Reminding the P1's to Be One - Holding On Good Strong

https://theathletic.com/2012586/202...s-at-the-athletic/?source=user-shared-article

Mike Rhyner: How I arrived at Square One with my new teammates at The Athletic


By Mike Rhyner 5h ago 44
I never said it.

Go back and look.

The ‘R’ word. Retire. It was somebody else’s word. Never mine.

When I posted the video on January 6, 2020, advising one and all that I was not coming back to my post at the Ticket, I didn’t couch it as retiring. I merely said I was stepping away from my gig at the radio station. At no time in there do I say the word ‘retire,’ ‘retiring,’ ‘retirement’ or any of its other forms.

Still, I was very mindful that it might turn out to be just that. I had no idea where I was going, what I would do or even if anyone would want me to do anything.

And that was the way most people framed it. They assumed that anytime someone of a certain age does something like that, they’re retiring. They took it and ran with it. I thought about saying, ‘No, I’m not retiring’. Something told me ‘Don’t do that. Let them take it and run with it if they want.’

And don’t get me wrong — I’m not pissed off by any of this. It’s just how things are. I get that.

Still, I was staring into an enormous chasm. Deep, blue, great, wide-open. And I was not afraid. It was kind of invigorating. We’d see what was next. That was down the road.

That down the road lasted three days. On January 9, I found myself sitting at the Lakewood Landing — come back, Landing!! — with Or Moyal and Kent Garrison.

Or had been around; he spent some time at WFAA producing Dale Hansen’s sportscasts and running their online sports scene. I didn’t know Kent at all.

But I did know The Athletic. And I dug The Athletic — lots. That’s where they were plying their craft these days, on the editorial/management side. They had something to talk to me about.

I didn’t know what that could be. I was not known much for writing about sports. That was not what they were thinking. They wanted me in their podcast space.

This excited me. I was not turned on by terrestrial radio, but the podcast thing was something I was probably going to look into one way or another, assuming I did anything at all.

But I didn’t get the allure of a neither-fish-nor-fowl, sometimes-sportsy, sometimes-not guy like me for them. I told them that I was all over the place. They said, ‘Fine; we want What’s On Mike’s Mind.’

That was all I needed to hear. I was in.

But first, there was that crazy little thing called the non-compete clause.

I didn’t think that would be a player, as a podcast is not over the air. Cumulus Media informed me otherwise and that if I did this, I would be in violation.

This caught me by surprise. I didn’t — and still don’t — see any point of contention between a podcast, which lives online, and over-the-air terrestrial radio. There are a ton of podcasts out there, and if the radio station was ever concerned with any, that was news to me.

I thought about fighting it and talked to a few attorneys. They told me different things, but they all arrived at the same conclusion: This all comes down to who adjudicates the case and how he or she views non-competes. Some hate ‘em and live for the opportunity to smash ‘em. Others view them as a legitimate way for a business to protect itself. Still others will be on one side or the other, but look at you and say, ‘Did you know that was in there when you signed the contract?’ And I did. I just never thought it would matter.

But one of those attorneys stopped things down, looked at me and said, ‘Look — I know who you are; I know what you’ve been doing. You’ve been in the grind for 26 years, and it’s not like this is a one-year or two-year non-compete. If you can take some time and do nothing and ride this thing out, that would be the best thing for you.’

And I could. So I did.

That’s over now. It’s time to get about the business of a new scene at the Athletic. I hope you’ll subscribe, and I hope you’ll check out ‘Square One with Mike Rhyner.’ It’ll include conversations with people I have gotten to know as well as people I don’t know but am curious about. I will have some of the other guys who write for The Athletic on, guys I know and have great regard for such as Levi Weaver, Jamey Newberg, Tim Cato, Saad Yousuf and Jon Machota, just to name a few. And it’ll be a lot of ‘What’s On Mike’s Mind,’ where I pontificate on who knows what, just as I used to do.

 

No the only conflict was that Cumulus wouldn’t let him do a podcast until his non-compete ran out.

Don’t think there’s anything keeping him from doing that. Dan said today that he’s filling in for Jake again next Friday

 

Haven’t been able to listen since early this morning so I guess I missed some news

 

the first Square One podcast was meh, mostly because it was Mike rehashing the start of the station and then his decision to leave, and the guy he had with him was annoying

but the one that dropped today with him and Wilonsky just shooting the shit

 

I assume you need a subscription

 

not that anyone would notice, but 103.3 eliminated local programming and is going to just straight national programming


I guess no more jokes about bringing home wings

 

He did admit he wasn’t hacked the one day he was in for the hardline last week because Dan brought it up in the cross-talk, but he clearly still didn’t want to talk about it. The fact that he can’t laugh at himself is reason #1 of many that he sucks

 

tuned in because I have nothing better to do on a Saturday night.

 

“What are the thumbs up versus thumbs down regarding drugs at this party?” - Mike Sirois