Kavitha Davidson of The Athletic joins us to talk MLB’s fraught and failed history simplifying and sanitizing Jackie Robinson, the exhausting harassment women in sports and sports media face and what allies can do to help make concrete and digital spaces welcoming, the intersections between sports, society and the rise in violence against Asian American and Pacific Islander peoples, and the difference between minorities being represented in a system versus safe from and within it. Matthew and Jonah also get their schadenfreude in as the Super League scandal crashes and burns.

Kavitha Davidson (@kavithadavidson) is a sportswriter who’s written for ESPN, Bloomberg, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, and been noted in Best American Sports Writing. She has appeared on SportsCenter, Outside the Lines, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC, co-hosted “The Lead,” The Athletic's daily podcast, and sits on the Board of Directors of the Yogi Berra Museum.

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This week’s guest is Sean Jacobs, a soccer polymath who joins Jonah & Matthew to discuss the Champions League quarterfinal results. Points of interest include Liverpool’s disappointing season and reasons to hope for a quick turnaround, Manchester City’s best shot at continental glory, whether PSG advancing helps or hurts their chances of retaining Kylian Mbappé and whether Chelsea succeeding is inherently bad for humanity. Other topics: the sociopolitical history of the semifinalists, Jonah’s anxieties re: Christian Pulisic, how the rise of capitalist plaything RB Leipzig makes Bayern Munich more popular to Gerrman fans, why Sean roots for clubs from port cities (Dortmund; Marseille; Napoli; Porto), how growing up during apartheid informs his perspective as a fan and how U.S. soccer’s greatest contribution to global football may have occurred in South Africa.

Sean Jacobs (@_seanjacobs) is an associate professor at The New School, where he is also Chair of the Media & Culture Concentration in the Graduate Program of International Affairs. He is the founder and editor of Africa is a Country, “a project to expand and amplify the voice of African writers across borders and languages to challenge the global narrative,” author of the book Media in Post-apartheid South Africa: Postcolonial Politics in the Age of Globalization, and a Shuttleworth Fellow.

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This week's guest is former college basketball player and current SB Nation writer Sydney Umeri. Topics discussed included but are not limited to: Stanford's championship proving one fist > five fingers; how Iowa’s Caitlin Clark shoots like Steph Curry and why that may mean something different for the future of the women’s game than Steph does for the men’s; what makes Paige Bueckers a unique talent; the discouraging shortage of Black women coaching at the highest levels of basketball; the underreported issue of long-haul Covid affecting elite athletes; and the best and worst of NBA alternate uniforms, including Matthew’s frustration with the Knicks’ repeated fashion faux pas.

Sydney Umeri is a programming fellow and writer at SB Nation. She is also a former college basketball player and currently a digital marketing and graphic design consultant.

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The latest Jacobin Sports Show is an NBA trade deadline special. Matthew and Jonah discuss Orlando’s moves and what they mean for Boston, Chicago and Denver; Miami acquiring Victor Oladipo; Tilman Fertitta’s embarrassing ownership in Houston; Rajon Rondo’s winding career forking a new path; what to takeaway from Kyle Lowry, Lonzo Ball and Andre Drummond not moving; and how New Orleans’ approach to Lonzo is emblematic of (one reason) why capitalism sucks. There’s also quick-hitters on the Champions League quarterfinals and why Manchester City fans may be less confident in their chances of winning than opposing fans and the Tim Peel/NHL controversy.

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This week on The Jacobin Sports Show, Matthew and Jonah traverse the NBA landscape, discussing a host of subjects: should the Indiana Pacers maximize their current talent or rebuild? Can the Miami Heat repeat last season’s bubble success? Is Meyers Leonard a dick? (Spoiler: yes) Can anything stop the Brooklyn Nets? Is Oklahoma City winning too much? Is Joel Embiid the MVP frontrunner? Why don’t we trust the Phoenix Suns? And why do we trust Dallas even less?

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The latest episode of The Jacobin Sports Show features Derek Silva (@derekcrim) of the End of Sport podcast. We discussed capitalism and exploitation in sports, particularly college football and basketball and the exploitation of mostly Black college athletes, systemic injustice exacerbated by the COVID pandemic. We also talked about structural injustice and the NBA, lowlighted by Detroit Pistons’ owner Tom Gores’ ownership of a company that gouges humans—disproportionately Black humans, Brown humans, poor humans, and disadvantaged humans—in prison.

Derek Silva’s work has appeared in Jacobin, Time, The Guardian, The Daily Beast and The Chronicle of Higher Education. He is one of the hosts of the End Of Sport podcast, along with Johanna Mellis and Nathan-Kalman Lamb, and a professor of sociology at King’s University at Western University. His areas of interest include critical sociology, criminology, sport, punishment, terrorism and radicalization studies.

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The latest episode of The Jacobin Sports Show features Dan Devine of The Ringer. We discuss the ascendance of the fun (!) Charlotte Hornets, LaMelo Ball’s early brilliance, the quiet but thorough dominance of the San Antonio Spurs’ bench, All-Star voting controversies and mulligans, the Atlanta Hawks’ firing of Lloyd Pierce, and what the New York Knicks’ success feels like as a fan and a sportswriter. Jonah and Matthew also dive into the Celtics' struggles, the Lakers' title chances, and whether the NBA's expanded playoffs is good for the fans or just more corporate excess.

Dan Devine is a staff writer at The Ringer, where he covers the NBA. Before that, he did so at Yahoo Sports. He also serves on The Ringer Union’s bargaining committee. Dan can be found on Twitter @YourManDevine.

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The latest episode of The Jacobin Sports Show welcomes Eno Sarris of The Athletic to discuss the Fernando Tatis Jr. contract from both the Padres' and player's perspective, how analytics impact teams' development and financial decisions, Kevin Mather's ignoble end in Seattle, just how good the Dodgers are, and weird sandwiches. Matthew and Jonah also debate some Hall of Fame standards, learn some of the more colorful names current teams almost went by, and close with a little Serena Williams and Tiger Woods talk.

Eno Sarris covers baseball analytics for The Athletic. He's written for FanGraphs, ESPN, Fox and MLB.com, edited a children's coloring book and enjoys good beer. You can follow him @enosarris.

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In the latest episode of The Jacobin Sports Show, Matthew and Jonah talk with Bhaskar Sunkara about all things NBA: success of the Knicks, struggles of the Celtics, whether the Jazz are title contenders, Blake Griffin's career, Draymond Green's take on double-standards in how NBA laborers are treated versus owners, and which teams are easiest to root for and against come playoff time.

Bhaskar Sunkara is the founder and publisher of Jacobin magazine and godfather of the Jacobin Sports Show. He's the author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequality and a columnist for The Guardian.

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In the latest episode of The Jacobin Sports Show, Matthew and Jonah talk with Lyndsey D'Arcangelo about the Big Game that was anything but, Sarah Thomas and the NFL's efforts to promote hiring more women, WNBA free agency, and Lyndsey's new book about the overlooked but meaningful history of the National Women's Football League.

Lyndsey D'Arcangelo (@darcangel21) writes for The Athletic, covering the NFL and the National Women's Hockey League, and founded the Courtside newsletter, which covers the WNBA. She is also the co-author with Britni de la Cretaz of the book Hail Mary, about the rise and fall of the Natonal Women's Football League, available in November 2021.

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