James Andrew Miller and Conrad Thompson

Episode 15 of the Sports Media Podcast with Richard Deitsch features two guests: First, a sports media conversation with James Andrew Miller, the best-selling author of books on CAA, ESPN and Saturday Night Live. The second guest is Conrad Thompson, the host of three immensely popular wresting podcasts: Something to Wrestle (with Bruce Pritchard); 83 Weeks (with Eric Bischoff) and What Happened When (with Tony Schiavone)   In this podcast, Miller discusses ESPN’s current relationship with the NFL under new president Jimmy Pitaro versus its relationship under former President John Skipper; the role of the ESPYs in the ESPN universe and why criticism might be unfair; whether journalism at ESPN will be supported by Pitaro or whether ESPN reporters should be concerned; the future of Outside The Lines; whether Pitaro would do a content deal with Barstool Sports or a company such as Barstool; the futures of Keith Olbermann and Chris Berman at ESPN; and much more. Thompson discusses the process of how he does each podcast weekly; how the Bischoff podcast came together; how he approaches distribution of each podcast; creating show extensions beyond the podcasts; how he and Pritchard developed the live show business; how that business is now worth six figures for each of them; the potential opportunities for the archives of the podcasts; his relationship with longtime wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer; the return of Hulk Hogan to the WWE; whether Hogan would commit to a weekly podcast; the impact of Ronda Rousey on WWE’s business; what we can expect from Rousey heading forward, and much more. You can subscribe to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher and more.