You Can't Go Home Again, But You Can Visit | Defector The most anticipated sporting event of my life was Sunday, Feb. 23, 2014: the Michigan men’s basketball team playing Michigan State in Ann Arbor. I’d grown up around Big Ten basketball, but I was a…

Lauren Theisen on Michigan's title win:

Michigan Met Connecticut In The Muck And Won | Defector Monday’s NCAA Championship Game delivered a huge victory for the University of Connecticut, in that Dan Hurley did not bring himself, his team, the university or the coaching profession into three…

UConn could not have picked a more dreadful night to challenge a bigger, stronger team at the rim.

Polymarket Apologizes For Taking Bets On American Pilots Downed Over Iran | Defector Less than one month after Kalshi got into a legal whoopsie over whether or not they should pay out bettors who wagered on the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in the early days of the United States’…

"This is as brazen as it gets, and is an extremely ominous sign about that dark future where markets, prediction and otherwise, do not reflect reality so much as dictate it."

You Can't Go Home Again, But You Can Visit | Defector The most anticipated sporting event of my life was Sunday, Feb. 23, 2014: the Michigan men’s basketball team playing Michigan State in Ann Arbor. I’d grown up around Big Ten basketball, but I was a ne...

I wrote about being nine years out of college and watching a national title win at a bar. defector.com/you-cant-go-...

I Wanna Be A Cowboy | Defector Time for your weekly edition of the Defector Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it. Today, we’re talking ...

"If you could pick any of the Muppets to be your home baseball team's broadcast team, who would do play-by-play, color, and on-field?" FUNBAG. defector.com/i-wanna-be-a...

I Guess We're Just Waiting Around To See If This Demented Psychopath Kills Everyone | Defector There is a particular indignity that comes from living in America, derived from the experience of waking up in the morning to see reports that Donald Trump has said something profoundly evil, and…

"We made one of the dumbest, most evil people this country has ever produced the President—twice!—and this is the consequence." defector.com/i-guess-were...

An Uzbek Chess Prodigy Is Laying Waste To The World's Best Players | Defector While Hikaru Nakamura was making an ignoble sort of chess history, Javokhir Sindarov yawned. Just 12 moves into their fifth-round match at the 2026 Candidates Tournament, the 20-year-old had tied the…

An Uzbek chess prodigy is laying waste to the world's best players:

Why We Fly | Defector It was a lovely day above the Moon. The Artemis astronauts did some science, took lots of pictures, didn’t die or get replaced by bodysnatchers, and perhaps most importantly, made me bawl a couple of ...

Barry's moon blogs have been so good, and this is the best of those. Really excellent stuff here: defector.com/artemis-moon...

You Can't Go Home Again, But You Can Visit | Defector The most anticipated sporting event of my life was Sunday, Feb. 23, 2014: the Michigan men’s basketball team playing Michigan State in Ann Arbor. I’d grown up around Big Ten basketball, but I was a…

You can't go home again, but you can visit: defector.com/you-cant-go-...

Willson Contreras Is Sick And Tired Of Being Plunked By The Brewers | Defector Willson Contreras has played in 121 career regular-season games against the Milwaukee Brewers, by dint of spending the bulk of his career in the NL Central. In 23 of those games, he has been hit by a…

Willson Contreras is sick and tired of being plunked by the Brewers: defector.com/willson-cont...

I Wanna Be A Cowboy | Defector Time for your weekly edition of the Defector Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it. Today, we’re talking…

I wanna be a cowboy: defector.com/i-wanna-be-a...

I Guess We're Just Waiting Around To See If This Demented Psychopath Kills Everyone | Defector There is a particular indignity that comes from living in America, derived from the experience of waking up in the morning to see reports that Donald Trump has said something profoundly evil, and then...

I guess we're just waiting around to see if this demented psychopath kills everyone: defector.com/i-guess-were...

No One Is Safe In The Champions League Quarterfinals Now that the World Cup field is set, and the international breaks are over, it’s time for the club season’s final sprint. The top European leagues have comfortable leaders—except for Paris…

No one is safe in the Champions League quarterfinals: defector.com/no-one-is-sa...

Why We Fly | Defector It was a lovely day above the Moon. The Artemis astronauts did some science, took lots of pictures, didn’t die or get replaced by bodysnatchers, and perhaps most importantly, made me bawl a couple of…

Why we fly: defector.com/artemis-moon...

Michigan Met Connecticut In The Muck And Won | Defector Monday’s NCAA Championship Game delivered a huge victory for the University of Connecticut, in that Dan Hurley did not bring himself, his team, the university or the coaching profession into three…

Michigan met Connecticut in the muck and won: defector.com/michigan-met...

Monet, Through The Iris | Defector Claude Monet’s painting The Path through the Irises is hard to ignore. First of all, there’s the sheer size of it—the canvas stretches six and a half feet high and over five feet across. The Path…

Rachelle Hampton on Claude Monet's 'The Path through the Irises' defector.com/monet-throug...

Mike Trout Starts Hitting, Is Rewarded With Fastballs Directed At His Chin | Defector Watching an all-time great athlete fade into anonymity comes with a perverse sadness: a slow death on a public stage, with stakes that only matter because people have decided to lend it some fictive…

Mike Trout starts hitting, is rewarded with fastballs directed at his chin: defector.com/mike-trout-s...

The Chicago Sky Cost Themselves Angel Reese | Defector The Chicago Sky were supposed to be getting a franchise building block when they drafted Angel Reese with the seventh overall pick of the 2024 draft. Instead they ended up with a player who didn’t…

The Chicago Sky cost themselves Angel Reese: defector.com/the-chicago-...

Giannis Antetokounmpo And The Bucks Are Feuding Right To The End | Defector A couple of Antetokounmpos took the court for the Milwaukee Bucks on Sunday, in a home win over the Memphis Grizzlies. Neither of them were the good Antetokounmpo. Thanasis, the second-oldest of the…

Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks are feuding right to the end: defector.com/giannis-ante...

What Would You Do Behind The Moon? | Defector For as reassuring as it may be to know you have a world-spanning team of geniuses overseeing your well-being, the Artemis crew has to get a little annoyed by mission control sometimes, right? They’re…

What would you do behind the Moon? defector.com/what-would-y...

The Islanders Swap Coaches With Four Games Left In A Playoff Chase | Defector In December of 1995, Patrick Roy let in nine goals in half a game at home against the Detroit Red Wings. With the crowd getting on his case, and the team already in a spiral, Roy exited the ice and…

The Islanders swap coaches with four games left in a playoff chase: defector.com/the-islander...

A Vengeful Deity Is Smiting The Lakers | Defector Sometimes circumstances force you to conclude that God bets. And while you may choose to question the existence of a deity, or more specifically wonder who or what it is that would book those bets,…

A vengeful deity is smiting the Lakers: defector.com/a-vengeful-d...

Polymarket Apologizes For Taking Bets On American Pilots Downed Over Iran | Defector Less than one month after Kalshi got into a legal whoopsie over whether or not they should pay out bettors who wagered on the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in the early days of the U.S.’s…

Polymarket apologizes for taking bets on American pilots downed over Iran: defector.com/polymarket-a...

The Crossword, April 6: Hit Parade | Defector Have a go at our Monday crossword. This week’s puzzle was constructed by Faren Roth, and edited by Hoang-Kim Vu. Faren is a soon-to-be Ph.D. student in speech, language, and hearing sciences who…

The Crossword, April 6: Hit Parade

Cori Close And UCLA Won At Their Own Speed | Defector There was a moment early in the third quarter of Sunday’s national championship game when you could see exactly how UCLA was going to win and why. The South Carolina Gamecocks, desperate for offense, ...

Cori Close and UCLA won at their own speed: defector.com/cori-close-a...

RFK Jr.’s Offal Advice | Defector In the supermarket or at the taco truck, whether it’s government subsidies for agriculture or the working conditions of food workers, food and politics are never far apart. Under the second Trump…

"The collective dimensions of health, such as herd immunity, are deemphasized, replaced by the idea of the individual body strengthened through diet and exercise."

Jo Adell Stole Three Homers And A Win From The Mariners | Defector If Jo Adell hadn’t been so precocious, his arrival as a big leaguer would seem right on time. The Angels made him the 10th overall pick of the 2017 MLB Draft and the breadth and voltage of his talent ...

Jo Adell stole three homers and a win from the Seattle Mariners: defector.com/jo-adell-sto...

The first product I see for sale is a trio of individually packaged strawberries that sell for $20 each. A small plaque next to the berries tells the curious peruser, "Our strawberries redefine sweetness and beauty. Each berry is cultivated to achieve perfect symmetry, brilliant color, and exceptional size." The berries confront you with their perfection. You gaze at the rubicund specimens and let yourself imagine indulging in the forbidden nectar. You imagine what it would be like to have both the material security and the freedom from embarrassment that would make you the sort of person who would buy a $20 strawberry. You think about the impossible logistics of producing the perfect strawberry in Japan and rushing it roughly 5,500 miles across the world's biggest and most powerful ocean—a process that places you, the would-be strawberry consumer, at the pointy end of the most decadent, most unfathomably specialized consumer experience currently possible under the extant limits of global human interconnectivity. You cannot smell the strawberries, unless you buy one.

"The first product I see for sale is a trio of individually packaged strawberries that sell for $20 each." defector.com/erewhon-is-n...

Monet, Through The Iris | Defector Claude Monet’s painting The Path through the Irises is hard to ignore. First of all, there’s the sheer size of it—the canvas stretches six and a half feet high and over five feet across. The Path thro...

Monet, through the iris: defector.com/monet-throug...

Rejoice, Tired Parents! Defector Will Raise Your Children Now | Defector When Defector decided to get in on the market for parenting advice, there were many questions we had to consider. After all, there is no shortage of content on parenting at the moment: Oscar-winning…

Defector is starting a parental advice column!