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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

🚘 NASCAR numbers. Viewership for the five NASCAR Cup Series races in May and June on Amazon Prime Video was released late last week, and the data are promising. While total viewership was down 15 percent, the average age for each race was seven years younger than NASCAR’s average viewer age on Fox and FS1 this year. It can seem odd at first blush to call an average age of 56 years old “young,” but this is the trend for most sports when they move to streaming. That a niche sport like NASCAR can follow that trend is promising.

📺 A new deal for the Mountain West. Commissioner Gloria Nevarez told the Las Vegas Review Journal that the conference is “near the end” of negotiations on a new broadcast rights deal. This news comes quickly after the newly reformed Pac-12 struck a deal with the MWC’s old partner, CBS Sports.

🏀 How to cover a betting scandal? After ESPN’s Shams Charania broke the news of Detroit Pistons guard Malik Beasley being the subject of a federal probe over unusual sports betting, fellow ESPN reporter David Perdum cut right to the chase. Perdum reported that “at least one prominent sportsbook” noticed irregular activity around Beasley starting in January 2024. Then, Perdum said (wrote) the quiet part out loud: “…modern betting menus, with countless prop bets, potentially incentivize attempts at corruption.”

️‍🚨LEADING OFF 🚨

Ryen Russillo, on the move?

If you’re like me, you hit play on the latest episode of The Bill Simmons Podcast with Ryen Russillo last night to hear all about the big moves of the NBA offseason so far.

We’re all excited to see if Giannis Antetokounmpo indeed lays the groundwork for an eventual departure from Milwaukee, whether LeBron James could actually be traded, and who ultimately coaches the New York Knicks.

But the guest on that podcast breaking it all down is also a free agent. Russillo, in an appearance with Colin Cowherd last week, let slip that his contract expires this summer. In jest, Russillo laughed that he shouldn’t smack-talk ESPN’s NBA Draft broadcast too bad to keep his options open for his next move. That was all we got, but it was enough to make Russillo’s own free agency one of the bigger sports media stories of the summer.

Russillo was early to see the vision of the podcasting business when he left his ESPN Radio show in 2018 to launch podcasts with both the Worldwide Leader and The Ringer. A year later, he jumped to The Ringer full-time, where he hosted one of the biggest pods in the sports space. Somehow both a studied sports hermit and a street smart gym bro, Russillo built a big tent and a massive audience.

Now, The Ryen Russillo Podcast boasts nearly 170,000 followers on Spotify and another 50,000 subscribers on YouTube. Russillo has hosted numerous live shows covering basketball and college football across the country, and is a weekly cohost on Simmon's’ Sunday podcasts from February through July. Despite the chip on his shoulder that he hardly tries to hide, Russillo is one of the more popular and renowned hosts in sports.

In theory, that should mean Russillo is a hot commodity. He is close with the Pardon My Take crew and Mark Titus. He and Cowherd come together a few times a year for great podcasts. Russillo and his rep are likely getting calls from Barstool and The Volume.

Back in Bristol, we’ve seen ESPN try to lure Cowherd back and successfully bring on Rich Eisen’s digital show. Would Russillo appeal to ESPN management as it tries to build a must-have streaming service?

All of these possibilities bring pros and cons for Russillo. Barstool would likely want him in Chicago. The Volume doesn’t have the Spotify infrastructure to compete with The Ringer. ESPN has plenty of in-house talent making podcasts; they would likely want Russillo to go back to something approximating radio.

At the same time, Russillo has long pursued a screenwriting career. It is part of why he moved to Los Angeles and left ESPN, and he has in recent months teased an under-wraps project finally coming to fruition.

Getting a television or film project off the ground while still hosting a huge sports podcast is a pretty good gig. The Ringer and Spotify have moved some money around in recent months, but Russillo can be a big part of their growth in video and bring in major revenue with his podcast.

The partnership made sense in 2018, and it still makes sense now. If The Ringer wants him, bet on his return.

💬 AROUND AA 💬

‘F1’ is a Brad Pitt vehicle that takes too many familiar turns

On a perfect schedule with the F1 race slate and a new U.S. broadcast rights deal, Apple is out with a new racing film called… F1.

It features a potentially too-old-for-the-role Brad Pitt as well as cameos from broadcaster Leigh Diffey and all the star drivers. And it is directed by Joseph Kosinski of Top Gun: Maverick fame. Sound good?

Not so fast.

Awful Announcing’s Michael Grant reviewed the film and called it nothing more than a “typical sports drama”:

The commitment to the look of F1 makes you wonder why there wasn’t the same due diligence on the screenplay. There was a real opportunity to take this story in a different direction without the formulaic ending. Pitt’s performance is satisfactory. We get what we expect, including his obligatory ‘let me take my shirt off so you can see how good I look at this age’ scene.

Read the full review right here.

📣 SOCIAL EXPERIMENT 🌟

Nikki Glaser tried her best to make the NHL Draft fun on Friday night:

Newly hired Amazon Prime Video basketball analyst Candace Parker had her jersey retired by the Los Angeles Sparks on Sunday:

Angel Reese had some fun with the “Mebounds” meme after a huge game on Sunday in a win for her Chicago Sky:

📈 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 💰

• Out with one star sideline reporter, in with another for the Big3. One week after firing Rachel DeMita for posting non-Big3 clips during a game, the league hired comedian Mike Epps to do the job. The two couldn’t be farther apart in style and audience, but speak to a desire on the part of the 8-year old league to continue innovating with its structure and talent.

• In a move that is both irrelevantly inside-baseball AND a sign of the professionalization of college sports, the Big 12 Conference is killing its preseason media poll for football. Many noticed that the change came after a 2024 season in which the Arizona State Sun Devils won the conference despite being picked to finish last in the poll.

• Joining Max Kellerman on the Netflix broadcast of the Canelo Alvarez-Terence Crawford will be… Jon Anik! It is the first major boxing card for Zuffa Boxing, the partnership between TKO Holdings and the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund. So it is not a surprise that Anik, the main announcer for UFC would get involved. But it is promising that the more serious boxing match will have a more serious broadcast booth than Netflix’s last card.

🔥 THE CLOSER 🔥

The future of NBA TV

It appears, after a pivot to streaming and a break from TNT Sports, that NBA TV is finally ready to get funky.

A few days after news broke that TNT would no longer be operating the network and the league’s website, John Ourand of Puck has more details on what the future will hold for NBA TV. No more studio shows or playoff games, lots more niche content.

Expect more live games from all over the world, including international competitions featuring top prospects in the NBA and WNBA. The network and the NBA App streamed French LNB Elite games in 2023 to showcase Victor Wembanyama, and will do more in the future.

NBA TV will reportedly also air more behind-the-scenes footage, like what NFL Network does with NFL Films content. Lastly, Ourand reported that he projects the network will show "creator-type content.”

This is the part that has to raise eyebrows. As Ourand notes, NBA TV has been direct-to-consumer for several years now, available through NBA League Pass and the NBA App. Because it is no longer a source of significant revenue for the league, it also need not worry about programming exclusives that cable carriers will value. That means the league can really experiment.

The NBA can think of NBA TV as the first iteration of what a league-owned streaming channel can be. In the future, rights-holders distributors could very well operate highly monetized channels within Prime Video, YouTube or even Netflix. The NBA can get a head start on how to make such a feed compelling, starting now.

Existing partners like Ben Taylor of Thinking Basketball, Mo Dakhil of Bleacher Report or the Dunker Spot hosts at Three Four Two Productions are all perfect to tap for more real-time content. NBA TV could air film breakdowns or podcast conversations with recognizable personalities in the NBA content space. The network could put different forms of exclusive content on its airwaves, like practice footage or interviews.

Getting any younger sports fan who likes this type of content to pay for it in 2025 is a tall order. But with the freedom to think about good content and experiment with form, the NBA can get ready for the next vintage of live content. People still love basketball.

Someday, a partner will come along and give the league a chance at a revenue-driving live content funnel just like cable did two decades ago. Think of the end of the TNT-NBA TV partnership as the beginning of what’s next.