Latest / Bottom Line on Sports / College Football Special: Protect College Sports Act, Coach Prime, How NIL Changes Programs & Ohio State

Transcript

College Football Special: Protect College Sports Act, Coach Prime, How NIL Changes Programs & Ohio State · Bottom Line on Sports

• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: What's up everybody?
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to another episode of the bottom line on sports.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_02: He's Jeremy Pink.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Jean-Jacques Taylor.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: And this is our show about the intersection of sports and money.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_02: You know how we get down.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_02: We like to start every show with a number after we ask you to subscribe, rate, and review.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_02: Five stars only.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: Now we got that out the way.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: The number this week, my friend, is what?
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh a million dollars for every star, five million dollars.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: Five million dollars.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that is the Protect College Sports Act, which is kind of weaving its way through the Senate this week.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's the five million dollars is the proposed cap for uh college coaching salaries proposed by two senators, both from the Northeast, both from neighboring states to me, one from Connecticut, actually, one from my home state of New Jersey and one from uh Connecticut, saying that college football coaches should be capped or college coaches should be capped at five million dollars a year in payment.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_02: Clearly, two senators who have never paid any attention to college football in the last 25, 30 years.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I guess I should say I appreciate your effort in trying to put a cap on coaching salaries, but I'd appreciate it more if you had like a realistic cap.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: Like we and I'm just throwing out numbers, maybe we could cap it at 15 million in 2027 and whatever the standard cost of living raise is for every year, you know, maybe 17 or 18 million next, whatever.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: But the bigger, bigger question is why is Congress even talking about this?
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: What what what is the Protect College Sports Act even gonna do?
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: Is it gonna be helpful to the players?
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: No, it can't, yeah, exactly.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, there's a lot of components to this.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_02: It's a very frustrating bill to me, and it's frustrating to me because you know, and I'm just gonna say it like it is, man.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: This is about limiting the amount of money young black men predominantly can make.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's what it is.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's all it is, and it's it's also limiting flexibility of them, too.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_02: Right, you know, because the coaches don't feel like they have control, so they want control, and because they couldn't really get it, they started talking to Congress to make it federal so you can get so that they could get it.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_02: Right, and it's very disappointing to me.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and there's no it's no there's no surprise that Nick Saban is involved in this because he essentially left college football when everything changed.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then you look at somebody like Davo Sweeney, who hasn't been able to adapt to the new college football, you know, and so it is designed to protect old college sports and protect the old way the college sports were were working.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it has nothing to do with protecting college sports in general.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and when they talk about, you know, one of the things uh this is a system that can't work, the uh athletic departments can't sustain this.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_02: Well, let me tell you the truth.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: The truth is you can sustain the payrolls to players.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_02: Now, maybe you can't sustain$80 million buyouts to Jimbo Fisher, and you know, I think Matt Rule's got an$80 million buyout.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe you can't afford those for when you make bad hires and you want to fire a coach.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: How about LSU?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_02: They're paying three coaches in addition to Lane uh Kiffin this year.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_02: So you want to make up for the bad financial mistakes the athletic directors have made by punishing the players who had and see here's the deal, man.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: This is supposed to be capitalism.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_02: If you have a 1% skill, it doesn't matter if you're a concert pianist.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_02: Or how about this?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_02: I saw on Twitter the other day a young, uh, young black girl, about 10 years old, uh has something like the best operatic voice ever for a 10-year-old.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_02: So guess what she's doing?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: She's singing opera and banking money.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: And she's making money.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Now that's and that's and that's how that's how it should be.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: I do think that there should be some level of governance to college sports.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and and I do think, you know, what's in the bill also is to limit the number of times a college player can transfer.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's to limit age and eligibility for college players.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: I I think those rules are, you know, certainly for discussion.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_02: We can talk about those.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can talk about those.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: But this actually shows to me what is sorely lacking in college sports in general, which is some sort of governing body with some sort of teeth.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's number one.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, the I I agree, I tend to agree with you about the reason the College Sports Act, Protect College Sports Acts exists in in one way, and what one reason is because it essentially means the players aren't going to be able to unionize or create a players union, you know, and and again, that's a problem too.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: So so it's it's none of it's good.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: College sports need to have, you know, needs to get its act together, and the Big Ten and the SEC should come together and force and create a a broader governing body for the sport, and actually, you know, actually put in guardrails or rules that make sense for the players.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um course that'll never happen, but because it's it's all about the coaches and the money, um, and the administrators and their money.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: And it's about the control of the coaches, and it's about the control of the administrators.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_02: No, you're right.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um, like I would have no problem if they wanted to say when you graduate from high school, you got five years, whether you play all five or red shirt for it, whatever.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_02: You got five years to get in and get out.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have any problem with that.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have any problem putting some guardrails on transferring, but I don't think you should be able to limit it.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: I think you should be able to say you have to be on board to graduate in five years.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_02: So after year two, you should have, you know, sophomore credits.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_02: And if transferring to said college doesn't allow you to have sophomore credits, then you can't go.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_02: Or something like that, where it's tied to your academic achievement.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_02: And then that alone will stop some transfers because some cats just won't add the credits.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: But but if you're going to limit transfers, which I think there's so I do think there it makes sense to limit age rules.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: And and one of the things in the Protect College Sports Act that kind of makes sense to me is like limit the age range from 19 to 24 and make five years of eligibility.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: That feels okay.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't feel onerous or that that feels fine because you don't want to have you know 28 year olds.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you don't want you don't want to have that.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's number one.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but if you're going to limit transfer and mobility for college players, why don't you do the same thing for coaches?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, no.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_02: Coach, they're grown men.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: But that's but that's they have families.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the point.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: And it also means that you know the the administrations will have to figure out man, if we don't like the coach, we're stuck with them for a couple of years, as opposed to we're gonna get rid of them every six months or every every you know every season.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um uh you're right, because what happens?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: They fire me, they hire you.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: What's going to happen when you come in?
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: Half the players who play for me don't fit your system, don't fit your scheme, and then the coaching staff, you bring in another third of them, their personalities don't fit because I was a laid-back players coach and you're a Stern Taskmaster, so that doesn't work, but now I'm stuck.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and you know that which is uh, you know, uh cow poop.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it's like it's it's you know what it's it's limiting the mobility for the coaches, everybody would be up in arms about because that's limiting you know labor and restricting, but I I can tell you right now, that rule was implemented, it would be an entirely different college coaching system in place right now.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not dissimilar to sort of term limits in Congress.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Once you limit the amount of time you spend in Congress, I think the politics changes pretty rapidly.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, and so so I think that it it is it is theoretically designed, and even the name of it is Protect College Sports Act, and that's not what it is at all.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's control college sports act, right?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Or it's to protect the status quo in college sports that favors the coaches and the administrators.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so the bottom line for me, man, is it's a crap bill, but uh because the administrators want it done and politicians want it done because they think the people want it done, it'll get done.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_02: Uh because all the politicians care about is uh is this something that people will vote for me affirmatively for because I I helped pass it.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um and they're all buddies with the coaches anyway.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: Bottom line for me, this is completely unnecessary.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it won't work, it'll ultimately probably be challenged, and the only thing that might survive is gonna be some sort of federal antitrust exemption because that happens in other professional sports in terms of you know negotiating television contracts and such.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but we'll see.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: We'll see.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: I I think that this uh uh I think this should light a fire under the Big Ten, the SEC, and the major conferences to get their act together and get their own governing body.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: But as we all know, they can't even figure out the number of teams they want to have in the playoffs.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that's never gonna happen.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, you're right about that.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, let's move on to one of the biggest names in college football.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: My guy, Deion Sanders.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_02: Deion?
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I call him My Guy because I spent the 2023 season with him in Jackson, uh Mississippi chronicling his season and turned that into a book called Coach Prime, uh Deion Sanders and A Megan of Men, uh, which came out in October 23.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was three years ago already.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, great book.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: You should buy it if you haven't.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: See, there you go.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: You can find it wherever you find books.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: Amazon, you got it.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Did you do an audio book?
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because I I read it.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't audio book was fantastic.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: And did you did you voice it yourself?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_02: No, that's why it was fantastic.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I forget the guy's name who did it, but he does several.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: But he he, I mean, he was it was fantastic, uh, the way he did it.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so no, it was it was really good listening.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, if you're in audio books like I am.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_02: But uh, I'm actually going to see Dion uh Saturday when they play Baylor because that's about an hour and 15-minute drive from my house.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_02: Because I live in southern Dallas and uh Waco is about a hundred miles from Dallas.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: So we're both going to college football games this weekend.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yours is a little better tilt than mine.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: You're seeing Colorado Baylor.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to uh uh the Coliseum to see Oregon uh play USC.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm impressed with you.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_02: You made several cross-country trips to see your kids.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's I know I who's to say I'm seeing my kids, or am I going for the football game?
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Either you don't know.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but Dion made headlines this week because first uh his team, the Colorado Buffaloes, got stomped by Northwestern 41 to 7.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_02: And then afterwards, uh he was dismayed because he saw, as he said, several of his players laughing and joking and acting like it wasn't a big deal as they walked off the field.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_02: And if you don't know Dion, you can get caught up in the fact that Dion, the aura that you saw as a player, is the same dude he is as a coach.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_02: And nothing could be further from the truth.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_02: He's as old school as Bear Bryant and Nick Saban and any of those other guys.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I mean, he is the oldest of old school coaches.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like, everybody's got to wear the same thing to practice, everybody's socks got to be a certain length, no earrings.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: I mean he's about he's about discipline.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: He's about yeah, yeah, literally.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so, and the other thing is um, you know, there's this perception he's a great player.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, that's not a perception, but you know, he just got by on athletic ability.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, Dion will tell you, and anybody you talk to about him, he was one of the hardest workers in practice.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_02: As he said, practice was my game, which meant the game became easy to me on Sundays.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_02: So you take all of that as a background, especially somebody who's very competitive, and then you see some of your players laughing after they got whooped 41 to 7.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_02: And so um he came out the next day, man, and said he cut several of the players from his team.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: Uh they were they were they were they were exhibiting that behavior.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_02: And uh, you know, you that's something that you don't see a lot in today's college football.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe you have him run some stands or do some other thing, but cut them from the team.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I'm sure they got to keep the scholarships, but just cut them from the football program.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_02: That's something you don't see often.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_02: But he he said, uh, and I'm paraphrasing that uh he let some of that go last year for some reason, and he just decided, okay, I uh it's gone too far, I gotta stomp it out right now.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's did you think now I because I don't, I don't think that would have happened uh if they were really college athletes.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think that they were, you know, they would have been given a second chance, they would have been counseled and talked to.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I think because college football players are essentially professional athletes now, I don't think it's that, you know, I think it's uh a coach is more likely to do that than they would have maybe 10 years ago.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_02: That's an interesting thing.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: I think some of it uh because we don't know who it was, we can probably guess that they were low-performing players, didn't make a lot of money, if if at all.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_02: And and so you know, it's like when Jimmy Johnson used to cut players for the Cowboys for sleeping in meetings, or he chastised, hey, get out, run over to the asthma field.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_02: You never did that with superstars.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: Of course not.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_02: You do it with the least valuable players and send a message that way, right?
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: So I assume that's the type of player that he removed from the team.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, he possibly, but you know, uh, if that if the beat reporters in Colorado are really good, they'll be able to find out, you know, and certainly during the next game, who's not on the who's not on the roster that was.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: So because Dion is so old school, um, this is one reason probably why, and you you should, you know, I I don't know, but probably why Colorado is maybe they're struggling a bit compared to other college football programs.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: They maybe they don't have the money, maybe Dion has Dion not, you know, embraced it as much, has he, or is it just a matter of Colorado doesn't have the money to compete with the Ohio states of the world?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's uh there's several factors going against them.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_02: That's all my opinion, but I think uh his biggest asset when he arrived at Jackson State, when he went to Colorado, his biggest asset was come to Colorado, come to Jackson State.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: I can show you how to market your abilities, how to make money off the field, I can teach you the game, you can get to the NFL.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: While you're here, we'll have rappers in the in the locker room that you've heard of.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_02: You'll get to know them, whether it's uh Gallo and um my other guy, or you know, whatever.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_02: There'll be superstars all over the place, actors, celebrities.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_02: It'll be great.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_02: And that worked until people started paying people.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_02: And then, and I think people forget that these kids got parents.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_02: And if you think, even if you think about Ohio State and the legend-based saga where his mom wanted him to go to Tennessee because Tennessee wrote her a big check and got her a job, and he was like, But I want to go to Ohio State.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_02: She's like, No, you want to go to Tennessee, you know.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_02: So, what I'm saying is, uh and I we we took we we were laughing about it earlier.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: We both got sons.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: They could Dion could recruit each of our sons and say, hey, and they could come to us and say, Hey, Dion's the greatest guy ever, Dad.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_02: Hey, what's the NIL package over at Colorado?
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_02: They're offering us 500,000.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_02: Hey, Aiden, AJ, that sounds great, but you're getting offered a million by USC and a million one by Alabama and a million two by Ohio State.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_02: Pick any one of them three schools you want to do.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: I would say you're picking Ohio State because it's 1.2 million.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's there.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_02: So it becomes a money issue and it doesn't even matter the other stuff.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: So the so the discussion or or the which again reinforces the idea that this is professional football, because you're gonna go in a free market, you know, you can go anywhere you want, but in a free market, labor tends to go to the highest bidder, or if not the highest bidder, it goes to a one of the highest bidders who might have the best situation.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's one of those two things, right?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: And Dion may be the best situation, but it's not one of the highest bidders.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: So no matter how good the situation is, it's not going to be as attractive to top recruits.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, here's the other thing.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and you just touched on it.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_02: Colorado ain't got no money.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, relatively speaking, for what they can spend on NIL, I mean, think about it.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_02: You can go Google Colorado higher, Colorado signs Sanders to an extension.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_02: They had to go find the money, man.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_02: He got 10 million a year, I believe, but they had to go find the money.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_02: Like, where is where are we getting the money from to pay him?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so when you talk about funding a roster, even if it's at 15, 20, 25 million, which is on the low end of Division I power for programs, um, they don't have a whole lot of extra money.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: And so they're not offering guys big dollars.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_02: It's one reason why Jordan Seaton left the left tackle, left for LSU in four million dollars a year.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's also shows you how out of touch the Protect College Sports Act is with a proposal for five million dollars a year to cap coaches' salaries.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that that also capped that that legislation also wants to cap, essentially create a salary cap, uh, what whatever a compensation cap or an NIL cap, I don't know exactly the terminology they're using for all college programs to try to put them on, to try to put them on equal footing uh and try to make them uh you know as as competitive.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um again, who knows if that's gonna do anything, and there's no reason to have a salary cap on there that I can see.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: Let's uh let's be real, man.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_02: The salary cap, just like it does in professional sports, serves only to enrich the owners.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's a yeah, it does two things.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: One, it right, well, to enrich the owners, what it does is you you always say this, it saves the owners from themselves.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Offering crazy contracts or or you know, spending all their money on contracts.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: But uh it, you know, it it also makes their cost predictable, it makes them you know artificially low, it's not market-based.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, precisely.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_02: And the second thing is uh when you think about this, and the reason why Sally Cat to me is dumb.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, Jerry, what's going to happen when you tell Ohio State and Alabama and Florida you can only pay your roster$20 million a year?
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_02: The duffel bags are coming back.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, of course, so you're not but so you're not going to stop anything because people are still going to get paid, they're just going to be like the SEC liked it, where it was under the table.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so everybody'll be paying under the table, or you know, we'll get our kids jobs at a golf course making$125 an hour.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe they can maybe make it get maybe gonna get Kawhi to help them figure out how to get news, you know, do do some of these sponsorship deals where you don't have to do much for them or anything for them.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: But but but essentially that'll things there'll be sort of creative ways that that will happen.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I think that's the biggest problem for Dion, man.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_02: He his team doesn't have any NIL money, his school doesn't have the NIL money to compete at the highest level.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, second, his charisma and the stuff that made him special is not is doesn't win against money.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: And finally, now this is this part time Dion, the other two aren't really his fault per se.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: In my opinion, the other thing about Dion is and we say this all the time, man, same thing make you laugh, make you cry.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_02: He's so competitive that, and I've talked to him about this on numerous occasions, he's also impatient, he doesn't have patience for things that don't work.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so to me, and when I see him this weekend, I'm gonna ask him about it.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think he's had he's been in Colorado three, this is year number three, no year number four.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: Year number four, yeah.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: Off the top of my head, he's probably had five offensive coordinators, maybe six.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_02: And he's had significant roster, you know, 65, 75.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, he's had major turnovers.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_02: Roster turnover area.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_02: So what I'm saying is the other thing he's been unable to do is what?
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: Colorado has zero identity.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what is Colorado football?
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, who knows?
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_02: Because everything is forever changing.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: We're drop back, we're run, we're now we're pass.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: We got we produce great receivers.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: No, now we're two-back running team with the option and the gadget off.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_02: They don't do they're not anything.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: And because you don't have an identity, that makes it even harder to recruit.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: Like, if you're recruiting at Alabama, you say, Hey, look at all the defensive linemen and players we put in the NFL.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_02: If you're at Ohio, if you're at Ohio State, look at all the receivers we put in the league.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_02: If you're in Texas, look at what we do.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_02: This is how we play.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um You know, but Colorado can't do that just from uh identity and style of coaching.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's it's hard to win like that.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they c they can't build anything, they can't build anything, you know, meaningful either, because if players are developed there, they can't afford to keep them.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that too.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of a lot of programs got that problem.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so that is they are essentially becoming feeder schools.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's sort of a feeder to some of the larger schools, not quite.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it also it also struck me this weekend.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: I actually had forgotten the name of the Colorado two-way player who won the Heisman Trophy.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'd forgotten his name because he's Travis Hunt.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: Of course.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: No, and now I I then I recalled.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then I was looking up to see what he did, what he's been doing in the pros.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: He's doing nothing.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I don't know, I don't know the reason why.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if it's him, I don't know if it's Jacksonville, I don't know if it's a scheme, I don't know if they drafted a two-way player and then can't figure out whether to put him on offense or defense.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: I'm guessing that's it.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: He's he's sort of un underdeveloped on both sides, therefore he hasn't developed at all.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: That would be my guess.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: But but the reason I thought of him was because he's he and Shador are really the only couple of Colorado players who've kind of broken through in the last you know three or four years since Dion has been there.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if I'm a you know college player and I'm looking to go get my name out there and go to some, you know, play in play on television on Saturday afternoons or Saturday nights every every week, I'm also not going to Colorado.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and that's a whole it's a whole thing that happens, the thing that happened, man, is when he had, and he did it a little bit, but he couldn't sustain it.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_02: When Shador and Travis were there the next year, that had to be a huge recruiting year because you had all that going in your favor.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_02: And you needed some of those, and so I don't think you had a huge recruiting year, but then you needed some of those guys like a Jordan Seaton and some others to really develop so you could say, Oh, look, it just wasn't used to, we're doing it, and then you can start to get players.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_02: But when that didn't happen, you know, they just became kind of the Kyle Ryder of the old.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, what's the bottom line for you on Dion?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, bottom line for me, man, is uh uh that's a good question.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_02: I'm trying to figure it out.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: Is when the NIL came, his one superpower left, and he hasn't figured out how to compensate for that.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but yeah, I'm very similar.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: The bottom line for me is Dion may be a great coach, but it doesn't really matter.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Much like the NBA, you can be a great coach.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't have great players, you're not gonna win many games.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: In college football, you can be a great coach.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: If you can't afford the best players, you're not gonna win a lot of games.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: No, that's that's a great way to put it.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_02: So uh and that's actually a good segue into we're talking about the NIL, and if you think about it, since the NIL has really jumped off, to me, it's made some programs like uh Indiana and Texas Tech that was largely irrelevant before NIL.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_02: It's enhanced some programs kind of like Miami and Ole Miss, which were kind of middle of the middle of the uh, you know, they're they were good programs, solid, but they weren't special.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: Well, NIL helped them leap to the top, and then I think it's affected some programs like Alabama, where and Clemson, which were at the top, didn't change with the times, and now you know Clemson's already done.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_02: And Alabama, if it's not careful, they'll be done.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: I I think that's I think that's right.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: And what happens is the schools that you name, with the exception of Ole Miss, the schools that you name, the Indiana's, the Miamis, the Texas Tex, either have a huge alumni base or an alumni base that has such a concentrated amount of wealth, like Texas Tech does, uh that can buy players, that can, you know, attract uh attract the top coaches, that can be competitive.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: And you can do that, you can do that uh instantly.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and what what I what I find pretty interesting about Ole Miss is that they vaulted into you know a top 15 program right now, I would say.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: And this this year they're they're doing well.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it seems to be not necessarily the coach doesn't seem to be maybe as meaningful as as you might have thought because they replaced Lane Kiffin, and the new coach is doing essentially the same thing, you know, at the program.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: He's got good players and and they just and he just beat his former coach.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: Well, see his his thing is we won't know about him for another year or two because the reality of it is he's some of it he's winning with with the with the with the few good players that Lane left, you know, and they supplemented the roster.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: But the the biggest thing for them is a quarterback and a running back, and both of them decided not to go to LSU.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_02: And so you're still winning with kind of the core of Lane's team.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, what happens is you got to have people who spend money to keep those guys.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_02: I think uh Trinidad Chambliss is making five million dollars a year this year, something like that.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: I I think that's I think that's fair.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think that they have, you know, certainly Chambliss is is a reason they're they're one of the top teams, but there's a lot of players who left to go with Lane Kiffin.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: They have to replace him, you know, and that's uh that and that's that's emblematic of the new era that we're in.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to have coaches and administrations that are that are nimble enough to anticipate that and replace those players.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you know, part of the thing coaches get irritated by is I gotta recruit my roster every year.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_02: And that's true.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_02: Uh welcome to life.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and look at and and the other thing is that you can also the the depth of the teams are much, much uh shallower now.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because you look at a backup, a backup looks around and goes, listen, I could be a backup at Ohio State and make you know X million dollars a year, or I could be a starter at Louisville, let's say, just just throwing out a random example there.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I could be a starter at Louisville, probably make close to the same money, but I'm gonna get to play.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_02: And if he stays another year, he will not be making that money next year.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: In that, in that that that dynamic really, really changes things.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got the better teams need to pay up to keep and retain their players, but they also, to your point, kind of have to restock every year because the backups are going to look around and go, okay, I maybe I make 10% less money, but I'll get to play, but I'll be visible, and that might actually be worth more to me in the long term.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I don't think there's any doubt.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_02: The depth has has been uh removed at a lot of places, or you know, it's been cut in half.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think, and I think that's that in and of itself is some of the the biggest issues for the SEC teams.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you recall, I I can remember watching SEC football as recently as 10 years ago.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: And if you were just to watch the the players from an SEC team play against one another, they all looked you know at roughly the same level.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: But boy, you take that SEC team and you played against almost any other team in the country, and they not only were they better, their backups were better too, you know, and it was it was it was such a huge delineation.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: You know, what's interesting is I'm curious to hear what you have to say, is every year there used to be well, there's probably four teams that can win it.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_02: There still might only be four teams that can win it, but now there's a lot of teams that can beat one of those four in a one-game playoff.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_02: Doesn't mean that they can make the whole run, right?
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_02: But but if you don't show up to play, they can get you in that one game during the playoff, which I think is actually good for college football.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: I do too.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: I do too.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: And it also means that you've got you know, the you know, the the the amazing story about what happened in college football, and I think, you know, when we look back on it, I think there's going to be one demarcation point that shows you when college football formally flipped.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll tell you when that is.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's when Brian Kelly said, I'm going to LSU because I can't recruit players and I can't win at Notre Dame.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: And he went to LSU because at that particular moment in time he was right, because players all went to the SEC for whatever reason, right?
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: Not implying that they were paying their players a lot more than everybody else.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: I would I would never say that.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: But the SEC, and he went there, but he went there at precisely the wrong time when the NIL era happened.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: Notre Dame is a huge endowment.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: They have a huge amount of money to play uh spend on football.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it's actually better to win, it's it's probably you have a better chance of winning at a school like Notre Dame now than you did at LSU.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's that that change when Brian Kelly left to go to LSU because he didn't think he'd win the national title was precisely the time where had he stayed at Notre Dame, he had a very good chance of winning the national title.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, man.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_02: You should all I mean that he's one of those guys who probably they'll never admit this publicly, he's probably got some imposter syndrome because at any level, you should be able to win at Notre Dame because one is your schedule is going to allow you to compete for a championship most years.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_02: You don't have to play that extra game and a champ, and you're you're the way it was set up, you most years Notre Dame's going to get the benefit of the doubt and get put into the tournament.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, um he just made a bad call on that, which is fine because he's a but but I do think the the reason he made that call is because he was he was living on the old rules of college football.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: I I do think that's why he made that call.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, and LSU is always a good place to go because it's the biggest state school.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_02: They got abundance of talent there.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: And and the the governor runs that school anyway, and the politics there run the school.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: So there's so much money in in LSU.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: But I also think you know Brian Kelly did play Alabama in a national championship game, you know, in the maybe 12, 13 years ago, and they just got absolutely rolled.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: And and and and I think he started to see that happening year in and year out, and said I the only place that has you know he could win is is in the SEC, and that's precisely when the money dynamics flipped.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it made it a school like Notre Dame or a school like Ohio State or or other, you know, even in Indiana.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: And what's funny is um he went down there, and one of his first big recruits is uh Bryce, the quarterback at uh Michigan right now, he had him committed, and then Michigan threw the bag at him and he left.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: And uh yeah, and and so the the whole the whole dynamic has changed.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I so I think the the I think the premium on coaching also is yeah, if you have a five-star at every spot now.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the coaches, right.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that there's two issues, right?
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: One is that you don't have the depth, you're not replacing a five-star with another five-star.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Number one.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is that a lot of coaches were paid because they were great recruiters.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to be a great recruiter now.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're a great recruiter if you say, Look, my stack of money is bigger than your stack of money.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a better recruiter than you.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_02: Well, see, and that evens up evens up a lot of things because some people have made a reputation and careers over being great recruiters.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_02: And now it's it's literally just about a check or situation.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Right, it's about a check.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: So the coach that you hire now has to be a coach who can actually coach.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that that the and that the recruiting is actually going to be done by the you know, the the the general manager or whatever the I forget what the whatever they're called, whatever they're whatever they're called these days, uh, that's handling the money and understands the budget and allocating the budget toward players, certainly with the coach's assistance.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: But this is not, you know, you're not going out to a high school and trying to convince some 19-year-old to come to your school anymore, you know.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: You just one text or one call and say, hey, I'm what what wait a second, Ohio State gave you$5 million?
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'll give you$5.2 million.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_02: That's really why.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_02: Now I was not one of those people that looked up recruiting every day, but I used to follow it.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_02: I don't even follow it now because it's all about a check.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_02: So it's either we paid enough for you that we didn't.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_02: It has nothing to do with the the school or the coaches or anything.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's just, you know, whether you wrote a big enough check.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and also, and also the premium is now finding players who have done something in college at the mid-major level or you know, you know, uh at schools, you know, in the larger.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we got we got one starting at receiver, Devin McEwen from UT San Antonio.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: Although I I was I was higher on him after the first game, but that's a different story altogether.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you'd have been higher on him after the second game if your quarterback hadn't overthrown it for Thomas.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: I know, I know, I know.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: But you'd have been you'd been like, yeah.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but but still, I'll have anyway.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: We'll get to Iowa State in a second and why they can't convert a third down, but that's a different story.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: The uh uh but but yeah, but I but I do think that's why I don't think uh that's why I think Signetti is is a good coach, is a good scheme, is you know, and and he now has the support to get he can buy whatever players he needs to you know complete his scheme.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: So he's gonna be he's gonna he's gonna be a very tough coach to be.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and I don't know what's gonna happen with Whittingham in Michigan.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he's he's been competitive, but he hasn't really had the top, top players.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: So my my my instinct is that you know he's gonna have to learn how to coach more expensive players, and it might take him a little while.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: But but I don't know.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's a great point because that's a really great point because at Utah, I'm just gonna keep it real.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_02: You never get the you never get the best players.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_02: In Michigan, you're getting the best players, but when you get the best players, you're getting the players with best player confidence, best player athletic ability, best player attitude.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_02: And some of those guys will follow in line and be perfect citizens, and some of those guys will be like, hey man, I'm that dude.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_02: Who are you talking to?
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: And you have to figure out how to coach those guys.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that's a great point.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_02: Where I don't think that was that big an issue at Utah, because in Utah, oh, I'm still at a power five.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, I'm great, I'm grateful to be there.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's a great program for what it is.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm happy.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: It's a good program.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: Uh really good.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um it's gonna be it's gonna be a different type of coach that's gonna succeed in this era now.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: And whether you know, Signet is that coach, who whether uh Mario Cristobal, I think, is a very interesting coach right now because I think he uh I think now that he has money and now that he has players, um I think he's a good coach for that type of player.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think he's one of those coaches that coaches the five stars because of his style and and his background and everything.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he's you know, I think he's a good coach for those types of players.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: Same with Marcus Freeman.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: I think Marcus Freeman is, you know, a really good coach for different reasons, you know.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: For different reasons, I think they both can handle that level of talent, you know, and a lot of coaches are just are gonna struggle to handle that level of talent.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's also gonna be so I think that the the attributes for finding your college coach have coach have changed dramatically today than they were 10 years ago.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_00: You wanted somebody with Dabosweeney's background, you wanted somebody with Nick Sabin's background who would kind of impress the families and show up and say, oh wow, he's at the door and he's actually gonna bless my son, and my son's gonna be part of his program.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't matter anymore, that stuff.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you just want some dude with a chick.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_02: Bottom line for me, man.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: Uh NIL has changed the game.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: And again, it's gonna be like social Darwinism, man.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_02: Some cats will adapt and some cats won't.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_02: Those who don't will die.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but but bottom line for me, uh, I think it's I think it's all good for college football.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's players are getting paid, and I like that.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I just hope that the government doesn't create some stupid rules to uh uh stop the evolution of college football that's grown, I think, so much in the last three to four years.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_02: I take it to Ohio State, they open up the Big Ten season home against Illinois this week.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_02: Uh tricky game.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think it's it's it's a you know, Illinois is always kind of a good team.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_02: Or the last few years, they've been a solid team.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_02: You got to strap it up, you got to show up, try to play well.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_02: And if you do, you'll beat them by 10 to 14 points.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: And if you don't, you'll be in the fourth quarter going, oh my god, what are we doing?
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so um, you know, they should beat Illinois by a couple touchdowns if they play the way they're supposed to play.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but uh, you know, it's uh I think everything's uh we're still learning what kind of team they are, what they're all about.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I like some of the stuff they did on offense, even against Kent State.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um because like I think it was their second touchdown there.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_02: They faked uh kind of like one of the typical power run moves and hit the tight end in the flat.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, you know what?
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_02: That's a nice play.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_02: I don't care who it was against, the play design, that's that's a good play at the goal line.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so you know, I like to see stuff like that.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'm still not convinced they can run the ball when they need to run it.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, so and I'm yeah, I'm still, you know, Illinois would be a good test because I still understand pass rush.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_02: And if you can't rush the passes, man, I don't care what level you're playing, yeah, you're gonna have problems.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I I I think there's two, I think the the lines are the the issue for Ohio State this year.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think the problem.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_00: I know, I know, I know.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think the offensive line doesn't, I mean the offensive line looked good for parts of the first half against Texas, yeah, and then and then it faded, and that could have been a function of the weather.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_02: That could have been a function of the weather.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not here's my hot sports opinion.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: I realize Texas beat us, I'm not arguing that anything else happened, but Texas has played one good quarter in the last eight.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right, you know, and so I'm not, and Arch Manning was 16 of 32 for whatever against UT7.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: Arch had a great quarter, and that's it.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_02: And that's it, man.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so I didn't want to sound like I was hating after the game, so I didn't say anything.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, but he played a terrific fourth quarter, and before that, he was typical Arch.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_02: He's missing guys.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I I'm gonna say it one more time.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_02: All these people, and I've seen several of them, he's the number one pick in the NFL draft.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: You have not seen anything he's put on tape consistently to say he's the number one pick in the NFL draft.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_02: All you said is some highlights and the manning name.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_02: And he's got great size and speed, but you haven't seen anything from a production standpoint that says he should be the number one pick in the draft.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_02: You haven't even seen anything, if we're being honest, that says he should be a first round pick.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: I I agree.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: I agree.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think, and I think they're gonna I don't know.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: I I I think they'll probably beat Tennessee, but I think it's gonna be close this week.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_02: Well, see, that's what I'm saying.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um I just want to see what he plays like against Tennessee.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_02: Does he play good against Tennessee?
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's a that'll be a tough environment, tough game.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_02: And so I just it's not that I don't like Arch.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_02: I think he's a cool dude from what I've seen.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_02: He just hadn't played well to me.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_02: Or he hadn't played to his pedigree.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but but back back to Ohio State.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think the you know, I think the offensive line doesn't get a push.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_00: I think the you you you mentioned this early in the year, they don't have a they don't have a really dynamic.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_00: We there we have B plus B to B plus running backs.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the the defense looks markedly weaker than last year to me.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: But it was supposed to.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_02: There's no way you're gonna replace all those guys.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and and but they have no pass rush.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_00: So so I think they're gonna get I think it's gonna be a tough year for Iowa State.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I what what I will say is I think the Big Ten is a lot worse than I thought it was.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, I think it's a lot worse.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: So they may be the beneficiary of what I think is gonna is a pretty weak uh on a relative basis, a pretty weak Big Ten this year.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: I was just saying, based off the first three weeks of the season, the game against Oregon no longer is like, oh my god, what are you gonna do?
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_02: USD is no longer, oh you know, Indiana still looks good to me, although uh you you never respect for Indiana.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: I think Indiana plays Northwestern Friday.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's gonna be I think that's gonna be a close game.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_02: That's uh it's a it's good that we'll see.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_02: But I like Signeti because he's got a method to his madness.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_02: His is we play nothing, we work on ourselves the first month of the season.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_02: We played nothing but cupcake you so we can be good at what we do, and then we'll worry about seeing how it fares against the big boys later.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, that ain't good for your fan base because everybody wants to see a marquee game, but it works for him.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_02: And uh he's the defending champion.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_00: He's very open about it, and he and he's and he's also said something to the effect of yeah, you say that, but still, if you have a loss in your first three games, that still hurts you more than playing cupcakes, you know.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_00: And that's you know, would would Ohio State still be number one in the country if it was playing cupcakes for three games in a row?
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but that uh, you know, for a long time, man, Ohio State has played a marquee opponent in the in, you know, they usually play one easy, one mid, one hard.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I can respect that.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but you know, it may now as the this is why I think if the college football playoff expands to 16 or 24 teams, I think then you'll start to see a lot of those games because you can then make the college football playoff with two or three losses.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_00: And and then you'll start to see a lot of those types of games during the regular during the regular game.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_02: And I think they're still fun.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, Texas and Ohio State was fun.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_02: Michigan and Oklahoma was fun.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, so I think they're fun, and it's uh it's good to see them.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh bottom line.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm sorry, did you watch it?
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: Did you watch LSU uh Mississippi?
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: That was great.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_00: That was great.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_00: But that's that that that is that to me is uh that's college football right there.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_00: Bottom line for you on Ohio State?
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_02: Hot F and Tiddy, baby.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh Buckeyes opened up with a win.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I think uh I think they'll play well, and they'll win by a little more than uh than I anticipated.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh bottom line for me, Ohio State should win.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: Uh let's hope let's hope they get a pass rush and let's hope they get uh a push on the offensive line.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not I'm not confident.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: What I'd also like to see, what I'd also like to see is uh the quarterback scramble a couple of times to show that he can actually run.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: He did that once against Texas, maybe.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_00: He ran, he ran uh, he ran uh first game of the year, he scored.
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know?
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_00: See, you need more than that.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_00: So he's so he's had two runs, I think, in three games.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: All right, well, you can't have everything, man.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh Jeremy Pink.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Jean-Jacques Taylor.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_02: Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: We can use all the help we can get.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_02: This has been the bottom line on sports.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_02: We'll talk to you next week.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_00: All right, thanks everybody.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: We'll talk next week.