FeedCity: Defector

Defector
21 Jan 17:48 • Ray Ratto

Major League Baseball Is Determined To Rain On Its Own Parade

Carlos Beltran and Andruw Jones are not in and of themselves exemplary Hall of Famers, but as of Tuesday evening they are duly elected Hall of Famers and are being celebrated as such. They may also end up being the last two Hall of Famers to be elected to applause and admira...

Defector
21 Jan 17:48 • Patrick Redford

The Good Team Always Wins, With Jeremy Gordon

This week on Nothing But Respect, we were thrilled to be joined by Jeremy Gordon, writer, editor, and author of last year's See Friendship. Topics discussed include: Rich Paul and Max Kellerman's unsavory podcast situation, intergenerational warfare vis-à-vis Jeremy's formative experiences watching Michael Jordan, Angel Reese's cameo in Kathryn Bigelow's latest, and, finally, Jeremy's polarizing unified theory of basketball.

You can find Nothing But Respect in Apple Podcasts or whatever podcast app you use. Thanks for listening!

Defector
21 Jan 17:48 • Tom Ley

Michele Tafoya Won’t Rest Until She Finds A Bigger And Better Way To Annoy Everyone

Minnesota is in turmoil, thanks to masked federal agents who spend all day driving around the Twin Cities terrorizing whoever the hell they want. This is a time that calls for strong leadership. Can I interest you in a senate bid from a lady you vaguely remember mumbling questions on NFL sidelines a decade ago?

That's right, former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya announced today that she wants to be the next Republican senator from Minnesota. She unveiled her candidacy this morning with a campaign ad that wastes no time getting to her qualifications: "For years, I covered the biggest football games in America."

https://www.instagram.com/p/DTxZ8WEES2-/?hl=en

Defector
21 Jan 16:51 • Jae Towle Vieira

The Bride’s Last Bribery Fund

There comes a time in everyone woman's life when she must decide if she is getting on the party bus or not. In this case, the party bus is a metaphor for the whole concept of bachelorette parties and all the nonsense and spiraling costs that are associated with the whole tradition. The party bus is also, in fact, a party bus, because how could you get the girls together for the Bride's Last Ride without an intermediate size bus loaded down with booze?

Calling all Omega Theta Pi’s and hot librarians—who’s ready for a trip to Nashville? Today’s episode is the recording from our September 2025 live show in Seattle!

Defector
21 Jan 16:00 • Danny Funt

How Bill Simmons Went All In

The following is excerpted from a chapter of Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling, by Danny Funt. The book is available for purchase now. Bill Simmons never seemed like the type to bite his tongue. In many ways, he earned the nic...

Defector
21 Jan 14:27 • Zach Gozlan

Are ‘Jeopardy!’ Contestants Really That Bad At Questions About Sports?

There’s a stereotype about Jeopardy! contestants: They can name the stars of 18th-century operas, but not the starting quarterback for the Buffalo Bills. It comes up again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and...

Defector
20 Jan 21:03 • Giri Nathan

The Knicks Are Exuding Toilet Aromas

The New York Knicks, beautiful NBA Cup champions of December, have drifted toward the toilet. After winning the midseason trophy amid a 23-9 start, they have gone 2-9 in the weeks since. Monday night at Madison Square Garden, a severely undermanned Dallas Mavericks squad rac...

Defector
20 Jan 19:18 • Drew Magary

Who Wants To Be A Hero?

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 music, Caleb Williams, dishwasher mishaps, best foods to throw up, and more.

Your letters:

Adrian:

Defector
20 Jan 18:09 • Luis Paez-Pumar

No, Carson Beck, No! What Are You Doing?! NOOOOOOO!!!!

After almost two weeks of hearing about how Miami would get crushed by Indiana, I was pleasantly surprised by how well the Hurricanes played in Monday night's national championship game. Miami's defense was brutal in the good way throughout, putting Heisman winner Fernando M...

Defector
20 Jan 17:45 • Chris Thompson

Jimmy Butler’s Injury Thrusts Steve Kerr And Jonathan Kuminga Once More Into The Hell Of Working Together

Jimmy Butler's season is over. His painful-looking collapse in the third quarter of Golden State's win Monday night over the visiting Miami Heat was caused by the sudden kerplosion of his right ACL, a crisis that will require surgery and then many months of recovery. This st...

Defector
20 Jan 17:00 • Barry Petchesky

I Am Not Immune To The Charms Of A Really Big Moon Rocket

I am occasionally high-minded about space exploration. The quest for knowledge, the nobility of the human spirit, the inexorable call of the great void, blah blah blah. But then there are other times when I admit to myself that a sizable part of my interest is a simple, prim...

Defector
20 Jan 16:24 • Ray Ratto

There’s No Such Thing As A Secure NFL Coaching Job

The thing about "unprecedented events" is that they rarely are. Something weird or unusual that you just saw has almost certainly happened before, usually within about four years, and in pretty much the same form. This isn't to say that strange and new-seeming things aren't ...

Defector
20 Jan 15:39 • Lauren Theisen

Fernando Mendoza Was Unstoppable

Indiana—yes, Indiana—won a national title in college football on Monday night because they made every single play that they needed to. This was true all year, since Indiana—yes, yes, Indiana!—went undefeated through 16 games. But after a pair of blowouts to get them to the c...

Defector
20 Jan 15:39 • Ray Ratto

It Will Never Get Better Than This

You are a supporter of the University of Miami, and that taste of fireplace ash that coats your mouth has not yet gone away. You spent what could have been one of the best nights of your life watching your Cinderella get her arse kicked by a better Cinderella, which in and o...

Defector
20 Jan 15:39 • Israel Daramola

Indiana Is A Champion For College Football’s New Era

Indiana vs. Miami for a national championship was the story of two magical runs colliding. The kind of thing that feels engineered by some mysterious "they" in order to sell the value of this sport to its shareholders and potential Saudi buyers. But it really happened, and i...

Defector
20 Jan 15:39 • Barry Petchesky

2026 Is For Fighting

The new year is not yet three weeks old, but it is already rife with signs. Signs and portents. I have examined the flights of birds. I have consulted with the Pythia at Delphi (she says hello). I have completed a correspondence course and trained my newly certified haruspe...

Defector
19 Jan 17:48 • Samer Kalaf

Sean McDermott Stood Up For Buffalo, And Now He’ll Get Out

For a year without many new and exciting head coaching candidates, there sure are a lot of head coaches getting canned. The Buffalo Bills announced Monday morning that they had fired HC Sean McDermott, two days after the team lost to the Denver Broncos in overtime. It'll be ...

Defector
19 Jan 16:45 • Lauren Theisen

Broncos Fans Have Six Days To Talk Themselves Into Jarrett Stidham

Jarrett Stidham and I have thrown the same number of passes in the NFL over the last two years. With that lived experience in common, I feel comfortable assuming that we shared the same thought as we separately watched the Patriots beat the Texans on Sunday: Well, this is al...

Defector
19 Jan 16:09 • Maitreyi Anantharaman

The Crossword, Jan. 19: Sole Cycle

Why not take our Monday crossword out for a spin? This week's puzzle was constructed by Hanh Huynh and edited by Hoang-Kim Vu. Hanh is a bankruptcy attorney who lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. with his wife and two kids.

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.

Defector
19 Jan 15:27 • Lauren Theisen

The Bears’ Final Magic Trick Was Almost Enough

With less than 20 seconds remaining in Sunday night's Bears-Rams clash, Caleb Williams successfully connected on an impossible-seeming touchdown pass. Chicago's season has been all about improbable comebacks, but this was a new peak. The Bears offense had been mostly stymie...

Defector
19 Jan 00:57 • Samer Kalaf

C.J. Stroud’s Nightmare First Half Dooms The Texans

C.J. Stroud played like a man possessed in Saturday's divisional round game against the New England Patriots. The problem was that for a lot of the first half, the Houston Texans quarterback was a vessel for the spirit of playoff Jake Delhomme. It was a hideous afternoon fo...

Defector
18 Jan 20:39 • Maitreyi Anantharaman

Rigging A College Basketball Game Seems Stressful

On Thursday, federal prosecutors in Philadelphia brought charges against 26 people they say were involved in a scheme to fix bets on college basketball and Chinese Basketball Association games. The point-shaving scheme, according to a 70-page indictment unsealed that morning...

Defector
18 Jan 18:48 • Maitreyi Anantharaman

The Seahawks Have A Need For Rashid Shaheed

First impressions can be deceiving, but the opening seconds of Saturday’s 49ers-Seahawks NFC divisional round game really did presage the lopsided evening to follow. Maybe the game was over before it began: The Niners won the toss and deferred, perhaps to get a better look a...

Defector
18 Jan 17:48 • Samer Kalaf

John Harbaugh Had The Giants Rework Their Org Chart For Him

News broke Wednesday that John Harbaugh would be hired as the next head coach of the New York Giants, but then the deal continued to be, as they say, hammered out. There must have been a lot of hammers banging away at that thing, because the team's official announcement was ...

Defector
18 Jan 15:36 • Samer Kalaf

Broncos Win The Game, But Lose Their Quarterback

Minutes after the Denver Broncos clinched a spot in the AFC Championship Game with a 33-30 overtime victory over the Buffalo Bills, CBS sideline reporter Tracy Wolfson noticed that something was off with the winning quarterback. "One thing to keep an eye on. It looked like B...

Defector
16 Jan 20:48 • David Roth

It’s Nice To Have A Process, But It’s Better To Have Money

Imagine a very orderly person who lives in an apartment with a very large dog. The two can coexist happily, with each providing necessary support to the other, but there is also going to be a tension inherent to that relationship grounded in the fact that one of the parties ...

Defector
16 Jan 20:24 • Veronica de Souza

Make It Nice: Gallery Wall Tutorial

Welcome back to Make It Nice, Defector's best interior design advice column. Today, we have an unused spare room, a crowded gallery wall, and a (partial) resolution to my ugly bathroom sink. Sean asks: We just de-Christmased the front room of our 125-year old bungalow in ...

Defector
16 Jan 17:45 • Nicholas Russell

Natan Last Has Thought A Lot About Crosswords

It may seem like they’ve been around forever, but the crossword as we know it is barely a century old. They started in the New York World in 1913, where it was originally called a “word-cross.” Going on to obsess writers like T.S. Eliot and Vladimir Nabokov, who reportedly w...

Defector
16 Jan 17:03 • Ray Ratto

Jonathan Kuminga Is In Basketball Purgatory

It's hard to pinpoint the moment that Jonathan Kuminga first became disenchanted with the Golden State Warriors and their management, so we will have to start the clock with the trade demand that sparked the latest stage in their preposterous standoff. By that reckoning this...

Defector
16 Jan 17:03 • Sabrina Imbler

In The War On Protein, We Have Been Humiliatingly Defeated By Protein

In light of the Trump administration's escalating threats of military action overseas and the militarized occupation of Minneapolis, the administration's announcement on Jan. 11 may have come as a surprise. The White House, it seems, will be ending the war on protein, per a ...