A podcast built to be clipped: the case of 200 million views in short clips
American host Zach Hirsch says his podcast Double Coverage has passed 200 million short-form views since the NFL season started. The secret isn't a tool: he changed the show itself so it could be clipped. Here's what you can copy in Brazil and what you can't.
A podcast built to be clipped: the case of 200 million views in short clips
American host Zach Hirsch says his podcast, Double Coverage, has passed 200 million short-form views since the NFL season started, according to a Digiday interview published today. What interests me about the case isn't the number, it's the decision behind it: Hirsch reworked the show's second season so it would be easy to clip. Clipping stopped being promotion for the podcast and became part of production.
This applies to people who have a podcast and to people who clip other people's podcasts. But part of the case doesn't cross the border, and I'll get to it.
Who is Zach Hirsch and what is Double Coverage?
Hirsch, known as "Mystic Zach," is a sports betting commentator with almost 2 million Instagram followers. Double Coverage is in its second season, hosts guests like Mike Tyson, Cody Rhodes, NFL players and UFC fighters, and has had DraftKings as its main sponsor since the American spring, in a deal that isn't exclusive.
He had already tried other formats. He hosted a picks podcast with former player Adam "Pacman" Jones, but only as a paid host, with no say in production or promotion. Then he made Kiss and Myst with rapper Jadakiss, sponsored by World Star Hip Hop in a deal he describes as seven figures. That's where he got his guest list.
His reason for building his own show, he says, was seeing how poorly sports podcasts used social media to get discovered.
Why did he go all in on clips?
Because that's where new audiences arrive. Hirsch cites an Edison Research figure: 85% of Gen Z sports podcast listeners find shows through social media, "meaning clips," in his words.
I went looking for the number. It exists and it's in the October 2024 Sports Audio Report from Edison and SiriusXM Media: 85% of Gen Z and 83% of millennials who listen to sports podcasts use social media to discover shows. The research doesn't say "clips," that's Hirsch's reading. But it's a fair reading: what circulates from podcasts on TikTok, Reels and Shorts is clips, not the two-hour episode.
His line that sums up the strategy: "I went all in on short-form and on figuring out what works best."
What did he change in practice?
Three things, according to Digiday, and none of them is a tool.
Editing right at the limit. The team trims half a second or a single word from a clip when that makes the cut drier. It sounds like a detail, but it's the difference between a clip that hooks and one that loses people at second three. I wrote about this in hard cuts and pacing: the breath between sentences that sounds natural in audio becomes a hole in short video.
A cover made by a designer. Hirsch hired a professional just for thumbnails. On Shorts and TikTok the cover matters less in the feed than on long-form YouTube, but it matters on the profile, in search and for anyone who lands on one clip and wants to see the next. The details are in how the cover decides the swipe.
The show changed pace. This is the part few people do. In season two, Double Coverage got faster precisely to produce clips. In his words: "There's no room to breathe, it's like you're watching one continuous TikTok clip, and that's what works with our audience."
Do the numbers add up?
Partly. The 200 million is Hirsch's own claim. Digiday adds platform numbers he showed the reporter: 151 million cumulative views on TikTok, growing steadily since July, and "43.7 million on TikTok." The platform appears twice in the text, so one of the two must be another network (YouTube is the obvious guess), and the article doesn't clarify. Adding the two gets you close to 195 million, which is consistent with the 200 million claimed, but the split can't be pinned down.
His goal going forward: 100 million short-form views per week, more than 1 million per episode and four long-term anchor sponsors.
Where the case doesn't work for Brazil
Double Coverage's money comes from betting, and in Brazil that path is closed. Provisional Measure 1,394, in force since September 25, bans bet advertising in any format, including podcasts, clips and affiliate codes. The measure hasn't been voted on yet: on October 29 the joint committee hadn't even been set up, and the initial 60-day deadline ends on November 23, extendable by another 60, according to Focus GN. In the meantime, it applies. Celso explained what the measure bans for clippers and where the budget can go instead.
And even in the United States the model carries risk. One of Hirsch's most-watched videos, an interview with Jake Paul, was removed from YouTube. According to Digiday, the video was reportedly sponsored by an offshore sportsbook that wasn't among Google's approved advertisers. Hirsch called the episode "very scary" and gave no details. Mat Micheli, co-CEO and cofounder of the agency Viral Nation, told the reporter that betting is no longer a red flag for brands evaluating creators, as long as the creator only works with licensed, regulated companies.
The lesson that carries over to Brazil is about production, and it applies to any niche: soccer, finance, comedy, interviews.
Who wins and who loses with a podcast built for clips
Winners: people with good conversation and few listeners who finish the full episode. Clips are the storefront, and a show built to yield 20 self-contained segments gets 20 chances a week to be discovered.
Winners: people who clip. A podcast recorded in short blocks, with no "like I said at the beginning," is much faster to clip and yields more usable segments per hour. If you clip other people's shows, this is the kind of program to prioritize.
Losers: the slow-conversation podcast that only works listened to from start to finish. It doesn't die, but it depends on people who are already fans, and it grows slowly.
Losers: also anyone who confuses pace with shouting. "No room to breathe" works with sports interviews and fighters. On a mental health podcast, speeding everything up ruins the best thing the show has.
My take
I think Hirsch got right the point that matters most and that almost nobody in Brazil does: deciding the show's format already knowing that most of the audience will find it through a 40-second segment. Most podcasts record as if the episode were the product and treat the clip as a leftover. He flipped that.
What I wouldn't copy is relying on a single sector to pay the bills. The video removed from YouTube shows how big the risk is when the sponsor sits in a gray zone, and in Brazil that zone has become a ban. Four anchor sponsors, his goal, is the sensible part of the plan.
What to do starting today
If you have a podcast:
- Record in blocks. One question, one complete answer, from 40 seconds to 2 minutes. If the answer depends on something said earlier, repeat the context in one sentence.
- Cut the filler while recording. Warm-ups, sponsor reads and "before we start" don't become clips and tire out anyone who arrived through a clip.
- Think about framing before you turn on the camera. Two or three people at the table change what you can do in vertical, as I showed in the podcast framing guide.
- Have a weekly clipping routine, not a marathon session when you have spare time. The playbook for getting 20 clips a week is a good starting point.
If you clip other people's podcasts, look for shows that already record this way and measure how many good segments come out per hour of episode. That's the number that tells you whether it's worth it.
On Cut.Pro, AI finds the segments in the episode, handles the vertical reframing and the captions, and you adjust in the editor before scheduling the post across several networks at once. The final tightening, trimming that half word Hirsch trims, is still down to the editor's eye.
