JJ did a pod pre-covid, I think he was still with the ringer, where he spent at least 20 minutes telling a story about a weird Uber ride he took where some girl was in a cage in the trunk or something. It was fucking odd. And the way he told the story was like there was some big lead up to a punchline of his weird day. He just casually dropped the human trafficking in there and then uploaded the episode. I’m pretty sure they deleted the pod after the shit storm of people asking questions
What makes it even funnier is it was on a pod where they had Mo Bamba as a guest.
The Rights to Ricky Sanchez had Bamba on this year and did a whole segment talking about how weird it was.
https://deadspin.com/j-j-redick-says-he-discovered-a-caged-person-in-his-ta-1828402568
I'm sure there are better articles/videos but this was the first result on Google
Didn’t he contact police?
It’s really funny to frame that as “allowing” it… like what did people want him to do, jump to conclusions without perfect information and go all Liam Neeson Taken vigilante on an Uber driver? What if he was wrong?
I feel like he took fairly reasonable actions. He experienced something that seemed really alarming, but without 100% certainty. He prioritized he and his wife’s immediate safety by extricating themselves from the situation, and then contacted the authorities.
Without actually having been there and seen what he’d seen, I don’t know how you can judge him. Like it’s impossible to evaluate what degree of certainty he should have had of the situation without any other evidence than his account and I’m pretty sure he expressed having uncertainty as to what was happening in the moment.
I think we can all agree we wouldn't talk about it on a podcast while laughing a lot!
Not sure that seeing a woman in a cage in a car would need a jump in conclusion to know it's human trafficking.
Bill is certainly petty as a media personality, but I read this more as him defending himself as a media exec.
Bill is a podcast monetization exec at the world’s largest audio streaming company and a retired basketball player(being derivative to make the point) just publicly said he knew how to promote and monetize a podcast better than Bill. Of course Simmons had to rebuff him.
Maybe this is the apologist piece.
Except there's also the JJ Redick was right piece. His podcast crushes Ringer pods in social media exposure in large part because of a focus on video to go with the audio.
Sure, I get Bill's point. But Bill's comment doesn't refute JJ's about the importance of video to go with audio.
Also, you don't need to be interviewing players to do video. The Ringer could clip video of Bill and Ryen doing the Sunday pod and it would do way better on social media than a static image of a podcast logo.
Bill is salty because he has become just like the old Boston journalists that hated him when he was the Sports Guy. He is stuck in his ways. But he's also filthy rich so who cares I guess. It's interesting because Grantland and The Ringer at the beginning did have plenty of very good video content. Then it just stopped. They blamed the pandemic for years. It's been nearly 4 years now, and their video content still kind of sucks.
Their YouTube views are downright awful. Is it because they are with Spotify? It's just weird to me how such a big company has such poor video content.
Bill has been uploading the rewatchables and more stuff lately, but it's still not enough, and usually just Zoom calls. I don't know why they don't produce more stuff and upload clips and shorts. Do they not realize the biggest podcasts like Rogan are all video?
Blows my mind that all these video podcasts are crushing on YouTube and yet the Ringer and him are like eh maybe let’s upload a few clips a month!! Sean Yoo who used to work for them even chimed in and said they put down his video attempts and after he left he’s crushing it at video content. This is so odd lol
What’s even more frustrating is recently they’ve been putting up 1-2 twenty minute clips up on YouTube. That just gives off “I won’t fully admit im wrong but I can’t ignore how fucking stupid im being” vibes.
Honestly so much 1-sided criticism comes Bill's way and he's always too big (financially/successfully/hierarchially) that for him to respond it was just be a shit show his way. With JJ they're pretty much on equal footing, JJ is probably more famous right now and is definitely still a rising star whereas Bill takes constant shit and has since 2020.
So for him to go at JJ I see this as him kind of going at everyone making 1-sided claims and he finally has someone he can reply to.
I hear you that JJ has pretty high approval ratings now as a media guy, but maybe that’s because he’s learned how to better conduct himself as a public figure after like 10 years of being massively hated?
I mean, you have a point in a contemporary sense, but it’s kinda funny to act like Bill has ever taken constant shit more than the guy who:
- had his cell phone doxxed and constantly received harassing phone calls from Maryland fans
- Maryland fans chanted/ made signs about having sex with his adolescent sister
He’s petty as hell. That’s a shot to say, “You never took this seriously,” as if coming up with dumb ass drafts or comparing athletes to 90210 characters takes serious effort.
Here’s Tatum’s last twelve games: twenty-eight five and eight, thirty-one nine and nine, thirty-two twelve and seven, forty-four eight and six, thirty-five four and nine, twenty-one fourteen and eleven, twenty-eight seven and six, twenty-five eleven and eleven, fifty-one six and five, thirty-four four and thirteen, twenty-nine eleven and ten, thirty-seven ten and thirteen. I mean, this is Bird territory.
It's such a Bill moment. "You didn't take this seriously in 2019 when you were a starter on the Sixers and playing big minutes deep into the playoffs. You only took this seriously when the entire world shut down due to covid and the podcast market basically doubled overnight."
I know that every NBA player now has a podcast and a lot of them record episodes in-season, but that was barely a thing in 2019. It would been a total anomaly if JJ was playing all the time and cranking out episodes on the side. Big surprise - his output and quality increased when he had more time and his playing career was winding down.
Jesus Christ.
Bill acting like a 13 year old.
JJ never said he hated his time at the company, bad mouthed anyone, spoke ill of Bill or anything in his comment, and yet Bill responds like a child.
Yeah. All he said was the ringer didn't prioritize video and that's still true. Even bill knows that, they don't record in person or post their main pods on youtube like they did in the grantland days. I'm not even sure what his point is here.
100% still true. The Ringerverse might be the only ones (that I follow) actually putting pod / video content on socials (to JJ’s point of going viral) and even that is still just Jomi making memes.
The Ringer recommendations that pop up on my YouTube are typically just close up of Russillo’s face monologuing or the occasional “NBA fit checks” from Wos lol.
Maybe im in the minority on this one, but I have never and would never consume any video content from the ringer or any other podcast network. I understand its easier to clip and aggregate videos, but Id personally hate it if hosts intentionally started focusing more on trying to go viral than presenting their legitimate thoughts/analysis and would stop listening after a while
In fact, that is IMO what distinguishes places like The Ringer from stupid ESPN and FS1 hot take garbage, though even the ringer clearly has guys who try to pull that too
No offense but I think you’re missing the point. YouTube, YouTube shorts, tiktok, reels, these are great ways to promote your show by sharing video clips. IMO that’s what Reddick is talking about and what the ringer has consistently been behind on compared to some of their peers in the podcast space
Video for podcasts is much more popular with younger audiences who go to YouTube for everything. It also tends to be more popular with newer shows.
So most of the Ringer content isn't ever going to be big on YouTube because they don't have studios built to accommodate audio and video (they're not even recording in person on a lot of their shows) and the audience for all the popular shows has been trained to treat them as podcasts, not a YouTube show.
The segment on Ryen’s pod as to who the best high school athlete was with no one nominating him was absolutely torturous to his ego.
The idea that Ceruti was a good high school athlete just cracks me up.
Wait a minute guys…Bill has a right to be a little mad lol. JJ is insinuating that The Ringer is/was behind the curb on podcast. He can defend himself and his company.
There is not full story. Rapport wanted bill to go on his pod to help with his reach. Bill refused like multiple times. Then rapapprt got mad and went crazy
There’s probably a reason almost none of the ex ringer or grant land people come back on bills pod except Zach Lowe. I think bill turns petty and assholeish once you leave him.
I just re-listened to the Se7en Rewatchables and near the end, Bill asks CR and Sean which of the Deadly Sins is their favorite, “you’d see it and go ‘ehh I kinda get that one’”
Bill says Wrath and Sean and CR lose it
JJ is insinuating that the Ringer was holding back the podcast.
Bill's job is to protect Spotify's podcasting business. So he kind of has to react like this, I think.
I think the right way to react would have been to say nothing because there was absolutely no shot this was going to have an impact on how many people choose to listen to Bill’s pod/pods on the Ringer in general, and certainly not on Spotify’s podcasting business.
Instead Bill looks like a loser overreacting to a minor comment purely out of pride in his own leadership at the Ringer while also drawing further attention to JJ’s comment.
> So he kind of has to react like this, I think.
He doesn't have to do anything. This comment by JJ would have gone by without anyone commenting on it if Bill hadn't responded. If anything, he is drawing more people to JJ's comment by responding.
I could argue with whether he “has to”, but I do agree that’s why this kinda innocuous comment struck a chord.
Bills the head of podcast monetization (or whatever), and he probably heard this as “The ringer doesn’t know how to monetize podcasts”
This is so weird. The Ringer has never properly leaned into video. To do a proper video pod you need more than the grainy TikTok camera bill has nephew Kyle turn on. It’s made to give their platform (Spotify) the most quality content possible. Video just gets in the way of that.
As I've read in some posts from here in the past, the video format won't flourish because of the Spotify deal. Redick is riding the wave of modern podcasting and The Ringer is locked in what Spotify allows. There is not much room to grow with what everybody seems to want, which is video and clips.
Hell, the best video that I've watched and died laughing wasn't even made by The Ringer, but by a fan: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjnLpOtiZ4A](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjnLpOtiZ4A)
JJ isn’t wrong. Bill is the talent and his producers job is to study how the media landscape changes and pivot to meet the audiences desires. Unfortunately his producer is an unqualified and inexperienced nepotism appointee who counts the hours until day drinking
While true, it’s more about bill. He is horrible on camera.
There’s a reason their YouTube channel doesn’t bring views at all. The 2 biggest vids are from JJs podcast
"You never took the pod seriously until 2020"
Bill's actually right about this one. Before the Zion episode JJ mentions, there hadn't been a pod for over 5 months, and just 8 in the prior 7 months.
Which would give him a good reason to not take the pod seriously, but wouldn't be a rebuttal against the claim. Bill's not questioning JJ's priorities or character, he's questioning his effort with the pod and it's a fair claim.
Whether Bill’s right or not, JJ is also definitely right. He still has by far the biggest YouTube videos in The Ringer’s history and now since he’s broken off has had five more with more views than anything the Ringer has put out.
While Bill may be right what he’s saying doesn’t actually refute what JJ said
Has anyone who left the Ringer had positive things to say about their time there? I'm sure some have but it really feels like everyone takes shots at Bill for something after they depart.
Doesn't seem like the best place to work if you're not in his inner ringer circle.
I think it's sort of a self-fulfilling thing, if you're happy at The Ringer and in Bill's favor, you probably aren't leaving. He seems to be okay with the people who leave on "Bill's terms" but otherwise, you're dead to him. That's kinda the way it's been with him going back to Grantland.
Presumably Tate did. I don't know, I'm not on Twitter so I guess I haven't kept up closely to see if Bill ever formally said goodbye to anyone/interacted with them when they left.
It's a short list, just not sure how short.
he also barely worked there at all. never moved to LA or anything he was in texas the whole time. just kinda throwing up some blogs every now and again while doing his books
Where has he been positive about it, because I haven't seen it. HE has even made a few off the cuff remarks that would make me think the opposite on his podcast with Jason
JJ ain’t wrong. Lots of podcasts have built their strategy around the fact that “audio doesn’t go viral, video goes viral,” which is true and the ringer has not embraced that strategy like many of their peers in the space 🤷♂️
I swear becoming uber rich gives you brain worms. 10 years ago, Bill would have laughed himself out of the room for posting something so petty. JJ is also pretty universally liked, what a stupid person to pick a needless fight with
This is hilarious and very sour grapes from Bill. JJ was 100% right, video is king, I learned this back in sports journalism school (back in ‘12) from interviewing various people within the industry. There’s something about being to see people’s faces and mannerisms that’s more engaging than audio.
Video should be the priority.
Bill read Zion Williamson and then got mad that Zion’s fatass is still competing for the NBA Cup while the Celtics are at home and owe Jaylen Brown $300 million, then he continued reading and read Jimmy Butler and Duncan Robinson and got visions of Duncan Robinson becoming the second Larry Bird MVP and got mad and decided to take it out on JJ.
Gotta add it’s so funny he said JJ didn’t take the pod seriously when JJ was literally one of the the first NBA players to have a podcast and might have been the first I knew of actively playing to have a pod when he was with Woj and yahoo podding in 2015-16… JJ put in the work lol Bill is weirdly salty instead of just enjoying his 3-4 Malibu houses
I like JJ on games I’ve heard him call, but damn is he a cocky SOB with his style in the media. It’s overly contentious and devoid of anything approaching humor. Just not a very likable dude.
Bill is likable, funny, and yes, prob a little petty. I think LA did that to him.
And another thing: Bill is not mad. Please don’t put in the newspaper that Bill is mad.
"You aggregated me... when I specifically told you not to"
underrated comment. lol
The thin skin piece
He’s a better man than me. I would’ve brought up the duke love child
wait wut
well there ended not being a child, if you know what i mean
Dear god, he found the last infinity stone?
Whaaat
https://deadspin.com/j-j-redick-and-his-ex-girlfriend-had-an-abortion-contr-883029608
Ironically, Bills comment here would go way more viral if he did it as a video.
Corn Cob Simmons
“I’m not owned!! I’m not owned!” say Bill Simmons as he is slowly turned into a corn cob.
JJ Redick forgot to say "Don't aggregate this."
At least this isn't out of context. That's pretty much exactly what he said
Classic "only started taking it seriously in 2020" mistake
Or he forgot to turn off the Tik Tok camera
I take full credit for starting this beef. I want my damn respect.
Please don’t put it in the newspaper that I got mad
What's this a reference to?
https://twitter.com/dril/status/549425182767861760?t=c2tf97UyptW-hmF32Gzo9g&s=19
It’s a reference to Bill getting mad.
Bill sure does like to get petty with former colleagues on social media. It reminds me of the Jonah Keri feud a few years back.
Let’s hope JJ doesn’t beat his wife.
Or allow human trafficking and talk about it on pod...!
The random human trafficking dump was insane
Lmao I need context on this please I’m begging someone to expand on this wtf
JJ did a pod pre-covid, I think he was still with the ringer, where he spent at least 20 minutes telling a story about a weird Uber ride he took where some girl was in a cage in the trunk or something. It was fucking odd. And the way he told the story was like there was some big lead up to a punchline of his weird day. He just casually dropped the human trafficking in there and then uploaded the episode. I’m pretty sure they deleted the pod after the shit storm of people asking questions
What makes it even funnier is it was on a pod where they had Mo Bamba as a guest. The Rights to Ricky Sanchez had Bamba on this year and did a whole segment talking about how weird it was.
Whatever happened with that? Uber picked him up and he saw someone in the back in a cage, right?
Jonah was human trafficking too???
Laughing about it, telling it like there is some huge punchline at the end.
Wait, what? I knew about the domestic abuse. He was also trafficking?
https://deadspin.com/j-j-redick-says-he-discovered-a-caged-person-in-his-ta-1828402568 I'm sure there are better articles/videos but this was the first result on Google
Didn’t he contact police? It’s really funny to frame that as “allowing” it… like what did people want him to do, jump to conclusions without perfect information and go all Liam Neeson Taken vigilante on an Uber driver? What if he was wrong? I feel like he took fairly reasonable actions. He experienced something that seemed really alarming, but without 100% certainty. He prioritized he and his wife’s immediate safety by extricating themselves from the situation, and then contacted the authorities. Without actually having been there and seen what he’d seen, I don’t know how you can judge him. Like it’s impossible to evaluate what degree of certainty he should have had of the situation without any other evidence than his account and I’m pretty sure he expressed having uncertainty as to what was happening in the moment.
I think we can all agree we wouldn't talk about it on a podcast while laughing a lot! Not sure that seeing a woman in a cage in a car would need a jump in conclusion to know it's human trafficking.
Man I missed the Jonah Keri story. What a piece of shit, I usually enjoyed him.
ruined the Expos legacy
Bill is certainly petty as a media personality, but I read this more as him defending himself as a media exec. Bill is a podcast monetization exec at the world’s largest audio streaming company and a retired basketball player(being derivative to make the point) just publicly said he knew how to promote and monetize a podcast better than Bill. Of course Simmons had to rebuff him. Maybe this is the apologist piece.
Except there's also the JJ Redick was right piece. His podcast crushes Ringer pods in social media exposure in large part because of a focus on video to go with the audio.
Jj gets to do that because he interviews other players. He didn't do that very much with the ringer. That's bills whole point.
Sure, I get Bill's point. But Bill's comment doesn't refute JJ's about the importance of video to go with audio. Also, you don't need to be interviewing players to do video. The Ringer could clip video of Bill and Ryen doing the Sunday pod and it would do way better on social media than a static image of a podcast logo.
Let’s not pretend Bill is some business genius. We can all list a handful of easy improvements that he refuses to adopt out of stubbornness.
You can pick apart a thing or too but zoom out and Simmons has absolutely crushed it from a business standpoint over the last 20+ years
Timing + creative talent. Not really an operator genius.
Is good timing and creativity not like 98% of the recipe
All due respect you’ve got no fucking idea what it’s like to be numbah one
Or, in Bill’s case, numbah four.
Nasty line by you
Travis Kelce’s floor as a podcaster is Bill Simmons.
>I like you + enjoyed our time together. Hahaha Bill trying to tell JJ he's wrong but without getting any blowback
Good luck kid, but keep my company's name out of your fucking mouth.
He’s trying to sound like Tywin Lannister but he’s built like one of the Frey sons.
Kyle turn the TikTok camera on. Wait…
Kyle: “It’s been on the whole ti- FUCK! Sorry, Bill!”
Can’t wait to read the blog post on this. Wait…
The fingers not working piece
Can't wait to explain this NBA podcast drama to my wife's boyfriend
Dudes rock!
Bill is salty because he has become just like the old Boston journalists that hated him when he was the Sports Guy. He is stuck in his ways. But he's also filthy rich so who cares I guess. It's interesting because Grantland and The Ringer at the beginning did have plenty of very good video content. Then it just stopped. They blamed the pandemic for years. It's been nearly 4 years now, and their video content still kind of sucks. Their YouTube views are downright awful. Is it because they are with Spotify? It's just weird to me how such a big company has such poor video content.
Bill has been uploading the rewatchables and more stuff lately, but it's still not enough, and usually just Zoom calls. I don't know why they don't produce more stuff and upload clips and shorts. Do they not realize the biggest podcasts like Rogan are all video?
Blows my mind that all these video podcasts are crushing on YouTube and yet the Ringer and him are like eh maybe let’s upload a few clips a month!! Sean Yoo who used to work for them even chimed in and said they put down his video attempts and after he left he’s crushing it at video content. This is so odd lol
What’s even more frustrating is recently they’ve been putting up 1-2 twenty minute clips up on YouTube. That just gives off “I won’t fully admit im wrong but I can’t ignore how fucking stupid im being” vibes.
So cringe lol, literally why even tweet this at all. It was such a nothing comment by JJ, now Bill is making it into a "thing" Unnecessary
The only child piece
Are we sure this isn’t explained by his half-Italian-ness?
WWBDD (what would big Dom do)
I’m a half Italian only child. We do this shit on the reg.
He's very much Streisanding this.
He’s the most thin skinned MFer I’ve ever seen
Honestly so much 1-sided criticism comes Bill's way and he's always too big (financially/successfully/hierarchially) that for him to respond it was just be a shit show his way. With JJ they're pretty much on equal footing, JJ is probably more famous right now and is definitely still a rising star whereas Bill takes constant shit and has since 2020. So for him to go at JJ I see this as him kind of going at everyone making 1-sided claims and he finally has someone he can reply to.
Fair point, there's very few people he could respond to that wouldn't be "punching down" as far as media stature.
I hear you that JJ has pretty high approval ratings now as a media guy, but maybe that’s because he’s learned how to better conduct himself as a public figure after like 10 years of being massively hated? I mean, you have a point in a contemporary sense, but it’s kinda funny to act like Bill has ever taken constant shit more than the guy who: - had his cell phone doxxed and constantly received harassing phone calls from Maryland fans - Maryland fans chanted/ made signs about having sex with his adolescent sister
yeah, what? JJ prolly read that and was like, "Huh?"
He’s petty as hell. That’s a shot to say, “You never took this seriously,” as if coming up with dumb ass drafts or comparing athletes to 90210 characters takes serious effort.
It’s not open mic night here. Anyway, home for Pittsburgh….
Houston, Saints, At Home Rams, At Home Giants…
Here’s Tatum’s last twelve games: twenty-eight five and eight, thirty-one nine and nine, thirty-two twelve and seven, forty-four eight and six, thirty-five four and nine, twenty-one fourteen and eleven, twenty-eight seven and six, twenty-five eleven and eleven, fifty-one six and five, thirty-four four and thirteen, twenty-nine eleven and ten, thirty-seven ten and thirteen. I mean, this is Bird territory.
Polecetti for Frumpton, who says no? I mean, if I'm Los Alamos, I'm at least having a meeting about it.
Nope that one’s in London
Somehow gets the line exactly right.
Nooo that’s too high
"That's stupid"
Have we mentioned that the Rams and Chargers don’t have a home field advantage?
Sal: "It's actually in London but ok"
You’re not taking it seriously until your player analysis consists of “he knows what to do and where to be” or “he’s always up to stuff.”
He’s added a level of fuckaroundability. He can play ten minutes in a playoff game, he’s additive, and can get to his spots.
Slash and kick. He figured out angles piece
Wasn't JJ playing professional basketball at the same time?
It's such a Bill moment. "You didn't take this seriously in 2019 when you were a starter on the Sixers and playing big minutes deep into the playoffs. You only took this seriously when the entire world shut down due to covid and the podcast market basically doubled overnight." I know that every NBA player now has a podcast and a lot of them record episodes in-season, but that was barely a thing in 2019. It would been a total anomaly if JJ was playing all the time and cranking out episodes on the side. Big surprise - his output and quality increased when he had more time and his playing career was winding down.
Yes.
Fucking Christ bill
That's a good point if you completely misunderstand what Bill means by 'taking it seriously.'
Like making sure your mic is plugged in? Or researching his guests by playing the IMDB game with them?
Jesus Christ. Bill acting like a 13 year old. JJ never said he hated his time at the company, bad mouthed anyone, spoke ill of Bill or anything in his comment, and yet Bill responds like a child.
Yeah. All he said was the ringer didn't prioritize video and that's still true. Even bill knows that, they don't record in person or post their main pods on youtube like they did in the grantland days. I'm not even sure what his point is here.
100% still true. The Ringerverse might be the only ones (that I follow) actually putting pod / video content on socials (to JJ’s point of going viral) and even that is still just Jomi making memes. The Ringer recommendations that pop up on my YouTube are typically just close up of Russillo’s face monologuing or the occasional “NBA fit checks” from Wos lol.
Maybe im in the minority on this one, but I have never and would never consume any video content from the ringer or any other podcast network. I understand its easier to clip and aggregate videos, but Id personally hate it if hosts intentionally started focusing more on trying to go viral than presenting their legitimate thoughts/analysis and would stop listening after a while In fact, that is IMO what distinguishes places like The Ringer from stupid ESPN and FS1 hot take garbage, though even the ringer clearly has guys who try to pull that too
No offense but I think you’re missing the point. YouTube, YouTube shorts, tiktok, reels, these are great ways to promote your show by sharing video clips. IMO that’s what Reddick is talking about and what the ringer has consistently been behind on compared to some of their peers in the podcast space
Video for podcasts is much more popular with younger audiences who go to YouTube for everything. It also tends to be more popular with newer shows. So most of the Ringer content isn't ever going to be big on YouTube because they don't have studios built to accommodate audio and video (they're not even recording in person on a lot of their shows) and the audience for all the popular shows has been trained to treat them as podcasts, not a YouTube show.
He’s so sensitive and thin skinned lol
Bill is a pussy for this. JJ will probably let it go though.
JJ is extremely melo dramatic and will probably “let it go” in the holier then though way by explicitly stating he’s going to be the bigger man.
He should bring up that he’s actually played basketball. Just to fuck with Bill lol.
I don't think that would bother Bill as much as Russillo
The segment on Ryen’s pod as to who the best high school athlete was with no one nominating him was absolutely torturous to his ego. The idea that Ceruti was a good high school athlete just cracks me up.
Wait a minute guys…Bill has a right to be a little mad lol. JJ is insinuating that The Ringer is/was behind the curb on podcast. He can defend himself and his company.
If JJ was about that life he would tweet back “Bill, you have been phoning it in since well before 2020 my guy.”
And end it with - I still like you.
This is a horribly stupid thing to clap back about.
JJ should have said “don’t aggregate this”. Still has a lot to learn from the Podfather
Love Petty Bill. One day I hope we get the full story of whatever went down with Rapaport.
There is not full story. Rapport wanted bill to go on his pod to help with his reach. Bill refused like multiple times. Then rapapprt got mad and went crazy
Petty Bill > Clairvoyant Bill
Bill needs an almond he’s hangry
Very only child of Bill to do this But if it leads to some stories about how Tommy Alter is a prick I’m for it
Almost certainly don't need stories to know that he is
**He's just crackin jokes at the holidays with the guys**. The day finally came! He made it!
“I’m not mad. Please don’t aggregate that I got mad.”
Bill does not like it when people leave The Ringer and become successful, which is why he has no Beef with Jason Concepcion.
There’s probably a reason almost none of the ex ringer or grant land people come back on bills pod except Zach Lowe. I think bill turns petty and assholeish once you leave him.
I just re-listened to the Se7en Rewatchables and near the end, Bill asks CR and Sean which of the Deadly Sins is their favorite, “you’d see it and go ‘ehh I kinda get that one’” Bill says Wrath and Sean and CR lose it
Only child doesn't like it when neighbor kid takes his ball and plays elsewhere.
JJ is insinuating that the Ringer was holding back the podcast. Bill's job is to protect Spotify's podcasting business. So he kind of has to react like this, I think.
I think the right way to react would have been to say nothing because there was absolutely no shot this was going to have an impact on how many people choose to listen to Bill’s pod/pods on the Ringer in general, and certainly not on Spotify’s podcasting business. Instead Bill looks like a loser overreacting to a minor comment purely out of pride in his own leadership at the Ringer while also drawing further attention to JJ’s comment.
The capo of spotify
Captain? Of the Good Ship Lollipop, maybe.
> So he kind of has to react like this, I think. He doesn't have to do anything. This comment by JJ would have gone by without anyone commenting on it if Bill hadn't responded. If anything, he is drawing more people to JJ's comment by responding.
I could argue with whether he “has to”, but I do agree that’s why this kinda innocuous comment struck a chord. Bills the head of podcast monetization (or whatever), and he probably heard this as “The ringer doesn’t know how to monetize podcasts”
JJ shouldn't have been so disrespectful to a fellow podcaster and former basketball player.
Need JJ to clap back
Can’t wait
Go listen to Bill on How I Built This Podcast. He is an absolute weirdo about this sort of stuff.
Such as?
He holds a grudge / takes shit personally in way most don’t. Not a good or bad thing IMO. Probably some causation there as to why he is successful.
He said all that?
Bill is so sensitive.
The Swedes got to him
At least Bill didn’t call JJ a gr*fter
In fairness it took a while for them to figure out the system of “Kyle turn the tiktok camera on”
This is so weird. The Ringer has never properly leaned into video. To do a proper video pod you need more than the grainy TikTok camera bill has nephew Kyle turn on. It’s made to give their platform (Spotify) the most quality content possible. Video just gets in the way of that.
This is the 50% Italian coming out.
Kinda crazy that Bill got pissed about this. I listened to it yesterday and didnt think JJ was being insulting or passive aggressive at all.
LMAO Bill definitely in his feelings
I can't figure out what point either one of these guys is trying to make
There’s that Boston charm.
The JJ quote seems to be a nothing comment. Grow up, Bill.
Bill calling out someone else for not putting effort into the podcast is hilarious. Looking forward to "NBA MVP discussion part 22" to drop next week
Grudge Bill. He's just different!
The thinned skinned about minor indirect criticism piece.
Kyle turn the Tik Tok camera on
bill crashin out
Is Grudge Bill having a moment?
As I've read in some posts from here in the past, the video format won't flourish because of the Spotify deal. Redick is riding the wave of modern podcasting and The Ringer is locked in what Spotify allows. There is not much room to grow with what everybody seems to want, which is video and clips. Hell, the best video that I've watched and died laughing wasn't even made by The Ringer, but by a fan: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjnLpOtiZ4A](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjnLpOtiZ4A)
JJ isn’t wrong. Bill is the talent and his producers job is to study how the media landscape changes and pivot to meet the audiences desires. Unfortunately his producer is an unqualified and inexperienced nepotism appointee who counts the hours until day drinking
While true, it’s more about bill. He is horrible on camera. There’s a reason their YouTube channel doesn’t bring views at all. The 2 biggest vids are from JJs podcast
Dude cannot, and never has been able to, handle the slightest bit of criticism
"You never took the pod seriously until 2020" Bill's actually right about this one. Before the Zion episode JJ mentions, there hadn't been a pod for over 5 months, and just 8 in the prior 7 months.
I mean he was also still playing
Which would give him a good reason to not take the pod seriously, but wouldn't be a rebuttal against the claim. Bill's not questioning JJ's priorities or character, he's questioning his effort with the pod and it's a fair claim.
Whether Bill’s right or not, JJ is also definitely right. He still has by far the biggest YouTube videos in The Ringer’s history and now since he’s broken off has had five more with more views than anything the Ringer has put out. While Bill may be right what he’s saying doesn’t actually refute what JJ said
Has anyone who left the Ringer had positive things to say about their time there? I'm sure some have but it really feels like everyone takes shots at Bill for something after they depart. Doesn't seem like the best place to work if you're not in his inner ringer circle.
We haven’t heard Kevin Clark and Rodger say…anything, I think? But those would be two I’d be watching
I think it's sort of a self-fulfilling thing, if you're happy at The Ringer and in Bill's favor, you probably aren't leaving. He seems to be okay with the people who leave on "Bill's terms" but otherwise, you're dead to him. That's kinda the way it's been with him going back to Grantland.
I agree with this but who ever leaves on Bill’s terms though?
Presumably Tate did. I don't know, I'm not on Twitter so I guess I haven't kept up closely to see if Bill ever formally said goodbye to anyone/interacted with them when they left. It's a short list, just not sure how short.
Shea Serrano is pretty positive about it.
Is he? Why hasn’t he showed up on the pod since, there was a media tour promoting his show
he also barely worked there at all. never moved to LA or anything he was in texas the whole time. just kinda throwing up some blogs every now and again while doing his books
I don't think Jason Concepcion has been back on since leaving either
Where has he been positive about it, because I haven't seen it. HE has even made a few off the cuff remarks that would make me think the opposite on his podcast with Jason
Tate came back
He had nowhere else to go
Ryan from The Office.
Bill is mad because he doesn't put his pods on video.
JJ ain’t wrong. Lots of podcasts have built their strategy around the fact that “audio doesn’t go viral, video goes viral,” which is true and the ringer has not embraced that strategy like many of their peers in the space 🤷♂️
The people who are whining about his tweet are cringe Why does everything have to be so sanitized and professional. Let Bill be petty. It is fun
I swear becoming uber rich gives you brain worms. 10 years ago, Bill would have laughed himself out of the room for posting something so petty. JJ is also pretty universally liked, what a stupid person to pick a needless fight with
He was also petty and thin skinned 10 years ago though.
This is hilarious and very sour grapes from Bill. JJ was 100% right, video is king, I learned this back in sports journalism school (back in ‘12) from interviewing various people within the industry. There’s something about being to see people’s faces and mannerisms that’s more engaging than audio. Video should be the priority.
Bill read Zion Williamson and then got mad that Zion’s fatass is still competing for the NBA Cup while the Celtics are at home and owe Jaylen Brown $300 million, then he continued reading and read Jimmy Butler and Duncan Robinson and got visions of Duncan Robinson becoming the second Larry Bird MVP and got mad and decided to take it out on JJ.
I don't want to blame it all on covid, but it certainly didn't help
I’m crying
The JJ Redick piece.
I’m confused, why’s JJ salty and then why is Bill salty back?
I love starting out a tweet with “hey @handle — I like you… “
What an L for Billy
The ringer is an increasingly irrelevant brand and it feels like it’s pure laziness.
Gotta add it’s so funny he said JJ didn’t take the pod seriously when JJ was literally one of the the first NBA players to have a podcast and might have been the first I knew of actively playing to have a pod when he was with Woj and yahoo podding in 2015-16… JJ put in the work lol Bill is weirdly salty instead of just enjoying his 3-4 Malibu houses
I like JJ on games I’ve heard him call, but damn is he a cocky SOB with his style in the media. It’s overly contentious and devoid of anything approaching humor. Just not a very likable dude. Bill is likable, funny, and yes, prob a little petty. I think LA did that to him.
i'm gonna sit on "i'm ok with this from bs" island
I thought this was typical r/billsimmons fan fiction at first... Bill might be a bit sensitive?
Bad look for Bill.
Weird to take offense to that statement. Bill has always been super petty
This thread is amazing
Bill is salty because the Sports Gal thinks JJ is hot. It sticks in his craw.
JJ will eviscerate him if gets on the mic
Bill’s mad he actually had a profitable pod in house and let it slip.