Longtime sports journalist and broadcaster Rachel Nichols will join Showtime Basketball as a show host and producer, contributing to multiple platforms, programs and projects, the network said Friday.
“We are delighted to welcome Rachel Nichols to the Showtime Basketball family,” said Brian Daly, senior VP of sports programming and content for Showtime. “Rachel brings unmatched journalistic credibility, great familiarity to our roster and a work ethic that will take us to another level.”
Nichols will contribute to Showtime Basketball’s premium, award-winning storytelling as she supports a group featuring Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, JR Smith and the King of NBA Twitter, Josiah Johnson.
Nichols said, “I have been fortunate enough to live my dream job with some of the best journalists in the business for more than 25 years, and this new development deal with Showtime Sports gives me the widest playing field I have yet. ” “They have asked me to create, produce and host new sports programming across platforms, working with the Hall of Famers, the championship ring with multiple people and an uber-creative team behind the camera. We’re going to have a lot of fun.”
Nichols’ first sit-down interview since his departure from ESPN will air on Friday’s episode of “All the Smoke with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson.” That program will be available at noon on the PT Showtime Basketball YouTube channel.
ESPN said it would remove Nichols from its programming in August 2021. In a leaked 2020 phone conversation, the former ESPN host expressed his disappointment that his former colleague Maria Taylor was chosen over him to host the “NBA Countdown” during the NBA Finals, suggesting that the decision was taken because Because the network was “feeling the pressure” on diversity.
Nichols later apologized to Taylor for her daily schedule, “The Jump”, which was eventually replaced with “NBA Today” with host Malika Andrews. She went on to say that she didn’t want to make up the story herself, but she wanted to address the elephant in the room as well.
“But I don’t want to let this moment go without revealing how much I respect my colleagues at ESPN, how much I respect them,” Nichols said. “How deeply, deeply sorry I am to disappoint those people, especially Maria Taylor, and how grateful I am to be a part of this team.”
The Emmy-award winning journalist is most widely known for his work creating and hosting the daily NBA program “The Jump” on ESPN from 2016 to 2021. She has been covering sports for over 25 years, including several Super Bowls. , World Series, Stanley Cup Finals, Olympic Games and tennis and golf majors. Nichols spent nearly a decade writing for The Washington Post’s award-winning sports section covering the NHL, NBA, MLB, tennis and the Olympics.
Nichols’ upcoming interview will go into detail about his journey in sports media and how he pursues this next chapter in his 25-year career.