How Does Dave Portnoy Keep Winning?
Dave Portnoy is on a winning streak that defies all logic. It spans many years and continents, has made him rich beyond his wildest dreams, and keeps him locked in place as arguably the king of sports (and now apparently finance) social media.
Late Monday afternoon, word emerged that Peter Nelson would be departing HBO. Allegedly he was leaving by his own volition, but it likely had at least something to do with his growing irrelevance in his old post.
It is hard to be the President of HBO Sports and command much authority when your company has spent the last year severing any and all ties with most sports content.
Either way, his departure was met with glee and laughter by Portnoy.
Casual beach day #RIPSuitman pic.twitter.com/8RFy8rocAu
— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) August 11, 2020
The two men had gotten mixed up in a messy beef over the Call Her Daddy podcast. Essentially, Nelson was said to have been advising his then-girlfriend Sofia Franklyn to leave Barstool Sports and take her podcast with Alex Cooper to a different network.
It ultimately did not work out, and Franklyn ended up losing both the podcast and her cushy gig at Barstool.
She has not been heard from since.
From that point on, Portnoy labeled Nelson a sworn enemy.
When Nelson fell from grace this week, Portnoy was there to celebrate.
Don’t say I didn’t try to warn him #suitman pic.twitter.com/JnnT8aOMbK
— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) August 10, 2020
Nelson is not the only Portnoy enemy to fall, though. The Barstool boss has watched and celebrated as other foes have similarly crumbled. Former ESPN president John Skipper and the entirety of old Deadspin come to mind.
Beyond that, Portnoy’s winning streak isn’t just about him persevering over his claimed grudges.
The 43-year-old genuinely seems beyond reproach when it comes to absolutely everything.
In a decade when sports media has been filled with firings and bankruptcies, he has somehow established an empire that puts his net worth at somewhere between $100 and $200 million.
When sports got cancelled and nobody had anything to talk about besides COVID-19, he somehow successfully invaded the financial world and became the voice of an army of young, know-nothing day traders.
Portnoy was recently embroiled in a controversy where he was literally caught on camera saying the n-word (to be fair, he was reciting song lyrics), and somehow two other people ended up stepping down for it.
Portnoy has a running joke about everything coming up pageviews (a reference to his old nickname as Davey Pageviews), but it genuinely feels like the universe wants to see him win. It’s insane. He has everything going for him except his height. His success is somehow inspiring, scary and confusing all at the same time.
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A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
