At least the Feds were nice enough to let them have their anniversary celebration first. Good looking out.

Here's the court complaint

Read the complaint: WFAN’s Craig Carton arrested on federal charges, official says | Newsday

Federal court allows for greater sentencing disparity (both for more time and less time) than most state courts.

That said, there is are general guideline that the courts use to start the sentencing analysis (called, not surprisingly, the Federal Sentencing Guidelines).

Assuming that he has no criminal history, and assuming that he pleads guilty, and assuming that the 2 million dollar number is right and assuming that there aren't any other aggravating factors in the case (big assumption; there tends to be at least one or two), then the Guidelines would recommend a sentence of 33-41 months.

Also, federal court is good about forcing fraudsters to pay restitution to their victims. That would mean that as part of any guilty plea, the prosecutor would almost certainly force him to agree to pay back his victims. That becomes an enforceable civil judgment against him (and keeps his victims from having to sue him separately and pay a lawyer to do it).

dola: Section 2B1.1 for the morbidly curious:

https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/f...16/GLMFull.pdf

Jemele Hill just got suspended for two weeks from ESPN:

.@espn has just suspended @jemelehill for two weeks "for a second violation of our social media guidelines."

— jamesmiller (@JimMiller) October 9, 2017

People seem to be making this a Trump thing, but isn't this just ESPN protecting its bell cow? We saw the same thing when Simmons criticized the NFL.

Yeah, the two rules at ESPN are you can't criticize the NFL or your fellow colleagues.

And when Schilling was warned, then suspended, then fired when he couldn't keep his opinions to himself. They are just following protocol with this and it doesn't just apply to the NFL.

It will become a Trump thing (much to ESPN's chagrin) when he starts tweeting about it tomorrow morning.

I think "When you tearfully apologize to your boss for putting him in the middle of a media firestorm and promise him you learned your lesson don't do it again two weeks later" is also a common workplace rule.

Had no issues with Hill the first time around but she was either incredibly stupid/naive in this case, or she knew exactly what she was doing and what she was trying to accomplish.

She probably wanted some extra vacation days.

On the eve of PFTCommenter and Big Cat's new show on ESPN2, Sam Ponder fires shots.

Welcome to the ESPN family @BarstoolBigCat (& welcome to all ur minions who will respond to this so kindly) pic.twitter.com/AzgfdDx2FK

— Sam Ponder (@sam_ponder) October 16, 2017

Barstool founder to Sam Ponder in 2014: Stop showing pictures of your ‘ugly kid’, ‘sex it up and be slutty’ | For The Win

She got the guy wrong, was told he didn't write it, still literally claimed "yes, yes he did", was told again it wasn't him, then changed her argument to "well that is what your employer says, so you own it too" before kind of apologizing.

I'm pretty sure she doesn't want to be painted with the "everything ESPN says, you say too" brush.

I was following the exchange and honestly wondered if she was drunk.

What a complete garbage operation ESPN is.

Wanted to make sure they took away pay right before Xmas too.

If u have two epsodes of a TV Show you dont have one

— PFTCommenter (@PFTCommenter) October 23, 2017

I am curious to see the future graduates of this program.

http://m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Jou...rts-Media.aspx

You've still got time - the Taco Bell drive-thru is open till 1 AM most places.

News coming out for the replacement of Mike Francesca on WFAN: Chris Carlin (who started as a Mike and the Mad Dog producer), former NY Jet Bart Scott, and Maggie Gray.

I can't imagine a less inspiring choice. I can't see why I'd ever turn that station on, and I actually like Carlin because of his Rutgers connection.

Enjoying the final week of Mike & Mike. They were never my thing, but the nostalgia effect is actually working a bit.

Disney-Fox deal gives ESPN a local strategy to combat its financial woes - The Washington Post

An overview of the Disney-Fox deal from a sports fan's perspective.

This is going to shake up my daily routine.

Russillo is one of my favorites on the radio as well. That's a shame.

I'm with him though that doing a daily radio show and being asked to stick around more hours to do appearances is a huge grind. It'll be interesting to see where he goes to do it, but once I made my money and had the national profile I'd definitely be more interested in doing podcasts x times a week and appearances where and when you want to.

He's pretty tight with a lot of the Barstool guys. They'd give him his own podcast and ability to do video stuff of his choosing.

ESPN admits it will “talk to” Peyton Manning about Monday Night Football – ProFootballTalk

I like Peyton Manning, but I don't see him in the booth working well.

I like Romo's goofball approach and Manning could deliver even more of that if he is comfortable in that environment. Would be a refreshing change from the bland tone most networks have seemed to prefer the last 10-20 years, as the older guys with personalities have been weeded out/retired.

WEEI cancels live programming for mandatory sensitivity training

So just a couple of weeks after the one WEEI host insulted Brady's daughter, another one mocked Brady's agent by using a stereotypical Asian accent. So WEEI cancelled all live programming Sunday so all the hosts can attend sensitivity training.

WEEI used to be kind of popular for being a cesspool, in that that was their gimmick, but the act has been growing old forever

Doesn't the sensitivity training really boil down to not making fun of Tom Brady's family and friends? I feel like making jokes at the expense of the region's most popular athlete is more concerning for WEEI than making fun of kids and Asians.

Ya, maybe that's why these incidents seem to be sticking more than all of the other offensive stuff that came out of this station over the years. But they have lost advertisers before, at least temporarily.

But, I'm always surprised just how loud the anti-Brady contingent in New England is. I think these people are disproportionately likely to call into WEEI and complain, but there's always been a small but nosy group of fans ready to move on from Brady, basically since he's been there. So there's always been a little element of that on WEEI that the hosts have played into.

Here's the real issue (from the article):

"In the fallout over the past week, WEEI has had at least five advertisers, including Comcast Corp., Citizens Bank, and the Massachusetts State Lottery, suspend or terminate commercial purchases with the station."

In related news...

Patrick Connor suspended from KNBR job over Barstool Radio comments

Let me say this upfront. I don't listen to WEEI nor do I listen to Barstool Sports. I may be completely wrong on my perception of them, thus being off on what their brand is. Here is the part of this story and the WEEI story that confuses me.


I don't know how this person defines "gutter brand" but aren't these comments and the comments made about Brady's daughter and agent consistent with the brand Barstool and WEEI trying to sell?

Seriously. If Barstool isn't a gutter brand, what is?

Barstool is definitely gutter brand.

I think younger, douchey people with a more modern media presence (like on the internet) get away with more than middle-aged or older people associated with traditional media outlets. Maybe with older people, it's assumed they're more sincere and say what they think, where with younger people, there's this hedge that this is really just all a part of the show and they're just trying to be entertaining.

It was a dumb thing for Braden to say because Barstool's founder and head of content literally says consistently that he (they) "live in the mud". Unlike many others though, they freely admit it and don't claim to be something they're not. Other companies/personalities frequently get on their high horse and claim moral outrage all while, deep down, being no better or actually being way worse.

Mike Patrick existing ESPN after 36 years.

Not quite sure what to make of the manner/timing of the announcement honestly. On the one hand it feels kind of like he got "creative has nothing for you", on the other hand there's a certain feel as though there could be some health/personal reason for it.

Whatever the case, he sure spent a lot of time in my ears through a very long career.

Sounds like Francesa is coming back to WFAN afternoons and the other afternoon folks are going to split time from 10 to 3. His first show is going to be completely unbearable.

Then again, he's reportedly crawling back at a "significant pay cut" so while he's busy destroying staff morale, I'm not sure how much he has to crow about ... at least not until he gives the station a daypart win that his replacements failed to deliver.

I'd expect him to get that based on the freakshow aspect of his return alone, followed by a slide back down in numbers & a second "retirement" within a year.

I love this. He thought people would be lining up to throw millions more at him than he was making at WFAN and boasted about how he could create the most profitable podcast of anyone. Now his plan is supposedly to develop a Mike and the Mad Dog app which he thinks people will just sit on all day watching old videos, not realizing that it's the sharing of that content across the internet and Twitter that makes it much more entertaining than just literally watching old clips.

It will be entertaining for a few days before it devolves into the same crap he had been doing for a few years before the final leg of the last run.

He's 60 something years old, a millionaire (unless he's blown his money), and he just finished a, like, two-year ass-kissing retirement tour. And it wasn't enough. What an emotionally stunted weirdo.

In a slight nod of fairness to him, despite his age, he has a few young kids. So I understand his desire to stay out of the house.

NSFW Audio.

McAfee is a funny dude.

Please take a moment to listen to Pat McAfee explain how Troy Polamalu ruined his life pic.twitter.com/Wx9X39UrSx

— NFL Access (@NFL_Access) November 2, 2017

Great story by McAfee.

Seems like Francesa's return had one silver lining in that it caused Michael Kay to go off the deep end over A-Rod being the first guest (and violating ESPN's policy on employees giving interviews to major market competitors.)

Peter King is leaving SI/MMQB for NBC Sports full time.

Big news.

Pushed out by SI? Or just ready to move on?

Looking to reduce his own workload apparently

https://thebiglead.com/2018/04/30/it...or-peter-king/

This is good.

Daniel Snyder sells WTEM-AM, taking Redskins out of radio business - The Washington Post

Are you sure that you want Snyder more involved in the day to day operations?

I thought that was part of the problems he became hands off.

Interesting (for me) to note that DawgNation is said to be the only part of their verticals that will stay up, being shifted into their Atlanta local operations (which include the #1 broadcast TV station in the market, as well as the newspaper).

Cox Media to shut down sports verticals Land of 10, SEC Country, DieHards, lay off numerous staffers