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Speaker 1: The following takes place between six pm and seven pm.

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Speaker 2: You want answers. I think I'm entitled.

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Speaker 3: You answer the truth.

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Speaker 4: You can't handle the truth. Truth anight and tonight you're

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Speaker 4: not gonna get Lance. McAllister. Good evening. Hope your Christmas

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Speaker 4: is going well. Merry Christmas.

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Speaker 5: Although a little bit late on moegar in for Lance,

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Speaker 5: Lance is back on Monday night for Bengals line.

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Speaker 4: This is RNL Carrier Sports Talk.

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Speaker 5: Presented by Kelsey Chevrolet on seven hundred wl W.

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Speaker 4: Hope your weekend.

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Speaker 5: Hopefully your weekend started like on Monday or Tuesday. Nonetheless

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Speaker 5: is a Friday night. Hopefully your weekend is off to

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Speaker 5: an awesome start. Let's begin with a Bengals update. The

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Speaker 5: Bengals are getting set to play their second to last

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Speaker 5: game of the season against the Arizona Cardinals at home.

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Speaker 5: That game at one o'clock on seven hundred wl W.

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Speaker 5: Zach Taylor today ruled Joseph Osai and Charlie Jones out

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Speaker 5: for that game.

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Speaker 4: I'm not sure either.

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Speaker 5: As a surprise, Noah fan officially listed at questionable, was

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Speaker 5: a full go at practice today. Sunday's pregame coverage from

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Speaker 5: the Holy Grail begins at nine o'clock. College football news,

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Speaker 5: the University of Michigan is set to agree to a

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Speaker 5: five year contract with former Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham

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Speaker 5: to replace Sharon Moore. Whittingham just wrapped up a long,

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Speaker 5: lengthy and successful run as coach of the Utes. When

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Speaker 5: he stepped down, he said he's not retiring, just needed

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Speaker 5: a change. That change will occur in ann Arbor. Ohio

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Speaker 5: University has announced that John Hauser has been elevated from

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Speaker 5: defensive coordinator to head coach. He was the interim coach

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Speaker 5: for Ohio's bowl game victory over UNLV on Tuesday, after

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Speaker 5: being elevated to the interim role following the ouster of

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Speaker 5: Brian Smith, who was fired a week ago yesterday following

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Speaker 5: allegations of quote serious professional misconduct that included claims he

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Speaker 5: had a romantic relationship with a student and an allegation

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Speaker 5: of public intoxication. College bowl games there are three of

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Speaker 5: them on this Friday. One of them took place earlier

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Speaker 5: today the game alone Sports Bowl Northwestern knocked off Central

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Speaker 5: Michigan by a score of thirty four to seven. The

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Speaker 5: Rate Bowl is happening right now in Arizona, New Mexico

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Speaker 5: Leeds Minnesota six nothing. Florida International takes on Utsa later

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Speaker 5: tonight in the First Responder Bowl. The Miami RedHawks are

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Speaker 5: playing Fresno tomorrow in the Snoop Dogg Arizona Bowl Best

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Speaker 5: of luxA Chuck Martin's team. You might have heard this

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Speaker 5: in the six o'clock news with Matt Reeese. If you

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Speaker 5: have tickets for tonight's Cincinnati Cyclones game, I've got bad news.

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Speaker 5: Not gonna be a game tonight. The ECHL players are

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Speaker 5: on strike, so no game tonight's The two sides have

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Speaker 5: been negotiating publicly now for about a week or so.

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Speaker 5: If you have tickets, you'll get a refund. You can

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Speaker 5: go to Cyclones Hockey dot com. But no hockey tonight.

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Speaker 5: Cincinnati was supposed to play the Kalamazoo k Wings at

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Speaker 5: the Heritage Bank Center. That ain't happening tonight, So if

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Speaker 5: you have tickets, got to go find something else to do.

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Speaker 4: There you go.

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Speaker 5: There are your sports headlines on an otherwise quiet Friday

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Speaker 5: after Christmas. We do have a lot of ground to

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Speaker 5: cover between now and nine o'clock when Sterling comes your way.

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Speaker 5: We've got the Bengals in the game on Sunday, which

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Speaker 5: doesn't matter all that much. In fact, it really doesn't

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Speaker 5: matter at all, except except it can help solidify something

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Speaker 5: that I think is very important. And we're gonna get

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Speaker 5: to this coming up in the seven o'clock hour, because

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Speaker 5: there is something very important about this team that we

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Speaker 5: have to keep in mind as we wonder how the

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Speaker 5: off season is gonna unfold, and Sunday can maybe help

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Speaker 5: solidify what I'm gonna talk about in the seven o'clock hour.

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Speaker 5: That is a very long winded tease, but we'll get

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Speaker 5: to that a little bit later on. We've got some

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Speaker 5: college basketball to get to as well. It is remarkable

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Speaker 5: that if you're a UC basketball fan, we are where

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Speaker 5: we are with this program five years into the West

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Speaker 5: Miller era. We'll spend some time on that. Do some

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Speaker 5: college football coming up in just a bit. One thing

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Speaker 5: that I think is interesting, and I just mentioned that

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Speaker 5: Michigan said to hire a new head coach, and I

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Speaker 5: think he would be the proverbial adult in the room

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Speaker 5: for a program in Ann Arbor that feels like.

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Speaker 4: He needed it.

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Speaker 5: It's interesting the reaction from fans of Ohio State in

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Speaker 5: the immediate aftermath of what went down with Sharon More

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Speaker 5: and you can to a degree understand their glee and

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Speaker 5: joy at watching that program and Ann Arbor just get

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Speaker 5: dragged through the mud, but be careful what you wish for.

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Speaker 5: I'll get to that a little bit later on. We

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Speaker 5: did recorded this show on Tuesday, and if you needed

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Speaker 5: something to listen to yesterday, maybe you heard it the

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Speaker 5: year end review show that we do sports talk Year

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Speaker 5: in Review show with Lance myself, Tony Pike, and Austin Elmore,

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Speaker 5: and we spent two hours reviewing twenty twenty five in

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Speaker 5: Cincinnati sports and then along with that a little bit

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Speaker 5: of a look ahead to twenty twenty six. If you

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Speaker 5: missed it, you can go listen to it right now

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Speaker 5: if you want, on the iHeartRadio app, or maybe make

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Speaker 5: some plans this weekend to listen to it on the

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Speaker 5: iHeartRadio app. We kind of divided the show into separate categories,

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Speaker 5: you know, just sort of an overall look at the

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Speaker 5: high points in Cincinnati sports in twenty twenty five, some

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Speaker 5: of the low points in Cincinnati sports in twenty twenty five,

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Speaker 5: and then kind of went through the year that was

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Speaker 5: with all the major entities in town, and in the region.

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Speaker 5: We didn't do stuff like Cincinnati Sports Story of the Year.

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Speaker 5: We didn't do Cincinnati Sports Person of the Year. Lance

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Speaker 5: does those things. I think this year's Sports Story of

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Speaker 5: the Year was pretty obvious and it leads us to

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Speaker 5: and what I think is going to be the sports

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Speaker 5: story of the next two months. We'll get to that

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Speaker 5: after Traffic and Weather Together, which is coming up right

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Speaker 5: now on seven hundred WLW.

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Speaker 4: Today night.

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Speaker 5: This is RNL Carrier's Sports Talk. We are presented by

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Speaker 5: Kelsey Chevroleigh. Lance McAllister is off this evening. Moegor My

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Speaker 5: show is typically heard on ESPN fifteen thirty from three

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Speaker 5: to six weekday afternoons. It invites you to check it out,

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Speaker 5: and that includes the Tony and Mo Football Show, which

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Speaker 5: airs on Mondays during football season.

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Speaker 4: We have two of them left.

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Speaker 5: Will be a Twin Peaks in west Chester right off

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Speaker 5: Ice seventy five at the Union Center Boulevard Exa Tony

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Speaker 5: Pike Me. Hopefully you talking Bengals Cardinals, NFL Week seventeen,

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Speaker 5: the Playoff Picture, do some college football playoff stuff, and

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Speaker 5: so much more.

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Speaker 4: We hope to see you at Twin Peaks in.

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Speaker 5: Westchester on Monday, that show from three to six on

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Speaker 5: ESPN fifteen thirty.

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Speaker 4: I mentioned we did the Year in Review show.

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Speaker 5: Tony was a part of that with Lance Austin and

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Speaker 5: myself and we talked about, you know, the year that

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Speaker 5: was for the Reds, the Bengals, the area colleges, FC Cincinnati.

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Speaker 5: I think the sports story of the year in twenty

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Speaker 5: twenty five, at least with five days to go, was

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Speaker 5: the Reds made the postseason. Now, you know, it kind

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Speaker 5: of got drowned out as October went on and November

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Speaker 5: went on.

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Speaker 4: Joe Burrow getting hurt, obviously was a huge story.

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Speaker 5: The Bengals failing to make the postseason for a third

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Speaker 5: consecutive year was a big story. Fans turning on the

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Speaker 5: Bengals and what felt like very nineteen nineties esque ways

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Speaker 5: was a big story. You know, what's happened with the

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Speaker 5: UC football team losing five consecutive games to end the season,

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Speaker 5: or I should say I guess four consecutive games to

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Speaker 5: end the season a year after they lost five consecutive games.

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Speaker 4: That's a big story.

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Speaker 5: The area college basketball teams have in and on themselves

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Speaker 5: been big stories f C Cincinnati, But I think the

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Speaker 5: story of the year is rights made the postseason.

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Speaker 4: That's not insignificant.

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Speaker 5: When you are a franchise that hasn't made the playoffs

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Speaker 5: in a full season in over a decade and you

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Speaker 5: get there just a couple of seasons after losing one

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Speaker 5: hundred games, it's a pretty big deal. We could we

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Speaker 5: could debate how huge of an accomplishment it was, and

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Speaker 5: they petered out very quickly once they got to the postseason.

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Speaker 5: But I think of all the stuff that happened in

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Speaker 5: twenty twenty five, that's the biggest story, right to get

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Speaker 5: to the postseason, to show tangible proof that, at least

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Speaker 5: to this point that their their plan, their rebuild, their build,

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Speaker 5: however you want to phrase it, is working. Is not

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Speaker 5: in significant now. It occurred during a year that was

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Speaker 5: often very, very frustrating. It was frustrating watching Ellie de

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Speaker 5: la Cruz not hit home runs over the final two

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Speaker 5: months of the season. It was frustrating hearing management make

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Speaker 5: excuses for Elie de la Cruz yet continuing to run

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Speaker 5: him out there. They had a lot of guys who

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Speaker 5: had some very frustrating seasons. The way that the front

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Speaker 5: office handled the trade deadline, you could argue frustrating because

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Speaker 5: their biggest weakness was offense and their big acquisition was

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Speaker 5: a guy who doesn't hit.

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Speaker 4: But at the end of the day, they made it.

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Speaker 5: After a fun, thrilling, interesting, chaotic, at times agonizing last

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Speaker 5: couple of weeks of the season, after Game one sixty two,

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Speaker 5: they were the six team left standing in the National

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Speaker 5: League and played in the postseason. That to me, was

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Speaker 5: the sports story of the year in Cincinnati. What I

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Speaker 5: think the story of the first few weeks of the

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Speaker 5: year is going to be is what do they do

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Speaker 5: to take this coming year's team and give it a

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Speaker 5: better chance to be better than this past year's team.

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Speaker 5: Like the story of the year in Cincinnati sports would

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Speaker 5: have been the Reds acquiring Kyle Schwarber had they been

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Speaker 5: able to pull that off. And I think for about

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Speaker 5: five hours on that Friday going into the weekend that

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Speaker 5: Kyle Schwarber ultimately signed, I think there's a lot of

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Speaker 5: us who kind of convinced ourselves that maybe they had

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Speaker 5: a chance. I think there's people with the Reds who

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Speaker 5: convinced themselves they had a chance to get Kyle Schwarber.

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Speaker 5: Obviously they did not, but trying to get him was

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Speaker 5: at least an acknowledgement that they have a big need

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Speaker 5: for a guy who could for a guy who could

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Speaker 5: hit the ball out of the ballpark. Easy for me

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Speaker 5: to say they obviously didn't get Kyle Schwarber said. The

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Speaker 5: question becomes now what and the calendar is set to

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Speaker 5: flip from twenty twenty five to twenty twenty six. The

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Speaker 5: Luise Robert rumors did not take a day off because

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Speaker 5: of Christmas. Been connected with the Reds Now for a while.

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Speaker 5: He has been connected with the New York Mets. He

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Speaker 5: has been connected with a handful of other teams. Luise

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Speaker 5: Robert has been the subject of trade rumors with the

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Speaker 5: Chicago White Sox for seemingly ever, certainly the last year

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Speaker 5: and a half, and when he has been brought up

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Speaker 5: in connection to a trade, one of the teams that

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Speaker 5: often gets that often gets brought up is the Reds

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Speaker 5: twenty seven year old outfielder who had a terrific season

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Speaker 5: in twenty twenty three. I guess the question for me,

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Speaker 5: and I can ask it to you at five point

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Speaker 5: three seven four nine, seven thousand, if the big obvious

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Speaker 5: play didn't work, which was a dude who had fifty

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Speaker 5: six home runs, last year that was going to be,

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Speaker 5: you know, the guy that addressed the glaring need on

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Speaker 5: this team, which was for pop protection in the middle

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Speaker 5: of the order, but more than anything, a dude who

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Speaker 5: can hit the ball out of the ballpark. If just

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Speaker 5: going after Kyle Schwarber was an acknowledgment that we need

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Speaker 5: a guy who can hit the ball out of the ballpark.

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Speaker 4: Does Luise Robert.

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Speaker 5: If they get him, satisfy that need coming off of

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Speaker 5: season where he hit forty six fewer homers than Kyle Schwarber.

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Speaker 5: And I guess more than anything, whether or not they

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Speaker 5: acquire Luis Robert via trade, and you would have to ask,

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Speaker 5: what is it going to cost? Will they have by

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Speaker 5: the time spring training gets here, and certainly by the

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Speaker 5: time opening day gets here, well, they have sufficiently addressed

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Speaker 5: what was easily the team's biggest weakness last year. They

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Speaker 5: got to the postseason largely in spite of their relatively

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Speaker 5: anemic offense. Anemic might be a little harsh, but they

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Speaker 5: got to the postseason largely in spite of an offense

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Speaker 5: that was league average at best in some categories and

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Speaker 5: well below league average in other categories. Can they do

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Speaker 5: enough over the next couple of months to take an

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Speaker 5: eighty three win team from last year and make it

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Speaker 5: even better or this coming season, because you know, I

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Speaker 5: was asked this often in the immediate aftermath of the

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Speaker 5: series against the Dodgers, when the Reds went down in

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Speaker 5: two games, pretty quietly, what was this season of success?

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Speaker 5: And in a vacuum, I think it's hard to say no, Right,

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Speaker 5: they made the postseason, had made the postseason in a

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Speaker 5: full year since twenty thirteen, which was forever ago. But

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Speaker 5: my real answer was, Oh, ask me in a year,

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Speaker 5: ask me in two years, ask me at the end

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Speaker 5: of the decade. Because if the twenty twenty five season

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Speaker 5: ends up being a jumping off point, if it ends

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Speaker 5: up being something that sort of, you know, is a

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Speaker 5: step along the way to things that are bigger and

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Speaker 5: better than getting to the postseason with eighty three wins

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Speaker 5: as the sixth seed and losing in two games. If

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Speaker 5: last year it just proves to be a step along

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Speaker 5: the way to advancing in.

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Speaker 4: The postseason, maybe winning a World.

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Speaker 5: Series, then yes, we'll look back on twenty twenty five

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Speaker 5: as a success. If it turns out to be the

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Speaker 5: high point of this stretch of time, If it turned

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Speaker 5: to be the high point of a rebuild that started

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Speaker 5: really after the twenty twenty season. Then, frankly, it's going

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Speaker 5: to be hard to call the twenty twenty five season

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Speaker 5: or anything else the Reds have done a success. So

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Speaker 5: what do you do to make next year's team better?

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Speaker 5: What do you add to a team that has good

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Speaker 5: starting pitching? Has some dudes? I think that they still

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Speaker 5: want to build around that they still believe can perform

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Speaker 5: better this coming season than last year. And can they

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Speaker 5: realistically go to spring training without any major addition from

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Speaker 5: outside that addresses a clear weakness and convince any one

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Speaker 5: of us they're going to be better this coming season,

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Speaker 5: Or if they successfully acquire Luise Robert offensively, can that

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Speaker 5: be the centerpiece? And can that take a team that

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Speaker 5: had an offense that was league average at best in

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Speaker 5: most categories last year and help propel the club as

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Speaker 5: a whole to something much much better than eighty three wins?

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Speaker 5: At Muleger on Twitter, how you can hit me up

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Speaker 5: thanks the Delta Dental. Delta Dental is building healthy, smart,

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Speaker 5: vibrant community for all good at Delta dentalh dot com.

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Speaker 4: That is the central.

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Speaker 5: Question facing the Reds as we get set to turn

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Speaker 5: from twenty twenty five to twenty twenty six. Different type

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Speaker 5: of question faces the Bengals. We'll get to that after

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Speaker 5: the six thirty News On seven hundred WLW twenty one

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Speaker 5: from seven o'clock, this is RNL Carrier's Sports Talk presented

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Speaker 5: by Kelsey Chevrolet on seven hundred WLW moleg or four.

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Speaker 5: Lance McCallister, don't forget Sunday morning. We're at the Holy Grail.

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Speaker 5: Kick off at one o'clock. Bengals and Cardinals pregame Sports

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Speaker 5: Talk starts at nine o'clock. It is an absolute blast.

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Speaker 5: This job is awesome for a thousand different reasons. Getting

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Speaker 5: a chance to be on before Bengals home games with

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Speaker 5: Ken Brew and Tony Pike is at the very top

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Speaker 5: of that list. We have an absolute blast. We'll obviously

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Speaker 5: have a lot to discuss as the Bengals get set

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Speaker 5: to play their second to last game of the season.

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Speaker 5: I just heard in the forecast it should be warm,

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Speaker 5: but should be rainy for the game on.

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Speaker 4: Sunday. You know many of I wonder if.

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Speaker 5: The Bengals win their last three games, which they should.

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Speaker 5: They crushed the Miami Dolphins, which was not a surprise,

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Speaker 5: especially once Miami bench two at Tenga Mailoa. There are

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Speaker 5: seven point favorites on Sunday, although they will have their

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Speaker 5: hands full with Arizona's tight end Trey McBride, and they're

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Speaker 5: gonna be favored at home against the Cleveland Browns Week eighteen.

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Speaker 5: We'll see who for both teams is playing in that game.

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Speaker 5: But the Bengals should finish with three consecutive wins to

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Speaker 5: end the year. And many have wondered, and understandably so,

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Speaker 5: is success by the team at the end of the

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Speaker 5: season going to impair judgment by people in a decision

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Speaker 5: making capacity once the offseason gets here.

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Speaker 4: It's a fair question.

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Speaker 5: In this franchise's history, there's a pretty well documented history

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Speaker 5: of late season results at the end of a poor

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Speaker 5: season influencing decision making. Maybe look no further than Marvin

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Speaker 5: Lewis was brought back at the end of the twenty

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Speaker 5: seventeen season when it felt like he was a goner

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Speaker 5: up until the very end, and yet on New Year's Eve,

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Speaker 5: they beat the Baltimore Ravens, knock them out of the postseason,

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Speaker 5: put the Bills in the playoffs. All the Bills fans

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Speaker 5: support Andy Dalton's foundation, and they bring Marvin back for

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Speaker 5: one more year, it can happen. I guess what I'm

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Speaker 5: more curious about than anything else is if we assume

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Speaker 5: that Zach is going to be brought back, and you know,

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Speaker 5: there's reasons for him to there's a lot of reasons

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Speaker 5: for you to think that Zach Taylor shouldn't be brought back.

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Speaker 5: But if we assume he will be back, and if

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Speaker 5: we assume that Duke Tobin's going to be back, and

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Speaker 5: as much as he has been in the public's crosshairs

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Speaker 5: more than at any point during his time as the

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Speaker 5: de facto general manager, I don't recall anybody saying, you know, what,

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Speaker 5: Duke's seed is hot. And if we believe, and I

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Speaker 5: think this is a fair assumption too, that Al Golden's

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Speaker 5: going to be brought back, I guess the main question

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Speaker 5: of the offseason becomes this, how do you make changes

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Speaker 5: without firings. Now that's not to say that everybody in

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Speaker 5: the coaching staff's job is safe. But if we believe,

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Speaker 5: and this is the general assumption right now, that it's

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Speaker 5: going to be status quo in the front office, status

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Speaker 5: quo with Duke, status quo with Zach status quo among

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Speaker 5: the main particulars on the coaching staff, how do you

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Speaker 5: make changes without firings? How do you make changes if

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Speaker 5: you're not changing out the people that are many believe

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Speaker 5: most responsible for this season gone awry. Now, the main

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Speaker 5: reason why this season spiraled out of control is Joe

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Speaker 5: Burrow missed most of it, like I would love to

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Speaker 5: despite all their deficiencies and they have many, despite all

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Speaker 5: of their issues on defense, despite all the games they lost,

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Speaker 5: where you know, the offense put up a bunch of

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Speaker 5: points when Joe wasn't healthy and not playing quarterback, the

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Speaker 5: games they lost when Joe Flacco did more than enough

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Speaker 5: to win. I would take my chances with this year's

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Speaker 5: team in a down year for the division and a

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Speaker 5: down year for the AFC, playing the full season with

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Speaker 5: number nine s QB. And I think if they do that,

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Speaker 5: they're a playoff team. I really believe that. Don't know

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Speaker 5: if i'd call them a championship team. Don't know if

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Speaker 5: i'd you know, have them winning the AFC or winning

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Speaker 5: the Super Bowl. But I think they're a playoff team.

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Speaker 5: But we can't do that. It's neither here nor there.

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Speaker 5: What we can say is that Joe Burrow spent years

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Speaker 5: kind of masking this team's issues, and many of them

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Speaker 5: kind of bubble to the surface once Joe Burrow was

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Speaker 5: no longer there. So how do you fix this? How

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Speaker 5: do you fix this? And how do you make changes

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Speaker 5: without firings. I don't know that any of us believe

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Speaker 5: that the Bengals will do these things, but they are

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Speaker 5: capable of being done. Like number one, you can make

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Speaker 5: changes without firing people by hiring people like you could,

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Speaker 5: you could, you could add And as much as the

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Speaker 5: Bengals get a lot of very fair criticism for you know,

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Speaker 5: not having the world's largest scouting department, not having a

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Speaker 5: full front office compared to a lot of NFL teams,

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Speaker 5: They've hired some some folks in the in the front office.

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Speaker 5: They've hired an analytics person. Hire more, and don't just

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Speaker 5: hire just to hire, and like, hire good qualified people,

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Speaker 5: have more good qualified voices in the room. You can

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Speaker 5: do that, you can and I'm gonna guess they don't

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Speaker 5: do this either. But this is this is kind of

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Speaker 5: where I would start above and beyond, you know, fixing

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Speaker 5: the defense, which is Duke Tobin's main direct of this offseason,

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Speaker 5: examine Zach Taylor's role in the offense. You know, I

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Speaker 5: am the first to admit that I don't know the

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Speaker 5: first thing about what goes into calling an NFL play,

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Speaker 5: and so I kind of roll my eyes when I

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Speaker 5: hear people talk about play calling. But you know, even

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Speaker 5: when the Bengals offense has been whole and everybody's been healthy,

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Speaker 5: they've gone through very long lulls. It's been something we've

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Speaker 5: talked about since twenty twenty one, right the year they

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Speaker 5: went to the Super Bowl. How come, in spite of

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Speaker 5: their weaponry and in spite of having a quarterback who

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Speaker 5: is among the league's best offensively, they just have a

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Speaker 5: few too many hiccups. Go back to the first game

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Speaker 5: of this season against the Cleveland Browns, which feels like

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Speaker 5: eight lifetimes ago. They won that game, but remember that day,

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Speaker 5: six year QB said, the year head coach. All the

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Speaker 5: offensive personnel for the most part being you know, holdovers

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Speaker 5: from last year and the year before and the year before,

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Speaker 5: and like they were still having a hard time getting

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Speaker 5: the play in. Or go back to the game almost

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Speaker 5: two weeks ago where they got shut out against Baltimore

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Speaker 5: and they're down three scores in the third quarter, and

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Speaker 5: it looked and felt like they were simply running out

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Speaker 5: the clock, like there was nobody in Joe's headset to go, Hey,

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Speaker 5: let's put our foot on the gas here, let's let's

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Speaker 5: go up tempo, let's play with some urgency here.

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Speaker 4: I just I've wondered this for a.

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Speaker 5: While that even if you, as I do, believe that

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Speaker 5: Zach has a lot of really good qualities as a

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Speaker 5: head coach, is there something about how the offense functions

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Speaker 5: that could be better? And is one of those things

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Speaker 5: Zach Taylor relinquishing play calling duties. I think something else

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Speaker 5: you could change is, you know, how they evaluate college players.

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Speaker 5: You know, Schamar Stewart still may end up having a

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Speaker 5: terrific NFL career, may end up really helping this team.

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Speaker 5: And I actually think there's some things to suggest that

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Speaker 5: that will happen if you go back to how he practiced.

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Speaker 5: We'll see his rookie season so far has been a wash.

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Speaker 5: But when they drafted him, you know, we all remember, God,

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Speaker 5: they drafted a guy who had one and a half

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Speaker 5: sacks last year, and they drafted a guy who in

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Speaker 5: his three years at Texas A and M had four

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Speaker 5: and a half sacks, and they bypassed other dudes who

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Speaker 5: maybe didn't have Shamar Stewart's measurables, but when you watched

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Speaker 5: him on film, they did more. And so is there

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Speaker 5: something to be said about prioritizing what college prospects put

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Speaker 5: on tape and maybe not prioritizing nearly as much the

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Speaker 5: measurables what they do at the combine what the tape

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Speaker 5: measure shows, how they look in their underwear.

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Speaker 4: That sort of stuff you can make.

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Speaker 5: That change, you can change in your philosophies when it

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Speaker 5: comes to roster building. And you know, frankly, when the

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Speaker 5: Bengals got good in twenty twenty one, that was a

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Speaker 5: result of the Bengals embracing more modern ways of roster building.

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Speaker 6: Now.

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Speaker 5: They kind of had to because they didn't have any

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Speaker 5: good players in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty. But they

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Speaker 5: used free agency, and they used it wisely, and they

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Speaker 5: overpaid some guys, but they needed to. It's not like

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Speaker 5: the Bengals have whifted in free agency every single year.

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Speaker 5: They've tried to nail it in free agency. That twenty

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Speaker 5: twenty one defense had Trey Hendrickson and Von Bell and

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Speaker 5: Mike Helton and DJ Reader and Chaudoba a Woozie, all

436
00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:28,800
Speaker 5: dudes acquired from other teams. Well go back to being

437
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:31,560
Speaker 5: more aggressive in free agency. And that doesn't necessarily mean

438
00:22:31,840 --> 00:22:34,439
Speaker 5: mean paying the most. It doesn't necessarily mean, you know,

439
00:22:34,480 --> 00:22:37,240
Speaker 5: getting the first wave of guys. It doesn't necessarily mean

440
00:22:37,800 --> 00:22:40,520
Speaker 5: you know, you overpay. But it does mean you do

441
00:22:40,560 --> 00:22:43,280
Speaker 5: what they didn't do last offseason, which is take one

442
00:22:43,359 --> 00:22:46,160
Speaker 5: or two guys and then just sort of hope everybody

443
00:22:46,160 --> 00:22:49,120
Speaker 5: else performs better in twenty twenty five than they did

444
00:22:49,119 --> 00:22:51,080
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty four. I don't know that the Bengals

445
00:22:51,080 --> 00:22:52,760
Speaker 5: will do any of these things. I don't know if

446
00:22:52,760 --> 00:22:54,560
Speaker 5: the Bengals will do one of these things but not

447
00:22:54,600 --> 00:22:58,359
Speaker 5: the others. But like this is this is the question

448
00:22:58,440 --> 00:23:00,240
Speaker 5: of the next couple of months, before we get to

449
00:23:00,240 --> 00:23:02,439
Speaker 5: the first wave of free agency, which will be in

450
00:23:02,560 --> 00:23:05,600
Speaker 5: early March, or before we get to the draft, which

451
00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:08,720
Speaker 5: is obviously going to be in late April, are there

452
00:23:08,760 --> 00:23:12,320
Speaker 5: things being done behind the scenes that reflect a shift

453
00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:15,479
Speaker 5: in how they do things, whether it be adding people,

454
00:23:16,040 --> 00:23:18,480
Speaker 5: taking a good heart look at how the offense operates,

455
00:23:20,280 --> 00:23:23,600
Speaker 5: going through a shift in priorities as it relates to

456
00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:29,800
Speaker 5: evaluating college players, getting back to I mean, I cannot imagine,

457
00:23:29,840 --> 00:23:32,520
Speaker 5: and I know it's the Bengals, so I guess anything's possible.

458
00:23:33,480 --> 00:23:35,680
Speaker 5: I would have a hard time imagining that they look

459
00:23:35,720 --> 00:23:38,560
Speaker 5: at this year's defense and don't touch it at all.

460
00:23:38,600 --> 00:23:42,439
Speaker 5: In free agency, my guess is they're gonna add or

461
00:23:42,480 --> 00:23:46,040
Speaker 5: try to at least add NFL caliber starters at nearly

462
00:23:46,080 --> 00:23:50,919
Speaker 5: every position on that group. But that's the thing, Like

463
00:23:51,280 --> 00:23:52,760
Speaker 5: you know, many have said, well, it's going to be

464
00:23:52,800 --> 00:23:55,440
Speaker 5: status quo if you bring everybody back, and it may

465
00:23:55,440 --> 00:23:59,159
Speaker 5: be like Duke Tobin has exhausted a lot of trust

466
00:23:59,160 --> 00:24:03,800
Speaker 5: and goodwill, Zach Taylor has two, and that's fair. I'm

467
00:24:03,840 --> 00:24:06,959
Speaker 5: not sure I trust either right now. But if they

468
00:24:06,960 --> 00:24:11,080
Speaker 5: are gonna bring back those guys, I think Thennett's worth

469
00:24:11,359 --> 00:24:15,560
Speaker 5: at least asking will the same people do things differently

470
00:24:17,480 --> 00:24:20,080
Speaker 5: and the answers can be yes, like people evolved. We

471
00:24:20,160 --> 00:24:23,080
Speaker 5: see it in sports. I've used this example, like you know,

472
00:24:23,119 --> 00:24:25,840
Speaker 5: back in the day, Mike Skrzhewsky didn't want to, you know,

473
00:24:26,000 --> 00:24:29,240
Speaker 5: recruit one and Dons, and then he saw the direction

474
00:24:29,320 --> 00:24:32,440
Speaker 5: college basketball was going, saw the success other programs like

475
00:24:32,520 --> 00:24:35,520
Speaker 5: Kentucky were having, and decided, you know what, I'm gonna

476
00:24:35,520 --> 00:24:37,480
Speaker 5: go get one and dons and won a national title

477
00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:40,280
Speaker 5: like you can. The Bengals, even off the field, have

478
00:24:40,359 --> 00:24:43,200
Speaker 5: done some things they've never wanted to do before, stuff

479
00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:45,320
Speaker 5: that might not matter as much as winning and losing,

480
00:24:45,359 --> 00:24:48,600
Speaker 5: but they have Ring of Honor, uniform, stuff like that,

481
00:24:49,680 --> 00:24:53,560
Speaker 5: so it is possible. If it's impossible, then you might

482
00:24:53,600 --> 00:24:56,440
Speaker 5: as well just shut down the entire franchise. But it

483
00:24:56,520 --> 00:25:00,359
Speaker 5: better worked this offseason because, barring something unforeseen, that's going

484
00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:05,000
Speaker 5: to be the same collection of people that have that

485
00:25:05,080 --> 00:25:07,000
Speaker 5: have been the target of a lot of fans I

486
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:12,000
Speaker 5: are now all season long. Can Duke and Zach at

487
00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:18,760
Speaker 5: all do their jobs better, different and put together a

488
00:25:18,800 --> 00:25:21,960
Speaker 5: team better capable of achieving better results In twenty twenty six,

489
00:25:22,920 --> 00:25:26,119
Speaker 5: five one three nine seven thousand is our phone number.

490
00:25:26,160 --> 00:25:29,200
Speaker 5: A college football program just hired an adult.

491
00:25:29,560 --> 00:25:30,520
Speaker 4: We'll get to that next.

492
00:25:30,680 --> 00:25:34,480
Speaker 5: RNL Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey chevroletout seven hundred

493
00:25:34,600 --> 00:25:39,360
Speaker 5: WLW seven hundred wl W. This is r NL Carrier

494
00:25:39,480 --> 00:25:43,399
Speaker 5: Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet. Lance is off tonight.

495
00:25:43,440 --> 00:25:47,760
Speaker 5: He is back on Monday for Bengals line. More on

496
00:25:48,160 --> 00:25:50,359
Speaker 5: the Orange and Black coming up after the top of

497
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:54,760
Speaker 5: the Allen Uh, the big college football story today, the

498
00:25:54,840 --> 00:25:59,119
Speaker 5: University of Michigan is hiring Utah's Kyle Whittingham. Kyle Whittingham,

499
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:02,720
Speaker 5: you know when the Utes were in the Mountain West

500
00:26:03,480 --> 00:26:06,840
Speaker 5: ushered that program into the Pac twelve and then helped

501
00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:09,320
Speaker 5: usher that program into the Big twelve. Thirt team this

502
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:13,119
Speaker 5: year U see played them and that that's kind of

503
00:26:13,119 --> 00:26:16,160
Speaker 5: when it is when the four game losing streak started.

504
00:26:16,200 --> 00:26:18,120
Speaker 5: That was a good team they had in Salt Lake

505
00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:22,800
Speaker 5: City this year wildly respected won sixty six percent of

506
00:26:22,840 --> 00:26:26,480
Speaker 5: his games, and when he stepped down made it known

507
00:26:26,520 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 5: I'm not retiring now. I don't know how much the

508
00:26:28,920 --> 00:26:32,080
Speaker 5: Michigan job was on his radar. Who knows if Alabama

509
00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:36,280
Speaker 5: loses in the college football playoff week, you go to Oklahoma.

510
00:26:36,280 --> 00:26:38,280
Speaker 5: If Caitlin Debora is the head coach of Michigan, I

511
00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:42,640
Speaker 5: do think it's interesting. You know, it's remarkable how much

512
00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:45,080
Speaker 5: things have changed in a year as it relates to

513
00:26:45,280 --> 00:26:48,640
Speaker 5: OSU versus Michigan were a year ago at this time,

514
00:26:49,200 --> 00:26:51,840
Speaker 5: you know, Ohio State had played in and won a

515
00:26:51,880 --> 00:26:55,680
Speaker 5: college football playoff game, but Ryan Day had lost to Michigan.

516
00:26:55,720 --> 00:26:58,760
Speaker 5: Again was in a position where a lot of folks

517
00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:00,119
Speaker 5: felt like he was going to have to win a

518
00:27:00,240 --> 00:27:03,159
Speaker 5: national championship to save his job. I'm not sure how

519
00:27:03,240 --> 00:27:06,320
Speaker 5: much any of that was based in reality, but he

520
00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:10,040
Speaker 5: was basically Sharon Moore and prior to him, Jim Harbaughs

521
00:27:10,080 --> 00:27:11,080
Speaker 5: Pinata for a couple.

522
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:12,840
Speaker 4: Of years, and losing that game.

523
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:17,200
Speaker 5: Added an element to pressure in the college football playoff

524
00:27:17,240 --> 00:27:19,320
Speaker 5: that is already there if you're the head coach at

525
00:27:19,359 --> 00:27:22,440
Speaker 5: Ohio State. A year later, Ryan Day has won a

526
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:24,600
Speaker 5: national title. He has a team that right now is

527
00:27:24,640 --> 00:27:28,480
Speaker 5: the odds on favor to win the national championship again,

528
00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:32,920
Speaker 5: and the Michigan program is in tatters. What's been interesting

529
00:27:32,920 --> 00:27:34,719
Speaker 5: about that to me is like, I get it when

530
00:27:35,040 --> 00:27:38,159
Speaker 5: your arch rival is in tatters, when your arch rival

531
00:27:38,760 --> 00:27:41,720
Speaker 5: is going through scandal, it's fun and it's fun to

532
00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:44,679
Speaker 5: watch your arch rival have to hire a new head coach.

533
00:27:46,440 --> 00:27:48,080
Speaker 5: But it is interesting to me. And I don't know

534
00:27:48,119 --> 00:27:50,760
Speaker 5: a ton of Michigan fans, but I know enough that

535
00:27:50,920 --> 00:27:53,879
Speaker 5: even before we found out the particulars of the weirdness

536
00:27:53,920 --> 00:27:57,960
Speaker 5: that Sharon Moore's situation involved, much of which has little

537
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:02,040
Speaker 5: to do with football, most Wolverines fans that I either

538
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:06,120
Speaker 5: know or watched react to that news. We're pretty excited

539
00:28:06,160 --> 00:28:08,080
Speaker 5: about the fact that Sharon Moore was never going to

540
00:28:08,119 --> 00:28:11,359
Speaker 5: be their coach, and it does feel like they have

541
00:28:11,480 --> 00:28:13,639
Speaker 5: hired at least an adult in the room for a

542
00:28:13,680 --> 00:28:16,440
Speaker 5: program that felt like it badly needed it. Whether or

543
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:17,800
Speaker 5: not they're going to be able to compete at a

544
00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:22,160
Speaker 5: national level, compete for Big Ten championships, knock off Ohio State,

545
00:28:22,359 --> 00:28:25,439
Speaker 5: make regular appearances in the College Football Playoff, I have

546
00:28:25,520 --> 00:28:30,080
Speaker 5: no idea, but I do feel like Michigan upgraded from

547
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:32,840
Speaker 5: one coach to the other, even if the route they

548
00:28:32,840 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 5: had to take was an unfortunate one, We'll put it

549
00:28:38,200 --> 00:28:42,000
Speaker 5: that way. We'll see, we'll see. But that story dominated

550
00:28:43,040 --> 00:28:45,320
Speaker 5: the couple of weeks leading up to the College Football Playoff,

551
00:28:45,360 --> 00:28:47,080
Speaker 5: and a lot of folks were having fun and making

552
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 5: great jokes at Michigan's expense, and the one thing it

553
00:28:50,760 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 5: felt like they needed was like a grownup. Kyle Whittingham

554
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:57,160
Speaker 5: seems like a grown up. More on that coming up

555
00:28:57,160 --> 00:28:59,320
Speaker 5: here in just a bit. We actually have a good

556
00:28:59,360 --> 00:29:02,680
Speaker 5: Ohio State guest coming up in the eight o'clock hour.

557
00:29:02,760 --> 00:29:05,360
Speaker 4: Duke Tobin's job is hard, but not that hard.

558
00:29:05,440 --> 00:29:08,320
Speaker 5: That coming up after the seven o'clock news, which is

559
00:29:08,320 --> 00:29:10,760
Speaker 5: happening right now on the home of the best Bengals coverage,

560
00:29:10,800 --> 00:29:14,200
Speaker 5: News Radio seven hundred WLW, Cincinnati.

561
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:27,800
Speaker 1: And the following takes place between seven pm and eight pm.

562
00:29:27,920 --> 00:29:30,920
Speaker 4: That's us eight minutes after seven o'clock.

563
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:34,800
Speaker 5: This is RNL Carrier Sports Talk on seven hundred WLW.

564
00:29:34,800 --> 00:29:36,440
Speaker 4: We are presented by Kelsey Chevrolet.

565
00:29:36,560 --> 00:29:40,720
Speaker 5: Hopefully you're having an awesome Friday night, a great Christmas holiday,

566
00:29:40,920 --> 00:29:44,360
Speaker 5: and going into what should be really fun sports weekend

567
00:29:44,440 --> 00:29:47,240
Speaker 5: full NFL slate. The three games yesterday were dogs. All

568
00:29:47,240 --> 00:29:49,880
Speaker 5: the college bowl games like the college bowl games, you know,

569
00:29:49,920 --> 00:29:52,600
Speaker 5: folks now with the college Football Playoff and the emphasis

570
00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:55,160
Speaker 5: on it and the era that we're in with the

571
00:29:55,200 --> 00:29:58,360
Speaker 5: transfer portal and opt outs. Look, we have coaches opting

572
00:29:58,360 --> 00:30:01,960
Speaker 5: out of bowl games to crying. How the Bulls, the

573
00:30:01,960 --> 00:30:04,000
Speaker 5: Bulls as we know them, are going like. Both games

574
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:05,920
Speaker 5: haven't been important in years, but they're still fun to

575
00:30:05,920 --> 00:30:07,640
Speaker 5: wageer on. So you have a bunch of them. Tomorrow

576
00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:11,840
Speaker 5: Miami plays Fresno State. All of this leading up to

577
00:30:12,120 --> 00:30:16,120
Speaker 5: Bengals and Cardinals on Sunday. Reminder, our pregame coverage from

578
00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:19,960
Speaker 5: the Holy Grail on seven hundred WLW will begin at

579
00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:23,360
Speaker 5: nine o'clock. The Bengals offense. You know the thing about

580
00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:26,000
Speaker 5: the game on last Sunday against Miami, a lot of

581
00:30:26,040 --> 00:30:27,480
Speaker 5: folks walked away from it going, Okay.

582
00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:28,160
Speaker 4: What's the big takeaway?

583
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:31,840
Speaker 5: What's kind of the big macro level takeaway from the

584
00:30:31,880 --> 00:30:34,520
Speaker 5: game against Miami? And for me, it was Bengals beat

585
00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:37,560
Speaker 5: a bad team they should have beaten badly, a bad

586
00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:42,680
Speaker 5: team that started Quinn Ewers, a seventh round pick from Texas,

587
00:30:43,240 --> 00:30:46,200
Speaker 5: making his first NFL start. But more than anything, it

588
00:30:46,360 --> 00:30:50,000
Speaker 5: was that's that's what it should look like like.

589
00:30:50,040 --> 00:30:52,160
Speaker 4: That's what it should have looked like all season long.

590
00:30:52,200 --> 00:30:54,520
Speaker 5: And had Joe Burrow not gotten hurt, maybe it's what

591
00:30:54,600 --> 00:30:57,080
Speaker 5: it would have looked like all season long. An offense

592
00:30:57,160 --> 00:31:01,560
Speaker 5: that is damn near impossible to defend because of all

593
00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 5: the weaponry, an offense with an offensive line that is

594
00:31:05,160 --> 00:31:06,080
Speaker 5: performing better.

595
00:31:06,160 --> 00:31:06,959
Speaker 4: This is right now.

596
00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:10,440
Speaker 5: It's not a great offensive line, but it's easily and

597
00:31:10,480 --> 00:31:12,520
Speaker 5: this is a low bar to clear, easily the best

598
00:31:12,520 --> 00:31:15,080
Speaker 5: offensive line that Joe Burrow has played behind, and they've

599
00:31:15,080 --> 00:31:17,680
Speaker 5: got some younger pieces in the offensive line that are

600
00:31:18,040 --> 00:31:22,240
Speaker 5: obviously worth moving forward with a defense that was solid,

601
00:31:22,400 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 5: not great, opportunistic that has holes, but the offense was

602
00:31:26,680 --> 00:31:29,920
Speaker 5: good enough to overcome in the Bengals won a blowout.

603
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:33,920
Speaker 5: To me, what it was more than anything else, it

604
00:31:34,080 --> 00:31:38,120
Speaker 5: was it was an offense on display that as we

605
00:31:38,160 --> 00:31:40,280
Speaker 5: talk about what this offseason is going to look like,

606
00:31:41,080 --> 00:31:45,440
Speaker 5: you say to Duke Tobin, dude, if you can just

607
00:31:46,320 --> 00:31:49,440
Speaker 5: fix and I hate the whole like just need a

608
00:31:49,520 --> 00:31:53,360
Speaker 5: league average defense thing, but I'll use it if you

609
00:31:53,400 --> 00:31:57,640
Speaker 5: can just fix the defense to a degree that it's okay,

610
00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:00,719
Speaker 5: look at what you have over here, offense. And I

611
00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:03,360
Speaker 5: say that knowing that in the game prior to the

612
00:32:03,400 --> 00:32:06,320
Speaker 5: one against Miami, the Bengals offense looked broken. Joe Burrow

613
00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:09,440
Speaker 5: looked checked out. Offensively, they were a disaster. They got

614
00:32:09,480 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 5: shut out against the Baltimore Ravens. But as a general rule,

615
00:32:14,520 --> 00:32:16,840
Speaker 5: this season, the offense has been fine. Think of all

616
00:32:16,840 --> 00:32:19,520
Speaker 5: the games they've lost where they've scored enough points to

617
00:32:19,560 --> 00:32:25,320
Speaker 5: win but didn't Jets game, the Bears game, the Bills game,

618
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:29,320
Speaker 5: games where the offense was really, really really good but

619
00:32:29,360 --> 00:32:32,200
Speaker 5: maybe not perfect, and because it wasn't perfect, they didn't win,

620
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,480
Speaker 5: Like Duke, all you gotta do, It's not that unlike

621
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:40,920
Speaker 5: Nick Crawl for the Reds, where he's got this really

622
00:32:40,960 --> 00:32:45,680
Speaker 5: good collection of starting pitchers Hunter Green, Andrew Rabbit, Nick Lodolo,

623
00:32:45,760 --> 00:32:48,480
Speaker 5: And it's like, Man, if you could just find a

624
00:32:48,560 --> 00:32:51,840
Speaker 5: bat or two and then get some guys to be

625
00:32:51,840 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 5: better this year than they were last year with that

626
00:32:54,120 --> 00:32:56,120
Speaker 5: starting pitching, you got a shot to be a really

627
00:32:56,120 --> 00:33:00,920
Speaker 5: good team in twenty twenty six. I have a quarterback

628
00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 5: who last year probably wins MVP if they sneak into

629
00:33:04,240 --> 00:33:07,640
Speaker 5: the postseason, a guy who when he is at his best,

630
00:33:07,760 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 5: is clearly one of the best in the sport. Offensive

631
00:33:12,800 --> 00:33:17,440
Speaker 5: weaponry that is not going anywhere. If you can just

632
00:33:17,560 --> 00:33:21,640
Speaker 5: take this one part of your team, this one part

633
00:33:21,680 --> 00:33:27,840
Speaker 5: of your team and make it okay, you'll be in

634
00:33:27,840 --> 00:33:31,520
Speaker 5: the playoffs next year. Now I'm making that sound easier

635
00:33:31,520 --> 00:33:35,280
Speaker 5: than it actually is. Duke Tobin last season had a

636
00:33:35,280 --> 00:33:38,880
Speaker 5: defense that was atrocious and did nothing really to it

637
00:33:38,960 --> 00:33:39,800
Speaker 5: that mattered.

638
00:33:39,880 --> 00:33:40,080
Speaker 3: Right.

639
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:43,760
Speaker 5: They signed Oron Burks who's done nothing this year, TJ. Slayton,

640
00:33:43,760 --> 00:33:46,520
Speaker 5: who's done nothing this year, and drafted a bunch of

641
00:33:46,520 --> 00:33:49,360
Speaker 5: players on defense who have made little to no impact

642
00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:52,000
Speaker 5: this season, some of whom I don't know. If you're

643
00:33:52,080 --> 00:33:54,320
Speaker 5: like me, I'm really okay with not being a part

644
00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:58,720
Speaker 5: of the team next year, we'll see. But if you

645
00:33:58,760 --> 00:34:00,560
Speaker 5: assume that they're gonna be a little bit more aggressive

646
00:34:00,600 --> 00:34:07,959
Speaker 5: this year, dude, all all you have to do is

647
00:34:08,080 --> 00:34:10,600
Speaker 5: build a defense that is good enough to allow your

648
00:34:10,680 --> 00:34:13,600
Speaker 5: quarterback to make an occasional mistake. All you have to

649
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:15,560
Speaker 5: do is build a defense that is good enough to

650
00:34:15,600 --> 00:34:18,560
Speaker 5: allow your offense to not have to score every single

651
00:34:18,640 --> 00:34:21,400
Speaker 5: time they touch the football. All you have to do

652
00:34:21,480 --> 00:34:23,759
Speaker 5: is build a defense that is good enough to not

653
00:34:23,920 --> 00:34:27,600
Speaker 5: consistently waste performances where they score thirty five to forty points.

654
00:34:28,440 --> 00:34:28,839
Speaker 4: That's it.

655
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:32,040
Speaker 5: I think the other thing about this offseason is it's

656
00:34:32,680 --> 00:34:34,920
Speaker 5: they've had. Last year I think was one of them.

657
00:34:35,440 --> 00:34:38,759
Speaker 5: It's what was so mystifying about the entire offseason last

658
00:34:38,840 --> 00:34:40,799
Speaker 5: year for me is they had a lot of stuff

659
00:34:40,840 --> 00:34:43,040
Speaker 5: to fix on defense. They also had some uncertainty on

660
00:34:43,080 --> 00:34:46,320
Speaker 5: the offensive line. This year's offensive line, and I referenced

661
00:34:46,320 --> 00:34:48,960
Speaker 5: this a few minutes ago, this year's offensive line has

662
00:34:49,040 --> 00:34:55,720
Speaker 5: performed capably, not great, you know, not league league best,

663
00:34:56,480 --> 00:35:00,239
Speaker 5: but capably, and they've done so with Dylan Fairschild, who

664
00:35:00,239 --> 00:35:02,279
Speaker 5: I think we're all very much on board with the

665
00:35:02,280 --> 00:35:06,560
Speaker 5: Bengals moving forward with Amarus Mims, who probably eventually is

666
00:35:06,560 --> 00:35:09,640
Speaker 5: going to be the team's starting left tackle, and you

667
00:35:09,680 --> 00:35:13,160
Speaker 5: know the acquisition of Dalton Reisner has worked out at guard,

668
00:35:13,280 --> 00:35:16,479
Speaker 5: and they've got some questions about what's going to happen

669
00:35:16,520 --> 00:35:19,680
Speaker 5: long term with Orlando brown spot, with Ted Carris's spot.

670
00:35:19,719 --> 00:35:22,840
Speaker 5: But I think for the first time in quite a while,

671
00:35:22,960 --> 00:35:27,479
Speaker 5: they will go into the offseason without offensive line being

672
00:35:27,560 --> 00:35:31,880
Speaker 5: listed as among their most pressing team needs. Now you

673
00:35:31,880 --> 00:35:35,160
Speaker 5: can never have enough depth may still be an issue

674
00:35:35,920 --> 00:35:38,520
Speaker 5: long term solutions. You should still be looking for them

675
00:35:38,560 --> 00:35:42,920
Speaker 5: at a couple of different positions, but the rise of

676
00:35:42,960 --> 00:35:46,880
Speaker 5: that group has I think streamlined the offseason to do

677
00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:50,640
Speaker 5: list for Duke Tobin, where it's a starting caliber player

678
00:35:50,680 --> 00:35:54,400
Speaker 5: at every level of the defense, with money to spare,

679
00:35:54,520 --> 00:35:57,400
Speaker 5: with money to spend, with cap room at your disposal.

680
00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:02,160
Speaker 5: I think the other thing that's important, Duke Tobin gets

681
00:36:02,160 --> 00:36:06,160
Speaker 5: beat up for his draft classes and his draft decisions,

682
00:36:06,200 --> 00:36:08,960
Speaker 5: and god knows, understandably so.

683
00:36:09,160 --> 00:36:11,719
Speaker 4: They they've had a.

684
00:36:11,680 --> 00:36:15,080
Speaker 5: Hard time replacing so many of the players they acquired

685
00:36:15,120 --> 00:36:16,879
Speaker 5: to make a part of the defense in twenty one

686
00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:20,160
Speaker 5: and twenty two, and they've struggled so much to replace them.

687
00:36:20,160 --> 00:36:22,600
Speaker 5: They're still trying to figure out how to replace Jesse Bates,

688
00:36:23,000 --> 00:36:25,239
Speaker 5: who last played for the Bengals in twenty twenty two.

689
00:36:25,239 --> 00:36:28,240
Speaker 5: They're still trying to figure out how to replace DJ Reeder.

690
00:36:28,280 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 5: It's taken them a while, though the outside corner play

691
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:33,520
Speaker 5: recently has been pretty good. They've struggled for a while

692
00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:37,000
Speaker 5: to replace Chudobi a Wuozie. They've had entire draft classes

693
00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:39,279
Speaker 5: full of guys that you go, Okay, what does this

694
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:42,000
Speaker 5: guy do? Or when is this guy gonna start to contribute?

695
00:36:42,000 --> 00:36:46,400
Speaker 5: If you look though at the twenty twenty three draft class,

696
00:36:48,600 --> 00:36:51,479
Speaker 5: you'll see a group of guys that I think you're

697
00:36:52,760 --> 00:36:56,200
Speaker 5: excited about being on the team next year, and in

698
00:36:56,239 --> 00:36:59,120
Speaker 5: many cases perhaps even beyond.

699
00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:00,680
Speaker 4: Here.

700
00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 5: Down the stretch in the second half of the season,

701
00:37:03,640 --> 00:37:06,279
Speaker 5: Miles Murphy has played like an actual dude.

702
00:37:07,800 --> 00:37:10,160
Speaker 4: And later than any of us would like.

703
00:37:10,440 --> 00:37:12,440
Speaker 5: Nobody is saying they have to extend him, but I

704
00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:14,600
Speaker 5: think clearly they'll pick up his fifth year option like

705
00:37:14,640 --> 00:37:19,440
Speaker 5: he's played like a legitimate dude, and maybe not having.

706
00:37:19,320 --> 00:37:20,759
Speaker 4: Trey Hendrickson here has help that.

707
00:37:20,880 --> 00:37:24,799
Speaker 5: I don't know DJ Turner, I don't think anybody really

708
00:37:24,800 --> 00:37:27,520
Speaker 5: cares about the Pro Bowl games, but DJ Turner should

709
00:37:27,520 --> 00:37:30,800
Speaker 5: have been a Pro Bowl starter as far as I'm concerned,

710
00:37:30,880 --> 00:37:34,600
Speaker 5: has been awesome for most of the season. Chase Brown

711
00:37:34,680 --> 00:37:37,440
Speaker 5: is a very good player, still has a shot for

712
00:37:37,520 --> 00:37:39,720
Speaker 5: what it's worth it being a one thousand yard rusher

713
00:37:39,840 --> 00:37:42,080
Speaker 5: still I think one hundred and twenty five yards away

714
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:46,880
Speaker 5: from eclipsing last year's total and yards from scrimmage a

715
00:37:46,960 --> 00:37:50,920
Speaker 5: terrific threat. Perfect Piece fits great that we all like

716
00:37:51,480 --> 00:37:56,600
Speaker 5: Chase Brown. Andre Yoshavas as a sixth rounder from Princeton,

717
00:37:56,680 --> 00:38:01,040
Speaker 5: has been a good pick. I wouldn't let his presence

718
00:38:01,080 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 5: on the team preclude me from finding a better options

719
00:38:04,600 --> 00:38:06,799
Speaker 5: the number three wide receiver. But I think we're all

720
00:38:06,800 --> 00:38:10,120
Speaker 5: on board with Andre Yoshabaz being on the team.

721
00:38:11,000 --> 00:38:14,560
Speaker 4: Think anybody would have any major issue with that. Like that.

722
00:38:16,080 --> 00:38:18,960
Speaker 5: Class Jordan Battle. Jordan Battle is going to be a

723
00:38:18,960 --> 00:38:22,120
Speaker 5: starting safety next year. Again, his presence on the team

724
00:38:22,160 --> 00:38:26,440
Speaker 5: shouldn't necessarily preclude them from finding solutions that safety in

725
00:38:26,520 --> 00:38:31,120
Speaker 5: free agency or in the draft. Like, there's five players

726
00:38:31,160 --> 00:38:33,399
Speaker 5: and you could maybe add Charlie Jones as a kick

727
00:38:33,400 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 5: return guide to it. There's five, maybe six players from

728
00:38:36,680 --> 00:38:40,160
Speaker 5: that twenty twenty three class that look like Piece is

729
00:38:40,239 --> 00:38:43,279
Speaker 5: worth moving footward with and a number of those guys

730
00:38:43,320 --> 00:38:46,640
Speaker 5: on defense. So you know, six seven weeks ago we

731
00:38:46,640 --> 00:38:49,600
Speaker 5: were all talking about, man the offseason overhaul. The defense

732
00:38:49,920 --> 00:38:52,200
Speaker 5: probably gonna move on from Trey Hendricks, and you basically

733
00:38:52,200 --> 00:38:53,800
Speaker 5: have one guy in DJ Turner.

734
00:38:54,280 --> 00:38:55,719
Speaker 4: They have a lot of work to do.

735
00:38:57,280 --> 00:39:00,200
Speaker 5: But I think there's two pieces of good news. Number One,

736
00:39:00,280 --> 00:39:02,640
Speaker 5: that offense next year is going to be pretty much intact.

737
00:39:02,719 --> 00:39:05,480
Speaker 5: Everybody's going to come back. It's an offensive line that

738
00:39:05,600 --> 00:39:07,520
Speaker 5: is as as good as shape going in new offseason

739
00:39:07,560 --> 00:39:10,920
Speaker 5: as they've been in quite a while. And there are

740
00:39:10,920 --> 00:39:13,560
Speaker 5: at least some building blocks from that twenty twenty three

741
00:39:13,600 --> 00:39:15,760
Speaker 5: class that are moving into what should be the primes

742
00:39:15,760 --> 00:39:19,040
Speaker 5: of their careers, who you not only are comfortable being

743
00:39:19,080 --> 00:39:20,759
Speaker 5: a part of the team next year, but you may

744
00:39:20,800 --> 00:39:25,000
Speaker 5: want to build around for the remainder of the decade. Again,

745
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:27,200
Speaker 5: and this doesn't get let Duke off the hook for

746
00:39:27,239 --> 00:39:29,120
Speaker 5: the way this team has played this year. Doesn't let

747
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:31,719
Speaker 5: the Bengals as an organization off the hook for the

748
00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:34,320
Speaker 5: way they have failed for a third consecutive year to

749
00:39:34,560 --> 00:39:36,920
Speaker 5: miss the playoffs while Joe Burrow was in his prime,

750
00:39:38,480 --> 00:39:42,040
Speaker 5: But as as much of an overallaul as they seemingly

751
00:39:42,160 --> 00:39:45,400
Speaker 5: have in front of them. It's a little bit easier

752
00:39:45,480 --> 00:39:49,320
Speaker 5: to start the overhaul when you have some building blocks

753
00:39:50,200 --> 00:39:53,839
Speaker 5: that twenty twenty three class. While maybe slower to as

754
00:39:53,840 --> 00:39:56,960
Speaker 5: send than we would like, it's provided some building blocks.

755
00:39:58,560 --> 00:40:00,600
Speaker 4: And the offense is elite.

756
00:40:01,000 --> 00:40:03,680
Speaker 5: It's been elite this year, even when Joe Burrow wasn't healthy,

757
00:40:04,239 --> 00:40:06,640
Speaker 5: even when they were losing football games.

758
00:40:07,640 --> 00:40:09,359
Speaker 4: It sounds like a lot of work, and it is.

759
00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:12,200
Speaker 5: And you know, they've got to find players in the

760
00:40:12,239 --> 00:40:14,840
Speaker 5: draft who don't take three years to make an impact,

761
00:40:14,880 --> 00:40:16,960
Speaker 5: and they have to find free agents who can make

762
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:19,879
Speaker 5: an impact almost immediately. And they have to keep number

763
00:40:19,920 --> 00:40:22,480
Speaker 5: nine healthy because, as we've seen multiple times now, when

764
00:40:22,520 --> 00:40:27,520
Speaker 5: when he's not, the whole thing falls apart. But they're

765
00:40:27,680 --> 00:40:29,239
Speaker 5: they're starting from There are a lot of there are

766
00:40:29,239 --> 00:40:31,400
Speaker 5: a lot of like gms or personnel people around the

767
00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:34,440
Speaker 5: NFL who have to figure out a way to take

768
00:40:34,440 --> 00:40:36,719
Speaker 5: a team that didn't make the postseason this year and

769
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:39,520
Speaker 5: turn them into a playoff contender or a playoff team

770
00:40:39,560 --> 00:40:42,320
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty six. How many of those general managers

771
00:40:42,360 --> 00:40:44,000
Speaker 5: would like to have one side of the ball that

772
00:40:44,080 --> 00:40:45,319
Speaker 5: is pretty much set.

773
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:46,920
Speaker 4: Duke Tobin has that.

774
00:40:48,480 --> 00:40:51,480
Speaker 5: Again, like you may want a different person in charge

775
00:40:51,480 --> 00:40:53,479
Speaker 5: of the roster may want a different person in charge

776
00:40:53,520 --> 00:40:57,000
Speaker 5: of the draft. I can't argue with you, but how

777
00:40:57,000 --> 00:40:59,239
Speaker 5: many people in his shoes, how many people in a

778
00:40:59,360 --> 00:41:03,000
Speaker 5: similar job have one side of the ball that is

779
00:41:03,080 --> 00:41:05,520
Speaker 5: pretty much set and not just pretty much set, but

780
00:41:05,560 --> 00:41:09,200
Speaker 5: when it's set, is among the best in the sport.

781
00:41:10,840 --> 00:41:13,600
Speaker 5: And that is the case this year. Five one, three, seven, four, nine,

782
00:41:13,680 --> 00:41:17,600
Speaker 5: seven is our number. We'll get to a couple of

783
00:41:17,680 --> 00:41:19,520
Speaker 5: guests coming up in the eight o'clock hour, one on

784
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:21,640
Speaker 5: the Bengals, one on the Buckeyes, Sterling coming up at

785
00:41:21,719 --> 00:41:22,240
Speaker 5: nine o'clock.

786
00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:24,760
Speaker 4: It's twenty after seven o'clock.

787
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:28,480
Speaker 5: This is RNL Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet

788
00:41:28,520 --> 00:41:29,839
Speaker 5: seven hundred WLW.

789
00:41:31,280 --> 00:41:33,960
Speaker 4: This is RNL Carrier Sports Talk.

790
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:38,080
Speaker 5: We are presented tonight by Kelsey Chevrolet on seven hundred WLW.

791
00:41:38,280 --> 00:41:43,240
Speaker 5: The Bengals and Cardinals on Sunday will be played amid

792
00:41:43,480 --> 00:41:48,279
Speaker 5: warm temperatures but probably some rain drops. Pregame covers when

793
00:41:48,280 --> 00:41:51,720
Speaker 5: the Holy Grail starts at nine o'clock, Can Brew, Tony Pike,

794
00:41:52,000 --> 00:41:55,640
Speaker 5: and myself as the Bengals played the second to last

795
00:41:55,680 --> 00:41:59,200
Speaker 5: game of the season Cardinals. Here they are playing out

796
00:41:59,200 --> 00:42:03,120
Speaker 5: the string, according to most who cover the league, looking

797
00:42:03,160 --> 00:42:05,360
Speaker 5: for a new head coach to our plays Jonathan Gannon

798
00:42:05,440 --> 00:42:06,840
Speaker 5: and then the Cleveland Browns.

799
00:42:06,920 --> 00:42:08,600
Speaker 4: Cleveland's going to be interesting.

800
00:42:10,239 --> 00:42:12,719
Speaker 5: Because there are a lot of younger players on that

801
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:15,120
Speaker 5: team that showed flashes this year. One of them, quin

802
00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:17,520
Speaker 5: Shawn Judkins, got hurt last week. We'll see what his

803
00:42:17,560 --> 00:42:20,839
Speaker 5: offseason entails. It feels like that game a week from

804
00:42:20,880 --> 00:42:24,120
Speaker 5: Sunday is going to be a showdown, so to speak,

805
00:42:24,160 --> 00:42:27,160
Speaker 5: between Joe Burrow and Shadoor Sanders. I don't know that

806
00:42:27,880 --> 00:42:31,160
Speaker 5: the flashes of promise that Shadoor Sanders has shown is

807
00:42:31,200 --> 00:42:32,680
Speaker 5: going to be enough to make them not want to

808
00:42:32,719 --> 00:42:35,719
Speaker 5: draft a quarterback in Cleveland. And obviously there's a lot

809
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:38,239
Speaker 5: being written and said about the future of Kevin Stefanski,

810
00:42:38,280 --> 00:42:41,600
Speaker 5: a two time NFL Coach of the Year that seems

811
00:42:41,640 --> 00:42:45,800
Speaker 5: to have exhausted his time with the Browns. We will

812
00:42:45,840 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 5: see could be an offseason of transition for both Ohio

813
00:42:49,239 --> 00:42:51,120
Speaker 5: professional football teams.

814
00:42:51,160 --> 00:42:53,680
Speaker 4: We are going to get to that coming up here

815
00:42:54,000 --> 00:42:54,880
Speaker 4: a little bit later on.

816
00:42:54,920 --> 00:42:57,600
Speaker 5: We'll do some college football in the nine o'clock hour

817
00:42:57,719 --> 00:43:00,640
Speaker 5: as well. Five point three seven four nine seven thousand

818
00:43:00,719 --> 00:43:04,759
Speaker 5: is our phone number. And uh eight hundred the big one.

819
00:43:05,360 --> 00:43:08,480
Speaker 5: Let's uh, let's talk to Kevin Kevin and Columbus. Kevin,

820
00:43:08,480 --> 00:43:11,000
Speaker 5: you're on seven hundred W l W Kevin, good evening,

821
00:43:11,320 --> 00:43:16,480
Speaker 5: How are you, Kevin and Columbus?

822
00:43:16,480 --> 00:43:16,919
Speaker 3: Are you there?

823
00:43:18,800 --> 00:43:19,120
Speaker 2: Hear me?

824
00:43:19,640 --> 00:43:23,120
Speaker 4: Kevin? Kevin? What's all loud and clear? What is going on?

825
00:43:23,239 --> 00:43:23,399
Speaker 5: Yeah?

826
00:43:23,400 --> 00:43:25,640
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, yeah, great, thank you.

827
00:43:26,080 --> 00:43:28,719
Speaker 7: Remember when Peyton Manning was a Colt quarterback, they had

828
00:43:28,760 --> 00:43:31,120
Speaker 7: the same problem. They had the best offense and the

829
00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:34,560
Speaker 7: worst defense. I can't remember how exactly long ago that was,

830
00:43:34,640 --> 00:43:37,359
Speaker 7: but what they did is they tired Tony Dunge as

831
00:43:37,360 --> 00:43:40,799
Speaker 7: they're head coach, and his his job was to, you know,

832
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:43,839
Speaker 7: don't touch the offense and fix the defense. And I'm

833
00:43:43,880 --> 00:43:47,720
Speaker 7: not suggesting fire our coach, but they had the same

834
00:43:47,760 --> 00:43:50,719
Speaker 7: problem just the other Their defense was horrible. I can't

835
00:43:50,760 --> 00:43:52,560
Speaker 7: remember what year it was, but it was when Peyton

836
00:43:52,560 --> 00:43:53,840
Speaker 7: Manning was a quarterback, you know.

837
00:43:54,400 --> 00:43:57,640
Speaker 5: Yeah, they had Jim Moore in the early two thousands, right,

838
00:43:57,680 --> 00:43:59,800
Speaker 5: and they had a team that constantly got to the

839
00:43:59,800 --> 00:44:02,480
Speaker 5: post season and then constantly defensively was a train wreck.

840
00:44:02,560 --> 00:44:07,440
Speaker 5: Once they got to the postseason, and ye couldn't stop anybody,

841
00:44:07,680 --> 00:44:12,239
Speaker 5: but it illustrated. It illustrated that eventually, because they tied

842
00:44:12,280 --> 00:44:14,920
Speaker 5: a lot of money into their offense, they eventually broke

843
00:44:14,960 --> 00:44:16,239
Speaker 5: through and at the end of that two thousand and

844
00:44:16,320 --> 00:44:19,759
Speaker 5: five season won a Super Bowl despite the investments they

845
00:44:19,840 --> 00:44:22,839
Speaker 5: had made on offense, and they made some smart acquisitions

846
00:44:23,239 --> 00:44:26,759
Speaker 5: in the draft, a handful of smart acquisitions in free agency.

847
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:30,120
Speaker 5: Maybe never had any elite level defense, but they didn't

848
00:44:30,160 --> 00:44:32,560
Speaker 5: need one. They just needed one that allowed Peyton Manning

849
00:44:32,600 --> 00:44:34,440
Speaker 5: to be good, but didn't need him to be perfect

850
00:44:34,440 --> 00:44:35,200
Speaker 5: every single week.

851
00:44:35,480 --> 00:44:37,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, and why can't we do that? I mean, I

852
00:44:37,520 --> 00:44:39,040
Speaker 2: don't know how we would do that, or.

853
00:44:39,400 --> 00:44:41,440
Speaker 7: Whether it's firing the head coach, but Bobby, that's what

854
00:44:41,480 --> 00:44:44,360
Speaker 7: they need to do, and they did it. Why can't

855
00:44:44,400 --> 00:44:47,239
Speaker 7: we Yeah, Well, the answer is, I.

856
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:49,440
Speaker 5: Mean, you know, if you go back to when the

857
00:44:49,440 --> 00:44:52,839
Speaker 5: Bengals made the Super Bowl nearly five years ago, they

858
00:44:52,920 --> 00:44:55,719
Speaker 5: had a defense that they could just throw money at.

859
00:44:55,880 --> 00:44:59,160
Speaker 5: You know, they signed DJ Reader, who at the time

860
00:44:59,239 --> 00:45:03,120
Speaker 5: was the most expensive free agent acquisition on the interior

861
00:45:03,200 --> 00:45:05,680
Speaker 5: of the defensive line in the history of the sport.

862
00:45:06,200 --> 00:45:08,040
Speaker 5: And a lot of folks said, well, God, they overpaid

863
00:45:08,080 --> 00:45:10,080
Speaker 5: for DJ Reader, and they had to because the only

864
00:45:10,080 --> 00:45:11,600
Speaker 5: way you were gonna get good players to want to

865
00:45:11,600 --> 00:45:15,080
Speaker 5: come here was to overpay him. And they acquired Trey Hendrickson,

866
00:45:15,080 --> 00:45:16,960
Speaker 5: and they went god should Obiah Woozia, and they went

867
00:45:17,000 --> 00:45:21,320
Speaker 5: god Von Bell and Mike Hilton, and those signings all worked.

868
00:45:21,320 --> 00:45:25,520
Speaker 5: Plus they traded for bj Hill, they acquired Larry Ogunjobi Like.

869
00:45:25,600 --> 00:45:29,880
Speaker 5: They got a lot of established NFL players from other teams.

870
00:45:30,440 --> 00:45:32,840
Speaker 5: The problem is they haven't been able to replace a

871
00:45:32,880 --> 00:45:36,320
Speaker 5: lot of those guys, and even some of their homegrown players,

872
00:45:36,360 --> 00:45:39,000
Speaker 5: like Jesse Bates, they haven't been able to replace him

873
00:45:39,080 --> 00:45:42,040
Speaker 5: using the draft. Dax Hill is playing well right now.

874
00:45:42,120 --> 00:45:45,200
Speaker 5: It's taken forever for Dax Hill to find a role

875
00:45:45,239 --> 00:45:48,880
Speaker 5: in the NFL. The plan to replace him or replace

876
00:45:49,000 --> 00:45:51,640
Speaker 5: Jesse Bates with Dax Hill didn't work out. They haven't

877
00:45:51,680 --> 00:45:53,960
Speaker 5: been able to replace Choudobia Wuzia, they haven't been able

878
00:45:53,960 --> 00:45:56,160
Speaker 5: to supplement Trey Hendrickson, they haven't been able to replace

879
00:45:56,239 --> 00:45:57,200
Speaker 5: DJ Reader.

880
00:45:57,400 --> 00:45:59,279
Speaker 4: And so they haven't been able to do that using

881
00:45:59,320 --> 00:45:59,840
Speaker 4: the draft.

882
00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:03,799
Speaker 5: Until they draft well consistently, they're going to have some

883
00:46:03,840 --> 00:46:05,880
Speaker 5: of the same problems we've watched unfold this season.

884
00:46:06,480 --> 00:46:08,640
Speaker 7: Yeah, you can't just hope everybody plays better.

885
00:46:08,680 --> 00:46:12,040
Speaker 3: Next year cross your finger. That seems the Reds to

886
00:46:12,080 --> 00:46:12,759
Speaker 3: do the same thing.

887
00:46:12,800 --> 00:46:14,920
Speaker 7: But hey, I just want to hear what you had

888
00:46:14,920 --> 00:46:16,799
Speaker 7: to say, what they might do about next year, because

889
00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:20,640
Speaker 7: he only got Burrow a few more years, right, So yeah.

890
00:46:20,000 --> 00:46:21,960
Speaker 5: Four more years. End of the decade and time is

891
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:23,719
Speaker 5: ticking right. You don't want to be thank you for

892
00:46:23,760 --> 00:46:25,160
Speaker 5: the phone call, Kevin. You don't want to be in

893
00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:28,399
Speaker 5: the same position a year from now that you've been

894
00:46:28,440 --> 00:46:31,560
Speaker 5: in this year, which is not only on the outside

895
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:35,720
Speaker 5: looking in of the postseason, but on the outside looking

896
00:46:35,760 --> 00:46:39,640
Speaker 5: into the postseason, with your quarterback expressing some level of

897
00:46:39,760 --> 00:46:43,840
Speaker 5: dissatisfaction with where things are in his career.

898
00:46:43,960 --> 00:46:44,839
Speaker 4: You know I have.

899
00:46:46,040 --> 00:46:49,880
Speaker 5: I have grown fatigued with the Joe Burrows psychoanalysis as

900
00:46:49,960 --> 00:46:53,080
Speaker 5: much as anybody. But do you want to do this

901
00:46:53,160 --> 00:46:57,480
Speaker 5: in a year where Joe is publicly expressing some level

902
00:46:57,480 --> 00:47:01,080
Speaker 5: of discomfort emotionally and mentally with where things are going

903
00:47:01,120 --> 00:47:01,720
Speaker 5: with his career.

904
00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:02,160
Speaker 4: You don't.

905
00:47:03,000 --> 00:47:05,080
Speaker 5: That doesn't mean he's gonna pull a Carson Palmer do

906
00:47:05,160 --> 00:47:07,120
Speaker 5: what Andrew Locke did, but you don't want to do it.

907
00:47:07,120 --> 00:47:08,640
Speaker 5: You don't want to tempt fate. They've got to be

908
00:47:08,640 --> 00:47:11,640
Speaker 5: better at drafting players. Who can make an immediate impact.

909
00:47:11,719 --> 00:47:13,680
Speaker 5: I just talked about the twenty twenty three draft class,

910
00:47:13,719 --> 00:47:18,040
Speaker 5: which is right now proving to be useful. The problem

911
00:47:18,040 --> 00:47:21,040
Speaker 5: is it's taken almost three full seasons for us to

912
00:47:21,080 --> 00:47:24,279
Speaker 5: talk about that class. Duke Tobin last year talked about

913
00:47:24,320 --> 00:47:26,880
Speaker 5: the need to draft players who can made an immediate

914
00:47:26,920 --> 00:47:29,120
Speaker 5: impact defensively.

915
00:47:29,560 --> 00:47:32,320
Speaker 4: That didn't happen now. Maybe Barrett Carter.

916
00:47:32,200 --> 00:47:35,200
Speaker 5: Ends up being really good one day, Maybe Demetrius Knight

917
00:47:35,680 --> 00:47:39,400
Speaker 5: ends up being really good one day. Maybe maybe Shamar

918
00:47:39,520 --> 00:47:42,399
Speaker 5: Stewart ends up playing like a first round pick. None

919
00:47:42,440 --> 00:47:45,560
Speaker 5: of those things have happened this year. This is a

920
00:47:46,200 --> 00:47:50,160
Speaker 5: cheap labor league. There's never been more of a premium

921
00:47:50,239 --> 00:47:53,800
Speaker 5: on draft picks making an instant impact. It just hasn't

922
00:47:53,840 --> 00:47:56,560
Speaker 5: happened here. What will happen right now is the seven

923
00:47:56,560 --> 00:48:00,680
Speaker 5: to thirty News on seven hundred WLW on a Friday

924
00:48:00,760 --> 00:48:03,720
Speaker 5: night edition of Rnell Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey

925
00:48:03,800 --> 00:48:08,160
Speaker 5: Chevrolet on seven hundred WLW, Sterling coming your way at

926
00:48:08,280 --> 00:48:11,800
Speaker 5: nine oh five. Lance is obviously off tonight on Moweger

927
00:48:12,040 --> 00:48:13,600
Speaker 5: from ESPN fifteen thirty.

928
00:48:14,120 --> 00:48:15,840
Speaker 4: Lances back for Bengals.

929
00:48:15,400 --> 00:48:19,200
Speaker 5: Line on Monday evening Bengals line, airing for a half

930
00:48:19,239 --> 00:48:23,920
Speaker 5: hour on seven hundred WLW before moving to Fox Sports

931
00:48:23,920 --> 00:48:28,520
Speaker 5: thirteen sixty on I'm Sorry on ESPN fifteen thirty. On

932
00:48:28,719 --> 00:48:32,440
Speaker 5: Monday night, we have UC basketball as the Bearcats on

933
00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:35,080
Speaker 5: Monday play their final non conference game of the season,

934
00:48:35,120 --> 00:48:37,760
Speaker 5: the tilt against Lipscomb, And you talk about twenty twenty

935
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:41,560
Speaker 5: six and the coming months ahead. You can't help but wonder,

936
00:48:41,600 --> 00:48:45,240
Speaker 5: if you're a UC basketball fan number one, with five

937
00:48:45,320 --> 00:48:49,919
Speaker 5: losses already and Big Twelve play looming starting a week

938
00:48:49,920 --> 00:48:54,959
Speaker 5: from tomorrow with a home game against Houston, how bad

939
00:48:55,080 --> 00:48:58,200
Speaker 5: might the next few weeks and months get for Wes

940
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:00,279
Speaker 5: Miller's team. You know, go back a year ago at

941
00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:03,479
Speaker 5: this time, Cincinnati was getting set to start league play.

942
00:49:03,560 --> 00:49:06,080
Speaker 5: They played Kansas State in the first Big twelve game,

943
00:49:06,920 --> 00:49:09,920
Speaker 5: and the Bearcats got through the non conference part of

944
00:49:09,920 --> 00:49:15,759
Speaker 5: their schedule with one loss, was a game against Villanova

945
00:49:15,760 --> 00:49:18,640
Speaker 5: they lost on the road, got through it with one loss,

946
00:49:18,840 --> 00:49:23,720
Speaker 5: and yet still didn't come close to making the NCAA tournament.

947
00:49:25,440 --> 00:49:30,160
Speaker 5: This year they have five A bad home loss from

948
00:49:31,600 --> 00:49:38,560
Speaker 5: a metrics perspective, and.

949
00:49:34,680 --> 00:49:37,640
Speaker 4: What other other other perspective you want to use?

950
00:49:37,680 --> 00:49:41,200
Speaker 5: A bad home loss against Destern Michigan, the loss on

951
00:49:41,239 --> 00:49:44,080
Speaker 5: the road to Zayvier in the Skyline chilea Crosstown shootout

952
00:49:44,120 --> 00:49:48,600
Speaker 5: a not great Xavier team, and then losses each of

953
00:49:48,640 --> 00:49:51,359
Speaker 5: the last couple of weeks to Georgia which ended up

954
00:49:51,400 --> 00:49:53,759
Speaker 5: not being very competitive after the Bearcats had a lead

955
00:49:53,800 --> 00:49:56,439
Speaker 5: in the first half, and then a Clemson loss where

956
00:49:56,440 --> 00:49:58,680
Speaker 5: the Bearcats were down thirty to five in the first

957
00:49:58,680 --> 00:50:01,239
Speaker 5: half before playing very copetitively in the second half and

958
00:50:01,280 --> 00:50:04,440
Speaker 5: losing by three, but still a loss. This plus the

959
00:50:04,640 --> 00:50:08,000
Speaker 5: neutral floor loss to Louisville five losses going into the

960
00:50:08,000 --> 00:50:12,200
Speaker 5: Big Twelve, a league that has six teams in the

961
00:50:12,239 --> 00:50:16,920
Speaker 5: top twenty four of the Kenpalm dot com rankings, and

962
00:50:16,960 --> 00:50:20,640
Speaker 5: so a season that I think for most was defined

963
00:50:20,680 --> 00:50:23,600
Speaker 5: by Wes Miller year five. If he doesn't get to

964
00:50:23,600 --> 00:50:26,680
Speaker 5: the NCAA tournament, UC is going to be in the

965
00:50:26,719 --> 00:50:31,080
Speaker 5: market for a new head coach, not only not making

966
00:50:31,080 --> 00:50:35,360
Speaker 5: the tournament, perhaps, but not making the tournament and not

967
00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:38,520
Speaker 5: even coming close, and not even coming close in ways

968
00:50:39,800 --> 00:50:42,160
Speaker 5: that you know weren't a part of last year's conversation.

969
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:45,400
Speaker 4: They have eighteen Big Twelve games.

970
00:50:47,719 --> 00:50:52,120
Speaker 5: They're going to be huge underdogs and a lot of them.

971
00:50:52,160 --> 00:50:54,360
Speaker 5: And if you just take the quality of that league

972
00:50:55,080 --> 00:50:58,680
Speaker 5: with how the Bearcats have played, they largely despite the

973
00:50:58,680 --> 00:51:02,319
Speaker 5: addition of Gisel James, like the same team here at

974
00:51:02,320 --> 00:51:07,600
Speaker 5: the end of twenty twenty five as they looked in

975
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:15,360
Speaker 5: early November. You can wonder how bad might it get

976
00:51:15,400 --> 00:51:19,200
Speaker 5: and could they end Big twelve play with I don't know,

977
00:51:19,239 --> 00:51:21,520
Speaker 5: thirteen fourteen, fifteen losses or more.

978
00:51:22,120 --> 00:51:23,000
Speaker 4: Let's think about that.

979
00:51:23,160 --> 00:51:25,479
Speaker 5: A season that was defined by, well, the Bearcats must

980
00:51:25,480 --> 00:51:28,359
Speaker 5: make the NCAA tournament, we're now wondering if they could

981
00:51:28,360 --> 00:51:33,080
Speaker 5: avoid like as many as twenty losses combining non league

982
00:51:33,120 --> 00:51:38,279
Speaker 5: and Big twelve play. So, you know, I like Wes

983
00:51:38,360 --> 00:51:40,160
Speaker 5: Miller a lot. He has been very good to me

984
00:51:40,239 --> 00:51:44,520
Speaker 5: since he's become Cincinnati's head coach. He's easy to work

985
00:51:44,560 --> 00:51:48,560
Speaker 5: with on UC basketball broadcasts. I've rooted like hell for him.

986
00:51:48,600 --> 00:51:53,160
Speaker 5: But if it was NCAA tournament or BUS and I

987
00:51:53,200 --> 00:51:54,640
Speaker 5: think for a lot of us it was like, all right,

988
00:51:54,719 --> 00:51:56,799
Speaker 5: NCAA tournament or bus, But like, what does it look

989
00:51:56,880 --> 00:51:59,759
Speaker 5: like like do they do they barely miss it? Do

990
00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:01,759
Speaker 5: they did they miss it? Because you know they were

991
00:52:01,800 --> 00:52:03,680
Speaker 5: one of the first four out. They were team number

992
00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:06,440
Speaker 5: sixty nine or team number seventy and you know, they

993
00:52:06,440 --> 00:52:08,600
Speaker 5: played great down the stretch, and the committee just didn't

994
00:52:08,680 --> 00:52:10,840
Speaker 5: like their resume where there are a whole bunch of injuries.

995
00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:12,719
Speaker 5: You know, what did it look like? What's the context?

996
00:52:13,680 --> 00:52:15,800
Speaker 5: I'm not sure any context is going to be needed.

997
00:52:15,840 --> 00:52:20,000
Speaker 5: If this season ends and there's an eighteen and nineteen

998
00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:23,000
Speaker 5: or twenty next to Cincinnati and the lost column.

999
00:52:23,040 --> 00:52:24,200
Speaker 4: It is remarkable that.

1000
00:52:24,080 --> 00:52:27,360
Speaker 5: That's where we are in year five, year three of

1001
00:52:27,400 --> 00:52:30,320
Speaker 5: the Big Twelve, where it's not are they going to

1002
00:52:30,360 --> 00:52:33,040
Speaker 5: make the tournament, but it's how bad might it get?

1003
00:52:34,239 --> 00:52:35,680
Speaker 5: And if you watch some of the teams in the

1004
00:52:35,680 --> 00:52:40,480
Speaker 5: Big Twelve, Houston, Arizona, who I watched them a week

1005
00:52:40,520 --> 00:52:43,399
Speaker 5: ago on Saturday against Alabama, they looked like an NBA team.

1006
00:52:43,480 --> 00:52:47,520
Speaker 5: Texas Tech, Iowa State byu UCF has played very well,

1007
00:52:47,600 --> 00:52:54,960
Speaker 5: Oklahoma States played very well. I haven't even mentioned Kansas again.

1008
00:52:55,040 --> 00:52:56,919
Speaker 5: Go back a year ago. They had one league loss

1009
00:52:56,920 --> 00:52:58,680
Speaker 5: and I'm not sure anybody felt great about how they

1010
00:52:58,719 --> 00:53:01,440
Speaker 5: were playing, but they had built in cushion, and I

1011
00:53:01,440 --> 00:53:03,439
Speaker 5: think the prevailing thought was, well, if they go five

1012
00:53:03,520 --> 00:53:05,280
Speaker 5: hundred in the Big Twelve, they're going to be okay.

1013
00:53:05,320 --> 00:53:07,160
Speaker 5: I think that would have been the case they did

1014
00:53:07,160 --> 00:53:13,160
Speaker 5: not finish five hundred in the Big twelve. Five hundred

1015
00:53:13,200 --> 00:53:15,360
Speaker 5: the Big Twelve this year would feel like a miracle.

1016
00:53:17,680 --> 00:53:20,919
Speaker 5: So it's certainly an uphill battle for Wes Miller's team.

1017
00:53:20,960 --> 00:53:22,960
Speaker 5: And you know, then you start kind of a larger

1018
00:53:22,960 --> 00:53:27,279
Speaker 5: conversation about UC athletics. Scott Saderfield is going to be

1019
00:53:27,320 --> 00:53:29,920
Speaker 5: back for year four, but the reality is part of

1020
00:53:29,920 --> 00:53:36,480
Speaker 5: that program's current brand is that they fall apart in November.

1021
00:53:37,560 --> 00:53:39,400
Speaker 5: I think they've lost their last ten games in the

1022
00:53:39,400 --> 00:53:41,880
Speaker 5: month of November. I believe Scott Sadderfield has won and

1023
00:53:41,960 --> 00:53:45,480
Speaker 5: eleven in the month of November. And while they did

1024
00:53:45,520 --> 00:53:47,480
Speaker 5: a lot of really good things this year, this was

1025
00:53:47,480 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 5: a team in twenty twenty five that was sort of

1026
00:53:50,040 --> 00:53:52,120
Speaker 5: the culmination of a lot of guys choosing to come

1027
00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:55,279
Speaker 5: back and play at UC despite maybe having a chance

1028
00:53:55,360 --> 00:53:58,640
Speaker 5: to make more money elsewhere, some guys maybe taking a

1029
00:53:58,680 --> 00:54:01,880
Speaker 5: hometown discount them, you know, spending money to add players

1030
00:54:01,960 --> 00:54:03,920
Speaker 5: via the portal, and it all adding up to a

1031
00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:08,440
Speaker 5: seven win season that went down with four consecutive losses

1032
00:54:08,480 --> 00:54:10,479
Speaker 5: at the end. They obviously have a Bowl game still

1033
00:54:10,480 --> 00:54:12,760
Speaker 5: against Navy a week from Friday, a week from tonight,

1034
00:54:13,320 --> 00:54:14,400
Speaker 5: in Memphis.

1035
00:54:14,400 --> 00:54:17,640
Speaker 4: But still, and as you know, I.

1036
00:54:17,719 --> 00:54:20,440
Speaker 5: Look online and I see all the you know, anger

1037
00:54:20,520 --> 00:54:22,839
Speaker 5: aimed at the basketball coach and all the anger aimed

1038
00:54:22,880 --> 00:54:25,480
Speaker 5: at the football coach. But the common denominator becomes the

1039
00:54:25,520 --> 00:54:26,680
Speaker 5: person who hired both.

1040
00:54:27,719 --> 00:54:28,319
Speaker 4: And if you're a.

1041
00:54:28,280 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 5: Director of athletics, and I think is a general rule,

1042
00:54:30,840 --> 00:54:33,720
Speaker 5: John Cunningham is a pretty solid administrator, But you're ultimately

1043
00:54:33,840 --> 00:54:38,000
Speaker 5: judged by the coaches you hire, and mainly the coaches

1044
00:54:38,040 --> 00:54:42,239
Speaker 5: you hire at the two highest profile sports. Scott Saderfield

1045
00:54:42,239 --> 00:54:44,319
Speaker 5: may have earned a fourth year at you see, but

1046
00:54:44,400 --> 00:54:46,560
Speaker 5: I would stop well short of saying that he's popular,

1047
00:54:47,520 --> 00:54:49,480
Speaker 5: and I would imagine he, for a lot of fans,

1048
00:54:49,520 --> 00:54:51,840
Speaker 5: is going to go into year four with a specific

1049
00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:55,520
Speaker 5: mandate to not only win more games, but along with that,

1050
00:54:55,640 --> 00:54:59,719
Speaker 5: of course avoid the late season meltdown. And a men's

1051
00:54:59,719 --> 00:55:03,799
Speaker 5: basket fotball coach who is in his fifth season is

1052
00:55:03,960 --> 00:55:08,399
Speaker 5: overseeing a team that has five losses already going into

1053
00:55:08,400 --> 00:55:11,239
Speaker 5: conference play. Oh and by the way, and I know

1054
00:55:11,360 --> 00:55:14,440
Speaker 5: Lance has mentioned this, A bunch has a lot of

1055
00:55:14,480 --> 00:55:17,319
Speaker 5: dudes from last year's team which underwhelmed, who have at

1056
00:55:17,360 --> 00:55:22,120
Speaker 5: least contributed to high major programs elsewhere. So I think

1057
00:55:22,120 --> 00:55:25,280
Speaker 5: one of the interesting storylines for Cincinnati sports in twenty

1058
00:55:25,360 --> 00:55:28,120
Speaker 5: twenty six is going to be like, is there a

1059
00:55:28,120 --> 00:55:34,840
Speaker 5: new basketball coach and how much patience is there ultimately

1060
00:55:34,880 --> 00:55:36,959
Speaker 5: going to be with the person and hired in charge

1061
00:55:37,000 --> 00:55:40,960
Speaker 5: of hiring the basketball coach and ultimately overseeing the football program.

1062
00:55:41,040 --> 00:55:41,520
Speaker 4: We'll see.

1063
00:55:42,360 --> 00:55:45,120
Speaker 5: But I'd be a line to you if I'd told

1064
00:55:45,120 --> 00:55:46,600
Speaker 5: you I thought, you know, we'd be here at the

1065
00:55:46,719 --> 00:55:50,000
Speaker 5: end of this year with UC sitting there with five losses,

1066
00:55:50,880 --> 00:55:53,080
Speaker 5: is still looking to make the NCAA tournament for the

1067
00:55:53,120 --> 00:55:57,080
Speaker 5: first time since twenty nineteen that was forever ago, And

1068
00:55:57,160 --> 00:56:00,879
Speaker 5: yet it feels extraordinarily unlikely, as much as I hate

1069
00:56:00,880 --> 00:56:03,200
Speaker 5: to say this is a Bearcat fan, that Cincinnati is

1070
00:56:03,280 --> 00:56:06,360
Speaker 5: gonna come even close to having its name called on

1071
00:56:06,400 --> 00:56:09,360
Speaker 5: selection Sunday, And like you know, invariably, they're going to

1072
00:56:09,400 --> 00:56:12,400
Speaker 5: be comparisons to what's happening with one program to the

1073
00:56:12,440 --> 00:56:13,520
Speaker 5: other across town.

1074
00:56:13,560 --> 00:56:15,000
Speaker 4: And Xavier has its issues.

1075
00:56:15,000 --> 00:56:17,719
Speaker 5: The Musketeers next game is going to be at home

1076
00:56:17,760 --> 00:56:21,120
Speaker 5: against Yukon on New Year's Eve, and the Huskies will

1077
00:56:21,160 --> 00:56:24,799
Speaker 5: present a world of problems for a talent efficient Xavier team.

1078
00:56:25,600 --> 00:56:28,000
Speaker 4: But I do think in terms of how they've been coached.

1079
00:56:28,160 --> 00:56:31,600
Speaker 5: Richard Patino deserves a lot of credit because number one,

1080
00:56:31,600 --> 00:56:34,279
Speaker 5: they have gotten better, and number two, they bounce back

1081
00:56:34,320 --> 00:56:37,319
Speaker 5: pretty nicely after getting destroyed in the most lopsided loss

1082
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:39,160
Speaker 5: in the history of the Cintas Center and playing well

1083
00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:43,400
Speaker 5: enough to be an Okay Georgetown team. Maybe Okay's pushing

1084
00:56:43,400 --> 00:56:46,120
Speaker 5: it a little bit, and so yeah, there's a little

1085
00:56:46,120 --> 00:56:47,880
Speaker 5: bit of a talent issue, but you do see a

1086
00:56:47,880 --> 00:56:50,400
Speaker 5: team that is responding to his coaching, and you do

1087
00:56:50,440 --> 00:56:52,280
Speaker 5: see a team that, relative to what they were putting

1088
00:56:52,280 --> 00:56:55,280
Speaker 5: on the floor very early in the season, has improved

1089
00:56:55,400 --> 00:56:56,880
Speaker 5: for the most part, and it's still going to be

1090
00:56:56,920 --> 00:56:59,000
Speaker 5: a very uphill battle for them in Big East play.

1091
00:57:00,000 --> 00:57:04,000
Speaker 5: It's year one with west Miller. Unfortunately, it's a year five,

1092
00:57:05,160 --> 00:57:07,840
Speaker 5: and without anything to kind of hang your hat on

1093
00:57:07,960 --> 00:57:10,400
Speaker 5: to point to as a track record that indicates that

1094
00:57:10,440 --> 00:57:14,279
Speaker 5: things will get better, you can't help but conclude that

1095
00:57:14,880 --> 00:57:17,880
Speaker 5: they're going to finish with way, way, way more losses

1096
00:57:17,920 --> 00:57:20,960
Speaker 5: than anybody ever would have imagined. And in the season

1097
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:24,320
Speaker 5: that is defined by does he make the tournament? If

1098
00:57:24,360 --> 00:57:26,560
Speaker 5: they don't come even close, I think most of us

1099
00:57:26,600 --> 00:57:28,880
Speaker 5: at that point assume what the outcome is going to

1100
00:57:28,920 --> 00:57:32,560
Speaker 5: be how many more coaches John Cunningham gets to hire

1101
00:57:33,800 --> 00:57:36,360
Speaker 5: is certainly going to be up for discussion as.

1102
00:57:37,840 --> 00:57:39,640
Speaker 4: Things continue to.

1103
00:57:39,680 --> 00:57:43,600
Speaker 5: Progress the way they appear they will be progressing seven.

1104
00:57:43,400 --> 00:57:45,440
Speaker 4: Forty nine at maleger on Twitter.

1105
00:57:45,640 --> 00:57:48,840
Speaker 5: Five point three seven four nine seven thousand is our

1106
00:57:48,880 --> 00:57:51,840
Speaker 5: phone number. You'll hear my conversation with Paul Danner Junior

1107
00:57:51,840 --> 00:57:54,160
Speaker 5: from the Athletic coming up at eight twenty as we

1108
00:57:54,160 --> 00:57:57,480
Speaker 5: talk Bengals, including a guy in T Higgins who will

1109
00:57:57,520 --> 00:57:59,560
Speaker 5: spend a few minutes on when we come back. But

1110
00:58:00,000 --> 00:58:03,240
Speaker 5: this is our and L Carriers sport Stock. We are

1111
00:58:03,280 --> 00:58:07,480
Speaker 5: presented tonight by Kelsey Chevrolet and awesome to have you

1112
00:58:07,520 --> 00:58:09,360
Speaker 5: with us. I hope you had a great Christmas sterling

1113
00:58:09,440 --> 00:58:11,960
Speaker 5: Coming up at nine oh five. Back to the football

1114
00:58:12,000 --> 00:58:15,480
Speaker 5: coming up at to the top of the hour and

1115
00:58:15,560 --> 00:58:18,080
Speaker 5: we'll do some Ohio state stuff as well as we

1116
00:58:18,080 --> 00:58:21,040
Speaker 5: look ahead to the college football playoff, OSU taking on

1117
00:58:21,200 --> 00:58:25,920
Speaker 5: Miami on New Year's Eve, which tons of defensive talent

1118
00:58:26,000 --> 00:58:28,160
Speaker 5: on the field for both of those teams, and it

1119
00:58:28,200 --> 00:58:31,120
Speaker 5: will be interesting to see how the Buckeyes bounce back

1120
00:58:31,120 --> 00:58:34,240
Speaker 5: after losing the Big Ten title game, which feels like

1121
00:58:34,280 --> 00:58:36,720
Speaker 5: about seven months ago. Yeah, I started the show by

1122
00:58:36,800 --> 00:58:39,560
Speaker 5: talking about the Reds and one of the more mystifying

1123
00:58:39,680 --> 00:58:42,400
Speaker 5: things to me about the Kyle Schwarber pursuit, I guess

1124
00:58:42,440 --> 00:58:47,320
Speaker 5: there were two. One would be this, Kyle Schwarber is

1125
00:58:47,360 --> 00:58:49,480
Speaker 5: from Middletown, you may have heard, and it felt like

1126
00:58:49,520 --> 00:58:53,160
Speaker 5: that was ultimately what drove their pursuit of him.

1127
00:58:53,920 --> 00:58:56,320
Speaker 4: And by the way, I like a fun story.

1128
00:58:56,480 --> 00:58:58,920
Speaker 5: And so if had the Rads brought in the reigning

1129
00:58:59,040 --> 00:59:02,080
Speaker 5: National League home run champion due to it fifty six

1130
00:59:02,120 --> 00:59:05,200
Speaker 5: bombs last year, and you know, part of the dynamic

1131
00:59:05,320 --> 00:59:07,520
Speaker 5: was he gets a chance to play in his hometown,

1132
00:59:07,560 --> 00:59:09,760
Speaker 5: that would have been fun. That never should have been

1133
00:59:09,800 --> 00:59:13,480
Speaker 5: the primary motivator behind going after Kyle Schwarber. And what

1134
00:59:13,680 --> 00:59:16,800
Speaker 5: has not made sense to me in the weeks since

1135
00:59:16,920 --> 00:59:20,680
Speaker 5: we found out the Reds didn't get Kyle Schwarber, is

1136
00:59:21,080 --> 00:59:24,240
Speaker 5: is why none of the other sluggers in free agency

1137
00:59:24,320 --> 00:59:30,280
Speaker 5: were apparently viable options like Pete Alonzo, who recently signed

1138
00:59:30,320 --> 00:59:32,800
Speaker 5: with the Baltimore Orioles signed for I think five million

1139
00:59:32,880 --> 00:59:36,760
Speaker 5: dollars more than Kyle Schwarber. The Reds made an attempt

1140
00:59:36,800 --> 00:59:39,480
Speaker 5: at Kyle Schwarber. We could debate how Earnest of an

1141
00:59:39,520 --> 00:59:42,640
Speaker 5: attempt it was. We could debate how serious of an

1142
00:59:42,640 --> 00:59:46,080
Speaker 5: attempt it was, but there was an attempt. Why do

1143
00:59:46,160 --> 00:59:50,120
Speaker 5: you go after Kyle Schwarber but not Pete Alonzo? Why

1144
00:59:50,120 --> 00:59:53,560
Speaker 5: do you go after Kyle Schwarber and not Cody Bellinger?

1145
00:59:54,920 --> 00:59:58,880
Speaker 5: Like the pursuit of him acknowledges not just that he's

1146
00:59:58,920 --> 01:00:02,919
Speaker 5: from here, but it acknowledge is he satisfies a very,

1147
01:00:03,040 --> 01:00:04,960
Speaker 5: very big need, the need for a guy to hit

1148
01:00:04,960 --> 01:00:10,480
Speaker 5: the ball out of the ballpark. In the in the

1149
01:00:10,480 --> 01:00:12,919
Speaker 5: week since we found out they're not going to get him,

1150
01:00:13,360 --> 01:00:18,600
Speaker 5: it is mystifying to me why seemingly the primary, maybe

1151
01:00:18,640 --> 01:00:22,000
Speaker 5: the sole, real motivator was the fact that he's from

1152
01:00:22,040 --> 01:00:27,320
Speaker 5: here and could have sold some tickets, like what I'm

1153
01:00:27,320 --> 01:00:28,680
Speaker 5: looking for as a guy who can hit the ball

1154
01:00:28,720 --> 01:00:29,400
Speaker 5: out of the ballpark.

1155
01:00:31,120 --> 01:00:31,960
Speaker 4: So there's that.

1156
01:00:32,080 --> 01:00:32,360
Speaker 3: I guess.

1157
01:00:32,400 --> 01:00:33,280
Speaker 4: The other one would be.

1158
01:00:33,320 --> 01:00:36,800
Speaker 5: Why would you really allow five million dollars a year

1159
01:00:36,960 --> 01:00:38,880
Speaker 5: to get in the way of signing a guy who

1160
01:00:38,920 --> 01:00:42,160
Speaker 5: could totally remake your franchise if your franchise has a

1161
01:00:42,320 --> 01:00:45,840
Speaker 5: valuation of one point two billion dollars. And I know

1162
01:00:45,920 --> 01:00:49,120
Speaker 5: bringing this up makes a lot of people really uncomfortable

1163
01:00:49,120 --> 01:00:52,040
Speaker 5: because one thing that baseball owners have done successfully is

1164
01:00:52,080 --> 01:00:55,720
Speaker 5: get people to care about their bottom lines. But Kyle

1165
01:00:55,760 --> 01:00:58,000
Speaker 5: Schwerber signed with the Phillies five years, one hundred and

1166
01:00:58,080 --> 01:01:00,600
Speaker 5: fifty mil. The Red's offer was reportedly five years and

1167
01:01:00,640 --> 01:01:03,080
Speaker 5: one hundred and twenty five mill. Now, in the real world,

1168
01:01:03,120 --> 01:01:04,920
Speaker 5: that's that's a lot of money, right, that's a lot

1169
01:01:04,920 --> 01:01:07,680
Speaker 5: of money. But in baseball terms, it's five million bucks

1170
01:01:07,720 --> 01:01:11,280
Speaker 5: a year. Five million bucks a year, And really, if

1171
01:01:11,320 --> 01:01:14,160
Speaker 5: you kind of understand how inflation is likely to work

1172
01:01:14,200 --> 01:01:16,600
Speaker 5: over the next five years, it's probably closer right now

1173
01:01:16,640 --> 01:01:18,400
Speaker 5: to like three to three and a half million dollars

1174
01:01:18,400 --> 01:01:18,680
Speaker 5: a year.

1175
01:01:20,640 --> 01:01:22,200
Speaker 4: Was not getting that guy.

1176
01:01:22,120 --> 01:01:25,480
Speaker 5: Worth saving the twenty five billion dollar twenty five million dollars,

1177
01:01:25,560 --> 01:01:28,479
Speaker 5: especially when your franchise valuation is one point two bill

1178
01:01:29,320 --> 01:01:31,480
Speaker 5: I know, when you talk about how much a franchises

1179
01:01:31,560 --> 01:01:33,840
Speaker 5: work worth, it's not like they have one point two

1180
01:01:33,880 --> 01:01:35,680
Speaker 5: billion dollars sitting in a drawer that they can go

1181
01:01:35,680 --> 01:01:38,720
Speaker 5: ahead and pay people. But still, a one point two

1182
01:01:38,760 --> 01:01:41,440
Speaker 5: billion dollar entity allowed a guy that could have remade

1183
01:01:41,440 --> 01:01:44,240
Speaker 5: their team to get away for five million dollars a year.

1184
01:01:45,240 --> 01:01:47,280
Speaker 5: That is head scratching as well. Guess the other thing

1185
01:01:47,280 --> 01:01:49,800
Speaker 5: I would wonder is this if the the Luise Robert

1186
01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:52,080
Speaker 5: pursuit doesn't work out, and I'd be the first like

1187
01:01:52,160 --> 01:01:55,120
Speaker 5: Louise Robert doesn't do it for me. I'm interested in

1188
01:01:55,120 --> 01:01:57,120
Speaker 5: guys who are like good now, who are in their

1189
01:01:57,120 --> 01:01:59,280
Speaker 5: primes now. Louise Robert's only twenty seven years old. It

1190
01:01:59,280 --> 01:02:00,760
Speaker 5: has been a couple of seas since he was an

1191
01:02:00,760 --> 01:02:03,520
Speaker 5: All Star. The Chicago White Sox have been trying to

1192
01:02:03,600 --> 01:02:06,120
Speaker 5: unload him forever. And as they've been trying to do so,

1193
01:02:06,240 --> 01:02:09,280
Speaker 5: one thing that you constantly read is they're waiting for

1194
01:02:09,360 --> 01:02:11,520
Speaker 5: him to play better so he can increase his value.

1195
01:02:11,560 --> 01:02:15,760
Speaker 5: The problem is he's never really played better, and so

1196
01:02:15,920 --> 01:02:18,800
Speaker 5: if he ends up being the centerpiece of their offseason,

1197
01:02:19,200 --> 01:02:21,040
Speaker 5: how much better is the team really going to be?

1198
01:02:21,320 --> 01:02:23,560
Speaker 4: And if they don't get Luis Robert, then what.

1199
01:02:27,680 --> 01:02:29,919
Speaker 5: There are a lot of guys on last year's team

1200
01:02:29,960 --> 01:02:32,320
Speaker 5: who need to perform better this year. That would have

1201
01:02:32,320 --> 01:02:34,920
Speaker 5: been the case with or without a major addition. And

1202
01:02:34,960 --> 01:02:37,480
Speaker 5: there are some guys from last year's team that I

1203
01:02:37,480 --> 01:02:40,200
Speaker 5: think you can reasonably expect to produce more.

1204
01:02:40,080 --> 01:02:40,680
Speaker 4: Of this season.

1205
01:02:41,080 --> 01:02:43,439
Speaker 5: Start with Sal Stewart, right, That guy had five home

1206
01:02:43,480 --> 01:02:46,640
Speaker 5: runs in September. He certainly looks somebody who could help

1207
01:02:46,880 --> 01:02:51,880
Speaker 5: solve your lack of pop issue. But you're really going

1208
01:02:51,960 --> 01:02:53,800
Speaker 5: to go to spring training with just a whole bunch

1209
01:02:53,840 --> 01:02:56,880
Speaker 5: of dudes from last year's team and no bona fide,

1210
01:02:57,200 --> 01:03:01,320
Speaker 5: no established in his prime slugger added from outside?

1211
01:03:03,240 --> 01:03:04,120
Speaker 4: And if it's.

1212
01:03:04,000 --> 01:03:06,840
Speaker 5: Luis Robert, is that really somebody who satisfies the need

1213
01:03:06,920 --> 01:03:08,960
Speaker 5: for a slugger from outside in his prime?

1214
01:03:10,760 --> 01:03:12,760
Speaker 4: AH, count me among the more skeptical.

1215
01:03:13,520 --> 01:03:16,200
Speaker 5: U five point three seven four nine, seven thousand is

1216
01:03:16,240 --> 01:03:20,600
Speaker 5: our phone number. Bengals, UH and Cardinals. You know, the

1217
01:03:20,640 --> 01:03:25,040
Speaker 5: game against the Miami Dolphins solidified something that I have

1218
01:03:25,160 --> 01:03:30,800
Speaker 5: believed for almost one calendar year. In fact, it was

1219
01:03:30,920 --> 01:03:34,720
Speaker 5: last year's game Week seventeen against the Denver Broncos. It

1220
01:03:34,800 --> 01:03:39,000
Speaker 5: kept the Bengals playoff hopes alive. There's an indelible image

1221
01:03:39,040 --> 01:03:41,800
Speaker 5: from that game that I think has continued through this season,

1222
01:03:41,880 --> 01:03:43,880
Speaker 5: and I thought of it often during the game against

1223
01:03:43,880 --> 01:03:47,120
Speaker 5: Miami last Sunday. We'll get to that coming up after

1224
01:03:47,160 --> 01:03:50,120
Speaker 5: the eight o'clock news, which is happening right now in

1225
01:03:50,160 --> 01:03:52,200
Speaker 5: the home of the best Bengals coverage, News Radio seven

1226
01:03:52,280 --> 01:03:53,840
Speaker 5: hundred WOW since ant.

1227
01:04:04,280 --> 01:04:09,080
Speaker 1: The following takes place between eight PM and nine pm.

1228
01:04:09,120 --> 01:04:09,680
Speaker 3: Sure does.

1229
01:04:10,000 --> 01:04:13,120
Speaker 5: It is seven after eight o'clock on a Friday night.

1230
01:04:13,200 --> 01:04:16,120
Speaker 5: Hopefully you're having an awesome Christmas weekend, an awesome long

1231
01:04:16,480 --> 01:04:19,800
Speaker 5: maybe an awesome two weeks off. I don't know, whatever

1232
01:04:19,840 --> 01:04:22,560
Speaker 5: it is. I hope it's awesome. That's the key word.

1233
01:04:22,560 --> 01:04:26,520
Speaker 5: I'm oeger in for Lance McAllister. This is RNL Carrier

1234
01:04:26,560 --> 01:04:29,080
Speaker 5: Sports Talk. We are presented by Kelsey Chevrolet on seven

1235
01:04:29,200 --> 01:04:33,200
Speaker 5: hundred WLW. Here it's on nine. Sterling takes over at

1236
01:04:33,520 --> 01:04:36,880
Speaker 5: nine oh five. Looking forward to that, you'll hear my

1237
01:04:37,040 --> 01:04:40,480
Speaker 5: conversation with the great Bengals beat writer Paul Danner Junior

1238
01:04:40,480 --> 01:04:43,520
Speaker 5: from The Athletic and the Growlar podcast coming up in

1239
01:04:43,600 --> 01:04:46,160
Speaker 5: just about ten minutes. As we look ahead to Sunday

1240
01:04:46,280 --> 01:04:48,720
Speaker 5: more than anything, and we'll spend some time looking back

1241
01:04:48,760 --> 01:04:53,320
Speaker 5: on Saturday. Saturday was another example of why T Higgins.

1242
01:04:53,320 --> 01:04:56,160
Speaker 5: I think T Higgins is the most beloved Cincinnati Bengal

1243
01:04:56,160 --> 01:04:57,960
Speaker 5: And that might not be the best. It's not the

1244
01:04:57,960 --> 01:05:02,360
Speaker 5: best wide receiver on his own tea, and you know,

1245
01:05:02,480 --> 01:05:05,080
Speaker 5: Joe Burrow might be in a class onto himself. But

1246
01:05:05,320 --> 01:05:08,120
Speaker 5: you know, a year ago, it was almost exactly a

1247
01:05:08,160 --> 01:05:12,200
Speaker 5: year ago, Bengals beat the Denver Broncos in overtime in

1248
01:05:12,280 --> 01:05:14,960
Speaker 5: a game that we all thought at least might be

1249
01:05:15,720 --> 01:05:18,400
Speaker 5: T higgins last home game in a Bengals uniform. That

1250
01:05:18,520 --> 01:05:21,400
Speaker 5: obviously turned out to not be the case. But he

1251
01:05:21,480 --> 01:05:25,000
Speaker 5: had the walk off touchdown grab and it just you know,

1252
01:05:25,280 --> 01:05:27,520
Speaker 5: that would have been cool no matter who caught it.

1253
01:05:27,520 --> 01:05:29,120
Speaker 5: It was a game that it was a win that

1254
01:05:29,240 --> 01:05:32,720
Speaker 5: kept the Bengals very faint playoff hopes alive. But I

1255
01:05:32,760 --> 01:05:35,360
Speaker 5: remember that night putting on social media something like that.

1256
01:05:35,480 --> 01:05:38,040
Speaker 5: There's I don't think there's a more beloved Cincinnati Bengal

1257
01:05:38,080 --> 01:05:42,640
Speaker 5: and always will be than T Higgins. And then you know,

1258
01:05:42,680 --> 01:05:45,520
Speaker 5: there's what he did last week. Now, let me make

1259
01:05:45,560 --> 01:05:50,600
Speaker 5: two admissions here. Number one, I would not be opposed

1260
01:05:50,760 --> 01:05:54,439
Speaker 5: to all the Bengals best players not playing these last

1261
01:05:54,440 --> 01:05:56,920
Speaker 5: two games, not playing these last three games, if he

1262
01:05:56,960 --> 01:06:00,360
Speaker 5: count the Miami game, like Joe Burrow, was terrific against

1263
01:06:00,400 --> 01:06:02,600
Speaker 5: the Dolphins, but like you can't help but watch it

1264
01:06:02,640 --> 01:06:05,880
Speaker 5: through your fingers, like ah Man, because if something bad

1265
01:06:05,920 --> 01:06:08,960
Speaker 5: were to happen, you know that risk is implied with

1266
01:06:09,120 --> 01:06:12,640
Speaker 5: every play of every game, but it's it's a little

1267
01:06:12,680 --> 01:06:18,720
Speaker 5: different when the games have no real meaning. I'll also admit, like,

1268
01:06:18,800 --> 01:06:21,240
Speaker 5: I'm not entirely sure T Higgins should have played against

1269
01:06:21,280 --> 01:06:23,720
Speaker 5: the Miami Dolphins, but I'm not a neurologist. He was

1270
01:06:23,760 --> 01:06:27,600
Speaker 5: cleared to play, he did, and I think what he

1271
01:06:27,680 --> 01:06:33,080
Speaker 5: did in order to play is pretty admirable. You know,

1272
01:06:33,120 --> 01:06:35,320
Speaker 5: this is a player who two years ago, if you remember,

1273
01:06:35,360 --> 01:06:37,720
Speaker 5: the Bengals played the game Week seventeen against the Chiefs,

1274
01:06:37,920 --> 01:06:41,400
Speaker 5: Jake Browning was the quarterback. Bengals had to win that night.

1275
01:06:42,480 --> 01:06:45,640
Speaker 5: They didn't. T Higgins had gotten hurt just a couple

1276
01:06:45,640 --> 01:06:48,640
Speaker 5: of weeks prior tried to play that night, came out

1277
01:06:48,640 --> 01:06:50,440
Speaker 5: of the game with a hamstring injury, and was like

1278
01:06:51,200 --> 01:06:53,760
Speaker 5: putting himself back in the game without the knowledge of

1279
01:06:53,800 --> 01:06:57,320
Speaker 5: his coaches, which may say something about the quality of

1280
01:06:57,320 --> 01:06:59,800
Speaker 5: the coaching they're getting, but he was just willing himself

1281
01:06:59,840 --> 01:07:03,120
Speaker 5: on to the field in an effort to try to

1282
01:07:03,160 --> 01:07:08,919
Speaker 5: help his team extended season. Bengals cannot extend their season. Here,

1283
01:07:09,200 --> 01:07:12,520
Speaker 5: you have a guy who was in the concussion protocol

1284
01:07:12,800 --> 01:07:16,000
Speaker 5: for a second time within a couple of weeks, who

1285
01:07:16,080 --> 01:07:20,000
Speaker 5: was like flying to go talk to concussion doctors in

1286
01:07:20,160 --> 01:07:24,080
Speaker 5: Pittsburgh just so he could be cleared to play in

1287
01:07:24,160 --> 01:07:28,080
Speaker 5: a game that has no bearing on the playoff picture,

1288
01:07:28,480 --> 01:07:32,880
Speaker 5: no bearing on the standings whatsoever. Like I think there's

1289
01:07:32,880 --> 01:07:35,000
Speaker 5: a lot of players who would have and you couldn't

1290
01:07:35,000 --> 01:07:37,800
Speaker 5: have blamed him for doing this. Who would have said,

1291
01:07:37,840 --> 01:07:40,560
Speaker 5: screw it, we're not going anywhere. I got a future

1292
01:07:40,600 --> 01:07:43,480
Speaker 5: to think about. I got a contract I'm playing under.

1293
01:07:43,520 --> 01:07:45,439
Speaker 5: I'm trying to collect every dime of it I can.

1294
01:07:46,400 --> 01:07:51,000
Speaker 5: I'm done, I ain't. I'll see you next year. This

1295
01:07:51,040 --> 01:07:53,160
Speaker 5: is a guy who signed up to play here, and look,

1296
01:07:53,200 --> 01:07:55,320
Speaker 5: he's making gobs of money.

1297
01:07:55,360 --> 01:07:56,120
Speaker 4: We all know that.

1298
01:07:57,240 --> 01:08:01,000
Speaker 5: But you know, I thought about this the Thursday night

1299
01:08:01,040 --> 01:08:04,160
Speaker 5: game where the Bengals beat the Steelers with Joe Flacco

1300
01:08:04,240 --> 01:08:09,400
Speaker 5: playing quarterback, which was probably the high point of the season,

1301
01:08:09,480 --> 01:08:11,120
Speaker 5: not that there has been all that many, but that

1302
01:08:11,440 --> 01:08:13,360
Speaker 5: was a really fun night and it was a fun

1303
01:08:13,440 --> 01:08:15,880
Speaker 5: night that made you think, like, you know what, Flacco

1304
01:08:16,000 --> 01:08:17,160
Speaker 5: can keep them afloat.

1305
01:08:17,160 --> 01:08:18,840
Speaker 4: They won that game. They were three and four.

1306
01:08:18,960 --> 01:08:21,880
Speaker 5: The next couple of games seemed winnable, and that night

1307
01:08:22,000 --> 01:08:27,519
Speaker 5: Jamar Chase was otherworldly. Sixteen catches one hundred and sixty

1308
01:08:27,560 --> 01:08:31,439
Speaker 5: one yards, made up a play running down the sideline

1309
01:08:31,439 --> 01:08:36,080
Speaker 5: where he blocks for Chase Brown, and the next day understandably,

1310
01:08:36,160 --> 01:08:40,040
Speaker 5: all anybody wanted to talk about was Jamar Chase. That night,

1311
01:08:40,040 --> 01:08:46,800
Speaker 5: T Higgins had six catches for ninety six yards. He

1312
01:08:46,800 --> 01:08:52,200
Speaker 5: he was terrific, caught a touchdown pass that night, had

1313
01:08:52,240 --> 01:08:56,880
Speaker 5: a critical catch that set up Evan McPherson's game winning

1314
01:08:56,880 --> 01:09:02,800
Speaker 5: field goal, and yet he was a footnote. Think about

1315
01:09:02,800 --> 01:09:06,320
Speaker 5: what you've come to understand about players who played that position. Right,

1316
01:09:07,960 --> 01:09:09,240
Speaker 5: They make a lot of money, but at the end

1317
01:09:09,240 --> 01:09:10,960
Speaker 5: of the day, like they for the most part, like

1318
01:09:11,000 --> 01:09:12,479
Speaker 5: they want to be the man. There's been a lot

1319
01:09:12,520 --> 01:09:14,680
Speaker 5: of good number two wide receivers who have like just

1320
01:09:14,840 --> 01:09:19,000
Speaker 5: chased opportunities to be a number one wide receiver elsewhere.

1321
01:09:19,840 --> 01:09:23,599
Speaker 5: T Higgins signed up to be at times a footnote

1322
01:09:23,600 --> 01:09:27,879
Speaker 5: to Jamar Chase. Where that night team makes great plays,

1323
01:09:28,120 --> 01:09:30,720
Speaker 5: nobody talks about it because of how awesome Jamar Chase was.

1324
01:09:30,720 --> 01:09:34,840
Speaker 5: T Higgins willingly signed up for four more years of that.

1325
01:09:36,120 --> 01:09:39,080
Speaker 5: Like I just I don't know, man. There have been

1326
01:09:39,080 --> 01:09:41,760
Speaker 5: a lot of popular Bengals players. There's been a lot

1327
01:09:41,760 --> 01:09:43,880
Speaker 5: of popular Bengals players on bad teams. Have been a

1328
01:09:43,920 --> 01:09:46,519
Speaker 5: lot of popular Bengals players on good teams, and some

1329
01:09:46,640 --> 01:09:49,200
Speaker 5: who have been on both. T Higgins has been on both.

1330
01:09:49,760 --> 01:09:53,200
Speaker 5: Jamar Chase is obviously very very popular here and understandably so.

1331
01:09:53,920 --> 01:09:56,000
Speaker 5: I think the connection that T Higgins has, though, is

1332
01:09:56,080 --> 01:09:58,559
Speaker 5: just a little bit different, and I think there's I

1333
01:09:58,560 --> 01:10:00,800
Speaker 5: think there's something about you know, a lot of the

1334
01:10:00,840 --> 01:10:03,920
Speaker 5: writers this week wrote pieces about T Higgins, and again

1335
01:10:03,960 --> 01:10:07,280
Speaker 5: you can understand why, Like that's for a franchise that

1336
01:10:07,400 --> 01:10:11,599
Speaker 5: has been long associated with not winning and at times

1337
01:10:11,640 --> 01:10:14,639
Speaker 5: associated with players who don't do the right things, Tevin

1338
01:10:14,680 --> 01:10:17,800
Speaker 5: Guy led T Higgins to kind of build around for

1339
01:10:17,880 --> 01:10:23,000
Speaker 5: whatever's next is pretty important. So you know, do they

1340
01:10:23,040 --> 01:10:25,479
Speaker 5: win while both these wide receivers and Joe Burrow are

1341
01:10:25,479 --> 01:10:26,639
Speaker 5: here for the next few years.

1342
01:10:26,920 --> 01:10:27,400
Speaker 4: I don't know.

1343
01:10:28,760 --> 01:10:31,040
Speaker 5: Nothing that happened in that game against Miamy Dolphins should

1344
01:10:31,120 --> 01:10:33,800
Speaker 5: mask some of the other larger issues the Bengals have,

1345
01:10:35,000 --> 01:10:37,600
Speaker 5: And god knows, I've talked about him a bunch, but

1346
01:10:38,960 --> 01:10:44,160
Speaker 5: as jaded and as cynical as every Bengals fan can be,

1347
01:10:44,360 --> 01:10:50,120
Speaker 5: and I would argue should be, it's still pretty cool

1348
01:10:50,280 --> 01:10:53,280
Speaker 5: to see a guy like T Higgins who just comes

1349
01:10:53,280 --> 01:10:55,719
Speaker 5: off as being about all the right things. And again,

1350
01:10:55,800 --> 01:11:00,280
Speaker 5: man like it didn't have the world's biggest statistical packed

1351
01:11:00,360 --> 01:11:02,719
Speaker 5: on that game, against Miamial though the catch he made

1352
01:11:02,760 --> 01:11:06,120
Speaker 5: from thirty five out sort of set the tone for

1353
01:11:06,160 --> 01:11:07,920
Speaker 5: the afternoon for the Bengals offensively.

1354
01:11:08,840 --> 01:11:10,920
Speaker 4: But you got a guy who just there.

1355
01:11:10,960 --> 01:11:15,040
Speaker 5: There's more than a few instances of this guy putting

1356
01:11:15,080 --> 01:11:17,720
Speaker 5: the team before himself, and I thought he did that

1357
01:11:17,880 --> 01:11:20,720
Speaker 5: last week. And I think that's among the reasons why

1358
01:11:20,800 --> 01:11:23,920
Speaker 5: this is just a beloved player on this football team.

1359
01:11:24,840 --> 01:11:28,880
Speaker 4: And uh, you know, I thought that was the case

1360
01:11:28,920 --> 01:11:29,760
Speaker 4: when the team was good.

1361
01:11:29,960 --> 01:11:31,760
Speaker 5: I think what he has done in the face of

1362
01:11:31,840 --> 01:11:37,439
Speaker 5: some adverse conditions has solidified that. And I think it's

1363
01:11:37,439 --> 01:11:39,799
Speaker 5: at least worth mentioning amid what has been a pretty

1364
01:11:39,840 --> 01:11:40,360
Speaker 5: rough season.

1365
01:11:40,360 --> 01:11:41,240
Speaker 4: Paul Danner Junior.

1366
01:11:42,280 --> 01:11:44,599
Speaker 5: You'll hear him talk about T Higgins because he wrote

1367
01:11:44,600 --> 01:11:47,000
Speaker 5: about him here in just a few minutes. Five win, three,

1368
01:11:47,120 --> 01:11:49,720
Speaker 5: seven four nine, seven thousand is our phone number will

1369
01:11:49,720 --> 01:11:53,120
Speaker 5: talk Ohio State Buckeyes with the great Bill Rabinowitz coming

1370
01:11:53,200 --> 01:11:55,400
Speaker 5: up at eight forty five, and we are most definitely

1371
01:11:55,400 --> 01:11:56,320
Speaker 5: looking forward to that.

1372
01:11:56,439 --> 01:11:57,520
Speaker 4: It is a quarter.

1373
01:11:57,280 --> 01:12:01,160
Speaker 5: After eight RNL Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet

1374
01:12:01,240 --> 01:12:02,920
Speaker 5: on seven hundred WL.

1375
01:12:02,560 --> 01:12:04,719
Speaker 4: Dowty nineteen after eight o'clock.

1376
01:12:04,760 --> 01:12:08,360
Speaker 5: This is our and L Carrier Sports Talk presented by

1377
01:12:08,439 --> 01:12:11,360
Speaker 5: Kelsey Chevrolet on seven hundred wl W. I am with

1378
01:12:11,439 --> 01:12:14,240
Speaker 5: Tony Pike on Monday at Twin Peaks in Westchester for

1379
01:12:14,280 --> 01:12:15,599
Speaker 5: the Tony and Mo Football Show.

1380
01:12:15,640 --> 01:12:16,720
Speaker 4: We hope you join us.

1381
01:12:17,360 --> 01:12:20,759
Speaker 5: We'll talk Bengals, Cardinals, NFL Week seventeen, the College Football Playoff,

1382
01:12:20,920 --> 01:12:24,160
Speaker 5: and so much more. Covering the Bengals for the Athletic

1383
01:12:24,640 --> 01:12:28,280
Speaker 5: and the Growler Podcast. Is my buddy, Paul Danner Junior.

1384
01:12:28,600 --> 01:12:30,720
Speaker 5: You know, here's here's among the many things I liked

1385
01:12:30,720 --> 01:12:32,960
Speaker 5: about how the Bengals played against the Miami Dolphins. Is

1386
01:12:33,400 --> 01:12:35,320
Speaker 5: it at least gave us a rest bite from all

1387
01:12:35,360 --> 01:12:37,519
Speaker 5: the Joe Burrow psychoanalysis.

1388
01:12:38,160 --> 01:12:43,320
Speaker 6: Yes, we don't have to take the temperature of how

1389
01:12:43,439 --> 01:12:47,360
Speaker 6: Joe Burrow is feeling, which is happiness scale today and

1390
01:12:47,400 --> 01:12:51,040
Speaker 6: we can just kind of enjoy a day where everybody

1391
01:12:51,160 --> 01:12:54,920
Speaker 6: was definitely happy. Everything looked the way that you would

1392
01:12:54,960 --> 01:12:58,280
Speaker 6: expect it to look. They played like an offense that

1393
01:12:58,479 --> 01:13:00,880
Speaker 6: is built to win a lot of games, even though

1394
01:13:00,880 --> 01:13:03,240
Speaker 6: it hasn't won many this year, and you can just

1395
01:13:03,280 --> 01:13:05,280
Speaker 6: sort of accept that for what it is right now.

1396
01:13:05,640 --> 01:13:08,240
Speaker 4: So what is the best way to process Sunday?

1397
01:13:08,600 --> 01:13:09,439
Speaker 3: Is it? Uh?

1398
01:13:10,560 --> 01:13:13,200
Speaker 5: You know, bittersweetness. This is what it could have been,

1399
01:13:13,560 --> 01:13:16,040
Speaker 5: is it? This is what it can be. Is that

1400
01:13:16,360 --> 01:13:19,760
Speaker 5: they're going to use late season success to cloud their

1401
01:13:19,800 --> 01:13:22,000
Speaker 5: decision making, is that they're going to screw up their

1402
01:13:22,080 --> 01:13:24,599
Speaker 5: draft positioning. How should I process Sunday?

1403
01:13:25,560 --> 01:13:28,280
Speaker 6: Well, I think there's different aspects to all of that.

1404
01:13:28,600 --> 01:13:30,640
Speaker 6: The drafts isitioning thing you can missmu with that I

1405
01:13:30,640 --> 01:13:33,840
Speaker 6: don't really like. First of all, the draft is not

1406
01:13:33,960 --> 01:13:36,160
Speaker 6: that great in the top ten anyway, so you're going

1407
01:13:36,200 --> 01:13:38,360
Speaker 6: to be seeing a lot of similar prospects in the middle.

1408
01:13:38,600 --> 01:13:40,679
Speaker 6: And come on, man, these guys need to go win games.

1409
01:13:40,680 --> 01:13:43,200
Speaker 6: There's too many. I'm just not I'm not doing that.

1410
01:13:43,479 --> 01:13:46,960
Speaker 6: But I will say I think the lens it is

1411
01:13:47,000 --> 01:13:49,640
Speaker 6: bitter sweet because this is what it was supposed to

1412
01:13:49,640 --> 01:13:52,160
Speaker 6: look like. I mean, the Bengals, even in their best times,

1413
01:13:52,200 --> 01:13:56,200
Speaker 6: haven't eviscerated teams like that. I mean, that's that is

1414
01:13:56,240 --> 01:13:58,160
Speaker 6: the way they played offense.

1415
01:13:58,280 --> 01:13:58,800
Speaker 2: Defense.

1416
01:13:58,880 --> 01:14:01,840
Speaker 6: Special to all of it together is the way it's

1417
01:14:01,880 --> 01:14:05,479
Speaker 6: supposed to look on a team that is capable of

1418
01:14:05,520 --> 01:14:06,920
Speaker 6: making a run in January.

1419
01:14:06,920 --> 01:14:07,720
Speaker 2: And here they are at the.

1420
01:14:07,760 --> 01:14:10,120
Speaker 6: End of December looking like a team capable of making

1421
01:14:10,160 --> 01:14:12,160
Speaker 6: a run in January, but none of it matters because

1422
01:14:12,200 --> 01:14:14,400
Speaker 6: everything that happened over the course of the season, and

1423
01:14:14,439 --> 01:14:16,799
Speaker 6: that is bittersweet and that's a little hard to swallow.

1424
01:14:17,040 --> 01:14:19,800
Speaker 2: But I will say this, I don't think it's meaningless.

1425
01:14:20,240 --> 01:14:21,160
Speaker 2: You do worry.

1426
01:14:21,320 --> 01:14:24,680
Speaker 6: What you mentioned is the biggest concern of all of

1427
01:14:24,720 --> 01:14:27,760
Speaker 6: this is that it's like, well, I see all of

1428
01:14:27,800 --> 01:14:30,479
Speaker 6: these players playing, well, they're coming along. We're just gonna

1429
01:14:30,479 --> 01:14:33,080
Speaker 6: bet on them next year and run run the whole

1430
01:14:33,080 --> 01:14:37,080
Speaker 6: thing back. I mean, I think there's very clear positions linebacker,

1431
01:14:37,240 --> 01:14:43,760
Speaker 6: defensive line that have to have significant, you know, a

1432
01:14:43,880 --> 01:14:46,559
Speaker 6: raising of the boats happening there. Like there's got to

1433
01:14:46,600 --> 01:14:51,400
Speaker 6: be some higher level play veterans brought in that can

1434
01:14:51,439 --> 01:14:54,360
Speaker 6: be reliable and bring you some juice and let the

1435
01:14:54,360 --> 01:14:56,760
Speaker 6: players that are currently here either find a way to

1436
01:14:56,760 --> 01:14:59,639
Speaker 6: play above them or b role players, which is probably

1437
01:14:59,720 --> 01:15:01,599
Speaker 6: kind of of where they sit.

1438
01:15:01,680 --> 01:15:04,400
Speaker 2: They just need a couple more starting level players in there.

1439
01:15:04,720 --> 01:15:09,680
Speaker 2: That said, this entire year was going to be.

1440
01:15:09,680 --> 01:15:14,439
Speaker 6: Based on the development of all of these young defensive players,

1441
01:15:14,760 --> 01:15:17,720
Speaker 6: and it had to happen at some point, and here

1442
01:15:17,760 --> 01:15:18,080
Speaker 6: we are.

1443
01:15:19,400 --> 01:15:20,960
Speaker 2: It didn't happen fast enough.

1444
01:15:21,360 --> 01:15:23,600
Speaker 6: Everything that happened in the first ten games of the

1445
01:15:23,640 --> 01:15:27,280
Speaker 6: season or whatever happened, there's no way around that. But

1446
01:15:27,360 --> 01:15:30,519
Speaker 6: I think the important element to look at it is, Look,

1447
01:15:31,040 --> 01:15:35,280
Speaker 6: you're seeing these young pieces start to actually look like

1448
01:15:35,400 --> 01:15:38,800
Speaker 6: they are individually developing and taking a next step. And

1449
01:15:38,840 --> 01:15:41,720
Speaker 6: that's not just from one game, that's from a continued

1450
01:15:41,840 --> 01:15:44,519
Speaker 6: trend this whole second half of the season.

1451
01:15:44,640 --> 01:15:49,719
Speaker 5: Did Duke Tobin actually oversee a successful twenty twenty three draft?

1452
01:15:51,680 --> 01:15:54,280
Speaker 2: It's like you're reading my notebook right now. I have

1453
01:15:54,360 --> 01:15:56,160
Speaker 2: a whole story, a.

1454
01:15:56,120 --> 01:15:59,160
Speaker 6: Whole story that is I'm a about to have published

1455
01:15:59,160 --> 01:16:02,599
Speaker 6: for tomorrow on the success of the twenty twenty three

1456
01:16:02,680 --> 01:16:06,639
Speaker 6: draft and more importantly, the opportunity it affords the Bengals

1457
01:16:06,680 --> 01:16:12,000
Speaker 6: to change how they operate and to look at things differently. Yes,

1458
01:16:12,439 --> 01:16:15,400
Speaker 6: they absolutely had a successful twenty twenty three draft. I mean,

1459
01:16:15,400 --> 01:16:20,880
Speaker 6: if you're talking about what constitutes a good draft, you're

1460
01:16:20,920 --> 01:16:23,519
Speaker 6: talking about what you want to get three starters out

1461
01:16:23,520 --> 01:16:25,120
Speaker 6: of it, and that's like, man, that's a good draft.

1462
01:16:25,520 --> 01:16:27,280
Speaker 6: You know, that's just the way that. However, you got

1463
01:16:27,280 --> 01:16:29,599
Speaker 6: to find a way to do that. They have far

1464
01:16:29,640 --> 01:16:33,439
Speaker 6: more than that. I mean you're talking Miles Murphy, DJ Turner.

1465
01:16:33,520 --> 01:16:37,599
Speaker 6: I mean, they look like real solid level pieces. Jordan

1466
01:16:37,680 --> 01:16:41,120
Speaker 6: battle is a part of this team's future. Certainly he

1467
01:16:41,200 --> 01:16:45,760
Speaker 6: seems undeniably going to be a starter for them next year.

1468
01:16:46,479 --> 01:16:49,840
Speaker 6: Chase Brown is a top running back in this league.

1469
01:16:49,960 --> 01:16:53,360
Speaker 6: Andre Josubasi is a solid three or four receiver. However

1470
01:16:53,439 --> 01:16:57,360
Speaker 6: you want to view him, like to find those pieces.

1471
01:16:58,360 --> 01:17:01,200
Speaker 2: That's real value. I mean, that's that is a good draft.

1472
01:17:01,479 --> 01:17:03,040
Speaker 2: It took till year three.

1473
01:17:03,160 --> 01:17:07,400
Speaker 6: Sometimes it takes to year three for guys to come around,

1474
01:17:08,000 --> 01:17:09,280
Speaker 6: but yeah, I think you look at that way. But

1475
01:17:09,360 --> 01:17:12,800
Speaker 6: now they're extension eligible. Now you're gonna see this. How

1476
01:17:12,840 --> 01:17:14,960
Speaker 6: are they gonna do this? Is it going to look

1477
01:17:15,040 --> 01:17:19,000
Speaker 6: like t Higgins and Jesse Bates and the Jamar Chase

1478
01:17:19,040 --> 01:17:22,400
Speaker 6: stuff that was all the off field drama and trade

1479
01:17:22,400 --> 01:17:26,560
Speaker 6: requests and bickering over how good they actually are or

1480
01:17:26,600 --> 01:17:30,680
Speaker 6: are we going to see an Eagles style early investment

1481
01:17:30,760 --> 01:17:33,840
Speaker 6: in some of these guys. These are hits. They look

1482
01:17:33,880 --> 01:17:37,040
Speaker 6: to be coming together, like you're seeing that. Go out

1483
01:17:37,080 --> 01:17:40,479
Speaker 6: and pay these guys before next season starts and get

1484
01:17:40,479 --> 01:17:42,720
Speaker 6: those done and avoid all of the bickering and.

1485
01:17:42,680 --> 01:17:43,719
Speaker 2: Off field stuff that happens.

1486
01:17:43,720 --> 01:17:46,559
Speaker 6: I think what we have now is an opportunity for

1487
01:17:46,600 --> 01:17:50,000
Speaker 6: them to say, hey, look we are doing some things differently.

1488
01:17:50,080 --> 01:17:51,160
Speaker 2: Now will that happen?

1489
01:17:51,840 --> 01:17:53,840
Speaker 6: I'm probably not holding my breath on a lot of it,

1490
01:17:54,320 --> 01:17:56,360
Speaker 6: but I do think it's a great.

1491
01:17:56,120 --> 01:17:59,280
Speaker 2: Opportunity to do some of the things that maybe Joe.

1492
01:17:59,080 --> 01:18:01,439
Speaker 6: Burrow is referencing, do things a little differently, be a

1493
01:18:01,439 --> 01:18:04,240
Speaker 6: little more creative. This would seem to maybe be an

1494
01:18:04,280 --> 01:18:05,840
Speaker 6: opportunity to do some of that with a couple of

1495
01:18:05,880 --> 01:18:06,679
Speaker 6: these guys from that track.

1496
01:18:06,840 --> 01:18:08,800
Speaker 5: Yeah, man, you know to me this this certainly doesn't

1497
01:18:08,880 --> 01:18:12,000
Speaker 5: let Duke Tobin off the proverbial hook. Whatever amount of

1498
01:18:12,000 --> 01:18:15,519
Speaker 5: criticism he has gotten, I believe he is deserved. I

1499
01:18:15,560 --> 01:18:18,640
Speaker 5: certainly believe his role with the organization should be examined.

1500
01:18:18,680 --> 01:18:21,840
Speaker 5: But I'm also a believer in giving credit words due.

1501
01:18:21,840 --> 01:18:24,120
Speaker 5: And admittedly it's taken Miles Murphy longer than a lot

1502
01:18:24,120 --> 01:18:26,679
Speaker 5: of us would like. It's maybe taking Jordan Battle longer

1503
01:18:26,720 --> 01:18:28,799
Speaker 5: than a lot of us would like. I certainly wouldn't

1504
01:18:28,880 --> 01:18:32,760
Speaker 5: use him as you know somebody that, hey, we're not

1505
01:18:32,800 --> 01:18:34,920
Speaker 5: going to take a safety because we have Jordan Battle.

1506
01:18:34,920 --> 01:18:38,639
Speaker 5: But he's played well. Chase Brown is terrific. DJ Turner

1507
01:18:38,720 --> 01:18:41,439
Speaker 5: should be a pro bowler. Andrea yoshabas for a sixth

1508
01:18:41,520 --> 01:18:45,439
Speaker 5: rounder from Princeton was an excellent pick or all five

1509
01:18:45,479 --> 01:18:48,880
Speaker 5: of those guys players that could still be here in

1510
01:18:48,920 --> 01:18:49,800
Speaker 5: twenty twenty seven.

1511
01:18:51,800 --> 01:18:53,880
Speaker 4: I you know that to be seen.

1512
01:18:54,360 --> 01:18:55,520
Speaker 2: I think it's possible.

1513
01:18:55,600 --> 01:18:58,840
Speaker 6: You get I mean, you get into the dynamics of

1514
01:18:59,360 --> 01:19:00,680
Speaker 6: can you pay everybody?

1515
01:19:00,720 --> 01:19:01,839
Speaker 2: How much do they want?

1516
01:19:02,439 --> 01:19:06,360
Speaker 6: Is there going to be a franchise tag decision of

1517
01:19:06,840 --> 01:19:09,320
Speaker 6: all of those things, you know, Miles Murphy, if your option,

1518
01:19:09,600 --> 01:19:11,960
Speaker 6: there's a lot of dynamics and ways to go about it,

1519
01:19:12,000 --> 01:19:14,240
Speaker 6: and so all of them, I mean, yeah, I think

1520
01:19:14,280 --> 01:19:15,760
Speaker 6: I think a good amount of them. I think they've

1521
01:19:15,800 --> 01:19:19,000
Speaker 6: got to find a way to do draft, develop Britain

1522
01:19:19,120 --> 01:19:21,960
Speaker 6: and still be about that and prove it they're about

1523
01:19:22,000 --> 01:19:23,599
Speaker 6: that and this is the best way to do it.

1524
01:19:23,920 --> 01:19:26,120
Speaker 2: There's a I mean a long.

1525
01:19:25,920 --> 01:19:29,519
Speaker 6: Way to go to get to that, right certainly, and

1526
01:19:29,600 --> 01:19:31,439
Speaker 6: a lot of things that happened, But I do think

1527
01:19:31,920 --> 01:19:34,320
Speaker 6: they have the ability to do it, and it's a

1528
01:19:34,439 --> 01:19:38,280
Speaker 6: chance for them to prove what they really want to

1529
01:19:38,280 --> 01:19:40,320
Speaker 6: be about in terms of how they build their roster

1530
01:19:41,040 --> 01:19:43,679
Speaker 6: by making sure that a vast majority of those guys

1531
01:19:43,720 --> 01:19:44,880
Speaker 6: are around for the long haul.

1532
01:19:44,920 --> 01:19:46,120
Speaker 4: All right, So I read your mind.

1533
01:19:46,160 --> 01:19:47,840
Speaker 5: I know what you're going to write about now I

1534
01:19:47,840 --> 01:19:49,800
Speaker 5: want to talk about what you did write about I

1535
01:19:49,960 --> 01:19:53,360
Speaker 5: didn't think and I you know, the big takeaway for

1536
01:19:53,479 --> 01:19:56,560
Speaker 5: me after the Denver game, same basic point in the

1537
01:19:56,600 --> 01:19:58,840
Speaker 5: season last year, though they were playing for something, was

1538
01:19:59,400 --> 01:20:02,679
Speaker 5: T Higgins is cemented as a beloved figure forever. That's

1539
01:20:02,720 --> 01:20:05,439
Speaker 5: before he signs his second contract. That's before we see

1540
01:20:05,520 --> 01:20:08,600
Speaker 5: him do what he did this past week, culminating with

1541
01:20:08,640 --> 01:20:12,280
Speaker 5: his performance on Sunday. I think there's a good conversation

1542
01:20:12,320 --> 01:20:13,920
Speaker 5: about whether or not he should have been out there.

1543
01:20:14,040 --> 01:20:16,680
Speaker 5: That's fine, But the fact that in a game that

1544
01:20:16,800 --> 01:20:19,280
Speaker 5: had no bearing on the playoff race, in a season

1545
01:20:19,280 --> 01:20:22,559
Speaker 5: that has gone awry, you have a dude doing everything

1546
01:20:22,600 --> 01:20:25,080
Speaker 5: he can to get on the field and then contributing

1547
01:20:25,160 --> 01:20:27,439
Speaker 5: and playing his ass off like.

1548
01:20:28,040 --> 01:20:30,240
Speaker 4: This is I've said this before.

1549
01:20:30,439 --> 01:20:32,000
Speaker 5: I'm not sure there's a more beloved player than T

1550
01:20:32,160 --> 01:20:34,360
Speaker 5: Higgins and I've had people say really, and I go, dude,

1551
01:20:34,479 --> 01:20:37,519
Speaker 5: you it's it's not just that he's good, it's it's

1552
01:20:37,720 --> 01:20:40,479
Speaker 5: dragging himself on the field against Kansas City in the

1553
01:20:40,479 --> 01:20:42,519
Speaker 5: game they had to have a couple of years ago.

1554
01:20:42,760 --> 01:20:46,680
Speaker 5: It's willingly playing second banana behind Jamar Chase, which a

1555
01:20:46,680 --> 01:20:49,320
Speaker 5: lot of guys wouldn't do. It's what we saw this

1556
01:20:49,360 --> 01:20:51,960
Speaker 5: past week, culminating with his performance against Miami.

1557
01:20:52,400 --> 01:20:52,679
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1558
01:20:52,720 --> 01:20:57,800
Speaker 6: I mean just talking to him afterwards and him discussing

1559
01:20:57,800 --> 01:21:00,160
Speaker 6: the process and how hard it was, you know, and

1560
01:21:00,200 --> 01:21:02,280
Speaker 6: I just sort of asked them because I can't imagine

1561
01:21:02,280 --> 01:21:05,920
Speaker 6: what it's like to be getting on a plane flying

1562
01:21:05,960 --> 01:21:08,400
Speaker 6: to Pittsburgh knowing that you're about to see a concussion

1563
01:21:08,439 --> 01:21:12,439
Speaker 6: specialist and wondering what they're gonna tell you, and how

1564
01:21:12,520 --> 01:21:15,800
Speaker 6: hard that must be to go through, and to go

1565
01:21:15,880 --> 01:21:18,960
Speaker 6: through it all with the idea of wanting to go

1566
01:21:19,040 --> 01:21:22,600
Speaker 6: be out there and playing the seemingly meaningless game, and

1567
01:21:22,640 --> 01:21:24,200
Speaker 6: then to go out there and do it like that,

1568
01:21:24,320 --> 01:21:27,680
Speaker 6: to be thankful to even have been a part of it,

1569
01:21:27,720 --> 01:21:30,519
Speaker 6: to have played well, and to care about being out

1570
01:21:30,560 --> 01:21:33,439
Speaker 6: there and being a part of this. These are the

1571
01:21:33,479 --> 01:21:35,160
Speaker 6: type of guys you invest in. These the type of

1572
01:21:35,160 --> 01:21:36,920
Speaker 6: guys you want their locker room. It's topic guys they

1573
01:21:36,920 --> 01:21:42,639
Speaker 6: don't have probably enough of that. The team matters that much,

1574
01:21:42,800 --> 01:21:48,160
Speaker 6: being a good teammate, being accountable, being available matters that

1575
01:21:48,280 --> 01:21:49,280
Speaker 6: much to Tea.

1576
01:21:49,640 --> 01:21:52,920
Speaker 2: And doing it the right way like this was not haphazard.

1577
01:21:52,960 --> 01:21:54,360
Speaker 6: I'm going to go out there and try to play

1578
01:21:54,360 --> 01:21:56,599
Speaker 6: through it and beause like, I don't want to ever diminish.

1579
01:21:56,680 --> 01:21:59,960
Speaker 6: It's very murky waters talking about that, but going through

1580
01:22:00,160 --> 01:22:04,759
Speaker 6: and making sure everybody, including the top specialists in that field,

1581
01:22:05,040 --> 01:22:07,559
Speaker 6: has said it's okay, and going out there and then

1582
01:22:07,600 --> 01:22:09,320
Speaker 6: embracing and saying I want to go do it.

1583
01:22:09,439 --> 01:22:13,800
Speaker 2: Nobody and guys said this afterwards. Nobody would have given.

1584
01:22:14,600 --> 01:22:16,920
Speaker 6: I would have cared at all if he would have said,

1585
01:22:16,920 --> 01:22:18,599
Speaker 6: I'm done, I'm done with this year.

1586
01:22:18,680 --> 01:22:19,800
Speaker 2: I've got these concussions.

1587
01:22:19,800 --> 01:22:21,960
Speaker 6: I just want to make sure I'm right, and no

1588
01:22:22,040 --> 01:22:25,760
Speaker 6: one would everyone would totally understand it. But the fact

1589
01:22:25,800 --> 01:22:28,120
Speaker 6: that he did do it, I think proved how much

1590
01:22:28,160 --> 01:22:30,040
Speaker 6: he is about this team, how much he does care

1591
01:22:30,040 --> 01:22:32,320
Speaker 6: about their success, and how much he cares about being

1592
01:22:32,360 --> 01:22:33,000
Speaker 6: a good teammate.

1593
01:22:33,080 --> 01:22:35,200
Speaker 2: And that wins you games.

1594
01:22:36,080 --> 01:22:37,040
Speaker 4: No question about that.

1595
01:22:37,080 --> 01:22:40,680
Speaker 5: Paul Tanner Junior covering the Bengals Forthathletic dot Com as

1596
01:22:40,720 --> 01:22:43,240
Speaker 5: well as the Growlar podcast. Paul, we appreciate the time.

1597
01:22:43,240 --> 01:22:46,200
Speaker 5: Don't forget Bengals and Cardinals On Sunday at one o'clock.

1598
01:22:46,600 --> 01:22:49,320
Speaker 5: You will hear the game live on seven hundred Wlwrpre

1599
01:22:49,400 --> 01:22:52,760
Speaker 5: game coverage begins at nine o'clock in the morning with

1600
01:22:53,040 --> 01:22:55,840
Speaker 5: Tony Pike, ken Brew and myself at the Holy Grail.

1601
01:22:55,920 --> 01:22:58,760
Speaker 4: We are excited for that.

1602
01:22:59,600 --> 01:23:02,080
Speaker 5: If you're a Ohio State fan, you're excited for the

1603
01:23:02,120 --> 01:23:04,519
Speaker 5: college football playoff. You should also be excited to buy

1604
01:23:04,600 --> 01:23:07,800
Speaker 5: Bill Rabinowitz's book about last year's national championship team. We'll

1605
01:23:07,840 --> 01:23:11,360
Speaker 5: spend time with Bill, coming up right around eight forty five.

1606
01:23:11,400 --> 01:23:14,559
Speaker 5: We are here till nine o'clock tonight before Sterling takes

1607
01:23:14,560 --> 01:23:17,200
Speaker 5: over at nine oh five. Right now, it's time for

1608
01:23:17,240 --> 01:23:20,200
Speaker 5: the eight to thirty news for yours sports talk show

1609
01:23:20,240 --> 01:23:24,480
Speaker 5: presented by Excuse Me, Kelsey Chevrolet on seven hundred WLW.

1610
01:23:24,600 --> 01:23:27,600
Speaker 5: Lance McAllister is off tonight. He will be back for

1611
01:23:27,640 --> 01:23:31,160
Speaker 5: Bengals line on Monday evening. Mullegger from ESPN fifteen thirty

1612
01:23:31,520 --> 01:23:35,120
Speaker 5: filling in excuse me. Let's roll through a couple of

1613
01:23:35,160 --> 01:23:39,040
Speaker 5: things that either have happened earlier today or are happening

1614
01:23:39,160 --> 01:23:43,559
Speaker 5: right now. Bengals Update Bengals Today, Zach Taylor announced that

1615
01:23:43,640 --> 01:23:47,120
Speaker 5: Joseph O'sai and Charlie Jones both ruled out for the

1616
01:23:47,160 --> 01:23:49,200
Speaker 5: game on Sunday. I'm not sure either one of those

1617
01:23:49,360 --> 01:23:51,479
Speaker 5: is a surprise. We'll see if Noah fan can go

1618
01:23:52,200 --> 01:23:55,000
Speaker 5: Noah Fan listed as questionable. Was a full go of

1619
01:23:55,040 --> 01:23:58,799
Speaker 5: today's workout one o'clock live on seven hundred WLW. Sunday

1620
01:23:58,800 --> 01:24:02,439
Speaker 5: afternoon pregame coverage from gil begins at nine toh five.

1621
01:24:02,680 --> 01:24:05,000
Speaker 5: The green Bay Packers are gonna be without quarterback Jordan

1622
01:24:05,120 --> 01:24:08,120
Speaker 5: Love for their game against the Baltimore Ravens tomorrow night.

1623
01:24:08,680 --> 01:24:11,879
Speaker 5: Love was downgraded from questionable to out after he sustained

1624
01:24:11,880 --> 01:24:14,679
Speaker 5: a concussion in that epic game against the Chicago Bears

1625
01:24:14,760 --> 01:24:18,080
Speaker 5: last Saturday night, So Malik Willis will start green Bay.

1626
01:24:18,200 --> 01:24:22,680
Speaker 5: With Detroit's loss yesterday has clinched a playoff berth Baltimore

1627
01:24:22,840 --> 01:24:25,160
Speaker 5: likely without its starting quarterback in the game. They have

1628
01:24:25,240 --> 01:24:29,479
Speaker 5: to have Lamar Jackson listed as doubtful because of a

1629
01:24:29,560 --> 01:24:33,400
Speaker 5: back contusion obviously taken out of Baltimore's last game, so

1630
01:24:33,520 --> 01:24:37,560
Speaker 5: Tyler Hunley is set to start for the Ravens. Baltimore

1631
01:24:37,600 --> 01:24:41,479
Speaker 5: has a tragic number of one in the AFC North.

1632
01:24:41,840 --> 01:24:44,320
Speaker 5: As I mentioned, green Bay is in the playoffs, but

1633
01:24:44,439 --> 01:24:47,000
Speaker 5: they can still win the NFC North if they win

1634
01:24:47,040 --> 01:24:50,400
Speaker 5: their final two games and the Chicago Bears lose their

1635
01:24:50,479 --> 01:24:54,639
Speaker 5: last two games. The University of Michigan has a new

1636
01:24:54,640 --> 01:24:59,840
Speaker 5: football coach, Kyle Whittingham is going to replace Sharon Moore.

1637
01:25:00,080 --> 01:25:04,240
Speaker 5: Kyle Whittingham just retired or didn't retire. He stepped down

1638
01:25:04,280 --> 01:25:07,679
Speaker 5: as the head coach of the University of Utah recently,

1639
01:25:07,720 --> 01:25:14,080
Speaker 5: where he had a terrific run. His winning percentage of

1640
01:25:14,600 --> 01:25:18,920
Speaker 5: six sixty six or six sixty seven, I guess perhaps

1641
01:25:19,000 --> 01:25:22,840
Speaker 5: not entirely reflective of the job he did there. He

1642
01:25:22,880 --> 01:25:25,360
Speaker 5: had been the head coach since two thousand and five

1643
01:25:25,560 --> 01:25:28,559
Speaker 5: up until this past year. He takes over as the

1644
01:25:28,600 --> 01:25:30,760
Speaker 5: head coach at the University of Michigan. You heard Matt

1645
01:25:30,760 --> 01:25:33,040
Speaker 5: Rees mention this that John Hawser is going to be

1646
01:25:33,080 --> 01:25:36,800
Speaker 5: the new head football coach at Ohio University. He took

1647
01:25:36,840 --> 01:25:40,360
Speaker 5: over as the interim head coach for the Frisco Bowl,

1648
01:25:41,400 --> 01:25:44,960
Speaker 5: and the Bobcats beat UNLV in that ballgame seventeen to ten.

1649
01:25:45,040 --> 01:25:49,559
Speaker 5: There are three bowl games happening, actually one happening right now,

1650
01:25:49,600 --> 01:25:52,240
Speaker 5: two earlier today. If you care about ball games, I'll

1651
01:25:52,240 --> 01:25:54,760
Speaker 5: tell you that in the game above, Sports Bowl, Northwestern

1652
01:25:54,880 --> 01:25:57,160
Speaker 5: was victorious over Central Michigan by I score at thirty

1653
01:25:57,160 --> 01:25:58,000
Speaker 5: four to seven.

1654
01:25:58,320 --> 01:26:01,240
Speaker 4: The Rate Bowl in Pena went to overtime.

1655
01:26:01,280 --> 01:26:04,639
Speaker 5: Minnesota holds off New Mexico by a score of twenty

1656
01:26:04,640 --> 01:26:08,720
Speaker 5: to seventeen. And FIU is taking on the University of

1657
01:26:08,760 --> 01:26:12,800
Speaker 5: Texas and San Antonio in the Serve Pro First Responderabowl,

1658
01:26:12,840 --> 01:26:15,000
Speaker 5: and FIU leads that game in the first quarter by

1659
01:26:15,040 --> 01:26:16,080
Speaker 5: a score of fourteen to nothing.

1660
01:26:16,120 --> 01:26:17,320
Speaker 4: There's a whole bunch of ball games.

1661
01:26:17,160 --> 01:26:20,360
Speaker 5: Tomorrow and one of them will pit the Miami RedHawks

1662
01:26:20,360 --> 01:26:21,400
Speaker 5: against Fresno State.

1663
01:26:21,439 --> 01:26:23,800
Speaker 4: That is the Snoop Dog Arizona Bowl.

1664
01:26:23,840 --> 01:26:27,280
Speaker 5: Of course, the UC Bearcats playing the Liberty Bowl a

1665
01:26:27,320 --> 01:26:29,960
Speaker 5: week from today in Memphis against Navy. As a matter

1666
01:26:30,040 --> 01:26:33,559
Speaker 5: of fact, I was looking at the unofficial depth chart,

1667
01:26:34,560 --> 01:26:37,400
Speaker 5: and there are some things that can happen between now

1668
01:26:37,439 --> 01:26:40,280
Speaker 5: and next Friday. Many have said, and I think understandably

1669
01:26:40,360 --> 01:26:43,360
Speaker 5: so that if you're playing in one of these call

1670
01:26:43,400 --> 01:26:46,360
Speaker 5: them what they are, lower tier bowl games, that the

1671
01:26:46,439 --> 01:26:49,800
Speaker 5: last type of team you want to play is a

1672
01:26:49,840 --> 01:26:55,439
Speaker 5: service academy because there are no opt outs, and the

1673
01:26:55,760 --> 01:26:59,040
Speaker 5: players go to the ball site and they're not out there,

1674
01:26:59,240 --> 01:27:03,799
Speaker 5: you know, they're living by military, Navy or Army rules,

1675
01:27:04,080 --> 01:27:08,040
Speaker 5: Service academy rules, and things are maybe a little bit

1676
01:27:08,080 --> 01:27:11,360
Speaker 5: different for you know, a school that could have opt out,

1677
01:27:11,520 --> 01:27:13,879
Speaker 5: so maybe the players aren't taking it quite as seriously.

1678
01:27:14,439 --> 01:27:16,719
Speaker 5: But I did notice. I guess there were two things

1679
01:27:16,800 --> 01:27:20,160
Speaker 5: in the depth chart that stood out to me. Number One, yes,

1680
01:27:20,200 --> 01:27:24,000
Speaker 5: the Bearcats will be without Brendan Sorosby, who has entered

1681
01:27:24,000 --> 01:27:29,640
Speaker 5: the transfer portal, but the entire offensive line is still practicing.

1682
01:27:30,479 --> 01:27:34,320
Speaker 5: Most of the weaponry was listed on the depth chart,

1683
01:27:34,960 --> 01:27:37,960
Speaker 5: including Evan Pryor, and so there are some players who

1684
01:27:38,000 --> 01:27:40,120
Speaker 5: could still decide to opt out. There are some players

1685
01:27:40,160 --> 01:27:43,280
Speaker 5: who could decide they're gonna hit the portal. But on

1686
01:27:43,320 --> 01:27:45,920
Speaker 5: the depth chart that came out earlier this week, as

1687
01:27:46,040 --> 01:27:49,320
Speaker 5: was released by the Liberty Bowl, most of UC's main

1688
01:27:49,400 --> 01:27:54,040
Speaker 5: offensive guys are listed on it. Defensively, it's a little

1689
01:27:54,040 --> 01:27:57,800
Speaker 5: bit of a different story, although it was worth noticing

1690
01:27:58,120 --> 01:28:01,320
Speaker 5: that the Bearcats didn't list their play in a three

1691
01:28:01,479 --> 01:28:04,719
Speaker 5: three five alignment, which I think most of us agree.

1692
01:28:04,760 --> 01:28:08,160
Speaker 5: You simply cannot play against Navy. We will see how

1693
01:28:08,200 --> 01:28:11,880
Speaker 5: that game unfolds. One other note, and you heard Matt

1694
01:28:11,880 --> 01:28:16,400
Speaker 5: Reeese talk about this in the news. The ECHL hockey

1695
01:28:16,400 --> 01:28:20,599
Speaker 5: players have gone on strike, and they've complained about a

1696
01:28:20,640 --> 01:28:23,879
Speaker 5: lot of things that I think are reasonable. The travel

1697
01:28:23,960 --> 01:28:27,720
Speaker 5: schedule in the EHL. You might not follow the Cincinnati Cyclones,

1698
01:28:27,800 --> 01:28:30,080
Speaker 5: or if you do, you may only pay attention to

1699
01:28:30,160 --> 01:28:32,920
Speaker 5: when they're at home. But they will have weekends where

1700
01:28:32,960 --> 01:28:36,320
Speaker 5: they play games like three games in forty eight hours

1701
01:28:36,320 --> 01:28:39,720
Speaker 5: in like two different cities, and so there have been

1702
01:28:39,760 --> 01:28:44,320
Speaker 5: discussions about the schedule. There have been discussions about equipment,

1703
01:28:44,560 --> 01:28:49,280
Speaker 5: properly sized helmets, stuff like that, and so the EHL

1704
01:28:49,360 --> 01:28:53,400
Speaker 5: players have gone on strike, leading leaving EHL teams to

1705
01:28:53,720 --> 01:28:57,080
Speaker 5: refund ticket money for games that are not going to happen,

1706
01:28:57,840 --> 01:28:59,800
Speaker 5: and one of them would have been played at the

1707
01:29:00,040 --> 01:29:03,000
Speaker 5: Heritage Bank Center tonight. The Cyclones were set to play Kalamazoo.

1708
01:29:03,360 --> 01:29:06,840
Speaker 5: Obviously that game didn't happen. You will get a full

1709
01:29:06,880 --> 01:29:09,760
Speaker 5: refund if you bought tickets to that game. And there's

1710
01:29:09,760 --> 01:29:12,000
Speaker 5: a number of Cyclones hockey games coming up. One of

1711
01:29:12,080 --> 01:29:13,559
Speaker 5: them is on the twenty fourth, which is one of

1712
01:29:13,560 --> 01:29:15,880
Speaker 5: the best, one of the best nights they have on

1713
01:29:15,920 --> 01:29:18,800
Speaker 5: the calendar, which is their Teddy Bear Toss, which that

1714
01:29:18,880 --> 01:29:21,679
Speaker 5: game is in the afternoon on January the twenty fourth,

1715
01:29:21,720 --> 01:29:24,240
Speaker 5: and now that, along with all the other games, is

1716
01:29:24,280 --> 01:29:27,280
Speaker 5: in jeopardy because of the ECHL player strike, and the

1717
01:29:27,320 --> 01:29:31,240
Speaker 5: EHL has issued a statement saying our last and best

1718
01:29:31,280 --> 01:29:33,479
Speaker 5: offer and This is always part of the posturing you

1719
01:29:33,560 --> 01:29:36,840
Speaker 5: have with sports labor disputes, where you'll hear the league say,

1720
01:29:37,000 --> 01:29:38,960
Speaker 5: or you'll see the league say, this is our last

1721
01:29:39,040 --> 01:29:40,840
Speaker 5: and best offer, and it turns out to not be

1722
01:29:40,920 --> 01:29:44,080
Speaker 5: their last and best offer. We will see, but nonetheless,

1723
01:29:44,120 --> 01:29:49,080
Speaker 5: the cyclones dark for the foreseeable future, including obviously tonight's

1724
01:29:49,200 --> 01:29:54,840
Speaker 5: originally scheduled game against Kalamazoo. If you're looking for something

1725
01:29:54,840 --> 01:29:57,439
Speaker 5: to listen to this weekend, this was a lot of fun.

1726
01:29:58,200 --> 01:29:59,960
Speaker 4: So obviously Lance hosts this show.

1727
01:30:00,360 --> 01:30:02,800
Speaker 5: I have my show on ESPN fifteen thirty from three

1728
01:30:02,800 --> 01:30:05,360
Speaker 5: to six, and then my buddy's Tony Pike and Austin

1729
01:30:05,400 --> 01:30:07,360
Speaker 5: Elmore do the show that's on before me noon to

1730
01:30:07,400 --> 01:30:11,040
Speaker 5: three since he three sixty on a ESPN fifteen thirty,

1731
01:30:11,520 --> 01:30:13,360
Speaker 5: and so we do this once a year. We take

1732
01:30:13,479 --> 01:30:17,719
Speaker 5: the hosts of the three regularly scheduled sports talk radio

1733
01:30:17,760 --> 01:30:20,439
Speaker 5: shows and the four of us get together and we

1734
01:30:20,560 --> 01:30:22,880
Speaker 5: do a year in review show where we also look

1735
01:30:22,920 --> 01:30:26,479
Speaker 5: ahead to the next year. And we've done this for

1736
01:30:26,680 --> 01:30:29,640
Speaker 5: years and it's always a lot of fun. It's like

1737
01:30:29,680 --> 01:30:31,240
Speaker 5: the one time of year all of us are in

1738
01:30:31,280 --> 01:30:35,480
Speaker 5: the same room together and we recorded it on Tuesday.

1739
01:30:35,720 --> 01:30:39,479
Speaker 5: It aired yesterday morning. Maybe as you were opening presents

1740
01:30:39,680 --> 01:30:42,320
Speaker 5: you listen to Lance, Me, Tony and Austin.

1741
01:30:42,920 --> 01:30:44,200
Speaker 4: If you missed it.

1742
01:30:44,200 --> 01:30:47,320
Speaker 5: It is podcast and it's a really fun show because

1743
01:30:47,320 --> 01:30:49,800
Speaker 5: we look at some of the high points of twenty

1744
01:30:49,880 --> 01:30:53,439
Speaker 5: twenty five and there were some like the Reds making

1745
01:30:53,479 --> 01:30:58,400
Speaker 5: the postseason, like FC Cincinnati beating Columbus, and then some

1746
01:30:58,479 --> 01:31:01,639
Speaker 5: of the low points, and there were many of those,

1747
01:31:03,160 --> 01:31:06,479
Speaker 5: like this entire Bengal season for the most part, and

1748
01:31:06,479 --> 01:31:09,400
Speaker 5: then we did segments on each of the individual.

1749
01:31:09,000 --> 01:31:09,720
Speaker 4: Entities in town.

1750
01:31:09,760 --> 01:31:12,600
Speaker 5: We kind of combined college basketball all into one or

1751
01:31:12,640 --> 01:31:14,920
Speaker 5: college sports all into one, and then we did a

1752
01:31:14,920 --> 01:31:17,439
Speaker 5: look ahead for twenty twenty six and if you want

1753
01:31:17,439 --> 01:31:19,080
Speaker 5: to listen to it, you can go find that on

1754
01:31:19,120 --> 01:31:22,200
Speaker 5: the iHeartRadio app, where you could also find it on

1755
01:31:22,200 --> 01:31:25,599
Speaker 5: my page at seven hundred wow dot com. And it

1756
01:31:25,640 --> 01:31:27,920
Speaker 5: was a lot of fun to do and hopefully a

1757
01:31:27,920 --> 01:31:30,240
Speaker 5: lot of fun to listen to. A book that's fun

1758
01:31:30,280 --> 01:31:33,960
Speaker 5: to read, and I say this as a diehard UC

1759
01:31:34,200 --> 01:31:38,040
Speaker 5: football fan, is the book that Bill Rabinowitz wrote about

1760
01:31:38,080 --> 01:31:42,080
Speaker 5: last year's Ohio State National championship team. Bill covered Ohio

1761
01:31:42,120 --> 01:31:45,240
Speaker 5: state sports, among other things, for years with the Columbus

1762
01:31:45,240 --> 01:31:48,320
Speaker 5: Dispatch and now does his own substack. But his book

1763
01:31:48,360 --> 01:31:51,320
Speaker 5: about last year's Buckeye's team came out a few months ago.

1764
01:31:51,400 --> 01:31:53,760
Speaker 5: If you're an Ohio State fan, you need to read it,

1765
01:31:53,880 --> 01:31:58,479
Speaker 5: and you'll enjoy it, and you'll enjoy reading about last

1766
01:31:58,520 --> 01:32:00,920
Speaker 5: year's team even a easy even as you hope that

1767
01:32:00,960 --> 01:32:03,720
Speaker 5: this year's team can do what last year's team did.

1768
01:32:04,000 --> 01:32:06,320
Speaker 5: That is a very long winded way of me saying

1769
01:32:06,360 --> 01:32:08,000
Speaker 5: that Bill is going to join us to talk about

1770
01:32:08,000 --> 01:32:11,040
Speaker 5: the book and the Buckeyes. Next on seven hundred WLW

1771
01:32:11,479 --> 01:32:14,600
Speaker 5: New Moweger for Lance McCallister. This is RNL Carry or

1772
01:32:14,600 --> 01:32:18,160
Speaker 5: Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet Sterling. Coming up after

1773
01:32:18,200 --> 01:32:20,559
Speaker 5: the top of the hour. If you're an Ohio State fan,

1774
01:32:20,640 --> 01:32:24,519
Speaker 5: obviously you are gearing up for the college football Playoff

1775
01:32:24,560 --> 01:32:29,840
Speaker 5: quarterfinal tilt against the Miami Hurricanes on New Year's Eve nights,

1776
01:32:30,320 --> 01:32:32,680
Speaker 5: but perhaps also still basking in the glow of last

1777
01:32:32,760 --> 01:32:36,840
Speaker 5: year's national championship run. Bill Rabinowitz is covering both for

1778
01:32:36,920 --> 01:32:39,599
Speaker 5: his sub stack. He has written a book, Buckeye Brotherhood,

1779
01:32:39,680 --> 01:32:42,720
Speaker 5: How Ohio State navigated a new world to win a

1780
01:32:42,840 --> 01:32:45,639
Speaker 5: national championship. It is a terrific read and I say

1781
01:32:45,720 --> 01:32:49,360
Speaker 5: that as a Bearcat fan. Bill covered Ohio State for

1782
01:32:49,479 --> 01:32:52,080
Speaker 5: years for the Columbus Dispatch and kind enough to join us.

1783
01:32:52,920 --> 01:32:54,960
Speaker 5: I guess when you look back to a year ago

1784
01:32:55,280 --> 01:32:57,760
Speaker 5: and kind of what everybody was saying about Ryan Day

1785
01:32:57,840 --> 01:33:01,120
Speaker 5: and coaching for his job, and a year later he's

1786
01:33:01,160 --> 01:33:03,880
Speaker 5: won a national title. They're the odds on favorite to

1787
01:33:03,880 --> 01:33:06,519
Speaker 5: win another one. The Michigan program has been in tatters.

1788
01:33:06,600 --> 01:33:08,200
Speaker 5: What a difference a year makes, Bill.

1789
01:33:08,800 --> 01:33:11,640
Speaker 8: Yeah, it is crazy to think how things changed. I mean,

1790
01:33:11,680 --> 01:33:14,479
Speaker 8: I think everyone went to that Tennessee game thinking, you know,

1791
01:33:14,560 --> 01:33:16,160
Speaker 8: which team's going to show up. Are they going to

1792
01:33:16,200 --> 01:33:18,080
Speaker 8: mail it in or are they going to come out inspired?

1793
01:33:18,120 --> 01:33:21,000
Speaker 8: And they blew the doors down and then rolled through

1794
01:33:21,000 --> 01:33:24,040
Speaker 8: the playoffs in one of the great turnarounds in college

1795
01:33:24,080 --> 01:33:25,840
Speaker 8: football history. I mean, they were as low as a

1796
01:33:25,920 --> 01:33:28,680
Speaker 8: team can get after losing the Michigan because all those

1797
01:33:28,720 --> 01:33:30,960
Speaker 8: guys came back primarily.

1798
01:33:30,439 --> 01:33:31,200
Speaker 3: To beat Michigan.

1799
01:33:31,520 --> 01:33:33,439
Speaker 8: You know, oh yeah, they wanted to win the national championship,

1800
01:33:33,479 --> 01:33:35,880
Speaker 8: but that was the most immediate goal is to beat Michigan.

1801
01:33:35,960 --> 01:33:39,240
Speaker 8: When they lost that game, inexplicably, they're like, what do

1802
01:33:39,280 --> 01:33:41,920
Speaker 8: we come back for? Then they had the you know,

1803
01:33:41,960 --> 01:33:44,640
Speaker 8: team meeting, it's kind of become famous, and then they

1804
01:33:44,680 --> 01:33:47,920
Speaker 8: went on that role and yeah, it's crazy, and you

1805
01:33:47,920 --> 01:33:52,080
Speaker 8: think about what's happened in Michigan since then, and looks

1806
01:33:52,400 --> 01:33:54,600
Speaker 8: it was kind of in some ways a bit of

1807
01:33:54,640 --> 01:33:56,040
Speaker 8: a house of cards there.

1808
01:33:55,960 --> 01:34:00,800
Speaker 9: Right especially after Harball left. And it is sad because obviously.

1809
01:34:00,479 --> 01:34:02,960
Speaker 8: There's you know, the human the toll it's taken, but

1810
01:34:03,560 --> 01:34:06,519
Speaker 8: the boy it's the programs are on different footings right now.

1811
01:34:07,160 --> 01:34:09,920
Speaker 5: I hear about brotherhood and football, and sometimes it can

1812
01:34:10,000 --> 01:34:10,719
Speaker 5: sound cliche.

1813
01:34:10,800 --> 01:34:12,800
Speaker 4: I actually talked with Patrick Ryder, who played for.

1814
01:34:12,800 --> 01:34:15,000
Speaker 5: The Bearcats this year, was on that Ohio State team

1815
01:34:15,040 --> 01:34:18,400
Speaker 5: and outline just for me, you know how how legitimate

1816
01:34:18,439 --> 01:34:20,960
Speaker 5: and real that was. That is I think one of

1817
01:34:21,000 --> 01:34:23,880
Speaker 5: the it's the central theme of your book. You've been

1818
01:34:23,920 --> 01:34:26,479
Speaker 5: around a lot of Ohio State teams. Was this the

1819
01:34:26,600 --> 01:34:27,679
Speaker 5: most close knit one?

1820
01:34:29,280 --> 01:34:32,360
Speaker 8: I think so, just because they've been through so much together.

1821
01:34:32,720 --> 01:34:34,600
Speaker 8: They you know, they stayed for four years, which is

1822
01:34:34,600 --> 01:34:37,760
Speaker 8: pretty unusual. And honestly, if you had asked me at

1823
01:34:37,760 --> 01:34:40,559
Speaker 8: the start of the process of writing the book whether

1824
01:34:40,640 --> 01:34:43,000
Speaker 8: I would have a title like Buckeye Brotherhood, I probably

1825
01:34:43,000 --> 01:34:45,400
Speaker 8: would have said no, because it seems like a cliche, right,

1826
01:34:45,439 --> 01:34:47,880
Speaker 8: every team is, oh, we're a family, we're so close,

1827
01:34:47,960 --> 01:34:50,800
Speaker 8: or so this, and usually it's it's kind of a

1828
01:34:51,080 --> 01:34:53,639
Speaker 8: this is not really the truth. But these guys were,

1829
01:34:53,840 --> 01:34:57,000
Speaker 8: I mean, and and time after time, that brotherhood sustained them.

1830
01:34:57,520 --> 01:35:00,960
Speaker 3: And as I kept doing their research, and it just.

1831
01:35:01,000 --> 01:35:03,439
Speaker 8: Was obvious that that had to be the title, because

1832
01:35:03,479 --> 01:35:05,720
Speaker 8: that was that's what it was. I mean, you can

1833
01:35:05,880 --> 01:35:08,000
Speaker 8: kind of roll your eyes at it, which is the temptation,

1834
01:35:08,760 --> 01:35:11,240
Speaker 8: but it was real and I think that's what carried

1835
01:35:11,280 --> 01:35:13,479
Speaker 8: the day for them. That's really what got him through it.

1836
01:35:13,600 --> 01:35:16,160
Speaker 8: That and the fact they were really talented too. I mean,

1837
01:35:16,200 --> 01:35:17,960
Speaker 8: they don't overlook that they were really talented.

1838
01:35:18,920 --> 01:35:22,160
Speaker 5: That that brotherhood, if you will, it's hard to achieve

1839
01:35:22,320 --> 01:35:24,400
Speaker 5: in the old way the college football was played.

1840
01:35:24,520 --> 01:35:25,880
Speaker 4: I think that's what stands.

1841
01:35:25,600 --> 01:35:27,880
Speaker 5: Out to me, right and in this era where you're

1842
01:35:27,920 --> 01:35:31,360
Speaker 5: you're seeing coaches across sports have a hard time, you know,

1843
01:35:31,479 --> 01:35:35,040
Speaker 5: cobbling together teams and building culture and and and keeping

1844
01:35:35,040 --> 01:35:36,880
Speaker 5: it keeping it going from one year to the next,

1845
01:35:36,960 --> 01:35:39,160
Speaker 5: I think to me, and you're much closer to it

1846
01:35:39,160 --> 01:35:39,519
Speaker 5: than I am.

1847
01:35:39,560 --> 01:35:42,200
Speaker 4: Obviously, that's what made what they had last year stand out.

1848
01:35:44,439 --> 01:35:47,200
Speaker 9: Yeah, again, you know, these guys could have gone to

1849
01:35:47,240 --> 01:35:48,280
Speaker 9: the NFL, could.

1850
01:35:48,080 --> 01:35:49,920
Speaker 3: Have made you know, look they at nil money.

1851
01:35:49,960 --> 01:35:51,680
Speaker 9: It's not like they were you.

1852
01:35:51,640 --> 01:35:54,880
Speaker 8: Know, poor, but they could have in some cases made

1853
01:35:54,880 --> 01:35:58,479
Speaker 8: a considerably u you know, the bigger amount and gotten

1854
01:35:58,560 --> 01:36:01,639
Speaker 8: closer to the second contract every NFL player, every football

1855
01:36:01,640 --> 01:36:04,320
Speaker 8: player once. But they they just felt like it was

1856
01:36:04,400 --> 01:36:08,000
Speaker 8: unfinished business, that they couldn't in good conscience leave Ohio

1857
01:36:08,040 --> 01:36:11,400
Speaker 8: State without having beaten Michigan and making a run at

1858
01:36:11,439 --> 01:36:14,000
Speaker 8: the national Championship and and to have the adversity that

1859
01:36:14,080 --> 01:36:16,960
Speaker 8: they did, to have, you know, to have lost to

1860
01:36:17,000 --> 01:36:20,320
Speaker 8: Oregon in October, which was a tough loss but not devastating,

1861
01:36:20,320 --> 01:36:22,800
Speaker 8: but then lose to Michigan was devastating. It was not

1862
01:36:22,840 --> 01:36:26,360
Speaker 8: a good Michigan team. And and they did not expect

1863
01:36:26,439 --> 01:36:28,600
Speaker 8: Nobody expected that. I don't think missig expected, you know,

1864
01:36:28,640 --> 01:36:32,640
Speaker 8: that that outcome. So yeah, that was that was a

1865
01:36:32,680 --> 01:36:34,680
Speaker 8: big part of it. But also, and I think the

1866
01:36:34,720 --> 01:36:37,200
Speaker 8: heart of the book is the are the personal stories

1867
01:36:37,760 --> 01:36:40,160
Speaker 8: that I that I really tried to dig deep and

1868
01:36:40,520 --> 01:36:43,120
Speaker 8: get to ryan days background. I mean, you know, most

1869
01:36:43,160 --> 01:36:46,000
Speaker 8: Peolhiostate fans know that his father died by suicide when

1870
01:36:46,000 --> 01:36:49,479
Speaker 8: he was eight. You know just what that impact was

1871
01:36:49,600 --> 01:36:51,720
Speaker 8: on his life, and and that was kind of the

1872
01:36:51,760 --> 01:36:54,160
Speaker 8: first chapter of the book. And then there are other

1873
01:36:54,680 --> 01:36:58,120
Speaker 8: players these stories. Jack Sawyer has a had an arc.

1874
01:36:58,360 --> 01:37:01,560
Speaker 9: To his story where, you know, five star guy from Pickerington,

1875
01:37:02,240 --> 01:37:05,360
Speaker 9: a suburb of Columbus, and his career was just kind

1876
01:37:05,360 --> 01:37:07,240
Speaker 9: of okay until the end of his junior year.

1877
01:37:07,400 --> 01:37:08,559
Speaker 3: Then senior year, he.

1878
01:37:08,520 --> 01:37:11,120
Speaker 8: Wanted to make a big splash and he was one

1879
01:37:11,160 --> 01:37:13,439
Speaker 8: minute late to a workout and thought that he'd blown

1880
01:37:13,479 --> 01:37:16,559
Speaker 8: his chance to be a captain, you know, and he

1881
01:37:16,640 --> 01:37:19,439
Speaker 8: obviously makes the most famous play of the season.

1882
01:37:19,479 --> 01:37:22,120
Speaker 9: That's the cover shot of the book is the Sawyer

1883
01:37:22,160 --> 01:37:23,720
Speaker 9: scoop and score against Texas.

1884
01:37:24,000 --> 01:37:26,799
Speaker 8: And I've got a whole chapter on just that one play.

1885
01:37:27,080 --> 01:37:30,200
Speaker 8: Just what guy sat, he hits from every angle, what

1886
01:37:30,360 --> 01:37:33,760
Speaker 8: he saw, what coaches saw, what players and coaches and

1887
01:37:34,120 --> 01:37:37,720
Speaker 8: ross By Orke the ad what they experienced watching that

1888
01:37:37,840 --> 01:37:40,080
Speaker 8: Play's that's kind of one of the fun chapters of

1889
01:37:40,080 --> 01:37:43,680
Speaker 8: the book is his people reliving that play. But the

1890
01:37:43,720 --> 01:37:46,879
Speaker 8: heart of the book is just the stories of these players,

1891
01:37:46,880 --> 01:37:50,160
Speaker 8: one after the other, who overcame adversity, whether it was

1892
01:37:50,320 --> 01:37:53,280
Speaker 8: injuries or whether it was not feeling like their career

1893
01:37:53,320 --> 01:37:54,760
Speaker 8: had gone the way they wanted it to.

1894
01:37:56,640 --> 01:37:59,560
Speaker 3: That was kind of That's the essence of the book.

1895
01:38:00,600 --> 01:38:03,959
Speaker 5: Buckeye Brotherhood, How Ohio State navigated a new.

1896
01:38:03,760 --> 01:38:05,960
Speaker 4: World to win a national championship.

1897
01:38:06,000 --> 01:38:10,240
Speaker 5: Bill Robitdowitz, if if you are thinking of a very

1898
01:38:10,360 --> 01:38:14,440
Speaker 5: last minute gift for an Ohio State fan, highly recommend

1899
01:38:14,840 --> 01:38:19,599
Speaker 5: really quick. With the college football playoff quarterfinal looming, how

1900
01:38:19,680 --> 01:38:22,920
Speaker 5: much should the performance against Indiana's defense in the Big

1901
01:38:22,960 --> 01:38:25,479
Speaker 5: Ten title game give folks pauses they look ahead the

1902
01:38:25,520 --> 01:38:27,840
Speaker 5: next I guess next Wednesday night.

1903
01:38:29,040 --> 01:38:31,400
Speaker 9: Well, we'll find out. But I do think it could

1904
01:38:31,400 --> 01:38:34,680
Speaker 9: be a blessing in disguise. I think that day that

1905
01:38:34,840 --> 01:38:36,880
Speaker 9: was kind of a weird week. It was signing day

1906
01:38:36,960 --> 01:38:40,479
Speaker 9: the Brian Hartline took the South Florida job. They had

1907
01:38:40,520 --> 01:38:42,719
Speaker 9: to try to hold onto Chris Henry Junior, of course,

1908
01:38:42,760 --> 01:38:44,840
Speaker 9: the son of the former Bengal receiver.

1909
01:38:44,920 --> 01:38:45,400
Speaker 3: It's weird.

1910
01:38:45,560 --> 01:38:50,120
Speaker 8: I covered Chris Henry as a Bengal for the Dispatch,

1911
01:38:50,160 --> 01:38:52,639
Speaker 8: and now I'll recovered Chris Henry Junior. And I saw

1912
01:38:52,680 --> 01:38:55,479
Speaker 8: him at a recruiting thing last year, camping last year,

1913
01:38:55,479 --> 01:38:58,160
Speaker 8: and I told him, man, he was a man, You're old,

1914
01:38:59,120 --> 01:39:03,519
Speaker 8: but had a weird week, and uh yes, I think

1915
01:39:03,560 --> 01:39:06,320
Speaker 8: that they probably they will probably help them to be

1916
01:39:06,400 --> 01:39:10,960
Speaker 8: humbled some and and realize that they're not invincible.

1917
01:39:12,160 --> 01:39:13,400
Speaker 3: But they have to fix some things too.

1918
01:39:13,520 --> 01:39:15,120
Speaker 9: You know, the offensive line did not play well in

1919
01:39:15,120 --> 01:39:16,920
Speaker 9: that game, and they've got to get some things sticked.

1920
01:39:17,200 --> 01:39:19,920
Speaker 8: But I'm not convinced that Jeremiah Smith or Carnell Tate

1921
01:39:20,040 --> 01:39:22,120
Speaker 8: was all that healthy in that game.

1922
01:39:23,240 --> 01:39:25,519
Speaker 3: I think it. You know, we'll see.

1923
01:39:25,680 --> 01:39:28,000
Speaker 8: Look, you'd never know last year all the teams they

1924
01:39:28,040 --> 01:39:30,160
Speaker 8: had to buy lost. Now some of those were the

1925
01:39:30,280 --> 01:39:32,040
Speaker 8: teams that probaly shouldn't have gotten a buy. But you know,

1926
01:39:32,120 --> 01:39:35,479
Speaker 8: there is that concern, and Miami is talented enough to

1927
01:39:35,520 --> 01:39:37,440
Speaker 8: beat them, and I'm not sure that they.

1928
01:39:37,479 --> 01:39:40,040
Speaker 3: Have been consistent enough and they've got some holes.

1929
01:39:40,120 --> 01:39:41,959
Speaker 9: But but you know, that's gonna.

1930
01:39:41,720 --> 01:39:44,400
Speaker 3: Be an interesting game. We'll see.

1931
01:39:44,520 --> 01:39:47,320
Speaker 8: Look and probably to answer a question you might be thinking,

1932
01:39:47,400 --> 01:39:49,280
Speaker 8: or somebody might be thinking, no, I do not have

1933
01:39:49,320 --> 01:39:50,360
Speaker 8: plans to write another book.

1934
01:39:54,000 --> 01:39:57,840
Speaker 4: Championship. You write a book. That's how it works.

1935
01:39:58,200 --> 01:40:00,160
Speaker 9: It's a little tough, you know, doing a book in

1936
01:40:00,280 --> 01:40:03,680
Speaker 9: four months with the level of reporting that I that

1937
01:40:03,800 --> 01:40:07,680
Speaker 9: I do is I don't think mentally or physically I

1938
01:40:07,720 --> 01:40:09,200
Speaker 9: can do that back to back years.

1939
01:40:09,240 --> 01:40:10,400
Speaker 3: But but I do.

1940
01:40:10,680 --> 01:40:15,400
Speaker 8: Ohio State fans follow me on substack Bill Rabinowitz dot

1941
01:40:15,400 --> 01:40:17,559
Speaker 8: substack dot com. That you know, I left the Dispatch

1942
01:40:17,680 --> 01:40:21,280
Speaker 8: in September on very good terms. It was my decision strictly.

1943
01:40:22,000 --> 01:40:25,040
Speaker 8: I've just been looking for something different and substack gives

1944
01:40:25,040 --> 01:40:27,320
Speaker 8: me freedom to write, you know, covered team the way

1945
01:40:27,320 --> 01:40:30,720
Speaker 8: I've I've always wanted to do it. Yeah, yeah, I

1946
01:40:31,240 --> 01:40:33,120
Speaker 8: am charging. I mean, you could get a free subscription,

1947
01:40:33,200 --> 01:40:35,840
Speaker 8: but I obviously you know what pays the bills of

1948
01:40:35,880 --> 01:40:38,720
Speaker 8: the paid subscription. So I appreciate if people would do that,

1949
01:40:39,800 --> 01:40:41,559
Speaker 8: you know, and I want to keep doing what I do.

1950
01:40:41,760 --> 01:40:42,120
Speaker 3: And so.

1951
01:40:43,680 --> 01:40:47,120
Speaker 8: Yeah, it's been a weird year because they didn't really

1952
01:40:47,160 --> 01:40:49,160
Speaker 8: have much of a regular season that was that had

1953
01:40:49,200 --> 01:40:51,360
Speaker 8: any drama. I mean it was Texas the beginning and

1954
01:40:51,439 --> 01:40:53,040
Speaker 8: Instring at the end and not much in the middle.

1955
01:40:53,640 --> 01:40:56,080
Speaker 8: But now it heats up, you know, now it gets interesting.

1956
01:40:57,280 --> 01:41:00,839
Speaker 5: No question, uh, Bill on the Buckeye Substack and Buckeye

1957
01:41:00,880 --> 01:41:04,479
Speaker 5: Brotherhood available as we say, Bill, where you get your books.

1958
01:41:04,720 --> 01:41:06,360
Speaker 5: Appreciate the time, man, have a great Christmas.

1959
01:41:06,360 --> 01:41:09,360
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, all right, thanks mo, appreciate it.

1960
01:41:09,680 --> 01:41:10,640
Speaker 4: Good you got it.

1961
01:41:10,680 --> 01:41:12,920
Speaker 5: That truly is, and yeah, I'm as big of a

1962
01:41:13,000 --> 01:41:15,599
Speaker 5: uc football fan asi'll find that is an excellent book.

1963
01:41:15,640 --> 01:41:18,920
Speaker 5: Bill Rabinowitz a longtime Ohio State beat writer for the

1964
01:41:18,960 --> 01:41:22,520
Speaker 5: Columbus Dispatch. Check out his substack and fine Buckeye Brotherhood

1965
01:41:22,520 --> 01:41:24,960
Speaker 5: wherever you get your books.

1966
01:41:25,160 --> 01:41:26,479
Speaker 4: Ohio State and Miami.

1967
01:41:27,160 --> 01:41:29,920
Speaker 5: On New Year's Eve night next Wednesday, This coming Wednesday,

1968
01:41:29,920 --> 01:41:32,559
Speaker 5: I guess in the Cotton Bowl for the right to

1969
01:41:32,600 --> 01:41:34,479
Speaker 5: move on to the Fiesta Bowl to take on either

1970
01:41:34,520 --> 01:41:38,640
Speaker 5: Ole Miss or Georgia. A couple of things before we

1971
01:41:38,640 --> 01:41:40,640
Speaker 5: get out of here. Don't forget Sunday morning, we're at

1972
01:41:40,640 --> 01:41:43,560
Speaker 5: the Holy Grail Ken Brew, Tony Pike and Me for

1973
01:41:43,640 --> 01:41:46,240
Speaker 5: pregame sports talk that starts at nine am, kickoff at

1974
01:41:46,280 --> 01:41:49,040
Speaker 5: one o'clock with Dan and Laponi on seven hundred W

1975
01:41:49,160 --> 01:41:52,600
Speaker 5: wel W Tony and I back for the second to

1976
01:41:52,680 --> 01:41:55,360
Speaker 5: last Tony and Mo football show of the year. Will

1977
01:41:55,360 --> 01:41:58,240
Speaker 5: be at Twin Peaks in Westchester from three to six

1978
01:41:58,400 --> 01:42:01,880
Speaker 5: on Monday afternoon. We have an absolute blast. And so

1979
01:42:02,000 --> 01:42:05,120
Speaker 5: if you're not working next week, and God God help you,

1980
01:42:05,120 --> 01:42:07,240
Speaker 5: I hope you're not, come on out and join us.

1981
01:42:07,280 --> 01:42:08,880
Speaker 5: It is going to be a lot of fun. Anything

1982
01:42:08,920 --> 01:42:11,280
Speaker 5: you might have missed. You can find on the iHeartRadio app,

1983
01:42:11,360 --> 01:42:13,360
Speaker 5: or you could just go to my page at seven

1984
01:42:13,439 --> 01:42:17,240
Speaker 5: hundred WLW dot com and you could follow me on

1985
01:42:17,280 --> 01:42:19,880
Speaker 5: social media. I'll just I'll go with the big two

1986
01:42:20,000 --> 01:42:22,639
Speaker 5: as they relate to my life. You got Twitter, which

1987
01:42:22,680 --> 01:42:25,920
Speaker 5: I still call Twitter at moegar and Instagram as well

1988
01:42:26,040 --> 01:42:29,240
Speaker 5: at moegar, and we post. We also have a YouTube

1989
01:42:29,280 --> 01:42:32,320
Speaker 5: channel now, so all that stuff on social media and YouTube,

1990
01:42:32,720 --> 01:42:36,400
Speaker 5: be sure to follow and subscribe. We're pretty much done.

1991
01:42:36,439 --> 01:42:39,960
Speaker 5: Sterling is coming up after the nine o'clock News. I

1992
01:42:40,000 --> 01:42:43,120
Speaker 5: want to thank Russ Jackson the return of Russ Jackson

1993
01:42:43,479 --> 01:42:46,360
Speaker 5: for producing tonight, and enjoy the rest of your weekend.

1994
01:42:46,400 --> 01:42:49,160
Speaker 5: The nine o'clock News is next on the home of

1995
01:42:49,160 --> 01:42:53,440
Speaker 5: the best Bengals coverage, News Radio seven hundred WLW, Cincinnati.