34 Comments

Let’s go straight to the third rail. We are seeing athletes do more at a much older age. Surely a large piece of that is exercise science but their have always been rumors of trips to Germany or Miami after a players has had his last drug test of the year.

How rampant are the PEDs in the NBA and should we care other than for historical statistical comparisons?

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Sep 9·edited Sep 9

Thanks! But can we also please submit mailback questions via this forum? Reason:

a) Paid subscribers have an advantage, but more importantly

b) One can submit here anonymously. I sadly work for an organization so left-wing that I setup my Substack account to be anonymous, that's not true of my email account. So I'd rather not have to send a message to houseofstrauss@substack.com.

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Just as a general note, I really enjoy hearing about the world of “backstage” ESPN. What people are really like off the air, the turf battles, the corporate politicking of it all. Some of your best writing and endlessly fascinating.

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What’s the song at the beginning of your podcast?

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Things I"m interested in:

* I'd like to hear from some of the old heads for NBA coverage, like Marc Stein and Ric Bucher.

* Curious about some of the "startup leagues" whether it be the Big 3 or Slamball or XFL again and what impact they're having if any (monetarily, ratings-wise)

* More about the transfer portal how it's impacting recruitment, esp in CFB and men's basketball. Something like Colorado just the beginning? Maybe hear from like an assistant coach even anonymously about how things have changed

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Just don’t start a Trade Value column, lest Bill Simmons publicly wreck you like he did Jonah Keri.

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Knock, knock!

Who's There?

Pandora's Box.

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How will the Boomer era end? Asteroid hitting earth, extreme chaos caused by numerous conspiracy theories colliding, more college football realignment, etc? I’ll hang up and listen.

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Apologies if you’ve brought this up in one of the articles that I may have missed, but what is your read on American sports leagues being overvalued via the regional sports network bubble? Is there any chance, either in your perspective or from people you’ve talked to, that we would see revenue for any of the big leagues go down once regional sports networks can’t afford to pay for live rights anymore? Or do people think that tech companies are an adequate backup to this? Is ESPN the first domino to fall?

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I think you should start getting into golf. Watching and playing. Your perspective would be interesting. Start with the Ryder Cup. Also Andy Johnson would be a good podcast guest. End of question.

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Without betraying anyone’s confidence, what are some of the things that you privately hear from colleagues in media institutions that they can’t or won’t share publicly?

Same goes for league personnel

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Novak…quietly a top 20

Men’s Athlete all time any sport.

He is better at tennis than curry is at basketball.

He trolls. He has a big personality. How come he’s not a bigger deal?

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Your oldest son is or about to be the age where he can start playing sports. If your son has no interest, is it something you gently force him to do or do you wait on him to show interest? If he does want to play, would you ever go down the path of AAU/travel teams?

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Are you a tennis fan at all?

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What podcast would you most like to appear on? You've personally mentioned listening to the Commentary Magazine podcast and they've had on guest commentators nearly every day this summer. I think you'd be great on one of those days when sports and politics intermingle.

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Mailbag needs to be in audio too! Although, I don't care that much about weather Ethan reads it or some voice actor does. Ethan = better than voice actor but voice actor = fine too.

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