Reign Of Error Podcast: Is James Dolan The Worst Sports Team Owner Ever?

 In the contest for the worst sports team owner ever, the race is like the Kentucky Derby. There are too many horses chasing only one coveted spot. The Washington football team boasts two in this rogue's gallery, with uber-racist George Preston Marshall and the slimy, creepy Dan Snyder. Marshall kept blacks out of the league for more than 20 years and then only added a Black player to his roster, Bobby Mitchell, when the NFL Commissioner threatened to take over his team.

Snyder is that rotten eggs smelling owner who combines toxicity with thievery and misogyny with arrogance. LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling was banned from the NBA for life because of his racist, hateful rants. Frank McCourt managed to degrade the brand of one of baseball's most prestigious teams, The Los Angeles Dodgers. McCourt bled the team's finances dry to pay for his messy divorce,  and the stadium became an eyesore that fans avoided like booster shots.

 If you enjoy listening to a narrative unfold about an entitled rich guy who had everything but acted like he deserved more, listen to Reign Of Error. Produced and distributed by Wondery, an Amazon company, Reign Of Error was created by Smartless Media, a podcast company started by actors Will Arnett, Jason Bateman, and Sean Hayes, who signed a podcast development deal with Amazon in 2021.

James Dolan was born into immense privilege. He could have done anything with his life. But he chose the family business — a cable television empire that came to include ownership of the New York Knicks, one of the most beloved franchises on earth. What happened from there is a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions. Dolan didn't just lead the Knicks to disaster (and the worst record in the NBA in the 21st Century); he also built a laboratory of shame, dysfunction, and, well, unintentional hilarity. 

Host David Greene is your concierge as he unpacks this trainwreck, over five riveting episodes, while chasing the answer to one elusive question: Why the hell won't James Dolan just sell the team?

If you don't know James Dolan, then believe me when I state that he is thick-headed and thin-skinned. Over his 20+ year tenure as owner of the NBA's Knicks and Madison Square Garden, Dolan has started a war and maintained trench warfare with the press. In 2017, Dolan had Knicks former great Charles Oakley escorted out of the Garden and arrested. After an avalanche of bad press and an Oakley lawsuit, the former Knick was finally allowed back into the Garden. 

Score: Oakley 1. Dolan 0.

In the last few years, Dolan has been banning and ejecting people who are related to law firms and other organizations involved in lawsuits or matters against him. 

Dolan once banned a fan for loudly urging him to sell the team. His security detail had used facial recognition to refuse admission to anyone who has -- in his warped mind -- become an enemy. That includes lawyers from a large firm suing Dolan, even though the lawyers ejected had no involvement in the case.

Score. Fans 1. Dolan 0.

Hiring David Greene as the host of this express train to deranged entitlement takes a steady hand. Too caustic and demeaning, and the host comes off as mean-spirited toward the subject, James Dolan. Too soft, and Dolan appears to get a free pass for exquisite pettiness and bullying behavior.

David Greene is a true pro. He handles the Dolan story with a perfect dosage of humor, snark, and natural curiosity about what powers the ego of James Dolan.

Greene's career can give anyone resume envy. In 2005, Greene joined NPR and continued to cover the Bush White House. From 2010-12, he was a foreign correspondent for NPR based in Moscow, and in 2012 joined Morning Edition. His reporting from Moscow, including a return in 2013 to travel the Trans-Siberian Railway, led to his first book, Midnight in Siberia, in 2014.

In 2011, Greene received the Daniel Schorr Journalism Prize for his work in Tripoli during the Arab Spring. Greene announced his retirement from NPR in October 2020, with his last Morning Edition broadcast being on December 29, 2020.

Greene is now the host of KCRW's Left Right & Center (LRC), a well-established politics podcast that is appropriately billed as "The civilized yet provocative antidote to the self-contained opinion bubbles that dominate political debate."

Greene, as the host, has the most difficult role, playing the political center, and acting as the voice of reason and moderation. 

I highly recommend Reign Of Error for several reasons. First, the tale about James Dolan is a cautionary story about the serious consequences of an America where economic inequality gives birth to entitled man-boys like James Dolan, Jeffrey Epstein, Elon Musk, et al. Second, Greene excels as the host, hitting his three-point jump shot of conclusions and insights at a higher rate than Steph Curry. 

Finally, the five-part podcast series leads listeners down this dark road of dysfunction until you say, "There's no way James Dolan could do something more egregious than this." 

And then he does.