Speaker
Zach Top
Appearances over time
1 episodes
Episodes
1
Podcasts
Quotes & moments
Zach Top won the first-ever Best Traditional Country Grammy, beating Willie Nelson in the category.
Zach Top went from working construction in Colorado to headlining arena tours within roughly five years of moving to Nashville full-time.
Zach Top revealed that 'I Never Lie' became his biggest song despite being an unexpected hit — no one originally picked it as the commercial breakout off his first record.
Phil allegedly showed his friend Pat Perez's wife a photo of himself flexing — with a bonus feature — while Perez was in the bathroom. He reportedly also paid a club kid $500 to carry his phone around the course so his wife couldn't track him. Not a great look.
For 40 years, the US kicked the ball around in the back to retain possession. Now under Poach, every kickoff goes straight to the corner flag to pin opponents deep and force turnovers in scoring position. America ran more miles in the group stage than any other nation — not a bug, it's the feature.
Uruguay got eliminated from an easy group, then their players attacked referees and had to be ejected. Their federation's response was ice-cold: private charter cancelled. Find your own way home. It's the most accountability any sports federation has shown in years.
Hank was one foot out the door during the Dixie Tour, taking all the blame for other people's mistakes. He was seriously planning to ditch Barstool and apply to USC film school. It was Big Cat telling him about the Chernin investment that made him stay. Dave is still skeptical he would have gotten in.
Zach Top grew up homeschooled on a farm in rural Washington, nearly finished an engineering degree at Colorado Boulder, worked construction, then moved to Nashville full-time in 2021. By 2024 he was headlining arenas. The first moment he knew it was real: 800 people in Gainesville, Georgia singing his words back to him.
The original Barstool Sports was a $3,000-per-issue printed newspaper in Boston, written almost entirely by Dave under about 10 different fake names. He'd fake ads from steakhouses to hit break-even and published until 4 AM with a designer he found by accident. The entire internet presence got accidentally deleted a few years in.
Portnoy's management style is simple: it's your thing, I trust you to do it. He offered PMT the Netflix deal and told them they could say no — it was their podcast. That kind of trust is shockingly rare, and PFT says it's why Barstool is the best place to work.
When you're on the road all year, writing becomes nearly impossible. The solution: take a week in Key West or the Idaho mountains with your producer and three writers, drink beers, stare at the ocean, and just create. Zach Top says he wrote the best songs of his career that way — and they're not out yet.
An analytics exec claimed Jaylen Brown was the 7th best player on a team. The crew spent ten minutes trying to find any NBA team where Brown would rank third or lower — they couldn't. Maybe the Lakers. It's an indefensible stat.
After an extremely chaotic debate, the crew lands on Las Vegas, an SEC college football game, Waffle House, and the Bass Pro Shop Pyramid in Memphis as the definitive Mount Rushmore of American experiences for foreign visitors. Honorable mentions include rodeos, Buc-ee's, Daytona infield, and Chili's.
The ESPN deal falling apart didn't hurt Barstool — it saved it. Portnoy says it created a shared enemy that united everyone: Dave, Big Cat, PFT, Hank. Without that common enemy forcing them together, the company never becomes the behemoth it is today.
Messi's free kick goal against the keeper who wandered behind his own wall generated immediate conspiracy talk — crypto accounts, late-night deposits, a goalie who made a business decision. The boys are on the fence, but the footage from certain angles does not look great for the keeper.
Country music has always been cyclical. Back in the '70s, Kenny Rogers was ruining country. Then Strait and Randy Travis saved it. Now Kenny Rogers sounds traditional. Florida Georgia Line blew the doors open in 2010, Morgan Wallen owns the peak — and now the pendulum swings back to roots. That's Zach Top's lane.
At the peak of his personal brand and Barstool's meteoric rise during the Chernin years, Portnoy was making $400,000 a year — a figure he never once renegotiated upward. Chernin's re-sign offer was around $2 million, which he found insulting. Without the sports gambling legalization, he was out.
There's a new Grammy category for Best Traditional Country, and its first-ever winner jogged out of breath to accept the award — then had to tell people he'd beaten Willie Nelson. He knows it feels wrong. He won anyway.
Analysis
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