Category: News

Beloved comedian and TV dad Bob Saget passed away tragically after hitting his head in a hotel room seven months ago and his absence has left a hole in a lot of people’s lives. His death was felt particularly hard by actress Jodie Sweetin, who played his daughter Stephanie on “Full House” in its original ABC run from 1987 to 1995 and reprised the role on “Fuller House” from 2016 to 2020.

She was cast in the role at the age of 5, and after Saget died, she memorialized him on Instagram using her famous catchphrase:

I would always say “you’re the best TV dad ever.” And he was.

I’ll miss you, Bob.

I’ll make sure and tell an inappropriate joke at your funeral. In your honor. I know you would’ve wanted that.

But you were supposed to be here longer…

How rude.

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Before her marriage to Mescal Wasilewski on July 30 in Malibu, California, Sweetin told People that Saget would be dearly missed at her wedding.

“I can think of all of these big life moments when he made a speech,” the actress told People. “I think weddings and moments like this, you always think about the people that you really wish could be there, and Bob has been there through so many moments of my life.

“So yeah, he will definitely be missed, and I know he never liked to miss an opportunity to get up with a microphone,” she added. Funny enough, Saget was at her wedding, all because of her TV uncle, John Stamos, and his wife Caitlin McHugh.

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Sweetin told E! News’ “Daily Pop” that when Stamos was leaving the house for her wedding, McHugh handed him a black shirt. After putting it on he realized it was a little big on him and then had a powerful realization.

“He realized it was one of the shirts that Kelly [Rizzo] had given him out of Bob’s closet,” Sweetin said. “And it was this black button-up that like Bob would always wear. Bob always had a black button-up on.”

Kelly Rizzo was Saget’s wife. They were married in 2018.

When Sweetin learned it was Saget’s shirt she was comforted to know that he was “there in his weird little way.”

“I hugged John and then, I like kissed the shirt and I was like, ‘Bob’s here too,'” she said. Then, Stamos told her, “I have to tell you like Bob had to be here. He just had to be here for this.”

Sweetin’s genuine affection for Saget and her “Full House” co-stars after all of these years is beautiful given the history that child stars have of being mistreated in Hollywood. They may have played a family on TV but it’s clear that they had a close relationship in real life as well. That’s probably why the show worked so well.

“I remember Bob always being funny and warm and kind to us kids, to everyone,” Sweetin told Today. “He really was like the glue that held us all together, in a lot of ways. He was kind of the head figure of that little family.”

Earlier this week, Grimes took to Twitter to ask her followers for reputable references for some potential body modifications she’s been planning. “These next few years will be spent doing al my dream body mods,” she tweeted. Among the modifications she said she’s interested in, are elf ear implants and vampire teeth caps. But even though she didn’t reach out to her ex Elon Musk about these, he had some advice for her anyways.

“…Has anyone done elf ear mods with a good outcome?” Grimes asked on Twitter. “Im scared about ear cartilage having a hard time healing. Especially as a musician this surgery seems risky but I’ve wanted it my whole life. Curious about peoples experiences!” Musk — on the same day he said he wants to buy Manchester United — cheekily chimed in with a reply that serves as some sage advice, if you will: “The downside of elf ear surgery probably outweighs the upside.”

Quite the level-headed take from the Tesla honcho. Grimes then hit her ex-beau back saying that, “Tbh this sounds like a job for crispr. Sad to be born just a few generations too early.”

Crispr is a company that is exploring gene editing therapy via synthetic RNA and DNA and Musk has shown an interest in them in the past. Grimes understands that Crispr’s offerings might not come until the later part of this century, so unless she wants to heed Musk’s advice, she’ll have to hope that she got some solid recs from the twitter hive. Good luck with that.

After dipping his toes into the comic book waters over the years, Sylvester Stallone finally has a superhero movie of his own. Arriving on Amazon Prime Video next week, Samaritan stars the iconic Rocky actor as a down and out hero who gave up on trying to save his city because he can’t even save himself. Described by Stallone as an “action movie with heart,” which is the kind of “mythology” he’s drawn to, Samaritan will pull Sly’s aged hero back into the fight after years of trying to keep a low-profile as a garbage man.

You can watch Stallone share a first look at Samaritan below:

Before flying solo in Samaritan, Stallone has made appearances in two team-based superhero films for both Marvel and DC Comics. He had a small part in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 as Stakar (a.k.a. Starhawk) before collaborating with director James Gunn again for The Suicide Squad where the Rambo star voiced the fan-favorite character King Shark.

Here’s the official synopsis for Samaritan:

Thirteen-year-old Sam Cleary suspects that his mysterious and reclusive neighbor, Mr. Smith, is actually a legend hiding in plain sight. Twenty-five years ago, Granite City’s superpowered vigilante, Samaritan, was reported dead after a fiery warehouse battle with his rival, Nemesis. Most believe he perished in the fire, but some, like Sam, have hope that he’s still alive. With crime now on the rise, Sam makes it his mission to coax Samaritan out of hiding to save the city from ruin.

Samaritan hits Amazon Prime Video on August 26.

(Via Prime Video on Twitter)

It’s been a brutal last half-year for Netflix. Once the king of all streamers, the service has fallen on hard times, as a mass exodus of subscribers and a long history of spending ridiculous amounts of money on super-pricey movies that almost never play theaters has put them in more dire straits. One solution to their money woes: attract more subscribers with a cheaper, ad-supported version. But it looks like it may lack one of the service’s most popular features.

In a report by Bloomberg, an interdependent developer stumbled upon code in Netflix’s iPhone app, which included the words, “Downloads available on all plans except Netflix with ads.” However, Netflix hasn’t confirmed that this is set in stone, with a rep calling it “speculation” and saying, “We are still in the early days of deciding how to launch a lower priced, ad-supported option and no decisions have been made.”

Netflix first started allowing downloads for offline viewing in 2016. It solved a problem that plagued commuters in particular: Someone sitting on a subway train, trying to stream Orange is the New Black on their phone, suddenly loses their internet connection in between stops. Now they can download episodes onto their gizmos for happy, uninterrupted viewing. But if they wind up with the ad-version, with commercials they can’t skip anyway, they’ll probably have to wait for the next stop.

(Via Bloomberg)

South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are pouring their heart, soul, and money into rebooting Casa Bonita in the Denver, Colorado area. In doing so, their cool dream has turned into a bit of a “nightmare.” Revamping the site and bringing construction up to safety codes have churned up astronomical costs, so it looks like those legendary sopapillas aren’t coming anytime soon. Still, the project’s attracted so much public interest that someone made a public records request. This could have (and most likely) sourced from a news organization, who knows? But Parker and Stone’s company, The Beautiful Opco, LLC, went on the record stating that they don’t feel great about schematics and planning data ending up in the wrong hands.

As such, the new Casa Bonita gods sued to make sure that no one knows about their secret tunnels to the actual South Park. What a terrible joke! In all seriousness, The Beautiful Opco expressed concern for what could happen (a mass shooting) if their construction plans and permit details went public. “This information, in the wrong hands, could be used by a person intent on doing mass harm in a public space,” Casa Bonita’s lawyers argued, and the court agreed, at least temporarily..

Via The Denver Post, Parker and Stone received a 21-day breather to go through their documents and make a more permanent request:

On Monday, Casa Bonita’s ownership company, The Beautiful Opco, LLC, sued the city to prohibit “sensitive” documents from being publicly released under the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA). A judge ruled Wednesday the company has 21 days to go through the documents and decide what needs to be redacted or what it believes should not be released under CORA, according to a minute order of the hearing.

Certainly, it’s wise of Parker and Stone to be wary of how such an infamous venue (now owned by an infamous duo) could possibly be of too much public interest. Security will likely be at the forefront of their minds, but at least there’s something that doesn’t need to be hidden: as Twitter user Erich Brock revealed, this fresh coat of pink paint looks splendid.

(Via The Denver Post)

We’re deep in August, which means it’s still backyard BBQ season. And with Labor Day coming, there’s a good chance you’ll be eating some ribs before the leaves start to turn. Hell, even if the leaves are falling, that shouldn’t stop you from eating great ribs. Moreover, if you are tucking into a slab, you need to know which bottle of bourbon whiskey to sip along with it.

For this tasting/pairing, I pulled eight classic and “finable” bourbon whiskeys from my shelf. The point of these bottles is that you can find them nationwide (in general) and that they’re affordable. Every bottle is under $50 with the average sitting around 20 bucks. Basically, I want you to actually be able to get the bottle that pairs best with the ribs.

Speaking of the ribs, I went to my local BBQ joint here in Kentucky. I got a full slab of fall-off-the-bone pork ribs which were rubbed, slow smoked, and then slathered in sweet and spicy bourbon sauce. You can see from the image below — it is indeed legit.

One last thing before I dive in: My method was pretty straightforward. I nosed and tasted the bourbon (spitting and not drinking) to prime my palate for the rib. I then had a bite of rib, enjoyed it, and then another taste of the whiskey. I did that with all eight bourbons. Here’s how it shook out.

Also Read: The Top 5 UPROXX Bourbon Posts Of The Last Six Months

• We Blind Tasted A Whole Bunch Of $30-60 Bourbons To See If Any Could Beat Weller
• We Blind Tasted Classic Bourbons And Were Shocked By The Winner
• The Best Ten-Year-Old Bourbon Whiskeys, Tasted Blind And Ranked
• We Tasted Bourbon Whiskeys ‘Double-Blind’ And Tried To Guess Each Bottle
• All The Double Gold-Winning Straight Bourbons From This Year’s San Francisco World Spirits Competition

Part 1: The Pairings & Ranking

8. Evan Williams Black Label — Taste 8

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $13

The Whiskey:

This is the entry point for Evan Williams. The juice is a mix of four to seven-year-old barrels of the standard Heaven Hill bourbon. The difference in this bottle is that it’s proofed at a slightly higher 43 proof.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

There was a big citrus note on the nose I’ve never experienced before with Evan Williams. It was kind of like a Mountain Dew vibe. The palate really leaned into standard and soft notes of vanilla, spice, oak, and cherry with a hint of apple juice.

The meat took on a sweeter edge but wasn’t that different than the control bite. There was a twinge more spiciness but that was about it.

Bottom Line:

This pairing changed the bourbon quite a bit but I’m not sure for the better. As for the rib, it didn’t have that much of an effect either way to make a big impact. And that’s why Evan Williams falls to last in this pairing and ranking.

7. Ezra Brooks Kentucky Sour Mash — Taste 5

ABV: 45%

Average Price: $13

The Whiskey:

Luxco’s Ezra Brooks is a throwback to the Mad Men days of bourbon. The juice is a standard rye-infused bourbon without an age statement. It’s made as a workhorse whiskey that’s easy to find and cheap when you do find it.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

This really pops with vanilla on the nose. The palate bursts with sweet cherry notes with an echo of sour in there. A good level of spice adds warmth to the taste as a hint of caramel sweetness sneaks in late with more of that vanilla and heat.

The huge vanilla note didn’t really vibe with the sweet, smoky, and spicy rib. It didn’t detract that much but it was kind of like a square peg in a round hole situation.

Bottom Line:

Maybe save the Ezra for the banana pudding or peach cobbler dessert course? This was just too vanilla-forward for this pairing.

6. High West Bourbon — Taste 4

ABV: 46%

Average Price: $32

The Whiskey:

High West Bourbon is quickly becoming one of the most sought-after sourced whiskeys. The whiskey in the bottle is a blend of two to 13-year-old barrels rendered from high-rye and low-rye mashes alongside undisclosed whiskeys, some of which are sourced from MGP.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

There’s a leathery and slightly funky nose with a hint of oatmeal and maybe some grilled corn. The palate has a nice char to it that matched well with the meat that leans into the sweetness of the bourbon. The end is all warming spices and brown sugar.

That charred note is a good pairing between this whiskey and the pork. It feels right. The sweetness of the whiskey also matches the sweetness of the sauce but is a little sweet on sweet and washes out the spiciness a bit.

Bottom Line:

This worked until it didn’t. The sweetness overpowered the spice and char relationship and left you with a sweet mouthful of pork and whiskey.

5. Knob Creek 9 — Taste 2

ABV: 50%

Average Price: $46 (one-liter)

The Whiskey:

This is Jim Beam’s small batch entry point into the wider world of Knob Creek. The juice is the low-rye mash that’s aged for nine years in new oak in Beam’s vast warehouses. The right barrels are then mingled and cut down to 100 proof before being bottled in new, wavy bottles.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

This is a cherry bomb on the nose with a woody sense of cinnamon sticks and a hint of sour mash (think sour biscuit dough). The palate holds onto that sour note as orange zest and cherry mix toward a Red Hot spicy mid-point and finish. The sweetness of the cherry does mute the hot spice a little at the end though.

The pork really matches on almost every level. The sour mash vibe pings with the vinegar sour edge in the sauce. The charred meat feels right with the woody spice. And the brown sugar in the sauce feels like it fits with the cherry sweetness.

Bottom Line:

Full disclosure, this and the next four were all great pairings. This is a little lower because it felt like the fat from the pork muted everything and washed it out a bit. In short, this paired nicely but faded fast. That said, at least it got to the point where I was thinking about it at that depth.

4. Wild Turkey 101 — Taste 1

ABV: 50.5%

Average Price: $20

The Whiskey:

A lot of Wild Turkey’s character comes from the hard and deep char they use on their oak barrels. 101 is a high-rye and high-ABV bourbon that leans into the wood and aging, having spent six years in the cask. A little water is added to cool it down a bit before bottling and that’s it.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

This is nice and spicy on the nose with a mix of pepper, clove, and cinnamon with a hint of sour mash (kind of like a sour note in a BBQ sauce). The palate mixes sweet cherry syrup with cinnamon and pepper to create a nice balance of sweet and spicy depth. The end is mildly woody with a hint of wicker and molasses before hitting that spice again for a warm finish.

With the pork, this really shines. This was the first taste/pairing and it was a good setup as it hit spicy, sweet, and woody notes that really get dailed in in the next three tastes. All of that aside, this is the most straightforward pairing. The spice matches the spice. The sour matches the sour. The sweet feels the same.

Bottom Line:

While this matches very well, it doesn’t elevate. This is just really good, not “wow!” good.

3. Michter’s US*1 Small Batch Bourbon — Taste 3

ABV: 45.7%

Average Price: $40

The Whiskey:

Michter’s really means the phrase “small batch” with their bourbon whiskey. The tank they use to marry their hand-selected eight-year-old bourbons can only hold 20 barrels, so that’s how many go into each small-batch bottling. The blended juice is then filtered and proofed before bottling.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

The nose on this one is oaky and full of old leather, soft cherry, and a hint of peach pie. The palate leans into a sweet cherry at first before diving into a woody spice mix with a hint of molasses caramel, more stewed peach, and a whisper of vanilla. The end lets the wood get a little worn as a hint of leather and cherry spice tobacco kick in.

This was the first complex bourbon that worked on every level while taking the pork somewhere new. The spiced cherry notes felt like they added to the bourbon sauce on the ribs, not just matching it. The molasses caramel also added a nice layer to counter the mild spicy heat in both the whiskey and the rib sauce. The meat felt lightly sweeter with the char working with that old oak.

Bottom Line:

This just works while actually adding some new dimensions to the overall experience of both the whiskey and the ribs. Still, this felt like a classic pour and ended before anything changed too dramatically.

2. George Dickel Bourbon — Taste 7

ABV: 45%

Average Price: $38

The Whiskey:

The whisky in the bottle is the same Dickel Tennessee whiskey but pulled from barrels that leaned more into classic bourbon flavor notes instead of Dickel’s iconic Tennessee whisky notes. The barrels are a minimum of eight years old before they’re vatted. The juice is then cut down to a manageable 90-proof and bottled.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

This opens with spiced peaches and cherries next to a sweet brown sugar syrup with a deep sense of brown butter in sour apple. The palate is spicy but moves towards a dry green chili pepper vibe before a twinge of vanilla smooths everything out. The end is supple and full of soft chili spices, sour apple compote, and spiced peach.

That chili pepper vibe really helps the rib’s sauce and spice pop. The brown butter and sour apple also added a great dimension to the meat and fat. The only thing missing was something to amplify the char and wood aspects.

Bottom Line:

The lack of woodiness aside, this was a delicious pairing that felt like it took both the whiskey and the pork to a new level. The whiskey became this classic and silky bourbon that I never would have guessed was from Tennessee (there was zero chalkiness). The pork and sauce felt like it got the last dash of ingredients it needed to take it up that last notch.

1. Maker’s Mark — Taste 6

ABV: 45%

Average Price: $24

The Whisky:

This is Maker’s signature expression. It’s made from red winter wheat with corn and malted barley and then aged in seasoned Ozark oak for six to seven years. This expression’s juice is then built from only 150 barrels (making this a small batch, if you want to call it that). Those barrels are blended, proofed, bottled, and dipped in red wax.

Tasting Notes with The Rib:

This opens with a soft nose that’s brimming with dry sweetgrass, sour cherries, woody cinnamon, and old cedar park. The palate leans into porch wicker with a hint of leather, woody vanilla, nutmeg and clove, and almost smoky applewood. The end blends the orchard wood, buttery biscuit, and spices with the sour cherry for a well-rounded and soft finish.

The wood helps the meat really pop with a sense of the char and the smoke amplified really well. The sour cherry and spice work wonders with the sauce as the applewood ties everything together on the palate as the buttery edge vibes with the pork fat.

Bottom Line:

This is the full package. This is also the woodiest Maker’s has ever tasted to me. That’s both the meat and the whiskey elevated to new places. That makes this pairing a winner to me.

Part 2: Final Thoughts

This was an interesting exercise. While the meat changed only minorly through the tasting, these whiskeys tended to shift pretty dramatically.

There’s always a vanilla note in most bourbons. But the way this pairing turned the Ezra Brook’s vanilla note up to eleven was kind of wild. It was also incredible the new notes I found in the Maker’s on the woody/grassy end of the spectrum thanks to the fatty smoked meat. Moreover, the Dickel Bourbon was almost a different pour.

Overall, I still stand by the top five as all being solid choices for pairing with spicy, sweet, and smoky BBQ ribs. The top three are all great choices with Maker’s being the one. It’s cheap, you can buy it anywhere, and it really does elevate both as a whisky and the pork ribs you’re pairing with it. It’s a win all around.

$51,674 might be a drop in the bucket for Rick Ross, but for the 244 employees of his Wingstop franchises making $7.25/hour who had their pay illegally docked, any portion of that is a significant sum. That dollar amount represents how much backpay Ross has already had to dole out to the employees of the Mississippi Wingstop franchises that he operates along with his mother and sister after the federal government’s Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division fined them for multiple infractions.

Some of these include making employees illegally pay for safety training, uniforms, background checks, cash register shortages, and even letting 15-year-old employees work past 7 pm. Nothing to sneeze at here; these are serious violations and not the image that Ross should be projecting as “The Boss.” So in an Instagram story today, he addressed the fines while sitting at a grand piano and sipping Bumbu Rum.

With a brand new Balmain sweater and a lavish, diamond-encrusted necklace around his neck, Ross said, “When you’re running a business, there will be mistakes. But as the biggest boss, you never make the same mistake twice.” Adding that, “You see… Taking accountability is big when you’re the biggest… And remember this: Most successful people don’t take stumbling as a setback, but actually as a stepping stone to greater things, ya heard me? Let’s be great.”

On the surface, it’s valiant of Ross to speak on the labor violations of his Boss Wings Enterprises. But it felt a bit tone deaf considering he dropped this clip on his Instagram Story right after other videos of him racking up a 10 foot-long Neimann Marcus receipt and dining out at a fancy restaurant. Here’s hoping the greater things he’s stepping towards include higher wages for Wingstop employees and at the very least, no cut corners on that road to being great.

It’s always fun to trace the histories and evolutions of songs’ serpentine paths through the labyrinth that is the music industry. It’s rare that a song makes it to commercial release in its original form — or even all that quickly after it’s recorded. Thanks to Hit-Boy, we’ve got a prime example from Beyoncé‘s new album Renaissance. As the California producer told Rolling Stone Music Now, he was forced to hold the beat for “Thique” for nearly a decade until Beyoncé herself was ready to release it.

“I had to sit on that beat for eight years!” he said. “That’s the way the game goes sometimes. I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in the game and certain people will perceive like, ‘Oh, where’s Hit-Boy been? What’s Hit-Boy been doing?’ But then I’m sitting on stuff like ‘Thique’ that just hasn’t materialized yet. Y’all don’t even know how ahead I really am… I’ve been holding onto legendary stuff, and there’s plenty more.” I think it’s fair to say that sometimes, the timing of a song’s release is more important than its quality. Perhaps the music business just wasn’t ready for a song like “Thique,” with its blend of four-on-the-floor techno and trap rap, until just now, as interest for EDM-inspired rap and R&B is cresting.

Elsewhere in the episode, Hit-Boy talks about a Beyoncé release that did come out around that time: “Bow Down” from her self-titled album. He also touches on a number of his biggest… ahem… hits. Check out the full episode here.

There are few things in NBA basketball more anticipated, maligned, scoffed at, and thought of by fans as a league-sanctioned conspiracy against their team as the regular season schedule. No one calendar should have all this power, and yet we picture evil genius masterminds hunkered down at NBA HQ mining our every fear and worry, even taking into account our social schedules somehow, to return to us a range of dates we will scrutinize until the season starts in October.

So, who are these masterminds? Well they aren’t evil, for one, just a dozen or so incredibly organized people across multiple departments that start their work for the next NBA season as the current season you are about to enjoy is getting underway. Think of them like friendly seers looking out for your future interests, or like basketball’s Farmers’ Almanac, but with more sophisticated software. However you think of them, please stop thinking they are out to get you.

Dime had the chance to chat with one of these scheduling czars — Gene Li, the NBA’s Senior Director, National Broadcast Lead — ahead of Wednesday’s 2022-23 season release.

When do you start putting together the schedule and how long does this process actually take?

So the process usually starts in the fall when we start collecting arena dates from teams. But I would say the actual scheduling of putting games on the board, that we don’t really start doing until early July. Basically after a Champion’s been crowned, after the NBA Draft, and basically after the start of free agency. So we have a better idea of what the teams will look like in the fall.

So you’re starting to put the schedule together for the next season, in the fall of the current season?

That’s right. So pretty much when the season starts, we’ll start planning for the following season.

Oh wow. Do you get any downtime?

We also do the WNBA schedule, the G League schedule as well, so there’s not really much downtime.

How do you take into consideration other events at venues, like concerts, or hockey games, or one-off things like circuses? Do you work closely with venues across all the NBA franchise cities to coordinate that information?

Of course. So my colleague, Tom Carelli, he’s our main lead with the teams and the arenas. Basically he gets all that information for our team, from all 29 of our arenas. Basically, when the NHL plans to play, when we have concert holds, the longer blocks like a Disney On Ice. We’re aware of all of those things and that’s honestly one of our bigger challenges when creating the schedule. If we were able to have every single available day in all the arenas, then the schedule would probably be great just because we would have more options for where we can schedule games. So we try our best to navigate around those arena conflicts and still create a schedule that works for everyone.

Teams will be traveling 50,000 fewer miles this season than last year and there are 88 no-travel instances for teams as well. How do you approach mitigating as much cross-country, or long road trip travel as possible for teams?

Basic travel efficiency — averages and mileages — is one of our top priorities. Those no-travel instances, especially toward back-to-backs, are something that we really focus on. Those teams that we have, you’re going to the same market for two games, whether that’s against a team, like the Lakers and Clippers, or Nets and Knicks, those really do help with reducing stress and mileage. In the past we actually had reservations about doing those. We weren’t sure how the teams would feel, both competitively and having the same opponent visit your market for two nights, but with these past two seasons and the small sample size, we’ve seen that there really isn’t a downside from a competitive standpoint. So we’ll keep monitoring that for the seasons to come, but we’re glad it’s working out, that the teams like it and that it’s had that positive impact on travel.

Is that something you and your team focus on, these adjustments season over season? Obviously travel is a pretty huge one, but maybe smaller adjustments to streamline or tweak things?

Yes, we’re always trying to improve things for the following season, and we always get feedback from teams, from our internal league stakeholders, even from our national broadcast partners. We always like to get feedback during the season, and then we try to implement those smaller things for future schedules.

So I’ve heard of the acronym, FTE: Fresh, Tired, Even. Does that factor into scheduling?

FTE is our Fresh, Tired, Even score. So that’s basically where it compares whether you’re on the second night of a back-to-back compared to your opponent. So if you’re both not on the second night of a back-to-back, or if you’re both on the second night of a back-to-back, then you’re even. If you are not on the second night of a back-to-back but your opponent is, then you’re fresh and they’re tired. We do take this into consideration. We basically want to make sure that no team, for the entire 82 game schedule, has too many fresh games compared to tired games, or vice versa. From a competitive standpoint, we don’t want one team to have too many of one or the other. So similar to everything else, we can’t get all things to be equal. But we basically try to have a narrow range.

This might be a really broad question. How do you even break down starting to schedule this all within your team? Is it like, “I’m going to take this division,” “I’ll do these teams from the Eastern Conference”?

In creating the schedule, the first games we’ll schedule are the 160 or so national TV games across ABC, ESPN, and TNT. I’m primarily responsible for that schedule. Obviously because our national TV schedule is a huge priority not only for us, but for our team and broadcast partners, we do those first. We make sure we can hit our broadcast windows with our most marquee and appealing matchups. After we finalize those games, then our basketball strategy team will use our optimizer software to build the rest of the full, 1,230 game schedule on top of the national TV games.

Got it. I bet the software makes it a lot easier than the wild way I just made up in my head.

I cannot imagine if there was one guy doing it by hand for all 1,230. I just … I just can’t imagine that.

What would you say to fans who swear the NBA schedule has something personal against their team every season?

[chuckles] I think, honestly, it’s very rewarding to know that our fans care so much. I think we’re the league that probably has the most scrutinized schedule, obviously our teams, our players, our fans, media, everyone’s very focused on the schedule. That’s rewarding to know our work is something everyone cares about. I think because there’s so much to the schedule, there’s 82 games, there’s only a limited number of broadcast windows, everyone can feel slighted in some way when you look at parts of the schedule. So that’s natural to us. Our mantra, at the league office, is we can’t please everyone, but we hope to displease everyone the same.

There’s that saying that if you try and make everybody happy, nobody’s happy. Would you say that’s true of undergoing something like the NBA schedule?

Yes. Basically, there just really isn’t a way to please everyone because there’s probably things that have competing interests and competing desires. We just want to make sure that we are fair and we’re equitable, both across the league and teams, in terms of the game schedule and national broadcast schedule. We hope to do things in a fair way that’s transparent, and if teams are equally not happy with us, then we probably did a good job.

How and when do you factor in national games?

That’s really why we have to wait until after the start of free agency. Usually the big movement happens at the start of free agency, and obviously knowing who’s the Champion, that’s important. They have to play on opening night, for the ring ceremony and that kind of stuff, they should probably play at home on Christmas and so forth. But throughout, I would say starting in the playoffs all the way through the start of free agency and us building out a schedule, we’re constantly having very collaborative discussions with our broadcast partners. So by the time we start scheduling the games, we’re aligned with our partners in terms of the teams they want to feature, matchups they want to feature, when and where they want to feature these teams and matchups. We have a really good idea by the time free agency starts of what we want to do.

How many people have to sign off on the schedule and are there a lot of edits?

I’ll speak to national TV and the game schedule. The overall scheduling process is very collaborative internally as well. We have stakeholders from all different departments in the league office. Everyone will weigh in. I take everyone’s feedback both internally, as well as broadcast partners. We’ll send ESPN, TNT the first draft, they’ll have some comments, and we’ll release the final broadcast schedule. For the overall game schedule, we’ll send teams a first draft of their schedule, and then teams will have about 24 to 48 hours for their feedback, and we’ll incorporate their feedback before the final schedule release.

So a lot of feedback.

A lot, a lot, a lot of feedback. Absolutely.

There are a couple new features in the schedule this year. There will be no games on Election Day, and there’s going to be an NBA Rivals Week. How do new features like this change the work your team does?

We just consider it basically like a new wrinkle that we should consider. Definitely very exciting for us to have these new tentpoles. We have various work streams within the league office, we’re always contemplating new tentpoles. Bringing awareness, for example, to civic engagement like Election Day, or to get fans’ attention, like Rivals Week. These things are always being discussed in the “lab” at the league office.

I have to say this level of competence and organization is very impressive and intimidating to me — what kind of wizardry does this amount of work take? Can you speak a little on what it is about this work that you love?

Just having the passion for the NBA — watching the games, following the teams, following the players. That passion for the league is what really drives us. And then, because our overall scheduling team, is the widest within the league office. Everyone has their skillsets that they can then implement into scheduling process. So people that have technical skills, or skills related to broadcast or to basketball and so forth. So we’re just able to incorporate everyone’s skillsets in a way that’s complimentary to create the overall schedule.

Are there any past schedules that stick out in your mind, that you look back on and think, oh we really nailed that one?

Yes, so we really caught lightning in a bottle in the 2017-18 season. We had already released the schedule in mid-August the summer of 2017, and then after we released the schedule, Kyrie Irving was traded from Cleveland to Boston. So on opening night, we had Boston at Cleveland already, we got lucky there. And then Carmelo Anthony was traded from the Knicks to OKC, and we had Knicks-OKC on opening Thursday on TNT. So we got really lucky that year, with our opening and with the big player trades that happened after we had finalized the schedule.

So happy accidents.

[laughs] Right, exactly.

And finally, do you ever get to sit back — I think of the Christmas Day games — and enjoy your handiwork?

Oh yeah. I try to watch as many of our national TV games as possible. Especially for the tentpoles, and the playoffs honestly, too. I’m always watching and thinking, you know, when the games are close and exciting, then we feel good for them, but when they’re blowouts we think, oof, that’s a tough one. Now obviously our scheduling games doesn’t impact what goes on on the court at all, but it’s definitely rewarding to get to watch those games that we had scheduled.

Ken Jennings and Mayim Bialik will continue to split hosting duties for Jeopardy! next season, but The Big Bang Theory star is the sole host of Celebrity Jeopardy!. The primetime spinoff series begins on Sunday, September 25, followed a few days later by the season three premiere of Bialik’s Fox sitcom, Call Me Kat.

In the episode, Kat returns to the United States from a trip to Paris; during the flight back, she’s seated next to a passenger played by none other than the Jeopardy! GOAT himself, Jennings, “who is much more interested in catching some sleep on the plane than hearing about Kat’s adventures,” according to TV Insider.

Jennings’ appearance comes after the sitcom’s second season premiere, in which cast members from Bialik’s ’90s sitcom, Blossom — Joey Lawrence, Michael Stoyanov, and Jenna Van Oy — guest starred as themselves. Then, in the May season finale, Bialik’s Blossom TV father, Ted Wass, appeared in a dream as Kat’s deceased father.

This was the first time Jennings and Bialik were in the same room at the same time, a claim that I am willing to make based on 15 seconds of research (a Google image search where there’s no photos of them together). Is what I just said true? Possibly!

No wonder I never got a response to my Jeopardy! host job application.

(Via TV Insider)