The Press Box - More Weekend Football Notes, Media News From Chicago, and the Profile Location of the Week

Episode Date: January 24, 2022

Bryan and David are back to discuss the weekend full of divisional-round playoff games. They break down the impact these games have had on the audience and touch on Aaron Rodgers’s interview with Kevin Van Valkenburg two days before his divisional game as well as Tony Romo's performance (6:42). Then, they address the potential career moves for New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton, former Cowboys star Troy Aikman, and NBC commentator Al Michaels (25:21). Lastly, in the Notebook Dump, they discuss the news that the Chicago Sun-Times was acquired and will become a nonprofit, touch on Robert Costa leaving The Washington Post for CBS News, and then wrap things up with a new feature called Chyron Copy Editor (39:20). Plus, the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained Pun Headline.  Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker Associate Producer: Erika Cervantes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The NBA season is heating up, and Kevin O'Connor and Chris Vernon have got you covered on the mismatch. They discuss all the news, the trends, and transactions happening around the league. They also offer their on-court analysis and occasionally get into heated debates. Check out the mismatch on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. David! I went to Vermont for a wedding last week. And one of the cool parts about travel is getting to read various publications on the road. Would you like some notes from my...

Vermont reading list. Yeah, please. All right. The coolest thing by far is I got to read the Boston Globe sports section every day on paper. They were delivering it to the hotel. The Boston Globe is one of like four newspapers whose sports section resembles in any way. It's 70s and 80s glory. Mm-hmm.

And one of the cool things about the globe is in the 70s, they blew out those notes columns. Like they gave Peter Gammon's a page on Sunday and said, just write a picture. page of national baseball notes. Same thing with Bob Ryan and the NBA. And this is before we could just find notes everywhere. Well, I opened the Sunday Boston Globe Sports section. And there is not only that, there is a page of national hockey notes. National hockey notes.

Wow. By Matt Porter. It's still intact. Any part of the old newspaper sports page is still intact makes me incredibly happy. That is incredible. I was so happy when I saw it. that. Note number two for you, David. Unfortunately for me, they were also delivering the USA Today, or just USA Today without the article, to the hotel. I never opened it, but I did glance at the

front page, which had this headline, Embattled Biden tries to hit reset. The double word score of newspaper cliches there. Embattled Biden tries to hit reset. Also, David, we got to spend some time doing something I know you love to do, visiting the airport bookstore magazine rack. First, David, from the New Yorker, which doesn't have cover lines. New Yorker is too august for cover lines, so they have that little flap on the front of the magazine. And I enjoyed this headline against the helicopter parent. Now, I know it's possible to be against the helicopter parent. I think I am against the helicopter parent. But isn't the helicopter parent kind of a disparaging term to start? Yeah.

I don't think, yeah, you wouldn't be like, you know, against the drill sergeant dad. Or like, against the overbearing sports mom. Against deadbeat dads. Yeah. Right. I mean, the shocking headline would be for the helicopter parent. Yeah, and defense to the helicopter parent. Yeah.

Okay. This is from The Economist. This is such an economist. this headline, beware the bossy state, government, business, and the new era of intervention. Watch out for that. This is from Us Weekly, David. It's a big picture of an angry-looking Queen Elizabeth. And the cover line is the Queen 95 finally snaps enough, exclamation point.

Did not open that to figure out what she'd snapped at, but I guess we can guess. The cover of people has Rob Lowe and says, Rob Lowe. how I survived Hollywood. I feel like he's been telling the story for some time. I feel like he has two. And what are we surviving at this point? Good question. Esquire, David,

big artie black and white photo of Keanu Reeves. And this is such a good celebrity profile headline or such an archetypal one. Keanu Reeves knows the secrets of the universe. That's what you want to do with a celebrity profile, right? something that's kind of, you know, complimentary, but then the piece can be anything. Yes. Yeah.

And it's also, it also like, you know, begs a question, right? Or you have to open the magazine to find out. Or even just, like, leads you in the door. It's not County Reeves has a cold. It's County Reeves has a third eye or something. According to Cosmopolitan, David, it is Haley Steinfeld's moment. According to In Style, it is Gal Godot's moment, though the headline reads, Oh, What a Gal, Badass Woman.

And finally, our winner, and it wasn't even close New York Magazine, with that profile of Josh Sweden, excuse me, that everyone's talking about. I'm guessing the headline is not, it's Josh Sweden's moment. It is not, it is not his moment. Indeed, it is not. The headline is interview with the alleged vampire. Oh, my God. Of course, she was Buffy, the vampire slayer.

By the way, the weirdest discovery, I go to the airport bookstore, and there is a copy of ESPN magazine. Now, ESPN magazine doesn't exist anymore. I was going to say. But what if they put out an issue to celebrate the life of John Madden? Oh. Following in the footsteps of other magazines who are celebrating the lives of. of deceased people. I mean, it's not a bad model.

For ESB and the Maga, what, I mean, do you think they'll put out like a, certainly if they're doing that, they'll put out like a post-super Bowl, you know, in praise of the chiefs. Yeah, Pat Mahomes issue, right? I guess. If you're going to put out sporadic issues,

I guess you can, yeah, I mean, that's kind of fun. But yeah, John Madden, the John Madden one-off is, man we get we still get to do this this is a whole segment for us just the one off magazine uh industrial complex let's do it i'm ready next week coming up on today's show david lots of notes from the weekend of watching football on television a local tv reporter gets hit by a car some very good news and very bad news from the chicago media we've got a political journalism Wodgebaum, a celebrity profile location of the week,

and a new feature here on the press box, Kairon Copy Editor. I designed this especially for David. All that more on a supersized press box, a part of the ringer, podcast network. Hello, media consumers, Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker here, along with producer Erica Servantes. David, I'm not going to lie,

we were going to start with the liable trial of Sarah Palin versus the New York Times, but the trial has been delayed until February because wait for it, Sarah Palin has tested positive for COVID. She is, of course, unvaccinated, Judge Jed Rakoff noted. So we'll do that another time.

I'm sorry. I don't mean to be one of these people who, like, you know, make silly jokes about COVID. Is there, can you just get out of anything by saying test positive for COVID? Or is there, are there a certain thing? Because I, like, get a lot of people, like, call into work, know, I tested positive.

Here's like a blurry photo that I took six months ago to back it up. But can you, is there, is there a tier of things for which you have to actually, like, have an in-person test of some sort to avoid them? Like, if you get called for jury duty, or they're like, nah, come on in. Like, we want to test you here? Can we just back up? Do people really take pictures of themselves to prove that they're too ill to come into work? No, you could, like, I'm just saying, if you had to prove, not that I've done it,

but if you had to prove that if you, you know, loosely that you were, uh, COVID positive, you might have a photo of being, if someone in your family having a positive at home test from the past that you could send into your boss as a suggestion. Oh, I see, the test itself. Yeah, yeah. Okay. I thought you were just going to like, that was like dark circles under your eyes. Yeah, just look at look at me.

I feel like crap. I don't have to come into work today. Well, Sarah Palin brought this trial. So I think we should probably take Sarah Palin's word for it. I guess so, yeah. That she is not allowed to appear. But good news, David. We had a fantastic NFL weekend.

It was, if you read Twitter last night, the best weekend in the history of the NFL playoffs. I love the rush to make that declaration. Well, yeah. You can think of all the retweets you'd get for that. Sure. Absolutely. And the funny part was, like, in about an hour, it weirdly transformed from this is the best weekend in the history of the NFL playoffs, which feels right, even if none of us really know offhand, whether that's the case, to this is why. people love pro football.

Or this is why people love the NFL. Now, at the risk of over-analyzing a tweet that was, as you say, just meant to get all the likes, I just found that really interesting because I'm like, what did the NFL do this week to put on four fantastic games that remind us all of why we love pro football? Yeah. And if they did something, why didn't they do it last week when most of the games sucked? Why did they wait for week two Of the playoffs What is it funny

What do we like about football We just be like close game We like shootouts Is that is that the idea We like four games decided on the final play Or that were won on the final play Well I mean I know they have all those like Over the middle rules

I know it's easier to play quarterback If you especially if you're a great quarterback In this day and age but you know If the NFL wants to exert control over it. I guess they could just like, you know, eliminate a defensive player or something like that. You know, if this is really, what we really love is quarterbacks just like, you know, scoring on every drive and coming down to the wire. There's a lot of ways you could just really hamstring the other side of the ball, I guess. We like snow falling on our screen.

Like it was on Saturday night in that Green Bay San Francisco game. We like one of the quarterbacks in the playoffs to build them. up as this giant heel character in American life and then lose in the first game that they play so that the Twitter, Schadenfreude, can just pour forth immediately after the game is over. Oh, yeah. We'll get to those jokes in a minute, by the way. We like another quarterback to win an unprecedented seven Super Bowl rings and then come back for one more year and then lose in the second round of the playoffs so we can see him humbled.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. I mean, he's sort of, I mean, that's sort of a heel, too. That's more of like the John Cena heel category where he thinks he's a baby face, but you know. Yeah. There's some grudging respect after all these years, you know, but still, yeah, people relish in the booze. we like all these things. I love all these things. I am as a dedicated to pro football as anybody on earth, but it's always just funny to think, what did the NFL do in any of this case? In fact, the only thing the NFL really did

was not change the overtime rules, which made everybody on Twitter really mad last night when the chiefs and the bills went to overtime and the bills never got to touch the ball. So like the one kind of affirmative thing the NFL did, unless you're talking about like changing pass interference rules to get more offensive to the games you mentioned is the thing everybody was actually mad about last night.

Yeah. But we love this is a weekend, David, that reminded us of why we love pro football. Well, I mean, in the theoretical defense of the NFL, part of what we love about football is having something to complain about, right? To have a really exciting game and to be like, but I have a take, you know?

And then the overtime situation, I think, really afforded us that. And you and I've talked about this a ton, but what we also really love about pro football is that everybody is watching pro football. So all of us on Twitter together, on sports Twitter together, all are working from the same palette. I've definitely heard some like diehard fans complain this season. You know, I feel like in a more urgent way than similar instances in the past that the games are too spread out, you know, that like there's sometimes where you want a little bit more time. I mean, you want a little bit of overlap. You want a little bit of like everything on one day.

So, you know, whatever. I definitely feel like, at least in my experience this year, the games being spread out is like really, really seductive to the casual fan. Right? Like, everywhere I went this weekend, like, you know, folks who I didn't know follow football, I would just sit down and they'd be just like, well, the Bengals won. What do you think about that? You know, I'm just like, really? And just everybody was paying attention. I went over to a guy's house yesterday in the couple's house and the football game was on in the afternoon.

And we just like hung through to watch the second football. And it just seemed like it made all the sense in the world to our significant others and everybody. It's just like, oh, yes, this is big time football. This is the game that's on right now. We will all sit still and watch. And we have the early game and we have the late game. And these are our two parts of the day that are structured around the two games. Yeah.

And especially when they're all incredibly exciting. It's like one exciting content opportunity has just. ended and now another one will begin. And in fact, it's going to build to something, right? Yeah. So that the last game of the weekend, the night game and what we all thought would be the best game of the weekend did in fact turn out to be the best game of the weekend. It was just teed up something extraordinary. And I love this tweet today from Kyle Koster over there at awful announcing. He's talking about Aaron Rogers. He says, the controversial MVP losing at home and potentially his last game with the only franchise he's ever known is in the

freaking C block this morning on all those argument shows. Now think about that. Aaron Rogers. Aaron Rogers gets humbled. And that's in the C block. Speaking of Aaron Rogers, David, he did something

kind of amazing last week with Kevin Van Valkenberg of ESPN. Van Valkenberg had been following Rogers all season, you know, watching all these interviews he does. Aaron Rogers gives lots of interviews on the Padmanaghani show every week. and Van Valkenberg sent Rogers an email and asked if he wanted to talk to him.

And on Thursday, two days before Aaron Rogers was going to play his first game in the NFL playoffs, he called Van Valkenberg and gave an interview. And not just an interview like, oh, you know, we're going to pull it together. We're going to win the game. I can't see where this, the ceiling on this team is really high. No, no. It was about stuff like Joe Biden, a wide-ranging interview, as they say. say. And when Van Valkenberg asked Rogers, why are you giving this interview, which is, by the way, usually one of the most interesting questions a journalist can ask a famous subject.

Yeah, now, yeah, for sure. Why are you doing this? The answer was, it seemed like you're thinking about writing a hit piece, Rogers said. So I just want to make sure that you got questions answered for me before you went ahead and did that. Wow. That's coming from a point of view, I guess, huh? Mm-hmm. Now, Van Valkenberg asked Rogers. A lot of questions about why he was talking so much and taking so many stands on various things, very unusual for a big time athlete or quarterback. This is what Roger said to that. I think for so long in my life, I was very private about everything and didn't like really a whole lot of anything out there. And I still enjoy a separation of private and brackets professional life.

But there were far too many people who were trying to write the narrative of my life and writing things or speaking for me that perpetuated this idea about who I was or what I felt or what the truth or what the truth was that was just patently false. So it wasn't so much about caring what people said about me. It was wanting to halt narratives about me that are just at their core not true. Now, that makes Aaron Rogers really interesting in the whole media sphere, does it not? Because all these guys have people talking about them. They all do.

You know, Aaron Rogers, even beyond, long before the COVID vaccine stuff, Aaron Rogers had lots of noise about him, but so do all these players. Dak Prescott has lots of people talking about them right now. Yeah. Most of them just kind of roll with it, do, you know, a big magazine piece here and there, maybe do something in their own media brand. But Aaron Rogers just started talking a ton. This was his solution.

Well, I mean, to some extent, I think there might be a little bit of chicken and eggery going on here, right? I mean, I don't think, do you think Aaron Rogers was like? like uncomfortable at his core that, you know, Kevin Clark was writing articles about what books he read or whatever. Like, I don't think that that's, I mean, that was like that, in some ways there was more access to him as a person than most of their quarterbacks ever give already.

Correct. But I don't think that it doesn't seem like there was, there would have been much of an issue about someone like writing his life story in a way that he disagreed with until, well, all the stuff that's gone down recently, right? Yeah. Or maybe it's just, you know, maybe the, since he started trying to get out of Green Bay, since he started, you know, dating a celebrity since, and then, you know, the COVID stuff sort of came on the heels of that. But that's, you know, I guess I can imagine in that sense those things sort of open yourself, open yourself up to some narratives that you're not used to being a part of, right?

Well, Middokimes talked about this on the press box the other day. Aaron Rogers is clearly fascinated, more fascinated by what reporters say about. about him than your average NFL quarterback, right? Not just stung by what the media says about them, which I believe a lot of athletes are. I don't, I don't think many of them achieve that state where they just don't care what anybody says about them, no matter what they say to that score.

But Aaron Rogers clearly cares. And he's clearly interested at some level in how the media works. In that sense, like he is football Kevin Durant, right? It's like, I am not only going to pay extreme attention to what you're doing, but I am then going to get on and attempt to rebut it, even if that just creates more noise around me. And I think that is sort of unique, you know, and that is just, again, not to be bothered by it, not to be surrounded by it, but just to be sort of interested in it. And I think he's interested in. I think that's true. I think he's always been interested to some degree, but I think it's true that he's interested.

But I also think that, I mean, there's got to be some sort of, yes, what sets him apart is that another quarterback in his position might give one big interview, you know, or one or two. I'd just sort of like let that set the narrative moving forward. But, you know, there's a certain amount of momentum to the narratives that are surrounding Rogers in particular, right? That he'll get out there to defend himself and the responses are not Aaron Rogers defends himself. That's not the headline. The headline is like, you know, Rogers puts his foot in his mouth again. Or Rogers did something even worse than we thought, you know? I mean, so it's regardless of whether or not that's true, he certainly got himself in a, you know,

in a line of argument or a subject matter or political mess, whatever, however, you know, euphemistically you want to put it that does not, it doesn't seem like he's making anything better every time. And so you kind of find yourself constantly grabbing, you know, trying to get the microphone again to say like, no, no, no, no, no. here's what I meant the first time, even if he feels like that's not, he's doing the opposite. Can we go ahead and endorse athletes calling reporters two days before a huge game? They're about to play in the playoffs?

I mean, if Jimmy Garopola wants to call Kevin Van Valkenberg, or really anybody, including the two of us, two days before the NFC championship games, say, I'm having the weirdest dreams. The dream is that I'm throwing five interceptions and I'm costing the 49ers the game. and then I'm going to get replaced next year by a second year quarterback. Please call up. If a quarterback ever calls you two days before a game, I think it's like incumbent upon you just at the end. Ask jokingly, shouldn't you be practicing? Shouldn't you be watching tape right now?

Just so when and if they lose, you can tweet that and say, you know, I didn't include this in the piece. I tried to. Rodgers said he didn't need to watch any more tape when we were. do we want to have a little bit of the Tony Romo conversation oh god please so Tony Romo lead color analyst of the NFL on CBS was calling that Chiefs Buffalo Bills game last night Tony Romo's been such an interesting topic of conversation and he can be very very giddy about football really about all football at this point and I think his giddiness is kind of people

have kind of gone up and down on his giddiness. But I tell you what, and me included, by the way, but I tell you what, him doing that game last night, that is one of those moments where I'm like, this is what Tony Romo was built for. This kind of crazy,

this is why we love pro football kind of game. Because not only does his giddiness match by what's happening on television, I feel he kind of honors the moment in a way that another announcer wouldn't do like Troy Aitman, Chris Collins all those guys could have called that really, really well last night.

They could have done an awesome job of it. But there's something about Tony Romo that allows him to wrap his arms around the excitement and to communicate the excitement to you in a way that is very, very rare for a guy who does that job. Yeah, I mean, he's got a,

frankly, like a youthfulness that most of his contemporaries don't have, even the other former players that make that transition. I mean, like, part of it, see, came up in a different era. But the second, Troy Aikman got the jacket and the tie, he seemed like a 55-year-old man.

You know, I mean, he's just like very, well, literally buttoned up, but just sort of formal, old-fashioned teacher-ex players to be announcers, like we discussed recently in a kind of very specific way. Tony Romo, you said to wrap his arms around him. I mean, Tony Romo, of all the people who were in any booth,

really on any sideline this weekend, seems like the kind of guy that could go up and hug Patrick Mahome, after the game, right? If Patrick Mahomes saw Tony Romo, he might tap him up. He might give him a hug. If he saw, you know,

Aikman or anybody else, there'd probably be a slightly more, you know, formal interaction. You'd be a nice handshake, nice firm handshake. Yeah, you're right. But that's that,

it's a connection. And like I said, in other contexts, it can be really frustrating. I think if that game had been 28 to nothing in the fourth quarter, it would have been really,

really frustrating last night. Yeah. But when you have that excitement, right, you want somebody who can kind of tap into that excitement in a way. Absolutely. And feels like you do, right? I mean, I think that's what's so interesting about announcers is because sometimes you want their job to be like something incredibly exciting is happening on the field. And I'm keeping my cool. I am going to the tellestrator and I am telling you why the safety blew the coverage on that play.

Why Cooper Cup was all of a sudden just wide open running down the field. That's my job here. But there are other moments where it feels like the announcer's job is to help you understand just how exciting the thing you just saw is. Yeah. To communicate that to you through their voice, through something, right? It's almost hard to explain. Yesterday was a combination.

There was a sort of overlap in the circle, in the concentric circles there because a lot of that stuff that happened, the Cooper Cup plays a good example where it's not just exciting. It's a huge, it's not just a huge moment, but there's also just enormous degree of like, confusion's not the right word, but you watch it, you're a little bit gobsmacked, right? Just like, how did that just happen? And he can explain it,

but also acknowledge that it's like, that's freaking crazy, you know? Like, it's, and to kind of be able to do both things at once, I think is his gift, at least it's his gift right now, you know? I mean, at some point, maybe if the schick is the same, he will sort of age out of it, or at least age out of being able to do it effectively. But I think that you're right.

Certain voices for certain games, for certain moments are really important. You wouldn't want, you wouldn't want, I mean, you know, you don't want to see every movie with the same buddy, right? Because some of them, like, if you have a buddy that just, like, cracks wise of the whole thing, you know, you take him to go see the movie that you want to just make fun of the whole way through. But you don't want to take him to see an Oscar film or something like that, right? So, I mean, it's like there's certain voices that you expect or want in certain situations. Totally agree. Finally on the NFL front, David, a report from front office sports from Michael McCarthy over there about the New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton. There's this whole potential musical chairs that's about to happen on sports television.

Al Michaels, we think, is going to leave Sunday night football to go to Amazon's new Thursday night football show. His contract at NBC is up. There are intimations that maybe Troy Aikman will leave Fox and join him on Thursday night football or both do Fox and Thursday night at the same time. double dip. This is from McCarthy. Fox Sports is targeting New Orleans Saints coach Sean Peyton as a candidate to succeed, Trayman, should the former Dallas Cowboy Star Bolt for Amazon sources tell front office sports. Payton has not committed to returning to the Saints for the 2022 season, according to Ian Rapp report of NFL network. The Super Bowl winning coaches at the top of Fox's hit list said sources. What do you think of Sean Payton leaving the sidelines for the

booth like Tony Romo left the field for the boot. Payton's an interesting one because, well, as a Dallas Cowboys fan, you well know that, like, he's always at the top of the potential Dallas Cowboys head coaching search, despite never being a free agent, right? So I don't know if it's something specific to him or just a huge coincidence that he's always sort of available even though he's not. But, well, first, and you do wonder, like, how long is the Fox Sports hit list, right? I mean, is it like, like, how many active players slash, you know, coaches slash GMs are on this list?

I mean, do you think it's like four names deep? Or do you think they just have everybody over the age of like 28 ranked? You know, I mean, is it, but, but it's a, I mean, it's, it's really intriguing. There's very like, you tell me if I'm wrong. It seems like there's probably, there's a version of this story where it's just very linear, where it's like, Peyton's functionally already out the door, either by his own choosing or whatever else, this is what he's going to end up doing next.

And we're sort of in this, this ambiguous negotiation phase where he can claim employment to ratchet up his price. If that happened, if he ends up working for Fox and taking Aitman's seat or whatever, it's not, none of this will seem so shocking in retrospect. But if he really is like weighing these options,

you know, I don't know which one I'm going to do, then it's not unprecedented, but it's pretty, it's pretty, you know, it's pretty incredible, right? I mean, I guess Jay Cutler didn't indeed go back and forth, didn't he take a job at around the same time as Romo and then end up back on the field? And I feel like Romo didn't, wasn't, weren't they talking about Romo

a year before he retired being, you know, getting a gig? I mean, these conversations happen. But, I don't know, it just seems like coaches so frequently have him, more job security, and they get paid a ton of money, man. I mean, it's, it's, it seems like you're not in the playoff. It's not like he got eliminated yesterday. It seems like Sean Payton probably has an idea of what job he wants to do this fall, right? So that's what makes it, I think, a little bit odd.

Well, it feels like there's lots of different kinds of leverage going here. There's Sean Payton's leverage over his current employer, The Saints. clearly want him to stay there. He's the best coach by far in franchise history, one the only Super Bowl in franchise history. There's Sean Payton's potential leverage over a team like the Dallas Cowboys. I mean, that was the report on Sunday that from Ian Rapp report reference there. Sean Payton's not sure he wants to return to the Saints.

Is that a bad signal that says, come get me. Dallas Cowboys team that always wants me to work for them. This is your chance. Honing up a few draft choices, you've got a better situation at quarterback. You've probably got more talent than the Saints right now. now come get me. This is the moment. And then there's the leverage of Fox of saying like, Troy Eggman, if you go chase that shiny object over there at Amazon on Thursday nights and potentially leave one of the best seats in television right here on Sunday afternoon of Fox,

we're thinking about it. We've got to think about other guys that might replace you. So I just feel like I don't understand the leverage. And maybe it's the way to understand is that everything is being leveraged. Yeah. And that we're just in the middle of this leverage windstorm here. Wait, could it be that Peyton's doing it? Is Urban Meyer the best example? I feel like there's a better example that happened recently.

Could he, could, can Sean Payton take the Fox job just long enough to get out of his Saints contracts? And then just be like, never mind, I'm going back and sign with the cow. Not quite sure how that works contractually. Just kidding. I'm signing with the Cowboys. I had a second change of heart. Yeah. It might foreclose some TV.

opportunities in the future if you just use Fox to get out of one guys in on it. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you're right. It is. There's a lot, there's a lot of different things at play here. And I think that, well, I mean, the Michael's thing is interesting to me on its own because Michael's always seemed like the sort of guy who would call two games a day every day of the week if it, if they, if it meant like a, you know, commensurate raise in his pay, right? I mean, he's just like incredibly talented and was always just like, no, I'll take the Thursday game. You know, like, I'll take whatever game is on this.

I'm the best there is at this, and I want to continue to prove it by being out there all the time. But, you know, I mean, maybe there's maybe part of the allure for Amazon is just having the exclusivity of these institutions, you know? It's a sort of like Fox skating Madden and Summerall sort of situation, you know? I think that's what it is, absolutely, right? You got Al Michaels, like, it's going to be great. Yeah. You know, you know, it's going to be good if you've never produced a football game before. You brought a really interesting idea, which is the list.

Yeah. the length of the list for all these networks about who's going to be the next color guy. I think that's such a fascinating question because so I think we could break this down like a hundred different ways. I think there's names on the list that are like if that guy wants to be an announcer, yes, here is all the money. Like Tom Brady. Tom Brady is not probably going to probably have time to do sports announcing as he,

you know, when he retires. He made so much money, et cetera, et cetera. But if Tom Brady wanted to call games for your network, yes. Yes, we will figure it out. If Aaron Rogers wants to sit on a set of a halftime show and troll all the other players in the network, yes, says the television network.

Yes, we are into that. Yeah. I mean, at some point we're going to, you know, there will be part of a biography or an oral history about all the money, all the brink's trucks that have been backed up to Peyton Manning's house since he retired, right? Absolutely. He's the, he's the ultimate example of that. Yeah. Nobody has. offered him as much money as they could possibly pull together. Absolutely. And then I think there's the kind of guys that are just like you just don't know if they're available. Like Philip Rivers, who's now doing high school coach in high school football, I believe,

but has been mentioned in this group, Sean Payton who has a job, Mike Tomlin, who has a job, guys that presumably would be interested in announcing, but they're just not available to do it right now. And you call them and say, like apparently Fox is doing with Peyton, hey, you ready? You know, are you ready? because this is a really interesting opportunity. And then I think there's the rest of the list is guys that have jobs like Greg Olson, who's the number two guy on Fox.

Yeah. Do we think he's ready to go into the number one seat? Do we think he's a big enough name because that name is almost always occupied by like really, really famous football players? Do we think he's big enough to go into the number one seat by himself? So that's the other part of the list.

Yeah, no. I mean, it's true. I mean, Olson was a weird one, right? Didn't he like start announcing and then go back to playing two? Am I remembering that correctly?

He was going to sign. He did an extra season in the NFL, but this was his first, and he's done, he did some games, but this was his first full season and he got, he was fantastic. He got rave reviews.

Yeah, I mean, he's, he's very good at it. And I know just from like, you know, just totally incidental conversations that he was on Fox's radar while he was still playing,

right? Sure. And so he's, he's an example of the list in action. Yes. We talked recently about the, you know, the quarterback meetings that happened before big games that the announcer's always reference and that being sort of a scouting opportunity, you know, when we're talking about Drew Brees, he's always good in the room, right?

I mean, those people are on the radar very early. I mean, there's also, I mean, listen, the star power of someone like Tom Brady is a good example. Maybe not the, maybe you wouldn't expect him to have just like the pure on-my- charisma of some of these other guys, but you never would say no to Tom Brady, right? You would always want him to do whatever he could do for you. But so, I mean, the name means a lot. But there's also just this, just a whole new generation of big, of very successful football in particular, but just sports commentators coming up through ESPN on shows like Get Up and everything else that are just that are not necessarily the stars, right? I mean, it just, it seems like there's a

Dan Orlovsky type. Yeah, there's, there's more of a machine for Dan Orlovskys to make it into the, you the big show as announcers, then there might have been five years ago. So I don't know. I mean, it is incredibly interesting, but certainly, like,

when these execs at Fox or wherever else are playing fantasy football with their, you know, fantasy football announcer, there, you'd probably have to be just an incredible character to stand out if you're not a huge name

and all the huge names. I'm sure they do. I bet they have them all ranked. I think that's, I think your, I think your breakdown was probably dead on. you know who else is on the list who Nick Saban

for NFL you think nah college yeah when are you ready coach uh huh do you have do you think the pile of national championship trophies is high enough because when you're ready we're ready yeah we want Nick Sabin

of the University of Alabama to be on our air whether that's on game day or in a booth or whatever it is absolutely that that is just that just tell us yeah and we're ready to sign a contract. Yeah. I mean, he's, he'll, he'll definitely be there. I can already see him just

sort of like half leaned back in his chair, relaxing and scowling a little bit. Scowling a little bit. Yeah. Like, you know, he's, they, they, they have like a stock ticker of his checks cashing as he's on the air. You know, it'll be great. Kind of an anti-charisma on television, but you're kind of leaning forward to hear everything that he says. Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Well, I mean, anti-charisma, but he does, I mean, obviously he has a lot of charisma. He, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, He must be very compelling in the locker room and he's, and he's, you know, compelling enough on the mic. He's sort of a more charismatic Belichick, right?

I mean, well, that's kind of a low bar, but sure. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. David, we're going to talk about the local TV reporter who got a hit by a car. But first, let's do the overword Twitter joke of the week where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious that all of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time. Send your nominees to at the press box pod where they are always,

always gratefully received. I love this one. Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin put up a Twitter poll about the Senate filibuster. The poll asked this, do you want to, all caps,

implode the filibuster? So the Dems can, all caps again, ram their voting rights legislation through Congress. I think you can get a sense of how Ron Johnson wanted you to vote in that Twitter poll,

but surprise the bowl got overrun by people who were not on the Ron Johnson team of politics 96% voted

yes let the dims win 4% voted no protect the Senate it was an overword Twitter joke to write and next time

you should try restricting who's eligible to vote let's see that's what he's trying to do thanks to Andy Mosley for that one

David the New York Post is confronting one of the true enemies of our society today with this headline, Dry January is pure evil to bars reeling from COVID. It was an over where Twitter joke to write, did a bar write this. That's fantastic. I saw an article just yesterday from Fox News about how there was just like tens of thousands of dollars of steaks sitting in the cool freezer at steakhouses that nobody was eating

because of January. Just the stakes we're supposed to shed a tear for some mistakes. This is the new war on Christmas. Yeah.

The war on the war on old January, old drunken January. Finally, David, as mentioned in wintry Lambo field on Saturday night, the Green Bay Packers

lost to the San Francisco 49ers on a last second field goal. And the Schadenfreude came pouring in for Packers quarterback Aaron Rogers, who isn't vaccinated but misled everyone into thinking that he was.

Here are some of the best jokes. Once again, we all mistakenly believed Aaron Rogers had a shot. Of course. Aaron Rogers is receiving more jabs tonight than he has all year. Aaron Rogers is going to wait for all the research to come in before he declares this score final. Wow.

And my favorite, and the absolute best, Aaron Rogers' playoff run thwarted by Snowflakes. That's good. Thanks to everybody. Special thanks to Dan McDowell. If you brought the world together to drag Aaron Rogers, congrats. You made the overworked Twitter joke of the week. All right, David, speaking of that local news reporter, I don't know if you saw this on Twitter. Her name is Tori Yorgie of West Virginia's WSAZ. You are going to hear a clip in which the anchor from WSAZ Tim Err sets her up for a winter weather report. You know this report this time, but you

I'm standing outside. I am reporting on the winter weather. Unfortunately, things take a little bit of a turn. The 3's Tori York. He joins us now live in Dunbar. And Tori, they're not seeing any flakes, but wet roads. And now we're starting to experience, unfortunately, in freeze thaw. We see this. Water main breaks. Got hit by a car, but I'm okay. I just got hit by a car, but I'm okay, Tim. That's the first for you on TV, Tori.

We're all good. I'm okay. Yeah, you know, that's like. TV for you. It's all good. I actually got hit by a car in college too, just like that. Wow. I am so glad I'm okay. Yeah. You're okay. You're okay. We're all good. You know what? It's a one woman, we're good. Tim. Man, you are so sweet and you are okay. It is all good. You know, I, oh Lord. So you, you know, it's my last week on the job and I think this would happen. So you were bumped in, were you bumped down low, Tori, or were you hit up high?

I couldn't really tell from looking. I don't even, do you know if I was bumped down, lower up high, sir? I just saw you disappear out. Credible reporter's instincts there by Tim Urr to ask where particularly she was hit by the car. I thought that was funny. His face, I have it up, paused right down my screen as he's just sort of like, he reacts with eyebrows only to her getting hit by the car. he's just so perplexed as one would be. And you know, you're not actually allowed to be human in that instance.

So he's just trying to be as like just maintain his journalistic integrity while being utterly shocked at what he's seen. And by the way, can I just add one thing? Apparently he could not see her terribly clearly. That was mostly like sound in his ear as it is when you do a live report like that. So he's hearing that and trying to figure out what just happened to his correspondent in the field. that's um first of all amazing that that this has happened to her twice now um in college yeah i mean she obviously was just trying to regain her composure like i can't believe she was able to string words together is it weird to me as a dad i'm sure the parents i'm listening to this will

get this that when you're there's very few times in life where something that significant happens and yet you are there is there is there is is something else that is just much more important. And in this case, it was her, like, continuing her live, her live report on camera. She couldn't just roll over and be like, oh, give me a second. Because she, there's just like the film, this is being broadcast. It's like, this happens somewhat frequently as a parent that, like, something incredible

is going on and you're just like, no, what's important is that, like, I don't let go with my kid's hand and literally, he's not going to run into the street or whatever. And, yeah, I mean, it's a very, it's, this is, wow. This is just incredible. What a, what a, what a wild, wild moment. I believe she's moving on to a job in Pittsburgh. That's why she says my last day. But incredible professionalism just to continue with, as you say,

continue with a spot. If there's a bigger point here, I learned this from a piece in the Deseret News by Kyle Dunphy. It is that a lot of times local news reporters go out by themselves. So she's not standing there with a cameraman. as would be like the ideal situation here, right? So there's a cameraman normally who's looking out for you and producing, you know, kind of on scene producing.

She is setting up her own camera and then standing in front of the camera by herself to do the live shot. This is a small town thing. I think this is probably elsewhere a budget cutting thing and also a technology thing. So she's all by herself. And that's also a really good way when you're all out there trying to, do live television, as you said, to accidentally be in harm's way. If I had to set up my own camera and do that, I'd get hit by a car every day. Dude, we experience this whenever you and I try to record our end of this podcast.

Much lower stakes than one of us manages not to do it. I see David peeking over to make sure he's recording right now. Not recording? Yeah, 4628. We're doing great. Got some media transactions for you, David. Both from Chicago, interestingly. The Chicago Sun-Times was acquired by Chicago. public radio station WB.EZ. So the newspaper, the home historically of Roger Ebert,

Mike RoiCo, many others, will become a nonprofit and form what the Sun Times calls, quote, one of the largest nonprofit news organizations in the country, which seems like a happy outcome. And I think we can now reorder the list of desired outcomes if you're a newspaper. Outcome, number one, your newspaper is financially solvent. Okay, well, let's move on from that one. Number two, your newspaper is bought by a benevolent billionaire. Yes. Who you hope remains both benevolent and a billionaire. Always touchy, yeah.

Yeah, always touchy. Number three, your newspaper is bought by a public nonprofit entity like this radio station. So you continue on a different course. In some ways, that's sort of the perfect, I mean, that's sort of like the ideal situation, right? Because it's not just the nonprofit, it's, you know, the ideals that, Presumably they will share, but it's an organization that, unlike newspapers, a lot of these radio stations have been operating as nonprofits for a long time. They sort of have the lay of the land and don't, are not presumably, under the constant threat of being remonitized or chopped up and sold off in parts or like whatever. I mean, this is a, I mean, the hardest thing is in an industry that's going through the kind of change that print journalism is, is finding.

just a place in the world where a corporate structure can even recognize what you are, right? I mean, it's just, it's hard to, it's hard to get. We've talked, so, we've had so many stories about sort of, you know, heartless startup CEOs that don't, that seem to not understand what they get when they get a, when they get a newspaper. I mean, part of that is, yes, the heartlessness. But part of that is just a complete divorce between the way a newspaper looks on a corporate level and the way anybody would start a business now.

So that's got to be really reassuring to land at a place like that. It really beats your newspaper being bought by Alden Global Capital. Anyway, which is, by the way, number 150 on the list of desired outcomes. In Suckier News, David, and also in Chicago News, we have this from the New York Times. The staff of the AV Club, the Chicago-based pop culture website published by Geo Media, was given a choice except a relocation to Los Angeles. or leave the publication with a severance package. On Tuesday, seven people on the staff said they had decided to stay put and give up their jobs.

In a time when employers have become increasingly flexible about where their employees live and work, geomedia forcing workers to relocate to one of the most expensive cities in the world without proper compensation. And during one of the pandemic's worst surges is mind-boggling at best. The Onion Union, which represents the AV Club employees, said in a statement at worst, it is short-sighted and cruel. So that really, really sucks. In a time, in this day and age, well, even if it weren't in this day and age,

I think it would be hard to sit where we're sitting, and in general, it would be hard for media Twitter to look at this and not feel like there was something underhanded going on. But in this day and age in particular, it's really hard to fathom a mandatory cross-country move that isn't just a facade for, you know, cutting salary or whatever else.

Mm-hmm. I just don't get it. It's just a way to just like work around, just skirt the union or whatever, you know? They're just trying to, we just want to, we just want to handpick our staff. So we'll just make one,

make a legal rule that'll make it impossible for half of the people to stay. Should relocate to Los Angeles. David, we got the equivalent of a pandemic. In the middle of a pandemic. we can just read the statement one more time. David, we got the equivalent of a journalist Wodgebaum.

Oh. You sent me this. Robert Costa, best known for his guest spot on the press box, but also known as an ace reporter for the Washington Post and co-author of a book about Trump with Bob Woodward, is leaving for CBS News. What do we think of that? 22 Washington Post to CBS News.

I don't... There's probably nobody, there's probably no major journalist that I feel like I can, I've like been present for every beat on their career arc, you know, every point, every, every, every, every, every point on their career arc than I have for Bob Costa, right? I mean, I remember, wasn't he, wasn't he an NRO, like one of those, like, scholarship NRO people? He was. Absolutely. One of the first ones.

And then, I remember the first, like, when he got his, when he left there, where he ended up probably in the Washington Post. first or something. But I remember him popping up on like news channels the first time and obviously through, was it Washington Week? Is that what he hosts? Whichever, and then... He did. He did. Yep. Which I've probably seen once or twice.

And of course, like I think you mentioned the Bob Woodward book was sort of the icing on the cake of everything else. I mean, it's, it's... I mean, listen, I don't know, I don't have any friends who are journalists that have like ironclad contracts that would effectively prohibit them from jumping ship from one to another so it's not free agency whatever in the sense that we're used to talking about for pro sports but it is interesting that that robert costa who

doesn't have a ton of currency to like a general populace right he's someone that like everybody that we know probably knows who he is but it's not like you know everybody who watches tv or reads the newspaper knows who he is but it is interesting that they could position this like them that CBS hiring him is like a huge press release for them, right? I mean, it's a really big deal. It's like we're going to, we're going to, we're going to acknowledge him as an important mover and shaker and media celebrity because he's going to be that for us. So we can't, you know, undersell it. Do we, by the way, do we, do we underestimate how well he's known in the world in which, you know, there is this just kind of like newspaper reporters under

Trump had this amazing currency, the co-by line with Bob Woodward. I'm looking at his Twitter. He has 729,000 Twitter followers. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure I do. I mean, listen, my favorite, my favorite memories of Bob Costa or when he was like, pop up on. I always wanted you to start a sentence like that. Go ahead. I was always kind of so impressed. And I don't know if it was a, if it was the game plan, if it was just like, I know where I'm trying to get and I know how I know what I have to do

or not more importantly not do in order to get there or if it's just sort of who Bob Costa is as a human being. But I remember so well that he would like pop up as a contributor on like hardball with Chris Matthews. And Matthews would always throw him these like totally just like all of his other guests like trying to get a sort of editorial page opinion out of them. And Costa would always just pivot so beautiful.

to like, well, that's what the people in the White House are asking right now. And then find like the most, like the most sort of like pointed way to say something without taking any personal responsibility for it. And it was, I mean, he's like, it's like, it's good journalism. He was like the only journalist that you would see pop up on some shows like that that would really just like not indulge in the talking headiness of the whole thing. Okay. We need to, we need to look for this because that is an absolute pro move.

journalist, you know, reporter doesn't want to have an opinion, but is being employed by the cable news shows, as you say often being lured into an opinion. If you see an example of that at the press box, we will play it on this podcast. That is awesome. Congratulations, Bob Costa. New feature for you, David, called Kairon Copyeditor.

David and I have done some freelance copy editing in our days. Remember, David, when you and I would see a sign somewhere and be like, why is that apostrophe right there? If only they had asked me before they printed that sign. Yeah. I would have told them that was not an apostrophe. Bodega sign editor is one of my dream jobs. But I don't think there's a lot of people, a lot of call for that.

This is from CNN's Oliver Darcy. It's from Fox News. America reports. So Fox News is reporting, David, that things aren't so great in America right now. Not a shock. This is how they put it on the Chiron, though. apocalyptic hellscapes take over

American cities now wouldn't it be that American cities are becoming apocalyptic hellscapes this is not like a company doing a hostile

takeover of another it's not like a hellscape was existing right at the town line well I mean this is just this is just you know

scare the grandparents mad libs here right I mean you've got to have to take over to make it seem super urgent, you know, it's, this is, the hellscapes aren't, aren't traditionally,

like actors in any sort of sense, but in this case, it just makes it seem much scarier and that's what's important. Yeah, but I just, I just love that. Like, isn't it scary that my, my American city is becoming an apocalyptic hellscape? Yes. It's not the hellscape is taking, it's not like there's there's a hellscape out there that is just going to come take over my city. Like, that doesn't make any sense. maybe it does in the universe that that's airing on, I just don't know. No, it'd have to be like a hell spawn or something. And they were taking over the cities.

Wait, by the way, Erica, I need to just the next time we have this segment, I fully expect that a Chiron Copy. What's it called? Kyron Copy editor to the tune of Karma Chameleon will be the theme song. Eric is noting that right now. David, I got our profile location of the week. Oh, this is from our friend Matt Craig, who emailed this to me. You know how when you do a piece about a celebrity or famous person,

the reporter always has to figure out something to do with the person? Oh, yeah. Because you're not just coming in contact, right? Let's go do something. Well, Matt Craig figured out that two different profiles actually landed on the same walk and talk activity here. This is from Marie Claire's profile of comedian Jenny Slate. Quote, As soon as we're past the ticket taker at the gates of the Huntington Botanical Gardens in Pasadena, California,

Jenny Slate tells me a story about ducks. So we're at the Huntington Botanical Gardens, which by the way, just down the street from me, we have a family pass. Oh, I had a family pass when I lived over there, and I wasn't even right down the street. It's an incredible place to go. It's a great, it's the answer to like, what do you want to do this afternoon? It's fantastic. It's so good.

the cafe is like above, you know, the Mendoza line. You can just chill and eat and sit outside. You can always find some new place for the kids to explore. And if you haven't been yet, the library museum thing is actually really cool too. Like you could just like, it's the whole, it's a great setup, man. It's so cool, David, that when Matt Craig read Lila Shapiro's justifiably praised piece on Josh Whedon in New York Magazine or Vulture, he saw this sentence. One day I took a walk with Rebecca X, that's a former writer for Buffy the Vampire Slayer,

around the Huntington Botanical Gardens near Pasadena. So if you visit the gardens, you can visit the Shakespeare Garden, you can visit that wonderful cafe you mentioned, or you can visit the long-form scene-generating garden. Get in on that. Oh, my gosh. It's right behind the bamboo stalks. It's fantastic.

I got a great bookstore name for you. Gal Beckerman, who covers books for the New York Times, tweeted a photo that a bunch of people sent us. It is a bookstore called Page Against the Machine. Oh my gosh. That's really good. I love the pun and I'm kind of mad. I didn't know about it because it's out here in Long Beach.

Page Against the Machine. What an absolutely awesome name for a bookstore. Yeah, we got to go there. We got to go there. We do a Pressbox Live event there. within the next year at the press box pod for more details. It's time for David Shrewmaker guess is a strain pun headline. All right, all right.

Monday's headline about the end of Novak Djokovic's Visa saga was game set Vax. Today's headline comes from the L.A. Times, David. First person who sent it my way was Lorenzo Kuyogue. It's about the NFL playoffs, as we were talking about. Specifically, the L.A. Rams beating Tom Brady and the Buccaneers. Tom Brady and the Buccaneers What was the L.A. Times's strained pun headline.

LA Times about the Rams beating the bucks? Yeah. Brady. Tom Brady and the bucks. Brady. I mean, it's going to be some Brady bunch thing. Brady.

What do we know Tom Brady has in terms of his NFL career? He's a Pat, an expat. that's funny but that's not it he is as quarterbacks go he is the oh the goat okay here we go here we go ram oh um rams

there's just like a rams dump goat Rams um rant they beat the goat they are the goat the goat the goat beater the goat the goat stopper the goat so close

the the the Do do do do do goet buster. Oh, Goat Busters. That's great. Goat Busters. Oh, that's been in somebody's back pocket for a while. That's fantastic.

He has David Shoemaker. I'm Brian Curtis. Production managing by Erica Servantes. Not sure yet who was on the pod later this week. I think a famous NFL broadcaster and Shoemaker and I'm back Monday with more lukewarm takes about the media. See you then, David. Can't believe you're having John Gruden on.

That's palsy. See you later, Brian. Thank you.