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The Cardinals are in the midst of a remarkable season. They have the top record in all of baseball, and their pitching staff ranks among the best ever. But a string of injuries has compromised the offense, and the rival Pirates and Cubs are in hot pursuit. The Rams have looked shaky this preseason, perhaps destined for yet another losing year, but each new day brings a fresh round of speculation about whether the team will stay in St. Louis or bolt for Los Angeles. As the cooler weather last week reminded us, hockey season is just around the corner. And did we mention that Mizzou football is in the top 25?
Sports here are hotter than ever, but for the past couple of weeks, Bernie Miklasz hasn’t been around to help us make sense of the latest news, his familiar voice missing from the morning paper, his daily videos absent from the Internet. The venerable columnist, who’s been sharing his opinions in the pages of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch since the 1980s, was busy preparing for a new challenge. He’s left the paper to join 101 ESPN, where he’ll host a three-hour morning radio show. It premieres at 7 a.m. tomorrow.
On Saturday, Miklasz took a few minutes away from plotting segments for the new show to chat with us, explaining the rationale behind his career move and previewing what we can expect from him in the new gig. We’ll jump into the full conversation below, but first, a few major takeaways.
1. Miklasz hasn’t given up writing. Though his focus will certainly be the new radio show, Miklasz still plans to write several pieces each day for the station’s website, keeping up the torrid pace that he’s set over the past few years as a prolific blogger. “I’m as committed to writing as ever, and I’m going to be delivering a ton of written content,” he says.
2. It’s not a done deal just yet, but Miklasz has been talking to Will Leitch—noted author, Deadspin founder, and big-time Cardinals fan—about possibly teaming up on a Cardinals podcast. For a preview of just how fun that could be, listen to this segment of Leitch quizzing Miklasz on trivia over at Sports on Earth.
3. The deciding factor that led Miklasz to make the move was a desire to connect with his audience in more ways—on the airwaves and on the web, through blog posts, videos, and the aforementioned podcast. But he also admits that the decline of newspapers, a trend from which the Post has been far from immune, was a factor.
So, without further ado, here is our (significantly abridged) conversation. One thing about Bernie, he’s never at a loss for words.
Obviously, after decades at the paper, this is a huge change, but you do have a lot of past experience in radio.
I was way ahead of the curve on that. I’ve had a simultaneous radio career in some form since like the early 1980s in Baltimore. I’ve always loved radio, and I’ve been fortunate enough to where people want to put me on the radio. It’s just a matter of being practical. There were times, it was just very difficult to do both jobs well. That frustrated me. I realized at some point I was just going to have to choose one over the other. I kind of put that decision off for as long as I could. This seemed like the ideal time.
What appealed to you about the specific opportunity at 101 ESPN?
It’s been hard for me to emotionally make the decision to leave newspapers, because it is such a huge part of my life for so long, but I’ve had this pull to go where I think the business is headed. I just think the way media is consumed in our culture has changed dramatically and it’s still changing. The notion that everyone is going to go to one place and not go anywhere else for their news and information, that is a hopelessly outdated and naive belief. Well, 101 ESPN offers me multiple platforms, and I think that’s the way you build an audience. I want to be able to present something for everyone. If you want to read, well, I’m going to be blogging like a crazy man at 101Sports.com. If you don’t necessarily want to read, but you want to hear me run my mouth on the radio, well, I got that for you, too. If you want some advanced video, that will be there.
What about podcasting? At the Post, you and beat writer Derrick Goold had a great Cardinals podcast.
I think podcasting is going to be big with 101 ESPN. I don’t want it to sound like it’s a done deal, but I’m hopeful that I’m going to team up with Will Leitch to do a Cardinals podcast.
From a more personal perspective, what made you want to make this move?
This will sound really self-serving. I don’t mean it to be. It’s just really honest. I’m 56 years old, and I’ve been in this business basically since 1980. I’ve never stopped trying to evolve. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten complacent. I’m really hungry. I’m really curious. I was doing radio in the early ’80s, when very few sportswriters in America were doing radio. I was way ahead of the curve on that. When the Internet became a factor, I started hosting a forum. This was maybe 15 years ago, maybe more. I had sportswriters around the country saying, “What the hell are you doing this for?” I said, “I’m investing in my future, because this is where we’re headed.” I say this with great pride, I think I was the first mainstream sports columnist in America to host an online forum. You got to adapt or you are going to fade or die. I really believe that. So for me, the next step for my career, even at age 56, was to put the old model aside and leave to go with what I consider to be the new model, which is multiple platforms, something for everyone, take advantage of technology.
Does changing career paths at age 56, after 26 years as a newspaper columnist, represent a risk?
I’m not an idiot. If I thought there was a distinct possibility or any possibility of failure, I would have never made this jump. To me, the risk is staying put. The risk is being afraid to try to reinvent yourself. I’m sitting at a desk all day, and I’m writing these pieces for STLToday. You’re just kind of in a rut. I enjoyed my work, but you’re just kind of bogged down with writing, writing, writing, writing, writing. After a while, I was wondering how many brain cells I was killing. It wasn’t a matter of getting complacent, because I will never be complacent. It was a matter of maybe wanting to challenge myself. I have had people say, “You could have worked there until you died.” That’s probably true. But am I really at a point in life and in my career where my goal is to run out the clock? No.
It also probably feels nice to have a company come to you and show that they value what you do.
This will sound self-serving, too, and I apologize, but frankly, I think they were intelligent enough to realize that I was a smart investment. They realized, we are going to have to pay this guy a lot of money, but he’s going to do this. He’s going to help grow the audience on the digital side. We’re going to have a local morning drive show, which we’ve never had. That’s new revenue. It just tells me they’re sharp in terms of recognizing the business opportunity. I’m just thrilled. To do this at 56, it’s just amazing. In terms of just optimism, and an extra infusion of energy and just having your creative juices recharged a little bit, it’s just gotten me really, really fired up.
How much did the slow death of newspapers play into this decision? Were you leaving a sinking ship?
My purpose is not at all the disparage the Post-Dispatch. I was very grateful for the vehicle they gave me. They gave me a chance. I’m eternally grateful. But we can’t sit here and pretend that there aren’t problems in the newspaper industry or that there aren’t problems with Lee Enterprises. The financial challenges are pretty extreme. There have been layoffs and more layoffs and more cutbacks. I mean what’s happening with the Post-Dispatch is happening everywhere. All newspapers have cut staff and the newsrooms are down to about as low as you can go. The people who are there who are excellent reporters want to do a great job. But they now have much more work put on their shoulders, and then there is another round of layoffs, and there is even more work put on their shoulders. It’s just really hard to not only maintain your physical and mental stamina to do the job, but also just to keep your morale up. It’s just becoming increasingly difficult. It’s just really sad actually.
You’ve really embraced advanced baseball statistics, writing a lot of technical analysis, especially online. How did that go over with readers?
For too long, I was just like just every mainstream baseball writer in the country. Certain things have been drilled into your head about what’s important in baseball: wins, losses, batting average. You just don’t know any better. I’m always just really curious and really hungry to try to find a better way. It’s like, wait a minute, this stuff actually makes a lot of sense. It was hard to hit, especially in St. Louis, a really traditional baseball town that’s rooted in such wonderful nostalgia and just this historically iconic franchise. It was annoying to a lot of people. But I tell you what, as time went on, as I was writing more and more of these pieces, and I started doing more and more and more and more, I think it started to turn. I think more and more people found it interesting. I feel like I know so much more about baseball now in terms of really understanding value and performance.
Will you still be writing just as much?
Yes, absolutely, but I am going to modify my approach. I feel I can do a much better job in terms of attracting an audience and also providing more content by having more discipline. Some of those pieces are hard to get through. The pieces were so lengthy that even people who like me and respect me I think sometimes probably found it like, “Come on, man.” I just think I need to write pieces that are shorter and more frequent. I’m going to try to do shorter pieces because that’s where we’re headed. Let’s face it, it is kind of a short attention span culture.
What can people expect from the show?
We hired Dave Cline as the producer. He’s got a good sensibility, like a little pop culture, a little entertainment, self-deprecating humor. I’ve told him that I really want him to be a listener’s advocate. Challenge me a little bit, make me explain myself. He’s got a good sense of humor, because I think the show has got to be fun. You are going to have a show of substance. I like issues and I like really sinking my teeth into that. I like analyzing baseball and everything else. But because it’s morning drive, I think the demands of the show are different, the nature of the show is different. There is a need to be more fast paced and also mix in a little bit of entertainment, a little bit of pop culture. I think a morning drive show, you have to have a little bit more variety, without missing what your mission is, which is to talk sports.
Will getting up earlier be a big adjustment?
Yeah, it’s going to be a challenge and an adjustment. What I did, this past Monday, I set the alarm for 4:15 a.m. and I did it every day this week, because I have to change my body clock. Let me tell you something, I was a zombie the first two or three days, but then I started to feel much better later in the week. I will be fine. I love the idea of starting your day of work earlier and then having your work day end earlier. As my wife joked, we can do some day drinking now.
Anything you want to add?
If you could emphasize that I’m as committed to writing as ever and I’m going to be delivering a ton of written content. It’s really important to me. I don’t want people to think I’ve walked away from writing. I’ll never do that.
