CBS’s Halloween "Bloodbath" and Michael Jordan as the NBA's Ombudsman. Plus: Vox’s Astead Herndon on Leaving The New York Times and the Future of the Democrats.

The Press Box

The Ringer

Sports

4.4 • 3.1K Ratings

🗓️ 31 October 2025

⏱️ 94 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Hello, media consumers! Bryan and Joel discuss the layoffs at CBS News (0:51) before diving into their thoughts on Michael Jordan’s two appearances on NBC thus far (14:05), the NBA's relationship to storytelling, and what they want from these MJ appearances. Next, Bryan and Joel educate the listeners on Jennifer Welch (28:41), including where she originally grabbed the spotlight, what she does, and where she fits in the modern political media ecosystem. They end the show with the next installment of 25 for 25 as Vox’s Astead Herndon joins to talk about leaving The New York Times and the future of the Democrats (47:13). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey Jack, I'm seeing your business everywhere. Have you got a new marketing person or something?
0:04.7	You could say I've got a new secret weapon for print. Print? Oh, Vista print, right? That's not a secret.
0:10.8	How did you know? Come on. Custom posters, branded mugs, stylish flyers. Only one place prints all that. Vista print.
0:17.7	Yeah, I got business cards, stickers, t-shirts, booklets, signage, even photo books from my last holiday.
0:23.2	Print everything for your business with VistaPrint.
0:25.9	If you need it, we print it at vistoprint.co.uk.
0:31.7	Sean has had some good ideas over the years, but using Canva was a really good one.
0:38.6	Sean designed some social posts to promote his friend's car boot sale.
0:43.2	They looked good.
0:45.3	Really, really good.
0:47.9	Next thing he knows, someone came and bought the loft, including the car.
0:54.6	Now Sean doesn't know how he's going to get home.
0:58.0	Thanks, Canva.
1:05.9	Hello, media consumers.
1:08.6	Welcome to Pressbox Thursday.
1:10.4	It's Brian Curtis. It's Joel Anderson. It's producer Bruce Baldwin. Coming up on the podcast, the Halloween bloodbath at CBS News, Michael Jordan breaks his silence on NBC. What do we want from an MJ interview? Plus, the rise of podcaster Jennifer Welch, fraud book tours, and in the latest installment
1:32.5	of our 25 for 25 series, Asted Herndon is going to join us to talk about leaving the New York
1:38.4	Times for Vox, the state of the Democrats, and much, much more.
1:43.3	You're not going to want to miss that. But first up,
1:45.9	Joel, we talked on Monday about John Dickerson leaving CBS News. Well, yesterday we learned that about
1:52.9	a hundred more people are going to be leaving due to layoffs. That's, I mean, we all sort of
1:59.9	expected this when the merger went through.
	...

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