When Sports and Scandal Collide: Inside the Biggest Controversies and Comebacks

Foreign.

Thanks, Jim and Tom, for joining me on the podcast. Love having you guys here this time of year because the fall, it's a great time of year for sports. So here's my first question for you. Tell me your fandom, who you follow in football.

Just football, baseball, Yankees, Giants.

Oh, God, I should hang up.

The. I'm guessing Patriots, sitting Red Sox.

Tom, how about you? I know you said you weren't much of a sports.

Yeah.

One of the ironies is that I'm really not a sports guy. I'm a crisis guy. But I will say I have had periods in my life when I was following the Mets and the Nets.

Okay.

I am from New Jersey and New York.

But hey, you guys, I'm glad that we had a chance to speak here. There was something about your book coming in the mail about sports crisis communications, the cases and the controversy, and also the background of the two of you. This is truly a melding of a sports background, a journalistic background. So just give me your brief bio and how you two came together to put this book together.

Yeah, I have a journalism background, and about 10 years ago, I went to the dark side, as they say, but mostly on the crisis side. So I do crisis communications, advising companies and individuals how to deal with the media when they have a negative situation.

We're essentially in the same business right there. And it is a very busy time. September, I find, is always busy. But it's interesting, Jim, so your firm also has a sports.

Yeah. So about seven years ago, our boss, Jim Hag, found that his sports footprint was expanding. I worked at HBO Sports for a number of years, and the timing was just right. I was able to come in, help him out with that stuff, a lot of straight pr. And of course, over the past seven years or so, I've really gotten acclimated and christened into the world of crisis as well.

Well, almost every sector obviously has crisis issues right off the bat. You mentioned the golf background. When we think of golf and crisis, we. We have one name that comes to the top, which is Tiger Woods. Just in general, how do you think he navigated from that very bad Thanksgiving weekend to now? Like, where does the industry view a Tiger Woods?

I think he's become, as he's gotten older, a little bit more, maybe likable or less harmful. He's been seen in the media as a great father. Lately, that's been where he's at. We see him not playing anymore, but caddying for his son and guiding his son through the process of becoming at Some point he's going to be a collegiate player. I think that image has helped that fatherly image. And when we see him now, he's there with his son and his daughter and his arms around them and they love him. I think that's helped his image. History will tell where people are going to have certain biases, but I think for the most part, he's just going to go down as one of the greatest golfers of all time and a guy who's right into the ship. How much of it was purposeful or inadvertently? I'm not entirely sure.

Yeah, because looking back on that incident with his wife, of course, it was fidelity scandal that came right into his sponsorship and just him being the golden boy of golf. But you're absolutely right. People wanted to still like Tiger Woods. They didn't want to cast him aside. I think it's somewhat reasonable that people understand that there are breakdowns in marriage, but you can always be a good parent, and that's definitely what we're seeing there. So let's highlight a couple of the crisis examples that you two talk about in your book. And they usually involve a superstar in the sport or like a big powerful team. You know what's interesting, as we were coming up with the stories to talk about, so many of these you forget about and then you just see a headline or two, and then it comes racing back to you. And the first one is Aaron Rodgers and State Farm, which brings us back to the days of the whole vaccination. So tell me a little bit about.

What happened in that crisis that goes back to 20. You're in the middle of the COVID and Rogers, let's say, fibbed a little about his vaccination status and that became a big scandal.

Are you vaccinated and what's your stance on vaccinations? Yeah, I've been immunized.

He's a big spokesman for State Farm, the big insurance company. So the question was, how were they going to deal with this and how were they going to react? And they basically didn't do anything that was noteworthy. This is a big subject in the book because sponsorships. What do you do if you're a marketer and you have a sports spokesman or spokes and they get into trouble, it's a reflection on your brand. So that was what we were discussing there.

It feels like maybe instead of going the spokesperson route of handing over it to having a star player be their spokesperson, as they went to Jake from State Farm, who certainly have different iterations right now, and is one of the more popular campaigns out there. So certainly they reign supreme coming out of this particular crisis. But the company said their take on it that you talk about is we encourage vaccinations, but respect everyone's right to make a choice based on their personal circumstances. So they really stood by their spokesperson.

Yeah, that was such a hot issue because a lot of people are against vaccination. So a state farm took a position on one way or the other, they would upset one group or the other. And that's such a standard issue in crisis.

Yeah. So that partnership came to an end two years later. Where do you see Aaron Rodgers right now as a brand? Because just in terms of a public figure, he's certainly destined for the hall of Fame, but he's had so many interesting storylines, certainly moving the teams. You know where he is right now. I believe he was just chosen captain.

He might have been, yeah. His leadership is undeniable. Obviously, like you say, he's a future hall of Famer, a seasoned veteran. Look, he's a quirky guy. There's just no getting around it. And that served him well in the most part, because I think it's. He was one of those classic guys who wasn't drafted as early as he wanted and had a chip on his shoulder and willed himself to win. It's a good story. He was in Green Bay for most of his career. I think he's wired as welcome with the jets in New York. We'll see how it ends up in Pittsburgh. But he's just one of those guys that if you hit your wagon to him, especially at this point, who he is, what he's about, what he brings to the table. Again, history will judge him, but I think largely he'll be viewed as a guy who was in his own little world and made it work for him. And that's who Aaron Rodgers is now.

Moving on to another quarterback, going back to Green Bay and a stop at the Minnesota Vikings, Brett Favre. Like, he was a different type of a problematic quarterback. So, Jim, tell me a little bit about the background and what you talk about in the book about.

So a lot of people might remember he's had a few different scandals, but the one that really occurred after his playing career was he pressured public officials to divert some welfare money to build a volleyball court arena at his alma mater where his daughter was a member of the volleyball team. And of course, there was a text thread that was evidence to all this, and it, of course, harkened back to the sexting scandal that he had when he was a player with the Jets. So there was precedence there. And I think Aaron Rodgers probably is one of those guys that maybe thinks he's a little bit smarter than he actually is. I think Brett Favre was always like the football player. He was that GU guy who was great on the field. Maybe not didn't have a whole lot else going on. And again, football fans maybe don't care about some of that stuff. It's not going to tarnish his image, his legacy. They'll forget about it. They'll just remember what he did on the field. But I think for the most part, he clearly has some reputational issues that are hard to shake at this point in his life.

We also use this as he's embroiled in this mess in Mississippi over these welfare funds. So we use it as an example to talk about litigation and litigation pr, because that's a big. I mean, in a certain sense, it's separate from crisis pr, but they're really kind of melding. And we always say that every crisis has a legal aspect now, but then you have absolute litigation and there's all sorts of best practices there in terms of communications in the media. He's basically not doing much in terms of that. I don't think he's not telling his story at all, really. But we did use it as a way to talk about the importance of telling your story, even in litigation.

Yeah, well, you mentioned that all crises have a legal implication. I say that all have a financial implication. And this usually all problems. The road leads back to money, certainly, which happened in this case. But comparing two quarterback and even Tiger woods for that matter, why does one survive and one doesn't? And. And not only that, when he had this issue, he was dropped by Sirus xm. He also was dropped by ESPN Game Day. He's taken a lot of hits on this Brett Favreau. Why do you think people dropped him? Why were they so quick to drop him compared to other athletes?

Sometimes I think it matters what you do afterwards. Like, Brett Favre isn't really doing a whole lot else. We're not seeing him outside doing anything. But again, a Tiger woods is present, even if he's not playing. But with his family, even an Aaron Rodgers is still playing. So his situation is a little bit different than somebody who's been retired a number of years. I think this is all we're hearing about Brett Favre. If he's not changing the narrative, there's nothing else that he's doing right now. So I think that has something to do with it. And it's easier to drop someone like that because that's the case.

Okay, so now moving on to the culture aspect of it, sports. Right now, where we are in the season, it's fall season, so we're inching closer to the post season in baseball and we're just kicking off the NFL season. Do you think. Where do you think the NFL is right now? As just a league in terms of reputation. And if I'm using a scale of measurement trust, how does the public feel about the NFL?

Wow. I think one thing that we've found out with some of the scandals that there have been in the NFL, whether they've been team related, player related, owner related, whatever the case may be, is that they're somewhat impervious and the ratings don't really dip. It's great to have a Taylor Swift bump, but regardless, it's just as popular as it's ever been. Numbers are through the roof. The super bowl always does great, even when people have issues. We talk about the whole kneeling thing during the national anthem in the book. And sure, that was a difficult time and it really was a great political divide, but people didn't stop watching. And if they did, they're back to watching now. I think reputationally, they're always going to have their challenges. The NFL, it just seems to be the nature of the beast for them. But I will never bet against them not being able to weather the storm.

Well, you said something very telling there in betting against them. What is the influence of or impact of gambling on sports right now?

We actually spoke to Bob Costas about this, who has an interesting background in his personal life about this. And look, there's so much going on right now. Interesting right now. What we're really seeing is Adam Silver, who of all the commissioners of the major sports has probably been the one that's been the most proactive in this area and spoken well about it from the day he became commissioner in, I think, 2014. And he's still talking about it because he advocated very early on for the legalization. And of course, with cell phones now, it's easier than ever. And of course, the argument is that make it legal and we could control it better. That seems to be working because they're catching guys now. Johntay Porter, a basketball player, was banned for life. It's these watchdog groups that are out there. Specifically, prop bets are the biggest issue, like where a guy's talking about his personal stats. We've seen it extend down to the ncaa. Recently, there's talk of minimizing some of the things that there could be prop bets on because it could be a little bit overkill. Do we have to take every single pitch in a baseball game? Is it going to be a ball? Is it going to be a strike? It becomes too easy for the players to manipulate without even changing the outcome of the game. Years ago, when it was illegal, it used to be point shaving, throwing games, throwing the World Series. Now it's just what seemingly is an innocuous little thing that should go under the radar. Except it's not going under the radar because there's these watchdog groups who are picking up on it straight away. So it's all come to a head now, and it's really an interesting time.

I really think that gambling, in terms of reputation, it's just a minefield for sports. And I think we're going to see a lot of crises related to that.

Yeah, they're going to have to untangle it because we've. It's. It sometimes it seems like we've come so far since Pete Rose and the gambling scandal back then, but then we also haven't. So just out of curiosity, what are your thoughts on a Pete Rose and a Hall?

And much like some of the other guys we've spoken about, I think time softens things a little bit. And as the generations turn over, I could pull in somebody from our office here who's a late 20s sports fan, who, if you explain the Pete Rose thing to him, he'd probably just shrug his shoulders. And it's not because he's indifferent. He's just like, yeah, that doesn't sound like. So I think he might get in posthumously, which probably a lot of people would have thought was always going to be the case. Sure. When you weigh it against other things. At first we thought Shohei Ohtani was going to be a Pete Rose situation until it sort of seemed like the interpreter was the sole bad guy in all this. Yeah.

I have to ask you about that because that's where, immediately where my head went. You work in a lot of sports in the industry, so you're deeper in it. That's the circle that you're in. What is the truth behind the matter? I mean, it felt at the time the interpreter was the shield, but then again, now we have Alex Cora at the Red Sox. But no, it just happened where he. The pitcher, where he knew the ball, catcher.

Okay, but I know what you mean.

Yeah, yeah. But in the response we had the interpreter and how interesting he said, no, I apologize, everything was fine. But I thought for sure that the interpreter was just the smokescreen, the straw man. But was there anything more behind this with Ohtani?

He's been vindicated legally. Right. So we have to go by that maybe it's not completely what we've been led to believe now. I mean, at. You're right at the start it seemed like, okay, could this guy be that oblivious to his finances, he didn't realize he was missing 16 million and this guy was just wiping it Sounds a little fishy, but listen, what? A lot of people measure these things by the results they see. Ohtani may be sort of machine like, but he's a human being and you would just think that it would affect his performance. Well, God, maybe he just compartmentalizes better than any athlete who ever lived. But he had a stellar year last year. If he had a guilty conscience, it sure didn't show up in his performance. So I think that helped a lot, that perception that like this must be the case. Maybe he's just so married to his job, is not paying attention, trusted this guy implicitly. Maybe he's just guilty of bad judgment, gave this guy the keys to his kingdom and couldn't trust him because it turned out the guy was an inveterate gambler. Maybe that's all it is. I guess you have to give him the benefit of the doubt though, for the most part.

But yeah, you know, Molly, it was so fascinating to follow that case in real time because of exactly what you're saying, that everybody thought it was one way in the beginning, beginning, and it moves so fast. And that's a big crisis thing too. We see a lot of it. You really don't know what the facts are at the beginning and you just have to withhold judgment on certain things. But if you're doing crisis communications, you have to make sure you have the facts straight.

But with sports, because sports, I look at it as a monoculture. You have your fans and you have your die hard fans and you have the money. It seems like so many of the issues fall to the side, whether it's in fault. So whether it's gambling or knocking on a garbage can like the Astros did to the, to the Red Sox and the Yankees. Okay, I'll give you Yankees. But there seems like in so many cases they get passes because unlike other people, like politicians or celebrities or people in the public eye, they don't directly impact people. But people love their athletes and they don't want to see anything negative about their athletes. So they tend to skirt. They get by a lot of times. So maybe be why he doesn't have a guilty conscience? Because maybe a lot of athletes don't see anything wrong with it either.

A lot of star athletes or any professional athletes have a little bit of arrested development because they've been on a pedestal since they were probably a young teenager. They stood out so much. One of the things we talk about in the book is what makes a sports crisis different than your average crisis. And what is the thing is that it's the deity of sports stars. It's just that their reality is a little bit different than the rest of us. And they are given passes because they're beloved. It's passionate. Right. Is like probably the first reason that I always talk about is you just don't see emotions like this elicited in everyday life. When you've rooted for a team your whole life and you believe in them and they're about to win and their biggest rival destroys them right in the end, it's an opera, it's tragic, and it's brutal. That transcends real life. People put so much stock into that.

It works both ways because on the one hand, okay, so you're the crisis counselor to some big athlete. You say, well, I don't have to do much. People love them so much you can get away with anything. But on the other hand, you'll be sleeping at the switch because after a while that stuff might catch up with you. So it works both ways.

Do you think there are any athletes right now who are more that scandal or problems seem to follow them, that it might catch up with them? Is there anyone on your radar right now?

I think. Anyone? No one specific. This is one why a lot of athletes are closed up, because they know that the more they open up and the more they put themselves out there and show their real personality, the more open they are to criticism. That could hurt. Endorsements could help too. Depends. But I think the showier and the flashy you are, the more the spotlight's going to be on you, and maybe you thrive on that. Everyone's going to have missteps. And unfortunately we know the discourse in the country at the moment. I hate to say this, but I think in a lot of ways the bar has been lowered. People will look at things now that maybe 20, 30, or certainly 40, 50 years ago were moments where you said, oh, God, that's terrible. And now it's like then that that's not too bad by today's standards.

I think that's really true. That's affecting the gambling issue.

Yeah. Another example to bring it back to my home team here, the Red Sox, I think it was last season when Jaren Duran was playing outfield and he's being heckled, which he is a player who's been heckled more than the average player out there. And then there was a homophobic slur that came out and that made big, instant news. Instant news. But Jaren Duran as a person showed such vulnerability because he was saying, I struggle. When I don't do well, I struggle. And the Red Sox worked with Netflix to come out the series the Clubhouse, where they sat down and they interviewed him. And I know, Jim, this is painful. As a Yankees fan, I could be unbiased, go on and on about the Red Sox. Yeah, there is some bias there. But I would say this, too. Even if this was like an Aaron Judge story, though, the guy's not faulting right now. But for someone to say, hey, I am struggling, they put him in a different position. And he's so open and vulnerable with his struggles he was able to turn out, which really a slur at that time, when it happened, would be very challenging for a team they would have to suspend for a significant amount of time. But there's something about him showing that vulnerability and just watching him on Netflix with the Clubhouse, I think there's something there. Again, you can be the bold athlete, but when you show what's happening. And here's actually another story. Cade Povich, the pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles in the past few weeks. Weeks put out a tweet on X with a screen grab showing what people were sending to his wife. Horrible, horrible commentary. And he put that out there to show people what it was like, the grief that they get now. Full disclosure, I know Kate, I know his wife. I was at their wedding, but I was shocked. I mean, I saw that on a news clip. Not from them and friends, but again, I don't think you would see that a couple years ago. But here's a young player who's so new to the majors coming out and saying something.

Yeah, I mean, certainly pre social media, that stuff might have been voiced at the ballpark anywhere around the country. And obviously some fan bases are a little bit more passionate and edgy than others. But now there is a trail, like an electronic trail. So they might be anonymous, but that stuff is there for people to see and for a guy like that to put out. So I think that's a big difference. And obviously, we could spend oodles of time on social media. But I think to your point about Jaron Duran, sure like a Netflix series humanizes him, right? I mean, that's something we as crisis people talk about all the time, right. Is showing that side of them and realizing that he has had mental health struggles. And it took him a while, but now he's really peaking. He's the type of guy you could root for as opposed to just a guy you want to root against or be mean towards or who unfortunately had a moment where he let the pressure get to him and responded in a way that he shouldn't have. But that's what second chances are for, right?

The other thing about Duran, in terms of the first incident, the slur early on, is he really apologized. It was a good, straightforward apology. And apologies are a big part of this. And it's just shocking how bad so many companies and organizations are at it.

They are at it. But there's also people will make apologies and people will dodge as well. Just curious your thoughts on if we were to look at the NFL and the CTE issue. That's one that's being dodged. So it. Does that ever catch up with the NFL or will they keep giving it to Heisman and keep out running it? Like what do you think about issues like that?

It's the Heisman where they're just going to dodge it. It's not that they haven't spoken about it, but again, it's not the type of thing where anyone's going to want their brand of football changed. We already hear people complaining about how football's gone too soft. And with the new kickoff rules and protecting the quarterback and cradling them, clearly the core football fan wants the rough and tumble game they grew up with. Can't deny the CTE stuff, right? It's omnipresent now. When you see the guys who do wear those extra big helmets, you're reminded of it. At least I am when I watch now. So I think things like that visually just bring it to the surface. It's no coincidence, I think that you're going to see like flag football as an Olympic event. Sure, that's to grow the game, but it's also a way to play football that's a lot Safer. Who knows, 20, 30 years or more beyond, could there be a scenario where it's flag football and not contact? I don't know. But I think the present day fan, longtime lifetime fan, struggles with that. If they were to even bother to think about it. Like, like I want need the brutality, but we don't want these guys dying before they're 50 and suffering these horrible lives that they sometimes have to endure because of head injuries.

Right, exactly. So now moving from the athlete itself, and then we talked about the different major league groups behind it now thinking it from more of a corporate point of view. You talk about in your book, the CEO takes us behind the scenes of a gun sale crisis. I bet a lot of people would forget about this, but in 2019 with gun sales. And in your book, you point out after Sandy Hook and after Stoneham Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, which has produced a lot of baseball players that high school, including Roman Anthony. But that was a case where Dick's Sporting Goods had to sit on a side. So what do you remember about that, writing about that in your book?

Yeah, we have some stories in there about what we call sports adjacent companies. I think sporting goods. It's a retailer. We just thought that was a good example of the CEO said, we're going to cut down on the gun sales. And he said in an interview, at first we were just going to put out a press release about it, but then they realized they needed a much bigger strategy. So the big thing in crisis is people just don't plan. They just hope nothing bad's ever going to happen. Here was a situation where he knew they were doing something controversial and they had to be ready for it. And he really did that, you know, at the time.

And I remember covering it, it worked. It came with a lot of bumps, certainly along the way, but fell on their value system and people, I find the public, from a public sentiment point of view, when you go with your values, you're going to get stakeholders who are going to follow you through that.

Which doesn't mean that you're not going to lose some revenue and stuff, right?

Yeah, you're going to take your hits with that. In another example that you highlight in your book as well titled here, Dodgers Try to Dodge a Bullet. This was such an interesting story about LGBTQ Pride night in June for the Dodgers. So, Tom, remind us about that story.

That's actually the opposite of the Dick Sporting Goods story. This was back in 2023, LGBTQ night for the Dodgers. They were going to honor this particular group, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. But then there was a backlash. And because the Sisters, they do demonstrations sometimes in nuns outfits. And so Catholic groups saw this as an affront, and the Dodgers eventually reneged on the invitation. But then, of course, you got backlash from the gay groups. And then to the point where the Dodgers eventually said, we will honor that. They went so back and forth. Our point was all that was predictable, that you were again in crisis. You always upset somebody. So they should have been aware that it was gonna be an issue. Especially at that time, you had the, it was a Mulroney, Dylan Mulvaney, I think Budweiser Mulvaney with the Budweiser ad. It was a hot topic around that time. So they really should have been more aware that was gonna happen.

I think that's what surprised me the most because you're absolutely right, Tom. We were in the throes of the Budweiser crisis, which started in March during when Budweiser came out with that special can included Dylan Mulvaney in the campaign. So that's where it first started. And then it trickled into April where it absolutely exploded. And it was still a topic of conversation because again, it brought in values. And Budweiser, instead of standing by it, they absolutely cut the woman whose idea it was to do. And then the CEO went on a victory lap on CBS Morning to talk about why they did it at cbs. Gayle King sat down with that CEO for a long time and gave them the platform to say, we are sticking by our one stakeholder here. And it was very obvious who that was. It was the typical Budweiser beer drinker. So they didn't care. But then the Dodgers skidded right into this in June during Pride Month, which made it really complicated. And why I found that crisis interesting in particular, because yes, they flip flopped. They had a lot of pressure. And if you remember, you, you talk about it in your book, it was Marco Rubio who was one of the names behind that put a lot of pressure because and this goes deep into it, but this is a part of it. It's the Dodgers I was imagining at the time, the front office. And not everybody in the front office like being hyper aware what happens online. But then you have still the young guys in the front office, young people who know what's happening online. And it was someone who made that decision, as someone who's not online savvy to know about that blowback. And then they made that first decision. But what I also found interesting just about that baseball aspect is yes, they satisfied the one arm of the Catholics, the Marco Rubio conservative Catholic, which is what we have now. But what they abandoned and didn't think about were the other side of the Catholics. A lot of their fan base, the Hispanic fan base, a lot of their players, they completely ignored them. And that's where A lot of the backlash came from as well. And so what happened, Tom? What did the Dodgers do then?

Like you say, it was a flip flop. And you have all these stakeholders and you're just not looking at including politicians. Right. Like Michael Rubio. I think sometimes people do this in such a bubble, they don't think about what the reaction's going to be.

Yeah. And they had to flip flop twice, which is a bad look. Which is a very bad look. Okay, one more. Because this is more current and this is going to bring us back into the NFL. So just yesterday I was reading my headlines and there pops Tom Brady, who's still considered in these parts of New England, like the goat. And then he abandoned us. And now there's some conflicts there because he's another guy. Everybody loves Tom Brady. You knew that he was just gonna walk into a bucket full of money. But Jim, what kind of conflict is Tom Brady dealing with right now?

Well, this is pretty interesting and I'll be as impartial as I can. I mean, you know, as my Giants beat him twice in the Super Bowl, I could, I could speak comfortably on this. But I do consider him the goat. He absolutely is. I think you're crazy if you don't think that he is. So there's this issue where he's a minority owner in the Los Angeles Raiders and he's of course also the lead analyst for Fox Sports and Sunday football games. They treaded lightly on this last year, last season, and he wasn't allowed to be in person at any facilities of other teams for pre production meetings and things of that nature that they some reason sort of rolled that back a little bit now and said he could be there remotely by zoom or whatever. So here's what happened Monday night. The Raiders are playing and he's there in the coach's box with a coach's headset on. Now everyone knows he's a minority owner with the Raiders, so optics are terrible at a minimum. Right. But the thing is, okay, the NFL statement is what really sort of made me laugh of how they dealt with this. They said there are no policies that prohibit an owner from sitting in a coach's booth or wearing a headset during a game. Well, he's more than just an owner. He is the lead analyst for Fox Sports. And as fact would have it, the Raiders are going to be playing the Chiefs, whose game he called the day before and presumably would have had access that not everyone gets because he gets to question them and talk to them and listen. If you listen to GMs and team owners, some anonymously, some out front. It's sort of split. You know, where they say it's not a big deal, we're not going to give him the keys to the kingdom. If that's just a game of we're not going to tell him anything, then that doesn't help his broadcasting credentials. But the problem with all this is that it feeds into the conspiracy theory that Tom Brady's on like this lofty level and enjoys this rarefied air that no one else gets and that these are Tom Brady rules. Because I'm pretty sure if it was anybody else, this just wouldn't be happening. So look, he could glean information from talking to these other teams and pass on to raise and he's an uber competitive guy. It's a big part of what made him so great. How are we just trusting that he's going to resist the urge to pass something along that he heard? It's a real problem. And as long as people keep complaining about it, I'm not quite sure how the NFL is going to deal with it. I don't think they've dealt with it well so far. Even the CEO of Fox Sports was kind of. We're not talking about that. At a conference here in New York earlier this week. They got a lot of figuring out to do.

I said yesterday at a gym, as the non sports person, I don't see how this isn't a conflict. It sounds crazy.

Is there anyone comparable to a Tom Brady where we could compare it like AB testing? There really isn't. When you think of owners, commentator, big money, big star players or anyone like it.

I think this is breaking new ground. I don't know that there's ever been a situation like this. It could pop up again. You could have a LeBron James who's expressing an interest in being a team owner. One day maybe he'll get into broadcasting as well, I don't know. But obviously if you're the goat, that means you're only around once a generation in a sport. So there's really not many people. There's not much precedence for something like this. That's part of the reason why I find it fascinating because this is going to pave the way for the future. I think in similar situations when they do arrive.

Yeah. So looking back at all these cases, from Aaron Rodgers to Brett Favre to to Tom Brady, what's the common thread you see in sports crises or sports issues that make or break a response?

I think it's a lot of the regular, I'll call it crisis rules do apply as far as timeliness and gathering all the facts. A lot of times as we know, the first response is usually bungled. It's not handled well in a lot of crises. I think a lot of that still applies. You have to navigate through social media and what the player might be ready to say or willing to say as opposed to what their reps want to not to morph off into basketball. I think we're seeing something right now with Kawhi Leonard, who's been accused of of accepting money to go around the salary cap in basketball. He hasn't said anything. The Clippers, his team, have spoken. The league has spoken. He hasn't said anything. And he's not going to have that luxury in a few weeks when training camp and media days start up again for the NBA. But I don't know, for me, I kind of look at it and say if I'm not guilty, I'm screaming from the mountaintops. And whether it's true or not, I think this helps him help people believe that he might be guilty. Again, that's the optics because he hasn't said a word yet.

It right. Yeah, that's a really good point. Tom, do you have any thoughts on that?

I think it is very similar to just crises outside the sports world that the main issue is people don't prepare for it. It's really like why should I put so much energy into preparing for something that might never happen? So that's a big issue.

So when you think about preparing, I have a question for both of you. Since you both work in public relations crisis management, what advice would you give if you had the ear of a new athlete, someone who's big college start starting to grow freshman year, maybe they're coming in, you sit down with them. What advice would you give them?

We have this concept called the credibility bank and that just meaning that one thing that really helps you with a crisis is to have a good reputation in the first place. It really helps you withstand a negative situation. That would be one thing to focus on that.

Yeah, absolutely. I would add just keeping your eyes wide open and head on a swivel. Be conscious that everything you say can be fodder for the media. There's always a camera or mic on and to just be conscious. This sounds kind of silly because Jim Haggerty, who I mentioned earlier, a boss has this theory of like putting out social posts late at night when you maybe you're not thinking clearly. Just wait till the light of Day a lot of times to express on certain thoughts, especially if there are things that could be seen as controversial or that would alienate some people. Maybe best to not send it, like at 10 o' clock or 11 o' clock at night when you may not be thinking as clear as you were earlier in the day.

That's great advice. Okay, so. So here's my last question. So here is someone else. And Jim, this will be a good segue between the Patriots and the Giants. Actually. What advice would you give to Bill Belichick right now?

Wow.

Yeah.

You know, he is. There's so few guys in sports since media has been a thing that are like him. Maybe a Greg Popovic, but he is so unique in the way that he's conducted himself over the years. That sort of animosity mixed with brilliant coaching and just sort of not, not really caring who he's pissed off. He's maybe purposefully and not purposefully just cultivated his image. What I tell him now, go win. Continue to be a winner. Like what you've committed to this college thing, this experiment, I'll call it. And look, the whole stuff with the girlfriend, that's a whole nother thing. There's so many different angles on that. But at the end of the day, winning cures a lot. If he could make North Carolina into a respectable football program, and I don't think it's going to happen in this one year, one season, if he wants to keep going into his mid to late 70s and coach him to a national championship, God bless him.

Tom, do you have anything to add? I know you say you're not. Not a big football fan, but certainly you have to be familiar with what's happening with the legacy of Bill Belichick and with his girlfriend.

Yeah, actually, I only followed it a little bit. So I'm just gonna agree with what Jim said.

You're gonna agree. I think it's interesting because here you have someone who has built a legacy and that's what you talk about, how you bank that credibility and you kind of bank that legacy and you see someone slowly chip away at it. I mean, step by step. And I also. Bill Belichick plays by different media rules that allowed him to get away with saying nothing and just kind of grunting through the pressers, post game pressers. But right now they're asking harder questions. So when he wants to sell a book and he's sitting down for a CBS television interview, you have to play by media rules and you have to speak and they have the right to ask any question, especially about the news that's being talked about right now in the form of his much younger girlfriend. All right. Well, Jim and Tom, thank you so much for spending the time speaking with me about this topic. We could go on about the topic of sports forever. But your book, sports Crisis Communications Cases and Controversy, it's a great book and it melds both of your backgrounds together beautifully. So I encourage anyone who's interested in both to check it out.

Appreciate you having us on.