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If you’re a regular follower of the NFL or if you watch any of the various morning shows across network television, there’s a good chance you’ve stumbled across Oz The Mentalist at some point in recent years.
Oz (pronounced Ohs), whose full name is Oz Pearlman, is, in essence, a magician. But he brands himself as a mentalist because his tricks are all based on the idea that he has supernatural mental abilities, such as reading minds, telepathy, or prediction.
He’s able to do all this by reading his subjects’ psychology, body language, and any other suggestions, which often leaves them in disbelief.
At least, that’s what he claims. Of course, if you’re skeptical of that, you may believe that there’s something afoot. Something is not quite right.
And Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Pablo Torre, on the last episode of his Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast, revealed how exactly Oz is doing at least one of his tricks.
Pablo Torre Debunks Oz The Mentalist Tricks With Simple Answer
On the latest episode of the show, Torre hosts Stevie Baskin, an amateur magician who is also well known for debunking the tricks of others.
Now, typically in the magic community, this is a big no-no. But as Torre and Baskin point out, Oz is not particularly well-liked in the magic community. As it turns out, it’s not just the fact that Oz isn’t what he says he is that annoys magicians, but also his methods for pulling off tricks.
Oz the Mentalist, exposed: @PabloTorre and Stevie Baskin break down how viral tricks get engineered with pre-show “meta-deception” and “a fake Google page” in disguise. https://t.co/Dj3lTEGg6E pic.twitter.com/Sk2cL1wEYd
— Pablo Torre Finds Out (@pablofindsout) May 19, 2026
Specifically, Baskin uses a clip from Oz’s appearance on the Bussin’ With The Boys podcast in 2024 to reveal how he has been duping people and how it can go wrong.
In the segment, Oz asks host Will Compton to think of any NFL player and then attempts to guess the player. While Oz comes close, he ultimately guesses a player with a similar name, but a completely different career.
So, what went wrong?
According to Baskin, Oz coordinates with others, in this case, Compton’s co-host Taylor Lewan, to insert the answer into a fake Google look-alike site, which then redirects the search term to a message on Oz’s phone.
In this situation, Compton told Lewan that the player he was thinking of was New York Jets running back Breece Hall. However, likely due to autocorrect, Lewan accidentally searched the name Bryce Hall.
Bryce Hall, coincidentally, was also an NFL player at the time who had played for the New York Jets from 2020 to 2023 before joining the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
So when Oz gets the message from Lewan, he guesses Bryce Hall.
“Just switched, did you not know that?” Oz says to a confused Compton. “Just switched to the Buccaneers.”
Compton, disappointed and not wanting to embarrass the show’s guest, then tries to guide Oz in the right direction.
The entire segment is extremely cringeworthy. And because, as Baskin says, mentalism isn’t a real thing, Oz isn’t able to recover the bit.
Compton and Lewan still give him credit and act amazed that he was even close. But the reality is, even with a system in place to get the correct answer, he screwed it up. And in doing so, he let the entire cat out of the bag.