The origin story of the Reds goes like this: In 1869, just after local boy and war hero Ulysses S. Grant was inaugurated as president, the Cincinnati Red Stockings became the very first entirely professional baseball team. They were later a charter member of the National Lea...

Generally you would not want to use a word like "catharsis" in relation to a podcast. That is just not what they are for, in my opinion, and it's not really in my range as a podcast co-host or guest to deliver that sort of experience. While last week's episode announcing the...

Across the 2024 and 2025 NWSL seasons, Temwa Chawinga scored 35 goals—more than many players could hope to score in their entire careers. She won the Golden Boot and MVP both years, and deserved to. The Kansas City Current forward was simply inevitable. There’s a real pleas...

Good science journalism is by its nature suspicious of grand or outlandish claims. Good science journalism does not take press releases at face value, but rather investigates the evidence behind those claims and the context in which they appear. Good science journalism is mo...

Some people are fans of the Buffalo Bills. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Buffalo Bills. This 2026 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here. Your team: It was an interception. Get over it. Your ...

So who believes in Reds Week? The Reds, you fools. The Cincinnati Freaking Reds. And all the rest of you cynical apostates do too. If you didn't know it before, you damned well know it now. And not just for historical, electoral, or tonsorial reasons, either. We're tal...

This is Defector Music Club, where a number of our writers get together to dish about an album. In honor of Reds Week, we're discussing Taylor Swift's 2012 pop-rock hit Red.

Patrick Redford: I can’t be the only one whose strongest and first thought about Red is that there’s a sound at the end of the first synth swell in “I Knew You Were Trouble” that sounds just like the jail-cell door slamming closed in Akon’s “Locked Up,” right?

Lauren Theisen: I primarily remember the screaming goat remix.

The actor Tim Curry died on Tuesday. He was 80. He was as purely and consistently fun a screen presence as anyone else I can think of, a cartoon of a performer, with outrageous charisma and the ability to communicate it through a wild assortment of constraints: obscuring mak...

As with some of my best decisions in life, I bought a red light mask because Kelsey McKinney uses one. I saw Kelsey posting Instagram stories with her face illuminated under the mask's sinister, Sith-like glow. I was newly 30, albeit not especially flirty or thriving, and I ...

Welcome to Listening Habits, a column where I share the music and musical topics I’ve been fixated on recently. In the music video for "Time 4 Sum Aksion," the second single from Redman's debut album, you don't really get much of the zany personality that would go...

If in the future my daughter develops some kind of Pavlovian response to the musical stylings of Pat McAfee, I'll blame the editors who "assigned" this review. But this outcome is unlikely. I almost wish it were a little more plausible. McAfee's debut album, though enticingl...

California. Perhaps you’ve heard of it? It is the edge of the continent, it is the apocalypse state, and it is the subject of many songs by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, though fewer than you might think.  California is one of Californian rock bands’ favorite things to si...

Have you checked under your bed recently to see if a member of the Democratic Socialists of America is there, waiting, with a pamphlet on taxing the rich clenched between their teeth and the glint of revolution in their eyes? Can you say, with real certainty, that a card-car...

Some people are fans of the Chicago Bears. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Chicago Bears. This 2026 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.

Your Team: The Chicago Bears, who are not yet the Hammond, Indiana, Bears

Your 2025 record: 11-6, a staggering outlier for a franchise far more comfortable with 6-11. A new coach, a repaired and better protected quarterback, and the next big running game. We were comfortable with the Bears being persistently mediocre, and now we have to deal with the possibility that they could own the NFC North for more than one year, which they haven't done since 2006, when Rex Grossman roamed the earth.

"High Sierra" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvKRwNR7kXw On Tuesday, in the moments after I heard that Dolly Parton had died, I returned immediately to "Light of a Clear Blue Morning." It's a song I've always loved, even when I was a child, and that feels so cathartic t...

It’s a rite of passage to get your ideals smashed in your early twenties, just in the normal course of trying to get your feet under you. It doesn’t seem to matter what exactly you care about, either. Whether you’re voting and then watching election results, or you’re trying to make a college relationship last beyond graduation, or you believe that with enough energy and grit, you and your ideals can save the trees, you’re in for a few bruises. 

But every bright-eyed youth loses innocence in their own way. Today’s friend of a friend is out to solve the affordable housing crisis, but she’s about to learn that all of us, however committed to “the work” we may seem, have a greater aptitude for mess than for the revolution. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KH1-Htdmg9U

In observance of Reds Week at Defector, Lauren and Alex decided to try a red lip, as modeled in this brief tutorial. Here, in the style of The Not-So-Great Defector Bake-Off, are their results. Lauren: Hi Alex! So as we start with moisturizer, I wanted to ask right up top, ...

The competition for the much-coveted Who Won The Offseason Prize is nearly over. Despite a late rally from the Cleveland Browns, who became the first team to eliminate themselves from the regular season by quintupling down on the disaster that has been, is, and seems he...

This week on Nothing But Respect, we spent the entire episode talking through the last 13 years of Los Angeles Lakers ownership drama. Our guest Harrison Faigen is a longtime Lakers media guy, and he joined us for a lengthy discussion on Mark Walter, Joshua Kushner, and Johnny, Jimmy, Jeanie, Janie, Joey, and Jesse Buss. It's crazy they're all named that. The tie-in to Reds Week is that my name is Patrick Redford.

You can find Nothing But Respect in Apple Podcasts or whatever podcast app you use. Follow the show on Instagram, and contact the Broke Jumper Tip Line at (347) 380-6426. Thanks for listening!

The most awe-inspiring thing in music is when an artist takes over the world. At least back when there was a monoculture, it was possible for a single person to dominate collective attention, at least for awhile. And 1998 should always be remembered as the year DMX did just ...

There are certain types of players that just are not coming back. Some of these guys have been written out of the story by changes in the game's rules; future generations will be unable to comprehend the wealth of saturnine lefty specialists whom the world once watched trudg...

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, Albert answers a question about a kid who might be a little bit of a mess.

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A couple of blocks from my office is a steep hill. Sometimes at lunch I go out into the sun and walk up the hill. The hill is very California: asphalt so newly laid that it looks AI generated; a handful of wheeling turkey vultures; golden dried grass edging up to fortress-li...

On Monday, the day after his arrest on a criminal charge of engaging in prostitution—later pleaded down to disorderly conduct—San Francisco 49ers owner Jed York, through his lawyer, submitted a motion in his criminal case. Specifically, he asked to the court to seal all records related to it.

His stated justification? The owner's request, which you can see in full by clicking here, gave a bit of background on the case before outlining the following reasons:

2. The Defendant is an eligible offender as defined by R.C. §2953.31.

3. There are no criminal proceedings pending against the Defendant.

4. The Defendant has been satisfactorily rehabilitated and poses no risk of recidivism.

5. The Defendant's interest in having the official records pertaining to the cases sealed outweighs any legitimate need of the government to maintain those records.

A not-insignificant part of my job is fielding phone calls from freelance writers who have questions. The questions can vary—Have you heard of any job openings? Are you interested in this pitch? An editor at another publication is trying to screw me, what should I do? Can you help me get a credential to this…

Some people are fans of the Jacksonville Jaguars. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Jacksonville Jaguars. This 2026 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.

Your team: Jacksonville Jaguars.

Your 2025 record: 13-4, which got you a division title and a brief mention on page 18 of the newspaper, right under the foreclosure announcements. Curious how your chronically irrelevant team pulled this off? Put your Crocs in sport mode and take a walk with me.

The Vuelta a España, long the runt sibling among cycling's Grand Tours, promised to be bigger and better than usual this year, thanks primarily to the participation of Tadej Pogacar. The protests that stymied last year's race had successfully de-Israelized the peloton, and t...

Time for your weekly edition of the Defector Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it. Today, we're talking about Tommy John, Tony Romo, babies at the movies, and more.

Your letters:

DP:

The Arizona Diamondbacks are angry at Quintin Berry, third base coach for the Chicago Cubs. Several Diamondbacks, including manager Torey Lovullo, suspected Monday night that Berry was picking up the changeup grip of Diamondbacks starting pitcher Merrill Kelly and then using...

John Ross knows a thing or two about self-deception. The songwriter and frontman of Wild Pink fills Still Coming Down, the latest from the shapeshifting New York indie group, with stories of men who have cooked their brains and lost their souls, without gaining much in the b...