{"id":566788,"date":"2026-03-27T01:33:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T01:33:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/566788\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T01:33:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T01:33:13","slug":"you-cant-do-inside-the-nba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/566788\/","title":{"rendered":"‘You can’t do Inside the NBA’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before becoming the head coach of the University of Wisconsin Green Bay Phoenix, Doug Gottlieb had quite the media career.<\/p>\n

Gottlieb\u2019s assignments ran the gamut. He worked as a college basketball studio analyst, a game analyst, and hosted his own nationally syndicated general sports radio show. At one point or another, Gottlieb has worked for practically every major sports broadcaster in the United States.<\/p>\n

So he\u2019s certainly qualified to present a media critique if he wants from time to time. And when asked what he thought about the studio coverage for this year\u2019s NCAA Men\u2019s Basketball Tournament on CBS and TNT, he didn\u2019t hold back.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re trying to be Inside the NBA, but if you don\u2019t have Ernie, you don\u2019t have Shaq, you can\u2019t do Inside the NBA. You just can\u2019t.\u201d \u2013 Former CBS college basketball analyst, Doug Gottlieb, on CBS\u2019s March Madness studio show. pic.twitter.com\/KiauTRdCrj<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) March 26, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI do think I\u2019m at liberty to comment on it because I worked at CBS, and I was on the studio show,\u201d Gottlieb said on\u00a0Fearless with Jason Whitlock<\/a>. \u201cThe first thing is that, I think you gotta decide who you\u2019re going to be as a studio show. It\u2019s like they\u2019re trying to be\u00a0Inside the NBA. If you don\u2019t have Ernie [Johnson] and you don\u2019t have Shaq, you can\u2019t do\u00a0Inside the NBA. You just can\u2019t. You\u2019re trying to serve too many masters.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is certainly an element of\u00a0Inside the NBA to the March Madness studio production, perhaps because mainstays Charles Barkley and Kenny \u201cThe Jet\u201d Smith are part of the cast. But beyond that dynamic duo, the show has relied on plenty of gimmicks to get by. Oz the Mentalist made his second consecutive appearance, the crew has played its standard guess-the-logos game, one segment saw a bunch of donuts stacked on top of each other to display how exceptionally tall one player was. It\u2019s not exactly a basketball junky\u2019s dream.<\/p>\n

Gottlieb had some opinions on the studio hosts, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought Adam Zucker was really really good. And considering you\u2019re trying to fill Greg Gumbel\u2019s shoes, that\u2019s very difficult to do. I think the idea of Nate Burleson is better than the execution of Nate Burleson. It\u2019s one of those, \u2018Hey, he\u2019s not doing\u00a0CBS Mornings and he\u2019s hosted before.\u2019 But there\u2019s an art to that. The host is an art. And Rece Davis is an artist. Adam Zucker is an artist. Burleson\u2019s just not. He\u2019s just not. He just doesn\u2019t know how to generate the conversation, not make it about himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then, in Whitlockian fashion, Gottlieb made a pivot to the show\u2019s diversity.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe NCAA wants it to be like a pamphlet you get for a school, \u2018Oh hey, we got a black guy, we got a white guy, we got a mixed-race guy, we got a woman, we got everything.\u2019 Like, you can\u2019t do a show that way. Just do the best show possible, and the talent will come out.\u201d<\/p>\n

And in one fell swoop, Gottlieb\u2019s credibility went straight into the toilet, despite making some cogent points about the rest of the show.<\/p>\n

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