The Sporting Class: All the President's Grizzly Men

Summary

Podcast Summary: Pablo Torre Finds Out

Episode: The Sporting Class: All the President's Grizzly Men
Release Date: January 29, 2026
Host: Pablo Torre with David Sampson (John Skipper absent)
Network: The Athletic Podcast Network / Meadowlark Media

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into the world of sports ownership, focusing primarily on Robert Pera, the enigmatic owner of the Memphis Grizzlies. Pablo and David dissect the complex business and ego dynamics behind NBA ownership, the role of limited partners (including celebrities like Justin Timberlake and Peyton Manning), the moral and legal implications of Ubiquiti (Pera's company) allegedly circumventing sanctions to supply tech for Russia in the war in Ukraine, and the broader debate about the state of journalism amid layoffs at historic outlets like the Washington Post. Throughout, the tone is sharp, irreverent, and self-aware, with plenty of inside-sports and media industry banter.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Robert Pera/Grizzlies Ownership Saga

[03:03–15:52]

• Main Character: Robert Pera, founder/CEO of Ubiquiti, becomes the youngest NBA owner (Memphis Grizzlies) in 2012 after a complicated acquisition process.

• Limited Partners: Because Pera's company stock dropped, he couldn't fully finance the purchase—so NBA insiders like Justin Timberlake, Peyton Manning, Steve Kaplan, and others were cobbled together as limited partners.

• Celebrity as Owner: The presence of celebrity limited partners led to confusion over who really owned the team, fueling Pera's resentment when people credited Timberlake as "the owner."

  • Quote: "A woman said, wait a minute, you're not the owner of the Grizzlies. Justin Timberlake is the owner. And this did not sit well with a guy who bought the Grizzlies for social capital." — Pablo Torre ([06:37])

• Comparison: David Sampson relates this to George Steinbrenner’s style with the Yankees—real power resides with the majority owner, while limited partners buy in mostly for the social cachet.

  • Quote: "There is nothing so limiting as being my limited partner." — David quoting Steinbrenner ([07:12])

• Syndicate Ownership: Modern franchises are structured with a controlling partner and a syndicate of others; this arrangement often breeds resentment, especially when public credit goes to the more famous names.

2. Ubiquiti Allegations and Moral Implications

[04:17–05:48, 13:19–15:52]

• Sanctions Circumvention: Investigative reporting suggests Ubiquiti conducted business enabling Russian military tech, especially for drone warfare in Ukraine.
• Acknowledgment: Pablo emphasizes the serious, ongoing moral implications—this is not just a business story but one about global conflict, technology, and potential crimes against humanity.
  • Quote: "Modern warfare is drones. Modern warfare is reliant on technology...most effectively produced and shipped...from Ubiquiti." — Pablo Torre ([05:48])

3. The Egos and Insecurities of Pro Sports Owners

[06:28–10:00, 22:12–27:48]

• Status Symbol: Ownership is less about money and more about personal status, reputation, and control.

• Move to Vegas: Robert Pera reportedly wanted to relocate the Grizzlies to Las Vegas—a common new-owner dream—but existing owners block such moves to avoid giving undue financial windfall to newcomers.

  • Quote: "You can't reward a new owner with the change in value of a team that's been relocated." — David Sampson ([23:10])

• Poison Pill Clause: Sellers often add clauses to limit a new owner’s ability to move a team (the Herb Kohl Effect, after the Bucks' ex-owner promising to keep the team local).

4. Owners as Would-Be Athletes: The Tony Allen One-on-One Challenge

[27:48–36:06]

• New Owner Syndrome: Pera wanted to play Tony Allen one-on-one to earn "athletic capital," even hiring ex-NBA player Dahntay Jones as a sparring partner, and printing up fight-style posters before ultimately being talked out of the stunt.

  • Quote: "He says, I want to play Tony Allen, the Grindfather, the most feared premier defender in the modern NBA, one on one." — Pablo Torre ([27:48])
  • Dante Jones: Invited out as a supposed tryout, ended up a sparring partner ([33:00])

• Parallels with Other Owners: Other team owners (Ted Turner with the Braves, Mark Cuban) have also attempted similar stunts, leading to league rules banning owner-managers and dugout shenanigans.

  • Quote: "Ted Turner managed a game...he had to be in uniform during a 16-game losing streak." — Pablo Torre ([30:33])

5. The Changing Face of Sports Journalism

[39:56–56:11]

• Washington Post Cuts: The closure of the Washington Post sports section becomes a flashpoint for debate about the business of journalism, loss of institutional accountability, and whether billionaires can or will "save" traditional media.

  • Quote: "Only a soulless corporate goon would think the paper's fine without it. A short sighted, cowardly decision. Shame is your legacy." — Pablo quoting Jeff Passan ([42:08])

• Pablo’s Lament: While acknowledging that the collapse of legacy outlets may indirectly benefit new media like PTFO, Pablo insists it’s a net loss for accountability and independent reporting.

  • Quote: "When you lose independence...all of that stuff leads to less truth being told about...sports, a part of our society which has never been more important." — Pablo Torre ([43:36])

• Sampson’s Pragmatism: David argues that, given industry realities, journalism must adapt, and that the business imperatives of ownership and shareholders supersede nostalgia for past eras.

  • Quote: "It's a very lazy take...If it got subscriber support, there would have been a business reason not to cut the sports section. Obviously, it's not carrying its weight." — David Sampson ([41:51])

• Broader Media Trends: Similar cost-cutting and consolidation happening at CBS and other institutions; discussion touches on billionaire owners (Bezos, Ellison), the transactional nature of business with government, and how newsroom priorities shift after buyouts.

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• "There is nothing so limiting as being my limited partner." — David Sampson, quoting George Steinbrenner ([07:12])
• "Ownership is supposed to solve your need for relevance, but now owners need even more of it, because there are people with no money who are more famous." — David Sampson ([12:41])
• “When you bring in a celebrity partner...you want the world to know you’ve got the team.” — David Sampson ([09:23])
• “Modern warfare is drones...most effectively produced and shipped...from a place here in America with this company called Ubiquiti.” — Pablo Torre ([05:48])
• "Ted Turner managed a game. If I'm smart enough to save $11 million to buy a team, I ought to be smart enough to manage it." — Pablo Torre ([31:00])
• “Only a soulless corporate goon would think the paper’s fine without it...Shame is your legacy.” — Jeff Passan, quoted by Pablo ([42:08])
• “I’m the guy who does journalism. I gotta acknowledge that this is, I think, good for the business of PTFO, but horrific for our country.” — Pablo Torre ([54:02])
• "You sound so pompous." — David Sampson, ribbing Pablo over journalistic mission ([56:00])
• “What we've got is a bunch of executives dressing up in baseball uniforms saying, I know how to win this game.” — Pablo Torre ([56:30])

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Timestamps for Noteworthy Segments

• [03:03–15:52]: The saga of Robert Pera, Memphis Grizzlies ownership, and limited partners
• [04:17–05:48]: Ubiquiti’s alleged enabling of Russian drone warfare
• [07:12]: Steinbrenner’s take on limited partners; the real power of ownership
• [22:12–24:22]: Robert Pera’s failed effort to move the Grizzlies to Las Vegas; “Herb Kohl Clause” on team relocation
• [27:48–36:06]: Robert Pera challenging Tony Allen; owner/athlete cosplay; Dante Jones episode; parallels with Ted Turner, Mark Cuban
• [39:56–56:11]: The business of journalism, the Washington Post, corporate ownership of media, state of sports reporting, discussion of CBS, billionaire involvement, and what it means for the future

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Summary Takeaways

• Ownership in pro sports is more about ego, status, and exclusivity than sound investment. The rise of celebrity limited partners both compounds and complicates these dynamics.
• Robert Pera’s path to ownership involved benefiting from loose syndicate finance, navigating collapsed stock prices, and ultimately suffering resentment as his celebrity partners gathered praise.
• Business entanglements: Pera's wealth (and, by extension, the Grizzlies) is clouded by serious investigative reporting about Ubiquiti's wartime tech supply chains.
• Owner vanity can become absurd spectacle—see Pera’s one-on-one basketball fantasies and the historical precedent set by Ted Turner and others.
• Sports journalism is in crisis: legacy outlets are closing or shrinking as digital upstarts rise, but with a diminished capacity for the sort of institutional accountability that once defined the field.
• Media consolidation and billionaire ownership have not proved to be a panacea for the industry's woes; in fact, journalistic independence is eroding further as financial pressures and political entanglements grow.
• Underlying theme: Even as new forms of content (like PTFO) emerge, there’s a deep sense of loss for what is slipping away—journalistic rigor, institutional accountability, and a sense that telling sports’ true stories matters for democracy itself.

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Tone:
Conversational, irreverent, occasionally combative, weaving inside-baseball shop talk with a genuine sense of alarm about the direction of sports, journalism, and cultural institutions.

Best for listeners who want:
A behind-the-scenes look at sports franchise dynamics, sports-media business, and a critical, self-aware conversation about the future of journalism in a messy, billionaire-dominated world.

Transcript

[Pablo Torre]

Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out. I am Pablo Torre and today we're gonna find out what this sound is.

[David Sampson]

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[Pablo Torre]

696891 lunch was great, but this traffic is awful.

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[Pablo Torre]

David is furiously, frantically.

[David Sampson]

Well, I'm trying to track down people because you screwed up on time and I'm very structured. This was the window.

[Pablo Torre]

The window is, is, is, is shattered. We are holding space, as they say, for John Skipper. There's a microphone that is pointed at nothing because John is not here despite saying he.

[David Sampson]

And I'm not taking it personally.

[Pablo Torre]

And now they're nadir is wheeling the chair.

[David Sampson]

That's a bad sign. I thought he was like in the elevator.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, this is going to be a different kind of sporting class. But it is one that I'm very excited to do with you, David, because we've done this story on the show this week in partnership with Hunter Brook Media and my friend Sam Koppelman that I've been truly curious. What does David Sampson think about this?

[David Sampson]

Well, let me just start with a part that you, you glossed over on the show that to me was spectacular because it resonated so well that someone mentioned, hey, Justin Timberlake owns the Grizzlies. And he was not too happy about that. That is a guaranteed true story. And I, I have like four things I want to talk about with that.

[Pablo Torre]

So the character, the main character of the story is Robert Pera, who's the owner of the Memphis Grizzlies. He is the founder and CEO of a company called Ubiquity. He's Ubiquity. And I'm going to tldr this. Please watch the episode. It is detailed and deliberate and structured and reported. And it's the product of six months of investigative journalism with Hunter Brook doing so much good work that I just want to continue to shout them out.

[David Sampson]

Is it by or with.

[Pablo Torre]

They did a six month investigation and then we added some fun stuff, some cheese to melt down their broccoli is how I would put it. Including what you just referred to, which.

[David Sampson]

Is that the LP story?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, and, and, and the Tony Allen one on one stuff. And Robert Pera is the owner of the Grizzlies and nobody knows who the this guy is. An NBA owner told Hunter Brook, you know, no one knows where their sales come from. Spoiler alert. It turns out a big chunk of them are coming from the war in Ukraine, specifically the Russian side, because through a process of Essentially sanctioned circumvention. Allegedly they have been getting these very effective WI fi routers and antenna.

[David Sampson]

The dildo satellites.

[Pablo Torre]

The dildo satellite. The dildo satellites is how we refer to it.

[David Sampson]

Very good investigation.

[Pablo Torre]

I mean, this is just the kind of rigor that we bring to the table. And that stuff has, according to both thank you notes from Russian soldiers as well as in depth undercover journalism that reveals that third party distributors are willing to ship these devices to the warfront in. In Ukraine to be used by Russian sold stuff is enabling a drone war which has resulted in like legitimate crimes against humanity, as the United nations has called them.

[David Sampson]

Did you not watch your episode thinking about Lord of War? Do you watch? So, so you did the episode? I don't rewatch my episodes generally, and I assume you don't have the time to rewatch once you've put them to bed and they're edited. But if. Did you take a step back and say, wow, this is sort of Lord of War?

[Pablo Torre]

Like, it feels cinematic in ways that are quite, yeah, entertaining and also terrifying because modern warfare is drones. Modern warfare is reliant on technology that it turns out is most effectively produced and shipped, originating from a place here in America with this company called Ubiquity. So anyway, that is the crimes against humanity side of the ledger. But the question of who is this guy who is Now a top five richest owner in sports? David? $30 billion.

[David Sampson]

Like you're going down the list. Bomber, you're like, is, I think it's good to be a poor owner in the NBA because maybe you won't get to them well unless you get a new contract.

[Pablo Torre]

We are constantly, it turns out, refreshing. Like Bloomberg's live list of the richest people on the planet. Who's here that we recognize? And Robert Pera was right there, but did not recognize him. And so the question of, like, who is this guy? What's he like? What's his story in the NBA? It brings us to the fact that, yeah, he threatened to buy out his limited partners, which included Justin Timberlake, because he was out one night and a woman said, wait a minute, you're not the owner of the Grizzlies. Justin Timberlake is the owner of the Grizzlies. And this did not sit well with a guy who bought the Grizzlies for social capital.

[David Sampson]

His stock could go down by 30 points. His net worth could decrease by 15 billion and it would not impact him the way it hits. Incorrectly and horrifically, when someone at a party who's a woman says, you're the owner of the Grizzlies, I thought it was Jessica Beal's husband. That is Defcon a thousand. That's when you pick up the phone and you're calling your lawyer and you want to get rid of that partner. And I've seen this. It's happened two quick things. One, George Steinbrenner did not like his limited partners. And there were a lot of limited partners. And there was a time in Jeffrey Lauria's life when he was offered to become a limited partner of the Yankees. And he wanted to have some power. He wanted to have some say. And what George Cyber had said is, just keep in mind there is nothing so limiting as being my limited partner. You may not talk about it. It's like, it's like Fight Club to be a limited partner with the Yankees. And so Jeffrey and many other owners in baseball and basketball and football have taken that thought process out into the world because they all have limited partners. Steve, even Steve Ballmer has Mr. Dennis Wong.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes. His one limited partner, which is, which is special because he only has one.

[David Sampson]

Which is very rare. In the old days, at a lower purchase price, 1000 could happen. But with right now, at billion dollar and $2 billion valuations, it's a syndicate and there's someone in charge. There's someone who puts in the most money. But so many other people get to say, yeah, I'm an owner.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, I own. I own the Yankees.

[David Sampson]

1%. No one asked that. No one ever follows up at a cocktail party, oh, you're an owner of the Marlins. Because I got this in Miami where I would get reports, wait a minute. I just met the owner of the Marlins. And it was one of Jeffrey's limited partners who would go around and there were multiple of them saying, yeah, I own the Marlins.

[Pablo Torre]

But it's the whole reason why you.

[David Sampson]

Buy in is to say so you can say it.

[Pablo Torre]

It's.

[David Sampson]

It's the.

[Pablo Torre]

By the way, and I get it. It's the coolest thing you could own is a pro sports team because you are visible and in exclusive televised spaces.

[David Sampson]

But think about the level of insecurity that this guy had. So the fact that someone thought Justin Timberlake, when you bring in a celebrity partner, and that's become a big thing that I learned about back when Steven Ross did it with the Dolphins, he had this red carpet were the Williams sisters and Mark Anthony and other people were supposedly had bought into the team. And they would come to games and they'd be announced like it was the damn Oscars And I thought to myself, there's only a certain number of owners who would ever want this sort of light to be shown upon someone other than themselves. And it turns out that number's dwindling down to zero these days where if you have a team, you want the world to know you've got the team.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, I want to recap for people who aren't somehow familiar with your backstory. You're the president of the Marlins and Jeffrey Lauria, who is your.

[David Sampson]

The man formerly known as my stepfather.

[Pablo Torre]

Correct.

[David Sampson]

Close relationship with him, though, for 50 years.

[Pablo Torre]

And the thing that I didn't know, that I only knew because I am friends with you, is that that dude grew up loving the Yankees.

[David Sampson]

Did he ever.

[Pablo Torre]

Which is hilarious and heartbreaking for me, a Yankee fan, because this gives new subtext to the whole, like, you guys beating the Yankees in the World Series thing and also gives new context for him considering should I be George Steinbrenner's limited partner?

[David Sampson]

Or why we had a no beard policy or why we would do all these trades with the Yankees, like trade for a Decky Arabu back with Montreal and do other such things.

[Pablo Torre]

That was Yankees Steinbrenner cosplay.

[David Sampson]

It was a lot of. We were. We were always in touch with Cash and Randy Levine and George.

[Pablo Torre]

Brian Cashman.

[David Sampson]

Brian. Sorry. Brian Cashman. Thank you. The general manager.

[Pablo Torre]

Synonymous, though, with the purse strings of the Yankees.

[David Sampson]

He's been there. Well, more synonymous with. With purportedly making baseball moves, but they've had the same leadership forever. Randy Levine, when I left baseball, he was the most tenured president. I was second when I left in 2017 and I dropped off the list having been eliminated. But Randy Lavine continues to still be the president. He's the longest tenured president, so he is the. In lockstep with. With George and the Sty Renner family. And the Yankees are just a funny example where they're. They do have limited partners.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah.

[David Sampson]

House D does not own the entire team.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh, there's that dude. I've talked to you about this off air, but we can mention it now. I've been like staring at this dude, Patrick Bet David, who is like this now right wing influencer who is in, I think south Florida, but He's a huge YouTuber and in his Twitter bio it says. Let me just get it, because this is exactly why you buy in despite not being the guy.

[David Sampson]

Right. Limited. Does he just write owner of New York Yankees? Because that would drive. That used to drive me crazy.

[Pablo Torre]

The first line at Patrick bet David the first line is Yankees minority owner, baseball emoji, author of your next five moves. And then the rest of it, you know, pvd, podcast and valuetainment. Valuetainment is the company, in case you wanted to, I don't know, claw your eyes out at some point after watching this. So anyway, so I've been curious, like, oh, a Yank. I didn't, I didn't know that. And I'm a Yankee fan. That guy is a co owner of the team.

[David Sampson]

Yeah, there was, There was an opportunity to buy into the Yankees. Not just he wanted to take over and George did not want to sell. This is back when I was much younger. I was probably in my teens.

[Pablo Torre]

Jeffrey.

[David Sampson]

No, he had an opportunity to buy the Yankees and they. The argument that he and George had was over control. What makes me smile about this grizzly story is that the need for relevance is supposed to come with ownership, but now what's happening is owners need. Need more of it. Because there's a bigger universe of people who have fame. Back in the day, there was not social media. You were not competing with people without money for fame. And now there are so many people who don't have money that have fame that the people who have the money want the fame and they need to figure out the way to do it. So this example is outstanding.

[Pablo Torre]

So let me give you some more context for it because I've been doing some more reporting. The story is ongoing, by the way. And I keep on needing to say this. There is vast and serious moral implication here for what Ubiquity was doing. But the backstage power stuff, that comes right into the wheelhouse of the sporting class, that's where I want to live with you today. Because what I was told was that when Robert Perra was buying the Grizzlies, there was an arrangement that fell apart because Ubiquiti's stock tanked. So he becomes spoiler alert again in 2012, the youngest owner in NBA history. He's in his 30s and he owns the Grizzlies. But the way that he was originally scheduled to buy the Grizzlies fell apart because he was. He was using the valuation of his company to provide all of his financial purchasing power. And so when the Ubiquiti stock tanks, what I'm told is that there is a meeting, and it is David Stern and Adam Silver and Robert Pera and his associates. And they got to figure out, how are we gonna. How are we gonna get what turned out to be $159 million, which is a bargain in Retrospect, but how do we get $159 million in, like, money, in, like, actual money to buy this thing? And so what David Stern outlines is that we can keep Robert Pera as the controlling owner, but his percentage share is going to be reportedly, you know, less than a third of the team. And what they do is they scrounge together a bunch of other investors. And so there's this guy, Steve Kaplan from Oaktree Capital Management, for those familiar with the aspiration saga. Oh, there's. There's that. There's a familiar entity. Oaktree Capital Management, Steve Kaplan, this guy Dan Strauss. Justin Timberlake. Peyton Manning is a limited partner of the Grizzlies. And there are a bunch of local owners, too, to the point where I am told it was just like, we just got to get people with money. And so there were, like, tiny. Can we get some local owners to combine for half a million dollars? You know, just to, like, meet the actual bottom line of 159 million, I am told. And so in the process, what that sets up is this. Is this recipe for resentment when Justin Timberlake and Peyton Manning are sitting courtside, bathing in the adoration of being the owners of this team, whereas the guy who was like, wait a minute, it was supposed to be me, is feeling resentful of the dynamic he has bought into.

[David Sampson]

Yeah. So take a look at some of the lists of limited partners for other teams. You'll find some great names, like Michael Jordan with the Marlins as an example.

[Pablo Torre]

He was a Marlin.

[David Sampson]

There are. There's a little known. Oh, I don't know if that's public. Yes, Michael Jordan was part of the partnership with Derek Jeter that bought the Marlins in 2017.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Here it is. Here it is.

[David Sampson]

Put in a little tiny. A little tiny nothing.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep.

[David Sampson]

And, yeah, I don't. I don't know that that was disclosed by MLB at the time, but there you have it. So it's putting together what's called a syndicate. And when you say he used the stock, the problem is that obviously you borrow money according to what potentially a stock is trading at, but there's a collar around it where it's almost like a callable loan that if the stock falls below a certain point, hey, you better fund this with something else. And my guess is that Robert had no other source of cash, and so he went and borrowed money and using his stock as collateral. And when it no longer was able to be collateral, he had to get partners. Think back to the Red Sox, by the way. John Henry and Tom Werner, marriage of convenience. When they bought the Red Sox, they didn't come in hand in hand as partners when they were combined with Larry laquino. That is not how that works. So what Bud Selig and has done in Rob Manford and David Stern and Adam Silver is they put groups together, they put people together in order to get more money available, to get purchase prices increased. Yeah, it's a very big story. We've read about the Dodgers this week, and if John were here, we'd be. And we could always talk about the argument of how the Dodgers got sold for so much because they got a revenue sharing deal, which other owners did know about, by the way.

[Pablo Torre]

Spell that out because it's interesting.

[David Sampson]

It's a very interesting story. Back when the, The Dodgers, Frank McCort.

[Pablo Torre]

If you know that name, parking lot magnate Frank McCort.

[David Sampson]

Well, that's what people would call me. He hated that. He really did hate that. And when he sold the Dodgers, side note, kept the parking lots, might I add. But anyway, his wife, ambassador to France, Jamie McCourt, they had a terrible divorce and they were fighting about a lot of stuff, including the Dodgers. So the Dodgers had to get sold. And Bud Selig wanted a really high purchase price on the Dodgers because that would inure his benefit. And so he cut a deal. And now it's being reported that it was a deal cut with the bankruptcy court. And I'm telling you, Pablo, that's not how it happened. I, because I was literally there watching this happen because we had a vote on it. I was in the room voting on this deal where the Dodgers would have a price tag of over $2 billion, which would help all of us. It would increase the value of every team getting a deal on the table of two plus billion. And the only reason Mark Walter would pay two plus billion is because there was a limit to what would be subject to revenue sharing. And what that means is he was able to take money all for himself instead of sharing it with the other owners. And what he got in return is he would pay more money up front for the team. So, true story.

[Pablo Torre]

Mark Walter, by the way, who is the CEO of Guggenheim Partners now, the guy who is, you know, behind the Lakers, that was a $10 billion valuation. The new, the new high water Mark at the time, you know, and by the way, Mark Walter has one of my favorite descriptors attached to him. Even more than parking lot magnate. He is famously private. And it's sort of like, well, what does he. What does that guy do we continue to have curiosity? Jamie McCourt, by the way, was not only the ambassador appointed by Donald Trump to France, she was also the ambassador to Monaco from 2017 to 2021. So how dare you erase. Sorry, key function of her diplomatic responsibilities.

[David Sampson]

I love Jamie. She was something else, man. I tell her, don't stop fighting with Frank. I mean, that was a knock him out, drag them out nightmare divorce.

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[Commercial Voice / Juliette (Ad and Promo)]

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[Pablo Torre]

The way in which love interests factor in to all of this brings us back to the Robert Para, like wait a minute, it was supposed to be me and not timber like thing. And it brings us back to the idea also that like and this is also something that I, I feel comfortable reporting now. Robert Pera's whole goal when he bought the Grizzlies was to move it to Las Vegas, Memphis. David, you know, if you were to put it in the sort of hierarchy of markets, not a particularly attractive one.

[David Sampson]

Better than Green Bay and not as good as Vancouver.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, certainly less valuable than Vegas.

[David Sampson]

Well, he never would get that. So a new owner, when, when we got in the game, we wanted to move our team to Montreal, wanted to move it to Washington and it never going to be allowed. So they would never, the NBA owners would never allow a newbie to take the Vegas market.

[Pablo Torre]

Explain that. This is 2012 and I want to understand.

[David Sampson]

Yes. So when you, if you buy team at X and with relocation you get a value of Y. In theory, what that means is that you've had an increase in your investment, you've made money on your money. And what owners say is, hey, you're new to this. They keep track of like how long have you been in the game? Like there's a list. Owned, own, team owned since 1990, team owned since 1992, 1978. And you can't reward a new owner with the change in value of a team that's been relocated. And what my response always was is just charge me a fee, charge me a relocation fee for the difference.

[Pablo Torre]

You're saying that once an owner gets the rights to move to Vegas, the valuation of that team is all his mushrooms.

[David Sampson]

Yeah, and it's all his. And, and what baseball did is they wouldn't allow us to move to Washington. They bought the X, Bose and themselves moved it to Washington and got the increase in valuation. When, when the NBA goes to Vegas, there's going to be a huge, huge expansion fee that gets split amongst the owners, not into the pocket of one of the owners. And whoever buys that team, LeBron or Shaq, who both want it, they've been rumored, will pay Accordingly. And it will be a multi billion dollar franchise to start with.

[Pablo Torre]

So one of the fun dynamics of the, okay, I would like to move the team to Vegas thing as, as perhaps ill fated as that had always been because of the power dynamics you just outlined is that the, the seller of the team was this guy, Michael Heisley. And Michael Isley wanted to keep the team in Memphis. And that was one of his. It's funny when it, when an owner is like, I want out of this but don't leave. And so reportedly, by the way, one of the bidders, one of the people, one of the suitors for the Grizzlies at the time was Larry Ellison. Larry Elson wanted to move the team out of Memphis. And it's called the Herb Cole.

[David Sampson]

Pablo, I don't know if you know that the Bucks, within our industry, that's called the Herb Cole.

[Pablo Torre]

Please explain.

[David Sampson]

The Herb Cole is when you own a team and you sell it and you claim that you are selling it to people who have guaranteed to keep the team. He didn't want Milwaukee to lose a team and so he famously sold the Bucks. And the thought was, what he was able to say is, hey, don't you worry, this team will not move. I have taken care of it. I'm even investing in the new stadium which there, there is now an old arena in Milwaukee. And it's always been a joke, the Herb Cole effect, because it's not everlasting. So there is no guarantee when you say, oh, my team's not going to move out of this market. That is a promise you can never make.

[Pablo Torre]

That's former senator.

[David Sampson]

Yes, he is Herb Cole.

[Pablo Torre]

So the, the thing that's funny about the purchase of the Grizzlies also is that so like, how do you make it so that they have to stay? And I'm told that there was a poison pill inserted into the agreement where basically if there was an application to move the team, if that was submitted to the league, what I'm told is that any of the other owners had the right to buy out the shares at that 2012 price, but they wouldn't.

[David Sampson]

So, so those types of poison pills are just, again, they're primarily. They would never actually impact because it would never get that far. Everything that happens with relocation, there's no surprise when the owners sit down and vote on relocation or vote on expansion. It's all been done prior to a vote that then becomes public. All the negotiating, all the discussion on price, on fees, on how it's going to work, it all Happens before a vote.

[Pablo Torre]

But the whole premise here, though, is that there needed to be some way to give a check to Memphis on the idea that this guy's going to move us immediately to Vegas or Larry Ellison, it was rumored, would move it to San Jose or wherever. And so Pera agreed to this poison pill clause, I am told, that gave. Yeah. The local limited partners the ability to say, actually, we can. We can stop this from happening here. We come to the basketball part of the program because one of my favorite things in this is that Robert Pera, against the wishes of everybody else in the Grizzlies, he becomes the new owner. And he says, I want to play Tony Allen, the Grindfather, the most feared premier defender in the modern NBA, one on one. And in the episode, we report the story of that and we flesh it out with details. Again, please go check that out. But the premise, David, of new owner comes in and everybody's like, what the. Is happening? Because he wants to do something to prove his own athletic capital, his own reputation.

[David Sampson]

Like that matters. The irony. Do you remember there's. There's the Ted Turner rule in baseball. Another rule that no one talks about. He wanted to put on a Braves uniform and be in the dugout because you have to wear a uniform in baseball. Ted Turner used to. On the Braves. Yes, and Ted Turner. The rule in baseball is owners and presidents may not be in the dugout during the game, because in order to be in the dugout, you have to be in a uniform. And the rule was made that owners and presidents may not be in uniform, but every owner talks about shagging during bp. Talks about taking ground balls. Shagging fly ball. Well, shagging anything but fly balls. Especially there are GMs who have lockers in the clubhouse. That exists. Oh, that exists.

[Pablo Torre]

What do they put in you?

[David Sampson]

It's a regular. The clubbies have to take care of it like it's a regular locker. There's clothes, there's a jock, there's toiletries, there's a uni. Oh, I promise you that is a thing.

[Pablo Torre]

Ridiculous.

[David Sampson]

Oh, oh, oh. Mark Cuban had a locker.

[Pablo Torre]

Mark Cuban was also, like, shooting around on the court pre game.

[David Sampson]

It's a thing. And so are there. Are there presidents who once wanted to shag fly balls? Yes, there are. Are there presidents who have. I have not. Because I was spoken to by people within my organization who said, david, don't do it, David, you're gonna break your nose.

[Pablo Torre]

Play shortstop tonight.

[David Sampson]

That's it. Let Jeter be the shortstop, you be the president. Like And I wanted to play, not in a real game, but I wanted to go in BP and just see if I could. Because I've always told people like what Lebatar talks about, you can't catch a fly ball in bp. And I wanted to go try. And I was told you can't.

[Pablo Torre]

You were overruled.

[David Sampson]

It is the. Ted Turner is.

[Pablo Torre]

I'm looking at it. I mean, so this is something that I, I feel like I should have known, but Ted Turner was the manager of the Braves during what appears to be a lengthy losing streak. And Ted Turner, by the way, one of the great media magnates of all time. The Superstation, cnn, tbs, tnt, like that's Ted Turner. Like that's what he did. But the idea that he was actually in the dugout.

[David Sampson]

He was in. But he had to be in the uniform. I'm almost positive he's in uniform in the dugout, but you'd have to remind me. But we're going back.

[Pablo Torre]

I'm now seeing a photo of Ted Turner wearing an Atlanta Braves uniform and a hat like clap. And it looks like he's has some cha. You know, just some, like some. Again, he honestly, he blends in. Mustache and everything blends in. But the point being that apparently, yes, there is a rule that, yes, if you own.

[David Sampson]

You thought I was making this up.

[Pablo Torre]

It's just funny that there has to be a regulation stemming from May 1977, when during, excuse me, during a 16 game losing streak. Ted Turner managed a game.

[David Sampson]

Correct.

[Pablo Torre]

And yeah, anyone who owns stock in a team was forbidden to manage it. They told him. And to quote Ted Turner, they must have put that rule in yesterday.

[David Sampson]

It was not a rule as far as I know prior to that, but it's definitely a rule now.

[Pablo Torre]

The quote continues. He was 38 years old at the time. If I'm smart enough to save a. If I'm smart enough to save $11 million to buy the team, I ought to be smart enough to manage it. Which says quite a bit, I think, about the perspective.

[David Sampson]

Wait, do you disagree with him? I find it to be remarkable that owning something you are told by anyone that's like you own a franchise in McDonald's, you're not allowed to flip burgers. Well, of course you should be allowed to flip burgers.

[Pablo Torre]

I don't think I want my burgers flipped by a non burger flipping.

[David Sampson]

Do you have any idea what it takes to flip a burger?

[Pablo Torre]

I. I don't. And that's why I want the experts to do it for me.

[David Sampson]

Mark Cuban. I thought about it with Cuban because that was something that we, when we were voting and thinking about voting Cuban in as an owner in baseball, one of the things, other than all the ways he was looking at the Padres, but he looked at a whole bunch of teams, he would have bought anything, the Texas Rangers, anything. But what makes me laugh about Mark is that our concern was not just that he would not play ball with Bud Selig and with the other owners, that he would be a pain in the neck that we'd have to deal with. The other thought that we had is, would he want to play? Like, would he argue about the rules, about not being in the dugout? Because it's bad enough when owners sit next to the dugout and peer in and, and are meddling in the way that all owners do. But would Mark Cuban take it to that next level? And I don't want to say the plane one on one with your players that level, because I have personally no issue with that, Pablo at all.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, we should, we should talk about this because the whole thing of like, hey, I want to play Tony Allen, and they print out a fight poster and they want to simulcast it and they want the press there and they put chairs on the pract, his floor and all of it, no one has embodied the thing you're describing of owner wanting to wear a uniform as much as Robert Pera. The other thing that I have been told, which I didn't even put into the episode because I didn't have it nailed down, but I can report it now, is that they actually also remember Dante Jones, former Duke guy. He was a guard. He was at this point in the timeline, out of the league, but he was an NBA player. Dante Jones, I am told, was invited to Robert Perez home in San Jose under some pretext that to Dante Jones resembled. Oh, they're working me out for a job with the Memphis Grizzlies, like, as a player. And what seems to have happened is that the entire goal was actually for him to be Robert Pero's sparring partner to prepare for Tony Allen. And so Dante Jones, who went out to San Jose, wound up just playing with Robert Pera, who was preparing and even hired a trainer, David Thorpe, which I mentioned in the episode, to prepare for Tony Allen. Dante Jones was also conscripted into this. And then Dante Jones left and was like, yeah, that seems like it wasn't a workout for a job playing in the NBA.

[David Sampson]

I assume he got paid and I think it would have been outstanding. And I'm thinking about owner Player and player owner. Because there's a lot of talk in the NBA where Steph Curry has come out and said, why can't we have equity in teams? Why can't we get paid in stock? The way if you work on Wall street or you work for many companies, you get equity in that company. There's real money in equity. And he's smart to say that because there is real money in equity versus salary. And the only example I can think of where there was a player who ended up getting the team, there was an issue with Pittsburgh, and you have to remind me, but I believe the Penguins were in bankruptcy and they owed. Mario Lemieux was like a creditor of the Penguins. He was owed deferred money and the team went bankrupt. And instead of giving him money, I believe they gave him pieces of the team.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah. So in 98, Penguins filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, culminating in 99 when, yeah. Lemieux, the largest creditor.

[David Sampson]

So there you have it. It's. It's what we talk about with deferred money. And everyone says, what happens if the Dodgers go bankrupt and they owe OTANI, you know, $680 million? Well, don't worry, they're not going to go bankrupt. Because since those days, and you had the Penguins, you had the Texas Rangers with Tom Hicks and you had the Orioles with Eli Jacobs in the early 90s, go bankrupt. None of the four major sports will allow a team to go bankrupt again, ever, because of the control you lose. The Dodgers sale to Mark Walter was a bankruptcy issue when they brought the Dodgers into bankruptcy because of the divorce. And so the reason you don't allow for a team to get sold in bankruptcy anymore is you lose in theory, control. And believe me, the four leagues control the sales process in ways that would shock you that you've come to find out a little bit when we've been on talking about these topics. But when the Grizzlies owner gets brought in and if the most he's going to do is want to play one on one with one of his players, that wouldn't even, you know, you say that that's of interest to the league and the league office. It's really not. If an owner wants to do that and an owner thinks he's a baller.

[Pablo Torre]

But what. Have at it. I suppose the last thought I have on this is, what if the game had actually happened and Tony Allen obliterates. And I mean this physically.

[David Sampson]

You mean like 12, 0, 11, 0, 21 0.

[Ayo Akimwaleri]

What?

[David Sampson]

I mean, what Elbow to the face.

[Pablo Torre]

Exactly. What if there's an elbow to the face?

[David Sampson]

So a little blood. It'd be great. It'd be great pr.

[Pablo Torre]

I am very sad that this never happened. I understand, of course, why it was a horrible idea at the same time.

[David Sampson]

So I can imagine a scenario where you have an employee and you showed video in your episode. I loved it. Of Putin playing hockey.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[David Sampson]

And of the goalie, in theory, taking a knee in order to let the one mile an hour slap shot, you know, hit the back of the net. Putin is different than an owner of a team. As much as we want to say that everyone's scared of owners, you would have no problem getting a player to go deep off an owner, pitching to him in a charity game. You have no problem with the player beating an owner one on one. Different with Putin, though.

[Pablo Torre]

Different with Putin. And yet, for reasons that we also explicate in the episode, there are some linkages between Robert Barrett and Vladimir Putin that are in fact worth making.

[Ayo Akimwaleri]

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[David Sampson]

That's creoninfo.com I'm asking my doctor about.

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[Pablo Torre]

I want to pivot because when it comes to what an owner can do with the thing they bought, it brings us to the Washington Post.

[David Sampson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

And to cbs and where do you want to start?

[David Sampson]

Are you upset? So I I had a conversation with myself on nothing personal about this issue, which is the show that I do on the Washington Post and everyone is aghast. And you PTFO is part of the Athletic.

[Pablo Torre]

We are a licensing partner and right.

[David Sampson]

Now the Athletic is the sports department of the New York Times. Can we agree on that?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, that is accurate.

[David Sampson]

And that the New York Times got rid of their sports section until they.

[Pablo Torre]

Purchased the Athletic for like half a billion dollars.

[David Sampson]

So whatever, whatever the price is, the New York Times sports section is the athletic. They far they've outsourced it entirely.

[Pablo Torre]

Well now they've insourced it. They have brought it underneath the.

[David Sampson]

Well, it's literally the body.

[Pablo Torre]

They literally bought it and they've now set about incorporating it into the larger New York Times infrastructure. So so they replaced yes, without belaboring it too much, they spent $550 million to purchase the athletic, replace the in house sports department. They relocated their various sports writers here and there in ways that I'm not fully caught up on. But yes, that was a decision.

[David Sampson]

People were aghast about the Washington Post and saying and Jeff Passon did a tweet Saying this is, he's a goon or a corporate goon, or there was some tweet that he had about Jeff Bezos that, that how can anyone do this? You're so rich that you own something, how could you run it like a business? And people were saying, the Washington Post sports is simply the greatest sports page ever. Well, if it were true and if it got support by subscribers or online support, there would have been a business reason not to cut the sports session. Obviously, it's not carrying its weight, and to me, I found it to be a non story.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, okay, so we're going to disagree on this on a couple of levels. And I want to read Jeff Passon's quote here because, quote, the Washington Post has the best sports section in the country, and I don't think it's particularly close. Only a soulless corporate goon would think the papers go without it. A short sighted, cowardly decision. Shame is your legacy. End quote.

[David Sampson]

Talking about Bezos.

[Pablo Torre]

That is the implication here, I would say. And by the way, I have various interesting, I think, incentives at play here, right? So I. This thing we're talking on is an independent sports journalism show that has filled a vacuum, abdicated in large part by the decline of traditional media, and especially traditional media that once relied upon journalism as its business, because the business of journalism is so hard. And so on the one hand, when I see the Washington Post is shuttering effectively or decimating effectively at sports section, and I'm like, that is good for the business of a PTFO that does journalism and is now distinguished further by its journalism. That is like the selfish read on this. The other thought I have though is that the decline in what has been sports journalism is a massive problem because when you lose independence, when you lose the ability to say, we're not compromised by the financial incentives that attend other arrangements, as in, I work for the team or I am explicitly trying to curry favor with our league partners, all of that stuff leads to less truth being told about in sports, a part of our society which has never been more important or influential or relevant or valuable.

[David Sampson]

It's a very lazy take to me, Pablo, because the people, if you're talking about the people who made up the department, is it possible that the people can find another avenue for their talent, another way to continue?

[Pablo Torre]

I want, I want to. I want to. Actually, I want to circumcise this conversation, so to speak. Right? I want to make. I want to. I want to. What I want to do is separate and trim. Why am I going this way, that's.

[David Sampson]

A lot of penis talk.

[Pablo Torre]

I mean, apologies.

[David Sampson]

I mean heated rivalry.

[Pablo Torre]

I have the, I have the, the, the dildo satellite in my head. What I want to do is pivot. What I want to do is pivot away from the individuals who are being affected as much as that is the human face on this. And that is what Jeff is speaking to, that there are these journalists over there who deserve better. As a matter of. I don't even want to.

[David Sampson]

But it's what you're speaking about. You're saying that journalism's going away because the Washington Post sports section is going away.

[Pablo Torre]

I, it's, it's not going away entirely, but this was an enormous, enormous institution that is both historical in ways that are beyond dispute. This is Tony Kornheiser. This is Michael Wilbon. This is David Remnick, who worked for the Washington Post. This is gone on David Ignatius. Go on. Just like the people who have come through that newsroom. As someone who recently watched all the President's Men and was inspired by it, it's just beyond, it's beyond dispute how important the Washington Post is in ways that I cannot even begin to summarize here. When you lose a sports section, though, in the macro sense, what you're losing is another place where people can get accountability, where people can get reporting that is ostensibly uncompromised by the incentives that are otherwise crawling over sports media. And that's the shame of it.

[David Sampson]

What's the barrier to entry? To be a competitor of yours? I must be confused because I view the barrier to entry as non existent.

[Pablo Torre]

Anybody certainly can start a YouTube channel or start a podcast and talk into a microphone. What I mourn is the loss of another newsroom that had infrastructure and collective experience and collective expertise that no longer is being funded. And look, John, Skipper not being here is also perfect as a metaphor for this conversation because at espn, where I worked under John, John funded journalism and had the luxury of doing so because.

[David Sampson]

Do you view that happening still at espn?

[Pablo Torre]

Well, this is, this is what I'm getting at.

[David Sampson]

Okay?

[Pablo Torre]

John's not here anymore, right? The idea of I want to fund a robust news gathering operation focused on sports journalism, even if it is not the thing that's making us money, because I have the league rights deals that are our business via cable television and subscription fees. That whole model is gone. So how can you support it, right? In the Washington Post, there was this premise initially, which is of course deeply naive, that a good billionaire, Jeff Bezos.

[David Sampson]

Save the day, will swoop in with.

[Pablo Torre]

His principles intact and fund something even if it loses him money. And that is what passion is speaking to. That is what everybody's realizing, oh, those.

[David Sampson]

Don'T exist, but they never did exist. It is a very silly sort of naive thought that people have. And obviously what Jeff is saying, whatever, it doesn't, it doesn't actually matter. But I'm talking about whether or not journalism is ending. And what people are saying is if there were more subscribers to the Washington Post, home delivery subscribers, the paper would continue as is. Home delivery's basically gone away. Printing presses are basically disappearing. The buildings in which printing presses existed are being repurposed for something else. So are you willing, instead of home delivery, will you buy the digital subscription? Some people like the paywall, some people don't. Some people do, but not enough to have the old business. The numbers have gone down because people get their news elsewhere. Why are we mourning that? You have built your career on adjusting to what the new reality is.

[Pablo Torre]

And I think there's fair critique in saying that the Washington Post did not figure out what others have figured out. By the way, the New York Times, what they figured out, hey, let's start a robust games division of our company. Let's get Wordle.

[David Sampson]

Unheard of.

[Pablo Torre]

Brilliant. We're going to find what is our equivalent to live sports rights. What is a business separate apart from journalism, such that we can support the journalism with the other stuff, with the toy department, so to speak. Right. And literally in this case, it's games. In. In this story though, what I'm also detecting is a macro level problem is the way in which journalism is giving way to opinion, the work of reporting and how to fund it, the newsroom as a concept, that collective expertise. It's not just Washington Post, right. It is now cbs. And so the question of, ah, cbs. Okay, so that's the Ellisons. That is the aforementioned Larry Ellison, one of the richest men in the world. Washington Post is Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world. Both of those men, incidentally, simultaneously figuring out how do we do business in the Trump era with the government, with Donald Trump, who is more transactional, needless to say, than any president we've ever seen. They are clearly trimming the journalism and they're figuring out their new business model. So CBS to you, David, as a.

[David Sampson]

Sometime I'm an analyst at cbs. I have to point that out exactly.

[Pablo Torre]

Sometime analyst.

[David Sampson]

What is funny word for it.

[Pablo Torre]

What is, what is. What is your view of what's happening in CBS then?

[David Sampson]

So when they had the all hands meeting. Here's what is the question? Do you have the ability to be independent as a journalist when there are so many intertwined governmental issues that frankly have always existed. They're just more out front now. So I'm laughing when you say that Trump is the only transactional president, that there is a long list of politicians who have gotten wealthy both in office and then after having been in office, sure. But as a function of degree, it's out of hand. And all the other things about Trump that we can talk about that upset me me, the transactional nature, it's almost, it's almost on the bottom of my list because it happens so frequently.

[Pablo Torre]

I will say quickly that I think it's impossible to extricate the transactionality from the policies that lead to horrors everywhere. But I want to get back to cbs.

[David Sampson]

So what what CBS is asking themselves and what all divisions are, is the juice worth the squeeze? My favorite expression to ask, because it actually happens in boardrooms. What is it that we are? What's at risk? What's happening with the value of our company, with the, with our value of shares? If we are doing this journalistic approach to this story that ends up having making an enemy in the Justice Department, an enemy in the White House, what impact will that have on all of our other business that we have to do? And that is what the job is of a CEO. And people don't like CEOs, but their job is not to do anything other than decide jump offs. They decide between departments who should win the day. They decide between big macro issues, where it is their company should be and should be going. That's their true job. And so I don't ever want to talk down about what they're doing at CBS because they're doing it for an actual reason of value. And the irony, and I close with this, CBS has just like metal arc, an equity plan, employees down at the lower levels. They're so focused on the value of their retirement fund, on the value of the share price that in one ear, one side of the mouth, they're arguing against what their CEO does. I hate my CEO. He makes so much money and I hate the decisions he's making. Where's our stock at? Oh my God, our stock went down 10 points in my, my, wait a minute, my RA is down 600 bucks. And it's always bothered me and I've always stood in lunchrooms. And I mean that metaphorically saying I, I don't understand how you cannot support your CEO because you're Rooting for him to succeed because you actually are acting in your own self interest. And it really does end arguments.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, hold on it. In this case, it starts one with five minutes left. The. The thing about the CEO though, in the context of journalism, right. Is that I fully admit how insanely difficult it is to create a profitable business model for journalism in an era in which the competition is endless, in an era in which people are habitually adjusting to frankly accept news and information from places that CBS and the Washington Post never had to worry about before. Before. Right. So all of that is true. And there is no magic solution where it's like, if only they would do the journalist's business plan. Right. It's not like there is a sliding door opportunity. And it's like, oh, they're just choosing to walk through this one. That said, the question of like, what can we mourn here? As a matter of how it is, is that there are these administrations now, with the CEOs included, for whom they are. They're not standing up for the thing that their institution that they're trying to save now was most distinguished by, which is to say the quality and the necessity of the journalism. Right. They are figuring out, okay, what do we do instead? How do we not lose credibility while also saving money? Me and the things that are being sacrificed are not merely the individuals who. I certainly feel horribly for the individual journalists who got to figure out what to do outside of these institutions.

[David Sampson]

Do you feel badly for all the people who get laid off, like at Amazon? Because there were a whole new list of. Okay, just want to make sure.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes. And if I was somebody who did that job in some regard, I would have even more direct empathy and by the way, air time for them. But I'm the guy who does journalism. I gotta acknowledge that this is, I think, good for the business of PTF foe, but horrific for our country. It's bad. It's bad when you lose these players and when you have people who are running the companies making compromises to favor administrations that are looking for more favorable coverage, which brings in Barry Weiss as a character, which brings in the Ellison who are active. I mean, again, their job is to transact. But there are no checks on those transactions anymore.

[David Sampson]

Think about what Allison's going to do as no owner of Tick Tock.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh my God.

[David Sampson]

He's going to make sure that everyone's algorithm. He's going to do what Elon Musk did, smartly. So make sure that the algorithms are such that it benefits your business.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah. And look so the reason they do the transacting is because with this administration, especially as a function of degree, it works. You know, you get something, there is a. There is a quid and there is a quo and they are finding ways to exchange.

[David Sampson]

So it benefits more people than just the people in the C suite. And I think that that is something that gets lost. And I hate to be the face of the argument of, of the CEO and the C suite, but the trickle down. And people will yell at me and incorrectly about trickle down economics. Let's just talk about the reality of what it is to be a 401k holder of a large public company.

[Pablo Torre]

So, sure. Is there the question of how do we get the value of this company to be as big as it could be so that we could support all of these employees and all of their retirement plans and all of that stuff. Stuff, sure. The question of what you are as. As what remains. Like what, what. What is still left here. I fear that it's very, very safe to say that you are. Yeah, you're not really journalism anymore.

[David Sampson]

You sound so pompous.

[Pablo Torre]

That's, that's, that's, that's. The fear is that you got to be about this and they're not about it. And that's. That's, that's. That's sad.

[David Sampson]

It's not. It's not sad, Pablo. What's sad is that your view that you're. What you're doing is somehow so integral to the ongoing life that we live. I love your show, I love being on it. But don't overestimate. We, we, we. We. I. You're making a difference when you inform people.

[Pablo Torre]

I think that there is.

[David Sampson]

I love you.

[Pablo Torre]

So much accountability that is even imaginable left in American life. And the Washington Post and CBS and his news programs used to be some of the foremost practitioners of it. And we're losing that. And in the meantime, what we got again to bring it full circle is a bunch of executives dressing up in baseball uniforms saying, I know how to win this game. This has been Pablo Torre Finds Out a Meadowlark Media production and I'll talk to you next time.

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[David Sampson]

Com.

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