BBCollective

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where today we present the second episode of this special double-drop week, centered around the life and impact of late American-Canadian middleweight contender, Rubin “Hurricane” Carter. The theme for this season is criminal justice and sports, and as Carter’s boxing career was cut short by a 20-year imprisonment following a wrongful conviction for mur...

Do not adjust your calendars, yes it is Monday and yes, we are the Bill Bradley Collective kicking off your work week with a special Monday drop. Following a busy and tumultuous week across the sporting world, your hosts had takes we couldn’t fit into Tuesday’s season profile so we went ahead and recorded a bonus installment for you, our faithful listener. Tune in as the panel examines the expecte...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week the Games of the XXXII Olympiad, more commonly referred to as the 2020 (2021?) Summer Olympics are underway, and your hosts are here to break down many of the major themes enveloping the events through a political and social lens. Ed frames the conversation around a terrific piece written on these games that asks a number of questions: w...

This week on the Bill Bradley Collective, your hosts venture into some familiar waters. You’ve heard us draft our favorite sports movies, draft our respective choices for the worst people in sports and in politics, respectively. But this week, we try our collective hand at amending sports drafts, namely the NBA and NFL’s, with a concerted concentration on labor rights and economic feasibility. But...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where with the Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo somehow set to commence, we examine the suspension of American track and field sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson following a positive test for marijuana. Richardson recorded the fastest time at the U.S. Olympic trials in the 100-meter, just months after recording the sixth-fastest 100-time in women’s history, qua...

This week the Bill Bradley Collective ushers in season five on location before a live audience of friends, family and listeners at New London’s own Draft Choice. The topic of conversation centers around the many lives of O.J. Simpson. One of the great collegiate and professional football players in modern history, Simpson’s second act saw him stay immersed in the public limelight as a network comm...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week we close the curtain on season four and revisit our selections from January 2nd of the worst people across politics. It would not be a proper Collective draft without a little competition, so the format is as follows. 18 politicos were drafted in total, representing three six-member teams. Each host defends their pick in the order they w...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where it is Father’s Day weekend and we are here to commemorate it with a deep dive into paternalism at work across the spectrums of both sports and politics. We lead with a mini-draft of sorts, as each of your hosts highlight a series of father/son pairs in seeking to find the most athletically accomplished duo of them all. The positive and negative im...

Welcome back...to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week you are cordially invited to the second installment of what we call Rantapalooza. That’s right, three fists to the face of sports and politics in our rawest form: the rants that typically set the table for a singular conversation on a broader topic are the chef d’oeuvre on this Saturday where our individual grievances and musings are t...

Welcome once again to the Bill Bradley Collective, where the topic de la semaine concerns the rights of athletes, specifically their rights as laborers, performers and/or contractors and how they are acknowledged and treated as such across sports by different leagues and institutions. Among the angles explored include the franchise/athlete dynamic in today’s NBA era of player empowerment; the raci...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week we dive into the deep-end of The Resistance. Formally adopted as liberal opposition to the Trump presidency, the #resistance movement grew to include many who have otherwise exclusively served GOP and conservative interests. Their credibility and bonafides in taking up the anti-Trump fight are examined, as is how an anti-Biden resistance...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, “Yes Jim Mora, we are talking about THE playoffs.” your hosts preview the now-underway NBA and Stanley Cup Playoffs. The matchups to watch, the narratives to monitor, and the picks to advance and eventually hoist the both the Cup and Larry O’Brien trophy in the next twelve weeks outline a conversation that also shines special light on two of the Collect...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts grant super-producer Brandon’s request for the weekend off following his FUCKING COLLEGE GRADUATION(!!!) with another pre-recorded Dollop-inspired bonus presentation. That’s right, tune in as Andrew tells the story of the 1994 NBA Western Conference first-round playoff tilt between the Seattle SuperSonics (Brandon’s childhood...

Coming to you via remote from the back patio of New London’s own The Social Bar and Kitchen, we welcome you back to the Bill Bradley Collective. In the outdoor company of friends, listeners and a wonderful stewardess, this week your hosts empty out our mailbag full of questions and return correspondence with some of our most ardent listeners. The questions are great and they span the breadth of th...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where we present yet another bonus Monday installment as something of an appetizer for what’s to come in tomorrow’s regularly scheduled release. Listen in for a Collective Q&A, as some of our wonderful friends who joined us live on the patio of New London’s own The Social Bar & Kitchen probe your hosts with a serious of thoughtful queries. The p...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts are three imaginary fists in the face of the politics of boxing. The Paul brothers, faded MMA stars and the forthcoming business of a former pound-for-pound king are not the focus of this boxing conversation, but rather why it is we are not at the very least previewing a potential super-fight in the real world of the sweet sci...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where here you can sink your teeth into an abbreviated, perhaps bonus “episode,” as your hosts tackle all things 2021 NFL Draft-related. The Collective enters a busy week where tomorrow you’ll hear three fists in the face of boxing punditry regarding everything boxing; past, present, future. And then Saturday we are on location at New London’s own The S...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts appraise the landscapes of both the fantasy sports and sports gambling industries in the U.S., and the ever-closing intersectionality between the two. No this is not a never-ending fable of bad beats and variance-induced injustices perpetrated at the expense of the members of this panel, but rather a discussion about the effec...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts present the Grovers, a dual celebration and desecration of the best and worst respectively; in the actions of athletes, power brokers and political figures over the last calendar year. Broadly modeled off the soon forthcoming 93rd Academy Awards intended to award excellence in film in a year where there was minimal excellence...

This week on the Bill Bradley Collective, women are rightly at the forefront, as your hosts present something akin to a “state of the union” on the condition of the top women’s sports in the U.S. and abroad. Three unique situations: the 21st century achievement of women in professional tennis finally garnering equality in prize and sponsorship compensation, the present fight of top female American...

This week on the Bill Bradley Collective, your hosts tackle the just-commenced NCAA v. Shawne Alston Supreme Court case, following the opening oral arguments of this past week. The history and (false) precedents upon which the NCAA argues to maintain in previous cases in their belief in denying their “amateur” labor force commensurate compensation set the table. Their lone prior appearance before...

This week the Bill Bradley Collective presents another installment of our in-season Dollop-inspired features, as Zak documents the life and times of Ryan Sutter. Coming to you from the intersection of sports and pop culture, Sutter’s NFL career is here and gone in a mere five second kick return, but it is his second life five years later as the winner of The Bachelorette’s very first season (and t...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts reflect on both a full year in the COVID-19 pandemic and the completion of our first year as a podcast. The conversation  focuses on the effect COVID has had on how we consume, critique and appreciate sports, and how this unprecedented year has shaped our consideration of this country’s politics and government. One o...

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts examine the complicated history of Boston sports and race. The focus centers on the Red Sox and Celtics franchises, but not before acknowledging one team’s ethos of “white slot receiver/failed white college quarterback” need not even apply. From Tom Yawkey’s steadfast refusal to employ top black ballplayers to an oft-described...

Wellcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week your hosts put a proverbial bow on the 2020-21 college basketball regular season and preview the madness to come later this March. As it has everything in it’s wake, the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged the season and the tournament itself is set to be presented entirely from the state of Indiana, with hopes that a confined geographic venue wi...