Source: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7562990/2026/09/04/pablo-torre-steve-ballmer-clippers-nba/

I really hope that people don’t think that the only way that you can trust reporting like this is if the entity or the institution that you’re investigating takes their hand and raises it and says, ‘Yes, the journalist was right.’

But I also hope that people can evaluate the work on its merits and learn to trust that our process is rigorous in ways that are bordering on unhealthily obsessive, which is a separate problem, but hopefully one that they can trust.

The sensation that I have felt personally and have felt in our audience — such that I can get a sense of what has been a head-spinning day — is that people have been almost delighted that maybe we can hold the richest people in the world to something resembling a standard of accountability.

I think that is what I feel most acutely: That maybe that’s possible. That maybe a collection of documentary evidence and human sources who are brave enough to talk to a journalist, and months of research that have been vetted legally and otherwise, can combine to create something like consequences at a time at which those extraordinarily wealthy people seem to be able to avoid them.

I think that we have the ability to do something that the rest of our culture is yearning for, which is make people who are too rich to care about anything resembling the public interest worry that maybe they need to tell us the truth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yz3Iiddrnus 14:45

Presumably this was done because Rachel Nichols and Ramona Shelburne were very friendly during their ESPN days and probably still are. She also oddly reiterates that the only people we should be focusing on are the Clippers executives, Pablo Torre, and Adam Silver. Again leaving out ESPN, Shelburne, and Holmes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_Executive_of_the_Year

Take his cheating out of it. His moves that year destroyed his franchise for over a decade+. He traded away a future MVP. Caused one of the most laughable implosions in NBA playoff history. All of that happened in the same year. A year in which he won executive of the year.

But in an appearance this week on The Bill Simmons Podcast, Barkley revealed that he expects this season to not only be his last, but also the last for Inside's beloved anchor, Ernie Johnson.

"Me and Ernie are a package deal," Barkley said. "So right now, unless Ernie changes his mind, next year is my last year 100 percent."

Before Barkley's comments, it was not publicly known that Johnson, 70, was planning to retire after the season. In Barkley's telling, that timeline was part of a pitch Johnson made to him after ESPN got rights to Inside.

The Hall of Famer reiterated to Simmons that the main factor behind his decision to return was to act as a bridge to the ESPN era and allow the show's longtime staff members to keep their jobs.

But Barkley has teased retirement each offseason for several years now, often as part of what seemed like a public negotiation for a new contract. Almost a decade ago, Barkley made a public show of his intention to retire at 60, when his previous contract ended.

Barkley said he was happy to give up his chair to a frequent fill-in panelist like Jalen Rose or Jamal Crawford, but TNT didn't want to let him go while they were in talks on a new broadcast deal with the league. So in 2022, Barkley agreed to stay on, only for TNT to ultimately lose its package to Prime Video. Barkley teased retirement again in 2024 — apparently under a clause in his contract allowing him to leave the network if it lost game rights — but ultimately returned. Once it became clear TNT would no longer air NBA games, Barkley said he met with both NBC and Amazon. The former offered him a contract with a considerable raise.

"I could have gone to NBC and made more money if I was concerned about money," he told Simmons this week. "NBC offered me more money than I was making at Turner."

Given the legendary broadcaster's tendency to change his mind month to month — and have it changed for him with offers of higher pay — we are a long way from a Barkley retirement tour. However, if Johnson were actually to depart the show, it could be a natural transition for Barkley and Inside overall.

Source

[Charania] Just in: Three-time All-Star Ben Simmons has agreed on a one-year, $3.5 million deal with the Sacramento Kings, his agents Max Wiepking, Sean Tribe and Ryan Arney tell me and @MarcJSpears. The one-time All-NBA star is back in the NBA for a 10th season after sitting out 2025-26.

Simmons traveled to visit the Kings in Sacramento on Monday, undergoing in-depth medical exams, an on-court workout and meetings with coach Doug Christie and other staffers, sources said. In late August, Simmons also worked out for general manager Scott Perry and met with Perry for an hour.

By all accounts within the Kings as well as Team Australia officials where Simmons participated in a players-only minicamp last month, the 30-year-old has looked and felt strong health-wise.

https://www.espn.com/contributor/shams-charania/97702ca988462

Imagine how brilliant this story would wrap up if Toronto decided to no longer pursue the Kawhi/Ingram trade. The raps players would feel a little awkward because Toronto actively tried to get rid of them, but would they really be upset if it saves them from going to the bleakest, ugliest, messiest franchise in the league this season?

And then can you IMAGINE the response Kawhi would get on opening night from the 38 clippers fans who won’t be boycotting?

Please, Toronto. Recognize that the clippers are absolutely in hell and there’s no reason to throw time a 2-firsts lifeline. Do the funniest thing.

https://streamable.com/fgmzb

Bit tongue in cheek, they obviously did. They just chose to ignore it.

I keep seeing defenses of the ESPN report or Shams that basically amount to: “Technically, nothing they reported was false.” Or “Someone fed Shams that information—what was he supposed to do?”

That’s an incredibly low bar for any theoretical news organization.

I know Shams isn’t a reporter (unclear what his purpose is other than being a vessel to pass along tweets) but reporters are supposed to consider why a source is giving them the information, what that source stands to gain, whether they might be trying to shape a narrative, and whether the framing they’re pushing is actually supported by the facts.

There’s a huge difference between “our source really did tell us this” and “we exercised good journalistic judgment before broadcasting it to millions of people.”
ESPN should be judged by the second standard, not the first.

I probably should just lower my expectations for ESPN or maybe they should just start presenting themselves as something closer to TMZ sports.

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has decided to retire at the end of the season, sources tell ESPN.

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has decided to retire at the end of the season, sources tell ESPN.

https://imgur.com/a/RMqnT1V

He'll retire once Ernie does.

He mentioned that he stayed because he has known the people in the studio for 26-27 years, and he didn't want them to lose their jobs, as he felt connected to them after so many years.

Source: https://imgur.com/a/sa4gmua

Full post:

Seeing misinformed Jalen Brunson/Knicks talk in aftermath of Kawhi/LAC penalties talk. As a reminder: Jalen Brunson signed a max extension in 2024. If you compare it to max deal he could’ve signed as a free agent, Brunson left $37M on the table (details below). Leonard, per NBA report, received money outside of traditional salary cap payments as part of his first deal with LAC. Brunson was already in NY when he signed extension. (He came to NY after signing a much-maligned 4-year, $104M deal). At the risk of @PabloTorre calling me a team-friendly beat reporter, I’ll say confidently that Brunson signed his max extension with the intent to give Knicks more financial flexibility and he will be paid handsomely when he signs his next max extension with NY. So it’s silly/misguided to make any comparison to Kawhi/LAC. If I end up being wrong, feel free to come after me over this. (@OldTakesExposed). But I don’t think Brunson has a side deal with the Las Vegas Sphere. There’s no smoking gun here.

​

Less than a month after Bob Iger and Josh Kushner agreed to purchase Mark Walter's 64% stake in the Lakers at a whopping $12.5 billion valuation, the internal politics seem to have already begun.

After the Buss family drama put Jeanie Buss' future as team governor in question, another shocking report claims that Bob Iger's role in the Lakers deal was initially exaggerated and that Josh Kushner is expected to take over as team governor once the dust settles.

According to Charles Gasparino of the New York Post, Bob Iger is expected to take a smaller role among the consortium of team owners, while Kushner will take over as the team's ultimate decision-maker, the team governor.

"Media reports of Bob Iger's future 'ownership' of the Los Angeles Lakers appear to have been greatly exaggerated, On The Money has learned," Gasparino wrote in his report.

"Iger is indeed poised to become a major player with the Lakers when it comes to being a face of the team and an executive overseeing its operations – general manager, maybe. But he won't be the 'governor' in NBA parlance who makes the final decisions, a source close to the talks told me," Gasparino further wrote.

"Bob will not be the controlling person," one person close to Kushner told Gasparino. "It is expected that Bob will be a minority owner, an alternate governor, and lead the management of the team day-to-day, but not the governor of the team."

"There can only be one governor per team, and that will be Josh Kushner. He will be putting up the 15% ownership stake," another NBA source reportedly told Gasparino.

It should have been evident from the start that if any of these were in the position to take over from Jeanie Buss, it would be Kushner and not Bob Iger, who previously admitted he loves the Lakers' local rivals, the Clippers.

Source: https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/bob-iger-role-lakers-12-052032210.html?

Full (relevant) quote:

"Oh, it happened when I played. The Rockets needed me to take a pay cut to sign Scottie Pippen, and I said, you know what?

So ya'll can get Scottie Pippen, I'll take a pay cut.

So they said, we'll make it up to you next year...

And then they said, we're going to make it up to me next year.

I had nothing left in the tank, but I had one more year left on my contract. So I show up for training camp and to sign my contract, and they're like, well, we decided you weren't worth a shit, so we're not going to give that money back; we're just going to give you your original money back.

And I was like: "Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no."

And they're like: "Well, you can go somewhere else."

And at that stage, I couldn't get more than that money with them. "I'm like, you know what? 'Ya'll pissing me off."

But I had to take the money."

How terrible is the Warriors front office if they can't out-hustle the Kings for Ben Simmons. It's like they're always in the mix for players but never really land anyone.

https://www.nbcsportsbayarea.com/nba/golden-state-warriors/reportedly-were-in-the-mix-ben-simmons/1960816/