Mike Pesca is one of our very favorite guests — on any number of topics.

His book, Upon Further Review: The Greatest What-Ifs in Sports History, is a whole series of earth-shattering, hypothetical, what-if questions (and posited answers to said earth-shattering, hypothetical, what-if questions):

What if a blimp full of money had exploded over world track headquarters in 1952? What if Nixon had been good at football? What if Bobby Fischer had received proper psychiatric help? What if the Dodgers hadn’t left Brooklyn? What if basketball rims were smaller than basketballs? What if the 1999 U.S. women’s national soccer team had lost the Women’s World Cup? And yes: What if the Olympics had never dropped tug of war?

It goes on and on.

Pesca joins us for the hour.

GUESTS:

• Will Leitch: Contributing editor at New York magazine, founder of Deadspin, and a whole bunch of other things
• Mike Pesca: Host of The Gist and the author of Upon Further Review
• Louisa Thomas: Staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of Louisa: The Extraordinary Life of Mrs. Adams

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

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Colin McEnroe, Carlos Mejia, and Chion Wolf contributed to this show, which originally aired June 7, 2018.

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The Trump administration’s messaging around the war with Iran feels reminiscent of stuff like … cowboy movies. And video games. And the manosphere. This hour, a look at the rhetoric around the war and where it’s all coming from.

GUESTS:

• Casey Ryan Kelly: Professor of Rhetoric and Public Culture in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He is also Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Speech, and author of books including Manifesting Violence: White Terrorism, Digital Culture, and the Rhetoric of Replacement
• Jonathan Guyer: Program Director at the Institute for Global Affairs at Eurasia Group, and a reporter and editor focused on foreign policy, national security, and the Middle East. He is host of the podcast “None of the Above”
• Roger Stahl: Author and Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Georgia. He is director of the documentary Theaters of War

Music featured (in order):

• “Hoe-Down” from Rodeo – Aaron Copland, NYO-USA, Michael Tilson Thomas
• You Should Have Seen the Other Guy – Nathaniel Rateliff
• Under My Thumb – Rolling Stones
• Son of Your Father – Elton John
• Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other – Orville Peck and Willie Nelson
• I Am a Rock – Simon and Garfunkel

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From the Golden Globes, to global conflicts, to elections, prediction markets have moved into the mainstream. What happens when we can bet on anything? What are the cultural impacts of that? This hour, we take stock of the status of prediction markets, and look at what they might do to politics and polling. Plus, a look at the "Wisdom of Crowds".

GUESTS:

• Kate Knibbs: Senior Writer at WIRED
• Danny Funt: Reporter and author of Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling
• Sarah Hughes-Berheim: Postdoctoral researcher in the Special Education Department at Vanderbilt University
• James Surowiecki: Journalist and author of The Wisdom of Crowds

Music featured (in order):

• Future Lover – Thee Sacred Souls
• Everybody Knows – Leonard Cohen
• Something’s Gotta Give – Sammy Davis Jr.
• We Can’t Predict the Future – The Flaming Lips
• What Comes Next? – Jonathan Groff, Hamilton
• A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall – Bob Dylan

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We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing.

This hour, the conversation winds around to Anthropic, cataract surgery, the burrito vs. bowl debate, Saturday Night Live, the general unhappiness in the U.S., plastics … Anything. (Seemingly) everything.

These shows are fun for us, and they seem to be fun for you, too. So we did another one.

Music featured (in order):

• Destination Heaven – Euphoria Again & Dogwood Tales
• Farther Along – Ron Carter, Ricky Dillard
• Coming Up Roses – Harry Styles (orch. Jules Buckley)
• Love, Love, Love – Stephen Sanchez
• Sirius – Katherine Priddy
• Blind – Yonder Mountain String Band
• With a Little Luck – Paul McCartney, Wings

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Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman premiered in 1949. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award for Best Play. It’s been said that it’s “probably the most successful modern play ever published.”

This hour, with a new Broadway revival in previews, and with Peter Jacobson playing the title role in a new production at Hartford Stage, a look at Arthur Miller’s masterpiece of American drama, Death of a Salesman.

GUESTS:

• Melia Bensussen: Artistic director at Hartford Stage and the director of their current production of Death of a Salesman
• Peter Jacobson: An actor; he’s playing Willy Loman in Hartford Stage’s current production of Death of a Salesman
• Stephen Marino: Founding editor of The Arthur Miller Journal and the author, most recently, of Arthur Miller’s New York: Visions of the City

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Colin McEnroe, Eugene Amatruda, and Robyn Doyon-Aitken contributed to this show.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How does reality television shape our politics and our opinions? This hour two reality TV scholars join us to discuss how reality TV helps us understand (or sometimes misunderstand) actual reality.

GUESTS:

• Danielle Lindemann: Professor of Sociology at Lehigh University and a Visiting Professor in Gender and Sexuality Studies at Princeton University. She is also the author of the book True Story: What Reality TV Says About Us.

• Eunji Kim: Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University and Faculty Affiliate at the Data Science Institute. Her new book is The American Mirage: How Reality TV Upholds the Myth of Meritocracy.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show, which originally aired on July 24, 2025.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Do you know your neighbors? This hour, we take a look at the role of our neighbors in our lives. We explore the psychological and social benefits of neighbors, hear listener stories, and discuss the role of neighbors in times of crisis. Plus, a look at "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" and how he thought about neighbors and community building.

GUESTS:

• Julie Beck: Staff writer at The Atlantic and the creator of “The Friendship Files.”
• Tricia Wachtendorf: Director of the Disaster Research Center and a Professor of Sociology at the University of Delaware. She is also co-author of American Dunkirk: The Waterborne Evacuation of Manhattan on 9/11
• Daniel Cueto-Villalobos: Sociologist and doctoral candidate at the University of Minnesota
• Maxwell King: Author of The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers. His forthcoming book is Fire in the Night Sky: The Steel Mill Paintings of Aaron Gorson

Music featured (in order):

• Then Your Heart is Full of Love – Johnny Costa
• Neighbors – Lucius
• The People Next Door – Ray Parker Jr.
• Rescue Me – Fontella Bass
• No One Is Alone – Into the Woods 2022 Broadway Cast
• Won’t You Be My Neighbor? – Fred Rogers, Johnny Costa
  from ep. 1765 “Mister Rogers Celebrates the Arts”
• Won’t You Be My Neighbor? – Benny Benack III

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This hour we convene a roundtable of faith leaders to ask: what is their role right now? How is it changing?

GUESTS:

• A.J. Johnson: Pastor at the Urban Hope Refuge Church in Hartford. He is also Director for Neighborhood Organizing at the Center for Leadership and Justice, and Deputy Chaplain to the Connecticut House of Representatives
• Sierra Fox: Cantor for Congregation Mishkan Israel in Hamden
• Sister Mary Ellen Burns: Executive Director and Attorney at Apostle Immigrant Services
• Hierald Osorto: Senior Pastor at Saint Paul Lutheran Church/Iglesia Lutheran San Pablo in Minnesota

Music Featured (in order):

• Montgomery Variations (I. Decision) – Margaret Bonds
• Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around – The Holy Lights
• Woke Up This Morning With My Mind on Freedom – Sweet Honey in the Rock
• CUT FOR TIME Prayer for Peace (Ose Shalom) – The New York Cantors
• Anima Christi – Mary Lou Williams
• Calling All Angels – Jane Siberry w/ k.d. lang
• Song of a Bernadette – Jennifer Warnes

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