Dr. Johanna Mellis is an Assistant Professor of History at Ursinus College where her research focuses on international sport during the Cold War, namely in the Eastern Bloc and Hungary especially, in order to connect the local voices and experiences of Hungarian athletes to the IOC and broader international sport society. Her manuscript, Changing the Global Game: Hungarian Athletes and International Sport During the Cold War, examines Hungarian sportspeople’s interactions with the International Olympic Committee from 1948-1989. Changing the Global Game shows how Hungarian athletes, Socialist Hungarian state sport officials, and the IOC gradually realized by the 1960s that sporting cooperation with one another - and not East-West political clashes nor resistance - was the way to achieve their respective aims of sport success, career and financial stability, and political and institutional strength. Our conversation covers many different topics, but we do repeatedly come back to a consistent theme of unlearning our early understandings of world history through sport to form a better, more accurate, and historically inclusive narrative.  You can follow Dr. Mellis's amazing and well curated Twitter feed @JohannaMellis. As I share in the podcast, my eyes have been opened to a multitude of different historical perspectives on sports through Dr. Mellis's Twitter account.  Dr. Mellis also cohosts the End of Sport Podcast, a podcast on capitalist sport, labor, and justice for end times. The show features interviews with athletes, critical sports journalists, and fellow academics to explore all the ways that people use sport to harm others - i.e. through racist mascotry, the NCAA and higher ed’s exploitation of Black and Brown college athletic workers, sexual abuse and harassment, transphobia, and more. You can read Dr. Mellis's writing alongside her End of Sport cohosts in The Chronicle of Higher Ed, The Guardian, Time, The Baffler, and more. She also has sole-authored pieces with The Washington Post and Arizona State University’s Global Sport Matters. As always, thanks for listening! Please share, rate and review Dear Adam Silver wherever you get your podcasts. 

Mikey Yates is a painter currently based in Kansas City, MO and a resident at the Charlotte Street Foundation, where our interview took place. Mikey paints tiny moments that carry a significant weight to him, sometimes also engaging with historical world events. Basketball, his first love, comes up again in different scenes that he depicts and his rich, dynamic palette brings a glow and reverence to each of his paintings. Grateful to have the chance to talk shop with Mikey and unpack how his work, and deep appreciation for basketball, came to be.  You can see and find out about his work here and be sure to follow him on Instagram @mikey_yates.  Please rate and review Dear Adam Silver wherever you get your podcasts! Thanks for listening, as always. 

Blake and Giovanni are on the pod today to discuss pickup basketball and the creative culture around the game. We touch on playing during COVID and post vaccines, including their personal experiences, and the ways they have used basketball and photography as a means to connect with  other likeminded people around the world. Thank you to Blake and Giovanni for coming on the show. Follow them on instagram! Blake is @sacredhoopsbook and Giovanni is @hgnext. And feel free to listen to my earlier conversations with Blake, featured in Episode 44 and Episode 48. Thank you to all you listeners out there! Please subscribe to Dear Adam Silver, and if you already are subscribed, please share, rate and review wherever you find your podcasts. Thank you so much for all of your support.

Noah Cohan and John Early who are on the show to discuss their project Whereas Hoops. Noah Cohan is the Assistant Director of American Culture Studies at Washington University St. Louis and is a previous Dear Adam Silver guest from Episode 22 where he joined the show to discuss his book on fandom entitled We Average Unbeautiful Watchers. John Early is an artist and senior lecturer at the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts at Washington university St. Louis. Their collective project Whereas Hoops was created to draw attention to the lack of basketball courts in Forest Park, which is located in St. Louis and is one of the biggest urban parks in the country.....but with all that space, there are still no basketball courts. Noah and John are working collaboratively to highlight this issue within its' proper historical context and hopefully correct it in the long term.  Follow Whereas Hoops on Twitter and Instagram. Thank you to John and Noah for coming on and thank you to you all for listening! Please subscribe, share, rate and review Dear Adam Silver wherever you get your podcasts.

Episode 79 features a conversation with Julie DiCaro, author of the recently published book Sidelined: Sports, Culture and Being a Woman in America. This book unpacks sexism in sports media for fans and non-fans alike. Julie writes about her time in radio covering sports, to the harassment she has received herself from fans and listeners to her time in the sport for development world. Thank you to Julie for coming on and sharing about all that went into producing this book, including her personal experiences.  You can read more of Julie's work on Deadspin, where she is a writer and editor, and hear more on her podcast The Ladies Room, which she cohosts with Jane McManus. Every week they dive into issues surrounding women and sports. You can follow her on Twitter @JulieDiCaro.  Thank you, as always, to Bookman's Entertainment Exchange for sponsoring this episode. And you can pick up your own copy of Side Lined at Bookman's! 

Long time Dear Adam Silver supporter and returning guest Brian Tran is back on the show to discuss our feelings about the first weekend of the NBA playoffs, including the play in tournament, the long standing question of whether refs and players are coworkers or colleagues, and our recent transition to sworn enemies as the Suns vs. Lakers series begins. Thank you to Brian for joining and indulging all of my emotional/over the top takes. And Happy Playoffs to all Dear Adam Silver listeners! Thank you for your support. 

Glacuo Adorno is back on the pod today (listen to episodes 40, 25 and 3 for more)! Long time listeners will remember that we collaborated in Lithuania on a body of artwork made about women’s basketball pioneer Senda Berenson. We met while we were both in graduate school at Louisiana State university, when I was studying fine art and Glauco was studying art history and he is now a curator based in Rio de Janeiro. He is back on the pod today to read some of the letters that we wrote to Berenson while we were Lithuania, a part of this work which we have not shared before. Thank you to Glauco for coming on and being so willing to discuss this ongoing work and the hardships of the pandemic in Brazil right now.  And thank you to you all for listening! Please share, subscribe, rate and review Dear Adam Silver wherever you get your podcasts.  Please note that we recorded this episode on Zoom and the sound quality is a bit lower than usual. 

I am so excited to share this episode, featuring Claude Johnson, founder of the Black Fives Foundation. The Black Fives Foundation’s mission is to research, preserve, showcase, teach, and honor the pre-NBA history of African Americans in basketball. The Foundation is doing incredible things around education and celebration of this history. I have been following Black Fives for the last couple of years, which is just a drop in the bucket of how long Claude has been doing this work and sharing these stories. The trajectory and development of what is now the Black Fives Foundation is a great reminder of all the good that can be done not just through your job, but through interests and subjects you find compelling that add to our shared discourse and push for change. So thank you, Claude for your work and for joining me today. You can follow the Black Fives Foundation and all the exciting things that are happening on Twitter @blackfives and on Instagram @blackfives.   Thank you all for listening! Please share, subscribe, rate and review Dear Adam Silver. Your support is so appreciated.

Episode 75 (!!!) features Gabe and Jamie, also known as the Menschwarmers, of the Menschwarmers Podcast. In their own words, Gabe and Jamie are Jews. They also love sports. But most of all? They love Jews in sports. Menschwarmers is their biweekly podcast where they gab about goings-on, interview fascinating industry figures and keep you updated on everything related to Jews in sports. I was excited to have the chance to speak with them about Jewish sports stuff and beyond. You can subscribe to the Menschwarmers wherever you get your podcasts and follow them on twitter @menschwarmers. These guys are great and we had fun and I hope you all enjoy listening to this episode! And please share, rate and review Dear Adam Silver. Thank you for your support!

New York Times Best selling author Andrew Maraniss is back on the pod to discuss his newest book, just out on March 2 (!!!!), entitled Singled Out: The True Story of Glenn Burke. The book is about Glenn Burke, the first openly gay MLB Player and the inventor of the high five. This is an incredible and devastating story and couldn’t be more timely, as Democrats in the House of Representatives just passed the Equality Act, which is now on it’s way to the Senate and if passed by both chambers and signed into law by President Biden, would establish anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people. In addition, there are also several states that are currently in the process of trying to pass anti trans legislation in the area of sports. The story of Glenn Burke is ever relevant as we continue to fight for equal treatment for everyone, no matter their gender or sexual identity. Thank you to Andrew for coming on again and thank you to you all for listening. Please share, subscribe, rate and review Dear Adam Silver wherever you find your podcasts.  You can follow Andrew on Twitter and Instagram. And you can buy Singled Out at Bookman's or wherever you shop locally!  Please note that this episode was recorded the same day as our first conversation from Episode 72 about Andrew's book Games of Deception, so we just jump right into the conversation about Singled Out without any of the usual formalities. We were also having some technical issues due to weather which is why it is a bit broken up in some parts of the conversation.