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3 Guys Before The Game - WVU General Manager Drew Fabianich Visits (Episode 494) · 3 Guys Before The Game

0:08
Hello, Hello, Hello, and welcome in everybody. It's time. So
0:13
what do we call this the fall series? Summer editions? Is it pretty
0:17
color? Call it late summer series, late summer series, late summer series.
0:23
Edition of three guys before the game. And why not? We have
0:26
an open week. And I've been chastised already this this day. It's not
0:32
a bye week because we're not in a tournament. Someone told me someone's it.
0:37
And it's not an off week because that's an insult to all football coaches
0:40
because they're still working. It's amazing the last couple years, people really get
0:43
bummed out of that terminology. You can't call it a bye week, no,
0:47
so welcome bye week I've always called always welcome in everybody else. It's
0:53
a super special edition, off week, bye week, whatever week you want
0:58
to call it. Of three guys before the game with a very special guest,
1:00
please welcome to the program. And historic figure in Mountaineer football history.
1:04
I mean he's gonna be historic, right. He becomes the answer to a
1:07
trivia question. He is the first general manager in the history of West Virginia
1:12
University football. It's our guy, Drew Fabianitch, who joins us here in
1:18
studio. There he is coming up on the program. Three guys before the
1:23
game, We're gonna hit him with Mike Wallace, like sixty minutes questions.
1:26
Three guys, better, I better get a chest protector. Already set off
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on that, trying to make him nervous. Three guys brought to us by
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the state of West Virginia. Three guys also brought to us by Go Mart
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CPA group, providing value beyond the numbers. We'll do some of those numbers.
3:36
Coming up on this episode we talk a little analytics. Please welcome to
3:39
the program now formally Drew Fabian, It's general manager of Mountain your Football.
3:45
Thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it. No, you really
3:49
mean that? Are you being serious or is it really truly a pleasure?
3:52
Or did you wake up this morning and go I gotta go do that thing?
3:58
I I got to tell you Saturday? Saturday was rough. Well,
4:01
I'm sorry, this Sunday morning was rough. Yea, how about that?
4:04
Yeah? Yeah, how about the jump on the bus at Pittsburgh drive all
4:08
the way down to Bridgeport to get your car. Yeah, that is true.
4:11
The people you want to talk about whinding and complaining, the people that
4:14
were on this trip that park, they think they're gonna this was a great
4:17
one. So everyone, when we leave for a trip, we leave from
4:23
Bridgeport. So there's a bunch of buses. You can get on the bus
4:27
at the Pushcar Center. They drive to Bridgeport and then then after the trip's
4:30
home, you get back on the bus and they drive you back to Motown.
4:32
Okay, fine, but there's this, there's this click, a group
4:35
of people that goes like, I'm smarter than everyone else. I'm gonna drive
4:40
my car to Bridgeport so that when we land on Saturday, Sunday morning,
4:46
whatever it is, I'm gonna get in my car in Bridgeport and I'll get
4:48
home quicker. Right. Well, that becomes a problem when the plane doesn't
4:51
land back in Bridgeport is scheduled, and now those people that thought they were
4:56
crafty by parking Bridgeport, now they're in Pittsburgh. They go like, uh
5:00
so that's problem problem, that's not you. No, I don't, I
5:05
go, I'm the best bus. Old school bus guy. No, won't
5:09
do the bus. Yeah, old school travel. I traveled for years,
5:11
and just like I will never check a bag because that saves me about forty
5:15
five minutes. Ye know, I understand. I mean, yeah, trust
5:18
me. I said, what should I do? Everybody goes, oh,
5:20
you should drive down there. I said, so, well, because you
5:23
don't have to wait on the bus to get loaded and unloaded, which makes
5:26
make a heck of a lot of sense to me. Sure, and you
5:28
landed Supposedly we're supposed to land in what three forty five? Yeah, yeah,
5:32
that didn't happen. I didn't have it so good. I'm glad Drew
5:34
and all the newbies got to experience the Pittsburgh to Morgantown like like the old
5:39
school we used to have to do. So that's what I told you guys,
5:43
learning experience. I told the people on the on the flight we were
5:45
flying home, I said, Hey, everyone's sitting around here going, hey,
5:47
we're winning old school don neel, Andy, you're gonna now you're gonna
5:51
travel like don Neil and there you're going to Pittsburgh. Enough. So anyway,
5:55
I didn't mind it really, I mean, other than the extra hour
5:58
and a half it took. Like no one cares about anything when you win,
6:00
right, Like if they would have gone to a place said, uh,
6:02
ladies and gentlemen, we've got a problem. We're gonna have to go
6:05
to Boise, Idaho and pick up a piece of a quid. Everyone go
6:09
like, all right, cool, yeah, we're good, ahead and get
6:11
it. Dubbs a dumb let's go okay. But if you lose, it's
6:14
kind of like everything becomes you know, multiplied, that's what it is anyway.
6:17
So that's why that's why my attitude is like that to say now we're
6:19
fine, Now we're gonna have you. So this is this is a we've
6:23
always talked and we've seen this coming, that college sports is becoming more and
6:28
more like professional sports. And you bring this vast background from being on both
6:33
sides of this. You've been in the college game, you've been in the
6:36
professional game for a long long time, and so you come here and you
6:43
fill a role that perhaps in the past wasn't you know, as needed.
6:47
But now we're dealing with transfer portal, we're dealing with roster management like we've
6:53
never seen before. So you need to evaluate not only the kids that potentially
6:57
could be high school seniors, well, you need to evaluate kids in the
7:00
portal and then figure out, okay, how are we managing this roster because
7:04
there could be this massive, unexpected change in roster management. So, with
7:12
all that being said, as the precursor, define what you think the role
7:16
is nowadays for a college football GM. I don't think it's any different than
7:24
what a pro general manager is. I mean, seriously, I mean,
7:27
the transfer portal is pro free agency without contracts, which really is restrictive to
7:33
you as college football you know, evaluators because at least in the NFL you
7:39
had restricted and unrestricted free agents, so you knew exactly who was in and
7:43
who was out. This you have no earthly idea. It could be fifteen
7:46
hundred that come out in December, it could be twenty six hundred that come
7:50
out, and it just keeps going up every single year, right, so
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you have to be ahead of it. And you know you're not supposed to
7:59
be about you're waiting, but you know you have to because if you don't,
8:03
you have a three or four day window, and how are college program's
8:09
going to evaluate that amount of players in that amount of time because most of
8:13
these deals happen within three days of the date, right, they really do.
8:18
And if they don't, then there's usually something wrong with a young man.
8:22
There's usually an issue. There's usually something that they're waiting on. It's
8:26
a transcript issue, it's something else. So you know to say that it's
8:33
I manage everything, but the coaching right as far as the recruiting goes,
8:37
whether it's high school, whether it's transfer portal, whether it's you know,
8:39
the kids on campus and put it this way, you can decide how you
8:43
want to handle this. You can handle it like Dion did. You can
8:46
handle it like Texas State has. You can handle it, you know,
8:50
like other people have tried to handle it. But you have to decide what
8:54
you are and how you're going to develop your your players, because sometimes when
8:58
you develop a player, that player is going to leave, you know,
9:01
because the money's different all across the country, and you have to show them
9:09
why it's valuable for them to stick around. And hopefully I can help with
9:13
that because I came here for the kids, because I want to prepare them
9:18
to be the best possible player they can be, to give them an advantage
9:20
because all of them think they're going to play in the NFL. Not all
9:24
of them are. I mean, let's be real, one point five percent
9:28
make it every single year, So you know, I just hope to increase
9:31
that percentage here. That's what I try to That's what I'm going to try
9:35
to do. It's a lot of other things that go into it. So
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what is if you've worked it out, what is your relationship specifically with with
9:43
the coaches? Is does Neil Brown or the OC of the DC come to
9:46
you and say I need a corner, and you start looking for a corner.
9:50
Then you come back to the coach and say, I got three possible
9:54
corners here that I've evaluated. What do you like? I mean, how's
9:58
this process going to work? Well, the process started with me actually evaluating
10:01
the entire roster, and I actually told them what they needed, okay,
10:05
and they put it this way, Coach Brown, the staff, they really
10:09
truly do. They're very aware of what they need and what they're lacking.
10:13
They do. But it's my job to say, okay, well we may
10:16
need three of three corners instead of two, you know, we may need
10:22
you know, two offensive linemen instead of four, you know in high school.
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And then I might say, well we need you know, two older
10:28
guys out of the transfer portal, and we have to be ready to have
10:31
a ready board, just like we did in the NFL, of those guys
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stacked, who's the best, who's the first to second and third guy?
10:39
We got to be ready to go and soon is that I'm sorry, then
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is that your decision as to who you get or is that coach's decision that's
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put this way, I'm going to have I'm going to have the board set
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the way I think, and then we have to make a decision together because
10:54
the thing that I learned thing, but the the issue that happens in the
11:01
NFL, it's well, personnel doesn't know what they're doing. Oh, coaching
11:05
doesn't know what they're doing as far as evaluating players right. And it was
11:09
always like if you brought a player in that the coaches didn't want, they
11:13
would never coach them. We called them to tag guys because they arrived and
11:16
they were already on the table in the morgue with a toe tag on and
11:20
the coaches weren't going to coach them because they truly didn't want them. Well,
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that's what I want to bring to this. I want to say I
11:26
like him, our department likes him. I want you to like them.
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I want you to want them, okay, because if you don't want them,
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I don't want to bring them here because I want them to want to
11:35
coach them. Because you'd be surprised that when a coach is really really motivated
11:39
to coach a kid, he develops a hell of a lot faster. So
11:43
that's it's going to be a we type of thing. I'm not going to
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override, Neil, I'm not. I mean, it's his football team,
11:52
but I'm going to put everything in front of him to make this a very
11:56
educated decision. And I hope that he trusts my opinion, you know,
12:00
because I do know what a football player looks like after eighteen years of just
12:05
evaluating them and coaching for seventeen years before that, I think I know what
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I'm looking at. So I don't know if I answered your question, though
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you did. Absolutely Now I gotta follow up, but we'll get to that
12:13
later. No, no, no, no, listen, hey, listen,
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this is this is free this is free form. Yeah, it's not
12:20
all right? No, Well, because you said, you said, I
12:22
know what a football player looks like. You ever see Moneyball? Yeah?
12:26
Do you really want me to get into this? Sure? Go ahead,
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this could be the common Let me let me do the question. You okay,
12:33
go ahead? All right? And when Billy Bean says to the scout,
12:35
you sit there and you talk to a kid and you say, you
12:39
know what he's going to be, and you know what his potential is,
12:41
and you don't. And so it was a diminishing of the role of scouts
12:46
and more of looking at analytics. So with all due respect, how do
12:52
you know, Because truly, the NFL combine has been in at for years
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now. I mean, all you're doing is tracking traits. That's all that
13:05
was going on. And everybody says, well, you know we're bringing in
13:07
analytics. No you're not. It's already been there. All you have to
13:11
do is understand how to use it. And I mean I'm gonna use every
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access. I mean from tracking football. There's a website tracking football. I'm
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gonna use every every tool that we can use to narrow the field down,
13:22
because there's also some ways that we can actually query players in and out.
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If I don't want a five to ten corner, we're gonna pull those guys
13:30
out of there, right, I want somebody it's five to ten or above.
13:33
You know, I'm just giving you I understand, strange exam. Okay,
13:37
And here's the other thing. I mean, those are analytic tools.
13:41
Right. But I'm gonna say this, how many world championships the Oakland As
13:43
win? None? None since none in a while. And isn't one of
13:50
their ex employees working for the Cleveland Browns, right? Well, the point
13:54
I understand, But the point being that, with all due respect and The
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question is how do you know? Is that's not meant as a slam on
14:01
you. It's meant how do you analyze to ensure that you're making the best
14:03
decision possible. Well, because because of trial and error of what I've done,
14:07
whether it's been growing up a coach's kid, coaching, and then in
14:11
personnel, I know what works and what doesn't work. And I'll give you
14:16
a perfect example. I mean, I was raving about a young man from
14:20
Tennessee and I wish I could remember his last name. It was I think
14:24
it was Mark Jackson maybe or something like that. But he played corner,
14:28
I mean, he played safety, played receiver. It's a pump returner,
14:31
kick returner. Right. He was a jack of all trades, really good
14:35
at all of it. Right. But he's five ten okay. And Bill
14:41
Parcells asked me, He said, how many years you coach Drew? And
14:43
I said seventeen coach. He said, obviously not blanken enough, right.
14:48
And he says, small guys wear down. Big guys don't get any smaller,
14:52
right. And he says, if we're going to take midgets, I
14:58
know that's derogatory term. Now, sorry about that. Little people put it
15:01
on put it on parcels. Good, put on parcels. They better walk
15:03
on water, okay, And I threw one right at him. I said,
15:07
Dave, make it and he goes walked on water. Right. So
15:13
that's that's where I'm going with a lot of things. I mean, I've
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seen so many and a lot of the younger people want to understand this.
15:22
But my role to dex is pretty full. And I can say this guy
15:26
I've already written twenty five times before. I know who this guy is.
15:30
I know he's a slow mic linebacker, right, that can't cover anybody in
15:33
space, right, But he's wearing a neck role and he can go fill
15:37
a gap, right, But how many snaps is he really going to play?
15:39
And he's really that valuable? Is he gonna be that valuable on teams?
15:43
No? So I mean there's there's an access to you know, not
15:48
an access, but a background of seeing what works and what doesn't. That's
15:52
what I mean. And the one thing I take the greatest pride in that
15:58
I was in that war room. We drafted sixty seven Pro Bowl appearances while
16:03
I was there, drafted, not free agents, drafted, and that was
16:08
second best in the entire NFL. In those eighteen years. So I was
16:14
pretty proud of that. Yeah, and you have to make sure that you
16:18
take a lot of risk out of it, you know, and try to
16:22
get the what we always said, the higher, the cleaner they have to
16:25
be. Does that make sense? Absolutely? So yeah. Yeah, who's
16:30
the Who's the riskiest player you ever took that worked out? Injury wise?
16:37
Are character wise? Yeah? Both? Yeah? Either or who did you
16:45
have to plead to get a guy picked and then it turned out to be
16:48
well I pleaded to try to get one picked and I got overruled. We'll
16:53
get into that in a second. Probably risk was probably Sean Lee because of
17:00
the knee and he never he never ever made it through a season ever.
17:04
But when he played, he was one of the best I've ever seen.
17:08
I mean, he was as good as dad. When Zach Thomas he just
17:11
could not stay healthy, you know. Character Wise, I didn't plead other
17:18
than saying we shouldn't. And it was when we took Hardy as a free
17:22
agent. Yeah, I didn't think that was the way to go. I
17:26
just didn't. So that's the sure now the now the short one, the
17:32
one I pleaded and pleaded for was Jordie Nelson and I single handedly saw him
17:38
beat Texas by himself at Texas and Jason Garrett and I were sitting at the
17:44
Senior Bowl, and you know, I said, he said, that's your
17:48
pet cat, and that's that's that's parcels term. You know, that's your
17:52
boy. Yeah, that's your boy, that's your boy. I said,
17:55
yeah, he goes, he goes. He looks a little clunky, and
18:00
I go, I go, well, I said, I saw him smoke
18:03
a jeep to lead right in one on one coverage, right, I said,
18:07
I I saw him beat Texas single handedly. I kept arguing and arguing
18:11
with him the whole time, and I kept saying, you know, hey,
18:15
you know what do we what does this guy not have? I mean
18:18
he's a power turner. I mean he's a receiver. He makes plays,
18:21
right, Well, we don't we pass him up? And we hire the
18:25
receiver coach, Jimmy Robinson from Green Bay, and he comes in and we
18:32
do a little review of what you're looking for in a receiver by every coach
18:36
you know, receivers tight ends. We did that every single year just to
18:38
make sure we're getting exactly what the coaches wanted. Well, Jason goes,
18:42
you know, he says, you had Jennings, you had Driver, He
18:45
said, you had Jordie, he said, he said, you had a
18:47
lot of James Jones. He said, you had a lot of real guys
18:49
up there. He goes, who's your best? He goes, hands down,
18:52
Jordy Nelson, and I went just like that. Jason goes, Yeah.
19:00
He tells that story all the time because I was beating him up.
19:03
I was breaking out a Littleville slugger on him every day, and he just
19:07
he wouldn't do it. Yeah, and we had we had to where we
19:11
could have taken him in the back end of the second round, and you
19:14
know, we would have taken him in the top of the fourth, you
19:18
know, but he was already gone. So so put some numbers to that.
19:22
So I'm sure that's extensive film work. It's watching live. You can
19:26
see the guy analytic. Should we at the stinger? Here? Is this
19:27
the first comedy c P questionnaire? Let me get the let me get the
19:33
stinger going there like one second, get the boom? Go okay, brought
19:38
to you by the only CPA group. They are fantastic people. Go ahead,
19:42
So combine wise, when you're watching, what's what's kind of answer that
19:47
question? What are you looking for in a receiver? What do you look
19:48
for in a defensive line? But what are the numbers that you look for
19:52
first scouting wise? Well, like I mean, and again it's it's a
19:56
specific to a position. Right, If you can't move laterally, you can't
20:02
play in the NFL. You really can't. So you look at the shuttle
20:06
right off the back of twenty yard shutle, because it shows you whether they
20:10
can bend, whether they can move laterally, whether they can celerate right,
20:14
you'd be surprised. That's all positive. That's one covers all positions there pretty
20:18
much pretty much. Yeah, defensive line, would you what would you think
20:22
it would be? Now you got a vertical, you got a broad right,
20:27
you got a shuttle, and you got a three cone and you got
20:30
a forty. What would you think give me three cone? Nope, broad
20:34
Joe, reason, explosiveness, explosiveness, right, pass rush, okay,
20:41
Now, vertical is always up. But they can't bend right, you'd be
20:47
surprised how many guys can go up that are really stiff, that can go
20:52
out bend land okay and stay on balance. Right, I mean, it's
20:57
it's pretty valuable. That's one of the most valuable tools that I saw as
21:02
a defensive line that he is in the coverage of that. So from a
21:06
fan perspective, you know how often people talk about the broad jump results,
21:10
never what are they running forty? Yeah, no doubt so. Seawan Martin
21:15
blocks a kick on Saturday. So is he one of those guys that has
21:19
this you know? I don't. I don't know yet. I mean,
21:22
I can tell you that he can come out of his stands and he can
21:26
bend. I mean, and for a man his size, he's got really
21:29
good flexibility. He's got all the traits, you know, he just needs
21:32
to tie a lot of things together. He needs some time to develop,
21:34
he really does. He's missed a lot of practice time too. Sure,
21:37
sure, absolutely, I mean that that hurts you well when you walk out
21:41
if you had your if you had your Cowboys scouting hat on, Actually guys
21:45
don't wear hats. They always wear those very nice golf shirts. He's very
21:48
well manicured when the scouts come out. When you when you started watching looking
21:52
at West Virginia, if you were still in that role, I would imagine
21:56
Sean Martin's one of those guys you immediately go like, okay, let me
21:57
take my notebook out right. Uh okay, well I'll call throw another Parcela.
22:03
It doesn't at you, he said, when you're sitting in the airport,
22:06
how many guys you see like that? He said, They don't grow
22:07
in trees, all right, you know, just body types alone. You
22:11
have to look at guys like body type makes you okay, look at them.
22:15
That's right. That's all that does is opens the door to say,
22:17
okay, now let's just do some evaluation, you know, because I mean
22:21
again you could look. I mean there's some there's some things that just still
22:25
just bother me, like you would not believe. Like arm length, right,
22:29
I mean short arm offensive linemen struggle, I mean because they can't stay
22:33
in contact. Plus you know when you planning against a longer player, they
22:38
can't get their hands in placement because you're on leverage, just on link alone,
22:44
and you can't stay with you can't sustain a block. So what overcomes
22:47
that any munch? I mean, you're just gonna automatically disqualify extensions certain number
22:52
they're not there. They go to the back of the line. Well,
22:56
now again, it's got to show up on tape, because again, a
23:00
guy can play short armed, and if if it doesn't show up on tape,
23:03
then you go, okay, well then it's not a deficiency and it's
23:07
not terminal. There are some guys. I mean, there was one a
23:10
couple of years ago that went to Baltimore and I said, this is terminal.
23:14
I said, this guy can't sustain a block. I said, many.
23:17
Does that mean somebody from a Big ten school by chance? Uh?
23:21
No, okay, no. But my point is that you know, there
23:25
are certain things I see that just don't work, and there's certain body type,
23:30
there's certain biomechanical issues also that certain people have that they cannot function in
23:37
this league. I mean they can't well, they can't function here, and
23:40
they can't function in the NFL. I mean, and a lot of it's
23:44
to do with flexibility too. You'd be surprised evaluate Zach Frasier. I shouldn't
23:52
be doing this, do it, and I already did, already did it
23:56
with him. He plays longer than his length. He looks like he's short
24:02
armed, and he's really not. He's thirty two and five eighths, right,
24:04
if he was thirty one, as I thought he was a thirty thought.
24:07
I mean when you watch him play there, certainly bring him We're go
24:11
to bring him over to Daniels a measure around his neck and got it perfectly.
24:17
There's easier ways to do it then. I don't even have to pull
24:19
out the tape. I can actually watch where the arms actually hang on the
24:22
hips, you know, and hang on your legs. I mean, I
24:25
just I can. So he's got thirty so many times, so thirty two
24:27
and five? Ah, yes, smart, physical, great quickness. He
24:33
needs to stay in contact at the second level. Better, his feet need
24:37
to follow his hands. I've told him this. He's gotten better against Tech.
24:41
He played really well. He played really well against DCU too. You
24:48
know. Does he have a lot of knockdowns? Yes he does. You
24:49
know? Does he easy tenacious? Yes he is. He Again, this
24:55
goes always back to who do you remind him of? You know, I
24:59
said he was a better be. We took Beatache out of Wisconsin. He's
25:02
better than him. Yeah, and the outage is start in the NFL,
25:06
you know for the Cowboys. Has got a chance. No, he's got
25:07
a chance. He's gonna play for ten years if he stays healthy. Yeah,
25:11
you know what's what's interesting is that colleges are just now hiring gms.
25:19
I mean, that's what's interesting when you consider the amount of money involved and
25:22
how important talent evaluation is, and every other major sport at the professional level
25:29
of course has GM and town evaluation. College football is behind the curve on
25:33
that they are. There's only about about six to seven of us, and
25:40
really only three that have a NFL experience, that's it. And there's none
25:45
that have coaching and NFL experience other than me. You know, it's either
25:49
you got NFL experience, or you've got you know, recruiting experience, or
25:53
you've got a little bit of coaching experience. You know. It's just I
25:57
think they're behind because they don't understand that roster management is going to be a
26:03
full time job. They think it's just like, oh, we're just gonna
26:07
keep recruiting these these four star and five star guys and we're gonna be just
26:10
fine. Yeah, we did this this way and it's worked. Force.
26:12
Well, those guys are leaving now. If those five stars aren't playing like
26:18
year one, some of them are leaving. So it's like, okay,
26:22
well are you prepared for that? Some of them arek, does that mean
26:26
when you see so and so before you know anything, when you see this
26:30
person's a five star, four star, does that mean anything to you?
26:32
Yeah? It really doesn't. I mean, I'll be blunt with you,
26:34
it really doesn't. Because again, I've seen some young men that you know,
26:42
I evaluated last year, and I said, how's this guy? A
26:45
four star guy? And they go, what do you mean? I said,
26:49
well, he can't play, and they go, why do you say
26:53
that? Well, so they can't move laterally, and you can't. The
26:56
kid doesn't have any foot speed to actually displace anybody in the offensive lineman.
27:00
And I go, how did this guy get the four star rating? And
27:03
I said, well he was that big in ninth grade. I said,
27:07
okay, well he was six forties two hundred ninety five ninth grade. I
27:11
said, do they ever reevaluate their star system? Do they ever decrease a
27:15
star? So I asked those guys from like on three and twenty four to
27:19
seven and arrivals and all that. They said, Now, I said,
27:22
but I said, you give him a star when somebody offers them, though,
27:25
don't you you know? Because all of a sudden, I lived in
27:27
Texas, so Texas and A and M offered a kid, it was a
27:30
three star all of a sudden, he's a four star next day. Okay,
27:33
So to me, they mean nothing. They really do. And when
27:38
Clemson was really starting to come on, you'd be surprised how many three stars
27:45
they had on that football team that ended up becoming really good NFL players because
27:49
they developed. And a lot of the five star kids are heightweight, speed,
27:56
They've already been given those grades early, right, their early commits,
28:02
right, and normally they're topped out as far as the talent goes, especially
28:07
like in the offensive defensive line, because they'ret a school that's got fifteen sixteen
28:12
coaches, right, they got a strength program since ninth grade, and they
28:17
kind of are what they are, right. I'd rather take a kid that
28:21
is a little bit smaller, the heck of a lot better athlete that's got
28:23
a chance to be a heck of a lot better, you know. And
28:26
that's and again I don't like. I don't like offering ninth grade kids.
28:30
I don't like offering sophomores. I really don't because you never truly know what
28:34
you're gonna get body type wise, unless they're already there so that makes sense.
28:40
I still have a tough time with a five to ten, one hundred
28:42
and fifty five pound kid. I just start it. I've got a tough
28:45
time with So you're saying I can't play. That's what you said. I'm
28:49
saying I think I couldn't play either. I was five times. You were
28:52
a quarterback. I was a quarterback. Bro broke my spine. I broke
28:56
my fourth and fifth lumbar early in my career my second year. So I
29:02
got lucky, and uh now it was illegal at the time. He kept
29:07
me on scholarship and let me be a student assistant and did it that way,
29:11
and I was really a full time coach, you know, down at
29:12
Mason because I remember you. We were talking to practice this summer and you
29:17
said you have good conversations with Garrett Green because you said, Buddy, I
29:21
was you a small er quarterback. Yeah, I told him, I said,
29:23
you got to be prepared to play another play. You can't take people
29:29
on. You've got to be smart, You've got to you got to learn
29:32
how to slide. You've got to get out of bounce, because I mean,
29:37
there were sundays where I felt like I was in a car wreck.
29:40
I mean, because big guys hit little guys. It's the law of inertia.
29:44
Yeah, I mean it doesn't work. Well, you get bounced,
29:45
I mean, and again I got bounced. I got Ben all the way
29:48
back over. That's how I broke my fourth and fifth lumbar. I mean,
29:52
so it just doesn't work. So I told him, I said,
29:55
learn to survive, you know, because it's a game of survival. He's
30:00
a fiery little dude, isn't he. Yeah, Yeah, he said something
30:03
to me Saturday. He goes, He goes, man. He says,
30:06
he said, why is this so tough? And I said, you know,
30:08
I said, guess what. I said. It's like this all the
30:11
time, baby, I said, get used to it. Yeah, it's
30:14
gonna be like this the whole year. So go back to valuation for a
30:17
second. Harder too, because you've got to do both here. Harder to
30:21
project high school into high level Division one or Division one Power five players into
30:27
the NFL. Oh, the high school kids into the Power five. It's
30:32
not even close because I haven't developed yet. Yeah, and plus you've got
30:34
to offer him so early. And I never really truly believed that until Mack
30:40
Brown told me that at Texas. He said, if you're not the first
30:42
or second offer on some of these kids, sometimes they won't let you back
30:45
in the door. Sure, and I went, are you kidding me?
30:48
I was like, you're the University of Texas. This is when he was
30:51
at Texas and he goes, yeah, he said, I'm serious, and
30:55
I go, that's insane because if I was a kid that grew up in
30:57
Texas, there is no other I said, I would have want to go.
31:00
I said, I'm gonna go to University of Texas. It's like when
31:03
I was Ohio. I was like, I want to go to Ohio State.
31:06
Yeah, I'm sure. It's loss like here West Virginia. I want
31:07
to go to West Virginia. You know He's like, not these days.
31:11
If they're not the first, second offer, he says, women, I'll
31:14
be able to get back in. I was like, I think he could,
31:17
but he was like, no, sometimes it doesn't. So but that's
31:21
that's harder than evaluating guys into the NFL makes sense. It is transfer portal.
31:27
As you said, you don't know how many are going in, and
31:30
that is the greatest risk. So you got these guys that are starting to
31:33
make plays, and then you might lose them. What do you think the
31:38
future looks like going forward for a team to be successful in roster management?
31:45
What are the musts that they must do every year in order to have a
31:48
roster that is made to win. I think you still have to have about
31:53
sixty forty high school athletes to develop. I really do, because I think
32:00
if you turn rosters over, and even in the NFL, you every roster
32:04
gets turned over about twenty to twenty one percent every year, and sometimes that
32:07
cohesion, sometimes that team building, sometimes that feel that that chemistry. You
32:13
lose it by maybe losing two players here or there, you know that were
32:16
great leaders or something like that of the room just felt felt different. Well,
32:22
I think if you wholesale change it, it's so hard to build that
32:25
chemistry with these guys because I mean, I'll tell you what, this offensive
32:30
line now, they're tight. I mean they're I mean, they're tight as
32:32
far as playing, but they're also tight together. You know. They always
32:37
call them trough guys. They're all in the trough together, you know,
32:40
and that's a good thing. You know. Now you bring you lose three
32:45
or four of those guys, and they try to replace some guys from you
32:46
know who knows where? I mean, are they going to fit with that
32:50
room? Are they going to be the right time kind of people? So
32:52
I think you have to keep that development going. I really do. You
32:58
have to have not a robust collective. You have to have an equal collective.
33:06
That's all I want. Just just let me be equal with everybody else.
33:09
Now you're not going to be equal with ten or eleven places. And
33:14
you guys know which ones I'm talking about because they are financially way ahead and
33:20
they can buy pretty much anybody they want. I mean, and let's just
33:22
be honest. Yeah. So so speaking of that, and in the NFL
33:25
you said that we were talking one of the great advantages is you know what
33:28
the contracts are and when people are going and when they're when they're coming in.
33:32
You know what the budget is and now you have no idea at the
33:37
college level who's leaving and also what the budget is. So do you have
33:40
a role in the budget. I mean, because now the idea of Ohio
33:45
State said the other day some kids wont five thousand dollars for a visit.
33:49
Yes, so huh, yes, yes for an official visit. How much
33:52
five thousand for an official visit. I heard that, and you heard that's
33:55
now they're now they're unlimited official visits. So so how do you how do
34:04
you do you have Do you have any impact on the money. I'm not
34:07
supposed to, I know, I know you're not supposed to, but I
34:09
mean that that that's a just that's a distinction that can't they can't continue.
34:15
That's it's impossible for you to do your job and for Neil Brown to do
34:20
his job if there's not some cross pollination with the people who have the money.
34:23
Well, that's what Brad always says. That's what that's he says.
34:27
That can't exist going forward. It can't exist that way. It can't exist.
34:30
You can't run a business. We're having someone else managing your business.
34:34
But that the guy procuring the talent should have to call someone else to see
34:37
what the budget is or should he just know what his budget is? He
34:38
should know what the budget. Thank you, no comment, next question?
34:42
I know I told you just sit there, I'll handle it. You don't
34:44
have to answer that. We got it. I don't know where I was.
34:45
I didn't know kids are asking for five thousand dollars to visit and it
34:49
was nothing, just this year. You gotta be a kid me. Man,
34:52
it's been the least couple of years. I was a testimony in Congress
34:54
by the year also asking for money to actually commit to bonus signing, a
35:00
cold commitment bonus or a CB or an an IL deal like early you know
35:05
which some are doing depending on the state. But you know, but the
35:08
other side, and this gets off for another subject, and we talk about
35:12
this all the time, is if you're gonna go for you, if you're
35:16
gonna go that, if you're gonna my compliance officers right here, if you're
35:21
gonna go that route. I mean, now we've gone so far to the
35:22
other side. If you're going to go that route, then it won't be
35:25
long before a coach says, you know what, you're fired, not you
35:30
the player. We paid you this money, you're fired. Three weeks in,
35:32
you're fired, not paying anymore. Yeah, I mean it's yeah.
35:37
It's also going to have to come a point where there is going to have
35:40
to be a salary cap put on this. Yes, you know, yes,
35:45
because if it doesn't happen, the halbs will be the habs and the
35:49
have nots will be the have nots. Yeah. And it's also gonna if
35:53
it doesn't get regulated, it's gonna hurt every other program within the university.
35:59
But the sea seeing the big tennil say we don't need to screw need screw
36:02
Sour cap will do what we want. We got our own to deal with
36:04
TV. But jump closer to that mic. But yeah, so so,
36:09
however, as you said, there needs to be a seller cap. There's
36:14
been cheating in college sports, allegedly since the first day of college sports.
36:19
And we all know the schools, and we all know the schools. In
36:22
basketball, there's just a certain group that they've been buying guys forever. Football
36:25
they buy guys forever. That's why I think it does make sense to say,
36:30
hey there's a seller cap. Well, there might be a seller cap
36:31
and the school can say, hey, this is exactly how much we're paying.
36:35
But you we all know that there are going to be other sources,
36:37
some way, somehow that are going to get money to the kids. And
36:42
so it's never been balanced, and I don't think it'll ever be balanced.
36:45
No, but I think at least it'll it'll level out the middle third of
36:52
the of athletics. Yeah, because it's going it's going to hurt the other
36:58
programs it is because if you're not. I mean, the non revenue sports
37:01
are getting hurt by this, they are. The facilities are getting hurt by
37:05
this too, because where you're gonna put your money, you're gonna put it
37:08
into facilities, You're gonna put it into the nil I mean, you see
37:13
what I'm saying. I mean, if I'm a fundraiser, I'm going like
37:15
foo, yeah, you know, I'm super hard, super hard, you
37:19
know, and put it this way. If you're if you're a donor,
37:22
you cannot write it off, right, I mean, you can write it
37:27
off as a marketing you know, part coming out. But if I'm coming
37:30
to you every single year, every single year, because once the money's in,
37:36
it's going out. So if I come to you every single year and
37:39
say I need three and a half million, aren't you going to get a
37:43
little tired of me coming by? I mean, really that's what happens.
37:46
Yeah, but yeah, he was again. So that's what I'm saying.
37:51
I think that there's got to be something regulated into where even those people will
37:55
feel like they're not getting held up every single year. Yeah, three guys
38:01
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com. That's Burdett Camping dot com. Went to TCU the other day.
38:44
They're going through the parking lot. Don't have this confirmed. Yeah, it's
38:47
RV RV fifth wheels, whole thing. I think they were all from Burdette,
38:52
hundreds of them from Burdett. From Burdett didn't confirm it, Yeah,
38:54
but I'm pretty sure working on that they were from verdet. Where's the game
38:59
of college football going? What's the absolute essential that a team must have to
39:02
be successful? An equal trust, an equal collective. If you don't,
39:09
you're not going to survive. You say, teams are going to get priced
39:12
out of the business. Absolutely, absolutely, and again especially the ones that
39:19
really don't have that big a budget to start out with. I mean,
39:22
you know, God save like the sun Belts of the world's the Americans and
39:25
all that. I mean, they don't have the money to do it in
39:29
the first place. I mean, I mean, I know they can survive,
39:32
but to actually put money in kids pockets with an nil, I think
39:37
it's really really hard for conferences like that, for schools that size. Yeah,
39:44
are kids fundamentally coming into college football better or worse than they used to
39:47
be? I mean everyone's playing the game nowadays, seven on seven, all
39:51
year line la la la la la la la, better or worse worse.
39:54
Why we're skill wise worse, preparation wise, understand fundamental toll wise, fundamentals
40:01
awful. I mean, these kids, like you said, they play seven
40:06
on seven, and I'll give you the first problem is they never tackle anybody.
40:10
I mean, and they never tackle and practice anymore either, because it's
40:14
all spread offenses and it's all pitching the rock all over the yard. You
40:17
know, it's still about blocking and tackling it truly is. And the fundamentals
40:22
are poor. They really are. Now they run better routes, you know,
40:27
they cover better. Right. But here's the other thing. It turns
40:30
quarterbacks into quarterbacks with no conscience. You know what I mean by that.
40:36
I'm throwing seven on seven and I go, you know, play all day.
40:40
I throw five six picks. Done. Boy, You doesn't bother me
40:45
because I just threw fifteen touchdowns, right, And that's how they go to
40:49
games. Now. It's like I'm forcing balls. You know, I'm playing
40:52
with my big arm. You know, I'm doing things you know that they
40:54
did all summer long, and there's no consequences, right, because in seven
41:00
on seven there's no consequences. Really, I mean, what do you get
41:02
a trophy or whatever? A big deal? Right? You're not playing for
41:06
a conference championship, not playing for state championship. So you think qbs aren't
41:09
as they're not intellectually prepared. No, no, And I'll tell you what
41:14
I'd be willing to bet you. You could bring any high school kid in
41:19
here, any high school kid anywhere, and ask him to idea mike right,
41:24
or tell me why I'm going to change a protection tell me what I'm
41:28
going to do with a four strong or four week right and wear my hots,
41:31
And I'll bet you none of them can answer that question, not the
41:34
whole thing, because they don't know. They really don't. And again there's
41:39
a lot of college quarterbacks that don't know because they're not asked to do it
41:43
either, you know. So, I mean, are they prepared for college
41:46
football? No? Are they prepared for the NFL? No? Not very
41:51
many of them. Now, there are certain cases where they are, certain
41:54
places are not notorious, but grat at preparing quarterback for the NFL. You
42:00
know, others aren't. And we knew it. We're like, okay,
42:04
this is gonna take a while or you know, you know, you're gonna
42:07
have to learn a whole new system because everything was verbage, you know,
42:10
all this no huddle, it's all verbage. You know. You give them
42:14
a call from the West Coast offense and those guys go like, holy really,
42:21
I mean, because you tell everybody what to do in the West Coast
42:22
offense, give me a call, oh gosh, six thirty six a flat
42:29
B cross? You know, Oh, I forgot protection would have been scat
42:32
you know, you know it, it's go you're literally telling everyone what they're
42:37
doing on one play. That's why it comes out as a sentence. Yes,
42:39
because because they want a bigger they want a bigger play call. I
42:43
mean, they want a bigger play sheet because they want answers for everything in
42:45
the NFL. This came from you know, I mean, Gruden's a West
42:50
Coast guy. I mean, it just came from. It came from guys
42:52
that you know, you don't have enough time to practice all those plays,
42:55
so you have to tell them what the motion is. You know, Hey,
42:58
it's it's it's a rip, it's a return. I mean, they
43:00
have to tell everybody everything, because then they can run all these plays,
43:06
you know, And that's I mean you saw those place sheets. I mean
43:08
some of them are four hundred plays. Well they n repped all those four
43:12
hundred plays that week. They maybe repped you know, one hundred and fifty
43:15
of them, you know, but what are you gonna do with the rest?
43:17
Yeah? You know, so, like I said, it's and then
43:21
you know, hey, it's two word Q. You know in college,
43:23
you know, it's it's it's rabbit, it's rabbit, rabbit left, or
43:28
it's you know, it's it's it's a scat blue you know, I mean
43:30
you know, I mean you, sir, You've heard all the the burbage.
43:32
That's all it is. You know, you're the general manager of an
43:38
NFL team, you can get to pick your head coach, either past or
43:43
present, who you're hiring. Bill Parcells. Reason that took long. He
43:52
was incredibly hard on them, incredibly good to them, treated everybody this same,
44:00
treated everybody different right, made everybody walk on eggshells right, and all
44:06
the coaches would say, somebody's going to get their tail ripped today, and
44:08
it may be me. Right. Well. He held everybody accountable, including
44:15
the personnel people. I mean, and again you have to be you not
44:20
only have to lead people, you have to control players. And I really
44:25
truly believe that a lot of players feared him, you know, and he
44:30
made it quite evident that you know, hey, guess what, you screw
44:32
this up, you'll be going somewhere else. Yeah. But he was also
44:38
very good to people too, you know, he really was very good organizer,
44:44
very good motivator. You have to be a very good X and NO
44:51
guy. You have to understand both sides of the ball. You also have
44:53
to be somewhat of a prick. Okay, to be a very good coach.
45:00
I'm totally with that. You do, I'm totally with that. So
45:02
who's your who's your current active do you think the best is there? Oh?
45:08
Wow, that's hard, guys, that is really hard. Dang Mike
45:20
Tomlin really yeah? Yeah? I mean does he ever hear a losing season?
45:25
Yeah? Not yet? Not yet? Well yeah, I mean but
45:30
again that's oh yeah, that's hard to do. Yeah, I mean that's
45:34
really hard to do. I mean, what about Belichick? Now? I
45:37
mean, and I got a great deal of respect for him. I mean,
45:39
but you know, Mike Tomlin's had a heck of a lot more different
45:44
quarterbacks than he has had. I mean, and how many Super Bowls?
45:49
Yeah? How many guys do you have currently inside WV football that are currently
45:54
at other schools that you have evaluated and ready in case they take a dip
45:59
into the portal? I can't say. But you do have a list,
46:05
Yes, you do have video. Yes you're ready. I'm not supposed to
46:08
be. Oh really? No? What was wrong? I mean, why
46:12
not? You can you get it? It's free world. You can have
46:15
guys tapes. No, we're not supposed to have evaluations on those guys.
46:16
Really Okay, but every other school does probably. Oh yeah, you know
46:23
what, I know. No rules right now? No rules. Yeah,
46:27
the only rule is there is no there aren't any rules right now. Lets
46:30
you have a basketball player trying to trying to get from I'm just I'm just
46:35
trying to do things the right way. Well, I know you are.
46:37
Of course, that's all means you're advanced scouting as well, right, yes,
46:43
team further teams down? Had can you hit my stinger at the status
46:46
question? You want the whole this quick stinger? You know you want the
46:50
quick one, Yeah, because you might do another one. Okay, hang
46:52
on a second, all right, stand by, stand by, There you
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your client's needs, challenges they face to provide valuable solutions and outcomes. Just
47:15
like Drew, They're providing solutions and outcomes for certain situations at the Conleague CPA
47:20
group and value beyond just the numbers. Oh, but I'm gonna ask a
47:22
numbers question here. So beyond the tape that you're watching for the teams you're
47:27
scouting, what's the one or two stats that you look at that you think
47:30
are the most valuable predictor of a team's success or that a team is good.
47:37
What do you use? Scoring offense, scoring defense, turnover margin?
47:40
So just that that's it, that's it. Yards per play you don't care
47:45
about. Nope, just those first two yep, and turnovers we know,
47:49
turnovers. Yeah, And then I said scoring defense, you know, scoring
47:52
offense, I mean makes I got a lot of sense. Yeah, I
47:57
mean it was funny. Whenever I was coordinating defense, head coach had always
48:00
come into me say you can only give up nineteen, right, and say,
48:06
okay, understand why because you only think you're gonna score it's twenty.
48:10
So, I mean it makes a heck of a lot of sense, right.
48:15
I thought you were gonna ask more. More so, like when I
48:16
do the too deep and everything else and breakdown in the opponent, So you
48:21
do it too deep of the other team. Absolutely, you evaluate each of
48:23
those players you submit that to Neil, and you're walking them through and I
48:30
give is there a total overview of their most vulnerable here, here's where I
48:35
think we attack. Yes, yeah, you know, and all that I'm
48:37
miss I'm the mismatch guy, as we would call it. I find the
48:39
fish. What's that mean? You find the fish? What does that mean?
48:44
We find that? I find the mismatches. Yeah, and if there's
48:46
a big mismatch, I mean they'll know about it. Yeah, you know.
48:50
I give them all the breakdown. It's a positive for the player,
48:53
positives, some just positive, and then they're the negatives. And then how
48:59
to attack that name negative? And again, that's that's what I told him.
49:02
I said, I spent eighteen years punching holes in players. I can
49:07
punch holes in all of them. I mean there's not anybody without not one
49:10
flaw. I mean there's no perfect player out there. Now you're starting that
49:14
though with the film study or is there other numbers that you're just going straight
49:17
film for film And I'll just see it right away, Okay, I see
49:20
there's something there that's right. Okay, see Hoppy, that's the Hopey went
49:22
to Africana Safari this summer hoppy. That's uh, put this in a context
49:28
to your trip. So what he does, he's kind of like the leader
49:30
of the hyena squad. He finds, he finds the woundedness. He finds
49:35
the wounded animal that's kind of limping across the serengetti, and he says,
49:39
that's your wildebeast. Go get that one right there, because he got a
49:42
little bit of a limp. Yeah, that's what you're doing. That's right,
49:45
Not so much limp, but really I mean, well that has a
49:46
little something to do with during the game, but it's more of what they
49:51
cannot do, you know, and where they struggle. You know, is
49:53
he bad in space? Is he bad in man coverage? You know?
49:58
Is the offensive tackle? Does he struggle with speed to power? I mean,
50:01
those types of things. I'm gonna tell those guys, because especially when
50:06
you're looking at it as a player, it's great to know the strengths and
50:08
weakness of who you're lighting up against. And before I mean, I saw
50:15
a lot of things, you know, with advanced reports in the NFL,
50:19
and some of them were a little too extensive to where there was so much
50:22
information that it was like, Okay, that's way too much. So I
50:27
tried to get together with the coaches and you know, and say, look,
50:30
what do you guys want? You know, and I'm knocked it down
50:34
to maybe offense and defense total, maybe eleven to twelve pages. That's it.
50:37
Do you see the mismatch of Fraser and that nose tackle of Williams?
50:42
Yeah, yeah, because the nose tackle couldn't move laterally, Fraser moved him.
50:50
Fraser moved moved him north south. But he also made him run when
50:53
he started zoning him, Yeah, made him run. Oh yeah. And
50:57
then when he turned sideways, didn't have any level ridge right, oh yeah,
51:00
he grabbed him because he didn't want him to work to the second level,
51:04
trying to free the backers up. Yeah, you know, but yeah,
51:06
I knew what he was. He was a true nose tackle, and
51:08
I knew exactly how he's going to rush, sack and everything else. And
51:12
they knew that too. I mean, they get the report, it's part
51:15
of the scouting import. Now they take it out of the advance and they
51:16
put it in the scouting import and they can give it to their players if
51:20
they want, and I think all of them do. I think, I
51:22
mean, I know the ones that have because they've come to me and said,
51:24
hey, this was really what this guy was. I was good,
51:28
you know, so hopefully it's valuable to him. I know it's valuable,
51:31
you know, to Neil. You know, we talked, how far ahead
51:34
are you? I'm already done with Houston, Yeah, already done. I'm
51:39
starting in Oklahoma State today. Yeah. Normally I would be it would be
51:45
the Thursday before that week that it would actually get distributed to the analysts and
51:52
to the gas. Then on that Sunday it goes to Kneel and the defensive
51:57
coordinator, the offensive coordinator coaches. So it's the Sunday before is the complete
52:00
product. The Thursday before that is actually to help the analyst and the gas
52:06
get their scattering ports ready to I mean, I just I'm not doing their
52:08
scottering report. I'm just helping them with it. So it's really that far
52:14
ahead, you know, And this this bye week, someone I get ahead.
52:22
Yeah, you know, I might actually get I might actually skip ahead
52:24
again. I might get really ahead. And then what I'll do is that
52:29
Sunday I'll recheck everything before I go to the final with the coaches, you
52:34
know, And that's usually Sunday morning, make well and just put it this
52:38
way. Are they did they change something? Are they? Are they flip
52:43
flopping the receivers? Are the receivers is a tight end missing? You know,
52:46
because I had one at TCU that I thought I was going to play.
52:50
He was out dressed eighty four. It was a receiver and he was
52:53
really really productive for the first like two or three weeks, and then he
52:58
just kind of fell off a cliff and Thompson Thompson, he transferred Marktsoft didn't
53:04
see him, I mean play. I'm going like, Okay, was he
53:07
hurt because he was out there on the field. Yeah, you know.
53:09
So they were running the same thing about Nico during warm ups too. What's
53:13
going on here? We've been talking about a lot of specifics as far as
53:20
that, but there's also a huge mental aspect of this game. How do
53:24
you determine if the person has the right heart to be successful? Because obviously
53:30
West Virginia is a developmental program, always has been, and that heart that
53:35
this team is showing, that fight that this team is showing, and resilience
53:37
that's kind of been the culture of this program. How do you figure that
53:40
part of it out. I think that the greatest thing about the high school
53:45
side of it is you get to spend so much more time with these kids.
53:47
I mean, you get to spend time with them at the school,
53:50
You get to spend time with them at their home with their parents, You
53:52
get to spend time with them on campus. I mean because unofficial visits,
53:57
I mean they're unlimited, right, get the affe visit, you get spend
54:00
time. I'll bet you we didn't get in person contact with the players in
54:06
the NFL now unless we brought them in for the thirty visit. Right,
54:09
You'd maybe get fifteen minutes at a bowl game, fifteen minutes at the combine,
54:15
and then if you really had an issue with them, it was,
54:19
you know, bring them in for the thirty visit. I think that's the
54:22
greatest part about this is I think you can gauge, you know, these
54:27
kids once you bring them on campus. And again, the more time you
54:30
spend with them, the less they can hide, and the more people that
54:36
you interview and the more people you talk to. I always tell these guys
54:39
that I was part of my presentation, I said, when you know,
54:42
when I came to a school, I said, you know, I talked
54:45
as many people as I could, I really would. I mean from quipment
54:47
managers to trainers, to strength coach, to the liaison to the coach.
54:52
I mean, I'm trying to get an opinion on this kid from everybody,
54:55
because you want to be right about the character the hard you know, see
55:00
they actually because again i'll i'll I digress a little bit. I would.
55:04
My question was, as I always say, this guy love football, like,
55:07
oh yeah, he leves. Well, can you give me an example
55:09
if they had to sit there and pause he didn't love football? Right,
55:15
because usually there was an example like he's always in the you know because like
55:17
the Fraser, I go down and you know, get my cardio at like
55:20
five o'clock every day. Well he's in there doing something extra every day,
55:22
in the way room every day. So that tells me guess what it's important
55:27
to him, you know. But I told them, I said, you
55:30
know, I said, when one person says you're not a good person,
55:36
sometimes that's personal. Right. If five people tell me you're not a good
55:39
person, you're not a good person, probably a bad day. Yeah,
55:43
right. So that's that's something that I think you can research a lot better
55:49
in the high school side. Transfer portal is gonna be a little bit harder.
55:52
But you've got to go through the coaches that did coach him, the
55:57
head coach high school. You got to talk to pe people that know him.
56:00
I mean, you got to find out because we never really truly made
56:05
a mistake on player's ability. We made mistakes on players character and you know,
56:12
and going back, he just triggered one. The worst one was Jason
56:15
Williams be Kase from Western Illinois. Right, I mean six two and a
56:21
half, probably two thirty five, ran like four or four, right,
56:27
And Keith Brookings came out of the meeting room and told me, he said,
56:30
you screwed this one up, right, And I said, why is
56:35
that? He said, this kid doesn't really even like ball. He said
56:37
he didn't want to spend time with it. He didn't want to learn it,
56:39
he said, you know, and guess what, we didn't spend enough
56:43
time with the kid. We didn't and we overlooked a lot of things because
56:47
he was that fast and that athletic and everything else. And you know,
56:52
you make mistakes by going like, oh, hey, that's that's pretty stone
56:55
right. Well, you make problem when you know whatever, you find yourself
57:00
saying yes, but you know this, but well, but see, here's
57:05
the thing. And I was I'm very lucky because I was on the coaching
57:08
side too. When you're coaching, your job's always on the line, so
57:14
you always want that pretty her stone, right. You're willing to take that
57:16
risk, right because you go, hey, the reward might be really really
57:21
good. Right. Well, sometimes it doesn't work out. I mean sometimes
57:25
it does, but you know, I'd rather have I'd rather have the Zach
57:30
Martins of the world than the Johnny Manziel. And that was that was our
57:34
decision, you know, that day. I mean, Zach Martin has been
57:37
a pro bowler. I mean, well, no, he's been an All
57:40
Pro like seven times, so you know, and he was the cleanest,
57:46
you know, I mean position flex and everything else. And it was like
57:51
everybody was like, we're good because he's safe. Yeah. So with this
57:57
team two more months to go in the regular season, seven more regular season
58:01
games, they feel good about themselves right now. They feel confident about themselves.
58:06
They were told they were going to finish fourteenth, but they're four and
58:08
one and they're two and ohero in the league. How much does mentality play
58:13
within a team as a season goes on? As they start to believe about
58:17
themselves. Well, I think it's big, I really do. I mean,
58:22
they started feeding on each other on Saturday, and I kept telling a
58:24
couple of them, I said, look, I said, you make a
58:27
play. I said, everybody will start feeding on it. Everybody. But
58:30
here's the other thing. I mean. And I was told that the crowd
58:37
for PITT would be better or as good as any place that I've ever been.
58:40
And I said, hm, better in Auburn, Alabama, better than
58:44
Tennessee, Georgia. Better in Alabama, Tennessee. And they were like,
58:46
yeah, well guess what it was. We need that because those kids fed
58:54
on that too. Yeah. Absolutely, you know, because they feel supported.
58:58
You know, because I'm gonna tell you what, they got a chip.
59:00
Because when somebody tells you you're going to be dead last that ought to
59:05
piss you off. And these people when they get behind these kids, I
59:08
mean I saw it at PITT. I mean it was amazing, it really
59:13
was. And they fed on it. And now they're going to start feeding
59:15
on each other because you know, once they start seeing that, hey,
59:20
you know, there were a lot of them that were waiting for somebody else
59:23
to make a play. Now they want to make that play because now they
59:29
know that somebody else is going to make the play too. Yeah, you
59:31
know, if that makes any sense, absolutely yes. Well that's like Lockhart
59:36
and Martin with those field goal blocks. Lockhart after the game said, I
59:38
told those guys, I'm blocking this field goal, right, And Martin comes
59:43
back and he said, they took that sack away from me on that spin
59:46
of the quarterback that they ruled as an incomplete pass. And he said,
59:50
they took that sack away from me. So I said, IM going to
59:51
block this field goal. I mean, it's this mentality that takes guys to
59:55
a different level, and when you don't have that confidence, then the it
1:00:00
goes to the opposite. You find ways to lose instead of finding ways to
1:00:02
win. Don't remind me of that, though, because when I saw Sean
1:00:05
chasing after that block, I was like, oh god, I was like
1:00:07
I was like, I was like, Leah, lad please, No,
1:00:12
Neil Brown almost got there before anybody else. Yeah, right, I was
1:00:15
right behind him, but I stayed in the box that's kept yelling. I
1:00:19
was like, No, that's another part of the game, man. A
1:00:22
lot of times like we see that in college sports sometimes, Man, those
1:00:25
little little things become massive a score time. What am I doing? What
1:00:30
am I supposed to do? What shouldn't I do? And most of the
1:00:32
time they're all covered And put it this way, you guys, I mean
1:00:37
you've been out there to practice. I mean, well organized, well disciplined.
1:00:40
I mean to the minute. You know, they do a really good
1:00:45
job. They know they were told, they were told, they were told
1:00:47
once of kids. In the heat of these I can't keep right ball.
1:00:52
I got to get the ball. That happens kind of like us at a
1:00:55
buffet. You know, you're not supposed to keep eating me. Just give
1:00:58
you with M and ms out there in a big Yeah, John didn't know
1:01:00
about those rights. They're not here, so you know they're humans. I
1:01:05
mean, you saw yesterday the NFL the guy from the Chargers intercepted to pass
1:01:09
and he could have probably run it all the way back, and instead he
1:01:13
said he went down, like all the game's over. No, it's not
1:01:15
over. There's two more minutes to play in the other team thirty. Yeah,
1:01:19
yeah, I saw that. But here's the other one. Well,
1:01:21
and again we got a little sections called not good ball. It's not good
1:01:25
ball. Well, there's clips of that just like the week before. You
1:01:29
remember when Minnesota was driving down and they were they were four down right,
1:01:34
and they got a first down inside like what the twelve and there was still
1:01:39
thirty six seconds left. They had no timeouts. They didn't spike the ball
1:01:45
right, They rushed up there, got set was in a huge rush.
1:01:49
Play clock was running right, but they had just gotten the first down,
1:01:52
so they still had probably seven seconds to get everything set right. He throws
1:01:55
a pick in the end zone, why not spike the ball? Get organized,
1:02:00
get ready and do that bad ball? So you got to you got
1:02:05
to remind everybody about bad ball. He does. Coach Brown does, Yeah,
1:02:07
Neil does. Show those guys bad ball, bad ball, good ball,
1:02:12
bad ball. That's right. Yeah, absolutely absolutely, Well, this
1:02:15
hasn't been that hard. Has a fan that's enjoyable now. But I get,
1:02:17
I got to go back to the office and I gotta, like I
1:02:20
said, start Oklahoma State. Do you wear your hair like that because your
1:02:22
dad was military? No? Actually, quite honestly, I want to get
1:02:27
rid of the grand sides. And you still can see a little bit of
1:02:30
grand the sides even though, but you learned a lot from your dad.
1:02:32
He was he was a tough guy. Uh. He was a drill instructor
1:02:37
for fourteen years and in the Marines. Then he coached for thirty two years
1:02:42
after that. Yeah, it was really tough. Tell me the story about
1:02:46
when you went to college and you called your dad and complained about well,
1:02:52
back in the day, I mean, scholarships were scholarships, and you got
1:02:57
a room, you got ford. I mean you got the the meal and
1:03:00
everything else. Right. The only extra money you got was laundry money on
1:03:05
Friday. And it was like twenty dollars, right. And I called him.
1:03:08
I said, you know, I said this twenty dollars doesn't go a
1:03:12
long way now, right, And he goes, you got three hots in
1:03:15
a cot. I go, I go, yes, sir, He goes,
1:03:19
you got to deal with it. That was it. I said,
1:03:21
you got to deal with it. Three hots in the cot. Three talking
1:03:23
about all of various pepperoni spots. Version. That was different. It's a
1:03:27
different deal. That's a totally different three hots in the cop. But he
1:03:30
also I told Tony this. He also made me go cross town. He
1:03:35
wouldn't let me play for him. Oh really, yeah, he said,
1:03:37
I do not want anybody to ever say you're playing quarterback because you're the coaches
1:03:42
kid. Yeah. Right, so I had to go across town from and
1:03:45
I kicked the tail every single year. You beat your dad, beat the
1:03:49
tar out of him, especially my senior year. Awesome. Yeah, make
1:03:52
your bed first thing every day. Yes, I still do. Yeah,
1:03:55
bounce a quarter off of it. And here's the other one. Sorry,
1:03:58
there was the first task of the day. Right, there is never there's
1:04:00
never a piece of clothing left on the floor. Never. That's called the
1:04:04
turnover. No turnovers, it's right. Hey, buddy, thanks so much
1:04:09
for being with us. Appreciate you real appreciate the asking for you come back
1:04:13
again, because there's not we're not. I'm not through here. I got
1:04:15
yeah, well yeah, you haven't opening that night and get started here.
1:04:17
Well, once all this transfer portal stuff happens, maybe we get them after
1:04:20
all that and kind of do an evaluation there. I was gonna say,
1:04:24
like, maybe that'd be that's computed. Well after clipping, Yeah, episode,
1:04:30
let's get that things settled, Let's do this. Let's keep the guys
1:04:32
that we want here. That's okay, that's what I'm planning them. Yeah,
1:04:35
that's that's there may not be someone I want I never know. Yeah,
1:04:41
I feel the same way here a lot of times. Anyway, that's
1:04:43
a dule different story. Yeah, that's we're good. Episode four. Three
1:04:47
guys, before the game is now complete, don't forget go mart, get
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Three guys. Also brought to us by the tremendous folks at the Connolly CPA
1:05:33
group. They prevent present I should say value beyond the numbers and spreads on
1:05:42
stats. Three guys, We'll be back as we get to readies. Next
1:05:47
week's get little different. We're gonna preview Houston Tuesday. Tuesday, previewing Houston
1:05:54
on Tuesday, and then we're going to do our post Houston on Friday,
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so check it out. Three guys also brought this by Comax Business Systems,
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keeping West Virginia's business data safe, secure and fishing for twenty five years.
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By the way, Yeah mentioned the other day that new gears. Oh yeah,
1:06:11
new gear. The T shirts out Hoppy. See we executed, see
1:06:15
executed as I projected, well really as I projected, he said, thanks
1:06:20
for having us. T shirts are now available with episode eight hundred dot com
1:06:25
for our guest Drew Gold and Blue. Well sure they would be both com
1:06:29
we don't do what his own Episode eight hundred dot com. Episode eight hundred
1:06:31
dot com. I'll give you the website. You'll get you the order one
1:06:34
you put credit, Get that credit card off, take those mock balls off
1:06:38
that credit card. Can I get yeah, absolute Episode eight hundred dot com.
1:06:41
I'll pull it up on your phone. Right, we have some privilege.
1:06:44
Save it, buddy, You're just like all these other kids entitled for
1:06:46
Hoppy. We're out three guys before the game. See you