Speaker 1: Welcome to the solid verbal ill that for me.
Speaker 2: I'm a man, I'm for I've heard so many players say, well,
Speaker 2: I want to be happy, you want to be happy
Speaker 2: for Dake Ado State?
Speaker 3: Is that?
Speaker 2: Whoo whoo? And no, Dan and Tye. Hey everybody, and
Speaker 2: welcome to a brand new only Homer's a Loud episode.
Speaker 2: Today we are discussing USC. It's just me, I am
Speaker 2: discussing USC with Ryan Abraham of USC football dot Com,
Speaker 2: part of the twenty four to seven Sports Network. We
Speaker 2: go way back with him, long long friend of the show,
Speaker 2: and it's quite simple. Obviously, this is a bonus show.
Speaker 2: We've already done one of these with Oregon, we did
Speaker 2: one with Notre Dame and LSU. Tie also has one
Speaker 2: this week with Larry Williams discussing Clemson. But we don't
Speaker 2: really have time to deep dive teams during the season
Speaker 2: because we spend a good chunk, if not all, of
Speaker 2: our time previewing or recapping games, so it's hard to
Speaker 2: take a step back and look at sort of a
Speaker 2: state of the program, state of the team situation. So
Speaker 2: I've found these to be quite helpful, interesting and hopefully
Speaker 2: you do too, whether or not you're a fan of
Speaker 2: the specific team we're talking about, or just a fan
Speaker 2: of knowing more about teams in general. We are going
Speaker 2: to do more of these throughout the season, throughout the
Speaker 2: off season, because why not. We like learning and really
Speaker 2: going deeper inside of teams than we have been able
Speaker 2: to during the season. So there's that. And we call
Speaker 2: it only Homer's allowed because of this clip. Would Homer Clublet.
Speaker 1: Look, it has no Homers, we're allowed to have one.
Speaker 2: I felt so left out, and I think that's a
Speaker 2: good thing.
Speaker 1: I like that.
Speaker 2: It's a nice reference. It goes way back to when
Speaker 2: I actually watched The Simpsons, and you probably did too,
Speaker 2: So I'm not gonna waste any more of your time,
Speaker 2: but I'm recording this after the fact. Ryan was sensational,
Speaker 2: not a surprise at all, usc and a complicated situation
Speaker 2: with the disappointed season, but still being a program with
Speaker 2: the capability of having a higher ceiling than just about
Speaker 2: any program in the country. So really cool talk with Ryan,
Speaker 2: and hope you enjoy it. Now, All right? With that,
Speaker 2: I and I guess the proverbial We are now joined
Speaker 2: by Ryan Abraham, old old, dear, dear friend of the
Speaker 2: solid verbal. We go way way back with Ryan. He
Speaker 2: started his podcast, the Parastyle Podcast in two thousand and eight,
Speaker 2: I believe when we started hours. He is the editor
Speaker 2: in chief Commando High Ranking Titan of USC football dot Com,
Speaker 2: which is part of twenty four to seven Sports And
Speaker 2: is it CBS now Yes?
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, yes.
Speaker 2: Yes, okay. How's life? How are you?
Speaker 1: I'm doing all right? You know, Southern California.
Speaker 3: It's a rivalry weeks, I guess for USC coming up.
Speaker 3: Been excited to talk to you guys again. It's been
Speaker 3: fun to watch you guys grow, like as the podcast
Speaker 3: industry grows, and you know how much work it to
Speaker 3: put in there. So it's been cool to kind of
Speaker 3: see you guys grow along with you know, all the
Speaker 3: other college football podcast out there. But you guys were
Speaker 3: you know, you guys are the original.
Speaker 2: I appreciate it and same just because even pre dating
Speaker 2: the solid verbal this, I mean, we've spoken about this before.
Speaker 2: You were on my pre SI video shoot that I
Speaker 2: eventually sold to SI as a series, and I think
Speaker 2: I interviewed you on camera in two thousand and six
Speaker 2: at a tailgate of yours.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we used to host big tailgates. It became harder,
Speaker 3: Like the more I got involved on the media side
Speaker 3: of it really was tough to do that, but yeah,
Speaker 3: we would.
Speaker 1: It was great.
Speaker 3: We get like two hundred people to come out to
Speaker 3: like our RV and had We had a lot of
Speaker 3: fun with it, but it was it was a lot
Speaker 3: of work. People ask me all the time, do you
Speaker 3: miss that. I'm like, not really, but now you got
Speaker 3: to be in the press box like three hour early.
Speaker 1: I couldn't do anything like that anymore.
Speaker 2: This is true, and I should mention and just in
Speaker 2: terms of like I don't need to blow up your
Speaker 2: bona fides anymore. But I did an interview with I
Speaker 2: was just gonna be like anonymous and try to play
Speaker 2: it cool. That was like a big broadcaster.
Speaker 1: But no.
Speaker 2: I did an interview with Chris Fowler and we were
Speaker 2: talking about podcasts, and he had been on our show
Speaker 2: before and he had listened to our show, hopefully not
Speaker 2: taking it too seriously ahead of big games he had
Speaker 2: to call. But he was asking about podcasting in general,
Speaker 2: and he mentioned that he listened to the Peristyle podcast
Speaker 2: ahead of any USC game he was calling. So if
Speaker 2: you want to know what kind of dumb dums are
Speaker 2: influencing major major broadcasts ahead of them. You are listening
Speaker 2: to two of them right now.
Speaker 3: I've heard of Chris Fauler's yeah that he would do
Speaker 3: that absolutely.
Speaker 2: So here's so we're obviously here talking USC. If you're
Speaker 2: listening to the show, there's a good chance you either
Speaker 2: already listened to Ryan's show, maybe listen to our show.
Speaker 2: You're probably from southern California or went to us by
Speaker 2: the way. If that's the case, I hope you and
Speaker 2: your loved ones survived the fires and everything is that
Speaker 2: like that is healthy and h and safe in your life.
Speaker 2: My parents barely barely escaped, which I'm very very grateful.
Speaker 2: I mean, they were fine, but their house barely barely escaped.
Speaker 2: So always a scary moment to hope everybody's all right.
Speaker 2: Here is on a much less serious note, USC football, Colin,
Speaker 2: what happened?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean that's a great uh, it's a great question.
Speaker 3: And there's it's funny you do. I'll do different radio shows,
Speaker 3: and it depends who you're talking to. Some people are like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 3: they're gonna get rid of Clay Helton, right, this isn't
Speaker 3: the right direction. And other people are like whow he
Speaker 3: went to the he won the Rose Bowl, they won
Speaker 3: the Packed Bull Championship last year. You got to give
Speaker 3: him some time. It's still pretty mixed. I think in
Speaker 3: the media as far as the USC fan base goes, Dan,
Speaker 3: it's not mixed at all. I've when you get a consensus,
Speaker 3: like on our message boards, that never happens.
Speaker 1: There's always fighting. There's always right now.
Speaker 3: The only fighting is I knew before you did that
Speaker 3: Clay Hilton was not going to be a good coach.
Speaker 3: So it's when it's a consensus on the fans side,
Speaker 3: it's probably not a good sign. And you know, to
Speaker 3: be fair, I think the when you talk to people
Speaker 3: inside the program, you get that, you get the hey man,
Speaker 3: he won the Rose Bowl, and they you know, they
Speaker 3: did great things last year, winning the Pac twelve for
Speaker 3: the first time in ten years, and you know they're
Speaker 3: gonna have You're at a freshman quarterback, you're gonna get
Speaker 3: all that kind of stuff. But I think if you
Speaker 3: just you consume a lot of college football, Dan, people
Speaker 3: that watch, the fans that die hard watch, they see
Speaker 3: the important games and how USC looks in them, and
Speaker 3: it's and there's a lot of advantages to being USC
Speaker 3: on the West coast, you get tons of five star recruits.
Speaker 1: You just just.
Speaker 3: By being just Clay Hilton being like a decent coach,
Speaker 3: You're gonna get some good things. And you can start
Speaker 3: off one in three and win the Rose Bowl.
Speaker 1: I don't think you.
Speaker 3: Can do that a lot of places, but you can
Speaker 3: at USC. You get the right quarterback Sam Darnold, and
Speaker 3: you make a run and you can do those kind
Speaker 3: of things. So but the fans see what's going going on,
Speaker 3: and you know, scoring three points on the road against
Speaker 3: Stanford and having fourteen to three leads against Texas and
Speaker 3: giving up thirty four unanswered, and you know this past
Speaker 3: weekend against Cal you haven't lost to them since two
Speaker 3: thousand and three.
Speaker 1: They're not passing the Eyeball test.
Speaker 3: So I do feel like, you know, Cloud is one
Speaker 3: of the nicest men that you ever want to meet.
Speaker 3: But I think there's a lot of shortcomings as far
Speaker 3: as the coaching staff goes. Some people argue with me, oh,
Speaker 3: they don't have great players. We do like a composite
Speaker 3: index on twenty four to seven sports where you look
Speaker 3: at the current roster and where they were ranked come
Speaker 3: out of high school. I know it's not exact science,
Speaker 3: but you look at the top four programs, USC is
Speaker 3: number four on that index. The three teams above them
Speaker 3: are Alabama, Georgia, and Ohio State. Those teams are all
Speaker 3: really good. The outlier is USC that isn't really good.
Speaker 3: So yeah, you can say recruiting rankings don't mean everything,
Speaker 3: but it's a pretty good indicationion of the top three
Speaker 3: teams in the country.
Speaker 1: And why is USC not.
Speaker 3: They're not like number ten or fifteen, They're like nowhere
Speaker 3: near that. So to me, yeah, and that's sorry for
Speaker 3: the long.
Speaker 2: Time year this is this this show for it.
Speaker 1: It's really for me.
Speaker 3: It's more about the coaching side, I think, the development
Speaker 3: side than the talent that they have on the team
Speaker 3: right now.
Speaker 2: So what is when you look at this season specifically,
Speaker 2: which obviously the conversation about USC is a bigger picture
Speaker 2: than just any one season. But when you look at
Speaker 2: this season, what is plain old dumb unluckiness and what
Speaker 2: where is their legitimate concern that was avoidable concern unforced errors?
Speaker 3: If you will, Oh, that's a good one for unluckiness.
Speaker 3: I feel like, I mean a lot of the unluckiness
Speaker 3: though I think you bring on yourself. Like you could
Speaker 3: say it was unlucky against Cal that USC had a
Speaker 3: snap go over JT. Daniel's head when they're up fourteen
Speaker 3: to nothing and they were driving, you know, to start
Speaker 3: the third quarter, and that set Cal on a like
Speaker 3: an eight minute run where they scored fifteen points and
Speaker 3: that was enough to win the game.
Speaker 2: I'd say a batsnap is an unforced era.
Speaker 3: Though, yeah it's but that's also for a bats snap
Speaker 3: from a center who's been committing bad snaps all year,
Speaker 3: and the coaching staff refuses to bench the seniors captain.
Speaker 3: So I think there's been some unlucky things, but a
Speaker 3: lot of them, Dan, I think you bring on yourself
Speaker 3: by dudes. I feel like there was coaching changes that
Speaker 3: needed to be made, like the the Neil Callaway yeah
Speaker 3: being fired after you know, after week nine, I believe
Speaker 3: it was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the offensive line coach, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: The offensive line coach that was he probably shouldn't have
Speaker 3: been around after last year.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: I think Clay Hilton kind of waited too long to
Speaker 3: do some of these things. And you know, we've seen
Speaker 3: him make, you know, some in retrospect poor decisions, but
Speaker 3: a lot of them. I think that the Sam Donald
Speaker 3: Max Brown people get upset for him, but I understood
Speaker 3: that in the beginning, you know.
Speaker 1: Maybe after a while.
Speaker 3: No, But but a lot of the other ones have
Speaker 3: been like very apparent, you know, and they have, you know,
Speaker 3: half of their staff are kind of like part time recruiters. Dan,
Speaker 3: they don't even get involved in that. If you remember
Speaker 3: the Pete Carroll years, like everyone and had to be
Speaker 3: a relentless recruiter. I think in college football, if you
Speaker 3: have a staff and not everyone just you might have
Speaker 3: one guy that's not a relentless recruiter, but if you
Speaker 3: have more than that, it's really a problem for the program.
Speaker 1: And USC has a lot of that. So I feel like.
Speaker 3: There's been some kind of you know, weird luck stuff
Speaker 3: in both directions. I mean, I think they're fairly lucky
Speaker 3: to get a win against Washington State, the best looking
Speaker 3: team in the Pac twelve right now. But a lot
Speaker 3: of it, to me, Dan was kind of self inflicted wounds.
Speaker 3: Things that you made a decision maybe you know, six
Speaker 3: months ago, eight months ago, and it's you know, it's
Speaker 3: coming to roost now you're seeing the results of it now,
Speaker 3: So it's hard to call that bad luck when you
Speaker 3: could have prevented that by making a change earlier.
Speaker 2: So I thought in watching and I just actually rewatched
Speaker 2: the second half and it was painful to watch of
Speaker 2: the usc COL game because I felt like in a
Speaker 2: lot of ways that was like a super microcosm of
Speaker 2: the season, and playing a pretty solid first half, and
Speaker 2: the defense really came to play, and really a defense
Speaker 2: you could argue came to playing that entire game. They
Speaker 2: just were not helped out by the offense. Then completely
Speaker 2: shut out in the second half, and mistake after mistake
Speaker 2: and drive stall after drives, all unnecessarily in some cases.
Speaker 2: So when just focusing on this offense, it was hard
Speaker 2: to have a real good concept of what JT. Daniels
Speaker 2: would look like as a true freshman coming in. I
Speaker 2: think everybody would agree on that, But just in terms
Speaker 2: of what this offense, you know, what everybody envisioned this
Speaker 2: offense to be moving forward after a pretty successful year
Speaker 2: last year, and what it sort of looks like now
Speaker 2: with certainly a couple of huge playmakers not there. And
Speaker 2: everybody knows Sam Darnold, but I think the Ronald Jones
Speaker 2: thing is pretty huge, and what he was able to
Speaker 2: do when he was healthy for USC, just in terms
Speaker 2: of moving that offense in a pretty big direction forward.
Speaker 2: What happened to get from optimism and talent to almost
Speaker 2: flatlining with or without Tim Martin calling the plays.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think the play calling thing doesn't matter all
Speaker 3: that much to me. It's more about the offensive design.
Speaker 3: It seems like when this coaching staff gets a quarterback
Speaker 3: that they just trust, like Sam Darnold, it was more
Speaker 3: about a one read and then go let him do
Speaker 3: you know, off script, do your own thing, be creative.
Speaker 3: And I feel like they're doing that with j T.
Speaker 3: Daniels as well, because if you saw games where his
Speaker 3: backups were in where Matt Fink or Jack Sears who
Speaker 3: played in different games when JT.
Speaker 1: Daniel was hurt, the.
Speaker 3: Offense looked like it would actually flowing, like they looked
Speaker 3: like there was some sort of cohesion, like there was
Speaker 3: a plan in place.
Speaker 1: It seemed like with JT.
Speaker 3: Daniels it's more of, hey, go find one of your
Speaker 3: five star wide receivers deep and huck it down to
Speaker 3: him and he'll probably go make a big play. It
Speaker 3: just doesn't seem like they're helping him out quite as
Speaker 3: much as they were some of the other guys, but
Speaker 3: they do have playmakers. I mean, I love, you know,
Speaker 3: Tyler Vonn's one of my favorite guys to cover. He's
Speaker 3: amazing players, just so smooth out there. And Michael Pittman's
Speaker 3: come on really well on the outside. I'm on Ross
Speaker 3: Saint Brown's a true freshman, makes a lot of plays.
Speaker 3: He was better earlier in this and that he is
Speaker 3: now they're they're kind of bracketing them a little bit
Speaker 3: more and trying to take them away. And you know,
Speaker 3: they got a good stable of running backs aka Cedric
Speaker 3: Ware was basically in Ronald Jones's shadow. Another Texas kid
Speaker 3: came in the same year and he's had a huge,
Speaker 3: you know, true senior season after Ronald Jones left. He's
Speaker 3: on his way to, you know, potentially get one hundred
Speaker 3: thousand yard season. So I think they're fine at the
Speaker 3: playmaker spot. The biggest issue to me, dan Is is
Speaker 3: the offensive line, because they had a lot of guys
Speaker 3: coming back, like full four, full time regular starters, a
Speaker 3: bunch of other guys that have starting experience. I think
Speaker 3: they were fifteen deep and all of them or four
Speaker 3: and five star guys, so and they've had the same
Speaker 3: system for about a six year stretch. Dan, They've had
Speaker 3: a different offensive line coach every year. They've had the
Speaker 3: same guy for the last three years.
Speaker 1: Now he's let go. But they should have been a
Speaker 1: lot better than what they were.
Speaker 3: I mean to have minus five yards rushing against Texas,
Speaker 3: the forty one yards rushing in the second, forty one
Speaker 3: yards total in the second half against Calk.
Speaker 1: Stuff like that shouldn't be happening.
Speaker 3: And you're seeing complete bus where you know, I think
Speaker 3: a Stanford game back when you know they almost scored
Speaker 3: three points against Stafford losing seventeen to three. There were
Speaker 3: so many instances where four rushers were trying to get
Speaker 3: to JT. Daniels or stop the run with six or
Speaker 3: seven guys blocking, and one or two of those rushers
Speaker 3: would come unblocked. It's amazing, Like the numbers just didn't
Speaker 3: work out. You could almost double team every guy and
Speaker 3: they still weren't.
Speaker 1: Able to block.
Speaker 3: So there's been a lot of bus you know, mental
Speaker 3: rep you know, mental bus, physical beats, things like that.
Speaker 3: But to me, I think it's the offensive line that's
Speaker 3: been the biggest issue. But that's coupled with overall just
Speaker 3: the offense when you're running with JT. Daniels just doesn't
Speaker 3: seem like it's it's something that's well thought out. Like
Speaker 3: you watch Mike Leach's offense, it's like you might not
Speaker 3: agree the way he does it or whatever, but it's
Speaker 3: well thought out. And if you look at USC, it's
Speaker 3: not well thought out.
Speaker 2: They are there playing to a system. You can tell
Speaker 2: that the players know why they're doing everything when everything
Speaker 2: is going to happen. And when Washington State is beat
Speaker 2: like they did lose to USC, it's because they were outplayed.
Speaker 2: It's because you know, people, Washington State fans I think
Speaker 2: have some some room to stand on some some calls
Speaker 2: in that game. Probably both teams do. But with USC, so,
Speaker 2: I guess my question with you know you're pointing to
Speaker 2: the offensive line is the big group that has disappointed.
Speaker 2: Is that a recruiting evaluation thing like four and five
Speaker 2: stars are really sort of Mountain West type talents or
Speaker 2: do you see it as a development thing where guys
Speaker 2: look great for two game stretches, three game, four game
Speaker 2: stretches and then for whatever reason, disappear and it's just
Speaker 2: sort of a development and you know, coaching them up
Speaker 2: kind of thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would lean more towards the development side because
Speaker 3: they are definitely players that were recruited by you know,
Speaker 3: Alabama or some other big programs, So there weren't like
Speaker 3: they weren't four star guys that they were four stars
Speaker 3: just because USC game.
Speaker 1: And offer like that.
Speaker 3: That can happen, you know, you can get, yeah, some
Speaker 3: inflation in the ratings and stuff like that, but for
Speaker 3: the most part it's been that way.
Speaker 1: Now there's been some missus.
Speaker 3: Stanford's done a really good job of recruiting five star
Speaker 3: offensive linemen on the West Coast and you know and
Speaker 3: around the country.
Speaker 1: So they'll get some of those guys.
Speaker 3: But you know, for me, I think they've developed some
Speaker 3: like a Chris Brown is probably their best offensive lineman.
Speaker 3: He's playing guard for them right now, and I think
Speaker 3: he's graded out the highest on Pro Football Focus and
Speaker 3: to've seen some instances of that. But there's other guys
Speaker 3: like Austin Jackson, who's playing left tackle right now, hasn't
Speaker 3: seemed to develop as much.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's a really athletic kid.
Speaker 3: You watch him like, yeah, I could see that guy
Speaker 3: being in the NFL, but we haven't seen him really
Speaker 3: take the next steps, and I think, you know, to me,
Speaker 3: it's coming down to coaching. It just seems like, you know,
Speaker 3: Neil Calloway was an older you know, he's an older coach.
Speaker 3: He's you know, really nice guy, wasn't really fun. He
Speaker 3: didn't really talk to the media very much. You just
Speaker 3: kind of kept to himself. But that you know, it
Speaker 3: just didn't seem to like resonate. He didn't seem to
Speaker 3: connect with these younger players, where Tim Drevno that have
Speaker 3: now seems like there's at least a connection there that
Speaker 3: players will talk about, Hey, we're doing more technique stuff.
Speaker 3: He's fixing things when we do something wrong. So I mean,
Speaker 3: I don't think you can change a whole lot. And
Speaker 3: I'm not saying Tim Drevis was the greatest offensive line
Speaker 3: coach in the world. It's hard to it's really hard
Speaker 3: to evaluate that. But when you could watch like the
Speaker 3: five guys play as a unit and just not pick
Speaker 3: up where you know, someone just runs a stunt or
Speaker 3: a delayed blitz or something and they have no idea
Speaker 3: what's going on? To me that that usually points to coaching.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, preparedness and coaching. So you are I mean,
Speaker 2: you're at practice covering the team. You obviously go to
Speaker 2: games you're on the road, but you're also there summer workouts,
Speaker 2: fall camp, like you are around this team, you and
Speaker 2: around you know the past, however many teams. You really
Speaker 2: have a good concept of what these teams look like,
Speaker 2: sort of soup to nuts before this season started, and
Speaker 2: you're watching workouts here in fall camp. How did this?
Speaker 2: I guess we can still focus on offense in your minds.
Speaker 2: Should the offense be far, far beyond what it appears
Speaker 2: to be?
Speaker 3: Are you?
Speaker 2: Are you actually surprised that they've struggled like they have.
Speaker 1: I kind of am.
Speaker 3: You know, we knew that the offensive line would be
Speaker 3: really the lynch pit. I mean, you needed the offensive
Speaker 3: line to play well, and it just seemed like, okay,
Speaker 3: all these guys back, they got to be better this year.
Speaker 3: And you know, to come out of the gate in
Speaker 3: the second game of the season and score three points
Speaker 3: against you know, a six wins stamp for team.
Speaker 1: We know now that's that's not a good look.
Speaker 3: And I get that there's a freshman quarterback, but he's
Speaker 3: he's been really I mean, he's been good in spots,
Speaker 3: he's not been great.
Speaker 1: A lot of the USC fans are on him.
Speaker 3: I don't think he's you know, best suited for the
Speaker 3: kind of offense they want to run, because when you
Speaker 3: when you have a quarterback that's not really a threat
Speaker 3: to take it and run himself when you're doing all
Speaker 3: those fakes and stuff with the zone reads, it just
Speaker 3: doesn't seem to work that well. But the guys behind him,
Speaker 3: like Jack Sears and Matt Fink, they're more runners. They
Speaker 3: can do that a little bit better. So if you
Speaker 3: want to run this offense, you're probably better off using
Speaker 3: one of the other guys. But I don't put a
Speaker 3: lot of the blame on the you know, the true
Speaker 3: freshman quarterback and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1: But really it is that.
Speaker 3: And I was kind of surprised because when you see
Speaker 3: seven on sevens, when you see the the offseason workouts,
Speaker 3: you see all the athletes out there, and I'll talk
Speaker 3: to coaches that you know from other Pac twelve programs
Speaker 3: and ask them like, hey, you know, what do you
Speaker 3: think of USC's talent level, And none of them have said, oh,
Speaker 3: they're overrated. They all said, yeah, that's a really talented team.
Speaker 3: They're just not that disciplined or not that well, coach,
Speaker 3: and it's it's kind of bad. So I would I
Speaker 3: thought they would be a little bit better this year
Speaker 3: on offense, at least, I mean a lot better than
Speaker 3: what they've looked like.
Speaker 1: And they'll they'll have like a great quarter, you.
Speaker 3: Know, where they score a bunch of points and then
Speaker 3: they'll like shut down for the rest of the game.
Speaker 1: And it just that to me, it has a little
Speaker 1: bit surprising.
Speaker 2: One of the interesting things to me about this USC
Speaker 2: team is given the offensive struggles, and that really does
Speaker 2: put a pretty big weight on the defense just because
Speaker 2: you are, you know, the offense stalls really quickly the
Speaker 2: defense is back out on the field, the defense can
Speaker 2: get tired. That's when we see injuries happen. And USC
Speaker 2: has had you know, the Ben Snake bitten in the
Speaker 2: secondary for a chunk of this season. Obviously, Porter Gustin
Speaker 2: is out for the year. Cam Smith, I believe, has
Speaker 2: missed time this year, and there was a lot of
Speaker 2: turnover up front just because of graduation and NFL stuff.
Speaker 2: But the defense largely has you know, kept it together.
Speaker 2: They've they've performed, you know, probably they've overachieved at times
Speaker 2: given what they've had to deal with. With their own offense.
Speaker 2: Has that surprised you that the defense, even with things
Speaker 2: stacked against them to whatever, to whatever extent, has accomplished
Speaker 2: impressive results.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I think it's it's kind of a
Speaker 3: mixed bag. I've seen them put in sudden changed situations
Speaker 3: quite a bit and respond well in games, you know,
Speaker 3: other games not as much. And some of it we've
Speaker 3: seen some frustration Isaiah Langley that the corner went over
Speaker 3: and kind of bumped JT. Daniels, but it seemed like
Speaker 3: maybe it was more mad at the offensive line or whatever.
Speaker 3: When you know, basically the USC was pitching a shutout
Speaker 3: against Cal and then they give up a safety, so
Speaker 3: it's like and but you know they two short fields
Speaker 3: and Cow scores two quick touchdowns and it's over. So
Speaker 3: that's a situation where we've seen other times during the
Speaker 3: season they would bounce back and get a stop, and
Speaker 3: that they didn't, and you know, you get it, like
Speaker 3: if the offense is just going to go not scoring
Speaker 3: for you know, twenty minutes, thirty minutes at a time,
Speaker 3: it's a lot to ask, uh for this defense. And
Speaker 3: I think they've had some some guys play well, like
Speaker 3: Emon Marshall had a horrible penalty at the end of
Speaker 3: the cow game, but his numbers are really good as
Speaker 3: far as like they're just not completing a lot of
Speaker 3: passes to his side of the field.
Speaker 1: I think he helped himself.
Speaker 3: He's a former five star kid who was going to
Speaker 3: he wanted to be, you know, leave as a junior,
Speaker 3: but came back and he's played a lot better this
Speaker 3: year than he has in years past, So I think
Speaker 3: that's helped. But as a secondary, uh, what's your what's
Speaker 3: your the line in the celibra, Like, what's your favorite
Speaker 3: interception from USC this year, they've had two, like the
Speaker 3: last in the country in interceptions, but they're they're I
Speaker 3: think they're second in the country, and like passes defended,
Speaker 3: but a lot of that's up at the line of
Speaker 3: scrimmage with defensive linemen and linebackers, so you gotta I
Speaker 3: think you've got to create.
Speaker 1: A few more opportunities. But it's hard.
Speaker 3: I think when one side of the ball is very
Speaker 3: hit or missed and there'll be some big plays and
Speaker 3: then just the lulls of nothing, it's hard for the
Speaker 3: defense to kind of keep in mind. So I might
Speaker 3: be a little bit more of a defensive apologist or whatever.
Speaker 3: When you know, people tell there's a lot of USC
Speaker 3: fans that are upset with the defense, but I give
Speaker 3: them more of a pass just.
Speaker 1: Because what they've had to do. So I agree with
Speaker 1: you more so.
Speaker 2: When you look at and you mentioned, you know, Clay Helton.
Speaker 2: Everybody loves him as a human and there are some
Speaker 2: things that you know, certain people are I think a
Speaker 2: lot of USC fans look at as shortcomings with him
Speaker 2: as running a big program. Where is he best as
Speaker 2: a coach?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 2: What is sort of unassailable that he has done well?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think he gets the team together and and
Speaker 3: he's they need they there's things that they needed that
Speaker 3: Clay Hilton brings to the table. So you could, you know,
Speaker 3: I don't agree with the higher I don't think his
Speaker 3: resume was anywhere near what you would want for someone.
Speaker 1: To coach USC.
Speaker 3: But they did need an adult in the room and
Speaker 3: Clay Hilton has certainly brought that to the table. He's
Speaker 3: brought some stability and I think the players you know,
Speaker 3: rallied around them.
Speaker 1: They like him.
Speaker 3: They feel like he's a father figure to them, and
Speaker 3: I think he's been honest with them.
Speaker 1: And I think he's been.
Speaker 3: Very steady and just a force that they needed someone
Speaker 3: that wasn't going to be a rollercoaster, and he's definitely
Speaker 3: not been that. And you know, he's bringing a routine
Speaker 3: to this team, but sometimes you could say it's a
Speaker 3: routine to a fault, like they don't change a lot.
Speaker 1: Every week is.
Speaker 3: Like the same thing, doing the same thing, and I
Speaker 3: feel like maybe after a while, by week ten, you're like, hey,
Speaker 3: let's mix it up a little bit, let's change practice
Speaker 3: days around or something like that. But I think the
Speaker 3: biggest thing he's brought some stability there because you had
Speaker 3: the Lane Kiffin and the Steve Sarkisian stuff. I mean,
Speaker 3: stark lasted I think it was fifteen or sixteen games,
Speaker 3: like that's all he coached at USC. It's crazy to
Speaker 3: hire a head coach and he doesn't last, you know,
Speaker 3: a year and a half.
Speaker 1: So I think they needed that stability. And if you
Speaker 1: were going to say.
Speaker 3: If Clayout only lasts for three years as a permanent
Speaker 3: head coach, I still think it was a positive thing
Speaker 3: overall for USA. I know there's a lot of fans
Speaker 3: that are upset, but he brought some really nice results
Speaker 3: in those first two years above what you would expect
Speaker 3: from someone Clay Helton, and they did bring some stability
Speaker 3: to the program. It just if you're looking at it
Speaker 3: and saying, hey, you want to be in the playoff picture,
Speaker 3: you want to be in the national conversation, it doesn't
Speaker 3: look like that's going to be a regular thing outside
Speaker 3: of you know, getting a Sam Darnold in the program
Speaker 3: and he can do some amazing things. It just doesn't
Speaker 3: seem like the staff and he has put together is
Speaker 3: the on the road to bring you there?
Speaker 1: Is it?
Speaker 2: Do you think it's a staff thing? Do you think
Speaker 2: it's a culture thing? Where he is you know, he
Speaker 2: has raised the floor of that that personal you know,
Speaker 2: he's drama free. You know, Sark and lang Kiffin, we're
Speaker 2: very much not where he's raised the floor of Okay,
Speaker 2: we are not going to be an embarrassment, you know,
Speaker 2: doing things around the program. But at the same time,
Speaker 2: he doesn't have that staff of killers, he doesn't have
Speaker 2: that culture necessarily. Will you see other schools that have
Speaker 2: succeeded and you know, you go behind the scenes of
Speaker 2: Michigan or Clemson or Alabama or Georgia where there is
Speaker 2: that that cohesive element where everybody is bought in every day,
Speaker 2: every hour, every minute. And maybe that's not necessarily the
Speaker 2: case with USC. Is that the big thing that's lacking
Speaker 2: culture and that that sort of staff of killers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with you one hundred percent.
Speaker 3: There they've you know, he took a different route if
Speaker 3: you look at what Justin Wilcox did. Who's you know,
Speaker 3: the new head coach at Calvin their couple of years.
Speaker 3: He brought in Bill Baldwin, you know, a head coach
Speaker 3: to be his offensive coordinator. He brought in Tim de Ruder,
Speaker 3: who was a head coach at Fresno State, you know,
Speaker 3: got ten win seasons and stuff, to be his defensive coordinator.
Speaker 3: He brought in people that would be threatening to take
Speaker 3: his job if he doesn't do well.
Speaker 1: And I feel like Clay Helton went the other way.
Speaker 3: He brought in familiar people that no one was really
Speaker 3: threatening to take his job, like there wasn't there's not
Speaker 3: really a head coach on the staff outside of, you know,
Speaker 3: of Clay Helton, so they don't have that those kind
Speaker 3: of generals that you would want to go to war with.
Speaker 3: They're all kind of lower level guys and you're you know,
Speaker 3: a lot of guys are doing jobs for the very
Speaker 3: first time. If you're a first time head coach, you
Speaker 3: don't want to hire a first time offensive coordinator. And
Speaker 3: that's what Ryleton with tem Martin, he brought in. He promoted,
Speaker 3: you know, from the support staff, Brian Ellis, who's the
Speaker 3: now the quarterback coach, knowing that he has no quarterback,
Speaker 3: he's not never been a permanent quarterback coach for a
Speaker 3: college program, and you knew you were going to have
Speaker 3: a you know whoever, your quarterback isn't going to start
Speaker 3: for the very first time, so all of that stuff
Speaker 3: is like you're wondering why, Like, yeah, you're familiar with
Speaker 3: these people, but they haven't done the job before. And
Speaker 3: I think if you're a young head coach who hasn't
Speaker 3: been around the block a lot, you'd want to bring
Speaker 3: in more experienced people. And the one hire he made
Speaker 3: that I liked was Delan McCollough, the running back coach
Speaker 3: last year, and he helped Ronald Jones have a fifteen
Speaker 3: hundred yard season he was at Indiana, And you look
Speaker 3: at that and a lot of people ask like, well,
Speaker 3: the coaches really even want to come to USC. Well,
Speaker 3: I talked to Delan McCullough quite a bit. He developed
Speaker 3: running backs from Indiana, put him in the NFL. He
Speaker 3: recruited in SEC country, trying to convince guys to not
Speaker 3: go to LSU or not go to Auburn, and he
Speaker 3: got somebody, didn't get other ones. And he would tell me,
Speaker 3: like after their careers, they would come to me and say,
Speaker 3: you know, I wish I would have came to see you.
Speaker 3: It's hard to get guys to go to Indiana, he said.
Speaker 3: Once he came to USC. It's more about picking which
Speaker 3: one you want. Then, Oh, I got to convince some
Speaker 3: guy to come to USC. They want to do that.
Speaker 3: So he saw the advantages that you have of just
Speaker 3: being at a USC and.
Speaker 1: He came in and did a lot of great things.
Speaker 1: He changed a lot.
Speaker 3: Now he ended up leaving and going to the Kansas
Speaker 3: City Chiefs after a year. And we didn't see that
Speaker 3: sort of hired. You know, that was a very successful hire,
Speaker 3: even only stayed for a year. I didn't see Clay
Speaker 3: Outon kind of do that again. It was more a
Speaker 3: one off thing. So for me, it's about getting out
Speaker 3: of your comfort zone when you're hiring people. Get the
Speaker 3: people that have done the job before somewhere else. They
Speaker 3: don't know the fights on, they don't know anything, but
Speaker 3: no know anything about USC.
Speaker 1: They've heard of it. That's it, and bring him in
Speaker 1: to do their job.
Speaker 3: And I think if Clayilt gets another chance and he
Speaker 3: can go out and redo the staff that way, I
Speaker 3: think he can be successful.
Speaker 1: But the way he's hired the.
Speaker 3: Staff that I just don't think it was really set.
Speaker 1: Up for success.
Speaker 2: So this is going to sound crazy, and most of
Speaker 2: my theories about USC generally are, but I think there
Speaker 2: is there's a little bit of meat on this bone.
Speaker 2: So the conventional wisdom with USC is the premiere program
Speaker 2: in the PAC twelve. I think that's correct. I think
Speaker 2: that's you know, I think that's irrefutable at this point,
Speaker 2: just because the PAC twelve sort of goes as USC
Speaker 2: goes at sometimes Oregon. When you have that flash, you know,
Speaker 2: when you had Pete Carroll, you had flash, when you
Speaker 2: had Chip Kel you had flash at the top of
Speaker 2: the conference, it made a difference. But the conventional wisdom
Speaker 2: with USC is you're in LA you can just walk
Speaker 2: out your door and choose, you know, whatever five star,
Speaker 2: whatever four star you want. And I don't think that's
Speaker 2: not true, but I think there is something misleading about
Speaker 2: or I don't know if it's misleading, but like we
Speaker 2: look at the stories about Larry Kocher at Miami where
Speaker 2: he just you could walk out the door in Miami
Speaker 2: and he sort of starchased. He went on like rivals
Speaker 2: dot Com and he just put together these amazing classes.
Speaker 2: But when you actually look at the physical makeup of
Speaker 2: these classes, it didn't makes sense in a lot of cases,
Speaker 2: and the evaluation wasn't There is there an element of
Speaker 2: USC recruiting actually being difficult because there are challenges with
Speaker 2: I mean USC, and this is along with Miami. You
Speaker 2: look at those top programs that you mentioned, whether it's Georgia, Alabama,
Speaker 2: Ohio State, Clemson, how many of those programs have a
Speaker 2: pretty big, healthy chunk of their recruiting classes come to
Speaker 2: them within a half hour, you know, forty five minutes
Speaker 2: an hour. And is that necessarily a bad thing that
Speaker 2: players aren't from that exact city.
Speaker 1: No, I think it's a great point.
Speaker 3: I think when you talk about recruiting, it's kind of
Speaker 3: like you're building a wall and you need brick and
Speaker 3: you need mortar.
Speaker 1: You don't need everyone to.
Speaker 3: Be a five star guy, you need some of those
Speaker 3: guys that gel and if there's some kid who's a
Speaker 3: three star that grew up I mean maybe you grew
Speaker 3: up close by, maybe it's a little further away dreaming
Speaker 3: about going to USC and you don't and there's a
Speaker 3: reason to take and like, hey, yeah, maybe there's a
Speaker 3: guy we have a little bit ranked higher on our board,
Speaker 3: but this is a good guy to bring into the program, right.
Speaker 3: I think Thomas Graham was a guy like that who's
Speaker 3: you know, you're familiar with up at Oregon. His sister
Speaker 3: I think was going to USC, like he wanted to
Speaker 3: go to USC forever, was committed. They didn't really recruit
Speaker 3: him all that hard, and it's like that's a kid
Speaker 3: that and he's actually good, you know, he's he's started.
Speaker 2: I think he started, Yeah, he started Ashman. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So someone like that, like USC would like kind of
Speaker 3: pass on because there was someone else with more stars
Speaker 3: or something that they were looking at.
Speaker 1: And ever, what you just needed to take guys like that.
Speaker 3: You need to fill in your class with other people
Speaker 3: that you just feel comfortable with that you know, that's
Speaker 3: what they grew up wanting to do. You know they're
Speaker 3: going to help the program, So I think you can
Speaker 3: kind of get star chasing. But I think Pete Carroll
Speaker 3: had it best where it's more about evaluation than recruiting.
Speaker 3: That there are those stars out there everyone you know,
Speaker 3: but if you don't like a four or five star guy,
Speaker 3: don't recruit them, you know, And I think sometimes you
Speaker 3: can chase those stars a lot and you get the
Speaker 3: average star rating to be really hot. USC's is always
Speaker 3: like you know, one or two in the country as
Speaker 3: far as like the average star guy coming in. But
Speaker 3: it's to me, it's more about the evaluation process because
Speaker 3: there's going to be some guys that are overrated, and
Speaker 3: you know, you can't avoid getting them all. I mean,
Speaker 3: you're going to get at some of them every once
Speaker 3: in a while, but if you get too many of them,
Speaker 3: and I think that really hurts your recruiting class. So
Speaker 3: I think you're right. Evaluation to me is the hardest part.
Speaker 3: Because you have so many talented players in Southern California
Speaker 3: you can choose from. You got to make sure you
Speaker 3: choose the right ones because then you let a Thomas
Speaker 3: Graham go because you went over him and he's starting
Speaker 3: at one of your rivals, and obviously when he comes
Speaker 3: back to play USC, he wants to beat him pretty bad.
Speaker 2: I also think there is something where you didn't grow
Speaker 2: up in southern California, or did.
Speaker 3: You No, I'm a Yankee Pennsylvania and then in Massachusetts
Speaker 3: is where I went to high school.
Speaker 2: Right, But then you went to USC, right?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I did, Yes, I moved out yeah.
Speaker 2: And now it's like you live in you live in
Speaker 2: the South Bay. You are a Southern California person through
Speaker 2: and through, which I think is important. I think there
Speaker 2: is something about college where you challenge yourself. You challenge yourself,
Speaker 2: you push yourself. There's something about inserting yourself into a
Speaker 2: new culture that helps to grow you. And I don't
Speaker 2: think that's all that different with college football. And that's
Speaker 2: why I mentioned, like, you know, Clemson has a bunch
Speaker 2: of Georgia kids, and Alabama has kids from Texas and
Speaker 2: Maryland and Indiana and California whatever that. I think there's
Speaker 2: something about people coming from different backgrounds and when USC
Speaker 2: and USC has had a ton of success stories with
Speaker 2: high school kids from LA you know, whether it's the
Speaker 2: Sarah kids, with Robert Woods and Marquis Lee. I think
Speaker 2: Juju went to Long Beach, Paully. I want to say,
Speaker 2: but you look at the Bedrocks at different position groups
Speaker 2: for USC over the years, whether it's Pete, Carol Linkiff
Speaker 2: and Sark whoever, and there are a ton of kids
Speaker 2: that it doesn't seem like that's still happening from out
Speaker 2: thousand miles two thousand miles away, whether it's you know,
Speaker 2: Dwayne Jared or Ray mal Luga or Jeff Buyers from Colorado,
Speaker 2: Lindell White from Colorado, Leonard Williams maybe the best defensive
Speaker 2: linean USC has ever had from about as far away
Speaker 2: as possible. And the more I see that USC has
Speaker 2: twenty of their twenty five kids from southern California, the
Speaker 2: more I wonder, Yes, they are more talented than everybody
Speaker 2: else in the Pac twelve. But does this sort of
Speaker 2: extension of high school make for a top five, ten,
Speaker 2: fifteen culture? Is there any truth to that in your mind?
Speaker 1: No? I think that's a great point.
Speaker 3: I think when you recruit nationally, you have to be
Speaker 3: relevant nationally. So it's harder for like five and five
Speaker 3: USC team to do that. But they got some guys
Speaker 3: that were on you know, achacentric ware. I think has
Speaker 3: been a pretty good leader coming out of Texas. So
Speaker 3: they have some guys. But when we've seen what we've
Speaker 3: seen from this staff, Dan is a good closing staff.
Speaker 3: But because you have like half of the staff being
Speaker 3: part time recruiters, that makes it harder to get more
Speaker 3: of the national guys, more from other states, because they've
Speaker 3: really closed on guys locally. Like they didn't have a
Speaker 3: safety class a couple of years ago and they got
Speaker 3: a kid from Arizona and a kid from Vegas, which
Speaker 3: is you know, it's pretty local to check out for it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but those were guys that were, you.
Speaker 3: Know, in the Pactuel footprint and you can get them
Speaker 3: pretty easy. But they've they've done a lot of it,
Speaker 3: sort of like cramming for a test at the end
Speaker 3: where they're they're really they're procrastinating, and then they recruit
Speaker 3: at the end and they still get some of these guys.
Speaker 3: But I think the problem is going to be, well, yeah,
Speaker 3: they had the Rose Bowl, they had the pact World Championship,
Speaker 3: and that helps you get those guys at the end.
Speaker 3: This year you're five and five fighting to be bull eligible.
Speaker 3: I think it's going to be a lot harder and
Speaker 3: the way we have it within the early signing period.
Speaker 3: Most people are signing in the early signing period. Now
Speaker 3: we thought it would be like a split thing. No,
Speaker 3: it's like pretty much you signed there and then signing
Speaker 3: Day in February is just not as big of a
Speaker 3: deal anymore. So it's it's changed. And this year, I
Speaker 3: think specifically Dan, because of the problems on the field,
Speaker 3: they're not going to be able to do the same
Speaker 3: thing they done the last couple of years. But I
Speaker 3: think you're right, they've done that the last couple of years.
Speaker 3: But a lot of it is getting Southern California guys
Speaker 3: at the last minute. It's gonna be harder to do that.
Speaker 3: You're gonna be a lot more planed B and maybe
Speaker 3: plan C guys for this recruiting class because the team
Speaker 3: has struggled so much. And then you look at the
Speaker 3: overall makeup of the roster. Yeah, it's like a bunch
Speaker 3: of Southern California kids, which are really talented, but you
Speaker 3: do need some of that now. It takes a maintenance
Speaker 3: sometimes if you get a player from out of state,
Speaker 3: especially as far away as Florida or something like that,
Speaker 3: guys get homesick, and.
Speaker 1: Things like that.
Speaker 3: But that's that's something you have to nurture and but
Speaker 3: you can make it a great part of your culture
Speaker 3: if you can work those guys in there. And I
Speaker 3: think it helps the overall team chemistry when you do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's you know, you look around the Pac
Speaker 2: twelve and the teams that are succeeding are not doing
Speaker 2: it with local talents. This is you know, Washington State
Speaker 2: is all over the west coast, and Oregon's all over
Speaker 2: the country. Stanford is all over the country. And I
Speaker 2: think there's there's probably something to that. You probably would
Speaker 2: have had a very different experience at USC if you know,
Speaker 2: you were surrounded by high school friends. Yeah, it was,
Speaker 2: it's probably it's probably not a huge deal, but I
Speaker 2: think it's it's sort of an underrated element of all
Speaker 2: of this. Do you think at this point that Clay
Speaker 2: Helton is fighting for his job?
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 3: It's interesting. I think the last two games do mean
Speaker 3: a lot. It means when you're talking to the fan
Speaker 3: base and you talk to boosters, Uh, they care that
Speaker 3: you got blown out last year by Notre Dame in
Speaker 3: Ohio State, Like those are two of the games that
Speaker 3: they really care about.
Speaker 1: Like they cared about Texas too, but.
Speaker 3: This year, you know, they don't want to see you
Speaker 3: not scoring agains Stafford. They don't want to see you
Speaker 3: on the road. I mean, you got to be competitive. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And that the Texas game, so many USC fans went
Speaker 3: out to that. Austin's a great it was a great weekend.
Speaker 3: And those are the kind of games the fans love
Speaker 3: to go see. But you don't get blown out. But
Speaker 3: you know, it's a decent Texas team. But it's not
Speaker 3: like it wasn't like you got blown up by Alabama,
Speaker 3: right right, you know, So those are the kind of
Speaker 3: things that really, you know, kind of upset the fan.
Speaker 3: So I think for Clay Hilton, everything we've heard from
Speaker 3: inside the program, most of the stuff we've heard, you're
Speaker 3: hearing all kinds of stuff. USC is in a weird
Speaker 3: spot right now because they got all these other problems
Speaker 3: that the Board of Trustees is dealing with. They don't
Speaker 3: have you know, Max Nikias is no longer there the
Speaker 3: president of university. They have an interim president right now,
Speaker 3: and you have Lyn Swan who's the third athletic director
Speaker 3: in a row, which just happens to be a former
Speaker 3: football player at usc SO, no athletic director experience, no
Speaker 3: hiring firing experience, nothing that would really prepare you for
Speaker 3: something like this.
Speaker 1: So for what we've heard dan the administration.
Speaker 3: That what's left or whatever's put together there would rather
Speaker 3: not make some sort of move. So if somehow he
Speaker 3: can beat UCLA in Notre Dame, I don't think he's
Speaker 3: going anywhere. I think that, you know, as much as
Speaker 3: the fans want I'm gone, I feel like he's going
Speaker 3: to stay. I don't know if he like loses the
Speaker 3: Notre Dame but beats UCLA and they're six and six
Speaker 3: in ball eligible, I'm not sure what's going to happen there.
Speaker 3: But my feeling is, and from the people I talk
Speaker 3: to you, they rather wouldn't make some sort of change.
Speaker 3: But if you talk to a lot of the fans
Speaker 3: and a lot of the boosters, it's completely a different story.
Speaker 3: And they're they're renovating the Colisseum right now, and the
Speaker 3: problem with it. They raised all the money themselves, but
Speaker 3: it's all through like a handful of a couple dozen
Speaker 3: boosters who bought ten twenty million dollars suites. Well, a
Speaker 3: lot of those people are not going to be very happy,
Speaker 3: especially if they lose the UCLA. If they start saying,
Speaker 3: you know what, I'm out, I don't want these suites.
Speaker 3: I think that sort of forces the administration's hand. So
Speaker 3: my gut is dan the administration would rather not do anything.
Speaker 3: They'd rather say, Hey, he won the Rose Bowl, he
Speaker 3: won the Packed Goff Championship.
Speaker 1: This is a blip on the radar.
Speaker 3: But I think that the boosters, especially after the Cow loss,
Speaker 3: are really really upset with what's going on, and depending
Speaker 3: on what happens these next two weeks, maybe push them
Speaker 3: over the edge and you might see a lot of
Speaker 3: pressure from I don't think pressure from their average fan
Speaker 3: is going to matter, but if it's pressure from those
Speaker 3: people that are flipping the bill for the Colisseum renovation,
Speaker 3: then I think, you know, that might be forcing them
Speaker 3: to make a change at a time that it wouldn't
Speaker 3: want to.
Speaker 2: So if USC does not look competitive against UCLA, which
Speaker 2: I don't think will be the case, but if they
Speaker 2: lose this game by whatever score, they just don't look competitive.
Speaker 2: They you know, twenty to seventeen, twenty four to seventeen,
Speaker 2: where they just they lose to a team that is
Speaker 2: not as talented that is not his experienced to a
Speaker 2: brand new coaching staff, certainly ucla team that has improved.
Speaker 2: We get into weird territory. And I think it was
Speaker 2: maybe not dissimilar to what happened with Mark Helfrich at
Speaker 2: Oregon and that very likable dude just don't lose to
Speaker 2: Oregon State. He lost to Oregon State, and it almost
Speaker 2: forced people's hands that they felt that they were going
Speaker 2: to be falling behind by keeping Mark Helfrich. If USC
Speaker 2: does make a move, if those boosters are infuriated, the
Speaker 2: important boosters are infuriated, and USC does make a move,
Speaker 2: and they say, thanks for your service, but we are
Speaker 2: going to move in a new direction. Where is your
Speaker 2: confidence that Lynn Swann, relatively new ad at USSE with
Speaker 2: obvious long USC ties. Where's your confidence in him making
Speaker 2: a big but not necessarily big, but more good decision
Speaker 2: after three pretty poor to various extents, USC decisions, not
Speaker 2: Lynn Swan decisions.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we just don't know enough about lind Swan. But
Speaker 3: if I had to bet on it, I wouldn't. The
Speaker 3: confidence meter wouldn't be very high US. He kind of
Speaker 3: keeps it in the family. You get named like a
Speaker 3: Jack del Rio who played at USC. People ask me
Speaker 3: all the time, like who should they hire. It's like,
Speaker 3: you know, I don't have any power, but I would
Speaker 3: give you two requirements. One, make it a college head
Speaker 3: coach with great success. You know, someone that's been successful
Speaker 3: in college if you want to look at Matt Campbell
Speaker 3: or you know whatever, someone that's like, hey, they're a
Speaker 3: good college coach. Like that's the one thing. Two, someone
Speaker 3: that doesn't know the USC fight song. Don't hire someone
Speaker 3: that you're familiar with, like, because then you're only basing
Speaker 3: it on a resume. Like they just keep hiring people
Speaker 3: that they know. Uh, I mean just even the athletic directors.
Speaker 3: If you dan, if you ever covered a game in
Speaker 3: the coliseum, if you took the elevator up to the
Speaker 3: press box, you looked on one side of the elevator,
Speaker 3: there was a picture of Pat Hayden. You look at
Speaker 3: the other side of the elevator, there's a picture of
Speaker 3: Lint Swan, Like those are that's who they hired.
Speaker 1: Like you didn't need a search for them.
Speaker 3: You just look to see who was on the walls
Speaker 3: of your press box elevator, and that's who you're going
Speaker 3: to hire.
Speaker 1: Your athletic director. You need to get away from that.
Speaker 3: And I'm not sure that Lint Swan and the board
Speaker 3: of trustees and all they would do something like that.
Speaker 1: It's like they feel like it's a circle of the
Speaker 1: wagon thing.
Speaker 3: We're going to get a guy that we know as
Speaker 3: opposed to taking a chance. I think you said on
Speaker 3: your preview show where you were comparing Tom Herman I
Speaker 3: think was to Matt Campbell.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, yeah, And it's like I would love to.
Speaker 3: See us do something like that where, yeah, maybe it
Speaker 3: doesn't work out, but that's someone you can look at
Speaker 3: it like, Man, they've had some really good success in college.
Speaker 1: Let's see what it's like if they step up.
Speaker 3: To the next level and they're playing, you know, at
Speaker 3: a top five or top ten program instead of you know,
Speaker 3: Iowa State. So I would love to see that. I
Speaker 3: just don't long answer. I guess I don't r a
Speaker 3: lot of confidence that they would do that.
Speaker 2: What is what do you feel like the view right
Speaker 2: now of the USC job is externally? I know you
Speaker 2: might be too close to the situation in LA covering
Speaker 2: the team every day, but what do you believe the
Speaker 2: perception is nationally of this USC job?
Speaker 1: And it's funny.
Speaker 3: We got even USC fans that are really kind of
Speaker 3: upset with the team, like, oh, no one wants to
Speaker 3: come coach there, And I don't buy that.
Speaker 1: And maybe it's just because I'm around.
Speaker 3: But I see, you know, you talk to coaches that
Speaker 3: are like, oh yeah, if I had that talent, I
Speaker 3: could do this. I feel like an alpha coach would
Speaker 3: come in and say, this is an amazing opportunity, Like
Speaker 3: I couldn't get these kind of players where I.
Speaker 1: Was or whatever it is.
Speaker 3: I still feel like it's a top five job just
Speaker 3: because of all the different factors, Like you can recruit well,
Speaker 3: but it's different than being like in an LSU, there's
Speaker 3: no Alabama or Georgia outside your door. You're you're the
Speaker 3: Aliba and there's really not you know, UTLA made a
Speaker 3: huge hire and Chip Kelly we'll see, you know, they're
Speaker 3: two and eight, but we'll see how that works out.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think Chris Peterson's doing an amazing job.
Speaker 3: I think Oregon, we've seen them have success, they can
Speaker 3: do more of that. You can have a Washington State
Speaker 3: every once in a while, but if you're good at USC,
Speaker 3: like you can do a lot so I still, Dan,
Speaker 3: I still look at it as a highly coveted job.
Speaker 3: If USC would treat it that way, I don't. I
Speaker 3: don't think the administration necessarily goes out and says, oh,
Speaker 3: they're they're going to bring in a link if in
Speaker 3: our Steve circuit, they're not going to go out and
Speaker 3: get who's the hot name that everyone wants to get
Speaker 3: and util I hadn't done that either. This is the
Speaker 3: first time they did, so we'll see how it works out.
Speaker 3: But to me, Dan, I still maybe, you know, maybe
Speaker 3: just because I'm too close to it, but I still
Speaker 3: feel like it's it's a coveted job that the right
Speaker 3: coach comes in and you can make magic happen.
Speaker 2: Will there come a point where and maybe this is
Speaker 2: wishful thinking, but will there come a point where USC
Speaker 2: fans do not compare everything to two thousand and three
Speaker 2: to twenty ten.
Speaker 3: I think for before that they compared everything to like
Speaker 3: the John McKay years. So there's there's been a like,
Speaker 3: you know, if you're either really good as a coach
Speaker 3: or bad at US, like you win a couple of
Speaker 3: national championships or you don't. And you know, Pete Carroll
Speaker 3: was one of those guys that did. But you can
Speaker 3: go back to like Howard Jones in the thirties and
Speaker 3: John McKay and John Robinson, you know, like they've guys
Speaker 3: that have, you know, won Heisman's one trophies. I think
Speaker 3: if they weren't comparing to Pete Carroll, they would compare
Speaker 3: it to any of those and that's what they want
Speaker 3: to kind of get back to, you know, they want
Speaker 3: to be able to compete. It's it's like winning the
Speaker 3: PAC twelve South is not on the high on the
Speaker 3: list of you know, USC fans don't hang.
Speaker 1: A bad or anything. They're not really excited at all.
Speaker 1: You know, we're competing for the PAC twelve South.
Speaker 3: And when you have like Clayhilton kind of talking about
Speaker 3: even this muddled mess of the PAC twelve South and
Speaker 3: that's your goal, it just it kind of falls on
Speaker 3: deaf ears. I guess you could say for the USC
Speaker 3: fan base. I don't think they demand you got to
Speaker 3: win a championship every other year or something. But if
Speaker 3: you're at least in that conversation, you want to be
Speaker 3: nationally relevant because it's it's a program that's set up
Speaker 3: to be nationally relevant. And if you if that, if
Speaker 3: USC is nationally relevant, it helps the whole PAC twelve.
Speaker 3: You just want to kind of be in that conversation.
Speaker 3: So I don't know if there will be a time
Speaker 3: because they're, you know, whoever the next coach, the next
Speaker 3: coach that wins some championships at USC, they'll probably talk
Speaker 3: about him too, but they'll always look back to even
Speaker 3: if it's not Pete Carroll, John McKay, Howard Jones, however
Speaker 3: you want that's those are the kind of errors they
Speaker 3: want to to get going again. There's there have been
Speaker 3: some good ones, but there's also times of you know,
Speaker 3: downtimes between those eras.
Speaker 2: Are there reasons to believe that if Clay Hilton is back,
Speaker 2: and I would imagine you think you're right that USC
Speaker 2: does want to bring him back like they do, not
Speaker 2: want to go through buyout and search and hoping for
Speaker 2: the best of the higher works outs. If Clay Helton
Speaker 2: is back, are there reasons to be confident that the
Speaker 2: problems USC currently has are fixable with whether it's new coaches,
Speaker 2: whether it's different recruiting strategy, whether it's change in scheme.
Speaker 2: Are these short term problems fixable?
Speaker 3: I kind of think they are I think that you
Speaker 3: want to see your head coach kind of develop and
Speaker 3: learn on the job. But I think maybe some of
Speaker 3: the lessons have been a little slower for him to
Speaker 3: pick up. But if it's a situation like a Brian
Speaker 3: Kelly from a couple of years ago, you know, they
Speaker 3: were four and eight, he completely redid the staff, yep.
Speaker 1: And you know now they're there.
Speaker 3: I'm not saying that's something USC can do, but I
Speaker 3: think they can get a lot better, I mean a
Speaker 3: lot better than five and five by making some changes.
Speaker 3: And I think it would have to be bring in
Speaker 3: a bunch of coaches that you don't know, that are threatening,
Speaker 3: that that could you know, if you screw up, they
Speaker 3: could take your job, you know that those kind of things.
Speaker 3: I think they can fix a lot of the problems.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure like he'll get you to the you know,
Speaker 3: being in the playoff conversation every year, but I think
Speaker 3: you can win the Pact, win more Pacdorf Championships if
Speaker 3: you do that, because you will get you know, there'll
Speaker 3: be a lot of good players there. You get two
Speaker 3: or three Dealer McCullough made a huge difference just one
Speaker 3: assistant coach. Yeah, last year, So I think you get
Speaker 3: a few more of those. I think you can. I
Speaker 3: think you could do things that might not make USC
Speaker 3: fans happy, because then he would win enough games to
Speaker 3: you know, save his job again. But I think he
Speaker 3: could fix a lot of that stuff in the in
Speaker 3: the short term.
Speaker 2: Well, they have a new offensive coordinator next year, if
Speaker 2: Clay Helton is back.
Speaker 3: I think that's a big issue because you look at
Speaker 3: the offense, it's really sort of like a mishmash of
Speaker 3: what you know, Lane Kiffin had and what the Sarkisian had.
Speaker 3: Neither one of those guys learned from some spread guru.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: You there's these trees that you have if you watch
Speaker 3: and guys you know how mummies or whoever they are
Speaker 3: at the top of the tree. You know, someone like
Speaker 3: Mike Leech, like, you know, he has this amazing system
Speaker 3: and if you're an assistant under him, you might learn
Speaker 3: it and go do it somewhere else. Those guys didn't
Speaker 3: really learn that from anybody amazing and do it somewhere else.
Speaker 3: So it's sort of like that's the hot thing. We're
Speaker 3: going to figure it out and do it ourselves. So
Speaker 3: for me, that would be the biggest piece, Dan is
Speaker 3: that you can't just say we're going to keep running
Speaker 3: our offense and who you switch somebody out to call plays?
Speaker 3: I think you bring in someone that just has you know,
Speaker 3: automated automic automicty.
Speaker 1: What am I like?
Speaker 2: That's a autonomous auto autonomous system.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, of control of the offense. That's a I've
Speaker 3: been speaking a lot later. I think I did like
Speaker 3: eight hours of podcasting yesterday.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so somebody would just come in and run their
Speaker 3: own system. I think that would be a huge, huge
Speaker 3: help because that would be, you know, one of the
Speaker 3: bigger pieces that you would need to fix.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they're going to do that. I
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of confidence, but I think.
Speaker 3: If they did that, that would be that would be
Speaker 3: a big, big gain for the team.
Speaker 2: That is, that is everything I have in the most
Speaker 2: I have talked about USC and a rational, mature, hopefully
Speaker 2: nuanced way, and I appreciate your time. I feel like
Speaker 2: I've learned a lot. I imagine everybody who has listened
Speaker 2: has learned a lot. So once again, everybody go out
Speaker 2: and even if you're just moderately interested in USC and
Speaker 2: USC football. Ryan does a great job. As Harv hid
Speaker 2: on there talking USC all year long on the Peristyle podcast.
Speaker 2: Check out USC football dot com if you are a fan,
Speaker 2: if you're a super fan, they will have you covered
Speaker 2: every day, every hour, all week long, all year long.
Speaker 2: You could not find a better destination for Trojan news
Speaker 2: and football. So once again, Ryan, thank you very much
Speaker 2: for your time. And is it sunny? And it just
Speaker 2: started snowing here. I am officially just I am gutted
Speaker 2: right now.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry when I when I went out there. Thank
Speaker 3: you by the way, Dan, you guys do an awesome job,
Speaker 3: and it's been great to kind of see you guys
Speaker 3: grow over the years and just you know, when you
Speaker 3: see you on Sports Center and all that stuff, it's like,
Speaker 3: this is awesome. I love that solid verbl It's great.
Speaker 3: But when I came out there, like in the summer
Speaker 3: or something, right, it wasn't cold or maybe it.
Speaker 1: Was a little cold.
Speaker 2: It was it was chilly. Yeah, okay, it was chill.
Speaker 3: It wasn't like snowy chili though, No, yeah chili, you
Speaker 3: like chili too. No, It's it's pretty nice here, Sonny
Speaker 3: and seventy. My wife is down in Tennessee, they got
Speaker 3: some snow there, so I was okay trolling her a
Speaker 3: little bit on Twitter, laughing at it. Like I said,
Speaker 3: I said, there's too much sun glare on my phone.
Speaker 3: I can't see what your picture is. Can you tell me?
Speaker 3: And it was a picture of like frost and snow
Speaker 3: in their yard and stuff. So sorry, sorry that, but
Speaker 3: you're in New York City.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know it happens. It's okay. I just realized
Speaker 2: I have to go grocery shopping soon. That's not going
Speaker 2: to be super pleasant to walk back with. But that's okay.
Speaker 2: It's a it's a sacrifice forgetting to pay a ton
Speaker 2: in rent and have rats on your commute, so you know,
Speaker 2: it's everything's a trade off. Ryan Abraham, on that note,
Speaker 2: thank you very much for your time and we'll talk soon.
Speaker 1: Sounds good, Dan, thank you.
Speaker 2: All right, Thanks again to Ryan Abraham. I hope you
Speaker 2: were able to glean some information, all right, thanks again
Speaker 2: to Ryan Abraham from USC football dot com. Hopefully you
Speaker 2: were able to download some of that information and maybe
Speaker 2: it colors your opinion of where USC stands and what
Speaker 2: they'll be doing moving forward in a little bit more
Speaker 2: complete way. And yeah, it certainly helped for me. I've
Speaker 2: always have these theories about programs and thoughts, but it
Speaker 2: you know, we have people that are actually on the
Speaker 2: ground covering them and are around the team, so it's
Speaker 2: good to lean on experts every once in a while
Speaker 2: because Ty and I, while America's college football podcast Sweethearts,
Speaker 2: are certainly by no means deep into every team. We
Speaker 2: try to be, but that's sort of an impossible thing
Speaker 2: with so many teams, So thank you very much for listening.
Speaker 2: There are shirts available i should say solidverbal dot com
Speaker 2: slash store, and they represent college football towns that we
Speaker 2: all love. But if you want to see your town
Speaker 2: get a shirt, and we really want your town to
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