|
Was Bill Simmons ever a unique voice? He was your typical sports radio talk show caller turned writer
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 21:31
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 17:23 |
|
|
Harlock posted:Was Bill Simmons ever a unique voice? He was your typical sports radio talk show caller turned writer Lol maybe you could argue he wasn't unique but the was certainly a good and prolific version of the archetype and I can't remember any more of those. I love how the hate train has turned on Billy so much that we forget we'd probably still be dealing with 50 year old whiteguy single sentence paragraph takewarriors and them alone without him and his cabal at ESPN.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 21:36
|
|
|
Simmons didn't invent the internet, and good sportswriting existed before Grantland
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 21:45
|
|
|
joepinetree posted:I know, and that's my point. Simmons is claiming that you don't need "the mother ship," but it's obvious that he was heavily subsidized, and that his bragging over podcast downloads is ridiculous. My favorite podcast network right now is bald move, and they're consistently ranking above Simmons stuff. And it's literally two guys in their basement who even with donations and merchandise make like 60 k a year podcasting. Your point was "Grantland wasn't making money, so Simmons won't make money with the Ringer" and my point was "ESPN wasn't trying very hard to monetize Grantland, so it's a poor gauge of potential profitability." E: And yeah, Simmons was a unique voice when he first started. His competition at the time was Rick Reilly and similar columnists. I get not liking the guy, but it's weird to try to discredit everything he does. midwat fucked around with this message at 22:47 on May 23, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 22:37
|
|
|
ElwoodCuse posted:I don't know if I'm Too Old or what but I give zero fucks about podcasts no matter who is doing them or who is on them. This might also be because I can read way faster than anyone can talk. You might not be old enough? It's just radio that's not live. Do you listen to NPR or know people that do? Their podcasts are incredibly popular because it's just NPR in a downloadable format. Do you listen to sports radio? There's a podcast. Etc. I subscribe to like 30 loving podcasts because I drive, and I have the opportunity at work to listen to stuff. Podcasts aren't a substitute for written content. They're a substitute for radio. It's like listening to a ballgame on the radio instead of watching it on tv. Sometimes it's because you can't do one of them, and sometimes it's because it's better.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 22:48
|
|
|
Harlock posted:Was Bill Simmons ever a unique voice? He was your typical sports radio talk show caller turned writer This may come as a surprise, but years ago that was enough to qualify you as a unique voice. By the time he started Grantland, Simmons was really no longer unique; his schtick had been taken up by more and better writers. But back in the proverbial day, he was basically the first guy to succeed at "writing about sports the way you'd talk about sports in a bar." Sportswriting was so drat hidebound and dull that that was enough to make him fresh and innovative. You know how we love to point at lovely, lovely columnists who can't get with the times? That used to be all there was.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 22:50
|
|
|
Yeah, Simmons was one of the first sportswriters to write about sports from a fan's perspective (as opposed to the Studied Voice Of Perfect Neutrality that most sportswriters used) and he'd write about rooting for teams and what it meant to finally win something and living through terrible losses and what cheering for Larry Bird meant for him, personally. That was almost nowhere to be found in sportswriting before him. Another big part of that was he was one of the first to write about fantasy sports and gambling as a legitimate part of the fan experience as opposed to things to be studiously ignore or railed against. This obviously doesn't make him worth paying attention to in 2016, but he was way ahead of the curve back in the early 00s and he gets and deserves credit for that.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2016 23:26
|
|
|
midwat posted:Your point was "Grantland wasn't making money, so Simmons won't make money with the Ringer" and my point was "ESPN wasn't trying very hard to monetize Grantland, so it's a poor gauge of potential profitability." That wasn't my point. In fact, I am legitimately curious about how the ringer will do financially. My point is that the argument that he does not need the "mothership" isn't supported by evidence, even when using the stuff he is best at. So my point was really that 1- the longer he's been away from ESPN the more his podcast rankings fall and 2- even if his podcasts were doing really well, podcast is an ultra small, ultra niche medium where even the juggernauts of the field don't make much money off of it.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 00:13
|
|
|
joepinetree posted:That wasn't my point. In fact, I am legitimately curious about how the ringer will do financially. My point is that the argument that he does not need the "mothership" isn't supported by evidence, even when using the stuff he is best at. So my point was really that 1- the longer he's been away from ESPN the more his podcast rankings fall and 2- even if his podcasts were doing really well, podcast is an ultra small, ultra niche medium where even the juggernauts of the field don't make much money off of it. Here is the list of the current top Sports Podcasts in the United States: http://www.itunescharts.net/us/charts/podcasts/sport/
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 05:20
|
|
|
Buffalo Bills beat reporters are giving a great middle finger to the Bills' idiotic media policies
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 18:28
|
|
|
FMguru posted:Yeah, Simmons was one of the first sportswriters to write about sports from a fan's perspective (as opposed to the Studied Voice Of Perfect Neutrality that most sportswriters used) and he'd write about rooting for teams and what it meant to finally win something and living through terrible losses and what cheering for Larry Bird meant for him, personally. That was almost nowhere to be found in sportswriting before him. Another big part of that was he was one of the first to write about fantasy sports and gambling as a legitimate part of the fan experience as opposed to things to be studiously ignore or railed against. This obviously doesn't make him worth paying attention to in 2016, but he was way ahead of the curve back in the early 00s and he gets and deserves credit for that. Yeah, it's weird and makes me feel old that I found out about Simmons back in '01 (during high school) and one of my favorite Friday past times was reading his NFL column, killing a nice chunk of class (and work in later years). I know that ever since he got really popular he's been accused of being up his own rear end, but it really wasn't until the last two years when I started to agree with a lot of that. I guess I've always viewed his schtick as a sort of "comfort food" entertainment. I just don't find him entertaining much anymore since the ESPN power struggle started.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 20:06
|
|
|
ColonelJohnMatrix posted:Yeah, it's weird and makes me feel old that I found out about Simmons back in '01 (during high school) and one of my favorite Friday past times was reading his NFL column, killing a nice chunk of class (and work in later years). I know that ever since he got really popular he's been accused of being up his own rear end, but it really wasn't until the last two years when I started to agree with a lot of that. I guess I've always viewed his schtick as a sort of "comfort food" entertainment. I just don't find him entertaining much anymore since the ESPN power struggle started. It occurs to me that Simmons was also one of the first sportswriters to write about how video games were now an important part of the fan experience, and he was fairly early on the stats and metrics train (when pretty much every other sportswriter was still all "a spreadsheet can't tell you what's in a player's heart, nerdlinger"). So, credit there as well.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 20:25
|
|
|
It did become a bit less fun when every team in Boston was winning titles too.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 20:31
|
|
|
soggybagel posted:It did become a bit less fun when every team in Boston was winning titles too. That in of itself wouldn't be a problem, but he keeps playing the hard luck card even though every single professional Boston team has won a title in the last decade. Made worse by the fact that he made a rule years ago that said if your team's won recently, you have to keep your trap shut if they make moves you disagree with, or start playing like poo poo. Does anybody really think he'd be defending Peyton Manning this vociferously if he'd been accused of deflating the ball with the same set of circumstances that Brady was? Although, to be fair, if there's one thing most NFL fans agree on, it's that Roger Goodell is a useless piece of poo poo. El Gallinero Gros fucked around with this message at 20:40 on May 24, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 20:38
|
|
|
Gay But Crush Puss posted:probably still be dealing with 50 year old whiteguy single sentence paragraph takewarriors Gonna derail the discussion for a second to address this. Why is this a thing? Is it standard sports journalistic practice? Is it that sports writers assume their base readership is too dumb or has too short an attention span to handle anything more than a single sentence per paragraph? Are they themselves too dumb to combine several thoughts into a paragraph? Some ridiculous combination of all of the above? It's something that has stuck out like a sore thumb for me for years.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 20:50
|
|
|
illcendiary posted:Gonna derail the discussion for a second to address this. Why is this a thing? Is it standard sports journalistic practice? Is it that sports writers assume their base readership is too dumb or has too short an attention span to handle anything more than a single sentence per paragraph? Are they themselves too dumb to combine several thoughts into a paragraph? Some ridiculous combination of all of the above? It's something that has stuck out like a sore thumb for me for years. It's an easy way to pad column inches and it can add emphasis (if used sparingly)
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 21:03
|
|
|
morestuff posted:It's an easy way to pad column inches and it can add emphasis (if used sparingly) Yeah it's this. Happens in regular journalism a lot too.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 21:21
|
|
|
It's a carryover from newspaper writing, where you need to fill a certain amount of space.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 21:41
|
|
|
morestuff posted:It's an easy way to pad column inches and it can add emphasis (if used sparingly) To further explain: column-inches is a method of measuring an article's length as used by newspapers. To explain still further: newspapers used to only come on paper, and...
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 21:48
|
|
|
It's also a simplicity/clarity thing. Newspaper stories/columns are written so that pretty much anyone can read and understand them. Long paragraphs tend to dissuade readers at the lower end of the spectrum.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 23:09
|
|
|
Gay But Crush Puss posted:Uh thats exactly how Norm works and Simmons was right to let him meander. That's Norm's schtick. He's funny but not for everyone. I was actually refusing to Kilborn and not Norm. Sorry for lack of clarification. Norm was way better but I didn't think it was good by any means and I think his schtick is awesome.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 23:38
|
|
|
Michael Wilbon: Black people won't get hired as coaches because fancystats
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 23:50
|
|
|
joepinetree posted:That wasn't my point. In fact, I am legitimately curious about how the ringer will do financially. My point is that the argument that he does not need the "mothership" isn't supported by evidence, even when using the stuff he is best at. So my point was really that 1- the longer he's been away from ESPN the more his podcast rankings fall and 2- even if his podcasts were doing really well, podcast is an ultra small, ultra niche medium where even the juggernauts of the field don't make much money off of it. The problem with making money on a podcast is fitting the business model with both the show and the audience. Simmons has a sports radio audience, which is generally more tolerant of advertising, and he gets ""real"" radio ads that are paying outright for the spot, rather than him plugging some sort of affiliate marketing. He would probably have to hustle a more (more shows, more regularly) if the HBO check wasn't coming in, but he could absolutely make it a sustainable, even profitable venture with his name and audience.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2016 23:52
|
|
|
A judge is allowing Colleen Dominguez's age discrimination suit against Fox Sports to go forward
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:41
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/RMac18/status/735252033117126657
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:57
|
|
|
There's a kernel of a good story in here but it seems ridiculous that overall they went with "Black people are just emotional!" as the overriding thesis.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:58
|
|
|
Yeah there's a legitimate point to be made in that Wilbon story but it's buried under several hundred miles of bullshit. It's also really funny to see a dude who brings up going to Northwestern in about every third sentence complain about snooty Ivy League intellectuals
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:29
|
|
|
It's cool that they're basically admitting their tactic was to run him out of money and funny that it didn't work because someone else bankrolled him and they're complaining about it.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:32
|
|
|
Get ready for a hot take Ready? Ready? https://twitter.com/GideonResnick/status/735259458918551553
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:36
|
|
|
I wasn't ready 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:38
|
|
|
MourningView posted:Yeah there's a legitimate point to be made in that Wilbon story but it's buried under several hundred miles of bullshit. It's also really funny to see a dude who brings up going to Northwestern in about every third sentence complain about snooty Ivy League intellectuals Northwestern is not in the Ivy League. They're in the Big Ten!
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 02:32
|
|
|
Finally, a venture capitalist is funding something worthwhile.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 03:48
|
|
|
As was pointed out in the Rowdy Ringsports thread about Bollea v Gawker, Gawker outed Thiel in 2007 when he wasn't ready to be out. Maybe that doesn't justify what he's doing but at least it's understandable.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 13:20
|
|
|
rebel1608 posted:As was pointed out in the Rowdy Ringsports thread about Bollea v Gawker, Gawker outed Thiel in 2007 when he wasn't ready to be out. Maybe that doesn't justify what he's doing but at least it's understandable. It totally justifies it. Even if Gawker did nothing to Thiel, helping someone sue the poo poo out of a company that practiced illegal tabloid tactics is justified on its own. There has long been a balance between privacy and free speech and this doesn't come anywhere close to the line. Gawker had several opportunities to back down and thought they were cleverly getting around a court order. gently caress em, assuming Thiel has a percentage interest in the damages this was both a smart business move and morally justified. I think the damages were pretty outlandish, but I totally see how they got there.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 13:57
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/annamphillips/status/735510522079088640?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw gawkernobody will miss you at all
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 17:53
|
|
|
DJExile posted:https://twitter.com/annamphillips/status/735510522079088640?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw I will. They're usually pretty entertaining. Hopefully their better writers will wind up in places that can retain their voices with better ethical standards. Henchman of Santa fucked around with this message at 18:01 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 17:56
|
|
|
I liked a couple of Deadspin's writers (Burneko especially, and HamNo was great if he wasn't talking about culture/politics) and I'm sure they'll find places to land, but I got burned out really fast by Gawker, who seemed to be HEH  : The Blog. Jezebel has one good article for every 4 that venture way into self-righteous eye-roll territory, literally nobody cares about lifehacker, and there are 10 billion other anime and tech blogs out there. Jalopnik seemed alright on the whole, I'll give them that.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 18:20
|
|
|
Oh whoops Teddybear posted:For clarity, this is still in front of the trial judge. This is one of the motions that gets appealed up to the higher circuit, where the general consensus among lawyers who weigh in is that the judgment will be greatly lessened or overturned entirely based on the appeal court's earlier decisions. It would have been more newsworthy if the trial judge had granted this motion.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 18:29
|
|
|
DJExile posted:https://twitter.com/annamphillips/status/735510522079088640?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Somebody over in PSP said that this is a denial of a re-trial in front of the original judge: this will get appealed to a higher court, where things play a bit differently. Also: if you watch Silicon Valley (and you should), Peter Thiel was reportedly the basis for Peter Gregory. RIP Christopher E. Welch.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 18:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 17:23 |
|
|
DJExile posted:I liked a couple of Deadspin's writers (Burneko especially, and HamNo was great if he wasn't talking about culture/politics) and I'm sure they'll find places to land, but I got burned out really fast by Gawker, who seemed to be HEH The most infuriating part of Gawker was how they would constantly "call out" other publications for being clickbait muckrakers as if the Gawker conglomerate was anything other than that.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 18:31
|
|