The Gulf States and China are spending billions to build stadiums and buy up teams — but what are they really buying? And can an entrepreneur from Cincinnati make his own billions by bringing baseball to Dubai?

• SOURCES:
  • Simon Chadwick, professor of afroeurasian sport at Emlyon Business School.
  • Derek Fisher, high school basketball coach, former N.B.A. coach and player.
  • Kash Shaikh, chairman, C.E.O., and co-founder of Baseball United.
  • Rory Smith, football correspondent at The Observer.

• RESOURCES:
  • "China Keeps Building Stadiums in Africa. But at What Cost?" by Elian Peltier (New York Times, 2024).
  • "Manchester Off-Shored: A Public Interest Report on the Manchester Life Partnership Between Manchester City Council + The Abu Dhabi United Group," by Richard Goulding, Adam Leaver, and Jonathan Silver (Centripetal Cities, 2022).
  • "Manchester City's Cozy Ties to Abu Dhabi: Sponsorship Money – Paid for by the State," by Rafael Buschmann, Nicola Naber, and Christoph Winterbach (Spiegel International, 2022).
  • "China Renews Its ‘Belt and Road’ Push for Global Sway," by Keith Bradsher (New York Times, 2020).

• EXTRAS:
  • "What Is Sportswashing — and Does It Work? (Update)," by Freakonomics Radio (2024).

Before she decided to become a poker pro, Maria Konnikova didn’t know how many cards are in a deck. But she did have a Ph.D. in psychology, a brilliant coach, and a burning desire to know whether life is driven more by skill or chance. She found some answers in poker — and she’s willing to tell us everything she learned.

• SOURCES:
  • Maria Konnikova, author of The Biggest Bluff.

• RESOURCES:
  • “Gender Differences in Performance Predictions: Evidence from the Cognitive Reflection Test,” by Patrick Ring, Levent Neyse, Tamas David-Barett, and Ulrich Schmidt (Frontiers in Psychology, 2016).
  • “The headwinds/tailwinds Asymmetry: An Availability Bias in Assessments of Barriers and Blessings,” by Shai Davidai and Thomas Gilovich (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2016).
  • “The Two Settings of Kind and Wicked Learning Environments,” by Robin M. Hogarth, Tomás Lejarraga, and Emre Soyer (Current Directions in Psychological Science, 2015).
  • "The Limits of Self-Control: Self-Control, Illusory Control, and Risky Financial Decision Making,” by Maria Konnikova (Columbia University, 2013).
  • “Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement” by J.B. Rotter (Psychological Monographs: General and Applied, 1966).

• EXTRAS:
  • The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win, by Maria Konnikova.
  • Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes, by Maria Konnikova.
  • The Confidence Game, by Maria Konnikova.
  • Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, by John Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern.
  • "This Year’s World Series Of Poker Is Different," by Risky Business with Nate Silver and Maria Konnikova (2025).

Cory Booker on the politics of fear, the politics of hope, and how to split the difference.

• SOURCES:
  • Cory Booker, senior United States Senator from New Jersey.

• RESOURCES:
  • "'When Are More Americans Going to Speak Up?'" by The New Yorker Radio Hour (2025).
  • "Cory Booker’s Marathon Floor Speech," (2025).
  • "Facebook Knows Instagram Is Toxic for Teen Girls, Company Documents Show," by Georgia Wells, Jeff Horwitz, and Deepa Seetharaman (Wall Street Journal, 2021).
  • "Tucked Into the Tax Bill, a Plan to Help Distressed America," by Jim Tankersley (New York Times, 2018).
  • United: Thoughts on Finding Common Ground and Advancing the Common Good, by Cory Booker (2017).
  • "But What Did Cory Booker Actually Accomplish in Newark?" by J.B. Wogan (Governing, 2013).

• EXTRAS:
  • "Ten Myths About the U.S. Tax System," by Freakonomics Radio (2025).
  • "The United States of Cory Booker," by Freakonomics Radio (2016).