Chuck Klosterman Isn't Even Here Right Now
Pablo Torre Finds Out
Pablo Torre
4.7 • 2.6K Ratings
🗓️ 22 January 2026
⏱️ 51 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
One of America's foremost cultural critics steps out of the writer's cabin and into the studio to predict the future of a game that seems too big to stop: What happened to the egghead prophecy of Peak Football? Is 11 minutes actually the perfect amount of hyper-connective, violent action? And, in a Post-Winning Era, will the relentless gold-mining of fandom threaten the NFL's dominance, as soon as 2070? Plus: best laid aquarium plans, killing your fake darlings, old love letters, the meaning of nostalgia... and becoming Don Rickles for Bill Simmons.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is. |
| 0:06.7 | No one wants to see someone die on the football field, but the fact that it is possible does raise the stakes. |
| 0:12.7 | Right after this ad. |
| 0:19.9 | There were, I'm sure, at, certainly at Harvard, there were people, I'm sure, who had a very |
| 0:26.2 | pejorative view of people who had my book in their room. I just, that's how it is. That is also true. |
| 0:30.3 | Yeah. You know, that's how it is. I'm not, you got to be self-aware, you can't, you know. |
| 0:35.4 | But I was trying to figure out, like, when did I first become aware of you and how was I most consuming you? And the answer, despite you being a writer I've long enjoyed, much of the protestations of the coolest kids in college. Bill Simmons, the pod, you've been doing that for, like, 20-plus years now? I would say the response I get from going on his podcast is about the same as releasing a book. |
| 0:58.2 | And I'm not exaggerating. |
| 0:59.6 | Like the likelihood that anytime, if it's someone coming up in an airport or I talk to a guy at the dog park or whatever, |
| 1:06.6 | the likelihood that what they want to talk about is that. |
| 1:10.5 | You know, I mean, it's kind of i i it's strangely |
| 1:13.0 | i've written 13 books i'm happy how they've worked out i've had more success than they would ever |
| 1:17.2 | dreamed but i do sometimes wonder if if i'm remembered if i'm going to be the way you know certain |
| 1:24.2 | carson guests right right you know um or or certain like you know certain people Carson guests are remembered, you know, or certain like, you know, |
| 1:29.2 | certain people who are on talk shows who are, you know, who, I, because it's just the magnitude |
| 1:35.5 | of that thing is crazy. |
| 1:37.7 | I've been on that show once in person and it still comes up all of the time with strangers |
| 1:44.0 | on the street. It is the street it is intense it is |
| 1:47.5 | intense and so the idea that you're here to talk about this book which i enjoy by the way |
| 1:52.1 | thank you football yeah this is you also talking about what's in the psychology of this audience |
| 1:58.1 | that i think you felt most acutely by sports podcasting. |
| 2:01.9 | Oh, well, I wouldn't know if I, I don't know if I agree with that, |
... |
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