Bill Simmons rode his reputation as “The Sports Guy” for years from AOL to ESPN to HBO, but these days at age 54 after a career in media, Simmons admits it takes more effort for him to maintain that relatable persona in his content.
Speaking at Bloomberg’s Screentime conference in an interview with editor Lucas Shaw, “The Sports Guy” explained the challenges of connecting as he gets older—and richer.
“There’s no question,” Simmons said. “In my 20s, I was that guy. Now I’m twice as old as I was in 1998.
“But I still give a ****. It’s been really instructive to me that the people when I was growing up, the people who did well, you could kind of always tell the people who had checked out … it started to show up in their writing or where they talked about it.”
Simmons explained he still watches hours of football every Sunday, keeps up with the NBA daily, and sucks up TV and movies as prep for his podcast.
“I made the decision a long time ago that the moment I felt like that was happening to me, I’m out,” Simmons said.
While Simmons is liable for a gaffe or two every now and then, it’s not any more egregious than any other big sports host. Despite adding more management responsibilities since selling The Ringer to Spotify nearly four years ago, Simmons still finds time to consume boatloads of content and talk about it.
And if the audience and revenue for The Bill Simmons Podcast is any indication, his fans still eat it up.
About Brendon Kleen
Brendon is a Media Commentary staff writer at Awful Announcing. He has also covered basketball and sports business at Front Office Sports, SB Nation, Uproxx and more.