Basketballs Newest Authority Isnt Sitting CourtsideHes Podcasting

By vertex

In July 9, 2017

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The NBAs collective bargaining ruleswhich mainly govern contracts for players and team-building protocolsare messy and complicated, even for some league staffers. So when they needed extra lessons on the finer points, they enrolled in a summer class with Nate Duncan. Hes not an executive or a former player, though. Hes a podcaster.

In the year since launching Duncd On, Duncan has become king of, as he puts it, the NBA nerds. While fellow pundits often parrot the hot takes of the momentsuch-and-such team is having an awful off-season, sayDuncan backs up his claims with a bevy of observations and research you cant find anywhere else. He knows listeners crave in-depth analysis, whether the topic is LeBron James shooting or the number of future draft picks the Memphis Grizzlies have traded. He does so much homework, in fact, that he and his cohost, sportswriter Danny Leroux, can role-play as general managers and player agents for all 30 teams. Because the hour-plus shows pack in so much information, Duncan suggests listeners speed up playback to 1.5X just to squeeze it all in. And with the NBA season starting tonight, their easygoing insight will be even more valuable.

One reason Duncans so good at all this? Before he was a podcaster he was a plaintiffs lawyer in the Bay Area. It was a good job, but not a dream job, he says. I wanted to be a fighter pilot, a nuclear sub commander … or work in an NBA front office. In 2011, the league introduced a new collective bargaining agreement, and Duncan saw an opportunity to apply his legal training to his favorite sport. He pored over the 500-plus-page document, methodically translating its legalese into everyday humanspeak. He even made flash cards and recorded himself reading them for daily commute listening.

From there, Duncan tried out sportswriting before jumping into podcasts for the 2015 playoffs. I was going to keep being a lawyer, watching the games and recording the podcast at midnight every night, he says. But after Duncd On hit the iTunes Sports Top 10 and big advertisers (like ticket search engine SeatGeek) came calling, he traded one court for another.