The Journalist vs. The Interviewer, with Adam Friedland

The host of “The Adam Friedland Show” is here to come out of the closet as the secret inspiration for one of PTFO’s most controversial episodes. Also: Pablo and Adam’s (real) LSAT scores; loving Kobe; telling Kobe how your ass tastes; @perfectbooties; if LeBron is the Millennial Michael Jordan; the secrets of good interviewing; calling Tony Kornheiser; photo shoots; campus protests; dunking on Chris Cuomo; Jonathan Livingston Seagull; cucking Richard Nixon; and value premises. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:23Speaker 01

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• 0:56Speaker 02

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• 1:40Speaker 02

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• 2:08Pablo Torre?

  Israel.

• 2:08Speaker 02

  Justice. Okay.

• 2:13Pablo Torre?

  Just kidding.

• 2:15Speaker 02

  Right after this ad.

• 2:22Speaker 04

  How's your summer been? Good?

• 2:24Pablo Torre?

  It's good. It's good, man.

• 2:25Speaker 04

  You've been working the whole time?

• 2:26Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:28Speaker 04

  I just finally took a break.

• 2:30Pablo Torre?

  I was gonna say, but you're, you're, you're in the midst of like prepping your Frost Nixon.

• 2:37Speaker 04

  Well, I had Frost yesterday.

• 2:38Pablo Torre?

  Oh.

• 2:40Speaker 04

  I had the millennial congressman Frost. Do you know him? Maxwell Frost?

• 2:45Pablo Torre?

  Oh, that's, that's a real thing.

• 2:46Speaker 04

  That boy a freak.

• 2:48Pablo Torre?

  Oh.

• 2:49Speaker 04

  Like did 25. The first year you can get elected.

• 2:53Pablo Torre?

  I just Googled him. I recognize this person.

• 2:55Speaker 04

  He's the first young bull that like, cause they, the Democratic Party like shanks any other child, like young, you know, like Zorron.

• 3:03Pablo Torre?

  Yes.

• 3:04Speaker 04

  Um, they don't want any new talent. They just want like, you know.

• 3:08Pablo Torre?

  So he, he made it.

• 3:09Speaker 04

  They want Sméagol and whatever.

• 3:11Pablo Torre?

  He made, he's their precious.

• 3:13Speaker 04

  And I think that he's the one that's not, that got through. He's like progressive. Are we, are we on the show?

• 3:19Pablo Torre?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 3:20Speaker 04

  We're going?

• 3:21Pablo Torre?

  Is that okay?

• 3:22Speaker 04

  I didn't know. Do you, you did the sneak attack on me?

• 3:24Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, I did.

• 3:25Speaker 04

  Dude, I have, um, I have studio envy right now.

• 3:28Pablo Torre?

  You, hold on.

• 3:29Speaker 04

  Cause you came to me first and I'm like, voila Pablo.

• 3:33Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, it's a full-on theater. You have a, you have a mid-century showroom of a theater.

• 3:39Speaker 04

  This is the most gorgeous, you have 27 people behind the camera.

• 3:42Pablo Torre?

  That's right.

• 3:43Speaker 04

  I feel like.

• 3:43Pablo Torre?

  A multiracial rainbow coalition that we've assembled here to surround you.

• 3:48Speaker 04

  Is it every single race is represented? The United Nations.

• 3:52Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, the DNA test would indicate.

• 3:54Speaker 04

  You have the flags everywhere.

• 3:55Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, we have a, we have a rice cooker with a soccer ball in it.

• 3:57Speaker 04

  Oh, nice.

• 3:58Pablo Torre?

  Check that out.

• 3:58Speaker 04

  Can we restart?

• 3:59Pablo Torre?

  This is mostly what I do.

• 4:01Speaker 04

  Can we restart? So welcome to Pablo, Pablo Torre finds out. Um, my guest today, Pablo Torre, Adam Friedland here.

• 4:10Speaker 04

  We're like, we're quite good friends. We're coming out of the closet as friends today.

• 4:14Pablo Torre?

  You did something when I left your studio.

• 4:17Speaker 04

  I farted?

• 4:18Pablo Torre?

  No.

• 4:19Speaker 04

  I've been holding it in the whole time.

• 4:20Pablo Torre?

  I don't know if you even caught this, because I did, and I was like...

• 4:24Speaker 04

  Is it embarrassing?

• 4:25Pablo Torre?

  No, no, no, you just said, you said on the way out. I was in there, you were premiering the Sarah Jessica Parker episode, which was...

• 4:31Speaker 04

  Okay, so you're like, as I said, the president of girls. So, or like, you're like, you know, you're the number one. You're the reluctant leader. Yes, father of the country. So I just want to ask you, as your majesty, your highness. Mom. What the answer is to some questions I have about girls. Okay. Okay. So when they say, "Take these fries away from me," are you supposed to physically do it? Or do they like, do they say they taste good? Oh. I don't know what to do. Yeah, fabulous.

• 5:00Pablo Torre?

  Really, the peak. It's a hard thing to sum it.

• 5:04Speaker 04

  The peak is not nice?

• 5:06Pablo Torre?

  Well...

• 5:07Speaker 04

  Oh my god. Your peak, well, your peak was the Frost-Nixon over with, in L.A.

• 5:12Pablo Torre?

  Oh, sure.

• 5:13Speaker 04

  With the king of Boston.

• 5:15Pablo Torre?

  That's right. Fair.

• 5:17Speaker 04

  Okay, let's start again. Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out.

• 5:20Pablo Torre?

  You told me on the way out, you were like, "Love ya."

• 5:24Speaker 04

  Oh, I say, "I love you a lot."

• 5:25Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, and I said...

• 5:26Speaker 04

  It's embarrassing. Oh, you have issues with that?

• 5:30Pablo Torre?

  No, I just didn't know if this was, I was kind of calibrating, like, is that... Am I one of many people who he tells that to?

• 5:37Speaker 04

  Oh, I'm a slut. Yeah, yeah, I'm a hoe. Yeah, uh, no, no, no.

• 5:41Pablo Torre?

  What's your body count on the "I love you"?

• 5:43Speaker 04

  Oh my god, I'm Chamberlain. Yeah, Neville Chamberlain, not Will. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Uh, no, uh, I, it slips out, yeah. It slips out.

• 5:54Pablo Torre?

  I, genuinely, I...

• 5:55Speaker 04

  It's only to guys, though.

• 5:56Pablo Torre?

  Felt great.

• 5:57Speaker 04

  It's only to guys.

• 5:57Pablo Torre?

  Felt great.

• 5:58Speaker 04

  I can't say, you can't say it to like, a platonic female friend, but...

• 6:01Pablo Torre?

  Not anymore.

• 6:02Speaker 04

  Not anymore, not in this, not in this culture, yeah.

• 6:05Pablo Torre?

  That's right.

• 6:06Speaker 04

  Thanks for having me, dude.

• 6:07Pablo Torre?

  Dude, it's funny that you have been...

• 6:10Speaker 04

  Can we call Kornheiser?

• 6:13Pablo Torre?

  I will call Tony Kornheiser at the very end of the episode.

• 6:17Speaker 04

  No way.

• 6:18Pablo Torre?

  Yes, and we'll see what happens. We'll just see what happens.

• 6:19Speaker 04

  Will he pick her?

• 6:20Pablo Torre?

  We'll find out.

• 6:21Speaker 04

  I...

• 6:21Pablo Torre?

  We will authentically find out together.

• 6:23Speaker 04

  I'm not gonna be able to stop thinking about it until the end of the episode.

• 6:43Pablo Torre?

  Football is upon us. Saturday college kickoffs. Sundays, of course, it's the pros. Surfside iced teas and lemonades plus vodka. They got you covered. And it is not a seltzer. How dare you suggest that? It's Surfside. It's 100 calories, 2 grams of sugar, no bubbles. So just ask for Surfside wherever you stock up for tailgates or watch parties or post-game hangs. You gotta be 21 plus, obviously, but please, please, drink responsibly. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. With Apple Card, you earn unlimited daily cash back on everyday purchases like groceries or merch or tickets to the game. Plus, it can be used anywhere MasterCard is accepted. No matter your team, no matter where you shop,

• 7:27Pablo Torre?

  Apple Card is here to help you tackle game day. Apply in the Wallet app on your iPhone today. Subject to credit approval. Apple Card is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank, USA, Salt Lake City Branch. Terms and more at applecard.com.

• 7:44Speaker 05

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• 8:29Speaker 05

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• 8:42Speaker 06

  Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.

• 8:56Speaker 04

  People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.

• 9:07Speaker 06

  And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.

• 9:12Speaker 07

  One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.

• 9:18Speaker 06

  So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.

• 9:44Pablo Torre?

  I want to convey to people that you are.

• 9:47Speaker 04

  Voice of a generation.

• 9:50Pablo Torre?

  Many people will be excited that you're here. Others, I think, should be introduced to you, maybe.

• 9:56Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 9:56Pablo Torre?

  I.

• 9:57Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 9:58Pablo Torre?

  I want to establish that, you know, various headlines that may have appeared in GQ and otherwise.

• 10:04Speaker 04

  Not true.

• 10:05Pablo Torre?

  I mean, there are photo spreads that indicate all of it.

• 10:07Speaker 04

  Very embarrassing photos.

• 10:09Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. What was the headline? I want to get it right.

• 10:13Speaker 04

  Is he the millennial Adolf Hitler?

• 10:16Pablo Torre?

  I believe it was Adam Friedland could be the millennial Jon Stewart. Period.

• 10:22Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 10:23Pablo Torre?

  Because you want that question mark?

• 10:24Speaker 04

  That's as far as I read. Actually, I read the first sentence. Or the first, the beginning of the article I read. And then I was like, I got scared and nauseous. I watched my girlfriend read it. I was like, is it a hit? Where's the hit? She's like, no hits so far. And then, it's long, right?

• 10:40Pablo Torre?

  It's very, it's exhaustive. And it's very, it is rightfully complimentary.

• 10:45Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 10:46Pablo Torre?

  I would say that.

• 10:46Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 10:47Pablo Torre?

  Your lip is quivering in the photo spread with.

• 10:53Pablo Torre?

  Again, just a real crackling masculine emotional openness.

• 10:58Speaker 04

  I saw those, they made me take the picture on the floor. Like the sexy one, I was like, can you not use it? And they used it as the main one. I stopped the floor part. I was like, I'm not, can we not do this? And then they used it the main one.

• 11:10Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, they're like, can you get that elbow crook at 45 degrees?

• 11:14Speaker 04

  I got basically every comedian's group chat just, I instantly knew. I was like, everyone's killing me right now. People text me, they were like, this is terrible. You look, I hate this.

• 11:26Pablo Torre?

  I had a photo taken in the studio, right over there in front of that vortex for New York Magazine. And they had me do a pose at the very end. And I was like, can you just like hold your?

• 11:36Speaker 04

  Come on.

• 11:37Pablo Torre?

  Your chin in your hand? And I was like, ah, they're not gonna use this.

• 11:42Speaker 04

  And they used it?

• 11:43Pablo Torre?

  And then I looked like, you know, Professor X.

• 11:46Speaker 04

  Sexy, so one of the sexiest guys.

• 11:47Pablo Torre?

  You know, Dr. Evil.

• 11:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, Pinoy Evil.

• 11:50Pablo Torre?

  Yeah. You are genuinely beyond being host of Come Town, which is a show that I can't even begin to explain here.

• 11:57Speaker 04

  It was like a comedy podcast, yeah, with Nick and stuff.

• 12:00Pablo Torre?

  Super, super influential. And this is very sincere, a super influential, wildly successful, generationally identifying, unscripted improvisational podcast with you and two friends.

• 12:13Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was like, um, we just acted like children for an hour, yeah. It was a comedy podcast that we did for a while. And I'd never, we didn't listen, I'd never listened to it at the time. And on YouTube, they're like fan-generated clip comps. And I've listened to it since and I was like, it was so funny. We thought it was terrible at the time. We're like, that sucked. But, uh, yeah, it was so funny, I guess, yeah.

• 12:37Pablo Torre?

  Turns out, turns out they were, the fan, the fan clip accounts were on to something.

• 12:42Speaker 04

  I think.

• 12:43Pablo Torre?

  The fan cams, the Adam fan cams were on to something.

• 12:46Speaker 04

  We had a no media policy that Nick instituted quite, quite intelligently.

• 12:50Pablo Torre?

  I didn't appreciate this.

• 12:51Speaker 04

  And, well, also the name prohibited us from like, I think the, we were like, said like a podcast whose name we can't write in, in this fine publication. And, uh, and we, I, I guess that's how the show grew, right? So, cause like, cause of, the fans are making these like compilations. We had no idea at the time. It was cool.

• 13:10Pablo Torre?

  It's the best thing you can ask for.

• 13:12Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 13:12Pablo Torre?

  It's organic.

• 13:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, a street team, if you will.

• 13:16Pablo Torre?

  Yes, a volunteer army.

• 13:19Speaker 04

  Yes, a volunteer army of ugly men, yes.

• 13:22Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, your proud boys were dressed.

• 13:24Speaker 04

  Come on, dude. No, it was hot, six pack guys. It was sexy.

• 13:29Pablo Torre?

  Also, like our staff, a multiracial coalition of very proud boys.

• 13:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 13:34Pablo Torre?

  But I say all that to say that the show that you do now that I visited, it's not that, and it is something that I love.

• 13:43Speaker 04

  Thanks, bro.

• 13:44Pablo Torre?

  And part of what I love about it genuinely is the sincerity of effort that I witnessed that is quite real.

• 13:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 13:54Pablo Torre?

  You're putting work into this and it's not, let me sit down to see what happens. It's like, no, you're prepping and you're structuring and you're producing.

• 14:01Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was like, I think it was the first time I tried in my life. Thirty-five, I decided to try. Well, it was the first time I tried since the LSAT.

• 14:10Pablo Torre?

  Oh, God.

• 14:11Speaker 04

  You told me you were gonna tell me.

• 14:12Pablo Torre?

  Oh, [BLEEP].

• 14:13Speaker 04

  What is it?

• 14:13Pablo Torre?

  That's right.

• 14:14Speaker 04

  What was yours?

• 14:15Pablo Torre?

  This is an exclusive. I've never said this.

• 14:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, what was yours?

• 14:17Pablo Torre?

  I've said it a lot. The first time I got the LSAT.

• 14:20Speaker 04

  You went to heart, I mean.

• 14:21Pablo Torre?

  No, so I took it, so the legend.

• 14:23Speaker 04

  I took three.

• 14:24Pablo Torre?

  You took three?

• 14:24Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 14:25Pablo Torre?

  I took two.

• 14:26Speaker 04

  Three, but the second time, I thought I, my second cousin is a psychiatrist, so I told my parents I needed Vyvanse, which is like the most intense ADD medication. And I was like, it's gonna make me smart. And it turns out, being on drugs, that my score was not enhanced, so, yeah. Okay, what, one, two, three, one sixty-nine.

• 14:54Pablo Torre?

  Oh, wow. One sixty-one, that's what I got the first time.

• 14:59Speaker 04

  No, no, the first time.

• 15:00Pablo Torre?

  Oh, yeah.

• 15:01Speaker 04

  One sixty-one.

• 15:02Pablo Torre?

  One sixty-one.

• 15:02Speaker 04

  Okay, and the final time.

• 15:05Pablo Torre?

  Was that, wait, did you say your score the second time?

• 15:08Speaker 04

  No, the second time is a wash.

• 15:10Pablo Torre?

  What does that mean?

• 15:11Speaker 04

  The, cuz I was on drugs.

• 15:13Pablo Torre?

  Oh, okay, so you asterisked.

• 15:14Speaker 04

  I was drunk.

• 15:15Pablo Torre?

  That season.

• 15:15Speaker 04

  Yes, okay, I was on PED, I thought it was PEDs, but it was a. You're getting nervous again. I'm getting the same nervous.

• 15:23Pablo Torre?

  I know. This is real.

• 15:24Speaker 04

  I got the dinosaur game, my third time, if [bleep] my ass. I would have been the president of the United States if it wasn't for the dinosaur game. No one knows what we're talking about.

• 15:33Pablo Torre?

  If you don't know, so I recently learned that on the LSAT, the most, the thing that I consider, we both considered clearly the most fearsome section, is logic games.

• 15:43Speaker 04

  I was, no, once you figure out the system, that you know they took them off for these snowflakes.

• 15:47Pablo Torre?

  That's what I was about to say, that they're gone now.

• 15:49Speaker 04

  I can't believe it.

• 15:50Pablo Torre?

  That's [bleep], I mean, it's just...

• 15:51Speaker 04

  We should go to law school together.

• 15:53Pablo Torre?

  We should retroactively, we should get our stats adjusted.

• 15:56Speaker 04

  We should leave our women and...

• 15:59Pablo Torre?

  And start a personal injury law firm together.

• 16:01Speaker 04

  Excessive plastic surgery, start over in a new town.

• 16:05Pablo Torre?

  We pose for photos at very particular angles.

• 16:08Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 16:08Pablo Torre?

  And put them on billboards.

• 16:09Speaker 04

  I think we just wrote a movie.

• 16:11Pablo Torre?

  I got a 161 the first time.

• 16:12Speaker 04

  Okay, same.

• 16:13Pablo Torre?

  And then I, really?

• 16:15Speaker 04

  Literally same.

• 16:16Pablo Torre?

  Oh my god. Okay, this is getting, this is very relatable so far.

• 16:19Speaker 04

  So you know what, you beat me or you didn't beat me last time?

• 16:21Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, I got a 171 the second time.

• 16:24Speaker 04

  Whatever, dude.

• 16:25Pablo Torre?

  So.

• 16:26Speaker 04

  So you think you're better than me?

• 16:28Pablo Torre?

  I didn't need that to know.

• 16:29Speaker 04

  Did you apply? Did you apply?

• 16:31Pablo Torre?

  No, no, no, no, I never did.

• 16:32Speaker 04

  Oh, I did. I deferred twice to do, and I told my parents I wanted to explore my stand-up comedy.

• 16:40Pablo Torre?

  Oh, man.

• 16:41Speaker 04

  It was really embarrassing. I came out of the closet as a clown to my parents. And my father said he was gonna sue me, and I said, "That's not how the courts work." He's like, "You promised us you'd be a lawyer." And yeah, so then, and then I told my parents this is what God has sent me on. It's, oh god, it's nauseating to remember that. I think I was too lazy to do law school, so I started doing stand-up comedy. It's, what a stupid idea. What a [bleep] millennial, like, what, to tell my parents I want to be a, I'm not even good at stand-up comedy.

• 17:16Pablo Torre?

  I told my parents I wanted to be a sports writer.

• 17:18Speaker 04

  That's a real job.

• 17:19Pablo Torre?

  I don't think it's that much more real than clown.

• 17:23Speaker 04

  I'm so jealous of that job. No, because there's actually, you get paid by a company.

• 17:28Pablo Torre?

  That's true.

• 17:28Speaker 04

  I was getting drink tickets for 10 years, yeah, and working as a paralegal, my real passion. Anyway, to go back to what we were saying initially.

• 17:37Pablo Torre?

  Which was?

• 17:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, we, we kind of, we changed the show and Nick, it was Nick Mullins, credit to him. I like, this is how everything happened. Like, it would start as a joke, because I was the least popular, I was the schmuck of Come Town. And we're like, what if we made the least popular guy in Come Town into like a public intellectual Dick Cavett-esque um, uh, talk show host? And then it kind of became a real thing. I kind of started to enjoy doing interviews and now we're three years in and yeah, now the show's, you know.

• 18:10Pablo Torre?

  And now you're like really good friends with Chris Cuomo.

• 18:13Speaker 04

  I think Joe's got it.

• 18:14Speaker 08

  Really?

• 18:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, he's sick.

• 18:15Speaker 08

  Are you gonna vote for Joe Biden?

• 18:17Speaker 04

  I think-

• 18:17Speaker 08

  When you say he's sick, you mean that he's dying?

• 18:19Speaker 04

  No, I think he's awesome.

• 18:21Speaker 08

  Oh.

• 18:21Speaker 04

  He's got a, he has a corvette and stuff. Uh, I don't know, I, well, see, yeah, I think, I think, I don't know.

• 18:27Pablo Torre?

  I love the dynamic, genuinely.

• 18:29Speaker 04

  Yeah, well, I mean, uh, yeah, I did a show on, uh, News Nation.

• 18:35Pablo Torre?

  You have been, I, so-

• 18:36Speaker 04

  I was on a panel with Andrew Yang and I could just tell that I don't think me and Andrew Yang liked each other.

• 18:41Pablo Torre?

  I don't, I did not get the sense that you guys were vibing.

• 18:44Speaker 04

  He, well, because he was, they were telling me what antis, that the campus protests are, uh, kill it, that they're killing people at Columbia or something, it was insane.

• 18:53Speaker 08

  This isn't just about antisemitism, it is about the growth of fundamentalism in America. When you have kids who are openly pro Hamas, it's not just antisemitism. And, uh, you guys are gonna have to vote and donate in a different way and not forget who was for you and who wasn't.

• 19:10Speaker 04

  You gotta, you gotta stop with the kids. As the Jew on the panel, Andrew, you're Jewish or no?

• 19:16Speaker 08

  No, I'm Jewish.

• 19:17Speaker 04

  I'll, I'll say this right now.

• 19:18Speaker 09

  I'm Jewish.

• 19:19Speaker 04

  We're acting as if kids are protesting at a, at a college and it's the first time ever.

• 19:24Speaker 08

  No.

• 19:24Speaker 04

  I mean, we gave 25 billion dollars to a war and kids are protesting it. It's not pro Hamas. It's the most normal thing in the world.

• 19:31Speaker 09

  Some of them are very pro Hamas.

• 19:33Speaker 04

  No, it's not, they're kids.

• 19:34Speaker 09

  And there is anti, and it was violent on some of these-

• 19:37Speaker 04

  Oh, okay, listen guys-

• 19:38Speaker 08

  People are being attacked and killed, I mean, you know, this has gotten very, very-

• 19:42Speaker 09

  And it's hateful.

• 19:43Speaker 08

  There's nothing wrong with being against what's happening in Gaza, but I'm just telling you, I've never seen Americans support terrorists.

• 19:49Speaker 04

  I don't think that 18-year-old, like, kids are, uh, the problem right now.

• 19:57Pablo Torre?

  Guys, I got a 169 on the LSAT.

• 19:58Speaker 04

  I got a 169, Yang. Okay, I got a 169, Yang. How much money does that get me every year? Um, no.

• 20:07Speaker 04

  So we started this talk show and now I do interviews and it's been really fun. And tomorrow's a big one, but we're not gonna say what it is.

• 20:12Pablo Torre?

  I was gonna say, well, that's the Nixon part of the Frost Nixon, uh, you know.

• 20:18Speaker 04

  He's my favorite, he's my favorite president. In terms of the writing, the writing on Nixon is the best.

• 20:24Pablo Torre?

  The writing about?

• 20:25Speaker 04

  The, the screenwriting of that character is, he's, he's incredible, uh, guy. Do you know about, um, he's a guy that just lost his whole life and everyone was like, ugh, you're Richard Nixon. He beat Kennedy and then the, America was like, we'd rather have a papist. We'd rather let a papist with a criminal, like, steal an election than Richard Nixon. Yeah, he was like, uh, he looked ugly at that debate.

• 20:51Pablo Torre?

  You think JFK benefited from pretty privilege?

• 20:54Speaker 04

  No, I think he benefited from dead people in Illinois voting for him, probably. What, okay, but here's the best, one of the best Nixons, I'll give you right now.

• 21:04Pablo Torre?

  Okay.

• 21:05Speaker 04

  When he, he liked Pat, who became his wife. And he, he was like, um, oh, you, you wanna go out with me? And she was like, uh, no, like you, you're Richard Nixon. And he was like, well, can I chaperone you on dates with other guys? And he did it for 18 months.

• 21:23Pablo Torre?

  Richard Nixon?

• 21:24Speaker 04

  That's great writing.

• 21:25Pablo Torre?

  Cucked himself.

• 21:26Speaker 04

  Well, no, he got Pat.

• 21:27Pablo Torre?

  To win her heart.

• 21:28Speaker 04

  He broke her, I mean, she broke, she, yeah, she eventually was like, I'll be with Richard Nixon, I guess, but yeah. He was, he's, I think.

• 21:36Pablo Torre?

  I visited, I did, I was at a wedding in, in California and it was within driving distance of the presidential.

• 21:43Speaker 04

  Did you go?

• 21:43Pablo Torre?

  Yes.

• 21:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, we love Nixon.

• 21:45Pablo Torre?

  Oh, I, I got, I got a shirt of him shaking Elvis's hand, that one.

• 21:49Speaker 04

  That one, Elvis was on, Fat Elvis, yeah, the anti-drug thing, right?

• 21:54Pablo Torre?

  I believe that's, that must be why Elvis was there.

• 21:57Speaker 04

  Yeah, and he was on a ton of like, speed at the time and fat somehow.

• 22:01Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, he has the, I mean, he has.

• 22:04Speaker 04

  Which is such a funny idea, is that like, the kids are gonna like Elvis to tell them not to do drugs, so like.

• 22:10Pablo Torre?

  This is the, this is exactly why he was there. So, King of Rock and Roll visited the White House in 1970 with one goal, this is a subhead of an article, to have Nixon grant him a federal narc badge.

• 22:24Pablo Torre?

  Which is, that's the, that's the movie.

• 22:26Speaker 04

  That's a Shaquille O'Neal move. Yeah.

• 22:29Pablo Torre?

  Like how Shaq was deputized by Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

• 22:33Speaker 04

  Where's Arpaio at? Oh, he's dead. I think he died. Sheriff Joe. Mariposa. We're just hanging out right now.

• 22:40Pablo Torre?

  Googling.

• 22:41Speaker 04

  This is how we talk to each other. We change the subject every two sentences.

• 22:45Pablo Torre?

  Sheriff Joe Arpaio is 93 years old and thriving.

• 22:48Speaker 04

  Good for him. You guys are gonna enjoy Pablo and I changing the subject 17 times. Saying you remember this guy. Do you remember Mookie Blaylock? Do you, yeah, yeah. John Olarud. Well, this will, this will cut down.

• 23:00Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, yeah, definitely. We're definitely gonna exhaustively trim this.

• 23:04Speaker 04

  So what's up? How you doing? Can we call coordinate?

• 23:09Pablo Torre?

  Do you consider yourself a journalist now?

• 23:12Speaker 04

  I don't know. What is it? You know, you didn't go to J school?

• 23:16Pablo Torre?

  No.

• 23:16Speaker 04

  What are like the rules of it?

• 23:18Pablo Torre?

  Well, that's part of the problem.

• 23:19Speaker 04

  Have I broken any of the rules?

• 23:20Pablo Torre?

  I don't know. But I think part of the issue is that there is no good answer that's widely known to that question. Like, what, what does it take? There are certainly, the Columbia Journalism School has a philosophy on it. Various other august institutions have journalism programs.

• 23:39Speaker 04

  So there's no like DSM of like the rules?

• 23:42Pablo Torre?

  Yeah. Is there a 700 page text that tells you whether you're clinically a journalist?

• 23:47Speaker 04

  So, so no one, I mean, but there are journalistic ethics, right?

• 23:51Pablo Torre?

  Yes, yes.

• 23:52Speaker 04

  Right, yeah. I mean, you've worked for news organizations like ESPN before.

• 23:58Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, Sports Illustrated is where I started.

• 23:59Speaker 04

  That's like a real publication, right? And they, who taught you the rules then? Who's your, who's your guru?

• 24:05Pablo Torre?

  Funny thing is that like, so my first job, the job that I chose, instead of going to apply to law school was as a fact checker. And that was not like a seminar. It was just like a thing you started doing. Like you're truly the lowest rung of a newsroom ladder.

• 24:19Speaker 04

  That's the, that's like the, the mailroom.

• 24:22Pablo Torre?

  Yes, except in this case, you saw, you saw.

• 24:25Speaker 04

  You were like Spostra. You were like in the tape. You were doing the tapes.

• 24:28Pablo Torre?

  I was grinding.

• 24:29Speaker 04

  Yeah, you were grinding. You worked your way up.

• 24:30Pablo Torre?

  And you had to cross off every single word in an article to make sure it was true. And that really did like convey the foremost, I think, principle of whatever journalism should be defined as, which is. You have to try and be as accurate as possible.

• 24:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 24:46Pablo Torre?

  I think that's probably task number one.

• 24:49Speaker 04

  Uh huh, yeah.

• 24:50Pablo Torre?

  But like journalism to you, how would you define it actually? I don't want to just give you my takes.

• 24:54Speaker 04

  I mean, I, when I have like a interview that's more substantive, I have like a friend of mine who is a journalist, who, I mean, we do research for the interviews. And so he, he like works on the, like a research packet for me and we like talk about, I don't know, I, I don't really, how would I define it? The newspaper? I don't know, is that what journalism? I Googled it when I first started doing interviews. I went on Wikipedia for journalism. Cause I didn't know how to do interviews. And I watched a bunch of different, um, like, I was like, who's good at interviews? And I watched Rogan. And what he does is like, he's like, well, he agrees, like he, he's very, uh, exuberant. And he like, uh, and easily impressionable maybe? I don't know.

• 25:39Speaker 04

  I'm trying to say it in a nice way. He's a colleague, he's a friend. But like, he'll have like Bernie and he'll be like, I, that's right.

• 25:47Pablo Torre?

  Joe Rogan is a great listener. I will say that. He's a great, active listener.

• 25:51Speaker 04

  Well, when a guest is on the show, they feel like they're crushing.

• 25:54Pablo Torre?

  Yes.

• 25:55Speaker 04

  Right? So he'll have Bernie and then he'll have like, uh, I don't know, like a Holocaust revisionist. And he'll be like, that's trippy. And then, because you feel like you're, take it out, he's a friend, he's, I, he's a good, whatever. And because people feel like they're being convincing, he can get more out of them.

• 26:14Pablo Torre?

  I think that part of what Rogan is there though, is a really good interviewer. But I think part of the definition of journalism is that that's not exactly the same thing.

• 26:24Speaker 04

  I don't really know what anything is anymore. It's a schizophrenic world and comedians are now public intellectuals. All I know is this, I really want to be careful not to speak from a position of authority. Like I hear a lot, there are a lot of people nowadays that. Think that they that aren't Wolf Blitzer.

• 26:42Pablo Torre?

  Sure.

• 26:43Speaker 04

  That have podcasts that will say things like I had a Congressman Ro Khanna on.

• 26:49Pablo Torre?

  That's why I ask.

• 26:50Speaker 04

  I can't be like.

• 26:50Pablo Torre?

  You have real guests.

• 26:51Speaker 04

  I can't ask him like, what do you think about HR 270? Like, I'm not a [bleep] I don't know, like, I'm an idiot. I'm like, I'm a comedian, like, you know, I'm not Ezra Klein, so like, I'm not. But I can't ask.

• 27:04Pablo Torre?

  Not with that attitude.

• 27:05Speaker 04

  But I can ask someone, like, you know, like, no one likes the government. Why do you want to be in the government? Like, that, I feel like.

• 27:11Pablo Torre?

  Asking really good questions, which I think you do.

• 27:14Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 27:15Pablo Torre?

  And I think you're really good, frankly, with people who like, seem to regard you as an alien of some kind. Especially and or people that you seem to not respect a lot.

• 27:25Speaker 04

  Oh, I'm not.

• 27:26Pablo Torre?

  Those are my two favorite genres of guests from my point of view that you have.

• 27:30Speaker 04

  Well, the, I think what it is is this is like, so like, when I watched Rogan, I was like, can I emulate that? Like, that, and no, I can't really emulate that because my voice is annoying and Jewish and like. So what I do is what like, what comes natural to me is that I can just self-deprecate. And I can be like, listen, like, you're sitting next to a guy who pooped his pants on a podcast once. And so like.

• 27:51Pablo Torre?

  That is a factual.

• 27:52Speaker 04

  Yeah, I'm a schmuck, like, so like, so, America doesn't, people don't like know-it-alls, right? It's the same reason why, like, Fetterman had a, like, had a stroke and, like, was struggling through a debate. But Dr. Oz was such a, was so smug that they're like, we're gonna vote for the guy that, like, was having trouble talking. Right? So during the Pennsylvania Senate run.

• 28:16Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, John Fetterman.

• 28:17Speaker 04

  Yes, John Fetterman. Um, and the guy that wears the hoodie to Congress, which is, come on.

• 28:23Pablo Torre?

  We can all agree.

• 28:24Speaker 04

  Put on a shirt, you know, like.

• 28:26Pablo Torre?

  I feel about John Fetterman the way I feel about NBA coaches, honestly, where it's like, you could dress up.

• 28:31Speaker 04

  John Fetter, but at least they're wearing like golf, like, business, like Friday business casual.

• 28:37Pablo Torre?

  Sure, golf club.

• 28:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, they're wearing, exactly. So like, what I can do is like. Is if a guest disarms, if I'm like, you know, like, just, you know, like, uh, and if I can like make them relaxed, then, you know, if they, if they're self-aware enough to realize, I don't want to come across as a know-it-all schmuck, I'd rather, you know, then they'll kind of drop their guard and I can like, you know, then I can kind of talk to them in a more natural way.

• 29:03Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 29:04Speaker 04

  And I don't think people are used to talking to someone like as, as unremarkable and mediocre as me. So like, uh, them trying to make sense of it, I think is kind of an advantage that I have because I'm so, I'm just, like, you know how AI is going to take all of the jobs? Like, I don't think that they could do something that's just so, like, just so nothing of a, you know? I don't think like a computer could emulate something so stupid and unremarkable, right? I think that's my advantage in life. I think I'm always going to have a job doing this.

• 29:50Speaker 05

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• 31:54Pablo Torre?

  Do you think Chris Cuomo is gonna listen to this and be like, "He was working me the whole time"?

• 31:59Speaker 04

  No, we got along, I thought, yeah.

• 32:00Pablo Torre?

  But that's, that example, by the way, is in, it is like jock nerd. That was the dynamic immediately established.

• 32:07Speaker 04

  But I was dunking. I think that he was the nerd.

• 32:11Pablo Torre?

  Well, but that's, that's, that was the joy of it, was that it got to, it got to be Chris Cuomo having to like reckon with the fact that you also knew what you were doing and he started to play along.

• 32:26Speaker 04

  I know ball, yeah.

• 32:27Pablo Torre?

  Yes, yeah, absolutely.

• 32:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 32:29Pablo Torre?

  Absolutely.

• 32:29Speaker 04

  I know sports, so. That's kind of, I think, I think when you're doing interviews, you have to kind of like, it's like when you're starting stand-up, you have to like look at the thing that's, when you're starting stand-up, you're like, what is fun? Like, what makes my friends laugh? Right? So when I was doing interviews, I was like, what's the thing about me that's like, makes people feel comfortable?

• 32:47Pablo Torre?

  So this gets me back to like the definition of journalism to me. Because I think asking really good questions, asking them charismatically or strategically, which you've been describing, is not quite journalism. But the thing you just said about who am I doing this for? I think journalism has a defined answer.

• 33:03Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:03Pablo Torre?

  And that answer is, and I'm gonna break out the scare quotes, "the public interest."

• 33:09Pablo Torre?

  Like, that's who I'm trying to serve. That's the real distinction to me.

• 33:13Speaker 04

  There are substantive cores of each one of them that I'm trying to get to, but I have to get to it in my way.

• 33:19Pablo Torre?

  Which is, by the way, and I am a subscriber and an imitator and somebody who tries to do the same thing. It needs to be stupid to get smart. I believe that as well, fundamentally.

• 33:32Speaker 04

  If you, like, I had this internet debate guy Destiny on the show.

• 33:38Pablo Torre?

  Oh, I know.

• 33:39Speaker 04

  And I didn't know who, I didn't really know who he was before I started doing the research, but I saw that everyone who was interfacing with him online, I didn't know that it was a thing that you could be famous for online, which is having an argument, right? What feels satisfying for you while you're doing one?

• 33:57Pablo Torre?

  I don't want to step on any toes and open the most divisive issue ever for a prior guest, but I did a lot of preparation for the Finkelstein interview.

• 34:07Speaker 04

  People said I cooked him way harder than you.

• 34:09Pablo Torre?

  I don't think that ever, I don't think we ever debated anything of substance.

• 34:13Speaker 04

  Not on your debate. I didn't watch a 17-hour debate on Lex Friedman about Israel, where some [bleep] is popping off about my [bleep].

• 34:21Pablo Torre?

  I'm...

• 34:24Speaker 04

  So, everyone, he's like a guy that can read a ton and get all the stats, right? And you're not going to get more stats than him. So, what I realized was like, you've got to come to someone like that. Everyone's trying to get more stats and more documents than him, and he's going to have more than you. So, you have to come to him with no documents and no stats. And that's like, kind of what, like, if I'm approaching someone and saying like, you know, "You're wrong," or like, "I know and you don't know," then it's going to be adversarial.

• 34:57Pablo Torre?

  I did high school debate. Destiny is a familiar character.

• 35:01Speaker 04

  Me too. Lincoln Douglas?

• 35:02Pablo Torre?

  Yeah.

• 35:02Speaker 04

  We're the bruh, we're like the [bleep] guy. We're the same guy.

• 35:07Pablo Torre?

  Let's say our value premise on three. One, two, three.

• 35:11Speaker 04

  Israel.

• 35:12Pablo Torre?

  Justice.

• 35:16Speaker 04

  Just kidding.

• 35:17Pablo Torre?

  But the thing about Destiny, which I enjoyed in your interview of him, was that you did not try to high school debate him. And I think part of what you do really well, which I admire, is that you find conflict, verbal rhetorical tension, while not doing it in the way that a high school debater would. You check facts, insofar as I can tell, but that's important.

• 35:41Speaker 04

  I don't want to be a journalist. I just think that people just don't care anymore. People just aren't reading it. They're probably on Twitter, looking at people getting killed and like...

• 35:49Pablo Torre?

  Well...

• 35:50Speaker 04

  You could... Twitter is Sodom and Gomorrah these days. It's so scary. I can't look at it anymore.

• 35:55Pablo Torre?

  Did you see that, like, that stat that, like, a super majority of accounts on Twitter?

• 36:00Speaker 04

  Are what?

• 36:00Pablo Torre?

  Are just bots, at this point.

• 36:02Speaker 04

  Really?

• 36:02Pablo Torre?

  Yeah.

• 36:03Speaker 04

  Really? So everyone likes Jewish people still?

• 36:08Speaker 04

  Because I got... I was getting nervous there for a second.

• 36:10Pablo Torre?

  But I think your point is a fair one also, that like, the reality of how we get news and use our phones.

• 36:17Speaker 04

  Probably more people are, like, you know, Rogan's probably getting 10 times more people than Anderson Cooper every day.

• 36:23Pablo Torre?

  Sure. But, as a sports fan, to bring it back to the guy that was the peak of my career...

• 36:28Speaker 04

  Uh huh.

• 36:29Pablo Torre?

  I also think that, like, modern journalism, like what Bill Simmons did in sports, is a really good way forward, actually. We should disclose...

• 36:39Speaker 04

  Sports is doing good, you're saying?

• 36:40Pablo Torre?

  I think that identifying your fandom and not pretending like you're this omniscient voice from nowhere.

• 36:49Speaker 04

  Uh huh. Oh, being a homer.

• 36:50Pablo Torre?

  Objective.

• 36:51Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 36:51Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, like, just disclose it.

• 36:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 36:53Pablo Torre?

  It's okay!

• 36:53Speaker 04

  I respect that about him, as a Laker fan, even.

• 36:55Pablo Torre?

  And that's... By the way, so, our friendship really did escalate when I'm like, alright, Adam loves to phone call people.

• 37:04Speaker 04

  I... It's... People get really annoyed by it, but yeah, I'm a phone call guy.

• 37:08Pablo Torre?

  Which I... So is Tony Kornheiser, by the way. Like, just refuses to have the deposition records. The Discovery refuses that.

• 37:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 37:17Pablo Torre?

  But the point being, that like...

• 37:20Pablo Torre?

  You, as an apologetic Laker fan, calling me and talking for an hour about your fandom. I'm like, you still can be somebody who writes or covers sports as a fan. You just gotta disclose that part.

• 37:36Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 37:36Pablo Torre?

  And that's okay.

• 37:37Speaker 04

  But the NBA media is just all Boston.

• 37:40Pablo Torre?

  Yeah.

• 37:40Speaker 04

  Right.

• 37:41Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, the Boston, you know, our friends at, our friends Ben Dupick and Andrew Quell at Cookies Hoops.

• 37:45Speaker 04

  Those people, those people.

• 37:46Pablo Torre?

  The, the, the Boston media mafia, the BMM, the little green hand.

• 37:50Speaker 04

  Yes, I'm out of the closet as a Laker fan and people just be aware of that. Um, but you know, it doesn't feel.

• 37:57Pablo Torre?

  You're unhinged, actually.

• 37:58Speaker 04

  I need him, I need him.

• 38:00Pablo Torre?

  Who is him?

• 38:00Speaker 04

  It doesn't feel the same with him as it felt with my.

• 38:04Pablo Torre?

  Yeah.

• 38:04Speaker 04

  When they, when the Lakers won in the bubble, I like, thought 30 seconds later, I'm like, it's different. He's never gonna be our, he's never gonna be my guy. Him.

• 38:15Pablo Torre?

  Mm-hmm.

• 38:16Speaker 04

  I don't know. I mean, uh, I'm a Kobe fan and you know what kids do nowadays? They're player fans.

• 38:24Pablo Torre?

  Oh, this is the biggest problem for the NBA as a, as a business.

• 38:27Speaker 04

  Really?

• 38:28Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, is that kids don't watch games, they follow players.

• 38:31Speaker 04

  Does it make more sense though? I think it's kind of, that's, makes more sense, right?

• 38:35Pablo Torre?

  It's, it's a, by the way, that's exactly what's happening in media.

• 38:39Speaker 04

  It's like, I'm not like a genie bus fan, right? I'm not like a, or like an outfit.

• 38:43Pablo Torre?

  Now a Mark Walter, your new owner.

• 38:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, we're gonna do great things.

• 38:47Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 38:48Speaker 04

  We're gonna do some huge things.

• 38:49Pablo Torre?

  He's also a friend, but, but truly like that whole thing though of like, young people would rather consume an individual's

• 38:55Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:55Pablo Torre?

  stuff, Joe Rogan, instead of fill in the blank institution.

• 38:58Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:59Pablo Torre?

  So too is it in sports fandom, where I'm not paying attention so much to the team, I'm paying attention to my favorite guy, whoever my favorite individual creator is.

• 39:08Speaker 04

  That's sweet. Yeah.

• 39:09Pablo Torre?

  That's real, that's how, that's how kids are apparently demographically trending.

• 39:13Speaker 04

  Yeah, it, it, what's interesting is that, um, I think that we didn't know who guys were, like, prior to, to like, social media and stuff, right? Like, we didn't, we thought, like, MJ hung out with Bugs Bunny every day. We thought, like, we didn't know that he was like, um,

• 39:31Pablo Torre?

  Sociopath.

• 39:31Speaker 04

  He had hate in his gut, you know? We just thought he was like, just a, like, a nice guy. Cause he was so insulated by Nike and by the NBA.

• 39:40Pablo Torre?

  By the way,

• 39:41Speaker 04

  And David Stern.

• 39:41Pablo Torre?

  The Last Dance is another good case study in, like, is this journalism? So my friend, Jason Hare, directed it. He does not identify as a journalist. But what he got Michael Jordan to say, in which he's crying, articulating his code of honor.

• 39:55Speaker 13

  I don't have to do this. I'm only doing it because it is who I am. That's how I played the game. That was my mentality.

• 40:08Speaker 13

  If you don't wanna play that way, don't play that way.

• 40:16Speaker 13

  Brilliant.

• 40:18Pablo Torre?

  That's also, like, supreme, perfect interviewing to get that part.

• 40:25Speaker 04

  Not the goat.

• 40:26Pablo Torre?

  Not your goat.

• 40:27Speaker 04

  Not my goat. Um,

• 40:28Pablo Torre?

  But you're, you're, you're a LeBron

• 40:30Speaker 04

  What I'm saying is this is like, I feel really bad. Well, like, the distance between it's, I hate this word, like, but the creator and then the consumer is blurred. Like, the

• 40:42Pablo Torre?

  The music production and the worker.

• 40:44Speaker 04

  There's a really, there's a really good, um, like, interview with David Bowie, like, in the 1990s, where he, like, predicts the internet, right? Where he's like, the distance between the Beatles and Elvis and then the fans was just light years, right? And what the computer is gonna do is it's gonna blur it.

• 41:03Speaker 14

  I think we're actually on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying.

• 41:10Speaker 14

  It's just a tool though, isn't it? No, it's not, no. No, it's an alien life form. What do you think, I mean, when you think then about the future? It's their life on Mars. Yes, it's just landed here. But that's, it's simply a different delivery system there. You're arguing about something more profound. Oh yeah, I'm talking about the, the, the actual context and the state of content is going to be so different to anything that we can really envisage at the moment. Where the interplay between the user and the provider will be so insympatico, it's going to, it's going to crush our ideas of what mediums are all about.

• 41:49Speaker 04

  So now everyone gets mad at LeBron for, for every single day for like trying to do something and then stepping like Sideshow Bob, stepping on a rake. But, um, I feel like now-

• 42:03Pablo Torre?

  Do you have empathy for that part of his life?

• 42:05Speaker 04

  I mean, like-

• 42:06Pablo Torre?

  When he liked perfect booties on Instagram and it got caught and screenshot it.

• 42:11Speaker 04

  I have empathy for the fact that like, he's kind of the beta tester of this, a different-

• 42:17Pablo Torre?

  Dude, he's our generation. LeBron is the, are the first millennial Jon Stewart, Michael Jordan generation equivalent.

• 42:25Speaker 04

  And because he's the main guy, like Steph can go to, uh, to like, what's that guy, that concert, uh, Benson Boone concert?

• 42:33Pablo Torre?

  Oh god.

• 42:34Speaker 04

  And like if LeBron wore that hat at a Benson, at a Benson Boone concert, LeBron would have gotten killed. What I'm fascinated by is like, there are all these like, you know, you could read an infinite stream of opinions about you, right? Like, there were three newspapers MJ could read and, you know, he'd have the journalist killed and then they, you know, whatever. Um, but these guys like, what, what I've come to understand is that these got that, all of them are re, like LeBron does consume the LeBum accounts. Even if he's not burnering-

• 43:08Pablo Torre?

  Okay, so I, this is, this, so this is where I should-

• 43:10Speaker 04

  And that drives me insane.

• 43:11Pablo Torre?

  What I should reveal to our audience is that you-

• 43:16Speaker 04

  Don't get me in trouble now, too.

• 43:17Pablo Torre?

  No, but you're the number one person who persuaded me to look into the

• 43:23Speaker 04

  It's my fault.

• 43:23Pablo Torre?

  Did LeBron go to the Kobe Bryant memorial?

• 43:27Speaker 04

  I told my dad that, and he's like, you just ruined the playoff run. He's like, the playoffs are about to start. He's like, why are you ruining the season?

• 43:35Pablo Torre?

  You convinced his podcasters, Dr. A people, to establish that he never showed up.

• 43:40Speaker 04

  Okay, this is an interesting thing that I'd love to talk about.

• 43:42Pablo Torre?

  But you were the person who were like, you should look into this, and I did, and you were correct.

• 43:47Speaker 04

  But let's be Christian for a second.

• 43:48Pablo Torre?

  Okay.

• 43:49Speaker 04

  The two of us are God-fearing Christian men, right?

• 43:51Pablo Torre?

  Absolutely.

• 43:53Speaker 04

  We never saw Michael be nice, like be like tender, ever, right? He was at his Hall of Fame speech drunk, talking about Byron Russell. And he's like, if he wants to come see me, it was like, no one remembers Byron Russell, except for like us.

• 44:13Pablo Torre?

  Brian, in fact, yeah.

• 44:14Speaker 04

  The first, oh, was it by?

• 44:17Pablo Torre?

  That was always, everybody, everybody. I know, everybody's, everybody's.

• 44:20Speaker 04

  Is this a Baron scene? Okay, anyway, can you imagine?

• 44:26Pablo Torre?

  The spelling is different, B-R-Y-O-N for.

• 44:28Speaker 04

  Can you imagine, like, the first time we ever see MJ, like, and it was a, it was one of the most beautiful moments ever. Where he said, there was this kid, and he bothered me, and he annoyed me, and, and he used to call me in the middle of the night. And I was, I was like, this fucking guy. And I realized he was like, he's like a little brother, and he was in pain about Kobe.

• 44:55Pablo Torre?

  At the memorial.

• 44:56Speaker 04

  And they, and he's like, I love this person. And if we accept the premise that MJ won't even, according to your former colleague Stephen A. Smith, that MJ won't even acknowledge LeBron's existence, can you imagine how painful? He wore 23 growing up. Can you imagine watching Michael, who ignores you and thinks you suck? And like, and has been torturing you probably through the media for the last 20 years about, and somehow the GOAT debate is a thing when we see a guy who's 40 and 20, what was he, 24, 8 and 8 last year? At 40. Can you imagine how terrible that would have been for LeBron?

• 45:40Pablo Torre?

  The stakes of that memorial service could not have been More emotionally profound.

• 45:48Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 45:48Pablo Torre?

  Like, that all is real, like, the Shakespearean whole, like, there's everybody, like, Michael Jordan is, in the way that Bill Belichick has been, like, America's emotionally unforgiving dad.

• 45:59Speaker 04

  But he was nice to Kobe.

• 46:01Pablo Torre?

  But he then reveals, after Kobe is not around to hear it, that he had always had this tender spot for this guy who was, like, trying to do Michael Jordan. You're actually tearing up.

• 46:14Speaker 04

  It makes me wanna cry.

• 46:15Pablo Torre?

  This is, again, I love the utter sincerity around your fandom.

• 46:19Speaker 04

  You know the, uh, do you know the, the Michael Jackson story?

• 46:24Pablo Torre?

  What is, what is the?

• 46:25Speaker 04

  You don't know the Michael Jackson story?

• 46:26Pablo Torre?

  Wait, about Kobe?

• 46:27Speaker 04

  About Kobe? So Kobe studied the greats, right?

• 46:30Pablo Torre?

  It was like, in his office, it was like Steve Jobs.

• 46:32Speaker 04

  Oh, God. Yeah. It was corny sometimes, the way he'd talk about it. But like, it'd be cool, because every summer, he'd come back and he'd, like, go to Houston for a summer and then have the dream shake. He'd, like, add a new weapon every summer.

• 46:43Pablo Torre?

  I love, I love that.

• 46:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, I love that. I love that. We love that.

• 46:49Speaker 04

  Bald-headed Kobe, Slam Dunk Champion rookie, was a babe. He was seventeen, right? And, uh, on that first offseason, he's like, "I need to get a man's body." Right? So he was in Gold's Gym, and he's lifting weights in Marina Del Rey, California. And he gets a call. And he picks up and he goes, "Kobe, it's Michael." And he's like, "This is a, this is a prank." And he hangs up. And, uh, the, the person calls back, he's like, "Kobe, it's Michael. I want you to come to Neverland." And he goes out to Santa Barbara. Tell me if I fact-check this.

• 47:23Pablo Torre?

  No, so far, this is accurate.

• 47:25Speaker 04

  Fact-check this.

• 47:25Pablo Torre?

  It was a gold gym.

• 47:26Speaker 04

  He was, how did I get that right? Okay. He's at Planet Fitness. And, uh, anyway. He goes out to Santa Barbara to Neverland. And Michael, apparently, they have this conversation. Michael's like, "Listen, I see you, and you're like me. And people are going to heap you with praise. People are gonna give you everything and tell you you're incredible."

• 47:50Pablo Torre?

  This is a paraphrase, but the quote from the story.

• 47:52Speaker 04

  Am I close?

• 47:53Pablo Torre?

  Oh, it is. This is Kobe recalling how, inside the French Normandy residence, otherwise known as Neverland, a 2,700-acre cornucopia of childlike delights, according to this ESPN magazine piece.

• 48:05Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 48:05Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, it's great. Only good things happen there. Um, the two men share a meal of marinated chicken and organic vegetables. He told me, quote, "This is what you love. This is your obsession," Brian recalls. He said, "I know what it's like to be different. Embrace it."

• 48:22Speaker 04

  Yeah, Michael's like, "They're gonna give you everything and they're gonna take it away." And every, and everyone, everyone's gonna love you and every, then all of a sudden, everyone's gonna hate you.

• 48:33Pablo Torre?

  This is where, this is where-

• 48:33Speaker 04

  And you cannot stop.

• 48:35Pablo Torre?

  This is where Michael shows him the smooth, he shows him like-

• 48:39Speaker 04

  And he gives him a book.

• 48:40Pablo Torre?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he shows him footage of Kobe had never heard of Grace Kelly Fred Astaire Ginger Rogers before this private screening by Michael Jackson, in which he explains the inspiration for Smooth Criminal, by the way. But the book, do you remember the book?

• 48:55Speaker 04

  Jonathan Livingston Seagull. It's a book about a bird who wants to fly higher than any other bird.

• 49:02Pablo Torre?

  A novella about an outcast bird who's unwilling to conform.

• 49:06Speaker 04

  And he said, "We are that bird. And when everyone hates you, you cannot stop being great."

• 49:12Pablo Torre?

  So, again, like, I'm laughing because this is a Mad Lib, but it's also, you're-

• 49:18Speaker 04

  And it is what happened in Kobe's career, where like he went-

• 49:21Pablo Torre?

  Emotionally, this is exactly right.

• 49:23Speaker 04

  He went evil Kobe after Shaq. Basically, he got blamed for the breakup with that team, and it wasn't his fault. It was the, much more the buses, right? They, they say that Kobe broke up that team and then Shaq is at a, wins a, basically rides D Wade's coattails to a chip, and then he's at a club and he's saying, "Tell me how my ass tastes."

• 49:45Speaker 15

  This is about B.I.G., AKA Big Shaq. Now that's the difference between first and last play. Kobe, n***a, tell me how my ass tastes.

• 49:54Speaker 04

  And everyone's laughing at Kobe.

• 49:55Pablo Torre?

  That's a great, that is a great clip.

• 49:57Speaker 04

  It's not that great.

• 49:58Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, I, I love-

• 49:59Speaker 04

  Well, let's start.

• 49:59Pablo Torre?

  I loved Sheriff Shaquille O'Neal rapping about that.

• 50:04Speaker 04

  You're gonna play the Detroit Pistons and then the referees are not gonna call a single foul against you guys.

• 50:09Pablo Torre?

  Oh, god.

• 50:10Speaker 04

  That series, you wanna hear really funny-

• 50:12Pablo Torre?

  He got beaten by-

• 50:14Speaker 04

  By Ben Wallace?

• 50:15Pablo Torre?

  By a six-foot-two center.

• 50:17Speaker 04

  He played big, though.

• 50:18Pablo Torre?

  I mean, he was amazing.

• 50:20Speaker 04

  He played big. Um, my, my dad, uh, I think like four minutes before we were about to lose those finals, my, my dad said, uh, he stood up and he goes, "We never go on family walks." And-

• 50:36Speaker 04

  And he's like, every, we, and he's like, and he's like, put your shoes on everyone. And me, my sister, my mom went on a walk with my dad where he was like, uh, five feet ahead of us, like walking as fast as he could, because he was so mad.

• 50:50Pablo Torre?

  Just working out his rage.

• 50:53Speaker 04

  And so, so, but anyway, yeah, apparently, Michael was like, do not ever stop trying to like be with your obsession. Do not ever stop like trying to be as great as you could possibly be. Go four for 28 every single night.

• 51:12Pablo Torre?

  In your last game.

• 51:13Speaker 04

  And then.

• 51:13Pablo Torre?

  You will take one million field goal attempts.

• 51:17Speaker 04

  That is the most.

• 51:18Pablo Torre?

  The score is 60.

• 51:19Speaker 04

  Oh, shut up. That is the most beautiful sports memory of my entire lifetime. I cried. I, I legitimately called my father and we were both crying. Because, do you remember that last season?

• 51:29Pablo Torre?

  I watched, I, I watched that game. That whole season was.

• 51:32Speaker 04

  Was terrible.

• 51:33Pablo Torre?

  It was a very.

• 51:34Speaker 04

  Nauseating.

• 51:35Pablo Torre?

  Nauseating retirement farewell tour.

• 51:38Speaker 04

  Well, no, it was so engineered by the league. Every stadium that was like, like, you know, everyone acted like they were Kobe fans.

• 51:45Pablo Torre?

  Exactly. That's what was so annoying about it was like, it was retomating history.

• 51:50Speaker 04

  Every stadium did a video tribute and we were saying goodbye to him and he was done. His legs, his knees were gone. He's, he sucked. And like, we were seeing him, he had that double digit like points streak that, he was scoring like six, you know, on, on 28 attempts or something. Like, it was heartbreaking. It was like, why are you doing this? It's like nauseating. And, uh, we got him back one night. We got, it, it.

• 52:19Pablo Torre?

  It was.

• 52:20Speaker 04

  It's God.

• 52:20Pablo Torre?

  Theatrically?

• 52:21Speaker 04

  It's God.

• 52:21Pablo Torre?

  It was perfect.

• 52:37Pablo Torre?

  No sport is, I think, narratively, theatrically, more interesting on an individual level. Because, again, it's like, there's no better seat in sports, by the way, than being on the court for a basketball game. It's like being onstage during a play.

• 52:50Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 52:51Pablo Torre?

  And so you see the faces, you see the tears, you hear everything. Like, it is theater. And so the NBA has these individualized, like, virtuoso performances. And the problem is that the kids today, the kids today, like, they-

• 53:03Speaker 04

  With these goddamn three-pointers.

• 53:06Pablo Torre?

  But, no, but they individualized that phenomenon-

• 53:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 53:10Pablo Torre?

  -to the exclusion of actual games, relative to us, relative to our parents, certainly. And that's like, the gift became the curse.

• 53:19Speaker 04

  But the thing that we're talking about, I think, the kids can understand. Because the beautiful moments are a 17-win team, like, winning that one game. Or Michael Jordan, like, this guy that we've never seen be like, uh, this beautiful moment in this beautiful speech. Or KD talking to his mom. I mean, it's just like, you have to-

• 53:43Pablo Torre?

  You're the real MVP.

• 53:44Speaker 04

  That, I mean, that's one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.

• 53:48Speaker 13

  When you didn't eat, you made sure we ate. You went to sleep hungry. You sacrificed for us.

• 53:58Speaker 13

  You're the real MVP.

• 54:02Speaker 04

  Because it's like, you create narrative and we love, like, to follow these people's careers.

• 54:07Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, it's human, human interest.

• 54:09Speaker 04

  And follow these stories, right? And that's part of the reason why Tiger makes me so sad. Because like, and when he won the Masters-

• 54:16Pablo Torre?

  It is so sad to see Tiger now.

• 54:18Speaker 04

  And I was proud when he won the Masters.

• 54:20Pablo Torre?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 54:21Speaker 04

  Because we're at the eight, we, did you have SI for kids?

• 54:24Pablo Torre?

  Of course.

• 54:25Speaker 04

  Like-

• 54:25Pablo Torre?

  Buzz Beamer?

• 54:26Speaker 04

  Do you know, Grant Hill was big on, uh, in our era.

• 54:29Pablo Torre?

  Well, Grant Hill was like- He was like the role model. He played the piano.

• 54:33Speaker 04

  He was a nice boy.

• 54:34Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, his dad went, his dad went to Yale.

• 54:36Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:37Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, he went to Duke.

• 54:38Speaker 04

  Well, so Tiger was like the good boy, right? And then we found out that he had, he got ladies or something and then?

• 54:45Pablo Torre?

  Yeah, the Perkins.

• 54:46Speaker 04

  And, you know, and then he went away. Like, we felt like-

• 54:49Pablo Torre?

  Well, he got deeply broken physically.

• 54:52Speaker 04

  Yeah, from, from thinking that he's SEAL Team Six.

• 54:55Pablo Torre?

  Well, he did do all those Navy SEAL exercises. His dad did, used to say that he believed that Tiger would be on par, if not in excess of Gandhi, when it came to his impact upon the world.

• 55:07Speaker 04

  When we were kids, we were like, this guy's the greatest of all time and he's also kind of a kid, right? And he's winning tournaments by like nineteen strokes. And we're like, this is awesome. Like, we're part of this thing right now. And then he just, he went away. We didn't get, we didn't get to see him anymore. And then he came back and won the Masters one time. And it was like, we saw our friend again one time. And it was like, I missed, I missed you. Like-

• 55:34Pablo Torre?

  Yes.

• 55:35Speaker 04

  It's, it's, that's, that's part of the same, I guess, uh, phenomenon. I love ball. I just love sports.

• 55:43Pablo Torre?

  It's very obvious to me that, uh, your genuine love of ball is like the thing you're most passionate about.

• 55:51Speaker 04

  I care about sports more than comedy. I, I don't care. I like songs and sports.

• 55:59Pablo Torre?

  Songs, yeah.

• 56:00Speaker 04

  I like movies. Movies, songs and sports. That's-

• 56:03Pablo Torre?

  Which is why Shaquille O'Neal is criminally underrated in your personal Hall of Fame.

• 56:07Speaker 04

  As a recording artist.

• 56:09Pablo Torre?

  As a actor, recording artist and-

• 56:11Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 56:12Pablo Torre?

  Ball player.

• 56:13Speaker 04

  All right. So what is journalism?

• 56:16Pablo Torre?

  I think we should call at the end here, uh-

• 56:18Speaker 04

  Can we call Kornheiser?

• 56:19Pablo Torre?

  Tony Kornheiser and see if he'll tell us what it is.

• 56:21Speaker 04

  Oh, this is, that's a good button on the episode. You're a real pro.

• 56:24Pablo Torre?

  Dude, you think I-

• 56:26Speaker 04

  That's a great button on the episode.

• 56:28Pablo Torre?

  I'm trying to, I'm trying to land a plane here.

• 56:30Speaker 04

  Land this fucking plane. He better, please pick up. This will be one of the best days of my life. I love him so much.

• 56:38Pablo Torre?

  I know, it's, I mean, same. Here we go, here we go.

• 56:41Speaker 04

  Do you remember being homesick from school and watching P T I?

• 56:43Pablo Torre?

  They're about to tape P T I, but we can sneak in, let's see.

• 56:45Speaker 04

  Is Will Bond there?

• 56:46Pablo Torre?

  Will Bond's gonna be way late. So I think we have time. Here we go, hold on.

• 56:52Speaker 04

  Oh my God, I'm so nervous.

• 57:06Speaker 00

  Hi, you've reached my voicemail.

• 57:09Speaker 04

  This is good enough.

• 57:10Speaker 00

  Send me a message, see what happens.

• 57:13Pablo Torre?

  What do you want to say?

• 57:13Speaker 04

  Uh, uh, uh, Mr. Kornheiser, big fan of Adam Friedland. I just, you know, I would honestly, if you'd like to come on the Adam Friedland Show.

• 57:22Pablo Torre?

  Oh, come on, dude.

• 57:23Speaker 04

  Sorry. Um, I just, I'm with Pablo right now and, uh, I just wanted to say, uh...

• 57:29Pablo Torre?

  What is journalism, question mark?

• 57:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, but he's, it's his voicemail. Is he gonna call us back?

• 57:34Pablo Torre?

  Probably.

• 57:35Speaker 04

  Yeah, just, uh, yeah, I was wondering what journalism's...

• 57:42Pablo Torre?

  Love you.

• 57:43Speaker 04

  Oh, love you. Did we get it?

• 57:58Pablo Torre?

  Pablo Torre Finds Out is produced by Walter Aberoma, Maxwell Carney, Ryan Cortez, Juan Galindo, Patrick Kim, Neely Lohman, Rob McCray, Matt Sullivan, Claire Taylor, and Chris Tumanello. Our studio engineering by RG Systems, sound design by NGW Post, theme song, as always, by John Bravo, and we will talk to you next time.

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