Jason Whitlock vs. Maria Taylor and Katie Nolan

Thanks.
I'm trying for the life of me to figure out why people find this shit interesting.

 

I did look at his twitter feed for the first time in ages. He still loves promoting everything he has written as important, must see work and retweets all praise.

 

Most of us, in TV news, stall out somewhere around Connecticut Avenue, maybe Vermont Avenue.

Maria Taylor was able to use all of the assets that executives covet. She got to start out, oh, on Illinois or Indiana Avenue for her career -- impressive for someone who doesn't have a HoF father doing play-by-play. (Not being snarky for once. She's really good and it's a damn strong career arc for her.)

To her credit, she's kept moving forward. Trying new spaces. Attractive. Good on live TV. I cringed at the Mercedes ads with Nick Saban a couple years back but, hey, that's the game.

Erin Andrews had her fans but was exposed when they had her anchoring an hour of GameDay before the main show. Just didn't have the skill set to carry a show. Michelle Beadle was a big thing for a year, going from Cowherd's co-host on SportsNation to NBC and back to ESPN. Somewhere along the way, she quit becoming a factor. (Likely another NBC victim -- where they hire a "trending" anchor, put them in a closet and they return with lesser impact. See Kelly, Megyn.)

I imagine that Taylor probably runs every step by her agent to see if it's a good idea. When she goes onto social media and talks about more than just asking Nick Saban two questions at halftime, there is a "long game" at play. She knows her clock in the business is ticking before she finds something bigger, replaced by the 26-year-old that she was seven years ago.

Perhaps it's to be more relevant outside of sports. Maybe she is another sideline reporter who would rather be on Access Hollywood, asking two questions of Ryan Reynolds on Oscar Night instead of Nick Saban against Clemson. Nothing wrong with that. I'm sure there is a long-term plan she is working on with her agent. AH, ET, Today Show, GMA, whatever. I don't know, really, what else in sports she can do.

She's got a lot of leverage... as Maria Taylor = eyeballs. One of the very few I'll stop what I'm doing and watch on TV. Even Ms. Laz-E-Boy likes her.

 

In all seriousness, a version of Erin Andrews but with wit and charisma?

High ceiling for someone like that.

 

Beadle just seemed to fall out of love with sports. ESPN tried to push her on everything. Gave her the NBA stuff she wanted. Tried to work her in other places....I remember she got herself into a bit of a pickle when she was ripping Floyd Mayweather for domestic violence and then taking selfies with wrestler "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, who has DV claims against him by two of ex-wives. She didn't explain her way out of that one easily.

ESPN, however, gave her the co-host spot on that shitty morning show with Greenberg and then she had what I consider the high-water mark of the show, when she was so frustrated by Ohio State's handling of Urban Meyer that she said to hell with football. I actually thought it was a refreshing moment of TV.

 

Perhaps Beadle just said “hell, I’ve made my money. I’ll be done playing along with the sports industrial complex.” And that’s fine, too.

The person in the crosshairs of Whitlock’s article I hope saves her money is Katie Nolan. I’m still unaware of her skill set. Clearly there is something there that’s digital. The long-term viability I am unsure of.

She’s the new Rick Reilly. ESPN pays her a lot of money and I’m sure what the ROI is for them. Perhaps it was just to keep her from doing anything else on FS1.

With the pandemic/recession, making extreme money in sports broadcasting/opinion will be even more difficult. The podcast space is about all taken up with Simmons, Barstool, whomever else. Live Sports on TV - the games, studio shows - is the final frontier for appointment viewing. That’s where a personal brand is made.

 

We don't need any of them to enjoy the games, and the average fan has been saying that for two decades.

 

I think the Katie Nolan hire was a bunch of olds trying to find a way to connect with the 18-34 set outside of live sports. Everyone is throwing everything against the wall and hoping something sticks.

 

We need a guy to take up the mantle and remind us (repeatedly) he's covered 30 Super Bowls and 20 NBA Finals - that was never an oddly insecure thing to say around here or anything.

 

Yeah - Maybe it was the other, similar thread to this one, and I can't remember who said it, but Nolan's FOX show, "Garbage Time," appealed to me, as an early 30s dude. "Talk Soup" but sports. But historically, this kind of stuff has been a really poor fit on sports networks. ESPN and athletes typically don't have much of a sense of humor about themselves - see the muted support for "Cheap Seats" over the years, and how usually funny hosts in other mediums bomb at the Espy's each year - which isn't surprising, when you have an industry of hyper competitive people. There's always going to be more of a feeling of kismet with a Kobe type vs. a Shaq type. "First Take," which is fucking awful from an information standpoint but which treats sports as Really Fucking Serious, is going to do better than if they did a Page 2 Sports Are Silly show.

 

We've had several posts about the talents of Taylor and Nolan. Some supportive. Some critical. But they were all more thoughtful, informed and respectful than Jason Fucking Whitlock's BS. If he's throwing out jobs to SJ posters, he's going to wind up getting overshadowed - except in the HOT TAKEZ department.

 

The more I think about it on Nolan, I really think ESPN pulled the trademark NBC move of hiring other talent, paying them well but killing their brand. (Gayle Gardner got this treatment from NBC when she left Bristol 30 years ago).

It wasn’t Nolan’s FS1 show that scared them. It was people like Dietsch who wrote and talked about how great she was. (I never saw it but anywho.). It was Nolan moving to something on Another FOX property, say, pregame on NFL Sundays that probably spooked them.

In this business, I think of it like basketball coaching. Always take the money at a larger program, even a dysfunctional one. Even if you know you’ll get fired in two years. Because having that bigger job on your resume will lead to a better job down the road.

Especially for women who have options.

My co-anchor makes more than I do by quite a bit. Beloved in the market whereas I feel some day I’m just “filling the seat”. Takes care of herself.

Yet we both agree that I’m far more likely to be doing the job in 20 years when we’re both in our mid-60s. She will have aged out, replaced by someone younger and cheaper. Just like she did to a 46-year-ole female anchor when she was 24.