The Press Box - Tyrese Haliburton Goes Full Reggie Miller. Plus: A Final Farewell to ‘Around the Horn.’

Episode Date: May 22, 2025

Hello, media consumers! Bryan and Joel are back on this Press Box Thursday Edition to discuss peak sports media beef (2:00), Reggie Miller’s unique perspective on the Eastern Conference finals and Tyrese Haliburton’s choke sign (17:00), and Draymond Green being added to ‘Inside the NBA’ for the ECF (23:00). Then, they discuss another wave of pieces chronicling the end of ESPN’s ‘Around the Horn’ and what it says about ESPN’s strategy (28:00). Finally, they discuss the latest in AI nightmares trickling into the journalism and media world (44:00). Hosts: Bryan Curtis and Joel D. Anderson Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, everyone? I'm Nora Prynciotti. And I'm Nathan Hubbard. And we're coming in like a wrecking ball to announce a brand new series. That's right. It's every single album, Miley Cyrus. Deep dive with us into the career of one of our most creative and confounding pop stars. We're starting, of course, with the best of Hannah Montana. And ending with her brand new album, Something Beautiful, in June. And don't forget about Miley Cyrus and her dead pets.

We certainly will not be doing that. So listen now on Spotify or we're ever you get your podcasts. Media consumers, welcome to press box. You've got Brian Curtis, Joel Anderson, and producer Bobby Wagner. Coming up on the podcast, what happens when Reggie Miller is calling Pacers Knicks and a player goes full Reggie Miller down to the hands around the throat in front of him? Plus, a final farewell to ESPN's around the horn, our AI nightmare of the week. And today in media, cowtowing to the the White House today because other stuff happened yesterday and the day before. But first, let us take you to a place where they taunt the crowd before and after they hit

the game winning shot. Let's go to J-school. J-school, Brian, we're bringing back the throat slash gesture. Well, on a really, really serious note to get started here, even though I just made that joke. I want to start this way. Last week, we were discussing changing norms with regard to how people folks talk to each other in newsrooms. And I mentioned recent reporting about Wesley Lowry, someone I've known for a long time in that particular context. Since then, a news story has been published in the Columbia Journalism Review that adds clarity and new reporting to the situation.

So it's important that I direct folks to that piece, which was written and reported by Betsy Morris. It includes extensive interviews with four female journalists who accuse Lowry of sexual harassment and sexual assault. Three of them are quoted by name, while one declined to be interviewed for the story. Above all else, I have tremendous respect for them coming forward and telling their stories to Betsy Morris and C.J.R. I can't honestly claim to understand what they went through or what they're going through now, but I can only imagine that it was difficult and might never stop being difficult. It's hard not to be moved by their courage and fearlessness. And I hope people who read that story will treat them with kindness and respect and allow them to move forward in their lives and careers.

And look, bottom line, I found the reporting in that story to be convincing and extremely troubling and upsetting. And again, I encourage you to read it. I will do the same. And one quote from Lowry stuck out to me in the piece, Joel. I have far more at stake in to lose than any other source in this piece. Yeah. I don't know if he wishes he had that one back, among so many other things he probably wishes he had back at this point, but that was not the quote you want attached to your name with that story. Absolutely not. And go read the CGRP's. Please. Please do. Please do. Brian, do you have a media nemesis?

Who's my nemesis? The people on the sports media beat are so nice. Nice. Yeah. Let me think about that. Yeah, think about it. Because what I mean is like, is there someone in media? Let's say you see them at the Society of Professional Journalist Convention or maybe on Media Row at Super Bowl and there'll be some smoke in the city, some furniture moving.

Maybe we, sometimes, you know, back in Houston we used to call a squabbing. You know, maybe there might be some squabin happening. So while you think about your nemesis, anyone who's followed me for some time knows that I have had won for more than a decade. Because I'm a professional, and I think I've already made my point, I won't name that person here or even get into any detail about those particular circumstances. To make it short and sweet, I won. I think I won that beef. But let's just say the same unsaid set of circumstances happened today that I had this active escalating grudge against someone in the business. Like I'm so mad at them, like I'm sitting in my parking.

I'd have to work thinking about pistol whipping them. And I was desirous of more attention, more followers, and I didn't really care about how I got them. I might consider doing this. I might set up my iPhone, get a nice little background, and drop like a five-minute disc track. Brian, what's your favorite hip-hop disc track? Give me one second on that one, too, while I get my immediate beef gun. You could just go with ether, you know, the blueprint, whatever.

Yeah, that's actually what came right to mind. I was thinking, I was thinking that might be one of them. We're the same generation. I might ostensibly use the inciting incident as the pretext, but then, you know, I might start getting into some personal attacks and then say something about how, like, that's why nobody likes you anyway. That's why you were a terrible teammate.

You know, that's why nobody wanted to sit next to you in the office. You know, I might do something like that. So what I'm obviously talking about is what's happening in sports media since Saturday's little dust up between Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese, which is, as people should know at this point, the latest flare-up in a personal rivalry that dates back to the 2023 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship game. After that, Robin Griffin III, Texas native, former Hisman winner, NFL QB,

and also a former ESPN analyst, he sparked things off by posting a video on the site formerly known as Twitter with his wife sitting in the background. Griffin, you know, who said in this video that he believed that Reese, quote, hated Caitlin Clark. And that's why Reese yelled at Clark and tried to get it after being filed. Then ESPN's Ryan Clark responds with his own video on the site formerly known as Twitter. And Ryan Clark made what I thought were, at least initially, some very strong points about fueling this narrative, about Reese being seen as an angry black woman

and turning her into a villain in a climate where there's already enough rancor out there, right? We don't need to generate more anger, talk about hate. But then he said, the one thing we know about RG3 is he's not having conversations at his home about what black women have to endure in this country. He goes on and so on and so forthwork.

I don't want to debate the bearer to that argument. I'm just telling you how it went. in a course that creates this opportunity for responses from the likes of Marcellus Wiley, who also has beef with Ryan Clark and many other folks who work in sports media or use to work in sports media. And what's really happening here is that people are using the pretext of Caitlin versus Angel to re-ignite and settle their own media beefs. And I was taken back, Brian, last year to, you remember when Stephen A. Smith used, he promoted this, his podcast where he was going to go. after Jason Whitlock. Like, it was this huge buildup. It was last February, February 24. How could we possibly forget? Yeah, I thought, first of all, I thought it was a big nothing burger.

Like, I thought he was at least going to curse. I don't know. It just didn't. It kind of fell flat. He was like, I just hate him and he's fat. Like, it just didn't really go anywhere for me. I was like, if you're going to do this, like, let's really go for it. But anyway, Whitlock had gone after Stephen A. Smith over what he alleged were fabrications about his playing career at his book. And it's this thing that's really become a thing in media in the past few years. And I'm trying to figure out, like, do you have a theory for what's happening here? So first of all, I just want to take my head hurt as soon as you mentioned Marcellus Wiley entering the chat there. Things got very, very complicated.

Yes. Part of it is the way the media is set up now. Yeah. The chat show era is necessarily going to be the media. a beef era because the way to score on that is to have big opinions, but also to have futes. We talked about this with Stephen A and LeBron. That was the best thing to ever happen to Stephen A. And when LeBron goes on McAfee's show, and again, if you need an Advil right now,

please take one. When he goes on McAvey show to talk about Stephen A, that's even better for Stephen A. Right, right. He loved that, right? Like, that was exciting for Stephen A. Smith. For somebody that's trying to sell a book, sell a podcast, and has ambitions to do more, having a very public beef with LeBron is great for him, right? It's fantastic.

I also think the other part of this is big media companies. And everybody you mentioned with maybe the exception of Wiley works for a big media company, we just learned RG3 is going to Fox from the athletic. They do not have the same kind of control over their employees that they used to. Yes, yes. That's a real thing. Yeah, like I'm sure nobody in Bristol and nobody in LA was happy about Ryan Clark and OG3.

Nobody wants that. But there's really not that much they can do. I would be terrified to do that, even under these circumstances. Like, you really can only do that if you've got a certain level of like financial security, right? And like what you perceived to be is like an air type position on air. You don't think that you're going to be replaced or you don't think a call from the boss really doesn't mean much to you, right? And I think it's because really like the sports TV millionaires that we're talking about here, with exception to Marcelus Wiley, of course.

Or maybe he's a millionaire still. I don't know. They think of themselves as stars. And a friend of I was like, they think they're the show, right? And in a lot of ways, they're right. Like it's a shortcut to building an audience through good reporting, smart analysis, thoughtful consideration. Like the show is whatever is happening in your life, your life. And like, it takes real liberties with the idea that the audience becomes invested, not just in what we say, but who we are.

Because we talk about that a lot, Brian, like a lot of, to the extent that you have fans in this industry, it's because people kind of become attached to us and they want to know about our lives. And, you know, they're like, oh, I recommended a good book for you. I heard you talking about you were in Chicago. Like, next time you're here, let's get a drink or go to this thing, right? And so I can only imagine how I would be if I had, you know, $5 million in the bank. And I hated somebody and they said something about me and I had an opportunity to kind of go after him. I mean, I might be tempted to say the thing. And you're saying that as we move into a world where we have ex players on television as much as we have journalists.

Yep. That's right. That's just going to pick up more. These are competitors. And also, I mean, so they're competitors. They're competing for attention, eyeballs. money, everything else. Also, I mean, there's these crazy backstories that these guys have. Like, Ryan Clark and RG3 played football together. They went in the NFL together in the same

locker room. It's just wild. Yeah. Just absolutely wild. Right. So I'm just, you know, I'm not above this, by the way. So if you want some, whoever you are out there, let me know. I'm getting my office and podcast room together and I'm going to get some teams to teach me how to use the front facing camera on my iPhone in the right way so I don't look horrible. and this are going to be over for my enemies. So we can set aside a part of J-School for that, Brian, or maybe I'll just take to Blue Sky and take my beef there. Well, if you want to go to the full Ryan Clark, I'd recommend getting a hype video together about your new contract. And then once you've secured that contract, then you will have the platform. I think that's it.

I got to get a new contract. I already have signed a contract. Oh, yeah. That's right. I got a It's never too early. We hear in sports media now, right? Because everybody's always talking, I don't know. This might be my last first take. I mean, you know what? We never see you guys again. Hey, look, I was saying, and also, you know, we don't know.

I mean, if somebody wants to give me Stephen A money to set up my own studio or whatever and do my side. Again, Brian, we'll talk about this off air, but press box after dark. We can, we can, I think we can do this. I have so many things I want to say right now, but I'm going to move on. Okay. To a B-school item. Okay. Hey, I'm loving this beast school stuff.

No, please, of course. So I woke up this morning, and like many Americans, I read the transcript of the Ezra Klein, Jake Tapper podcast interview. Oh, man. Okay. Of course, about Tapper's new book, Original Sin. Some people like to listen to a podcast. I think of it as a literary form and just like to read transcripts of podcast.

But I'm going along, and they are talking about Joe Biden's decision after the 2022 midterms to run for president again. And if you remember, the Democrats did really well or unusually well in the 22 midterms. So Biden had this political mojo instead of being seen fully as a failed president. And they described this instance in time in 2022 as a sliding doors moment. Hmm. Okay. Now, if you've ever listened to any ringer budget, besides the press box, I'm not sure we've ever used that term here.

I'm going to say, I'll just come up here before. I'm sure it slipped out once or twice. We have this term, sliding doors moment for when history can go one way or the other. It comes from a Gwyneth Paltrow movie called sliding doors. What's so funny is here are Jake Tapper and Ezra Klein talking about the business of the nation and they stop down the podcast to first define what a sliding doors moment is.

just in case anyone in the New York Times audience is confused. No credit, by the way, to Simmons, who was doing this bit 20 plus years ago, but we'll leave that aside just for the moment. And then they get around and they're talking about it and they realize that neither of them thinks they have actually seen the movie sliding doors. So just think what's going on here.

Bill put something out into the ether. People start using it, because it's very catchy, but they haven't actually seen the original movie. Yeah, neither have I, for the record, by the way. Same. I have not seen sliding doors. And this is my question for you. If we think of things that have metaphorical value or just drop it into a podcast because I can't think of a better term for it value,

what are the other things that people have not actually seen with their own eyes? Oh, my God. What a great. Oh, that is a great. Question. Oh, man. What would that be? Oh. Uh-oh. Here comes Big Pig producer Bobby Wagner with some answers. Okay. Come on, Bobby. How about Gaslight? The term comes from a 1930s movie. That is a great. That is a great example. Nobody has seen that film. Well, except the cinefiles out there. Great movie. Check it out, everyone. That is a fantastic example. See you with the movies, Bobby. I'll add another one. If you've ever read political stories, you will see. They will talk about the Kabuki Theater of Politics.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I'm just going to guess that 0.1% of political writers ever have actually seen any example of Kabuki theater. That is a good. Okay, so I got one for you then. So I don't people don't use this quite as much to describe something as Felini-esque, but I don't really believe that a lot of people are watching a lot of, is it.

Frederico Felini films. Yes. I don't believe that very many people who use that reference had seen Felini films. That's a great. when Felini-esque, also Pinter-esque, pauses or for Harold Pinter plays. And I feel, again, you read this stuff and so you're like, oh, yes, that is Pinterest, even if I can't give you chapter and verse of actual Harold Pinter. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yep, that's right, that's right.

But send us examples. If you can think of anything, movies, television shows, historical events that are repeated as metaphors. Have people crushed the novels of Franz Koffel? I feel like I hear Kafka Kafka as quite a bit Kafka as that's all that's a good one too

yes again we just talk about like the actual you know ratio of Kafka novels that you have consumed versus times you've used Kafkaesque

in a news story I like that one write us with more I'm sure there's more out there Joel do we want to talk about last night's game I would love to

I love any opportunity to make New York people feel bad dude If people didn't see this, which means you are not a listener of Ringer podcast and not know the term sliding doors moment, game one of the Eastern Conference finals, Knicks are up two points in the garden, times running out. Tyrese Halliburton steps back. And by the way, did you just do a deep breath when Tyrese Halliburton step back? The thing is, it's not even stepping back. I would describe him the way that he runs is like when you see a toddler try to run into a parking lot and you're like they're trying to

scamper array. Like it's like a really weird step back. Like he moved like five or six steps back to the three point line. So yeah. Totally did. Yeah. Launches a shot. Ball hits the iron, goes straight up in the air.

I'm going to fall in. Tie game Pacers later win in OT. And then Tyrese Halliburton puts his hands around his throat. Just like Reggie Miller was announcing the game for T&T, did when he took out the Knicks in the 1995 playoffs. Trying to create a moment. Yes. And if you're watching the broadcast, this happens,

and it's kind of a little bit weird because it becomes clear that they're going to check not only to see the ball get out of his hands before the buzzer, but was his foot on the line as it turned out to be. And by the way, the choke thing sounds a little weird when you've just tied the game and sent it into OT. Yeah. And he admitted it after the game. I saw an interview, the postgame interview with Ali LaFourres.

And he said, I made a mistake there. That wasn't, you know, I thought I'd won the game. And he seemed a little bit chastened by it. But it still, I mean, look, it was a, I get why he did it. But I was just like, man, you're going to use all your bullets in game one, huh? You want to be that kind of a villain already, huh? But yeah, I mean, I get why he did it. But it was like, we got a long way to go in this series, presumably.

Two very funny moments. One on the telecast, as they're sorting this out, Reggie Miller's just laughing. I'm not saying anything. He's just laughing with delight. He was like, that was me right here. I did that. Had you seen there was an interview clip with Reggie that was circulating a few days ago. It was him sitting on a couch with Mark Jackson.

And I think Josh Hart came up and said something to him, like F you. during one of the previous games that he'd broadcast. Like, I think it was kind of a joke, like Josh Hart was trying to do a bit or whatever. But it actually seemed to sort of get under Reggie's skin. So I think that, like, not that he, I mean, he's a professional. He's been doing this, but he's also, you know, he likes digging an end to the Knicks fans a little bit.

So I think it, like, it actually activated him in a way. So he feels a little more free to indulge and how happy it makes him feel to see that the Knicks fans hurt like that. Totally. And I'm one of these people. I'm like, I don't think we need to do like the full Stephen A, my Knicks. I'm upset, all that stuff. We don't, we don't really want to do that with color analysts during the game. But there are moments when you just can't resist it. It's okay. We all know this happened. We don't need to pretend like you are not known for this, that this is not going to be on the front page of the post tomorrow, as indeed turned out to be. Well, it's, I mean, it's actually really good. And I was listening to, you know, the show on Monday when you talked about it was David Hill, his book, like, don't assume that the audience knows. That happened a long time ago. That was 25, 27. Not everybody probably can immediately call to mind the Reggie Miller choke sign thing. So it actually was kind of fun to have it back up again and see it, you know, become a thing again in this media moment. It did. 30 years ago, by the way. 30 years ago. Shut up. Oh, God.

I'm so old. It's always funny to me how networks are always scared of this. I remember talking to Chris Collinsworth a few years ago when the Bengals, when the Bengals, the freaking Bengals made the Super Bowl. Oh, man. And here is Mr. Bengal in the broadcast booth. And he was reluctant to talk about it too much because he's like everybody would have

been mad at me. And I'm just like, if you have Reggie freaking Miller on your air, this is who I want to talk about this right now. There's nobody in the world I want to hear from other than maybe Spike Lee right now than Reggie Miller. The choice is already made when you put Reggie in the quote booth. Right. If he's, you've already sort of made that decision. So yeah, I don't think it doesn't the viewers any favors if you run away from it. I think you got to talk about it.

And I think it's cool that he laughed about it and chuckled a little bit. I mean, sorry to Nick's fans, but like it was cool. By the way, Nick's fans getting pissed off about Reggie even before game one, calling the series. That just made me so happy as well. I love it. I love it. I love it. Man, can you imagine how that guy that was in the Madison Square Garden that was wearing the Halliburton jersey, you know, Halliburton, you know, for people that don't know, the guy that was attacked on the streets of New York wearing a Halliburton shirt by New York Knicks fans, and Halliburton gave him a jersey and brought him tickets to the game. I know that guy had to feel electric last night. Like,

I know that he was feeling so good. He had the best night. And by the way, we should specify, guy attacked on the streets of New York who was not Brian Winhorse. Not windy. Yes. Not windy. Because Nick's fans have had something of a week. Let's also throw Draymond Green in here because Draymond Green was part of inside the NBA and the halftime show last night. There's so much to say here.

I mean, I do find it a little lot that we are saying goodbye to inside the NBA, at least on T&T. It's not going anywhere. We're saying goodbye to it. but we're going to have a guest star for our final appearance on T&T. Don't you think Draymond? I think of Draymond as functionally a member of that crew, except when he's not playing. Like, I feel, and he, I mean, I don't know how people feel about Drayvon. I'm sure that people have complicated feelings about him.

I think he's really good with those guys. I think he fits right in, right? Like, I don't know if people enjoy them as much as they used to, but, like, I remember last night, like he was saying, hey, they should have filed. on that play when Mitch I think Mitchell Robinson blew, blew an assignment on an in-bounce play and the Pacer's got a quick bucket. I don't know if it was Obie Toppin that scored or whatever, but I was like, oh, okay, like he brought up something,

some analysis of the game that usually that crew doesn't really get into. But he also can joke around and he's a little bit more, he seems a little bit more willing to laugh at himself than I would have thought. Yes. He was really good last night, I thought, just breaking down tape. at halftime. It's a little bit of a weird half time because Mary J. Blyge was playing. And this is the other thing. Like we're so used to inside being in a studio. It's like now we're saying goodbye with a halftime show that the guys were admitting they actually wanted to watch

rather than break down the game. I know right. Playing just on blast behind them. Man, I wonder how much it costs to get Mary J. Blige in for the vassas of Square Garden, man. People were wondering that and we definitely needed a figure for that. That feels like a special treat. That is a lot of money, man. That's a lot of money. But I mean, that's the thing. It's quite a scene. I wish we could go there. I wish we could be, we could broadcast from there, do a show from Madison Square Garden. Here's the thing about Draymond. It's interesting to me. We know he's a good announcer. Yep. We know he was born to be a great basketball player and then be a great announcer in some form or fashion. I did wonder if he at some point would get past a line

where people are like, however good you are at announcing, I just don't like you. You are too much of a wrestling heel for me, you know, whether it's his own teammate, whether it's getting quote unquote tangled up with every single player he winds up on the court with that there was a point. Now, you can go back and look at Charles Barkley's career and there's a lot there before Charles Barkley became America's favorite teddy bear. Right. But it's interesting with Draymond to me.

What do you make of that? I do think it's interesting. And again, I totally understand if people don't want to hear what Draymond has to say. Because he seems like such a reasonable, personable guy. Like if you don't know anything about him as a player and you see him on air, he seems really smart and really funny. You know, he fits in with the guys. But then if like, yeah, the context is that this guy is out of control on the basketball court a lot of the time.

And it's just like, I don't know if I want to hear you analyze what somebody should have done when you're getting kicked out of games, when Steph's not playing, or whatever, right? Like, it's just like, you don't, you don't have the gravitas to pull that off. But I just think the thing about it to me is that Draymond's just really good. And we've seen enough people joined that panel and not be good to know what good is. Like, Dwight Howard was on that panel last week. And I was just like, is he paying attention?

I was like, is Dwight tuned into what's happening right now? Because it just didn't seem like he cared. Yeah. I think the one that Draymond that Bob, me the most was the Carl Anthony Towns thing. Yeah. Remember that where he was like Carl Anthony Towns is maybe ducking this game? Yeah.

I mean, that was really beyond the pale. And it turns out he was at the funeral. And instead of just apologizing for it, because whatever, I think that just falls into the general realm of trash top. It's like, no, no, please listen to the next episode of my pod because I will be, this must continue. I was like, this is, this is just bad media is what this is. It's really ugly. And also the other piece of this, too, I think is that, and like, I don't, I'm not a Rudy Gobert fan, but I really think it's ugly, like, how that panel treats him.

You know what I mean? Like, I mean, we were talking about God is ultimately going to make the Hall of Fame. He's not a bad player. Like, sometimes he's got his deficiencies. But, like, the way that they make him a punchline over and over again, I just, I find that to be unbecoming. And I wish they would stop doing that. Final episode of Around the Horn is tomorrow, Joel?

Man. Yeah, man. I didn't know if we were going to do it. segment about this. But around the horn has been thrust into the think piece zone. Yeah. This week. We got a New York Magazine piece.

We got a Washington Post piece by Ben Strauss. Yep. There are a few interesting things to talk about here. One is, why is around the horn being canceled? That is a fantastic question. I'm so glad people finally started asking that. Because as Strauss notes and the New York Mag profile notes, the show does pretty decent ratings.

Right. It'd be hard to build up something like around the horn from scratch. But if I can guess what the answer is here, everything that's happening at ESPN, every single thing, with the notable exception of the hire of Dan Wetzel, every single thing that's happening at ESPN is in service of two things. Okay. The Super Bowl, first ever on that network in a couple of years. Ooh, okay.

Or more importantly, the standalone, flagship app that is going to launch later this year. And I just think if you look at every decision ESPN has made, it's like what gets us closer to what we want to do on the app. It really is. So like Zach Lowe, that made absolutely no sense. And by the way, thank God he's here with us. Absolutely.

That made absolutely no sense in like good basketball journalism terms. Right. But if you think of the future is the app, then that's, I think, that's what they think. That is what they think about this stuff. So around the horn, I'm just like daytime television, as we know it and as we have grown up with it and around the horn 20 plus years of it, it just doesn't make sense to them in that context anymore. That's what I believe the answer here. I can see that. So do you give any credence to the idea promoted by the esteemed former.

Chicago sometimes columnist Jay Marriotti that is wokeness. And I mean, that has been whispered. You don't think it has anything to do with that? I don't think, I think it's a little bit like, you know, when we talk about executives, like, did they want around the horn addressing social issues that crept into sports as much as they did? Absolutely not.

I think in their, in their happy place, they did not want that to happen. By the way, let's just talk about, let's just talk about the charge of quote unquote, woakness for a second. So you're doing a sports debate show in the time of Colin Kaepernick and the content of the debate show is not going to change? I just, yeah. And I think the other piece of it too, and it's the subtext there is that like, well, they started inviting on a lot of brown people and women.

And, you know, that's a critique that is being made all over the country in a whole bunch of other different professional fields or whatever. They're like, whatever, those folks show up that that's wokeness. But I actually thought that was a strength of the show and that they helped develop other voices and that sometimes you heard some perspectives on there that you might not have otherwise heard in sports. But yeah, to your point, like, do I think the show is going away because of it? No. I mean, I think that like you said, I don't think it hurts. You know what I mean?

I just like, well, if like that's just one less email, one less phone call, one less thing, one less complaint that we have to deal with in the media or whatever, then fine. But I don't think it ultimately was like the thing that hobbled the show. It was a fatal blow. And you can look at the people that are around around the horn on around the horn every week as being representative of the way sports media has changed. Like this show starts off with newspaper columnists. Yeah, man. Who are white guys and were overwhelmingly white guys. And that was the business, you know, for better or worse.

Now, did they go off and actually try to find a, you know, a panel that was different than those guys? No, they didn't. But that was a huge chunk of the business back in 2002. And we were a world of newspapers. Like, that's what we were coming out of. And that doesn't look like that anymore. It just sports media doesn't not look like that anymore. Thank God, or at least as much like that, perhaps is the better way to say it.

I would wonder what would happen to all these careers if around the horn did not exist. Because around the horn created a lot of opportunities for people to make money in media that proc. You know, because again, like it's not like this show was founded, what, 2002. It's not like newspapers were staring into a bright future at that point. So if that show's not there, I don't know what happens. But Moni, you know, Jones talks about this a lot. Like he credits around the horn to basically creating his career on TV. He says, look, that was the thing they put me in front of people and let me know that

I could talk about sports in a particular way. And so- I'm saying the same thing. Yeah. And I agree. And I mean, can I just be honest? There will always be a hole in my heart that I never got to be on a round of horn. I mean, it was, I mean, because the thing is like if you're in a certain point, like you're, you know, I'm working in Hernandez County, Florida or Shreveport or, you know, whatever.

You're writing a relative anonymity. And you look at the people on TV there and you're like, man, I have, have I really made it if I haven't gotten on around the horn yet? And so, yeah, I mean, I'm sad for the show going away because it meant something to a lot of people. It created a lot of opportunities for a lot of other people. But also, like, I ain't get my shot, man. I didn't get a chance to go on there and score some points. And that kind of stinks. I told you to previous podcast.

And I always feel bad saying this because I feel like the guy who shows up at the funeral and looks at the deceased and be like, you know, he kind of, he wasn't for me. It wasn't most of my, he wasn't my favorite person. around the horn was not my cup of tea. It just wasn't. But I have been touched by the point you made where it's like, if you're a young sports writer growing up in a certain time, you look at it's like, that's how I will know that I have made it.

Right. That's the marker. Yeah. Just like it was for a certain generation, it was a sports reporter. Man, if I'm up there with Mike Lupica and Bob Ryan, then I will have done something in this business. If I'm that young guy who penetrates that world,

And in those terms, I'm like, okay, I do see that. I do see why that's interesting. Where's the next marker? I mean, for having made it in journalism, you know, in sports media. I don't, like, what would, what is equivalent to getting your first invite on around the horn? That's a great question. Getting a video podcast. Is that why we don't have one?

Is that it? We haven't made it yet. We haven't made it. Do, can we, should we say something about Tony Realeigh real quick, though, too? Absolutely. I mean, so I met Tony once. I got to go up to the studio there. And this is right at the end of my tenure working at ESPN.

And everything everybody says about him is true. He's the nicest person in the world. I don't know. Like, there are people that are probably as nice, but people that, I can't imagine anybody nicer. And the thing is, like, he's so good. He was really so good at his job. Like, because he was everybody that,

Tony reality came to us a stat boy on PTI. So I don't know that there was any suggestion that he was going to be what he became. And, you know, Max Kellerman was kind of a force in his own right when that show started. Like, Rex Hellerman was really, really good. But like Tony became so good and so polished that I thought inevitably, oh, he's going to be hosting a show. He's going to be on Good Morning America or something like that. And so I, you know, to lose a guy that is just that fundamentally kind and nice and good at his job, And to hear him say that he's looking for another job and hadn't made any headway at ESPN,

I was like, man, that was heart-rending. Yeah, I was like, surely somebody is going to come scoop this guy up, right? And also a guy where the kindness and heart comes through the screen. Like, we meet people in this business, maybe not a huge number of people, but we meet people in this business. You're like, man, that is a good person. I think it's a different level where your goodness comes through the television set. and you're just you're just even goodness maybe is the wrong word your humanity comes through the

television set yeah i mean like let's i mean do you want to make a list of people at esPN that that's true of oh man SVP i'm gonna put on that list man who else is on our list of like people where you're just like again not that they're not you know smart nice cool whatever it is but just that like you see a flicker of that what you know what it is it's like if they like you like you like you like you you, you feel like, oh, I must be, I must be doing something right. Like, if they were, you refer to you warmly or they knew you or if, like, you saw them, you would want them to like you because it would say something about your own character, right? Yeah.

Oh, man. I feel like I don't want to say any days because if I, if I miss one. Let's not offer this as a complete list. Let's just say that Tony Realli is on the list and SVP's on the list and there are other people on the list. You can offer your own list up if you, if you'd like. I will say it's a short list in, like, at ESPN. and in television generally.

Yeah. Just again, not just to be that person, but to be able to make that visible to viewers. Yeah, that you embody, you embody kindness in a way. It's like, it radiates off the screen, and you're like, I want to go hug that guy, you know? I remember when he talked about,

I mean, he's talked a lot about his grief from losing a child and dealing with his own anxiety or whatever. And it's like, it's a guy that was like, I wish I could step through the screen and hug you, you know? Mm-hmm. Such a good word is said. Yeah, and that's how I kind of felt with Tony. Man, I met Tony, man.

I'm a nobody, dude. And I go into his office. He's talking to me. Like, I'm just like, I'm following somebody around. And I'm just trying to get to where I'm, and like Tony Riley's talking to me. He's like, fastest 10 year old in the country. You're in here, huh? And I'm just like, huh?

You know what I'm saying? It's just like, oh, man, Tony is, you know, I don't know how he even has the capacity to remember all that kind of stuff. But, like, there's not very many people like him in the business. And I hope he's rewarded for that. Like, I hope he gets to stay in. Somewhere, somehow. Speaking of the think piece zone,

Tony Reale used the J word to describe around the horn this week. He was talking to Dan Patrick, and he said, the bones of the show is journalism. And when this one goes away, there ain't anymore. I love Tony and Mike. They're not writing in the Washington Post on deadline tomorrow. Now, he sort of climbed down from this word in an interview with Andrew Marchand over at the athletic. but I would just say this.

I think there is a thesis out there, one that you and I have stepped into the fitting room and tried on many a time, that ESPN has abandoned journalism. And that thesis has the benefit of being true. Like during the John Skipper, John Walsh heyday, a lot of us would make fun of ESPN whenever they had any kind of screw up or scandal.

Right. That looks like Mr. Sean's New Yorker compared to ESPN now. But if I can Stephen A. Smith this for just a second. But that does not mean that everything ESPN does is a data point for this thesis. And I don't believe the cancellation of Around the Horn is about ESPN abandoning quote unquote journalism. Do you know what I would say and maybe makes it a little bit more accurate? ESPN is abandoning journalists. How many journalists are getting hired over there anymore?

I mean, Wetzel aside, right? But are getting prominent spots on air. Usually it's former, you know, former athletes or like media personalities. But like, do you think there will ever be another Woody page to come on there? Well, yeah, for a number of reasons. Yeah, right. But I mean, I can. could see it if you're saying like in terms of like opportunities or platforms for people that got

their starts in journalism and reporting and writing and everything, where are they going to go on TV now? On TV, not just like podcast or whatever. Then I might say, yeah, you're right. I don't, ESPN is kind of walking away from journalist, not necessarily journalism. I think that's a good way to put it. I just backdate all this because I'm like, if you wanted to create opportunities for the writers who appear on Around the Horn, you could have them write. You could have more platforms for them to write columns and features and reported stories. Like that's what's gone away here. And yeah, right, the talent pool for Around the Horn, maybe it's different than other shows.

I think it's changed a little bit over the years. It's not like, hey, you know, sit in your newsroom and project your journalistic values to America while we have like two minute things. But like it's not putting journalists on a game show. show, it's giving journalists assignments. Yeah. That's a journalism to me. That's what abandoning journalism is about.

Do you want to complain about ESPN.com again, the website and how bad it is? Do you have it up? Should we look and see what? You know what? Are we going to do live browsing? What, summing up every offseason for every AFC team, Barnwell's 16 superlatives. That's the lead. That's probably good, by the way.

That's like, that's the ESPN high watermark these days. But go ahead. Are the NBA playoffs too, so I'm reading that middle column, right, where the, you know, they feature everything. Are the NBA playoffs too physical, how the refs actually lost control? Here's what the data says. That's by Baxter Holmes. That's a think piece.

Okay. I'll accept that. Test your knowledge of the WMBA's many franchises, ESPN staff. That was from a day ago. You know, what teams are the most QB needy for 2026? This is a college football thing. Here are the 11 teams that are in the market. I just got to why Stephen A isn't ready to bestow superstar status on Tyrese Halliburton,

so I'm going to go ahead and click off. Okay, that's not going to. I'm fine. I'm complete. Michael Malone, I expect Anthony Edwards to have a great game too. What do you think about that? That's 29 minutes ago. So, yeah, it's just, you know, it's just not what it was when I was there. And no disrespect to the people that are still producing great work over there.

But clearly, like I said, they don't. they don't respect, it's ESPN itself that just doesn't respect journalists and what they do anymore. And it just kind of seems like just kind of walking away from that. For the, it large, not all the way, but at large, it seems like that's just not the focus of the company anymore. Can I be like Stephen A and put one more butt into this? Please. If we're teasing out this idea that ESPN has abandoned journalism and or journalists, I will say this. If you watch NFL Live, which is one of sports Emmy, not only Mina Kimes, who is justifiably praised,

But like Dan Orlovsky, the way he breaks down football or the way Laura Rutledge gets him in and out of the segments and sets everything up, there are a lot of parts of ESPN that are way more sophisticated than old ESPN. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. The language, the statistics, the analysis, it is just being handled at a totally different level. But SVP in that bucket, or at least SVP matching the kind of sophistication of Dan and Keith and old sports center. You know, I mean, there's, you know, the podcast network, what podcast networks they have, I guess. But that is there too. So I think if you're talking about abandoning journalism, we have to also acknowledge that there are parts of ESPN that are just better than they were in another era.

Their coverage of women's sports. And yeah, is definitely much better, like to WMBA and everything else. And I would say, like, NFL Live is sort of the platonic ideal, right? I mean, it's not just that you get good information in the presentation of it, but there's an enthusiasm that is, like, good for TV. Like, it goes sort of beyond, like, they're good at the journalism piece of it or conveying information, but they're also sort of good at the TV part of it, the theater of, like, creating a vibe and making people excited to tune in for it.

We have to stop down the show right now because we've just gotten another one, Joel, Plotonic Ideal. Oh, man, I'm sorry, yeah, played it. I'm not, I'm not, I can not say that I can not say that I can recall very many Play-Doh. Do I spot any volumes of Plato in the background there? I'm so sad. Along with your Franz Kafka.

I do have a house full of Play-Doh. We'll accept that for a father of young kids. All right, AI Nightmare of the Week. Oh, man. This is so bad. Yeah, go please. Let's say you were checking out the Chicago Sun-Times or perhaps the Philadelphia Inquirer this week.

Yep. And you saw a summer books roundup. Some kind of generic content and, you know, this one didn't even have a byline. But she thought, okay, I'll read in here and I'm going to find a couple of books. Tidewater Dreams by Isabel Allende, the last algorithm by Andy Weir. That sounds very promising, that last algorithm, right? I would read that, right? And it turns out to be kind of ironic given what we're about to say.

Or perhaps show the rainmakers by Percival Everett, who just won the Pulitzer Prize. Big fan of personal level, I would definitely read that, yeah. A lot of interesting books there. Well, these books, at least the ones I just mentioned, do not exist. Oh, man, that's unfortunate. And the piece that ran in those newspapers was published by a syndicate. King Features. Jason Cobler did some excellent work on 404 media with this story.

He found the writer, Marco Buscoglia, who says he wrote this piece and wrote maybe the wrong word because this piece came, at least partially, from AI. Oh, man. But AI can do everything. I mean, I thought this is the future, right? AI can do everything. Buscoglia says, huge mistake on my part and has nothing to do with the Sun-Times. They trust that the content they purchase is accurate, and I betrayed that trust.

it's on me 100%. Well, it's not totally not on the Sun-Times. If you had to do a pie chart of blame, I mean, it's at least 50-50 sometimes in Marco Biscoglio, right? Ideally, you would have somebody there who would read the things that go in the newspaper, or at least eyeball them, be like, wow, Percival Everett has a new novel out? Yeah. So quickly after James, oh, wait, let me do a quick Google search.

This doesn't exist. So I don't see, and it appears that the Sun Times does have a copy desk to some extent, but I don't know the extent of like how it's happening. There's not very many places that have copy desk anymore. That's like the saddest thing you've ever said. It appears they have a copy desk to some extent. Yeah. And I mean, I don't, like desk is probably overstating it, like a copy cubicle. They have a copy cubicle. They're freelancers and they're across the country. But yeah, yeah, perhaps they're there. Yeah. So. I mean, where it used to be once upon a time, there were at least two layers of people that would catch this, right?

Like your assigning editor and then whatever other editor that was going to usher it into the page or whatever. And then maybe there might even be another read or another editor that looked it over as it was laid out on the page. And clearly that is not what is going on at the Sun Times now. Do we think it's that publications don't care what's in a lot of their pages, that they're so understaffed, that there is no one to care or that they're not incentivized? to care beyond the core group of, let's say, you know, stories about the Bears and a couple of local stories in Chicago. Isn't it all the above, I guess? Because, I mean, I know that they're overwhelmed over there.

Like, people still have, my dad refuses to subscribe to the Houston Chronicles. They don't have anything in there anymore. They don't, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, look, the Chronicle is still trying to meet, and all newspapers are still trying to meet the news mission of the generations that preceded them. but they don't have the resources and they don't have the people to do what they used to do, but people still have these expectations of them. So the people that are there are really already behind the eight ball on that, right?

And so I'm assuming that's probably what's going on to the Sun-Times. I mean, they just had in March, they laid off about a fifth of the people on their payroll, so it's not getting any better. So I don't even know, it's like you don't even have the time to care. Like, it's not about you're incentivized to care. you have a job to do. It's very limited in what you can do, and you just can't really worry about,

like, you can see how these kind of things are creep up, which is really scary because, I mean, how much have we supposed to trust in your newspaper then, right? Like, how much, like, where is the vetting going on here? A couple of Trump stories before we go. Yep. A couple of these we can speed through here.

We had his confrontation with the South African president in the Oval Office. Yeah, man. By the way, only in journalism were to a bruising oval office meeting according to the New York Times. We had Team Trump scrubbing transcripts from the White House website. Yeah, man. Replacing them with videos, or at least videos of some of his speeches and public remarks.

That's really going to hurt as somebody like you, because, I mean, you just admitted earlier that you read transcripts of things. It's tough, man. Yeah, that's going to be hard. As I'm going to watch these videos, please do not replace the transcripts of your podcast that I read on the New York Times website. but why don't I take you to the continued immediate appeasement of Trump? Yep. Because we've already had CBS this week. So why don't we throw in ABC News?

Oh, God, okay. Story by Corbyn Boyleys in The Daily Beast. It's about the view. Okay. ABC News's president tells the cast of the view that they need to tone it down in terms of politics. kind of an odd conversation the week after you got the former president of the United States on the show seems like kind of a good get yeah right right I just I mean everybody's scared man everybody's running scared and they don't want to get sued they don't want to be on truth

social they don't want to be investigated um and if if there's not people that are courageous and take the fight back in those spots. And it's really hard to be courageous right now and in those spots. Then what do you? But it's kind of like, Wuppie Goldberg don't have to do this, man. She could just retire. You know what I mean? Joy Behar.

Joy Behar is still on the view, right? She's still on the view. I presumably, she's made enough money that they don't have to do this, you know, if they don't want to. So we also just note this is the view. Yeah. this is not Defector the TV show? Right.

This is not, dog, this isn't even 2020. You know what I mean? It's not even that. Like, I mean, what do you,

if you're going to have people that don't like Trump anywhere on your network, isn't this where you kind of would want it anyway? And remember, when we're talking about ABC, this is the same network that when George Stephanopoulos misspoke on the air, went and settled with Donald Trump. Yeah, man,

rather than fighting it in courts. So this is the appeasement scorecard. What's the sign they used to have a factory this many days since our last accident? So we need to have a press box graphic where we just go back to zero. I mean, man, it's just really sad. And yeah, I mean, I think is when you watch 60 minutes fall apart and like the CBS News Division kind of capitulate, that's really worrisome. But then it's just like, if they're going to fold, then of course the view is going to to follow you know right everybody else is going to follow the view and by the way the view having

like politics and when again i'm not i'm not i'm not the person who is you know standing up for it or being like you you've changed my favorite tv show but the fact that they had political stuff happening on there and arguments you know between whoopi and joy behar and conservative du jour i always thought that was like those are the parts of the show that made it to me that went viral right yeah yeah maybe they need to bring back elizabeth has to Haselbeck, you know, because I feel like... Was that the answer? I think maybe that's the answer.

It's just like, I feel like, oh, they're jumping on poor Elizabeth Hasselbeck again, or whatever. So maybe they need to bring her back or somebody that's similarly inclined to fight it out with them. Because, you know, again, I don't watch The View. That's obviously not my cup of tea, so to speak. But if you can't have these conversations with the view, I don't know where else you're going to be able to have them on TV pretty soon. And just to review, our sports media friends, they want beef. ABC does not want beef for the view. They don't want no beef.

No beef at all. Brian, have you thought about your favorite beef track yet? Yeah, I'm still working on it. Actually, you know, I still got a headache after you mentioned Marcelus Wiley. So I may need the weekend, the holiday weekend. We can come back on Monday with David. You guys can share your favorite beef tracks. He is Joel Anderson.

I'm Brian Curtis. Plains a Magic. by Bobby Wagner. And let me just correct one thing, Joel, it's Tuesday because Monday Memorial Day. So on Tuesday, I'll return with David. I'll return with you next Thursday for more lukewarm takes about the media. Can't wait to talk to you then. Likewise, buddy.