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Best of Ian Furness 9/30 · The Ian Furness Show

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: All right, back here at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Ian Furness with you. Until 3 o'clock, Seahawks just wrapping
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: up their walkthrough. You should ask Grace Abel. What's a
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: walkthrough like? You can't watch the walkthroughs. We're not allowed.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: What do you think they do there?
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Well, there's the famous story. God, when was this? This
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: was years ago.
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: Uh....
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Like, you know, Earl would go a thousand miles an hour.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: And they were doing a walkthrough and Michael Bennett and
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Cliff Averill were out there. They're chewing sunflower seeds and they're,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: wait for it, walking through it.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Oh, wow.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: And they almost got in a brawl with Earl because
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: he was like, you guys aren't doing it.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: You've got to get faster.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: He's like, it's a walkthrough, dude. Like, shut up.
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Like Earl. I know you're Earl and you're going, you know,
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: you're doing your thing.
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: So.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: But yeah, so we'll ask Gray that. Gray Zabel's walking
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: in right now. Hi, Gray. Ian Furness. Nice to meet you.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: We're going to throw that headset on there and grab
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: you for a second as we are live here on KJR.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: I think that might be it. This Greg Bell messed
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: that thing up. He's our previous guy. Yeah, just blame,
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: we blame Greg. We always blame the print guys. You know,
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: the newspaper guys. They're a different breed. How are you?
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Doing well. Doing well. Thanks for having me on. I
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: appreciate you coming by. I know it's in between walkthroughs
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: and practice. We were just joking about this. What's a walkthrough?
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: And I said, like, Because you know when we're out there.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Like we're out there for the first 10 minutes of
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: the real practice. We're not out there for walkthroughs and
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: things like that. I was telling a story. It's a
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: great story. I'll just real fast. Back years ago, Cliff
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Averill and Michael Bennett were here, and so was Earl Thomas,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: and they were doing a walkthrough, so to speak. And
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: as Cliff tells it, they're walking through. They had some
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: sunflower seeds, and they're just kind of messing around, doing whatever.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: And Earl snapped on them saying, hey, you've got to
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: go higher. And they're like, wait a second. Relax, fella.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: Like it's a walkthrough. And Earl will go 1,000 miles
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: an hour. Try hard, guys. So what's a walkthrough?
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Um, you kind of described it. Uh, it's supposed
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: to be a walkthrough, but obviously tempo just starts to
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: pick up as you go throughout. Yeah. Um, there's one
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: guy that maybe violates the tempo.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: A little bit. That's what I was going to ask you.
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: Everyone else matches him. And then the coaches start getting
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: frustrated and tell us to back it down or it's
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: the other way they come out and kind of feel
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: sorry for yourselves and, um, maybe taking a little too
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: slow and few guys get on each other and then it's,
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: it's back to being how it's supposed to be. But
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: Walkthrough is a very loose term around the football dictionary.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: So there is, on occasion, and you guys probably did
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: them in college too, right? On occasion, there's probably a
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: try-hard guy, like YMCA or LA Fitness basketball try-hard guy
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: that's just going to go 1,000 miles an hour. There
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: is that guy sometimes?
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. Riley Mills. I'll say it. Okay, I was
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: going to ask you, but you want to still? I
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: love him to death too. Good friend. Love watching him play,
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: but yeah, it's. it's life or death out there and
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: walk through. And I mean, that's the way it is.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: Notre Dame guy.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: That's probably what it is.
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: Notre Dame guy, Notre Dame guy.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: How are you doing?
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: How's, how's your two?
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's good.
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: Um, still some learning curves, some ups and downs. Um,
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: obviously need to play better up front myself and, and
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: our offensive line, but we're kind of getting to a
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: flow of things and it's a, it's a progress. Never,
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: never finished kind of form and always, uh, developing, get better.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: You, uh, the, the, Arizona second half, well, the last quarter,
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: the last drive of the Arizona game was like what
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: football linemen's dreams are made of, right? 16 plays. You
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: guys were playing, but I can just tell you like
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: the visuals on TV, they kept showing tight shots of
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: the linemen for the Cardinals and they just had this
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: look on their face of complete defeat and exhaustion. That's
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: what you guys want to do, right? You had that
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and then we struggled. You struggled a little bit against
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: the commanders. What was the difference?
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, obviously like Two completely different ball games there. Maybe
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: Arizona's a little more base defense, play more kind of
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: forward and understanding that we might not get as many
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: blitzes and pressures and all that stuff. And then you
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: fast forward to Washington where it's not the best conditions.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: Everyone kind of knows you're going to have to run
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: the football well. And then they're obviously pressuring and blitzing
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: us and showing us different looks and fronts and stuff
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: like that. But At the end of the day, I mean,
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: it's one week, you have good performance, and maybe it's myself,
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: our offensive line, we might be feeling good about ourselves
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: being able to run the ball like that, and then
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: you kind of get a reality check and then slice
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: a humble pie on Sunday against Washington. We don't run
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: the ball very well. Just back to the drawing board,
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: back to the basics, and understand it's any given Sunday,
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: and you've got to bring your best.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: The Seahawks left guard, Gray Zabel, with me, and Furness
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: with you here at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center. You
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: had two guys filling in for Anthony Bradford and rotating
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: the snaps. One had 60, one had 40% of the snaps.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: It's probably more for Sundell and for Abe. Good football players,
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: both of them. We know that in Christian and Bo Stevens,
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: the rookie. Bradford's been there. How difficult and challenging is it?
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: When I always hear about the offensive line, it's all
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: about cohesiveness and teamwork. Now you're missing one of your
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: key guys. a guy that's a massive force, I believe,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: in the run game, right, in Big Anthony.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: And then you have guys rotating in, and they're trying
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: to find that combination, and it's all about chemistry. Does
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: that make it a little more challenging as well? Not
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: to take a shot at those guys, it's just it
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: could be any player out there just to have basically
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: you've had three guys playing right guard this year.
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Chemistry, not so much. I feel like our group
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: is extremely tight and close, and obviously I have a
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: lot of great friendships and stuff in the O-line room.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: It's more of maybe play styles, if anything. Obviously, whoever
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: lines up out there has got to play well together.
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: I think Christian and Bo are doing an unbelievable job
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: filling in for AB while he's gone. Maybe they play
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: style a little bit. That's no excuse or anything. It's
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: just some guys, maybe how they play a certain reach
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: block or a drive block or something like that is
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: just all different. It's getting into the feel of that.
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: I think kudos to JB for having the ability to
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: put whoever in there and still make everything flow and
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: function and I think that's a testament to how well
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: our coach is of the O-line group but tough spot
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: for those two to come into both Bo and Christian
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: and they've excelled unbelievably can't say enough good things about
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: how well those two are playing stepping up to a
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: plate but obviously it's we're missing AB and love them
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: to death and hope you can get back and get
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: healthy and recovered, but those two are doing a great
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: job while he's out.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: JB, you mentioned John Benton, who's the offensive line coach
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: for fans who don't know. This team, there's a couple
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: running jokes in this town. One of them is that
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: Mariners go through hitting coaches, like most of us change
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: our undergarments or what have you, all the time. That's
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: been the same way. There's been a revolving door, not
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: even with head coaches, just a revolving door with offensive
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: line coaches for a while, but he's the second one
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: under Mike McDonald, and it looks like this guy has
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: really made a difference in Tell us about John Benton
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: and what he does for you guys as a group.
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I can't speak enough about JB and what he's
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: done for the O-line, myself, this team, this offense. It's unbelievable.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: He's a truly great coach. He understands the X's and O's.
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: He understands the personalities, the players, how to coach certain people.
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's truly remarkable what he can do in
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: that offensive line room on how to how to pull
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: the best parts out of everybody and get their understanding
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: and kind of have a different coaching style with every
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: single guy in that room. And love him to death. And, no,
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: he's been a staple. And I don't think we have
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: the success that we've had here in Seattle if it
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: wasn't for him.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: It's funny watching Hard Knocks. We didn't see him on
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: Hard Knocks. He wasn't really ever featured.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: Just how he wanted it, too.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: That's an offensive lineman's dream, right?
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's kind of what it is. The funny
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: part about that is if you were just watching it and,
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: You didn't see anybody in the room. If I saw
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: Coach Hammock, if I saw your running backs, Coach, I
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: would have thought that was the offensive line coach. Is
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: he always going like that? I mean, you're not with him.
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah. You can hear him through the walls. Can you?
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: It's classic, yeah. Everyone kind of goes silent a little
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: bit in the old line room when he's yelling over there.
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: Sometimes it's good. Sometimes it's bad. Maybe he's yelling and
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: there's a few laughs afterwards.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: He's got the intensity though, huh?
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: He's the best. Coach Hammock's the best.
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a great part of it. Uh, just
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: a couple of quick things before I let you go, uh,
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: for you and year two, but sitting there every snap,
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: every play practice, walkthroughs, whatever you look over and you
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: see a guy that you played college with roomed with
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: good friends with, well, do you ever pinch yourself and say,
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: I'm not just in the NFL, but I'm playing with
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: this guy?
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: Absolutely. Absolutely. And it was so cool just to have
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: the chemistry, um, camaraderie last year with them. And then
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: you add another year, you add another off season, uh,
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: another however many hundreds of plays playing next to each other.
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: It's super cool and I think the coolest part is
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: maybe we took our relationship and bond that me and
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: Jalen have from college and now it's kind of spreading
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: throughout the O-line room. And I will say North Dakota
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: State's extremely different on how tight-knit the offensive line room
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: is and how the relationships turn into being a best
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: friend to a brother to we're knowing everything about each
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: other's families now and I think that's kind of been
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: a thing that has happened here in the past year,
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: year and a half is we accelerated that throughout the
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: entire offensive line room. So now it's like Charles Cross,
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: one of my best friends. Truly a brother to me.
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: Same thing with Olu and Josh and Abe and AB
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: and all those guys. It's unbelievable but what a unique
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: surreal experience to be able to say that you played
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: next to a college roommate and a lifelong friend.
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: And win a Super Bowl together.
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: It's just a dream season all the way around. The
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: offensive line is different than any other position group, I believe,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: I think. My son played college football and was an
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: offensive lineman, and all I hear about is just how
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: close you guys are. How different is the offensive line, room, group?
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: You just kind of talked about it. Then everybody else
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: on the team. It just, it feels like that. It's
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: just a, and you said you guys didn't want to
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: be necessarily part of hard knocks or anything like that.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: You just, you just do your own thing, but that's
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: just a unique thing in sports.
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: You're rooting each other on. It feels like.
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: Absolutely. And it's, it's five is one, um, seeing everything
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: through the same set of eyes and understanding how everyone's
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: going to play off each other. And I think truly the,
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: the best position group to be a part of is
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: the offensive line. And, um, obviously that's, that's really important
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: to us out here, but you see it, kind of
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: throughout every single position group. We aren't just the special
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: ones to have that bond. The D-line, the quarterbacks, the
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: wide receivers, the safeties, everyone has that type of bond
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: in their room, and I think that's what's truly remarkable
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: about this team.
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: I had one question that came in from the outside.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: Are you a bush, light, apple guy? Are you a
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: bapple guy?
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: Not.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: Maybe one or two.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: Maybe one or two. It's pretty sugary.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's not a thing for you?
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: No.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: You're not standing in line like everybody else?
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: No.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: Because the person that asked me was asking if you
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: had any inside information, like when it's coming out again.
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: No, I don't. I got a little bit of shipment
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: after a Super Bowl of Bush Light Apple.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: Oh, they had some left over.
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that was some strings, yeah.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: But no inside info when it's coming back?
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: No, I don't. But hopefully here soon, because I know
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: a lot of friends and buddies that absolutely love it.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Okay. The guy that's asking me used to be an
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: offensive lineman. I'll just leave it at that.
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: That's their thing. I told him, just drink some cider.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: It's the same thing.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: It tastes like cider.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, or just put apple juice in your beer, take
• 11:49
  Speaker 3: a few sips, and throw some apple juice in there.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Bam.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: That's a veteran move right there.
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: That's a veteran move. Graze Abel, thanks for coming by.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: I appreciate it. And we got all kinds of good
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: insight today, including what a walkthrough is. So I thank
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: you very much for that. Graze Abel, we'll take a
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: quick break. Come back with more.
• 12:04
  Speaker 4: From scratches and dings to major repairs, trust the folks
• 12:08
  Speaker 4: at Absolute Auto Body for quality work at fair prices.
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: Visit them in Linwood or Everett or online at absoluteautobody.com.
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: Absolute Auto Body, when only the absolute best will do.
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: Now with Stuart Mandel, here's Ian.
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: All right, here we go. Stuart Mandel, weekly visit, talking
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: all things college football from The Athletic and, of course,
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: the great Audible podcast. Joining us right now is Stu,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: what are we like? Are we like a third of
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the way, 25%, a quarter of the way through the
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: football season, the college football season? It feels like as
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: we end this month of September, it's wild how fast
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: it goes. It does.
• 12:44
  Speaker 5: You wait all summer for it, and then it flies
• 12:47
  Speaker 5: by pretty quickly. But I always like this time of
• 12:50
  Speaker 5: year as we get through the kind of early non-conference games,
• 12:57
  Speaker 5: and now we kind of get into the harder conference play.
• 13:00
  Speaker 6: Should be a fun month.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Should be indeed. Let's get to some of the storylines
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: from last week and then we'll look ahead, obviously. We'll
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: just start in the L.A. Coliseum with what took place
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: down with Oregon and USC. Obviously, the Ducks winning was huge.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Lots of questions about Lincoln Riley and then, of course,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: the situation with Dante Moore and the hit and the aftermath.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: We've all had some time to process it. Emotions are
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: always high. Suspensions have happened. Apologies have taken place. What
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: was your read on everything that took place with that hit?
• 13:31
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think the aftermath, the real takeaway
• 13:34
  Speaker 5: has been that it's just, I feel like it's been
• 13:38
  Speaker 5: a turning point in the wrong direction for Lincoln Riley.
• 13:41
  Speaker 6: And I think a lot of people there had, I mean, he.
• 13:45
  Speaker 5: Himself had said, like, the window's open, right? We're in
• 13:48
  Speaker 5: a much better position now to compete. We have this
• 13:50
  Speaker 5: great freshman class. And I don't know that he had
• 13:53
  Speaker 5: to beat Oregon necessarily, but the way it happened, both
• 13:58
  Speaker 5: in terms of terrible defense against And then lack of discipline.
• 14:03
  Speaker 5: And this was obviously a very extreme example of that.
• 14:05
  Speaker 5: And it just left a lot of people there feeling
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: like this is just never going to change. Why do
• 14:09
  Speaker 5: we keep getting our hopes up every year?
• 14:12
  Speaker 6: It's the same thing.
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess you wrote about it, too. I thought
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: it's a very interesting situation with Lincoln Riley. And I
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: think I'm wondering about buyer's remorse. for him going there.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: I wonder also about his former school. Is there buyer's
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: remorse going to the SEC? Maybe not with the payouts
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: and the money involved, but let's just start with what
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: Lincoln Riley has been able to work with at USC
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: and the pressure he's under right now. One of the
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: proud programs in the history of our sport, going back
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: obviously to John McKay, John Robinson, and certainly through Pete
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: Carroll's era as well. He did so well in the
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Big 12 at Oklahoma. It has not translated necessarily to USC.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Why do you think that is?
• 14:59
  Speaker 5: I think, you know, I wrote about this in the mailbag, but,
• 15:02
  Speaker 5: you know, hindsight's 20-20. I'm not going to claim to
• 15:04
  Speaker 5: have picked up on this at the time, but you
• 15:06
  Speaker 5: look back and you think, oh, he was dominating in
• 15:09
  Speaker 5: a conference in the Big 12 that was just not
• 15:12
  Speaker 5: nearly as strong as first the Pac-12 when he got
• 15:15
  Speaker 5: there and now the Big 10. You know, Oklahoma and
• 15:18
  Speaker 5: Texas were in this position in the Big 12 where
• 15:21
  Speaker 5: they were the two alpha programs where they recruited at
• 15:25
  Speaker 5: a higher level than everybody else. And then on top
• 15:27
  Speaker 5: of that, when he was there, Texas was a mess.
• 15:30
  Speaker 5: So they ruled that conference. And since going to conferences
• 15:35
  Speaker 5: that have lots of other programs that recruit.
• 15:37
  Speaker 6: At a high level, that have a lot of money,
• 15:40
  Speaker 6: he's really been exposed.
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: And It's hard to say why after all this time,
• 15:45
  Speaker 5: and he's been a head coach since 2017, he's been
• 15:47
  Speaker 5: a head coach for a decade, why the same mistakes
• 15:51
  Speaker 5: and the same shortcomings keep coming up. But I think
• 15:54
  Speaker 5: it's pretty telling that he hired Gary Patterson, Hall of
• 15:59
  Speaker 5: Fame coach at TCU, one of the best defensive coaches
• 16:02
  Speaker 5: at our time, and the defense got worse. And so
• 16:05
  Speaker 5: it tells you maybe Alex French got a lot of
• 16:09
  Speaker 5: heat at the time, like the DCs always get a
• 16:11
  Speaker 5: lot of heat, but You know, maybe it's a head
• 16:13
  Speaker 5: coach problem.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I was thinking that because when I read what
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: you wrote and thinking about this a little bit, you know,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: the first thing I thought of was Alex Grinch. And,
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: you know, we know him well at Wazoo. He was
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: brought in with a lot of fanfare by Mike Leach.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: And first game he ever coached, he gave up like
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: a zillion yards to an FCS school. And then somehow
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: he finds his way up the ladder at Oklahoma. That
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: never worked. Ohio State, what have you. You know, because
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: you can always blame the coordinators, but it has to
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: be the head of the snake at some point. Stuart,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you just a bigger picture question.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: You've covered this sport for a long time, and I'm
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: fascinated by this. As we go through the Protect the
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: College Sports Act and the debates back and forth, and
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of conversation about, well, players are trying
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: to limit players' money, what the players can get, and
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: the players' salaries are NIL, I guess, so to speak,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: and transferring. And I always come back to one thing,
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: because people will bring up coaches. I just feel like
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: in college sports, and maybe in all sports it's the case,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: but certainly in college sports, college basketball specifically, but college football,
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: the coaching position is just so darn important, is it not?
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: I mean, USC is a great example. Before Pete, they
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: struggled for a while, right? And then they brought Pete in.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: They did well. Post-Pete, they didn't do well. USC, you know,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: is it the brand or is the coach in college football,
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: do you think? Because I think we can make that
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: argument for Oklahoma. We can make that argument for a
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: lot of schools across the country. Well, I think.
• 17:34
  Speaker 5: the brand is your starting point, but you still have
• 17:38
  Speaker 5: to have the right coach. And a great example of
• 17:41
  Speaker 5: that is as Teflon as Alabama seems, they went through
• 17:45
  Speaker 5: a long period in the nineties and pre-saving who came
• 17:49
  Speaker 5: in 2007, where they.
• 17:51
  Speaker 6: Were just another team.
• 17:53
  Speaker 5: They were sometimes good, sometimes mediocre, sometimes bad team in
• 17:57
  Speaker 5: the SEC. And it took getting obviously a Hall of
• 18:00
  Speaker 5: Fame coach to get that back on track. So, Um,
• 18:04
  Speaker 5: everybody in college football for the most part has gone
• 18:07
  Speaker 5: through a down period.
• 18:08
  Speaker 6: Um, except for Ohio.
• 18:09
  Speaker 5: State, Ohio state has been, it doesn't seem to matter
• 18:12
  Speaker 5: who the head coaches, they, they do extremely well, but, um, yeah. And, and, uh,
• 18:19
  Speaker 5: by all accounts, Lincoln Riley should have been that guy.
• 18:21
  Speaker 5: I mean, it's one of the great mysteries, how you
• 18:24
  Speaker 5: could win at that high level at one blue blood,
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: go to another blue blood and go eight and five
• 18:29
  Speaker 5: a lot.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: It's a great point. I mean, we can even just
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: transfer down to the SEC.
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: Florida.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, I think a lot of us were just
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: trying to figure out how can Florida not be Florida?
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: There's a team that's won national championships not too long ago,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: and then they go through some really down times. The
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: right coach and the right brand, John Summerall, right? Look
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: at the turnaround. I mean, Florida's one of the better stories,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: unless you hate the SEC or what have you, but
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: they're one of the better stories in college football this year, right?
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: The bounce back that Florida's had.
• 19:01
  Speaker 5: Yeah, in Florida, another example where they won. Steve Spurrier
• 19:05
  Speaker 5: turned them into a national championship program. Urban Meyer won
• 19:07
  Speaker 5: two national championships. And then it's just been a run
• 19:10
  Speaker 5: of mediocre coaches.
• 19:12
  Speaker 6: And bad hires.
• 19:13
  Speaker 5: And I was really high on the John Sumrall hire because,
• 19:17
  Speaker 5: to me, if you see a guy do it at
• 19:20
  Speaker 5: more than one school, that's a good sign. And John
• 19:23
  Speaker 5: Sumrall won big at Troy, went to Tulane, won big
• 19:26
  Speaker 5: again there. And that's at a time when you're in
• 19:29
  Speaker 5: a group of six, like, having any sort of continuity
• 19:32
  Speaker 5: from year to year is really hard. So, and then
• 19:34
  Speaker 5: he walked into a situation at Florida where, you know,
• 19:37
  Speaker 5: they went four and eight last year and the Billy
• 19:39
  Speaker 5: Napier regime was a mess, but you had Jaden Baugh there,
• 19:43
  Speaker 5: you had Dallas Wilson and Vernell Brown there, the receivers,
• 19:46
  Speaker 5: like this wasn't a clean the house kind of situation.
• 19:49
  Speaker 5: There was Taylor, there and then he made a great
• 19:52
  Speaker 5: uh oc hire and buster faulkner brought his quarterback with
• 19:55
  Speaker 5: them and yeah they got it going um i think
• 20:00
  Speaker 5: it's a little early to say oh yeah this team
• 20:02
  Speaker 5: could win the sec but they're certainly not just better
• 20:05
  Speaker 5: but a lot more exciting than they have been in
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: recent years.
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: Jaden Baugh, the running back, he's, I mean, as far
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: as a Heisman goes, I mean, him, Smith, Chambliss, right?
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: Those guys have to be the three guys at the
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: top of the list right now in the conversation.
• 20:19
  Speaker 5: Yeah, those three, Camario Taylor, Mississippi State.
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 20:24
  Speaker 5: I think this weekend's game where he's going against Keelan
• 20:27
  Speaker 5: Russell from Alabama, you know, whoever wins that game, whoever
• 20:30
  Speaker 5: has the better game is probably going to be a
• 20:33
  Speaker 5: big part of that conversation.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Stuart Mandel brought to you by Absolute Auto Body.
• 20:37
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• 20:40
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• 20:42
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• 20:49
  Speaker 1: will do. Let me move back to the Big Ten
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: focus here, obviously, in Seattle for so many. Washington, USC
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: this weekend. It's a massive matchup that maybe will fly
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: a little bit under the radar screen. Washington not ranked,
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: for people nationally at least, because Washington unranked, losing to Minnesota.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: USC coming off that loss, albeit their first one of
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: the year, to Oregon unranked. last weekend. Just a huge
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: game for both programs. Let's handicap that a little bit.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: Let's first start with the importance of it for USC
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: and Lincoln Riley.
• 21:23
  Speaker 6: Must win.
• 21:24
  Speaker 5: Because you look at the rest of their schedule, this
• 21:28
  Speaker 5: is not one of the harder games, frankly. They're going
• 21:30
  Speaker 5: to play Ohio State. They're going to play Indiana. They
• 21:36
  Speaker 5: need to win this one. And Washington is, right now,
• 21:40
  Speaker 5: not looking that great. So I think if they do
• 21:43
  Speaker 5: lose at home to them, it suddenly becomes a matter
• 21:47
  Speaker 5: of when, not if, they have to make a coaching change.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: What's your read on what's going on up here in
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Seattle with Jed Fish in Washington? DeMond Williams, there was
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: the drama in the offseason, Stu, and he looked like
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: he was on his way to LSU. The Big Ten
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: specifically kind of held him to the contract, brought him back.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: He comes back. Everyone says, hey, everything's good and fine
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: and all that. Yet they go out. They've been unimpressive
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: so far. in the first few weeks of the season,
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: struggling for three quarters before pulling away against Wazoo, struggling
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: most of the game against Utah State. Obviously what happened
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: last week against Minnesota, which maybe Minnesota's better than we think,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: and they've got maybe an NFL quarterback along the way.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: But that loss to Minnesota late night at home was
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: a tough one for Washington in Jed Fish's third year.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: They can't run the football. They're getting beat at the
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: line of scrimmage. But what's your read on Washington?
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: And I'll tell you this, too.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: I'll leave you with this. The expectations here this year
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: were quite high, and maybe unrealistic, but quite high. There
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: were people here, most people in town, talking about the
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: possibility of a college football playoff team, and that looks
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: like it's very far-fetched now.
• 22:49
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, they were number 16, right, in the
• 22:52
  Speaker 5: preseason poll. This was a team being talked about as
• 22:56
  Speaker 5: a possible playoff team, and a lot of that had
• 22:58
  Speaker 5: to do with DeMond Williams. The idea that he is
• 23:01
  Speaker 5: now coming into his third year and is going to
• 23:03
  Speaker 5: be one of the star quarterbacks in the sport.
• 23:06
  Speaker 6: And obviously that has not been the case. Now you're right.
• 23:08
  Speaker 5: They cannot run the ball. They, you know, they, they all,
• 23:12
  Speaker 5: we all underappreciated Jonah Coleman at the time. And I
• 23:14
  Speaker 5: know there's been injuries too, but you can't run the
• 23:17
  Speaker 5: ball and you're putting the, basically the whole, the onus
• 23:21
  Speaker 5: of the whole offense on DeMond Williams.
• 23:22
  Speaker 6: And, you know, it hasn't, it hasn't gone well.
• 23:26
  Speaker 5: And that doesn't mean they can't snap out of it
• 23:28
  Speaker 5: and improve, but, You asked about Lincoln-Riley. This may have
• 23:33
  Speaker 5: looked like more of a toss-up kind of game before
• 23:34
  Speaker 5: the season, but now it's like a game that USC
• 23:37
  Speaker 5: should win.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: USC should win. Washington thinks it has to win as well.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: They've got a tough schedule coming up, including a little
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: team called Iowa. You wrote about Kirk Ferentz. I thought
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: that was an interesting thought. longtime coach at Iowa, the
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: evolution of college football. Nick Saban saying last week, I
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: didn't leave because of NIL. I just left because I
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: was getting older or whatever. He's still working every week
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: on ESPN. I don't buy that. It's like I don't
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: buy Tony Bennett didn't leave coaching at Virginia because of NIL.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: Those guys are old school thinkers. Kirk Ferentz has kind
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: of been that way too. What's been the turnaround at Iowa?
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: They got a huge one this week, by the way.
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: Their game this week against Ohio State is massive coming
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: up at 1230 on Saturday. That's a great matchup, fun
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: game to talk about, but how has Kirk Ferentz been
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: able to evolve with the college sports landscape?
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: That's a program that has an identity and sticks to it.
• 24:32
  Speaker 5: So many programs, not only do you have head coaching turnover,
• 24:36
  Speaker 5: but even from year to year, depending on what your
• 24:39
  Speaker 5: record was, well, we were playing a 4-3, but now
• 24:42
  Speaker 5: we're going to go to a 3-4. We were running
• 24:46
  Speaker 5: this kind of offense, but we've changed the playbook, and
• 24:48
  Speaker 5: it's like, Kirk Ferentz does what Kirk Ferentz does year
• 24:51
  Speaker 5: in and year out. Tough defense, physical running game, great
• 24:55
  Speaker 5: special teams. Is it going to get you the national championship?
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: No.
• 24:59
  Speaker 5: But I think that is the rare fan base where
• 25:01
  Speaker 5: everybody has really realistic expectations. And as long as he's
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: winning eight, nine, ten games a year and taking them
• 25:07
  Speaker 5: to bowl games, everybody's pretty happy. I thought the Michigan
• 25:10
  Speaker 5: win was significant, though, because.
• 25:14
  Speaker 6: We've spent, what, a decade making fun of Iowa's offense
• 25:17
  Speaker 6: and Iowa's quarterbacks.
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 25:19
  Speaker 5: And I'll admit, I didn't know much about Hank Brown.
• 25:22
  Speaker 5: It wasn't like he'd come out and lit the world
• 25:24
  Speaker 5: on fire, but those were big time throws to win
• 25:27
  Speaker 5: that game at the end. They clearly have a couple
• 25:29
  Speaker 5: of really good receivers. And so it makes you think, huh,
• 25:33
  Speaker 5: maybe the ceiling's a little bit higher than usual. If
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: they do have that element of their game, they're never
• 25:39
  Speaker 5: going to be a team that tries.
• 25:40
  Speaker 6: To score 45 points on you.
• 25:42
  Speaker 5: Like that's just, you know, when they're the only, in fact,
• 25:44
  Speaker 5: the only hope they have against Ohio state is they're
• 25:46
  Speaker 5: going to try to drag Ohio State into playing their
• 25:49
  Speaker 5: style of football. But if you have a quarterback you
• 25:53
  Speaker 5: can count on, it makes a big difference.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: A lot of people are saying karma came into play
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: because of the way the game ended. For people that
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: missed it, Hank Brown, the quarterback for Iowa, threw a
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: late touchdown pass in the final second from the 16-yard
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: line and they won the game. By the way, a
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: lot of things went into that. There was a long
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: pass play. Michigan has a player hurt, so the clock
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: stops Because they had a timeout left, Iowa didn't. They
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: were able to benefit from that. But they still had
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: to put the ball in the end zone. They got lucky,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: in a sense, did Iowa, because of the injury and
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: the timeout and all that. But then Brown still had
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: to make the play. And that's what was pretty amazing. Now,
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: people say it was karma, whatever. Michigan's still 4-1. It
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: was one of those wild innings. But that's what made– still,
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: I'm just going to go with this.
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: I love the sport.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: You love the sport. You cover the sport every day.
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: Games like that, finishes like that. we don't see that
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: necessarily in the NFL, the unlikely finishes like that. That's
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: to me what makes college football great.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: Of course that's, that's unless you're, if you do see.
• 26:53
  Speaker 5: A finish like that in the NFL, sorry, if you
• 26:55
  Speaker 5: do see a finish like that in the NFL, right.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 26:58
  Speaker 5: Probably it was probably Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 27:02
  Speaker 6: It wasn't Hank Brown.
• 27:04
  Speaker 5: And that's what I think people love about this sport
• 27:07
  Speaker 5: is the unlikely heroes.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. And again, Who's Hank Brown? Iowa
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: has a quarterback? What are we talking about here? What
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: kind of world are we.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: Living in right now?
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: Stuart Maddell from the Athletic The Audible podcast joining us
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: here on the Beacon Plumbing Hotline. Just a couple other
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: thoughts on games this weekend. We'll just start with Tennessee's
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: got Auburn. Tennessee had some high expectations. They get blown
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: out or get kind of taken control of by Texas.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: Let me start with Texas just for that standpoint. Texas,
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: that's a heck of a bounce back for Sark, isn't it?
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, we talked about the emotions. I think we
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: saw the emotions with Ole Miss, right, not being able
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: to pick up their emotions and carry that into their
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: next game. Texas coming off a tough loss. They go out,
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: get a big win. The emotional ups and downs of
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: a sport in which, unlike the NFL, one or two
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: losses can cost your season. That was an impressive day
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: by Texas.
• 27:57
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that was, you know, a tough, tough atmosphere they
• 28:02
  Speaker 5: were going into. And it was a real eye-opening, wow,
• 28:07
  Speaker 5: is Texas' defense good? They had 10 sacks. And we
• 28:12
  Speaker 5: saw it in obviously in the second half against you
• 28:14
  Speaker 5: and against Ohio State as well. But if that's how
• 28:17
  Speaker 5: they're going to play this year, you know, look, this
• 28:20
  Speaker 5: is not any any visions people have that Arch Manning
• 28:24
  Speaker 5: was going to be a 350 yards a game kind
• 28:26
  Speaker 5: of quarterback. Like, clearly, that's not going to be the case.
• 28:28
  Speaker 5: That's not their identity. But they have a defense that
• 28:31
  Speaker 5: they can really trust.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: I wonder if Arch not throwing for– that feels like
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: a conscious effort. Even with a running back banged up
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: in that game, they've got kind of a two-headed monster there.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: It feels like that's how they want to play, though.
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: Defense wins it. You can ball control offense, make the
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: occasional play on offense as well, big play. But for
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: the most part, it's win by defense and running the
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: football in Texas, right?
• 28:54
  Speaker 5: It's a very NFL model, which is not surprising with Sark.
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 28:58
  Speaker 5: But, look, if Arch was truly– the kind of, you know,
• 29:02
  Speaker 5: superstar they thought coming in, I'm sure they would throw
• 29:05
  Speaker 5: the ball around a lot, but he's the 79th rated
• 29:07
  Speaker 5: passer in the country right now. Um, he is amazingly
• 29:12
  Speaker 5: even lower than, um, than, um, uh, John Mateer, Oklahoma, like,
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: you know, but he has that fourth quarter comeback against
• 29:20
  Speaker 5: Ohio state that so far has, you know, been the
• 29:24
  Speaker 5: enduring image of his season. So I think you're right.
• 29:27
  Speaker 5: I think Texas is going to try to win a
• 29:29
  Speaker 5: national championship. Um, kind of more of a traditional NFL
• 29:33
  Speaker 5: way and, and, and knowing that, you know, arch does
• 29:36
  Speaker 5: have it in him, right. He might not be able
• 29:38
  Speaker 5: to carry you for four quarters, but he is, has
• 29:41
  Speaker 5: come through in the clutch in several big games.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: And for people that think I'm sometimes heartless when it
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: comes to guys that transfer and leave my, my beloved
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: school that got beat by Arizona this week, I did
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: text Stu. You can confirm this too. I actually almost
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: feel bad for John Mateer right now. Like it's so bad.
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: Like I feel bad for this guy. Like it just
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: isn't like those, the fumble, the, the ball that fell
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: out of his hands for the scoop and score was
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: just atrocious. And that just tells me that that guy
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: is as rattled as it gets. And I talked about
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: buyer's remorse earlier with, uh, with our friends at, uh,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: you know, with, with Lincoln Riley, God, Oklahoma, man, going
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: to the big, uh, going to the sec, it's just not,
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: not going well. And obviously with, with material, they got some,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: they got some issues going on with him right now.
• 30:20
  Speaker 6: You can just tell his confidence is completely shot.
• 30:23
  Speaker 5: And, um, And everybody wants to bench him, but nobody
• 30:27
  Speaker 5: knows who the backup quarterback is. So easier said than done.
• 30:30
  Speaker 5: It's one of the more puzzling. Also, frankly, the regression
• 30:40
  Speaker 5: of Marcel Reed at Texas A & M also has
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: been pretty dramatic. But I think the difference is John
• 30:47
  Speaker 5: Mateer was so good at Washington State.
• 30:50
  Speaker 6: He was a star that year. And you didn't get
• 30:52
  Speaker 6: it last year. but Oklahoma went to the playoff.
• 30:56
  Speaker 5: So it was kind of all it's forgiven, but you know,
• 30:59
  Speaker 5: it's looking pretty bleak right now for him and for Oklahoma.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm thinking I might be speaking out of, I
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: might be speaking ill-informed here, but one of the things
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: that made Mateer great at Wazoo was there was always
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: the threat of a designed run, not, not just a,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: you know, a scramble and he can maybe elude somebody
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: or a third and one and what have you. There
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: was always the, the, the threat that he was going
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: to just flat out run the football and, Big, strong,
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: fast kid. I'll go back to Washington. Jed talked about
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: this this week. I think there's a thought that maybe
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: I know nobody knows who the backup at Washington is.
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: I actually asked their sideline guy, our afternoon guy, who's
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: the backup? I don't even really know. I mean, geez, like, okay, good.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: So you don't know. But like with DeMond, he's much
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: more slightly built. But there's no doubt Washington's offense is
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: better when DeMond Williams is running and not just scrambling
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: for his life, but actually design runs. Same thing with
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: John Mateer. But it brings us to the final thing
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: I'll talk to you about. Not every team is Oregon
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and has a quality backup quarterback in the country in
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: today's day and age, right?
• 32:00
  Speaker 6: Very few.
• 32:02
  Speaker 5: And it's not a coincidence that one of the richest
• 32:04
  Speaker 5: programs in the country has the five-star two-year Nebraska starter
• 32:09
  Speaker 5: as its backup quarterback. And I think a lot of
• 32:12
  Speaker 5: teams find themselves right now in a really tough spot.
• 32:16
  Speaker 5: You invest a lot of money in your starting quarterback.
• 32:19
  Speaker 5: The season is riding on them. They're not delivering on that. Well,
• 32:23
  Speaker 5: we didn't really have a plan B. So Oregon obviously
• 32:27
  Speaker 5: had a great plan B. And frankly, I mean, Rayola
• 32:30
  Speaker 5: came in and looked way better than he ever did
• 32:32
  Speaker 5: in Nebraska. He wasn't bad at Nebraska, but he didn't
• 32:34
  Speaker 5: look like that. So that's a really good situation they
• 32:37
  Speaker 5: have going there. I don't know that a lot of
• 32:39
  Speaker 5: teams have that.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: Good stuff, as always, Stu. Tell people about the Audible
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: podcast with you and Ralph as well. You guys do
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: a great job with that every week. Bruce, tell people
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: about that, what you've got going on there.
• 32:52
  Speaker 5: We will be live Sunday morning, like we always are,
• 32:56
  Speaker 5: recapping the weekend live.
• 32:57
  Speaker 6: At 8.30 a.m. Pacific. You can go on YouTube at
• 33:03
  Speaker 6: Audible Show.
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: I love it. Also, check out Stu's work at The Athletic, theathletic.com.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: Wednesday is the mailbag, which I love. Also, you get
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: the recap of the weekend games on Sunday as well.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: And sometimes Stu throws in sprinkles and some other fun
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: stuff too. So make sure you check that out at theathletictheathletic.com.
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: We'll talk to you next week, my friend. Thank you.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: All right. Thanks, Ian.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: That is Stu Mandel.
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: Much more to come. Don't forget Factor Fiction 235 and
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: 93.3 KGRFM.
• 33:26
  Speaker 4: It's time to take a deep dive into all things
• 33:29
  Speaker 4: Seahawks with Corbin Smith, sports reporter for Emerald City Spectrum.
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: All Seattle sports, all the time. Brought to you by
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: Jim Elliott with Windermere Real Estate, helping homebuyers and home
• 33:39
  Speaker 4: sellers in Western Washington. Whether you're buying or selling, contact
• 33:43
  Speaker 4: Jim at 206-769-5466 or at Jim at soldbyjim.com. Now with
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: Corbin Smith, here's Ian.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: Corbin, also part of the Seahawks Triple Option with our
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: friend Rob Rang and former Seahawks running back, Super Bowl
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: champion Robert Turbin. That podcast is available wherever you get
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: your podcasts. Also on YouTube, so check that out. Seahawks
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: Triple Option, Emerald City Spectrum for all your local sports coverage,
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: including the Kraken. I just mentioned them a moment ago
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: as they get things going tomorrow night in Calgary. He
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: joins us right now here at the Virginia Mason Athletic
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: Center where the Seahawks just hit the field a few
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: minutes ago. We were out there. Can't really discuss what
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: we saw yet. But we can sort of because Mike
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: McDonald gave a precursor. Let's just go through the news
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: of the day. First of all, Corbin, because we were
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: talking to Graze Abel in here when Mike McDonald was speaking.
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: So let's start first with Julian Love. They got to
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: have him back this week. The good news is he's
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: expected to practice in some capacity today. So that's always
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: a good sign on the Wednesday practice that you're getting
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: in bag.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: I will say this.
• 34:46
  Speaker 7: Anybody that's blaming A.J. Finley and Rodney Thomas for the
• 34:49
  Speaker 7: loss on Sunday, get out of here. That is not correct.
• 34:54
  Speaker 7: There were some much bigger problems than that. But this
• 34:57
  Speaker 7: defense needs Julian Love out there.
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: They need the mayor.
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: He's an integral part of what they do.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: He really is.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: What's the deal with it? DeAnthony Bell, what happened there?
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 35:07
  Speaker 7: It's anybody's guess at this point, because I thought for
• 35:11
  Speaker 7: sure that he was going to be called up this week,
• 35:14
  Speaker 7: but then they chose Max and Hook instead.
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: And I like Max and Hook.
• 35:17
  Speaker 7: I think Max and Hook's got some upside, but that
• 35:19
  Speaker 7: was the first time he'd ever played in a regular
• 35:21
  Speaker 7: season game. I'm wondering, you know, Mike McDonald made it
• 35:24
  Speaker 7: sound like, well, it was just a 70-man roster mechanism,
• 35:28
  Speaker 7: but this... this screams like D'Anthony Bell's like, well, if
• 35:30
  Speaker 7: I'm not getting called up for this circumstance, then why
• 35:33
  Speaker 7: am I here?
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: And it just, it's.
• 35:36
  Speaker 7: Weird because he was, he was the main guy replacing
• 35:38
  Speaker 7: Nicky Manwari in training camp.
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: And then suddenly he was, clearly he wasn't even part
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: of their plans if they had a litany of injuries.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was, was weird. I, I thought, I think
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: we've all kind of wondered that with, he's.
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: A good player too.
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: Like, and was the second even worry was hurt. And, and,
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: coming back. And then when we saw the Bud Clark injury,
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: you're like, well, DeAnthony Bell's on the 50th. Not on
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: the practice squad. He's on the 53, man. That thing
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: is just odd all the way around.
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: Is something weird going on?
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 36:11
  Speaker 7: What did McDonald say today? He just said that it
• 36:15
  Speaker 7: was part of the issue with the 70. They've got
• 36:17
  Speaker 7: more than 70 players that they're looking at. Typical coach
• 36:22
  Speaker 7: speak on that front. But it's It's a bizarre situation
• 36:26
  Speaker 7: because he's been really good when he's played for them,
• 36:29
  Speaker 7: and he's experienced.
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 36:32
  Speaker 7: I'm assuming that in this case it was like we
• 36:35
  Speaker 7: wanted somebody that was more rangy on the back end
• 36:37
  Speaker 7: for insurance, which they must feel Max and Hook is
• 36:40
  Speaker 7: going to provide that more than D'Anthony Bell, who's at
• 36:43
  Speaker 7: his best when he's playing in the box.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: Let's look back before we look ahead at the Chargers
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: and everything else this week. Let's look back a little bit.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: It's probably simple to say turnovers were the big reason
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: why they lost. So let's just start there. Was that
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: the biggest reason they lost?
• 36:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah, if they have two of those three turnovers that
• 37:00
  Speaker 7: they don't commit, they win that game by double-digit points.
• 37:04
  Speaker 7: They just gave up some really, I mean, obviously six
• 37:06
  Speaker 7: points off of the interception late in the game.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: The fumble coming at the 21-yard line. Short field.
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: Short field.
• 37:15
  Speaker 7: I don't care how great your defense is. When they
• 37:17
  Speaker 7: get put in a situation like that, good luck winning
• 37:19
  Speaker 7: that battle. I thought the defense played pretty darn well
• 37:23
  Speaker 7: most of the game. It's just they got put in
• 37:24
  Speaker 7: some horrible situations.
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: And not just from the offense.
• 37:29
  Speaker 7: This would be my other takeaway, and this is why
• 37:31
  Speaker 7: I asked Mike McDonald about this on Monday on our Zoom,
• 37:34
  Speaker 7: and he made it clear the special teams is not
• 37:36
  Speaker 7: good enough right now. They have plunged from third in
• 37:40
  Speaker 7: expected points added in special teams last year to 26th
• 37:45
  Speaker 7: so far this year. And it's been most noticeable in
• 37:47
  Speaker 7: their kick coverage.
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: It's been bad.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: I think we all think highly of Jay Harbaugh, right?
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: So is it personnel?
• 37:55
  Speaker 7: They have most of the same guys back. I mean,
• 37:59
  Speaker 7: Dariq Young is proving to be a big loss on
• 38:01
  Speaker 7: special teams and not having Irv Charles to help replace
• 38:05
  Speaker 7: him right now, and he's not going to be back
• 38:07
  Speaker 7: practicing this week. Yeah, they've got to clean.
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: Up some things.
• 38:12
  Speaker 7: I think they have the players in place, but they
• 38:15
  Speaker 7: have not looked in sync on special teams. It just
• 38:18
  Speaker 7: hasn't looked like the group we saw last year. Yeah,
• 38:20
  Speaker 7: I mean, you wrote about it on Monday in Emerald
• 38:22
  Speaker 7: City Spectrum. The good news is Jason Myers has been good.
• 38:27
  Speaker 7: He was not good in the preseason. That was the
• 38:29
  Speaker 7: one special teams question. But this is what was crazy.
• 38:32
  Speaker 7: I know that there was rain on Sunday, but Tress
• 38:35
  Speaker 7: Way was booting the ball. Michael Dixon, for whatever reason,
• 38:39
  Speaker 7: he did not look good. I said this on our
• 38:43
  Speaker 7: Seahawks triple option on the show yesterday that Michael Dixon
• 38:48
  Speaker 7: looked like he needed his Snickers and he was hungry.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: He was just getting no power on the football. He
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: just wasn't himself.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: It was odd because it's not often that you hear
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: a commentator kind of say that, but who's doing the game?
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: Whoever's doing the.
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: Greg Olson mentioned a couple of times.
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: He's my teammate.
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: He's like, Hey, this, this, he's normally Mr. Reliable and
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: he's having a, like I think he said, he's having
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: a really bad day today. And it was, it was like,
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: he looked like a high school punter out there. That's
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: never been Michael Dixon.
• 39:15
  Speaker 7: And like I said, if the weather was impacting both punters,
• 39:18
  Speaker 7: then it'd be, but Tress way.
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: Was booting it.
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: So I, I don't know.
• 39:22
  Speaker 7: They, I just felt like this first three games, there's
• 39:26
  Speaker 7: been at least one phase of special teams that's been
• 39:29
  Speaker 7: bad in every single game.
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: Let's talk corbin smith with us emerald city spectrum by
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: the way he's got a couple really good stories up
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: there including special teams a long story on special teams
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: you can read it at emeraldcityspectrum.com rashid shaheed the return
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: on investment so.
• 39:43
  Speaker 7: Far Not good, but I'm not going to say that
• 39:45
  Speaker 7: it's his fault necessarily. The drop he had in week
• 39:48
  Speaker 7: two would be on him, but it's hard to get
• 39:52
  Speaker 7: the ball to other guys right now because nobody can
• 39:54
  Speaker 7: defend Jackson Smith and Jigba.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: Cooper Cupp was pointing this out today.
• 39:58
  Speaker 7: Look like you're not going to skip throwing it to
• 40:01
  Speaker 7: JSN if he's open, and they're trying to take him away,
• 40:04
  Speaker 7: and they can't. When you have a guy that's that
• 40:07
  Speaker 7: utterly dominant, he is right now, I know this is
• 40:12
  Speaker 7: diverting from the question, but I'll get back to it.
• 40:15
  Speaker 7: He is playing at a Jerry Rice prime level right
• 40:18
  Speaker 7: now in terms of, I don't think that's hyperbole. There
• 40:22
  Speaker 7: was a sequence in that second half where I just
• 40:25
  Speaker 7: keep thinking, okay, he's had three straight catches. There's no
• 40:28
  Speaker 7: way they're letting him catch. Oh, he caught another one.
• 40:31
  Speaker 7: He's just on a heater right now.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, just look at the numbers. 27 catches
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: in three games.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: He's on pace for 34 touchdowns. 27 catches, 405 yards,
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: and six touchdowns.
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: In three games.
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: I mean, those are video game numbers.
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: Cubs got eight. I'm just going through the receivers. Cubs
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: got eight. Shaheed's got six. Torrey Horton his first three.
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: And no other receivers caught a ball.
• 40:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I'd say it was on Shaheed and some of
• 40:59
  Speaker 7: those guys. But I just think, you know, when you've
• 41:01
  Speaker 7: got a player that is that special.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: And he's getting open.
• 41:06
  Speaker 7: Sam Darnold is going to throw the football to him,
• 41:09
  Speaker 7: and he should.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: I want to go back. This is one of the
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: things we brought up earlier, Corbin, is I think the
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: start to games has to– I mean, they've got 17
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: first-half points in three games. They've got seven total. They
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: got one touchdown in three first quarters. One touchdown in
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: the second quarter plus a field goal. 17 total first-half
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: points so far for this team. 31 for the opposition.
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: 31 to 17, they've been outscored in first halves. They've
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: been great in second halves. By and large, offensively, they've
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: been really good in second halves. But part of it
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: was helped by Drake May and his interceptions and going
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: against Jacoby Brissett. But they've got to be better in
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: first halves.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: They've got to run the football better in first halves.
• 41:45
  Speaker 7: And I'm working on an article. This will be up
• 41:49
  Speaker 7: here in a little bit on Emerald City Spectrum. Because
• 41:51
  Speaker 7: there's a balancing act with Zach Charbonnet. You don't want
• 41:54
  Speaker 7: to rush him back too quick. But if he's ready
• 41:57
  Speaker 7: for practice, then get him out there and open that
• 41:59
  Speaker 7: 21-day window. Was he expected to practice today? No, he's
• 42:01
  Speaker 7: not practicing today. McDonald made it sound like there was
• 42:04
  Speaker 7: a chance he could have his window open tomorrow.
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 42:08
  Speaker 7: That makes sense when you're talking about a guy that
• 42:09
  Speaker 7: we know is not playing this week. We can bring
• 42:12
  Speaker 7: him back on Thursday, and then that means you have
• 42:15
  Speaker 7: that three weeks from now until that Thursday to make
• 42:18
  Speaker 7: a decision on what you're going to do with him.
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: But they have been so bad in short yardage. This
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: is based.
• 42:26
  Speaker 7: On stats that I got from True Media, Ian. They
• 42:30
  Speaker 7: right now are converting on three yards or less opportunities,
• 42:34
  Speaker 7: doesn't matter what down. They are converting first downs with
• 42:38
  Speaker 7: a run 37.5% of the time.
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: On three yards or less?
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: Yes, with a run game.
• 42:43
  Speaker 7: That is dead last in the NFL by more than 10%.
• 42:47
  Speaker 7: They have just been extremely inefficient. And I think one
• 42:52
  Speaker 7: or two of those pickups are barnyard runs. Like when
• 42:56
  Speaker 7: they've done, when they've done traditional runs, it just has
• 43:00
  Speaker 7: not worked. And they, they also have no third and
• 43:04
  Speaker 7: three or shorter conversions with the run game this year. Yeah.
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: Barnard's got the one carry. So yeah. So one of
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: those would be a barn.
• 43:09
  Speaker 7: But every time they've had third and three or shorter,
• 43:12
  Speaker 7: they have not gotten the first down on those third downs.
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: Well, like I go back, I'm it's, It's not a
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: stat that anybody that's worth their salt would look at normally,
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: but I'm going to look at it anyway because through
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: three games, they have one rushing touchdown, and it was Barnyard.
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: A Barnyard touchdown.
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I said this yesterday.
• 43:28
  Speaker 7: I think Brian Fleury's done a really good job from
• 43:31
  Speaker 7: the 20 to the 20. I think he's gotten way
• 43:33
  Speaker 7: too cute when they've been in the red zone. He's
• 43:36
  Speaker 7: gotten away from what his identity is to an extent,
• 43:38
  Speaker 7: and he's been, like, the Arizona game, it was just run, run, run, run,
• 43:42
  Speaker 7: and then this game, it was pass, pass, pass, pass,
• 43:44
  Speaker 7: and they got stuffed on both times. There's no variance there.
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: I'm going to utter words I never thought I'd utter.
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: How much do they miss Anthony Bradford?
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: A lot.
• 43:53
  Speaker 7: They miss A, B, and this shouldn't be a surprise
• 43:57
  Speaker 7: coming from me because you've heard me talk. I've been
• 44:00
  Speaker 7: much higher than Anthony Bradford. It is the physicality and
• 44:04
  Speaker 7: the nastiness. He brings a different play style than the
• 44:08
  Speaker 7: entire rest of that line, and I think that everybody
• 44:10
  Speaker 7: else follows suit. When they don't have him in there, though,
• 44:14
  Speaker 7: It changes that complexion.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: The group just is not as physical.
• 44:18
  Speaker 7: 75 is out there looking to kick somebody's butt.
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 44:22
  Speaker 7: And he'll whiff occasionally, but he's also going to drive
• 44:25
  Speaker 7: guys off the ball and drive them into the turf.
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: Well, their offensive line coach, Sean Benton, loves him.
• 44:29
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: And there's a reason. And it might not just be
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: for what he does physically on play. A play-by-play basis.
• 44:35
  Speaker 7: That chemistry, that contagious effect that his nastiness has on
• 44:41
  Speaker 7: the entire group.
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: Well, with him, so now with him out, he's got
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: three more games he's got to miss on IR. So
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: you go last week, Christian Haynes played 60% of the snaps,
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: Bo Stevens 40%. So they rotated those guys in.
• 44:57
  Speaker 7: I mentioned this last week, you do it until it
• 45:01
  Speaker 7: doesn't work. It didn't work this weekend.
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: It didn't.
• 45:04
  Speaker 7: Like, I thought the Cardinals game, they made it work.
• 45:07
  Speaker 7: But most of the time when you try to rotate
• 45:09
  Speaker 7: offensive linemen, it does not work. Maybe it does in college.
• 45:14
  Speaker 7: It does not work in the National Football League. And
• 45:17
  Speaker 7: it just seemed like Haynes and Stevens, neither one of
• 45:21
  Speaker 7: them were able to truly get in a rhythm because
• 45:22
  Speaker 7: they were just coming in and out of the lineup.
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I hate it.
• 45:26
  Speaker 7: To me, it's no different than if you have two quarterbacks,
• 45:29
  Speaker 7: you don't have one. I think even with backup offensive linemen,
• 45:32
  Speaker 7: if you have two right guards, you.
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: Don't have one.
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: I think you've got to have somebody.
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: Who should it be? Haynes. Really?
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 45:42
  Speaker 7: I like Bo Stevens, but I thought Christian Haynes was
• 45:45
  Speaker 7: much more effective than he was in that game on Sunday.
• 45:49
  Speaker 7: You could tell the rookie kind of had some welcome
• 45:52
  Speaker 7: to the league moments. Seattle may look at this like,
• 45:54
  Speaker 7: we want to get Stevens these reps, and I understand that,
• 45:57
  Speaker 7: but if that's your mindset, then just start him. But
• 46:00
  Speaker 7: I think Christian Haynes has been the better player.
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: Jadarian Price, their first round pick, 28 carries, 119 yards,
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: averaging 4.3, but there's a couple long pops in there.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: We've seen the explosiveness, but I don't think there's a
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: football coach at any level in the country that is
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: okay with turning the ball over. Two turnovers in two weeks.
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: Do you expect to see more Jadarian Price this week?
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: I think we saw the limitations of Emmanuel Wilson, especially
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: when they tried to go wide with him. And do
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: we expect to see more Price?
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: They've got to. They just don't have juice.
• 46:34
  Speaker 7: George Helani and Emmanuel Wilson between the tackles, can be
• 46:39
  Speaker 7: really effective runners, and Helani can run outside stuff.
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: But neither one of those.
• 46:44
  Speaker 7: Guys has the athletic juice and burst that Jadarian Price does.
• 46:48
  Speaker 7: So they're going to give him, I think that Turbo
• 46:51
  Speaker 7: and I disagreed a little bit on this.
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: Turbo thinks that there's a chance.
• 46:54
  Speaker 7: That he doesn't start this week, just based on his
• 46:57
  Speaker 7: experience from being an NFL running back. Like, that's how seriously,
• 47:00
  Speaker 7: but I think the soft benching that they did this
• 47:04
  Speaker 7: last week was probably the equivalent of I think he
• 47:07
  Speaker 7: starts in this game and they try to get that
• 47:08
  Speaker 7: confidence built back up. But, man, if he puts the
• 47:11
  Speaker 7: ball on the turf again, if it happens again, he
• 47:15
  Speaker 7: might not get out of that doghouse for the rest
• 47:17
  Speaker 7: of the year. And Zach Charbonnet is going to be
• 47:19
  Speaker 7: on speed dial here getting him back to start.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: Well, I think that's the thing is that, like, you
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: see the ability. Like, you see what he can do.
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: You see the flashes of it.
• 47:29
  Speaker 7: The confidence, though, has got to be– that's got to
• 47:31
  Speaker 7: be tough. It's a trust thing, and I can tell
• 47:35
  Speaker 7: you this. I coached high school running backs, and I
• 47:39
  Speaker 7: was lucky. The seven years that I coached high school ball,
• 47:42
  Speaker 7: I only had one of my star backs that.
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: Had some fumble issues.
• 47:46
  Speaker 7: I had one I coached in Indianapolis that he had
• 47:50
  Speaker 7: some issues in training camp the first year I was
• 47:52
  Speaker 7: with him, and then he started sleeping with his football.
• 47:56
  Speaker 7: He had almost 400 carries the two years I coached him.
• 48:00
  Speaker 7: never put the ball on the ground a single time.
• 48:02
  Speaker 7: So I was blessed as a coach. I had guys
• 48:05
  Speaker 7: that really took it seriously, and we had some really
• 48:08
  Speaker 7: fun drills that we did.
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: But, like, the one guy that I had.
• 48:12
  Speaker 7: That was incredibly talented and coached him here in Washington, and, man,
• 48:20
  Speaker 7: there was always in the back of my head, though, like,
• 48:22
  Speaker 7: is he going to get 10 yards downfield and then
• 48:24
  Speaker 7: somebody's going to cough the ball up out of his hands?
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: And that's how.
• 48:28
  Speaker 7: These NFL teams view it, too. Like, there is a fear,
• 48:31
  Speaker 7: and it goes into the player, too. Like, Turbo was
• 48:34
  Speaker 7: talking about this on our show. Like, you start to
• 48:36
  Speaker 7: have the psychological effects as the player, like, and it
• 48:39
  Speaker 7: makes it you're not playing fast. And if you're not
• 48:42
  Speaker 7: playing full speed in the National Football League.
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: Forget it.
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: Well, you're thinking about, I've got to hold on the ball.
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: Hold on the ball.
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: Hold on the ball.
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: Hold on the ball.
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: You're not thinking about which hole I'm hitting, you know,
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: where I'm cutting back to. Like, all the things that
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: could probably go through your mind. Corbin Smith, Emerald City Spectrum.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: Triple Option Podcast joining us right now. Let's get to
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: the defense. They've, by and large, played well. I think
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: that's safe to say. They've given up this season just
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: 50 points. You take the seven off the board that
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: was a pick six. I mean, 43 in the three games.
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: They've done okay defensively. They didn't get the stops at
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: the end. Marcus Mariota with the big play. We talked
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: about Julian Love. But now they're going against, I keep
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: wanting to say San Diego. It's all these years later, right?
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: It should be.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: San Diego.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: It should be. Chargers team, Justin Herbert has struggled. This
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: team has struggled. They're 0-3. Everyone's like, well, they're not
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: going to go winless. They're going to get some wins
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: at some point in time. I don't think this is
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: the week they get one. But what are they going
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: to see? What are they looking at when they look
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: across and see Justin Herbert, Amari Hampton, et cetera?
• 49:38
  Speaker 7: Herbert can be one of those. He can be a
• 49:41
  Speaker 7: top five quarterback any given Sunday. He can be a
• 49:44
  Speaker 7: bottom five, 10 quarterback any given Sunday. He is incredibly inconsistent,
• 49:50
  Speaker 7: has all of the physical tools and you can see
• 49:53
  Speaker 7: the athletic ability with him, but he just, something is
• 49:57
  Speaker 7: missing there and something, I mentioned this the other day
• 50:00
  Speaker 7: with Rob Rang when we were doing our postgame show
• 50:04
  Speaker 7: and talking Chargers looking forward, like, It almost feels like
• 50:08
  Speaker 7: Mike McDaniel is.
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: Their new offensive coordinator, former Miami head coach.
• 50:11
  Speaker 7: It almost feels like he's meshing with Harbaugh about as
• 50:14
  Speaker 7: effectively as Ryan Grubb meshed with Mike McDonnell.
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: It just has not worked so far.
• 50:20
  Speaker 7: Now, maybe there will be a light switch that comes on,
• 50:22
  Speaker 7: but that marriage looks like that might be one of
• 50:26
  Speaker 7: those 90-day fiancé things that just ends up blowing.
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: Up in your face real quick.
• 50:33
  Speaker 7: They don't have anybody that can... They have some good receivers...
• 50:37
  Speaker 7: They don't have any receivers, though, that you're like, okay,
• 50:40
  Speaker 7: that dude can separate. He scares me.
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: They just don't.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: Labakaki's their leading receiver with 12 catches.
• 50:45
  Speaker 7: Quinn Johnson has the athletic ability, but he drops half
• 50:47
  Speaker 7: the passes thrown at him.
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: They've got some good players. They just don't have anybody
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: that scares you. They just don't.
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: 20th in the league in total offense are the Chargers
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: right now. Their pass offense is 20th. They do run
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: the ball okay with Amari and Hampton. I say okay,
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: but They're just a team that seems to be lost.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: That new offensive coordinator is not working. A guy that
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: everyone thought, well, he's going to go there, turn around
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: Justin Herbert. He's going to get another NFL coaching job
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: right away. Instead, it's going the opposite direction right now.
• 51:18
  Speaker 7: Now he's trending in what I call the Adam Gaze Club,
• 51:21
  Speaker 7: where you go from head coach to being an OC again,
• 51:25
  Speaker 7: and then, oh, wait, I don't have Peyton Manning anymore.
• 51:28
  Speaker 7: And in this case, I don't have Tyreek Hill in
• 51:31
  Speaker 7: his prime. It's incredible how much that's impacted, but I mean,
• 51:35
  Speaker 7: this Chargers team doesn't have anybody like that on the outside.
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: No, no. End of the day, like, and if you're
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: sitting in L.A. right now, the Chargers, you're like, yeah,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: we're 0-3. Our offense hasn't been great. Justin Smith's so-so, blah, blah, blah,
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: all these things. Oh, no, we're going against the Seahawks
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: defense this week. And they're coming off a loss. Coming
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: off a loss at Lumen. And Mike McDonald's probably red-ass
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: all week. Like, that's probably not a good recipe for
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: success for the Chargers.
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: No, and look, it's... It's very similar to last week.
• 52:02
  Speaker 7: If Seattle's turning the ball over, coughing it up, making
• 52:05
  Speaker 7: mistakes on special teams, then they could lose two in
• 52:08
  Speaker 7: a row.
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. The Chargers have some talent.
• 52:11
  Speaker 7: But again, they look to me like that just kind
• 52:16
  Speaker 7: of middling roster that, you know, I know they won
• 52:20
  Speaker 7: 11 games last year, but they had some things that
• 52:22
  Speaker 7: helped them out, like, oh, Patrick Mahomes got hurt, and
• 52:25
  Speaker 7: different things like that. I just, I think they are
• 52:28
  Speaker 7: a middling team at best. Quick thought about the NFC West.
• 52:32
  Speaker 7: Rams 1 and 2.
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: No reason to be worried there. Yeah, but 49ers 3
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: and 0.
• 52:38
  Speaker 7: Yeah, San Francisco looks great, but I'm going to keep
• 52:41
  Speaker 7: saying this every week that you ask me.
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: How long can they keep their guys healthy? And then
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: every week they have guys.
• 52:47
  Speaker 7: Exiting games, and they got some good news this week
• 52:49
  Speaker 7: on Mike Evans and stuff, but it's just like They've.
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: Got a lot of older players. They are top-heavy. They've
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: already had a bunch of injuries.
• 52:57
  Speaker 7: If a few of their really good players go down,
• 53:00
  Speaker 7: and they don't have Bosa playing right now, what Kyle
• 53:03
  Speaker 7: Shanahan is doing is, again, masterful. There's no question about that,
• 53:07
  Speaker 7: but it's a week-to-week thing with them. How healthy are they?
• 53:11
  Speaker 7: Can they keep their guys? Because if they can, they
• 53:14
  Speaker 7: can beat anybody. Right, but if not, Bosa, they can't
• 53:18
  Speaker 7: even put a guy on the IR right now.
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: They're full. Like, no room at the end. It's crazy.
• 53:22
  Speaker 7: Well, to explain that, like, they technically can, but if
• 53:27
  Speaker 7: they put Bosa on injured reserve, they've exceeded the number
• 53:31
  Speaker 7: of players that can come back.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: Come back, yes.
• 53:32
  Speaker 7: So that makes it they have to then pick, okay,
• 53:34
  Speaker 7: who's going to be the one guy we know we're
• 53:36
  Speaker 7: not going to get back this year?
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: We're not getting back. Who's the guy that we can
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: afford to?
• 53:39
  Speaker 7: And if your team ends up in that position in
• 53:41
  Speaker 7: week three or week four, you're in trouble.
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: And we'll see Spectrum. And tell us about the great
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: new podcast as well, the Triple Option.
• 53:48
  Speaker 7: Yeah, EmeraldCitySpectrum.com. Today's the last day that you can get
• 53:52
  Speaker 7: this deal. If you enter in the code SEATTLESOCCER, you
• 53:56
  Speaker 7: can get 25% off on the first month of a
• 53:59
  Speaker 7: monthly or 25% off the first three months on a
• 54:03
  Speaker 7: quarterly plan.
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: So again, that's the code SEATTLESOCCER.
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: Okay, Emerald City Spectrum is the website. And again, this
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: is no AI, right? You guys just do your own stuff?
• 54:12
  Speaker 7: If somebody's doing AI on my website, they will not
• 54:17
  Speaker 7: be employed.
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: I like that.
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: I like that. And the podcast.
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: The Seahawks triple option. We're rolling.
• 54:23
  Speaker 7: We've actually been going seven days a week because I'm
• 54:26
  Speaker 7: doing Q & A shows on Saturday and we're doing
• 54:28
  Speaker 7: postgame shows on Sunday.
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: And we do seven o'clock.
• 54:32
  Speaker 7: Had to go six last night, but pretty much every
• 54:34
  Speaker 7: night at 7 p.m.
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: Pacific time, YouTube.
• 54:37
  Speaker 7: You can get it after we go live on YouTube
• 54:39
  Speaker 7: on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart, wherever you get your podcasts.
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: Rob Rang and Robert Turbin with you as well, so
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: great stuff. All right, have a great week. I'll talk
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: to you next week.
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Ian.
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: That's Corbin Smith. We'll take a break. Come back. We've
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: got Factor Fiction and your text at 49451. Coming up next.