We’re officially in the sports TV summer doldrums. Not that there aren’t plenty of solid competitions on the old boob tube. There are. Baseball, tennis, auto racing, WNBA, soccer, the Tour de France and NBA Summer League, UFC, bowling, cornhole, etc. Just nothing that draws huge audiences, even by the atrophied standards of the cord-cutting … Read more
Last month, on her fourth day as the National Basketball Players Association’s executive director, Tamika Tremaglio laid down a new rule for her senior management team. They would spend the next 21 days without saying no to a thing. This was the beginning of a mental remodeling for her staff and an organizational rewiring by … Read more
Broadcast rights money has been the lifeblood of American sports for decades, and Tuesday’s news that Major League Soccer landed a 10-year, $2.5 billion global deal with Apple Inc. is the latest windfall for a domestic league. It’s fair to wonder how MLS’ unique relationship with Apple — the deal will put most of the … Read more
As she worked on “Dream On,” the sports documentary that would dominate her life over a span of 12 months, Kristen Lappas would stare each day at a yellow Post-it note affixed above an office desk at her home in southern Connecticut. On that desk sat three items — a collage of her daughter Zoey, … Read more
The WNBA’s 26th season has finally arrived after a long but entertaining offseason; one that saw superstar players and championship-winning coaches relocate, the return of the in-person WNBA Draft, and the exciting introduction of ESPN’s Fantasy Women’s Basketball league. And now that all of the offseason’s happenings have been processed, The Athletic’s Cole Huff, Chantel … Read more
On the morning after the Nets’ Play-In game victory in April, Rich Kleiman said he received a text message from Kevin Durant. In it, Durant pitched Kleiman on a young Philadelphia designer he wanted Boardroom to partner with for a capsule collection. This, Kleiman said, is not irregular. Durant has a quotidian interest in Boardroom, … Read more
The NBA Finals begin tonight, and one of the storylines of the Celtics-Warriors spectacle will be TV viewership. That’s in part because the league’s audience consumption has been culture war fodder for years, but also because the numbers are a major popularity indicator for a major league jockeying for the No. 2 spot in America’s … Read more
Jan. 4, 1988, was as normal a night in the NBA as there could be. There were five games featuring 10 of the then-23 NBA teams in four time zones. One of those games featured the San Antonio Spurs visiting the Los Angeles Lakers at The Forum in Inglewood, Calif. By that time in the … Read more
If you’re reading this column, you are likely familiar with Lisa Salters, given her work over the past 10 seasons on “Monday Night Football.” Though multiple play-by-play and analyst changes, Salters has been the on-air constant since 2012 on ESPN’s most important game property. While Salters has earned praise for her work on “Monday Night … Read more
This has been a remarkable year across the NBA. The Warriors, once dormant, have returned to the NBA Finals for the sixth time in eight seasons. The Celtics have made it there for the first time with their young nucleus of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Nikola Jokic won his second consecutive MVP. And yet, … Read more