The Worst Moments From Pablo Torre's Podcast And His Failed Attempt At ‘Investigating’ Riley Gaines

There may only be one word to describe Pablo Torre and his ‘Pablo Torre Finds Out’ podcast, and that word is something. The former ESPN contributor has done creepy, far too detailed deep dives into Bill Belichick's dating life, but also uncovered quite the alleged conspiracy involving Kawhi Leonard and a circumvention of the NBA salary cap, all in the last handful of months. You never know what you're going to get. 

In the most recent episode of the podcast, Torre and Mother Jones reporter Madison Pauly teamed up for an episode focused on OutKick's very own Riley Gaines. 

Riley Gaines was the subject of Pablo Torre's latest deep-dive podcast. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

On YouTube, the episode is titled ‘What Is Riley Gaines Hiding? We Investigated’ and on podcast platforms, the episode was titled ‘All-American Grift: We Investigated Trump’s Favorite Sports Troll.' If those two titles don't make the episode's agenda and tone abundantly clear, let's look at some of the recent stories Pauly has published over at Mother Jones.

In June, Pauly published ‘Women’s Health Care has a Racism Problem. Trump's War on DEI Is Making It Worse.' In September, Pauly stepped away from the health care space and co-wrote a story titled ‘A Timeline of Right-Wing Attempts to Blame Trans People for Charlie Kirk’s Murder.' Her latest story was recently published as a preview to the podcast with Torre, with the title ‘How Right-Wing Superstar Riley Gaines Built an Anti-Trans Empire.’

With those facts in mind, it shouldn't come as a surprise that Torre and Pauly were able to sit down for 80 minutes and dig into nearly every fact of Gaines' life. Pauly revealed that she had put together a 31-page timeline of Gaines' life, which is baffling given that Gaines is only 25-years-old. Tax records were also shared, and there's plenty more on those to come.

Torre and Pauly put forth quite an effort to expose something, anything, about Riley Gaines, and while the pro transgender athletes in the women's sports crowd will applaud them, those in reality will recognize it as just the latest nothing burger attack on Gaines.

Torre Discovers That People Change Over Time

The Riley Gaines who was swimming collegiately at the University of Kentucky almost four years ago isn't the same Riley Gaines of today. Everyone's lives, thoughts, and beliefs change over the years, but we apparently needed to hear that from Trinity Ward, one of Gaines' former teammates.

At the 21-minute mark of the podcast, Pauly states that "it's really clear that Riley has gone through a significant revolution," which leads into a story from Ward about how she wasn't a "die-hard Trumper" in 2021. 

People change their opinions over time, a truly life-altering discovery.

‘There Aren’t That Many Trans Athletes, So We Should Ignore It'

Among the go-to arguments from the liberal media when it comes to transgender athletes in women's sports is that there aren't all that many trans athletes competing against women or sharing locker rooms with them, so it shouldn't be taken as such a serious issue.

Pauly and Torre checked that box at the 37-minute mark.

"The problem that they have is that they just don't have a lot of trans athletes to point to. There are very, very few of them. So, how do you see that this is a real problem? It's extremely convenient to go point at somebody like Riley Gaines who can say, ‘Hi, I was a victim of this.’ Who can go sit in the Kentucky legislature and say, 'Look, there is a real victim of these policies." And that's why I think her story breaks through," Pauly said.

No, Gaines' story breaks through because she is a female who was forced to compete against and share a locker room with Lia Thomas, a biological male, during the 2022 NCAA Championships. People who possess one iota of common sense and a simple understanding of both biology and rightful boundaries see the issue with that situation.

One of Riley's former teammates, who spoke on the podcast anonymously, claimed that Thomas changed in the corner of the locker room, "wrapped in a towel, keeping to herself." The anonymous teammate went on to say that she "felt bad for her," referring to Thomas, not any of the women forced to share the locker room with a biological male.

Torre took the side of the anonymous teammate, insinuating that it wasn't a big deal for a biological male to be naked inside a women's locker room because a towel was involved. OutKick founder Clay Travis slammed the door shut on that ridiculous opinion.

BREAKING: Riley Gaines Gets Paid For Her Job

On top of hosting OutKick's ‘Gaines For Girls’ podcast, Gaines appears regularly on Fox News and is asked to speak at various events all around the country. Apparently, we were all supposed to think that she wasn't being paid for any of the speaking engagements. Or if she was getting paid, it wasn't a substantial amount of money.

As Pauly and Torre discovered, Gaines is paid to do the various jobs asked of her, and as she's continued to grow her career and outreach, she's made more money. It's a stunning concept.

"So in 2023, we have Riley Gaines making $3,000 at an appearance in Kentucky. In 2024, we're seeing a $13,929 fee from the Republican Central Committee in Nevada. And then on page 45 of a filing from Harris County Republicans in Texas this past June, $25,000," Pauly explains while presenting screenshots of documents on the screen at the 46-minute mark.

Pro-Women Organizations Increase In Value Amid Leftist Chaos

Gaines isn't the only one rightfully earning money while standing up for women; conservative organizations have also grown in profits in recent years.

The conversation later turns a focus to the Independent Council on Women's Sports (ICONS), which Pauly labels as "another nonprofit in the anti-trans movement." According to their tax findings, ICONS went from a $100,000 organization in 2022 to a million dollar organization in 2024. All of this takes place at the 57-minute mark of the podcast. 

Riley Gaines. Photo: NATHAN J. FISH/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Listeners are apparently supposed to be surprised that a pro-women's organization has seen an uptick in profit over the last few years while the liberal media continues to tell you that there is no issue with biological men in women's sports and men do not have a physical advantage over women. 

But remember, there are only a few transgender athletes out there; it's not a serious issue.

Allegations Against Riley Gaines' Former Coach, Lars Jorgensen

While the tone of this story has been sarcastic up to this point, there isn't any sarcasm involved with this next topic.

Lars Jorgensen, a former Olympic swimmer who recruited Gaines to Kentucky and coached her in Lexington, was introduced at the start of the episode. While the first 60 or so minutes of the podcast were dedicated to diving into Gaines' life and career, it circled back to Jorgensen for the final minutes, focusing on the heinous allegations made against him in 2023, the year after Gaines graduated.

Jorgensen resigned from his position a week after an investigation into allegations against him were made. In April 2024, two people on the Kentucky swim team who had recently been hired by Jorgensen as assistant coaches, filed a lawsuit alleging that he had sexually assaulted them, according to Pauly's reporting. One of the swimmers alleged that he forcibly raped her multiple times between 2019 and 2023, which includes Gaines' time on the team.

After Pauly noted the allegations against Jorgensen, both she and Torre attempted to drive home a point by comparing the number of comments Gaines has made about the allegations against her former coach to all she has said and done in her fight for women's sports.

Gaines issued the following statement about the allegation in April 2024, which Torre and Pauly did quote.

Topics Torre And Pauly Conveniently Ignored

There is no denying that Torre and Pauly did extensive amounts of research for their episode together. If you make it through the entire 80-minute podcast, you'll be exhausted after taking in all the information. But that doesn't mean the two hit everything.

For starters, the duo spent quite a bit of time talking about Gaines earning money for speaking arrangements and media appearances, yet failed to mention anything about her being attacked during a speech at San Francisco State University in April 2023. For a podcast that chose to anonymously quote someone who said they felt "bad" for Lia Thomas having to share a locker room with women at a swim meet, at least mentioning the attack on Gaines feels important for such an in-depth conversation.

For anyone who may have been holding out hope that Torre or Pauly shared their own opinions on transgender athletes in women's sports, they failed to do so. Shocking, I know. They each have opinions and beliefs on the topic, just like every other person does, but they get to play the journalist card when it's convenient and not share their opinion on certain controversial topics, such as this one.

In this case, instead of being bold and sharing an opinion, they spend months trying to find dirt on the woman who was forced to compete against a biological male who has done nothing since then but try to make sure other female athletes don't have to endure the same.

Instead of sharing their own thoughts about transgender athletes in women's sports, they surround the leader on the side of the conversation they very clearly do not agree with. 

They will do anything but answer the simple question: Should men be allowed to compete in women’s sports?

Email your thoughts over to mark.harris@outkick.com, or find me on X @itismarkharris.