Latest / AFR Saints / Eagles OC Kellen Moore Now Favorite To Land Saints HC Job | Is New Orleans Settling?

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Eagles OC Kellen Moore Now Favorite To Land Saints HC Job | Is New Orleans Settling? · AFR Saints

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  Speaker 1: AFR on Demand is brought to you by Breck Golf.
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  Speaker 1: dot org, Golf dot Breck dot org. Well, shortly after
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  Speaker 1: the Philadelphia Eagles punched their ticket Super Bowl fifty nine,
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  Speaker 1: reports started at the Saints plan to interview Eagles offensive
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  Speaker 1: coordinator Kellen Moore up in Philadelphia. Obviously, he's got a
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  Speaker 1: lot of matters to attend to, and lo and behold
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  Speaker 1: is exactly what happened. The Saints hopped on a plane.
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  Speaker 1: Saints brass hopped on a plane. They went up to
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  Speaker 1: Philadelphia and Monday night interviewed Kellen Moore. As a matter
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  Speaker 1: of fact, Our Ross Jackson from Louisiana Sports dot Net
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  Speaker 1: filed his report at twelve twenty five a m. So
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  Speaker 1: that interview was Monday night and into Tuesday morning with
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  Speaker 1: kell More. But the Saints have since completed that interview
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  Speaker 1: in person. So now we know Anthony Weaver, the Dolphins
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  Speaker 1: defensive coordinator, Mike Kafka the Giants offensive coordinator, and Kellen Moore,
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  Speaker 1: the Eagles offensive coordinator, are the three candidates that have
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  Speaker 1: completed in person interviews, in addition to Darren Rizzy, the
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  Speaker 1: Saints interim head coach. So that's the four. The expectation
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  Speaker 1: is that former coach Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy will have
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  Speaker 1: his in person interview with the New Orleans Saints later
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  Speaker 1: this week. However, there was a report on Monday evening
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  Speaker 1: that the Saints were quote not enamored with McCarthy in
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  Speaker 1: the early conversations that they've had, so we'll see what
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  Speaker 1: may manifest there. You know, I find it interesting with
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  Speaker 1: Kellen Moore because he is now the odds on favorite
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  Speaker 1: to become the Saints' next head coach, and Kellen Moore
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  Speaker 1: does check the boxes that I had kind of imposed
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  Speaker 1: early in this process where I said I wanted the young,
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  Speaker 1: offensive minded coach with no ties to the Saints organization
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  Speaker 1: and preferably from the Shanahan McVeigh tree. So you don't
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  Speaker 1: get that component of it directly, but you do get
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  Speaker 1: all the other check marks there. Kellen Moore is a young,
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  Speaker 1: offensive minded coach who's never been a head coach before,
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  Speaker 1: and he has obviously been the play caller in Dallas
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  Speaker 1: and now is the play caller in Philadelphia. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know that necessarily anything that went wrong or maybe didn't
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  Speaker 1: go right, Perhaps the way to say it in Dallas
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  Speaker 1: was his fault necessarily, But he was outstaff for twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty two, spent one season with the Chargers in twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty three. Of course, Brandon Staley was not retained, so
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  Speaker 1: he was looking for a job and now in Philadelphia
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  Speaker 1: for this season. It certainly helps in Philadelphia when you're
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  Speaker 1: calling plays and you can turn around and hand the
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  Speaker 1: ball to Saquon Barkley. As Paul told us yesterday, good
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  Speaker 1: running back gets a lot of arts. You can hand
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  Speaker 1: the ball to Saquon Barkley, get throw it to Devonte Smith,
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  Speaker 1: AJ Brown, Dallas Goddard. It's a good offense. I don't
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  Speaker 1: suspect that it's too hard to call plays with all
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  Speaker 1: with all that talent, it would be a decidedly different
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  Speaker 1: experience calling plays in New Orleans with this hodgepodge of
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  Speaker 1: average to bad for the New Orleans Saints. But again,
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  Speaker 1: Kellen Moore looks like he is now the front runner
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  Speaker 1: to get that job. One thing Ross Jackson mentioned here
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  Speaker 1: on Monday that was interesting is the longer this goes
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  Speaker 1: the more likely it is that they hire someone else.
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  Speaker 1: Because the truth is, if they wanted to hire Kellen Moore,
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  Speaker 1: like if they were blown away with that interview, hire now,
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  Speaker 1: you couldn't formally announce it until after the Super Bowl,
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  Speaker 1: but you could have you know, Saints likely to hire
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  Speaker 1: Kellen Moore and that would be the deal. But the
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  Speaker 1: longer this goes on, it tells you they want to
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  Speaker 1: talk in person with Mike McCarthy. Maybe it is Cliff
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  Speaker 1: Kingsbury that they want to have a conversation with his
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  Speaker 1: well that his season's over in Washington. I guess when
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  Speaker 1: I look at Kellen Moore, he does, as I said,
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  Speaker 1: check a lot of those boxes. But I don't know
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  Speaker 1: if that's the necessary wow factor that you might have
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  Speaker 1: gotten with some other coaches or candidates. I went back
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  Speaker 1: and checked. So there were some early odds for who
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  Speaker 1: would be the next Saints head coach, and I went
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  Speaker 1: back and looked. On December the nineteenth, So this is
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  Speaker 1: a little more than a month ago. On December the nineteenth,
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  Speaker 1: there were sixteen names that had odds to be the
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  Speaker 1: Saints head coach. Kellen Moore was not one of the sixteen.
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  Speaker 1: Little more than a month ago, he wasn't even on
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  Speaker 1: the list five days ago. Five days ago there were
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  Speaker 1: seven names on that list. Now, Joe Brady was at
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  Speaker 1: the top of the list, and of course then on
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  Speaker 1: Saturday night, Joe Brady withdrew from consideration. Of the seven names,
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  Speaker 1: Kellen Moore was sixth of the seven when it came
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  Speaker 1: to odds. So all that to say, at no point
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  Speaker 1: during this process until now has Kellen Moore been been
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  Speaker 1: or perceived to have been the favorite to land this job.
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  Speaker 1: But as we know, you didn't land Aaron Glenn, Joe
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  Speaker 1: Brady pulled out of the process. So the guys who
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  Speaker 1: we all thought were at the top of your list
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  Speaker 1: aren't going to be there. So what do you do next?
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  Speaker 1: I mean, you got to hire someone you know. But
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  Speaker 1: I would also say, are you rushing with Kellen Moore?
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  Speaker 1: Like did one game against the Washington Commanders all of
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  Speaker 1: a sudden dramatically elevate his starts? Where you go yep,
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  Speaker 1: that's our guy. And I don't know that I could
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  Speaker 1: definitively say that the longer this goes on, the thing
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  Speaker 1: that becomes more appealing to me is the is the
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  Speaker 1: thing that I've floated a few times that I don't
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  Speaker 1: think the Saints are actually going to consider, but I
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  Speaker 1: do think would be the best path forward here, which
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  Speaker 1: is to retain Darren Rizzy for one year. Now, you
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  Speaker 1: don't retain Darren Rizzy and tell him he's being hired
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  Speaker 1: for one year, and you don't go into it with
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  Speaker 1: that intention, because what if he has a great season, awesible,
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  Speaker 1: then he keeps the job. But when I look at
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  Speaker 1: the Saints, there's just so much that's very obviously going
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  Speaker 1: against New Orleans here, and a lot of it that
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  Speaker 1: could be rectified. For twenty twenty six, you would have
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  Speaker 1: I mean, you have no dead money on the books
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  Speaker 1: right now for twenty twenty six. You have a sixty
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  Speaker 1: million dollars in cap space for twenty twenty six. Now
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  Speaker 1: that it's gonna change because you're gonna have to do
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  Speaker 1: some contract restructuring and that number is gonna come down,
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  Speaker 1: but you're gonna be closer to even or could potentially
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  Speaker 1: be closer to even twenty twenty six on the salary cap.
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  Speaker 1: I think you'll probably have a top five pick because
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  Speaker 1: you're gonna be really bad in twenty twenty five. And
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  Speaker 1: so the same way that the Raiders hired Antonio Pierce
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  Speaker 1: and fired him after one season and got Pete Carroll,
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  Speaker 1: or New England hired girod Mayo internally fired him after
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  Speaker 1: one season, landed on Mike Frabel, maybe the same thing
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  Speaker 1: Dallas is doing right now, Brian Schottenheimer. I will see
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  Speaker 1: if maybe next year they're in the market again. I
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  Speaker 1: just think a year from now, the Saint's job is
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  Speaker 1: more attractive to a potential candidate. So why not have
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  Speaker 1: Darren Rizzy be, in essence, a lame duck coach, a
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  Speaker 1: sacrificial lamb to just steer the ship into this storm
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  Speaker 1: that's coming in twenty twenty five, and then when you
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  Speaker 1: find calmer sees in twenty twenty six, you go hire
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  Speaker 1: your speedboat captain, whoever's going to take you, and take
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  Speaker 1: that thing you hope to the moon. I don't think
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  Speaker 1: that's what Mickey Loomis and the Saints Brass we're thinking
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  Speaker 1: right now, but that seems like a more plausible option,
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  Speaker 1: playing a long term game instead of thinking you're going
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  Speaker 1: to get this right for twenty twenty five. Because I
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  Speaker 1: don't know that Kellen Moore is the guy the Saints.
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  Speaker 1: It feels like they'd be settling. You got to hire somebody.
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  Speaker 1: So Kellen Moore, okay, when five weeks ago he wasn't
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  Speaker 1: even on your list, and now he's the guy. Look,
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  Speaker 1: that can reveal itself through the process. So we'll see
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  Speaker 1: what ultimately they do. We'll see if Cliff Kingsbury agrees
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  Speaker 1: to an interview, if the Saints want to interview, and
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  Speaker 1: if they do in fact interview Mike McCarthy, Kellen Moore
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  Speaker 1: just said no Kingsbury. Oh Kingsbury okay, right now? Yeah, Okay,
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  Speaker 1: Kingsbury Okay. So Kingsbury is a no go. So you're
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  Speaker 1: not going to go forward with Cliff Kingsbury. So that's
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  Speaker 1: another name off your list. I don't know how realistic
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  Speaker 1: that was to begin with, but now theory be down
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  Speaker 1: to those two more McCarthy, Rizzy or Weaver Kafka who've
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  Speaker 1: already interviewed. I mean, that's not exactly a list that
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  Speaker 1: instills a ton of confidence in what direction your organization
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  Speaker 1: might be heading. So if it is Kellen Moore, it's
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  Speaker 1: what it is, we'll talk about it when it happens.
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  Speaker 1: But if it happens, but I am, I am leaning
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  Speaker 1: more and more toward the feeling of, hey, look retain Rizzy,
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  Speaker 1: go into the tank for a year, just take your medicine,
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  Speaker 1: go through the storm, understand what it's going to be,
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  Speaker 1: and then next year you'll be in a healthier situation
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  Speaker 1: to find the right person long term who could hopefully
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  Speaker 1: bring you back to being a competitor or in a contender.
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  Speaker 1: But it ain't right now, and I don't know that
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  Speaker 1: it's Callin Moore.