Diamonds & Scribes Podcast: Bob Nightengale - Philadelphia Baseball Review
Bob Nightengale has spent most of his career living in the uncomfortable space where baseball information is both everywhere and never truly confirmed until it is.
That’s the tension at the heart of the latest Diamonds & Scribes episode: the difference between “hearing it” and knowing it, and the daily discipline required to do the job at a national level without letting the job do you.
Nightengale, the longtime USA TODAY MLB columnist and insider, explains that national reporting often starts with a built-in advantage: agents want their message to travel. But the same pipeline comes with traps—noise, leverage plays, and manufactured lists of “interested teams.” And because clubs are constrained by labor rules and PR realities, the denials are rarely clean. “A team is not allowed to say they’re not interested in someone,” Nightengale said, describing how the CBA environment can make false links hard to kill publicly.
What separates the good insiders from the loud ones, he argued, is less about access than judgment. “You got to know who to trust, who’s got a track record,” he said. And then you have to do it fast—because the modern news cycle doesn’t reward patience. It rewards typing.
That urgency comes with a personal cost. Nightengale doesn’t romanticize it. The phone is always there—at dinner, in the quiet moments, in the middle of family life. “You can’t be away from your phone for 45 minutes,” he said. “I don’t know a reporter that doesn’t have their phone to their side.”
The conversation also pulls back into the era when time still existed—when Baseball Weekly (now Sports Weekly) aimed to fill a real gap: box scores, yes, but also the luxury of depth. Nightengale remembered the appeal clearly: “You can do quality journalism without just trying to spit something out day after day.” In those years, access meant something different, too—days with Tony Gwynn, Ken Griffey Jr., and the kind of reporting immersion that’s nearly extinct now.
And then there’s the craft lesson that’s aged best—his reminder that great writing isn’t a transcript. He told the story of LA Times legend Jim Murray, who listened, watched, took notes… and still left quotes out of the finished piece. Murray’s advice still sits with him: “If I can’t write better than they can talk, it’s time for me to get out of the business.”
If the episode has a single through-line, it’s respect—earned, protected, and constantly tested. Nightengale says success isn’t just scoops; it’s being the kind of writer people trust enough to open up to, and the kind of reporter prepared enough to deserve it.
His final counsel is as simple as it is ruthless: show up ready. “Be prepared every single day,” he said. Because the moment a player, GM, or agent senses you haven’t done the work, you don’t just lose an interview—you lose credibility.
Listen to the full conversation with Bob Nightengale below:
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