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09 Feb 18:33 • Kelsey McKinney

Artificially Large Skier Penises Should Stay Legal

To ski jump is to momentarily become a god. The track is narrow and slick, and the athletes plummet down the sloped hill at almost 60 mph. They leave the track and take up, up, up into the sky, where they bend themselves forward. Their chests are almost at their skis, which ...

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09 Feb 17:27 • Maitreyi Anantharaman

The Crossword, Feb. 9: Italian Class

Break the ice with our Monday crossword. This week's puzzle was constructed by Matthew Stock and edited by Hoang-Kim Vu. Matthew is a freelance puzzle maker and newly minted stay-at-home dad originally from Dallas. His puzzles have been published in the New York Times, USA Today, and the New Yorker, among other venues. When he’s not making puzzles, Matthew enjoys cooking, birdwatching and playing ultimate frisbee.

Defector crosswords, launched in partnership with our friends at AVCX, run every Monday. If you’re interested in submitting a puzzle to us, you can read our guidelines HERE.

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09 Feb 17:27 • Lauren Theisen

Devin The Dugong Wins The Internet With The Super Bowl AI Ad Everyone Can’t Stop Talking About

"The future of media is AI!" That's what Devin The Mixed-Reality Dugong has been telling me every single day, ever since he stopped talking about the metaverse. I'm certainly in no position to argue with him. In Devin's role as Chief AI/Metaverse/Surveillance Officer for Def...

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09 Feb 16:33 • Lauren Theisen

What An Unbelievable Fourth Quarter From Drake Maye!

I can't speak for every neutral, but I think for a lot of us, the experience of watching the Super Bowl was sitting around willing Drake Maye to do something for the New England Patriots—not because we wanted the Pats to win, but because the game was extremely boring. By th...

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09 Feb 16:33 • Chris Thompson

Giannis Antetokounmpo Jumps In Bed With Sleazy Prediction Market

Giannis Antetokounmpo has purchased some shares of the prediction market platform Kalshi. Kalshi, which would prefer to be described as a market-based "filter" on the otherwise unreliable flow of human knowledge but is in fact just a way for normies to lose money wagering on...

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09 Feb 16:33 • Tom Ley

Sam Darnold Is A Normal Super Bowl Champion

You could see what the Patriots were up to from the first drive of the game. They blitzed Sam Darnold without hesitation and instructed the defensive backs to undercut routes as much as possible. A wager was being made: If we make this guy as uncomfortable as possible, event...

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09 Feb 06:03 • Ray Ratto

Super Bowl LX Was The Beatdown That Will Leave No Trace

For a half, the Super Bowl's Most Valuable Player was either Jason Myers or Bad Bunny, and you could have gotten equal odds on either one. But bad games rarely stay bad forever, and because the second half more resembled a normal game with exotic things like touchdowns,...

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08 Feb 23:39 • Diana Moskovitz

James Pearce Jr. Arrested, Charged With Aggravated Battery, Stalking

South Florida police arrested Atlanta Falcons edge rusher James Pearce Jr. over the weekend, after a police chase followed by a crash in a residential neighborhood that was captured on cell phone video. Law enforcement charged Pearce, 22, with a slew of possible crimes, acco...

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08 Feb 20:33 • Ray Ratto

The Sacramento Kings Are Dedicated To Dignified Losing

Tucked in the smallest corners of the NBA trade deadline or, as it has come to be known, Giannis Interruptus, there are the Sacramento Kings, quietly making a deadline of their own. And when we say quietly, what we mean is they're not being as brazen in their quest...

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08 Feb 18:42 • Ray Ratto

Luck Finally Failed Lindsey Vonn

Lindsey Vonn had dreams, and hers had a definite expiration date. She had one last legitimate crack at an Olympic downhill medal because she is 41 years old, and she had to be perfect because the infrastructure of her knees seemed to have just celebrated their 70th...

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06 Feb 22:51 • Denise McQuade

A Message From Dan McQuade’s Mom

Dan’s mom here. While I hope to thank everyone more formally, for so many of you it won’t be possible; I don’t know how to reach you. So I thought I’d reach you the way my Dan did—through the online written word. To the Defector staff and readers, former Daily Pennsylvanian staff and UPenn community,…

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06 Feb 22:51 • Giri Nathan

Now That Jose Alvarado’s On The Knicks, Let’s Remember Him As A Queens High School Star

Excuse me while I go Dave McKenna mode: I watched Jose Alvarado as a high school star in Queens nearly a decade ago. His team at Christ the King Regional High School took on Bishop Loughlin, another local powerhouse, in the Brooklyn-Queens Catholic High School Athletic Assoc...

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06 Feb 22:09 • Patrick Redford

What Time Does “What Time Does The Super Bowl Start?” Start?

Well well well. Well WELL well! My sources tell me it's a big weekend for the Bay Area, in the sense that luminaries such as Bad Bunny, Tom Brady, and Kalyn Kahler have descended upon San Francisco to be within an hour's drive of the Super Bowl, which will be held in Santa C...

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06 Feb 18:30 • Heather Wei-Xi Chen

The Westminster Dog Show’s Youngest Handlers Don’t Know If They Want To Do This Forever

When Emerson Jaquish’s mother decided 10 years ago to get a saluki, the contract for the dog said that the canine needed to be “shown.” In other words, if they were to buy the dog, they would be contractually obligated to enter it at dog shows. So at the age of 9, Emerson en...

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06 Feb 17:48 • Rafaela Bassili

‘Suburban Fury’ Is Strange, Blinkered, And Very Compelling

On Sept. 22, 1975, 45-year-old Sara Jane Moore fired two bullets at then-President Gerald Ford. They were in San Francisco, outside a hotel. Moore missed her first shot, but seeing an opportunity, took another. She missed that one, too. An ex-Marine named Oliver Sipple, who ...

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06 Feb 16:42 • Sabrina Imbler

This Week In Delicious Scams; Or, I Yam Not What You Think I Yam

If you are anything like I once was, you moved through life feeling pretty sure you were not going to get scammed. You had an eye for the desperation of a fake Craigslist posting. You were attuned to the strange formatting of a phishing email. You had not even written a book...

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06 Feb 15:48 • Israel Daramola

Max B Is New York Rap’s Best Hope

Welcome to Listening Habits, a column where I share the music I’ve been fixated on recently.

Max B has been home from jail for a little less than six months now. It's been a pleasure to watch him gallivant around the city, making up for all the lost time.

https://youtu.be/xfn-eba0spM?si=YDgM9GyD5si9vgBd

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06 Feb 14:57 • John Mohr

I Watched The “Lost” Live-Action ‘Dilbert’ Pilot Episode, And It’s Clear Why It Didn’t Get Picked Up

The death of Dilbert creator Scott Adams in January at age 68 was followed by obituaries with a predictably wide range in tone. While some were charitable to the late cartoonist, most were less forgiving. Adams’s long leap into infamy on the back of countless racist, sexist,...

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05 Feb 19:33 • Kathryn Xu

My Life Among The 33 Pomeranians (And A Few Thousand Other Dogs)

NEW YORK — In the days before the Westminster Dog Show, I could not stop saying the phrase, "33 Pomeranians." There’s a pleasing rhythm to the phrase—better spelled out as thirty-three Pomeranians—that lends itself to any multitude of cadences. Excitedly: thirty-three Pomera...

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05 Feb 18:00 • Drew Magary

People Of America, It Is Cocktail Hour

Drew Magary’s Thursday Afternoon NFL Dick Joke Jamboroo runs every Thursday at Defector during the NFL season. Got something you wanna contribute? Email the Roo. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it. Late afternoon football is ...

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05 Feb 15:42 • David Roth

The Last Mayor Of Philadelphia

The understanding that we have reached when we've talked about it, to the extent we've talked about it at all, is that The Distraction should try to be a good hang even in bad times. This is dependent, of course, on the extent to which Drew and I are capable of managing that...

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05 Feb 14:12 • Defector Staff

What We Loved About Dan McQuade

Today is Dan McQuade’s funeral. To celebrate our friend, we wanted to give the people he worked with a place to explain what they loved so much about him. If you would like to support Dan’s widow Jan, and his son Simon, you can do so here. David Roth, Defector Editor Dan was always into…

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04 Feb 20:09 • Heather Wei-Xi Chen

The Secrets Of Human And Canine Fashion At The Westminster Dog Show

NEW YORK — “I don’t think that bitch looks fit,” a woman next to me murmurs. She’s carrying a Louis Vuitton bag, wearing Hermes riding boots, and speaking, of course, about one of the three female Cane Corsos still in the ring. It’s not exactly an unwarranted thing for her...

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04 Feb 17:10 • Chris Thompson

The Washington Post Lays Off A Third Of Its Workforce, Is Dead

The Washington Post is being gutted. Jeff Bezos, one of the handful of wealthiest people on the planet, is through pretending to be a conscientious steward of the 150-year-old newspaper, and is now radically remaking it into what could only seem appropriate to a profoundly i...

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04 Feb 16:18 • Owen Lewis

A Pure Tennis Boy

MELBOURNE — “I just want him to be a pure tennis boy,” the journalist behind me said to their neighbor as we waited for Carlos Alcaraz to come to the main interview room. They were saying how they hoped well-paying exhibitions wouldn’t distract the world No. 1 from his main ...

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04 Feb 14:33 • Mychal Denzel Smith

I Thoroughly Enjoyed Watching Michael Rapaport Eat Shit On ‘The Traitors’

As the parent of a toddler, my TV watching habits have lately tended more toward Peppa Pig and Ms. Rachel than Heated Rivalry or The Pitt. I would like to keep abreast of whatever the internet is buzzing about, but when my child finally gets to sleep at the end of the day, I...

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03 Feb 18:57 • Patrick Redford

James Harden’s Latest Trade Demand Isn’t About Basketball

James Harden, who demanded a trade from the Houston Rockets in 2021, the Brooklyn Nets in 2022, and the Philadelphia 76ers in 2023, has demanded a trade from the Los Angeles Clippers. The language is more couched than that—per Shams Charania's latest runic dispatch, "Both si...

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03 Feb 18:57 • Samer Kalaf

Fanatics Makes More Excuses Than Sellable Jerseys

Like its more tangible products, Fanatics' apologies are shoddy and practically worthless, yet Michael Rubin's sports apparel company keeps issuing them anyway. In this latest instance, Fanatics is sorry for its shitty Super Bowl merch that is definitely not worth the listed...

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03 Feb 18:03 • Ray Ratto

Two Sourpusses Missing Out On The Hall Of Fame Is The Most Uplifting Story Of Super Bowl Week

The multiple annoyances of having The Big'Un in your town do not really become evident until Thursday, and sometimes even as late as Friday. That's when the rubes show up in their cheap Fanatics knockoff jerseys, clogging the airports and highways, swallowing all the restaur...

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03 Feb 17:33 • Drew Magary

The NFL Doesn’t Have To Pretend It’s Not An Old Boys’ Club Anymore

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 fake booze, depressing old sex movies, driver’s ed in a Tesla, and more.

PROGRAMMING NOTE: Today’s Funbag will be mildly truncated as I and the rest of the Defector staff prepare for Dan McQuade’s memorial later this week. I’ll be back at normal length next week, although I’ll still be quite testy that Dan is no longer with us. Stupid cancer; you’re almost worse than Trump.

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