1. Even in the offseason, even when football isn’t being played, the NFL rules analysts are still a mess.

CBS’s Gene Steratore and NBC’s Terry Maculay can’t seem to get on the same page about UConn’s Danny Hurley getting in the face of referee Roger Ayers at the end of the Huskies’ shocking win over Duke Sunday.

McAulay was very upset that Hurley wasn’t hit with a technical foul and called out Ayers on social media.

McAulay even doubled down when Ayers was not assigned one of the Final Four games.

I don’t know if Steratore then decided he had to weigh in solely because he saw another NFL rules analyst publicly sharing his thoughts, but it absolutely felt like Steratore was subtweeting McAulay here with this way-too-long defense of Ayers. (Steratore also reffed college basketball for two decades and serves as rules analyst for CBS’s March Madness coverage.)

When I first saw the video, I didn’t think it was confrontational, either. However, it’s absurd for Steratore to say, “Hurley isn’t physically contacting him, he’s just between Ayers and the scorer’s table.”

That’s just flat-out gaslighting. And McAulay wasn’t putting up with it.

When a user sent McAulay Steratore’s post, McAulay dismissed Steratore’s take and stood his ground on the matter.

It’s good to see NFL rules analysts in midseason form months away from the start of the season.

2.  A brand-new SI Media With Jimmy Traina dropped this morning. The episode features a conversation about all the latest news with The Athletic’s sports media reporter, Andrew Marchand.

Topics discussed include: Netflix’s awful broadcast of the Yankees-Giants game on Opening Night; what Netflix gets out of a deal with Major League Baseball; NBC’s return to airing MLB games; Ian Eagle, Bill Raftery and Grant Hill’s work on the men’s NCAA tournament; CBS and Turner’s very deep and impressive roster of college basketball announcers; issues with the CBS/Turner tournament studio show; the NFL trying to feature as many standalone games as possible and much more.

Following Marchand, Sal Licata, from SNY TV and The Sal Licata Show, joins me for our weekly “Traina Thoughts” segment. This week, Sal gives a report on what it was like to experience the ABS challenge system in person at a recent Mets game while I break down my issues with a new commercial starring Larry David. In addition, I talk about becoming obsessed with HBO’s new show, DTF St. Louis.

You can listen to the SI Media With Jimmy Traina podcast below or on Apple and Spotify.

3. On last week’s SI Media With Jimmy Traina, I talked about how much I love the new ABS Cchallenge system in Major League Baseball. I had mentioned that I couldn’t wait for the first ABS challenge walkoff win.

It happened in yesterday’s Rangers-Orioles game.

4. Netflix paid MLB $50 million to air two regular season games and the Home Run Derby.

That $50 million got the streamer 3 million viewers last Wednesday on Opening Night for the Yankees-Giants game.

The following evening, NBC pulled in 3.2 million viewers for the Diamondbacks-Dodgers game that was going head-to-head with the NCAA tournament.

5. Some people are up in arms because the Wizards played an April Fool’s joke on a fan by making him think he won $10,000 in a halfcourt shot contest. See for yourself.

I get the point that the Wizards should maybe not mess with a fan who paid for a ticket to watch a 17–59 team in person, but what I couldn’t get past was the host of this stunt telling the fan that he was rich because he had “won” $10,000. What world is she living in? After taxes, that basically gets you a few tanks of gas these days.

6. The Prime Minster of Australia announced that he’s going to do something about the gambling explosion without actually making gambling illegal.

It would be fascinating to watch sports on television or listen to sports talk radio or listen to podcasts without any gambling ads, but there’s no way that would happen here in the United States because everyone is too greedy and there’s too much money at play.

7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: It was 26 years ago today that The Sopranos gave us the most shocking murder scene in the show’s history.

Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on X and Instagram.


This article was originally published on www.si.com as NFL Rules Analysts Have Different Takes on Dan Hurley-Ref Confrontation.

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