The Last Refuge of Scoundrels with Kelsey McKinney & Alex Sujong Laughlin

The Distraction: A Defector Podcast

Defector Media

Society & Culture, Sports

4.4 • 2.5K Ratings

🗓️ 25 June 2026

⏱️ 66 minutes

🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Kelsey is here! Drew is not! Alex Sujong Laughlin is also here to discuss the new season of Try Hard, the first episode of which just came out last week. Alex has written some really good and really scathing stuff about the scourge of The Video Podcast—how is she trying to make this one different and better? Also, Kelsey is about to disappear for a month to write a book. How does she tackle the mental and emotional challenge of locking in for that kind of thing? Finally, Roth is taught about Love Island, and they open up the funbag to answer real questions from Defector readers and Distraction listeners.

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

Speedrunning a sewing class, any%
Fiber
A sex barracks & other lustfulness
Shaking the ant farm
Men learning basic skills
A wombat with the zoomies

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. It's the distraction. As you can tell, I'm Drew McGarry. I'm David Roth. Drew is not here. Drew is on vacation. He's with his family. He's at the beach. Kelsey McKinney is here, though, which is nice. Hi, Kelsey.
0:14.7	What's up, David? Good to see you. Good to see you. Thank you for agreeing to be Drew and hold down the Drew role here.
0:22.3	You know, one of us has to. Yeah, I'm not going to talk about the Vikings offseason enough and
0:28.6	somebody's got to jump in and do it. Although you will have some help here. Our junior Vikings correspondent,
0:35.2	also the host of Try Hard.
0:39.9	Alex Tujong Loflin is here. Hi, Alex. How are you?
0:42.8	Hi, I'm a huge Vikings fan. I know, I know. Which is part of why I asked you on. Obviously,
0:49.3	most of the podcast, we're going to be breaking down last night's NBA draft, pick by pick,
0:53.4	winners and losers
0:54.6	great so I know you got in my head I don't know that I could name a member of the Vikings
1:00.3	or someone drafted last night who was selected in the NBA draft yeah it's okay I think that's
1:05.8	that's not the type of episode we're doing it's what the people want it's June it's very nearly
1:10.6	July it's a it's a silly time and so we're doing. That's what the people want. It's June. It's very nearly July. It's a silly time.
1:13.9	And so we're just going to, you know, talk about the various different silly things that are
1:18.2	happening right now. Some of that will be a TV show a little bit later. One of them will be a
1:22.8	podcast that recently became something more like a TV show. Wow.
1:28.2	Yeah, pretty good, right?
1:29.7	Hate that's right.
1:30.6	Pete Davidson's Garage debuted on Netflix.
1:35.1	I don't remember when.
1:37.0	Alex, you...
1:38.0	So there's the first episode of the new season of Try Hard came out last week,
	...

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