The Bill Simmons Thread

8slim

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Simmons and Klosterman was great. Chuck hammered Simmons on Trae Young and Bill was in full Ralph Kramden, "Hom an ahhh, hom an ahh," mode.

And we got an epic grade word from scarcity. Scar-city. Loved it. I have never once heard a pronunciation like that. Highly recommend. Also can't wait for Chuck's book on the 90s.
In the Memento Rewatchables, Bill once again said "subseekwent". It's the strangest thing, and I have to assume he does it intentionally to troll at this point, since no one else on Earth pronounces the word that way.

I only listen to Bill's main podcast when someone mentions a particularly good guest here, so thanks for the heads up about Klosterman's appearance. Chuck is... Chuck, but he's always interesting to listen to.
 

luckiestman

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Simmons and Klosterman was great. Chuck hammered Simmons on Trae Young and Bill was in full Ralph Kramden, "Hom an ahhh, hom an ahh," mode.

And we got an epic grade word from scarcity. Scar-city. Loved it. I have never once heard a pronunciation like that. Highly recommend. Also can't wait for Chuck's book on the 90s.
Klosterman is great. I used to teach intro Econ a lot so I have heard scar sit EE quite a few times.
 

johnmd20

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In the Memento Rewatchables, Bill once again said "subseekwent". It's the strangest thing, and I have to assume he does it intentionally to troll at this point, since no one else on Earth pronounces the word that way.

I only listen to Bill's main podcast when someone mentions a particularly good guest here, so thanks for the heads up about Klosterman's appearance. Chuck is... Chuck, but he's always interesting to listen to.
It was interesting and worth listening to. And the subseekwent thing("thing" is a really important Simmons word) has been going on for the last few months. Nothing will ever top Hank from PMT pronouncing posthumously "post-mosly" but Simmons is up there.
 

Bunt4aTriple

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Simmons and Klosterman was great. Chuck hammered Simmons on Trae Young and Bill was in full Ralph Kramden, "Hom an ahhh, hom an ahh," mode.

And we got an epic grade word from scarcity. Scar-city. Loved it. I have never once heard a pronunciation like that. Highly recommend. Also can't wait for Chuck's book on the 90s.
This weekend we got "subSEEquent".

edit: whoops, lol.
 

luckiestman

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So I just finished the Klosterman pod and I thought one of the most interesting parts happened right at the end where he brought up that for some reason he always find himself rooting for certain teams and he doesn’t know why. I would like a whole podcast dedicated to this topic.
 

Mystic Merlin

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In the Memento Rewatchables, Bill once again said "subseekwent". It's the strangest thing, and I have to assume he does it intentionally to troll at this point, since no one else on Earth pronounces the word that way.

I only listen to Bill's main podcast when someone mentions a particularly good guest here, so thanks for the heads up about Klosterman's appearance. Chuck is... Chuck, but he's always interesting to listen to.
I think it is a combo of Bill putting hundreds (thousands?) of hours on tape and therefore letting slip some of his odd diction plus him trolling where he’s realized he has habitually mispronounced a word.
So I just finished the Klosterman pod and I thought one of the most interesting parts happened right at the end where he brought up that for some reason he always find himself rooting for certain teams and he doesn’t know why. I would like a whole podcast dedicated to this topic.
Oh this would be a good one. Anecdotally I’ve heard a range of explanations for fandom, some being not so obvious. For example, a kid I went to school with in an insignificant suburb of Waterbury, CT is a Dolphins fan because he loved ‘Ace Ventura: Pet Detective’ growing up, not because he’s from Florida or his parents were Dolphins fans.
 

ifmanis5

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So I just finished the Klosterman pod and I thought one of the most interesting parts happened right at the end where he brought up that for some reason he always find himself rooting for certain teams and he doesn’t know why. I would like a whole podcast dedicated to this topic.
Agreed and I would guess that the most popular reason would be: "They were a popular team when I watched them on TV aged 8 to 15."
 

SoxJox

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Reggie's anonymous quote reminds me of when I was in about 5th grade and was presenting a book report in front of the class. The report included the word "Catholicism."

I, being raised as a non-denominational Protestant, and having not yet knowingly been exposed to or given any thought to religion, pronounced the word "Catholic"-ism. And repeated it several times throughout the report.

The teacher didn't take me aside afterwards and whisper to me the proper pronunciation. No. Right there in front of the whole class. Maybe it was a teaching moment for many of my classmates too. But boy did I turn red.
 

reggiecleveland

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Reggie's anonymous quote reminds me of when I was in about 5th grade and was presenting a book report in front of the class. The report included the word "Catholicism."

I, being raised as a non-denominational Protestant, and having not yet knowingly been exposed to or given any thought to religion, pronounced the word "Catholic"-ism. And repeated it several times throughout the report.

The teacher didn't take me aside afterwards and whisper to me the proper pronunciation. No. Right there in front of the whole class. Maybe it was a teaching moment for many of my classmates too. But boy did I turn red.
I teach ESL and the funny thing for me is how little embarrassment ESL kids have when you correct them, and they improve quickly. I would probably correct you during your report, but add praise that you picked up new word by reading.

As for Bill Simmons, I mention it in jest. But, as a guy who got his start as a blogger and at one time woe the "nerd in the basement" as a badge of honor, it may be a possibility. But, decades into being an on air talking head, probably not.
 

8slim

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I think it is a combo of Bill putting hundreds (thousands?) of hours on tape and therefore letting slip some of his odd diction plus him trolling where he’s realized he has habitually mispronounced a word.
I used to assume that it happened when Bill was reading notes and just mispronounced a word because he wasn't entirely paying attention to what was coming out of his mouth. I'm sympathetic to that, because being a podcast host is no easy task, so I'd totally understand multi-tasking in your brain while you plan the next topic of conversation and read at the same time. In this case though, he was clearly just riffing. So I assume he was either trolling, or has the oddest pronunciation of that word among all English speaking humans.
 

Shelterdog

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So I just finished the Klosterman pod and I thought one of the most interesting parts happened right at the end where he brought up that for some reason he always find himself rooting for certain teams and he doesn’t know why. I would like a whole podcast dedicated to this topic.
You're on an entire website dedicated to this topic.
 

SoxJox

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I graduated from high school in Lancaster, PA. You can tell immediately if someone has never been there or knows little to nothing about the place (as if there's alot to know beyond its association with the Amish).

They'll pronounce it Lan-Caster, as they do in Texas for a city with the same name. The proper local pronunciation is Lank-ister.
 

jmcc5400

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Reggie's anonymous quote reminds me of when I was in about 5th grade and was presenting a book report in front of the class. The report included the word "Catholicism."

I, being raised as a non-denominational Protestant, and having not yet knowingly been exposed to or given any thought to religion, pronounced the word "Catholic"-ism. And repeated it several times throughout the report.

The teacher didn't take me aside afterwards and whisper to me the proper pronunciation. No. Right there in front of the whole class. Maybe it was a teaching moment for many of my classmates too. But boy did I turn red.
I am not sure if that is better or worse than the retroactive shame you feel when you find out you've glaringly mispronounced a word and no one corrected you.

During my freshman year of high school we read A Midsummer Night's dream and read some scenes out loud in class for discussion. I had to lead off with Theseus's opening lines: "Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour draws on apace."

I pronounced "nuptial" as "noop-tee-al" and felt pretty slick that I had skated past a word I didn't know. Until a year or two later when I heard it pronounced correctly and felt like a moron.
 

Spelunker

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I am not sure if that is better or worse than the retroactive shame you feel when you find out you've glaringly mispronounced a word and no one corrected you.

During my freshman year of high school we read A Midsummer Night's dream and read some scenes out loud in class for discussion. I had to lead off with Theseus's opening lines: "Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour draws on apace."

I pronounced "nuptial" as "noop-tee-al" and felt pretty slick that I had skated past a word I didn't know. Until a year or two later when I heard it pronounced correctly and felt like a moron.
Ironically, when I was young I first pronounced cacophony with a soft second c. And I still want to say "bi-OP-ic" for biopic.
 

cromulence

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Reggie's anonymous quote reminds me of when I was in about 5th grade and was presenting a book report in front of the class. The report included the word "Catholicism."

I, being raised as a non-denominational Protestant, and having not yet knowingly been exposed to or given any thought to religion, pronounced the word "Catholic"-ism. And repeated it several times throughout the report.

The teacher didn't take me aside afterwards and whisper to me the proper pronunciation. No. Right there in front of the whole class. Maybe it was a teaching moment for many of my classmates too. But boy did I turn red.
Pretty much the exact same thing happened to me with the word "gauge", except I wasn't as young as you. Now I can't see that word without flashing back to that moment.
 

luckiestman

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You're on an entire website dedicated to this topic.
I laughed. It’s my fault for not explaining what Klosterman said well. Klosterman was saying something about how for a reason without any real explanation he always finds himself rooting for the Titans if he catches them on TV and he doesn’t know why. Also that he likes Denver teams but has no connection to Denver.
 

Riconway3155

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Pretty much the exact same thing happened to me with the word "gauge", except I wasn't as young as you. Now I can't see that word without flashing back to that moment.
Mine was "indicted" my sophomore year of college as I was reading an ESPN headline out loud to my roommate about Jamal Lewis. Ugh, I think about that all the time.
 

Shelterdog

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Mine was "indicted" my sophomore year of college as I was reading an ESPN headline out loud to my roommate about Jamal Lewis. Ugh, I think about that all the time.
I've always known there's a spanish word Heffay for a boss, but somehow thought that el jeffe as used for central and south American dictators was an Arabic word or something ponounced El Jef-fay.
 

ManicCompression

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Throughout the entire Memento Rewatchables, he kept calling it "Mo-mento" which drove me nuts. I get mispronouncing things (I pronounced awry "awww-ree" until college) but it's like he though it had a different name.
 

luckiestman

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Throughout the entire Memento Rewatchables, he kept calling it "Mo-mento" which drove me nuts. I get mispronouncing things (I pronounced awry "awww-ree" until college) but it's like he though it had a different name.
That one didn’t even register for me, sub see quent cracked me the hell up though.
 

Mystic Merlin

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The entire Momento pod was the apex mountain for him pronouncing things like an alien.
Have we ever seen someone hit this level? Maybe Pacino? And I really think this Simmons podcast era is gonna mark a change from podcasts being over edited for precision in diction to a more free flowing, authentic experience for the audience. We saw it with paid ads a few years back, and you gotta think other podcasts are watching what’s going on here.

Anyways, I love Rewatchables; even, and this is high praise for podcasts, the so so episodes are worth listening to. I do wonder given how prodigious their output is when the well on good candidates for the format will run a bit dry, but luckily I don’t think that is in the near future.
 

johnmd20

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Have we ever seen someone hit this level? Maybe Pacino? And I really think this Simmons podcast era is gonna mark a change from podcasts being over edited for precision in diction to a more free flowing, authentic experience for the audience. We saw it with paid ads a few years back, and you gotta think other podcasts are watching what’s going on here.

Anyways, I love Rewatchables; even, and this is high praise for podcasts, the so so episodes are worth listening to. I do wonder given how prodigious their output is when the well on good candidates for the format will run a bit dry, but luckily I don’t think that is in the near future.
A lot of movies have been made. They have plenty of content to choose from.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Have we ever seen someone hit this level? Maybe Pacino? And I really think this Simmons podcast era is gonna mark a change from podcasts being over edited for precision in diction to a more free flowing, authentic experience for the audience. We saw it with paid ads a few years back, and you gotta think other podcasts are watching what’s going on here.

Anyways, I love Rewatchables; even, and this is high praise for podcasts, the so so episodes are worth listening to. I do wonder given how prodigious their output is when the well on good candidates for the format will run a bit dry, but luckily I don’t think that is in the near future.
I think if it was a matter of Simmons being the only host of the pod, and all choices had to run through him, they might start to run short of options. But since other hosts can step in to do episodes on movies that aren't in Simmons' wheelhouse, the choices are arguably endless.

Plus as long as Simmons feels comfortable putting off obvious choices for future shows (such as Boogie Nights), it seems like he hasn't reached a point where he's running out of options.
 

Mystic Merlin

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I think if it was a matter of Simmons being the only host of the pod, and all choices had to run through him, they might start to run short of options. But since other hosts can step in to do episodes on movies that aren't in Simmons' wheelhouse, the choices are arguably endless.

Plus as long as Simmons feels comfortable putting off obvious choices for future shows (such as Boogie Nights), it seems like he hasn't reached a point where he's running out of options.
These are great points. And to be clear I’m thinking several years out, not months, because I am fond of worrying that great content will evaporate.

They’ve definitely held some heavy hitters in reserve; I think they’ve done 2-3 Heat episodes, but to wait like 3-4 years to do Goodfellas is frankly amazing because it’s perfect for their format. And, yeah, having Fennessey and Ryan continually free to helm their own episodes will keep their scope pretty broad, especially if they increasingly construe a ‘Rewatchables’ movie to mean ‘movies we like and are worth discussing’ and play with the format as needed. I’m all for Fennessey and Ryan dipping into Malick, Kurosawa, and other choices that Simmons wouldn’t likely go for.
 

jmcc5400

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The core group of Bill, Fennessy and Ryan have such great chemistry. During the Raiders pod, I loved the moment where Bill wondered aloud whether Hitler "had really been into the occult" and Fennessy and Ryan basically raced to tag the other as the "Hitler expert" (Ryan beat Fennessy to the punch, responding to Bill's question with "I don't know. Sean?")
 

johnmd20

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These are great points. And to be clear I’m thinking several years out, not months, because I am fond of worrying that great content will evaporate.

They’ve definitely held some heavy hitters in reserve; I think they’ve done 2-3 Heat episodes, but to wait like 3-4 years to do Goodfellas is frankly amazing because it’s perfect for their format. And, yeah, having Fennessey and Ryan continually free to helm their own episodes will keep their scope pretty broad, especially if they increasingly construe a ‘Rewatchables’ movie to mean ‘movies we like and are worth discussing’ and play with the format as needed. I’m all for Fennessey and Ryan dipping into Malick, Kurosawa, and other choices that Simmons wouldn’t likely go for.
Granted, Binge Mode did do Harry Potter and Star Wars and Marvel but it's absolutely nuts the Rewatchables has never done any of those movies.

Like, you're telling me The Fellowship of the Ring wouldn't be a great Rewatchables? It would be. So would Thor Ragnorak. Or Empire Strikes Back.
 

luckiestman

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Granted, Binge Mode did do Harry Potter and Star Wars and Marvel but it's absolutely nuts the Rewatchables has never done any of those movies.

Like, you're telling me The Fellowship of the Ring wouldn't be a great Rewatchables? It would be. So would Thor Ragnorak. Or Empire Strikes Back.
The minor problem with most of those movies is that they suck.

edit: Not Empire, that one is great.
 

Auger34

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Granted, Binge Mode did do Harry Potter and Star Wars and Marvel but it's absolutely nuts the Rewatchables has never done any of those movies.

Like, you're telling me The Fellowship of the Ring wouldn't be a great Rewatchables? It would be. So would Thor Ragnorak. Or Empire Strikes Back.
Who would host it? Simmons shits on those types of movies all of the time
 

johnmd20

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Who would host it? Simmons shits on those types of movies all of the time
Rubin, Fennessy, Ryan, Littman, and/or bring in a guest host.

The question isn't "can they find hosts?" The question is, "Is Simmons' closed mindedness about things he doesn't like getting in the way of some of the most popular movies in history?"
 

8slim

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Rubin, Fennessy, Ryan, Littman, and/or bring in a guest host.

The question isn't "can they find hosts?" The question is, "Is Simmons' closed mindedness about things he doesn't like getting in the way of some of the most popular movies in history?"
Simmons famously didn’t appear on the Toy Story episode. I imagine he’ll cede the floor to other hosts for a handful of future movies that he disdains. But just a handful.
 

kenneycb

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A lot of the non-Simmons ones aren’t great IMO. Simmons can generally balance the lightness with people who can analyze the film. Too often without him you just get the latter.
 

Nick Kaufman

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In the old dark days before the internet, I was on the phone with the woman I wasted years chasing with unrequited love.

At some point, the quality of the call dropped, so I told her to click "RE-dee-al", because you know proper people pronounce i as an eee, you philistines. She just laughed at me as she corrected my mistake.
 
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8slim

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Pronunciation all depends where you are. More people speak English in India than there are people in Canada. If I go there my pronunciations will be wrong.
Sure but Bill is in America and speaks for a living. It’s not a big deal, just funny how freekWENTlee he mispronounces words.
 

Shelterdog

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A lot of the non-Simmons ones aren’t great IMO. Simmons can generally balance the lightness with people who can analyze the film. Too often without him you just get the latter.
Agree with you. I love the rewathchables and part of the fun is Simmons' unique combination of positivity, some decent comic observation, and absolute occasional idiocy; in the indiana jones it was absolutely priceless when the guys made fun of him for not really knowing who r2-d2 and c3po are or for suggesting that gene hackmans hould have played the nazi. I like film a lot and can enoy Fennessey in observations but would rather watch rewatch Daisuke take his sweet time through 118 pitches in four innings than listen to a big picture featuring a Fennessey Andrew Nayman discussion.
 

mcpickl

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Mine was "indicted" my sophomore year of college as I was reading an ESPN headline out loud to my roommate about Jamal Lewis. Ugh, I think about that all the time.
This is the same word I have burned into my brain, but my awakening to it was in front of a public speaking class freshman year of college.

It somehow never dawned on me that there were two words meaning the exact same thing, but I'd never heard in-DICK-ted said out loud, and never saw indeited in print.
 

johnmd20

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Agree with you. I love the rewathchables and part of the fun is Simmons' unique combination of positivity, some decent comic observation, and absolute occasional idiocy; in the indiana jones it was absolutely priceless when the guys made fun of him for not really knowing who r2-d2 and c3po are or for suggesting that gene hackmans hould have played the nazi. I like film a lot and can enoy Fennessey in observations but would rather watch rewatch Daisuke take his sweet time through 118 pitches in four innings than listen to a big picture featuring a Fennessey Andrew Nayman discussion.
R. . . .2? Deeee. . . .Two?

edit - and Adam Nayman is literally the most insufferable person I have ever heard on a podcast. He's brutal, he thinks he's the smartest dude in the world, and he's cynical and contrarian just to be a cynical contrarian. The podcast about cult movies left me never wanting to hear Nayman on anything ever again.

Plus, he looks exactly like he sounds. Where is the punchable face thread again?
 

Kliq

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R. . . .2? Deeee. . . .Two?

edit - and Adam Nayman is literally the most insufferable person I have ever heard on a podcast. He's brutal, he thinks he's the smartest dude in the world, and he's cynical and contrarian just to be a cynical contrarian. The podcast about cult movies left me never wanting to hear Nayman on anything ever again.

Plus, he looks exactly like he sounds. Where is the punchable face thread again?
Most professional movie critics are like this.
 

Shelterdog

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Most professional movie critics are like this.
Which is why I just spent two hours giggling to the Rewatchables Indiane Jones and don't listen to any "serious" film podcasts even though I really do like serious films.

Plus Adam Nayman isn't a very bright man. He cloaks his lack of insight with a lot of jargon but fundamentally doesn't have interesting things to say about movies. And yes, super punchable.
 
Which is why I just spent two hours giggling to the Rewatchables Indiane Jones and don't listen to any "serious" film podcasts even though I really do like serious films.
FWIW, you should check out the Kermode and Mayo Film Review podcast (taken from their Friday afternoon BBC radio show). Serious reviews and interviews, but loads of silly stuff and recurring gags - it's a great listen.