Speaker 1: Welcome to the solid verbal.
Speaker 2: Hell that for me. I'm a man, I'm for I've
Speaker 2: heard so many players say, well, I want to be happy.
Speaker 1: You want to be happy for a day?
Speaker 2: Edith state is that?
Speaker 1: Woo?
Speaker 3: Woof?
Speaker 1: And Dan and Tie welcome back to the solid verbal
Speaker 1: Boys and girls. My name is Tie, his name is Dan.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining in.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, your voice the register, it's hitting.
Speaker 1: It's a Q and A episode. I did a different
Speaker 1: intro than I usually do normally. It's true muscle memory
Speaker 1: and boys and girls and no, no, no, no no, we
Speaker 1: got questions from the verballerhood. Dan, I'm going to play
Speaker 1: the sound right off.
Speaker 3: The right off the congratulation, Skippy, you've got mail, You've
Speaker 3: got mail?
Speaker 1: On the solid verbal? Mix it up here a little
Speaker 1: bit at the top, sir, how are you?
Speaker 2: I'm good. We're recording. This is today President's Day? Did
Speaker 2: I get that right?
Speaker 1: Believe so? Yes? Correct?
Speaker 2: Who's your least favorite president ever?
Speaker 1: Tye?
Speaker 2: Well, right on the spot ty, do you have any
Speaker 2: John Tyler thoughts.
Speaker 1: No, Why don't we just move on to a different plage.
Speaker 1: I don't want to get in hot water. There is
Speaker 1: a college football show man.
Speaker 2: That's fair all right, how are you. I'm good, Ty,
Speaker 2: I'm good. We have a number of really really strong questions.
Speaker 2: I just had a smoothie because I'm trying to do right,
Speaker 2: trying to get tight, get right. I turned forty this year, Ti,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm trying to live my life. So I'm
Speaker 2: very excited for these questions and I'm a little bit
Speaker 2: bummed out and I'm sure we're going to get into
Speaker 2: it because we're in that zone. Right it's too far
Speaker 2: ahead of the draft. Spring practice isn't really a thing
Speaker 2: yet because it's what mid to late February as we
Speaker 2: record this, The National Championship has done, recruiting is done.
Speaker 2: That there seems like there's not a lot to talk about.
Speaker 2: But something that everybody can agree on is things are
Speaker 2: looking sad for the PAC twelve, even worse than what
Speaker 2: we thought they would be, and that makes me sad, Ty.
Speaker 2: So I'm trying to stay positive with my outlook here
Speaker 2: this morning. We've got a lot of good quality college
Speaker 2: football questions, but I wish there was something more positive
Speaker 2: that we could hang our hats on. In terms of news.
Speaker 1: Well, look, we put a call out across Twitter, across Instagram,
Speaker 1: across obviously our Patreon over at Theballers dot com, both
Speaker 1: on Discord and on Patreon proper to get some last
Speaker 1: minute questions to put this show together. We as always
Speaker 1: got great questions that I'm excited to dive into with
Speaker 1: you email as well, still a thing, you know, sliverbo
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. We had questions there that we're
Speaker 1: going to try and go as go through as many
Speaker 1: as we can. If we have to, we'll break it
Speaker 1: off into two shows, but we won't put the cart
Speaker 1: before the horse here. We'll see how we do. Don't
Speaker 1: forget to hit subscribe or follow whatever your podcasting app
Speaker 1: of choice allows you to do. Dan and I will
Speaker 1: be with you all throughout the long cold months of
Speaker 1: the offseason at a minimum twice a week. Of course,
Speaker 1: you can get bonus content if you're going out to
Speaker 1: Verballers dot com. Last, but certainly not least, we got
Speaker 1: a newsletter, quick Slants dot Sliverble dot com. I'm putting
Speaker 1: that out every Thursday if you were ever so inclined.
Speaker 1: If you want just like a quick wrap up with
Speaker 1: a little bit of personality, not too much, I don't
Speaker 1: want to scare people away, but a little bit of personality,
Speaker 1: a little bit of college football news every Thursday afternoon. Dan,
Speaker 1: that's what we're doing, all right.
Speaker 2: I love to see you're doing a bang up job
Speaker 2: with quick slants.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I wrote like seventeen hundred words last week,
Speaker 1: which is a little great. It's a little long in
Speaker 1: the tooth, But I'll be honest with you, Ty, I
Speaker 1: thought your fingers were retired, Settle. I thought you were
Speaker 1: done with that kind of just action. There are a
Speaker 1: lot of people pursuit. There are a lot of we
Speaker 1: know a lot of people who got their start as
Speaker 1: writers sports writers and then migrated over into podcasting and
Speaker 1: just can't write anymore, yeah, or don't have the desired
Speaker 1: right anywhere video TV.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I'm trying to I mean, I guess I kind
Speaker 1: of got my start that way, but I'm now trying
Speaker 1: to migrate back in the other direction a little bit.
Speaker 3: It.
Speaker 2: Do you feel like you fulfilled the promise and the
Speaker 2: title of the next great American sports writer circa twenty.
Speaker 1: Circle, two thousand and six.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was the honor and title bestowed upon you.
Speaker 2: Do you feel like you attained that you sort of
Speaker 2: moved in the direction of that potential or no.
Speaker 1: You know that was seventeen years ago.
Speaker 2: Somebody has been born and started driving and connected they're
Speaker 2: being recruited. Were born around the.
Speaker 1: Same time I won that damn contest. Yeah. Also, on
Speaker 1: a related note, before we get into real questions, Dan
Speaker 1: and I had a lengthy discussion earlier about graying temples.
Speaker 3: So yeah, with that being said, here's the sound again.
Speaker 3: Congratulations Skippy, you've got mail. You've got mail on the
Speaker 3: solid ruble.
Speaker 1: We do this as often as we can, definitely a
Speaker 1: little bit more frequent in the off season, Dan, But
Speaker 1: why don't we dive right, and we will start with
Speaker 1: some questions that we got regarding the news. We will
Speaker 1: start with a question from me to you.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm ready.
Speaker 1: I sent this one into my own damn show, Dan Rubinstein. Yeah,
Speaker 1: are college football games too long?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: I saw this topic this.
Speaker 1: N the news.
Speaker 2: Are they too long?
Speaker 1: And how do you feel about any of the proposals
Speaker 1: to try and make them shorter? So a little bit
Speaker 1: of context.
Speaker 2: Give me the content. It's Greg Sankye, Yes, it's yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, basically, this is a question that stemmed from
Speaker 1: a tweet from a write up that our friend Rossdellager
Speaker 1: over at St. Sid dot com put out earlier today.
Speaker 1: And it all stems from this growing sense I guess
Speaker 1: that college football games are getting a little bit, a
Speaker 1: little bit too long. Right, There are four proposals that
Speaker 1: are currently under consideration to try and shorten games. Number one,
Speaker 1: prohibiting consecutive timeouts, i e. Icing kickers that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Number two, no untimed downs at the end of first
Speaker 1: or third quarters.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Three the clock runs after first downs except inside of
Speaker 1: two minutes in a half. And four the clock runs
Speaker 1: on incompletions once the ball is spotted. Now, okay, some
Speaker 1: interesting idea is there for reference, just as a reference point.
Speaker 1: Another reference point, the average NFL game takes about three
Speaker 1: hours and twelve minutes. College football games, at least at
Speaker 1: last check around the end of September this year, were
Speaker 1: about twenty minutes longer three hours thirty two minutes, which
Speaker 1: is a long time. Is as of September, that number
Speaker 1: probably came down a little bits.
Speaker 2: That's the standard window as well, right, the TV window.
Speaker 2: It's a new Eastern. I mean, obviously things are staggered
Speaker 2: in different ways, but it's a new Eastern. And then
Speaker 2: the next big window is the three thirty eastern right.
Speaker 1: And then just as a non football reference point, the
Speaker 1: average Major League Baseball game last season was a shade
Speaker 1: over three hours, three hours and three minutes. So look,
Speaker 1: we've been hearing complaints about the length of college football
Speaker 1: games for a good long time. It seems as if
Speaker 1: there are some proposals on the table that could be
Speaker 1: recommended to a rules committee, which could be enacted at
Speaker 1: some point. But where do you stand as a father
Speaker 1: of two, as a college football full time college football podcaster? Yeah,
Speaker 1: obviously as a college football fan? Or games too long?
Speaker 2: Probably? But the caveat and I tweeted this out. We
Speaker 2: were I was talking digitally with Andy Stables. Is brag
Speaker 2: much that I know? Andy Stables? I don't think it's
Speaker 2: the games. I don't think there's too much football. I
Speaker 2: don't think the football lasts too long. It's the totality
Speaker 2: of the TV broadcast. Like with our exact rules, if
Speaker 2: there were an untelevised game for whatever reason, if this
Speaker 2: were nineteen ninety eight and it was a pay per
Speaker 2: view Oklahoma Kansas State game or something, my guess is
Speaker 2: we'd be talking about a football game that's closer to
Speaker 2: two hours and twenty six minutes rather than three hours
Speaker 2: and thirty two minutes because of commercials. The issue with
Speaker 2: football is that it's an incredibly a rhythmic sport, especially
Speaker 2: in person, right where the game's happening, and then oh,
Speaker 2: there's the TV ref with the Neon orange you know,
Speaker 2: headset and armband sleeve whatever. Who is telling people Nobody
Speaker 2: on the field until I say it's okay. It's incredibly
Speaker 2: a rhythmic, which does not make for a fun experience
Speaker 2: in person or on TV when you get the touchdown commercial,
Speaker 2: kickoff commercial, and then it's the beginning of a new
Speaker 2: drive that's you know, that has that CBS feel to it.
Speaker 2: When it would be that huge Alabama LSU game and
Speaker 2: it would just be commercial sandwiches all the time, it
Speaker 2: would be a buffet of commercials. And so I just
Speaker 2: think we need to rethink. With so much money pouring
Speaker 2: into these TV deals and obviously networks needing to recoup
Speaker 2: that money via commercials, what's kind of rethink how I
Speaker 2: don't know advertisers are charged. Maybe there are fewer advertisers
Speaker 2: and it's more of a premium because oh, there's only
Speaker 2: going to be two commercials during commercial breaks instead of
Speaker 2: five or something. I don't think college football fans by
Speaker 2: and large have a problem with three and a half
Speaker 2: hour games per se. If a majority of that is football,
Speaker 2: I think they have a problem with the oh I
Speaker 2: mana ja Applebee's on a Friday n whatever. Those awful.
Speaker 2: And I know I just conflated two different things. A
Speaker 2: song in an Apple base.
Speaker 1: It's okay, it's okay, they're run.
Speaker 2: But w'ah' wah bah blah blah blah, and like having
Speaker 2: pitball and having Fansville and like it's cute for a
Speaker 2: week and then all of a sudden, you've you've watched
Speaker 2: more of Fansville than you have Jake Browning or whatever.
Speaker 2: And so I think it's on the TV networks who
Speaker 2: now own the sports, to figure out how to make
Speaker 2: the best possible TV product, because, like you mentioned, it's
Speaker 2: one of those things where it's not necessarily that the
Speaker 2: game is too long. It's that not everybody is like
Speaker 2: us and consumes the sport the way that we do,
Speaker 2: which is ten, twelve, fourteen hours each Saturday. It's I'm
Speaker 2: an Arkansas fan. I want to watch the Arkansas game,
Speaker 2: and I want to watch USC Oregon or Ohio State Michigan,
Speaker 2: and they're not sitting there for twelve fourteen hours. And
Speaker 2: so people try to plan their days around the games
Speaker 2: they care about most. And if they're saying, Okay, this
Speaker 2: game starts at you know, three point thirty Eastern, dinner
Speaker 2: should be cool, and then all of a sudden it
Speaker 2: goes to overtime and it's eight pm or something, it's
Speaker 2: not great. I don't think Again, I think people like,
Speaker 2: or love, or are obsessed with watching football, they're just
Speaker 2: not obsessed with Applebee's commercials and the place that those
Speaker 2: things have in our life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one of the notions that I was sensing across
Speaker 1: social media is, well, if you're a real college football fan,
Speaker 1: it shouldn't matter should mar right, It should't matter how
Speaker 1: long the game is. If you like the sport, you're
Speaker 1: in it.
Speaker 2: It's it's like identity politics, right, Everything is identity politics,
Speaker 2: Like you have to prove that you are the most
Speaker 2: true college football fan with that kind to take.
Speaker 1: And I just, I just I don't agree with that.
Speaker 1: I think attention spans are shorter now than they've ever
Speaker 1: been before. I think our phones are probably part to
Speaker 1: blame for that, But that's not the only thing. I
Speaker 1: think surely, if a game is good, if you've got
Speaker 1: a fifty one to fifty two thriller, it doesn't matter
Speaker 1: how long that game is. Most games aren't like that,
Speaker 1: so there has to be a happy medium. What I
Speaker 1: found notable in the proposals that Ross laid out in
Speaker 1: his tweet and his article no mention of replay. No
Speaker 1: mention of I mean, replay for sure has played a
Speaker 1: huge role in lengthening these games. And for as much
Speaker 1: as I'm a supporter of replay, when they have to
Speaker 1: keep going back to look at a play and then
Speaker 1: another play, it seems like it happened more often than
Speaker 1: not this past season, where you had like consecutive plays
Speaker 1: being reviewed. That tends to be a little bit much.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if there is some way we
Speaker 1: can automate the whole replay to a greater degree to
Speaker 1: maybe knock a little bit of time off of that.
Speaker 1: One of the other things that Ross called out is
Speaker 1: that eventually they'd like to get to a system where
Speaker 1: there's a challenge type system like they've got in the NFL,
Speaker 1: where maybe not everything is automatically replayed, but coaches can
Speaker 1: challenge and you know, we're familiar with that from the NFL.
Speaker 1: Maybe that is the next iteration of replay to try
Speaker 1: and shorten things. But look, I'm in favor of this.
Speaker 1: People are busy. People are busy the weekends. For the
Speaker 1: overwhelming majority of the football loving population, it's a time
Speaker 1: when you should be able to kick back and relax
Speaker 1: and you don't have to work, or if you do
Speaker 1: have to work, maybe there's a way that you can
Speaker 1: follow the game on your phone and like get enjoyment
Speaker 1: from the game, Like it's supposed to be something that
Speaker 1: we enjoy, and when it starts feeling like it is
Speaker 1: taking too long, when people stop losing or when people
Speaker 1: start losing interest in it, that to me sort of
Speaker 1: defeats the purpose. So to your point, Yeah, if it's
Speaker 1: a TV product, if I think the veils are off here,
Speaker 1: and we all know that college football is being run
Speaker 1: by the TV networks, then let's find a way to
Speaker 1: make it as appealing as we can. One other idea
Speaker 1: that you know, I know they've they've talked to various
Speaker 1: TV executives over the years on the topic of commercials.
Speaker 1: Let's get creative about how we do in game advertising. Sure,
Speaker 1: right does not everything needs to break away from the action.
Speaker 1: You know, we got graphics, we got the first and
Speaker 1: tent line can be sponsored by Wendy's. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm not a TV executive, but you get the point.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, after that kickoff, instead of going to commercial
Speaker 2: as the teams enter the field or something like that,
Speaker 2: then you have brad Nessler, say, introducing Applebee's new you know,
Speaker 2: chicken tinga Nacho's. Boy do they look great? Look at
Speaker 2: those things? All right, let's get going. It's not the worst.
Speaker 2: It probably affects the bottom line of a bunch of
Speaker 2: you know, wide and in Kennedy type places, the ad
Speaker 2: firms that are producing all of these commercials. But also
Speaker 2: if it's a sport owned by TV networks, the onus
Speaker 2: is on them to make this the best possible TV show.
Speaker 2: And so the a rhythmic nature gets people changing the channel.
Speaker 2: Like you said, it's replay, it's commercials. It's a delay
Speaker 2: for this, a delay for that. And I think it
Speaker 2: just behooves everybody to even if it's not a demonstrably
Speaker 2: shorter game, if it's a much more rhythmic experience, I
Speaker 2: think that's the way you capture people and keep them
Speaker 2: locked into your chair.
Speaker 1: Here's a free idea please for the TV people that
Speaker 1: are watching out.
Speaker 2: There, big fat cats with the networks.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Dan. That was a great voice for the
Speaker 1: people that are listening that have any stake in this game,
Speaker 1: which is most assuredly nobody. But if you are in
Speaker 1: any position of influence. We know this in the podcast world,
Speaker 1: but when we read an ad, it does better then
Speaker 1: when it sort of gets cut in from somebody else.
Speaker 1: And there are reasons that you do one versus the
Speaker 1: We're not going to go into that. We would encourage
Speaker 1: everybody to listen to the ads, of course, but we
Speaker 1: know from our numbers that that's what people pay most
Speaker 1: attention to, So find some way to do that. Can
Speaker 1: you get a player to read it. Can you get
Speaker 1: somebody from the team to read Can you get Quinn
Speaker 1: Kessenick to read it on the sidelines, to do whatever
Speaker 1: ad reads you have to do. That's one way they
Speaker 1: keep people sort of engaged and and not lose interest,
Speaker 1: not have people tuning away.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree. I think priority number one for
Speaker 2: all of these networks, aside from completely destroying the sport,
Speaker 2: which has been the priority in these past couple of years.
Speaker 1: Trend a little bit.
Speaker 2: The trend, yeah, is to find a way to make
Speaker 2: this a TV show that people stay locked in on,
Speaker 2: and traditional advertising has not been a super fun watch.
Speaker 2: I don't think for a lot of people. As we
Speaker 2: gravitate towards a more streaming universe, that promises fewer and
Speaker 2: fewer of the visual of taking in doctor or taking
Speaker 2: in all of these. You know, American Family Insurance congrats
Speaker 2: on the free pub.
Speaker 1: Not a sponsor, could be not sure.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I think one of those things is. One
Speaker 2: of the big ideas with this is you can't rest right.
Speaker 2: We've seen a lot of sports come and go like
Speaker 2: this is the next big thing, this is going to
Speaker 2: be huge forever, and then ratings take a dip and
Speaker 2: then they have to rethink where they broadcast and how
Speaker 2: they broadcast. Right, Nascar was the next big sport. Right.
Speaker 2: You have to be forward thinking with this. You have
Speaker 2: to be three steps ahead with an issue and right
Speaker 2: now unless something and look, if it's a rules thing,
Speaker 2: it's a rules thing, but you want to say, you
Speaker 2: want to promise that you are concerned about player safety
Speaker 2: and they should have fewer plays. Great, but also the
Speaker 2: experience needs to be. I mean, the in person experience
Speaker 2: has suffered and the TV experience has suffered. So what
Speaker 2: does that tell us? We need to go forward and
Speaker 2: move forward as a sport, not stay where we are
Speaker 2: or look backwards. Look if you want to eliminate replay.
Speaker 2: Speaking of moving backwards, I'll listen to that conversation. I
Speaker 2: know it's going to cause a whole set of like, well,
Speaker 2: this team lost by three, Well, this toe is clearly
Speaker 2: in bounds dragging through the end zone for the game
Speaker 2: winning catch that was called out of bounds or incomplete
Speaker 2: or whatever. I understand that's a whole new host of issues.
Speaker 2: But I don't know. A rhythmic football game might be
Speaker 2: enough for me, as a jaded college football fan, to
Speaker 2: be able to make peace with that. I'd be willing
Speaker 2: to listen to the pros and cons of eliminating replay.
Speaker 2: At this point, let's go to Brad from Patreon. Yes, Dan,
Speaker 2: you're a PAC twelve guy.
Speaker 3: Mmmm.
Speaker 1: Explain to me why George Clavicle's plan George Klee of
Speaker 1: coough excuse me, Brad? Yeah, to bring SMU and San
Speaker 1: Diego State into the conference would make any sense whatsoever?
Speaker 1: I can't rumoredly. Yeah, I can't see any real tangible
Speaker 1: value that justifies adding them. So yeah, this is rumor,
Speaker 1: but it's it's probably a very poorly kept secret. At
Speaker 1: this point. There was a tweet that you sent me
Speaker 1: from a gentleman, Jason Sheer said that at Arizona. At
Speaker 1: a Swim and Dive championship banquet in Houston yesterday, the
Speaker 1: San Diego State Athletic director told people that the Aztecs
Speaker 1: will be joining the PAC twelve. It will be announced soon.
Speaker 1: So you know this has been reported for a while,
Speaker 1: that the rumors have been there for a while. Where
Speaker 1: are you at as a PAC twelve fan? How do
Speaker 1: you feel about all this is it? Does it make sense?
Speaker 1: Is it good for the conference?
Speaker 2: I feel like as I hear a dog barking in
Speaker 2: the background, who your Your dog must have a lot
Speaker 2: of thoughts. You know, she can go to football. She
Speaker 2: tends to get boisterous. Yeah now she is right now
Speaker 2: whenever we talk about things that disgruntle us one way
Speaker 2: or the other. Okay, So this is obviously two major markets,
Speaker 2: you know, the Dallas Fort Worth market with SMU and
Speaker 2: San Diego, which I don't think is an enormous, enormous market.
Speaker 2: But it's a big place, bigger than Eugene, Oregon. It's
Speaker 2: bigger than Palo Alto, bigger than Palwot, I guess is
Speaker 2: part of the broader Bayry and Silicon Valley, but bigger
Speaker 2: than Pullman, Washington. And so I look at San Diego
Speaker 2: State and like, okay, this is an interesting at least,
Speaker 2: right They've had big basketball success, which is not the
Speaker 2: most there's not the sport we're talking about here, but
Speaker 2: as it's a huge, huge campus, I think a ton
Speaker 2: of kids. Enrollment's pretty huge at San Diego State. They
Speaker 2: have a history of winning football over the past decade
Speaker 2: twelve fifteen years. You know, Brady Hope part one, Rocky
Speaker 2: Long and now Brady Hope once again. Big names have
Speaker 2: come out of that program. I didn't realize the number
Speaker 2: of names associated with San Diego State, by the way,
Speaker 2: like a ton of NFL coaches, obviously Marshall Fox going
Speaker 2: back to the nineties. Like it has been a program,
Speaker 2: not a major program, but that has had an impact
Speaker 2: on the sport at large. They have the new stadium,
Speaker 2: they don't have an NFL team anymore, they have a
Speaker 2: Major League Baseball team, they don't have an NBA team,
Speaker 2: And with UCLA and USC leaving, I assume there's still
Speaker 2: gonna be a lot of interest in LA and Southern
Speaker 2: California and UCLA and USC football. But if there are
Speaker 2: a host of three star borderline three four star type
Speaker 2: kids who don't get that USC and UCLA offer but
Speaker 2: have the ability to stay in Southern California and go
Speaker 2: to San Diego State, whereas maybe they had otherwise thought well,
Speaker 2: I'll go to Arizona, or I'll go to cal or
Speaker 2: I'll go to Oregon State or something like that, you
Speaker 2: can build up the roster to a power five level
Speaker 2: at San Diego State. Of course, so that to me
Speaker 2: is at least interesting if you're talking about schools to
Speaker 2: add value to the conference because of its location, because
Speaker 2: it has a winning infrastructure to a certain point, SMU
Speaker 2: hasn't had that as long in the recent past. And
Speaker 2: I also think where SMU is located, it's like in
Speaker 2: fourteenth place in terms of interest of team, right because
Speaker 2: you're talking about Okay, obviously the Cowboys and Texas football
Speaker 2: and Oklahoma football. You have a playoff team in TCU,
Speaker 2: a small footprint in terms of an alumni base. But
Speaker 2: you have the MAVs, you have the Texas Rangers right
Speaker 2: that they'd say, a completely saturated market. And so SMU
Speaker 2: going from big G five conference to smallish medium power
Speaker 2: five conference whatever, the PAC ten to twelve ends up
Speaker 2: looking like this is as an outsider, and it's an
Speaker 2: assumption and it's a guess how much does that actually
Speaker 2: move the needle for local fans? Are people going to
Speaker 2: swarm to SMU games because Oregon State or cal or
Speaker 2: Arizona States in town when so much of that area
Speaker 2: is consumed with fandom too much larger, large organizations, So
Speaker 2: that to me is just sort of there's somebody we
Speaker 2: can add, but not really And so big picture, I
Speaker 2: think the PAC twelve is in a lot of trouble.
Speaker 2: If if George Clavicle can find a bunch of money
Speaker 2: via ESPN and streaming services, Amazon obviously is the big name,
Speaker 2: so be it. Good on him. But in terms of
Speaker 2: the future of the conference, if you can get that
Speaker 2: twenty five to thirty million dollars per year, it's you know,
Speaker 2: it's still dwarfed by the big ten in the SEC.
Speaker 2: But if you can get around that number and you
Speaker 2: can get Washington and Oregon at least short term on
Speaker 2: board to see what can happen with the conference. It's
Speaker 2: a big win for those two schools because their path
Speaker 2: of the playoff is super smooth. Right that those are
Speaker 2: the two teams right now that seem to be building
Speaker 2: towards Okay, we're in a good spot to get into
Speaker 2: a twelve team playoff. We have a smooth sailing through
Speaker 2: this conference because Cal and Stanford and Washington State and
Speaker 2: Oregon State and the Arizona schools will not build up
Speaker 2: rosters in this way. Utah's right there. I left Utah out. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: Utah's also there with Oregon and Washington. They're just not
Speaker 2: that big name, organizational franchise type name that is coveted
Speaker 2: on a national level. But yeah, it's smooth sailing for
Speaker 2: those schools. But then what is the Big twelve going
Speaker 2: to offer? Right? How much do you want to be
Speaker 2: in on the ground floor of what essentially becomes a startup.
Speaker 2: I don't know. Man, If I'm Oregon and I'm Washington,
Speaker 2: I sign on short term and see how USC and
Speaker 2: UCLA like being on an island in the Big ten.
Speaker 2: They're gonna make a ton of money. But you know
Speaker 2: that kind of travel is going to become a lot
Speaker 2: for those schools. And if the Big ten is looking
Speaker 2: to compete with the SEC to have that big Western division,
Speaker 2: you could see that being attractive. I'm sure Oregon and
Speaker 2: Washington would snap up a Big Ten offer in a
Speaker 2: matter of seconds if it came their way. I just
Speaker 2: it's hard to see a PAC twelve existing with San
Speaker 2: Diego State and SMU existing on anywhere near the level
Speaker 2: of the SEC and Big Ten come twenty thirty.
Speaker 1: Right, here's another question for you.
Speaker 2: Do you have any thoughts as an outsider.
Speaker 1: Well, my thoughts as an outsider are I don't feel
Speaker 1: if I were a PACK twelve.
Speaker 2: Because I'm a stakeholder. I want Oregon to succeed. I
Speaker 2: want Oregon to be on the national stage and keep succeeding.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I like the PAC twelve and I
Speaker 1: don't want want to see this kind of turmoil surrounding
Speaker 1: the conference. I think it sucks royally that USC and
Speaker 1: UCLA are leaving. I will always associate USC UCLA with
Speaker 1: the PAC twelve as many people will, you know, as
Speaker 1: many do with the Houston Astros in the NL. Right,
Speaker 1: that type of it's one of those deals. For me
Speaker 1: as a sports fan, my thought is, without any real
Speaker 1: skin in the game, is that when I see a
Speaker 1: Twitter posting like the one that we saw about a
Speaker 1: week ago. Now, the joint statement quote the ten PC
Speaker 1: twelve universities look forward to consummating successful media rights deals
Speaker 1: in the very near future based upon positive conversations with
Speaker 1: multiple potential mediaized partners over the past few weeks. We
Speaker 1: remain highly confident in our future growth. And I'm not
Speaker 1: going to read the rest of it. If you have
Speaker 1: to say that that doesn't leave me feeling confident. I
Speaker 1: post that at all. That to me was a little
Speaker 1: bit weird. And I do think that they're like the
Speaker 1: article has been written. This isn't my idea. I think
Speaker 1: there's an outside chance that the whole thing could go
Speaker 1: bust depending on how these media rites negotiations go. There's
Speaker 1: a chance the whole thing could go boom that if
Speaker 1: they can't come to an agreement that's beneficial for everybody.
Speaker 1: We're staring down the barrel of more conference realignment as
Speaker 1: a result of PAC twelve or PAC ten or whatever
Speaker 1: this is, you know, inability to get a deal done.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's likely. But I think the fact
Speaker 1: that that's on the table at all, that people have
Speaker 1: written that article at all in February of twenty twenty three, right,
Speaker 1: I don't know, that doesn't leave me feeling all that
Speaker 1: confident about where things head next. So, you know, the
Speaker 1: San Diego state move, you know California better than I do. Right,
Speaker 1: you know California much better than I do. Pulling SMU
Speaker 1: into this potentially, you know, again, it feels a little
Speaker 1: weird to me. I don't know. It just seems like
Speaker 1: you're trying to get numbers as opposed to adding real quality,
Speaker 1: no offense to SMU people out there. So I don't know.
Speaker 1: They're in a very awkward spot now because of those
Speaker 1: two California schools deciding to go and join the Big ten.
Speaker 2: I still am a proponent, and I have no idea
Speaker 2: how feasible it is, because all of the sudden, it's
Speaker 2: not a network necessarily negotiating or it's not, excuse me,
Speaker 2: a conference negotiating with networks. I'm a big proponent of
Speaker 2: the What is it when they unlike the NFL red zone,
Speaker 2: never we're.
Speaker 1: Like, we're going four wide, four wide, so many teams.
Speaker 2: In the red zone. Yeah one Oregon, Washington, the Bay
Speaker 2: Area schools. I'm still micro conference Dan, That's where I'm at.
Speaker 2: Negotiate your deal, have deals with the ACC, have deals
Speaker 2: with the Big twelve, have deals with the Big ten. Right,
Speaker 2: so you get all these matchups. Have a deal with
Speaker 2: Notre Dame, like an annual rotating Oregon or Washington or
Speaker 2: Stanford with Notre Dame. That seems like a win, Well,
Speaker 2: that seems like a huge win. Give Notre Dame two
Speaker 2: home games to your one, fine whatever. Sign all sorts
Speaker 2: of deals and go four wide with those that they're
Speaker 2: in the same geographic footprints, so you can still travel
Speaker 2: relatively local. You play each other, and you sign deals
Speaker 2: with other conferences, and you get to that number, that
Speaker 2: magic number, while controlling your own TV deals. Right because
Speaker 2: right now Oregon and Washington kind of have George Clavicle
Speaker 2: by the Gonads for lack of a better term. So
Speaker 2: now are they going to get more money like USC
Speaker 2: probably should have been getting from the PAC twelve under
Speaker 2: Larry Scott. It's entirely possible that they're going to sign
Speaker 2: twenty nine million dollar deals and some of the smaller
Speaker 2: PAC twelve schools are going to sign twenty three million
Speaker 2: dollar deals. So I'm still that micro conference for wid microe.
Speaker 1: Or wide kind of guy. Yeah, this is by the way,
Speaker 1: this is directly from Dennis dot article. I was looking
Speaker 1: for it as I was saying it. Quote. Industry sources
Speaker 1: still project a meteorizes deal split between ESPN and Amazon
Speaker 1: for the Unbattled conference. However, However, however, the dissolution of
Speaker 1: the PAC twelve is being talked about openly in those
Speaker 1: same industry circles as a potential consequence if the league
Speaker 1: does not wrap up its deal soon. Right, the fact
Speaker 1: that it could happen in these tenuous times is enough
Speaker 1: to project what the process might look like. So that
Speaker 1: does not instill confidence in it.
Speaker 2: No, I mean, look, the most realistic way this all
Speaker 2: falls apart is the Arizona Schools, the Corner Schools, Arizona Schools, Colorado,
Speaker 2: Utah joining the Big twelve. So the Big twelve is
Speaker 2: now trying to compete with the other mega conferences without
Speaker 2: the headline names. But in terms of the depth of
Speaker 2: quality teams, they're approaching. They're absolutely approaching. When you add Utah,
Speaker 2: who's been a top ten, twelve to fifteen national program. Lately,
Speaker 2: Colorado has more juice because of Dion. You know Arizona.
Speaker 2: Both Arizona schools have been to conference championship games, so
Speaker 2: we know what those look like built up. So then
Speaker 2: the Big twelve becomes a lot more interesting. And then
Speaker 2: you're left with the Bay Area schools and the Pacific
Speaker 2: Northwest schools, and so then you're gonna see the sharks,
Speaker 2: right the sharks are going to be swimming in the
Speaker 2: water for that chum. And somebody's gonna pick up Oregon
Speaker 2: and Washington. Be it the Big ten, be it you know,
Speaker 2: some sort of affiliation with other conferences, but not fully
Speaker 2: joining the other conferences. And then where does that leave
Speaker 2: Oregon State in Washington STI.
Speaker 1: I mean, it puts us right back to where we
Speaker 1: were like a year ago. It brings us right back
Speaker 1: into the meat of that discussion where you know, honestly,
Speaker 1: if we're talking about one whole conference shuddering and teams scattering,
Speaker 1: now we're talking about what happens with Notre Dame. Now
Speaker 1: we're talking about what happens for Florida state conferences. It's crazy,
Speaker 1: but you know, we're starting to have those types of
Speaker 1: conversations again, and we're right back to square one. People
Speaker 1: were not happy about that conversation with regard to USC
Speaker 1: and UCLA. Yeah, people were. People were very affected by that,
Speaker 1: and we saw a lot of the emails in the comments.
Speaker 1: It left a lot of people feeling like college football
Speaker 1: was going to a bad, dark place, and you know,
Speaker 1: maybe it's still headed there, but we'll see where this goes.
Speaker 1: The PAC twelve definitely interesting to follow.
Speaker 2: Would have been interesting. I know there were conversations right
Speaker 2: the Big twelve and PAC twelve aligning themselves with each other,
Speaker 2: but they couldn't figure it out in terms of a
Speaker 2: value add and like is it worth it to add
Speaker 2: these teams into like a semi deal or something like that.
Speaker 2: You know, that would have been a move from the
Speaker 2: PAC twelve signaling we don't have anywhere else and have
Speaker 2: no other exit plans, so we're going to take twenty
Speaker 2: two million dollars each instead of you know, gambling on
Speaker 2: ourselves in the opening in the open market. And so
Speaker 2: that would have been a signal that it was waving
Speaker 2: the white flag as a sovereign nation.
Speaker 1: Neat Case Scott on Instagram, what's the best SEC schedule
Speaker 1: format for the fans? For the fans. So speaking of
Speaker 1: Super conferences, yeah, we got news last week Texas and
Speaker 1: Oklahoma officially joining the SEC starting with the twenty twenty
Speaker 1: four season. Twenty twenty four season, by the way, is
Speaker 1: shaping up to be a pretty monumental season. It's not
Speaker 1: just when I think we're gonna get what USC and
Speaker 1: UCLA over in the Big Ten, but obviously Texas and
Speaker 1: Oklahoma now joining the SEC, the start of the new
Speaker 1: playoff format, the twelve team playoff format also get the
Speaker 1: video game in twenty twenty four, So a lot happening
Speaker 1: this season after this one that's coming up here at
Speaker 1: the end of twenty twenty three. But I think as
Speaker 1: a result of going up to what sixteen teams now
Speaker 1: in the SEC, they are going to be doing a
Speaker 1: way with the divisional model that they've had. This is
Speaker 1: the last year for it in twenty twenty three, and
Speaker 1: they're going to be changing up how they schedule games.
Speaker 1: So there are two formats that it appears the SEC
Speaker 1: is centered around, and it's been this way for a while.
Speaker 1: The first is eight conference games with one permanent rival
Speaker 1: or nine conference games with three permanent which is the
Speaker 1: format that you most prefer.
Speaker 2: I like the three permanent rivals. I like three permanent rivals,
Speaker 2: and I like, get me some ping pong balls on TV, right,
Speaker 2: get me some representative from Texas A and M reaching
Speaker 2: into a big old bag of ping pong balls and
Speaker 2: having conspiracy theories around it and having to raise up
Speaker 2: and you. And I don't know why they're using a
Speaker 2: vaguely European accent, but I think that's going to be requirements,
Speaker 2: and I am for that. I am for three permanent rivals. Well,
Speaker 2: it was three permanent rivals or what.
Speaker 1: Three permanent rivals nine conference games and three permanent rivals
Speaker 1: or eight conference games in one permanent rival?
Speaker 2: Oh, the three? Definitely the three. There's too much bad
Speaker 2: blood and there's too much scar tissue within that conference already.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if it's a thing where you
Speaker 2: split it into microdivisions where it's just four four team divisions,
Speaker 2: if my math is right, sixteen total teams, whatever the
Speaker 2: case is, I want the three. I want, you know,
Speaker 2: I want Alabama to be every year playing Tennessee, Auburn
Speaker 2: and LSU. I just do. And I'm good. I think
Speaker 2: enough teams can figure out enough permanent rivals that makes sense,
Speaker 2: and then the rest of it is open. The rest
Speaker 2: of it is open. The rest of it's ping pong balls.
Speaker 2: So we got all the teams playing all the teams
Speaker 2: much more often than we do now, and we have
Speaker 2: some sort of ceremony, and you know, it's a big
Speaker 2: deal in whatever it is in January or February or
Speaker 2: something like that, when the scheduled are determined FIFA style
Speaker 2: and there's already there's already conspiracy theories. Now why not
Speaker 2: put those conspiracy theories in four K on the SEC?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 1: I love it, I love it. Yeah, I'm with you.
Speaker 1: I'm with nine and three. I think the nine and
Speaker 1: three model is the one that that I like the most.
Speaker 1: You may not be an SEC fan. I know we
Speaker 1: got a lot of Midwesterners that listen to this show.
Speaker 1: May not be a big fan of the of the SEC.
Speaker 1: And that's fine. It's you're right. It is good for
Speaker 1: it is good football. It is I think the highest
Speaker 1: level conference in college football, and so I want to
Speaker 1: see more of that. And I like the fact that
Speaker 1: in doing a way with the divisional structure, it means
Speaker 1: a team like Georgia is not going to be locked
Speaker 1: into playing Vanderbilt in South Carolina and Kentucky every year.
Speaker 1: No disrespect to those schools, but I'd like to see
Speaker 1: what Georgia can do against some other opponents on a
Speaker 1: more regular basis. And this would get us to that point.
Speaker 1: This would get us to the point of not having
Speaker 1: to wait twelve years in between matchups against some other
Speaker 1: hated rivals or competitive schools on the other side of
Speaker 1: the conference.
Speaker 2: It also more openly integrates Texas and Oklahoma. Absolutely, it
Speaker 2: weaves them into the fabric of the SEC, the quilt
Speaker 2: that is SEC football. So you get Texas and Williams
Speaker 2: Price and in Kneeland and in Sanford and in Tuscaloosa.
Speaker 2: Well you get Texas Tuscalosa this year, right, But then
Speaker 2: you get Florida in Norman, you get Ole Miss in Norman,
Speaker 2: you get Tennessee at Texas, you get that more often
Speaker 2: where you get all of the fan bases intermingling a
Speaker 2: little bit more, the schools intermingling a little bit more.
Speaker 2: And if it is this new era of SEC football,
Speaker 2: you know it's it's, for lack of a better term,
Speaker 2: it's like the positionless idea of sports, right that you're
Speaker 2: just like, no, you're not locked in on a division
Speaker 2: just because that's what the title says you should be.
Speaker 2: There's nothing terribly traditional about playing your fourth most hated
Speaker 2: rival in a conference. There just isn't. And I know
Speaker 2: there's scar tissue, and I know there's battle wounds and
Speaker 2: all that stuff between these two teams. Because of this
Speaker 2: one game four years ago, You're still gonna play them,
Speaker 2: maybe not every year, but you get those locked in
Speaker 2: three and then you spread it all around and it's
Speaker 2: novel every year. That's great. That to me is the
Speaker 2: secret sauce.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm I'm for more SEC games. I'm for the
Speaker 1: spice of life. I'm for the nine and three model
Speaker 1: for sure. YEA, not even a question. All right, let's
Speaker 1: go to Let's go to Cole Schwartz on Twitter. He says,
Speaker 1: as a diehard wisconstant fan, give me the ceiling for
Speaker 1: this year's team. Am I an idiot for thinking ten
Speaker 1: and two is realistic?
Speaker 3: So?
Speaker 1: Look, we did an episode like last week where we
Speaker 1: talk through our coach draft new coaches, and we picked
Speaker 1: two teams of five. The first overall pick for me
Speaker 1: was Luke Fickle. It would have been for you as
Speaker 1: well if you had the choice. We talked about that
Speaker 1: as well, but I am on the record saying that
Speaker 1: ten and two is very realistic. That I tend to
Speaker 1: be overly optimistic about new coaches and new places, but
Speaker 1: I like Luke Fickle a lot. I think Wisconsin is
Speaker 1: still in a pretty good spot. I like what they
Speaker 1: did in the transfer portal. The schedule is conducive to it.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of things that are that are
Speaker 1: that are very much in their corner. So I think
Speaker 1: it's realistic. I don't think you're an idiot. That's not
Speaker 1: the same. I'll get to ten and two, but I
Speaker 1: think it's a very high flour for Wisconsin, and I
Speaker 1: think ten and two is there. You weren't quite as
Speaker 1: optimistic about Wisconsin, but even you, I think acknowledged that
Speaker 1: if you squint it, if you look at all the
Speaker 1: factors here going into the twenty three season for the Badgers,
Speaker 1: ten and two, it's not unrealistic, Dan, No.
Speaker 2: It's not unrealistic. It doesn't happen a ton in a
Speaker 2: scenario in which a new coach wins double digit games
Speaker 2: in his first season, just because generally speaking, there's a
Speaker 2: reason why a school has a new coach, right that
Speaker 2: the old coach is bailing for whatever reason. And maybe
Speaker 2: it's lack of confidence in the future of the team,
Speaker 2: or maybe just sees the grass greener elsewhere, or they're
Speaker 2: bad and need a new coach because they got rid
Speaker 2: of the old guy. That's right, and so this year
Speaker 2: was an especially good year for new coaches to come
Speaker 2: in and win double digit games. When you look at Washington,
Speaker 2: you look at USC, you look at TCU, Oregon, depending
Speaker 2: on if you count the bowl game, I tend not to.
Speaker 2: They were and three team that won a bowl game,
Speaker 2: but even still flirting with it in that place, so
Speaker 2: it's entirely possible. We talked about their schedule. We talked
Speaker 2: about improvement what we perceived to be improvement at quarterback,
Speaker 2: improvement perhaps in scheme. The defense isn't where it was
Speaker 2: a couple of years ago. But once again, I think
Speaker 2: they miss Michigan and Penn State. Is that correct on
Speaker 2: their schedule?
Speaker 1: Believe? I believe that's accurate.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's a great place to start. I know
Speaker 2: they traveled to Wazoo, right they return that trip, they
Speaker 2: lost to Wazoo. I can't randle last season, but all
Speaker 2: things considered, it's a great schedule for a first year
Speaker 2: coach to get acclimated to a new conference and new program.
Speaker 2: So yes, it's a ten and two with three and
Speaker 2: a half breaks, right, A couple strokes of luck, maybe
Speaker 2: a doinked field goal, an injured quarterback, bad weather or
Speaker 2: something like that. But it's attainable. But it's also you know,
Speaker 2: seven to five is on the table because there was
Speaker 2: a reason why Wisconsin took a downturn, and some of
Speaker 2: that was talent acquisition, some of it was talent, some
Speaker 2: of it was talent not being used correctly. I just
Speaker 2: I think it's a lot to ask, but yes, I'll
Speaker 2: stand by three and a half breaks can get you
Speaker 2: to double digit wins if you set, if you gave
Speaker 2: me even money either way, I would go under if
Speaker 2: you said nine and a half. But it's a universe
Speaker 2: exists absolutely in which they can get there.
Speaker 1: Dan, let's move on. Let's talk about the Georgia offense.
Speaker 1: Gary on Patreon asks does Todd Monkin's departure to the
Speaker 1: NFL set George's offense back? So toddmunkin offensive coordinator hired
Speaker 1: to the same position with the Baltimore Ravens. So he's
Speaker 1: going pro and Mike Bobo a name from George past
Speaker 1: I believe it was an analyst on the staff. Was
Speaker 1: he not this past year something like that. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Mike Bobo's back as offensive coordinator.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was most recently a coordinator in the SEC.
Speaker 2: As a full time job, does it set their offense
Speaker 2: back absolutely in a meaningful way, in an appreciable way,
Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't know. Well, here's the thing.
Speaker 2: So we have a new quarterback who's presumably younger than
Speaker 2: twenty five.
Speaker 3: We have.
Speaker 2: A team that's not going to be reliant on scoring
Speaker 2: forty points to win despite what they lose once again
Speaker 2: on defense. They are built and they have built themselves
Speaker 2: up in such a way where they scored twenty four
Speaker 2: points the game to win, and most offensive coordinators, with
Speaker 2: the talent on hand, we'll be able to score twenty
Speaker 2: four points with this team. Now, whoever wins that job
Speaker 2: is probably going to be starting in a better place
Speaker 2: than Stetson Bennett did. With how much Bennett moved around
Speaker 2: and was counted out and didn't have the confidence of
Speaker 2: his coaches, you'd think whoever gets the job this year
Speaker 2: will have will be more empowered at quarterback with the
Speaker 2: job immediately, but it's a lot to start over with
Speaker 2: with a new quarterback and a new coordinator. It has
Speaker 2: to be the vision of Kirby, it has to be
Speaker 2: the vision of the guys they do return on the
Speaker 2: offensive coaching staff. So yes, i think they're going to
Speaker 2: take a step back, but I'm also excited to see
Speaker 2: what Bobo can do. He is still considered be a
Speaker 2: good offensive minus I've had some health issues. I just
Speaker 2: for the short term because of the lack of experience
Speaker 2: on this offense. I think they're going to be more
Speaker 2: conservative than they've been these past couple years. I think
Speaker 2: there are going to be happy to get up to
Speaker 2: a medium amount, right, to get up twenty seven to
Speaker 2: ten and sit, to get up twenty one to three,
Speaker 2: twenty one to seven and sit, and just shorten that
Speaker 2: game even more than Greg Sankie already wants to shorten games.
Speaker 2: They are going to absolutely crockpot every week in the medium,
Speaker 2: short to medium term. So yeah, I think it's going
Speaker 2: to change the complexion of the Georgia offense. I don't
Speaker 2: think they're going to succeed less in the wins and
Speaker 2: losses column. Yeah, I mean a couple things that I
Speaker 2: point out. Yea, right, Mike Bobo was there for a
Speaker 2: good long time under Mark Rix, so Georgia fans are
Speaker 2: familiar with Mike Bobo. He was there this past season
Speaker 2: as an offensive analyst, and his role on that squad
Speaker 2: really was to do self scouting and to look at
Speaker 2: whatever Monkin was doing and figure out ways to either
Speaker 2: avoid tipping off plays or make things more efficient or
Speaker 2: make them better. So he's familiar with the offense that's
Speaker 2: been installed at Georgia, he knows the verbiage, and there's
Speaker 2: been some commentary out there that he doesn't want to
Speaker 2: change it too much. He doesn't want to be like
Speaker 2: he's starting things from square one, because obviously what they've
Speaker 2: done has been really successful.
Speaker 1: So that's the first thing. If I were a Georgia fan,
Speaker 1: I'd at least feel heartened by that. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's going to be any kind of tectonic shift. It
Speaker 1: might be a little bit more conservative. I think that's
Speaker 1: fair to say. But the second point, the players that
Speaker 1: are on Georgia's squad now are so much better than
Speaker 1: they were the last time he was there. Right, if
Speaker 1: he had brock Bauer back in the old day. If
Speaker 1: he had Darnell Washington back in the old day, like
Speaker 1: perhaps we would see a different version of the mic
Speaker 1: Bobo offense as opposed to the one that you know,
Speaker 1: some would say was all too happy to just run
Speaker 1: at every play right, to lean too heavily on the
Speaker 1: on the ground game. So I don't think it's going
Speaker 1: to take any step back in a meaningful way as
Speaker 1: you described. I mean, they're so talented up and down
Speaker 1: that roster that the splits, the run pass splits might
Speaker 1: look a little different. Maybe they're not as explosive as
Speaker 1: they were under Todd Munkin just because of the play calling.
Speaker 1: But by and large, I think George is just such
Speaker 1: in such a good place with their talent that as
Speaker 1: long as they remain at that really high level on
Speaker 1: the defensive side of the ball, which I think we've
Speaker 1: come to know and expect this point, the offense is
Speaker 1: always going to be in a position to score points
Speaker 1: and succeed. So I'm not too worried about it. I
Speaker 1: hate retreads, but I think just given the fact that
Speaker 1: he's been around the program, he's a hell of a motivator.
Speaker 1: By all accounts, people like playing for him, so I
Speaker 1: think it'll be fine.
Speaker 2: Here's the devil's advocate is that Kirby has not hit
Speaker 2: a thousand. Is not bad at a thousand in terms
Speaker 2: of quarterback decisions, quarterback evaluation, offensive coordinators. You know, the
Speaker 2: tail end of the Jim Cheney Jake from experiment wasn't great,
Speaker 2: right that, and they weren't as talented as they are now.
Speaker 2: They couldn't get away with mediocrity on offense and the
Speaker 2: way that they could hypothetically now because of where the
Speaker 2: defense is. But this is now the era that it's
Speaker 2: Kirby Smart dealing with attrition as part of the success, right,
Speaker 2: the attrition of coaches in successive years. He's now lost
Speaker 2: a defensive coordinator and an offensive coordinator who wouldn't want
Speaker 2: to coach at Georgia, who wouldn't want to recruit at Georgia,
Speaker 2: who wouldn't want to be responsible for that level of
Speaker 2: success at Georgia. Right, it's a crazy enticing of coordinator jobs.
Speaker 2: But also success isn't guaranteed. Success is just not guaranteed.
Speaker 2: We're coming off of a year in which Alabama, who's
Speaker 2: had everything in the world, not make the playoff, not
Speaker 2: even win the sec West, Right, it's entirely possible with
Speaker 2: a roster full of NFL players to not win your division,
Speaker 2: to not win your conference as one of the two
Speaker 2: three four most talented teams in the nation. And so
Speaker 2: I don't think anything's guaranteed, but this year, I think
Speaker 2: the train will keep running well next year, So twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four new teams in the conference, because you know
Speaker 2: how everybody's scared of Texas right now. Sure, in Oklahoma's defense,
Speaker 2: it's a question. It's a question what the actual long
Speaker 2: term plan is for Georgia's offense and who that quarterback is.
Speaker 2: You know, they put ever, they put all, They pushed
Speaker 2: all their chips to the middle for arch Manning and
Speaker 2: it didn't work out. And so again they'll be just fine.
Speaker 2: But what's the next phase. What's Kirby three point zero
Speaker 2: look like at Georgia? That to me is an interesting
Speaker 2: question because again, nothing guaranteed, even with a back to
Speaker 2: back national champion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll see. They tried to fill that vacancy very quickly.
Speaker 1: As soon as Munket was gone. It was Mike Bobo's job.
Speaker 1: So clearly continuity is something that Kirby's put a premium
Speaker 1: on and they're going to try to keep this train rolling.
Speaker 1: But like you said, they're gonna be new faces. Success
Speaker 1: is never guaranteed. Even though the guy had a lot
Speaker 1: of success there before, and he did have a lot
Speaker 1: of success there before, there's no guarantee that this next
Speaker 1: iteration will produce the same result. I think they'll be fine.
Speaker 1: I don't see any reason to really doubt it, but
Speaker 1: it is a fair question.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's things are looking a little bit better than
Speaker 2: they could just because Florida seems to be a mess,
Speaker 2: seems to be an ice flow on fire headed out
Speaker 2: to see. But other than that, Yeah, Tennessee has improved
Speaker 2: but showed itself to be not quite ready for primetime
Speaker 2: last year in Athens, and look, South Carolina is coming up.
Speaker 2: Kentucky has showed flashes of danger, but that specific division
Speaker 2: as currently constituted, it's got to be Florida and Tennessee
Speaker 2: as the threat. That's a dual threat whatever to George's dominance,
Speaker 2: and right now it's not a twenty twenty three problem
Speaker 2: for the dogs, it seems.
Speaker 1: Is Florida really going to start Graham Mertz as starting quarterback.
Speaker 2: As opposed to in Yeah, I as far as I
Speaker 2: can tell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, sorry, Florida fans, hate to do that to you.
Speaker 1: Let's close it out on this day. We get a
Speaker 1: bunch of other questions. Maybe we'll save those for our
Speaker 1: Thursday show. If you're cool with that, sure, let's do it.
Speaker 1: A lot of good ones here. I wanted to close
Speaker 1: this one out with an email that we got from Kevin,
Speaker 1: very specific email. What does Syracuse do with Dino Babers.
Speaker 1: We had one great season, a bunch of five and
Speaker 1: sevens went seven and five after starting six and oh
Speaker 1: this past year. I don't think we should extend him
Speaker 1: anytime soon, but I don't know who would a better
Speaker 1: hire be. I'm not delusional and think Syracuse should be
Speaker 1: ten and two every season, right, but eight and four
Speaker 1: seems reasonable from Kevin. Thank you, Kaz, A good question.
Speaker 1: We like Dino on the show. We always have a
Speaker 1: couple reference points, just to throw them out there. In
Speaker 1: terms of returning production, which is not everything but is
Speaker 1: a meaningful number, especially for a school like Syracuse. They're
Speaker 1: a top twenty five team in terms of returning production
Speaker 1: seventy three percent on offense, seventy two percent on defense.
Speaker 1: That's inside the top forty on both fronts, so got
Speaker 1: enough coming back to hopefully continue some of the momentum
Speaker 1: from last season. I would also add that the schedule
Speaker 1: looks beautiful on some level. There is a stretch. There
Speaker 1: is a stretch in the middle of the season last
Speaker 1: week of September through the middle of October where it's
Speaker 1: Clemson at North Carolina at Florida State. But otherwise it's Colgate,
Speaker 1: it's Western Michigan, It's at Purdue, It's Army at Virginia Tech,
Speaker 1: Boston College home against well the neutral site game, excuse me,
Speaker 1: against pitt the one that they're playing in Yankee Stadium
Speaker 1: now at Georgia Tech, close out the year against Wake Forest.
Speaker 1: So I'm not counting anything as a surefire win for Syracuse. However,
Speaker 1: outside of those three games in the middle of the season,
Speaker 1: it feels like a pretty workable schedule. So what I
Speaker 1: would say here is whatever you want to do with
Speaker 1: Dino Babers, it will probably be very clear after this season,
Speaker 1: because this is a schedule, and this is a roster
Speaker 1: that's got enough back and that's got I think enough
Speaker 1: runway here with this slate that if they want to
Speaker 1: win eight games, seems like it's there.
Speaker 2: Okay, all good points, ty, do you have many eight
Speaker 2: win seasons Syracuse has as an ACC team, so since
Speaker 2: twenty thirteen, one if eight and three is a reasonable expectation,
Speaker 2: sometimes one, one, yeah, one win in the Big East
Speaker 2: since two thousand, okay, so going back to two thousand,
Speaker 2: so that's the Paul Pasqualone era. How many eight win
Speaker 2: seasons do they have in the Big East in the
Speaker 2: regular season? Eight and four plus type seasons since two
Speaker 2: thousand because they actually did, you know, under Donovan mcnapo team,
Speaker 2: so two thousand more modern era, So two thousand and one,
Speaker 2: they go ten and three after the Bowl nine and
Speaker 2: three top fifteen team. After that, the number of eight
Speaker 2: win seasons in the Big East in the regular season
Speaker 2: is zero. So it's nice to say, and maybe the
Speaker 2: schedule workout has it definitely did a couple of years
Speaker 2: ago when they won ten games. If you remember, they
Speaker 2: played a bunch of all kind of overrated ACC teams
Speaker 2: and pulled those out with the senior quarterback. They got
Speaker 2: very lucky on in Eric Dungee, who I think is
Speaker 2: from Portland, Oregon. Eric, you're your guy, Eric Dungee. The
Speaker 2: evidence is not there that Syracuse should be an eight
Speaker 2: ish win team more often than not, and that's generally
Speaker 2: not because on paper they look like they could be,
Speaker 2: but in practice, this is not a team that can
Speaker 2: recruit a too deep that can compete with the upper
Speaker 2: half of the ACC consistently in an average year, and
Speaker 2: so six I think Bowl should be the expectation at Syracuse,
Speaker 2: all things considered, with the amount of dedication or lack
Speaker 2: of dedication, however you want to view it. For Syracuse.
Speaker 2: I think Dino's fine. I think he's absolutely fine. The
Speaker 2: weird thing. The thing I would be concerned about is
Speaker 2: cash money, because they don't seem to keep coordinators around ever.
Speaker 2: And so maybe that's a good reflection on Dino Baper's
Speaker 2: ability to evaluate new assistant coaches and hires and everything
Speaker 2: like that, But it doesn't seem like they're matching buyouts
Speaker 2: or doesn't or matching you know, Okay, we're off. You
Speaker 2: were raised to stay instead of going to coach you
Speaker 2: know Nebraska's defense Tony White, and so lack of turnover
Speaker 2: is concerning ability to recruit and build up that too
Speaker 2: deep to win eight games more often than not, pretty
Speaker 2: concerning interesting home field advantage in whatever they're calling the
Speaker 2: carrier dome now, JMA wireless.
Speaker 1: They get that, right, May wireless.
Speaker 2: Yeah, look at me, I just I don't know. I
Speaker 2: it's it's again, it's an on paper thing. And the
Speaker 2: ACC is in a weird place right now. But even still,
Speaker 2: you start six and oh, then everybody realizes you don't
Speaker 2: have a defensive front and run straight at them and
Speaker 2: there's nothing you can do and your quarterback gets hurt.
Speaker 2: There just there's very little wiggle room, there's very little
Speaker 2: margin for error at Syracuse. And so who do they
Speaker 2: got just demolished in that year they went ten? I
Speaker 2: think it was Notre Dame, right, Yankee Stadium, I believe, so, Yeah,
Speaker 2: they lost like thirty five to three. And so that's
Speaker 2: that's the issue where you just don't have a twelve
Speaker 2: game roster. And I think you win six or seven
Speaker 2: in Syracuse. It's pretty good. And Dino Babers is buy
Speaker 2: and large done that.
Speaker 1: Dino's been there since twenty sixteen, went to a bowl
Speaker 1: this past year, went to a bowl back in twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: hasn't gone to a bowl at any point beyond that.
Speaker 1: A lot of five and sevens and four and eight's
Speaker 1: in here for Dino Babers. The one season where they
Speaker 1: did go ten and three, they finished up ten and three.
Speaker 1: That was the year where they had a top fifteen offense. Right,
Speaker 1: I don't think this is ever going to be the
Speaker 1: kind of program that is driven by defense. Dino's an
Speaker 1: offensive guy. If he can get offense out there, then
Speaker 1: we're talking, then we're talking.
Speaker 2: I think expectations foot it kind of was driven by
Speaker 2: defense these past couple of years. To go five and seven, yeah, right, six,
Speaker 2: to go five.
Speaker 1: And have to go six and six, even still has
Speaker 1: not fielded a top fifty defense. So relatively speaking, defense
Speaker 1: has been okay, but the offense has not been there
Speaker 1: to match and to hold up its end of the bargain.
Speaker 1: Maybe that'll be different this coming season. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but I tend to agree with you. I don't know
Speaker 1: if the historical data is there to suggest that Syracuse
Speaker 1: can get there to be a consistent eight and four team.
Speaker 1: But what I am saying as we look forward down
Speaker 1: to twenty three, the schedule's there for it, and the
Speaker 1: roster is there, I think to go eight and four
Speaker 1: if they want to, not a whole lot of teams
Speaker 1: on that schedule that really put the fear of God
Speaker 1: into even on the road at North Carolina with some
Speaker 1: of their turnover, with how they've underperformed on defense, it's
Speaker 1: not a stretch to envision to shootout in which Syracuse
Speaker 1: comes away winning. But I think this is the year.
Speaker 1: This is like the mistest for Dino. If you're a
Speaker 1: Dino fan, if you believe in Dino, if he can
Speaker 1: get everything going in the same direction, you can envision
Speaker 1: an eight and four season. If not, if he goes
Speaker 1: five and seven again against a schedule like this, then
Speaker 1: then maybe there's a reason for some healthy skepticism.
Speaker 2: And it's also because I remember the end of the
Speaker 2: Perdue game. Was there another game that Syracuse eked out
Speaker 2: like they're just always going to be eight points, Like
Speaker 2: the swing between seven and five and four and eight
Speaker 2: is going to be so tiny, right that margin I'm
Speaker 2: pulling up what they did this year. It's just when
Speaker 2: you have that kind of coach turnover, especially, it's just
Speaker 2: when you don't have that any sort of successful continuity,
Speaker 2: it seems. So they lost five straight, they lost by six, seventeen, ten,
Speaker 2: thirty five and ten once again, and so in their wins.
Speaker 2: They beat Perdue last second, they eke by Virginia by two.
Speaker 2: So they go seven and five this year and they're
Speaker 2: like ninety seconds from going five to seven. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: that just it doesn't give me a lot of confidence
Speaker 2: that they're able to build up that roster to like, oh,
Speaker 2: our you know, left guard went down, our week side
Speaker 2: linebacker went down, and we're not going to miss that
Speaker 2: much of a beat, which is what better teams are
Speaker 2: able to do. And so they obviously didn't have it
Speaker 2: at quarterback when they got hurt there. Yeah, I just
Speaker 2: think they're right around five hundred.
Speaker 1: We shall see Sliverblegmail dot com as always, is the
Speaker 1: email address that does it. For today. We've got a
Speaker 1: bunch more questions that I'm going to save nice and
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Speaker 2: Yeah. I just came up as you were saying that,
Speaker 2: I came up with the stupidest idea I've ever come
Speaker 2: up with for an episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I'm
Speaker 2: only going to talk about it on an episode on
Speaker 2: Forballer Stuff on our bruin a or something that's some
Speaker 2: sort of special reveal there. Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1: Dan, Happy President's Day. Okay, Hey you as well.
Speaker 2: Hope you get a new mattress or something to take
Speaker 2: advantage of the sales for that guy.
Speaker 1: Dan for myself tied, Thanks again for tuning on in.
Speaker 1: We will talk to y'all soon. Stay solid, peace,