Season 6 Episode 9- Tim Keown, Kevin Armstrong

On the ninth episode of the sixth season of The Sports-Casters hosts Steve Bennett and Don Russ welcome Tim Keown (ESPN the Magazine) and Kevin Armstrong (NY Daily News). Starting the show with 3Things, Steve and Don get ready for March Madness, talk about the abrupt retirement of Adam LaRoche, and look back at the first 8 days of the Gawker v. Hulk Hogan trial including testimony from a former guest of the show. The book club says goodbye to the first book of 2016 called, This is Your Brain on Sports: The Science of Underdogs, the Value of Rivalry, and What We Can Learn from the T-Shirt Cannon by Jon Wertheim and Sam Sommers and stats fresh with a new book called, Boys Among Men: How the Prep-to-Pro Generation Redefined the NBA and Sparked a Basketball Revolution by Jonathan Abrams. Finally, the show ends with Don talking about Facebook turing into shit, and Steve tries to figure out what Yale hockey means to him. -Tim Keown is making his first appearance (0:24:59) on the podcast to talk about his ESPN the Magazine feature on Bryce Harper. Tim compares Harper to Cam Newton, talks about how Bryce wants to change some of the unwritten rules in baseball, and Harper taking the next step towards being the face of baseball. Tim also talks about his position at ESPN the Magazine, explains why he loves his beat (or lack there of), and hints at a future story about the demographics that make up youth baseball in the United States. -Kevin Armstrong is making his first appearance (0:59:37) on the podcast to talk about his feature in the New York Daily News about the unique basketball gyms in Brooklyn. With the NCAA Tournament set to make its debut at Barclays, Kevin wrote about the windows on the top of roofs, the visiting player benches that don't exist and the unique ways money has been raised in some of Brooklyn's toughest neighborhoods to build new gyms. Kevin also talks about hockey at BC, the front and back page cover wars in New York City, and gives a prediction for the Final Four.