What Makes A Failson?

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 about college football, Madden, dirty sponges, and more.

Your letters:

Pete:

Drew, I lived in Lakeland, Florida, in 2007, and made $31,033 as a teacher. My wife made a bit more, and we were able to buy a house during the housing market collapse. And buddy, we were broke. How did you survive living in MANHATTAN on $25k, when we lived in podunk Florida and barely made it?

Take a wild guess, amigo. You’re talking to the son of an airline exec who went to prep school and then [Rainier Wolfcastle voice] a fancy East Coast college. So how do you think I was able to pay my rent? I got the assist from my folks. I didn’t want it. I came out of college knowing that I’d already been spoiled far beyond what I’d deserved. Also, I was a proud young man who wanted to pay his own way. I didn’t want to be beholden to my folks for the rest of my life. I didn’t wanna owe anyone anything. I was my own man, dammit.

Then I went apartment hunting in New York and whoa hey, turned out I wasn’t quite my own man just yet. I wouldn’t have been able to afford to live a supply closet in the Bronx without mom and dad kicking in a few hundred every month. So I found a place in Midtown, and they helped me with some of the rent until my now-wife moved in and we could foot the tab on our own.

I was still “broke,” in rich-kid terms. My wife and I would spend days ogling fancy restaurant menus because we couldn’t afford to actually eat at them. And the apartment we lived in was just a studio, with a half-fridge and no dishwasher. We reminisce over those days like we lived in a Frank McCourt memoir, which is laughable to any American who knows what being poor is REALLY like. So I’m not all that far removed from the stock character in the New York Times story who started a successful business from nothing, only you find out in the 11th paragraph that they got a $500,000 loan from the bank of dad as seed money. My folks didn’t give me anywhere near that much money when I started, but I still got a leg up that most people don’t.

I think about that. We goof on failsons here at Defector quite a bit: people who have zero talent, but still sit atop the food chain because they came from money. From time to time, I wonder to myself, does that mean I’m a failson? What makes me all that different from the Woody Johnsons of the world? Do I get some kind of magical failson exemption because I have decent taste in politics, or because I don’t toil in the same line of work as my parents once did? What about Clark Hunt? He inherited his team and then won three titles with it. Does he still count as a failson if he hasn’t, you know, failed? Or should I just consider him a failson just because I think he’s a dipshit? It’s probably that.

But you and I live in a country where how much people make (or how much people think you make) defines them. This is deeply unhealthy, given the inequality baked into the system that favors people like myself. It wildly distorts how people view one another, and it breeds resentment from top to bottom. In the case of someone like Clark Hunt, it likely is. In my case, I was just a simple, hard-working lad who came to New York in 1998 with nothing more than a dream. And $700 a month from mommy and daddy, give or take.

Sarah:

How old can your kids get before you have to make sure they're in clothes when company comes over? Asking for a friend.

I’m gonna be generous and say five, although guests will definitely look at you weird if they walk into your house and suddenly there’s a four-year-old running around with their little dick and balls flapping around in the breeze.

When our sons were in preschool, they used to piss in the yard when everyone was around. We had to manage that. It wasn’t easy, because kids that small have a hard time learning to wear clothes, to use a fork while eating, and to shit into a working toilet. These are tasks that I, a grown adult, used to take for granted. After wiping preschool ass hundreds of times over, I no longer take them for granted. Raising a kid is like being a physical therapist for someone who just spent the past decade in a coma.

Scott:

How far away as a society are we from going full on Darmok in terms of speaking to each other? Recently, I have noticed that myself and others are casually slipping in either meme descriptions, classic videos, or other stories (don't get Coldplay concert'ed) as a way to describe a situation. It doesn't bother me. If this is how speaking will turn, then so be it. I just wonder how much I need to keep up with stuff to be able to communicate. 

I’m on the record as being anti-meme, so I go out of my way to exclude all meme-ese from my day-to-day interactions with people. I also don’t recap shit I saw online to my friends or family, because explaining something you saw on the internet is like any other “I guess you had to be there” type story, only five times lamer. So whenever one of my kids starts yapping at the dinner table about some shit they saw on Reels, my wife and I cut that shit off at the root. If these kids wanna slip and find themselves talking Borg for the rest of their lives, it sure as hell won’t be because I encouraged them to.

I don’t care if I come off a tightass about this. Words are my job, and I have no interest in abetting in the ongoing cultural decay we’re all living through. I have a personal incentive, not to mention desire, to protect words. I’m sure it’s already a lost cause, but sometimes the fight is the point.

(By the way, when I quote movies or TV shows to my friends? That’s totally different and way cool.)

Dylan:

Every March, I promise myself that I won't waste time this year with whatever new drama is happening in the college football world. Yet every August, my wife catches me on Reddit passionately arguing with strangers about how the Big 12 should merge with the ACC or some other nonsense. Fandom is cool and whatever, but what the hell is wrong with college football fans (me)?

Nothing. You’re a college football fan. You’re SUPPOSED to be insane. You’re supposed to overinvest in this shit, to the point where you question your own values. That’s what makes sports cool and fun. Just this week, I let out an audible cheer while listening to a podcast about how well J.J. McCarthy’s joint practice sessions went. What kind of loser does that? Me. I do that, and with great relish.

Because passion is a virtue, even if it makes jackasses of us all. Why do you dance around like a shithead at concerts? Because you love the music. Why do you spend hours carefully orchestrating a playlist for some girl at school who doesn’t even know you exist? Because you’re madly in love with her and will do anything to catch her eye. And why do you dress up in as a giant War Eagle when you attend an Auburn game? Because FUCK BAMA, that’s why. This isn’t Victorian England. We don’t suppress all of our passions under a tightened corset in this country. We let it out. Sports, college sports particularly, are one of the best places to do that. Even if you wanna get into the weeds and issue takes about conference realignment and all of that other stupid shit, it’s fair game. I’d rather you go crazy over what you love than just say “meh” to it like a total dipshit.

So stop policing your own sports fandom. We have enough cops already in this asshole country, know what I mean? Also, the Power Five and its broadcast partners are already doing their best to destroy your love of college football entirely, so there’s no need to aid them in the cause.

By the way, did you know that Texas is No. 1 in the preseason AP poll? And that Penn State is No. 2? Both of these programs are being set up for humiliation, and perhaps all season long! So I’m all in on college football 2025. No need to keep myself in line there.

Eric:

We saw Queens of the Stone Age live again last month and they played a killer set. Couple deep cuts we had not heard live before. I feel like Era Vulgaris is completely underrated. What's your definitive ranking of Queens albums? 

When it comes to any of my favorite artists, I tend to rearrange such rankings on a regular basis. Like, if you ask me to name my favorite Metallica album or song, I’ll probably give you a different answer from one day to the next. My answer changes because I change, so certain songs will hit me harder at one point and less at another.

That’s what good art does. It doesn’t conform to clean rankings; it’s a dynamic relationship between you and the work. So keep that in mind when I give you these QOTSA album rankings, because I’m entitled to shuffle them around as I please an hour from now:

1. Songs for the Deaf
2. Rated R
3. Like Clockwork
4. Lullabies to Paralyze
5. In Times New Roman
6. Self-titled
7. Era Vulgaris
8. Villains

Side note: the expanded Era Vulgaris includes one of my favorite QOTSA songs, “Running Joke.” I love that song so much that I wanted to include a lyric from it as the epigram for The Hike. But the publisher said, “You gotta get the band’s permission to use it,” so I looked into how to secure the rights. Turns out this lone track had multiple songwriters, each with separate representation, and even different profit shares. I’d have had an easier time doing a pull-up than navigating that sea of shit, so I peaced out early and never used the lyric. If you ever meet someone who works in music rights business, give them a hug. They’ve been through a lot.

(The lyric, by the way, was this one: “Standing in the shadows/A whisperer to be/Just fishing in the darkness/Of possibilities”)

DK:

All that WNBA talk on your pod and not a single mention of the object that was heaved from the cheap seats. Biggest bummer on The Distraction since the 2024 Election Hype Up pod. 

We didn’t mention the dildo thing on the pod because it was early on in the scandal and there wasn’t really much to say about it. Throwing dildos is for Bills games, dammit. Besides, Brandy Jensen addressed the whole affair better than I ever could. Maitreyi, Patrick, Roth, and Harry also had a great conversation about it on our new basketball podcast, Nothing But Respect. There are way too many assholes out there whose only goal in life is to waste other people’s time. This is but one such instance. I’m not even certain that most Americans even know what a good joke looks and sounds like anymore.

Nicholas:

How long do think EA Sports hangs onto the “Madden” name for their games? 

Forever. John Madden retired 16 years ago, and he died four years ago. EA also stopped using his voice in the Madden games (“That’s just a bad throw!”) God knows how long ago. None of that has stopped the company from keeping Madden’s name on the product. I don’t even need to point out that millions of people who play Madden today don’t actually know who the man was. They may not even know he was a person at all. That curiosity has been noted plenty of times by plenty of other people. John Madden lives on as a brand name now, and no one seems to mind it, least of all EA. So there you have it.

As long as EA uses the Madden name, though, I really do wish they made his namesake better instead of just reskinning the same janky game every year. I shouldn’t still be waxing poetic over Tecmo Bowl Bo Jackson. If EA actually gave a fuck about the shit they put out, I wouldn’t have to.

HALFTIME!

Dan:

I was reading the Funbag from a few weeks ago when you answered a question from a reader about the dirtiest item in the kitchen and you mentioned the sponge. It reminded me of a lifehack I had read years ago if you microwave the sponge it supposedly kills bacteria on it. Whether or not it’s true I have no idea, but it helps me sleep at night thinking it does.

My wife, being half-German, is fastidious about cleaning. Thus, she’s long been aware of how nasty sponges can get, so her move is to toss the sponge in the dishwasher with the rest of the load every night. So far, none of us have died from sponge-transmuted e. coli, so I consider her methods to be ironclad. Imagine if we ran the sponge through the dishwasher and then nuked it. It might start growing the cure for cancer inside of its pores. REMARKABLE.

Also, I think I’ve noted this before, but my mom only uses a sponge for washing dishes. We finally got her to buy a dish brush for whenever we visit. But left to her own devices, she’ll scrub pots using just a plainass sponge, not even a sponge that has that bonus gritty side. I don’t know how she still has skin on her hands. You don’t have to live like this, mom! Welcome the dish brush into your life, dammit!

Kevin:

Is there a limit/any sense of decorum with regards to taking food from work? We had a breakfast thing recently and I took six bagels home. Am I trash?

Did anyone see you take the six bagels? Because that’s really the only thing that matters here. Back when I was a lowly office schlub, I didn’t dare to bogart an outsized share of conference room food. I didn’t want the big bosses to see me going for it and then to say to each other, “We have a little piggie down in Accounts. He must be dealt with.” So I exercised restraint, even on breakfast pastry day. Too risky. The worst was when I walked into a meeting before the food was officially served. I’d see trays of brownies, cookies, and tasty sandwiches all shrink-wrapped on a side table, but I couldn’t eat any of it. No no, I had to sit there like a fucking grade schooler waiting for his mommy to say it was okay to eat now. Sometimes they wouldn’t officially serve the food until after we’d gone through the PowerPoint deck. Torture.

But if NO ONE was around, and the plastic wrap was already off of the serving platters, it was go time. Same goes for Kevin up above. You are not the scum of the earth if you take more than an individual portion in that scenario. First of all, your company paid for it, so fuck ‘em. Second, you need the extra energy to finish all of those spreadsheets. Third, your salary represents what? 0.05 percent of your company’s overhead? Far as I’m concerned, the least they can do is provide you with some lightly stale bagels that you can sneak into your messenger bag to bring home with you. They’re counting on your sense of decorum—or your fear of everything thinking you’re a fatty boom boom—to keep you from hogging all of that food. You know who else foolishly counts on decorum to keep people in line? You guessed it: Democrats. Fuck. That. It’s your duty to go ham on that Panera catering, motherfucker. Don’t let those fat cats shame you out of it.

Greg:

Let's say medical science invents a way for people to go a month without pooping and peeing. You could schedule a time to dump a hyperconcentrated load of waste which is no bigger, no messier, and no smellier than usual. Would you do it?

Of course I would. You’re telling me that I never have to get out of bed in the middle of the night to piss again? Or run out of a theater mid-movie to shake the weasel and then rush back to my seat in the dark? Or bomb a gas station toilet because the urge to shit suddenly hit me while I was on the road? I’d literally pay you $25,000 for that luxury.

One caveat, though: I don’t want my monthly shit/piss to be everyday in size. I wanna drop a fucking warhead down into that toilet, and then stand back up and rip a stream for so long that it would leave even Adam Sandler in complete awe. I’d need some sort of custom, Galactus-sized toilet to gulp all of this down, but I’m willing to make that sacrifice.

Michael:

I couldn't sleep at all last night and ended up watching a bunch of the My Wish videos from ESPN on YouTube. After a few of them I ended up just skipping past the sentimental part to where I could see the kid having fun and meeting the athlete. Should I feel bad about that? 

No. Those human interest stories follow a template, and have been for my entire life. Watching Holly Rowe or whoever do a teary interview a kid with Hodgkin’s isn’t some mandatory course in personal betterment. It’s just content. So you’re excused from fast forwarding through the sad. And why can’t the kids’ folks just pay to have Russell Wilson come visit them in the ICU? Everyone wants a handout these days!

Glenn:

Does it seem like the inter-commentariat vitriol has significantly increased here since Trump started dismantling the country?

I’ll leave it to our commenters to answer that definitively. All I know that is that everyone is crankier in 2025, and with good reason. The President is a deranged asshole, the price of everything is going up, and this country is gonna start burning babies as Mars rocket fuel. That tends to harsh everyone’s mood.

So if our commenters are getting a little bit too spicy with one another, that’s just a reflection of the environment that all of us currently dwell in. Everyone wants the bad shit to end, and everyone thinks that they alone have the answer to it. That tends to have an adverse effect on how Americans interact with one another.

Todd:

I have the opportunity to travel overseas next year to a place I've always wanted to go. The thing is the trip will take place over the Super Bowl. Because of where we're going, there is a good chance I will be unable to watch the game live. I'm a Lions fan. For the majority of my life, the notion of a Lions Super Bowl was laughable. Now it's not unrealistic that it could happen. Am I being ridiculous for even letting such thoughts enter my considerations of this trip?

See my college football answer up above. Your fansanity is shining bright and clear in this instance, which I consider to be normal. I’m not even gonna get cheap Lions jokes off at your expense. Your team is good, and you don’t wanna miss out on something incredible that they could potentially accomplish.

That said, if you think about this rationally, you already know that the Lions should have made the Super Bowl a year ago and didn’t even get out of the divisional round. Even if your organization has its shit together, you still need a million things to go right to win a title, or even get within a game of it. Fatalism doesn’t have to be part of the equation here. It’s just a simple matter of probabilities. Right now, the Lions are +1100 to win the Super Bowl. Those odds are carefully calculated by Vegas, and they aren’t even money. So you can cancel your trip on the analytically small chance they make it, or you can keep everything as is. I can’t make that choice for you.

(I wouldn’t cancel.)

Joe:

Last week I flew from Colorado to China, so I got to spend a lot of time in the airport. I was wearing a collared shirt and chino shorts. (I like the collared shirt because I'm traveling with kids and the extra pockets come in handy). I realized I was, by far, the best dressed man in the airport.  As someone who hates wearing ties, I've never been the best dressed man ever until I went to that airport. Am I dressing too formal for the airport?  

Clearly. As an American, it’s your duty to report to the airport in sweat shorts, a pro-Trump shirt you bought at a surf shop, and dirty flip flops.

I kid. Dress how you wanna dress. You have no social obligation to look like a pig while loitering around an airport. You can make like Catch Me If You Can and treat it like a dressier affair if you want. Nothing beats the ego charge you get walking around DFW and realizing that everyone else in the joint is ugly except for you.

(My folks made me wear chinos and a sport coat while flying when I was a kid. I now hate both of those garments with a passion, and now only fly in my day-to-day wear. My wife says I dress like a coach. She’s not wrong.)

Email of the week!

Don:

Didn’t this exact game happen to the Pirates and Rockies like a month ago? Never let go of your dreams, Don.