Latest / Cocaine Willie / The Postseason Purge: Honest Grades, Hard Truths & Your Spiciest K-State Questions (S4//E37)

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The Postseason Purge: Honest Grades, Hard Truths & Your Spiciest K-State Questions (S4//E37) · Cocaine Willie

0:00
You actually have to be on cocaine to be on this park
0:03
there. It's
0:20
a great day. We like
0:31
it dirty. What is up, everybody?
0:33
You're listening to yet another edition of Cocaine Willie, the
0:36
official K state representative on the college huddle.
0:40
I am your commissioner, Bob Trollsby.
0:41
And as always, I'm joined by my Co host, the good chef, Andre
0:45
Napier. Fireball Matt is feeling under
0:47
the weather. I guess.
0:48
I don't know, a week in Europe and Thanksgiving will probably
0:52
do that to someone. But Chef is here, I am here.
0:55
We've got rants, we've got mailbags, and we've got
0:58
championship week locks that we're going to go through as
1:02
well on this episode. So we'll see.
1:05
We'll see how long we make it or if we decide to just cut locks
1:08
and do that on our own. But before we get into the
1:11
preview, we first want to give a quick shout out to our sponsor.
1:14
You know him, you love him, Auntie Maze Parlor.
1:18
They're located at 616 at N 12th St. in Aggieville, the heart of
1:23
Aggieville, if you will, right there, smack dab at the
1:26
intersection of 12th and Morrow. If you look at their website,
1:31
auntiemaze.com, I'm actually looking at their list of events
1:34
and I'm not seeing the list of events, but rest assured, the
1:38
Christmas tree lighting, the annual Christmas tree lighting I
1:41
believe is happening this week as you're listening to this.
1:45
So hopefully, hopefully that website we can get, we can get
1:49
up and running again. I'm just going to look up Auntie
1:52
Maze just to confirm exactly when that event is.
1:56
But that's a, that's like a big deal.
1:58
That's a big deal for Auntie May's.
2:00
The Christmas tree lighting, I guess maybe it's not even a
2:04
Christmas tree, it's just the Christmas lighting. 35th
2:07
Christmas lighting with The Dirty spoons.
2:09
That is going to be on Thursday, December 4th, which is this
2:18
Thursday. Just wanted to confirm I'm
2:19
looking at the right year. Saw some stuff for 2024 there,
2:23
but we're all squared away. But yeah, dirty spoons,
2:26
Christmas lighting, that's happening the 35th annual on
2:29
Thursday, December 4th. But check them out.
2:31
Craft cocktails, draft beers, everything you could possibly
2:35
imagine or want, they've got it there.
2:37
Live music, comedy, all sorts of other events.
2:39
Check out their website againauntiemaze.com.
2:42
They may get that fixed, they may not.
2:44
We'll see. But just in case Jeff is
2:46
listening, your, your website was down when we recorded this
2:49
at 8:30 on Tuesday night, December 2nd.
2:54
That's going to do it for the ad read Chef, how was your
2:57
Thanksgiving? I, I liked, I liked your spread.
3:00
You look like you had a good spread there.
3:02
You were one of the only few people that actually got a, a,
3:06
you know, a signature picture of the spread.
3:09
And I had about three or four of those plates.
3:11
So mind you, I was going, I mean, very hard for
3:16
Thanksgiving. It hit in all the right places,
3:19
if you will, but I, I love Thanksgiving, seeing family,
3:24
people that you, you know, come around once in a while and then
3:27
friends and family. I, I love a good Friendsgiving
3:30
as well, but hosted this year was real good time, man.
3:35
We, we killed it. We killed Thanksgiving.
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We loved it. Wish you know, sports was better
3:43
to go along with this thing. Wish I was more thankful for
3:46
that. Dang, I hope I didn't just cut
3:52
out there. You did for a little bit, but I
3:54
heard sports sports were bad. Sports ball.
4:03
Yeah, sports are bad right now, especially if you are AK State
4:06
fan, men's basketball fan, football fan, women's basketball
4:09
fan. If you're a volleyball fan, you
4:12
are you are set. You're looking pretty despite
4:15
the fact that the the K State women are going to be playing in
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Lincoln, NE. So that ghost is coming back to
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haunt us yet again. Shortly after K State men drop
4:25
their game to to Nebraska and Kansas City a couple weeks ago.
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Still still have some PTSD from that.
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I am going to be attending the K State Creighton game in Omaha
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for the men's team, which two weeks ago when we played
4:38
Nebraska was looking like it was going to be a pretty good match
4:41
up and is now looking like it's not going to be a very good
4:43
match up between two teams that are now not looking very good.
4:47
And Ken Palmer, the net right now either.
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Creighton really slid recently and they're probably going to
4:52
build that back up a little bit. They've got a game against
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Nichols tonight. That's happening as we're
4:56
recording this. But yeah, things are looking bad
5:00
for the basketball team. I guess before we get into the
5:03
mailbag, before we get into basketball, because I'm sure you
5:07
and I both have some rants and not a whole lot of raves on the
5:11
basketball side, but just want to give you a chance to maybe do
5:15
quick little post mortem on the football team.
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I know we've we've still got a bowl game ahead.
5:21
There's going to be a lot of decisions.
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Transfer portal, commitment day is signing days tomorrow.
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So we're going to have a lot more to chat about probably next
5:29
week once we get the bowl selection and and commitments
5:32
and all that good stuff. Signees, rather not commitments,
5:36
but anything that take away from the Colorado win.
5:40
Anything that you want to do to put a bow on the regular season,
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at least for the football team. And we've kind of already buried
5:45
them for the most part as the season has gone on.
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But just just take, take this time, take the mantle and chat
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about football. Well, the Colorado game in
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particular, I mean, I wasn't overly thrilled the play calling
6:02
that it was kind of, you know, a sum all of what happened
6:06
throughout the season. It just things came too little
6:10
too late. I mean, we won that game.
6:12
But I mean, Colorado's bad. You know, it's just it was bad.
6:17
Joe Jackson was a bright spot. Avery was very inconsistent, but
6:22
he was down weapons. I mean, I don't I didn't know
6:25
Garrett Oakley was going to be out for this game.
6:28
You know, it's just little things like that.
6:30
It added up throughout the season and for this game in
6:33
particular, it just we were down weapons, but some people stepped
6:37
up. I really, I was really impressed
6:39
with parts of the online. I was really impressed with Joe
6:43
Jackson. Obviously the young tight ends
6:48
have a lot to, you know, work with, but getting, you know,
6:53
your five star gem of a prospect and Lincoln cure, he's not
6:57
getting as many reps as I thought he would.
6:59
Obviously he burned his red shirt season and I can't think
7:02
of one highlight play from him other than him throwing an
7:05
interception. But the Colorado game was a win
7:10
that you needed. So it wasn't an absolute
7:13
dumpster fire of a season. It was just a a season that was
7:17
a failure and there was no signature wins on the season.
7:22
It's just it was one of those seasons where it's like, could
7:27
things have changed with the was it was it our one score luck?
7:31
You know what I'm saying? Like we we got someone one score
7:34
games last season and this season we just fell short on
7:38
every single one of them. So it was it was tough to see
7:42
the season as a whole, but that Colorado game, at least you left
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on a dub. He left the dub senior night.
7:51
You you get him a dub. So I I can't complain about a
7:55
win to an extent. I'm I'm not satisfied with the
7:59
season, but at least they didn't leave me with complete.
8:02
Sour grapes, Yeah, Joe Jackson was great.
8:06
He he definitely over the last two games is is definitely the
8:10
MVP of of the Utah game and the Colorado game, both of them.
8:15
I think in my opinion, he he really shine.
8:17
He's he's only what, 105 yards or something shy of 1000 yard
8:22
season now, which all of us were were not thinking that was even
8:26
going to be possible three games ago.
8:28
So he's really been able to to rack up the stats in the last
8:32
two games, which is which is great.
8:33
It's great to see K State go back to more of that power run
8:36
game that we really haven't seen all year.
8:39
And you were, you were one of the 1st and, and loudest people,
8:44
I would say in in the K State podcast, fear media sphere,
8:47
whatever you want to call it. When it came to at the beginning
8:50
of the year, you were worried we're going to turn into a Texas
8:53
Tech offense and a Matt Wells offense.
8:55
And it really did turn into that.
8:57
We didn't see a whole lot of that power run game.
9:00
We didn't see a whole lot of even like quarterback power with
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quarterback run, which we've seen a lot through Snyder
9:06
through climbing to date. So it it's good to see us return
9:10
to some of that. It was good to see Avery pop off
9:13
a couple big runs in the game against Colorado as well.
9:16
So, you know, I'm I'm optimistic about the bowl game.
9:19
Obviously, I'm not super excited about playing in Shreveport, LA,
9:24
probably against like a Louisiana Tech.
9:26
But at the end of the day, this gives you one more opportunity
9:30
to get another win and hopefully climbing can shake this G5
9:35
boogeyman that he has against AG5 team and and it's looking
9:39
like it might be that. I hope my connection is good
9:45
enough to get my thoughts out on this.
9:47
But yes, I was I was very disappointed with what the I I
9:51
could see the vision though, because we because K State
9:55
needed to start inching their way to a more modern style
10:00
offense and Matt Wells seemingly had that as his game plan.
10:06
You need that to attract higher rated players.
10:09
You need that to attract talent that you seemingly were trying
10:14
to get, because if you were trying to keep an Avery Johnson,
10:18
you were trying to get a Lincoln Cure, you know, running Snyder
10:22
Ball or even, I mean, Connor Riley, as much as we wanted to
10:26
give him gripe, I mean, he still threw the ball quite a bit and
10:30
and it just wasn't the most visually appealing.
10:35
But I'd rather have substance and I'd rather fit the, you
10:40
know, the characteristics of this, you know, program of this
10:44
university. And I think it would, it goes a
10:48
long way if you just stick with what, with what you know, mind
10:54
you, it might not. It's a gamble and IPA, lot of
10:59
people wanted to take that gamble and I'm, I'm not here to,
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you know, cast aspersions on any of those people.
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But you know, when you gamble and you miss, you're going to
11:10
lose it. So that's what happened this
11:12
season. In my opinion.
11:14
The defense also not that great this season.
11:17
We couldn't handle mobile quarterbacks all that well.
11:21
And I don't know if it's a Klanderman thing.
11:23
I think it was obviously some of this personnel, lot of injuries
11:28
wrote bringing in new faces. We thought the D BS were outside
11:32
of the safety room was going to be, you know, questionable and
11:35
and to a certain extent it was VJ Payne had a regression
11:40
season. Unfortunately.
11:42
Gunner Maldonado was awesome towards the back half of the
11:46
season, but it just took him so long to get there and losing
11:51
Austin remain hurt losing Toby Osunsami, who was, you know,
11:55
doing really, really well. These are things that build up
11:58
to, you know, unsuccessful season, but you have to you have
12:03
to persevere through that. I am, you know, what would I
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like to see going forward? I kind of is like what pops into
12:12
my head about this to because I know we have a question in our
12:17
mailbag about like maybe a letter grade, what we would
12:20
provide for that letter grade. And in my opinion, it's about
12:25
what you want for the future. Because if you're if you think
12:28
you can build on this season and you know, continue with that
12:33
risk of trying to be that modern style offense, trying to recruit
12:40
better athletes and have a more appealing thing.
12:43
I think this was AC minus ACI mean it's AC minus season.
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I think an A gets us to Arlington, AB gets us nine wins,
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eight wins and AC performance is maybe you win, maybe you win
13:02
that Baylor game, but you know, something, something along those
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lines. But this is the this is the
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bottom of the barrel of a a passing grade because it's it's
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not a failed season. It's not like we're, you know,
13:15
four and eight or something like that.
13:17
I mean, we're 6:00 and 6:00. We had some squeaker losses.
13:20
We also got the brakes blown, our doors blown in a couple
13:24
times too. So it's not great, but it's not,
13:28
I mean it's not earth shattering.
13:30
It's not program defining bad. I would still say, I would still
13:37
say it's a failure compared to the expectations, which were
13:41
valid expectations because you had Brett Mcmurphy do the
13:44
informal poll of all the coaches in the Big 12 and K State was
13:48
clearly the favorite by all the coaches to compete and win the
13:53
Big 12 championship in in Arlington for this season.
13:56
Everybody in the outside media, the pollsters nationally had K
14:01
State in that top 25. So I I would say compared to the
14:05
expectations, it's absolutely a failure of a season.
14:10
To your point, though, it's not, it's not the biggest failure of
14:14
all. I, I, I went on Twitter after
14:17
the army game and did kind of a quick just video with my
14:21
thoughts after that army game or the North Dakota game, one of
14:23
the two. And I'm like, I, this team is
14:25
showing me they could go 3:00 and 9:00 or 4:00 and 8:00 right
14:28
now. And they were pretty close to
14:32
that. Like there's some one score
14:33
games and you know, if you if you don't pull out the win, if
14:38
you don't win against TCU, if you don't win against Colorado
14:42
or Oklahoma State, those are three games right there that
14:44
were way I would say Colorado, not maybe not TCU, but Colorado
14:49
and Oklahoma State are two games that should not have been
14:52
remotely close, but we're ended up being way closer than they
14:55
ever should have been. K State did not cover either of
14:58
those of either of those spreads.
15:00
So you weren't too far off from 4:00 and 8:00 at least.
15:04
When you look at those two games, you just happen to have
15:07
the ball bounce the right way and and those are two really bad
15:09
teams that you were able to help play, but you still played
15:12
pretty bad games against those two teams.
15:15
But on the other side of it, climbing in these one score
15:20
games this season, K State, for whatever reason, is losing all
15:23
these one score games. You lose the game to Army, you
15:26
lose the game to to Utah. You lose all these one score
15:31
games. Baylor, those are three that I
15:33
can think of off the top of my head.
15:34
You win those three one score games, you're nine and three.
15:37
All of a sudden the Iowa State game, you're 10 and 2.
15:41
So it's just it's insane. I think that the razor's edge
15:45
margins, margins this season that at this football team,
15:49
it's, I mean you are that close to having a 10 and two season If
15:54
the ball bounces the right way. If you just execute a couple of
15:57
things correctly, like the Baylor game with the the weird
16:00
drive that they had, the interception, the passing plays
16:04
that you're running and within the 2 two minutes in the fourth
16:08
quarter of that game, blowing the 14 point lead, similar to
16:11
the Utah game. You're you're blowing a lead
16:13
there army game. It's just you don't possess the
16:17
ball at all in the third quarter.
16:18
Just ridiculous, ridiculous ways to lose those games.
16:22
So it's just wild to think that you you were really, I mean, the
16:26
swing between 4:00 and 8:00 and 10:00 and 2:00 for this team
16:31
this year is kind of wild. And it's, you know what's even
16:34
crazier? Yeah.
16:35
I mean, you're missing one in there and it's still A1 score
16:38
game. It didn't feel like it, but
16:40
Arizona was a six. Point Arizona, yeah, totally,
16:42
totally. I mean, it's this season has
16:45
felt like a year. So I like Dublin.
16:48
Ireland does not feel like it was in August.
16:50
It felt like it was in March. Right.
16:53
No, it's you're absolutely correct.
16:55
The season flew by and and I and let me get to, I just want to
16:58
talk to we're just talking ball, really.
17:00
I mean, I love just going back and forth this recap of the
17:03
season. OK, the expectations, yes, the
17:08
expectations were high, but I think a lot of us went into the
17:13
season, me included, with blinders on.
17:16
And inevitably what happened was we were so enamored by the
17:22
talent, you know, the some of the experience, the pedigree of
17:27
what we thought our coaching staff was this, that and the
17:30
third. But we put our blinders onto the
17:34
the dynamics of what this season really is.
17:37
Mind you, we give a home game away to go to Dublin, Ireland
17:41
versus a rival first game of the season and the schedule matrix
17:48
that we had like it just it was doomed from the start.
17:52
We're implementing a new defense.
17:56
Why? OK, that's fine.
17:59
It is what it is. We're we're trying to fit
18:00
personnel. We could justify why we're doing
18:03
that defense has not been the the main reason why we haven't
18:07
been successful. OK, we're implementing a new
18:10
defense. Fine.
18:12
We have a new offensive coordinator with a totally new
18:15
style juxtaposition of what Connor Riley was last year, and
18:20
we expect that to just flip on its head and we're going to be
18:23
fine. Then we have to the scheduling
18:27
matrix of Army after North Dakota and then that short week
18:34
going into Arizona. It was just all meant to not be
18:38
successful. Like we didn't have a break
18:40
after Ireland. We got we survive.
18:44
We have a nail biter versus North Dakota.
18:48
OK, we survived it, but did we really think playing a military
18:53
school after that was a great idea?
18:55
No, it's a terrible idea. That is the worst thing that you
18:59
could possibly have had to do. And then a short week after the
19:03
triple option team, it was just, it was it was doomed from the
19:08
start. And I'm, I'm survived.
19:12
What am I saying? I'm surprised that we even ended
19:16
up six and six. Like you said, after Arizona, I
19:20
was not thinking 6 and 6 at all. There was in my brain.
19:25
There was no way. There was no way we thought we
19:29
were going to lose the KU this season.
19:33
That that really should be, you know, if we made six and six
19:38
after thinking we were going to lose the KUI mean that that just
19:42
tells me that this season is not as bad as we thought.
19:46
But it's definitely not great and it's definitely not what
19:49
what we were expecting in terms of pre season expectations.
19:52
But we kind of should have saw it coming a mile away.
19:56
Yeah, yeah, I and and a lot of us were saying pre season, this
20:02
is going to be a gauntlet of a schedule to start the year.
20:04
It's a weird schedule to start the year.
20:06
And whenever you have a weird schedule, it throws you off
20:09
balance. It throws you off of your
20:11
routines and everything that you're used to, especially
20:14
playing a football game against a rival on a different
20:18
continent. So I mean there are, there are
20:21
people who I mean, I, I would, I would, you would be hard pressed
20:24
to find. A large amount of people who
20:28
travel 8 hours on game day to get to AK State game when it's
20:32
in Manhattan, let alone board a flight for 8 hours, 9 hours to
20:37
get over to Dublin, Ireland for that game.
20:39
So it's got to throw you off your routine.
20:42
But we've got a lot of questions about the football team.
20:45
So I want to get to those with, with the mailbag.
20:48
Let's get to the mailbag. And then I I'm also going to, I
20:51
think we've got some rants that that we can go down with the
20:54
basketball side of things as well.
20:56
But let's just get to the mailbag.
20:58
So first question is from Ed Helinski.
21:01
What letter grade do you give K State football for its record
21:05
and efforts this season, which I think Segways in perfectly with
21:09
what we were just talking about. Do you prefer pass fail instead?
21:13
I, I think this is kind of a 2 Part 2 part question.
21:15
I will, if I'm going to give a final letter grade, I mean 6:00
21:22
and 6:00, that's like the the bare minimum that's barely,
21:27
that's barely passing, right? If you're, if you're going to
21:29
put it in football terms, college football terms, your
21:32
bowl eligible, you get to see the postseason.
21:35
So I would say that's like AC -6 and 6 is kind of AC minus I
21:39
would say. That's exactly where I'm at.
21:42
I, I, I, I kind of explained it earlier, but yeah, C minus.
21:46
But like what? Like you said, I mean, you gave
21:48
a really good point in terms of expectations.
21:53
If you were doing like he said, if you wanted to do pass fail,
21:55
it's obviously a fail. If you wanted to do a grade
21:58
based on expectations, I would still, I would say you're
22:01
probably below AC minus because this team had the ability to be
22:06
an A+ team, an A, A to a plus team.
22:11
With what we thought the Big 12 was going to be.
22:13
We knew it was going to be challenging.
22:16
I didn't think Utah was nearly as good as they were.
22:20
They were they, they surprised me this year.
22:23
BYU, they had a weak schedule. But you know, you still, you
22:26
still should be in that vein. You still, you should be in that
22:30
conversation with Texas Tech, with BYU, with Utah.
22:35
We should be up there amongst them, not bottom third of the
22:41
conference there. It's just that's not how it
22:44
should have been and not how it should have played out, but it
22:47
did. So for me, I'm a non losing
22:53
season. You can't, I can't fail you.
22:55
I can't. I mean, you won six games.
22:58
I mean, but you should have won more.
23:00
So it's you don't get a great passing grade.
23:03
If I, if I had to put a letter grade on, it's like you said, C
23:06
-, D plus somewhere in there. I'm going to go there.
23:10
I'm going to go there. And I'm, I'm right there with
23:12
you on that. And I think Scott brought up a
23:14
great point on Bosco's boys earlier this week too, where he
23:18
had a similar question. I think it was this morning on,
23:20
on his Q&A where he said, I mean, that Baylor game is really
23:26
the biggest one that probably haunts you because realistically
23:30
it's any of those conference losses that you have, whether
23:32
it's Baylor, whether it's Utah, you know, pick your poison.
23:36
But I mean, if you are three losses in conference play as
23:41
opposed to 4 losses in conference play, that's the
23:43
difference between being tied for fourth and being tied for
23:46
8th or 9th or something like that is something that he said.
23:49
So I I agree with him on that. And I agree with your assessment
23:52
on like what final letter grade versus pass fail versus
23:55
expectations versus when you just look holistically at
23:59
college football, is this passer or?
24:01
Fail. Yeah.
24:02
And and I think to what we were talking about earlier and you
24:06
brought up Baylor, that's one of those games that whoa.
24:11
Someone's here we weren't expecting.
24:13
Hello Fireball, Matt Let. Me hear everyone, I just want to
24:17
say hello. That sultry voice.
24:20
But despite my shortcomings today.
24:25
Welcome, welcome. Yeah, you have such a poignant
24:30
way of describing such horrific things from football and
24:35
basketball. So keep going.
24:37
Keep. Keep.
24:37
OK. Well, I was saying was, you
24:39
know, Baylor that game in particular because Arizona
24:45
wasn't a conference game. You had a chance to start off 2
24:49
and O, and then you beat TC, you're 3 and O, then you beat
24:52
Kansas, you're 4 and O. In that scenario.
24:55
I mean that the season is totally different.
24:57
That Baylor game really does haunt you.
25:00
Obviously you get your doors blown off by Texas Tech, but
25:03
you're in a totally different light even if you do lose that
25:06
Texas Tech game. But the Texas, let's talk about
25:10
that. So in that scenario, let's say
25:12
you let's say you are four and O heading into you said you're 4
25:15
and O heading into Texas Tech in conference play.
25:18
Well, you're you're one loss because of Iowa State.
25:21
You do have one loss. OK.
25:22
Yeah, of you know, and I mean that's a whole different thing
25:26
too. I mean, you obviously started
25:29
off O and one in conference play, which really did hurt you.
25:31
But I think you kind of that was a totally separate season in
25:36
terms of mentality. Like you said, it felt like it
25:38
was in March, but it really wasn't the last day of August.
25:42
But with with that Texas Tech game going into halftime that
25:46
was 7 to 12 like that is A1 score game going into halftime.
25:50
If you're riding this momentum and not this deflated 3 and
25:54
three team in Big 12 play going into that matchup and it's 12 to
25:59
7 at halftime, who knows it you, maybe you have Dylan Edwards who
26:03
seems like a front runner in a bit of a prima Donna.
26:06
Maybe you have Dylan Edwards playing in that matchup or he
26:09
decides to give it a go and then you have that electric athlete
26:13
that we all thought we were going to have this season, but
26:15
no, he decided to call it quits instead.
26:19
I just maybe, maybe you have that.
26:21
Maybe you're not as deflated. Maybe you're not as injured.
26:24
Maybe you're not as dejected and maybe your morale is in a better
26:27
place going into that Texas Tech game.
26:29
So maybe it's not a 40. Yeah, maybe it's not 43 to 20 at
26:33
the end of it. But yeah, I, you know, that's
26:36
the pass fail question. That's the letter grade question
26:38
that would you like to would you like to give your letter grade
26:42
for for K State football? ADAD.
26:46
Even. D even, I mean, despite all the
26:52
expectations and everything from this season, I mean, I won't
26:57
give it an FI guess we're going bowling, you know, six and six.
27:02
Let's go to the Armed Forces Bowl or whatever.
27:06
But I mean, all around it was just obviously a very poor
27:13
season and a lot of different, you know, a lot of different
27:15
facets of it. You think about the
27:18
expectations, you think about who you expected your stars to
27:21
be this season and what we thought they would be, you know,
27:25
they would accomplish just all around it.
27:29
It it was very poor. And you look at it from a
27:33
coaching staff perspective and, you know, getting guys ready to
27:37
play for games and getting guys ready to play for four quarters
27:40
in a game, it was not necessarily something we saw in
27:46
maybe any games this year. So I I give it AD just because
27:53
if you look at it, you know, you look at it as a whole.
27:57
I'm not saying that six and six is, you know, like going to a
28:01
bowl is like the best thing in the world, like some people
28:05
might think. I'm also gonna say, you know, to
28:11
to have three more weeks of practice with these guys with
28:15
the potential of some of these young guys.
28:16
I mean, we think about the bowl game last year and we got to see
28:20
a lot of young guys on the field who we thought were going to be
28:23
making a lot of plays for us this year.
28:27
You know, thinking about Zeishawn Rich and you know, Joe
28:30
Jackson had a good game and, you know, against Rutgers and
28:32
obviously Dylan Edwards had a really good game in that game.
28:35
But it is an opportunity for growth, improvement the next
28:40
three weeks. That is something that I think
28:42
this team can use, you know, as a motivating factor.
28:46
I think the coaching staff can use that, too.
28:49
I'm not going to call it an F An F would have been 5:00 and 7:00
28:52
and we lose the Colorado game and it seemed like there were
28:59
potential opportunities. But I'm going to go D for the
29:04
football team. Very sad, but it is what it is.
29:08
Yeah. Next question.
29:09
Comes from Kay Slim. Why is Gene Stiller acting ADI?
29:14
Will caveat this with he's not the acting AD, he's just the ADI
29:18
don't I mean. I, I guess the, I guess I just
29:26
need a little clarification. I'm not really tapped in like I
29:29
should be more tapped in. I'm not as online as I used to
29:32
be probably like, and I think that's a good thing.
29:33
But what's the gene hate for because he's climbing bud or
29:39
what? So I think it's.
29:41
I think it's a mix of that and obviously there's a.
29:44
Lot of vitriol. Right now, after Bowling Green
29:47
beats K State men's basketball in Bramwich Coliseum by 16
29:51
points last night, Coach Tang is apparently going back down the
29:57
same rabbit hole he has been for the last two years that I've
30:01
been very vocal about. Chef, I think you've been very
30:04
vocal, but all the same things. He didn't call time out until
30:07
one minute and 28 seconds left in the in the game last night,
30:11
which is something you've been very, very vocal about for the
30:14
last couple of years. I think here's the thought
30:18
process with the Gene Hate is, yeah, he's Kleiman's bud.
30:22
It seems like there may be. It's it's not necessarily, I
30:25
don't think nepotism, the dictionary definition of that,
30:27
is necessarily pertinent here. But it's similar in that you
30:31
hired your bud, you gave Jerome Tang A ridiculously high buyout.
30:36
Kleiman has a ridiculously high buyout in a season where both
30:41
teams seem to be on track. Well, K State football certainly
30:45
on track to not meet expectations.
30:47
K State men's basketball certainly appears to be going
30:50
down that road again, yet again. For the third season in a row,
30:55
the. The thought process here.
30:57
Is maybe the issues aren't with what's happening down, down on
31:01
the bottom with the coaching staff and the players starting
31:05
to trickle back up to the CEO, the guy who's running both
31:09
programs, who all the programs roll into.
31:12
Ultimately, Jean is the decision maker.
31:14
He's the one putting together a lot of these contracts.
31:16
He's the one he's working with the coaches to get stuff figured
31:20
out. And I believe another thing that
31:23
people maybe aren't talking about as much, if either
31:26
President Linton or Jean depart the program, those buyout
31:31
numbers for climbing and Tang go down dramatically.
31:34
So if Richard Linton decides, hey, I don't like the direction
31:39
that these things are going in, if you want to be able to save
31:42
some dollars and reallocate some of the dollars that you would
31:45
otherwise put towards a buyout for climbing or Tang, you get
31:49
rid of Jean. I don't know what his buyout
31:51
looks like, but those buyout numbers for Tang and Climbing go
31:55
down dramatically if either if either Linton or Jean depart the
32:00
program leave. I think.
32:03
Is is at least where my head would be at if I'm Richard
32:06
Linton or a fan that's wanting to affect change.
32:09
OK, I I, I. Guess I'm on, I guess I can get
32:13
on board with why you would want, I mean financially that
32:16
makes a lot of sense. If you get rid of Gene, then you
32:19
can, you know, work with getting rid of Tang at a, you know, at a
32:23
fiscal rate that that helps, you know, a financial rate that
32:28
helps. But, you know, I don't before
32:31
this season, I never had an issue with climate at all.
32:34
I mean, climate obviously is dealing with the same issues
32:37
that people are probably associating with Jean Taylor
32:41
where he's, you know, hiring his buddies, you know, he's leaving
32:45
them in positions the coaching staff needs freshened up.
32:48
But those are all things that are not fireable offenses to me,
32:53
the production of this season, and you know, that's where
32:57
you're starting to get it. But before this season, climate
33:00
wasn't unsuccessful. Obviously the expectations are
33:04
higher. Everybody wants to have higher
33:07
expectations, but you don't reach them all the time.
33:10
Now this season is a little bit different than all the other
33:13
seasons, but I don't I don't think that's on a gene thing.
33:16
Now the basketball part of it, Tang is on a leash that is so
33:22
it's so incredibly tight. It needs it needs severed.
33:25
Like we do need to get possibly get it away from Jerome Tang
33:29
because not only did he have the one successful season that was
33:34
tied to to all Americans, but he had the whole fiasco with
33:40
Naquan. He had, you know, then the
33:43
unsuccessful seasons and then just a chore, A chore.
33:46
You had two. Players dismissed in the month
33:48
of January in consecutive seasons in December, in
33:52
December, in December, it's the same started guys.
33:54
So it could. Happen again this year it just
33:57
seems like. He doesn't have a firm grip on
34:00
the basketball program as much as I think he does in the
34:04
football. I think he's more of a football.
34:05
Gene is more of a football guy. He kind of lets the basketball
34:09
program and, and, you know, he got rid of Bruce.
34:13
Bruce was, you know, struggling mightily and Jerome Tang's on
34:17
the same path. I just don't know what the
34:22
buyout thing. So I could see why is why is
34:25
Gene our active acting ADI don't know.
34:27
I don't know. I like Gene myself.
34:33
I like Gene. I mean the last thing that I'll
34:36
say with. This, and obviously he's getting
34:40
a lot of recent hate for a lot of the, the reasons you're
34:44
describing. And the fact the matter is the
34:46
programs aren't meeting the expectations of in this era
34:50
where fans have in a lot of cases more of a monetary
34:55
investment in the team by participating in IO and, and
34:58
things like that. And so there is an expectation
35:01
that your teams are going to, excuse me, your teams are going
35:07
to follow through and do what they need to do to make it to a
35:10
big bowl game, make it to the NCAA tournament, etcetera.
35:14
Am I of the opinion that? I think a lot of people.
35:20
When Jerome Tang got the new contract extension were
35:26
freaking. Out with the fact.
35:27
That he could leave at such a late stage and go to Arkansas,
35:30
which would completely kill the. Program's momentum at.
35:34
The time, absolutely. There was a lot of that.
35:38
A lot of the same people that were freaking out at that time
35:41
are now freaking out at the fact that we're not seeing success.
35:45
And you're looking at that buyout figure that he has.
35:49
That's a pretty extensive number.
35:50
Like, at the end of the day, it's not something that I think
35:53
our athletic department is gonna be comfortable making a move on
35:56
this year. And I think a lot of us, even
35:59
though we look at last year and how poorly last year went, even
36:02
if we have a year that's similar to last year, this year he's not
36:06
going to be gone. Fact.
36:09
That's the. Fact and so, you know, for from
36:14
from a Gene perspective on with this, he's done a lot of good
36:17
things for our athletic department.
36:19
You think about how this athletic department has grown
36:22
since John Curry was here. I think Gene did a really good
36:25
job from a a fundraising perspective getting, you know,
36:30
thinking about it outside of the football and basketball
36:32
spectrums. You know, we have the soccer
36:35
facility or you know, the soccer stadium, the new volleyball
36:38
facility. We have a lot of great
36:40
infrastructure projects that he helped lead for our athletic
36:43
department. I do think from 568 years ago to
36:49
now, the entire dynamic of college sports has shifted and
36:54
you need an athletic director who is on the same wavelength
36:58
with those changes and those adjustments that are being made
37:00
across all of the NCAA. Do I think having somebody who
37:05
is a little bit more strategic with how we are marking the
37:11
department and how we are putting ourselves out there, I
37:15
do think that I do think you need to have somebody who is
37:21
keep it or, you know, is putting a little bit more of this idea
37:26
of what NIL and how important NIL is to the forefront for the
37:31
for the athletic department to be competitive.
37:35
And I think there are some people internally, at least from
37:39
what I've heard, that feel that Gene is not necessarily met that
37:43
yet. Whether he will, who knows.
37:47
Yeah. I I just I just don't know where
37:51
where does that he can grow into that.
37:54
I think that that's it's all new for everybody.
37:57
I mean, is Gina forward thinker? I don't I don't know if he is,
38:02
but this is all new. And I don't think the nil stuff
38:07
has been on the back burner at K state by any means, But we've
38:10
just not in the we're, we're not the university that's going to
38:14
be. We don't have a a couple
38:16
billionaire oil barons that are able to, you know, put us up
38:21
with the level of the big 10 in the SEC in terms of what we can
38:25
pay the players outside of what we are already promised them
38:29
with the new agreement. So I, I just, I'm not sure where
38:34
what more gene can do. I, I guess there's somebody out
38:37
there that is willing to, you know, do more, but I, I just
38:41
don't, I'm just not more tapped into what gene is supposed to be
38:45
doing as opposed to like what somebody else could do.
38:49
My my thought process. With it is more so around the
38:51
buyout stuff. If you go back to when Tang's
38:55
extension was announced, there's an article by Kellis Robinette
38:59
in The Wichita Eagle and Kansas City Star going back to June
39:03
20th, 2024 where Tang's buyout will drop by 50% for the 12
39:11
months following any type of departure by his boss.
39:13
So effectively his current buyout drops from the 5,000,000
39:18
per year. I think it's $5,000,000.
39:21
Then 4321 by Matt Matt. Matt's leaving audio.
39:26
See you later. Get better your voice.
39:29
Your voice sounds. Great, though no it doesn't.
39:32
It's. Sultry.
39:34
Yeah, it. Is woof.
39:36
And I didn't even get the Colorado game because of this,
39:38
so it's very sad. There you go.
39:40
There you go. Have a good night.
39:42
Everyone. You too.
39:44
You too. But yeah, the buyout gets
39:46
reduced by 50%. So instead of owing, you know,
39:50
if, if K State wanted to make a coaching change, I believe we
39:54
would have owed 18.7 million back in 2024 if any kind of
39:58
coaching change was done before 2026.
40:03
So let's just say that number gets reduced by 50%.
40:06
If if Jean Taylor were to leave and be some sort of he's
40:10
basically having to be a sacrificial lamb in this
40:12
scenario. If he feels like what's best for
40:15
K State athletics is to get rid of Jerome Tang, he kind of needs
40:19
to step down in order to save K State money.
40:22
And then an interim AD would then make the firing or they
40:26
would have another guy lined up to to come in as B and be the
40:29
AD. But on the climbing side of it,
40:32
it's also interesting if either Linton or Taylor is no longer
40:35
employed at K State, then climbing may terminate his
40:38
contract for just $1 million at any point before his buyout
40:42
drops to 0. So it's interesting when you
40:46
think about the Gene Taylor stepping down part of all of
40:49
this, that's tremendously impacts the buyout situation for
40:54
both coaches, not just Tang, not just climbing, it has a
40:58
tremendous impact on the buyout situation for both coaches,
41:00
which is just it's an interesting quirk to all of
41:03
this. So something that something to
41:04
think about with the with the Gene Taylor chatter or
41:08
frustration, if you will, at Skojek O2.
41:13
Why does K State suck? I don't really know who this is.
41:18
Directed towards, we've already much laid out the football side
41:23
of it, the basketball side of it we can get into.
41:25
But yeah, there's a number of reasons.
41:28
But I think we, if you listen to the podcast over the course of
41:32
the last four years, you would know why K State sucks in
41:36
certain areas and why it doesn't in others.
41:39
Yeah, I mean. Yeah, it's, it's, it's tough
41:45
because you, you want your program to do, you want your
41:49
programs to do so well. And they're, I got to be
41:54
reminded that they're 18 to 22 year old kids and they're being
41:58
led by, you know, they're being led by men.
42:02
But you know, some of it, they're just humans.
42:04
And I'm not the best at my job. And I know that I have bad days.
42:09
And there's just happened to be on, you know, nationally
42:13
syndicated and nationally broadcast television for
42:16
everybody to see. And when they're bad, it's so
42:19
obvious and it's so easy to point at and be like, hey, this
42:23
is the reason why they're not being more successful.
42:26
So man, I Jerome Tang has got a, you know, a Dictionary of a
42:34
pamphlet of a full folder of reasons why he is not successful
42:41
at K state and that it's some of it may just I'm maybe my lizard
42:45
brain telling me that it's simpler than it is, but I can
42:49
just look at it and say, hey, the buy.
42:52
In from the. Team is not there because this
42:57
that or the third like you let runs you let OK PJ.
43:04
Haggerty's awesome. And I love PJ Haggerty because
43:07
he he was averaging 30 points a game-winning us a lot of games.
43:12
But when you have a green light special on your team who is an
43:17
absolute, just fire it at will. They can.
43:21
Shoot you out of ball. Games and I think for this
43:24
Bowling Green game in particular, when all the.
43:31
Other it's a. Close game.
43:33
I mean, it's we're down for they led the entire game.
43:36
So don't get me wrong, we had no reason to win that game, but
43:40
there was middle stretches of that game where PJ is just
43:44
missing shots so blatantly. It it there's no chance for us
43:50
to win. It's empty possession after
43:52
empty possession because he is. I think at one point he was
43:57
maybe 2 of 14 or something crazy like that and he was only
44:02
shooting 50% from the free throw line.
44:05
Like we're not going to win if our star player.
44:09
That's just for any team. I think for any team that is,
44:14
you know, led by a ball handling score first guard, if he's off,
44:22
your whole team is going to be off because we're expecting 24
44:27
from you every night and we need you to be at least be efficient
44:31
with it. When you're not efficient with
44:34
it, that's empty possessions and it just so happens that you're.
44:39
If the refs and. P JS game in particular his.
44:43
If the refs aren't on his side, that it it gets ugly real fast.
44:50
And then Jerome Tang he he does himself no favors by, you know,
44:55
he's he's getting back to that roll the ball out there kind of
44:59
stuff. Driscoll, don't even get me
45:01
started. Driscoll can only do.
45:03
So much, I don't know. I actually after the first few
45:07
games, I haven't seen his touch on the offense really at all.
45:12
And then the time out situation, he just lets things snowball,
45:18
man. I mean, if I had a dollar for
45:21
every time K State finished the basketball game with three
45:25
timeouts, I'm going to I'd be a billionaire.
45:28
So yeah, Jerome Tang, he's not doing himself any favor, but
45:33
maybe there's a turn around. Maybe this is just a stretch of
45:37
cold basketball for PJ Haggerty where they could get themselves
45:41
out and they get a couple wins and then we're we're back to
45:44
being OK. That was an oddity, that Bowling
45:49
Green game. Yeah, Yeah.
45:52
I'll move on now. Mandy Marchesini.
45:55
Shout out to Mandy, chief marketing officer of the Cocaine
45:58
Willie podcast. Who would you fire after this
46:01
season, if anyone? I'm going to start with Luke.
46:05
Wells. Luke Wells, I don't know what
46:08
he. Does so, yeah, I could see that,
46:14
man. I don't.
46:20
What's the special teams guy that is Nate Katzer?
46:26
Nate Katzer's got to go. I, I think bringing, I mean
46:31
bringing the Weber boy home is just so obvious.
46:35
Like, is it Landry? Is it Landry Weber?
46:38
Stanton Weber? Stanton, Weber.
46:40
Stanton. Weber, who's Landry, is his
46:43
brother. Is his brother, who's currently
46:45
a Catholic seminarian, shout. Out to God.
46:54
Yeah, Stanton Weber, Stanton Weber.
46:58
It's so obvious he needs to be back in doing that.
47:02
I think even if even if it's it not any better, it it feels
47:06
better and then. Man, oh man.
47:12
Luke is Luke the Wells brothers just in general.
47:16
I just feel like that's the obvious answer.
47:18
But maybe that's just putting a Band-Aid on something that's,
47:21
you know, bigger because if you're not fitting the like, I'm
47:26
just going to keep harping back to it.
47:27
I just don't think that this we had pipe dreams growing up.
47:32
Like man, imagine if we were like an air raid style team,
47:37
what could be done? How cool would it be if K State
47:40
was just throwing the ball? 80 * a game just doesn't fit.
47:44
It just doesn't look right. So I think we need to get back
47:49
to more of that physical style offense and lean into it.
47:54
Lean into it. I mean, there's got to be some
47:57
backs out there that is like, oh, I can get 14 carries as a
48:01
backup or I could be the Bell Cal back and I can have 22
48:05
carries. Oh, there's a quarterback that,
48:07
you know, he might not be able to throw, but he's 6, three, 233
48:12
lbs. Oh, I can run it 16 times.
48:14
Yeah, I'll do that. Why not?
48:17
So I mean, there's it's got it. Something's got to change.
48:21
I, I do want Avery back, by the way.
48:23
I kind of, as much as you know, some people don't want that.
48:28
I want Avery back. I think Avery was outside.
48:32
Of. Maybe two games it was.
48:35
I think he was pretty damn good. I think he was pretty good.
48:39
He was solid. On the defensive staff, anybody
48:42
that you would, that you would name.
48:45
I I think. Tui would have been my answer
48:48
like so many years, but I think he's found an identity with the
48:53
D tackle room that I'm I'm not opposed to keeping Tui.
49:01
I think he's great. I just think he's not, you know,
49:04
no one's asking him questions outside of that little stretch
49:07
in August. No one's talking to Tui.
49:09
So I like Tui Buddy. I can't, you know, can't get rid
49:14
of Buddy. Buddy's a dog.
49:17
Maybe Steve Standard, but I I like what he's done with
49:21
Romaine. I mean, it's he I as you know,
49:24
my thoughts on Romaine and I think he's he's made desperate
49:29
Desmond Pernell, a really good football player.
49:32
I think he's done done fine, Van.
49:37
I don't know, it might be getting.
49:38
Stale. It might be getting stale there
49:40
because you think about the DBS this season compared to seasons
49:43
past the corners, specifically just the corners.
49:47
Coach, mind you, just corners as the corners specifically have.
49:50
Been brutal this season. They weren't.
49:53
They weren't. The best I discipline stuff.
49:57
With the They're young though. That's the.
49:58
One thing, they are young and I think they started playing
50:01
Fortenberry too late in the season.
50:04
I don't know what was going on with him.
50:05
I think Fortenberry was probably the best corner the last three
50:10
or four games. Dang man, it's it's tough to see
50:15
that defense. We're so familiar with all these
50:18
guys. It's like firing Van Malone,
50:22
getting rid of Van Malone. That sounds crazy.
50:25
I mean, it'd be like it. It'd be.
50:26
Like firing MO Lattimore at this point.
50:28
Dude spent like 40 years at Casta State dude.
50:33
Wait, I was like I. Remember looking at those
50:35
programs in in the 20 tens and I'm like MO Latin, like he's
50:39
been here before Snyder. Was he like, why would he even
50:41
retain someone from any of those previous Staffs?
50:45
Oh, my God, Gary Parrish, like the Gary Parrish era.
50:49
It's just weird. Yeah, players.
50:53
So Mandy's next question, players that you think should
50:56
should stay or leave? I think obviously we've got to
51:01
retain some of the the core offensive guys.
51:06
I think you need Avery back. I think if you can get Chase to
51:10
somehow come back, yes, that would be amazing.
51:13
Lincoln. Cure.
51:14
I think they need to invest more into Lincoln Cure.
51:20
Garrett Oakley, Why not? I mean, I'm not opposed to
51:23
Garrett. He had some crazy drops.
51:26
I think some of the most insane drops of the season were due to
51:30
a lot of the tight ends and that in a little bit it's on Avery.
51:33
I mean, he throws absolute 90 mile per hour fastballs all the
51:37
time. Maybe simmer that down a little
51:39
bit. But Garrett Oakley, the the
51:42
tight end room in general. Maybe Lofton can go.
51:45
Swanee's gone. Obviously Ansio's not as good as
51:50
I thought he was going to be. The old line.
51:54
Who's our online coach, that is. Brian Lepak.
51:59
Lepak that's. Right.
52:01
Rough season, rough season, rough season.
52:05
Nobody on the offensive line screams that they need to be
52:08
back. Vas.
52:09
I like Vas at guard. He was a a bright spot.
52:12
I did not expect that that story.
52:18
He was all right, I mean. A lot of it's going to be a lot
52:23
of your mistakes at off its tackle in terms of pass Pro is
52:27
made-up by Avery Johnson's ability to get out.
52:31
If you don't have the athlete of Avery Johnson back there, I
52:34
think our offensive line and pass pro looked a lot worse than
52:37
it. The stats show.
52:41
Obviously Sam hecked no, but he's gone.
52:44
He's a senior. He gone, He gone.
52:46
So we're we're going to be replacing good little chunk of
52:49
that a lot, yeah. Lange gang gone.
52:53
Poitier gone. Heck gone.
52:56
Yeah. Man, I mean and.
52:58
Then yeah. And then Joe Jackson.
53:00
Joe Jackson is serviceable. Is he a number one?
53:04
Was he not healthy at the beginning of the season?
53:06
Did they just not believe in him because they were trying to feed
53:10
Dylan Edwards, who eventually was going to leave anyway, so it
53:14
was all for none? Maybe Joe Jackson could have
53:17
been a bright spot in this offense.
53:18
He looked rough at the beginning of the season.
53:20
I owe Joe Jackson an apology because I was dog walking him at
53:26
the beginning of the season. I'd like to.
53:28
Invest, I'd like to invest in him.
53:30
I I feel like if you can, if you can bring him up to the level
53:35
that we saw, it doesn't have to be Utah game level good, but
53:38
Colorado game level good. If you can bring him up to that
53:42
as a an average, as an expectation, that's, I think
53:47
that's. Solid.
53:48
I think like a a. 90 game not give me 17 carries for 90 yards
53:52
and a touchdown every game. I mean he's that's awesome.
53:56
I think that's great great potential mind you, I think we
54:00
need to bring in fresher backs. I think we need to bring in more
54:04
talent in that backfield. We obviously saw JB Price hit
54:07
the transfer portal. It's just.
54:12
Trying to share. The load at running back is one
54:16
of those things that it's it's a sweet science.
54:19
It is a sweet science and I don't know if a lot of if this
54:23
staff can do it. I mean, I like Brian Anderson,
54:26
Brian Anderson, but you know from.
54:29
What we've seen. From, you know, Mr. Anderson
54:32
himself when they came over from North Dakota State, we we were
54:38
saying, oh, they're going to have a bevy of backs.
54:41
They're going to. And outside of that first season
54:43
when you had Brown and Gilbert and Harry Trotter and all them,
54:48
they really have been a solo kind of backfield.
54:52
One guy has been getting the carry.
54:53
So I don't know if they, they don't have a proven track record
54:56
at K State of bringing in multiple guys and using them to
55:00
their best abilities. So because you had a guy like
55:03
Joe Jackson who obviously showed that he can get it done and they
55:07
just never gave him reps because they were trying to give
55:09
somebody else that well and and to be fair.
55:12
Too. Well, I, I, you're right, you're
55:15
right. I mean, we did have the season
55:16
where we brought in Trey Sean Ward and there were a couple of
55:19
games where he popped off. I I think against UCF in that
55:23
first season that they were in the conference, there was at
55:25
least one or two games where they were going back and forth.
55:29
Maybe not every other snap, but they were definitely mixing it
55:33
up a lot more. But yeah, it's that I agree with
55:36
all those players staying. If you can keep Romain around,
55:39
if you can keep some of the some guys on Davis Toby.
55:44
Toby had his injury, I think his upper body injury, so I'm not
55:48
too concerned about that. Was going to say Romain in the
55:50
edges Romain. I would like.
55:53
To see, you know. I mean, really, nobody.
55:59
Nobody from the corners, nothing really lit up.
56:05
So yeah, I think it is the edge. Like you said, it's the edges in
56:08
Romaine. And Romaine is a specialty kind
56:11
of player, so if you don't have him in the right situations,
56:14
he's not going to look as good as you'd want him to.
56:16
Yeah, yeah, like we. Saw at the beginning of the
56:18
season. Next question from Mail order
56:21
McBride, Garrett McBride, Pride of Hugoton, KS Did Ron Prince
56:25
ever get in trouble for setting up that fake business with the
56:28
old K State president? I believe yes, but I think K
56:33
State actually settled it with him.
56:35
And I was looking up an old article.
56:37
K State has a press release from 20000.
56:40
Kenny Lanu, Shout out to Kenny Lanu.
56:42
He's never going to have us on his, never going to allow us to
56:45
have anybody from the athletic department come on the show.
56:48
May 2009 Press Release $1.65 million lump sum got paid out to
56:55
Ron Prince. K State incurred a total of
56:57
$395,000 in outside legal fees during the process.
57:02
So it looks like Prince never got in any trouble.
57:08
Prince engaged, never engaged in any wrongful or unethical
57:12
conduct. Discovery has demonstrated that
57:15
the situation was not of Coach Prince's making, so that fell
57:18
entirely on God. What was the name of the guy who
57:23
was the athletic director at the time prior to Curry?
57:27
Krauss. Robert Krauss.
57:31
Yeah, that was all. I'm Robert Krauss.
57:32
So the answer is no, Ron Prince never got in trouble because
57:36
apparently he had no wrongdoing there.
57:38
Next question from Travis Clones.
57:41
Outside of one game per year, is Iowa State and K State having
57:44
football success mutually exclusive?
57:51
I mean. What, what did Iowa State do?
57:54
What was their record end up being this year, seven and five?
57:58
God damn. I, I, I hate it.
58:03
I don't know. Right there.
58:06
There's seven and five, I think, yeah.
58:11
I don't want to be tied to Iowa. State at all though, I hate it.
58:17
They're they're 8. And four, if they finished four,
58:20
yeah, they. But it was.
58:21
Dicey. They almost freaking blew it
58:23
against Oklahoma State too. I don't know man, I just.
58:29
God, that's. 6:00 and 6:00. Season after you, but they tied
58:31
they tied with. Us in the Big 12 standings, that
58:34
is great, that is. Crazy how are non con really
58:39
shelled us, you know bad this year we lost every one of our
58:44
well no, we won one non con game this season 1 non con game.
58:49
That is crazy, yeah. Yep, I can't believe it.
58:56
All right, last question for the mailbag.
58:58
It comes from my father. Todd asks.
59:02
I've been AK State fan for decades.
59:04
I must say that the past In past years, coaches pretty much made
59:08
decisions late in the game that any football enthusiast would
59:11
agree with. This year there's been at least
59:14
10 or 12 occasions where decisions made late in the game
59:18
were not only head scratching, but so opposite of what the
59:21
consensus would do in these situations.
59:24
It sounds to me like these decisions are mostly made by
59:27
Matt Wells, and these decisions, in my opinion, cost us at least
59:31
three wins, which is the difference between mediocrity
59:34
and being above average. Does this sound like anything
59:38
I've said in the past, in the past 59 minutes?
59:43
It's almost like we're related. That said, is there any hope
59:46
that Matt Wells will be sent packing?
59:48
I think the answer to that is very small percentage chance
59:51
that he gets sent packing. I think Kleiman and the staff
59:55
are going to value more so having consistency.
1:00:00
At offensive coordinator and not having Avery move on to his
1:00:04
fourth offensive coordinator in Four Seasons at K State, I think
1:00:08
they're going to value that over some of the idiosyncrasies that
1:00:11
maybe Matt Wells has in situational play calling that I
1:00:15
think are things can be fixed. That at least can be let's say
1:00:20
maybe Kleiman has a talking to with Matt Wells about in the
1:00:24
offseason, but who know? I, I think the to answer the
1:00:28
question, I think there's no hope that Matt Wells will be
1:00:30
sent packing. But I don't necessarily agree
1:00:33
that that's even the right path to go down because I I value the
1:00:37
fact that he's going to have some consistency for Avery and
1:00:40
offensive coordinator. And if Avery, if we want to keep
1:00:44
Avery around, if that means keeping Matt Wells around, I'd
1:00:46
rather keep Avery and have Matt Wells and maybe have some of the
1:00:49
baggage that comes along with that for the time being than
1:00:54
not, yeah. IIA. 100% agree with you.
1:00:58
I brought that up at the beginning of the season with
1:01:02
Avery Johnson. If we when I when we had the
1:01:07
talk, this was before we even hired Matt Wells.
1:01:10
The talk. This was in January, Yeah.
1:01:12
Getting rid of Connor. Riley, we're not getting rid of
1:01:15
him. He moved on.
1:01:16
But I mean, just having Avery Johnson with a third offensive
1:01:20
coordinator in three years was man, what, what, how is this guy
1:01:26
ever going to develop? And now if we even think about
1:01:30
getting rid of Matt Wells, that'd be 4 offensive
1:01:32
coordinators in four years. The messaging just isn't there.
1:01:36
And that that stunts players growth.
1:01:38
And I would imagine that's one of the things that, I mean, even
1:01:41
if Avery Johnson was to transfer it, I mean, that's four
1:01:44
offensive coordinators of a totally new system now.
1:01:46
Yeah. So yeah, I think Avery Johnson,
1:01:50
for his benefit, whether he's an NFL caliber guy or not, you want
1:01:55
to keep Matt Wells, let him get his vision out there.
1:01:59
Obviously it wasn't a successful one.
1:02:01
And maybe I don't agree with how he's, you know, moving this
1:02:05
offense, but I'm not an offensive coordinator and I
1:02:07
don't know nearly as much football about than him and the
1:02:11
late game stuff. Your dad is absolutely correct
1:02:14
man. Oh man, there's.
1:02:16
Some blunders that happen and and we can armchair quarterback
1:02:20
it to we're blue in the face, but some of it's just obvious.
1:02:25
Some of it is just time management stuff, you know,
1:02:28
conversion stuff. God, God Almighty, you're
1:02:33
winning the game. Why are we going for two to go
1:02:37
up 14? It's it.
1:02:39
Some of this stuff is just bananas.
1:02:41
I know the analytics say one thing, but let's play some
1:02:44
football here, brother. The Texas Tech game.
1:02:46
Where you go for, you go for it on 4th down on 1/4 and 10, but
1:02:50
then don't go for it on 1/4 and two and you punt it away.
1:02:53
I like that. That kind of stuff too.
1:02:55
Even not in late games. There's still decisions and
1:02:59
situational football that's just like, if it's almost just lacks
1:03:03
consistency I think is the best way to put it.
1:03:05
Where you wonder, it's not even analytics if there's no
1:03:09
consistency to it. So it's just it's a head
1:03:12
scratcher. It's a yeah, you want, you want
1:03:14
if you're going. To be that 4th down team that
1:03:16
you know consistently goes for it or a team that's very
1:03:20
conservative. The other way you want your guy
1:03:22
to be either Dan Campbell or I don't even know who the most the
1:03:27
most conservative coach there is, but Bill Snyder, I don't.
1:03:31
Know man, you want to be that? You don't want to be wishy washy
1:03:35
because then it leads to you don't know what your identity,
1:03:38
what you're going to do in a certain situation, because now
1:03:41
you're less up in the air. You you're going with the wind
1:03:44
you're blowing. You know, if the if the wind's
1:03:46
right, you might be going for it.
1:03:48
If it's not, you don't want to be that.
1:03:50
You want to be like, hey, 4th and 6th or if it's I love some
1:03:54
of those, you know, some of those calls like it's third and
1:03:58
seven and we run the ball. I love that.
1:04:02
That just screams, Hey, we're going for it, but then you don't
1:04:05
go for it. OK, now, now we're we're getting
1:04:08
into that inconsistency part. What what was the vision?
1:04:12
What was the vision with running the ball there?
1:04:15
Some of those things do eat at me, but I think you grow.
1:04:19
I mean, when was the last time that Matt Wells called plays?
1:04:24
About 10. Years ago, I think, right?
1:04:27
So you got to. Think this is the he's getting
1:04:30
back in the saddle too. So I hate to think that this was
1:04:34
you know, a growing year for Matt Wells, but maybe it was so
1:04:38
I'm all for bringing Matt Wells back if but I mean what's his
1:04:46
leash like then what is it? These are all questions that you
1:04:49
have to ask. What is his leash like?
1:04:51
What's his recruiting like because he's he's the
1:04:54
quarterback coach and his newest is most recent commitment at
1:04:58
quarterback is a left-handed underarm thrower.
1:05:02
So maybe he is going to be the truth.
1:05:07
But as right now I'm I'm not holding my breath on what's his
1:05:11
name Total Deki. Total miles to Deki.
1:05:14
Miles to Deki. I'm not holding my.
1:05:16
Breath on that. And that is Matt Wells, first
1:05:19
recruit as K State's offensive quarterback coach guru.
1:05:24
So I'm going to give him some grace, but it's not looking
1:05:28
positive. I think he was.
1:05:30
Also involved in Dylan Duff, if I'm not mistaken, but he was not
1:05:35
the primary OC when that happened.
1:05:37
He was at OC. So you know, Yeah, yeah.
1:05:40
Oh, apples in order. Whatever.
1:05:42
We are over an hour. We're not going to get to locks.
1:05:45
I think we're just going to do a separate locks pod, record it
1:05:48
independently and we'll get you, we'll get you that stuff because
1:05:53
we we want to make sure that you get your locks.
1:05:55
We want to make sure you get that It's my record and locks.
1:05:58
By the way, you're still in last place.
1:06:00
But the the, the margin is the margin is close, brother, the
1:06:03
margin is close. You're two games back from me
1:06:06
and I am 9 games back from that. So things are things are looking
1:06:10
bad. Things are looking bad.
1:06:12
But hey, if I run the table this weekend, I can close that gap.
1:06:16
We'll see. We'll see.
1:06:18
All right, that's going to do it for us tonight.
1:06:20
Any final words, Chef, before we get out of here?
1:06:23
Man, I love you boys. It's it's been fun.
1:06:27
It's been a hell of a season and we still got more to go before
1:06:30
the Cocaine Willie season is over.
1:06:32
Hopefully we have more positive stuff to talk about because even
1:06:36
last year we had women's basketball to lean on a little
1:06:39
bit. Not not looking good this
1:06:42
season. I don't know what we're going to
1:06:43
do for content, but I'm, I'm having fun and I I hope that,
1:06:50
you know, we get a great bowl and, and maybe this is an
1:06:53
offseason for. Maybe some drama I like.
1:06:57
It I love a little drama, a little little.
1:07:00
Dramatics happening and hey we are we are officially a women's
1:07:04
volleyball podcast for from this point forward K State women are
1:07:08
playing San Diego that's the University of San Diego the
1:07:12
Toreros I've got a good friend Brandon Smith who went to school
1:07:15
there Toreros playing December 5th.
1:07:18
That's going to be this Friday at 4:30 PM central time.
1:07:22
So be sure to check them out, watch them wherever you watch
1:07:26
your volleyball. And they're in the Nebraska
1:07:29
regional. So have fun with that one
1:07:31
because Nebraska is the think the number one team in the
1:07:34
country. So shout out, shout out to the
1:07:36
cats for having to go through that regional.
1:07:38
But that's going to do it for us tonight.
1:07:41
We are the cocaine Willie podcast.
1:07:42
Follow us at cocaine Willie. Shout out to our sponsor, Auntie
1:07:46
Maze Parlor. Maybe they fix their website.
1:07:48
Let's see maybe maybe maybe maybe not yes, it is fixed.
1:07:53
If you're listening to this website is fixed 35th Christmas
1:07:56
lighting with The Dirty spoons Thursday December 4th.
1:07:59
Be there or don't be there and we are the college huddle
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website is the college huddle.com all the show at
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A hell of a drug baby we are. We are all coke, no joke.
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We are all coke and no joke and Kalani Sataki is still at BYU
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Wildcat Country. Joey McGuire Still Red Raider?