Who Had the Worst Week?

  • Big agency Burson just reported that its 2025 earnings fell 6% year over year.
  • Fox31 parent company Nexstar is cutting journalists in newsrooms across the country to reduce costs in advance of its expected acquisition of 9News parent company Tegna. The math is curious: more stations, and fewer people to staff them.
  • AI company Anthropic has found itself at an impasse with the Pentagon over a philosophical line it won’t cross: Claude cannot be used for fully autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance. The Pentagon assures Anthropic it has never considered such applications. I’m guessing Anthropic asked Claude if the Pentagon can be trusted, and, well, you can guess the answer.
  • Colorado‘s own U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert temporarily derailed the deposition of former U.S. Senator and First Lady Hillary Clinton by secretly photographing Clinton and sharing it with a conservative podcaster – a violation of the agreed-upon ground rules for the Jeffrey Epstein-related proceedings. Democrats objected to the breach of protocol; Republicans lamented that the photo became the story. Asked why she did it, Boebert offered a two-word philosophy: “Why not.”
  • If the BAFTA awards were looking for attention after being routinely overshadowed by numerous other film awards, they certainly picked a curious strategy. Tourette Syndrome advocate John Davidson, the inspiration for the BAFTA-nominated movie “I Swear,” was invited to the ceremony, and his condition caused him to shout, among other things, the N-word at presenters Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo. The host of the awards show offered two statements – one thanking the crowd for its “understanding” of Davidson’s disability and a second generically apologizing if “anyone was offended.” It took another two days for BAFTA to realize that it probably should extend an apology specifically to Jordan and Lindo, and for putting presenters and audience members in that position to begin with.
  • NBC‘s Savannah Guthrie and her family increased the reward for information about her kidnapped 84-year-old mother to $1 million. Nancy Guthrie, 84, has now been missing for four weeks.
  • Juan Padro, the co-founder of Culinary Creative Group that runs Denver-area restaurants such as Tap & BurgerKumoya, Señor Bear, A5 Steakhouse and Bar Dough, is stepping down amid a lawsuit accusing the group of “keeping employee tips under the guise of a ‘service charge’ and paying a manager with the money.”
  • University of Virginia QB Chandler Morris has filed a lawsuit against the NCAA demanding he be allowed to return for a seventh college season. One of his arguments: He was injured early in the 2022 season, but returned to play three games at the end of that season. He says those three games weren’t normal games but rather “three appearances (that) were part of a medically prescribed mental health treatment plan” and therefore shouldn’t counted as using up a year of his eligibility.
  • Microsoft founder and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates apologized to Gates Foundation staff members for his affairs and ties to Jeffrey Epstein that have cast a cloud over the foundation and its work.
  • Meanwhile, CBS News contributor Peter Attia has resigned after the extent of his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was disclosed in files released by the DOJ.
  • What started as a feel-good, unifying moment – the U.S. Men’s Hockey Team winning the gold medal for the first time since the 1980 Miracle on Icequickly turned partisan when FBI Director Kash Patel celebrated in the locker room like he won a medal and President Donald Trump took a swipe at the gold-medal-winning U.S. Women’s Hockey Team during a congratulatory post-game call.
  • The Westernaires, the Golden-based youth horseback-riding organization, will no longer perform “cowboys-and-Indians tropes — including a reenactment of the 1876 Battle of Little Bighorn and white children dressed in Native-inspired regalia performing sacred Indigenous dances.” That decision wasn’t made willingly, though. A threat from the National Western Stock Show to ban them forced their hands.
  • Italian golfer Andrea Pavan was hospitalized after suffering serious injuries when he fell down an elevator shaft. Pavan “called for the elevator but failed to notice, when the doors opened, that there was no elevator car waiting to collect him.”
  • The Colorado Rockies are Rockie-ing again. They traded for pitcher Pierson Ohl in the offseason, and a week into spring training announced he would need to undergo Tommy John surgery that will cause him to miss the entire upcoming season. Rockies Fever! Catch It!
  • The Met Gala could use some public relations help after it announced that Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos will serve as honorary chairs for the 2026 event. Jeff Bezos has most recently been in the new for gutting The Washington Post with extensive layoffs, and even causing some foreign correspondents to find themselves out of work and stranded in war zones.

Who won the week?

  • The Denver Press Club has reached the half-way point in its 2026 membership drive. You can join here.
  • Good news for local bars and brewpubs: drinking at bars is on the rise even as alcohol consumption is on the decline.
  • Former Colorado state Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis avoided jail time after being convicted of four felony charges of forgery and attempting to influence a public servant. She was sentenced to two years of probation and 150 hours of community service.
  • Warner Bros. Discovery may have jilted Netflix to accept a better acquisition offer from Paramount, but it did receive a $2.8 billion break-up fee in the process.

Who Had the Worst Week?

  • Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor – formerly Prince Andrew – appears to be getting his reckoning, albeit Al Capone-style. Caught up deeply in the Jeffrey Epstein human trafficking and rape scandal, British authorities have finally arrested Mountbatten-Windsor … for sharing confidential trade paperwork with Epstein.
  • If you have a lunch scheduled with your prospect at Palantir next week, you might want to reconfirm it. The company slinked out of town this week like they were the Baltimore Colts.
  • Colorado is the modern-day equivalent of the Wild West. You want drugs? We were the first state in the country to legalize recreational marijuana. Psychedelic mushrooms, you say? Legalized those, too. Gambling? Feel free to head to Black Hawk or Central City. Guns? We’re an open carry state – no permit needed unless you are one of those dandies who wants to conceal it. So what’s left? Why, prostitution, of course. Fear not – the Colorado legislature is on it.
  • It is not uncommon for accidents to occur in rural areas of I-25 and I-70 during blowing snow whiteouts in the winter. But brownouts? Extraordinarily dry conditions, dirt-covered fields and high winds combined to cause a February brownout south of Pueblo that resulted in a 30-car pileup. Five people were killed and nearly 30 more were injured.
  • Washington, D.C., is at risk of becoming a cesspool. Literally.
  • Anderson Cooper is the latest journalist to leave “60 Minutes” following Bari Weiss‘ appointment as editor in chief of CBS News. Pretty soon, there will only be enough journalists on staff to create “30 Minutes.”
  • Eight people died in an avalanche in the Lake Tahoe backcountry. Six of the eight were mothers who bonded over their love of the outdoors and two were sisters.
  • Actor Eric Dane, best known for roles in “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Euphoria,” passed away at the age of 53. He had been diagnosed with ALS a year ago.
  • The high price of cocoa has caused Reese’s to shift from milk chocolate to a chocolate-flavored coating that can’t legally be referred to as milk chocolate. Reese’s is now the Cheez Whiz of chocolate.
  • A pickleball dispute over the legality of a winning shot escalated into an argument, then a fistfight, then a 20-person brawl and finally felony charges. Yes, the incident took place in Florida.
  • A Wisconsin man who may have just earned honorary Florida citizenship faces multiple charges after he allegedly stole an ambulance that had a patient inside and then led police on a high-speed chase.
  • A judge ruled in favor of Buffalo Wild Wings in a $10 million lawsuit that accused the restaurant of fraud because the boneless chicken wings it serves don’t actually come from the wings of chickens.

Who won the week?

  • Colorado ski resorts are celebrating the massive snow storm that delivered as much as 44 inches over the past week.
  • Mumford & Sons announced it will perform a June show at Folsom Field in Boulder.
  • Mikaela Shiffrin is unquestionably the greatest ski racer in the world, but she hasn’t always shown that in the Olympics. This week, she broke an eight-year Olympic medal drought with gold in the slalom event.
  • Every Olympics has its breakout stars: snowboarder Shaun White in 2006, swimmer Michael Phelps and sprinter Usain Bolt in 2008, swimmer Katie Ledecky in 2012, gymnast Simone Biles in 2016 and snowboarder Chloe Kim in 2022, for example. So who is the breakout star of the 2026 Winter Olympics? The drones.

Who Had the Worst Week?

  • The Denver television news landscape continues to be a dumpster fire:
    • There was a bloodbath among the senior ranks at Denver7 (ABC) this week. GM Brian Joyce shared with employees that Senior Director of News Megan McRae, Assistant News Director Olivia Dickenson and Digital Director Landon Haaf have all left the station effective immediately.
    • And the uncertainty at Denver7 isn’t just in the newsroom. The station is owned by E.W. Scripps Company, which continues to be aggressively pursued by right-wing news holding group Sinclair.
    • Meanwhile, President Donald Trump reversed his position and has now endorsed Nexstar‘s proposed takeover of Tegna, a deal which would have the owner of Fox31/CW2 absorb 9News, potentially dismantling the highest-functioning television newsroom in the state.
  • Speaking of President Donald Trump, his ongoing war against the media is working. A Pew Research Center survey finds that a majority of Americans – 57% – lack confidence that journalists act in “the best interests of the public.” That confidence level split significantly along party lines, with just 25% of Republicans expressing confidence in journalists while 61% of Democrats saying they had confidence.
  • Omnicom is consolidating PR agencies Porter Novelli with FleishmanHillard and Ketchum with Golin following the completion of its merger with IPG. It is the latest big-agency restructuring and it underscores the economic pressures larger agencies are under with more-demanding clients and AI disruption.
    • PRWeek, which broke the story, noted, “…This is a new era for marketing services holding companies where tough decisions have to be made, and we have already seen the death of similarly famous brand names in the creative and media agency sectors, both after the Omnicom acquisition of IPG and at competitor holdcos such as WPP. Nothing is sacred anymore.”
  • The co-owner of the storied Manchester United soccer team is apologizing for his statement that the UK has been “colonized by immigrants.” On the one hand, who would know more about colonizing than an Englander? On the other, that’s probably not a statement you want to make when more than two-thirds of your players are foreign-born.
  • Tennis players can be quick to complain about a lot of things – line calls, distracting fans, matches that end too late. But Daniil Medvedev dropped an entirely new one this week: the Head Tour XT tennis balls used in a tournament in Rotterdam are “not round. Medvedev added, “I think maybe we should consider not playing with Head (tennis) balls,” which no doubt sent the company’s public relations team into full crisis mode.
  • A few Winter Olympics updates:
    • U.S. Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn‘s comeback tour after rupturing her ACL in her final tune-up race before the Winter Olympics came to a disastrous end. A horrific crash in the Women’s Downhill resulted in what doctors described as a “complex tibia fracture” – a term often used to describe when the shin bone shatters. She has had three surgeries since the accident to repair her leg, and doctors caution that her recovery will take at least another six months.
    • The U.S.O.C. disqualified Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych after he refused to stop wearing a helmet that includes photos of Ukrainian athletes and coaches who have died defending Ukraine from Russian forces.
    • The Olympic medals from Milano Cortina keep breaking.
    • Norwegian biathlete Sturla Holm Laegreid used a perfunctory media interview that came with his bronze medal win as an opportunity to reveal that he had been unfaithful to his former girlfriend in an attempt to win her back. Not surprisingly, that move did not go over well with the ex-girlfriend.
  • The HGTV show “Rehab Addict” has been cancelled after leaked footage showed host Nicole Curtis using the N-word on-camera.
  • The Ontario Hockey League has apologized for sending an email to season-ticket holders asking them to “be mindful of personal cleanliness while sharing our space with fellow fans. Before backtracking and apologizing, a team representative elaborated on the reason for the email, saying, “I got a lot of people complaining about the (person) next to them smelling like cat pee, bad breath, this, that and everything else.”
  • James Van Der Beek, the actor who co-starred with Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams and Joshua Jackson in the late 1990s/early 2000s teen drama “Dawson’s Creek” has died from complications of colorectal cancer. He was 48. And Brad Arnold, the lead singer of 3 Doors Down, died from kidney cancer. He was 47.

Who won the week?

Who Had the Worst Week?

  • Jeff Bezos took The Washington Post motto “Democracy Dies in Darkness” as an instruction rather than a caution this week when he laid off one-third of the paper – 300 employees. Bezos, who apropos of nothing is worth $249 billion, indicated the layoffs were part of a growth strategy (he may have been holding the revenue projections chart upside down). The layoffs at The Post overshadowed the Atlanta Journal-Constitution‘s announcement that it was laying off 50 employees, or about 15% of its workforce.
  • Many recognizable names were included in the latest round of Jeffrey Epstein documents that the U.S. Department of Justice released. Among them: President Donald Trump, former President Bill Clinton, Tesla/X/SpaceX entrepreneur Elon Musk, Virgin founder Richard Branson, former British Prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, New York Giants co-owner Steven Tisch, former Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak, former Secretary of the Treasury and former president of Harvard University Larry Summers, current U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Google co-founder Sergey Brin and former Trump advisor Steve Bannon.
    • There was also one notable local name: Boulder restaurateur Kimbal Musk, who is Elon Musk‘s younger brother. His name was mentioned in the new files more than 100 times.
  • After attempting to shoe-horn his name onto the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and finding that few big names were then willing to perform there, President Donald Trump announced that the center would shut down for two years for extensive renovations. President Trump claimed it would be a renovation rather than a demolition, but anyone who followed his East Wing “renovation” project won’t believe it for a second.
  • How unexpected was a New England PatriotsSeattle Seahawks Super Bowl this year? Fanatics, the manufacturer of official NFL jerseys, can’t keep up with demand because it didn’t bother to make extras for those teams in case they made the Super Bowl.
  • Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie, remains missing and feared kidnapped. Adding to the family’s nightmare, they received competing ransom notes demanding Bitcoin payments, one of which resulted in the arrest of an opportunist who was not involved in any kidnapping. Savannah was scheduled to host the NBC Winter Olympics opening ceremonies later today, but has taken leave to be in Arizona near her mother’s home. Mary Carillo will replace her.
  • You will never guess what drives many youth coaches to quit. Okay, you will. The answer is abusive parents.
  • The beer at Wonderland Brewing Co. in Broomfield is quite strong, and I know that because the owner must have been consuming a lot of it this week when in the span of a few hours, he 1) made a Vanilla Ice “Ice, Ice Baby” joke on Facebook about competitors who closed to support the ICE protests, 2) deleted that post, 3) replaced it with a heartfelt apology for his first post he described as “insensitive and ignorant,” 4) then deleted that apology post, and finally 5) posted a lengthy rant saying he wasn’t sorry and blaming “Broomfield moms” for the controversy.
  • “The 2026 Edelman Trust Barometer reveals grievance has devolved into insularity. Seven in 10 respondents report unwillingness or hesitance to trust someone with different values, approaches to social issues, backgrounds or information sources.”
  • What has two wheels, handlebars and a pretty decent chance of landing you in the hospital? According to the latest Denver data, it’s an electric scooter. Last year, 15 people in Denver died while riding standing e-scooters, and another 1,800 were admitted to Denver Health after accidents.
  • Last week, I reported that former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick – the owner of eight Super Bowl rings as a head coach and assistant coach – inexplicably was not selected the the Pro Football Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. This week, we learned that New England Patriots owner Bob Kraft, who has won six Super Bowls so far, also was not selected in his first year. If I am Tom Brady, I might be getting nervous for my first year of eligibility in 2028.
  • The diminutive singer ironically named Ariana Grande summed up the Vogue Japan cover photo that featured her with six fingers by saying, “Holy s–t.” It may be time for Vogue Japan to find a new AI tool.
  • A Zamboni driver in Fort Collins died when he hit his head on a partially open overhead door while driving the machine. It is Colorado‘s worst sports-related accidental death since a hammer thrown by a high school track-and-field competitor cleared the protective barrier and flew into the crowd at a meet at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs last year, killing one.
  • What do you do when a couple of dine-and-dashers take you for a little more than $100? Two Fraser restaurant employees chased them across town, threatened them with a gun and put one of them in a chokehold. Police who responded to the fight ended up giving the dine-and-dashers a ticket and then arrested the two restaurant employees for felony menacing and misdemeanor assault. No word on whether they’ll get their $100.
  • Normally, having your boxing opponent literally knock the toupee off your head would be a sign that the fight is not going well, but boxer Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller somehow lost his hairpiece and won the fight.

Who won the week?