Well, this is a bit surprising. Media Matters’ Matt Gertz writes, “Pete Hegseth hasn’t been on Fox News in 11 months.”
It’s surprising for two reasons. First, Fox News is usually a friendly place for Trump administration officials to get their message across — especially when public opinion is against them.
Second, Hegseth came from Fox News. He was a regular co-host on the weekend edition of “Fox & Friends” when Trump tapped him for defense secretary.
But we’re closing in on a year since Hegseth gave an interview to his former employer. Gertz writes that his last appearance was in October. Peter Doocy interviewed him on the sidelines of the Navy-Air Force football game on Oct. 4, and the interview aired the next day when Doocy hosted “The Sunday Briefing.”
According to Gertz, that was Hegseth’s 24th Fox News interview since he became defense secretary in January 2025.
Gertz wrote, “Over that 11-month period, Trump and Hegseth embroiled the U.S. military in an open-ended war with Iran; the U.S. military continued to carry out their policy of illegally bombing purported drug cartel boats at sea and oversaw a regime change in Venezuela; and the defense secretary repeatedly came under fire for purging the top ranks of the armed forces.”
Hegseth has not disappeared from television altogether. He sat down for interviews with CBS News in January and June.
Gertz wrote, “It’s unclear why Hegseth has not appeared on Fox since October 5 of last year — but the timing is conspicuous. Just days after that interview, Fox became one of numerous outlets to condemn the defense secretary’s stringent new restrictions on Pentagon reporters.”
Speaking of the Department of Defense, The Washington Post’s Dan Lamothe and Alex Horton had this scoop Wednesday: “Pentagon cuts access to classified information amid Iran war concerns.”
Lamothe and Horton wrote, “The Pentagon has pulled decades of classified documents from a secret computer system commonly used by defense officials and U.S. troops, after The Washington Post published a story detailing senior military officers’ concerns about the Iran war. Documents associated with the Secretary of Defense Orders Book (SDOB) were removed from an internal web portal on the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet), three people familiar with the matter said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the classified system.”
They added, “It was not immediately clear if the documents remain otherwise available to U.S. personnel or how the reduction in access could complicate military planning. SIPRNet holds information that is labeled ‘secret,’ while top-secret information is held on more highly classified networks, where fewer people have access.”
Check out the story for more concerning details.
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In Wednesday’s newsletter, I linked to a story about the Massachusetts Gaming Commission looking into some bets placed by The Ringer founder Bill Simmons.
On his podcast, Simmons talked about how he had his daughter’s boyfriend, who lives in Massachusetts, place some bets on FanDuel because Simmons was in California at the time, where he lives and where sports betting is illegal.
Simmons said on the podcast, “I let Hank log into my FanDuel as me, (sent) the code to make sure it’s me to my phone, I give him the code, he logs in. And I have all this money that I had from last year because I actually hit a bunch of futures last year. And he’s putting in bets for me, and honestly it’s the closest I’ve ever felt to Hank. Real bonding moment for us. A week later, I called him up, ran it back. We did some more.”
The problem? Proxy betting — that is, having someone place bets for you — violates FanDuel’s rules and is illegal in Massachusetts.
By Tuesday night, Simmons had recorded another podcast in which he said the bets had been voided.
Simmons said, “I talked about how I got my daughter’s boyfriend to place some bets for me in Massachusetts, because I was in L.A. Did not know about the proxy rules. Yeah. There’s some real rules with this stuff. I learned my lesson; apparently, proxy betting — not allowed. I actually thought it was, but that’s fine.”
Simmons then joked, “And now my daughter has to break up with her boyfriend. … But I did learn. Not allowed to do that. So all those bets went out the window. All that special time I had with Hank out the window as well. The good news is I’m going to be in Boston, and maybe at some point I’ll make some more wagers down the road. There you go. Lesson learned.”
I can buy that Simmons had no idea what he was doing was wrong. As Awful Announcing’s Tyler Lauletta wrote, “The brazenness with which Simmons shared the initial anecdote is pretty clear evidence that he didn’t think he was doing anything wrong, which makes the entire scenario all the more baffling.”
Journalist and podcaster Pablo Torre, shown here in May. (Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
The NBA cracked down on the Los Angeles Clippers in a big way Wednesday. The league handed down the largest punishment in its history after its investigation found the team and owner Steve Ballmer circumvented the league’s salary cap rules by arranging for millions of dollars to go to star player Kawhi Leonard. The team will lose five first-round draft picks and pay a $30 million fine. In addition, Ballmer has been suspended for one year, the NBA said, “for knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income opportunities.”
Clippers president Gillian Zucker will be suspended for one year, and basketball operations president Lawrence Frank will have a six-month suspension. Leonard will pay $700,000 in restitution. The team said it would fight to prove its innocence.
What happened? Well, the short version is this: A report said Leonard accepted a $28 million, no-show contract with Aspiration, the California environmental company that also sponsored the Clippers. Ballmer had also invested in the company. That meant Leonard would receive money from Aspiration for a job he never did, giving him compensation beyond what the Clippers could pay him under league rules.
And what was that initial report? It was on the podcast “Pablo Torre Finds Out.” For his work on that story, Torre, formerly of ESPN, won a Pulitzer Prize for Audio Reporting.
The NBA launched its investigation after Torre’s report.
On Wednesday, after the league handed out its devastating punishment, Torre sent out a tweet with the emoji of a hamburger. As USA Today’s Mary Clarke explained, “‘Hamburger’ has become a popular meme with Torre and his show after a segment on his podcast about comedian Alonzo ‘Hamburger’ Jones went viral.”
Meanwhile, former NBA team owner Mark Cuban tweeted the breaking news of the Clippers’ punishment and wrote, “Congrats Pablo.”
Scott Jennings is the CNN contributor who goes on the air to give the conservative and often pro-Trump point of view. Ever since Karoline Leavitt announced she was stepping down as White House press secretary, Jennings’ name has been among those floated as her replacement.
So it was notable that when Jennings appeared on Kasie Hunt’s CNN show Wednesday, Hunt felt the need to drop this disclaimer: “We have to mention to our viewers that Mr. Jennings is reportedly being considered for the role of the next White House press secretary.”
Mediaite’s Sean James wrote, “Jennings smirked and shook his head as if to say ‘it ain’t gonna happen’ as Hunt issued her disclaimer, which drew a laugh from the host.”
James added, “This is becoming a recurring practice for Hunt and Jennings, with the anchor having to issue a similar disclaimer on her show last week. Hunt quipped at the time, ‘you can continue your audition’ to replace Karoline Leavitt as President Donald Trump’s press secretary, after recent reports CNN’s resident conservative commentator is in the running.”
Peter Schrager, shown here in 2022. (Steve Luciano/AP Images for NFL)
As expected, Peter Schrager is getting his own TV show on ESPN. Ever since ESPN started tearing up its daily programming by canceling “Around the Horn” in May 2025, there has been speculation about how the network would fill its daytime schedule. After it hired rising star Schrager, whose specialty is the NFL, the guess was he would someday get his own show.
Now it’s happening.
The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand was the first to report that “Big Day with Peter Schrager,” an hourlong show, will debut on Sept. 10 at 2 p.m. Eastern. ESPN has since put out a release confirming the news.
Marchand wrote, “It is a high-profile move for Schrager and ESPN as he joins Mike Greenberg, Stephen A. Smith, Pat McAfee, Tony Kornheiser, Michael Wilbon and Scott Van Pelt with daily programs centered on their personalities on the network. ‘Big Day with Peter Schrager’ replaces ‘SportsCenter’ in the time slot.”
During college football season, Schrager’s show will air Monday through Thursday. A new college football show — “Bussin’ with Pate,” featuring Josh Pate, Taylor Lewan and Will Compton — will air on Fridays. After college football season is over, Schrager’s show will air five days a week.
The show will focus mostly on the NFL but will include other sports. Schrager is expected to be joined by various other ESPN personalities.
It has been quite the rise for Schrager since joining ESPN. After a successful long run as the affable co-host of the NFL Network’s “Good Morning Football,” Schrager joined ESPN in 2025. His upbeat personality and knowledge of the NFL made him a valuable contributor to shows such as “NFL Live,” “Get Up,” “First Take,” “The Pat McAfee Show” and “SportsCenter.”
It could end up being a show that looks like a bunch of other ESPN shows — a rotating cast of panelists discussing the latest NFL news, analyzing players and games and debating the hot topics of the moment. But that doesn’t mean Schrager shouldn’t be given a chance.
He’s likeable. He doesn’t spew hot takes for the sake of going viral. And he’s fair but never insulting. In fact, if there’s a criticism — and it’s not much of one — it’s that he’s too enthusiastic sometimes. But it feels genuine, and therefore, he makes for a good TV personality. He has a chance to be a mainstay on ESPN’s daily lineup for a while.
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