The Sporting Class: Worldwide Leaders, Killer Apps, and Michael Jordan's Special Contribution

As you've probably heard by now, we've teamed up with Bet MGM this season.

We'll be using Bet MGM Lines to make all of our picks, and we'll have special offers for our listeners each week.

If you haven't signed up for Bet MGM yet, use bonus code The Athletic and you'll get a one-year subscription to The Athletic, plus up to a $1,500 first-bet offer on your first wager with BetMGM.

Here's how it works: download the BetMGM app and sign up using bonus code The Athletic.

Make your first deposit of at least $10.

Place your first bet on any game and claim your voucher for a one-year subscription to The Athletic.

See BetMGM.com for terms, U.S.

promotional offers not available in DC, Mississippi, New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico.

Gambling problem?

Call 1-800-GAMBLER available in the U.S.

Call 877-8-HOPENY or text Hope NY467-369 in New York.

Call 1-800-NECSTEP in Arizona.

1-800-327-5050 in Massachusetts.

1-800-BETS OFF in Iowa.

1-800-270-7117 for confidential help in Michigan.

1-800-981-0023 in Puerto Rico.

First bet offer for new customers only in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel.

Don't forget, if you haven't signed up for Bed MGM yet, use bonus code The Athletic and you'll get a one-year subscription to the athletic, plus up to a $1,500 first bet offer on your first wager.

Coach, the energy out there felt different.

What changed for the team today?

It was the new game day scratches from the California Lottery.

Play is everything.

Those games sent the team's energy through the roof.

Are you saying it was the off-field play that made the difference on the field?

Hey, a little play makes your day, and today it made the game.

That's all for now.

Coach, one more question: play the new Los Angeles Chargers, San Francisco 49ers, and Los Angeles Rams Scratchers from the California Lottery.

A little play can make your day.

Please play responsibly, must be 18 years or older to purchase, play, or claim.

Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out.

I am Pablo Torre.

Today's episode is brought to you by DraftKings.

DraftKings, the crown is yours.

And today we're going to find out what this sound is.

I get great cargo shorts and undies right after this ad.

You're listening to Giraffe Kings Network.

Glad, David, that you're here.

And you're not complaining about anything yet.

Well, you did clean up my hair, I guess.

I don't think you complained about your hair.

It was an observation.

Observations are not complaints.

I wish I had that hair.

Don't look great.

I wish I had that hair before.

Isn't Observations are not complaints the title of the David Sampson story?

Just a series of observations, totally neutral observations.

You above all people know that.

I do observe a lot.

I don't complain much.

I don't like the dearth of snacks that exist right now in the office.

I'm hungry.

I'm grumpy.

John, can you put your headphones on, I guess, is the other thing.

Very good.

Jesus Christ.

First time we've been doing this.

How long?

When did we start doing this show?

Coca, when did we start doing the show?

Can you tell me in my year?

Because I have my headphones on when we started this.

When I started doing this with John.

So the way I started, I started just with John, and we were missing a third piece.

And when we asked you to host this, August 2023.

Wow.

Do you remember what you said?

You said, listen, I'm going to listen anyway.

I might as well participate.

So therefore, it's the same hour that i'm spending that's right it was sort of like

mo and larry without

curly curly dan got upset that you chose to do this i got to be curly yes so dan wanted to be curly but he couldn't commit to the necessary time to be curly and then you stepped in and then off to the races and he's commented from time to time like hey you know i could sit in that chair

i said yes that's true I mean,

this chair, the structural integrity, is already a bit on the brink.

It's good to see both of you guys, by the way.

John, David.

John, are you happy to be here?

David is seemingly always, as himself, kind of conflicted.

I'm very happy to be here, including with you, Mr.

Samson.

Thank you.

Very nice to be here.

And good, good head of hair.

Are you crying?

That was emotional for me.

He's happy to be with me.

Yeah, I'm surrounded.

You understand?

I'm surrounded in this company by people who are not happy to have me around.

Well, but we love his podcasting.

We love the game, David.

We love what we do together.

I have a story before we start.

No one asked you for this story.

It's a funny story about this show.

Okay.

It's a true story about the show.

I was in an Uber

on the way to the studio, and this had not happened to me yet.

The driver of the Uber knew about, recognized my name and me, and didn't ask about Survivor, didn't ask about nothing personal, didn't ask about the Marlins.

He was asking and mentioned that he listens to Sporting Class.

That happened about

20 minutes ago.

And what did he want to know about us?

Just, that's it.

He just was happy to see us.

He is captive to the radio.

Yeah, he

maybe a lot of he's driving all the time.

He's got a lot of choices, though.

Maybe a lot of things to say.

Maybe he saw David holding up the app and mouthing to him.

There's a tip at the end of this.

Over $100, 15%.

Under $100, 18%.

That's helpful.

Do you not do it?

You Uber all the time.

You do not do it that way.

I do the automated thing.

I don't even look.

Five stars and whatever the automated option is.

I'm saying give them that.

It's a difference between me and you right there.

And the difference between the three of us is

I never have any interest in rating.

You know, every time I make a phone call now, it says, rate your phone call.

I'm like, well, I was in an argument.

Does that mean it's a bad phone call?

Or are you asking about the quality of the video?

How do you know now?

Hit not like.

No, I do.

Every time.

I'd like to be able to hit a thing that says, please never ask me to rate, like, post, comment.

Hold on.

When I say that we're podcasters, John, the whole thing is that our audience needs to know.

Any Uber drivers out there need to know, like, subscribe, five stars.

Thank you.

However, it would not surprise you to find that my reflex tip at all times is whatever the highest option is.

So that's about, that's about 22%

on top of everything.

Although, do you now tip anytime you go buy a bagel at H ⁇ H, and I love H ⁇ H, shouting out, even though they're not a sponsor, I shouldn't say it.

But now when you get a bagel, there's a place when you do Apple Pay for adding a tip, and I hit no tip.

Yeah, I feel free.

I don't normally tip when I go to tip.

I don't co-sign David's no tip on the bagel strategy.

So do you tip on top when you go to a newsstand and buy a sticker?

I round up.

Rounding up is different than tipping.

Rounding up is you're too busy to wait for change.

Well, that's a bit of a motive that you've assessed.

For me, it's not about the

not waiting, it's about I do not want to carry a bunch of coins in my pocket.

Yeah, I don't have coins in my pocket, but you just have them in a pool that you dive into after work.

That's exactly right.

Did you see the game last night?

Of course you did, because you used Instacart to do your grocery restock.

Plus, you got snacks for the game, all without missing a single play.

And that's on multitasking.

So we're not saying that Instacart is a hack for game day, but it might be the ultimate play this football season.

Enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders.

Service fees apply.

For three orders in 14 days.

Excludes restaurants.

Instacart.

We're here.

Dad, you take a noticeable.

If we have a Verizon, we danced

for espresso de 3.

Die verdad?

Es comos y la cuarta linea pora gratis.

Ok, una paramí otra para tú mama, una para tí y,

para para mino vio.

Excuse me?

Dad, mira, quiero está en contacto con el todo da al tiempo.

Astan las vacaciones, but

counts.

No important.

Well, no violent converizing your telephone también loss and imaginate.

you have to text as if I contented.

I also.

When vaccines and theories with MyPlan de Verizon, however, ya batuna cuerta linen so that two por el presso dress por zo $3 por linea mes en el limit welcom yuro paymas in puestos di cargo.

Ademos uso tú telephon en el extranjero con travel pass en unpa yes quejas 3 días almes por 1 a la regregarlo en MyPlan.

Visita túnda Verizon in San Francisco.

Eno dan al limba welcom los das unlimited 5G for GLT and podium templates that the other traffic guarantee una conquest Roman devos national

If you owe $10,000 or more in credit card debt, medical bills, or personal loans, help is here.

More and more Americans turn to credit cards to get by.

National debt relief is helping qualified clients reduce what they owe.

For many, continuing to struggle, making minimum monthly payments could take years to pay off.

National Debt Relief has already helped over 550,000 Americans reduce their debt by negotiating directly with their creditors.

When you call, you'll be amazed at how much you can save and how quickly you can become debt-free.

If you want off the debt treadmill, visit national debtrelief.com today.

You don't need to declare bankruptcy, and you may qualify for significant debt relief.

To find out what savings you may qualify for, simply visit national debtrelief.com.

That's nationaldebtrelief.com.

I think we need to start with ESPN, though.

And I say that knowing that John Skipper, to my right here, former president of ESPN, who had to figure out something like the decision that has just been made around the direct-to-consumer product that is the future of ESPN, a huge part of the Walt Disney company, which is its app.

It's DTC app.

Do you want to give the fine print on this?

I want to give the branding first because remember, there was the talk of it being flagship, but they didn't like that.

So what they they announced is their new thing that they've been working on for multiple years, if not multiple CEOs and presidents, what is called the four letters that we all associate and love and associate with the worldwide leader, ESPN.

Wait for it, that's the name of it.

They called it that.

It's a good name.

It's a good name.

But we've seen, just before we get into the brass tacks of the numbers and the pricing, like

Max,

we hardly knew ye.

Like, the name has been messed up actively.

One of the advantages we enjoyed at ESPN before I got there, while I was there, and since I am not there,

is that we have a single brand.

Remember, ESPN took over the sports on ABC and called it ESPN on ABC.

How hard was that?

That was painful for the ABC sports people, right?

A great tradition, lots of Brunearlage.

I mean, ABC Sports was a great brand name, Wide World of Sports.

But we had decided long ago at the company, we had one sports brand, and it was highly advantageous as we were competing with

the company that owned AOL Sports and Sports Illustrated and CNNSI and

this Turner.

The idea of having multiple brand names for a single genre is baffling.

And it usually has nothing to do with the fact of anything other than these sports illustrated people don't want to sublimate their name to AOL, nor does AOL want to sublimate their name.

Somebody at the top of an organization needs to say, we have one brand name for sports.

In our case, it was ESPN, and we were always fortunate to compete against people who had multiple brand names.

Let me talk for a minute about mergers and how that works.

So when two companies merge, merge, one of the things there's...

Two companies love each other very much.

No, they don't love each other.

They're doing it to try to bolster both of their stock prices.

But there's two major discussions that happen.

One, which of the CEOs is going to run the merged company?

Because you have two CEOs.

And two, what's the name of the company going to be?

And the name is how fraught an argument.

It is major.

So I'm going to mention Morgan Stanley very quickly.

Morgan Stanley merged with Dean Witter and it became Morgan Stanley Dean Witter for a minute.

And then Dean Witter disappeared and it's back to Morgan Stanley.

Law firms do this where Proscow arose.

There's five names after it, but Proscow arose.

Federal Express became FedEx.

People have a way of saying things.

ESPN, to your point, that is what people say.

That's what they associate.

No matter what ESPN buys or who they merge with, ESPN would always come out on top of that discussion.

We bought a soccer website in the UK back in 2000.

It was called soccernet.com.

And I

had the great privilege to be in charge of it because I was running ESPN at the time.

Because you lost it.

And I said, great.

We're going to call this ESPN FC or

ESPN football or ESPN soccer.

And they're like, oh, we can't do that.

The people who know soccernet.com will be upset.

They won't be upset.

People, they will not be upset.

They care about the content as long as it's not confusing.

They have trouble finding it.

They don't know what they're getting.

A better brand is a better brand.

My first appearance at ESPN was to start the magazine.

They'd started a magazine, and it was called Total Sports.

Oh, I didn't know this.

Yes.

As a former ESPN, the magazine employee, I didn't realize it was something else.

It was called Total Sports.

And the first thing I said was, well, why isn't it called ESPN?

Which is what we call the magazine.

And they said, well, because people think of ESPN ESPN as a television station, they don't think we have expertise in magazines.

And it was all people want to have their own brand.

Well,

hold on, though, just because I'm trying to now put the pieces together.

So, John, is it true that what I am finding out today is that you are responsible for the name ESPN the magazine?

No, yes, but it was ESPN the magazine.

But I'm just saying, like,

there was no comma.

Is there a more, but yeah, so the tongue-in-cheek part of it, it, it's just the most clear embodiment of the philosophy you're articulating is the fact that the magazine was

called ESPN the magazine.

But it was called by one and all pretty much ESPN.

Well, so.

And by the way, ESPN.com, at one point, we took the dot-com off.

Right?

It's a good decision, in my opinion, to call this ESPN.

Why try to confuse people?

And by the way, that's the marketing.

You want ESPN?

Here is the best way to to get it.

Buy our app, get everything, all the bells and whistles, which they keep saying.

I'm not sure which bells and which whistles yet.

I don't know who told Bob Iger what to talk about, but I was shocked at the way he described this.

I understand why they've been building to this, and everyone in the market is petrified of CNN Plus.

Petrified.

Of what happened

for a day.

Of CNN Plus.

Right.

And there was a huge building to that.

They were signing talent.

There was going to be a lot of stuff.

Yeah, there was a lineup of net.

There's a lineup of the whole thing.

And I believe, am I wrong that it was on for a day?

Is it, it may be, I'll take the over on a day, but it was not a year.

I don't even think it was a month.

It was brief.

I don't think it was a day.

March 29, 2022, shut down April 28th.

It was almost a month.

That's pretty good.

My memory's wrong.

I thought it was like the next day.

But the question of, and that was not even a reflection of the quality of the shows that they had lined up.

It was this larger job.

Well, the problem there, too, was it was a different entity.

This new

app, streaming service, is just

overwhelmingly an aggregation of content you can already get, either on ESPN Plus or on your cable subscription.

There are these so-called bells and whistles that will provide, oh, you know, if you round up, maybe 1% of the value here for the difference.

But the difference, to be clear, right?

If you're a consumer, what ESPN Plus, which has always existed as ESPN standalone app, what it did not give you was the stuff that you get as a fan of certainly live events through your cable subscription.

All the best, well, that's because they couldn't, right?

You had deals with the distributors that had requirements as to where else you could put the content they were paying you a lot of money for.

Clearly, at this point,

they have moved to a place and the cable television universe has declined to a place where ESPN has no choice but to say, we still want to be in business with you, DirecTV, Spectrum, et cetera, et cetera, but we're going to make our content available to our subscribers, to our fans directly if that's the way they want to get it.

Now, the compromise is, but if they already have a DirecTV subscription, they get this automatically.

So they're using that, of course, to say to the distributors, we're not looking to disrupt your business at at all.

It's showing there is barely any business, though.

It is showing that the shrinking platform that the commissioner and baseball talked about is true.

But it's not de minimis.

It's certainly not de minimis.

50 million subscribers at somewhere 120, for ESPN, 120 million

or to 10 times 12 to

$120 a year for 50 million subscribers is not de minimis.

And by the way, that will...

Well, it's going this way.

It is going that way.

But the curve of that going down will

decline slightly, meaning it will go down slower at some point.

Some number of people will just keep the cables up.

They just will.

They're all going to die.

They will die eventually.

So I don't view that as right.

It's not

going to sound like half-life and half-life.

Well, but it would be a good idea.

But the steepness of the curve, though, John, is the question that informed when do we finally launch the DTC option, which is something that you could have done, but clearly it took until 2025.

Why would you do it when you have 90 million, 80 million, 70 million subscribers?

It still would be an interesting mathematical parlay to know when the lines cross that more people pay them directly than get their subscription through somebody else.

I would argue that it's not going to be this year, next year, the year after.

It will be several years before the lines cross and more people

and more money.

They've got projections.

When you unveil an app like this internally, Bob Iger is not allowing this to happen without a financial plan of what's going to happen.

How many people are going to pay $29.99 a month?

How many people are going to pay for the whole year and pay the 300 bucks that it costs to get it?

What are you getting?

And what we heard from Jimmy Petaro and Bob Iger is: hey, you're going to get ESPN as though you had it through cable, as though you had it.

It's actually SPN.

Well, I'm a Hulu Live guy.

I get ESPN.

I'm not sure why I need to spend.

It's like, to me, a venue where it's like paying extra for a site to have stuff that I already can get.

Yeah, it's a little more convenient in one place, but for $29.99 a month, I don't think I need it, which is why they went to the, hey, there's some bells and whistles.

You get personalized sports center and all such other stuff.

Of course,

I'm skeptical of bells and whistles.

You know, you'll be able to sync up your bet, your bets you've made on this game and see on the screen whether you're winning or not.

That is

of fairly de minimis interest to most sports fans.

Again, people have been talking about camera angles, special mega casts for a long time, and mostly people care about the game as it is played and produced on a linear network.

I mean, that is

why sports retains so much of its value.

Now, they may come up with some things eventually, but it actually, you also have the problem of every subscriber who cancels their subscription to Spectrum and buys

and buys the Disney app.

I don't, I'd have to, you'd have to do some projections, but my guess would be those subscribers are, have less net income per unit than the subscribers who are on the cable system.

On the cable system, you have no costs for customer service.

You don't have to bill anybody.

You don't have to have any bells and whistles.

You've just...

You got the cable man who never comes.

Well, they're not paying for the cable man.

Yeah, I guess we are.

Yeah, you are.

The ESPN's not paying.

It's a beautiful model to get 10, 12 bucks a month, and it is pure profit.

But the beautiful model, I keep on, it's just funny.

There are still people out in the world who need to listen to this show we do together called The Sporting Class, clearly, because what John said once is the thing that I keep on repeating to people, and they're flabbergasted.

The idea that ESPN, at its peak, made more than the rest of the Walt Disney company combined because of the beautiful model that John is describing.

And And so the question about the pricing schedule must be in this era, by the way, in which we're just tossing around terms like venue, the ill-fated skinny bundle we've talked about previously, and Max, the ill-fated branding for HBO, which got just this week switched back.

In that era, how do you price this thing?

And so David alluded to some of the pricing of it, right?

$299 per year, in addition to a select plan, which offers all content available on ESPN Plus for $11.99 per month or $119 per year.

There's some fine print there.

But, you know, if you go with Disney Plus and Hulu, introductory offer, all three services, $29.99 for the first year, we're getting into the language of, as I used to hear as a New Yorker, you know, the triple play is the deal, like these jingles from cable companies.

We are in that era for DTC now.

Well, we're now,

bundling is my favorite word because what we talked about was breaking the bundle and having people go a la carte and pay for what they want.

That was the whole argument of why people were cutting their cord.

I don't want to pay for a baseball game that I don't want to watch.

Now, what all these companies are jumping over each other to do is to bundle and give the consumer an offer and the ability to get more than one streaming service.

You put them all together and you pay a price per month.

And what it leads to is

you end up paying more.

And so it's been one of the great grifts.

It makes me so happy

from a stockholder standpoint is that people have not yet figured out that they're paying more per month.

And we almost got caught just now with the NFL schedule release.

Why?

Because it was announced where the NFL is going to have games on YouTube and games here, games there.

Someone added up how much it would be to get every NFL game.

And it became a lot of money.

And I got nervous because if people start paying attention to that, there's going to be a bit of a kick.

back.

And this is from the league that said they were going to be free for as long as possible.

Well, that's

fire.

And they were.

And that was a fine place to be at the time.

But there's a reason it's $29.95.

The cable operators are paying probably at this point $11,12

for ESPN 10, 11, 12 bucks.

$29.99, by the way.

Yeah, $29.99.

That's very relevant.

So they're already having to charge more money to get to the same economics on the customer.

And get ready for something else which you will love, which is, and they've already done it on ESPN Plus.

If you want to watch the really high-profile UFC match

or a high-profile boxing match, you got to pay extra.

I will bet you this app has the capability to say, you know, we would love to give you that Alabama, Georgia game free, but we've decided this year we're going to charge

an extra $4.99 for that game.

Well, by the way,

it's called pay-view.

It's called pay-per-view, but it's going to be good business.

But you're going to, people think pay-per-view has to be the Tom Brady wrote, well, it wasn't, but they cost.

It has to be a big boxing match, a big UFC match.

We've talked on this show before that the Super Bowl will be a pay-per-view event.

This is John's most long-standing take.

Is that the money?

Oh, I got other long-standing takes that were wrong, so this could be as well.

But I'm consistent in my phone.

It used to be in the phone, another long-standing.

But you're going to,

as they struggle with delivering the growth the to the shareholders they're going to say how else can we make money oh we have these people captive we have their information we can send them some talk about the information so about about about data as well well they data is interesting and it will be people will overestimate how valuable it's going to be you still don't get much data from having somebody on app you can ask them to give you some who are your favorite teams you know where do you live how much money do you you have?

Maybe you'll give it to them.

Maybe you won't.

They can do implied data.

They can take outside data, put it against their files and find out where people live, where likely, what kind of cars they have.

But then what are you going to do with it?

I guess you would do better.

Rental advertising.

You'll go to more return on investment advertising.

It will work somewhat.

That is everything, though.

Everyone's playing Netflix.

It's

Netflix.

That is everything when you have a lot of data.

Data is not worth very much at all when you have a little data.

And it's worth a lot if you have a scalable and if you have a mechanism to deliver

more personalized ads.

Nobody delivers completely personalized ads.

Everybody's had the phenomenon of talking about going to take a Greek cruise and suddenly you get ads.

So there you're getting a personal ad.

Well, because your phone's listening to you?

Yeah, because you're not.

I get that every day.

Maybe I assume we all do now.

But cut that off, and you don't get personalized ads.

You still get the same ads.

Do you want that?

Oh,

I get the best chargers for my devices.

I got things to help with cords that are all tangled.

I get great cargo shorts and undies.

It is the ads that get pushed to me.

I'm so worried about David Sampson's OPSEC,

as they say in the Defense Department.

I'm not at all.

I would just also add that with the projections, I don't want to get off that, if you don't mind, because when Iger pitches this, there's an investment here, quite a bit of infrastructure investment.

There is an assumption that there will be X number of subscribers and there's then a growth rate that's implied right onto this first number.

And you have to get back to analysts.

You have to get back to Wall Street.

You have to get back to your board.

And if they don't get the crossover that you're talking about with people signing up for this flagship, that's how, and we're going to call it flagship, even though it's

let's not call it flagship.

So we call it ESPN DCC.

Is that what you're going to call it for short?

ESPN the app.

If not enough people purchase the app and become subscribers on a monthly and annual basis because they don't feel as though they're getting any incremental benefit to what they already have, this app is not going to work.

And it will be gone.

Yeah,

in my opinion, the app will work.

I mean, they will.

How long would you give it?

How long before you have to show your board that it worked?

At least three to five years.

I was saying two years in the state.

Let's walk through this because for me, it's very obvious that every company,

it's the most obvious thing that ESPN was going to do this at some point, such that even John, I assume John, at some point.

Do you remember actually, because I want to give a bit of the logic behind the scenes here.

Do you remember when this was first presented to you as a possibility that, hey,

this is something we should consider?

The first year that cable subscriptions went down was 2012.

So in 2012 would have been the first time that there began to be discussions about if this declines,

what is going to replace it.

And you were already having things that were starting as apps, right, as businesses.

So we were aware that that's another way to do business.

And I think that they are actually have made

about the right call on timing that doing it before this, they would have just given money away.

But now they have to because you've reached a point in the pay television universe, particularly when you look at it age-wise, right?

So lots and lots of young people, the most valuable people that advertisers won't, are giving up their cable subs.

So it's not just.

They're called never quarters now, actually, because they're not cutting their cords.

They actually now never even have them to start with.

But they're more valuable customers.

And now there's enough of them that they have to do it now.

But their timing is pretty good.

And I think they will get a

this uptake will not be enormous.

I don't think you're going to see 5 million subs at the end of one year.

The only person really who needs this is the person who still has a cable to television scription and wants to get rid of it.

Or the never quarter, what do you call them?

Never quarters?

Never quarters.

Did you, you've heard that before?

Somehow I hadn't.

Okay, I may have it wrong then.

Because you're waiting for it.

No, I think it's right.

But

you've got enough of those.

They have to do it now.

It will work over time.

They're going to be successful.

The only question is how successful.

And how quickly.

And how quickly.

And how big a runway did Disney give them?

And how satisfactory is where they get to for the shareholders.

And if they don't get to a place, do they become a target for someone else to acquire them, right?

Because

it's judged that they would be more valuable in a different aggregation of.

The reason why you started in 2012 is that what your company realized is that your revenue was going down and your expenses had no avenue to go down because leagues were not giving you a break on the rights deals and you were stuck in long-term contracts and if you have fixed expenses with declining revenue that's it that's how a business goes under so those discussions have to start and here we are 13 years later so i would argue that espn it's not the perfect time because they have had declining results in that area now they've made up for it they've had declining results they have not had declining revenue.

The decline of subscriptions until very recently

was under the increase in per subscriber rate.

ESPN was getting 7% increases every year in what the cable operators were paying them.

Until very recently, the subscriptions weren't declining 7%.

The more important fact, which you just mentioned, was the rights fees, on the other hand, were going up.

Now, rights fees in a long-term contract are only going up 2%, 3% or 4%.

So you're fine.

Subscriptions go down 3%.

Rates, your rights fees go up 3%.

What's eating at your margin, though?

It's eating to your margin.

I mean, I understand your five.

You're correct.

And the margins were declining even back in 2012, 13, 14, 19.

And that's what they'd say on Wall Street.

I mean, that's when you talk about why stock prices are not going up the way they should, it's because what John just said, when you have declining margins, that means you have declining earnings per share.

As you've probably heard by now, we've teamed up with BedMGM this season.

We'll be using BedMGM Lines to make all of our picks, and we'll have special offers for our listeners each week.

If you haven't signed up for BedMGM yet, use bonus code The Athletic, and you'll get a one-year subscription to the athletic plus up to a $1,500 first bet offer on your first wager with BetMGM.

Here's how it works.

Download the BetMGM app and sign up using bonus code The Athletic.

Make your first deposit of at least $10, place your first bet on any game and claim your voucher for a one-year subscription to the athletic.

See BetMGM.com for terms, U.S.

promotional offers not available in D.C., Mississippi, New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico.

Gambling problem?

Call 1-800-GAMBLBRER available in the U.S.

Call 877-8-HOPENY or text HOPE-NY-467-369 in New York.

Call 1-800-NEXTSTEP in Arizona.

1-800-327-5050 in Massachusetts.

1-800-BETS Off in Iowa.

1-800-270-7117 for confidential help in Michigan.

1-800-981-0023 in Puerto Rico.

First bet offer for new customers only in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel.

Don't forget, if you haven't signed up for Bet MGM yet, use bonus code The Athletic and you'll get a one-year subscription to the athletic, plus up to a $1,500 first bet offer on your first wager.

You open the fridge, there's nothing there.

So what's it going to be?

Greasy pizza?

Sad drive-through burgers?

Dish by Blue Apron is for nights like that.

These are the pre-made meals of your dreams.

At least 20 grams of protein, no artificial flavors or colors, no chopping, no cleanup, no guilt.

Keep the flavor.

Ditch the subscription.

Get 20% off your first two orders with code APRON20.

Terms and conditions apply.

Visit blueapron.com slash terms for more.

National debt relief has already helped over 550,000 Americans reduce their debt by negotiating directly with their creditors.

When you call, you'll be amazed at how much you can save and how quickly you can become debt-free.

If you want off the debt treadmill, visit nationaldebtrelief.com today.

You don't need to declare bankruptcy and you may qualify for significant debt relief.

To find out what savings you may qualify for, simply visit nationaldebtrelief.com.

That's nationaldebtrelief.com.

I think the way that I have come to understand

how you guys see this in our perpetual quest to explain as rich guys only fans what it's like in these board meetings is is the arrow green or red?

Is it growing or is it going down?

And managed decline has been certainly like an undeniable phenomenon since 2012 is the date John gave us.

But at the same time, when it comes to the, and this is now cleanup, Isle Sampson, cord never's.

Oh, I got it opposite.

Very, very.

It's probably true that most of them were never cords either.

Never quarters.

Never quarters.

They were never quarters either.

It's a funny old person thing to flip the term that describes a young person.

Guilty.

But I thank you for that cleanup.

Really important stuff there, Pablo.

Even if ESPN has some decline, it still is a significant contributor to the bottom line.

And the reason they build a theme park, which they, I think they just announced as well, in the Middle East is because they believe that will

allow them to show overall, because people buy Disney stock.

There is no ESPN stock.

So you really have to look at it.

And I know you know this as a collection of assets, some of which may have a green era, some of which may have a red era.

That may change year to year, right?

Do you think Abu Dhabi is getting a Disney park because there's a lot of people in Abu Dhabi who want to to go to a Disney park?

I read that news totally differently, and we didn't talk about this, but I assumed that it was some sort of other deal involving the government, involving Disney, which gave them quite a bit of incentive to build a park.

I would assume

that...

Where are they building it?

Did I get it?

Abu Dhabi.

I thought it was Abu Dhabi.

I would assume the government of Abu Dhabi is paying them a very handsome amount of money to build a park there because they want the

brand halo that they get from having a Disney park.

You build a park there, you are basically giving the Disney

imprimateur to the government of that country and they pay for it.

Much like getting a plane.

Well, speaking of the planes, right?

Like that's part of

the whole Middle Eastern.

It's a little different, I would say.

It's a little different, I would say.

I would say that the president's job is is not to grow his personal wealth.

It is the job of a CEO to grow the wealth of his company.

So this is a great point you're making because, therefore, you're saying it's fine when companies are doing business in places where it is less than, shall we say, moral.

You're totally fine with that.

No, I didn't say that.

I'm totally fine.

I just said there is a...

There is a hierarchy or a literal egregiousness and an individual getting a plane when he exit office if if the ceo of the company was getting a plane from abu dhabi that would become his personal plane upon retirement which is what will happen no matter what the president says he will get that plane it will be part of his library uh do you not think that bob iger will have use of a private plane as a definition

i i expect that the consideration given from the abu dhabi uh from abu dhabi to Disney will not go into Bob Iger's pocket other than the compensation he gets for doing a good job.

That's different than taking, yeah, you think Bob Iger gets away with taking a player

for personal use pocket.

I'm telling you that the deal with Abu Dhabi is not because Disney did market research around the world and said, oh my God, I've got it.

We need a park in Abu Dhabi.

Right now, the world of all business is rushing to the Middle East because they will spend money for reasons other than seeing a direct financial return.

And they have a lot of it.

Well, we saw, by the way, the world of politics and business converge on the Middle East as part of this whole week in which it turns out

that when, in this case at least, when the cable television ecosystem is drying up, you got to find some places where there is ability to make profit, to increase earnings.

And so the plain thing I'm going to say briefly is that, look, the premise of it is:

Abu Dhabi, Dubai, these airports, which are very nice and have very nice planes, admittedly, right?

That's part of the marketing for those regimes.

And so they're saying, hey,

you want to come from Shanghai, Hong Kong, to a Disney park?

Guess what you can do?

And this very beautiful, high-class, luxurious thing that also may or may not just not include, I don't know, some unsavory,

let's say, less than American ideals that you're sort of like flying over, quite literally.

I view Disney, I associate the brand.

The reason this surprised me is my view of Disney is very much all-American.

It's very Disney pure.

Disney, they don't want it.

They're upset with all the McAfee stuff.

Like, they don't want any part of that.

And then they're building a park in Abu Dhabi.

It blew my mind until I started doing the math.

Well, it's also just omnipresent.

Like, we, again, we have to, this is a separate episode, truly, and we should do it.

And I am doing episodes about this too, but just like the Middle East and its role as the bankroller of media, entertainment, sports, this is Disney is part of this true week of stuff in which everybody is getting into business in a way that's obvious.

I want to get to Michael Jordan.

Can we do that?

David is not interested.

Okay.

You're not interested?

No, I mean, listen, the NBA has made its bed with new partners.

There's new TV deals that start next year.

NBC has really played it up that they're back in the business.

They're calling out the 1990s with the round ball rock theme, which is John Tesh, my favorite guy.

I love you, Connie Selica.

What was that shout out?

Connie Selica is

Gil Girard's ex-wife, who's now married to John Tesh.

She was in the greatest American hero.

That is.

Hotel.

Am I the only person?

Man, he's got some information.

Okay.

That's just called puberty, but okay.

And so.

Google this person.

You've never heard of Connie Selica.

I mean, we can edit this out because I'm so upset right now.

I don't think we're going to damages that.

Let's move on.

Michael Jordan.

So Michael Jordan got, he is part of the 90s sort of.

Well, wait, he's arguably, I would argue, the greatest player in the history of the NBA.

And potentially the most popular player in the history of the NBA.

And merely the second most relevant Jordan in the world of North Carolina

these days, John.

Notably, I'm sparing you from my own investigation there.

And it's a coup to get him.

How good he'll be, I don't know.

But if you are sitting around a room going, we now have the NBA, who do we want on the air?

You'd say, Michael Jordan, the first thing you would get around the table is we'll never get him.

He's not going to be on the air.

So he's a special contributor.

Isn't that what he keeps saying?

A special contributor.

What does that?

So, so I want to get into the room, though, right?

In which, okay, guess what?

You've acquired this rights deal for billions of dollars and you got to staff it with,

you know, the not staffing with Jordan.

They did a contract where he has to make several appearances.

He taped something for the upfronts.

He didn't even show up at the upfronts.

They did a tape of

that's a funny signal.

So to me, you have to manage manage expectations about this hologram of michael jordan look it's marketing if if nothing else it will be successful marketing that they are getting associated we just talked about the the abu dhabi wanting to be associated with the walt disney brand they want to be associated with the dis with the jordan brand do you think his first contribution will be him giving an interview to somebody or doing the interview of somebody if you're a special contributor there you're working on stories it will be the former they will

They will be interviewing him.

We're going to have something that Michael Jordan is going to say about the upcoming game.

I don't think Michael Jordan.

Michael's going to give us 10 minutes on who he thinks is going to win the championship this year.

He's going to meet with advertisers.

He's going to be part of the Brady Fox deal.

Well, I would assume, depending on the number.

See, with Brady, we got the number, and part of the number was not just being the number one analyst.

It was he had to do up fronts.

He had to do ambassador work.

We have to see what special contributor means.

If he's getting $7 million a year, that's one thing.

If he's getting $30 million a year, that's a wholly different thing, right?

It'd be hard for me to understand why he would do it for $7 million a year.

Isn't he a billionaire?

Yep.

You become a billionaire by making money.

Well, I realize, but $7 million is not a matter of money.

That's aggregating that clip.

Ha-choo, hot-choo.

I mean, why would you say

someone offers you $7 million a year?

You're like, oh, no, sorry.

I mean, you're talking to the guy.

You're not talking to a billionaire.

But if somebody said to me, you know,

for $96 a month, I would like you to do something, I would say no.

And this is probably about $7 million would be about $96 a month for Michael Jordan.

Oh, I love that.

Proportionally to me.

That's my favorite.

The argument of, oh, when he gambles $10,000 on a golf hole, he has enough money that's the equivalent of you and I on a weekend gambling $5.

I get that math.

It is the cruelty.

But it is not how very well-to-do people think.

Very well-to-do people.

It's like $25 to do nothing, you would do it.

Why would you turn down that's like an uber per month free well

one it's an interesting supposition that'd be offering

somebody offer me 96 to do nothing a month and i know you'll be surprised but i wouldn't take it why would i take money to do nothing it's my goal

david would would love to be a special contributor to any organization out there that wants a no-show contribution you know what i'd like to offer my services right now as a special contributor to anybody listening who is prepared to pay

$1,000 a month for

no contributor.

So your number is not 96%.

Well, I've already now we're just quick.

I always said you asked me about the Middle East one time.

Trillions, I believe.

Everybody is prepared at some number.

Mine is a trillion right now.

So your numbers are a thousand, though.

You just said there's a shot.

You have an ongoing chart, by the way.

The way that people have stock charts is what would we do to sell out to the Middle East.

Currently, the bar is at $1 trillion.

That may adjust over time.

yeah and we already know he'll do something for a thousand dollars ninety six not not good enough that's a hell of a negotiation that's happening right my only point was to make

the point

that i want i always wonder why people do things that are not material to their lives Because you add up little things, they become material.

That's like saying, why do something nice for someone that's not big gesture?

Because a lot of small gestures add up and become noticeable to the person who's doing it.

I mean, I don't know this because I don't do those gestures, but I'm just going to say that.

You're way off into

interesting philosophical territory.

You have to balance it against the use of your ever-dwindling time.

And Michael Jordan is not a baby.

And to me, it would have to be a material amount of money for him to spend any time doing it.

Yeah, Baby Jordan, Harold Miner, a different contract negotiator.

He doesn't know who that is.

What a gray car.

We don't remember

number 45 for the Miami Heat, Harold Minor.

I don't know if he wore 45, but it just feels like he wore 45.

Though maybe that was Jordan's number when he came out of retirement.

If my name was Minor, I would take 24

as my jersey number.

So perfectly.

In the way that David Sandson flip-flopped never quarters and cord nevers, Harold Minor is number four.

32.

Wow.

That's funny.

Not an accident.

No.

Withdraw.

Thank you.

It's the best thing you can do.

It was a a long time strategy of mine.

It's just

incredible restraint.

The whole idea of we want to get our dream hire in here, and that would be Michael Jordan.

I'm just curious, John,

was there a white whale for you in terms of as the president of ESPN, the guy who made billion-dollar decisions, is there someone that you wanted to hire as a special contributor that you couldn't get?

And he's already laughing.

Well, I have to say, at ESPN, we weren't big.

Our problem was not, we didn't want special contributors.

We weren't looking for headlines.

We were looking for people to work.

And it was frequently why I could not get some of the best talent into

ESPN, right?

Mr.

Barkley was the best in the business at NBA, and we wanted to get Charles Barkley.

But

he would have had, by the way, he just complained the other day.

This is in the news the other day.

Charles Barkley said, don't think you're going to get me in that ESPN car wash.

I'm not doing that.

I'm not doing Sports Center.

Nobody's going to tell me what to do.

Yeah, so you'll get the quote as you're trying to work less

versus more, I believe you said.

And yes, we had lots of people we wanted to get that we couldn't get.

First of all, at the time we were kind of cheap, right?

We paid.

lower scale because we had a lot of people.

And we did,

I tried very hard to get Shaq when he was available, tried to convince him that

he'd be his show on ESPN.

He wouldn't be the second fiddle to Charles Barkley.

And David Levy, good friend of mine, went to him and said, you know, I'm going to pay you as much, probably more than John Skipper will.

And you won't have to do anything except show up, start talking.

And

that's all you have to do.

And by the way, Shaq, who was very very funny about it, basically told me, I ran into him one time.

He's like, I wasn't going to come over there.

You were going to put me up.

And he was right.

We gave him an offer.

It included sports center appearances.

It included whatever the early morning show at the time was appearances.

It included, you know, post-game, pre-game.

You got to show up.

You got to rehearse.

And he said, why would I do that?

And by the way, he was right.

I've not been able to get those kind of offers.

I did not say I was immune to very material offers that did not require a lot of heavy lifting.

To quote Charles Barkley on the record, quote, they're not going to work me like a dog and not pay me.

They'll have me on ESPN 1, 2, 3, ESPN News, ESPNU, ESPN Radio, and then come up with that puny little check.

They're going to have me on ESPN Deporte saying, muy bien gracias.

He really said that.

Yes.

I would like to point out to Charles, because Sir Charles may not understand the concept of licensing.

His His contract will remain with Warner Brothers Discovery.

A little nugget here for you, Pablo.

He's not going to ESPN.

He's not an employee of ESPN.

He has nothing to do with ESPN.

ESPN is licensing inside the NBA.

Yeah.

Licensing is a very good question.

I think that's

an earlier quote.

That was an earlier quote by Barkley, by the way.

Oh, I think this was just this week.

No, he's been saying this stuff.

He did say it again.

This was 2016 that he said that quote.

But he's been saying a version of this.

Yes, this week.

He said it this week.

I'm not going to be.

I'm not sure you're reading this week's quote.

Why would you read this week?

This said it from 2016.

Because he's been saying it for over a decade.

There wasn't a license deal.

That's when he had not signed his big deal with Turner yet.

That was the Shaq story.

So he was also

trying to host the show.

I'm not trying to host the show.

I'm trying to understand what the hell you're talking about.

So

Barkley did say it this week, and he said it in the context of complaining that it had not been made clear to him what the relationship between inside the NBA and ESPN.

So he's basically saying it had been made clear to him, by the way.

That I'm not privy to, but I would not disagree.

And what he was saying was, I'm unhappy they have made it clear to me.

And by the way, they haven't made it unclear what my obligations are to ESPN.

And I'm not going to do what they always do, which is do the car wash, go along all the shows, which is what people used to do.

Can I help, Sir Charles?

His obligation is exactly as that is outlined in his Turner contract.

Those are the obligations.

It is not that his contract has been assigned to ESPN.

It is not, I think he kind of...

Charles Barkley once said, I got misquoted in my own autobiography.

I don't think he's necessarily reading the fine print on anything.

Well, whether he is or not, he also

has

a great reputation as a character, non-conformist,

non-authoritarian.

So he's just being true to his brand there, that he's

not controllable.

It's good for him.

Even if he knows exactly what he has to do, it's good for his soul to say, nobody tells me what to do.

Charles Barkley,

beyond sounding like people that we may know or

like and love in our own lives, he does play a game, Charles does, called Who He Play For?

in which he doesn't know the answer to any of those questions.

And it seems like maybe David is saying that applies to his own employees.

Which called what?

Who he play for?

They show him a picture of, or rather, a name or a jersey-less player, and they say, Who does he play for?

And he does not know.

I worked one time for a couple of years at Us Magazine, and we had a game played Alive or Dead, which you chose somebody's picture,

and it is shockingly hard.

Oh, yeah.

I had Lorraine Bracco on that list until I watched the most recent Nona movie with Vince Vaughan on Netflix, and I said, Oh, my God, I got that wrong.

I just had to double-check.

Connie Selica,

don't say it,

alive, and more than that, to quote the characters we've been talking about.

I just want to apologize to Connie Selika.

I was not familiar with your game.

What?

I don't know.

I surround.

Withdrawn, as they say.

Remind me who Connie Selica was.

The essence of beauty.

Okay.

Wow.

I think it's probably

to stop podcasting.

Wow.

And how was that manifested?

Is she an actress?

Is she

I listed the thing she was on.

Pablo,

you have a ding in your table and a mark.

One of the shows that I've got.

If you've been listening and not watching on YouTube, you've made a mistake for lots of reasons.

But David has identified what I now identify as a pockmark

on the table.

And a scratch.

And a scratch.

It's got to be repainted.

Is that you, John?

It's incredibly distracting.

I don't think so.

It looks like a scratch.

Someone scratched it.

One of your guests, I assume, on your award-winning show.

Yeah.

This is inexcusable right here.

This is Mark, though.

Anyway, we'll talk about it after the show.

I feel like we just did it.

Okay.

John.

Thank you.

David.

Happy to be here.

Love podcasting.

Goodbye.

Pablo Torre Finds Out is produced by Walter Averoma, Ryan Cortez, Sam Dawig, Juan Galindo, Patrick Kim, Neely Lohman, Rob McRae, Rachel Miller-Howard, Carl Scott, Matt Sullivan, Claire Taylor, Chris Tumanello, and Juliet Warren.

Our studio engineering by RG Systems, our sound design by NGW, post, our theme song, as always, by John Bravo.

And we will talk to you next time.

When disaster takes control of your life, ServePro helps you take it back.

ServePro shows up faster to any size disaster to make things right, starting with a single call, that's all.

Because the number one name in cleanup and restoration has the scale and the expertise to get you back up to speed quicker than you ever thought possible.

So whenever, never thought this would happen actually happens, ServePro's got you.

Call 1-800-SERVPRO or visit ServePro.com today to help make it like it never even happened.

Hey everybody, it's Nicole Beyer here with some hot takes from Wayfair.

A cozy corduroy sectional from Wayfair?

Um yeah, that's a hot take.

Go on and add it to your cart and take it.

A pink glam nightstand from Wayfair?

Scalding hot take.

Take it before I do.

A mid-century modern cabinet from Wayfair that doubles as a wine bar?

Do I have to say it?

It's a hot take.

Get it at Wayfair.com and enjoy that free shipping too.

Wayfair, every style, every home.

Wouldn't it be nice if your cash savings could just grow by itself?

With the Wealthfront cash account, it can, earning 4% annual percentage yield from partner banks on your uninvested cash, nearly 10 times the national average.

Just imagine if other things in your life worked the way Wealthfront works.

If your houseplants grew at 10 times the average rate, you'd have 10 times fewer issues with sad stunted succulents.

Your crocodile ferns would go to the size of crocodiles.

Wealthfront's cash account keeps your money thriving just like that, earning you an industry-leading rate with no account maintenance fees and with free 24-7 instant withdrawals so you can access your money whenever you need it.

Money works better here.

Go to WealthFront.com to start saving.

Cash account offered by Wealthfront Brokerage LLC member FENRA SIPC.

Wealthfront is not a bank.

The APY on cash deposits as of December 27, 2024 is representative, subject to change and requires no minimum.

Funds in the cash account are swept to partner banks where they earn the variable APY.

The national average interest rate for savings accounts is posted on FDIC.gov as of december sixteenth, twenty twenty four.