THE DAILY NEWSLETTER - THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2022

Media Winners & Losers

MEDIA WINNER:
Al Michaels

Iconic play-by-play voice Al Michaels talked with Eminem at Super Bowl LVI on Sunday and the two stars were seen chatting like best friends as they traded compliments with each other.

Michaels told Eminem, who was one of the halftime performers, that he was “the best in show.” And Eminem was straight up giddy as he called the veteran sports broadcaster “the GOAT.”

Eminem brought up the big question: Is Michaels going to retire?

NBC inked a deal in 2018 poaching Mike Tirico from ESPN to eventually replace Michaels on Sunday night. The dissent against Michaels leaving was voiced by Howard Stern fairly emphatically recently. But would leaving NBC mean leaving football?

“I’ll be somewhere,” Michaels insisted.

While it’s been widely assumed that Michaels is not ready to retire, the 77-year-old has been mostly quiet on his future. But the reassurance that he’ll be calling football games somewhere next season puts that at least partly to rest.

Sunday’s match-up between the Cincinnati Bengals and Los Angeles Rams was the 11th Super Bowl call of Michaels’ illustrious career. Michaels has been featured on NBC’s Sunday Night Football since 2006, but his contract expired after Super Bowl LVI and the network has Mike Tirico ready to take over the broadcast.

According to data from Nielsen, Super Bowl LVI drew 99.18 million viewers. That's a big jump from last year, but short of the 100 million mark reached in 10 of the 11 seasons prior. However, when you include Telemundo, and the streaming and digital viewers, it's well over that mark.

From a Stern defense to Eminem fandom, ratings up and reputation intact, Michaels has been getting good press at the end of a good season. Though his future won’t be with NBC, he's an elite play-by-play voice and a hot commodity among some of the NFL’s other broadcast partners, and it sounds like one of them may be grabbing him up.

MEDIA LOSER:
Jesse Watters

Jesse Watters falsely claimed that Hillary Clinton paid hackers to plant fake evidence in an effort to show Donald Trump colluded with the Russian government.

The Fox News host then used his mischaracterization of the filing to state as fact that Clinton had attempted to frame Trump.

Last week Special Counsel John Durham filed a motion alleging Clinton hired a tech executive, confirmed to be Rodney Joffe, with legal access to non-public, non-private internet data, some of which was allegedly used in an effort to link Trump to Russia... ICYMI.

Durham is investigating the probe into Trump that culminated in the Mueller Report, which found no evidence Trump conspired with Russia, but that Trump nonetheless welcomed the country’s help during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Watters certainly isn't alone among conservative media figures making sensationalistic and false claims about the filing, but the allegation that fake evidence was planted stands out. He told his audience Durham's documents "show that Hillary Clinton hired people" who hacked Trump and "planted evidence that he colluded with Russia."

"Yeah. You heard that right," Watters emphasized, saying again, "Her hackers planted evidence, fabricated evidence connecting Trump to Russia, then fed that doctored material to the feds and the media."

The obvious problem is Durham’s documents don’t show this – at all.

Not even close, actually.

This goes past wildly speculative on the part of Jesse Watters. It's irresponsible for a news channel, it's deliberately deceptive to the audience for the sake of being provocative, and the reporting on the story from his own network does not support the wild claim. And this wasn't even the only false thing said on-air last night that's contradicted by the Fox's own reporting.

People spend a lot of time talking about media bias, which is a real thing and can go both ways. But this isn't that. This was bad, wrong, Media Loser "fake news."

The A-Block

Is Trump really a ratings bonanza for Newsmax?

Two months into 2022 and we have so far had two rallies by former President Donald Trump – neither of which were aired on the three major cable news networks, including Fox News.

More pro-Trump networks like Newsmax and OAN have been all too happy to fill the void. Newsmax has touted its boost in the ratings during both rallies, spawning media coverage and speculation that Fox may “ultimately follow their audience” – as conservative commentator Charlie Sykes told the Washington Post.

However, while Newsmax is scoring big from Trump rallies, his most recent appearance on the network was a total dud. Trump’s interviews on the network offer a counterpoint to the narrative that his base may eventually dictate coverage.

Newsmax boasted on its website that the network pulled in 2.9 million total viewers during Trump’s Jan. 15 Saturday night rally in Arizona, which was enough to surge past CNN and MSNBC in the ratings, but not enough to top Fox.

But a ratings bonanza, or long-term strategy for growth?


In Other News...

Sean Hannity Exposes Anthony Weiner to Hard Questions Amid Media Comeback: 'Have You Changed?'

India Arie Calls Joe Rogan's Repeated Use of 'N-Word' 'Consciously Racist' on The Daily Show

Trump's Surgeon General Says We Could Have Better Separated Medicine from Politics

CHRISTOPHER: The Young Turks Celebrate 15 Years of Tommy Christopher — And Their 20th Anniversary

Must See Clip

Why Buy Ads If Your Product Is So Great?

Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown claimed Tuesday that Super Bowl ads prove that cryptocurrency isn’t real.

Sunday’s Super Bowl featured crypto commercials from companies such as FTX. In a hearing, Brown said this is "a bit of a giveaway."

"If this were actually meant to be used as a currency, why would you need to buy ads?" asked Brown. "I don’t think I’ve ever seen in 40 years of Super Bowl watching, the Federal Reserve buy a multimillion dollar commercial for U.S. dollars."

"That’s because crypto isn’t money," he said.

Links We Like

Mass Youth Hospitalizations, Covid-Induced Diabetes, And Other Myths
- Vinay Prasad, Tablet
Durham’s Jaw-Dropping Revelation
- The Editors, National Review
The Best, Worst, and Sketchiest Super Bowl Commercials of 2022
- Justin Peters, Slate
Kanye West's on Civil War-Themed Meme Rampage and Deletions
- Jordan Hoffman, Vanity Fair
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