It's not clear there's any "blaming someone else with a clearly different storyline" here. The storylines seem to agree almost down to the lowest detail, even to the ascription of "blame": both accounts agree that the author was afraid, the publisher pushed him to publish, but the author was so paranoid that even the publisher's (amazing) attempts to calm him only spooked him further. Even from reading only Pollan's account, the podcast interviewer reached the impression of "In reading that chapter, that section, coming back to Rick, I kind of fell in love with Rick MacArthur, honestly".

The only disagreement is over Pollan's speculation in this podcast about why the publisher supported him to such an extraordinary extent, and although MacArthur felt those words to be "nasty jibes" (understandable, if one focuses on the "He was hoping I would get arrested" part rather than the "He’s not afraid of controversy" part), such clearly-marked speculation ("And I shouldn’t speak for him, but my guess is…") seems not quite a case of the truth being twisted.

I’m generally pretty selective of what I listen to, and I try to by critical of what I hear, so the idea of being bothered by what I hear isn’t too crazy. There are definitely episodes/casts/whatever where I hear things and come away disappointed.

You’re probably right though; if what Pollan said elicited a response, he probably shouldn’t have said it. I’m wondering why he did, now. It wasn’t a very entertaining account by any means.