Tri Bourne has come under a lot of scrutiny for his off-season decision to dump Trevor Crabb — the 2023 VolleyballMag Defensive Player of the Year — and pick up Chaim Schalk instead. While Crabb and Theo Brunner are No. 2 in the USA Olympic rankings after a 4th at the World Championships, Bourne and Schalk are No. 3 and trending in the wrong direction. In our fall fan question episode that drops on Wednesday, the most-oft asked question was: Does he regret dumping Trevor for Chaim?
Enjoy the full episode on Wednesday!
Author, journalist, podcast host, and broadcaster, Travis Mewhirter has written 4 number-one bestsellers — including Kings of Summer: The Rise of Beach Volleyball, alongside Olympic gold medalist Kent Steffes. He has also written award-winning features, including a package at the Northwest Florida Daily News that earned him Sports Writer of the Year, and a heartfelt story on the late Eric Zaun in Volleyball Magazine, which was an honorable mention in the 2020 Best American Sportswriting.
Following the passing of Eric Zaun, Mewhirter, alongside Jon Mesko and Katie Spieler, founded the Eric Zaun Award, which has raised more than 25 thousand to fund beach volleyball players.
Mewhirter now devotes most of his time to playing and covering beach volleyball, via his podcast: SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, as well as writing for Volleyball Magazine and commentating on Volleyball TV. Mewhirter and Bourne have written two books together: Volleyball for Milkshakes, and Playbook of Champions, both of which were number-one best-sellers.