One of the best shows on radio (or anywhere, for that matter) is Jeremy Schaap’s The Sporting Life on ESPN Radio. It is the sports version of NPR’s Fresh Air with long-form stories, comprehensive interviews and commentary from Schaap, one of the best in the business.

Unfortunately, it airs at odd hours (Fridays at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN Radio’s main network). As Schaap said, “It’s not a ratings machine.”

No, but it does serve a loyal, niche audience who enjoy smart radio in any genre. Such as me.

I had become frustrated at not being able to hear the show. Every time, I talked to an ESPN official in recent months, I’d ask, “When are you going to put Jeremy’s show on a podcast?”

Now fortunately, Schaap’s shows finally are available on podcast. Here’s the link. Check them out. You’ll be glad you did.

Also, be sure to check out Schaap’s piece Sunday on Outside the Lines (ESPN, 9 a.m. ET). He reports on a Jewish hockey player who decided to become a dual German-U.S. citizen to be able to play for Germany. It’s a powerful story.

From ESPN:

Sixty-seven years ago, as World War II was coming to an end, allied troops liberated the concentration camps where Adolf Hitler had called for the murder of millions of innocents, mostly Jews. Today, the descendants of the camp’s victims and survivors grapple with the issue of modern Germany – how to forgive without forgetting. A young American hockey player, Evan Kaufmann, has come to embody those tensions. Jeremy Schaap reports Kaufmann’s dilemma – should he represent and wear the flag of the country that killed and tortured members of his family?

“A lot of my family was either chased out of Germany, or ended up being murdered in the Holocaust. So, is it right for me to come here? Is it something I should even be thinking about doing? I think to become a German citizen, knowing all of that, was definitely, at the time, a very tough decision.” -Evan Kaufmann

“You can’t help but think about what my family went through 70 years ago and the hardships that they suffered. But I think, more than that, you had to think about the strides that have been made since then, and in my own personal experiences.” –Kaufmann

“When I initially came here, being in the locker room with my teammates, I’d be wondering, ‘What was my teammate’s grandfather doing at the time that my grandfather was suffering, and was he part of the actions?” –Kaufmann