7 Interesting Things That Happened With Ian Rapoport

Ian Rapoport

American sportswriter, pundit, and television analyst, Ian Rapoport, was born to be an NFL Insider. But do you know his birthday? He came into this world on January 9, 1980 and wanted to become a lawyer! Some other interesting facts lie down below, so keep scrolling! 

Ian Rapoport: Funny Facts, Career Beginnings, Social Media and More! 

Ian Rapoport’s son burst into the room while he was on live television: 

Ian Rapoport, was on air in 2018 doing a live hit in the immediate aftermath of Dez Bryant’s signing with the Saints when life intervened. 

It was Rapoport’s son, Jude, home sick from school who burst into the home studio just as dad was breaking it all down. But Rapoport, the consummate pro, barely skipped a beat. He just picked him up and continued. 

Guess who he blamed for this mishap? 

The working dad blamed his wife without skipping a beat. 

Ian Rapoport had yet another comically intrusive on-air moment: 

The reporter took a football off the head while doing a review a few years back. Again, note the focus.

Last year, the NFL suspended Ian Rapoport for two weeks because he advertised genital grooming:

The NFL usually suspends players or bosses but last year they suspended their top information gatherer/provider/reciter.

Ian Rapoport issued a statement to PFT explaining that he’ll be off the air until October 22 because “I posted something to my social channels without clearance from NFL Network, which went against its guidelines.”

The statement, tweeted shortly thereafter by Rapoport, created plenty of questions and speculation regarding the contents of the post. The truth is much more innocuous, and it makes the league seem unreasonable for its decision to suspend Rapoport for two weeks, presumably without pay.

According to multiple reports, which PFT has confirmed, Rapoport posted a commercial for Manscaped, a device intended to groom the male groin, on Instagram. Rapoport’s colleague, Jane Slater, then posted it on Twitter. Within a day, the video had disappeared; it quickly became clear that the deletion related to the league’s reaction.

The content of the ad, delivered from Rapoport’s usual in-home broadcast position for NFL Network, contained the usual puns and campy content that makes indirect and direct reference to the purpose of the product. 

Sources say there was an issue with Rapoport doing a deal directly with Manscaped without receiving all appropriate clearances and permissions from the league.

Ian Rapoport is on social media:

Ian Rapoport has an Instagram account that he keeps updated with lots of great new photos. 

Just this one social media account will give you an idea of how popular he is. He has over 290,000 followers on Instagram. For those who like Twitter more, Rapoport tweets it to his more than 1.3 million followers 

It appears that a great many of his fans love his breaking news type pictures and a treasure trove of updates and information. 

Ian Rapoport is following 129 people himself and he does a great job of keeping fans updated. He has made a total of 1000 posts on the site and there are pics of him in his work from home fashion but we don’t think the pandemic made much of a difference to his work as he used to work from home anyway! 

Childhood and Education: 

Rapoport grew up in Westchester County, New York and attended Hackley School in Tarrytown. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Columbia University.

A native of Westchester County, Rapoport was a history major. He planned to go to law school, but enjoyed covering sports for Spectator and by sophomore year, he says, “I knew I wanted to give journalism a try.” 

He decided to give it two years, and if things weren’t working out, it would be on to law school. 

Rapoport worked part time in the sports department of the Journal News, his local newspaper, and, shortly before his self-imposed deadline, landed a full-time job at The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Miss., where he covered Mississippi State football. “When I was interviewed, they kept asking me whether I really would leave New York and move to Mississippi, like they couldn’t believe anyone would do that. But I really wanted to give it a shot,” he says. And while he admits to “a little bit” of culture shock, he notes, “I lived in Starkville, a real college town, for two years and that’s where I met the woman [Leah] who would become my wife. So there was a lot to like in Starkville.” 

Ian Rapoport Career: 

As reported on Pardon My Take (“PMT”), he applied for a job with the Boston Herald on the basis that he would cover Bill Belichick in the same manner he covered Nick Saban. After receiving the job, he served as a Patriots beat reporter for the Boston Herald for three seasons starting in 2009. Rapoport joined the NFL Network in 2012. 

“I like covering something that people really care about and need to know about,” says Rapoport, who has been an on-air reporter for the NFL Network since 2012. Rapoport, like his chief rival, ESPN’s Adam Schefter, is charged with “breaking news, telling the viewers things they didn’t know and giving them insight into what is going on around the league,” says David Eaton, news editor for the NFL Network. 

Rapoport also appears regularly on the shows Good Morning Football and NFL Total Access, often with segments that air from his basement studio at his home in Rye, N.Y., just north of New York City. 

The reporter is a regular on the Sunday pregame show during football season and reports from the NFL Playoffs, the Super Bowl and the NFL Draft, among others. 

Rapoport started his career for the Jackson Clarion-Ledger in 2004 covering the Mississippi State Bulldogs. 

From there it was on to The Birmingham (Ala.) News, where he covered Alabama football and the Crimson Tide’s famously controlling coach, Nick Saban. “Nothing could have prepared me for what became the craziest experience of my life,” he says. “Everything he said was a story, and everyone in the state wanted to read everything about him,” Rapoport says. “I went from a nobody to one of the most widely read writers in college football.” After three years, Rapoport moved to the Boston Herald to cover the New England Patriots and their similarly controlling head coach, Bill Belichick. He did so for two years and also did some television work, including reports for the NFL Network, which caught the attention of editors there. “I was covering the Super Bowl,” Rapoport says, “and they asked me to come in and talk. I told them I didn’t know anything about TV, but they said, ‘ at’s OK, we’ll teach you.’” Eaton says that he was attracted by the skills Rapoport developed while covering high-profile teams and demanding coaches. “He had very strong sports editors early on in his career. The time in Alabama made him a better reporter and New England is another good place to learn how to develop news sources. Those experiences made him a very solid reporter.” 

Rapoport became a Dallas-based regional reporter for the NFL Network and after a year was promoted to the position of NFL Insider. He, his wife and two sons Max (5) and Jude (4), who enjoy playing in his home studio — relocated to Rye, a 20-minute drive from where he grew up. 

“My goal always was to get back to New York,” he says. “It took a long time to get back here, but I’m extremely happy the way it worked out.” 

Asked about his plans, Rapoport says he loves his job despite its consuming nature. “I’m the guy telling NFL fans what’s up, and to me, that’s fun.” He concedes that he sometimes misses writing, though, and says he’d like to write a book in the near future. But at the pace that news breaks around the NFL, that’s unlikely to happen anytime soon.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *