 On Real Sports. Up next, a profile of a new name on the sports scene, and what a name it is. Tyson Fury. The story about mountain climbing's recent surge in popularity. For years, FIFA officials enriched themselves by taking bribes and embezzling funds, only to see it all brought to an end after a series of arrests. This is the Michael K Show. Thank you for watching. On 98.7 ESPN. Alright, we are so happy to have our next guest. We love talking to him, and we usually have the pleasure of seeing him in person. We'll just walk to the studio, but that's not the case now. His Real Sports 25th year of the show, this 25th season debuts tonight on HBO, and it will be at 10 o'clock Eastern Time until 11, and it features a round table of Mike Breen, Joe Buck, and Jim Nance. I'm looking forward to it, and it's odd. I said this earlier, Real Sports returns before Real Sports returns, and Brian joins us now. I believe he's at his home in Florida. Brian, thanks for coming on. I hope you're safe and doing well. Fordham's fine. It's how are you, Michael? I'm doing great. How are you? How are you doing? I'm good. I'm good. I really don't have any complaints. Same menu, different day, but I'm alright. Now, doing a monthly investigative news magazine type of show in a time where everything changes from minute to minute, how tough is this to conceive of the show right now, Brian? Yeah, it's pretty much a huge challenge. I mean, as you guys are more aware than most, I mean, you know, you're afraid that when you say anything, it's outdated the minute you finish the sentence. And so we really had to kind of pick and choose what we can and can't try to do. We can't really try to project what anything is going to look like, and we can't do anything that's going to be dated the minute we get it in the can. So we tried to find a couple of things that we thought would stand the test of time that would not be dated if somebody only gets to see this a week from now or two days after we did it. And so we basically took a pro and a con look and we looked at those sports that acted in a fashion that we thought was not responsible. And we took a look at those in the sports industry who are going out of their way to be of assistance in a time of great need. Is there anything you can compare this pandemic to in your career? You know what, Don, I can't. I'm scared to say I'm coming up with a 72nd birthday and I've never even seen anything even close to this. I mean, if you guys have, please help me out here. This is new territory for all of us and we're all, I think all of us in the media business are kind of trying to find our way and strike the right balance between what people want to hear about and what people want to be relieved of for a time and it's a difficult balance. Do you have, and obviously, listen, I know you're not an expert in this, you're just a smart guy who loves sports. What sort of expectations do you have in your mind for when you see some sense of normalcy in our future when it comes to sports? Well, you know, if you'd asked me a month ago, I would have had a much more optimistic outlook. Now, I don't know if it's realistic to think we're going to see gatherings and stadiums and arenas before the year is out. I mean, I don't want to be a doomsayer. I'd love to see baseball. I'd love to see the conclusion of the NBA season. I'd love to watch the PGA tour guys go at it, but I have a very difficult time seeing Yankee Stadium packed and cheering with fans. I really do. I'd love to see that, but I have a hard time visualizing. What about you? Well, we had Bob Costas on last Friday, Bryant, and he said he didn't think live sports would be played in the United States in 2020. I mean, that's really a very dim view of it, but he truly believes it. There's so many hurdles, Bryant, to getting even the teams on the field without fans. So I'm going to be pleased when it happens, but I'm not going to bet that it will happen this year. I agree with you. I mean, you know, people talk about having, you know, spectator-less sports and bringing all the teams to one place. Well, you know, that assumes these guys who have responsibilities off the field and off the court are going to turn to their families and say, you know what, I realize this is a very difficult time, but I'm off for a couple of months. I'll see you around. I just don't think that's realistic. I just don't see that happening. Now, what are the round table? What did you guys talk about with the round table? Well, you know, it was interesting. I mean, you know, Mike, better than I do, Michael. Too well. Way too well. He's a wonderful guy, and so is Jim and Joe. And I promised them going into this that I wouldn't put them on the spot and ask them to say something projecting into the future that would make them look foolish a week from now or a month from now. And so what I tried to get from them was a sense of what I thought were very serious questions, which is, you know, for example, in Mike's case, if and when the NBA or ESPN decides, hey, we're going back, is that going to be enough for you? Or will you have your own guidelines about when you think it's safe to go back? Or asking Joe, does he see himself at some point calling games from a remote location? What of what they're hearing about each of their sports? Do they like? What do they not like? What do they feel their future is? How much do they miss it? I think it was just a case of four guys who've been around sports and been in sports for a long time, sitting around talking about how lost we all are amid this. The only thing I guess we can all compare it to in our lifetimes was 9-11 in the sense that there was a pre-9-11 and a post-9-11 world. And I'm just curious to see what post-coronavirus world is going to be. That's actually a great point. And I've been telling folks who are saying, oh, things are never going to be the same. I can remember as you can, right after 9-11, people saying, well, I'm never going to get on a plane. Well, I'm never going to go up a skyscraper again. And obviously, that didn't come to pass. People adjust. People move on with their lives. So when this is all over and done, hopefully very soon, I suspect people will get back to a new normal that will come very close to what we had before. Now, when that happens, whether that's a year off, whether that's two years off or three years off, is open to debate. But I do think eventually it will get back to where it was. Now, it's interesting. I'm wondering if you cover this in the roundtable, that I believe the future, at least in your future, we will be doing games if games return. We'll be doing it from a studio. And I think that networks will say, we could save a lot of money doing this, and that might be the way moving forward. But if there are announcers at the events, and there are no fans, you know, we had Gary Thorn on about a month ago because he announced that Oreo game where they didn't have any fans after the riots in Baltimore. And he said he was calling the game, and Adam Jones hit a double. And from second base, he shouted up to Gary, shut up, I can hear you. So it's kind of odd. Did they talk about that? I mean, the logistics of doing a game with no crowd. Yeah, I think Joe, in fact, talked about the difficulty of it. I mean, you know, it's one thing to even pipe in sound. You know, we've all watched on television as various comedians and comedy shows have attempted to replicate some kind of studio audience. And it's a very difficult thing to do. It's a strange adjustment of how much do you put in? How do you modulate it and how much do you react to it? But I suspect it'll become something, I don't know, that we'll get used to of necessity. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm kind of cool with that, Brian. Like, I kind of cringe when I hear athletes say, if there's not going to be fans, I don't want to come back. No, you're playing to a smaller room, right? I mean, the vast majority of people are going to be watching this on television, listening on the radio, consuming it after it's already played. Yeah, you love to have fans, and I think they're important, but I don't think it's to come at the expense of trying to get games going. No, nothing should stand in the way of that. And I don't think the game should come at the expense of risking anyone's life. I'd love to see an NBA champion claim, but not if it means one person getting sick. I mean, I just don't think it's worth that. I mean, it's not worth risking someone's life. You know, we all love it very much. We all miss it very much. It's left a big void in our lives, but can we withstand it for a half a year? Yeah, I think so. Now, Brian, I placed a really big bet when I was 16 years old in 1995 when Real Sports won on the air that you guys would not outlast real sex. And it turns out they only made 33 episodes, and you're still here 25 years later. I hope you're talking about going not the host. Now, looking back, when you look at your career and the run on the Today show, after 25 years of Real Sports, is this the show that you think most defines you as a broadcaster? You know, I wish I could answer that. I'm not real good at looking in a rear-view mirror. I'm really not. And like a lot of people, we're always the worst judges of ourselves. I'm very, very proud of Real Sports. I've said, and I think I've said this, Michael, to you personally, I think it's the best show in which I've ever been associated with which I've ever been associated. And I'm real proud of it. I'm real proud of the people who've worked with us. Many of our key people are folks who, you know, I don't want to say I've raised them, but, you know, they were young people when we first met and now they're family members. They're, you know, they've got kids of their own. They're married. They're grown-ups. I mean, it's really been very gratifying to watch. And aside from all the awards, I'm just, I'm proud of the fact that we've taken a responsible view of sports and told good stories. Now, is it true that you enlisted your wife to be your cameraman? My wife, Hillary, has been a trooper in this. I mean, I've been that very seriously. You know, we've all had our difficulties getting on the air. In this case, because I barely know how to log on, it would have been virtually impossible unless she'd come to the aid. And HBO shipped in enough equipment here for us to start our own studio. But she took to it and working with our people served as not only my camera person, but my lighting director, my sound technician, my makeup artist, stage manager, the prompter operator. She really did everything. I mean, we could not have gotten on the air without her. She's been a trooper extraordinaire. She really has. She's been wonderful. Now, when you see, you know, what you and your wife went through to put this show, which is a tape show, on the air tonight, do you, someone who's a veteran in this business, do you marvel at what ESPN was able to pull off with the draft? I was stunned. I mean, I really was. Look, was it fabulous television by a standards of a year ago? No, of course not. But when you consider that they had 32 different separate entities checking in, and then they had so many people who were analyzing it, and then Goodell's part and the fan's part and the video footage and everything else, it really was quite an operation. It was very impressive. Did I think it was great television? No, did I think it was a great technical achievement? Absolutely. My hats off to them. They took what was a very difficult assignment, and they put it together, and it was pretty glitch-free. I was enormously impressed. And I also was very much on the side of Goodell, and some people disagreed that I thought the draft should go on. A lot of people said, you know, with what's going on, carnage in the streets, I didn't think that that was the case. I think that life does have to go on, and as long as people are not endangered, why not run the draft? What was your take? I agree with that. If they had tried to do anything from Vegas, I'd have been all over them. I really would. It's not worth endangering one person. But what they did in the grand scheme of things, there was no loss to anyone. There was no risk to anyone. I had no problem with it, and it's very hard for me, as you know. It's hard for me to short-tier anything the suits the NFL do. I am not a fan of NFL owners, but in this case, I thought they did something that was worthwhile and it was entertaining. So as you're, you know, quarantined here at home like we all are, for me, I missed the drive into work. I got about a 50-minute ride, cranked the tunes, cruise up the term pike. I miss that every day. That's like my me time. What does Brian Gumbel miss when you're stuck at home? You know, I've been trying to busy myself with some things that you might think are strange. I like spending time in the kitchen, so I've been cooking a lot. I know that sounds really weird, but I've been cooking a lot. I always read a lot. My wife and I have made a 7 o'clock movie date every single night. We take turns picking what we're going to watch. Last night we watched a great documentary. The night before we watched a foreign film from Spain. The night before that we watched a comedy and that's kind of the way life has gone on. You know, I do miss tuning in the games in the evening. I can't lie about that, but, you know, if this is the biggest challenge I'm going to face, then I'm all right. I've got it a lot better than most folks. Have you been engaged in the last dance of the first four episodes? I've watched. I am not and never have been an MJ sycophant. I am not one of those people who thinks his middle name is greatest player who ever lived. I'm acutely aware that he manages to get the last word on everything and so I am not deluded in the thinking this is totally objective. It is very subjective. But it's certainly entertaining. I've enjoyed watching it. I confess that they've gone through the primary characters of great interest. I'm not necessarily sure the will Purdue and section is going to be that great. It's the Wendington episodes. Tremendous I hear. Yeah, I can imagine. You know, so I don't know what the next six are going to be like, but yeah, it's been pretty good television. Did you ever have any run-in with Michael who didn't like him? I don't say I don't like him. I've never had a run-in with him. I'm just not one of these people who worships the shrine. Who's your number one then? I try never to talk in superlatives. I'm inclined to say that MJ is definitely in the conversation. But I also think LeBron's in the conversation. I think Kareem is so often overlooked. He's in the conversation. Wilt is in the conversation. Oscar, magic. There's a bunch of people who are in the conversation and comparing errors is ever difficult. When people turn to me and say, MJ, I'm simply forced to ask, well, if you're talking about records, he doesn't match Wilt. And if you're talking about rings, he doesn't match Russ. So I'm trying to figure out how he goes to the front of the line. That's all. I don't know if you felt the same way I did watching the, I believe it was, forget what episode it was on Sunday, watching that Bull's Pistons rivalry and getting a flavor of Celtics Pistons. And two teams really hating each other to the point where Jordan can't let go things 30 years ago. Do you look and say that those days are over? Can we ever get a series of rivalry where two teams actually hate each other to that level anymore? That's a great question. My suspicion is that these guys are so much on social media now that social media won't let them do that. They'd be forced to retract anything that came close to bitterness or hatred or intensity of a rivalry. I just don't think they're built that way and the game is different now. The game now is such that if you breathe on a guy, it's a foul and if the guy goes to the ground, that's flagrant. It didn't used to be that way as you saw. I'm old school so I like the old way but you know what, I'm an old guy. Real sports with Brian Gumbel marks its 25th anniversary season tonight at 10 o'clock on HBO. Roundtable of Jim Nance, Joe Buck and Mike Breen, a discussion on the impact of COVID-19 on sports. Brian, you know we love talking to you. It's always a really special time when you join us and hope to see you in person real soon. Peter, Don, Michael, thank you also very much and guys, stay safe. You too. All the best.