The geography of sports movies (with Chuck Klosterman and Michael Weinreb)

“"When I was in the third grade my teacher announced to our class that Ronald Reagan had been shot. When she asked if we had questions, I raised my hand and asked her if the Indiana - North Carolina basketball game was still going to happen that night.” – Chuck Klosterman

In this episode of Deviate, Rolf, Chuck, and Michael hypothesize about where in Texas the town of "Dillon" is in the TV show Friday Night Lights (2:30); the role of sports and sports movies in how people perceive Indiana, and which sports fandoms are independent of geography (17:00); sports movies (and hypothetical sports movies) set in Michael's hometown of State College, PA, or Chuck's home-state of North Dakota, or Rolf's hometown of Wichita (27:00); working-class sports cities with bad reputations, and how geography determines the sports stories that are told there (40:00); the inherent placelessness of the NFL Scouting Combine and the Super Bowl, how sports are the last media events where the outcome is truly unknown, and what the best hypothetical scenario is for diehard fans watching a big game (50:00).

Chuck Klosterman is a cultural critic known for analyzing pop culture, sports, and philosophy. He is the author of 13 books, including Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, The Nineties, and, most recently, Football.

Michael Weinreb (@MichaelWeinreb) is the author of three sports books, including Bigger Than the Game and  Season of Saturdays. His Substack newsletter is called Throwbacks: A Newsletter About Sports History and Culture.

Notable Links:

• Kansas Never Plays Itself (video essay)
• The Rewatchables (Ringer Network podcast)
• Friday Night Lights (TV show)
• Pflugerville, Texas (shooting Location of Friday Night Lights)
• Odessa, Texas (setting of the book Friday Night Lights)
• Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (book)
• Friday Night Lights (2004 film)
• Perfect Strangers (TV series)
• Jesse Plemons (actor in Friday Night Lights)
• Hoosiers (1986 movie)
• Bob Knight (Indiana basketball coach from 1971–2000)
• Season on the Brink, by John Feinstein (book)
• Gene Hackman (actor in Hoosiers)
• Woody Hayes (football coach)
• Rudy (1993 film)
• Subway Alumni (NYC Notre Dame fans)
• America's Team (nickname for the Dallas Cowboys)
• Middletown (PBS series about Muncie, Indiana basketball)
• Something for Joey (TV movie)
• Paterno (2018 HBO movie featuring Kiki Bush)
• Three-Man Weave (Chuck Klosterman article about ND basketball game)
• The Slaughter Rule (2002 American coming of age sports movie)
• Hoop Dreams (1994 basketball documentary)
• Downtown Owl (2023 movie)
• Wichita Monrovians (Negro Leagues baseball team)
• Vision Quest (1985 film)
• The Battered Bastards of Baseball (2014 sports documentary)
• How Rolf Ruined the 1990s (Deviate grunge episode)
• Dawg Pound (Cleveland Browns fan section)
• Major League (1989 movie)
• Punk icon Ian MacKaye (Deviate episode)
• Massillon (football-crazed town in Ohio)
• St. Elmo Steak House (restaurant in Indianapolis)
• NFL Scouting Combine (event in Indianapolis)

The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.

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