Sports Slaw episode #46 – Lomas and Deb are talking football with good friend and everything you want to know about the behind the scenes of football, Bill Keenist toPreview of the 2021 NFL Draft and Chauvin Decision verdict
Lomas and I came up with the idea of a podcast almost a year and a half ago. It seems like forever ago, as we navigate our way through COVID and the changes it has made to our daily lives.
The idea was simple – while there are many sports talk shows and podcasts, and there are many sports law podcasts, where do the lawyers and the pros talk together about how sports and the law actually intersect? We want to be real world.
We started with the equipment, and the idea of discussing how a legal action affects the on-field action. In February we set everything up, and Lomas brought in Ray, our Producer extraordinaire. I made dinner and afterwards we sat down – in the basement – to do a podcast. We talked for a few hours, everything from how we each got into our areas (Lomas played trombone in the band, and I went to law school to avoid an awful employment market) to Curt Flood to CTE litigation, and, you get the picture…. Ray decided we would launch the podcast on April 1st.
Then COVID hit. We scrapped everything and pivoted to COVID, thinking that it was a short term event that shut down sports for a few weeks. It became a bit of a contest on which sport would come back first. I picked golf. Lomas picked baseball.
We talked about COVID over and over. Many times we talked about what was happening and posed questions that were later picked up by major news sources. We brought on an epidemiologist and a vaccine expert. COVID cuts across everything, and we felt it would be a disservice not to discuss the medical aspects as they relate to sports. We talked social justice issues and attended a Black Lives Matter peaceful protest. We discussed our personal experiences as a black man and a white woman. Sometimes uncomfortable conversations and yet enlightening. We have had fabulous guests – broadcasters, players, team management, trainers, doctors, and…. We have an internship program and invite our interns to be part of the program. One even does a fantasy football segment.
As we continue with Sportsslaw and choose topics to discuss, we invite our readers and listeners to participate with us. What are the issues you want to hear about?
– Deb.