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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

🏈 Money grab. Oklahoma is charging fans $692.11 to attend postgame press conferences, testing whether desperate fan bases will pay luxury prices to watch reporters do their job. The Illinois State opener package is already sold out.

⚾ Nightengale strikes again. Bob Nightengale erroneously reported the Mets would face the Phillies in the 2026 Field of Dreams game, forcing outlets across the country to correct their stories when it turned out to be the Twins vs. the Phillies instead.

🎾 Court chaos. Daniil Medvedev's US Open match was delayed after a photographer wandered onto the court, leading to nearly seven minutes of crowd booing and Medvedev calling out the umpire on live television before ultimately losing in five sets.

🏈 Sabotage narrative. Kevin Stefanski addressed accusations he's sabotaging Shedeur Sanders after the rookie's underwhelming preseason finale, with former NFL stars questioning Cleveland's decision to play him with third and fourth-string teammates.

📻 Mental health moment. Dan Bernstein launched his new podcast by taking full responsibility for his 670 The Score firing, revealing he underwent intensive therapy for what he called "a slow-rolling mental health crisis" rooted in Twitter addiction.

🚨 LEADING OFF 🚨

ESPN’s education problem

For the first time in its existence, ESPN should have a totally new top priority: education and awareness.

The WWE Premium Live Events launch in September will expose the scope of the problem. Wrestling fans are about to discover they need ESPN Unlimited to watch, but there's no clear indication that most of them know this is coming. ESPN acquired premium content without ensuring customers understand how to access it.

But the confusion runs deeper than poor communication. ESPN created much of it themselves. They marketed ESPN Unlimited as a benefit available to all ESPN subscribers, regardless of their method of receiving ESPN. In reality, that promise was premature. ESPN still hasn't secured distribution deals with major providers like Comcast and YouTube TV, leaving millions of customers unable to access a product they were told they could get. The hasty rollout, clearly timed to launch before the NFL season, prioritized generating buzz over operational readiness.

This represents a fundamental shift in ESPN's business challenge. It built its empire on appointment television. You knew when SportsCenter was on, you knew what you were getting. Now they're asking customers to navigate complex streaming tiers while simultaneously dealing with incomplete distribution, all without providing clear guidance to the customer on exactly what they're getting. And that messaging is because there aren't clear answers. Your current ESPN experience is wholly dependent on what cable provider you're subscribed to, contrary to the company's marketing around its new product.

The stakes are enormous. ESPN needs millions of direct-to-consumer subscribers in the next few years to justify its investment in streaming. Additionally, they want subscribers of the traditional cable bundle to also use the new product. Every frustrated fan who discovers they can't actually access what was promised damages decades of brand building in ways that go beyond typical launch hiccups.

Customer confusion is everywhere, as social media is filled with fundamental questions about ESPN's streaming offerings that shouldn't be mysteries. "Do I need ESPN+ for this game?" "What's the difference between the tiers?" "Why can't I watch this with my cable subscription?"

The WWE launch becomes a test case. How many wrestling fans will ESPN lose due to confusion versus converting them into paying customers? The answer may determine whether ESPN's streaming strategy succeeds or becomes an expensive lesson in poor customer communication.

If ESPN doesn't soon make clear who receives its new streaming product and who doesn't, the goodwill of fans will be difficult to earn back.

📺 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 🎬

• Ken Solomon is suing Sinclair Broadcasting and reveals multiple buyers offered over $1 billion for Tennis Channel, nearly three times what Sinclair paid in 2016, though Chairman David Smith rejected all offers as the company now explores spinning off the tennis property.

• Fox and YouTube TV are reportedly in a carriage dispute with a 5 p.m. ET August 27 deadline that could black out Fox, FS1, FS2, and Big Ten Network for 9.4 million subscribers just as football season begins, though Fox's new direct-to-consumer Fox One service provides some leverage.

• Jon "Stugotz" Weiner announces partnership with FanDuel for two new shows, including "Stugotz and Company" with Israel Gutierrez as co-host, marking his formal split from Meadowlark Media and Dan Le Batard amid their public feud over competing gambling sponsors.

• NBC is expected to retake the Sunday Morning MLB package from Roku just two years after exiting the $30 million annual deal, as the network builds a Sunday doubleheader strategy alongside its new Sunday Night Baseball rights starting in 2026.

• Jordan Schultz launches his own YouTube channel after leaving Fox Sports, bringing back his football show with Draymond Green and adding long-form NFL interviews, which gives him editorial control after reportedly disagreeing over breaking news timing at his previous stops.

• ESPN is reportedly in advanced talks to acquire UFC Fight Pass and integrate the platform's extensive combat sports archive into its new streaming service, helping maintain an MMA foothold after losing live UFC rights to Paramount's $7.7 billion deal.

📣 NOTABLE QUOTABLES 🗣️

"Of course. Of course. " - Cris Collinsworth on expecting Micah Parsons to play in the Cowboys-Eagles opener despite his contract holdout.

"He intentionally does not want those relationships. He doesn't talk to these guys, because he doesn't want to feel conflicted on what he has to say. So he keeps at arm's length from all of them... He wants to just say whatever it is he sees, and he doesn't want to feel like, 'Oh, that's my buddy. I'd better not say that.'" - Kirk Herbstreit explaining why Lee Corso avoided personal relationships with coaches throughout his career.

"I would say if you're the kind of sports fan that finds yourself increasingly annoyed at how much gambling content you're forced to consume or how bone dry a lot of the analysis and columns you read can be. If you, like us, are finding yourself mystified and befuddled by some of the sentences that get published by Shams Charania and other scoop reporters who have a strange way of writing." - Tom Ley on why sports fans should subscribe to Defector on its 5th anniversary.

"He's always brought an unbridled enthusiasm to his announcing that I don't think any other commentator can match. Better yet, his level of study and preparation is equal or better than anyone in our profession. His love for the sport and dedication to it puts him at the top of his craft." - Mike Joy defending Leigh Diffey against NASCAR accent critics.

"People are making stuff up. Somebody's in there just trying to be the first to report a story of their own. So, that's completely false... I understand reporters have to do their job, but you don't have to spread lies. You don't have to make stuff up." - Mookie Betts, admonishing media reports about potential position switch discussions with Dodgers’ management.

️‍🔥 THE CLOSER 🔥

We should all be embarrassed by the Shedeur Sanders coverage

Entering the 2025 NFL Draft, I knew Shedeur Sanders was famous.

Admittedly, I didn't realize he was this famous.

Sure, there's always going to be a certain level of attention focused on the top quarterbacks in any given class, especially when one happens to be the son of one of the most decorated football players in history. But at some point during Sanders' slide from projected first-round pick to fifth-round selection, I realized that this wasn't just another Aaron Rodgers-esque draft day tumble. This was something much more akin to the circuses that surrounded Tim Tebow and Johnny Manziel, despite Sanders never possessing the same level of celebrity as a college star.

Unlike all of those aforementioned quarterbacks, Sanders' skid didn't stop in the mid-20s; it lasted all the way until the Cleveland Browns took him with the No. 144 pick. And yet, the further he fell, the more famous he became. Conspiracy theories emerged. The President of the United States weighed in. Mel Kiper Jr. openly moped as Sanders assuredly set a new record for the longest time a prospect has ever sat atop his best players available board.

By the time Sanders arrived in Northeast Ohio for training camp this summer, he wasn't just one of the most famous players on the Browns' roster, but one of the most famous in the NFL. Nevertheless, he remained QB4 on Cleveland's quarterback depth chart heading into a season in which the Browns possess the NFL's lowest projected win total according to oddsmakers.

But lest you thought that sitting behind Joe Flacco, Kenny Pickett, and Dillon Gabriel or Cleveland's status as one of the league's least interesting teams would remove Sanders from the spotlight, you haven't been paying attention. If anything, the cognitive dissonance of one of the NFL's most famous players being a member of one of its least relevant rosters has only amplified the attention the entire situation has received.

For more from Awful Announcing’s Ben Axelrod on why we should be embarrassed by the Shedeur Sanders media coverage, read the whole piece here.