Latest / The Sean O'Connell Show / Ari Temkin on NFL players coming back to college football, Week 0 is here, TCU vs UNC Saturday in Dublin + more

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Ari Temkin on NFL players coming back to college football, Week 0 is here, TCU vs UNC Saturday in Dublin + more · The Sean O'Connell Show

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Speaker 1: No, you are tuned to The Sean O'Connell Show from
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Speaker 1: the Murdoch Chevrolet Studio of ESPN seven hundred at ninety
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Speaker 1: two to one a half.
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Speaker 2: MS Well, welcome back to the Sean O'Connell Show.
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Speaker 3: Welcome in our good friend.
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Speaker 4: Ari Timkin to talk all things college football, Big twelve
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Speaker 4: Little NFL sprinkled in.
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Speaker 3: Ari, Welcome again. How are you, sir?
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Speaker 5: I'm great, OC. How are you, buddy?
0:36
Speaker 3: I'm doing all right.
0:38
Speaker 4: So I think I'm starting to figure out the best
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Speaker 4: way for college coaches to maximize their roster. You gotta
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Speaker 4: have someone on the staff, like a GA or something
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Speaker 4: who's always got one eye on the transfer portal and
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Speaker 4: the potential transfer portal. And now you have to add
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Speaker 4: somebody who's watching NFL preseason games and figuring out who's
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Speaker 4: gonna get and then you can be the first one
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Speaker 4: to grab that guy out of the NFL and put
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Speaker 4: him on your college football roster, because why not make
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Speaker 4: it even more chaotic. What are your thoughts on this
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Speaker 4: wave that I hope doesn't become a tsunami of preseason
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Speaker 4: NFL guys coming back and saying no, I want my
1:21
Speaker 4: fifty year of eligibility. I'm playing another season of college football.
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Speaker 5: I mean, it seems very black and white, cut and dried, right, Like,
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Speaker 5: there's no confusion and ambiguity over any of this, right,
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Speaker 5: It's just totally obvious and easy, and I'm sure it's
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Speaker 5: really easy for people to figure out, you know, I mean,
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Speaker 5: it's unbelievable. You know, we've got the Colorado ruling, which
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Speaker 5: over the weekend was sort of invalidated, so anybody that
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Speaker 5: just you know, blanket twenty twenty two class is no
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Speaker 5: longer eligible. I sort of positioned it on my show
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Speaker 5: like this, and that is, you know, let's say that
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Speaker 5: they're handing out chocolate milk in your classroom, but then
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Speaker 5: they decided you've already had too much. You already had
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Speaker 5: enough chocolate milk. But then there are certain people within
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Speaker 5: that class that went to a different classroom to get
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Speaker 5: chocolate milk, but the people that remain in the same
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Speaker 5: classroom are no longer getting the chocolate milk because they
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Speaker 5: already had enough chocolate milk. That's probably the best metaphor
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Speaker 5: I could possibly come up with, because I feel like
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Speaker 5: explaining it like to a six year old is pretty
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Speaker 5: much the best explanation that I would need.
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Speaker 4: It's absolutely crazy that we've reached this point in the
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Speaker 4: idiocracy of sports where NBA players, guys who played basketball
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Speaker 4: in an NBA uniform, whether it was in summer league
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Speaker 4: or not, are now back on college basketball rosters. And
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Speaker 4: the same appears to be happening in college football, where
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Speaker 4: you could have been in a preseason game, or at
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Speaker 4: least in a preseason camp, you could have put on
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Speaker 4: that Cleveland Brown's helmet or that Philadelphia Eagles helmet, and
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Speaker 4: now you're going to go back and be at LSU
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Speaker 4: or at Texas Tech or whatever.
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Speaker 3: I just I never thought we'd get here.
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Speaker 5: Ari, I mean truly, you know, and you know, look,
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Speaker 5: I think in some ways it's it's interesting the way
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Speaker 5: that the sort of talent pool has gotten deeper, and
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Speaker 5: you know, I mean, it really comes down to money
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Speaker 5: and resources, right Like the industries that have the most
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Speaker 5: money tied to it will be mostly competitive because people
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Speaker 5: want access to that money. And so you know, we're
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Speaker 5: seeing that within basketball, right like, where before guys leave
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Speaker 5: college to go play in any you know, any part
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Speaker 5: where they could to get paid to play in basketball,
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Speaker 5: whether it was in the G League or internationally. You know,
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Speaker 5: they would just take the first you know plane they
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Speaker 5: could and do that. And you know, now because college
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Speaker 5: is competitive in terms of what they're paying in the
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Speaker 5: international game against G League teams, you know, suddenly the
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Speaker 5: arithmetic is a lot different. And you know, it's funny
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Speaker 5: because I've been talking to some of my friends that
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Speaker 5: are former college actetes or professional players, and you know,
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Speaker 5: it's like so many of them are like, I just
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Speaker 5: can't believe the ego would kind of allow you to
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Speaker 5: do that. You know, you feel like you get to
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Speaker 5: the NFL, like that was the dream, and even though
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Speaker 5: you know you're still fighting for survival, you just want
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Speaker 5: to keep fighting for that as opposed to going backwards
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Speaker 5: one step. And so it is. In some ways, it
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Speaker 5: shows how much I think just the dynamic, like the
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Speaker 5: internal competitiveness of some of these players have changed.
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Speaker 3: Everybody.
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Speaker 4: I know, all of my buddies from the old days,
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Speaker 4: we've all had a dream at some point, like a
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Speaker 4: literal sleeping dream where you dream that you're back in
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Speaker 4: your high school football uniform and you have like a
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Speaker 4: weird in the dream guilt trip about the fact that
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Speaker 4: you know you're not supposed to be there that you
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Speaker 4: graduated already and you're not supposed to be playing, and
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Speaker 4: of course you know it's just a dream, but then
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Speaker 4: you wake up and there's a certain amount of like
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Speaker 4: shame involved where your laugh fit yourself just like I
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Speaker 4: guess I really peaked in high school and I want
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Speaker 4: to go back there on some subconscious level, and that
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Speaker 4: we're watching it happen in college football.
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Speaker 5: Well, and I mean I also like I can't imagine
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Speaker 5: what the like the team dynamics, So like, let's just
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Speaker 5: play this out here, because this impacts the NFL in
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Speaker 5: a big way where you've got guys that are kind
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Speaker 5: of one foot in, one foot out. But like think
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Speaker 5: about practice squads, you know, whereas this is the time
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Speaker 5: of year where guys, you know, if they weren't going
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Speaker 5: to make the roster, they were positioning themselves for a
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Speaker 5: practice squad spot. And you know, the reality is a
5:37
Speaker 5: lot of undrafted free agents are going to end up
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Speaker 5: on practice squads, you know, and what you do with
5:42
Speaker 5: that is just based on how much work you put
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Speaker 5: in and what the organization thinks about you. But over time,
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Speaker 5: like you can find yourself in an active roster. It
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Speaker 5: happens for a lot of guys, but it starts the
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Speaker 5: practice squad and you know what you can make there
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Speaker 5: is you know, low six figures for a practice squad spot,
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Speaker 5: depending on how long you've been in League two hunred, thousand,
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Speaker 5: three thousand. Now, now these guys go back to college.
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Speaker 5: You know, they're going to most of them are going
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Speaker 5: to be at the top level of the salary base.
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Speaker 5: So you know, it's it's it's an easy math problem.
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Speaker 5: They're going to make more money going back to college
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Speaker 5: than they want to practice squad. So what does the
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Speaker 5: NFL do to react as in reaction to it, because
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Speaker 5: they want their feeder system with the practice squad to
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Speaker 5: be intact, and they don't want to lose a ton
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Speaker 5: of you know, the talent pool that they have there.
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Speaker 5: And then you know, so how do they disincentivize that
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Speaker 5: from losing players? And then on the other side, you know,
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Speaker 5: I mean the train has left the station for these rosters.
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Speaker 5: You know, how are they positioned themselves as players to
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Speaker 5: get back on these rosters? You know, and again it's
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Speaker 5: important to point out that like the Blanket twenty twenty
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Speaker 5: two class that that has been stayed by the appeals court.
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Speaker 5: So you know, no longer. Are is every twenty twenty
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Speaker 5: two athlete now eligible? But if you got eligibility from
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Speaker 5: a different state, and there's you know, Texas and Kentucky
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Speaker 5: and Louisiana and many other states involved here. You know,
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Speaker 5: like Thomas Castellanos, who's you know, who looks to be
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Speaker 5: going to Texas Tech. Now he's part of the Kentucky ruling,
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Speaker 5: so you know he could still he's still eligible based
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Speaker 5: upon a court whereas you know, everybody else that just
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Speaker 5: has that blanket twenty twenty two clearance is non eligible.
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Speaker 5: So it is again extraordinarily confusing.
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Speaker 4: It's very strange, and yet here we are. Okay, let's
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Speaker 4: I'm very excited. It's week zero now, so we can
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Speaker 4: actually talk about at least one Big twelve matchup. We
7:30
Speaker 4: can talk about one game involving a Big twelve team
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Speaker 4: that is going to get I think a little bit
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Speaker 4: of a national attention. North Carolina TCU a Viva Stadium
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Speaker 4: in Dublin, give me your keys in this one. And
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Speaker 4: how important is this When we talk about the Big twelve,
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Speaker 4: we always talk about you've got to establish yourself in
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Speaker 4: bowl games, in the non conference. You've got to set
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Speaker 4: your level relative to the other power for feels like
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Speaker 4: there's a big opportunity for TCU here to do just that.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, and in some ways it's kind of a lose
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Speaker 5: lose from the standpoint of, you know, the expectation to
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Speaker 5: win this game is very high, you know, and so
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Speaker 5: to your point, like this loss here is almost like
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Speaker 5: two losses because of what it means to the conference
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Speaker 5: because TCU was expected to be towards the top of
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Speaker 5: the conference. North Carolina should be better, but there's still
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Speaker 5: going to be a bottom of the acc type team.
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Speaker 5: You know. Bill Belichick, I think learned from some of
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Speaker 5: the mistakes he made in the portal last year and
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Speaker 5: made a much larger commitment to the high school ranks.
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Speaker 5: So they've got some playmakers. They flipped a guy from
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Speaker 5: A and M who's a pass rusher. They got another
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Speaker 5: guy from Ohio State on the defensive line. They ended
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Speaker 5: up with double digit four star recruits. They've got one
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Speaker 5: of the I think it was top fifteen classes in
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Speaker 5: the country in terms of high school recruiting, and conversely,
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Speaker 5: they had like the sixty fourth rank transfitportal class. So
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Speaker 5: the majority of their talent is you know, incoming freshmen
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Speaker 5: so this team could be considerably will be considerably better
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Speaker 5: from a talent perspective, but might not win many more
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Speaker 5: games than they did last year because their skill schedule
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Speaker 5: is way tougher this year than it was last year.
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Speaker 5: And look, there's also no shortage of drama when it
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Speaker 5: comes to North Carolina too, and this has nothing to
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Speaker 5: do with Bill Belichick's girlfriend. There's Michael Lombardi, the drama
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Speaker 5: with him, the GM who's on indefinite leave based on
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Speaker 5: some improprieties and and you know, he's the highest paid
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Speaker 5: GM in college football. And then the bigger one I
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Speaker 5: think is that Steve Belichick, Bill's son, the defensive coordinators,
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Speaker 5: was put on medical leave in early August, and you know,
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Speaker 5: the indication seems to be that he's not going to be,
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Speaker 5: you know, traveling with the team to Dublin. So you know,
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Speaker 5: it looks like Bill Belichick, who has not called a
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Speaker 5: defense at the college level, will be calling defensive plays,
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Speaker 5: which is not a far cry from what he's done
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Speaker 5: throughout his career, and he's been very good at it
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Speaker 5: and very successful at it. But that part it will
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Speaker 5: be interesting. I think this could be a low scoring game.
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Speaker 5: I think both teams defenses stand out. And again, you know,
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Speaker 5: TCVES sort of built itself, reimagined itself to be more
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Speaker 5: of a ground and pound offense, and so I think,
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Speaker 5: you know, that's what we'll see probably, you know, and
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Speaker 5: a new team learning this new offense, playing a little
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Speaker 5: bit slower against the defense that has some talent. And
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Speaker 5: you know, I really think very highly of this TCU defense.
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Speaker 5: It's gonna be one of the best of the Big twelve.
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Speaker 4: TCU with some of its own drama in the locker
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Speaker 4: room after they dismissed Jacob Fields, who is a projected
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Speaker 4: starter on this team, for an assault that happened in
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Speaker 4: the locker room. I'm trying to have been reading between
10:21
Speaker 4: the lines and reading all the publication on this one,
10:23
Speaker 4: because look, you can get away with a lot of
10:27
Speaker 4: Tom Fooler in the locker room, and you can get
10:29
Speaker 4: away with a fight with your teammate to a certain extent,
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Speaker 4: especially if you're a good player like Fields. Is there
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Speaker 4: there's something that it feels to me like there's something
10:41
Speaker 4: we haven't been told about the situation, even as all
10:44
Speaker 4: the reporting has effort at giving us the full truth
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Speaker 4: on it. But I wanted your thoughts on well, two part,
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Speaker 4: how big a loss is Jacob Fields on the field,
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Speaker 4: and of course how big of an issue is this
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Speaker 4: for a TCU locker room that is now, you know,
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Speaker 4: a few days away from playing a game.
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Speaker 5: No, I mean, you're you're one hundred percent right. And
11:04
Speaker 5: this was an aggravated assault charge. So it wasn't just assault.
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Speaker 5: It was you know, either assault with a weapon or
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Speaker 5: assault in an extreme manner. And and you know, I
11:13
Speaker 5: haven't heard any reporting in terms of the specifics, but
11:17
Speaker 5: you know, a locker room fight that's ended with a
11:19
Speaker 5: kid in the hospital and you know, so you've got
11:22
Speaker 5: to do something if your sunny Dykes in the TCU program,
11:25
Speaker 5: and obviously they did. I mean, it's a huge void.
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Speaker 5: They brought in Field, who is the code defensive player
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Speaker 5: of the Year in the Conference USA last year. You know,
11:33
Speaker 5: really take that Bud Clark spot. After losing Clark. You know,
11:36
Speaker 5: they're really good. They're arguably their best player on defense
11:40
Speaker 5: at Jamal Johnson. But now they've got to figure out
11:42
Speaker 5: who's going to play opposite him. And you know he
11:44
Speaker 5: was he was supposed to be that guy. But yeah,
11:46
Speaker 5: I mean, you you get a guy that basically knocks
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Speaker 5: out another guy in the locker room and sends it
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Speaker 5: to the hospital. That's going to cause some some friction
11:55
Speaker 5: and drama within the locker room. So you know, it
11:58
Speaker 5: is a bizarre situation. And yeah, like you said, I mean,
12:02
Speaker 5: this game is no shortage of internal drama and strife.
12:05
Speaker 5: So we'll see because that is going to be the
12:07
Speaker 5: one area of concern for this football team. On defense,
12:10
Speaker 5: like their front seven is pretty stout. I think their
12:12
Speaker 5: defensive line is one of the best in the Big twelve.
12:15
Speaker 5: Jamal Johnson is one of the best, you know safeties
12:17
Speaker 5: in the Big twelve. So you know they're ready to go.
12:20
Speaker 5: But that was a big spot where they were expecting
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Speaker 5: Fields to be a major contributor and this is what
12:23
Speaker 5: it does during fall camps. So the fallout is, you know,
12:26
Speaker 5: who do he hit and is that player now going
12:28
Speaker 5: to be out for an extended period of time and
12:30
Speaker 5: how much depth will be tested there? And you know,
12:32
Speaker 5: now what do they do at safety?
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Speaker 4: There's the other wrinkle to this where you know, according
12:37
Speaker 4: to to some to sources hashtag sources, Fields had you know,
12:42
Speaker 4: kind of asked for coaches to intervene with this whole
12:46
Speaker 4: like tension between him and the Easyu Kanma kid the
12:50
Speaker 4: receiver that ended up being the victim of the assault
12:52
Speaker 4: or the alleged victim of the assault, And those same
12:56
Speaker 4: sources were saying that Sunny Dyke's never really was given
13:00
Speaker 4: understanding of how severe the tension between the teammates was.
13:03
Speaker 4: But head coaches typically don't have to.
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Speaker 3: Intervene on that level.
13:07
Speaker 4: Usually this is a GA slash position coach thing that
13:10
Speaker 4: is like, hey, knock it off, you know, do your
13:13
Speaker 4: talking on the field and then your teammates in the
13:15
Speaker 4: locker room whatever. But there was that wrinkled to it
13:19
Speaker 4: as well, that like there's maybe some negligence on at
13:21
Speaker 4: least one member of the staff here. If if Fields
13:25
Speaker 4: did indeed tell a coach like, hey man, this is
13:27
Speaker 4: going to escalate if you don't get him to shut up,
13:29
Speaker 4: or you don't get them off me or whatever else
13:33
Speaker 4: the coach's job. I mean, it's we're not talking about ari.
13:36
Speaker 4: I'm preaching to the choir here. I realized that, but
13:38
Speaker 4: we're not talking about something in springball. We're talking about
13:41
Speaker 4: they got when this happened. They had a game in
13:43
Speaker 4: ten days, So like maybe Sunny Dikes has to address
13:48
Speaker 4: that with the coaching staff too.
13:50
Speaker 3: I'm not sure.
13:51
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, I mean it's a great point. And like
13:54
Speaker 5: I also wonder, you know, it's one of those things
13:57
Speaker 5: where if you're a coach, you know, did you see
14:00
Speaker 5: certain warning signs, but did you not realize that those
14:03
Speaker 5: were warning signs? Is just one of the negative drawbacks
14:06
Speaker 5: of you know, a really expedited portal. You know, remember
14:10
Speaker 5: there was only one portal this year, so instead of
14:14
Speaker 5: you know, two to sort of go through spring and
14:17
Speaker 5: then make some decisions where maybe this kid goes through
14:20
Speaker 5: spring and starts to have some disagreement with some of
14:23
Speaker 5: these other guys, you know, could he have entered the
14:25
Speaker 5: portal and left you know, I mean this could be
14:28
Speaker 5: the result of just the one portal deal where you
14:31
Speaker 5: had to furiously fill out your roster and you're not
14:34
Speaker 5: really able to take into account what the chemistry could
14:37
Speaker 5: could be within that. So I mean, I think it's
14:39
Speaker 5: a great point in your part too. Also, like you know,
14:42
Speaker 5: guys are getting after each other this time of year,
14:45
Speaker 5: like they're sick and tired of hitting each other. They
14:46
Speaker 5: want to hit somebody else, And you know, how seriously
14:50
Speaker 5: do you take these sorts of things, Because I'm sure
14:53
Speaker 5: in the past. You may have as a coach, heard this,
14:55
Speaker 5: but did you realize did you not you know, did
14:57
Speaker 5: that not escalate to this point? I would I would
15:01
Speaker 5: imagine Sunny Dyke's is doing some sort of post mortem here,
15:06
Speaker 5: because if not, then he's not doing his job. His
15:09
Speaker 5: job is to evaluate what went wrong here and how
15:12
Speaker 5: this got to such a bad point and the chain
15:14
Speaker 5: of command, like what lagged because you know, serious or
15:19
Speaker 5: unseerious of a threat. You know, this leads to a
15:22
Speaker 5: whole bunch of drama that you don't need right before
15:24
Speaker 5: your season starts. And the situation that you know is
15:27
Speaker 5: not is pretty unique, you know, within your your set
15:31
Speaker 5: of circumstances here. I mean we there's obviously drama on,
15:34
Speaker 5: there's fighting and stuff, but to like knock a guy
15:36
Speaker 5: out cold and set him to the hospital, you.
15:40
Speaker 4: Can allegedly kick him in the head after he was
15:42
Speaker 4: knocked out cold.
15:43
Speaker 3: According to another source, that was right.
15:46
Speaker 4: I mean, that's crazy, that's and that's where the aggravated
15:50
Speaker 4: in the assault comes from.
15:51
Speaker 5: Yeah, right, Like you're you're trying to do more damage
15:53
Speaker 5: than just you know, shut this guy up, like you
15:56
Speaker 5: are you this guy has bothered you to the point
15:58
Speaker 5: where you are trying to kill him because I don't
16:02
Speaker 5: know how else to take those acts that happened. And
16:05
Speaker 5: so yeah, I mean again, like football, it's intense. There's
16:09
Speaker 5: a lot of guys that there's a lot of us
16:11
Speaker 5: talking this time of year. You know, there's a lot
16:13
Speaker 5: of new guys you're bringing in. You're trying to infuse
16:15
Speaker 5: competition while you know, making sure that everything stays above board.
16:19
Speaker 5: So I'm sure there's an element of like, I didn't
16:21
Speaker 5: realize it was going to go this far, but you've
16:22
Speaker 5: got to do a post morning after Sunny Dyke. So
16:24
Speaker 5: it's it's a complete breakdown within your program, regardless of
16:28
Speaker 5: how culpable they are or aren't, you know, I mean,
16:31
Speaker 5: this happens, and maybe there were no warning signs, you're
16:34
Speaker 5: still culpable as a coach for this being a part
16:36
Speaker 5: of your program.
16:39
Speaker 4: We are, what nine days away from Utah kicking off
16:43
Speaker 4: their season. The camp is done, it's now game prep
16:47
Speaker 4: and game installing. Things like that all around the Big
16:50
Speaker 4: Twelve Conference and here in Salt Lake, we've talked about
16:52
Speaker 4: position battles that intrigue us if I open.
16:56
Speaker 3: It up to the whole conference.
16:57
Speaker 4: Is there a position battle that you were paying close
17:00
Speaker 4: attention to for any of the Big twelve teams this
17:02
Speaker 4: year because that should be resolved.
17:06
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think you've got quarterback battles and
17:11
Speaker 5: two spots. You know, it looks like Cutter Bowley will
17:14
Speaker 5: be the starter in Arizona State, but we're not entirely
17:17
Speaker 5: certain of that. And for a team that you know
17:19
Speaker 5: should at least factor in the top half of the league,
17:22
Speaker 5: you know, that's pretty significant Kansas too, but I'm not
17:25
Speaker 5: sure that you know they're going to factor into the
17:27
Speaker 5: top half of the league. There's battles for left tackle
17:31
Speaker 5: in some spots.
17:33
Speaker 3: You know.
17:33
Speaker 5: Obviously, Utah's got battles along their offensive line they're trying
17:36
Speaker 5: to figure out. So you know, safety Texas Tech has
17:39
Speaker 5: a has a battle opposite Brendon Jordan. Is their their
17:42
Speaker 5: other safety on defense. We just talked about TCU Jamel
17:45
Speaker 5: Johnson and who the other safety will be there with
17:47
Speaker 5: Jacob Fields out. So yeah, I think there are some
17:51
Speaker 5: decent battles that rage on here, and you know, I
17:54
Speaker 5: think with quarterback that'll be a really interesting one, especially
17:56
Speaker 5: with you know, last few seasons. Whoever, there's been guys
18:00
Speaker 5: that were named starters that didn't make it through a
18:03
Speaker 5: few games. There's injuries that will happen. You know, we
18:06
Speaker 5: start with sixteen quarterbacks, I'm sure we'll end up seeing
18:09
Speaker 5: you know, maybe twice as many of that, you know,
18:12
Speaker 5: across the board. I mean, USCF played five quarterbacks, had
18:15
Speaker 5: to start five different quarterbacks last year, So that will
18:17
Speaker 5: always be an interesting one to me too. As you
18:20
Speaker 5: sort of survey the Big Twelve, it's also reallyaesting to
18:23
Speaker 5: oc to see, you know, like I took a look
18:26
Speaker 5: at seven different bowl projections across like CBS, ESPN, College
18:30
Speaker 5: Football News, Athlon on three, you know, and just to
18:35
Speaker 5: see the sort of variance of the beliefs of the
18:38
Speaker 5: Big twelve. All seven that I looked at, zero of
18:42
Speaker 5: seven had the Big Twelve with the top four seed,
18:45
Speaker 5: but four of seven had the Big Twelve with two
18:47
Speaker 5: playoff teams. In fact, Pete Futech had Utah finishing number
18:51
Speaker 5: twelve but finishing outside the playoff because of that automatic
18:54
Speaker 5: bid for the group of six. And I'm there was
18:57
Speaker 5: one writer that had Utah not even playing in a
18:59
Speaker 5: bowl game. So it's interesting to see sort of the
19:01
Speaker 5: discrepancies that some of these writers will have in terms
19:04
Speaker 5: of boll projections, the one other than Utah. It was
19:07
Speaker 5: really interesting in terms of the variance that some of
19:09
Speaker 5: the writers had was that the two teams that went
19:11
Speaker 5: zero for seven in bold projections, the only two teams
19:14
Speaker 5: that were not in any of those seven bold projections
19:17
Speaker 5: were both Iowa stayed in Colorado.
19:22
Speaker 4: You're doing some stuff with the Cowboys Star time at
19:25
Speaker 4: the Haymaker Network, and it's like little viral moment from
19:29
Speaker 4: a preseason where Schiah's Pete got to play for the Cowboys,
19:34
Speaker 4: the first Navajo NFL player as far as we know,
19:39
Speaker 4: and the reaction he got, the support that he got,
19:45
Speaker 4: the postgame speech, all of.
19:47
Speaker 3: It kind of heartwarming if nothing else.
19:50
Speaker 4: And there's questions about whether or not this guy's going
19:52
Speaker 4: to be on the practice squad where he's going to
19:54
Speaker 4: be an active roster type player. He's a really inspiring
19:57
Speaker 4: story going all the way back to you know, being
20:00
Speaker 4: raised on a reservation and finding his way into football.
20:03
Speaker 4: But I wanted, you know, to give you an opportunity
20:06
Speaker 4: to add more context to it and talk more about
20:09
Speaker 4: it because it was one of the big big things
20:12
Speaker 4: that came off of social media from a preseason weekend.
20:16
Speaker 5: Yeah, and the presence of the Navajo tribe at the stadium,
20:21
Speaker 5: you know, showing him their appreciation. It really was a
20:24
Speaker 5: remarkable situation. Everything you just outline there. I would encourage
20:28
Speaker 5: people that have not seen this to go find it
20:30
Speaker 5: on social media. The video of the standing ovation that
20:33
Speaker 5: he got, the video of him talk in the locker room,
20:36
Speaker 5: all of it, and you know, look some of it
20:38
Speaker 5: you could you could, you know, it's corny or whatever,
20:41
Speaker 5: but like just the essence of football and like what
20:44
Speaker 5: football has meant to this person and how much that
20:48
Speaker 5: person brings to the forefront in terms of you know,
20:53
Speaker 5: just helping people understand what's happening and being a visibility
20:56
Speaker 5: for the Navajo, right, Like that stuff is so cool.
21:00
Speaker 5: I mean, there's just something like it. I love it.
21:02
Speaker 5: It really is one of the most unique and amazing
21:04
Speaker 5: things about sports that you know, suddenly you can see
21:07
Speaker 5: these stories that you know, transcend the sport itself. You know,
21:12
Speaker 5: I'm pretty confident he's going to be a practice squad
21:14
Speaker 5: player for the Cowboys this year, Like they've had this
21:17
Speaker 5: over the years where they bring in projects along the
21:20
Speaker 5: offensive line. I certainly think that that's gonna be the
21:23
Speaker 5: case for him. I don't see him being you know,
21:25
Speaker 5: a hot commodity in terms of you know, not being
21:28
Speaker 5: able to pass their waivers once he doesn't make the roster.
21:31
Speaker 5: But here's a guy I think over the next couple
21:32
Speaker 5: of years to watch and track to see his growth
21:34
Speaker 5: and see if he can become an NFL player, because, like,
21:37
Speaker 5: you know, it's funny. I think most of the guys
21:40
Speaker 5: that will start in the Big twelve as part of
21:42
Speaker 5: the two deep, oh, they all think they're going to
21:43
Speaker 5: play in the NFL, and the reality is like one
21:45
Speaker 5: percent of them are going to play in the NFL,
21:47
Speaker 5: only the top of the top. And so like for me,
21:50
Speaker 5: it's just really interesting, Like you see these stories of
21:53
Speaker 5: guys that like had no shot, that are you know,
21:55
Speaker 5: that are constantly bucking the trend. And I think following him,
21:58
Speaker 5: seeing him his career, if he can do it, like
22:00
Speaker 5: the work that goes into it, would be an incredible story.
22:03
Speaker 4: All Right, the next time I talk to you, we're
22:05
Speaker 4: gonna have actual college football game play to react to.
22:09
Speaker 3: Wow, how wonderful was that?
22:12
Speaker 5: It's a beautiful thing. And no more courts, no more courts.
22:17
Speaker 3: Knock on wood, let's not curse ourselves. Are you the man? Thanks?
22:22
Speaker 3: For jumping on again. Appreciate you. Take care of se
22:26
Speaker 3: Ari Tempkin Big Twelve Today over on tune In Radio.
22:30
Speaker 4: Also doing some work with the Cowboys for the Haymaker
22:33
Speaker 4: Network Star Time. Also, if you haven't checked out Southern
22:37
Speaker 4: Steer Butcher yet, I really don't know what you're waiting for.
22:40
Speaker 4: I've been talking about it for a few weeks now,
22:43
Speaker 4: but no more excuses because college football season is upon us.
22:50
Speaker 3: This week. Zero stuff that we're talking about.
22:53
Speaker 4: Utah not playing BYU not playing only one Big twelve
22:56
Speaker 4: team and TCU is playing a perfect dry run for
23:00
Speaker 4: you to kind of rehearse your tailgating, rehearse your game
23:04
Speaker 4: day grilling.
23:05
Speaker 3: And if you're gonna give it.
23:06
Speaker 4: The real shot, if you're gonna give it the old
23:08
Speaker 4: college try, you gotta do it with the actual product.
23:11
Speaker 4: You're gonna be making up for all your guests when
23:14
Speaker 4: they come over to watch the utes or when you
23:17
Speaker 4: take it up to the tailgate party at the University
23:20
Speaker 4: of Utah up at Rice Eycle Stadium in those parking lots.
23:23
Speaker 4: Southern Steer at seventeen oh five North Redwood Road wants
23:27
Speaker 4: to get you set up with the best meats for
23:30
Speaker 4: your tailgate.
23:31
Speaker 3: They've got great prices.
23:32
Speaker 4: Three ninety nine pound for the all natural chicken, five
23:35
Speaker 4: ninety nine pounds for the pork chops, the black angus
23:38
Speaker 4: ground beef seven And this is hormone.
23:42
Speaker 3: Free, humanely raised, free range stuff.
23:46
Speaker 4: This is not the factory farm, extra antibiotics, chemical laden
23:50
Speaker 4: meat that you're used to from a supermarket. Southern Steer
23:54
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23:59
Speaker 4: want something besides beef, chicken, pork, turkey, you want something
24:05
Speaker 4: a little outside the box, just go let Dan and
24:07
Speaker 4: Aubrey gun throw. The owners know they'll track down a
24:11
Speaker 4: little wild boar for you. They'll get you some elk,
24:14
Speaker 4: they'll maybe get you those ostrich burgers. You just got
24:17
Speaker 4: to give them a little bit of notice and they'll
24:19
Speaker 4: make sure that they can get it on the shelves
24:20
Speaker 4: at Southern Steer for you.
24:22
Speaker 3: Join the Southern Steer Reward Club. Tellamosi sent you.
24:25
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24:32
Speaker 4: Everything you need for the tailgate and college football season
24:35
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24:36
Speaker 3: So use Week zero as your dry run.
24:39
Speaker 4: Let Southern Steer be your supplier for all your tailgate
24:43
Speaker 4: parties and all of your game day grills. Seventeen oh
24:47
Speaker 4: five North Redwood Road, down in Saratoga Springs.
24:49
Speaker 3: Telamos sent you