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Leagues and Governing Bodies

NFLPA's DeMaurice Smith Defends Strength Of His Union When Compared To MLBPA

NFLPA Exec Dir DeMaurice Smith on Wednesday addressed the perception that his organization is not as strong as the MLBPA during a conversation with ESPN's Dan Le Batard. Asked how he responds when NFL players ask him why the MLBPA is "so much stronger than our union," Smith said, "I ask them why do they think so." He said, "You look at where we came from at the beginning of this lockout in 2009, and [the] facts are clear: the league wanted us to play 18 games, they wanted to take away the players' defined benefit plan, they wanted a strict rookie wage scale. Those three things were things that the league had prepared for for years. When we got through the lockout, we ended up with a larger share of revenue than we’ve ever had in the history of the National Football League. We certainly aren’t playing 18 games and every one of our players kept their pensions.” Smith said the “best part of this job is you get to know the young men behind the helmet." Smith: "While I may not rise and fall on how a game ends, the great part of this job is really knowing the young men as family men, good husbands, good sons, good brothers, and that part’s cool” (“Dan Le Batard Is Highly Questionable,” ESPN2, 2/13).

SBJ Morning Buzzcast: March 25, 2024

NFL meeting preview; MLB's opening week ad effort and remembering Peter Angelos.

Big Get Jay Wright, March Madness is upon us and ESPN locks up CFP

On this week’s pod, our Big Get is CBS Sports college basketball analyst Jay Wright. The NCAA Championship-winning coach shares his insight with SBJ’s Austin Karp on key hoops issues and why being well dressed is an important part of his success. Also on the show, Poynter Institute senior writer Tom Jones shares who he has up and who is down in sports media. Later, SBJ’s Ben Portnoy talks the latest on ESPN’s CFP extension and who CBS, TNT Sports and ESPN need to make deep runs in the men’s and women's NCAA basketball tournaments.

SBJ I Factor: Nana-Yaw Asamoah

SBJ I Factor features an interview with AMB Sports and Entertainment Chief Commercial Office Nana-Yaw Asamoah. Asamoah, who moved over to AMBSE last year after 14 years at the NFL, talks with SBJ’s Ben Fischer about how his role model parents and older sisters pushed him to shrive, how the power of lifelong learning fuels successful people, and why AMBSE was an opportunity he could not pass up. Asamoah is 2021 SBJ Forty Under 40 honoree. SBJ I Factor is a monthly podcast offering interviews with sports executives who have been recipients of one of the magazine’s awards.

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