Is It Possible To Police NIL? Ohio State Finalizes Arthur Smith Hire & MORE

Summary

Cover 3 College Football Podcast

Episode: Is It Possible To Police NIL? Ohio State Finalizes Arthur Smith Hire & MORE
Date: February 2, 2026
Hosts: Chip Patterson, Tom Fornelli, Danny Kanell, Bud Elliott

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Episode Overview

In this episode, the Cover 3 crew tackles some of the biggest headlines and debates in college football, including breaking news about Gus Malzahn's sudden retirement at Florida State, the realities and potential enforceability of NIL (Name, Image, and Likeness) regulations after the College Sports Commission's (CSC) initial investigations, Ohio State’s official hire of Arthur Smith as offensive coordinator, and perennial topics such as National Signing Day, the future of the targeting rule, and motivational tactics at Florida.

The conversation is lively and candid, featuring behind-the-scenes insights, tongue-in-cheek moments, and some pointed skepticism about the future of NIL policing.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Gus Malzahn Retires from FSU ([02:26]-[10:30])

• Surprise Announcement: Florida State OC Gus Malzahn retires after only one season; promoted Tim Harris to OC.
  • Danny Kanell: "I'm surprised... Everything was great until it wasn’t. I actually thought the offense put up some pretty good numbers." ([04:43])
  • Bud Elliott suggests friction between Malzahn and Mike Norvell: "I really question how he and Norvell got along and worked together this year. Just from, from stuff I had heard... I don't think that relationship was great." ([05:27])
• Personnel Discussion: FSU recruited for a Malzahn-style offense and will likely have to stick with those schemes for now.
  • Bud Elliott: “You kind of have Malzan style personnel here. So I think you kind of need to run something close to that offense.” ([08:03])
• Malzahn’s Legacy: Remembered for innovative offenses, the “hurry-up, no-huddle,” and an indelible impact on the college game.
  • Chip Patterson: “Very much, very much. Something I will always remember because of the hurry up, no huddle and the offensive explosion of that decade.” ([10:12])

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2. Can Anyone Actually Police NIL? College Sports Commission’s Authority Questioned ([10:30]-[19:51])

• CSC Investigation into LSU: Reports CSC is investigating unreported NIL deals at LSU, but clarified not football related.
• Hosts Question Enforcement Power:
  • Bud Elliott: “Like, what's their actual enforcement mechanism here?” ([14:05])
  • Chip Patterson: “The CSC is not run by the NCAA... what motivation do the Power 4 conferences have to levy any kind of penalties?” ([14:05])
  • Danny Kanell: “If LSU didn't opt in and sign this agreement ... what can they do? ... Can they make a player ineligible? It's not their field. Like, no one knows.” ([14:44])
• General Skepticism:
  • The CSC may just be posturing; real enforcement, eligibility issues remain NCAA territory.
  • Tom Fornelli: “So it's the NCAA all over again.” ([18:18])
  • Chip Patterson: “The old playbook was somebody at the NCAA leaks it to a reporter that we're investigating somebody... then by the time the process plays out, it doesn't end up being that much of a punishment.” ([18:57])

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3. Does NIL Money Lead to Complacency or Less NFL Talent? ([19:54]-[25:30])

• Fan Mailbag Question: Will pro-caliber players become complacent after getting paid in college?
  • Danny Kanell: “Yeah, I think you'll see that. ... But there'll always be elite talent that'll come to the forefront because it gives other opportunities for other guys.” ([20:38])
  • Tom Fornelli: “I think it's already always happened. Some guys show up to college... they think they've got it made, and then they just flame out.” ([21:15])
  • Bud Elliott: “Do I think it will happen? Yeah, but like, how are we gonna see it? ... I don't think we're gonna see it in a number that will matter.” ([21:32])
• Counterpoint: NIL actually keeps more borderline draftees in college, making CFB better and the NFL’s draft pool more mature and less of a “mystery box.”
  • Bud Elliott: “It's probably going to be offset by the guys not jumping pro early because they were usually jumping out of desperation financially or because they failed out of school.” ([24:12])
  • Tom Fornelli on NFL scouting: “There's not less talent in the draft, there's just less mystery box talent.” ([25:13])

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4. Ohio State Officially Hires Arthur Smith as Offensive Coordinator ([29:29]-[33:43])

• The Hire: Arthur Smith, formerly of the NFL, joins OSU as OC; seen as a big win, especially since he was also fielding NFL attention.
• System Expectations & Fit:
  • Tom Fornelli: “Everything's kind of built... around the run. But it's not what I would call smash mouth, kind of old school. It just, it looks like a modern NFL offense...” ([30:30])
  • Bud Elliott: “I'd be a lot more worried about hiring Arthur Smith if I didn't have Ryan Day as the head coach...his offenses in the NFL were not very good.” ([32:05])
  • Danny Kanell: “It's amazing how good you can be as a coach when you have elite talent on the field.” ([32:27])
• Recruiting Calendar Note: Little expectation of major movement ahead of National Signing Day; the recruiting calendar shifts due to early enrollees are mostly here to stay.

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5. National Signing Day Shifts & Calendar Debates ([33:45]-[43:42])

• Early Enrollee Dynamic: Early high school graduation and enrollment has permanently shifted the recruiting landscape.
  • Bud Elliott: “You can't unring the bell of setting up high schools to allow players to graduate early...” ([35:23])
  • Danny Kanell: “Coaches like them coming in in January, too.” ([36:18])
• Calendar Quirks: Next year, only nine days between the national title game (Jan. 25) and Signing Day due to playoff/calendar alignment; debate over whether the longer postseason is good for the sport’s visibility.
  • Tom Fornelli: “The sport is going to get absolutely lost in the NFL playoff ... There will be no this year.” ([44:45])
  • Chip Patterson: “The long layoffs are not good for maintaining the excitement of the event.” ([47:38])

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6. Targeting Rule: Potential Changes and Lingering Issues ([50:34]-[55:14])

• Reviewing Targeting: NCAA’s Steve Shaw indicates another review of the targeting rule to make it “less punitive.”
• Flags vs. Ejections:
  • Danny Kanell: “Having a player sit out the half of the next game is ridiculous...maybe even eject the player if it's bad...But an automatic half if you miss. You know, if you're kicked out in the second half of a game because of targeting. That's the one that's too harsh.” ([51:44])
  • Bud Elliott: “What they really need to do is look at, like, initial intended path and if the ball carrier ducks into it, there's no foul. ...going like flagrant one, flagrant two and not having a disqualification is at least a small step in the right direction.” ([52:32])
  • Tom Fornelli: “You know when a football play happens and you know when somebody's being an asshole.” ([54:11])
  • Banter about yellow/red card system and the inherent dangers of football.

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7. Old School Motivational Tactics: ‘Earn the Logo’ at Florida ([56:14]-[62:45])

• Gators’ New Policy: New Florida coach John Summerall removes the Gator logo until players "earn" the right to wear it—echoes Urban Meyer’s early tenure.
• Viability in Modern Era:
  • Bud Elliott: “I don't know how well Urban Meyer would do coaching guys who get paid. Oh, not well, right?” ([57:30])
  • Danny Kanell: “I do think it still can work at the college level. I think it's a good mindset to have to make them earn it to show that nobody's above anybody else...” ([58:00])
  • Tom Fornelli: “It would work on me. If I'm a football player and I see my teammates or get logos on their helmet, and I don't have one, guess what? I'm gonna work a little harder...” ([59:48])
• Roster Outlook: If Gators hit on QB, they could threaten in the SEC due to favorable scheduling.

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Notable Quotes

• Bud Elliott on NIL Enforcement Power ([14:05]):
  “What's their actual enforcement mechanism here?”
• Tom Fornelli on Arthur Smith ([30:30]):
  “Everything's kind of built... around the run. But it's not what I would call smash mouth...it looks like a modern NFL offense...”
• Danny Kanell on NIL & Motivation ([20:38]):
  “There'll always be elite talent that'll come to the forefront because it gives other opportunities for other guys...But I think, yeah, I think you would see potentially some guys throwing the towel.”
• Tom Fornelli on Targeting ([54:11]):
  “You know when a football play happens and you know when somebody's being an asshole.”
• Bud Elliott on College Calendar ([35:23]):
  “You can't unring the bell of setting up high schools to allow players to graduate early...”
• Tom Fornelli on College Football Playoff Layoffs ([44:45]):
  “The sport is going to get absolutely lost in the NFL playoff ... There will be no this year.”
• Chip Patterson's Farewell ([63:05]):
  “Listen, if you want to be able to have this Cover 3 sticker on your helmet, tell me what I got to do.”

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Important Timestamps

• [02:26] – Malzahn retires from FSU; implications for staff and offense
• [10:30] – CSC probes LSU NIL deals; enforcement skepticism
• [19:54] – Do early NIL payments impact pro readiness?
• [29:29] – Ohio State finalizes Arthur Smith as OC; system fit
• [33:45] – National Signing Day mechanics, early enrollees influence
• [50:34] – NCAA to review targeting rule again; is the penalty too harsh?
• [56:14] – Florida’s “Earn the Logo” motivational ploy and generational coaching tactics

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Episode Tone

Spirited, irreverent, and unsparing—combining deep knowledge of college football culture with relentless skepticism of bureaucracy and embrace of the messy, money-driven realities of the sport.

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This summary reflects all crucial content and argumentation of the episode and allows a non-listener to understand the major stories, themes, and perspectives discussed.

Transcript

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[Bud Elliott]

Welcome Back to the COVID 3 podcast with your hosts Chip Patterson, Tom Fernelli, Danny Cannell and Bud Elliott. It's your call for the best college football coverage from national Signing day to the national championship and everything in between. CBS Sports presents the COVID 3 podcast.

[Chip Patterson]

And Welco Cover 3 podcast here on CBS Sports. That's Danny Canel. That's Tom Pinelli, that's Bud Elliott. I'm Chip Patterson. Come to you [e-mail] 3 and every digital podcast on demand. Thanks for hanging out. Smash that subscribe Smash that like and come and join us in the chat aka the COVID 3 tailgate where they got questions about the Bag man. Oh yeah, questions about the bag man. So among the many things we will be discussing here on a Monday will be but what does Policing nil. Look like we had some reports over the weekend about some schools starting to get some letters from the College Sports Commission. Do they have any teeth? We'll get into that. And so much more. John Summerall channeling a little bit of Urban Meyer, excited about that. National signing day does still exist. Is it a thing? Not as much, but at least want to remind you that that's coming up on Wednesday. Ohio State officially announcing its new offensive coordinator and more. But we begin with a little bit of breaking news from this Monday morning, speaking of offensive coordinator, because Florida State offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn has announced he is retiring from football. He is excited about whatever is going to be, you know, next for him in life. Just one season with Florida State, he was, I think, the architect of an awesome win. Right. You know, like, he, Danny, Bud, he. He gave y' all that one that one day in Tallahassee. I, I guess we are. We are grateful for that. In terms of what's next, no outside hires being done. Mike Norvell will promote Tim Harris to offensive coordinator. Danny, I guess the, the starting point for me is, were you surprised at all? Like, was there any buzz behind the scenes that Gus Malzahn might be looking to go ahead and shut things down after just one year?

[Danny Cannell]

I had not heard that. I'm curious to know if Bud has heard anything. He's a little more dialed in on some of the buzz around Tallahassee. It's a surprise to me. You know, it's wild how things change. I talked to the Tallahassee quarterback club the Tuesday after the Bama win.

[Chip Patterson]

And.

[Danny Cannell]

I'm telling you, the standing ovation. Gus was the coach that was speaking standing ovation. Like, this guy is the hero we needed. Here comes the savior. And it was all, all roses. Everything was great until it wasn't. And I actually thought the offense put up some pretty good numbers statistically with what they had with, you know, Castellanos was a little dicey as a qb. They figured out a way how to put up points. I don't think he was the issue, but yes to your question, yes, I'm surprised. And then it goes back. Think about how we talked about Ashton Daniels Brand brought in. Oh, he's a good fit for Gus Mountain.

[Chip Patterson]

Oh, yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

You know, like, that's where I'm wondering how much of a surprise this is to Norvell and the staff as well.

[Bud Elliott]

I, I do think that a lot of people expected him to retire, but probably not at this point. Like, I think they thought it was going to happen earlier or not at all. I, I really question how he and Norvell got along and worked together this year. Just from, from stuff I had heard, I, I don't think that relationship was great. I think the offense was good at times. I also think it's like heavily propped up by them running up the score on those two FCS games in September. But like, you know, I, I think he did an okay job. And I think honestly, like, my biggest takeaway here is that Malzahn waiting as long as he did, might have done FSU a favor because it's so late in the process that you can't go out and give somebody a multi year guaranteed contract that you're then gonna have to buy out when they have to fire this staff.

[Chip Patterson]

Oh.

[Bud Elliott]

Damn Dances. What brought you like, that's my big. That was my immediate takeaway. It's like, cool. We don't have to go waste money on a guy you're gonna have to fire. Just like pretend like it's gonna work.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. Tom, what's your final verdict on the, the Gus Malzahn era in Tallahassee?

[Tom Fernelli]

The timing is weird. I wonder, you know, now that signing day is done, I guess, you know, you coaches can finally start moving on. Now that that late signing day is over and you've brought in the quarterback that runs the Gus Mills on offense, you can get rid of the guy who runs the Gus Miles on offense. My biggest concern is for you, Chip, because I know that you've been a big fan of the putt putt offense for so long and now that Gus is leaving, who, who are you looking to, to carry on the tradition?

[Chip Patterson]

Listen, open search, you know, we will be, we will be having our boots on the ground. We will be digging in. We will find the next gimmicky offense to be able, you know, and, and not enough. I was, I was reading some research today. Our, our, our possessions per game are down, you know, as a continued trend as we continue to see that our plays per possession are up. So we're getting a lot more. I mean, just the whole idea of the, the putt putt offense is to do a lot of gimmicks to hit it through the clown's mouth and hit the explosive play. Like, I just, I, I'm worried that the shifts in college football are really eliminating, you know, the things that can get you that big stuffy animal when you finish 18. You know, I just, I, I don't know. We'll, we'll, we'll be in search if you Got a nomination for the next, the next putt putt offense. Apple of my eye. I will definitely be taking it. But is there any change in the offense with Tim Harris taking over or is this now the Mike Norvell's offense? Basically?

[Bud Elliott]

Well, I think you have to run the Malzon offense. I mean there's probably 70 quarterbacks making more than what Ashton Daniels is making this year. So I think you clearly recruited for this Malzon style offense, right? Like you have one stud receiver and a couple gadget guys, right. Like Boggs hit the portal. I think drastically overestimated what his market was. He had to come back, you know, like Dany. I guess there's some pipe dream that Dany becomes like a complete receiver. He certainly showed more in, in terms of that, that track than I thought he would show last year. Right. But he's a really nice gadget guy. Like Squirrel White sucked last year and honestly like, like, you know, Castellano's missed him a bunch, a bunch of times too. So like he's not really a loss in my opinion. He did have a nice catch against Bama, but you haven't really have like, you kind of have Malzan style personnel here. So I think you kind of need to run something close to that offense.

[Tom Fernelli]

Do you have a list of quarterback salaries? Because you said that with pretty strong authority. There's 70 quarterbacks making more than Ashton Daniels this year.

[Bud Elliott]

That's my best guess. Yeah. Somewhere between like 70, 80.

[Tom Fernelli]

More than Florida State.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, I think there's a number of P5 backups who make more than what Daniels is making.

[Chip Patterson]

Oh, okay.

[Danny Cannell]

Well, they're making really good money too.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, exactly, right. Like I, I would bet my house that Long street makes more than Daniels at lsu.

[Tom Fernelli]

Well, we're going to talk more about that later.

[Bud Elliott]

Right? That's called a trick that segue guys.

[Chip Patterson]

But yeah, before we hit that one, one last piece here, Gus Malzahn, you know, final bow on his career. The highlight. I think obviously you win a national championship as a coordinator, you've got a Gus Malzahn tree that continues to be successful. You know, the offensive stats that he had at different times from quarterbacks, coach, quality control, they've moved on and they continue to spread their wings all across football. His high school time was obviously a legend. Made the BCS national championship game with Auburn as head coach. I think he'll be celebrated ultimately. Right. For offensive innovations of the time. Very much, very much. Something I will always remember because of the hurry up, no huddle and the offensive explosion of that decade. And I think Gus Malzahn will always be a part of it as sort of the front facing poster child of that.

[Tom Fernelli]

Agreed. Not a Hall of Fame coach, but a very good coach.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah, very, very good and very innovative. Well, bud, total professional giving us a nice little segue there because there is the, there's like the explosive headline and then there's when you get to unpack it. But I think once we unpack it, there's still some interesting things to discuss because the explosive headline is, you know, coming from the athletic the College Sports Commission has opened an investigation into LSU over potential unreported nil deals. The Tigers are the first known program under an inquiry from the new enforcement body, which when I saw it, I was like, oh, baby, they are about to tap. They're going after Lane, they are going after the Levitt deal, the Longstreet deal. Then with a little bit of further reporting, we've got some comments from lsu.lsu in an official statement. We have been in regular communication with the CSC since the organization's formation and appreciate their ongoing collaboration and guidance. We anticipate this specific inquiry will be resolved shortly. We will not comment further. A source telling Ross Dellinger, LSU's inquiry letter is not related to football. Okay, all right. So it's not football. But several programs, according to Ross, including one in the Big Ten and one in the Big 12, have been receiving letters of inquiry from the CSC over the last few weeks over athletes not reporting nil deals. And some, according to Ross, have already been resolved through communication with the CSC officials. But I heard your. Do you think that LSU's football program is in the clear here or do you think that this is a, this is a sign of the beginning of the CSC trying to take a little bit of action in terms of trying to police nil in the space.

[Bud Elliott]

I like, I want this to be an entertaining program, but, but I really don't know. In looking at this, there are a lot of schools out there who are trying, who are having to figure out how to go outside the cap. And does it really matter which sport you're going outside the cap for? Right? Like you have your total nut of rev share +nil. And if you want to dump a lot of rev share into football, you're going to have to go outside the cap with creative ways to fund basketball or women's basketball or baseball. Like it. Maybe you want to put a little more rev share towards those sports and you have to get creative to go outside the cap in football, but it's really kind of the same thing, right? You're paying some company to gin up some nil deals for you. They're going to take like 30% as a cut, and then all of a sudden they have, you know, Mike's Cleaners or like, you know, Iron State bank that wants to run 8 or $10 million of nil advertising. They're taking about a 30% cut on the money that you filter through your boosters that you give to them to. To find these nil deals. But I guess the key question here is if it's around unreported nil stuff. I think there are two key questions here. One I would have is why wouldn't you report it if you're paying some company and you think it's like, legit to do it? Right? But there are all kinds of ways you could structure this to where you could say this is actually not nil. Right? And then you could tell the CSC to go pound sand. I think you'd actually have a great case to do so. Right. Two, like, what's their actual enforcement mechanism here?

[Chip Patterson]

That's what I, that, that is like, what, Like, I, I'm kind of on that. Like, okay, so based on what I understand, the CSC is not run by the ncaa. Okay, so it's a completely separate body.

[Tom Fernelli]

The CSC run by the Power 4, isn't it?

[Chip Patterson]

It's being run by the Power 4 conferences. And what motivation do the Power 4 conferences have to levy any kind of penalties? I mean, in the old NCAA rules, as archaic as they were, we understood levels and violations and punishments, and we were able to sometimes connect dots here and have some precedent. We've got no precedent. We've got no handbook that I know of. What?

[Danny Cannell]

Well, isn't that the issue, that they were supposed to sign over their rights? Like, and not their rights, but, like, sign over the policing and enforcement they were supposed to give the CSC Commission, and then nobody was signing it. It's like, well, I'm not signing if they're not signing it, and you needed everybody to be on board and they can't even get that figured out. So, like, that still begs the question, if LSU didn't opt in and sign this agreement with the College Sports Commission, what, what, what are they. What can they do? You know, can they make a player ineligible? It's not their field. Like, no one knows.

[Tom Fernelli]

The LSU doesn't have to opt into CSC when it's one of the people who governs it.

[Danny Cannell]

But aren't you under that understanding that they're like, these schools are not signing this agreement.

[Bud Elliott]

There are certain states whose AGs have told them, like, hey, don't sign this as written. Like, this is not lawful in our state. Like Texas Tech.

[Chip Patterson]

Right. Get out of here.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, so, yeah, I know.

[Danny Cannell]

And once people heard that, a lot of schools were like, well, if they're not signing it, I'm not signing it. By the way, the CSC is hiring. If anybody's looking for work, you're just.

[Bud Elliott]

Not going to be able to like to tell schools, hey, there's some Neville's like, nebulously legitimate business purpose to this deal and you can't do it right now if it's totally fraudulent. I, I think that like, I mean, maybe, but like, if you, like, if you're a rich dude and you have a real company, you're going to be able to do it.

[Tom Fernelli]

Maybe the CSC can run ads during the super bowl seeking enforcement agents and offering them $60,000 a year. Well, it's been worked for a lot of other organizations recently. Very, very well trained ones.

[Chip Patterson]

That's that. It is, it is a method, you know. Yeah, it's, you know, we talk about precedent. You know, there is, there is some precedent there. I, I don't know. Like, I. They are not in charge of eligibility.

[Tom Fernelli]

Right.

[Chip Patterson]

Ultimately, the NCAA still has eligibility of a student athlete, which I think at this point is only down to.

[Bud Elliott]

I think there are eligibility ramifications. If they said, hey, this deal's not legit and the money was already paid and you had to pay the money back and you said no, but at that point I think they would just probably sue over it. Right?

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah.

[Bud Elliott]

And like keep the money until the.

[Chip Patterson]

Matter was adjudicated and then unreported nil deals. Is it just you're behind on your paperwork? Oh, my bad. We didn't fill out that one. Here's all the paperwork and then everything's good.

[Bud Elliott]

Maybe, but also maybe, like, maybe you needed to get something to a guy fast and didn't really have the deal in place, but you paid him anyway. I know that there's been some objections to some of these deals. Like Dellinger got a hold of the LSU contract. That was for Soursby. Right. I believe. Yeah. That had a certain amount of nil guarantees with no brands or deliverables associated with it. Right. Which seems like standard practice, but I guess is not form.

[Chip Patterson]

So the Power 4 conferences are running the CSC, but they're not giving them any Power to enforce rules. Right.

[Tom Fernelli]

Sure, sure. So it's the NCAA all over again. Yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

Yes.

[Tom Fernelli]

So, I mean, my prediction for what will happen with the CSC going forward is the other sports will get punished. Football, by and large, unless it's egregious, won't because football is the one where the money's being made. So maybe LSU's basketball team, the women's basketball team or its baseball team or it's volleyball team. Maybe they're, you know, because they said it's not football, maybe they're going to lose a scholarship and they're. The CSC is going to be out there like, look at us. We're out here enforcing the rules just like we said we would. Then everything else will go unchecked.

[Chip Patterson]

Which is the old playbook from the ncaa.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah.

[Chip Patterson]

Of, you know, you say you're investigating someone and I don't want to, I don't want to take the. I appreciate the reporting on all sides of this matter. All, all the, you know, references we had there, both to the athletic, obviously, Yahoo Sports, Ross Dellinger. But the old playbook was somebody at the NCAA leaks it to a reporter that we're investigating somebody that leads to a really big headline. Everyone starts to get excited about how the NCAA is going after somebody. Then by the time the process plays out, it doesn't end up being that much of a punishment and it ends up being a lot of feeling as though the NCAA is enforcing rules without an actual punishment. That includes allowing for schools to say, you know what, we should probably not do that. Schools are still doing basically whatever they want, right?

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah.

[Tom Fernelli]

King is dead. Long live the king.

[Chip Patterson]

Let's go. What about this one? Speaking of getting the bag, this was a question that came from the tailgate before we got started. Casey 5, says, on a side note, do you guys think we will see any drop off in pro talent due to guys getting paid sooner? I think in case he goes on, I think the elite guys have the mentality. But I wonder about some guys who get the bag early. I interpreted this one as I got my money, so therefore I'm not going to put in the extra work that will lead me to being a better pro prospect by the end of my college career.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah, I think you'll see that. I saw in the NFL you see it all the time. Guys either their first round draft picks and they get paid and they've got their money and that was sort of their goal and then they start coasting and they're out of the league in a few Years, see another free agents, they want that first big deal. They get fat and happy and they're like, hey, what do I. You know, they kind of start going through the motions. They don't last. It's just human nature. So, yeah, I think there would be. But there'll always be elite talent that'll come to the forefront because I gives other opportunities for other guys. But I think, yeah, I think you would see potentially some guys throwing the. Throw in the towel.

[Tom Fernelli]

I think you'll definitely see it. I just don't know that you'll see it more like the way, like, we'll see a drop off. It's like. No, I think it's already always happened.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah.

[Tom Fernelli]

Some guys show up to college thinking they got the scholarship, they got, you know, the. And they think they've got it made, and then they just flame out.

[Bud Elliott]

I don't, I don't think we'll see it. And the key word there to me is see, like, do I think it will happen? Yeah, but like, how are we gonna see it? Like, do we think we're gonna. Do we think that, like, we'll be able to identify, like, a meaningful trend in, like, the number of highly rated guys who get paid at a high school who don't hit? I. I mean, we can measure that. I don't think we're gonna see it in a number that will matter. I think we'll probably hear some anecdotal stories about a few guys who, you know, got a big bag, got comfortable, settled, you know, and didn't. Didn't keep grinding. And then they'll probably talk, you know, years later to a reporter for a feature story about, like, hey, I wish I would have, you know, tried harder here and whatnot. But I don't think we'll. I don't think we'll. That it will occur enough for us to, like, see it and be like, wow, like, this is really changing this.

[Chip Patterson]

I wonder. Yeah, I wonder if you could also just sort of tack on or, or pivot this to player movement. You know, the guys, the guys who end up at five schools, you know, across the course of their career, and it is, it is difficult for me to imagine that development is not harmed by having to go and restart that many times. And maybe you can even say that goes all the way back to the high school where we're starting to see that as well too. But guys who started one school, big recruit, because of the current environment, they do get a bag, but it don't meet the standards, end up going Somewhere else, going somewhere else, going somewhere else, then you don't end up being the pro talent that you were projected to be as a 17 year old when you were given that 4 star or 5 star rating.

[Tom Fernelli]

I do think it will change the way NFL teams evaluate college players in that it gives them another data point where it's like, hey, this kid showed up, got paid and he still kept working. And I think that that's going to be one of those things on scouting reports because that's one of those things NFL teams are always interested in is, you know, what's this kid gonna like, do they have that mentality? And I think that that's going to show up. Like if a guy shows up as a freshman QB, gets 10 million and then balls out for three years, works his ass off, that's certainly going to help him as far as his draft evaluation or defensive end or anybody.

[Bud Elliott]

Now do we think this will be offset by the positive impact that NIL has where we only had like 40 something guys to clear early for the draft?

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah, I think the question was more about the. What, what's happening at the end of the line? Like, are the, is the NFL getting less good players? I think the answer is probably no.

[Bud Elliott]

I don't think so. Because I, I think you're getting like this morning I was playing around with making an all star team of the guys who in prior years would have gone pro but instead decided to return to college football.

[Chip Patterson]

Right.

[Bud Elliott]

And it's like a national championship team. I mean, you're talking probably 40 dudes who are somewhere between like top 100 and top 150 type picks if they decided to turn pro. You know, I listen to a lot of these like, like podcasts, you know, doing the mock draft type stuff and they're all complaining about the lack of, of talent in the draft because it's staying in college, you know. Right. Yeah, yeah. It makes our game a lot better. So I, this is kind of where I'm saying I don't know if we're gonna be able to actually see a meaningful decline in guys getting the bag and not working out because it's probably going to be offset by the guys not jumping pro early because they were usually jumping out of desperation financially or because they failed out of school, which also really doesn't happen anymore with online classes. Somebody else can just do the work for you.

[Tom Fernelli]

Also, there's not less like the way that the draft guys are framing it. There's not less talent in the draft, there's just less mystery Box talent. Because most of the guys who are in the draft, you kind of know who they are. Whereas there's no longer that kid that's like, this kid. We don't know his ceiling. It's like. Well, actually, he's played for five years. You know what his ceiling is? This is who he is.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. And if they. If they were smart, they should appreciate that.

[Tom Fernelli]

You think so?

[Chip Patterson]

Less of these, like, super tools guys that everybody in college can tell you. Like, I don't know. His coaches kind of told us that.

[Tom Fernelli]

I don't know.

[Chip Patterson]

We'll see.

[Tom Fernelli]

But then the mystery box, though, Chip. It's always appealing.

[Chip Patterson]

They see him in the underwear Olympics and they're like, oh, underwear Olympics. Coming up later this month. Happy February, everybody. We, of course, will be giving you combine preview. Combine recap coverage here on podcast.

[Danny Cannell]

Or you just watch the Grammys. Get some underwear Olympics.

[Chip Patterson]

What happened last night?

[Danny Cannell]

You guys didn't see Justin Bieber in his drawers?

[Chip Patterson]

No.

[Tom Fernelli]

No, Danny, I haven't watched the grammys in like 20 years.

[Bud Elliott]

Grammys.

[Danny Cannell]

I have three teenage daughters.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. Grammys is the music one.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

There are actually some good performances.

[Chip Patterson]

Nice. Well, I mean, I hope so.

[Danny Cannell]

Justin Bieber in his drawers. He was in his underwear.

[Chip Patterson]

Was it. Was it a song of sensual nature? Not really.

[Danny Cannell]

It was very introspective, but just slept in.

[Tom Fernelli]

Oh, I gotta go to the Grammys.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah, I. The. I missed it. Well, I'm glad there were some good performances, Danny, because that is the legacy. I think for me, the legacy of the Grammys that I do appreciate is not the actual awards and who gets them, because that's such a political, like, you know, back room voters and all that things. I think the event itself, the fact that there is a long history of top performers bringing their A game. There's performances then good, good Grammys Post.

[Danny Cannell]

Malone with a little tribute to Ozzy Osborne was pretty good.

[Chip Patterson]

Nice.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah.

[Chip Patterson]

Let's go. All right, coming up on the other side, Ohio State has finally announced its offensive coordinator hire of Arthur Smith. What to expect there? John Sumrall making some waves with logos in Gainesville and more Dukes.

[Tom Fernelli]

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[Bud Elliott]

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[Tom Fernelli]

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[Bud Elliott]

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[Tom Fernelli]

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[Bud Elliott]

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[Tom Fernelli]

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[Bud Elliott]

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[Chip Patterson]

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[Tom Fernelli]

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The Home Depot Dream Baths built here.

[Chip Patterson]

Back here on the COVID 3 podcast. Yes, over the weekend what was initially reported as Ohio State zeroing in on Arthur Smith as its next offensive coordinator was finalized and based on my read of the situation, really the holdup was some attention that Arthur Smith was getting for potential NFL jobs as well. If I'm to, you know, take all that as as it is reported, kind of seems like this is a big win for Ohio State to get a candidate that could potentially have been in the NFL. He now joins Matt Patricia in what is becoming a Listen, Bill Belichick tried to get out here and talk about his team as the 33rd NFL franchise with Ohio State's raw talent and Arthur Smith and Matt Patricia that like that the closest thing that we have to the 33rd team in the NFL might be there in Columbus. Tom, what's your expectation for what we will see from Arthur Smith's offense with the Buckeyes?

[Tom Fernelli]

I Mean, it probably won't look that much different than what you've already seen. I think it's not going to look like, I mean, if you go back to his time as an offensive coordinator in the NFL and also his time as a head coach, it's. Everything's kind of built about, around the run. But it's not what I would call smash mouth, kind of old school. It just, it looks like a modern NFL offense, which is what they're going to be bringing to Ohio State, which is trying to run a more modern NFL offense because it has a bunch of NFL talent on it. It's got a bunch of guys that's trying develop for the league. And I think it makes sense given what Ryan Day's hiring habits have been in recent years, where he wants his coordinators just to be coordinators. He's not asking them to go out there and be recruiting and all that kind of stuff. So that's going to appeal to Arthur Smith. And then also, I mean, he comes obviously with the recommendation of Mike Vrabel because he was Mike Rabel's offensive coordinator in Tennessee. And Mike Vrabel is very connected. He's a former Buckeye. He cares very much about the program. He's very much involved there. So much like Matt Patricia, Arthur Smith comes with that kind of variable kind of endorsement. So it makes plenty of sense.

[Danny Cannell]

Thoughts?

[Bud Elliott]

I. I am curious, like, the more double, like the, the more heavy personnel they use, right. You know, do they become even more like. I agree with Tom. I don't think he's super smash mouth, but like, by college standards, maybe. So. So like, will they use more two tight end stuff? I. I'm pretty curious about that. Like, how does say in fit into that? But like, I'd be a lot more worried about hiring Arthur Smith if I didn't have Ryan Day as the head coach.

[Tom Fernelli]

Oh.

[Bud Elliott]

Because I think his offenses in the NFL were not very good.

[Chip Patterson]

Ryan Day's offenses or Arthur.

[Bud Elliott]

No, Arthur Smith's. But, but Ryan Smith's a hell of an offensive football coach, in my opinion. Like, everybody gets got sometimes, but he usually is the one winning, especially with that personnel he has. So I'm not real worried about it.

[Danny Cannell]

It's amazing how good you can be as a coach when you have elite talent on the field. Like, I think it can make a good coach outstanding. And I think that's what Arthur Smith realizes. He's going to have elite talent to work with. I'm not really that worried about it. You'd have to pretty. You'd have to screw it up pretty royally.

[Chip Patterson]

Well, I mean, I don't think you'd have to be worried about it. I think that the, the question is, are you enthused or excited about it? Because two years with the Pittsburgh Steelers yielded what. I mean, I, I don't, I'm not a, I'm not on the pits. I'm not Ryan Wilson. I don't my heart ride with the Pittsburgh Steelers. But best I can tell, that was still a, a team that won with defense and. Right. Am I correct there? Yeah.

[Tom Fernelli]

Quarterbacks were Justin Fields and Aaron Rodgers.

[Danny Cannell]

Right.

[Tom Fernelli]

Aaron Rodgers can't throw the ball more than 10 yards downfield. Like, it's kind of hard to win that way. And I would say at Tennessee, he turned Ryan Tannehill into a damn all Pro. Like, he had a lot of success at Tennessee as the offensive coordinator. That's how he got the Falcons job to begin with. Now, it didn't really work out for him in Atlanta, but I don't know, man. I don't think he's ever had as much talent as far as the, the ability that he's going to be dealing with that he's going to have at Ohio State.

[Danny Cannell]

That's true.

[Chip Patterson]

You mentioned the, the recruiting portion of this national signing day is on Wednesday. So I guess. But my question here is your understanding that for the most part, like our, our team rankings are mostly locked. Are there players that we've got our eyes on with our partners at 247 Sports who obviously are going to be, you know, keeping tabs on, you know, any sort of late changes that happen along the way or, or what any of the new hires might have been able to do with a, with a little bit of extra time? Is there any reason to think that USC will not be the number one team and win, win this 2026 recruiting cycle, things of that nature?

[Bud Elliott]

Not, not at this point, no. I think you have to have something that is really kind of shocking. And out of nowhere, you know, this brings up an interesting conversation because a lot of people are like, change the calendar. Get rid of the early signing period. Which. Cool. Do it. Guess what? Like, there are so many kids now who get all their credits done from high school in three and a half semesters and go early. Like, are you all of a sudden gonna say you can't enroll as a mid year if you have your high school credits done? I mean, to me, that doesn't. Like you're gonna lose that, that lawsuit immediately. Right? So even like you, you can't unring the bell of setting up high schools to allow players to graduate early, that was brought on largely by the early signing period.

[Tom Fernelli]

Right.

[Bud Elliott]

Like that. They're still going to do that. So you'd be like, all right, signing period is until February. Cool. You know what? Grant nay period is late December, because I'm enrolling January 1st to start the spring semester so I can go through spring football. Like, I don't. I don't think it's going to change anything. This is why I think if you are going to change some stuff, you have a very slightly better chance of changing this, the portal window, you know, to after spring. I still think you lose on that, especially because certain guys are going to want to transfer just like high school.

[Chip Patterson]

To get in for spring practice.

[Bud Elliott]

Correct? Yeah, but, like, yeah, it's just. This is where I'm very skeptical on all these. Hey, we're going to change this. This in the calendar. We're change this in the calendar. I haven't seen a single article or, or any like, like, quote from anybody explaining why they think that, like, that's going to sustain a challenge.

[Danny Cannell]

Coaches like them coming in in January, too.

[Chip Patterson]

Love it.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah. Extra development.

[Bud Elliott]

If you're one of our young listeners and you weren't around for all the debates like 10 years ago about the early signing period, the entire reason we have the early signing period is because coaches wanted their Christmas back and they did not want to have to babysit the commitment status of these recruits for another seven weeks until the first Wednesday in February, because these kids were committing over the summer, you know, like Texas. Mac Brown would have their entire class done by June with one or two exceptions. And then you had to sit there and wait and wait and wait and just check in. Hey, are we still good? Hey, we still good? And like, the coaches made their own bet on this, honestly. Right. And then they started pushing everybody to enroll early. Hey, if you're going to sign early, might as well enroll early. And so they did. And high schools all over the country got set up to allow them to. To finish their credits early. And so you get out of high school in three and a half, not four. Semest investors. I don't know how you can go back on that when.

[Chip Patterson]

All right, so the early signing period started in 2017. And by the way, when you just said a decade ago, it kind of blew my mind that realized we've been, you know, doing this for that long. So the early signing period starts in 2017. When do we re is it? We still had early enrollees before then.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah.

[Chip Patterson]

It was just not robust. Right.

[Bud Elliott]

Urban was doing it heavily at Florida.

[Chip Patterson]

Okay. In the early 2000s.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah. I remember like, like, I remember thinking, hey, this is pretty sharp to get these kids in, right?

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah, I remember, like, it used to be like a thing where, like, you'd be like one or two kids in your class would be an early enrolling. You'd be like, ooh, now it's like half the class.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. Now it's 19 kids.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah.

[Chip Patterson]

Now, as Miami is preparing for the national championship game, they've got all their early enrollees out at practice with them. And Mario is talking about how awesome it is that, like, Mark Fletcher is getting to be a tone setter, you know, letting everybody know who's who and what's what as they start to not only prepare for the title game, but start to get ready for 2026.

[Tom Fernelli]

Like, going to the question about talent earlier, are we more worried about talent or are we more worried about the fact that all these college programs are recruiting a bunch of nerds who are graduating high school early enough to enroll early in school? Like, are we destroying this sport with nerds?

[Chip Patterson]

If what was the.

[Danny Cannell]

What was the loophole they were using to get him in early before? Like, what's to prevent. Is it just like an honor system? Like, yeah, we'll have you gray shirt or have some early eligibility and then we'll give you the scholarship February. Like, how did they get around that then?

[Chip Patterson]

If I remember correctly, I was in high school at the same time as a player who ended up going to Duke. And it came down to all he really needed was senior English, like, to graduate. Like, all. Like, the only thing he absolutely had to do was senior English. Now because he wanted to stay for his whole senior season and not, you know, enroll early or leave. He took probably, what, seven weightliftings, you know, just to fill out the rest of the thing and just hang out in the gym and maybe a couple electives along the way. But I think that if you can work in your senior English all in one semester or, you know, pack it in or have some summer school added to it, I think the loophole is that for some graduation in some states, you don't actually have to do a lot your senior year.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

But like, if you went. If you went, and let's say we said we're going to fix the calendar, we're going to have, you know, we're going to wait until after and we're going to do the only signing day as February 5th. Schools could still have players come in January, couldn't they?

[Bud Elliott]

Totally. I think the way to fix this.

[Danny Cannell]

Is no signing day.

[Bud Elliott]

No, I think you have to remove the true incentive that these guys have right now to skip prom and skip into their senior year. And skip being a high school senior. Right. Which there are a couple. One is the money, like you're starting to make real college money in January as opposed to June for almost any of us. That's going to be enough. Like if I'm a decent recruit, you know, if I'm like, if I'm like a four star going to a power five, I'm making 400 year one pretty much. And if I'm a three star, that actually is going to a P5. And I'm not some kind of like just, you know, in throw in. I'm still making very low six figures based on what I know about this market. Okay. So like I'm really not down with waiting until June. So I don't know how you fix that piece. The other way to disincentivize or at least like not disincentivize, but remove some of the incentive to enroll early and skip the end of your senior year with all your buddies is to move spring football to summer. Because then I'm not missing out on my professional development of being in the program for spring ball. I'm still missing out on six months of weights and six months of off season training.

[Chip Patterson]

Right.

[Bud Elliott]

Which isn't nothing. So like I'm just trying to figure out like how do you, how do you make this slightly less punitive to have these guys not enroll early?

[Chip Patterson]

What do you think the coaches, I mean, what do you think the coaches would want? I mean six months, a whole spring semester with the strength and conditioning coach and like not a lot of technical work. And that's great for Matt drills.

[Bud Elliott]

And I think they want them in their program, to be honest, just in.

[Chip Patterson]

General, they wear building.

[Bud Elliott]

Right.

[Chip Patterson]

The fact that you're not doing installation and the fact that you're not teaching the offense doesn't matter that much.

[Bud Elliott]

Right.

[Chip Patterson]

Interesting, interesting. But yes, Wednesday, national signing day. That will be the conclusion of the class. I looked at quick scan. Excuse me. I think that it was only what like one or two players in the top 224 7. The top two 4, 7 are actually in. They're committed to. They just need to get in there and get signed. But still the conclusion of the cycle and then as you will start to see the recruiting headlines, the work on 2027 has already begun.

[Tom Fernelli]

Is that comment from H.J. gadian.

[Bud Elliott]

True.

[Tom Fernelli]

Next year, there are nine days between the title game and national signing day.

[Chip Patterson]

Well, next year's national championship is January 25th.

[Bud Elliott]

What's the first Wednesday? It's like a February 1st. February 1st. Guy.

[Tom Fernelli]

Why are we having the title game on January 25th?

[Bud Elliott]

It's insane, dude.

[Chip Patterson]

And it's like a 12 day.

[Tom Fernelli]

What's the reasoning for that?

[Bud Elliott]

It's so annoying.

[Danny Cannell]

Must be the fall.

[Tom Fernelli]

Oh, is it just to avoid like a weekend?

[Chip Patterson]

Well, the semi finals are to avoid the weekend. And so it's about a 12 day break between the semi finals and the. The national championship game.

[Tom Fernelli]

That's ridiculous.

[Bud Elliott]

So it's on the 25th.

[Chip Patterson]

Yep.

[Bud Elliott]

We can't play this on MLK.

[Danny Cannell]

That would be.

[Chip Patterson]

Which is what we did this year, right?

[Danny Cannell]

Right.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah. That's just idiotic.

[Chip Patterson]

This next year was the COVID 3 podcast, realizing how long January is.

[Danny Cannell]

So this is because next week, next year, Labor Day is September 7th. Like, it's the week zero is going to be August 31st. So, you know, get rid of a buy.

[Tom Fernelli]

Who cares? You don't care about these players anyway.

[Chip Patterson]

We are getting rid of a buy. Next year is only a one by season.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah, unless you play week zero.

[Tom Fernelli]

What are we doing?

[Chip Patterson]

25Th is absurd for a national title game. Like January 1st, national college football holiday in 24 days until you'll get all the way to get all the way to crowning a champion. But we'll be crowding them in Las.

[Danny Cannell]

Vegas, it's the 24th after that in New Orleans, 22nd in Tampa after that. So it's the new window. I. So here's my thing. I'm gonna go against you guys because I love it. Would you rather. What would you rather be talking about? Like, I know everybody's like, oh, let's end the season on January 1st. Or like, you want one game on January 1st. No, I like having a bunch of games to watch on December 31st and January 1st. And I actually like, what do we do in August? Oh, my gosh, I can't wait till college football. I can't believe we had a college football. Why do we complain if we get more college football around the schedule? Like, I like the fact that it goes that deep. I don't want to turn my attention to college hoops until it's late as possible.

[Tom Fernelli]

Daniel James Canal. I don't care about myself. I care about the fact that the sport is going to get absolutely lost in the NFL playoff. Yeah, nobody will give a shit about the college football Playoff next year. There will be no this year.

[Danny Cannell]

Yeah, the ratings were off the charts. Like they're. But that's good. Like that's not going to change. No matter when you air the game, it's going to be the same time in the college football that it was. Like, that's not changing. It's still. The NFL will be going on. We didn't lose that much interest this year. Like people were talking about the ratings.

[Tom Fernelli]

Ratings. That's just four hours on one day of people moving on.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah.

[Tom Fernelli]

They're not paying any attention to the sport outside of that. As soon as the game's over, they're going right back to the NFL coaching cycle. We do. Who cares.

[Danny Cannell]

Whatever. That gives more opportunity for our listeners.

[Tom Fernelli]

But it's better for the sport if more people are focused on the sport when the sport's not actually being played. Because then it becomes better for us because then more people are watching our show.

[Chip Patterson]

I. I think that it is undeniable that the Monday through Friday buzz really starts to take a hit.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yes. When there's like 13 days between the semifinals in the title game and it's just.

[Chip Patterson]

It's. If your team is in it, then you're still living and breathing, but a lot of people just move on and sort of keep it moving. And that's, you know.

[Danny Cannell]

You know what no one talked about the past week? No one. The Super Bowl. No one did. Like it was. I didn't get called at all for. Because it was all Bill Belichick getting snubbed and it was all head coaching cycles. And granted I get the Patriot Seahawks isn't like the biggest brands out there. But I think the super bowl do just fine. I think it's okay.

[Tom Fernelli]

I disagree that nobody's talking about the Super Bowl. Every time I turned on hq, somebody was talking about the Super Bowl.

[Chip Patterson]

I will say that. That, you know that that is one spot where I see it where you can just tell that the attention we go, we go from a certain rhythm and a certain cadence in terms of our promotion and discussion of the sport that we love as a big outlet. And it really. You start to see it ramp down and then it's right at the title game, we crank it back up again. But it is it. The long layoffs are really tough. I mean there are. Danny. How many times can we power rank the quarterbacks in the semifinals? How many times can we do. Do keys to the game and players to watch? You know, I mean, it's just the more time there is. That's my Argument, Danny. My argument is that the long layoffs are not good for maintaining the excitement of the event. I'm. If. If you need. If you need it to be on a different time or later or earlier, we can talk about that. But I. I think the long layoffs, especially deeper into the playoffs, are really tough.

[Danny Cannell]

I'd be okay if we went back to the way it was with four teams. Like, if we finished January 8th, January 9th. Like that Monday.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah.

[Danny Cannell]

I do not want to have a national championship game on January 1st. I don't want one game and potentially that's it. The whole weekend of the biggest college football holiday. I think I don't have a problem with that week.

[Tom Fernelli]

Put the semifinals on January 1st and then put the title game a week later. A week, seven days, even if it's on a Wednesday.

[Danny Cannell]

Although I do like the fact that teams get healthy. You know, you're banged up, you've paid 16 games. Get some guys back. I want to see guys go at their full strength.

[Tom Fernelli]

I want them to be dying. I want this to be a battle of attrition. I want falling off. I want blood on the field.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, I. I just. I do think the NFL does a much better job of spacing out events and keeping, like, keeping event style stuff throughout the off season.

[Danny Cannell]

Well, that's where I think the transfer portal would be fixed. If we could get that after the season, then we got topics built in, ready to go as soon as the national championship's crowned. All right. Bam. And then if you did high school recruiting after that, like, it would start to fill the cycle. Then you drop in the schedule, kind of like the NFL does, then you've got stuff to discuss year round, which is, the NFL does better than anybody.

[Bud Elliott]

I mean, Right. And the portal is so distinctly different from recruiting. Right. Like, we were trying to do like 15 to 20 of these recruiting episodes with Ivan's. Like, I've tried to do either run beyond or launch a recruiting style podcast like, three times in 20 years. People don't give a damn, dude. Not. Not enough to scale it. Right. Like, it's great for subscription style business, for the absolute die hard sickos who are going to subscribe to their message board. But, like, you can't scale it. The portal, I think you can scale because enough people have seen these players.

[Tom Fernelli]

They're known quantities. Yeah.

[Bud Elliott]

Right.

[Chip Patterson]

Good call. All right, coming up on the other side. Oh, one of our favorites. Looks like targeting is going to get another review. Plus question for Tom and more Nukest. The world moves fast.

[Tom Fernelli]

Your workday even faster Pitching products Drafting.

[Chip Patterson]

Reports analyzing data Microsoft 365 Copilot is your AI assistant for work built into Word, Excel, PowerPoint and other Microsoft 365 apps you use, helping you quickly write, analyze, create and summarize so you can cut through clutter and clear a path to your best work. Learn [e-mail] M365 copilot LinkedIn hiring pro can't predict the future, but it can help you feel confident about future hires. Because Hiring Pro combines real time insights and candidate Data from the LinkedIn network with the criteria you've set for your.

[Bud Elliott]

Role to deliver you a list of.

[Chip Patterson]

Top fit candidates, businesses who use LinkedIn are 24% less likely to reopen a.

[Tom Fernelli]

Role in the next 12 months.

[Chip Patterson]

Hire right the first time with LinkedIn Hiring Pro post your first job today and get $100 [e-mail] Pandora offer. Terms and conditions apply. Back here on the COVID 3 podcast it is a comment that we have made here on the COVID 3 podcast before where a lot of fans, especially as you're watching on a Saturday, you know, we discuss whether something is or is not targeting and fans might not realize this dagum rule gets tweaked almost every single season. You know, and so why not? Okay, we're going to open it back up once again. The NCAA accordance. NCAA national coordinator of officials Steve Shaw says that decision makers will analyze the targeting rule and make penalties potentially, quote, less punitive. That needs to be an annual discussion, shaw said. And it will be a focus discussion. What needs to be the changes in a rule that I think if I remember last time we took a straw poll has been getting better with some of these software updates. Fair?

[Danny Cannell]

Yes.

[Chip Patterson]

Okay.

[Danny Cannell]

The only they're not going to get rid of the rule. The only thing that needs to change is the punishment of the rule because having a player sit out the half of the next game is ridiculous. And Mario brought that to and it wasn't. It wasn't even it was a questionable targeting call as it was. I think they've got to go to some sort of system where there's a quick review process during the game, maybe even the eject the player if it's bad on the field. But and and maybe it's harsher if there's a head hunting targeting where it's like hey, the guy was violent and it was a dirty play. I'm okay if you spend them for a game, but an automatic half if you miss. You know, if you're kicked out in the second half of a game because of targeting. That's the one that's too harsh. That's the one that's got to change.

[Bud Elliott]

So seven years ago I wrote and you got it. This is, this is like killed now. Spanish society that wiped it, I think. But I think a lot of these changes make a lot of sense. Right. They, they do need to have it at the very least like a flagrant one and a flagrant two type thing. What they really need to do is look at, at like initial intended path and if the ball carrier ducks into it, there's no foul. Right. The problem is doing that implicitly admits that the sport is unsafe and that like that any, no amount of behavioral change is going to be able to make it safe. And they cannot admit that via how they legislate it. So they won't do this to actually fix it because that would get rid of a decent amount of your incidental, like incidental accidental targeting shots and would allow you to focus on the ones that are like, pretty clearly like targeting just by definition has the word intent. Right. You don't accidentally target something. Right. It's self defined. So. But they really can't admit this and be like, well guys, actually this is a, it's a collision sport, not a contact sport. And it's inherently dangerous to play and you're rewarded by getting millions of dollars and your brain might get scrambled a little bit. Right. For the very, you know, like unfortunate few of you. So they won't fix it that way. But I do think going like flagrant one, flagrant two and not having a disqualification is at least a small step in the right direction.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah, I would get rid of the automatic dq. I would go more to like you were saying, a flagrant one or a flagrant two kind of style where there's like, you know, it's, we're not idiots. Like if you're watching football, you know when a football play happens and you know when somebody's being an like, you know when somebody's out there trying to hurt you? Yeah.

[Chip Patterson]

Or bored. Remember when Caleb Downs was bored that one time over the middle and he.

[Tom Fernelli]

Just said, I'll try to kill you. Like it's not hard to tell the difference between a cheap shot and a football play period. So you could save that for cheap shots, ejections, suspensions. You could also go to more of like a, like if you go to soccer's yellow card, red card thing where if you accumulate too many targeting calls over the course of a season, then you get Suspended for a game. Like, if you've been called for targeting four times. All right, buddy, you clearly aren't learning. You've got a. You know, you're not adapting. You're not adjusting to how to play. You're going to miss a game because of it.

[Chip Patterson]

We do have that with personal foul penalties. Right now. I don't have.

[Tom Fernelli]

Yeah, but that's two in a game and you get ejected.

[Chip Patterson]

Right, but it's because I just.

[Tom Fernelli]

I'm talking like, it doesn't stop. Like, when the game ends, you. You still have that break on your record. Like, you got two more, and then you're going to sit again. Or. Or just eliminate targeting altogether and let them die. If they die. Going back to my battle of Trisha comments. I mean, it's football. I want to. You know, let's. Let's let them hit each other.

[Chip Patterson]

Anything else, Danny? Were you leaning forward? Do you have a thought? No, No.

[Danny Cannell]

I just think the punishment is too harsh for the crime. Yeah, I'm okay. If you had a harsher punishment, that could come out, you know, it's kind of your way to appease the most ardent, you know, target might be upset by this.

[Tom Fernelli]

Every year, we put everybody who was called for targeting's name into a bowl, and we draw one name and we sacrifice that man to the go and let him serve as a warning to everybody who still plays that this could be you.

[Danny Cannell]

Oh, man.

[Chip Patterson]

From the.

[Tom Fernelli]

Let's.

[Chip Patterson]

I thought that this was a little bit of an interesting headline. We don't always get the. The very. The old collegiate motivational type stuff. Right. Like, one time, North Carolina basketball coach Roy Williams came back and he took all the rims off the baskets. He said, no. It's like, if you guys don't want to play any defense, if you just want to shoot, we're just going to be passing and playing defense. Right. Mike, you know, famously, like, took a. Took ever. All the. All the uniforms away. And. And if you've been watching any of the Florida Gators workouts, you'll notice you don't have the Gator logo on them. That's right, because John Summerall has brought in something that actually was done at Florida before. John Summerall telling the Associated Press, quote, gotta earn it. Gotta earn the logo. We ain't earned it yet. We haven't earned a damn thing. All we've got is our name to wear the Florida Gator logo, to wear the Gators across your helmet, to wear the Gator head, you gotta earn that. He says he wasn't quite aware that Urban Meyer had something similar when he took over back in 2005. Bud. What, Troy boy, What do we make a summer all going? I. It's a little old school, right? Yeah.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, it is old school. I don't know that I love this. I don't know how well Urban Meyer would do coaching. Well, actually, I do know how well Urban Meyer would do coaching guys who get paid. Oh, not well, right?

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. It didn't work out well in Jacksonville. That is correct.

[Bud Elliott]

Now, I think you could argue from a team building perspective, maybe it makes sense, but, like, you don't really see. I mean, maybe Danny knows of it. Like, do you see NFL teams doing this?

[Danny Cannell]

No.

[Bud Elliott]

Right.

[Danny Cannell]

But there's always been a difference, you know?

[Chip Patterson]

And.

[Danny Cannell]

And is that difference still there? Can you get, you know, guys that are in college because they're not amateurs, can you get them? Like, you're paying guys a lot of money to play football for you. Like, are you gonna hold back their check until they deserve the logo? You know, like it. But I kind of. I don't hate it. I did see, like, the comments on one of the stories that I saw was like, hey, Coach Sumrall, you haven't earned that. Have you won a game yet with the Gators? Are you allowed to wear that? And then the other ones, like, you're paying. Are you gonna, you know, you're gonna be playing players seven figures. Are you gonna make them earn it? But I do think it still can work at the college level. I think it's a good mindset to have to make them earn it to show that nobody's above anybody else and you've got your starting quarterback who has to earn the Gator. Just like the walk on, you know, backup off, Right?

[Tom Fernelli]

Does it. Yeah.

[Bud Elliott]

A lot of programs, I think the age is important in this, right? Like, while the differences between the NFL and college are shrinking yearly because these guys get paid real money now, the age gap is not tricky, right? Like, these are. You're still dealing with a lot of guys who are 18, 19, 20, 21. The NFL is for the most part, like 22 and up, you know, so if you're talking like a 34 year old entering his 12th NFL camp and he has to earn his. His, you know, his Patriots logo on his helmet, he's gonna be like, you know, go yourself. Right?

[Tom Fernelli]

So if Mike Rabel told me that, I wouldn't say that to Mike Rabel.

[Bud Elliott]

Right. Well, okay. Yeah, yeah. He don't skip the gym much. I'd be like, yes, sir. Maybe with the age, like, you could do certain team building stuff still, even though these guys are paid.

[Tom Fernelli]

This would work on me, period.

[Bud Elliott]

I love it.

[Tom Fernelli]

I mean, it's, it's hokey, it's silly, it's old schooly, but it would work on me. If I'm a football player and I see my teammates or get logos on their helmet and I don't have one, guess what? I'm gonna work a little harder because I'm gonna feel like, I don't want to feel like a loser without a.

[Bud Elliott]

Logo on my helmet.

[Tom Fernelli]

I'm gonna do what I have to.

[Danny Cannell]

Do to get it right. I think you want to create an atmosphere of competition, you know, and that works. I mean, we've seen guys, whoever wins the spring game gets to have lobster and steak, and whoever loses get hot dogs. You know, like, everybody's always trying to do something just to gain a little bit edge and create an atmosphere that's positive peer pressure. I think that's what you're trying to do.

[Chip Patterson]

What about an overall vibe check on, on the Gators? I mean, just, I thought we'd tack this on because we're going to be doing a lot more, obviously, summer school. We'll be diving into the big deep dives of the, the roster, the changes and what to expect. But, you know, we've, we've had a lot of smaller changes along the way. But, you know, when you got Buster Faulkner in there, you got Aaron Philo in there, you were able to retain a lot of key players that possibly could have gone elsewhere, including Jaden Ball. Including Jaden Woods, Dallas Wilson. What's, what's our feeling of sort of where the, where the Gators are at as they prepare for year one?

[Bud Elliott]

I mean, they hit on quarterback, they're a threat to win the sec.

[Chip Patterson]

Okay, I would call that ceiling.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, right. But I mean, you know, like, the schedule's nice. They're, I mean, how many games are they favored in?

[Chip Patterson]

Well, I, I, what, nine?

[Bud Elliott]

I mean, are you favored over, over Oklahoma in the Swamp? I think so. Right? Are you, you're not favored at Texas, and I don't think you're favored against Georgia on a neutral because the neutral is in Mercedes Benz this year because they're doing renovations to the Jacksonville Stadium. Yeah, but I think your favorite overall miss at home, I, I like you better than Missouri. Even on the road, you get South Carolina in the Swamp, you get first year Auburn. I mean, at Kentucky.

[Danny Cannell]

I think a lot of these, though, are going to be like two and a half points.

[Chip Patterson]

I think the margins of favored for some of those games that you just mentioned.

[Danny Cannell]

Right, but that's why you brought in some raw to win those close games. You know, that's going to be everybody's case in the sec. They're going to beat some tighter spreads. We saw it this past year.

[Tom Fernelli]

Correction for you. But it's not the Georgia game. It's the Invesco QQQ Atlantic Red Iron Classic.

[Bud Elliott]

Excuse me. That, that is an important clarification. Q. Q. Q. Yeah, you can, you.

[Chip Patterson]

Can go ahead and be my proxy to, to that game.

[Bud Elliott]

Yeah, seriously, dude, I'll be okay there. No, look, yeah, obviously they're not going to be like touchdown favorites on the road at Missouri, but. And you're not. It's not that intimidating of a schedule.

[Chip Patterson]

Exciting times, Tom, I'm with you. It would totally work on me. I like it. I'm a former camp counselor. Like this type of stuff is right up my alley to, you know, get, get motivated, get enthusiasm, get positivity going.

[Tom Fernelli]

It would work on me right to hell now. And I'm no longer a child.

[Chip Patterson]

Listen to. If you, if you want to be able to have this Cover 3 sticker.

[Tom Fernelli]

On your helmet, tell me what I got to do.

[Danny Cannell]

Coach, you gotta take away his microphone.

[Bud Elliott]

He doesn't get why cover 3 hat.

[Tom Fernelli]

I will die for that sticker, Coach.

[Chip Patterson]

Yeah. Let's go. All right, good stuff here. We will be back on Wednesday, 11am Eastern Time and then on Thursday. Go ahead and get ahead of this one. We will be opening up the big old bag of mail. Of course, you go and you leave us a five star review and in that review, you put a mailbag question. We'll throw it in the bag. Big old bag of mail. Tackle it either Thursday or in a future mailbag episode. As always, you can reach out to us on Twitter @Cover3podcast. Tell us it's a mailbag question. Reach out to us individually as well. We will be collecting those all over the coming weeks. Spotify comments as well. That will start to get to you. Maybe leave it in the comments of this episode so that it's got enough time to be able to make it to Thursday's show. And you can follow him on Twitter at Danny Canal. You can follow him at Tom Pernell. You can follow him@blood Elliott3. You follow me. Chip Patterson, gentlemen, thank you very much.

[Tom Fernelli]

Thank you.

[Chip Patterson]

Paramount celebrates black voices with stories of excellence and dreaming.

[Tom Fernelli]

Whilst black and Watson mysteries are what.

[Chip Patterson]

We do of love in lawman Bass Reeves.

[Bud Elliott]

My heart hurt when we apart and of community in the neighborhood and the shy.

[Chip Patterson]

Well, if you need anything at all, I got you.

[Bud Elliott]

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[Chip Patterson]

In the Black Voices collection on Paramount stream now.