Sports reporter and podcaster David Samson returned to his “Nothing Personal” show after a two-week hiatus with a heavy heart.
“I’ve been gone for two weeks as my family has been dealing with a critical situation,” Samson, 57, said in an emotional opening monologue on Monday, September 29. “I have a daughter who is seriously ill, and it came out of nowhere. I have been spending the last two weeks trying to figure out how to do the only thing that matters, which is to take care of her and my other children and my family.”
Samson explained that he hesitated to speak publicly until he felt ready.“I wasn’t ready,’ he admitted.That’s the bottom line,”“I wasn’t ready to talk about it. I wasn’t ready to think about it other than to do what was in front of me, which was to figure out how to deal with something that is unthinkable, unimaginable, can’t be happening. And you open your eyes 24 hours a day, and it happens. It’s in front of you. There’s nothing you can do. There’s no escape from the nightmare of a life changing in the blink of an eye. And that’s what happened.”
The former MLB executive-turned-media personality described the moment the family’s ordeal began.
“It started after our show, our last show, on Friday, September 12,” Samson recalled. “I got a phone call, and it’s the type of phone call that you just don’t think you’re ever going to get and then all of a sudden it happens. There is life before the phone call and life after the phone call, and there is never going back. You cannot go back. You figure out what a new normal can be.”
Samson described the feeling of being overwhelmed by medical terms and fear while clinging to his loved ones.
“You hang on tight to the people you love, to the people you think who love you, to the people who end up loving you,” he said. “And the people who you realize that what we do for work, and it’s the ultimate joke, is that work, to me, always defined me. Always.”
Samson admitted that for decades he believed his identity came from his career, from baseball, business, and media. Now, he sees things differently.
“Turns out it was all just wrong,” Samson mentioned. “Turns out what defines me is trying to protect the people I love more than anything in the world. It doesn’t matter the characters you say, it doesn’t matter the things that you say, joking or not joking, the reality is when you have a child whether I am a good dad or a bad dad is not relevant. Talking about the amount of love and desire for that child to have a life that they want … and then all of a sudden the wrong phone call comes, and it’s done. There is no more control.”
Samson said he hopes to continue producing his show, he warned consistency might be fleeting given the circumstances.
“I don’t know that I’ll be able to do a show every day,” Samson said. “I will promise to continue to let you know what I’m feeling and what I’m thinking, the frustrations that I’m having, the anger, the sadness, the despair, the wonderment, the questioning.”
Samson, who has hosted “Nothing Personal with David Samson” since 2019, closed his remarks by thanking listeners for their loyalty and pledging honesty through his family’s ordeal. Samson was the president of the Miami Marlins from 2002 until 2017.