Leandro Zapponi went viral for all the wrong reasons following the United States’ 2-0 win over Australia on Friday. A clip of the Argentine broadcaster was circulated after the game, and it appeared to show Zapponi making a racially insensitive comment about American singer-songwriter Ciara, who was shown on the broadcast alongside former NFL quarterback…
Conventional wisdom among sports media industry types when the UFC signed a surprising seven-year, $7.7 billion deal with Paramount last summer was that the popular MMA promotion well outkicked its coverage. Observers saw newly anointed Paramount owner David Ellison attempting to make a splash in live sports, and thus overpaid for the UFC. The jury…
The NASCAR Cup Series is in San Diego this weekend for the Anduril 250 on Sunday at Naval Base Coronado. On Saturday, a fan made a poor decision during the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series United Rentals Driven to Serve 250 at the active military base, and The CW Sports broadcast gave viewers a clear…
This week’s NASCAR Cup Series race is at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego, CA, for the Anduril 250 on Sunday. It’s the first NASCAR race ever on an active military base and will feature a 3.4-mile circuit and 75 laps. And the incredible, historic NASCAR setup on Naval Base Coronado also includes an amazing…
All Times Eastern HAPPY FATHER’S DAY!!! Baseball Banana Ball World Tour Game 3, Great American Ballpark, Cincinnati, OH Savannah Bananas vs. Indianapolis Clowns — ESPN/ESPN Unlimited, 3 p.m. Banana Ball Live — ESPN, 2:30 p.m. Return of the Clowns — ESPN, 5 p.m. College Baseball NCAA Men’s College World Series CWS Finals, Game 2, Charles…
Even on a Friday afternoon, the 2026 FIFA World Cup group stage match between the United States and Australia brought in another impressive audience for Fox and Telemundo. Fox revealed preliminary numbers on Saturday showing that the USMNT-Australia match averaged 14.781 million viewers, making it the most-watched Friday afternoon telecast on any network since the…
Jalen Hurts is on his way to being the most accomplished quarterback in Philadelphia Eagles history, but you wouldn’t know it from much of the conversation around him. All Hurts has done in six seasons is lead the Eagles to five playoff appearances, three division titles, two Super Bowl appearances, and a Super Bowl championship.…
Reporting live from sporting events is always a risky proposition. Usually, you’re on the lookout for errant f-bombs and people disrupting your shot. When you’re reporting on the Mexican National Team during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, however, you have to have your head on a swivel for an entirely different reason. There’s a decent…
Golf has often been referred to as the gentleman’s game, but some modern men’s pro players have made headlines for their ungentlemanly moments. At this week’s US Open at Shinnecock Hills outside of New York, Joaquin Niemann was charged with a two-shot penalty for throwing a club while playing the 6th hole on Friday. That…
The hydration break. The scourge of the soccer fan at the 2026 FIFA World Cup (well, the other one, aside from Alexi Lalas). Aside from who you think is going to win it all, it’s been the most hotly debated aspect of this year’s tournament. Not because they’re entirely new, per se. There were three-minute…
Dan Hurley left the White House South Lawn on Sunday with one idea in mind: to put a basketball court where the Octagon was. The UConn head coach was among the guests at UFC Freedom 250, the first professional sporting event ever held on the South Lawn, a seven-fight card on Paramount+ that coincided with…
When Ismaël Koné was stretchered off the field during Canada’s World Cup match against Qatar on Thursday, broadcasters around the world deliberately chose not to show it again. The company behind that decision explained why. Koné, Canada’s 24-year-old midfielder, went down in the 51st minute of what became a 6-0 Canadian victory after Qatar’s Assim…
Alexi Lalas has never met a hill he didn’t want to die on, and this week’s hill is, of all things, vocabulary. A fan pushed back on the Fox Sports studio analyst for repeatedly saying “soccer” instead of “football,” arguing that even American players make the switch in overseas interviews as a basic show of…
Last week, New Yorkers had the chance to do something they’d waited their whole lives to do: Celebrate a New York Knicks NBA championship. This week, they got the chance to do another thing they’ve been waiting their whole lives to do: Boo Stephen A. Smith to his face. The First Take host appeared as…
Colin Cowherd has owned The Volume outright since 2021 and has resisted every conversation about selling it. That resistance now comes with conditions attached. Cowherd founded The Volume in 2021 and has never taken a salary there, instead reinvesting revenue into the company’s management structure and using his income from Fox Sports and iHeartMedia to…
Rich Eisen’s This Was SportsCenter podcast series has been a great opportunity to relive some of the most iconic moments from ESPN’s flagship show’s past. The latest episode, featuring longtime ESPN and SportsCenter host Linda Cohn, provided plenty of those. But not all of those iconic moments felt positive in the moment. Before she became a staple…
Netflix made a big splash last year when it inked deals with various media companies to become the exclusive home for some of the biggest video podcasts around, including The Bill Simmons Podcast and Pardon My Take. So far, it doesn’t sound like the multi-million dollar bet is paying off. Netflix announced in October it…
CBS Sports is heading into the 2026 NFL season with presumably two open slots in its fourth broadcast booth. ESPN re-signed Jason McCourty to a new multi-year exclusive deal on Thursday, pulling him away from the CBS booth he shared last season with play-by-play man Andrew Catalon, analyst Charles Davis, and sideline reporter A.J. Ross.…
Gary Lineker left the BBC in May 2025, ending his 26-year run as a soccer commentator there. On Saturday, he’ll appear on BBC’s biggest rival. Per Matt Slater and Sam Joseph at The Athletic, Lineker is expected to make a guest appearance during ITV’s broadcast of Saturday’s Group E match between Germany and Ivory Coast. This would…
All Times Eastern Australian Rules Football AFL Men’s — Round 15 Richmond Tigers vs. North Melbourne Kangaroos — Fox Soccer Plus, 11 p.m. St. Kilda Saints vs. Western Bulldogs — FS2/Fox One, 1:01 a.m. (Sunday) Baseball Banana Ball World Tour Game 2, Great American Ballpark, Cincinnati, OH Savannah Bananas vs. Indianapolis Clowns — ESPN/ESPN Unlimited,…
The vibes were impeccable at Thursday’s New York Knicks championship parade. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s speech was near-universally praised, James Dolan aside. And many other city politicians got the chance to speak about how the Knicks overcame adversity and the odds to defeat the San Antonio Spurs in the 2026 NBA Finals and…
Jon Rahm was pretty sure he had a birdie all lined up on the ninth hole at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club on Friday. Until he didn’t. And by that point, he couldn’t help but let an f-bomb fly, one that was easily picked up by NBCSN and Peacock mics. For context, the 2021 U.S. Open…
Kendrick Perkins is the latest ESPN NBA personality to dip their toe in the world of college basketball program management. Big Perk, a 14-year NBA veteran and ESPN NBA analyst, has agreed to become the men’s basketball general manager at Jackson State. The news was first reported by ESPN’s Sham Charania. ESPN analyst Kendrick Perkins…
Meadowlark Media’s Mike Fuentes announced his departure from the company on Friday. In a post on X, Fuentes wrote that he was “no longer working with the Dan Le Batard Show and Meadowlark Media in any capacity,” adding, “Will share more when I’m ready.” The video producer and occasional on-air talent joined Meadowlark in May…
WNBA viewership on USA Network reached a season high on Tuesday as Caitlin Clark continued to prove herself a viewership draw, even against World Cup competition. Tuesday night’s Toronto Tempo-Indiana Fever matchup on USA averaged 1.00 million viewers, the most-watched WNBA game on cable this season. It is also up 134% from the WNBA’s 2025…