Well, I’m guessing you could get a lot of different answers to this question. To my mind, an alcoholic suffers from a disease; he (or she, obviously) can get help and be in recovery, but will never be cured, and cannot drink in a controlled fashion. A drunk likes to drink, and does so a lot, but if they decided to change their behavior, it might be possible for them to just ‘cut back’ to a drink or two on occasion.
No, I think you should be watchin Hustle. It’s in a similar vein, with con-men using their powers for good, but I think better written with better capers, to be honest. YMMV. It aired on AMC a few years before Leverage.
Just my two cents.
Can someone give me a thumbnail sketch of the backstory re Nate and Sophie?
Nate used to be an insurance investigator. Apparently that involved tracking down the thieves that stole things from his company’s clients. Sophie ran a con and stole stuff from one of those customers, and Nate ended up tracking her down. But she got away.
Apparently Nate knew who each of these people were from his career.
Yep, he stated in the pilot that he has chased every member of the team at one point or another, which is why he was chosen to lead them. But he’s chased Sophie more than anyone else, to the point where they actually knew each other quite well. (They state in one episode how long they’ve known each other. I wanna say it was somewhere between 5-10 years.)
But Nate and Sophie have a “thing,” right? In this episode I just watched, they were in bed together. Why did she leave the team?
Also, I think that Parker is very hot- she has kind of a nerdy, unself-conscious sexiness… much hotter than this new blond woman (whose name I don’t remember). Do the guys here agree?
I’m assuming you just saw the season finale. That was the end to all the unresolved sexual tension between them. I think they kissed once before, but that was it.
As for why she left, in real life, it’s because Gina Bellman was pregnant. In the story, it’s because she realized that she’s been living a constant string of cons her entire life (Sophie isn’t even her real name) and went to go find herself (which can all be seen in “The Two Live Crew Job,” one of my favorite episodes.
Some of the more amusing trivia on the DVD commentaries relates to all of the times that they had to frame various shots to keep Gina Bellman’s tummy from showing. 
Apparently the plan was always for Sophie to go away at some point in the show’s arc; Bellman’s pregnancy just forced them to do it sooner.
I’m watching ones I’ve recorded, so I’m not sure what the chronology is. Also watching several in a row makes them all run together…
in the episode in question, Eliot (the long-haired guy, right?) breaks in Nate’s hotel room door (when there’s no answer) to tell him it’s time to get a move on, and Nate (in bed) says he had a late night. When Eliot leaves, Sophie emerges from under the covers next to Nate.
Re hiding pregnancies: that happened on Will & Grace to the point where it got ludicrous. After a while, they just let her tummy show and everyone ignored it.
Yep, that was the most recent season finale.
And that’s the only time Nate and Sophie ever did it?
Yep.