Hello and welcome again to South Beach sessions. This epic sort of series with John Skipper

who is our friend and our new CEO and also across many years was the most powerful executive

in sports. I hope you've enjoyed sort of an inner workings viewing of the corridors

of power. The first two episodes were to get to know him and what his objectives are

for the new metal arc media. The last two episodes are and have been about his journey at ESPN,

some of the cool stories, some of the things that happened while he was in those corridors

that you might not normally have access to where you find the rich and the wealthy. We've

covered his career now. It's mostly just ESPN stuff and the stuff at the height of sports

when you're making decisions and making for Disney more money than anything in the Disney

Empire and furthermore, the most profitable six year run in the history of the network

that has been very profitable. So here is episode four, part four. We will have a surprise

fifth part that we didn't know was coming. That is coming up shortly. But for now, here

is part four of our conversation with friend and metal arc CEO and former ESPN president

John Skipper. Can you explain to us as you have done this job and advocated for people who

are the people that have become signature personalities at ESPN or elsewhere with your

endorsement that were received with the most reluctance that you had to fight for, but

it wasn't as popular as perhaps in retrospect. It would appear now that they have become

stars. Well, it's interesting, of course, there's almost a funny inverse correlation between

the people who became the biggest stars in the most resistance. There's very seldom resistance

to benevolent mediocrity, right? Nobody gets unhappy when somebody's bland but kind of

does the job. Look, it's an interesting place to insert. Maybe somebody you wouldn't think

I would say, Stephen Ace Smith. Stephen Ace Smith may be the most important person at

...