1. The Lakers and Thunder were in the middle of the fourth quarter Tuesday night when Luka Doncic drained a short jump shot to give L.A. a 108–107 lead. Doncic then turned to a fan to jaw at him. Referee J.T. Orr, though, thought Luka was targeting him, and ejected the superstar.
To say Lakers radio play-by-play guy John Ireland was unhappy with Orr’s aggressive actions would be an understatement. Orr went off and it was awesome radio. The yelling was effective and not over the top. The hyperbole was strong. And Orr cutting off analyst Mychal Thompson, who was trying to explain what happened, was perfect.
Immediately after Doncic’s ejection, Ireland screamed, “WHY?!?”
When Thompson explained that Doncic was talking trash to a fan, but the ref thought Doncic was talking to him, Ireland snapped.
“Oh, this is an ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE decision by J.T. Orr, by the official. Absolutey HORRIBLE. You cannot throw a star player out of an NBA game for talking to a fan.”
Ireland continued, “You cannot DO THIS. Oh my God. This is unconscionable. You cannot do this in a game that’s this good. This is one of the worst pieces of officiating I have ever seen and I have done this for 25 years. I hate this call, and I would say the same thing if they were doing this to Shai.”
Ireland then mixed in a drop of play-by-play, but did not miss a beat continuing his rant.
“The free throw is good to tie the game at 108. You cannot, Mychal, throw a star player out of for talking to a fan.”
Thompson once again tried to explain what took place, but Ireland wasn’t having it.
“He didn’t think he was talking to the fan,” said Thompson.
Ireland then cut off Thompson and yelled, “I DON’T CARE!!! They had three Lakers explain it to him and he still stuck to his guns because his ego is bigger than Luka staying in the game.”
That’s great radio.
2. I fought this crusade last year and I’m going to fight it again this year.
Over-the-top, gluttonous food concoctions at sporting events make for great clickbait on social media, but are completely impractical in reality. (And kinda gross, but that’s subjective.)
When I see things like this pop into my feed, my first thought isn’t, “Ohhhhh, that looks so good.” My first thought is, “Who the hell would want to eat that at a baseball game?”
New at @Braves games: The Home Run Stack!
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) April 8, 2025
2 angus patties, candied bacon, house smoked brisket, red slaw, onion rings, curly fries with Carolina BBQ & Coca Cola BBQ. pic.twitter.com/dh0mjjHZJJ
You can’t eat that monstrosity without making a mess. It probably costs a ridiculous amount of money. And there’s no way you can eat that and then avoid having to use the disgusting stadium bathroom for an act you don’t want to do in a disgusting stadium bathroom.
3. The Sports Emmy Awards nominations were announced on Tuesday. The networks that earned nominations were really into bragging about their accomplishments because they all emailed press releases touting themselves. These were the subject lines of the emails that came into my inbox Tuesday afternoon.
“ESPN Inc. Earns Industry-Leading 63 Sports Emmy Nominations”
“Prime Video Earns Best-Ever Total of 21 Nominations Across 17 Categories for 46th Annual Sports Emmy® Awards”
“NBCUNIVERSAL EARNS 48 SPORTS EMMY AWARD NOMINATIONS – MOST SINCE 2013 – LED BY 2024 PARIS OLYMPIC GAMES”
“FOX SPORTS SCORES 31 SPORTS EMMY® NOMINATIONS”
“National Football League Earns 22 Sports Emmy Nominations”
I think it’s foolish to get worked up over awards, but I’ll just throw out a couple of quick takes here on the nominations.
It’s a travesty that ESPN’s Joe Buck did not get a nomination for Outstanding Personality/Play By Play. Mike Breen, Joe Davis, Ian Eagle, Noah Eagle and Mike Tirico earned the nods. Buck’s partner, Troy Aikman was nominated in Outstanding Personality/Event Analyst.
Speaking of the Outstanding Personality/Even Analyst category, I have no idea how John Smoltz got a nomination. The others in this category are Aikman, Peyton Manning, Greg Olsen and Bill Raftery.
You can see the full list of nominations here.
4. It’s totally possible that I’m a complete idiot on this one, but I find catches like this one—from Marlins outfielder Derek Hill against the Mets on Tuesday—so much more impressive than the catches we regularly see of an outfielder reaching over the fence to rob a home run.
Derek Hill makes an unbelievable catch! 🤯 pic.twitter.com/B1FsQGLsiy
— MLB (@MLB) April 8, 2025
5. In Monday’s Traina Thoughts, I wrote about Caitlin Clark’s impressive ratings domination. Here’s another nugget to show how wild of a ride it was last year for Clark during Iowa’s NCAA tournament run: Monday’s Houston-Florida title game, which went down to the wire, drew 18.1 million viewers. It was the most-watched men’s national championship game since 2019.
National Championship between Florida and Houston delivers 18.1 million viewers on CBS, capping off the most-watched Final Four weekend since 2017 pic.twitter.com/3FmBOMDGuF
— March Madness Men’s Basketball TV (@MM_MBB_TV) April 8, 2025
The women’s championship game last year, featuring Clark, drew 18.9 million viewers.
6. The latest episode of SI Media With Jimmy Traina features an interview with CBS’s Ian Eagle and Bill Raftery.
The duo discuss their longtime partnership, going back to working New Jersey Nets game together in the early 1990s, Eagle shares his impression of Raftery and the pair reminisce about funny stories over the years.
Raftery also shares a shocking admission about his famous catchphrases, talks about a viral line from this year’s NCAA tournament and discusses whether he has ever thought about retirement.
Eagle talks about the prep work for doing the tournament, what it’s like to do four games in a day during the first round and the amount of broadcast partners he has had over the years.
In addition, Eagle shares his thoughts on getting a new NFL partner this season in J.J. Watt.
Following Eagle and Raftery, Sal Licata from WFAN radio and SNY TV in New York joins me for our weekly “Traina Thoughts” segment. This week’s topics include streaming issues for MLB.TV and Major League Baseball’s horrible response to its own streaming issues and the torpedo bats story.
You can listen to the SI Media With Jimmy Traina podcast below or on Apple and Spotify.
You can also watch SI Media With Jimmy Traina on Sports Illustrated‘s YouTube channel.
7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: It was 25 years ago today that Tony killed Salvatore Bonpensiero. The most underrated scene in that episode was Tony fighting with Artie after getting food poisoning.
Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on X and Instagram.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Absurd Luka Doncic Ejection Leads to Great Lakers Radio Call.
