He exposed double-talk, pointed out hypocrisy and could draw laughter with a wide-eyed look of incredulousness or fear.

In fact, a common theme of the news conference was incredulousness that two thriving athletic programs, on the men’s and women’s side, should find themselves in this predicament.

One of the funnier moments in his 2019 special, “Downhill Ever Since,” was his extreme incredulousness over the name of the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter: “We’re supposed to believe,” he said, pausing to let the crowd register his umbrage, “there’s this cannibal who just happens, just happens, on the rarest of odds, to have the only name in the history of names to rhyme with cannibal.”

He has also said it was ethically necessary to take the vaccine, expressing incredulousness at vaccine and virus skeptics, because “you’re playing not only with your health but the health of others.”

Occasionally, the very sight of a presidential debate — the precooked zingers, the waving arms, the feigned incredulousness — could feel divorced from the gravity of the era and the policy contrasts that will color the course of American life for the next four years: sharp disagreements on health care access, environmental regulation, the future of the Supreme Court.