algorithm to be your assignment editor. And it's a very, very fine line, as you just illustrated.

Well, this dude is a thing, so maybe we should write about him. But at the same time, you can take that so far as you're just writing about things that other people are tweeting. Yes. And it may not be a massive page. paid for campaign either, but you're just going by tweets and being like, oh, look, there's a thing happen. I should talk about that thing. And then eventually it just

becomes this reinforcing loop. Yeah. This human centipede, and nobody winds up doing anything interesting anymore. Human centipede sort of fits the bill for this thing, too. It's interesting that you brought that up. Yeah, you're right. Was that actually a big movie or did we all just start tweeting

about it because it was gross? Yeah. No, I mean, it's it it's it's i mean that's that's that's the real question right i mean i think that there i mean certainly it was a line of things being completely inorganic and being somewhat organic and i'm i would guess that the new york times or whoever else would have some rubric to to differentiate between the two because again it's not like any of those pieces are illegitimate it's just sort of as a reader are you aware that this that i don't know there's a difference between like between like a

social media fad and actual relevance. But, yeah, I mean, it's really intriguing. I guess it also becomes a different set of skills that you're promoting inside the editorial office. It's almost like footspeed is what counts most because I was thinking back to the New Yorker documentary when they had the editorial meeting, which I'm sure was staged to some degree, but it was just sort of the platonic ideal of what you think an editorial meeting is going to be like, right?

where you're just all sitting around a table and you're like, hear me out. There's a festival of spiders in Omaha, you know, like whatever. And then everyone's just like, yeah, that sounds great. But if you're the first person, if everybody's seen clavicular videos for a week, then maybe they're, you know, it's a different pitch. But if you're the first person to come to the table and you're like, there's this dude named clavicular, yes, clavicular. And he's what's called a looksmaxer.

And let me tell you what that means. You know, then you're just like, are you fucking kidding me? like imagine David Rimnik hearing this for the first time he's like please here's a million dollars go write this story you know but but if he's heard of him then it doesn't seem like that revelatory it doesn't see you know so it's sort of like who's on the cutting edge of this of absorbing the clipping culture um but but yeah i mean it's a yeah i mean i i don't i think that just the there are a lot of revelations in that piece just in terms of how canny they were when you hear anything about so-and-so's manager is the same manager for you're like oh they're all

those are the 12 people i've seen most on across all the platforms on various clip videos lately it's that's where it just becomes it feels like you're part of a game and whether or not the journalistic endeavor is legitimate it's just like it just feels disheartening the whole thing check out the piece which is called the feed is fake over on vulture by the way how many times have you i mean it's definitely, I'm not, I'm sure it hasn't happened a million times. But certainly it's happened in your career where, you know, well, certainly it's definitely happened where you have a great idea for a story and then you Google and find out somebody wrote it a year ago, right?

Like that happens. But there's also been times I can imagine where you have a gray idea for a story and you mention it to a friend that works elsewhere and they're like, oh yeah, my co-worker is writing that piece and that's enough to dissuade you, right? Sure, sure. That's not the culture anymore. The idea that somebody We put off by an opposing outlet

Running a similar subject Just doesn't really happen These things get Mass produced in the same way That people Consume social media in some ways There's just so much stuff too And you don't have to make hard decisions

As a publication Yeah You know before you're essentially saying Well we're going to devote Five pages to that Or a couple of columns to that If someone else has already done the story And now you don't really have to choose

Like we will also do that Because we have finite space From time to time David here we do a feature Called the Best Piece About Yeah This week we have a Star Wars movie A Mandalorian movie

A Baby Yoda movie And I thought What's the best piece about Star Wars? Oh, that's a good question Yeah and it's one that I don't feel terribly qualified to answer But I can give you the one that I go back to and read again this week.

It's by John Seabrook. It ran in the New Yorker in January 1997 before any clavicular stories were assigned by that magazine or even considered. Do you know how the New Yorker has a department name above every story? Oh yeah.

Like onward and upward with the arts. This story by John Seabrook was called Letter from Skywalker Ranch, which has got to be the coolest department name in New Yorker history. The piece, if you want to look it up, is called Why is the Force still with us? And it's an essay that has some of the vital organs of a profile

and since that Seabrook is writing about the phenomenon of Star Wars but also went to Skywalker Ranch and interviewed George Lucas. He had Huevos Rancheros with Harrison Ford, which is something I would have liked to have done in my journalistic career and unless may not before it's over. but what's interesting about this piece is it comes out in January 1997 so the three original movies have been made Star Wars is pretty dormant for a while

that month the re-releases the special editions of those movies would come out where George Lucas had tuned up the special effects if you remember those were the things that really pissed off the fan boys and girls first before the prequels and then at that point all of Star Wars writing became about how the new thing ruined the old thing or honored the old thing.

It was all very self-referential. But at this point, Seabro could sit or stand there in January 97 and just write about the original phenomenon of Star Wars and what it meant to us. Remember, at that point in history, they had not been an original movie in 14 years, and it was still this huge industry of books and toys and all those kinds of things.

And I'll read to you one passage that I really, liked. Seabrook writes, The movie has all the really cool parts of the future. Interplanetary travel, flashy effects, excellent machines. But it also has the friendships, the heroism, the other reassuring conventions of the cinema process

past. Outlaw saloons, dashing flyboys, sinister nobles, brave nights, and narrow escapes. It makes you feel a longing for the unnameable thing that is always being lost, dot, dot, dot. But it's a longing

sweetened by the promise that in the future will figure out some way of getting that unnameable thing back. Such a great way to describe Star Wars and there's 20 sentences like this in this piece which again

you can read on the New Yorker's website or as a part of John C.brook's book No Brow. And she wrote about all these various parts of American culture that were half culture, half marketing. Star Wars being one of them. All right, David, coming up in 30 seconds,

Stephen Colbert's last stand with a comedy expert from the New York Times. 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 add the press box pod, where they're always, always gratefully received. David, last week we had a guerrilla trade.

Megan Swift of the Pittsburgh Tribune review reports that the Pittsburgh Zoo in Aquarium is set to trade guerrillas with Boston's Franklin Park Zoo. Frankie, Pittsburgh's 7-year-old male Western lowland gorilla will head to Boston. And in exchange, Boston will send 33-year-old Little Joe the Silverback back to Pittsburgh. The zoo announced.

Are you ready to hear what Twitter did with that one? Please. Pittsburgh got absolutely fleeced here. Another one. Glad to see Nico Harrison found work again. And this is my favorite. Classic win now move. You have to give Pittsburgh credit for going for it

while their championship window is open. Thanks to Greg Horowitz and Vetstone. If you went full shams, congrats. You made the overworked Twitter joke of the week. Ladies and Germs with Stephen Colbert signing off on Thursday night. It's just one man I want to talk to. His name is Jason Zineman.

He is a critic at large for the New York Times who makes a specialty of writing about funny people. Comedians. It's got a great new profile of Martin Short up at the New York Times right now that you need to go read. He has been a long-distance friend of this podcast for many years. Jason, I am so happy to say, welcome to the press box. Oh, it's incredible to be here. We've never met, but we were colleagues at sports magazine, but should have been the greatest sports magazine of all time,

once upon a time, Play Magazine. RIP Play Magazine. What a three-year quarterly run it was. It was like the Derek Rose of sports magazines. That is the perfect pull. Thank you. And welcome to the ringer with that NBA analogy. All right, Colbert signing off on Thursday.

How is Stephen Colbert's late show going to be remembered? Well, I think it's going to be remembered in part for how it ended. There's such a, this is such a massive story, and it's a political story, and it's also a business story about a referendum on late night. But I think, you know, I was thinking about this, that there is this kind of history in late night of like, sort of sophisticated New York. aspirational voices. If you look at like Jack Parr, going all the way back to the second host

of the Tonight Show, who would commute in from Connecticut to the Algonquin Hotel where his office was, where he would hang out with Dorothy Parker and Noel Coward and the like.

And then, you know, Dick Cavett in the 70s, who was the sort of, the smarty pants alternative to Johnny Carson. And I think, you know, when Colbert filled that niche, I believe,

for this generation, and when he leaves, it's not going to be replaced. Like that is, he was a talk show host who could recite poetry from memory with the creator of Fleabag who could talk to, could talk about his favorite Sondheim song, could have, you know, long discussions about the afterlife with, you know, whether it's, you know, Neil deGrasse Tyson or Keanu Reeves. And I think that is, I don't think it's like a comedy bit. I think, you know, interestingly enough, I think some of his most memorable moments are more kind of soulful, literary, are moments that are often about. And I think this will, that we'll see more of this in the last couple shows about, you know, loss and grief and more serious issues.

It's such an interesting point because Jimmy Fallon is not that person. Jimmy Kimmel has grown in office. He's not Mr. women jumping on trampolines anymore. But he doesn't really go there. His interests are not in Neil deGrasse Tyson. No. I mean, he'll fill the political, he'll benefit from Colbert leaving because all of the people

who gravitate to Colbert as a critic of Trump will go to Kimmel. And he is certainly, I think, will benefit in the ratings for that. And he does that part of it. But you're right. It's a different thing. There's a non-crazy scenario where Colbert would have done three more years, five more years, and then just decided to hang it up and write Lord of the Rings movies and do a podcast and talk about deeper subjects.

How much bigger do you think Donald Trump and Brennan Carr made Stephen Colbert by trying to shove him off the air? Much bigger. Much bigger. Honestly, it's the best possible scenario for Colbert. Because, I mean, you know, late night, the knock on late night was that it was diminishing in relevance, right? It didn't have a young audience.

It was not capturing the zeit guys. It was definitely, you, Colbert, we forget, was leading and is leading in the ratings and his leading, led in the ratings for many years. And, oh, by the way, for the history of television, the way we judged success was ratings. So he was wildly successful by the way, we've always measured these things. But you could credibly say that, you know, because of the internet and because of where the conversation's moving, it was decreasing in relevance until this happened. And suddenly, if the president's attacking you every day and it looks like you're hounded off the air for political reasons, whether it's true

or not, you move from a comedian, a talk show host into the realm of, you're a woman. And you're realm of kind of martyr folk hero, which is where, you know, Conan went when he got taken for different reasons when he left the Tonight Show, where Chappelle became when he left the Comedy Central show. And I think in a large degree, Chappelle's people forget, but his stature now, in part, is due to the way he left a show. So I think that Colbert is a real opportunity now to capitalize on this. His exit has a meaning that it wasn't going to have. You could add Letterman leaving NBC to that list too, you know, full on martyrdom, denied the job I had wanted for my entire life. You and I grew up watching Johnny and Dave and Jay to a lesser extent and Conan and all these other

guys. So I feel nostalgia for late night. Yes. Beyond that, though, what do we lose? What do we actually lose when we lose late night television? Well, it's a good question. I think a couple things. First of all, a lot of what late night does has been replaced by other forms, right? So you can now get longer form, more interesting conversations on podcasts. You can promote your movies on places like chicken shop date or hot ones or a variety of other places or, you know, Theo Vaughn's podcast or whatever. stand up. It used to be like the place where you become a star, you get on Johnny, you become a star. That, you know, you're more, that's more likely to happen on a Netflix or YouTube now. What I think you lose, and I was thinking a lot about what I'm actually, I think like you, I'm nostalgic for the late show as an institution more than Colbert. Colbert's going to be fine. But the late show has been around now for longer than Johnny Carson hosted the Tonight Show. Incredible. Which is crazy, right?

It's been a part of people's lives for a long time. And what I think these shows always did well is there was an element of kind of variety show about them, a sort of a little bit of a little bit of a few jokes, a little bit of song, a little bit of celebrity chat. And if you were kind of a casual fan of comedy, you might, you know, discover a band that you didn't know about. You might hear about something in the news that you didn't know about. It wasn't, you know, today we live in this culture where it benefits fandoms and obsesses.

If you love the Red Sox, there's 10 podcasts for you. If you're obsessed about music, there's a podcast for you. What we have less of today are these kind of last gasp of the monoculture where somebody a casual could watch and get a sense of something, casualty with a rich sense of curiosity, could learn about something new. You know, Colbert, there's a sociological term called the third place. And I know Colbert mentioned this. He cared about this, where it's the idea that it's not your workplace, it's not your home, but it's sort of this place that like kind of strangers can gather and

meet, right? It might be the bar, it might be a Starbucks. Colbert took seriously the idea of the talk show as a third place. and there aren't many of those places left. And I think that's why you see so much attention to his leaving. There's the political story, but I actually think it's more than that. I think if you compare it to say Mark Merrin leaving last year, Mark Marron started this new institution and tremendously important figure in a much cooler art form, right, podcasting, right?

And he left and there was some Ballyhoo. but not the amount of full-course press media obsession that the end of the late show has. And I think that's part of it. When did you first notice that late-night shows were losing some of their cachet? I mean, I think it's probably around the, when you realize that people were making the jokes on Twitter

that before the, the late, my hosts were making them in the monologue. Because a big part of the, what they gave you was crazy stuff happened during the day and then you get to turn on on television and watch Johnny Carson or Letterman and whoever

make a topical joke. The topicality was essential. That kind of made sense of the day. And when Twitter started feeling that service, then that posed a real problem for late night. And then that was the beginning of a kind of like series of domino's falling where the late night show kind of vanished and it became like a collection of loose parts, some of which would distribute the internet. And suddenly they're competing with all the rest of us. The loose parts portion of that is fascinating to me because I know my mom would watch Colbert's monologue.

I'm not sure she ever sat down at 1030 Central and watched the late show, but was just watching. because places like your newspaper would cover the monologue or aggregate the monologue. Here's what these people said last night. But to your earlier point, it was no longer show that was made up of all these constituent parts. It was like, here are some jokes. A lot of these jokes are about Trump, so they're fulfilling the needs of the resistance. Here we go. You'll never believe what Stephen Colbert said, but it wouldn't a show anymore.

As you said, it was just all pulled apart. And that was like a fascinating moment for me because I'm like, you know, again, you and I grew up in an age we're like either staying up late or we're taping these things. And, you know, you'd make it to that weird band at the end of Letterman on NBC. And you'd be like, I have no idea who this is. But I feel I should sit here because this is part of an institution. This is part of a thing I like. And Dave has blessed this just like he's blessed stupid pet tricks.

And it was coherent. Like there were sometimes like he'd letterville would make a joke early in the show and it would pay off later in the show. And so you want, and I think also. you know, I don't know if you were like this, but there's something very powerful about the way we watched those shows. So when I was a little kid, Letterman was on pass by bedtime.

So I had to sneak away from my bed and, like, put the TV on very low. And it was like a transgressive act just to watch it because I was so, you know, I wasn't supposed to be up. And that's a very powerful memory. And a lot of people, a lot of kids, got that relationship to those shows that way.

and it had this young, passionate audience, which it doesn't anymore. I mean, the daily show is the only late-night show that has a growing young demographic. I was thinking about this the other day, like when you're a kid, what are your portals to the adult world? And in the 80s, for me, it was sports pages

and late-night television. Those were two things that I could understand from a young age, but it felt like eavesdropping odd stuff my parents were talking about. And what do you want to know more when you're young? Sports and funny comedy. Right.

But also like what the adults are saying. Like, you know, you're like, you know, even my parents and friends over, you're listening in and what they're saying. And I mean, I think for Letterman's generation, that was very much what watching Carson was all about. I think Letterman was a little bit, you know, it was a little different in that. that you felt yourself represented a little bit, I think, more. That would, it was, it felt like it was four young people and the way Arsenio Hall was too. This is like a part of late night that doesn't exist anymore, which is that it, it felt like it was four young people. It was late night felt cool.

That was part of it. It was late night, right? Now it, it really, I mean, look, I think the older audiences are still watching Colbert and late night shows religiously, and it still means a lot to them. But the younger audiences, you know, are on the scrolls, you know. And they're interacting with some of these late night shows,

but not on TV, but, you know, on YouTube or TikTok or whatever. One data point in the death of late night that I wanted to run by you. When I was a kid, let's say Dave would come out and tell a joke. And sometimes that joke was a 10 out of 10, and the audience would just explode. And sometimes that joke was a four out of ten. And the audience would kind of chuckle.

At some point in the last 10 or 15 years, every single joke that a late night host told got a 10 out of 10 reaction in the audience. No matter how funny it was. This is true of Kimmel. This is true of Colbert. It was true of Letterman at CBS at the end. The audience just sounded so juiced.

And I feel like late night shows lost a lot of their authenticity because of that. Oh, my gosh. That's such a good point. Such a good point because that was integral to Carson. Carson, everyone says, if you ask, he's funniest when the joke didn't work than to watch him react to it. If every joke kills, he doesn't get to exercise his greatest talent. And you're right. Letterman, I mean, I just rewatched one of the first episodes of The Late Show, which I went to go visit the late show in second week in 1993.

And I watched it again, Siskel and Evers, Robert Plant. And there was a lot of you're right. There was jokes that bombed in that show. And then that was the funniest stuff. And it's crazy. I mean, you listen to Bill Maher's audience. Oh, there's booing cat whistles for some of the jokes. It's so juiced.

It's so juiced. It's, it's, it's, I had somebody, I had a reader who was obsessed with this and would email me. He had all these conspiracy theories about plants in the Bill Maher audience who were like, because they also have these, they, they, they hoot. right and he he was like he was like the Woodward and Bernstein of the the Bill Maher

you know packed audience and there may be so there's definitely true that like that audience is just is is every everything is just you know raucous yeah that you can't fail as a late night host that every no joke could possibly bomb and even with Bill Maher

when I haven't watched that show too much lately but I feel like the audience would at least turn on him once in a while And he goes, oh, too soon, oh, too much for you? You know, and he gets to be mock offended and that would at least be a moment. That's true, but if you, it's usually when he's at the desk, not when he's doing the monologue. Okay. See, we're going to, this is good investigation for those reporters like yourself at the New York Times.

Last one for you, Jason. So no offense to Byron Allen, who's going to be filling the late night slot on CBS. But could one of these networks, if they want to spend less money, if they want to nod towards, the times we live in, could they just make this a podcast? Could they strip it down? No audience, kind of a monologue, make the cameramen laugh, have a guest come in, Tom Snyder-style. Could you do it like that now, do you think? I think it's inevitable. I think it's inevitable. I think look, the reason the late-night talk shows, the real reason they became popular is because they were cheap. They were cheaper than sitcoms, hour-long dramas,

even like new shows. They were, it's, and over the years, they became more expensive because of the late night war at Sullivan Theater and these big theaters. But the fundamentally, it's humans talking to humans, as people telling jokes, they don't need to be as expensive. They can be video podcasts of which there's no shortage of them now. And I think at some point, as you know better than I, as I'm covering the media as much, we keep reinventing the wheel, right?

and they're going to realize like, oh, yeah, people like comedians talking to comedians. Like, that's why these podcasts are popular. And we got this form that's really cheap. And we have all this talent on YouTube. Why don't instead of having Byron Allen on where, like, the risk reward is very low. And the comic might be dead. Yeah, we get Zeeway or we try to convince Amy Poehler or we get, you know, Adam Friedland or any number. of people. I think what's going to happen, if you look ahead to 10 years from now or five years from now,

is it's going to look more like these video podcasts now. You have podcasts becoming more like talk shows and talk shows have already been becoming more like podcasts with the cutting of bands and the shrinking of theaters. So I think it's inevitable that and I think the podcast has proven that there is a audience for conversation. And so I think I could see that the next successful version of a late-night talk show, and I think there will be, will be one which leans more into conversation.

And it just feels like you could export that to YouTube, you could make it into an actual podcast, you could just sell it in all the ways that a show is required to be sold now. Yes. It's very weird that we've gone through decades and decades of late-night and eventually come back to Tom Snyder. That's why.

That's where truth and enlightenment lay the whole time. Jason Zendam and read him in the New York Times. It's great to see you. Thanks so much for coming on the press box. Great to be here. Thanks for having me. All right, it's time for David Schumacher guesses the strained pun headline. Yeah.

Last week's headline about U.S. escort ships in the Street of Hormuz was Naval Piercing. Today's headline comes to us from alert listener Mark Mosley. it's from ESPN.com. The Vegas Golden Knights, David, finished off the Anaheim Ducks 4 to 2 last Thursday to advance to the Western Conference Final where they'll play the avalanche. The Knights coach John Tortorella

after this victory refused to speak to reporters. And the team did not open up its locker room. This is after a victory, I remind you. Big story in the world of sports. media. For what the NHL calls flagrant violations,

Vegas had to forfeit its second round pick this year, and the coach got fined $100,000. So the

Golden Knights did not speak to the press. What was ESPN.com's Drainpun headline? See, I thought it was

going to be Vegas. Some, like, you know, Omerta thing. Oh, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

Yeah. Um, or that, yeah, uh, okay, so the knights, um, that's the word. Night, uh, night moves. They were not available to the press. So what kind of nights were they? Quiet night? Uh, mm-hmm. You're getting there. What, quiet nights? What do you say? Not quiet nights? Silent nights. Silent nights. Yeah, there we go. Silent Knights. He's David Shoemaker. I'm Brian Curtis. Production Magic by Isaiah Blakely and

John Romer. Follow us on Instagram at Pressbox Ringer. Write us Press Box Ringer at Gmail. Coming up this week, David, can I interest you in this? John Crackhauer is going to be on the press box. To talk about the 30th anniversary of his book Into Thin Air. Breaking his silence.

Breaking his silence, which I also read on paper this week. Plus, Sarah Longwell, the founder and publisher of the bulwark, is going to be in studio. with me here in Los Angeles to talk politics and other matters. Joel's here Thursday, David. Got something else to say?

If you're one of those audiobook listeners, then you probably know that Barbara Rosenblad, who he named checked earlier, is in fact a giant of the game, one of the absolute best and most widely respected to ever do it. Just wanted to give her a shout out for dismissing her. And she read Into Thin Air, or we're just giving her a plug here?

No, no, she did the Grifters. Oh, she did the Grifters? Yeah. Good job, Barbara. Joel's here Thursday, David, I'll see you next Tuesday with more lukewarm chicks about the week. See you later, Brian.