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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

⚖️ Skip to the settlement? Three months after the bombshell workplace misconduct lawsuit implicating several current and former Fox Sports employees, it now appears the case could be headed for a settlement. Per a court filing obtained by Awful Announcing, Fox Sports, former FS1 host Skip Bayless, current FS1 host Joy Taylor, and current Fox Sports executive Charlie Dixon attempted to mediate the lawsuit brought by former Fox Sports hairstylist Noushin Faraji last month. While no resolution was reached, negotiations remain ongoing.

⚕️ Health update. Former NFL Network and Fox Sports star Rachel Bonnetta, who recently returned to sports media on Vice’s new television show, The Grudge, revealed that she received an autism diagnosis a few months ago. “It has completely changed my life and the way I understand it.”

🏈 Howard the Chuck(er). After Pat McAfee told a story about former OSU quarterback Will Howard throwing passes in the parking lot before the Combine, Warren Sapp accused him of making it up to pump up Howard’s draft stock. However, the QB seemingly confirmed the tale on ESPN’s Hey Rookie: Welcome to the NFL series (and inadvertently revealing that NY Giants coach Brian Daboll may have been McAfee’s source).

🚨LEADING OFF 🚨

Kirk Herbstreit's raison d'être

Things got weird for Kirk Herbstreit last year.

The ESPN college football analyst (and Prime Video NFL analyst) spent the season committing a never-ending series of own-goals. Chief among them was his strange confession that one of his sons runs his X account (which was often engaged in unnecessary controversies), a claim he later took back. He spent most of the year feuding with Ohio State fans, which came after he feuded with Florida State fans. He was a major part of ESPN’s miserable and negative CFP coverage, full of complaints about underdogs who got in over big-name programs. That this all happened amidst losing his beloved dog Ben and finding out his wife had been diagnosed with breast cancer only added to the emotions and confusion.

Herbstreit has been making sporadic media appearances during the offseason. When he discusses his job and critics, he often sounds like SNL’s Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, seeming oblivious to the complaints about him and critiques of ESPN’s CFB coverage.

We’ve still got a while before the 2025 college football season, but the Nico Iamaleava story has provided CFB pundits with the perfect talking point for the moment we find ourselves in. People are coming out of the woodwork to share their thoughts on the former Tennessee (now UCLA) quarterback and his NIL demands. Everyone’s been blamed for the situation, with most ESPN talking heads putting it squarely at the feet of the NCAA.

Herbstreit entered the fray on Wednesday during an appearance on The Pat McAfee Show, implying4 that you can blame the NCAA all you like, but it’s high time someone stands up to the true menace: student-athletes.

“If you do anything perceived to not be willing to give what the players want, then you’re a problem,” said Herbstreit. “You need to be removed… They’re terrified to leave. They’re terrified to make big decisions, and ultimately, they’re sitting back and not doing what, to me, what they need to do, which is having some balls and making some decisions and taking the heat. And the problem right now is if you do that, you get an attorney who either threatens to sue you or sues you, and now you’re in a tough spot because the players win all these arguments. The players win all these debates.

“I’ve seen an ESPN analyst [Ryan Clark or Dan Orlovsky] come out, and they want to blame the NCAA. Like, when in doubt, just blame the NCAA. That’s all you have to do. The NCAA is like the boogeyman… Has anyone ever come out and said a player’s ever at fault, ever?”

Herbstreit went on to say that he wasn’t criticizing Iamaleava personally, but that he’s waiting for someone to step up and have “the stones to become that guy who’s going to be the leader and say, ‘This is what we’re doing.'”

There is truth to what Herbstreit is getting at. And he’d probably find that he, Orlovsky, and Clark are essentially saying the same thing. But it’s fascinating that while the other ESPN folks put the onus on “the adults in the room,” Herbstreit seems to see it more as a situation where the players must be put in their place.

Similar solution, but a different bad guy.

That’s not out of step with Herbstreit's approach to many college football issues over the years. A champion of the status quo and scourge of underdogs everywhere, Herbstreit has long denied his role in attempting to encase college football in amber and chided those who give him guff about it. In 2022, he said, “I think this era of player just doesn’t love football,” for which he made a non-apology apology that reads like a “things were better in my day” diatribe. And who can forget when Kirk got into a Twitter fight with a college football recruit, telling him that five-star players are “replaceable” and “a dime a dozen.” Very cool!

These would be fine enough if not for Herbstreit’s constant “I don’t know what you’re talking about” reactions whenever he gets called out for having strong opinions. And let’s be clear, he is an incredibly powerful person in college football. He can play the “aw shucks” game all he wants, but his College GameDay rants have changed the trajectory of major programs. When Kirk speaks, college football folks listen.

It’s a shame, then, that Herbstreit instinctively blames the players for the problem rather than the incredibly wealthy adults who run the sport at the NCAA, conference, and school levels. It’s absolutely the Wild West right now, but that’s only because those who pull the levers would rather do nothing than willingly hand over a piece of the billion-dollar pie they’ve been gorging themselves on for decades.

But that’s another topic, and not one we’re expecting too much critical analysis on from anyone at ESPN, let alone Herbstreit.

👀 AROUND AA 📰

Jeff Passan is on a mission to prove the Pittsburgh Pirates are the problem

When ESPN MLB insider Jeff Passan speaks, baseball fans listen. Passan is the rare insider who goes beyond breaking news to cover the sports' big stories daily. And over the past year, there’s one story Passan can’t let go.

That story is the Pittsburgh Pirates, who employ young pitching phenom Paul Skenes and a glut of arm talent but are spending just $88 million on the major league roster this season, fifth lowest in baseball.

In nearly every major media appearance Passan has made since Skenes’ breakout last season, Passan has taken the opportunity to skewer the Pirates.

Brendan Kleen breaks down the ESPN MLB insider’s ongoing gripes about the Pirates and their ownership.

📣 NOTABLE QUOTABLES 🗣️

• “I’m not kidding you when I say professionally and personally, wildly embarrassing to me that any of that would land on Pablo [Torre] because the work that he’s doing is singular and it’s extraordinary.” - Dan Le Batard apologizing Wednesday for comments he made about his Meadowlark Media colleague earlier in the week.

• “No, why would I? Don’t they have skin and stuff?” - Orioles analyst Jim Palmer responding to announcer Kevin Brown, who asked if he’d ever eaten a chicken wing.

• “Tennessee is screwed.” - Fox Sports’ Urban Meyer reacting to the Nico Iamaleava drama.

• "Mat Ishbia needs to understand that right now you are on the verge of being recognized as the worst owner in the history of basketball." - A very hyperbolic Stephen A. Smith

🗣️ THE PLAY-BY-PLAY 🗣️

On the latest episode, Awful Announcing’s Drew Lerner joins Brendon Kleen and Ben Axelrod to discuss CBS’s stellar coverage of the Masters, UFC’s media rights negotiations, and how current market volatility could hasten the death of linear television.

Click the video above to watch or find The Play-By-Play wherever you listen to podcasts, including Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

📈 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 📺

• Paige Bueckers’s impending arrival with the WNBA’s Dallas Wings means dollar signs for Dallas TV station KFAA. This season, they’ll air 28 Wings games that are not designated for national television broadcasts. That’ll probably change next season, so they'd better make the most of it.

• With ESPN and Top Rank Boxing set to part ways after its current agreement expires in August, CEO Bob Arum said they plan to “not rely on one outlet but have, like in other sports, various outlets take [the] product.” DAZN is expected to be a contender for some inventory.

• Starting with the NBA playoffs this week, Fubo is distributing game alerts to opted-in subscribers in real time based on their past viewership and location.

• French soccer league Ligue 1 is facing a media rights nightmare. Its primary broadcast partner, sports streaming platform DAZN, has begun withholding payments, citing the league's “lack of support” in fighting digital piracy.

🔥 THE CLOSER 🔥

Introducing the Stephen A. Smith Presidential-O-Meter

Whatever you think of Stephen A. Smith, it’s hard to argue that he is the king of keeping a narrative alive. For better or worse, the longtime ESPN host is a master of squeezing every last drop out of a story and somehow finding juice in places you didn’t even know contained any.

That’s all well and good when the topic is LeBron James vs. Michael Jordan or his ongoing feud with Kevin Durant. However, Smith’s most recent gambit has been his long-gestating political pivot, culminating in a will-he-or-won’t-he presidential run in 2028. Depending on which Smith media appearance you watch, the ESPN pundit sounds like someone who doesn’t want to run for political office or believes they have a calling to be the next POTUS. Sometimes he’ll even say both of those things in the same discussion.

While many see this as nothing more than schtick or a PR play, there appears to be some appetite for President A. Smith as the person to lead us out of the Trump era.

One thing we know for sure is that Smith will continue putting himself in the conversation for the foreseeable future, regardless of whether or not anyone actually wants it. So, we have to consider the possibility of ESPN’s star taking his talents to D.C. in a few years, giving up a very lucrative sports media career to become the leader of the free world. 

Above, you’ll see the inaugural Stephen A. Smith Presidential-O-Meter, which charts how we at Awful Announcing see the current reality of an SAS presidential run. The infamous Stephen A. quotes included in the meter help explain how realistic or unrealistic these intentions seem in this moment.

Based on the latest comments from Smith and others, we remain skeptical that this will turn into an actual political campaign, so we’re setting the meter at “You Cannot Be Serious.” That’s still high enough that we reserve the right to shift it into “this could actually happen” territory at some point.

Because let’s face it, we no longer live in a world where the idea of a sports media talking head with a penchant for being in the news becoming President of the United States seems all that far-fetched.