By Brandon Simmons
Paul Pierce had a bitter-sweet weekend which might have lead him to an even sweeter gig. The former NBA player was let go from his ESPN analyst job Monday, after displayed footage on his Instagram Live of him partying with strippers over the weekend. But when one stripper pole comes down, another one goes right back up. Tuesday, it was reported by Bro Bible that Cam Soda, an adult webcam site, was offering Pierce a quarter of a million dollars to live stream an NBA show with strippers in the background:
The only downside to this news is that it might not even be taken seriously. The way people receive their sports topics these days is far from the format of suit, tie and yelling at 9 in the morning on basic cable. There are plenty of digital platforms, for visual and audio mediums, that provide content in a myriad of ways. Look at Shannon Sharpe on FS1’s Undisputed with Skip and Shannon. In addition to his sports takes dripped in southern reasoning, he has bolstered his brand with bringing black and milds and Hennessy to his workplace. It’s hard to lie and say those are not career goals. Still, bringing in strippers is sort of along those lines, but obviously a little wilder in content. Aside from the sports perspective, there is a lot of mainstream shine being placed on subscription-based content such as CamSoda, Patreon, OnlyFans and other platforms. With the pandemic closing down jobs in the last year, a lot of people have resorted to these outlets to help bring in money until things became normal. Thus, the awareness strengthened the idea for others – i.e. celebrities and public figures – to expand their brands into these platforms. Pierce is someone who catches a lot of flack for his sports commentary, but so do a lot of analysts. This move could be something help put him in a better light than he has been received in regard to being an analyst since 2017.
And while it does seem cheesy, because it’s capitalizing off one moment that seems insignificant, it could be something that points in the future direction of sports content. Who’s to even say Pierce would be the right host for this potential gig? Is the audience going to be paying attention to the stripper or Pierce throwing more shade on Lebron James? It may eventually be turned into a podcast covering a multitude of topics. There is a lot to be asked about for this, which may not even come to fruition, but the idea is something to not be dismissed like the internet does with most of Pierce’s basketball takes.