Episode 71 of the Sports Illustrated Media podcast features Terry McDonell, the former editor of the Time Inc. Sports Group and the author of "The Accidental Life: An Editor’s Notes on Writing and Writers".
In this episode, McDonell, who ran Sports Illustrated for 10 years (2002-2012), discusses what it was like to edit Outside, Newsweek, Rolling Stone, Esquire and Us Weekly among other publications; spending time with Hunter Thompson and George Plimpton; the secret to managing editorial egos; being an outsider at Sports Illustrated; how Lance Armstrong repeatedly lied to him during his SI tenure; why surrogates on behalf of Alex Rodriguez called for SI writers to be fired; whether Rick Reilly leaving SI was a mistake for Reilly and why Reilly was angry with him when Reilly left for ESPN; discussing with the SI staff whether the Swimsuit Issue should end, putting Beyonce on the cover of Swimsuit; how magazines can survive in the future, and much more.