Time for your weekly edition of the Defector Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. And buy Drew’s book, The Night The Lights Went Out, while you’re at it. Today, we're talking about cool stadiums, Danny DeVito, cancelled puddings, and more.
Your letters:
Mike:
As the election draws closer, I’m seeking more distractions. How about a nice Carter story? Please and thank you!!
For people who don’t know, Carter is my dog. He is an extremely lazy dog. He gets up late. He hasn’t walked a full block in over a calendar year. When it’s playtime, he will fetch a toy once and only once before hopping back up onto the couch. He is not amused when we try to dress him in funtime Halloween costumes. He’s a useless piece of shit, which makes him the perfect dog. Whenever we have to get a new dog, I’m gonna have to make sure it’s a dog that’s equally chill. If we get a dog that needs “attention,” I’ll be terribly inconvenienced.
Not that Carter is always so accommodating. Every night after dinner, Carter makes a point of hassling me. I sit in my chair and he gives me the paws because he wants to go out for his final piss before bedtime. Then I sit back down and he gives me the paws again because he wants to jump into my lap so that I can feed him some cheese. So then I have to get up again and grab some cheese cubes from the fridge to get him off of my jock. Then he jumps off of my lap and gives me the paws AGAIN, this time without having any motivation for it. Then I’m like, “What the fuck, dog? This is Dad time now. Your needs have been addressed.” But since he’s a dog, he doesn’t understand any of that.
Meanwhile, the 15-year-old will take on the role of Carter and speak on his behalf. “Give me cheese or I will bite you.” “Don’t call me mangy, that is not appropriate.” “I have to pee again because, umm, I like to pee.” Things like that. And there are moments when I really do take the boy’s Carter impression as the real deal and try to negotiate with the dog to leave me the fuck alone. Then I give up and get more cheese from the fridge.
(I now get a stockpile of cheese from the fridge right after dinner and put it in my pocket to avoid having to get up from my chair repeatedly; asking me to get out of my chair is the single rudest thing you can do to me.)
Tigh:
Do you think NFL coordinators/play-calling will ever be replaced by AI? Can’t imagine we’re too far off from teams using it to at least assist with in-game decision making.
I’m sure the latter is already happening as we speak. Microsoft is a league sponsor, and Microsoft is as invested in AI as any tech giant, if not more so. Will NFL coaches ever let Copilot call a whole game for them? No, because no self-respecting American will ever let a computer do a job that they believe they’re already the best in the universe at. But when it comes to play design, which is way more important than playcalling, you bet your ass they’ll ask a computer what's up. Like I said before, asking AI to write you a letter or paint you a picture is a hollow endeavor. But if you need AI to be your digital pissboy and gather up every defensive trend over the past 24 months and seek out underused-but-effective route combinations, now you’re talking about some shit that the LaFleurs of this world will be interested in.
Because while football coaches are insane, they also want any edge they can find, and they’re more than happy to delegate tedious busywork to someone else, or something else, so that they can spend more time concentrating on big-brain coach shit.
My bestest Vikings friend Matthew Coller got at this when he wrote a history of Pro Football Focus (buy it; it’s got good tea in it). PFF has value for hardcore fans of the NFL, but its value to TEAMS is what earned it national credibility. PFF was the first company to grade every player for every game, and then sculpt advanced metrics out of those grades. More important, PFF was able to isolate video of every play, catalog it, and then make it searchable by player/play/situation. Before that, assistant coaches had to do all of that evaluation and sorting manually, usually at 3:00 a.m. on a Tuesday. Think about what a fucking pain in the ass that would be. Technology obviated the need for that work, and AI could potentially obviate more of it. That’s true across every industry, and it’s why Silicon Valley believes it’s sitting on a growing monster.
But again, useful AI will only ever be allowed to flourish in areas unmonitored by mankind’s collective ego. So the day you see Sean Payton turn over playcalling duties to Gemini is the day I send a campaign donation to JD Vance.
Will:
Danny DeVito is always on my TV, praising Jersey Mike's subs to an unhealthy degree. He is also 4-foot-10. How many footlong subs do you think Danny DeVito could realistically eat in one sitting?
God, I love me some Danny DeVito. Easily our best DeVito. Danny DeVito is so awesome that I’m HAPPY whenever a stupid Jersey Mike’s ad comes on, and I hate every other celebrity in every other ad. Jen Garner alone makes me want Earth to die. But Danny DeVito? That man could post photos of his gross-ass feet on Twitter—and he does!—and I’d still be down with him.
But enough with the fanboy shit. You wanna know how many footlong subs the little man could throw down. Factoring in size and age, I’ll say two. That’s pretty generous, given that 24 inches of sub is a lot of sub. But you and I both know that the human appetite expands to unnatural size when presented with a Mega Italian Molto Meatfest when there’s a football game on. Danny DeVito can do it. He’s just that talented.
Roger:
With a nice bit of warmth hitting the last few days in my area, I have wondered if the term "Indian Summer" is still OK to say?
Nope. You’re gonna have to fall back to saying “unseasonable warmth,” like your local weatherman. You also shouldn’t call Indian pudding “Indian pudding” anymore. You should definitely still eat it though, because it’s AMAZING. Call it Shirley or whatever other woke name you like. I don’t give a shit. Just bring me a gallon of that heavenly püd. I don’t need the racism, just the molasses.
Joe:
What would you put on your vanity plate? Seven characters, alphabet and/or numerals, and you have to consider whether it would draw unwanted attention from the police. If we’ve done this exercise, my apologies. I’ll be hammered until Jan 7, so don’t bother.
My longstanding daydream is to own either a vanity plate or a boat (probably just the vanity plate) with NSFW on it. It doesn’t matter that “NSFW” rarely gets used online anymore, I just want people to know that porny things may be afoot in my vessel. Don’t come a knockin’!
Also, we have to have a chat with states that have license plates which run seven letters with no numbers in them. I have spent way too much time at stoplights trying to read license plates that I only think are vanity plates. MEGOBLS must mean they sell large blouses!
Chris:
Is airport security ever going to get less shitty? Even with TSA Pre, I still dread it. On our recent trip to New Zealand (wife didn’t murder me!), most of the airports had no security checkpoints and it was sublime.
They don’t ask for your boarding pass at security anymore (unless you’re a kid, because you have no ID), so I guess that’s something of an improvement. Otherwise no, I don’t see much changing before I die. The TSA is a needless relic of the George W. Bush presidency, and TSA Pre has made it evident that the whole song and dance of taking off your shoes and taking your iPad out of its case is both wasteful and ineffective. We don’t need this shit to keep us safe anymore, and we likely never did.
But both the government and the overlords at Clear have found a way to monetize these hassles, and neither entity is interested in giving money back. So here it stays. Kamala could vow to end TSA lines today and win all 50 states.
John:
Why isn’t it standardized which side of the car the gas port is on?
Ooh, here’s my chance to point out that every car has a little arrow on the dashboard fuel gauge that tells you which side the port is on. Someone out there is always unaware of this, and it’s super fun to deliver the news to them. Same deal with showing people Reader Mode on Safari. A lot of them have no clue!
Anyway, gas ports aren’t standardized because how a car is engineered factors into the location. If a car’s engine needs more space on the passenger side for its six cylinders (I know nothing about car parts, so roll with me here), then that dictates where the gas port goes. Also, BIG GAS STATION probably wants an even mix of sides so that they can get constant business on either side of the pump. It’s enough to make you think about buying a Tesla before you remember who owns that company.
Michael:
Have you ever had to leap/dive/fall into a bed in order to avoid an injury before sex? And if so, how much did your significant other laugh at you? I'm definitely asking for a friend.
You mean, like, while disrobing for it? I don’t even have to be on the verge of scoring for that to happen. That pratfall is as real as any. You try to remove a pair of jeans while standing, only to realize your folly just as you’re midfall. Not a fun moment. And yeah, I’ve stumbled onto the bed before sex. When I do, I just pretend it didn’t happen. Nothing will keep any man from closing the deal in such an instance. I’m strictly about touchdowns and not field goals.
Cory:
Was there a time when sports radio was good?
Oh there have always been good shows if you look hard enough. I make fun of Mike & the Mad Dog all the time (despite that show going off the air in 2008), but it was legitimately great radio. I also loved the Sports Reporters (no, not that one) on DC radio earlier this century. If you have hosts who are good at talking, and a “colorful” assortment of regulars phoning in, then you’ve got solid companionship. That’s true now, and it was true back when Goonie & The Cock were your only drivetime option.
Most of those quality sports talk shows have since immigrated to podcasts, but Paul Finebaum is still on terrestrial airwaves, and PAWWWWL still has a neverending supply of dudes named “Bullet” who call in after pounding 30 beers to detail how they’d murder Kalen DeBoer if they ever came face to face with him. Sports talk radio is like any other art form: you have to hunt around for the good stuff. Did I mention that David Roth and I host a sports podcast called The Distraction? Wow! That sounds amazing!
Shane:
What are the pros and cons if we kill the internet?
This is not aimed at Shane since he asked your question objectively, but “The internet was a mistake” is the doomer take that I hate the most. Don’t go online just to tell me how bad online is. Go fucking live in a cabin if you think analog living is the answer to everything. I’ll stay here and remain gainfully employed, you fucking baby.
Now for Shane’s question, let’s break it down listicle style.
PROS OF KILLING OFF THE WEB:
- No more brands trying to be cute online
- No more online abuse/bullying
- No more YouTube parody clips
- Our worst conspiracy theorists get their oxygen supply cut off
- Artists, musicians especially, would get fairly compensated for their work again
- Lessened risk of an Uber driver groping you
- People would be more likely to leave the house and talk to one another
- Porn would go back to being special again
- Less white noise in your head to start, fill, and end your day, every day
- More people doing business face to face, which makes it harder for those same people to lay off employees en masse
- Instant decrease in fossil fuel usage thanks to the end of crypto
- Fewer conversations killed by people Googling answers to shit
- No more learning about people like Hawk Tuah
- No more Zoom calls
- More hand-written communiqués
- More time for fucking
CONS OF KILLING OFF THE WEB:
- I’d lose my job
- You would also lose your job
- We’d all have to buy CDs again if we want to listen to stuff
- All of that cool, free porn gone in an instant
- No more YouTube TV (I love YouTube TV)
- If you’re stuck in a small town, you’re REALLY stuck in a small town
- No one to talk to during the next pandemic lockdown
- No more ordering Seamless when you’re drunk as shit
- No more Defector
- No more peaceful online communities where you can find people who are interested in this one niche thing that you thought you alone might be interested in
- No more instant access to the collective knowledge of the world
- Increased car and air travel
- You’d have to actually go to your high school reunion to see what that one girl looks like these days
I think that covers all of it. Anyway, the internet is good. Take it from a guy who’s had to wind dozens of cassette tapes using a pencil. [Kamala voice] We are not going back.
Brian:
If you go into a men's room to take a piss and all of the urinals are taken/broken, do you close the stall door when you pee? Seems to be about 50/50 where I work. I myself am a door closer.
I’m not consistent, which is to my detriment. Because why NOT close that door when you piss? You’re guaranteeing yourself a bit of solitude, and you’re eliminating the risk of Seabass the trucker kicking an ajar stall door directly into your butt because he didn’t know someone was already in there. But sometimes I’m lazy, and I think I can get away with leaving the stall door open because I won’t be that long (or because I’m high). This is always a mistake, even if I don’t get got. It takes all of half a second to close that stall. My dick can wait.
Greg:
If an ad agency offered you any car free with the following conditions, would you take it? Rolls Royce, Porsche, Lexus SUV, even a Prius if you want. Free gas, insurance, and maintenance too. The conditions are:
-It has to be painted like a Cheetos bag. Not subtly, we're talking the whole car bumper to bumper, bright orange, cartoon cheetah, etc.
-Your name has to be on it, in big letters, saying, "Drew Magary loves Cheetos!”
-You have to drive it at least 10,000 miles a year. No handing it off to your kids.
-You have to commit to five years.
I hate the idea of cheating on my beloved Hyundai, but I’d take this deal on the spot. Because I DO love Cheetos. They’re the perfect snack. Unimpeachable. I’d gladly scream, "Drew Magary loves Cheetos!” without being paid for it, that’s how much I love Cheetos. And if I had a bright orange car with Chester decals on both sides, I’d never lose my car in any parking garage (true story: took me half an hour to find my car after I attended a Megalopolis screening in Tysons Corner). Also, 10,000 miles a year is nothing. It’s the minimum number of miles you put in when you’re fudging your tax return. I wouldn’t even have to drive the Cheeto car full-time to hit that mark. I could just use it for selected road trips. Everyone would point and stare, but not in a Cybertruck way. Gimme a top of the line Mercedes (Frito Lay pays for maintenance) and I’ll ride that fucker until it’s dust at the bottom of the bag.
My wife and kids will object to this arrangement. In fact, they’d be mortified if Dad ever became the Cheeto Car guy. They’ll get over it. Make me an offer, Chester. You might be surprised.
Jamie:
I gather you also love to fritter away time with online Yahtzee. Let’s talk strategy. What’s the deal with getting several early full houses and then never getting one when you’re trying?
I hate full houses in Yahtzee. They’re just like the large straight, where you either get it on a magical first roll, or you never get it at all. Even worse, an early full house forces you to choose between 25 free points and stockpiling at the top of the card so that you can get your bonus. I almost always opt for the latter, because getting that stupid bonus is the key to victory. One time I did this in front of my sister-in-law and she CHEERED me. She was like, “Yes! I love passing on the full house!” Me too, sister girl. If I have to zero out a box, and I know that I have to keep the Yahtzee box open, I’m usually gonna zero out the full house box first. Or the quad box. A lot of people zero out the Ones, but that usually ends up having deeply annoying consequences when I’m trying to snag that bonus. If you don’t play Yahtzee on your phone 20 times a day like I do, please ignore this entire paragraph.
Dennis:
Let’s say you’re an actor, would you rather be a highly paid corporate mascot (like Flo, Mayhem guy, Mr. Whipple), or a mid-level character actor doing critically acclaimed films but always wondering where your next role is coming from?
Mayhem guy is Dean Winters, who had a role on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. So you can be a corporate mascot AND a That Guy actor all in one go. But let’s say God points a gun at my head, as God is wont to do, and is like, “No! You must choose one career path or the other!” In that case, I’m taking the ad money. You just saw me take a free car from Cheetos, and cars aren’t worth jack shit long term. I also do live read ads on The Distraction for bread kit apps, and all I get from that is free bread! I’m a whore, and I won’t be shamed for it.
A while ago, I would’ve taken the “acclaimed character actor” option because I believed that prominent character actors made a shitload of money, much like anonymous relief pitchers do. Then I read Dave Itzkoff’s biography of Robin Williams (highly recommended) and learned that Williams, one of the biggest movie stars of my lifetime, took a role on the quickly cancelled CBS sitcom The Crazy Ones (co-starring Sarah Michelle Gellar) because he needed the money. Robin Williams needed the money. I know that Williams had lingering debts from both addiction and divorce when he took that role, but still. I need enough money to ensure that I can do as much cocaine and get as many divorces as I please. That’s how you win at life.
Richard:
I watched Greg Zuerlein doink two field goals and it got me thinking… it's gotta be way harder to hit the upright than to actually make a field goal, right? Like, the uprights are only like four inches wide. What if there were a rule that you could declare you were aiming for the upright and, if you hit it, you got six points? Can you imagine the drama?
I want less kicking in my football, not more of it, so real-world me has to shoot this proposal down. Also, doinks are more amusing when they hurt a team and not when they help. Ask anyone who watched Matt Nagy coach the Bears. A doink is the sound of failure resonating across a packed stadium. I love doinks just the way are.
But let’s go to Imaginationland and test out Richard’s idea. If you’re gonna reward teams for hitting the goalpost, you need to go full carnival and assign different point values to different parts of it. If you hit the top half of an upright, that’s two points (five points if the kick is good after the doink). Bottom half and crossbar, one. Stanchion? Twenty points, so long as the ball doesn’t hit the ground first. NOW we’ve got ourselves some drama.
Chaz:
What is the coolest stadium in America? Not the best stadium or the nicest stadium, but the coolest stadium. This thought crossed my mind while in Chicago to run the marathon and I passed Solider Field, because while it’s not a good stadium, it’s cool as hell that it has an ancient facade and the guts of a somewhat modern stadium, plus it’s actually downtown on a lake.
Yeah but the renovations they made to Soldier Field ruined it. They kept the façade but then dropped an airport terminal on top of it, so now it looks like Soldier Field walked out the door wearing mismatched socks. This is why Matt Eberflus calls for an O-lineman dive at the least opportune time to do so. The NFL’s thirst for luxury stadiums has essentially rendered cool old football stadiums of yore—Soldier Field, RFK, the Astrodome—obsolete. Only Lambeau remains, and I guess that’s a cool stadium if you don’t hate the Packers as much as I do. Otherwise, we need to venture outside of the NFL to find active stadiums that are still cool. Here are a few choices:
- The Rose Bowl
- Wrigley Field
- Fenway Park
- Madison Square Garden
- The Yale Bowl
- Tiger Stadium (LSU)
For my money though, the coolest stadium still standing is Dodger Stadium. I’m not saying that because I’m a Dodgers fan (I’m not), or because the Dodgers are about to win the World Series. I’m saying it because Dodger Stadium is fucking gorgeous, and always will be.
MSG takes second place.
Jack:
Are you good at typing on your phone? I'm a fast typer on a normal keyboard, but it takes me forever to type anything on my phone and I try to avoid anything but the shortest texts when I have to use that feature. It seems like the people who can type quickly on a phone use their thumbs, but that skill eludes me, maybe because I was already super proficient with a keyboard before smartphones were invented and my brain is just hardwired for that now.
Ditto. I fucking hate typing on a virtual keypad. I’ll get up from my chair and type stuff on my desktop PC if I know I have to write a lot of text. It’s not worth doing it on my phone. I require the tactile pleasures that only an analog keyboard provides.
Email of the week!
Mike:
I selected a few snippets from your answers in the last FUNBAG! and went ahead and put them into a track listing for your next album. Which one is Kid Rock going to mix with a Molly Hatchet song for his next #1 hit?
- @RizzGirl68
- Dipshit In My Feed
- Eberflus’ Ass
- Asshole Full of Sauerkraut
- Ruminating Over the Epidemic of Hyperbole in Digital Society
- Pissing and Moaning
- A Better Poker Face Than a Dead Man
- Oakland Quake
- So Many Taters
- Partial Shart
It’s No. 7 and I think you know that.
