J.J. Redick has quickly climbed the ladder in the sports media world, as he now occupies a seat on ESPN’s lead NBA commentary team with Mike Breen and Doris Burke, and his podcast, The Old Man and the Three, is incredibly popular and regularly lands some of the biggest names in the NBA as guests.
Redick’s next venture may just be his biggest though, as he’s adding a second weekly podcast to his schedule with a pretty notable co-host: LeBron James. The podcast, called Mind the Game, will be co-produced by LeBron and Redick’s respective production companies and promises focus on the game of basketball and let the two dive into how they think about the game, rather than arguing about GOAT status or topics you’d see on First Take, via Andrew Marchand of The Athletic.
“It’s meant to be a very free-flowing conversation about the sport and about the game,” Redick said in a phone interview. “If you look at it in a very simplistic way, it’s just about basketball.”
“I’m really proud of what we’ve done to innovate in sports media,” James said in a statement to The Athletic. “… When I do a project, the only thing I think about is whether me and my friends would watch it. That is definitely the case with ‘Mind the Game.’ Everything doesn’t need to be designed for internet culture and clicks.”
The first clip he saw of the podcast shows the two breaking down how to defend a pick-the-picker out of bounds play while drinking a glass of wine, and it figures to be that kind of laid back conversation about the finer points of the game, with guests occasionally popping in to offer their thoughts on the tactical side of the game.
.@kingjames and @jj_redick are obsessed with basketball.
Consider their podcast, Mind the Game, a celebration of the sport as they discuss the state of the game, dissect X’s and O’s (like they do here), and wax poetic about the game they love. pic.twitter.com/lDf8ToVlHE
— Mind the Game (@mindthegamepod) March 18, 2024
Redick has long wanted to focus more on that, but has lamented that his efforts in doing so don’t draw the same level of attention as rants about Doc Rivers or debates over player rankings. Now, we’ll see if the appetite for that kind of content increases with LeBron James on board, and it could be a very good thing for giving fans a chance to hear from one of the greatest basketball minds to every play the game.
