In 1994, Carlson left Major League Baseball and became a freelance journalist. He reviews books and film, and wrote three books in the Pocket Essentials series, on the film directors Sergio Leone, Clint Eastwood, and Oliver Stone. He also writes obituaries for The Guardian and The Independent and on sport for a number of outlets, including NFLUK.com. On screen he has also appeared occasionally as a baseball pundit on MLB on Five hosted by Jonny Gould, a sport he previously presented on Sky Sports in the mid-1990s. He also wrote the Channel Five Guide To Baseball. He is the commentator for World Baseball Classic on Eurosport. He has covered a variety of other sports on television including Basketball, Poker, Soccer, and Lacrosse. He has worked behind the scenes on the television coverage of both Olympic Games and FIFA World Cup tournaments. In 2000, he and Mark Webster provided commentary for the Meridian TV and ITV2 series Trans-Atlantic Wrestling Challenge. On 21 May 2011, Carlson "will call all the action from the Sheikh Amri Abeid Memorial Stadium in Arusha when Tanzania hosts the first game of college American Football to be played on the African continent."