Colin’s top takes of the week!
He reacts to the news of Russell Wilson being released by the Denver Broncos (2:00) assigns blame for where it went wrong in Denver (5:00) and names an AFC team that could be a great fit (7:30).
He’s joined by John Middlekauff, host of “3 and Out” to remember the life and impact of legendary ESPN reporter Chris Mortensen (15:30) and discuss the value of Kirk Cousins and why he’s been underrated (18:30).
They also debate whether it’s worth taking a flier on Michael Penix Jr. despite his injury history (23:30)
Colin’s also joined by Mike Mulvihill, President of Insights and Analytics for FOX
Colin asks Mike whether women’s college basketball will continue to be a big draw going forward, or if it’s just the “Caitlin Clark effect” (36:00)
They break down why the Dallas Cowboys and Kansas City Chiefs have the most powerful brands and what teams are close to that status (40:00). They dive into the future of cable TV and why sports has proven resilient despite a decline in overall cable viewership (46:00)
(Timestamps may vary based on advertisements.)
Follow Colin and The Volume on Twitter for the latest content and updates! #Volume #Herd
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
The Vine this week on Prime Cuts, John Middelkoff on
NFL free agency, Michael mulva Hill, who is fascinating for
Fox Sports Analytics and insights. You'll want to listen on
Caitlin Clark star power in my top takes of the week.
(00:21):
All right, here we go, semi instant reaction. I had
to speak to a USC grad class today, so I
was really interesting kids and did that for an hour,
a little over an hour. So I came out of
the class and I heard the news the Denver Broncos
had released Russell Wilson, which saves them thirty seven million,
but they still have about eighty five million in dead
(00:43):
cap money, which is like double the most ever. And
I think that was I believe that was Matt Ryan
Falcons when they moved off him. So you're going to
have to hit on some draft picks the only way
to ease the pain. And remember the NFL did come in,
gave everybody a thirty million more dollars in cap space.
That hell, and hitting on four draft picks that could
players start. That helps. But for a year it's going
(01:05):
to be pretty ugly. Let's first start about blame. Who
to blame? Well, Sean Payton needs to win games, and
Russell Wilson wants to find a landing spot. Those guys
are not in the blame game. They're in the turn
of the page game, and I don't blame them. Their
energy is going to be Russell Wilson wants to find
a better team. I think Pittsburgh's perfect. You cannot be
(01:26):
in a division with Joe Burrow twice a year, Kevin
Stefanski and DeShawn Watson twice a year, and Lamar Jackson
and John Harbaugh twice a year with Kenny Pickett, can't go.
Look at the Vegas odds Steelers near the bottom of
the NFL. I think you roll the dice. You go
with Russell Wilson. His maturity and devotion and commitment is
what the Steelers need. Offensively, it's they got some receivers
(01:47):
who I really like, but they're a little young, a
little immature. They're ready to go, and their offensive line
is okay, not special, and Russell Wilson is still mobile
enough to avoid some of that stuff. So I think
it works. I think I think the culture and the
person ellen Pittsburgh is good. They don't have a trigger guy.
They don't have a quarterback. And in the AFC, you're
not going anywhere unless you have a star, even if
(02:10):
it's a declining star. You got to have a star
to win games. So I think Russell Wilson will do
just fine. Denver's gonna probably go get out a JJ
McCarthy or a bow Nicks. I will tell you Denver schedule.
They get the NFC South, that's the good news. The
bad news they also face the AFC North. So they
are at road games next year for Denver beyond facing Harbaugh,
(02:34):
Justin Herbert and the Chargers, beyond facing Mahomes and Andy
Reid and the Chiefs. They go to Baltimore. Yeah, Raven's
pretty good. At home, they go to Joe Berwin, Cincinnati,
two New Orleans and Derek Carr, to Tampa and Baker
Mayfield two Aaron Rodgers and the Jets, and to Seattle.
That ain't great for a rookie quarterback. Now the home schedule,
(02:55):
they get Atlanta Carolina at home, but Pittsburgh Cleveland Colts
at home. Now they have the schedule. They don't know
when the dates are, but those are some tough road games.
Those are harsh environments. Going toe to toe with really
good quarterbacks in many instances, Aaron Rodgers, Baker Mayfield, Joe Burrow,
Lamar Jackson. There's some l's there, Mahomes once, Justin Herbert
(03:17):
once with Harbaugh. You know, I just I think maybe
I wasn't like this in my twenties. But as I've aged,
pointing fingers doesn't solve anything. Listen, you want to point fingers,
you could point to the Broncos GM George Payton. He
gave up two first two second round picks. I think
he gave up three players and maybe a fifth round pick.
He also hired Nat Hackett, and that was a complete disaster.
(03:40):
Many believe he hired Nathaniel Hackett because he tried to
get Aaron Rodgers and when he couldn't rustle in, Nat
Hackett's off as just didn't work. So he has created
eighty five million a dead cap. He gave up a
lot of draft capital, he picked the wrong head coach,
and Sean Payton's got to pick up the pieces from there.
But you know, I don't think George Peyton and I
and I do respect the job he's done mostly, but
(04:02):
you can only have so many big whiffs. And Hackett
and Russell. That's a big whiff coach quarterback league whift
on both so and I don't think Russell would have
You know, people can get all over Sean Payton this thing.
Sean and Russell were not going to work. But what
coach would you really need to work? I mean, after
Nat Hackett bombed, who wanted the job? Ask yourself you
(04:24):
would have a rookie coach? Would he have worked with
Russell Wilson? I mean, the personnel is what it is
based on what you were paying Russell Wilson and what
you surrendered in the draft. There were some limitations here.
So I think Sean Payton will figure it out. But
I think if Russell Wilson went to the Steelers, he'll
have a better year than JJ McCarthy or bow next
with the Broncos. I don't think there's any question about that.
So year two feels like, you know, Sean Payton just
(04:47):
getting out from under Russell Wilson the player. Now he
has to spend another year getting out from under the
dead cap hit in a division with Justin Herbert Harbaugh,
Pat Mahomes, Andy Reid. That is a big, big hill climb.
But I've never felt and I said this. I know
Sean Peyton well enough, after twenty interviews with him and
(05:07):
a dinner with him and spending time with him and
talking to him, I just never felt he and Russ.
That's why I thought it was strange when he took
the job. I just I didn't think it was a job.
He wanted the charger's job initially, but I think the
Denver owners have a lot of cash, came in, wrote
a big check, and it's hard to look the other way.
I get it, but this was never going to be easy.
Sean is a very direct, very authentic, very opinionated person,
(05:34):
and you know Russell is hopelessly optimistic, and he has
a declining quarterback, and there are some psychological factors when
a quarterback gets older. He wants his money, he wants
his protection. And I don't think Russell ever felt supported
by Nat Hackett's incompetence or Sean Payton's brewed lawnesty. And
so I didn't think it was a good fit. So
(05:54):
let's move on and start over. I still think Russell
Wilson has several good years in him. He's not a disaster,
he's not washed. He just needs the right pieces and
you know, I've been saying this for years. Pittsburgh's personnels.
I mean, they have all the things you need. They
have weapons on the outside. Offensively, they have a run game,
and they have speed on the perimeter. They have a
pass rusher, they have playmakers on defense. They're not great
(06:16):
at corner. Nobody outside of maybe the Jets and the
Chiefs is great at corner. We have a corner shortage
in the NFL, and elite corner shortage. So and once again,
it's a great NFL draft for wide receivers. It's like
the fourth straight draft, great wide receiver draft, not a
great corner draft. So that you just that problem will
be exacerbated. You're just gonna have more great receivers and
(06:37):
fewer great corners. But I tend to think we can
sit and point fingers at this stuff. Denver's in the AFC.
They gonna go find their next quarterback star. And history
tells you if there's five quarterbacks taken in the first round,
one's going to be a hit, two are gonna work
kind of, one's gonna be a bust, and one or
two won't be as they won't get a second contract.
(07:00):
And so you know, I'll say this, I think outside
of Caleb Williams, the rest of these quarterbacks will be
as good as the place they land. So I think
if it's bo Nix or JJ McCarthy, I think both
can succeed with Sean Payton both. I think JJ McCarthy's
got a better arm than bow Knicks. I think bo
Nix has far more college starts and is more accurate
(07:21):
than JJ McCarthy. But it just depends on what you like.
JJ's a little taller, I think, in my opinion, bon
Nicks is. I feel like he's kind of elusive the
deep ball. I take JJ McCarthy accuracy, I take bo
Nicks experience. I'd take Bo next. I think JJ McCarthy
may have a higher ceiling. Bnick's a little lower ceiling,
(07:41):
But it could be that bow Nex has a higher
floor than JJ McCarthy. So I think both those guys
that would be a perfect place to land. I don't
think Michael Pennix, though I love the way he throws,
I don't think Denver would take the risk on him
being his injury history. They got to get this thing right,
and I just feel like bo Nix works for that offense. Accuracy, experience,
kid that's been around. He carried Oregon at times, whereas
(08:05):
JJ McCarthy felt sometimes not to be unfair, but like
he was carried by Michigan's O line, run game coaching
and dominating defense. So I think that's the direction they'll go.
Jarrett Stidham can start for the time being. He's capable,
he's okay. That's obviously not the future. It does matter, though,
that the rookie quarterback is going to come into a
system where you know, they pay like twelve million bucks
(08:27):
for Jarrett Stidham, so he's going to take some snaps.
You know, Stidham got some snaps this year. He'll probably
start the season. I could see absolutely. You get a
JJ McCarthy or a bow Nicks and you're like, listen,
we're earmarking Thanksgiving, and you know, Stidham struggles with a
tough schedule that includes trips to Baltimore and Cincinnati and
Kansas City, and you know, I could see the jarretts
(08:50):
that I'm struggling, and then Sean Payton saying, all right,
it's week seven, Week six, let's go with a kid.
I'm fine with that too. But in the end, it
was a big swing by Denver was surprised how bad
the Russell, Wilson nat Hackett combination was. I just remember
the first game that he played in Denver and they
went to Seattle to face the Seahawks, and they couldn't
(09:12):
figure out the clock with two minutes ago. It was like, oh, oh,
we got a coordinator, not a great one, trying to
be a head coach. This isn't gonna work. So and
I think you've seen that in New York with Matt
Hackett and Zach Wilson. So it happened. We can point fingers.
I think it was inevitable. I don't think the personalities clash.
(09:33):
You don't have to be best friends with your quarterback.
Belichick and Brady reportedly didn't have a dinner in twenty years.
You don't have to be best friends. But I think
Russell maybe the most optimistic player in the league, and
I think Sean Payton on the other end, is the
most authentic and raw and outspoken in the league. So
I mean you have a chasm there of personalities. Whereas
(09:54):
Belichick and Brady are both intensely driven, workaholics everything else,
they were kind of on the same plane and in
the same direction for years. I think Tom's a little
more joyful and easier to be around. Builds a little
more old school, but a.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Lot of things.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Brady and Belichick were very similar on their ascension, their drive,
their work ethic, and their commitment to the sport. Sean
and Russell. You couldn't pick a more optimistic quarterback, maybe
Kirk Cousins, and a more raw coach than Sean Payton.
It's oil and water. It never worked. That's okay, don't
need to blame anybody.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
It's okay.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Shawn's won a Super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
So is Russ.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They've both won Super Bowls. They're more than capable. George Peyton,
on the other hand, I would be surprised if he
has a lot of tarmac left. You Whiffin a coach,
You Whiffin a quarterback eighty five mil dead cap. That's
going to leave a mark that lingers. And remember this
division now, Nega, Andy Reid and Jim Harbaugh. Pretty good coaches,
(10:58):
Pretty good coaches, all right. Welcome in. It's our usual
Sunday hour. John Middlecoff, former NFL scout who just got
back from the combine like Thursday night after spending four
or five days there for the volume. We certainly appreciated
(11:20):
that I should mention right off the top. Chris Mortenson
passed away today. He'd been battling cancer for some time.
He was seventy two years old. Mort was one of
the more respected you know, he was as kind as
he was wise, one of those kind of guys that
I think transcended eras Paul Zimmerman Sports illustrates the first
(11:42):
like NFL guy. I remember, like what you would call
like your beat columnist, Peter King, Chris Mortenson. He came
from the Atlanta Journal Constitution where he was breaking stories
down there. Just a really nice guy. How was he
viewed in the league? John, I mean, these guys now
it's basically about breaking story. Chef took kind of Mortenson's
roll and it's like minute to minute breaking stories. Chris
(12:04):
grew up in a generation well without the iPhone. It
was more about contextualizing stories and breaking stories. How was
he viewed her on the league?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Yeah? I think people loved him. I mean I saw
Peyton Manning, who obviously was very close with him in
the Manning family in general. You know, when I think
about football, like like you said, I mean growing up
in the nineties, Chris Mortenson, Peter King. I mean those guys, really,
you know, from outside of people broadcasting games like a
John Madden, played an integral, integral role in all of
(12:35):
us that loved football. I mean the access that they had,
it's so I mean you can find out everything now
on social media and all these articles or all these blogs.
They had something that not many people had, and that
was information. So I think he was a trailblazer that
way for sure. And just an awful day obviously had
been sick for a while, sucks. I mean, he's I
(12:58):
think he's one of the key figures in terms of
like NFL reporting, NFL just stories and someone that you
had to go to for information before inform when information
was really really hard to get and it was much
more difficult to communicate.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah, and uh, you know, he was one of the
first guys that was a beacon right at a major network.
I mean, remember sports departments at the network level were
just ABC, NBC, CBS. You didn't get daily stuff. They
were basically on for the weekends. And then guys like
mort who were on this this this initially tiny cable
outfit that could give you hour by hour day by
(13:34):
day reporting. It made kind of rock stars out of
all of them. And mort always Hellett and check in
terms of gratitude, very very gracious. You know, rest in
peace to Chris Mortenson, one of the old time greats.
Everybody likes Kirk Cousins, everybody. And somebody the other day
(13:54):
said this, They said, you know, everybody talks about Russell
Wilson and Justin Fields and Baker may Field. And this
person said, you know, he's got like a career ninety
nine passer rating and completed sixty nine percent of his
throws last year. And I mean, is a proven high accuracy,
(14:14):
high values win, a bunch of game quarterback. When you
were at the combine, a lot of stuff. Guy like
me in the opinion space, we don't talk about Kirk
Cousins because he doesn't make news. You know, he's just
very quiet. But when you're at the combine, how is
that Atlanta opening viewed? For instance?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people think
that Cousins is the biggest domino to fall in terms
of he's the number one target for the teams that
are aggressively going to try to get a quarterback here
in two weeks or whenever. The official date is the thirteenth,
because Justin Fields is not viewed very highly. He's viewed
highly on Twitter, not by NFL gms and coaches, right,
(14:55):
not people that are trying to win nine ten games
last year. And Russell's a little more fascinating because he's
a very interesting guy because his money's going to be low.
But you always talk about this when you're really famous
coming into a place. He's a little more complicated, right
with Russell, even though actually number wise he wasn't terrible.
He resurrected his career based on two years ago. He
(15:18):
was terrible. Cousins before he tore that Achilles remember that money,
and I came against the forty nine ers. He looked
at Peyton Manning he had really kind.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Of oh and the year before he had a game
at Buffalo against Josh Allen and outdueled him. He has
He's got a list of six or seven games against Mahomes,
Josh Allen, the Niners where he has been the best
player on the field.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
I think he mastered his talent, right. He knows exactly
what he is and his mind. You know a lot
of quarterbacks talk about this, right that they get as
they get older, they realize the game becomes easier than
the problem is their physical skills diminish. Right. Tom's like,
I've never been smarter a football. Just don't want to
get hit anymore. Or Peyton Manning's arm was shot, Drew
(16:01):
Brees's arm was shot. Cousins did get injured, though, and
a pretty major injury. I was with his agent one night,
who I've known for a long time, obviously loves him.
I mean they've made a lot of money together. He
got a special contraption that like a lot of I'm
sure facilities have and like hospitals have when it comes
to rehabbing the Achilles. Because that's so much money, he
(16:23):
just bought it for his house. You know, this is
the guy that takes this stuff very very seriously, and
I guess it's gone really well. He's like we've put
out videos of him moving around. They're not bound in
their chest like Aaron Rodgers, Like this is going to
be a three month but they think, all things considered
with the injury. Here's the other thing, Colin. His game
isn't predicated on running around, right, like when a corner
(16:44):
or a wide receiver tears an achilles, you go even Rogers,
like a big part of Rodgers' game is the movement.
Cousins is Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Philip River. He has
a move so when you look at it, you go, well,
if he's healthy, it's not like you have to worry. Well,
he's not as fast we never ran to begin with,
So you're getting the guy, I think Atlanta. I mean
a lot of signs are pointing to that. Now he's
(17:04):
not cheap, right, and he's proven like that. From a
business standpoint, they have been very like they don't take discounts.
So you're not getting the guy for two years sixty
million dollars would you be willing to give him, you know,
seventy eighty ninety million dollars guaranteed for sure. You know
it's a three four year contract. But if he's healthy,
I mean, Atlanta could all of a sudden be an intriguing,
(17:25):
you know, playoff level contender. I mean, hell, they were
kind of right there this year for a long periods
during the season. But their quarterback play.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Like me or you, yeah, I mean it's interesting. In
this league there's there's sort of three levels of successful quarterbacks.
The stars you know, and we all know who those are,
mahomes Lamar Josh.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
It's a small handful, two.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Yeah, very small, six seven. And then the rising young
stars people are excited about, you know c. J. Stroud,
you know, Trevor Lawrence, Jalen Hurts, whoever. And then there's
the guys that you know there'll be no chaos, Jared Goff,
Dak Prescott, Kirk Cousins. I think Goff's the most talented
(18:08):
of those, but they don't get the fan base necessarily excited.
But the minute they land, you start winning double digit games.
I mean, say what you want about Dak, he may
have a lower ceiling. Dak gets you into the playoffs.
Dak wins games three years in a row. So I
find like Kirk Cousins, he's almost you juxtapose him with
(18:28):
Justin Fields. He's the opposite. There's no flash, no excitement,
there's no topics. But I just get sixty nine percent
completion percentage and not a lot of doesn't miss a
lot of games, doesn't turn it over a lot moves
the chains. If he doesn't score, he puts your defense
in pretty good field position. So I think within the
(18:51):
league there's a great appreciation for guys like Goff and
guys like Kirk Cousins. I just don't think in the
media there is kind of wrapping up combine. I want
to talk about this. You know, when when when I
was younger, you know, some women you date and some
you look at and think, you know, this could be
long term. You could marry, and that's okay. Women look
at men just the same way. Some you date, some
(19:11):
you marry. And I've thought about this for a long
time as I watched the combine and listened to all
the quarterback talk. If you told me Michael Pennix give
me four years, I would draft him if I was
a team that was just sort of stuck. If I
was Sean Payton and somebody said, you know, he's available,
(19:33):
it's funny. Whereas everybody else is viewed as a long
term solution this league. Now by Thanksgiving of year two,
people in the building are making decisions on quarterbacks. I mean,
I think the Giants coaches that they're not Daniel Jones
fans mara is. There's some sort of weird connectivity to
(19:55):
Eli Manning and Daniel Jones, Southern kids, tall, dark hair, whatever.
But I sort of look at Michael Pennix and I'm like,
not every quarterback you draft has to be Brady. If
you're in Washington's in chaos.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
They're not gonna get him with that pick, obviously, but
if you start looking where.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Pennicks can is it two of the best example with Miami,
he's not great, but he's just he just stabilized the franchise.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
Like I see.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Penix in terms of throwing the football. You know, big
strong kid, he's not gonna run. He's clearly a pocket guy.
What are you hearing about him? Because you know he
came out, his hand size, his wingspan. I watched him live.
He throws up the sideline like a twelve year pro.
Like he is really aside. You know a lot of
(20:48):
these quarterbacks like bow next, I like, doesn't throw a
good deep ball. Pennis with a great deep ball. He's
not gonna move it all. What are you hearing?
Speaker 2 (20:56):
You know? I think Daniel Jeremiah said yesterday when he
was throwing, he throws the most beautiful ball by far
of the quarterbacks that were throwing. I mean half of
them didn't throw. I had friends, I remember watching him
a lot. I remember the game. You went to and
watching that game, thing like this is a top ten
pick and start texting around. A lot of people had
him in the second and third rounds. Now, when you're
a scout, you're closer to it, right, you have all
(21:17):
the in depth medical information. He had basically not completed
four straight years, and a couple of those were shoulders,
So if you've been scouting for ten fifteen years, that
terrifies you. And then in the game against Oregon, In
both games against Oregon and definitely the game against Michigan,
which are his best competition and NFL level players everywhere
on the other side of the ball, he had to
(21:39):
be picked up and kind of carried. So physically he's
not His arms are really long and his hands are huge,
but he's not a very I don't want to call
him slender. To me, Jaden's more slender, but Jaden's much
Jaden's an elite athlete, so he can get away. Mike
Penix is not a lot like Tua. Their pocket quarterbacks.
(21:59):
They're not mobile guys. They can move a little bit,
but you're not running them at all. So I think
the the size and he did not play well in
that Michigan game and that's an NFL team, and he
had an NFL team in terms of his wide receivers.
So I think you can find people like myself. Again,
I'm just a couch scout now that went like, I'm
with you. I've seen enough shitty quarterbacks in the NFL.
(22:22):
If you're Sean Payton just a couple of years, figure
it out. Can this guy have you competing for the playoffs?
And I have a lot of people the guy I
wouldn't touch him in the first round. So he is
easily one of the more most polarizing guys because ultimately
Jayden McDaniel or Jade Daniels and Drake May they're going
two and three in some order. Even Caleb he's not
polarizing at all. He's going number one. Bo Nicks polarizing
(22:43):
a little bit, but he's still gonna go pretty high. Yeah,
I think. And JJ McCarthy, a guy someone people having
a lot of discussions on, is gonna get drafted high.
I bet you go in some draft rooms and they'll
have this guy in the third round and other draft
rooms that have them, you know, competing to be a
top twenty pick. I like it because accuracy always matters.
(23:04):
Deep ball in this NFL matters. If this was nineteen
ninety two and we had to play the Cowboys, the
forty nine Ers and the Packers and Reggie White was tackling,
I'm like, this guy's gonna get broken in half. The
quarterback doesn't get touched that much. I've seen Brock Ferdy's
not that big, doesn't really get touched a lot of
small quarterbacks. Right. It's just even some of Kyler Murray
(23:24):
didn't get injured in terms of tearing his acl tackled.
He tore it running. And Michael Penis is not a runner.
So the offensive line is gonna matter like it will
with any young quarterback. But I like Michael Pennix. But
I don't think a lot of NFL teams. I think
a lot of NFL teams lean second day draft pick.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah, Andy Reid goes to the combine. McVeigh shanahan not interested.
What is that?
Speaker 2 (23:56):
I think, Andy Reid. One defense I've heard of the
shanahans and the mcveigh's and McCarthy is this event's become commercialized, right.
They like prodding around their coaches and almost profiting off them,
and it pisses off that crew of guys, which I
push back and say, the reason you guys make twelve
fifteen million dollars is the commercialization of the NFL, like,
(24:19):
welcome to the deal, guys.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
They also would say, well, I still zoom into all
the interviews at night, so when we interview ten guys
at night, I'm sitting right there on the computer, and
any human being would say it is not the same
that being there. Andy Reid told me none of this matters, right,
the workouts, the medical I have nothing to do with
as the head coach, out of my hands. The only
(24:43):
thing that I come here for is when that guy
walks into the room, Trent McDuffie, and for the first
time I meet him and get to talk to him
and just get a feel for be in the league
long enough, just like all those guys, I get to
introduce myself and talk to him and see how he
interacts with my coaches. We tape tape that too. But
the react you've interviewed people, what's your reaction interviewing someone
(25:06):
for your show when they're on zoom or when you're
sitting next to him in person, when you're interviewing someone
for the volume in person at you know, meeting him
for lunch then a telephone call. It's dramatically different. And
these are million dollar investments. So I don't agree with
them not coming. Can I understand some of the stuff.
You're not obligated to talk to the media. You don't
(25:28):
have to go to that little thing that Andy goes to.
Belichick never did, never went. He still showed up for
all the other stuff, the football stuff, which is very important.
One thing with the forty nine ers, like they've hit
on a lot of picks in the third, fourth, and
fifth round. They've missed on a lot of high picks.
So you know, if Andy Reid's going to be there,
if Belichick went for forty years, Pete Carroll never missed it,
(25:49):
there's definitely some value there. And I'm not these guys
aren't lazy individuals, but I do think they're they're wrong,
And I mean, who am I to tell them? But
I just that there's a value there. Clearly the best
coach in the league. If you said, hey, there's a
podcasting convention, Coward's going, Rogan's going, and Big Cat's going,
(26:10):
Should I go? Probably right, It's like, what are we doing?
You know I would get if Kylea just won the
Super Bowl and he was off with his family, like
you lost. This draft's kind of big McVeigh. You've been
They got knocked out in the first round, right, but
they just can't stay I saw a less sneed somewhere.
He didn't even go like it's not pinching pennies. His
(26:32):
league's making so much money. I can't get behind the
interview meeting these guys because it is important. And then
you talked a lot of it. Then what happens middle
of the season. This guy can't learn, This guy can't
figure it out. It's not this guy. Well, you at
the opportunity to meet the guy, right, you could have
controlled some more of it. So coaches are always quick
to complain when they don't want to do some of this,
(26:53):
and in fairness like this is not the combines, more
about the scouting staff. But ultimately, once the guy's drafted,
the coaches around and I'm a lot more than GM
and the.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Scouts get in on the action. With the Draftking sports
book and official sports betting partner of the NBA, new
customers who deposit five dollars or more can get a
no sweat bet up to one thousand dollars back in
bonus bets. How cool of a deal is that? All
you have to do is download the Draft King sports
(27:23):
Book app now takes ninety seconds and use the code
colin cli N. This is the best deal you're going
to find new customers. It's a no sweat bet up
to one thousand dollars if your first bet loses. How
cool is that? Only at Draftking sports Book code is Colin.
(27:43):
The crown is.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Yours gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler or in
West Virginia, visit one eight hundred gambler dot net. In
New York call eight seven seven eight hope and WI
or text hope and Y four six seven three six nine.
In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling Call eight
eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or
visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of
(28:05):
Boothill casino when resorting. Kansas twenty one and over age
varies by jurisdiction, Void and Ontario one. No sweat bet
per new customer issued as one bonus bet based on
amount of initial losing bet. Bonus bets expire one hundred
and sixty eight hours after issue ince see dkang dot
com slash promos for deposit wagering and eligibility restrictions, terms
and responsible gaming resources.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Will I always try to stay away from too many
conversations with the suits on the fifth floor. You just
get in trouble when you're on the air and you
get in the company of powerful men. And Michael Mulverhill,
the President of Insights and Analytics at Fox across the board,
is one of those powerful guys. But he's so disarming
(28:53):
first of all, and second of all, he's got I mean,
it's a perfect title, Insights and Analytics. There's so many things.
I don't really talk a ton about my industry. If
I do, Michael's the guy at Fox that I talk to.
So there's a kind of a myriad of topics here.
Let's start with something we've never seen before. Caitlin Clark. Now,
(29:15):
years ago, when Tiger Woods came into golf, there was
this sense that, oh, golf ratings are going to explode.
And my takeaway was, no, when Tiger leaves. I mean,
three million people take up golf a year and three
million people quit. It's hard, but there are these Caitlyn Clark,
Michael Jordan, figures in our life that are just unique
(29:38):
and spectacular. Women's ratings have been growing. Do you see
Caitlin Clark as the creator of a new reality or
to some degree she's just a spectacular unicorn with her style,
tenacity and excellence for multiple years.
Speaker 5 (29:58):
That's a great place to start. And first of all,
thanks for having me. I really enjoy doing this with
you from time to time. I also try to avoid
having conversations with powerful people up here on the fifth Blok.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
And I have that in common.
Speaker 5 (30:10):
Look, certainly, this is a unique moment in the evolution
of interest in women's sports. I don't think we've ever
seen such a groundswell in interest across certainly basketball, collegiate volleyball,
international soccer. I think what we're seeing is the payoff
of literally over fifty years of title nind and the
(30:32):
way that that's changed the way that girls have access
to sports, and the way that both men and women
think about women's athletics, and it's brought us to this
moment where college basketball ratings on the women's side are
up sixty percent across all networks, and Caitlin Clark's game
on Sunday against Ohio State did almost three and a
half million viewers, and I think your question is the
(30:53):
right one. You know, what does this mean going forward?
And is Caitlin at Unicorn? And I don't think she is.
I think that what she is is she's at the
forefront of an evolution in the skill level that we
see in women's basketball and the players that are coming
up behind her, whether that's Pagebeckers who's coming back for
(31:14):
another year at Connecticut or Juju Watkins who has several
years to go at Southern cal and obviously they'll be
part of the Big Ten next year. I think she's
just on the leading edge of a new generation of
players that are elevating the game. I think Tiger Woods
is an interesting precedent as well. I think you could
even go back as far as the nineteen eighties NBA
(31:37):
where Magic and then Jordan entered the league and they
were at a skill level that we hadn't seen before,
but they just represented an evolution of the game that
then continued even after they had moved on. So I
think once Caitlin moves on to the WNBA, I'm not
sure that we'll see viewership at the collegiate level. That's
(31:57):
exactly what we're seeing this year, but I don't think
it's a reset back to where we were five years
ago either. I think a permanent step forward has happened,
and we're still going to see some pretty strong interest
in the future.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Obviously, the Dallas Cowboys when they're viable, rate very well
with the NFL, and there are markets right now that
are underachieving Chicago, New York. You just wish the teams
were better. I've always argued it's hard to understand how
big the influence of the forty nine ers is unless
(32:30):
you live out west. If the Niners are playing in
your stadium, they've got forty percent of the seats. Other
than maybe Denver, they're the Yankees of the West coast
that they literally fill your stadium. So I've always thought
the Niners were undervalued as an NFL market. San Francisco's
obviously a big city, and I do wonder about Pittsburgh
(32:53):
that was so dominant for years, but it's a small
city relative to other big markets. So if I said
to you six best, if Fox could pick and now
these days you guys share AFC NFC, if I said
to you, all things considered, market brand quarterback, can you
(33:16):
unveil like the top six or seven picks in this league.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
Yeah, that's an interesting way of framing it, right, because
there's a very clear top two, and then there's a gap,
and it's sort of an open question as to what
team might step up and become the third most powerful
brand because for years, at least on the NFC side,
it was Dallas and Green Bay. Well, on the side
it's still Dallas. It's probably always going to be Dallas.
(33:40):
It could be Green Bay again, but I think right
now there's a little bit of a blank space that
some team could step into and become that third marquee brand. Certainly,
it's been Dallas for a long time now. Kansas City's
right alongside them. I think when we talk about our
schedule and when we talked to the league about what
we would like to have for next season, Dallas and
(34:03):
Kansas City very clearly have separated themselves from the rest
of the league. And then there are a number of
teams that have the potential to become that third marquee team.
Philadelphia definitely is one. Philadelphia was a holding penalty away
from sending the Super Bowl to overtime two seasons ago.
(34:24):
They obviously struggled second half of this season, but that's
a big brand. They've got exciting star players. The market
of Philadelphia, it's you know, not only is it one
of the biggest cities in the country, but it rates
extremely well. Philadelphia contributes more viewers to our national viewership
than any other city. So if Philly can bounce back
(34:44):
from that tough second half that they had last year,
they're definitely eligible to become that third big brand. I
think you're right about San Francisco. San Francisco's another team
was very close to winning a championship. Deep and talented
on both sides of the ball, fun to watch. They
play that kind of positionless offense that I think is
very watchable and just fun. So San Francisco is another one.
(35:07):
Still a lot of built in following for the Packers.
They looked a lot better in December than they did
in September, which is what they to be, so they
have the potential to step up. I think Buffalo is
a giant. I think what's interesting with Buffalo is that
not only is it the quality of the team and
the quality of Josh Allen, but there's just a culture
(35:30):
around that team and the idea of the Bills Mafia
and Buffalo being a super passionate football city that has
been at the doorstep of a championship a couple times
and just never quite got there. They've got a little
bit of that Chicago of the NFL feeling, right where
if they the big game, that becomes an enormous national story.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
And you could probably put Detroit in that category.
Speaker 5 (35:55):
Two.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
I was thinking of my yeah, they travel well. The
Lions travel like crazy this year.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Yeah, well, I think Detroit And look, I grew up
in Pittsburgh, right, so I'm very familiar with that team
and that city. Detroit and Pittsburgh are sort of in
similar circumstances where they're both industrial Midwestern cities where economic
realities forced a lot of people to move away, Right.
So You've got a lot of former Pittsburgh's and a
lot of former Michiganers around the country, And so when
(36:26):
the Steelers go on the road, there's always a lot
of Steeler fans there because people have relocated. A lot
of people from Detroit a relocated I think those teams
from the industrial Midwest, we think of them as traveling
well because a lot of people used to live there
and now they've gone to the sun Belt and they
go to the road games.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
You know, TV rights as a whole. I can remember
reading articles, sports illustrated cover articles. You know, when's it
going to end? You can't pay this much for TV rights. Well,
now you've got Amazon Apple on the doorstep of you know,
either buying networks or buying right So the numbers, you know,
(37:06):
you need content obviously, the cliche content's king. It just
is fill the bandwidth. That's what they do. You know,
it's interesting, I work in cable. Explain this to me.
So Cable obviously has been eroding for several years, for
about a decade. Talked about for about six seven years,
(37:27):
but you know, about ten years ago people started. People
within the industry didn't talk about it publicly. They tried
to keep it secret, but it started happening. But yet
the ability by Fox to team with YouTube create streaming
eventually here is stemming some of the losses. My show,
for instance, it's we were up twenty five or something
(37:50):
percent this year and cable is eroding, and I've I'm
gonna throw something at you. It's theoretical and Michael just
literally take a pinatit to it if it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (38:02):
But I have made this argument.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
That if TikTok, because of government regulations, was regulated to
a level that only two things could be on it,
culinary stuff and pet stuff, and it lost seventy percent
of its audience, But culinary and pet videos were all
(38:26):
that was allowed or all that flourished, that it would
be an incredibly dynamic platform for those two right industries. Well,
television now cable TV is sports and politics, Linear TV
sports and politics. So people say cable's dying, and I'm like, no,
yes it is, but it's overwhelming. We don't share it
(38:49):
with anybody. We share it with Trump and Biden for
five Otherwise, television's now dominated by the industry I grew
up in. So is that as the platform may be
dissolving or shrinking or dressing, it's now wholly owned by
two factors, of which it should be noted, Fox, between
politics and sports, is well suited to flourish. So when
(39:11):
you look at the cable erosion, they've been talking about
newspaper erosion forever. New York Times is more powerful than ever,
in my opinion, they bought the Athletic which for four
or five hundred million dollars I don't know how to
position it or if you can talk about it too much?
But what do you make of the cable erosion? But
some of those losses appear to be being are stemmed
(39:32):
by sports gambling, the increased dominance of sports by YouTube
and relationships. Talk me through how you view that.
Speaker 5 (39:39):
Yeah, that's an incredibly rich topic, right, and that is
what everybody in our business spends a lot of our
time thinking about. Is how is that? How is that
cable business changing? What does it mean to our revenue streams?
What's going to mean to sports rights going forward? I
think if you want to understand our business, a good
(40:00):
place to start is to simply understand that for the
entire time that you and I have been doing what
we do, sports content has in some way been subsidized
by non sports fan.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
Who paid for cable TV.
Speaker 5 (40:16):
And so for the last forty years, while media has
changed incalculably, what we've always seen in sports is a
rising number of PATV subscribers, more people paying for content,
and so the pool of money that's available to us
in sports has just grown and grown and grown. Nobody
(40:36):
our age or younger, has ever really known what it
means to be in a contracting sports economy. Well, now,
because of that what you're describing where people are getting
out of the cable bundle, entertainment viewers are figuring out
that they can get the content they want from streaming platforms,
and so fewer and fewer non sports fans are paying
(40:58):
for sports content. That era of subsidization is either coming
to an end or it's already over, and that pool
that we have to pay for sports rights is going
to contract, and it forces all of us to be
a little bit more disciplined in our deal making and
(41:18):
in the way that we consider rights opportunities. But what's
also interesting there is that as that number of people
that are subscribing to cable TV shrinks and it goes
from nearly one hundred million to now closer to seventy million,
you know, I believe that most of the people that
are getting out of the sports, that are getting out
(41:39):
of the PayTV bundle, they're not really big sports fans.
They're people who are subscribing to cable for entertainment content.
Now they're getting their entertainment content from Netflix and from
Prime Video, Disney Plus. And what that means is that
your number of cable subscribers is going down. The revenue
associate with those subscribers is going down. And yet because
(42:03):
those people that are leaving the bundle aren't sports fans,
the people that are left behind are spending more of
their time on sports and on twenty four hour news.
And so here we are for this year to date,
FS one viewership is up seven percent, right, may not
sound like a lot, but when you're in an environment
(42:23):
of declining subscribers, to have any growth is pretty noteworthy.
Your show is growing, Nick Wright's show is growing. We
see shows on ESPN that are still growing. If you
talk about live events, NFL college football, we talked about
women's basketball earlier. NASCAR has been up the last couple weeks.
There's a lot out there that's growing. And so sort
(42:44):
of the paradox of it is that the viewership for
sports in many many cases is going up, and yet
because that subscriber base is eroding, the revenue associated with
sports TV is going down. And so there's a little
bit of a decoupling between popularity and revenue generation. And
(43:06):
I think it's very confusing to people because you're constantly
reading about record ratings for the Super Bowl, record ratings
for college football, and yet we and companies like ours
don't necessarily have the same The revenue streams that we
draw on to make these deals aren't as powerful as
they were even just a couple of years ago.
Speaker 3 (43:27):
So that's a transformational change. It's I think it's.
Speaker 5 (43:33):
A major adjustment for people who do what I do
and who have only ever known and expanding sports economy,
And it's going to affect all of us, right It
affects what's available to spend on rights, it affects what's
available to spend on talent, It affects people like me
right like, we all are going to have to sort
(43:55):
of redemonstrate and re establish our value because we can't
just rely on the rising tide of growing cable revenue.
So that's kind of a long explanation, but that's probably
as best as I can put in the volume.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Thanks so much for listening. If you've enjoyed the podcast,
take a moment, rate and review
The Vine this week on Prime Cuts, John Middelkoff on
NFL free agency, Michael mulva Hill, who is fascinating for
Fox Sports Analytics and insights. You'll want to listen on
Caitlin Clark star power in my top takes of the week.
(00:21):
All right, here we go, semi instant reaction. I had
to speak to a USC grad class today, so I
was really interesting kids and did that for an hour,
a little over an hour. So I came out of
the class and I heard the news the Denver Broncos
had released Russell Wilson, which saves them thirty seven million,
but they still have about eighty five million in dead
(00:43):
cap money, which is like double the most ever. And
I think that was I believe that was Matt Ryan
Falcons when they moved off him. So you're going to
have to hit on some draft picks the only way
to ease the pain. And remember the NFL did come in,
gave everybody a thirty million more dollars in cap space.
That hell, and hitting on four draft picks that could
players start. That helps. But for a year it's going
(01:05):
to be pretty ugly. Let's first start about blame. Who
to blame? Well, Sean Payton needs to win games, and
Russell Wilson wants to find a landing spot. Those guys
are not in the blame game. They're in the turn
of the page game, and I don't blame them. Their
energy is going to be Russell Wilson wants to find
a better team. I think Pittsburgh's perfect. You cannot be
(01:26):
in a division with Joe Burrow twice a year, Kevin
Stefanski and DeShawn Watson twice a year, and Lamar Jackson
and John Harbaugh twice a year with Kenny Pickett, can't go.
Look at the Vegas odds Steelers near the bottom of
the NFL. I think you roll the dice. You go
with Russell Wilson. His maturity and devotion and commitment is
what the Steelers need. Offensively, it's they got some receivers
(01:47):
who I really like, but they're a little young, a
little immature. They're ready to go, and their offensive line
is okay, not special, and Russell Wilson is still mobile
enough to avoid some of that stuff. So I think
it works. I think I think the culture and the
person ellen Pittsburgh is good. They don't have a trigger guy.
They don't have a quarterback. And in the AFC, you're
not going anywhere unless you have a star, even if
(02:10):
it's a declining star. You got to have a star
to win games. So I think Russell Wilson will do
just fine. Denver's gonna probably go get out a JJ
McCarthy or a bow Nicks. I will tell you Denver schedule.
They get the NFC South, that's the good news. The
bad news they also face the AFC North. So they
are at road games next year for Denver beyond facing Harbaugh,
(02:34):
Justin Herbert and the Chargers, beyond facing Mahomes and Andy
Reid and the Chiefs. They go to Baltimore. Yeah, Raven's
pretty good. At home, they go to Joe Berwin, Cincinnati,
two New Orleans and Derek Carr, to Tampa and Baker
Mayfield two Aaron Rodgers and the Jets, and to Seattle.
That ain't great for a rookie quarterback. Now the home schedule,
(02:55):
they get Atlanta Carolina at home, but Pittsburgh Cleveland Colts
at home. Now they have the schedule. They don't know
when the dates are, but those are some tough road games.
Those are harsh environments. Going toe to toe with really
good quarterbacks in many instances, Aaron Rodgers, Baker Mayfield, Joe Burrow,
Lamar Jackson. There's some l's there, Mahomes once, Justin Herbert
(03:17):
once with Harbaugh. You know, I just I think maybe
I wasn't like this in my twenties. But as I've aged,
pointing fingers doesn't solve anything. Listen, you want to point fingers,
you could point to the Broncos GM George Payton. He
gave up two first two second round picks. I think
he gave up three players and maybe a fifth round pick.
He also hired Nat Hackett, and that was a complete disaster.
(03:40):
Many believe he hired Nathaniel Hackett because he tried to
get Aaron Rodgers and when he couldn't rustle in, Nat
Hackett's off as just didn't work. So he has created
eighty five million a dead cap. He gave up a
lot of draft capital, he picked the wrong head coach,
and Sean Payton's got to pick up the pieces from there.
But you know, I don't think George Peyton and I
and I do respect the job he's done mostly, but
(04:02):
you can only have so many big whiffs. And Hackett
and Russell. That's a big whiff coach quarterback league whift
on both so and I don't think Russell would have
You know, people can get all over Sean Payton this thing.
Sean and Russell were not going to work. But what
coach would you really need to work? I mean, after
Nat Hackett bombed, who wanted the job? Ask yourself you
(04:24):
would have a rookie coach? Would he have worked with
Russell Wilson? I mean, the personnel is what it is
based on what you were paying Russell Wilson and what
you surrendered in the draft. There were some limitations here.
So I think Sean Payton will figure it out. But
I think if Russell Wilson went to the Steelers, he'll
have a better year than JJ McCarthy or bow next
with the Broncos. I don't think there's any question about that.
So year two feels like, you know, Sean Payton just
(04:47):
getting out from under Russell Wilson the player. Now he
has to spend another year getting out from under the
dead cap hit in a division with Justin Herbert Harbaugh,
Pat Mahomes, Andy Reid. That is a big, big hill climb.
But I've never felt and I said this. I know
Sean Peyton well enough, after twenty interviews with him and
(05:07):
a dinner with him and spending time with him and
talking to him, I just never felt he and Russ.
That's why I thought it was strange when he took
the job. I just I didn't think it was a job.
He wanted the charger's job initially, but I think the
Denver owners have a lot of cash, came in, wrote
a big check, and it's hard to look the other way.
I get it, but this was never going to be easy.
Sean is a very direct, very authentic, very opinionated person,
(05:34):
and you know Russell is hopelessly optimistic, and he has
a declining quarterback, and there are some psychological factors when
a quarterback gets older. He wants his money, he wants
his protection. And I don't think Russell ever felt supported
by Nat Hackett's incompetence or Sean Payton's brewed lawnesty. And
so I didn't think it was a good fit. So
(05:54):
let's move on and start over. I still think Russell
Wilson has several good years in him. He's not a disaster,
he's not washed. He just needs the right pieces and
you know, I've been saying this for years. Pittsburgh's personnels.
I mean, they have all the things you need. They
have weapons on the outside. Offensively, they have a run game,
and they have speed on the perimeter. They have a
pass rusher, they have playmakers on defense. They're not great
(06:16):
at corner. Nobody outside of maybe the Jets and the
Chiefs is great at corner. We have a corner shortage
in the NFL, and elite corner shortage. So and once again,
it's a great NFL draft for wide receivers. It's like
the fourth straight draft, great wide receiver draft, not a
great corner draft. So that you just that problem will
be exacerbated. You're just gonna have more great receivers and
(06:37):
fewer great corners. But I tend to think we can
sit and point fingers at this stuff. Denver's in the AFC.
They gonna go find their next quarterback star. And history
tells you if there's five quarterbacks taken in the first round,
one's going to be a hit, two are gonna work
kind of, one's gonna be a bust, and one or
two won't be as they won't get a second contract.
(07:00):
And so you know, I'll say this, I think outside
of Caleb Williams, the rest of these quarterbacks will be
as good as the place they land. So I think
if it's bo Nix or JJ McCarthy, I think both
can succeed with Sean Payton both. I think JJ McCarthy's
got a better arm than bow Knicks. I think bo
Nix has far more college starts and is more accurate
(07:21):
than JJ McCarthy. But it just depends on what you like.
JJ's a little taller, I think, in my opinion, bon
Nicks is. I feel like he's kind of elusive the
deep ball. I take JJ McCarthy accuracy, I take bo
Nicks experience. I'd take Bo next. I think JJ McCarthy
may have a higher ceiling. Bnick's a little lower ceiling,
(07:41):
But it could be that bow Nex has a higher
floor than JJ McCarthy. So I think both those guys
that would be a perfect place to land. I don't
think Michael Pennix, though I love the way he throws,
I don't think Denver would take the risk on him
being his injury history. They got to get this thing right,
and I just feel like bo Nix works for that offense. Accuracy, experience,
kid that's been around. He carried Oregon at times, whereas
(08:05):
JJ McCarthy felt sometimes not to be unfair, but like
he was carried by Michigan's O line, run game coaching
and dominating defense. So I think that's the direction they'll go.
Jarrett Stidham can start for the time being. He's capable,
he's okay. That's obviously not the future. It does matter, though,
that the rookie quarterback is going to come into a
system where you know, they pay like twelve million bucks
(08:27):
for Jarrett Stidham, so he's going to take some snaps.
You know, Stidham got some snaps this year. He'll probably
start the season. I could see absolutely. You get a
JJ McCarthy or a bow Nicks and you're like, listen,
we're earmarking Thanksgiving, and you know, Stidham struggles with a
tough schedule that includes trips to Baltimore and Cincinnati and
Kansas City, and you know, I could see the jarretts
(08:50):
that I'm struggling, and then Sean Payton saying, all right,
it's week seven, Week six, let's go with a kid.
I'm fine with that too. But in the end, it
was a big swing by Denver was surprised how bad
the Russell, Wilson nat Hackett combination was. I just remember
the first game that he played in Denver and they
went to Seattle to face the Seahawks, and they couldn't
(09:12):
figure out the clock with two minutes ago. It was like, oh, oh,
we got a coordinator, not a great one, trying to
be a head coach. This isn't gonna work. So and
I think you've seen that in New York with Matt
Hackett and Zach Wilson. So it happened. We can point fingers.
I think it was inevitable. I don't think the personalities clash.
(09:33):
You don't have to be best friends with your quarterback.
Belichick and Brady reportedly didn't have a dinner in twenty years.
You don't have to be best friends. But I think
Russell maybe the most optimistic player in the league, and
I think Sean Payton on the other end, is the
most authentic and raw and outspoken in the league. So
I mean you have a chasm there of personalities. Whereas
(09:54):
Belichick and Brady are both intensely driven, workaholics everything else,
they were kind of on the same plane and in
the same direction for years. I think Tom's a little
more joyful and easier to be around. Builds a little
more old school, but a.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Lot of things.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Brady and Belichick were very similar on their ascension, their drive,
their work ethic, and their commitment to the sport. Sean
and Russell. You couldn't pick a more optimistic quarterback, maybe
Kirk Cousins, and a more raw coach than Sean Payton.
It's oil and water. It never worked. That's okay, don't
need to blame anybody.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
It's okay.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Shawn's won a Super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
So is Russ.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They've both won Super Bowls. They're more than capable. George Peyton,
on the other hand, I would be surprised if he
has a lot of tarmac left. You Whiffin a coach,
You Whiffin a quarterback eighty five mil dead cap. That's
going to leave a mark that lingers. And remember this
division now, Nega, Andy Reid and Jim Harbaugh. Pretty good coaches,
(10:58):
Pretty good coaches, all right. Welcome in. It's our usual
Sunday hour. John Middlecoff, former NFL scout who just got
back from the combine like Thursday night after spending four
or five days there for the volume. We certainly appreciated
(11:20):
that I should mention right off the top. Chris Mortenson
passed away today. He'd been battling cancer for some time.
He was seventy two years old. Mort was one of
the more respected you know, he was as kind as
he was wise, one of those kind of guys that
I think transcended eras Paul Zimmerman Sports illustrates the first
(11:42):
like NFL guy. I remember, like what you would call
like your beat columnist, Peter King, Chris Mortenson. He came
from the Atlanta Journal Constitution where he was breaking stories
down there. Just a really nice guy. How was he
viewed in the league? John, I mean, these guys now
it's basically about breaking story. Chef took kind of Mortenson's
roll and it's like minute to minute breaking stories. Chris
(12:04):
grew up in a generation well without the iPhone. It
was more about contextualizing stories and breaking stories. How was
he viewed her on the league?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Yeah? I think people loved him. I mean I saw
Peyton Manning, who obviously was very close with him in
the Manning family in general. You know, when I think
about football, like like you said, I mean growing up
in the nineties, Chris Mortenson, Peter King. I mean those guys, really,
you know, from outside of people broadcasting games like a
John Madden, played an integral, integral role in all of
(12:35):
us that loved football. I mean the access that they had,
it's so I mean you can find out everything now
on social media and all these articles or all these blogs.
They had something that not many people had, and that
was information. So I think he was a trailblazer that
way for sure. And just an awful day obviously had
been sick for a while, sucks. I mean, he's I
(12:58):
think he's one of the key figures in terms of
like NFL reporting, NFL just stories and someone that you
had to go to for information before inform when information
was really really hard to get and it was much
more difficult to communicate.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah, and uh, you know, he was one of the
first guys that was a beacon right at a major network.
I mean, remember sports departments at the network level were
just ABC, NBC, CBS. You didn't get daily stuff. They
were basically on for the weekends. And then guys like
mort who were on this this this initially tiny cable
outfit that could give you hour by hour day by
(13:34):
day reporting. It made kind of rock stars out of
all of them. And mort always Hellett and check in
terms of gratitude, very very gracious. You know, rest in
peace to Chris Mortenson, one of the old time greats.
Everybody likes Kirk Cousins, everybody. And somebody the other day
(13:54):
said this, They said, you know, everybody talks about Russell
Wilson and Justin Fields and Baker may Field. And this
person said, you know, he's got like a career ninety
nine passer rating and completed sixty nine percent of his
throws last year. And I mean, is a proven high accuracy,
(14:14):
high values win, a bunch of game quarterback. When you
were at the combine, a lot of stuff. Guy like
me in the opinion space, we don't talk about Kirk
Cousins because he doesn't make news. You know, he's just
very quiet. But when you're at the combine, how is
that Atlanta opening viewed? For instance?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people think
that Cousins is the biggest domino to fall in terms
of he's the number one target for the teams that
are aggressively going to try to get a quarterback here
in two weeks or whenever. The official date is the thirteenth,
because Justin Fields is not viewed very highly. He's viewed
highly on Twitter, not by NFL gms and coaches, right,
(14:55):
not people that are trying to win nine ten games
last year. And Russell's a little more fascinating because he's
a very interesting guy because his money's going to be low.
But you always talk about this when you're really famous
coming into a place. He's a little more complicated, right
with Russell, even though actually number wise he wasn't terrible.
He resurrected his career based on two years ago. He
(15:18):
was terrible. Cousins before he tore that Achilles remember that money,
and I came against the forty nine ers. He looked
at Peyton Manning he had really kind.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Of oh and the year before he had a game
at Buffalo against Josh Allen and outdueled him. He has
He's got a list of six or seven games against Mahomes,
Josh Allen, the Niners where he has been the best
player on the field.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
I think he mastered his talent, right. He knows exactly
what he is and his mind. You know a lot
of quarterbacks talk about this, right that they get as
they get older, they realize the game becomes easier than
the problem is their physical skills diminish. Right. Tom's like,
I've never been smarter a football. Just don't want to
get hit anymore. Or Peyton Manning's arm was shot, Drew
(16:01):
Brees's arm was shot. Cousins did get injured, though, and
a pretty major injury. I was with his agent one night,
who I've known for a long time, obviously loves him.
I mean they've made a lot of money together. He
got a special contraption that like a lot of I'm
sure facilities have and like hospitals have when it comes
to rehabbing the Achilles. Because that's so much money, he
(16:23):
just bought it for his house. You know, this is
the guy that takes this stuff very very seriously, and
I guess it's gone really well. He's like we've put
out videos of him moving around. They're not bound in
their chest like Aaron Rodgers, Like this is going to
be a three month but they think, all things considered
with the injury. Here's the other thing, Colin. His game
isn't predicated on running around, right, like when a corner
(16:44):
or a wide receiver tears an achilles, you go even Rogers,
like a big part of Rodgers' game is the movement.
Cousins is Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Philip River. He has
a move so when you look at it, you go, well,
if he's healthy, it's not like you have to worry. Well,
he's not as fast we never ran to begin with,
So you're getting the guy, I think Atlanta. I mean
a lot of signs are pointing to that. Now he's
(17:04):
not cheap, right, and he's proven like that. From a
business standpoint, they have been very like they don't take discounts.
So you're not getting the guy for two years sixty
million dollars would you be willing to give him, you know,
seventy eighty ninety million dollars guaranteed for sure. You know
it's a three four year contract. But if he's healthy,
I mean, Atlanta could all of a sudden be an intriguing,
(17:25):
you know, playoff level contender. I mean, hell, they were
kind of right there this year for a long periods
during the season. But their quarterback play.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Like me or you, yeah, I mean it's interesting. In
this league there's there's sort of three levels of successful quarterbacks.
The stars you know, and we all know who those are,
mahomes Lamar Josh.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
It's a small handful, two.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Yeah, very small, six seven. And then the rising young
stars people are excited about, you know c. J. Stroud,
you know, Trevor Lawrence, Jalen Hurts, whoever. And then there's
the guys that you know there'll be no chaos, Jared Goff,
Dak Prescott, Kirk Cousins. I think Goff's the most talented
(18:08):
of those, but they don't get the fan base necessarily excited.
But the minute they land, you start winning double digit games.
I mean, say what you want about Dak, he may
have a lower ceiling. Dak gets you into the playoffs.
Dak wins games three years in a row. So I
find like Kirk Cousins, he's almost you juxtapose him with
(18:28):
Justin Fields. He's the opposite. There's no flash, no excitement,
there's no topics. But I just get sixty nine percent
completion percentage and not a lot of doesn't miss a
lot of games, doesn't turn it over a lot moves
the chains. If he doesn't score, he puts your defense
in pretty good field position. So I think within the
(18:51):
league there's a great appreciation for guys like Goff and
guys like Kirk Cousins. I just don't think in the
media there is kind of wrapping up combine. I want
to talk about this. You know, when when when I
was younger, you know, some women you date and some
you look at and think, you know, this could be
long term. You could marry, and that's okay. Women look
at men just the same way. Some you date, some
(19:11):
you marry. And I've thought about this for a long
time as I watched the combine and listened to all
the quarterback talk. If you told me Michael Pennix give
me four years, I would draft him if I was
a team that was just sort of stuck. If I
was Sean Payton and somebody said, you know, he's available,
(19:33):
it's funny. Whereas everybody else is viewed as a long
term solution this league. Now by Thanksgiving of year two,
people in the building are making decisions on quarterbacks. I mean,
I think the Giants coaches that they're not Daniel Jones
fans mara is. There's some sort of weird connectivity to
(19:55):
Eli Manning and Daniel Jones, Southern kids, tall, dark hair, whatever.
But I sort of look at Michael Pennix and I'm like,
not every quarterback you draft has to be Brady. If
you're in Washington's in chaos.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
They're not gonna get him with that pick, obviously, but
if you start looking where.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Pennicks can is it two of the best example with Miami,
he's not great, but he's just he just stabilized the franchise.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
Like I see.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Penix in terms of throwing the football. You know, big
strong kid, he's not gonna run. He's clearly a pocket guy.
What are you hearing about him? Because you know he
came out, his hand size, his wingspan. I watched him live.
He throws up the sideline like a twelve year pro.
Like he is really aside. You know a lot of
(20:48):
these quarterbacks like bow next, I like, doesn't throw a
good deep ball. Pennis with a great deep ball. He's
not gonna move it all. What are you hearing?
Speaker 2 (20:56):
You know? I think Daniel Jeremiah said yesterday when he
was throwing, he throws the most beautiful ball by far
of the quarterbacks that were throwing. I mean half of
them didn't throw. I had friends, I remember watching him
a lot. I remember the game. You went to and
watching that game, thing like this is a top ten
pick and start texting around. A lot of people had
him in the second and third rounds. Now, when you're
a scout, you're closer to it, right, you have all
(21:17):
the in depth medical information. He had basically not completed
four straight years, and a couple of those were shoulders,
So if you've been scouting for ten fifteen years, that
terrifies you. And then in the game against Oregon, In
both games against Oregon and definitely the game against Michigan,
which are his best competition and NFL level players everywhere
on the other side of the ball, he had to
(21:39):
be picked up and kind of carried. So physically he's
not His arms are really long and his hands are huge,
but he's not a very I don't want to call
him slender. To me, Jaden's more slender, but Jaden's much
Jaden's an elite athlete, so he can get away. Mike
Penix is not a lot like Tua. Their pocket quarterbacks.
(21:59):
They're not mobile guys. They can move a little bit,
but you're not running them at all. So I think
the the size and he did not play well in
that Michigan game and that's an NFL team, and he
had an NFL team in terms of his wide receivers.
So I think you can find people like myself. Again,
I'm just a couch scout now that went like, I'm
with you. I've seen enough shitty quarterbacks in the NFL.
(22:22):
If you're Sean Payton just a couple of years, figure
it out. Can this guy have you competing for the playoffs?
And I have a lot of people the guy I
wouldn't touch him in the first round. So he is
easily one of the more most polarizing guys because ultimately
Jayden McDaniel or Jade Daniels and Drake May they're going
two and three in some order. Even Caleb he's not
polarizing at all. He's going number one. Bo Nicks polarizing
(22:43):
a little bit, but he's still gonna go pretty high. Yeah,
I think. And JJ McCarthy, a guy someone people having
a lot of discussions on, is gonna get drafted high.
I bet you go in some draft rooms and they'll
have this guy in the third round and other draft
rooms that have them, you know, competing to be a
top twenty pick. I like it because accuracy always matters.
(23:04):
Deep ball in this NFL matters. If this was nineteen
ninety two and we had to play the Cowboys, the
forty nine Ers and the Packers and Reggie White was tackling,
I'm like, this guy's gonna get broken in half. The
quarterback doesn't get touched that much. I've seen Brock Ferdy's
not that big, doesn't really get touched a lot of
small quarterbacks. Right. It's just even some of Kyler Murray
(23:24):
didn't get injured in terms of tearing his acl tackled.
He tore it running. And Michael Penis is not a runner.
So the offensive line is gonna matter like it will
with any young quarterback. But I like Michael Pennix. But
I don't think a lot of NFL teams. I think
a lot of NFL teams lean second day draft pick.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah, Andy Reid goes to the combine. McVeigh shanahan not interested.
What is that?
Speaker 2 (23:56):
I think, Andy Reid. One defense I've heard of the
shanahans and the mcveigh's and McCarthy is this event's become commercialized, right.
They like prodding around their coaches and almost profiting off them,
and it pisses off that crew of guys, which I
push back and say, the reason you guys make twelve
fifteen million dollars is the commercialization of the NFL, like,
(24:19):
welcome to the deal, guys.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
They also would say, well, I still zoom into all
the interviews at night, so when we interview ten guys
at night, I'm sitting right there on the computer, and
any human being would say it is not the same
that being there. Andy Reid told me none of this matters, right,
the workouts, the medical I have nothing to do with
as the head coach, out of my hands. The only
(24:43):
thing that I come here for is when that guy
walks into the room, Trent McDuffie, and for the first
time I meet him and get to talk to him
and just get a feel for be in the league
long enough, just like all those guys, I get to
introduce myself and talk to him and see how he
interacts with my coaches. We tape tape that too. But
the react you've interviewed people, what's your reaction interviewing someone
(25:06):
for your show when they're on zoom or when you're
sitting next to him in person, when you're interviewing someone
for the volume in person at you know, meeting him
for lunch then a telephone call. It's dramatically different. And
these are million dollar investments. So I don't agree with
them not coming. Can I understand some of the stuff.
You're not obligated to talk to the media. You don't
(25:28):
have to go to that little thing that Andy goes to.
Belichick never did, never went. He still showed up for
all the other stuff, the football stuff, which is very important.
One thing with the forty nine ers, like they've hit
on a lot of picks in the third, fourth, and
fifth round. They've missed on a lot of high picks.
So you know, if Andy Reid's going to be there,
if Belichick went for forty years, Pete Carroll never missed it,
(25:49):
there's definitely some value there. And I'm not these guys
aren't lazy individuals, but I do think they're they're wrong,
And I mean, who am I to tell them? But
I just that there's a value there. Clearly the best
coach in the league. If you said, hey, there's a
podcasting convention, Coward's going, Rogan's going, and Big Cat's going,
(26:10):
Should I go? Probably right, It's like, what are we doing?
You know I would get if Kylea just won the
Super Bowl and he was off with his family, like
you lost. This draft's kind of big McVeigh. You've been
They got knocked out in the first round, right, but
they just can't stay I saw a less sneed somewhere.
He didn't even go like it's not pinching pennies. His
(26:32):
league's making so much money. I can't get behind the
interview meeting these guys because it is important. And then
you talked a lot of it. Then what happens middle
of the season. This guy can't learn, This guy can't
figure it out. It's not this guy. Well, you at
the opportunity to meet the guy, right, you could have
controlled some more of it. So coaches are always quick
to complain when they don't want to do some of this,
(26:53):
and in fairness like this is not the combines, more
about the scouting staff. But ultimately, once the guy's drafted,
the coaches around and I'm a lot more than GM
and the.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Scouts get in on the action. With the Draftking sports
book and official sports betting partner of the NBA, new
customers who deposit five dollars or more can get a
no sweat bet up to one thousand dollars back in
bonus bets. How cool of a deal is that? All
you have to do is download the Draft King sports
(27:23):
Book app now takes ninety seconds and use the code
colin cli N. This is the best deal you're going
to find new customers. It's a no sweat bet up
to one thousand dollars if your first bet loses. How
cool is that? Only at Draftking sports Book code is Colin.
(27:43):
The crown is.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Yours gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler or in
West Virginia, visit one eight hundred gambler dot net. In
New York call eight seven seven eight hope and WI
or text hope and Y four six seven three six nine.
In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling Call eight
eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or
visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of
(28:05):
Boothill casino when resorting. Kansas twenty one and over age
varies by jurisdiction, Void and Ontario one. No sweat bet
per new customer issued as one bonus bet based on
amount of initial losing bet. Bonus bets expire one hundred
and sixty eight hours after issue ince see dkang dot
com slash promos for deposit wagering and eligibility restrictions, terms
and responsible gaming resources.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Will I always try to stay away from too many
conversations with the suits on the fifth floor. You just
get in trouble when you're on the air and you
get in the company of powerful men. And Michael Mulverhill,
the President of Insights and Analytics at Fox across the board,
is one of those powerful guys. But he's so disarming
(28:53):
first of all, and second of all, he's got I mean,
it's a perfect title, Insights and Analytics. There's so many things.
I don't really talk a ton about my industry. If
I do, Michael's the guy at Fox that I talk to.
So there's a kind of a myriad of topics here.
Let's start with something we've never seen before. Caitlin Clark. Now,
(29:15):
years ago, when Tiger Woods came into golf, there was
this sense that, oh, golf ratings are going to explode.
And my takeaway was, no, when Tiger leaves. I mean,
three million people take up golf a year and three
million people quit. It's hard, but there are these Caitlyn Clark,
Michael Jordan, figures in our life that are just unique
(29:38):
and spectacular. Women's ratings have been growing. Do you see
Caitlin Clark as the creator of a new reality or
to some degree she's just a spectacular unicorn with her style,
tenacity and excellence for multiple years.
Speaker 5 (29:58):
That's a great place to start. And first of all,
thanks for having me. I really enjoy doing this with
you from time to time. I also try to avoid
having conversations with powerful people up here on the fifth Blok.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
And I have that in common.
Speaker 5 (30:10):
Look, certainly, this is a unique moment in the evolution
of interest in women's sports. I don't think we've ever
seen such a groundswell in interest across certainly basketball, collegiate volleyball,
international soccer. I think what we're seeing is the payoff
of literally over fifty years of title nind and the
(30:32):
way that that's changed the way that girls have access
to sports, and the way that both men and women
think about women's athletics, and it's brought us to this
moment where college basketball ratings on the women's side are
up sixty percent across all networks, and Caitlin Clark's game
on Sunday against Ohio State did almost three and a
half million viewers, and I think your question is the
(30:53):
right one. You know, what does this mean going forward?
And is Caitlin at Unicorn? And I don't think she is.
I think that what she is is she's at the
forefront of an evolution in the skill level that we
see in women's basketball and the players that are coming
up behind her, whether that's Pagebeckers who's coming back for
(31:14):
another year at Connecticut or Juju Watkins who has several
years to go at Southern cal and obviously they'll be
part of the Big Ten next year. I think she's
just on the leading edge of a new generation of
players that are elevating the game. I think Tiger Woods
is an interesting precedent as well. I think you could
even go back as far as the nineteen eighties NBA
(31:37):
where Magic and then Jordan entered the league and they
were at a skill level that we hadn't seen before,
but they just represented an evolution of the game that
then continued even after they had moved on. So I
think once Caitlin moves on to the WNBA, I'm not
sure that we'll see viewership at the collegiate level. That's
(31:57):
exactly what we're seeing this year, but I don't think
it's a reset back to where we were five years
ago either. I think a permanent step forward has happened,
and we're still going to see some pretty strong interest
in the future.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Obviously, the Dallas Cowboys when they're viable, rate very well
with the NFL, and there are markets right now that
are underachieving Chicago, New York. You just wish the teams
were better. I've always argued it's hard to understand how
big the influence of the forty nine ers is unless
(32:30):
you live out west. If the Niners are playing in
your stadium, they've got forty percent of the seats. Other
than maybe Denver, they're the Yankees of the West coast
that they literally fill your stadium. So I've always thought
the Niners were undervalued as an NFL market. San Francisco's
obviously a big city, and I do wonder about Pittsburgh
(32:53):
that was so dominant for years, but it's a small
city relative to other big markets. So if I said
to you six best, if Fox could pick and now
these days you guys share AFC NFC, if I said
to you, all things considered, market brand quarterback, can you
(33:16):
unveil like the top six or seven picks in this league.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
Yeah, that's an interesting way of framing it, right, because
there's a very clear top two, and then there's a gap,
and it's sort of an open question as to what
team might step up and become the third most powerful
brand because for years, at least on the NFC side,
it was Dallas and Green Bay. Well, on the side
it's still Dallas. It's probably always going to be Dallas.
(33:40):
It could be Green Bay again, but I think right
now there's a little bit of a blank space that
some team could step into and become that third marquee brand. Certainly,
it's been Dallas for a long time now. Kansas City's
right alongside them. I think when we talk about our
schedule and when we talked to the league about what
we would like to have for next season, Dallas and
(34:03):
Kansas City very clearly have separated themselves from the rest
of the league. And then there are a number of
teams that have the potential to become that third marquee team.
Philadelphia definitely is one. Philadelphia was a holding penalty away
from sending the Super Bowl to overtime two seasons ago.
(34:24):
They obviously struggled second half of this season, but that's
a big brand. They've got exciting star players. The market
of Philadelphia, it's you know, not only is it one
of the biggest cities in the country, but it rates
extremely well. Philadelphia contributes more viewers to our national viewership
than any other city. So if Philly can bounce back
(34:44):
from that tough second half that they had last year,
they're definitely eligible to become that third big brand. I
think you're right about San Francisco. San Francisco's another team
was very close to winning a championship. Deep and talented
on both sides of the ball, fun to watch. They
play that kind of positionless offense that I think is
very watchable and just fun. So San Francisco is another one.
(35:07):
Still a lot of built in following for the Packers.
They looked a lot better in December than they did
in September, which is what they to be, so they
have the potential to step up. I think Buffalo is
a giant. I think what's interesting with Buffalo is that
not only is it the quality of the team and
the quality of Josh Allen, but there's just a culture
(35:30):
around that team and the idea of the Bills Mafia
and Buffalo being a super passionate football city that has
been at the doorstep of a championship a couple times
and just never quite got there. They've got a little
bit of that Chicago of the NFL feeling, right where
if they the big game, that becomes an enormous national story.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
And you could probably put Detroit in that category.
Speaker 5 (35:55):
Two.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
I was thinking of my yeah, they travel well. The
Lions travel like crazy this year.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Yeah, well, I think Detroit And look, I grew up
in Pittsburgh, right, so I'm very familiar with that team
and that city. Detroit and Pittsburgh are sort of in
similar circumstances where they're both industrial Midwestern cities where economic
realities forced a lot of people to move away, Right.
So You've got a lot of former Pittsburgh's and a
lot of former Michiganers around the country, And so when
(36:26):
the Steelers go on the road, there's always a lot
of Steeler fans there because people have relocated. A lot
of people from Detroit a relocated I think those teams
from the industrial Midwest, we think of them as traveling
well because a lot of people used to live there
and now they've gone to the sun Belt and they
go to the road games.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
You know, TV rights as a whole. I can remember
reading articles, sports illustrated cover articles. You know, when's it
going to end? You can't pay this much for TV rights. Well,
now you've got Amazon Apple on the doorstep of you know,
either buying networks or buying right So the numbers, you know,
(37:06):
you need content obviously, the cliche content's king. It just
is fill the bandwidth. That's what they do. You know,
it's interesting, I work in cable. Explain this to me.
So Cable obviously has been eroding for several years, for
about a decade. Talked about for about six seven years,
(37:27):
but you know, about ten years ago people started. People
within the industry didn't talk about it publicly. They tried
to keep it secret, but it started happening. But yet
the ability by Fox to team with YouTube create streaming
eventually here is stemming some of the losses. My show,
for instance, it's we were up twenty five or something
(37:50):
percent this year and cable is eroding, and I've I'm
gonna throw something at you. It's theoretical and Michael just
literally take a pinatit to it if it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (38:02):
But I have made this argument.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
That if TikTok, because of government regulations, was regulated to
a level that only two things could be on it,
culinary stuff and pet stuff, and it lost seventy percent
of its audience, But culinary and pet videos were all
(38:26):
that was allowed or all that flourished, that it would
be an incredibly dynamic platform for those two right industries. Well,
television now cable TV is sports and politics, Linear TV
sports and politics. So people say cable's dying, and I'm like, no,
yes it is, but it's overwhelming. We don't share it
(38:49):
with anybody. We share it with Trump and Biden for
five Otherwise, television's now dominated by the industry I grew
up in. So is that as the platform may be
dissolving or shrinking or dressing, it's now wholly owned by
two factors, of which it should be noted, Fox, between
politics and sports, is well suited to flourish. So when
(39:11):
you look at the cable erosion, they've been talking about
newspaper erosion forever. New York Times is more powerful than ever,
in my opinion, they bought the Athletic which for four
or five hundred million dollars I don't know how to
position it or if you can talk about it too much?
But what do you make of the cable erosion? But
some of those losses appear to be being are stemmed
(39:32):
by sports gambling, the increased dominance of sports by YouTube
and relationships. Talk me through how you view that.
Speaker 5 (39:39):
Yeah, that's an incredibly rich topic, right, and that is
what everybody in our business spends a lot of our
time thinking about. Is how is that? How is that
cable business changing? What does it mean to our revenue streams?
What's going to mean to sports rights going forward? I
think if you want to understand our business, a good
(40:00):
place to start is to simply understand that for the
entire time that you and I have been doing what
we do, sports content has in some way been subsidized
by non sports fan.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
Who paid for cable TV.
Speaker 5 (40:16):
And so for the last forty years, while media has
changed incalculably, what we've always seen in sports is a
rising number of PATV subscribers, more people paying for content,
and so the pool of money that's available to us
in sports has just grown and grown and grown. Nobody
(40:36):
our age or younger, has ever really known what it
means to be in a contracting sports economy. Well, now,
because of that what you're describing where people are getting
out of the cable bundle, entertainment viewers are figuring out
that they can get the content they want from streaming platforms,
and so fewer and fewer non sports fans are paying
(40:58):
for sports content. That era of subsidization is either coming
to an end or it's already over, and that pool
that we have to pay for sports rights is going
to contract, and it forces all of us to be
a little bit more disciplined in our deal making and
(41:18):
in the way that we consider rights opportunities. But what's
also interesting there is that as that number of people
that are subscribing to cable TV shrinks and it goes
from nearly one hundred million to now closer to seventy million,
you know, I believe that most of the people that
are getting out of the sports, that are getting out
(41:39):
of the PayTV bundle, they're not really big sports fans.
They're people who are subscribing to cable for entertainment content.
Now they're getting their entertainment content from Netflix and from
Prime Video, Disney Plus. And what that means is that
your number of cable subscribers is going down. The revenue
associate with those subscribers is going down. And yet because
(42:03):
those people that are leaving the bundle aren't sports fans,
the people that are left behind are spending more of
their time on sports and on twenty four hour news.
And so here we are for this year to date,
FS one viewership is up seven percent, right, may not
sound like a lot, but when you're in an environment
(42:23):
of declining subscribers, to have any growth is pretty noteworthy.
Your show is growing, Nick Wright's show is growing. We
see shows on ESPN that are still growing. If you
talk about live events, NFL college football, we talked about
women's basketball earlier. NASCAR has been up the last couple weeks.
There's a lot out there that's growing. And so sort
(42:44):
of the paradox of it is that the viewership for
sports in many many cases is going up, and yet
because that subscriber base is eroding, the revenue associated with
sports TV is going down. And so there's a little
bit of a decoupling between popularity and revenue generation. And
(43:06):
I think it's very confusing to people because you're constantly
reading about record ratings for the Super Bowl, record ratings
for college football, and yet we and companies like ours
don't necessarily have the same The revenue streams that we
draw on to make these deals aren't as powerful as
they were even just a couple of years ago.
Speaker 3 (43:27):
So that's a transformational change. It's I think it's.
Speaker 5 (43:33):
A major adjustment for people who do what I do
and who have only ever known and expanding sports economy,
And it's going to affect all of us, right It
affects what's available to spend on rights, it affects what's
available to spend on talent, It affects people like me
right like, we all are going to have to sort
(43:55):
of redemonstrate and re establish our value because we can't
just rely on the rising tide of growing cable revenue.
So that's kind of a long explanation, but that's probably
as best as I can put in the volume.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Thanks so much for listening. If you've enjoyed the podcast,
take a moment, rate and review
Hosts And Creators
Colin Cowherd
Jason McIntyre
Popular Podcasts
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy And Charlamagne Tha God!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Decisions, Decisions
Welcome to "Decisions, Decisions," the podcast where boundaries are pushed, and conversations get candid! Join your favorite hosts, Mandii B and WeezyWTF, as they dive deep into the world of non-traditional relationships and explore the often-taboo topics surrounding dating, sex, and love. Every Monday, Mandii and Weezy invite you to unlearn the outdated narratives dictated by traditional patriarchal norms. With a blend of humor, vulnerability, and authenticity, they share their personal journeys navigating their 30s, tackling the complexities of modern relationships, and engaging in thought-provoking discussions that challenge societal expectations. From groundbreaking interviews with diverse guests to relatable stories that resonate with your experiences, "Decisions, Decisions" is your go-to source for open dialogue about what it truly means to love and connect in today's world. Get ready to reshape your understanding of relationships and embrace the freedom of authentic connections—tune in and join the conversation!