The Press Box - Hulk Hogan Vs. Gawker, Bill Belichick Fever, and the New Washington Post Exodus

Episode Date: July 28, 2025

Hello, media consumers! Bryan and David cover some headlines, including the approval of the Paramount-SkyDance merger, a discouraging new study about google searches and AI, Bill Belichick rapidly approaching his first game as a college head coach, the WaPo exodus (cont.), and more (9:45), Then, they discuss the wide-ranging obituaries of the late Hulk Hogan, "obit wars" whenever a complex figure passes away, and Hulk Hogan vs. Gawker in the early 2010s (27:15). Plus, an addition to the "Only in Journalism" vocabulary list, and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained Pun Headline 'The Mortal Hulk Hogan' by David Shoemaker Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David ShoemakerProducer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey everyone, Danny Hyfitz here from the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. We're coming to you multiple times per week to tell you who to draft, who not to draft. Honestly, that's kind of most of it. The Ringer Fantasy Football Show. YouTube, Spotify, wherever get your podcast, the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. Damn it? Yes. I have a few further East Coast adventures I'd like to talk to you about.

Okay. When I was in New York the other day, I made my way to our old stomping grounds. Oh. The Lower East Side. Very different place now. No. And to the restaurant that I was both lucky enough and cursed enough to be within walking distance of. Yes, I'm talking about Katz's Deli.

I had not been there in so long. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know when the last time you got there was. It's been a while. It's been a while. I mean, listen, you actually went to Katz's more than I did back in the day. I'm a big sandwich guy, but I am also, sandwiches are like pizza for me.

It's like, I just get them from the bodega and I had my sandwich favorite. for a couple of days. But yeah, Katz's is just one of a kind. And I swear their sandwiches only get bigger with every passing year as everything else gets smaller. It was much bigger. And partly it was bigger, I think, because when I walked into Katz's Deli,

if people don't know, you walk up to a counter. Mm-hmm. And you find a meat cutter behind the counter because they cut all the meat by hand right in front of you. They even give you a little sample, if you remember, David. Mm-hmm. And I don't know anybody who's like had the sample and be like, this is disgusting, I'm out of here.

Yeah. But you get a little sample and then they cut the meat. Well, as soon as I walked in, all the old instincts took over. And I made sure that I got a $5 bill out of my wallet. And before any sandwich making happened, I conspicuously put the $5 bill in the tip jar of the meat cutter. And if you do that, then we're off on the right track. Yeah. Sandwich is bigger, sandwich is a little leaner, perhaps.

The other thing that just killed me was, so I order pastrami on rye. I don't eat any of your cheese. I don't eat any of the weird stuff. Pestrami on rye, here we go. Wait, is cheese in the weird stuff category for you? Well, like an orange sauce or something. Oh, okay. Which is totally fine on its own merits, but it cats is deli.

We're talking pastrami on rye. That's my order. So I order that, and he gets to the top slice of the rye bread. and the guy behind the counter dips a wooden spoon, as in the kind of wooden spoon you would use to stir a soup on the stove, he dips a wooden spoon into the mustard, and then just spreads the mustard over the slice of rye with a spoon. At first of all, I was like, this is so awesome.

Yeah. This is the only place on earth where mustard is administered with a giant wooden spoon. And secondarily, but importantly, he never asked me if I wanted mustard. It was just assumed. Yeah. God, I love cats. All right, another East Coast adventure. As you know, we're staying in a cabin in the woods in Connecticut.

Very cool, lake down the road, great place for my wife and I to work remotely, kids to have a great time. So I am sitting on a screened-in porch the other day. And I'm typing on my laptop, no doubt, doing the important business of media criticism. And my wife, Christine, walks into the room and she's like, I don't want to startle you, but there's a bear right behind you. And I turn around and about five or six feet away from me through a screen door is a bear. A black bear and a baby bear, it should be noted. but it's right there.

And I do a cartoon version of a flinch where my whole body goes back like a foot even though my feet don't move and my eyes bug out. And the funny thing was the bear did the exact same thing. By being startled, I startled the bear. And then it ambles off, you know, back into the woods. That was bear experience number one. Bear experience number two, David. Okay, so the cleaners are at the house. My family's gone, but the cleaners are at the house.

I finish up something for work, and I am leaving because I'm going to go meet them. Well, I notice the front door to the cabin is open. I'm like, oh, they must be airing things out or bringing stuff, whatever they're doing. So I walk out the open front door. I get in my car and I drive halfway down the driveway, and there is another black bear. Not the same black bear. I want to make sure I have the scientific nomenclature right. This was the mama bear.

Oh, okay. So mama bear's there now. I'm kind of just sitting in the car looking at it. I'm like, huh, well, I feel safe because I'm in like an SUV and bear is sitting there looking at me. Then I realized, oh my God, the front door to the cabin is open. I can't just drive away because bear might go into the, house. Yeah. So I back up and I get out of the car like Alan Grant got out of the land cruiser in Jurassic Park. Just eyes on that T-Rex. I'm back into the house because I'm looking at the

bear like the bear's like to chase me, is it? I'm back into the house. I tell the clear's, hey, just FY, there's a bear outside and you need to close the door so that everybody's safe here. well now I come back out the door I'm still going to meet my family and it's like now I have to go back to my car so I'm walking forward still eyes on the bear bear is looking at me like what did you forget your wallet what's going on here

I get back in the SUV and I drive away wow that's my David Attenborough story from the East Coast yeah there's a lot of bears out there there's a bear running around Princeton right now supposedly is it a black bear are we going to have a grizzly man situation in Princeton

No, I think it's a... What's the rhyme? If it's black fight back, if it's brown, lie down... Is that real? Is that a thing? I feel like... Did you learn that in the Boy Scouts? No, I've learned it since being, living in the Northeast.

I don't know. We got a lot of wildlife around here. I had a fox on my porch just the other day. You had a fox? Yeah. Not as cute in real life. Foxes are kind of cool, right? Well, they're cool, but they tell you very quickly.

It's like if a fox is ever friendly, it's because it has rabies. So you just learn, even though my son has like four stuffed foxes. They're not actually fun to play with. Last story for you, I'm in Boston. I'm going to take a few days off. We're recording this on Sunday afternoon. And tomorrow, David, I'm going to try to go by the Brattle Bookshop. Oh, yeah.

You've seen or people have seen the movie The Holdovers with Paul Giamatti. And they take that illegal trip to Boston. And they're looking through the books and the outdoor corrals there. That is the Brattle Bookshop. Yeah. And David, we have an insider at the Brattle Bookshop. a guy named Zach Marconi, who remember sent us that actual published book that was like words used only in journalism. Oh, yeah.

I mean published decades ago. Somebody was on the beat somehow before we were. Anyway, Zach Marconi works there. He's the official bookseller of the press box. But I cannot tell you how much stuff I'm going to buy there. Oh, my gosh. Oh, I'm going to buy. He made a good investment when he started courting you.

That was. I hope he gets a commission. Little does he know. He wrote me a note the other. the day because fantasy and I did that physical media podcast. And I was talking about like just like you, the right number of books to own is too many books. Yeah. And he sent a picture from the story. He's like, by the way, I say this as someone who bought 1,100 books yesterday. And there was just all the stacks of them. Oh my God. In our next life, we will be reincarnated as booksellers.

Oh, absolutely. I mean, listen, I spent most of my big book, I mean, I think I mentioned this in another show, but I was up in New Hampshire and went to a couple big book barns up there. I mean, it's just like... Love the book barn. And, well, they're both actually not full barn. One is Lakeside Bookshop and Old Number 6, both around the Newbury, New Hampshire area. I highly recommend both of them. But it's just a giant old house that is 100% given over to bookshows.

It's just stacks and stacks of books. And most of them are hard covers because it's just like these are the books that like people of a certain age are bringing up to the cabin and then decide to get rid of at some point. You know, it's like leisure reading almost or whatever. It's really, really incredible. I was just all that is to say. it does seem like that half of the joy is just in the collection of the books as the book buyer. And like I own the used bookstore. I don't care if you buy them.

This is my library. This is why we'd be bad at it. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. It only buy the books we want. And then somebody comes in and you're just like, ooh, that's going to be $500. You know? All right, David, in this lifetime, we are media podcasters.

And coming up on the press box, how much did CBS cough up to merge with Skydance? what there are still people leaving the Washington Post, plus Hulk Hogan left behind quite a legacy, including with Gawker. Who better to break it down than the masked man himself? All that and much more on the press box. A boiler ringer podcast network. Hello media consumers, Brian Curtis.

David DeShuemaker and producer Kyle Crichton here. Some quick headlines for you, David. All right. The Paramount Skydance merger finally, got approved by the FCC. You will not have to do any more pre-merger segments on the press box. Here are some of the things

and some of the reported things that Paramount did before that deal got over the goal line. These are via our friend Matt Bellany. Count along with me here. Cancelled Stephen Colbert. Yeah. Paid $16 million to settle

the Donald Trump's 60 Minutes lawsuit. According to Trump himself, agreed to give him an additional $16 million or $20 million, he has cited both figures, for public service announcements for his administration. Now, God only knows

what form those will take. I'm hoping for the old NBC, the more you know spots of our childhood. Except Trump? Except Trump. Oh, my God. Smiling at the end of it. Here's some more viability.

Paramount, promises to cancel all DEI programs. They promise to hire an ombudsman for CBS News. Now, that's a great thing to sort of offer up, and it's completely meaningless because who cares what the ombudsman says. And potentially, Paramount slash CBS News will buy the free press

and install Bari Weiss as a kind of spiritual advisor to the news arm. our friend Peter Kofka asks, is this the new normal? If you want to get something through the FCC? I think so. I think so too. A new Pew study about Google searches, David. Do people in the news business care about Google searches?

Yeah. Let me read you some absolutely depressing findings from this new study. Users who encountered an AI summary, this now appears, of course, whenever you do a Google search, clicked on a traditional search link in 8% of all visits. 8%. Those who did not encounter an AI summary clicked on a search result nearly twice as often, 15% of visits.

So it was only 15%. We had a 15% chance that they would click on a ringer.com link or a New York Times link. Give us that little click. Now that's been halved. Google users who encounter an AI summary also rarely clicked on a link in the summary itself. Pew writes, this occurred in just 1% of all visits to pages with such a summary.

They just read the summary and that's all they need and they move on. And they move on. One more note for you. The most frequently cited sources in both Google AI summaries and standard search results are Wikipedia, YouTube, and Reddit. Is it like a specific Reddit or just is it like a no dumb questions Reddit or is it just like random people spouting off? I would think it's the Bill Simmons subreddit. A font of great information over there. They've got quite a few ideas about how things should be.

And quick as Google is Ryan Curtis good at his job? Let's find out. Oh my God. I got to say we're reflexively anti-AI, but dude, when you're. you click on, when you do that Google search sometime and those, when was this player's last basketball game? Mm-hmm. Oh, the handy AI summary gave me the date without me having to click through one time.

Yeah. Pretty magical. It is. When they get it right. Sometimes, you know, they get it wrong. You should always double check, but it's pretty great. I'm sure you had some whole code. I'm sure we all double check our facts and our pieces and we have a wonderful copy desk.

It does that. No, I mean, I'm thinking more like the, hey, how late is the drugstore open or whatever? and then Google AI gives you the answer and then it's wrong. It's not ideal. And by the way, when you're looking for restaurants, Reddit AI summary, absolutely the way to go. I'll happily use all those sites that are like Best Brunch near Carnegie Hall or whatever it is.

Yeah. Let me tell you, there's always a Reddit page. It always has good ideas. A couple of sports things for you. Bill Belichick, David, just one month until he coaches his first college football. football game. I thought it would never happen.

That is September 1st, UNC versus TCU. What a matchup. What does the horn frogs do? Don't they have a, not a hookum, gig them? What is the horn frog? What does the hornfrogs rip off? It's hard to convey. It's like a curve two fingers, like a P sign by a witch.

But what is it, but don't they have a saying that goes with it, or am I imagining that? A P sign by a witch. I was reading a piece by David Ubbin and the Athletic where he just followed Belichick around at ACC Media Days. What does this feel like to you? Does this feel like Michael Jordan going to play minor league baseball? Does this feel like a major league baseball player going down to AAA for a rehab assignment? There's just gobs of people there more than there would ever normally be.

What does it feel like? It's hard for me to wrap my head around it. which is to say it's hard for me to answer this question. Because I feel like there's a sort of, like I don't think I know if he's going to be here for the long haul or if he's going to be back in the NFL in like a year. And I have a hard time dealing with that sort of uncertainty when I'm trying to draw big picture,

draw out big picture thoughts from times like this. Yeah, I mean, I don't think it's exactly my, Michael Jordan playing baseball, but it's not not that, you know, I mean, especially when you talk about these giant outlets following him around every day. I mean, that was the big, maybe the biggest, you know, odd piece of the Michael Jordan baseball experiment was the media attention that the AAA, you know, White Sox team was getting or whatever. It's, it is. I mean, in some ways, it is this sort of grand experiment. I'm not sure if that's the most interesting part of this. I think most most interesting part is like, I think that most people are paying. attention to is just like how much does he have left sort of but the idea that like can the best coach in NFL history come and like remake college sports or the way that we you know X's and O's wise at least it's pretty intriguing there's also all this uncertainty just surrounding the kind of existential crisis of college football you know i don't want to get you to up in your feelings right now Ryan but like you know we it's not i'm not i don't i wouldn't make the case that it's getting like

disappeared i'm not trying to be that but we just don't know really what the shape of college football is going to be in five years, you know? So it's kind of hard just to fit Bill Belichick into that. I have a hard time imagining he's going to be a huge mover with Shaker when it comes to the sort of big, big seismic moves that the business of college football is going to make. So it's kind of hard to imagine how he's going to fit into it in general. But I don't know, man. I like the story when it started.

I enjoyed the idea of Bill Belichick going to UNC and trying to just do something, just trying to see if he could, you know, if he could make a little experiment work. But I don't know. What do you think? I'm excited about it. I mean, of course,

I'm going to watch that first game because you're like, it's just so intriguing. And I guess if we have a template is kind of Dion, but even that wasn't the best coach of all time. That was just more like, holy crap,

Dion Sanders is a college football coach. And he's coaching at Colorado. It still seems kind of funny. You said the most interesting thing is how much is Bill Belichick have left? Is that really the most interesting thing about Bill Belichick right now? I'm doing that pretty

generously. Like how much at the top of his game does he have left and it's tied to all these other things? Yeah. No, I'm saying, but is that really the most interesting thing about Bill Belichick right now? No. We're listening to the Pablo Torre podcast. I'm a big fan of the Pablo Tori podcast. Thank you. No, there's a lot more interesting stuff.

He has the girlfriend, is all this kind of fiancé, whatever all this stuff is. But like, that's it. It's like how in the game, how, how, engaged as he in the Ashcroact of coaching. I kind of lump all those things together. Because the people always said college is harder. And that was when it was just pure recruiting. Those were your high school counselors, Brian. But yeah. That was when it was pure recruiting and not salary cap NIL recruiting. So, shoot, imagine it now. One last sports thing for you. I was listening to Simmons and Zach Lowe the other day. Yeah. Catching up on my on my Simmons podcast.

And I don't know why this thought pops in my head. But Luca Donchitz gets traded by the Dallas Mavericks. Yeah. Perhaps you remember. What was the one pro Mavericks talking point that was planted in all the now they tell us stories? Well, the Luca wasn't committed to his rehab or to staying in shape or, you know, whatever else. And probably as a result of that wasn't a great defender. It wasn't an adequate defender because of that.

Is that fair? Yeah. What is the one thing that we have as a media talked about since Luca Donchish got traded to the Los Angeles Lakers? LeBron James? How is fit with LeBron's going to be? There was that, but also the Luca health. Oh, yeah. The Luca defense.

The Luca isn't, is Luca really in good enough shape to be the best Luca he could be? Yeah. Don't you feel like that? Now they tell. Dallas talking point kind of boomeranged into the mainstream conversation. Oh, yeah. Well, that's true. I mean,

it's true. I think we were talking about it in Dallas before the trade, too. But sure, I mean, I think you're right. That is, that isn't how they tell us boomerang. And maybe it's just because Lucas at that point in his career.

Yeah. He doesn't want a title. So you're asking the big questions, what does he need to do? What's how can he get the most out of it? I mean, it is a legitimate question. Yeah.

It's just funny how we laughed so much of that. Rightfully so. Like, you really is generational player you're going to trade him because you weren't yeah that was the nico story like defense wins championships or whatever but i feel it weirdly wound up because it was it was out there and it was rightfully laughed at it has now become somehow a more legitimate or at least more widespread point of discussion about luka funny how that worked that's true all right david the washington post i sometimes worry

when we do a Washington Post segment that we are creating a picture of the newspaper that is actually too dire because as we always say, there's still great people at the Post. There's still a gigantic bench of young, hungry political reporters, ready to step in for a Josh Dossie or at Ashley Parker.

But, dude, as we speak, the Washington Post is still losing people at a crazy rate. you would have just bet that at some point it would have stopped losing people yeah that things would have balanced out a tad yeah let me give you just a little rundown we don't even have to do the the nut graph here these are just all evidence we've done the nut graphs about what's happening at the Washington Post here's some more evidence mm-hmm these are from Charlotte Klein's story in New York magazine Washington Post lost three deputy managing editors who took the buyout they're politics and government editor. Hank Stuver, great writer, go pick up his collection, who had been the features editor. They lost their

TikTok star. Remember Dave Jorgensen who appeared during the Marty Barron era? Yeah. The woman who covered legal affairs and federal courts is leaving for the New York Times. She also accepted the buyout. By the way, you can do both. Take the buyout,

go to the competitor. Yeah. Over in the embattled opinion, section. People saying goodbye include the following. Jonathan Capehart, Molly Roberts, Philip Bump, David Von Dreley, Perry Bacon Jr., Catherine Rampel, who's very big on Twitter and is also on TV, took a buyout. She's going to be doing more anchoring on MSNBC. Pinyan writer Eduardo Porter is gone, saying that Bezos was taking the paper down a path I cannot follow. I don't even think you and I talked about Eugene Robinson.

Eugene Robinson who left the paper in April. Crazy. I might say, Brian, that's a hell of a list. But wait, there's more, David. My God. According to Mike Schaefer over at Politico, the Adam Bernstein, who ran Obitz

for the post, he's gone. Leaving for the New York Times as well. And here's a sentence from Schaefer's piece. I've learned that all but one person on the Obit desk has taken the organization's buyout offer. The loan holdout is too junior to qualify for the buyout deal. Oh my God. But wait, there's still more, David, at the Washington Post. Politico notes that at least 100 journalists have left the post since November.

100? What? Can you believe that? I can't believe a list. I can't believe there's still a daily paper being produced.

But maybe that was the problem. Maybe the staff was too big. If you could lose a hundred, Jesus Christ. Jeff Bezos definitely thought the staff was too big. Yeah. It's funny because you and I've talked about before that the problem with publisher

Will Lewis was not that he had bad British ideas. It was that he didn't seem to have any ideas about how to run the paper. Yeah. And his one idea. that stood out, at least as being an idea, was the creation of this third newsroom. Remember, which was something, something video, something, something, social media, find the young readers where they are? Yeah. Well, the woman overseeing the third newsroom, Chrisa Thompson, has taken a buyout and left the paper.

Third newsroom will no longer be part of the newsroom. Oh, God. I was at a bookstore, Oblong Books in Millerton, New York, this week, and I saw this book. Michael Lewis's name on the cover and the book's called Who is Government? And I'm looking at it and I'm like what Michael Lewis book is this?

And then I realized it was a collection of essays that were published in the Washington Post where they were actually trying to tell you these are the people that work in government. These are the people who devote themselves to public service who do all these things that you don't even know are being done.

And you remember there was a great Lewis piece that kicked it off. They got Casey SEP, Dave Eggers, writing about the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Sarah Vowl, W. Kame Bell. I mean, they got so many people. And these were like, I remember the Eggers piece was like 10,000 words running in the Washington Post.

It was almost underrated because you just couldn't believe it even happened. Yeah. They did that before Doge. Like, those pieces started running during the Biden administration before this whole, idea of even like what is the federal government became such a going concern and such a

you know an extreme political flashpoint if i can use the only in journalism word those pieces were commissioned by the opinion section of the washington post which has now been gutted yeah crazy crazy all right coming up in 30 seconds the man who body slammed gocker but first david let's do the overworked twitter joke of the week where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious that all All of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time. Send your nominees to at the PressBucks pod on Twitter or Blue Sky, where they are always, always gratefully received.

David, last week, as you know, the world lost Hulk Hogan. Yeah, so I've heard. Within a week of the world losing Ozzy Osbourne and Malcolm Jamal Warner. It was an overwork Twitter joke to write. Once again, Hulk Hogan is the third man. If you're going to make that joke for life, congrats. You made the overworked Twitter joke of the week.

All right, I wanted to carve out some time for you and I to talk about Hulk Hogan. She wrote an awesome piece at the ringer.com about the Hulkster and his legacy. It's called The Mortal Hulk Hogan. Also an awesome headline, sir. People need to go read it.

If you're a wrestling fan, you've already read it. If you're not a wrestling fan, you need to go read it right now. because David is the person you want to read about Hulk Hogan at a time like this before we get into the particulars here. Yeah. Take me back to last week.

This is Thursday. You've gotten this shocking news along with the rest of the country. What does it like to sit down and try to write a piece like that? Wow. Well, back you up even further. A few weeks ago, there was a rumor that was out there.

I think Bubba the Love Sponge himself on his still exist. sent radio show. It said, Hulk Hogan's on his deathbed, deathbed gathering family around. That was then shot down my people close to him. And apparently he did not die that day. And so we all kind of let it go.

But that day, I was just sitting there and I was like, I saw the news. My wife was working in the next room. And I was like, oh, Hulk Hogan might be dead. And she was like, well, you've already written that one, though, right? Like, you've pre-written it like an obituary. And I was like, no, I have not. I've actually been actively avoiding writing anything about Hulk Hogan for quite a long time. And she was like, well, you should really write the big ones.

You know, just a very matter of fact. And I was like, you know what, you're right. I probably should do that. And then fast forward three weeks, he actually dies. I still have not written a word. Hadn't even thought very deeply about it. So I just did my podcast on Thursday and sat down and got a text from Brian H. Waters, a producer, former producer of the press box.

And he was like, yeah, I think Hogan's dead. And I was like, oh, God. And so I went and looked it up, and I just sort of leaned into it. I mean, it's, you know, a lot of what I do when I write these obituaries is sort of a little bit of a TikTok. So traditionally, I'll go through

and kind of start looking at the Wikipedia page and just jog my memory. With Hogan, I had to look at the Wikipedia page and to get some dates right and stuff, but for the most part, it was I just, I went in other direction. I just started writing down the things I actually, remembered, you know, like, like, like not just things he did, like my personal memories, you know,

like I remember watching, you know, Andre the Giant versus Hulk Hogan is on Saturday night's main event on my parents' bed. The only time that like the family of four, you know, my, my parents and my sister and me all watched wrestling together, you know, I remember going to see Hulk Hogan versus Killer Khan at Louisville Gardens. Someone just sent me the promo, like the newspaper ad for as part of the Kentucky State Fair. $2 for adults, $1, $1 for children. I remember Hulk Hogan turning heel at Bash of the Beach.

I remember Hogan versus Rock at WrestleMania 17. And then where I was and what I was doing and those memories sort of carry you through the whole thing. I remember, as I wrote in the piece, I interviewed Hogan in the early days of Grantland. Me and Peter Rosenberg interviewed him out in the ESPN LA Studios. and I told the story on my podcast on the Masked Man show, but at the last minute, they said,

I've been waiting and waiting and waiting for him, and I just increasingly needed to go use the bathroom. And when they were just finally like, okay, his car's pulling up now, I was like, well, that means I got time. So I sprinted to the bathroom with the intention of sprinting back, but he was already, he was in the bathroom, putting his hair extensions,

which I didn't know they were, but they were like tucking them into the back of his bandana or whatever. So great. And, you know, and I was like, I just am going to pretend, not here. He did not notice me. I just snuck out behind him and went to wait for him in the studio. But yeah, you know, those moments are pretty transformative, you know. I remember being with you, right, at Madison Square Garden when Hulk Hogan came back to save Sean Michaels from the hands of Muhammad

Hassan and Davari. And I think we kind of had an idea that was going to happen, but you and me remember, I mean, this is before any of the, I mean, any of the past 15 years of weird stuff happened. But like, you know, this is after a point where we were all kind of just out on Hogan from some sort of, in some sort of like hipster way, right? We were all just like, yeah, yesterday's news. Yeah, he's like, full, he's hard to work with backstage. It's like, whatever. But man, that real American hits and you're just like out of your chair. Like, I can't believe I'm here for this.

You're like eight years old all over again. You and I were so excited in the most non-execided. in the most non-ironic way possible. So, yeah, that's how I wrote. I just kind of sort of piecing those things together, and then you start pulling the threads. And, you know, at the same, like, I kind of write two things at one time. Like, I'm like, I'm, like, writing straight through.

And I also just have a notepad of, like, the thing that I think of that I'm not getting to in this paragraph. And to make sure I get to those things, you know, at some point, you know? And, and so, yeah, yeah, I just kind of crank through it. and then went back and added all those things and then took a walk around the house and re-read it again and added a few more things. And it was a real rush job. I really regret not having written it before

because then you go to bed, terrified of what you're going to wake up to the next day. You know, both as a wrestling writer, it's always like, what fact that I get wrong that people are going to be like pouncing on me about? And then with this one in particular,

It's like, listen, if I were doing this from an unbiased point of view, if I were the magical person that literally doesn't care about Hulk Hogan's racism or about his pro wrestling career, you would have to have some sort of conversation with your writer about how to like thread the needle, right? About how to like, how to like weigh those two things, all the different parts against each other. I am someone who cares about all that stuff, way too much in some cases.

And it's, you know, mostly just it was through my personal, experience. So it's not like I can get it wrong, but you didn't want, didn't want an army of people from any direction coming in and saying, I got it wrong. And this is like, it's real fraught, you know, this is one you'd like to have like a year with, not a day with. But the reaction was mostly good. And I think a lot of that's because I was was able to lean on my own mixed feelings about the whole thing. You know, my own sort of personal uncertainty. I mean, it's a real luxury of the sort of journalistic time we live in. I don't think this would have run in the New York Times of the 50s or something like that.

But, but, but, but, but, you know, just sort of, sometimes you just sort of get to the end and, and, uh, hope that the copy desk will, or your editor and then the, after the copy editor will, pull it all together, sort of, you know, and, and it was, it just sort of happened. But yeah, it's weird. I mean, it was, there's very few things that will happen

in any of our writerly lives where you kind of get done and you're like, well, that's the only time I'm ever going to do that. Like, that's, it's sort of just like a capstone

of my career, you know, when you finish it. It's sort of like, should I just write part two for next week? Like, I wonder what happens next? You know? Well,

let's, let's consult Dom first because she seems to be the key assignment. Yeah. Encouraging you to get behind. to keyboard and write this stuff. Yes, please do. You mentioned the complexities of it, and I do want to get into that because I obviously was on the exact same arc with him that you were from a little more removed in my adult years than you've been. But you said you first saw him in the piece in 1987. I think I saw him either that year or the next year in Albuquerque. I'm sure some

wrestling fan can look that up. And the only thing I can compare it to is when, And people older than us talk about the Beatles or talk about the Rolling Stones and how seeing them was an out-of-body experience. Yeah. And it wasn't seeing somebody you liked and was cool, but it was something that you just put you on the ceiling. In my case of the tingly Coliseum in the New Mexico Fairgrounds, that's what it was, you know, the first time I saw it. Now we're at this place, the whole Kogan. And it's funny, we mentioned on Thursday's pot, I was like, Joel, do you think he's an A1 obituary in the New York Times? He did turn out to be an A1 obituary in the New York Times.

The question I wanted to post to you was, if it had just been wrestling, if it had not been the GOP convention last year, the tape where he was caught making racist remarks, the Gawker lawsuit that we'll get into more in just one second, if he'd just been a wrestler, this towering pop culture figure of that period, is he still news in the way he was last week?

It's an interesting question for sure. I think if he had just been a wrestler, he would have probably been treated so hard it probably would have been treated more of an more as an oddity frankly despite the oddness of the life that followed wrestling you know i mean he was such a pop culture star outside of wrestling too in the 80s and i know we're counting we're counting that i mean he was just such a of them i mean it's like mr t like his you know ressomania one counterpart mr t was just like this guy was so so so famous but why was he famous again? You know, like the answer is not

the whole answer, right? The A team is not enough to understand Mr. T. But no, I mean, I think that it's everything that happened outside the ring. I don't think it's necessarily the bad stuff, necessarily the racist tape, so much that is just the sort of

like way that he came to represent the evolution of celebrity, you know, the reality show, um, and just his continued presence. as like someone you would talk about, even the Republican convention. You know,

I think that, I think that that sort of, um, I think the R&C probably did a lot for his placement, too, because it kind of made him, you know, saw a figure of, of recent relevance.

Um, but it's, you know, I mean, maybe, but I mean, maybe if he had sucked strictly to wrestling, he was there through such a high. If he had come back at his last appearance that Saturday night's main event to great raucous cheers and was seen as a,

or not Saturday's main event, sorry, the Netflix debut. If he had come back and kind of been a part of this modern era of great wrestling, you know, excitement, maybe, maybe page one, but I would say probably not. We do have to also factor in that people that were, that are our age, that live through what we did, they're making editorial decisions now, as alarming as that fact is. So when you talk about Mr. T, and that's such a great comp,

where it's like you had to be there, the people choosing what's going to be on the front page, New York Times, they were there. Oh, yeah, for sure. Of the right age or around the right age to appreciate just how big that was. Yeah, it's absolutely true. I mean, yeah, you're right.

It's our cohorts that are making these calls now. And the, and the, it's hard to, it's really hard for anyone now to wrap their mind around how big a star anybody was. Have you crossed that certain threshold in pop culture in the 80s? You were just one of them. I mean, you can be one of the 10 most famous people in the world. Like, you're like, Hulk Hogan's famous, more,

was at his peak more famous than all but two foreign leaders, you know, like whatever, like, you know, it's just, I mean, really. It was like, Hulk, it was what we would rank national leaders and wrestlers as like Reagan Gorbachev Hogan, right? I mean, would that be, like, does anybody else? How dare you down, great, Edward Chevronauts? Yeah, but like, you know, I mean, he was just that famous. I mean, and there's not, it was much more of a monoculture.

And even as odd as a thing as wrestling was, like wrestling was part of MTV culture at the beginning. You know, wrestling was just like such a big deal. And it was, it was, he was sort of unavoidable. And it was, you know, so yeah, I mean, writing, having to deal with his death, especially after all the stuff that happened later was, was, it was something I was hoping to avoid for a really long time. I really wished his health and the best with all of his health. I was at that Netflix debut that you talked about. So was Simmons when Hulk Hogan got booed and booed out of the building was the word.

And I saw that word appear a couple times in the last couple of days by a wrestling crowd. Yeah, I talked to Bill about that a little bit on his pod. Can you just explain? Because I think that's just one of those things that when you mention that to people, they're really, really surprised by it. Yeah. Because they're like, wait a second. All the things we mention, those are the things.

that make non-wrestlesing people hate Hulk Hogan or at least look at him differently. But wait a second, the wrestling fans in the wrestling arena, they're mad at Hulk Hogan? Can you explain why that is? Yeah, there's a lot of different things that go into it. I mean, one, Hogan was, you know, after the racist stuff, he did apologize on, like, ABC News, and then in People magazine, using apology pretty loosely here. I don't know that he ever set the words, I'm sorry. Maybe he did, but then he kind of proceeded to be like,

you know, see from a distance it seemed like he was just sort of perturbed that people were still asking him questions about it. He was like, dude, I apologize. Like, what more is there to say? Yeah, this is kind of a big deal. When he finally went to apologize to the WW locker room a year and a half or so

after the incident, because he'd sort of been banned for a while, apparently he went back in the locker room and gave them all a pep talk on how to avoid cameras when you're, you know, so you don't get caught on tape saying private stuff. And I know a lot of wrestlers at the time we're just like, yeah, done with that guy. And, of course, word of that leaks out to the online message boards and stuff

and all the wrestling fans know about it. So it sort of becomes a more intimate problem or, you know, more specific problem at that point in time. Hulk Hogan was always in character, right? Hulk Hogan was always Hulk Hogan. I mean, you know, he always had the mustache, always had the bandana, always had the muscles and the tan. And I think sort of being a human being was tough for him, despite, you know, Hogan knows best the reality show and whatever else. I don't think he knew how to come out in front of a crowd and sort of break that fourth wall and be like,

no, let me talk to you for real. You know, what's he going to do? Let me tell you something, brother. I said some racist things in my life, you know, like it just doesn't sort of compute. I think every time he'd come back in public since then, I think all the wrestling fans were just like, you're really not going to mention it ever, right? Is this really what it's going to be? Just like playing the hits and pretending the bad stuff never.

happened. And then when he finally came back the last time, it was to promote his beer and it had been leaked out by WWV that he was there to promote his, that he might be there to promote his beer, that he was going to be there to promote his beer. And I think that gave the wrestling fans the time to process it a little bit. So it wasn't just like, if we had just heard real American play, even after all that shit, maybe he would have gotten a warmer response if it was a surprise. But when he came out and we were all expecting it, and it was not, I said this on Bill's show, the number one wrestling fans want is for the wrestlers to love wrestling as much as we do.

And when someone's there just to promote their thing, that's not showing any love for the sport that's using us. You know? And so he comes out to promote a beer, Jimmy Hart, waving the flag behind him and everyone's just like, no, we're ready for this. And they just booed him. Boo, boo, boo, boo, boo, boo.

I mean, we also love to, you know, build them up and tear him down and all that stuff. But like I said, in my piece, I think we all, it's also the, the people, the part people always leave out of that is like, we also want to forgive too, you know, but you got a, the contrition is the tough part. You know, we all have to sort of,

it's hard for a giant stadium of wrestling fans to decide the contrition is complete. And they decided it had not, it was not. It's always interesting to me when a figure like Hogan dies. And people are a little bit thrown that there are going to be these obituary, obituary wars.

where their legacy is debated. And I'm always like, but isn't that the work of writing an obituary? Yeah. Not to be too grand about it, but isn't that the work of history? Yep. Where you're looking at all these things and thinking about them and trying to piece them all into a story like the one you wrote or a book like the ones people will write,

not just about this guy, but about all kinds of figures. and, you know, I read all the pieces. I read yours. I read David Dennis over on Anscape. Where he called him a racist who also became a professional wrestler. For him, the racist tape was kind of like, okay, now I know who you are. Yeah. And by the way, we shouldn't soft pedal what was on that tape, but I'll quote Dennis here.

Caught on tape using the N-word freely on multiple occasions and also dreading the idea that his son's arrest could mean that the two could be reincarnated as black men. truly, truly vile stuff. Yeah. But I read all the pieces and I'm like, this is what should be happening. This is the thing, right? People are looking at it.

People are processing the facts. And they're doing the work, you know, of the man and the man. And part of that story, by the way, is Hulk Hogan versus Gawker. When you and I talked about what he, that guy was to us, we were kids, we're living in New York in the early 2000s when Gawker is born.

Yeah. Our friends are writing for various arms of that company. It is put out of business by Hulk freaking Hogan. It's crazy. I mean, just think about that for a second. Yep. Elizabeth Spires wrote about this in the New York Times. Elizabeth Spires, a Gawker veteran.

And she made a number of great points. So this all starts with Gawker's editor, publishing, and I'm quoting Spires here, a clip from a tape that featured him, that's Hogan, having sex with his friend's wife. That is a thing that happened. Now, usually you and I, when we talk about suits that involve the media on this podcast, it's like a media outlet got something wrong, maybe a George Stephanopoulos misspoke on the air, and then there's a lawsuit to determine how did they get it wrong?

Did they know it was wrong when they ran the facts? As Spires points out, because the sex tape was undeniably Mr. Hogan, right? There was no question about the facts here. He could not sue Gawker for defamation and win. Yeah. She continues, but Gawker had made plenty of powerful people angry in its day, one of whom was the billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel. A Gawker cited out of Mr. Teal as gay in 2007 and later reported that his hedge fund had gone into freefall. Again, truthful, she writes.

What Mr. Teal recognized then was that, someone with deep pockets can try to drown an outlet in legal fees and make truth legally irrelevant by suing for invasion of privacy. She writes that the original Hogan suit was in federal court. I had forgotten that part. That went nowhere. He then goes to Tampa, Florida, where he is likely to get a friendlier jury. He sues Gawker for invasion of privacy.

Jury gives him $140 million in a decision. Gawker, she writes, ultimately settle for $31 million. A cocktail of bad luck and an angry billionaire resulted in an industry-defining judgment. Gawker did not have the money left to put up the $50 million bond needed to appeal the decision. And that leads to the end of Old Gawker, which is the only Gawker we recognize. And later, Old Deadspin, which is also the only deadspin we recognize. At the hands of Hulk Hogan, I repeat to you. Yeah.

And also, if we're playing this forward a little bit. Here's some more spires. Mr. Teal and Mr. Hogan created a playbook for deep pocketed people to pressure news outlets by weaponizing the judicial process and threatening them with bankruptcy. Today, President Trump is suing or has threatened to sue multiple news outlets seemingly because he doesn't like the corrective unfattering information they published about. Yeah. A couple of other quick notes.

I realized looking at Twitter that just about every person in the state of Florida had their picture taken with Hulk Hogan at some time or another. Okay. And this goes up from Ron DeSantis all the way down. And I tweeted that thought, and somebody, Blue and G minor on Blue Sky wrote back, Hulk Hogan was Florida man. Somebody wants a free think piece.

That is it right there, because that's true. I also saw a note from CNN's Elizabeth Wagmeister that Hogan was filming a Netflix documentary at the time of his death. And we're going to confirm this, but yes, it's no, it's true. that is pretty wild stuff too all right so some only in journalism for you david i was bringing a a marring down column the other day i was as usual i was insorcelled by miss dowd's prose but i came across a phrase i don't know or i didn't know and i want you to tell me if you do the pentagons poor eternus pete hegsith was sitting right beside trump

this is a Latin term poor eternus P-U-E-R-A-T-E-A-R-N-U-S Pure Eternus It means eternal boy Huh Okay That is a phrase I did not know, sir

Thank you Maury and Dowd for expanding Our only in journalism collection right before our eyes Speaking of Expanding One's Mind It's time for David Shoe Maker guess This is a straight pun headline Yeah Last Monday's headline about man-made submarines was U-Boats. Today's headline comes to us from Simeon Barbed.

It's from the Toronto Globe and Mail David. Turns out Beck is playing some concerts with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. And the music lovers of Toronto, David, are very excited. They cannot wait for. these concerts to happen. I want you to think of the Woodwind section as you ponder. What was the Globe and Mail's

strained pun headline? But he's playing with the orchestra. That's why you're saying the Woodwind section. Oh, but the pun might involve the woodwind section. No, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. We're very excited. I just cannot wait. Bairnette, bassoon. Oh.

My sister's a bassoonist. You know this. You should have gone for Anne. Bissooner than later. Bassoon. Bassoon. I think we're there. The Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the concert, couldn't arrive bassoon enough.

Oh, there you go. Bassoon enough. Shout out to the great Anne Shoemaker. He is David Shoemaker. I'm Brian Curtis. Who thanks to your magic? By Kyle Crichton. Joel Anderson's here Thursday.

David, I'll see you next Monday with more lukewarm takes about the media. See you then, David. See you later, Brian.