We're not hugging Spike Lee. A podcast about where pop culture and sports culture collide… inspired by the relationship between Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. Culture critic and novelist Zan Romanoff and journalist and Scamfluencers senior producer Sarah Enni discuss Zan's new book; Sarah meets a couple Mariners; how the Dodgers do and do not reflect the politics of Los Angeles; baseball players being buds; playoff updates; college athletes are gonna get paid; the World Cup… will it happen?; youth sports, delusional parents, and precarity ruining everything; and we talk to Forever 35's Doree Shafrir about tennis!

Links:

• Effectively Wild Episode 2333: Don't Hate the Player, Hate the In-Game Interview (Fangraphs)

• Poker Face (Hulu)

• Square Waves (Bookshop.org)

• Zan's book tour schedule (831stories.com)

• The Enni Way, Sarah's substack currently going (strategically) insane about baseball

• Cal Raleigh on MVP race w/ Aaron Judge & if 'Big Dumper' is a good nickname | YouTube Exclusive (YouTube)

• The story behind Mariners' Andrés Muñoz taking his cat on road trips (Seattle Sports)

• Why Does "K" Stand for a Strikeout in Baseball? (Encyclopaedia Britannica)

• Party in the Diamondbacks pool: Ex-players recount chaos, celebrations as potential World Series splash looms (The Athletic)

• The Nats' clubhouse book club is on a journey to Middle-earth this season (The Washington Post)

• 'It's reimagining team travel.' Why the Dodgers are using two planes on road trips this year (The LA Times)

• Nats calling up Bruce the Bat Dog from Triple-A ... really (MLB.com)

• At Nationals Park, a tradition continues and a ballpark becomes a 'safe space' (Washington Post)

• NBA Finals 2025: Tyrese Haliburton, Caitlin Clark and the most powerful friendship in basketball (ESPN)

• Right-Wing Outlet Claims They Were Denied Press Access to Two WNBA Games (Them)

• With $2.7 billion settlement approved, college sports' big money era is officially here (NPR)

• Stars, Stripes, and Double Standards (Sports Politika / Substack)

• Playing Secretary (New York Magazine)

• World Cup travel ban fallout is 'part of what it means to host an event': State Dept (The Athletic)

• Parents invest so much in youth sports. Then came Trump. (The Washington Post)

• Court Date (Substack)

• Thanks for Waiting: The Joy (And Weirdness) of Being a Late Bloomer (Bookshop.org)

• Startup (Bookshop.org)

• Changeover: A Young Rivalry and a New Era of Men's Tennis (Simon & Schuster)

• Jannik Sinner's doping case explained: What three-month ban and Italian Open comeback mean for tennis (The Athletic)

• The Inner Game of Tennis: The Classic Guide to the Mental Side of Peak Performance (Bookshop.org)

• Aryna Sabalenka Addresses Her Controversial Comments About Coco Gauff After French Open Loss (People)

• Cutting Words (BenRothenberg.com / Substack)

• Morgan Riddle (TikTok)

• The Best Tennis Apparel and Gear (The Strategist)