Inspector Fuzz Is On The Case with Giri Nathan

The Distraction: A Defector Podcast

Defector Media

Sports, Society & Culture

4.7 • 2.5K Ratings

🗓️ 21 August 2025

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Giri Nathan, author of the new book Changeover: A Young Rivalry and a New Era of Men's Tennis, joins Drew and Roth to tackle one of the most difficult questions of our time – how did Giri write a book and have a baby at the same time? They also talk about Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner’s epic new rivalry. Then, they open up the funbag to answer real questions from real listeners, like you!

Do you want to hear your question answered on the pod? Well, give us a call at 909-726-3720. That is 909-PANERA-0!

Stuff We Talked About

Giri’s new book, Changeover: A Young Rivalry and a New Era of Men's Tennis
Titanic what-ifs
Toilet paper lint
Ads that need to try harder
Fascism being lubed by masculine inadequacy

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Credits

- Hosts: Drew Magary & David Roth

- Producer: Brandon Grugle

- Editor: Mischa Stanton

- Production Services & Ads: Multitude Podcasts

- Subscribe to Defector!

About The Show

The Distraction is Defector's flagship podcast about sports (and movies, and art, and sandwiches, and certain coastal states) from longtime writers Drew Magary and David Roth. Every week, Drew and Roth tackle subjects, both serious and impossibly stupid, with a parade of guests from around the world of sports and media joining in the fun! Roth and Drew also field Funbag questions from Defector readers, answer listener voicemails, and get upset about the number of people who use speakerphone while in a public bathroom stall. This is a show where everything matters, because everyone could use a Distraction. Head to defector.com for more info.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	We're back, we're back, it's a distraction on Drew. That's raw. They do, Roth. I'm good, man. How are you? I'm fucking, I'm tan. I have a beachy vibe. And I'm on island time. I'm completely back from vacation, but I look amazing. We were at the beach. We didn't go to the beach together, though. You didn't get to see my rash guard. My rash guarded beach bod. And that's on you. I missed it. I was in Maryland for the Defector Retreat for like 16 hours, which is not ideal. But I did get to see everybody a little bit. I just didn't get to see anybody in their bathing suit. What a shame. Let's get to our guest. It's Defector's own Giddy Nathan, who has a new book
0:42.8	out this week. And also has a new baby. Can you, can you believe it? An American man actually can
0:53.4	have it both ways. What a miracle. I don't know how he does it.
0:58.4	Giddy, is it true that you can have it all? Some are saying that all can be had. Now, it's great
1:04.2	seeing you guys last week. It was also really nice to just like not think about the book for the
1:09.1	week leading up to it. Well, then this is the wrong show for you. Yeah. I knew I'm going through this gauntlet. We can avoid talking about it if you want. I mean, if you were... We could just go only baby for a couple minutes. I'm afraid you're going to have to plug your book on this show so that people buy it.. Poor bastard. Can someone say the name of the book?
1:28.6	Yeah, Giddy, your new book is, it's out this week. It's called Changeover, a Young Rivalry, and a new era of men's tennis. Now, am I right, Giddy, from the title of that book, that it is about SEC football? Would that be correct? That's correct. We're talking about the dry fit polos and different styling and across coaches.
1:29.9	But... Would that be correct? That's correct. We're talking about the dry fit polos and different styling and across coaches.
1:48.2	More damn eagle.
1:50.8	No, it's about men's tennis.
1:53.4	And I think the useful context for it is that we just finished the kind of big three era of men's tennis with Federer Djokovic and Adal.
2:01.2	And there was a lot of kind of hand-wringing and panic about what's going to come next and
2:05.2	how could it possibly be as good as that.
2:07.4	So my whole goal with this book was to kind of assuage that sort of generational panic.
2:15.1	And like actually what's coming next is maybe even a little better
2:18.1	based on what we've seen so far from Carlos Alcraz and Yonik Center. They've just been absolutely
2:23.5	insane to watch. How did you know that prior? How did you know that while pitching the book?
2:30.7	No, because I assume you pitched the book kind of before the 2024 tennis season had taken place.
2:36.0	Is that correct?
2:36.9	That's right.
2:37.6	Yeah, I kind of stumbled ass backward into this beautiful narrative.
2:41.1	But I think at the end of 2023, I was talking to my now editor about what tennis ideas I thought could hang a book on.
	...

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