Speaker 1: Three two one zero, all engine running lift off.
Speaker 2: We have a liptop.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the UFO Show.
Speaker 3: Dan, Thank you, Wow, whoa Wellye, that's that that spooky
Speaker 3: tie voice.
Speaker 1: I like, how are you? It's got a little grovel
Speaker 1: to it, a little more raspiness than usual. It's ever
Speaker 1: since that McConaughey interview. Man, that's what did me in. Really. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know about midway.
Speaker 3: Gave so much juice about midway.
Speaker 1: Through if you go back and listen. I don't know
Speaker 1: how intently folks listen to our show, but about midway
Speaker 1: in my voice just starts cutting out. I've I'm starting
Speaker 1: to worry that maybe McConaughey took my voice. Maybe it's
Speaker 1: gone for good. Wow.
Speaker 3: You know what, Maybe it'll come back in an interesting way.
Speaker 3: Maybe it goes all the way down and you reboot
Speaker 3: it from square one and you have like a cool accent.
Speaker 1: It comes back Portuguese exactly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would love that. I would love for that.
Speaker 3: That's a real differentiator in the space. Tis It's the
Speaker 3: UFO Show, is it not?
Speaker 1: It is the UFO Show. And as you know, so
Speaker 1: we had a big interview a week ago. We're continuing
Speaker 1: with that trend that ultra megastar Friday trend in with
Speaker 1: another superstar in our world, are we not?
Speaker 3: We are absolutely Welcoming back to the show Bruce Feldman
Speaker 3: to talk about his new book, brand new book, Flip
Speaker 3: the Script. Lessons learned on what on the Road to
Speaker 3: a Championship? I always get it on the road there.
Speaker 3: It is on the Road to a Championship about not
Speaker 3: just the twenty nineteen LSU undefeated, wildly successful and explosive
Speaker 3: offensive season, but also the specific path that ed Orgeron
Speaker 3: took from longtime assistant to interim coach at USC and
Speaker 3: too essentially being unemployed. And I asked, Bruce what and
Speaker 3: this I did the interview myself spoiler right now, but
Speaker 3: what ed arsand was up to in that year gap
Speaker 3: he took a gap year between when he was hired
Speaker 3: by Les Miles as a defensive line coach and everything
Speaker 3: that happened at USC and what that added to his
Speaker 3: path and then how everything came together for twenty nineteen
Speaker 3: Joe Burrow stuff, Joe Brady stuff, David Randa stuff, and
Speaker 3: even touched on how we look back on it now
Speaker 3: knowing that the PostScript flip the script post script, you
Speaker 3: see what I come.
Speaker 2: On on time?
Speaker 3: You're true pro rubbing my back? How that characterizes it,
Speaker 3: if at all? Because of the weird defensive downfall and
Speaker 3: offensive struggles and injuries and new assistants, so fascinating stuff
Speaker 3: With Bruce. He gave me and us a ton of time,
Speaker 3: and we also talked PAC twelve with the season out
Speaker 3: west beginning. I guess you're listening to this Friday or Saturday,
Speaker 3: but imminently.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we're going to get to some news on
Speaker 1: that front. Maybe not all PAC twelve teams will be
Speaker 1: in action this weekend given circumstances, but alas some probably will,
Speaker 1: and it is exciting to now have the full boat
Speaker 1: back in general, as he said, since you did the interview,
Speaker 1: trying to give my voice a little bit of a
Speaker 1: bye week here. Yeah, what was Bruce's general takeaway with
Speaker 1: regard to the PAC twelve this season? Is it playoff worthy?
Speaker 1: Are there any teams that he is super bullish about?
Speaker 1: I guess we'll get into that. Well, we'll get to
Speaker 1: hear all of that, But what was your initial takeaway
Speaker 1: from I guess Bruce's takeaway of the conference.
Speaker 3: I think he has a lot of optimism, and I
Speaker 3: use the term room for growth because it's obvious when
Speaker 3: you look across the conference where the specific room for
Speaker 3: growth lies with new coaches in I think there's only
Speaker 3: two new coaches this year. Maybe I got that wrong,
Speaker 3: but Carl Durell and Jimmy Lake. Am I missing anybody?
Speaker 3: I think that's across the board. Those are the new coaches,
Speaker 3: but a lot of new coordinators, big time coordinator hires,
Speaker 3: big questions, And we don't really talk about playoff stuff
Speaker 3: because I don't know at this point in the Pac
Speaker 3: twelve season that doesn't seem fully relevant and where the
Speaker 3: back twelve has been these past couple of years. I
Speaker 3: just want to see good football and improve football in
Speaker 3: the Pac twelve, and I think Bruce is aligned with that,
Speaker 3: and so he weighed in on his thoughts on Oregon
Speaker 3: losing what they did, but what the guys they have
Speaker 3: back can possibly do along with Joe moorehead and Jimmy
Speaker 3: Lake at Washington and the experience of Keaton Slovas at
Speaker 3: USC with that new Todd Orlando defense on the other side,
Speaker 3: and possible optimism with the Arizona schools and UCLA and
Speaker 3: so we get onto a lot of the PAC twelve
Speaker 3: mountain top just in terms of ten thousand foot view
Speaker 3: of the conference, so very I mean, he's out west,
Speaker 3: he knows all these guys he's going to you know,
Speaker 3: he's at their practices in normal times, so he's a
Speaker 3: relationship with a lot of the people in the conference.
Speaker 3: So really cool to have Bruce Way in. And obviously,
Speaker 3: as you know, aside from the book flip the script,
Speaker 3: you can listen to to Bruce with Stumandel on the
Speaker 3: audible and read them at the Athletic.
Speaker 1: All right, before we get to your interview with Bruce,
Speaker 1: we do have some news dance since I don't we
Speaker 1: do since I can't do the breaking news thing. Here's
Speaker 1: the sound. Do you have a spin on my normal
Speaker 1: kind of antics that you would like to add in here.
Speaker 3: For breaking news? Not that rich healthy boys.
Speaker 1: You don't have the falsetto, but it's okay.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't try breaking new. Yeah, there are some unfortunate
Speaker 3: COVID cases around college football. So if you're wondering why
Speaker 3: your perceived slate has been disrupted for Saturday and beyond,
Speaker 3: it looks like Louisville, Virginia has been postponed. I think
Speaker 3: only a week to November fourteenth, if my calendar math
Speaker 3: is correct. CAL Washington looks to be somewhat in doubt
Speaker 3: at the time we're recording this because of a positive
Speaker 3: test within the CAL program. Tulsa excuse me, yeah, Tulsa,
Speaker 3: excuse me. I think it's Tulsa Navy is off. I
Speaker 3: don't want to get that wrong and say two Lane Navy.
Speaker 3: I know it's a tul but I'm verifying now. It
Speaker 3: is Tulsa Navy that has been it says postponed, with
Speaker 3: no makeup date announced at the moment. So there's that.
Speaker 3: Joe Rossi, the Minnesota defensive coordinator, has contracted COVID. I
Speaker 3: haven't seen anything regarding symptoms. I hope he is all right.
Speaker 3: And to sort of bring it all full circle, so
Speaker 3: obviously Rossi will be missing Minnesota's game against I believe Illinois.
Speaker 3: And to bring things sort of full circle just with
Speaker 3: a show Bruce Feldman is involved with. I don't know
Speaker 3: about his specific health, but because of COVID protocol, Big
Speaker 3: Noon Saturday. So it's Urban Meyer, Rob Stone, your Boy,
Speaker 3: Brady Quinn, Reggie Bush, Matt Liinert are all quarantining because
Speaker 3: of Fox Sports COVID protocol, and so there will be
Speaker 3: no big Noon Saturday this weekend hosted by the normal people.
Speaker 3: If that's a show you watch, I think they're bringing
Speaker 3: on like a manual a show and stuff like that.
Speaker 3: Who's great, But I think it's a bunch of NFL people.
Speaker 3: I want to say, just standing in. We were available.
Speaker 3: No longer because we're insulted, but we were available.
Speaker 1: Yeah we were. Now it's true. My voice isn't it's
Speaker 1: still not back.
Speaker 3: But I mean we can get Pete right, we get
Speaker 3: Mayor Pete, he's still the experience. We get Pete Boodha
Speaker 3: judge to talk.
Speaker 1: About to do a ty hilt and brand impression.
Speaker 3: I think that's the move if why settle, that's people
Speaker 3: watching Boardwalk impressionist in DC.
Speaker 1: That's what folks said.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I think that covers a lot of the news.
Speaker 3: Maction is back, which is pretty exciting. So we'll talk
Speaker 3: about a little bit more about you know, the MAC
Speaker 3: returning on our recap show. But I think that's the
Speaker 3: news I have, And stay tuned post Bruce another teas
Speaker 3: because we'll get into the interview. Now Ty will give
Speaker 3: his gut, intrigue, instinct thoughts about what he just wants
Speaker 3: to watch this season, these six regular season games in
Speaker 3: the Pac twelve for everybody. And also so we're going
Speaker 3: to tie this tie UFO show to the I Guess
Speaker 3: guest as well on this Undefeated Feldman Orbit.
Speaker 1: Wow, thank you Undefeated Feldman Orbit. We are excited to
Speaker 1: hear from Bruce. It's always a pleasure to have him
Speaker 1: on the show. Don't forget if you're out and about
Speaker 1: this weekend, if you're looking to stay in tune with
Speaker 1: college football, find out what's going on in the world. Yeah,
Speaker 1: College Football Blitz put on by our good friends at
Speaker 1: Learfield IMG College. You can get to it by searching
Speaker 1: for college Sports now on tune In or by going
Speaker 1: to channel eighty four on your series XM dial. They
Speaker 1: jump in and out of local broadcasts. It's really cool.
Speaker 1: I said this time and again. It's been my secret
Speaker 1: weapon over all these years. I'm glad that we finally
Speaker 1: get the promo with because they do an awesome job
Speaker 1: jumping in and out of broadcasts to get something like
Speaker 1: fifty six minutes I want to say, of actual play
Speaker 1: by play coverage every hour. It goes all day long,
Speaker 1: all throughout the college football Saturday. So if like me,
Speaker 1: you're going to be out there in the world, you
Speaker 1: can't always be perched in front of the TV. Maybe
Speaker 1: you're making your own window of opportunity. I don't know,
Speaker 1: whatever the case may be for you, College Football Blitz
Speaker 1: is where it's at. They can help you stay up
Speaker 1: to date, of course, until you get the Sunday or
Speaker 1: Monday and get a chance to listen to Sliverble.
Speaker 3: All right, And with that, it's been far too long. Obviously,
Speaker 3: it's very difficult. During the season, we had him on
Speaker 3: to talk about I think Miami Ohio State when we
Speaker 3: were doing the rewatches. But he is the author of
Speaker 3: the brand new book Flip the Script, about ed Orgeron
Speaker 3: in the twenty nineteen LSU Championship Tigers. You read Meat Market,
Speaker 3: you read the QB. You've seen him on sidelines, you've
Speaker 3: listened to him on the audible, you read him on
Speaker 3: the Athletic I don't know, Big Noon Saturday. I mean,
Speaker 3: I honestly, we could turn this show into your resume.
Speaker 3: But Bruce Feldman, thanks for coming on.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Dad. It's good to hear your voice. You
Speaker 2: know how much I respect you guys and what you do.
Speaker 2: It's very cool to reunite with you.
Speaker 3: Nice all right, So you you write this book, I
Speaker 3: want to talk about this. I have not read the
Speaker 3: book yet, I've read reviews, I've listened to you talk
Speaker 3: about it. I watched a lot of twenty nineteen LSU football.
Speaker 3: But what does flip the script and lessons on the
Speaker 3: way to a championship season? I think I'm paraphrasing that,
Speaker 3: but what is where does flip the script come from?
Speaker 2: So it here's where it comes from. So as you
Speaker 2: you know, mentioned meat market at some point the UH.
Speaker 2: I really wanted to tell the story of how college
Speaker 2: football programs retreat, and so I was on the flannel
Speaker 2: wall for two years there and basically the book did
Speaker 2: pretty well, and I think a lot of people kept
Speaker 2: ask me, Hey, are you ever going to do a
Speaker 2: sequel for this? And I really didn't think I would,
Speaker 2: But I did follow Ojon's career from after a spectacular
Speaker 2: flame out at Ole Miss and then he gets on
Speaker 2: and you know this where eventually get to be the
Speaker 2: interim head coach after Lane gets fired at USC and
Speaker 2: then right you know, things really turn up for him
Speaker 2: and go in a different direction, And I think, to
Speaker 2: flip the script, term really came from basically in Dan
Speaker 2: and Bruce parlance. You know, he basically pulled the Costanza
Speaker 2: and he did everything the opposite of all his instincts
Speaker 2: at USC, and it worked. Now, I don't think it
Speaker 2: was as as simplistic as that, But because he had
Speaker 2: been through the process of his battles with substance and
Speaker 2: he's now twenty years sober, but his issues with alcoholism,
Speaker 2: I think he's he's learned from the recovery process and
Speaker 2: taken those lessons in that really deep look inside of like, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, I may I may not have had a
Speaker 2: great relationship with my ideal miss, and I may not
Speaker 2: have the resources and this and that, but ultimately it's
Speaker 2: I got to look inward with me first. I can't
Speaker 2: make all these excuses and on other people and blame
Speaker 2: other people. I got to start with me. So I
Speaker 2: think he learned from his own mistakes then when he
Speaker 2: got to USC, and certainly when he was a Tennessee,
Speaker 2: he was Lane's right hand man there, and then he
Speaker 2: was certainly a Lane's right hand man at USC. So
Speaker 2: he when Lane gets fired, he sees all this stuff
Speaker 2: that Lane has been doing and how he's running the program.
Speaker 2: And he was like, we're going to flip the script
Speaker 2: and do all these things basically opposite to get guys respond.
Speaker 2: And it's crazy because as you know what his persona is.
Speaker 2: I had asked him, I said, you know, you're kind
Speaker 2: of doing it George Costanza here, do you know what
Speaker 2: that is? And he kind of knew who George Costanze was,
Speaker 2: but he's he's not a Seinfeld watcher.
Speaker 1: It wasn't right.
Speaker 3: So but and the Seinfeld reference, to be clear is
Speaker 3: George wakes up one day and decides everything he's been
Speaker 3: doing has been wrong, so he might as well do
Speaker 3: the exact opposite.
Speaker 2: Yeah, at some point, I feel like they're in the
Speaker 2: diner and there's like a really attractive woman and he's like,
Speaker 2: I'm going to own this, this and this, and he goes, no,
Speaker 2: I'm not, and then he rethinks it. It goes against
Speaker 2: everything else, and all of a sudden his luck turns.
Speaker 2: And that, to some degree, is how things change for
Speaker 2: ed Ozeron in USC and then subsequently I think he
Speaker 2: really kept on building on that. So that's where flip
Speaker 2: the script comes.
Speaker 3: Okay, and so he obviously after USC and before LSU,
Speaker 3: he's sort of in no man's land.
Speaker 1: He's not working.
Speaker 3: Les Miles eventually hires him to be a defensive line coach,
Speaker 3: and at Oorzron eventually goes on to be an interim
Speaker 3: and full time.
Speaker 1: Coach at LSU.
Speaker 3: What was that period of time, like when a major
Speaker 3: head coach at USC, interim head coach and assistant coach
Speaker 3: at LSU, there's that space. Is that a time where
Speaker 3: at Orizron's working on himself? Is that a time where
Speaker 3: he's working on what he's going to do if and
Speaker 3: when he gets another opportunity? What is that that blank period?
Speaker 2: Like that's a great question. So it really was, And
Speaker 2: I don't know if he would have described it as
Speaker 2: I'm working on myself, but I think what he really
Speaker 2: realized is, remember, this is a guy who when he
Speaker 2: was the head coach, when he was at Tennessee, he
Speaker 2: lived in a hotel and he didn't want to take
Speaker 2: his kids at a school in Louisiana, and so you know,
Speaker 2: he would commute back to see them sometimes. Know, when
Speaker 2: he was at USC, the kids were in high school,
Speaker 2: he did not want to move them, so he lived
Speaker 2: in the Radisson near USC and that was for a
Speaker 2: few years. So when he gets told and he finds
Speaker 2: not out, doesn't find this out from Pat Hayden, the
Speaker 2: ad at US, see, he finds it out from somebody
Speaker 2: else that Steve Sarkisian's actually getting the USC job, not him.
Speaker 2: He is crushed and you know, he said, other than
Speaker 2: when his dad died, it was the worst day of
Speaker 2: his life. And so he flied, you know, he goes
Speaker 2: back home with his wife, and he is you know,
Speaker 2: he has devastated to the point where his kids had
Speaker 2: told me and now his kids are both out of college,
Speaker 2: but he had said that they had told me, we've
Speaker 2: never seen our dad like unshaven and scruffy and lying
Speaker 2: and sleeping on the couch all day like it was like,
Speaker 2: wasn't just like like like a guy going through a
Speaker 2: woman going through a bad breakup who was like that
Speaker 2: time's you know, probably twenty for him. And you know,
Speaker 2: I think the guy who's really been kind of a
Speaker 2: big brother to him, Brian Kennedy, who's really helped him
Speaker 2: out through the recovery process for these twenty years. You know,
Speaker 2: he had talked to me about Brian sober now about
Speaker 2: fifty years about just how much concern he had because
Speaker 2: when when people go through very traumatic experiences, you know,
Speaker 2: lose a job, wife leaves them, whatever that can I mean,
Speaker 2: for a lack of a better term, you know, when
Speaker 2: guys people go off the wagon. And he was like,
Speaker 2: I called him, I couldn't hear anything back, and I worried.
Speaker 2: And Ojoran told me in the for the book that
Speaker 2: you know, at one point urban Meyer had reached out
Speaker 2: to him about possibly a d line job Nick Saban
Speaker 2: had and he was like, I would have been good
Speaker 2: to nobody at that point. The way I felt and
Speaker 2: where the work done himself part was he really threw
Speaker 2: himself into getting back into his son's lives. His one
Speaker 2: son was like, I guess the best tennis player in
Speaker 2: the state of Louisiana and his age range and he's
Speaker 2: so he started going out to all the tennis matches
Speaker 2: and his son was telling me, and this is Cody,
Speaker 2: who actually ended up being the quarter starting quarterback at
Speaker 2: McNee State, was like, you know, my dad's coming to
Speaker 2: these tennis matches and you know he's got that voice,
Speaker 2: and I'm like that you don't do that at tennis
Speaker 2: matches and you know, he's and he goes and nobody
Speaker 2: goes to tennis match in Louisiana. So it's bad enough
Speaker 2: his voice carries, but now he's one of like three
Speaker 2: people there, and he's grumbling and rough, you know, and
Speaker 2: yelling things like that you got a chill. And then
Speaker 2: you know his other brother, his other his twin brother
Speaker 2: played football, and so he would be out at those
Speaker 2: and same thing. You know, it's just like he really
Speaker 2: I think he kind of got a deep connection with
Speaker 2: his sons and I think that really impacted him. Now crazy,
Speaker 2: There's so many crazy twists in Ojeon's life, but I
Speaker 2: think this one really is something that you have to
Speaker 2: take a step back to kind of get how improbable
Speaker 2: his story is. So he obviously gets a law. Like
Speaker 2: most guys who are football coaches, if you become an
Speaker 2: interim head coach, you maybe get one or two or
Speaker 2: three games tops. Usually guys don't get fired in September
Speaker 2: or with almost a full season. So Lane obviously got
Speaker 2: fired early in the season at usc So Ojean got
Speaker 2: eight games to basically show that he was not the
Speaker 2: head coach that he looked like he was at Ole Miss. Well,
Speaker 2: then he goes to LSU. And remember LSU, there was
Speaker 2: a game that they were playing in November against Texas
Speaker 2: A and M and all the reports are that LSU
Speaker 2: is going to fire less Miles, and the stadium is
Speaker 2: all packed in support of less Miles is obviously a
Speaker 2: a you know, beloved character who also is kind of
Speaker 2: larger than life, you know, Less's persona and the players
Speaker 2: play their butts off for him, and they beat Texas
Speaker 2: in them and unss she doesn't end up firing him
Speaker 2: late in the year, but you know what, like so
Speaker 2: there's no coaching search at LSU. If there was a
Speaker 2: coaching search, they're not hiring it o'jon at that stage
Speaker 2: to be the head coach at LSU. Instead, they keep
Speaker 2: less On. He loses to Wisconsin at in Lambeau to
Speaker 2: start the season, and later he loses to Auburn. They
Speaker 2: fire him early. So the chance of being an interim
Speaker 2: head coach twice is rare to begin with, the chance
Speaker 2: to be an interim head coach and have almost a
Speaker 2: full season is ridiculous. And then he gets it. He
Speaker 2: you know, he's kind of made the additional tweaks from
Speaker 2: his time at you know, when he was at USC
Speaker 2: even more so. And I think that really helped helped
Speaker 2: him get at least a real shot at getting this job,
Speaker 2: which is again so shockingly improbable given his path.
Speaker 3: What is the biggest difference between I remember there was
Speaker 3: a cookie story right at USC that he let guys
Speaker 3: eat cookies, and it sounds funny, it sounds silly, but like,
Speaker 3: you want guys to buy in, You want guys to
Speaker 3: trust you, You want guys to believe that you are on
Speaker 3: their side. What is the biggest difference? Is it a
Speaker 3: culture thing? Is it an on field thing between whatever
Speaker 3: at Origron was doing even at USC, but between what
Speaker 3: he did in a less successful part of his head
Speaker 3: coaching career and what he eventually was able to do
Speaker 3: at LSU.
Speaker 2: You know, before we get to that, it's funny. The
Speaker 2: cookie thing stands out to a lot of people. And
Speaker 2: when we talked about it at USC, one of the
Speaker 2: things that he kept on bringing up was like, Lane
Speaker 2: will get the turkey bacon in there. And I was like,
Speaker 2: he talked about turkey bacon like the way I think
Speaker 2: of like fat free cheese that I once had. It
Speaker 2: was like, Okay, you know this is this is unconscionable
Speaker 2: or whatever, but his distain for the turkey bacon they
Speaker 2: served at USC, you know, just like it seems to
Speaker 2: stick in his craw to this day. Well, anyway, to me,
Speaker 2: the biggest difference in him, and I didn't know this
Speaker 2: until we started working on the book really and talking
Speaker 2: about it, and then it started to materialize, was his
Speaker 2: understanding of like I knew he had evolved, and you know, look,
Speaker 2: I once worked on a book with Mike Leach. Michael
Speaker 2: Leach might be the most stubborn of the stubborn people
Speaker 2: in a profession that's you know, loaded with stubborn dudes,
Speaker 2: and they don't usually evolve or they don't change much.
Speaker 2: So I knew Oseron had evolved, and it was clear
Speaker 2: that he had. But what I was kind of thinking
Speaker 2: in terms of this is you become different. And what
Speaker 2: he had kind of explained and articulated in a way
Speaker 2: where I don't even know he was like not telling
Speaker 2: me that this is what happened. He was just telling
Speaker 2: me about it. As the instincts you have, they don't change,
Speaker 2: the impulses you have, they don't change. What change is
Speaker 2: if you're fortunate or if you've done the work and
Speaker 2: get to know yourself and get to know who you
Speaker 2: are and for better or worse, how that And this
Speaker 2: is why I think the book is like, this is
Speaker 2: why I'd be selling the book in terms of like
Speaker 2: why it's a lot more than a football book is.
Speaker 2: And this is, you know, relatable to anybody, not just
Speaker 2: at Ozeran or a football coach. Is the awareness that
Speaker 2: he ended up having was like, Okay, this is my
Speaker 2: my instinct would have been to do this. Well, I
Speaker 2: did it that way at Oldness, right, did it that
Speaker 2: way before and it didn't work so good. So I
Speaker 2: know I can't do it that way. And so I
Speaker 2: think what's so different for him is he knows his
Speaker 2: he knows himself, and he knows because he said this
Speaker 2: to me at one point and there's a story after
Speaker 2: they beat Alabama and Tuscalalusa. Yes last year, he's like,
Speaker 2: the old me or the one when I was at
Speaker 2: Old Miss, I would have done it this way, and
Speaker 2: it would have been And the example he you know,
Speaker 2: we're talking about in the book specifically to this was
Speaker 2: they beat Old Miss and I don't know, I mean,
Speaker 2: they beat Alabama. I don't if you remember this, but
Speaker 2: there were one of the players took out a cell
Speaker 2: phone in the postgame speech, and it was the you know,
Speaker 2: I don't know if I can say it out loud
Speaker 2: on your shop, but like that gets out. No, it's
Speaker 2: not the most inflammatory thing, but it's definitely not something
Speaker 2: that LSU's going to put on their Twitter feed. And
Speaker 2: so he apologized for it. But then he said, you know,
Speaker 2: the player who did it basically came to me. It
Speaker 2: was very apologetic, and he was like the old me,
Speaker 2: you would have turned that into like a two day
Speaker 2: story and I would have gone off on him and
Speaker 2: know whatever. And he's like, you know, I knew, he
Speaker 2: knew he made a mistake. It wasn't It wasn't like
Speaker 2: a guy who got in front of a car, you know,
Speaker 2: under the influence and had a horrific accident. You know,
Speaker 2: like whatnot. It was like an error in judgment. It's like, okay,
Speaker 2: this is like one of my sons. How would I
Speaker 2: handle it. I was like, you know, you screwed up. Hey,
Speaker 2: don't do that again. I love you. I love you still.
Speaker 2: Just let's let's you know, make better decisions. And the
Speaker 2: team ends up noticing how somebody gets treated, you know,
Speaker 2: like it's treated in that where they already feel bad
Speaker 2: enough and you know they don't want and then all
Speaker 2: of a sudden you run a truck over them, you know, emotionally,
Speaker 2: and then it just makes it worse. And so I
Speaker 2: think that was a really interesting window where when he
Speaker 2: told me the story, it didn't all that was sink
Speaker 2: in all the way, and then it did the more
Speaker 2: we talked about it.
Speaker 3: So something that's obviously been talked about a ton and
Speaker 3: credited to at ojeron a ton was his hiring of
Speaker 3: Joe Brady before the twenty nineteen season. As he realized,
Speaker 3: and I know you've written about this, that they wanted
Speaker 3: to go to the spread, he just sort of told
Speaker 3: Steve Ensminger, the existing offensive coordinator, we're going to the spread.
Speaker 3: Make preparation stuff like that. He made that decision. But
Speaker 3: Joe Brady specifically does not fit necessarily with the types
Speaker 3: of coordinator hires that ed Orgeron made before, Like you've
Speaker 3: mentioned at ole Miss. I think he hired himself as
Speaker 3: defensive coordinator at ole Miss. And even since you know,
Speaker 3: instead of going with a sort of an up and
Speaker 3: comer and paying them and somebody who has been identified
Speaker 3: and recommended like Joe Brady was, even since hiring Bo
Speaker 3: Polini for example this year. I don't know if that's
Speaker 3: with his instinct or against his instinct, whatever, but Joe
Speaker 3: Brady definitely stands out. Was any of that expected, any
Speaker 3: of the all timiness of Joe Brady and that hire expected?
Speaker 3: And did he have to be pulled into and convinced
Speaker 3: of Joe Brady.
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: And in fact, Joe Brady is in part why why
Speaker 2: Flip the Script exists as a book now, Because as
Speaker 2: I said, I would always get asked about are you
Speaker 2: going to do this sequel or a sequel? And so
Speaker 2: Ozeran had told me about Joe Brady. You know, I
Speaker 2: don't know, maybe a year before he hired him, or
Speaker 2: at least you know, a long time before he hired him,
Speaker 2: because he remembered and I didn't know who Joe Brady was.
Speaker 2: I thought Joe Brady was older. I mean, I think
Speaker 2: he was like forty five. I thought he was like
Speaker 2: thirty seven. And then he explained more, and then I
Speaker 2: was like, oh, he's a morehead guy. And I know
Speaker 2: Joe moorehead and so, but then when he hired him
Speaker 2: and he interviewed like he basically offered Brady the job,
Speaker 2: and then like Brady didn't accept the job right away,
Speaker 2: Like I guess, Joe Brady's the mine where I'm not
Speaker 2: going to you know, I don't know if it's his
Speaker 2: dad or somebody had said, hey, don't make a decision
Speaker 2: instantly or whatever on anything. And so Joe eventually, you know,
Speaker 2: tells me I definitely want the job. And I don't
Speaker 2: know how long it was, but I remember I said,
Speaker 2: how is it going. He goes, you got to see
Speaker 2: this guy. He said, he just raved about what Joe
Speaker 2: Brady was braining. He kept on saying he's got answers,
Speaker 2: He's got answers for everything. And I said, all right, well,
Speaker 2: you know, I'd like to come down there. And I
Speaker 2: thought I was going to do a story about it
Speaker 2: for the Athletic. Well I eventually did do that. But
Speaker 2: so I went down in April of twenty nineteen, and
Speaker 2: I sat in a bunch of the meetings and I
Speaker 2: had good access, and I went to spring practice and
Speaker 2: then I met with Brady for a long time. And
Speaker 2: it's crazy because you know, like that was the first
Speaker 2: time I think Joe Brady had ever done an interview
Speaker 2: like remember, like most of these coaches, with the exception
Speaker 2: of like and Leach and Charlie Weiss, like at some
Speaker 2: point they were a really good high school football player,
Speaker 2: so you know maybe in their town they got you know,
Speaker 2: they get some coverage or whatever. I mean. Joe Brady played,
Speaker 2: you know, was a receiver in a really good area
Speaker 2: football in Day County, and then he was a backup
Speaker 2: receiver at William and Mary and then he was a
Speaker 2: gat at Ohio I mean at Penn State, and then
Speaker 2: he was basically a quality control guy at the Saint
Speaker 2: So it's not like he's getting interviewed or anything. So
Speaker 2: it's like he's under the radar. But Ed was so convinced,
Speaker 2: like he loved, he loved what the Saints do, and
Speaker 2: he just got such a good vibe on him that
Speaker 2: he was like, this is going to be the perfect
Speaker 2: compliment to what I think. Like he likes that Steve
Speaker 2: Nsminger is willing to be aggressive and throw the ball downfield,
Speaker 2: but in the RPO game, which Brady obviously had been
Speaker 2: burst in from his time with morehead at Penn State,
Speaker 2: but also a lot of the attacking stuff that the
Speaker 2: Saints do, especially what he was going to bring for
Speaker 2: the third down and in the red zone. He was like,
Speaker 2: this is going to be gold now. At helped that
Speaker 2: he had a lot of us played into how Joe
Speaker 2: Burrow is wired anyway, Joe burrowuld rather, I don't want
Speaker 2: you guys Max protecting is not protecting me. It's causing
Speaker 2: me more problems. Right, I get everybody out and I
Speaker 2: will and I will attack it, you know, and give
Speaker 2: me options. I don't need this all getting muddled in
Speaker 2: the middle of it, and I'm like relying on two
Speaker 2: guys to try to make magic. And that stuff took off,
Speaker 2: and so what's what was you know, fun for me
Speaker 2: with the book was when you talk to Joe bradyer
Speaker 2: when you I mean, I got some great stuff from
Speaker 2: Joe Burrow and from other guys on the staff about
Speaker 2: how this thing evolved and how quickly it evolved and
Speaker 2: how it took off like wildfire. Was that to me
Speaker 2: is like the inside stuff like if I'm a football
Speaker 2: coach or if I'm an SEC fan, I want to
Speaker 2: dig into. But he was convinced and so like, did
Speaker 2: I think they were going to win a national title?
Speaker 2: After I came back from from Baton Rouge on that
Speaker 2: trip in the spring. I didn't think that, but I
Speaker 2: thought they had a chance to be a real, you know,
Speaker 2: playoff team, and to the point where like the athletic
Speaker 2: does these state of the program stories and I'm writing
Speaker 2: about how yeah, I know, you feel like you've heard
Speaker 2: this before, whether it's Cam Cameron and less smiles, and
Speaker 2: they're going to change, They're going to be something different.
Speaker 2: Oh here comes Brandon Harris. He's more talented than the
Speaker 2: other quarterbacks l she's had. Oh wait, Ojon just hired
Speaker 2: Matt Canada. He was the hot coordinator at pitt and
Speaker 2: it never worked out for LSU, and it just underwhelmed
Speaker 2: and disappointed. But I know you heard that this guy
Speaker 2: Joe Brady, who by the way, you never heard of.
Speaker 2: Now he's going to be it's going to be way different,
Speaker 2: especially because you know, with the exception of really the
Speaker 2: UCF Fiesta Bowl game, it wasn't like Joe Burrow was
Speaker 2: lighting up teams. He was playing well, but it wasn't
Speaker 2: like nobody saw that coming. And so when I came back,
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, boy, I think I That's when
Speaker 2: I started working on the book proposal for Philip the
Speaker 2: script after that trip, because I was so convinced and
Speaker 2: because Ojon had, you know, been so high on what
Speaker 2: he had seen. He was like, nobody ever, this never
Speaker 2: happens where the offense just torches the defense in spring football,
Speaker 2: not here, and it was happening. And so that was
Speaker 2: where the ground started to move.
Speaker 3: What was the interplay of egos like between So you
Speaker 3: have ed Orzron and Steve Ensminger, who have combined to coach,
Speaker 3: you know, for one hundred years or whatever, and you
Speaker 3: have Joe Brady, who's thirty has never been thrust in
Speaker 3: a position like this. And obviously, in order to really
Speaker 3: move an offense forward in order to generate big points
Speaker 3: in big plays, whoever is calling the offense has to
Speaker 3: feel empowered, has to feel like they are in control
Speaker 3: and they don't have somebody looking over their shoulder constantly
Speaker 3: saying this is how I think we should be doing things.
Speaker 3: And obviously there had to have been a very successful
Speaker 3: interplay during the season between ed Orzron and his expectations,
Speaker 3: Steve Ensminger and what he had already done and what
Speaker 3: he is in control of, and Joe Brady and what
Speaker 3: he is bringing to the offense. It doesn't seem like
Speaker 3: it's obvious that a situation like that would just click.
Speaker 3: Why did it?
Speaker 2: I think some of it clicked because Steve Ensberger knew
Speaker 2: that right. You know, I was the tight end coach
Speaker 2: for a while, been there, done that, and you know,
Speaker 2: I want to be part of something really big, and
Speaker 2: this guy is going to help make that happen. I
Speaker 2: think when it came to Oseron's part about bringing this
Speaker 2: other guy in, he knew this guy is the r
Speaker 2: Sean McVay like he had a lot of respect for
Speaker 2: Lane his mind as an offensive mine as a play caller,
Speaker 2: and I think their personalities are way different than Joe
Speaker 2: Brady and Lane. But I think he, you know, there
Speaker 2: was something he was really sold on with. Again, you know,
Speaker 2: in game adjustments, Joe Brady's going to attack it like
Speaker 2: he had a great admiration. I was gonna say in respect,
Speaker 2: but it's like a great admiration for how Joe Brady
Speaker 2: thinks in the middle of things. So, you know, I
Speaker 2: think if you would asked him and said, who's the
Speaker 2: best recruiter on the staff, who's the best evaluator of talent?
Speaker 2: He's not budgeting on that. If you had asked him, like,
Speaker 2: who knows the most about the lie? You know, even
Speaker 2: though he works with Bill Johnson, who was a mentor
Speaker 2: to him, I think that would be more of a
Speaker 2: more of a begrudging whatever. But if it came down to, like,
Speaker 2: you know, who is the like, do I know more
Speaker 2: than than Joe Brady, even though he's almost half my age,
Speaker 2: He's not fighting that battle. He's he's embracing it all
Speaker 2: the way to the point where when Joe Burrow came
Speaker 2: on his visit from you know, came from Ohio State,
Speaker 2: and they had a bunch of their coaches in this
Speaker 2: Saturday meeting where they're watching all these cutups of Joe
Speaker 2: Joe Burrow's stuff in addition to some LSU stuff that
Speaker 2: they thought catered to him. He said to Obern said
Speaker 2: to me, he goes. It did not take very long
Speaker 2: for me to realize who the smartest guy in the
Speaker 2: room was and think about that, Like Oseron is you know,
Speaker 2: very accomplished as a as a position coach, certainly, but
Speaker 2: he's been in the NFL, he's been at USC. He's
Speaker 2: like he's learned under Jimmy Johnson, he's learned under Pete Carroll,
Speaker 2: he's n under Paul Pascal, and he like he's learned
Speaker 2: under some of the best in football. You know, you
Speaker 2: have Steve Envener, who's been you know, an SEC coordinator
Speaker 2: at a bunch of places. You have a lot of
Speaker 2: other guys who's been coordinators. And he's saying, you know what,
Speaker 2: this other guy who really has never played college football
Speaker 2: at any real length of time at this point because
Speaker 2: he couldn't get on the field at Ohio State. So
Speaker 2: this guy is the smartest guy in terms of football
Speaker 2: in the room. That's quite an admission. But when you
Speaker 2: see and again, I'm the biggest believer in Joe Burrow
Speaker 2: as a as a player after what I've heard, what
Speaker 2: I've seen, you know, for in meetings, at practice and walkthroughs,
Speaker 2: and they got it. Like I don't know if I
Speaker 2: don't know if os Wrong was the only one who
Speaker 2: felt that way at that point, you know, because he's
Speaker 2: a he's a defensive guy. Listening to somebody talk about
Speaker 2: how assertive he is, what he's seeing, how he's processing,
Speaker 2: you know, obviously, and Burrow is the son of a
Speaker 2: longtime defensive coordinator in the MAC. But you know, again,
Speaker 2: I think that speaks to like, Okay, I know what
Speaker 2: I don't know, and I want somebody who can bring
Speaker 2: me that, and he found guys who could bring them in.
Speaker 3: When did belief develop in you know, the coaches room,
Speaker 3: in the locker room, whatever, from Okay, we have a
Speaker 3: really fun offense. We're scoring points. This is unlike anything
Speaker 3: we've ever done. When did that belief translate into I
Speaker 3: don't know if anybody can stop us? Is it you
Speaker 3: know that Texas game? Is it the weird Auburn game?
Speaker 3: Is the Florida back and forth? Is it Alabama? When
Speaker 3: is that belief of like we're unstoppable? Where does that start?
Speaker 2: I actually think it happened in the spring when when
Speaker 2: there was a and you know, in the book, there's
Speaker 2: a really cool kind of passage where Burrow gets basically
Speaker 2: in the two fights. One that starts where Jacoby Stevens
Speaker 2: their safety jumps, you know, jumps up to try to
Speaker 2: block a pass and they say comes down on Burrow
Speaker 2: and that starts a fight. And then Burrow felt like
Speaker 2: he wasn't in that enough, so he gets into a
Speaker 2: fight with Patrick Queen like right after and it's a
Speaker 2: full scale brawl. And then at that same practice Odron said,
Speaker 2: like he just torched our defense and like completed like
Speaker 2: eighty five percent of his passes that day, and I
Speaker 2: came off the field going, We're going to be really,
Speaker 2: really good. He told, you know, he told one of
Speaker 2: his staff was that. I think then, because you know,
Speaker 2: I heard that from multiple people in the program, not
Speaker 2: just ozeron that and Joe certainly felt that way, and
Speaker 2: one of the offensive assistants felt that way. And I
Speaker 2: think they just realized, we know we have players on defense,
Speaker 2: and we are just embarrassing them. And so like, I
Speaker 2: knew that Jamaar Chase was a lot better than people realized,
Speaker 2: because I you know, I'd been out at some practices
Speaker 2: in that spring and I didn't know he was going
Speaker 2: to win the bullet in the call, but I knew
Speaker 2: he was like all American caliber. I knew Justin Jefferson
Speaker 2: was a big time guy. I didn't see the Clyde
Speaker 2: thing coming for a while. I can't say that, but
Speaker 2: I think there was a lot of elements of that.
Speaker 2: So then when they got to Houston, when they got
Speaker 2: to Texas, I think it was like, hey, this is
Speaker 2: what we do now, you know, it's we're not doing
Speaker 2: four minute offense because we're up and it's third and seventeen.
Speaker 2: We're putting our foot on the guess and this is
Speaker 2: a different this is a different day for LSU, and
Speaker 2: it built I mean for me personally, Like I thought
Speaker 2: they were after they beat Alabama and I was like,
Speaker 2: all right, I got a book. But I thought, ultimately
Speaker 2: I figured, all right, they're way better than Georgia. I mean,
Speaker 2: they kicked Georgia's butts the year before, you know, without
Speaker 2: the same kind of team, and I just figured they
Speaker 2: would do it again. I thought they would beat Oklahoma.
Speaker 2: I'd seen them. Oklahoma is a bad matchup, and I
Speaker 2: just remembered, you know, like before the playoffs started, I
Speaker 2: was like, going to Clemson and Ohio State are just
Speaker 2: so talented on both sides of the ball. And it's
Speaker 2: Trevor Lawrence, it's justin field. I think at some point
Speaker 2: the Cinderella story is going to not have a great ending.
Speaker 2: Well after Oklahoma, I remember walking out of there because
Speaker 2: I had now I've seen a couple of games up
Speaker 2: close from the sideline and been with them, you know,
Speaker 2: for practices and meetings, and so you know, after five
Speaker 2: years at Fox have been a sideline requorter like, I've
Speaker 2: seen a lot of teams right before games, you know,
Speaker 2: good teams, Ohio State, Oklahoma. You know, I've seen kind
Speaker 2: of the feel for it. I have never seen a
Speaker 2: team as loose, focused and confident right before kickoff as
Speaker 2: that LSU team is. I mean, I saw it against Georgia,
Speaker 2: I saw it against Oklahoma, and it's the exact same
Speaker 2: way they look at a Wednesday practice, and I was like,
Speaker 2: no matter what I think Trevor Lawrence is terrific, I
Speaker 2: think Travis ATM is terrific. Nobody's beaten this team, not
Speaker 2: this year, not the way they're playing. And you know,
Speaker 2: so I, you know, kind of changed my thought on
Speaker 2: the fly after seeing it after a couple of times,
Speaker 2: because I just I at that point, I was like,
Speaker 2: all right, I get it. You know, Clempson may score
Speaker 2: a bunch of points, they're not outscoring Joe Joe Burrow,
Speaker 2: and they're not outscoring Clyde and Jamar Chase. It's just
Speaker 2: they're just on a different level at this point. And
Speaker 2: that actually was kind of what happened. At one point
Speaker 2: they're down seventeen to seven. Then also Jamar Chase was
Speaker 2: likes that I'm going to take over. You can put
Speaker 2: your best defensive back on, he can play me well,
Speaker 2: and I'm still going to beat him. And it was
Speaker 2: like that's what happened. And then all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: Trevor Lawrence, as talented as he is, could not keep up.
Speaker 2: And I just felt like their offense puts so much
Speaker 2: pressure on teams that and these were really good quarterbacks.
Speaker 2: I mean, Trevor is a great quarterback, right, and they
Speaker 2: just they either get you in a hole or they
Speaker 2: just you know, Ellinger played probably the best game of
Speaker 2: the season against them, and they still lost at home.
Speaker 3: You mentioned as playing as loose or feeling as loose
Speaker 3: as they might in a Wednesday practice, and practice has
Speaker 3: become sort of lore in college football, right You talk
Speaker 3: about Pete Carroll's loose practices that ed Orgron was around,
Speaker 3: and maybe Nick Saban's practices where players say practice is
Speaker 3: harder than the games. You know, if you're able to
Speaker 3: perform in practice, games are nothing. Games are easy. And
Speaker 3: that is pretty apparent to anybody that watches a lot
Speaker 3: of Alabama football. What are at Orgron practices like? Because
Speaker 3: obviously something worked from those practices After the spring, when
Speaker 3: Joe Burrow looked that good. What were practices like last year?
Speaker 3: Either from your own experience or from what you've.
Speaker 2: Heard, you know, I think they're intense because he just
Speaker 2: radiates intensity. You hear that barking voice and everything, and
Speaker 2: so you know he wants to be precise in the
Speaker 2: details as it is in physical play. I think he
Speaker 2: had told me like he'd never seen teams practice any
Speaker 2: harder or with more energy and intensity than what Jimmy
Speaker 2: Johnson's teams had at USC, because those players were nasty
Speaker 2: and it was like they were all about it, and
Speaker 2: you just didn't see anybody, you know, practice like that.
Speaker 2: USC had a lot of talent, I don't think it
Speaker 2: was quite to the degree of the nastiness and the
Speaker 2: edge that those Miami teams practiced with. Then when he
Speaker 2: got this team at LSU. One thing that was interesting
Speaker 2: he told, which I didn't realize when I was there
Speaker 2: in the spring, but I noticed it later, was they
Speaker 2: you know, most teams when you go to the practice,
Speaker 2: they usually have like, you know, music blaring, and he doesn't,
Speaker 2: And he was like, music is fake energy. I want
Speaker 2: our guys to have their own energy. If you don't,
Speaker 2: if you don't clap if you don't bring the energy
Speaker 2: you guys are running. And so that was a big
Speaker 2: thing for him, and so there was I mean, you
Speaker 2: know his iron sharpened iron deal well and you know
Speaker 2: he would I remember he showed this in one of
Speaker 2: like a morning film session that I was sitting in
Speaker 2: the room for. It was like he must have rewound
Speaker 2: Jamar Chase against Derek Stingley Junior like a half dozen times,
Speaker 2: and like there's like Burrow completes a pass and I
Speaker 2: don't know how Stingley how uh, Stingley's right on top
Speaker 2: of him. I don't know how Chase, you know, makes
Speaker 2: to catch sliding down to the ground. And it was
Speaker 2: just like this is what makes us so good. You know,
Speaker 2: this is every day where these guys are being forced
Speaker 2: to challenge themselves. And so that's what those practices were like.
Speaker 2: And you know, being at the practice where you know
Speaker 2: there there's a lot of Joe Burrow is challenging. Everybody's
Speaker 2: challenging the defense in ways that those guys have never
Speaker 2: been challenged, both verbally but also obviously you know on
Speaker 2: the field, it's just different. And you know, like that's
Speaker 2: there's a lot of guys with with with ego and
Speaker 2: and you know, big personalities who are trying to measure
Speaker 2: up there, and I think that really helped them.
Speaker 3: To what degree does either at ourson or people around
Speaker 3: the program do they acknowledge that there had to have
Speaker 3: been some element of lightning in a bottle and sort
Speaker 3: of the universe everything stars aligning between Joe Burrow back
Speaker 3: up Ohio State quarterback working out to become an all
Speaker 3: time accurate successful competitor, ed Orzron getting this job, which is,
Speaker 3: you know, he's local, it's you know, a dream job
Speaker 3: of sorts. I'm sure for him, the four receivers and
Speaker 3: that quality. Dave Randa is sticking around and signing the
Speaker 3: extension that he did to keep him at LSU and
Speaker 3: having the LSU always has talent. But it felt like
Speaker 3: there were elements, especially the unknown of Joe Brady, you know,
Speaker 3: not really a big known commodity and coaching circles. Is
Speaker 3: it acknowledged that, yes, the stars aligned, but also we
Speaker 3: took advantage when we had that moment.
Speaker 2: I think it is. I don't think, you know, even
Speaker 2: with a pandemic, I'm not sure how much anybody sat back.
Speaker 2: Now that's something you and I were sure would think.
Speaker 2: You know, I think when they're in the moment, they
Speaker 2: don't think, hey, Clyde was a three star that look,
Speaker 2: Clyde's actually better than Leonard Fournette and Darius guys, you know,
Speaker 2: and he's because this offense fits him so well. I
Speaker 2: don't think anybody but he stopped and thought that way.
Speaker 2: I don't think anybody stopped and thought like you. Patrick
Speaker 2: Queen became a first round pick last year. Nobody saw
Speaker 2: that coming. Like I remember being there when they were
Speaker 2: recruited Patrick Queen and got him on signing day, and
Speaker 2: he thought he was talented and could really run. But
Speaker 2: like Patrick Queen wasn't the starter going into the year,
Speaker 2: like we haven't. You know a scene in the book
Speaker 2: where Patrick Queen's parents want to speak to Ojeron and
Speaker 2: he's thinking, oh, he's probably wants to go in the
Speaker 2: portal and basically, you know Patrick, you know, his family
Speaker 2: says what does he need to do to get better?
Speaker 2: And he was like, Okay, these are the things I
Speaker 2: need to see from him. Well, Patrick Queen took that
Speaker 2: to heart and did those things and then he was
Speaker 2: you know, he was playing about as well as any
Speaker 2: linebacker in the country by the end of the year,
Speaker 2: like he was a big reason why they were able
Speaker 2: to neutralize Travi Tate DNA in the National title game.
Speaker 2: So I think it's all that in that environment where
Speaker 2: that happened. But I don't think it's like ever been Like,
Speaker 2: let me stop and think and think how improbable all
Speaker 2: these things are, just because I think you know when
Speaker 2: you're in it like they were. I just think if
Speaker 2: you stop and analyze it, it's counterproductive.
Speaker 3: Sure, totally final question, and then we'll get into Pac
Speaker 3: twelve stuff because we have six games that each team
Speaker 3: is going to be playing and we should talk about that.
Speaker 3: Has LSU start this year. We're now in Week ten
Speaker 3: and I don't know how many games LSU has played,
Speaker 3: you know, schedules all over the place. But they've since
Speaker 3: hired essentially two new coordinators are a passing game coordinator
Speaker 3: and a new defensive coordinator, a new starting quarterback. They
Speaker 3: have opt outs. The defense looks different. They obviously have
Speaker 3: a crazy Week one and the defense looks very different.
Speaker 3: The offense looks very different. Injuries to two key dudes.
Speaker 3: Has LSU's twenty twenty characterized or made you reflect on
Speaker 3: twenty nineteen any differently than you thought you would.
Speaker 2: Not really, you know, like, look, they basically you have
Speaker 2: almost the entire starting twenty two moved on to the NFL,
Speaker 2: and the ones that didn't you know, they had Jamar
Speaker 2: Chase ops out, Tyler Sheldon ops out, Terry Vincent ops out,
Speaker 2: a few other guys opt out, so it's like it's
Speaker 2: almost an entirely new cast. As you said, there's coaches
Speaker 2: who are not there. I mean, so basically the ones
Speaker 2: who are the holdovers is Terrace Marshall was a really
Speaker 2: good receiver, and Derek Stanley, who's a terrific cornerback, but
Speaker 2: he did miss the opener like on you know, he
Speaker 2: gets sick the night before the game, and then everything
Speaker 2: else is new pretty much. So it's a big rebuild
Speaker 2: that is happening in the middle of a pandemic. And
Speaker 2: I did not expect this, Like I didn't think they
Speaker 2: were going to be a playoff team, but I still
Speaker 2: thought they'd probably had the talent to be a top
Speaker 2: ten team. Like their defense has been a huge dud,
Speaker 2: Like I really would have thought they would have been
Speaker 2: a lot better than this even without like Tyler Sheldon
Speaker 2: opting out. I still thought, Okay, they're really good in
Speaker 2: the secondary. I know how talented some of those young
Speaker 2: guys are. They get Jabril Cox from from North Dakota State.
Speaker 2: He's a really good player. I know they're high on
Speaker 2: them and Clark and some of these other players in
Speaker 2: the front seven, and it just Bo Polini comes in
Speaker 2: and it's been a really bad fit. You know, Ozeran
Speaker 2: is more comfortable in the fore man front and because
Speaker 2: that's was Jimmy Johnson system, that was certainly Pete Carroll's system,
Speaker 2: and Bo Polini had learned under Pete Carroll. Well, like
Speaker 2: a lot of the you know, it's been a lot
Speaker 2: of miscommunication. The players seem like they've had a lot
Speaker 2: of blown assignments. I don't know if they're just not
Speaker 2: understanding the checks to the defense or what. But it's
Speaker 2: been really bad. I mean, I don't think the offense
Speaker 2: has been obviously when they played Auburn, you know, and
Speaker 2: the true freshman, they're playing a true freshman quarterback for
Speaker 2: the first time on the road. TJ. Finley. He looked
Speaker 2: pretty good against South Carolina, and he looked obviously overwhelmed
Speaker 2: against Auburn. I don't think it's by and large, it's
Speaker 2: been really the offense has been like I'm not sure
Speaker 2: what anybody expected given who was coming back, and especially
Speaker 2: if you know you're going to have to play a
Speaker 2: true freshman at some point. It's just been the defense.
Speaker 2: It has been so so bad. I think it's like, hey,
Speaker 2: tread Water, do the best you can in twenty twenty
Speaker 2: for the rest of the season, and then look, we
Speaker 2: have a lot of really good young players. Hopefully we
Speaker 2: get this thing straightened out in twenty twenty one. And
Speaker 2: this year. I mean, it's not the same, but there
Speaker 2: are some parallels to his twenty seventeen season, where he
Speaker 2: hired Matt Cannan on offense that was a bad fit.
Speaker 2: It didn't work out. They had a horrible loss, a
Speaker 2: blowout loss Mississippi State, They lost to Troy, they barely
Speaker 2: beat Sarahcuse. I mean, they were really shaky. Now, what
Speaker 2: was different was they had better personnel on defense and
Speaker 2: they were more patched up on defense, so they could
Speaker 2: kind of carry that at least be competitive and have
Speaker 2: a chance to win some of the games against some
Speaker 2: good teams. Right now, I don't think they have that,
Speaker 2: I mean, and so this is like I said, this
Speaker 2: is a rebuild. I mean, you know, it's like just
Speaker 2: how do you how do you kind of you know,
Speaker 2: kind of just spread water and plow forward. I mean,
Speaker 2: from from my standpoint, it's just like putting out a book.
Speaker 2: This book was supposed to come out around SEC Media Days,
Speaker 2: but that was then the pandemic hit and the publisher
Speaker 2: wasn't sure if we were going to have a season,
Speaker 2: and then they pushed it back to late October, and
Speaker 2: as much as we tried to get them to move
Speaker 2: it back up, they didn't. And so, you know, it's
Speaker 2: hard to put out a book when even if you
Speaker 2: feel like you have a really really good book, people
Speaker 2: are still going to see it as definitive, like on, hey,
Speaker 2: it's this even though the book was ready and you know,
Speaker 2: in late August, it's still it's a two and three team,
Speaker 2: you know, and LSU fans are are kind of I
Speaker 2: don't say over that they want just won a national title,
Speaker 2: but now they're dealing with the right now as opposed
Speaker 2: to still feeling the high of that. Especially like I said,
Speaker 2: it's in a pandemic. It's already a crazy enough you're
Speaker 2: on top of.
Speaker 3: That, I can tell you this. If you're listening to
Speaker 3: this show, if you're listening to three solid verbals a week,
Speaker 3: you're going to be interested in a behind the scenes
Speaker 3: look at a championship team with championship coaches and championship
Speaker 3: players and what culture is like, and what practice is
Speaker 3: like and what game is like. So even if you're
Speaker 3: an LSU fan who has moved on to being upset
Speaker 3: about this season, maybe pick up Flip the Script to
Speaker 3: remember the good times and stay warm as we head
Speaker 3: into winter. Because I love me markt, I love the QB.
Speaker 3: Flip the Script Lessons learned on the Road to a
Speaker 3: Championship by it. I don't know Amazon, local bookstores, wherever
Speaker 3: you can find it. I'm positive it's great. So Bruce, thank,
Speaker 3: I want to talk about you for that, of course,
Speaker 3: I want to talk about the PAC twelve, just because
Speaker 3: you're on the West Coast. I will not take nearly
Speaker 3: the time that we took talking about the book because
Speaker 3: I'm sure there's just a ton to unpack with Flip
Speaker 3: the Script. But here's my first professional segue. There's a
Speaker 3: team in the PAC twelve that won their conference. They
Speaker 3: lost a top ten pick at quarterback. They made a
Speaker 3: splashy coordinator Higher. We don't know if it's going to
Speaker 3: work out better than bo Polini has worked out thus far.
Speaker 3: But the big question now is did they lose too
Speaker 3: many dudes to both the draft and to opting out.
Speaker 3: That is the orgon Ducks. Do you anticipate we are
Speaker 3: going to be saying they just lost too many dudes
Speaker 3: and the coordinator Higher may not have fully worked out.
Speaker 2: I like the coordinator Higher. I think he is a really,
Speaker 2: really smart guy, and he sits in with a staff.
Speaker 2: I think he will do well. You lose an entire
Speaker 2: offensive line right now, that is challenge. You lose a
Speaker 2: big chunk of the secondary, and you lose the best
Speaker 2: player I think on the defense in Javon Holland. We
Speaker 2: did a couple of their games last year and he
Speaker 2: was yeah, he was, yeah, I'm sorry. I thought that
Speaker 2: without saying I still think I have them to come
Speaker 2: out of the North. But again, like you said, I
Speaker 2: mean new quarterback. I think the receiving core is going
Speaker 2: to be better because it felt like it was always
Speaker 2: a little underwhelming in the last couple of years. And
Speaker 2: good running back. You know, Mario Cristobal is an O
Speaker 2: line guy. And he's a good recruiter. I think they'll
Speaker 2: be pretty good still on the O line, but I
Speaker 2: just think the margin for error. You know, Tyler Schuck
Speaker 2: will see what he does. I've heard really good things
Speaker 2: about him in the last year plus. So I see
Speaker 2: when you look at what else is in the division,
Speaker 2: which you have Washington, new head coach, new offensive coordinator,
Speaker 2: and new quarterback, and I don't you know, well, I
Speaker 2: think they're really good in the secondary, but I think
Speaker 2: they have even more questions whereas and they don't have C. J.
Speaker 2: Verdell to a lean on Cal the new offensive coordinator.
Speaker 2: I think Cal's actually going to surprise a lot of people.
Speaker 2: But to me, I think Oregon is a top fifteen team.
Speaker 2: I'm not ready to say much more than that, just
Speaker 2: because of what you said. They lost a lot of
Speaker 2: really good dudes.
Speaker 3: I assume in the South you feel pretty good about
Speaker 3: USC and their big offseason splashy coordinator. Higher was less
Speaker 3: splashy because Todd Orlando was going to be I think
Speaker 3: the defensive line coach for Texas Tech before USC made
Speaker 3: him their coordinator. USC does not have a tough schedule.
Speaker 3: I think though they should be favored in all of
Speaker 3: their games. Their toughest game looks like it's at Utah.
Speaker 3: If Todd Orlando is considered to be a good hire
Speaker 3: for the Trojans, where will it show on the defense
Speaker 3: this year that it just wasn't there for Clancy Pendergast
Speaker 3: and the Trojans last year.
Speaker 2: Well, I think if they can keep Talano Hufanga healthy,
Speaker 2: he's terrific. He's just you know, he's had a lot
Speaker 2: of wear and tear and you know, schuber injuries, played
Speaker 2: through it, that kind of thing. But he's terrific. They
Speaker 2: got to get better on the corners. That's where they
Speaker 2: have not been like an elite program. I think if
Speaker 2: they can get some of their linebackers who when you
Speaker 2: look at them, you're like, man, these guys should be
Speaker 2: really good and then they miss a lot of tackles
Speaker 2: and they're aut a position and that part has been
Speaker 2: a disappointment. They they're good up front. I like Todder Orlando.
Speaker 2: I think he is He's very aggressive. I think he's
Speaker 2: not easy to play against. From talking to the coaches
Speaker 2: who played against so, I think one of the challenges
Speaker 2: that they had a Texas was sometimes they were doing
Speaker 2: so much that some of those guys maybe got out
Speaker 2: of position. And you know, when I've talked to people
Speaker 2: now who talk about Texas, They're like, well, the difference
Speaker 2: is maybe these guys you're at Texas in the Big twelve,
Speaker 2: you probably have better athletes. Maybe not way better, but
Speaker 2: better athletes. You don't need to do a lot of
Speaker 2: crazy stuff. So I think, like I like a lot
Speaker 2: of the Hires. Clay Helton made a lot of the
Speaker 2: moves he's made this offseason. I think they're a class
Speaker 2: of the of the division. By far. I really am
Speaker 2: a big believer in Slovas. I think he's really talented.
Speaker 2: I love his temperament. The receivers are fantastic as a group.
Speaker 2: You know, you got on mo On Ra, you have
Speaker 2: Tyler Bonds. Those guys are headliners. They are really excited
Speaker 2: about Drake London, who's a big receiver almost tight end size.
Speaker 2: They have a stable of running backs, the offensive line
Speaker 2: now that they got Elijah vera tucker back after he
Speaker 2: opted out top back in and they have some you know,
Speaker 2: like as you said, the schedule, I mean, they get
Speaker 2: by Arizona State this weekend. I don't think Utah is
Speaker 2: going to be as good as they've been the last
Speaker 2: few years. They have so many guys for a place.
Speaker 2: Unless they stumble somewhere, I think they're gonna. I think
Speaker 2: they're going and they get Wazoo out of the you know,
Speaker 2: out of the North, who's in rebolt rebuild mode. I
Speaker 2: think they're well positioned to run through this regular season undefeated.
Speaker 2: I really do.
Speaker 3: Let's sort of stay in the city because UCLA and Arizona,
Speaker 3: I should add, both have head coaches who had sterling
Speaker 3: offensive reputations at previous college stops. Who is between those
Speaker 3: two guys, Kevin someone and Schip Kelly, who is closer
Speaker 3: to even approaching that level of at least just offensive
Speaker 3: success with their current teams.
Speaker 2: I think. I think UCLA is because they have dtr
Speaker 2: who's now got three years. This is a third year
Speaker 2: in the system. He's really talented. We've seen flashes from him.
Speaker 2: Dimitri Felton's a really good fit for what Ship Kelly
Speaker 2: likes to do. He's a scat back is the right
Speaker 2: way to call him. But like a he's very shifty.
Speaker 2: He's he is a matchup nightmare to deal with coming
Speaker 2: out of the backfield. They have a pretty good group
Speaker 2: of receivers. I don't know what they're going to be
Speaker 2: like on defense, you know, in terms of I don't
Speaker 2: know how much confidence you have in that group, because
Speaker 2: they've been really, really bad since he's been there, batnestly
Speaker 2: bad even before that. Whereas with Arizona, I know that
Speaker 2: staff likes Grant Ganel, they are really excited about him.
Speaker 2: I just don't know. Maybe it's another year from now
Speaker 2: before that that offense is clicking. Whereas I think I
Speaker 2: think Dorrian Thompson Robinson has breakout star potential there. I mean,
Speaker 2: he has a terrific arm, he runs well, he's in
Speaker 2: a system that I think like he knows now, and
Speaker 2: he's got pretty good skill around him, you know. I
Speaker 2: mean between between Felton, you've got Kyle Phillips, who's a
Speaker 2: really good slot receiver. You've got some big targets. I
Speaker 2: don't think right now, and look, there's no reason for
Speaker 2: people to be Chip Kelly's Oregon day is notwithstanding. I
Speaker 2: don't think there's any reason for people to look at
Speaker 2: what UCLA has done in the first two years and say, oh,
Speaker 2: this is a team that has a chance to be
Speaker 2: anything close to a top twenty five team. Because there's
Speaker 2: nothing that's really shown that at this point other than
Speaker 2: if you watch DTR a bit. You know, like, all right,
Speaker 2: you know there's there's a chance there. And given the
Speaker 2: two things of what you said, you know, one of
Speaker 2: the two, I'm more inclined to look at UCLA at
Speaker 2: the stage of development that program is in compared to
Speaker 2: what I think Arizona is, where they've got a bunch
Speaker 2: of opt outs and kids transfer. Not that Uclia haven't,
Speaker 2: but you know, like I feel like they've had like
Speaker 2: core nucleus guys leave because they didn't think they were
Speaker 2: going to have a season, And now like West Virginia
Speaker 2: is like the most productive linebacker in the Big twelve,
Speaker 2: who should be at Arizona instead of there, And you
Speaker 2: know the schoolers are in the Big twelve. There's both there.
Speaker 2: So I just think that, you know, to me, I
Speaker 2: see UCLA having a better upside right now.
Speaker 3: There are a number of teams who, you know, through
Speaker 3: different results in twenty nineteen, they've got a lot of
Speaker 3: room to grow based on the twenty nineteen obviously Ucla
Speaker 3: and Arizona two of them. So Oregon State looks way
Speaker 3: more improved and way more competitive. Last year, Cal, when
Speaker 3: Chase Garber's is healthy, certainly fits that as well. Washington
Speaker 3: State took a pretty big step back on defense after
Speaker 3: Alex Grinch left a couple of years ago. Washington took
Speaker 3: a pretty big step back on offense with Jacob Easton
Speaker 3: last year, and they'll have a new quarterback, like you mentioned.
Speaker 3: Of all the teams I suppose in the Pac twelve
Speaker 3: that have obvious room to grow, who gives you the
Speaker 3: most confidence that they're going to approach the their sort
Speaker 3: of growth ceiling based on what you've seen and what
Speaker 3: they look like right now.
Speaker 2: I really think Cal is an easy choice for me
Speaker 2: on that you mentioned Joe Garver's when he was healthy,
Speaker 2: they were good. When he wasn't healthy, they were not good.
Speaker 2: And the bowl game and we are crew at Box
Speaker 2: did the bowl game. All the guys who scored touchdowns
Speaker 2: for them were freshman and sophomores. They're all back in
Speaker 2: the second aary. It really helped them that they got
Speaker 2: cam Binham, who I think is arguably the best defensive
Speaker 2: back on the West Coast, or at least the best cornerback.
Speaker 2: I think Talano might be even better, but he's a
Speaker 2: leader and he's a really good corner and I think
Speaker 2: that they have some really good pieces there, guys of
Speaker 2: experience at all at all three levels of the defense.
Speaker 2: I really think Justin Wilcox is a very underrated coach.
Speaker 2: I think they have a chance to be a real
Speaker 2: top twenty five team. Christopher Brown is a big, physical
Speaker 2: running back. They have some good young receivers. As I said,
Speaker 2: Garber's is very underrated. I like them a lot, I
Speaker 2: really do. I mean, it wouldn't shock me if they
Speaker 2: ended up winning the Pac twelve to be honest.
Speaker 3: Wow, the other team I think that I think people
Speaker 3: are looking at in terms of showed flashes last year
Speaker 3: at times, especially with the quarterback. But it wasn't always
Speaker 3: there for sure, wasn't always there. It was ASU. ASU
Speaker 3: beats Oregon. They sort of have an up and down season.
Speaker 3: They look absolutely dreadful against Utah. But they have a
Speaker 3: high round talent in Brandon Ayuk leave for the NFL,
Speaker 3: so they're developing guys. They have interesting young talent they've
Speaker 3: been recruiting. Interestingly, are you as high on ASU as
Speaker 3: it seems many are who look at the depth I
Speaker 3: guess atop the conference, I'm pretty high on them.
Speaker 2: Not maybe as high, but I really like Jayden Daniels.
Speaker 2: And remember he played last year one of the guys
Speaker 2: in their steps ond me. He was like one hundred
Speaker 2: and sixty five pounds. Now he's a hundred eighty five.
Speaker 2: I think you will only get better now. Look, you're right,
Speaker 2: they lost a terrific receiver and they lost a really
Speaker 2: good running back in Eno Benjamin, and I'm curious how
Speaker 2: they replace Eno on that. On that front, I mean,
Speaker 2: right now, I would pick them second in the South.
Speaker 2: I'm very interested to see how Marvin Lewis is the
Speaker 2: defensive coordinator now and how that defense looks. But they're
Speaker 2: an interesting team, and I have to admit I did
Speaker 2: not think Herr would have done this good of a
Speaker 2: job as a head coach there. And he has done
Speaker 2: a really good job. I mean, her Edwards MATC. Brown
Speaker 2: to me are and like her hasn't you know, He's
Speaker 2: had some nice wins. His record hasn't been much different
Speaker 2: than Todd Grahams was. But I didn't think it would
Speaker 2: go this well. And I didn't, you know, like you
Speaker 2: didn't ask me this, But I didn't think Mack would
Speaker 2: do as well as he has done so far. At
Speaker 2: do you enter mean, he obviously has a terrific quarterback
Speaker 2: to build around, but I think those were ones that
Speaker 2: have been pleasant surprises. And I say pleasant surprises not
Speaker 2: just because you know, I think there are two personality
Speaker 2: types where Herm is an interesting guy, and I think
Speaker 2: he makes the PAC twelve little more interesting. And so
Speaker 2: let's see what they do in year three, because it's
Speaker 2: I think a lot of people now as you, as
Speaker 2: you alluded to, are in that like, hey, we have
Speaker 2: some expectations. Now let's see what happens.
Speaker 3: Final question, just because you reference being on the sidelines
Speaker 3: for seeing major programs, major schools and big games. Who
Speaker 3: in the PAC twelve when you are on the sideline
Speaker 3: or when you are at practice? And I know it's
Speaker 3: obviously been a different year this year, but when you
Speaker 3: look at the programs in the PAC twelve, who can
Speaker 3: either compete nationally or look like they have a ceiling
Speaker 3: of compete nationally, how far away is the conference as
Speaker 3: a whole from I don't know, the best five teams
Speaker 3: in the conference stacking up against the best five in
Speaker 3: the Big twelve or the ACC or the SEC or
Speaker 3: the Big ten. Is there a chasm? As some people
Speaker 3: like to say or is it closer than you believe
Speaker 3: that the Warriors seem to think.
Speaker 2: I think Oregon is that team often. I mean they
Speaker 2: there's a You remember William blayhosts short offensive lineman at Alabama.
Speaker 2: He's a coach, and so I saw him. We did it.
Speaker 2: I think it was a Friday night game Colorado against Oregon.
Speaker 2: It was at Autin and Blahost is on the CU staff,
Speaker 2: and you know, he was there with mel Tucker and he's,
Speaker 2: you know, like he's he's got good perspective and everything.
Speaker 2: And obviously new Mamorial Crystal and I remember I had
Speaker 2: talked to him on the pregame and he eyeballed Oregon.
Speaker 2: He was like, that looks like an SEC team, and
Speaker 2: he's right, they do. And obviously, you know when you
Speaker 2: had today Sewel and a bunch of you know, more
Speaker 2: experienced th alignement like they did, that added to it.
Speaker 2: But now you're gonna have these these huge linebacker dudes
Speaker 2: that have that have come into the program. Sewel's brother,
Speaker 2: you know, may Scooner was there last year as a freshman.
Speaker 2: And you certainly had Justin Flow, who looks like a
Speaker 2: looks like a comic book hero kind of thing that
Speaker 2: definitely does that. USC I think needs to continue to,
Speaker 2: you know, ramp up recruiting. But they have, you know,
Speaker 2: like I said, there, they have a receiver corps that
Speaker 2: matches up pretty well with anybody. They have a bunch
Speaker 2: of guys like who do you know they have. The
Speaker 2: thing with USC is a little bit of a misread
Speaker 2: is like I remember going out there last year in
Speaker 2: the spring and seeing their linebacker group and it's not
Speaker 2: just not ok Ota, who was obviously a huge recruit,
Speaker 2: but there was a couple other guys who were, like,
Speaker 2: I mean, a couple of those guys look like American
Speaker 2: gladiator guys. Now they don't. They didn't play like you know,
Speaker 2: one or two of them were injured and so you know,
Speaker 2: sometimes with USC it's like, you know, you know about
Speaker 2: them and recruiting and then either they're hurt or something.
Speaker 2: It's just there's something just isn't quite there. I think
Speaker 2: what's different with USC is they had for so long
Speaker 2: they had some special running back there. Now it doesn't
Speaker 2: have to be Reggie Bush or even Linda White, but
Speaker 2: right now you don't see and Marquis Steph is talent
Speaker 2: and they have guys who Stephen Carr have talent, but
Speaker 2: it's not like the one who's there who's like the
Speaker 2: wow factor, right, And so to me, those are the
Speaker 2: programs at this point that that you could say, oh
Speaker 2: if they if this breaks right or whatever. Like I
Speaker 2: think given all the stuff we talked about with the
Speaker 2: change with Oregon, new quarterback, new O line, no more,
Speaker 2: no more Javon Holland, I think that separates them from probably,
Speaker 2: you know, maybe they're a year away from being that team,
Speaker 2: you know. I don't, I don't know, but I think
Speaker 2: the way Mario has recruited there, it's an SEC it's
Speaker 2: an SEC vibe all the way around with Oregon, and
Speaker 2: I think there's some of that happening at USC at
Speaker 2: this point too, all.
Speaker 3: Right, Bruce Feldman, SEC vibe all the way around ties
Speaker 3: it really nicely back together to flip the script. Do
Speaker 3: check it out about ed Orzron, about LSU, about George Costanza.
Speaker 3: I guess, in a roundabout way, look it up, pick
Speaker 3: it up, digest it.
Speaker 1: You will like it.
Speaker 3: I promise you. Bruce, thank you so so much for
Speaker 3: coming on the solid verbal.
Speaker 2: Always a pleasure, Dan, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: All right, Danny, That is Bruce Felman. Anny, Bruce Feldman, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Fox Sports, the athletic author of the new book. Really
Speaker 1: interesting stuff from Bruce. If I don't say so myself,
Speaker 1: it always is. But you know, the books that he's
Speaker 1: written in the past have been groundbreaking in a college
Speaker 1: book since Meat Market right me, Market is one of
Speaker 1: the best books I've ever read period. It just so
Speaker 1: happens to be about college football, and so it's always
Speaker 1: a pleasure when he dropped something new, and I'm really
Speaker 1: excited to get a chance to read it. Haven't yet,
Speaker 1: but will soon.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: No, my copy is arriving shortly. I am my favorite
Speaker 3: thing that Bruce talked about in that interview, and this
Speaker 3: is the stuff that when you read pieces throughout the season,
Speaker 3: it's hard for guys to really extrapolate what's going on
Speaker 3: behind the scenes because everybody's interested in games. Everybody's interested in, Oh, man,
Speaker 3: why did LSU score so many points? Blah blah blah.
Speaker 3: So when you have the time to write out books
Speaker 3: and look at your notes and listen to your tapes
Speaker 3: or whatever. When Bruce is talking about LSU's spring practice
Speaker 3: last year with Joe Burrow actively starting fights, with Joe
Speaker 3: Burrow saying I don't want Max protect. We need to
Speaker 3: get receivers on the field. I'll figure it out, with
Speaker 3: Joe Burrow absolutely torching a very very good LSU first
Speaker 3: defense in spring practice, and them, you know, having a
Speaker 3: sense like, oh, we might have like a team of killers,
Speaker 3: and them having the sense behind the scenes that maybe
Speaker 3: they're not a national championship team, but all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: this is a serious playoff contender. And knowing that from
Speaker 3: early on that something was just different with the makeup
Speaker 3: of that program last year. It's fascinating stuff to know
Speaker 3: that sort of lead the lead time to the season.
Speaker 3: You're like, well, we're gonna f up some teams.
Speaker 2: Tie.
Speaker 3: I like that. Those are the type of anecdotes I love. Yeah, anecdotes.
Speaker 1: Well, we'll post. We'll make sure that we post the
Speaker 1: link so that you can check out Bruce's book, and
Speaker 1: you know any and all. Bruce Velman works over at
Speaker 1: the Athletic as well. We're huge fans. He was one
Speaker 1: of our earliest guests on the show way back when.
Speaker 1: Has always been so gracious with this time, and he's
Speaker 1: a good friend of the show, so it's great to
Speaker 1: catch up with him once more.
Speaker 3: Give me some elements of the PAC twelve season. I
Speaker 3: don't necessarily need specific matchups, but when you think about
Speaker 3: where the PAC twelve was last year, team by team,
Speaker 3: new faces, face is gone, faces returning whatever, I just
Speaker 3: want some like straight out of the Arrows, out of
Speaker 3: the quiver, gun, out of the hole Star Tie takes
Speaker 3: on what will make him turn it from an intriguing
Speaker 3: SEC game, an intriguing Big ten game to an intriguing
Speaker 3: PAC twelve game. What are you hoping to see from
Speaker 3: teams that will make you turn the dial?
Speaker 1: Well, you know the USC. The USC stuff is probably
Speaker 1: the low hanging fruit here. But okay, the intrigue around
Speaker 1: Clay Hilton and what his life span will be at
Speaker 1: USC is always interesting to me, if not cliche. By
Speaker 1: the way, for the Trojans it is it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I qualify that by saying interesting, if not cliche.
Speaker 1: And well, Keaton Slovas had an incredible year last year.
Speaker 1: It really burst onto the scene in an impressive way.
Speaker 1: And given the schedule, given the fact there is always
Speaker 1: good skill position talent at USC, if they could just
Speaker 1: get all cylinders firing at the same time, I would
Speaker 1: love to see what that team could do. They have
Speaker 1: not done that. Inconsistency has been a real problem for
Speaker 1: the Trojans over the last I don't know better part
Speaker 1: of the last decade, let's say, I would really like
Speaker 1: to see what they could do if they finally got
Speaker 1: everything on the same page. So that first and foremost
Speaker 1: probably the low hanging fruit. The PAC twelve North as
Speaker 1: a whole really intrigues me because I kind of don't
Speaker 1: know what to expect out of Washington and Washington State
Speaker 1: and even Stanford to some extent. You know, I think
Speaker 1: we feel a degree of confidence with Oregon. They've had
Speaker 1: a bunch of opt outs and there's I know, a
Speaker 1: bunch of turnover there. But even beyond all that, the
Speaker 1: North really did for a long time feel like the
Speaker 1: stronger side of the conference, or at least the one
Speaker 1: with the fewest variables. And now with new coaches and
Speaker 1: with I think the step back we've seen from Stanford recently,
Speaker 1: I kind of don't know where it stands. Cow may
Speaker 1: have a clearer path to get up closer to the
Speaker 1: top of that side of the conference than we've seen before.
Speaker 1: They might not even play this weekend, but you know,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of intrigue for me in the North
Speaker 1: and in the South. I would say just the you know,
Speaker 1: Utah maybe is not the most exciting program in the world.
Speaker 1: But they did bring Jake Bentley over from South Carolina,
Speaker 1: and I'm just I'm curious to see how that plays out,
Speaker 1: if it looks any different with him.
Speaker 3: A lot of new full time faces.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there's there's just a lot of like
Speaker 1: new things across the conference that I don't know from
Speaker 1: a thirty thousand foot view, catch my eye and keep
Speaker 1: me interested.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think all that's right. News came out that
Speaker 3: Jaden de Laura, I want to make sure I pronounced
Speaker 3: that correctly, true freshman starting for Washington State Saint Louis
Speaker 3: High the powerhouse High school in Honolulu, is starting for
Speaker 3: Washington State. I think he was either committed to Hawaii
Speaker 3: when Nick Rolovich was there or interested or something like that.
Speaker 3: And I think that connection really paid dividends. If indeed
Speaker 3: Jaden de Laura, who I think played really well, not huge,
Speaker 3: but played really well in high school. Same area of
Speaker 3: you know, Tua and Marcus Mariota went to Saint Louis,
Speaker 3: I believe, and Dylan Gabriel, all those guys, so really
Speaker 3: rich history there on the islands. Yeah, there's so much
Speaker 3: unknown right now. I just I'd like to see Oregon
Speaker 3: State take a next step. I'd like to see ASU
Speaker 3: take a next step. I'd like to see Stanford correct
Speaker 3: whatever the hell went wrong. I know they have some
Speaker 3: promising guys on offense. The defense was rough at times
Speaker 3: last year. I just I want to see teams figure
Speaker 3: it out because I want to go into the season
Speaker 3: thinking there are great games across the conference, even if
Speaker 3: it doesn't matter with the playoff or anything like that.
Speaker 3: But I just I want to care about ASU USC
Speaker 3: more than I probably do right now, even though I'm intrigued.
Speaker 3: I want to care about Oregon Washington. I want to
Speaker 3: know who's starting at quarterback for Washington. I want to,
Speaker 3: you know, I want to care about the Territorial Cup,
Speaker 3: the U of A and ASU, stuff like that. I
Speaker 3: want Chip Kelly and UCLA to be ooh, they just
Speaker 3: got scary. They are finally realizing the quote unquote Chip
Speaker 3: Kelly off whatever. I just I'm selfish and I want
Speaker 3: all of those things. So that, to me is my
Speaker 3: sort of higher picture view, taller view of the conference,
Speaker 3: and I missed Oregon football and it's very strange to say,
Speaker 3: in a very strange season, but you watch other schools play,
Speaker 3: like where's.
Speaker 2: Where are the Ducks?
Speaker 3: Where's that team? So excited to see a lot of
Speaker 3: those freshmen and the new Joe moorehead offense for organisms
Speaker 3: that goes without.
Speaker 1: Saying yeah, I mean. And you do another show on
Speaker 1: our trusty network here called Big Boy Bets with our
Speaker 1: friend Jeff Schwartz, another fellow Oregon alum. What is the
Speaker 1: I don't know mood given the fact that Oregon now
Speaker 1: is coming back like it is such a weird year,
Speaker 1: and we've talked about this many times now, there's just
Speaker 1: sort of like, I don't know, glass ceiling almost how
Speaker 1: excited you could get about a really oddly misshapen year
Speaker 1: due to the pandemic. How would you grade out your
Speaker 1: level of excitement for this iteration of the Oregon season
Speaker 1: versus normal circumstances.
Speaker 3: I think people Oregon fans just want to watch the Ducks.
Speaker 3: I don't think it's a matter of like, oh man,
Speaker 3: can they get back to the Rose Bowl? Can they repeat?
Speaker 3: And they just want to watch new players, new coaches.
Speaker 3: I think there's a lot of frustration that Justin Herbert
Speaker 3: was kind of wasted with the old Oregon offense, and
Speaker 3: Joe Morehead will we'll give Orgon something more creative and new.
Speaker 3: So I think there's excitement about just watching the progression,
Speaker 3: the hopeful progression of what Oregon football can look like,
Speaker 3: especially with I mean this is I mean opt outs.
Speaker 3: Notwithstanding with the reigning Outland Trophy winner in Pine Sewel
Speaker 3: and Javon Holland considered be a top flight draft prospect,
Speaker 3: the recruiting level, the talent level at Oregon has never
Speaker 3: been higher, So I think people are really excited to
Speaker 3: see how the gaps are filled in and the new faces,
Speaker 3: especially on defense for sure. So it's a I think
Speaker 3: two or three five star guys are going to be
Speaker 3: in the rotation in that too, deep on defense as
Speaker 3: true freshman So I think it's just a lot of
Speaker 3: excitement about unleashing so much talent, even behind Caveon Thibodeaux,
Speaker 3: who looks to be one of the best edge rushers
Speaker 3: in the country.
Speaker 1: Really good. Yeah, now I'm excited to see it too. It's,
Speaker 1: as we've discussed here, this gradual build into a full season.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Whatever, A full season is in this sense, it's talked
Speaker 1: about it on Wednesday. You know, it's exciting that it's here.
Speaker 1: It's probably long overdue at this point for the PAC
Speaker 1: twelve being so everybody else started, and we just hope
Speaker 1: that situations a cal and elsewhere can get cleared up
Speaker 1: and that we can get as much football out of
Speaker 1: out of this, uh, you know, twenty twenty seasons possible.
Speaker 3: Can I tie this all together to our guest Bruce
Speaker 3: Feldman in the UFO Show. Excuse me, the unbeatable Feldman Orbit. Yes,
Speaker 3: the unbeatable Feldman Orbit. I'm going to focus on the
Speaker 3: name Bruce, because sometimes you come across people and people's lives,
Speaker 3: and this is all from Wikipedia. This is I did
Speaker 3: not do further research than a cursory scan of Wikipedia,
Speaker 3: and my jaw dropped. Okay, Bruce McCandless, mcc A N
Speaker 3: D L.
Speaker 1: E S S. Okay, I'm pulling this up. Go ahead, continue.
Speaker 3: Bruce McCandless completed the first untethered spacewalk using the manned
Speaker 3: maneuvering unit that giant sort of rectangular boxy backpack looking thing,
Speaker 3: the rosters. Yeah, the rocket backpack. Okay, the rocket backpack,
Speaker 3: so untethered, he's not connected to the Space Shuttle. He
Speaker 3: did the first one, the first untethered MMU tye. It
Speaker 3: goes without saying ballsy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of pressure there. If you slip on
Speaker 1: the joystick, you know that's that's an issue.
Speaker 3: Through space and hope for the best. So Bruce McCandless
Speaker 3: from southern California goes to Stanford, gets his electrical engineering degree,
Speaker 3: gets an NBA, joins the Navy, is a board uh
Speaker 3: board multiple ships during the Cuban Missile crisis, flying planes.
Speaker 3: I think that it was aircraft carriers. Yeah, it looks
Speaker 3: like he was the word aircraft carriers during the Cuban
Speaker 3: missile crisis. Went to NASA. Was the mission control capsule
Speaker 3: communicator on the Apollo eleven mission. So he was communicating
Speaker 3: with Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong during launch and during
Speaker 3: the first moonwalk. Okay, then he gets involved in Skylab.
Speaker 3: He's like he takes point on Skylab. He logged, eventually
Speaker 3: became and this was like declassified that he became a
Speaker 3: Space Shuttle pilot. He logged over three hundred and twelve
Speaker 3: hours in space. The MMU time.
Speaker 1: Four hours, four.
Speaker 3: Hours He was a mission specialist on STS forty one,
Speaker 3: BSTS thirty one, whatever. He deployed satellites. He was all
Speaker 3: over the place. I actually did check. He worked for
Speaker 3: Lockheed Martin after he retired from NASA. He actually passed
Speaker 3: away three years ago. The board people are like, yeah,
Speaker 3: this dude lived a life. Yeah, this dude lived a life.
Speaker 3: He graduated from his Navy graduating class or whatever, the
Speaker 3: Naval Academy, which he also received a Bachelor of Science from.
Speaker 3: He was in John McCain's graduating class. So some big
Speaker 3: names in that class, it seems. And this was the
Speaker 3: after the PostScript, I guess as it were. On September thirtieth,
Speaker 3: twenty ten, McCandless launched a lawsuit against British singer Dido
Speaker 3: for unauthorized use of a photo of his nineteen eighty
Speaker 3: four spaceflight for the album art of her two thousand
Speaker 3: and eight album Safe Trip Home, which showed McCandless quote
Speaker 3: free flying about three hundred and twenty feet away from
Speaker 3: the Space Shuttle challenger Mike. They settled everything amicably, is
Speaker 3: what I'm what I'm reading here, But that is a lifetie.
Speaker 1: I have many thoughts on this The first thing that
Speaker 1: comes to mind is that he is sort of like
Speaker 1: the Space Program's version of Forrest Gump, where he just
Speaker 1: shows up. I was gonna say that these do Sekis Guy,
Speaker 1: the do Sekis Guy, but Forrest Gump, I'm thinking of
Speaker 1: those scenes where he just sort of like wanders into
Speaker 1: the background of famous news events and whatnot. But secondly foreground.
Speaker 2: To be good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, secondly good hell, what a life?
Speaker 2: Yeah? What a life?
Speaker 3: Bruce McCandless HoTT. You just stumble upon these things, You're like,
Speaker 3: Holy hell, this guy was all over from Long Beach,
Speaker 3: Southern California.
Speaker 2: Guy.
Speaker 1: Well look fun show, weird way to end it, but
Speaker 1: always informative. On the UFL Show, we would encourage everybody
Speaker 1: to subscribe if they haven't all ready, to check out
Speaker 1: the Patreon at verbowlers dot com as well as our
Speaker 1: social media accounts, which you could find pretty much everywhere.
Speaker 1: Just look for the Solid Verbal. We've also got a
Speaker 1: YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash the the Solid
Speaker 1: Verbal Dan. We will be talking to folks on the
Speaker 1: Patreon and our discord channel. We would urge everybody if
Speaker 1: you're not there and you still want to be part
Speaker 1: of the activity four to oh eight verbal one is
Speaker 1: the reverb blind. It's four oh eight eight through seven
Speaker 1: two two five one. That's how you can get in
Speaker 1: touch with us and give us your thoughts stream of
Speaker 1: consciousness throughout the course of a college football game day.
Speaker 1: On Saturday, we'll pick our favorites and put them together
Speaker 1: on Sunday. I can't wait time. I cannot wait for
Speaker 1: that guy over there, my good friend Dan Rubinstein, for
Speaker 1: myself to Hildebrand. We will talk to you all in
Speaker 1: a few days. Have a weekend. Stay sol, please,