Welcome to the ninth installment of a weekly mailbag that I will be writing about the world of sports media (and anything else you want to chime in on). Please email me any questions you have to Jimmy.Traina@si.com or send them via Twitter.
It’s the middle of May, and you guys had tons of NFL questions this week. Let’s get to it.
So… Brady can’t call any Raiders games, right? And probably shouldn’t call AFC West games. Or games involving teams on Vegas’s schedule that year. Or games involving anyone in the AFC since they’re potentially in a playoff race. So that leaves… cowboys/giants? 😆
— Kyle Speicher 🇺🇸 (@TVKyle) May 23, 2023
How can Tom Brady be allowed to be an analyst at FOX if he owns a piece of the Raiders? Surely he can’t be permitted to work Raiders games…
— Brian Adamowsky (@BrianAdamowsky) May 23, 2023
Couldn’t disagree more with this. We are all aware that Tom Brady is now a minority owner of the Raiders, so I have no problem with him calling any of Las Vegas’s games because we know where his allegiance lies. If you’re an NFL viewer and Tom Brady is calling a Raiders game on Fox in 2024, you know going in that he won’t be entirely objective. I actually think it would be fascinating to hear him call a Raiders game just to hear how frustrated he’d become when Josh McDaniels screws something up (if McDaniels is still head coach in ’24) or how much he’d go over the top praising Jimmy G.
The cases where we don’t know about a conflict of interest are problematic. For example, Quarterback X shares the same agent as Network Analyst Y. Or General Manager X gives scoops to Play-By-Play Person Y. Those unknown connections lead to a bias viewers have no clue about. The Brady situation, on the other hand, is straightforward.
I’m a Pats fan in MO. When will the NFL allow me to pay $100 via any cable/dish provider to watch ONLY the Pats game instead of like $300 for Ticket or go to BWW 13 Sundays? They would get SO many $100 subscribers for out of state teams!
— Clinton (@ClintonOftedahl) May 23, 2023
I don’t see the NFL ever allowing single-team subscriptions. The NFL is all about protecting CBS, Fox and the local market. For example, the NFL and the networks don’t want New Yorkers shunning the Jets game on the local CBS channel so they can watch an out-of-town team on a separate package. CBS and Fox pay an astronomical amount of money for their respective packages and they don’t want single-team subscriptions, so the NFL is going to side with them on this one.
How can the #NFL continue doing "Thursday Night Football" flexible-scheduling and not think it is an incredible insult to their fans?
— Dan Meyer (@MeyersMusings) May 23, 2023
With one game being flexed out and another game being flexed in, it's approximately 100,000 football fans having their lives directly impacted.
As I said in Tuesday’s Traina Thoughts, the NFL doesn’t care about 100,000 fans with tickets being affected by flex scheduling when 1) Amazon paid the NFL $1 billion for Thursday Night Football and 2) 10 million people will watch Thursday Night Football and 10 million is more than 100,000.
Do you think DIRECTV will acquire the rights to NFL RedZone this season?
— Ken Gelman (@kengfunk) May 23, 2023
If RedZone is offered on cable services, there’s no reason it shouldn’t be offered on satellite as well. I don’t know whether there’s any bad blood between the NFL and DirecTV after the NFL moved Sunday Ticket to YouTube, but I’d be surprised if DirecTV doesn’t add the Scott Hanson–led version of the RedZone channel for the 2023 season.
Haven’t heard much about the YouTube latency concerns now that they have have the ticket. What is the latest there or plan to fix it?
— goshdarn (@p_silly) May 22, 2023
I recorded proof during a recent Nuggets game to show more than 30 seconds between the live scoring on ESPN app and the game clock.
I've been told YouTube is looking into the latency issue, but, obviously that doesn't help us right now. My guess is that come Week 1, NFL fans watching Sunday Ticket on YouTube are just gonna have to deal with the latency.
Is direct tv setting up something got bars to still have the nfl ticket ???
— Chad Shumate (@cshu76) May 22, 2023
Yes, bars and restaurants will still carry NFL Sunday Ticket. You can read all about it here.
What do you think happens to SportsCenter and This Just In now that the Pat McAfee Show is coming to ESPN?
— Dalton Mott (@dmott225) May 23, 2023
Given that ESPN has multiple channels, I’m sure they’ll just get moved somewhere else. Unfortunately, layoffs are expected to hit ESPN talent soon, so that could also be a factor in whether a show even survives to be moved.
How does the Pat Mcaffe hire at ESPN reflect the strategy at the network over the next 5-10 years?
— Adam Waller (@adamdigital) May 23, 2023
I think ESPN’s strategy with Pat McAfee is pretty clear: Get in bed with a guy who 1) has a huge following of younger fans, 2) has fans who understand new media and 3) has amazing access to a wide array of people in the sports world. It also helps that McAfee is an NFL guy since the NFL rules everything.
Just look at the Aaron Rodgers deal. The future Hall of Famer was never going to do a weekly interview with ESPN. But he does it with McAfee. That alone is a massive win for ESPN now that Aaron Rodgers Tuesdays will happen on their air.
With the new rules and shorter games Will there be an uptick in MLB playoffs and World Series ratings??
— Luis Antonio Chirinos (@luischirinos) May 23, 2023
I doubt it. While the game is so much more digestible thanks to the pitch clock, the factors that lead to an uptick in baseball ratings are big markets and lengthy series.
How/Why does First Take get away with not talking hockey?
— Hatty Mealy (@Lo_FideIity) May 22, 2023
Because the people in charge at First Take and ESPN know that talking hockey won’t increase the show’s ratings.
Who will succeed Logan Roy in the finale of Succession?
— Steven Carroll (@StevenCarroll8) May 23, 2023
I’m not smart enough to figure out how a show that good will end. I’ll just say that I don’t want it to end with Cousin Greg in charge of the whole shebang, which some have predicted. That would be such a weak way out, in my opinion. I’d love to see the Gerri-Karl-Frank trio somehow come out on top.
How has your Twitter experience changed since Elon Musk took over?
— Jason Potere (@jaypot23) May 23, 2023
I get many more porn bots and Bitcoin spam responses to my tweets. I also can’t check to see whether most of the verified people I follow liked or retweeted any of my tweets because they all lost their blue check marks. And Elon got rid of Echofon, which was the app I used on my phone for Twitter. Other than those things, it’s still the same hellhole as always.
Had a Curb scenario over the weekend. Met up with two buddies for lunch and got there first. I strategically moved the place mats so they were across from me. Both guys arrive at the same time and the last one to sit sits next to me. What is wrong with people?
— Kevin Riveras Biggest Fan (@ilovemfrancesa) May 22, 2023
Huge flub by you. Nobody cares where the place mats are set up. It’s all about your body placement. If you were in a booth, you needed to be positioned just 1/4 of the way from the edge. No human being with any sense of decorum would ask you to scoot over or attempt to climb over you, thus leaving them both to sit on the other side of the booth. If you were at a table, then there’s nothing you can do because when chairs are at play, it’s every man for themself.
