Episode 62: From Bill to Shill Simmons — One Fan’s Journey Through the Stages of BS Pod Listening, and the Making and Breaking of a Pod Friendship (Pod-ship); Plus, Why Did Bill Abandon Baseball?

The r/BillSimmons Podcast

Welcome to Episode 62! We bring on Neil from Twitter (@NeilYayamanj) to discuss his journey of Bill Simmons fanhood over the last several years. This is the spiritual sequel to the fan favorite 4-hour Epic, Definitive Bill Simmons Retrospective, this time exploring in depth the period of Bill Simmons from 2017-2024.

We kick off the pod talking about Neil's introduction to Bill and how he immediately took to him as he was yearning for sports talk. Bill mixed in other qualitative features that made him a great listen and hang, and Neil earnestly began his Podcast friendship or "pod-ship."

And for awhile, the pod-ship was great. Bill was the guy you could talk to at the bar who knew his stuff on sports and pop culture. Neil enjoyed his celebrity interviews, inside look at stories like Magic resigning from the Lakers, and his understanding of sports and pop culture as a plugged in operator.

But then we hit on the dissolution of the pod-ship. Bill started outright going through the motions and mailing it in, including zero mention of baseball (even though he made his name on the sport) and his MIA Mark Cuban selling the Mavs and McAfee vs. Norby takes. We also examine Bill's personality on his Smartness and Marc Maron appearances.

We finish up how Bill finalized his journey from epic columnist and podcaster to Shill Simmons.