Death at the Wing

(Three Uncanny Four)

Though hoops is the common thread in Adam McKay’s current podcast series, said Bryan Kalbrosky in USAToday.com, “you don’t need to be a basketball fan, even in the slightest, to become infatuated.” The Oscarwinning screenwriter of The Big Short and director of Anchorman examines the early deaths of several rising roundball stars to illustrate how the sport and the larger culture took a turn under President Ronald Reagan. “If you are someone who loves sports, you will be hooked by some of the fascinating details that McKay unearths about some of the game’s biggest legends.” But the focus of the series is on would-be stars, such as Boston Celtics draftee Len Bias, mercurial NBA guard Terry Furlow, and Chicago high schooler Benji Wilson. “Though the fits between the biographies and the historical trends McKay is describing can be messy,” said PodcastReview.org, “the show’s ambition—to identify what changed and was lost during Reagan’s economic revolution—is worthwhile.”