It was Sunday night in Los Angeles and streets of the city legendary for its traffic sat empty. Even Trader Joe's—the beloved grocery chain known as much for its tiny parking lots as its low prices—had plenty of spaces. For once, as the Clueless joke goes, you really could g...

The master plan is clear to anyone with eyes. FIFA rigged the World Cup draw so Argentina would become the first team to make the semis without playing a side ranked in the top 15. FIFA has rigged every match in favor of Argentina. FIFA demanded that the VAR take away Egypt's second goal over a much-delayed foul call. In that same match, FIFA instructed the referees to not call a foul by Argentina's Julián Alvarez on Mohammed Salah. FIFA even put an all-Argentine referee crew on the France-Morocco match.

And, during Saturday night's quarter-final against Switzerland, FIFA pulled out the big guns, rigging the game in Argentina's favor by forcing Breel Embolo to commit the single stupidest dive I've ever seen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ttdGtk8eGI

For all of its defensive solidity and possession dominance, Spain has been missing a finishing touch in this World Cup. It hurt the Spaniards in the opening match, the stunning draw to Cape Verde. It made them struggle against Uruguay in an ugly game on the final day of the ...

BERGERAC, France — The 2026 Tour de France is thus far mostly bereft of big narratives and interesting surprises. The race for the first two podium places seems mostly over. There is no off-bike story that's captivated the race or raised larger-order implications like the sa...

Is Plato’s Republic too gay?   This is one of many brave questions posed by the Texas Tech University System’s chancellor and Board of Regents as they implement an “extraordinary system of censorship in higher education,” according to a new lawsuit filed Wednesday...

Cheri Kempf knows exactly how hard it is to sustain a professional women’s sports league. She was the commissioner of the now-defunct National Pro Fastpitch league. During her tenure, the NPF’s league office had two full-time employees, one of whom was Kempf. It launched in ...

Norway's charmed and charming run to the World Cup quarterfinals has been a good time all around. Erling Haaland is probably the most lovingly memed man on Earth at the moment, and with good reason. The Norwegians are getting really into cowboy fashion. It's all very fun. Th...

GAVARNIE-GÉDRE, France — Millions of people travel to the Tour de France every year, almost all of them on purpose. This is the story of three people who did so by accident. While waiting for the riders to make their way up to Gavarnie-Gédre for the finish of Stage 6, I too...

Welcome back to Make It Nice, Defector’s best interior design advice column. Today we have a balcony makeover, thoughts on washable rugs, and a plea to please, please not use contact paper on your countertops! Jessica asks: By NYC standards my balcony is HUGE (11' x 5') b...

In September 2025 the NBA hired the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to investigate the Los Angeles Clippers for potential salary cap circumvention after Pablo Torre Finds Out reported that the team had arranged a no-show endorsement deal for Kawhi Leonard with a ...

World Cups are rarely wire-to-wire coronations. In fact, the competition is so fierce, and the margins so small, that usually there isn't a single clear "best" team that goes ahead and wins it all. In 2010, you could argue that Germany looked stronger than eventual champions...

Nervy tennis is so rich. It can contain both the worst of the sport (in a technical sense) and the best of it (in a narrative sense). You can witness breakdowns in routine strokes, diseased shot selection, and facial expressions that indicate a horrible geyser of bile into t...

Terry Thompson is part of a lawsuit against FanDuel and DraftKings claiming that the sports books used their VIP services and products to intentionally prey on his gambling addiction. Thompson says he wagered $18.5 million with FanDuel and became addicted to gambling via the...

PAU, France — Some people are natural performers. Torstein Træen is not, though his work on the bike might have been the last exciting general classification action before we get to Paris. As the 30-year-old Norwegian rider ascended the podium in Foix after Stage 4 to be wr...

I went to the Great American State Fair figuring it would make me feel lousy about my country. I don't remember being so right about anything. 

I'd read all about how entertainers wouldn't take the stage, how states wouldn't staff the booths, and how nobody was showing up because the president had hijacked America's 250th birthday celebration and messed everything up. But with only a few days before this circus leaves town—the fair closes tomorrow—I wanted to see for myself if The Mess on the Mall could live down to its billing. And, sure, I wondered if Trump's Stonehengeian rendering of his proposed Arc de Failure looked as ridiculous in the flesh as online. (Yup and yup.) So I went. Turns out I was prepared for most of the awfulness. But not all the Jesus. So much Jesus.

First, a summary of its pros and cons. 

There was always an irony to Happy's name. The elephant's misfortune stamped her a celebrity. In their home in the wild, female Asian elephants roam for hundreds of miles and form lifelong attachments to a group of around seven relatives. In her home in the Bronx Zoo, Happy ...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — If you regret that you never got a chance to see the 1899 Cleveland Spiders, the losingest team in MLB history, can I interest you in a trip to Staten Island? No wait, come back. Just a few steps away from the ferry terminal, a morbidly curious fan can ...

The Carolina Hurricanes are worthy NHL champs, plowing through the playoffs with a 16-3 record. It's a victory of commitment to an approach, as head coach Rod Brind'Amour's system finally paid ultimate dividends after seven years of postseason exits. It's a victory for blogg...

OK, now shit is about to get even realer. The FIFA World Cup sponsored by FIFA and presented by FIFA is now down to eight teams. If your favorite team isn’t among the last countries standing, that’s tough shit. You must pick a NEW favorite country, and you must do it right this instant or else suffer the consequences.

[I draw my sword]

But how can anyone pick just one team from France, Morocco, Belgium, Spain, Norway, England, Argentina, and Switzerland? Fear not, amigo, because this week’s episode of The Distraction is here to help you do just that.

The Chicago Bears are one of the most storied franchises in the NFL. One of just two charter members of the league still playing today (the other being the Cardinals, a somewhat less-storied franchise), the Bears have had a lengthy and stalwart kinship with the City of Big S...

Welcome back to Minor Dilemmas, where a member of Defector's Parents Council will answer your questions on surviving family life. Have a question? Email us at minordilemmas@defector.com.

This week, Billy dives into the tricky question of screen time.

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Spite is a powerful emotion too often cast in an ugly light. To feel slighted or doubted is a natural urge, as is our desire to press our doubters' eyes up against a window to watch as we prove them wrong. We are taught to repress and do away with such unbecoming resentments...

Skylar Diggins, to her credit, isn't one to trade in the classic cryptic fare of her fellow disgruntled athletes. What she writes on social media requires no close reading or careful analysis. There's no Crazy how people switch up on you or TIME WILL TELL&nbsp...

As an online basketball fan, you are encouraged by the discourse to consider the Jaylen Brown trade as a matter of asset valuation. One day the Celtics seemed to consider Brown, the asset, as approximately valuable enough to swap for Giannis Antetokounmpo, plus or minus some...

Vanity pickup trucks: I fucking hate these things, and so you do. The second I see a Dodge Ram SuperUltraMegaSoldierDuty on the highway, I already know that it'll have a Blue Lives Matter decal splashed across its rear windshield, a pristine flatbed untouched by manual labor...

Some things are just timeless. Gossip, for instance, has likely been around as long as humans have been able to communicate with one another, and then share someone else’s business. Ötzi, the 5,000-year-old ice man? Probably a gossiper and definitely a messy guy. Something else just as timeless? Pranks!

Normal Gossip is back for its 10th season! Who could have guessed that so many friends had silly, outrageous and harrowing stories they wanted to share with the world. We’re grateful to every listener and everyone who keeps sending us their gossip. To celebrate season 10 we’re bringing back some of your favorite guests and sharing some of the most chaotic gossip ever to grace our inbox! And as you may have heard, Defector is swiveling to video! (We will not use the word “pivot” here.) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nwoXWiaSz0

The crud-ass New York Mets were able to manage a series split on the road against division-leading Atlanta during the long weekend, overcoming severe bullpen issues for 10-9 and 7-6 victories on Sunday and Monday. But before any fan could even begin to think about letting th...

Heading into this year's Wimbledon, neither Coco Gauff nor Naomi Osaka had made a deep run at the tournament, despite winning a total of six Slams elsewhere. Gauff had peaked at the fourth round, and Osaka at the third round, three times apiece for both players. An observer ...

SAINT-GAUDENS, France — On Monday morning, the Tour de France's media-wranglers sent us all a text announcing something genuinely shocking for such a French organization: They had banned smoking. The ASO said nobody could smoke in the TV areas "in order to combat fire risks,...

What’s the sickest action sequence you’ve ever witnessed on screen? I’ll give you five. There’s the tea parlor shootout at the top of John Woo’s Hard Boiled, of course, as well as Jackie Chan’s multi-level shopping mall free-for-all at the close of Police Story. William Frie...