The Andy Staples Podcast: Talking food, football with Dan Rubenstein

Fellow Sports Illustrated writer Lindsay Schnell posed a familiar question on Twitter on Wednesday afternoon. Lindsay asked the question of Dan Rubenstein, the

Fellow Sports Illustrated writer Lindsay Schnell posed a familiar question on Twitter on Wednesday afternoon.

Friend wants to know how you get job that involves talking to coaches & eating all the delicious college town food. Paging @DanRubenstein.

— Lindsay Schnell (@Lindsay_Schnell) August 13, 2014

Lindsay asked the question of Dan Rubenstein, the video talent extraordinaire for SBNation.com and the co-host (with Ty Hildenbrandt) of the excellent Solid Verbal podcast. But I’ve also received this question several hundred times, because that sentence also describes my current vocation. So, I decided to call up Dan to discuss how one winds up doing this sort of thing for a living. Spoiler alert: We arrived from very different directions.

Of course, we also talked some college football. Dan is an Oregon alum, and he discussed his current level of anxiety following a season-ending knee injury to Ducks left tackle Tyler Johnstone. We also talked about the competition at the top of the Pac-12 and the Big Ten team that has a schedule conducive to making the playoff (assuming the selection committee doesn’t really care about strength of schedule).

Naturally, the conversation shifted to food. I introduced Dan to the concept of the Gut Pak, and he ripped me for my terrible food photography. Give it a listen …