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Ohio State Football Insider: The New Rule That Could Benefit The Buckeyes In 2026 · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Buckeyes Tomorrow Morning for Thursday, September 3rd. I'm
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  Speaker 1: your host, Tom, or the Ball State game in two days,
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  Speaker 1: the game against Michigan in 86 days. Today's episode presented
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  Speaker 1: by Jeff Ruby's at Columbus, proudly offering nationally acclaimed USDA
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  Speaker 1: make a reservation today.
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  Speaker 2: All right. The attention to detail.
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  Speaker 1: That is going to be one of the sort of
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  Speaker 1: guiding principles of today's show, because we are going to
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  Speaker 1: be talking about a rule that is I think it's
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  Speaker 1: gotten completely overlooked almost in the discourse around the rule
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  Speaker 1: changes around college football this year. I think this is
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  Speaker 1: a rule that you might think you're going to watch
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  Speaker 1: this show and go, what? Why are you talking about this?
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  Speaker 1: Hold hold this in your heads and. And watch and
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  Speaker 1: see if I'm not right about this. I think this
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  Speaker 1: is something we might see in an Ohio State game
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  Speaker 1: later this season. And I think Ohio State might have
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  Speaker 1: made a roster move With this at least specifically, not
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  Speaker 1: solely in mind, but at least sort of in mind here.
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  Speaker 1: So I'm going to welcome in Tony Gerderman of BuckeyeInsiders.com. Tony,
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  Speaker 1: we've got to talk about the fair catch kick rule.
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  Speaker 1: And this is something that has been a rule in
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  Speaker 1: the NFL for decades and decades and decades. And it's,
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's like the kick six or the, you know,
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  Speaker 1: the one point safety where it's like, yeah, this has
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  Speaker 1: been a rule, but it's, you know, how often do
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  Speaker 1: you see it? But I think this is something that
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  Speaker 1: is going to potentially play a role in a game
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  Speaker 1: of some consequence this year. Do you want to explain it?
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  Speaker 1: Are you courageous enough to try to explain it? Or
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  Speaker 1: would you like me to do all the heavy lifting?
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  Speaker 3: I'll explain how I understand it. And then you can
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  Speaker 3: correct me. Perfect. That's your favorite part of the show.
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  Speaker 3: My favorite part of the show.
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  Speaker 4: Basically, when a team receives a punt or a kick,
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  Speaker 4: any kind of kick, They have the option of, wherever
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  Speaker 4: they field it, saying, okay, we want to attempt a
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  Speaker 4: free kick from here. It would be a three-point. It
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  Speaker 4: would be a field goal. But you can't try to
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  Speaker 4: block it. It's just basically a free kick. If you've
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  Speaker 4: ever seen it, it's basically a kickoff type thing. You're
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  Speaker 4: just trying to kick the ball through the uprights. And
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  Speaker 4: that could be from wherever. And you just have to
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  Speaker 4: sit there and watch it. And you can't do anything
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  Speaker 4: about it. And– Now that you've talked more about Ohio
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  Speaker 4: State bringing in Robbie Disher as the special teams coordinator,
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  Speaker 4: what kind of advantages can Ohio State get? I'm sure
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  Speaker 4: Ryan Day's like, what can you do for us? Like, well,
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  Speaker 4: there's this rule. And you mentioned like it kind of
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  Speaker 4: just flew under the radar. A couple of other special
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  Speaker 4: teams rules flew under, rule changes kind of flew under
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  Speaker 4: the radar. But this one, I'm not saying you're wrong
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  Speaker 4: that we won't see. I think we'll see it this
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  Speaker 4: year because now that's the rule, Tom. We'll get into
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  Speaker 4: the situations because... You're not going to see this in
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  Speaker 4: the first quarter.
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  Speaker 1: No, this is a very, very specific circumstance. I think
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  Speaker 1: this is last play of the first half, last play
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  Speaker 1: of the game kind of thing. And so I'm going
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  Speaker 1: to just sort of walk you through a scenario there.
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  Speaker 1: Ohio State is playing at Texas. Texas is pinned back
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  Speaker 1: deep in their own end. And it is fourth and
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  Speaker 1: seven from their own seven yard line. And there's three
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  Speaker 1: seconds left in the first half. And Ohio State calls
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  Speaker 1: a timeout or Texas has thrown an incomplete pass or
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  Speaker 1: whatever it is. So the clock has stopped. Three seconds
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  Speaker 1: left in the first half. Texas is lining up. They
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  Speaker 1: have to punt the ball away. Now, normally, under the
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  Speaker 1: old rules before this year, you'd punt the ball away.
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  Speaker 1: It would, you know, the guy would catch it. He
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  Speaker 1: would maybe try and return it. He'd maybe fair catch it.
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  Speaker 1: And that's the end of the half. Unless there's a
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  Speaker 1: defense penalty, that's the end of the half. Now, you
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  Speaker 1: punt the ball from the seven-yard line and you kick
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  Speaker 1: it 38 yards. That goes to the 45-yard line. Brandon
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  Speaker 1: Innes or whoever is back there fair catches it at
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  Speaker 1: the 45-yard line.
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  Speaker 3: With time remaining. No time.
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  Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Clock can hit zero.
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  Speaker 1: It does not matter. If you fair catch it, you
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  Speaker 1: can kick the ball from there. And this is not, well,
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  Speaker 1: it's at the 45 yard line. So then you have
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  Speaker 1: to add 10 yards. So it's 55 yards. And then
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  Speaker 1: you also have to go seven yards behind the snapper.
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  Speaker 1: You don't go seven yards behind the snapper. You kick
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  Speaker 1: it from right there. So if you fair catch it
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  Speaker 1: at the 45 yard line, it's a 55 yard field
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  Speaker 1: goal from right there. You line up, you kick it.
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  Speaker 1: As Tony said, this is essentially like a kickoff where there's,
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  Speaker 1: you're not kicking off a tee, but you're, The defense
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  Speaker 1: just has to stand there and watch you do it
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  Speaker 1: from 10 yards away. And your team is not lined
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  Speaker 1: up in an offensive line formation. You're essentially lined up
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  Speaker 1: like you're covering a kickoff. You kick it from there.
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  Speaker 1: If you kick it, you make it.
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  Speaker 2: Three points. If you don't make it, half's over.
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  Speaker 1: The only downside here is if you're trying for a
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  Speaker 1: 65-yarder and you kick it short, you could get kick
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  Speaker 1: six the other way.
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  Speaker 2: That's the downside.
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  Speaker 1: Now, Ohio State, you mentioned Robbie Disher, new special teams coordinator.
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  Speaker 1: He's not the only guy coming from west of Ohio
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  Speaker 1: to the Ohio State football team in the special teams
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  Speaker 1: this year. Marcello Diamidi.
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  Speaker 3: Good job.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you.
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  Speaker 1: He is Connor Hawkins from Baylor, is the transfer kicker
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  Speaker 1: that everyone's talking about. Marcello Diamidi from Notre Dame. big
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  Speaker 1: leg guy. We've talked about him in terms of being
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  Speaker 1: a long field goal kicker before. Now, this is not
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  Speaker 1: someone who's going to be trying a 72 yarder, but
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  Speaker 1: Ohio State has not made a 50 yard field goal
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  Speaker 1: since 2019. I'm expecting him to at least attempt one
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  Speaker 1: or more of these, you know, one or more 50
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  Speaker 1: yard field goals this year. I think with as many
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  Speaker 1: potentially close games as they're going to be playing this year,
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  Speaker 1: I think you may see him, if they find themselves
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  Speaker 1: in this kind of situation, try a 55-yarder, try a 58-yarder.
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  Speaker 1: Give it a shot because there's, other than a kick six,
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  Speaker 1: there's not really much of a downside there.
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  Speaker 4: Well, and the interesting thing is, Ryan Day has talked
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  Speaker 4: about Marcello being the.
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  Speaker 3: Kickoff guy as well.
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  Speaker 2: Yes.
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  Speaker 3: So that would put him there.
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  Speaker 4: In terms of, even if it's like 52, do you
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  Speaker 4: want the free kick from 52, or do you want
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  Speaker 4: to kick a field goal from 52 with a rush?
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  Speaker 4: You're going to take the free kick there, provided the
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  Speaker 4: accuracy is there. It is interesting, and back when the
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  Speaker 4: kickoff was at the 35-yard line, we've all seen the
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  Speaker 4: kicks go through the uprights.
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  Speaker 1: Yes.
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  Speaker 3: So this doesn't have to be on your side of
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  Speaker 3: the field.
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  Speaker 2: Those were off of a tee. Kickoffs were off of
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  Speaker 2: a tee.
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  Speaker 1: So that gives you a little bit of an advantage.
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  Speaker 3: True, true.
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  Speaker 4: But the big legs now that we've seen in the
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  Speaker 4: NFL and we've seen Ohio State has two big legs
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  Speaker 4: right now, the accuracy we'll see. But, boy, you are
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  Speaker 4: so confident that this is going to happen. In any
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  Speaker 4: given game, how many points would that be worth in
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  Speaker 4: a bold prediction?
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  Speaker 2: It's something that has never happened in college football history.
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  Speaker 3: But you expect it to happen.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, but that's because I'm very bold. It has happened.
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  Speaker 1: And just to give you a sense, this has happened
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  Speaker 1: in the NFL one time since 1976. It's been tried
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  Speaker 1: about 10 to 12 times since then. It happened once, 2020,
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  Speaker 1: for the Chargers, Los Angeles Chargers.
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  Speaker 2: I know this. I know where the Chargers play.
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  Speaker 3: Where is Los Angeles?
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  Speaker 2: That's where UCLA is.
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  Speaker 3: I got you.
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  Speaker 2: I heard that at Big Ten Media Days a couple
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  Speaker 2: of years ago. I think it was Cameron Dicker, the
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  Speaker 2: former Texas kicker.
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  Speaker 3: No, it was Sean Foster.
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  Speaker 1: The kicker for the– I'm really trying not to say
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  Speaker 1: San Diego. The kicker for the Chargers. I believe it
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  Speaker 1: was Cameron Dicker.
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  Speaker 2: I think so.
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  Speaker 1: This was Jim Harbaugh had one of his brilliant Jim
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  Speaker 1: Harbaugh moments and sent him out and they made this
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  Speaker 1: kick in 2024. Only time it had happened, it happened
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  Speaker 1: on a Thursday night game. So– It has happened. It
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  Speaker 1: is a very specific set of circumstances for this to
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  Speaker 1: line up exactly because if you fair catch it and
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  Speaker 1: it's a tie game and there's 10 seconds left in
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  Speaker 1: the game, you're not doing this. Because if you kick
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  Speaker 1: from there and you miss it, then the other team
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  Speaker 1: gets the ball right there. You've turned it over, they
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  Speaker 1: get the ball right there, and then they can take
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  Speaker 1: a shot the other direction with a Hail Mary or whatever.
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  Speaker 1: So there's a very specific set of circumstances that would
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  Speaker 1: lead up to this, but I just, I feel like
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  Speaker 1: between the rule change, the addition of the special teams
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  Speaker 1: coordinator where they're looking for any little advantage they can,
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  Speaker 1: and the addition of a kicker who specifically is like,
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  Speaker 1: here's the big leg guy.
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  Speaker 2: It just feels like this is a watch this space.
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  Speaker 4: Well, it'll also be interesting because you're not going to
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  Speaker 4: want to put yourself, put your opponent in that position,
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  Speaker 4: you know?
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  Speaker 3: Right.
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  Speaker 4: If you're putting there, you know, they're just going to
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  Speaker 4: fair catch it and kick it. So now you've let's,
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  Speaker 4: let's kick it on the ground. Let's do some kick
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  Speaker 4: it away, angle kick, Australian rules, whatever kind of– now
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  Speaker 4: Australia has become even more important. We already know they're
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  Speaker 4: the most important thing in football. But it just creates
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  Speaker 4: another layer of how do we deal with this? How
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  Speaker 4: do we handle this? And that then can add just
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  Speaker 4: a little bit of chaos into the situation as well.
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  Speaker 1: So, yeah, they just wanted to share that thought, just
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  Speaker 1: sort of get that on the record right now just
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  Speaker 1: as a– so when you're watching the game and someone
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  Speaker 1: tries this and someone goes, what is this?
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  Speaker 2: You can go, aha.
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  Speaker 1: for today. Thank you guys all for joining us.
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  Speaker 2: Have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.