← Josh Pate's College Football Show
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- [00:00]
Josh Pate
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.
- [00:04]
Lenovo Advertiser
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- [00:31]
Josh Pate
Lenovo.
- [00:35]
Jennifer
Oh, could this vintage store be any cuter?
- [00:38]
Josh Pate
Right?
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Jennifer
And the best part, they accept Discover. Except Discover in a little place like this? I don't think so, Jennifer. Oh, yeah.
- [00:46]
Josh Pate
Huh?
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Jennifer
Discover's accepted where I like to shop. Come on, baby. Get with the times. Right. So we shouldn't get the parachute pants? These are making a comeback, I think.
- [00:58]
Lenovo Advertiser
Discover is accepted at 99% of places that take credit cards nationwide, based on
- [01:03]
Josh Pate
the February 2025 Nielsen report. Do you want to find a stress free way to buy your next car? Start at CarMax and shop your way. If you want to browse with confidence, get pre qualified online with no impact on your credit score, and shop cars within your budget. From luxury cars to family rides, CarMax has options for almost every price range, including more than 25,000 cars priced under $25,000. So, hey, want to get started? Just head to CarMax.com for details and get pre qualified today. Want to drive CarMax?
- [01:38]
Julian Edelman
This is Julian Edelman from Dudes on Dudes with Gronk and Jules. All right, real quick. Take a look at yourself right now.
- [01:44]
Josh Pate
Why?
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FanDuel Advertiser
What's wrong?
- [01:45]
Julian Edelman
Nothing's wrong. You look like a guy running on three hours of sleep and vibes.
- [01:50]
Josh Pate
Okay, yeah, I'm tired, kind of cranky, and very thirsty.
- [01:54]
Julian Edelman
Congrats. Those are some of the potential signs of mild dehydration. And I bet your last bathroom break showed you another sign your body might be throwing you a penalty flag.
- [02:07]
Josh Pate
So what's the play?
- [02:07]
Julian Edelman
Call Liquid IV hydration multiplier. One stick in water helps hydrate faster than water alone.
- [02:15]
Josh Pate
Okay, but where's the proof?
- [02:17]
Julian Edelman
Liquid IVs, clinical studies, not just a guy I know. Real science. Results you can trust.
- [02:26]
Josh Pate
Well, take a look at me now. Liquid IV is officially part of my daily hydration routine.
- [02:31]
Lenovo Advertiser
Pass the firecracker.
- [02:32]
Josh Pate
Popsicle flavor.
- [02:33]
Julian Edelman
Stay hydrated like a pro, not like Jack. Before this. Stock up on Liquid IV hydration multiplier atliquidd I.com and use the promo code Nuthouse for 20% off your first purchase.
- [03:05]
Josh Pate
I need reminders every now and then. And today I got a reminder. We really have not arrived. We really have not accomplished much of anything around here because a local youth today at the gym asked me, and I quote, hey, you doing the show tonight? You know, with the conference tournament in town and everything, it's the most insulted I've been in a hot minute. Yeah, we are, believe it or not, Nashville big enough for it to host the SEC basketball tournament and host us doing a year round. Are you listening children? Year round college football show. We're jam packed. We're high atop a buzzing downtown Nashville, Tennessee lot going on, happy to be part of it. It's Thursday, March 12th, the year of our Lord. Yeah, 2026. There are threats. There are threats. There are at least rumblings, suggestions, scare tactics, whatever you want to call it, that as recently as today, the SEC might just break away. Jesse, did you see Ross Dellinger? Shame on him. Fear mongering like he was today. But you know what? We know Ross Dellinger to be a good and decent reporter and he's only reporting what he's hearing. And I'm going to explain to you why none of it's going to happen in just a few moments. We've also got a loaded jam packed show full of spring whispers and intel. Now I know half of you haven't even started spring practice yet, but for the other half that have, we've got our ear to the ground and we will deliver the latest. Let me ask you a question. You're listening or you're watching. And it may be live. It may be the recording the next day. Do you feel like you've been heard not by me, but by people who run college football? Do you feel like your voice matters? Season ticket holder Cable bundle Subscriber do you feel like your voice is being heard? Do you think they give a crap about you is what I'm trying to ask you? I think I've got an idea. Got a couple of suggestions. I'm gonna weave it into the show tonight and we're gonna talk about the top wide receiver rooms and we're gonna talk about the USC mood tracker. So we're jam packed. They're watching us in Davenport, Iowa. Bell, Meade, Tennessee. Redding, California. Mesa, Arizona, wherever you're watching and listening, please subscribe to the YouTube channel. It helps us out immensely and it doesn't impact you in any way financially or spam wise in your email inbox. So it's just all good without any of the bad and we need some of that these days. Okay, let's dive into this. I can't pretend I haven't seen this Ross Dellinger earlier Today over on on3.com posted an article and he kind of put a synopsis of it in a tweet. And I'm putting it on the screen right now. Quote, an SEC president says the conference might be forced to go our own way. He continues during key meetings in Nashville this week. The league's executives are set to hold that discussion. More in our weekly sports Biz column for ON three. What is Ross Dellinger doing here? What is he trying to accomplish here? Well, he's trying to inform us. So Greg Sankey went on Paul Feinbaum's show a couple days ago. It may have even been yesterday. Within the past 48 hours, the commissioner of the SEC, Greg Sankey has gone on Paul Feinbaum's show and he talked about a lot of stuff. Feinbaum had him on for like 30 minutes, like half an hour with the commissioner. That's no small feat. And so Greg Sankey talked about stuff like the SEC adopting their own governance structure, you know, cuz it doesn't seem like any rules are enforceable right now. So it stands to reason people in the SEC would say, well hey, why don't we just create our own rules? Maybe we can get around this whole pesky legal column that keeps getting in our way and falling on our heads. I could see that. I could see why people would be up in arms and they would suggest that he continued. And he also talked about the SEC potentially just breaking away. Now I've got to tell you, I've always thought this was a scare tactic more than anything that's actually going to happen. I still feel that way as of this very moment in time. I think a lot of this is going to be a moot point not too long from now. I'll tell you why in a second. But he did talk about that. Now to make sure we accurately summarize how the commissioner of the SEC sounded on Paul Feinbaum's show. He sounded resistant to all this. He was merely addressing the fact that, yeah, this has come up. And yeah, there's some people who want either or both of these things. I may not particularly want it, but hey, I'm not my final boss. Believe it or not, I have to answer to people as well. I feel like we've pretty accurately represented his thoughts on the matter. Obviously you can go find the full 30 minutes. Don't do it right now, but do it after the show. So here's what I want to start talking about a whole lot more. All due respect to Greg Sankey let's put what he wants and what the SEC wants over in that corner. And he's not alone. Because then I want to take Tony Petiti and what the Big Ten wants and put it over in that corner. I want to put what network executives want in a third corner. We need a big house because we got a lot of corners to put a lot of people in. And I really want to just ask one fundamental question, if I may have the audacity to do this for a second. I want to ask one fundamental question, and you probably haven't heard this in a long time. What do we want? What do we want? Just mere pawns in this whole equation. Just college football fans. You know, there still are many of us out here left. What do we want? Well, I wrote down a few things I want. I'm not going to go as far as to speak for everyone, although I do get a sense that most of you want the things that I want. And that is one, I'd love a really good TV product. Number two, I. I love strong scheduling. I love smart scheduling. I kind of low key hate when there's a soft week and then it's followed by a week where four of the seven games I've looked forward to all year happening at the same time. Not a huge fan of the fact that Penn State has to settle for Minnesota as the Whiteout because their top three games all get shoehorned at noon. Not a huge fan of that. So I'd like smarter scheduling in the sport. I'd love for more of the sport to matter. Think it's really stupid right now that we have to talk about the Big 12. The way we do and the way we talk about it right now is in a sense that, well, the Big 12 could be a cool conference title race to follow. But I mean, we all know the Big 12 is not going to win a national title. We know the PAC12 is not going to win one because it kind of doesn't even exist anymore in the framework that it used to. It's stupid that college football exists that way. It's stupid that you have two conferences that have gobbled up a vast majority of the most valuable properties and therefore, disproportionately, they take up all the oxygen in the room. I kind of low key hate that it's not low key. I think most people feel that way. So I would love for that to be less of a factor in the equation. I'd love for us to have strong leadership. I'd love for when someone walks up to me and asks, who's the face of college football? For me to have an answer, I would love when someone asks, hey, who makes the final decisions in college football, I'd love to have an answer. I'd love to have an answer to that. And I'd also love for our sport to have rules that are actually clearly defined and enforceable. These seem like 90% super majority stances, wouldn't you say, Jesse? I don't think I said anything too controversial there. So how do we get it? Because everyone can point out the problems. How do we get it? Do we really need to arrive at a place where the SEC is threatening to break away or where we've got this theory that floats around where, oh, man, the next shoe that falls is the Super League Big Ten in the SEC just going to put a big circle around 30 or 40 teams and then they're going to break away and do their own thing. In no world should we have ever come this far or even come close to those kinds of conversational topics. But we're kind of there. So how do we get away from that? How do we steer away from that port and we head over to this more reasonable port? You know, there's a lot of. A lot of clouds. There's thunderstorms over in that port. This one looks sunny and it looks bigger, and I kind of want to go over there. How do we get to a place where all that foolishness stops and no one's talking about breaking away and no one's talking about a super League, and we're talking about more of the sport mattering and we're talking about appeasing most everyone who's complaining in the process. Well, as you know, I've spent a good deal of time on this show over the past month talking about these two seemingly separate matters that aren't separate matters at all. And I'm going to keep talking about it because you're going to see pretty soon that I think there's going to be action on this front. And it doesn't just matter to executives and it doesn't just matter to commissioners. It's going to matter to me. It's going to matter to you. And for the right reasons and for the betterment of the sport we love. The first thing that you've probably heard a lot talked about and I've talked about it on the show, is the score Act. Now, that's the whole. The whole movement where we really want to get Congress to step in and do what we can't do, give us the tools, give us the ability, give us some antitrust exemption where we can write our own rules and we can enforce it. And as a blind man could have seen coming, there isn't enough agreement on that in Congress at the moment because, well, because why? Because the players aren't really represented in it. Because there's not really every voice that needs to be at the table. At the table. It really just kind of looks like a bailout of people who have done a piss poor job of running their own sport. And that would be an accurate representation of the current matter at hand. And so then on the other side, you've got people like your Cody Campbell's of the world who have spoken up pretty publicly about this recently about overhauling the Sports Broadcasting Act. As recently as last week we talked on the show about how you've got senators from, from Eric Schmidt to Cantwell, you've got bipartisan agreement, it's no small thing around the idea of amending the Sports Broadcasting Act. I'm not going to go back over all of this. You can watch previous shows, you can do a lot of reading. Ross Dellinger has done a good job of reporting on this. But the entire concept there is you overhaul that or you amend that and that allows college football to collectively pool its media rights and then negotiate and sell those like the NFL does collectively. And the theory which I happen to agree with, is that it brings a much bigger financial windfall for everyone, including not just major conferences, but it bleeds down, I don't want to say to lesser conferences but to smaller profile conferences. But more important than that, it bleeds down to the non revenue sports as well. And the whole thinking is, hey, over here, these people want protections around college football because they just think it matters that much and it's that much an integral part of the American fabric that they need protections. And hey, in theory, I don't disagree with that. But then these people over here are saying, well, hold on, why should you guys get protections? Meanwhile, we're not really addressing the issue of female sports going bankrupt. Hey, a lot of the male sports, all of the non revenue generating sports look to be left on their own when you guys get your protections over here, but you really do nothing for us. And then you've whole third rail over here is hello, are the players going to be able to collectively bargain in any of this? And so we arrive at a place where it looks clear as day to me what should happen. And what should happen is this group over here and that Group over there need to realize how much overlap there is between the two. This group over here, the score act group, that group over here, the amend, the Sports Broadcasting ACT group should be. Could be. I think in time will be common bedfellows and you ought to just link arms. It works in red rover. It could work here as well. And I think in time that will happen. And not too far down the road, mind you. And I also think in time, the SEC in the Big Ten, instead of talking about breaking away, instead of talking about super conferences, instead of talking about all this, instead of basically threatening the rest of the world to try and get what they want, I think they'll look at the landscape that could build and even they will have to say, okay, yeah, we want in on that. And I'm going to tell you why. Because nobody loses. Nobody loses. The players don't lose. The players get represented. The players make a lot more money. More players make more money than they are now. Coaches get the structure that they're begging for. They get the enforceable rules that they're begging for. Fans get a whole new world entirely. First off, we get a sport with structure, but secondly, we get an insane overhaul of the way the sport's covered, the way the sport is presented, the way scheduling works, the way broadcast networks have to cover college football collectively instead of one network being siloed into just covering one league. And the SEC in the Big Ten at the end of the day, still get what they want the most, and that is majority control over the thing. Because you're realistically not going to pull this off without guaranteeing them that, without guaranteeing that they're going to make more money than they do now, which they will. And also, look, in the end, I think a lot of the worst fears will be alleviated. A lot of, I think the bad faith arguments that are being floated about right now, which is, oh, this really won't bring the financial windfall that you think it will. It will, it will. I've never been more confident in that than I am right now. It will. And so, yeah, I listened to it earlier this week. Yes, I heard Greg Sanke talking about not just his personal opinion, he was more echoing the opinions of many people that he has to answer to inside that SEC ecosystem. But I mean, I think we're getting to a place pretty soon where even if they don't want to, begrudgingly, you're going to have to have people with letters on their chest that represent conferences have to make some decisions that. And I know I know you're going to have to hold on to your seats for this may be in the best interest of college athletics as a whole. Gasp. Gasp. I saw hands go up in the control room. Yeah. Believe it or not, there's a world where that happens and we all win. And it's not a Disney movie. It could really happen in real life. So let us all, let us all hope, let us all pray. All right. As for actual football matters on the field. Got a big stack of papers in front of me. Bradley, here's a good endpoint for you. Spring practice has started for some, is continuing to start for more. This time of year, what we like to do is we just like to get in an office room, close the door and call as many people as we can, hit up as many contacts as we can. I'll be out on the road starting next week for the rest of spring doing two things. Storm chasing and watching spring practices and meeting with coaching staffs. That's three things. But I will be doing all those three things so that we can have the most, the freshest intel that one could have. I want to start at Texas. There are rumors that they're favored to win the national championship. Now at FanDuel, it's Notre Dame, but at Texas, they would disagree with that. At Texas, they feel like. I feel like that they feel like they've upgraded in every portion of that offense, even offensive line, where there's still some mixing and matching questions. But I feel in the aggregate they probably upgraded along their offensive line. I don't even talk about quarterbacks here. That's your SEO friendly headlines out there. Everyone can talk about quarterbacks. Hey, Arch Manning is going to be pretty good this year. So there's your quarterback breakdown for Texas. But outside of that, I think they upgraded every offensive unit. Cam Coleman should explode this year. Cam Coleman went to Auburn last year. He was in a terrible position. He had no one to throw him the ball and he goes to Texas and not only does he have a guy to throw him the ball, not only does he have a functioning offense around him, but he's also got a play caller in Steve Sarkeesian that could use him in 15 different ways. So Cam Coleman, I can't imagine the feeling of last year versus this year when he's in that offensive structure and you got him and you got Ryan Wingo and you got Emmett Moseley. You got a lot of young guys there. I think the offensive five on the offensive line seems set, especially if the NCAA comes through on the Western Kentucky transfer. So that's the one thing I'm waiting on there. I have no clue if he's going to be eligible because I have no clue about anything pertaining to NCAA eligibility. But outside of that, I think they're starting five if they can get that guy on the offensive line. Seems pretty set. Hearing good buzz at D line, hearing really good buzz at corner. That's one of the most loaded cornerback rooms in the country. Safety and linebacker. This is the kind of, this is the time of year where there's not doubt. We're just kind of putting question marks around different units, mainly for depth purposes, mainly because it's spring football. So these aren't games, they don't count. And so guys maybe unproven, but Texas and I know it's a surprise in a pretty good position, hearing pretty good things so far. Alabama, what is going to happen here on offensive line? Again, I'm skipping over quarterback. I've made my thoughts known. We did a whole video on the Alabama quarterback situation and nothing has changed since we did that video the other day. Biggest focus by 100 miles at Alabama's offensive line. Kaylyn DeBoer had a presser the other day. Someone asked him about it and he kind of went as far as to say, yeah, I've never really been in a position where you're starting from scratch on offensive line, but they are by necessity they're kind of starting from scratch. Did you hear Mark Slayerith go on next round live the other day? Jesse, did you hear the segment where Mark Schlayrith is talking about going down and hanging out with Gruden and they're trying to watch Ty Simpson tape and then it all of a sudden gets derailed and they swerve over into realizing, wow, this Alabama offensive game tape is some of the worst we've ever seen this. This was a functional running game for an SEC title participant last year. How is that possible? So he just trashed him and rightfully so. So now it can get worse. So we're trying to ask how much better is Alabama's run game going to be at the tackle positions? This is really interesting because if you think about starting from scratch, you start thinking, oh man, they must be working with a lot of three star developmental project type guys. No, they've got bookend tackles here that are former five star guys. Jackson Lloyd, Michael Carroll are both second year guys. Ty Heywood's there, he's a former five star guy, former blue chip guy. So it's not that they don't have talent there. It's a lot of them are young and we haven't seen the unit function together. And then you've also got with that you're going to be breaking in a new quarterback and you've got along with that right now running back by committee. You're wondering like what can Xavier Crowell end up being? That's a true freshman that I'm pretty high on there. Ryan Williams is added to his last name and changed his number. What's he going to be at? Wide receiver. Said Morgan is another true freshman. They're counting on a lot. So just a lot of questions. That's what God invented spring football for, as Memaw used to always tell us. But that offensive line, everything to me with Alabama kind of works downstream of that. South Carolina, you want to talk about offensive line being in a state of flux as we talked about the other day, they're without both offensive tackles in spring. One of them's done for the year. Josiah Thompson's done for the year. Jacarius Peak was the the big transfer portal pickup. They actually beat Bama for peak and then he goes down in pre spring conditioning. I think it was. They think they may get him back. But me and Jesse were talking earlier today in sort of one of those if the season started right now conversations and we wrote down what we think the starting rotation would be for South Carolina on the offensive line if the season started right now. I did not even have the guys bother to make a graphic. Just take it. Take my word for it. It's not good. Not good at all. So prayers up that we get some guys back here before the season starts. No media viewing periods for spring practice, no spring game. Now Mike Norvell tried to pull this off last year and the good news was they had a big win in week one. The bad news is the season was still a disaster. How does it work out for South Carolina? No one knows. It's still spring right now. What about Florida? I'm going to say it's March 12th. I'm going to say we may have the most underrated wide receiver room in the country in Gainesville, Florida. What are they rated? I don't know. So don't come back at me with that line. You are not allowed to weaponize my comeback lines against me as a comeback. But I would venture to think if we did power ratings of the wide receiver rooms out there, I don't know where Florida would be. I think they would be too low. Consensus. I think they would be way too low. Eric Singleton, remember him? A couple of years ago. He's at Georgia Tech. He transfers to Auburn. Nothing at Auburn offensively worked last year, so I'm still high on the idea that Eric Singleton could be a star. He's at Florida right now. Vernell Brown has been the talk of their camp early on so far. Dallas Wilson, get him back healthy. You've got him there as well. Their defensive line lost a lot and so we're keeping an eye on guys. Jamari Lyons at nose tackle, Jeremiah McLeod at tackle. L.J. mcRae is down there. He's on the edge. I'm just. I'm just interested to see how they play. I know that's a very all encompassing. That's not spring intel, but just the energy, the identity, the DNA. Does it feel different? Like, does it jump out to you? Does it feel different? Not in spring, but come fall. Whatever it is in fall is being built right now. And just quickly at Missouri, one of the things we've talked about a lot is Austin Simmons transferring from Ole Miss to Missouri. And if you want to talk dark horse at a position, not a lot is going to be said about Austin Simmons nationally. They're going to overlook him. How much is he going to have to do? Well, that depends on what Missouri can do defensively. And they saw Damon Wilson transfer out of there and go to Miami. Zion Young's headed to the draft and so you got to replace a lot on that front. And Nicholas Rodriguez has got to be the leader of that defense. But behind him, Smith, Jaden Jones, like, there's a lot of unproven commodities there. What do we get out of that? Is this a situation where Missouri needs 40 every week to win, in other words? I don't think so, but I don't know. Again, it's spring football. And by the way, at Florida, before we move on, just at Florida, the quarterback situation, I know because Buster Faulkner took the offensive coordinator job there and then Aaron Filo followed him. I think it's just widely assumed he's going to be the starter. And I just want to say maybe he will be, maybe even the odds on favorite right now, but Tramell Jones is going to have a lot to say about that quarterback battle. So the Alabama quarterback battle is getting all the headlines in the sec. Understandably so. But that Florida quarterback battle is at least one to watch. Another thing to watch as the seasons change. It's been crazy in the Northeast. There were places in the Northeast, Maryland, Virginia that were in the 80s yesterday that saw heavy snowfall today. And the Reason I mention that is because had you prepared yourselves by shopping@patstatematerial.com you could have been equipped for both days. Because we've got a number of very very fashionable short sleeve shirts, but we've got some more heavy duty winter gear. And just imagine the flex it is when you're the only guy in the cul de sac that's wearing the Pate State strength and conditioning short sleeve shirt one day and then the very next day you got the full freights hoodie on. Maybe even buy a pillow while you're at it. A lot of good items over there at the paint state store. Paintstatematerial.com
- [27:25]
Lenovo Advertiser
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- [27:32]
Josh Pate
No.
- [27:32]
Lenovo Advertiser
A toaster. No. A hamster and a jetpack. Fun. Let them put golden wings on a dog. Good boy. Let them color correct anywhere and everywhere. Let them make. Powered by Intel Core Ultra processors, Lenovo gives creatives everything they need. Lenovo.com let creatives create.
- [27:55]
Julian Edelman
This is Julian Edelman from Dudes on Dudes with Gronk and Jules. All right, real quick, take a look at yourself right now.
- [28:02]
Josh Pate
Why?
- [28:02]
FanDuel Advertiser
What's wrong?
- [28:03]
Julian Edelman
Nothing's wrong. You look like a guy running on three hours of sleep and vibes.
- [28:07]
Josh Pate
Okay, yeah, I'm tired, kind of cranky and very thirsty.
- [28:11]
Julian Edelman
Congrats. Those are some of the potential signs of mild dehydration. And I bet your last bathroom break showed you another sign your body might be throwing you a penalty flag.
- [28:24]
Josh Pate
So what's the play?
- [28:25]
Julian Edelman
Call Liquid IV hydration multiplier. One stick in water helps hydrate faster than water alone.
- [28:33]
Josh Pate
Okay, but where's the proof?
- [28:34]
Julian Edelman
Liquid IV's clinical studies, not just a guy. I know real science. Results you can trust.
- [28:43]
Josh Pate
Well, take a look at me now. Liquid IV is officially part of my daily hydration routine. Pass the firecracker Popsicle flavor.
- [28:50]
Julian Edelman
Stay hydrated like a pro, not like Jack. Before this. Stock up on Liquid IV hydration multiplier@liquid-I.com and use the promo code nuthouse for 20% off your first purchase.
- [29:07]
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- [30:09]
Jennifer
could this vintage store be any cuter?
- [30:11]
Josh Pate
Right?
- [30:11]
Jennifer
And the best part? They accept Discover. Except Discover in a little place like this? I don't think so. Jennifer oh yeah, huh? Discover is accepted where I like to shop. Come on baby, get with the times. Right? So we shouldn't get the parachute pants. These are making a comeback I think.
- [30:31]
Lenovo Advertiser
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- [30:36]
Josh Pate
the February 2025 Nielsen report. Let's move on. I talked about this in the intro and I want to hit this. This actually is the second time I've talked about this in the span of 24 hours. That's how good a question it was. Preston from Greater Columbus, Ohio, he said, what is a fair but semi realistic way to allow fans to have their interests directly represented in major college football decisions? Phenomenal question. I don't know the answer. I've got some suggestions, but I don't know the answer. But I'll say this. There is a mentality in college sports, especially college football, doubly especially, that exists right now. There's a mentality that is so out of whack with reality and it is that of ignoring the consumer base. Because the consumer base is taken for granted. Because a lot of people have their hands on the decision making lever in this sport that came along well after college football was popularized. They came along well after it exploded, well after it had become the number two sport in this country behind the NFL and only behind the NFL. These people aren't responsible for building it. These people are merely responsible for guiding it. You don't even need to grow it, just guide it as is. If it grows, that's just a nice little cherry on top. But we've had a good thing for quite a while. A lot of us have loved this sport for a long time. And yet the very people who have loved the sport for a long time look around and ask questions like our boy from greater Columbus, Ohio just did. It's like, is anyone even listening to us? Does anyone even care what we think? So let me give you a little microcosm of this. Earlier today I was going back and forth about something kind of unrelated to this, but I got a response, I got a reply on Twitter that perfectly encapsulates the mood that I'm talking about. So earlier today I was talking about. What was it? Something came up. I can't even remember what it was. It was like access to spring practice or depth charts. That's what it was. Bill Connolly was complaining. Cause there are several universities that still haven't posted their rosters, which is so archaic, by the way. But that's how college football exists. So Bill Connelly's trying to do the S and P for this year. We're all sitting here waiting on it. Everyone's waiting on it. Just please put your rosters on your websites. Side note, so I retweeted it, I said something like, college football is number two sport in the country and it's run with like the operational transparency of a CIA black site. They treat it like you're not supposed to know anything about what's going on. It's none of your business who's on this roster. Well, I said that and a guy responded. David responded and he said, schools owe nothing to media and fans. Who cares about rosters in March? Spoken like a circus elephant. It's been cut free. It doesn't even know it can run away. David, you don't need to carry water for these people. And let me tell you something, the schools do owe media and fans, and especially the latter part of that equation. They owe you everything. They don't owe you that when it comes to the lit courses that they offer at said university. But when it comes to the football program that generates millions per year, you better believe they owe you everything. You know why? Because you are the millions that they generate. So I replied, I responded and I said, yeah, David, without distribution, media and consumption fans, college athletics would really take off. College athletics would be dead without fans and media. And media is a distant, distant, distant second in that equation because neither of them exist if the fan interest and engagement and support is not there. They don't build 100,000 seat cathedrals to seat alumni. I promise they don't. And they don't sign multi billion dollar media rights deals just because Those networks, out of the kindness of their hearts, want to air those games. They do those things because you exist. Everybody listening to and watching this show exists. I exist. The dudes in the control room exist. There's a microphone in front of me. And we get to make a living talking about this sport because interest exists. But does anyone listen to you? That was the question. And you remember that little roundtable they had last Friday? You remember they had a lot of administrative types up in Washington, D.C. you got some senators up there, you got the president up there, you got Nick Saban, you got Urban Meyer, you got some high level boosters up there. You notice what was absent? Players were absent. There were no players up there. A lot of people pointed that out, rightfully so. No player representation. This is a farce. Who's going to speak up for the players? Well, you know, to take that a step further, who speaks up for fans? Who. Who's responsible for listening to fan feedback? You know what they would say? You know what someone would say right now? They'd look at you dead serious, not a smile to be found. They would look at you and they'd say, josh, we. We do listen to the fans. And I'd say, really? The first thing I would do is say, why don't you echo their sentiment on a number of matters? And they would stumble all over themselves because these people don't live the life you live. They don't roll in the same circles as you do to begin with. So they certainly don't share your worldview on this sport. But I don't even expect them to share the worldview. That's fine. I would like them to listen every now and then. I would like them to shut up for a second and maybe care what the dude sitting in section 238 feels about this or that. But you know what they would say instead? It could be a network executive, it could be an athletic director, or we could be talking about any of a number of sweater vest types here. Here's what they'd say. They'd say, we do. We promise. We listen to the fans. You know how we listen to the fans? TV ratings. That's how we listen to the fans. Yeah. We look at the numbers and we see 11 million people watched Ohio State versus Nebraska. We are listening to the fans. Obviously, if that many people are watching, that means we're doing a good job. And to that I ask you, how crowded is a prison lunchroom every day? Because memaw used to always tell me, when it comes to lack of options. Prison lunchrooms are sold out every single day. Doesn't necessarily mean it's the best dining experience in the world, just means it's the only one. And likewise for anyone who grew up on college football. You're not tapping out of college football just because of some poor decision making. But that also doesn't mean that you should have your viewership taken for granted. So I would love as much as people talk about players needing to be represented, as much as we need player representation, man, a little good old fashioned fan representation every now and then wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. Maybe we need to put together a committee. Maybe we need joint hearings on that. If I can find some free time, I will even be happy to volunteer my services. They're watching us in Somerville, Alabama. Midland, Texas, Marietta, Ohio is tuned in. Appreciate you guys so much. I had a guy hit me up earlier today from Midland, Texas and he, you know, we conducted a certain high profile interview on the show recently and he said, you know, I didn't know anything about your show. I found out about your show through said interview and he said I hated it. However, I've watched your content since then. I love everything else about the show. Maybe that was our plan all along. Maybe. Dusty from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, producer Jesse country, as they call it up there, he said, what are your early Heisman thoughts? The value is probably now for some of these guys, right? Well, yes, there is always value. Now to give you an idea, FanDuel already has this up. You can already go bet on this right now. I know because I did earlier today. I'll even tell you who I bet on in just a second. But first, what you should know is 12 of the top 13 guys in the Heisman odds are quarterbacks. Stands to reason, right? Eight of the last 10 winners are quarterbacks. And outside of Travis Hunter, we had a pure wide receiver win the thing in 2020. That was Devonte Smith. We had a pure running back and Derek Henry win it in 2015. Mark Ingram in 2009 outside of Alabama non quarterbacks and Travis Hunter, who is a two way player. Nobody has won this thing outside of the quarterback position in several years. So it's probably going to be a quarterback, but then again, probably is not definitely. Therefore, if we're looking at value, I'm going to find you some value down the board. Now Bradley's got the odds up right now on a good old fashioned slider on the screen here. If you're listening on podcast though, that's fine. It is My duty to inform you, C.J. carr, quarterback, Notre Dame, is the current odds favorite to win the Heisman Trophy. Do you think C.J. carr is going to win the Heisman, yes or no? It's not a tweet. I don't even know why I said it that way. It's not a poll. I guess you could put one in the live chat. Yeah. Okay, go ahead. I'm sure we. I'm sure we have no idea how that'll go. I don't think I like it now. I do think I like C.J. carr. I think I like Notre Dame. I may even pick him to win the national title. I think C.J. carr is going to be a wonderful player this year. Here's the problem. If you're telling me he's going to be the favorite, then I've got to believe that he's going to put up big enough numbers. Therefore, I've got to believe they're going to be in games that require them to call the kind of offensive game that sees him put up big numbers. And I got to be real with you, I think Notre Dame's going to splatter like eight of their 12 opponents, and I just don't know that he's going to put up big enough numbers. I don't see that. And so I do not think CJ Carr is my pick here. I think out of the top 10, honestly, Darian Mintz is probably the best value that I see because he's fourth out of all the returning quarterbacks in the country this year in terms of passing yards from a season ago, and he did that at Duke. So he's going to have better players around him. He's going to be in a better system. They upgraded system and skill. Well, Darian Mensah upgrades his surroundings, but also, if you think about what Miami's losing defensively, maybe Miami needs to score a little bit more this year and not quite Cam ward. Please score 50 and then we'll hope to only give up 49. Not going to be like that at all. Miami is going to be a national title contender. We trust Corey Heatherman implicitly to put a good defense on the field. Maybe it's not a great defense, though. And so maybe, unlike CJ Carr up in South Bend, maybe they do need to keep the pedal down all four quarters a vast majority of the season at Miami. So I think Darian Menz is going to have a great year. And I look, they don't call me Fanduel, doesn't call me for consultation but if they did, I'd say bump him up a little bit now in the 11 through 20 range because we are talking about value here. Heisman breakdown in March. What has become of this show? 11 through 20 range. Look at number 11. That's Brendan Sorsby plus 2000 odds. Let me sell you on this idea for just a second. He's playing for Texas Tech in case some of you wandered away and somehow you've come back to a college football show in March. Welcome back. Brendan Sorsby no longer at Cincinnati, he's at Texas Tech plus 2000 odds. 11th in the overall FanDuel Heisman odds. They're going to be favored in all 12 games. So what we've learned in years past is you kind of got to be 9 and 3 or better. Colorado had Travis Hunter win the thing. They had nine wins. It's been a long time since any player on any team worse than that won this thing for obvious reasons. So I need a team that's going to be good. I know Texas Tech is going to be good. I think their defense takes a little step back this year. Still going to be good, but maybe not great. They did lose a lot of impact guys and they bring in a quarterback in Brendan Sorsby with dual threat ability. So they're going to be in a lot of high profile games. They're going to be favored in every single, every single one of them probably. And I think he's going to put up big numbers, so that's worth the roll of the dice there. Now I went with John Mattier last year, so really what I could do is I could just call FanDuel and say, hey, the ticket I had last year, I know it doesn't transfer over. Just give me the same one again. Because John Matier is 16th in the odds right now at +3500. And firstly, I already had one finger up. He's going to be healthy. I already read the spoilers. So he's going to be healthy all year. This year we're not doing the thumb thing again. We're done with that. And it is his second year. I say second year in the system. It's really like his third year in the system. But it's his second year at Oklahoma so he knows his way around. Now, Jesse, he knows his way around campus. You know, he knows all his professors and professoras so he's good now. He knows his restaurants, he knows where to go, where not to go. He can't win the Heisman in year one. It's too tough. Can't win the Heisman in year one, but he can in year two and he's got several primetime games. Oklahoma's going to be in the spotlight, so who knows, Maybe there's some value there. But that's not what we're here for. We're not here to pick someone in the top 20. What we're here to do is we're here to take a dart, or in this case, an ink pen, and we're trying to throw it all the way across the room and at least score points. No, we want a bullseye here. It has come to my attention that Austin Mack of Alabama is plus 3000 odds to win the Heisman Trophy this upcoming year. The reason this is noteworthy is because there are some of us who believe Keelan Russell's going to win the starting quarterback job at Alabama. Where is Keelan Russell at FanDuel, you might ask? He is at plus 8,000 odds to win the Heisman. I bet it an hour ago, so I'm putting my money where my mouth is here. Keelan Russell, if he remains healthy, will not remain plus 8,000 because I think there's a more than reasonable shot he wins the job. So if you're a dynamic dual threat starting quarterback at a place like Alabama, you're automatically going to vault yourself up into the top 20, probably top 15. And then if he has a good first quarter of the season, he'll be top 10. And at that point he's basically won the trophy. So that's the math, that's the calculus. That's, that's how I'm trying to figure this thing. Also, if you don't want to go the quarterback route, if you are anti quarterback, Bo Jackson is your guy. He was in the 80s if you were anti quarterback and he is in 2026 if you're anti quarterback now, he's not playing at Auburn, he's playing at Ohio State. Good tailback coming back. Had a good year last year. Could have a great year this year. In case you missed it, they just hired Arthur Smith as offensive coordinator because they've just built a death star of a coaching staff up there. That's kind of what Ryan Day does now. So you've got a run first guy, plus that offensive line, plus this talent at tailback. I think bo Jackson at plus 10,000 odds is okay. And if you want to go receiver, Cam Coleman's plus 10,000 odds too. Jesse, do you think that's going to stay at plus 10,000 if we keep reading these practice Reports. I'm not saying he's vaulting into the top 20. I think Cam Coleman, who is, at this point, less than an alien, but more than a man, I think he will vault up the Heisman odds board, too. So that's as thorough a Heisman breakdown as I've ever done at any point in the season, much less March. So please don't ask me, at least for another month. We move on. Hmm. Pain from Richland Hills, Texas, he said, you know what? I gotta get the town right. I gotta get the town right. No, no, no. Payne from North Richland Hills, Texas, said, what do you remember about the Johnny Manziel era at Texas A and M? Well, everything. I remember everything. This was a very formidable time in my college football upbringing. I had just started talk radio. They had just put me on radio for free, but they had just put me on radio in Columbus this season, right here, the 2012 season. So the first time that I ever got to professionally talk about anything, the first time someone put me on a microphone where my company could be sued if I said the wrong thing, was when Johnny Manziel was making his run. So you could argue that Johnny Manziel and my careers have basically paralleled each other is what I'm trying to say. Yeah. So that game where he beat Alabama was the first time I realized how much money there was to be made when someone beats Alabama. Cause that following Monday and Tuesday, I've never seen phone lines light up like that. So here's what happened. Johnny Manziel rewrote narratives on what was possible. I hate the word narrative. I use it, like, five times per year, but it really fits here. So there was. You remember when we were talking about Urban Meyer the other night from a coaching perspective, and there was, like, this existence that the SEC had for a long time, and there was like, what would work, what wouldn't work? And then something that they thought would not work. A coach from Utah coming in and dominating. That happened. So then it changed everything about what people thought could and couldn't work at the coaching position. Well, Johnny Manziel was that at the quarterback position. This is, mind you, just a few years, is a couple years after the Cam Newton year at Auburn. So people had already had their confidence rattled a little bit about their worldviews down there, down here. And then Johnny Manziel happens. And the second thing I remember about it is he didn't flash on the scene like it was a. It was a slow build. Now, A and M, folks, like, he was the talk of the early part of the season down there and people like us who watch all of the games, like we saw him against Louisiana Tech go off and you're thinking to yourself, dude, this kid at Texas A and M is insane. Are you seeing what he's doing? But the rest of the country, you know that that group of the more casual crowd that watches two or three big games per week, if that, they're thinking about it like it's a novelty act because everybody's mind worked the same way back then. If you're doing anything of note offensively in the sec, all people did was they pulled up your schedule and they said, do they play? Yep, they play Alabama. That'll be where that ends. And so come November, Johnny Manziel and Texas A and M go into Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It was a game changing moment in the league. It was a game changing moment for Texas A and M. I say it was a game changing moment for Alabama. Jesse, you look at those rosters a couple of years later, there weren't any more 250 pound linebackers on Alabama's roster. They were all Rashaun Evans. They were all like 215, 220. It's because they witnessed what it was like to try and chase a guy like this around and they wanted none of it. And the league was really changing. And then everyone tried to go find their Johnny Manziel and they failed. And to varying degrees, but still it kind of changed the entire worldview that a lot of people had in the sec. But I just remember then when that happened, it was an earthquake. And that Bama team went on to win the national title anyway. But no one even remembers that when they talk about that game, they talk about from that point on Johnny Manziel being a rock star. And I don't know how else to describe it. There have been a few players. Tebow was one, Cam Newton was one of Johnny Manziel was one. I would say in LSU's 2019 year, Joe Burrow became this. Tuatanga Wailoa was this guys that had like legit rock star vibe about them when they showed up places. You just would have had to have lived it. We should have gotten Lucci on Skype. We should have just. I should just call him right now. Put him on speaker. Hey, 10 best Manziel stories. Billy, first off, how many of them are from the past five years? No, I want you to tell me stories from 2012, 2013. So anyway, that year happens in 2012. He didn't go to the draft, he had a whole nother year. Now, in a perfect fairytale world, in a world where this is animated and we are commissioning Disney to license this movie that we're writing, Johnny Manziel is a model citizen. Johnny Manziel's got his head on straight, okay? Johnny Manziel is a very, very forward thinking old soul and he handles all the success with the measured approach that a full grown adult would. This is not an animated movie. Johnny Manziel was all over the place. Johnny Manziel was. If you've ever just watched a fireworks show, that was him personified. And there were all sorts of off the field incidents. Remember the whole autograph thing, he's like nil, but 10 years too early. So, I mean, Manziel's running a full autograph ring. You know, he dared to make money off his name, image and likeness. That's a no, no. Can't have that. 10 years ago. 12, what is that, like 15 years ago now? Can't have that. Let's see, he missed the Rice game. A and M somehow still managed to handle food, but without Johnny Manziel. And then he came back and they, they had another big year in 2013. But I just remember how big a deal it was covering Johnny Manziel from an off field perspective. Like, I had never witnessed anything like that because Tebow was a choir boy, quite literally when he was at Florida, so there was never any extracurricular stuff. The Cam Newton year at Auburn, yeah, that was crazy. But I wasn't in sports media at all, so I watched that as a fan. But, you know, you never quote, unquote, covered it. So Manziel, that run he had, I remember it selfishly because that was the first time I was ever calling myself covering college football in some small way. But I always ask about him. What would it have been like if he were born 10 years later? What would it have been like instead of 2012 and 2013, it was 2022 and 2023. You know, in a different world where things are legal, where things are allowed, where things are encouraged, how much money would he have made? For that matter, you could, you could throw Cam and Tebow in there as well. Like, how much money would they have made if they came along 15 years later? But then the other part of it is, and you have to have been in College Station, Texas prior to Manziel to respect this, he, like, fundamentally overhauled College Station, Texas. If you look at Texas A and M, especially from a campus facility standpoint, pre Manziel and Post Manziel. I don't even know if you could put a dollar figure on it. Nine figures, ten figures. I have no idea what kind of dollar figure you put on it. But to look at the impact he had on the mentality of the way they view themselves. Like when Texas A and M looks in the mirror, what they thought was possible, what they thought they should be, how they should carry themselves. It changed because of one dude. It changed. That's what I remember. I guess I should be doing that. Yeah, that's what I remember about Johnny Manziel. Crazy. Feel like he's lived five lifetimes. Just an amazing time.
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With the times.
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Let's move on. We had a question about the staff. Are you serious? Eddie from Fairhope, Alabama. I'm going to be doing some speaking down in Fairhope later this summer, Eddie. It's a closed event. I shouldn't have promoted it. But, yeah, I'm going to be down there. Beautiful part of the country. I wish you could join me. Anyway, Eddie asked. We've heard about Jesse and Bradley, but now I'm hearing about Prez and Mitchell. I've never called Mitchell by his full name. So you've heard about Prez and Mitch. Can you give us the background on your staff immunity? His word, not mine. And how they came to work with you? Yeah, I can. Prez's name is Prez. Mitch's name is Mitch. They were at 24 7. They were over at CBS when we were working over there. And what we would do, so what producer Jesse and I would do is we would put the show together, a vast majority of it ourselves. But then, you know, what we kind of did is we, we, for lack of a better term, commissioned some of the staff there that we thought we may trust to touch our show. And indirectly, we were giving them job interviews, but we couldn't call it that for legal reasons. And so we would, we would let people, hey, hey, do you want to help out with the show? Some of them would say, no, that's cool. And then some of them would say, yeah, okay. And some of them were good and some of them were not as good. But what we found was, so Bradley was there, but we've already talked about Bradley. So no one even asked about Bradley. And Jesse was there, but of course no one asked about Jesse either. So you're asking about Prez and Mitch. I realized probably about six months before we left that we were going to leave, that we were going to do the show like this. We were going to go about it independently. And so we kind of floated the opportunity. You guys want to come with us? There are no guarantees. I can tell you what you're going to make, but that's about it. No guarantees. And they jumped at the opportunity. And they have good instincts. That's why we even trusted them to touch the product. They are available. Meaning, and this is a very, very popular buzzword out there, availability means stepping up when someone needs you to do something. That's basically the long and short of that. It is the most precious commodity, especially in our world, the ability to just be available. That doesn't take any talent, by the way, but they're always that they're trustworthy. So we implicitly trust them to touch every aspect of the show. They take ownership in the brand. And look, when you come from the corporate media world, you got a couple of different kinds of people. Neither of them are bad, they're just different. You've got some folks who really want to clock in, clock out, and be part of the machine and understand that if they didn't come to work for a week, the machine wouldn't fail. There may be some papers that stack up, but in the grand scheme of things, there's not a lot of pressure on that job. It's good pay. And there are those kinds of people. Those aren't the kind of people you build a new business with. The other kinds of people are the ones who constantly feel boxed in. And I am not speaking about their specific situation that they were in. I'm speaking generically about this entire industry. Those kinds of people, the people who are, like, balling their fist up to want to create on their own or be part of a creative process and to take ownership, those are the ones where you don't have to hit the gas on them. You got to constantly pump the brakes on them. Those are the kinds that you take to start a new company. So we took them with us, and they have flourished. The show has grown. They'll end up making a ton of money because of it. We don't have a huge staff here because we got the people on the staff that understand how to get the job done. And it's not that we would never add to the staff. We'll end up needing to add to the staff. But it is not an easy door to get into by the very design of how we built the door. So that's Prez and Mitch. Give him a round of applause. Not here, but, you know, in your own free time. Give them a round of applause. Let's Move on. Jerry in Norman, Oklahoma, who has the best wide receiver room in 2026? Well, Jerry, I wrote down five teams. I am not going to go in any particular order here because it's March so I don't have to. But I think Oregon's way up here. Decorian Moore having him back. Jeremiah McClellan having them both return. Evan Stewart. We spent the latter portion of last year thinking every week we were going to see him in a practice report. We never did. Well, maybe in 2026 we see him. But they added Iverson hooks from UAB. That's nearly a 1,000 yard receiving guy last year and there's several young guys on that team. So I think Oregon absolutely has a top five wide receiver room. I think Ohio State is up here every year and there's no reason they shouldn't be up here again. Yes, Jeremiah Smith is back. Yes, Brandon Ennis is back. But Devin McKeown from UTSA comes in, 726 yard receiving guy last year. Plus you're just plugging him into Ohio State's offense so I trust that they're going to be productive. Chris Henry, immediate plug and play impact guy. I think also legend Bay, true freshman, been the talk of camp up there. Ohio State's always going to have like one or two freak shows that you look at and you say, oh, I remember him from recruiting. Whoa, he's good. So that's Ohio State. So they're in there. I think Texas is going to be in here. Now. We already talked about Cam Coleman tonight, but you're going to be talking about him a lot between now and fall. Ryan Wingo's there, probably the most overqualified wide receiver too in college football and both of them very versatile, can do a lot of different things with them in this offense. But Emmett Moseley's there and then there's just this laundry list of underclassmen. Don't know which of them are going to end up being the impact guy, but there'll be a fourth guy out of that group that just end up, you know, you'll hear the first scrimmage of fall camp, second scrimmage of fall camp, same guy stands out both scrimmages and then lo and behold, he's on the field week one. I expect that to happen. I just don't know who it's going to be. I think Miami's got to be in here as well. We debated this pretty heavily. I think Miami's got to be in there, firstly because Malachi Toney is Back in his second year. And secondly, Cooper Barkate came to Miami from Duke and you may be thinking to yourself, oh no, no, no, no, you got him mixed up with the quarterback. No, no, no. Darian Mensah came there from Duke. Yeah, they both did. Lost in all this. Translation is Duke's leading receiver also transferred to Miami. I didn't see it get a lot of running, but Cooper Barkate is down there and Joshua Moore, potential breakout guy. They've got some good depth from the portal and you know who they got throwing the ball to him. So I didn't even mention Jacobs. So yeah, I think Miami is going to be a top five receiver room this year. I had a number of teams I could put in the fifth slot. I could put Indiana here, I could put Oklahoma there. A and M, I would buy. Clemson, I would buy, I could sell you on Notre Dame. But I put Florida in the fifth spot because I believe that it's the most underrated wide receiver room in the country. So Vernell Brown's there, Dallas Wilson in year two. Eric Singleton is really the key to all this to me, because if he ends up becoming what some people thought he could become, transferring from Georgia Tech to Auburn, if that just gets delayed a year, and I think it will, of course, given health of all these guys, I think he's going to explode this year. T.J. abrams, Stockton. There's a lot of blue chip depth here. So I think that if they do nothing else down there, John Summerall's got to put me a top five wide receiver room on the field this year. Making sure I didn't leave anybody out. Yeah, I mean I could. Clemson, Clemson could easily be in this group. They easily could. A and M could be there. Indiana, Notre Dame, Oklahoma. So yeah, it was really a hard fought contest to land the number five spot. Breaking news. It's not really breaking news. FanDuel has informed us. I guess this is kind of breaking news. I got this news like 5 minutes before the show. So Fanduel has informed us that conference tournaments are going on. That's not the breaking news. The breaking news is that the NCAA tournament happens shortly thereafter. That's also not the breaking news. Come to think of it, the breaking news is that if you mosey on over to Fandor right now, new signups get as much as $300 back in bonus bets. When you're betting. What are they called, Jesse? Tournament games. Bastardized pronunciation. If you're betting the tournament games though, turn the mut games. Yeah, new signups over there. Could get as much as $300 back in bonus bets. You'll see all the details over there. You can't miss it in this. In this crazy little scheme to make a profit, FanDuel has made it glaringly obvious how you access all of this. But you know what? You could go over there and make a profit. In fact, I encourage you to go
- [66:11]
FanDuel Advertiser
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- [66:58]
Josh Pate
Let's end with this. Everybody seems to be in a good mood tonight. Got a big weekend coming up. But what's the mood at usc? We've been doing the mood tracker in spring. What's the mood of the fan base? And tonight we decided to spin the needle. It landed on usc. And we all know Lincoln Riley watches every show and he's probably pretty curious. He's been bunkered in. He's been getting ready for spring practice. He's probably wondering, what do my fans think of me? You think Lincoln Riley's wondering that? I think he is. And so here is the official mood right now. This is certified. This is the official mood for usc fans entering 2026. I call the mood payday. Mood. Not the candy bar. Not even the loose concept of you getting a physical paycheck or a direct deposit every two weeks into your account. Not that kind of payday. The kind of payday where, I don't know, maybe you needed some fast cash, maybe you took out a loan and maybe it's time to repay that loan. And maybe, maybe the bank or maybe even back in the day, maybe a dude named Freddy, maybe a bookie from around the way comes over and just kind of not so subtly lets you know, hey, you remember that money I loaned you? It's due back. I want it, plus interest. And that's kind of the vibe around usc Fandom right now. USC fans were ecstatic when Lincoln Riley got hired there for, I guess, five years ago now, and he went 11 and three in his first year. And you're thinking, oh, this is the floor. Whoa. Well, it wasn't it. So far it's been the ceiling. But they didn't bail on him. They didn't. And they didn't even bail on him after year two, eight and five. Okay, we regressed. We got to find our way. In this post Caleb Williams world of ours, we got to find our way. And then it was 7 and 6, and that was, oh, time and 9 and 4. Last year, mathematically, was the beginning, maybe of an upswing, a little bit more of an upward trajectory, but it didn't really include many high points. The season didn't include many high points. And so people are looking around and I don't blame them for feeling this way. They're saying, hold up now. We were all bought in. We want a return on that emotional investment or just maybe our outright financial investment. If you're running usc, if you're a season ticket holder, maybe it's time for you to collect and for you to collect. Lincoln Riley's got to deliver. Now, the bad News is they're 16 and 10 in conference play and Big Ten play since he's been there. The good news is I think there's a solid path for it to get better this year. I fully expect USC to be in the playoff conversation this year. So putting all my cards on the table, I'm kind of high on their possibility this year. And they don't start off with this murderer's row September. But when Oregon comes in there to the Coliseum September 26th, that's the first time you'll watch a USC game unless you're a Southern Cal fan. That's the first time you'll watch them this year. Okay? And then they go to Penn State in early October. I don't want to overlook Washington. Okay? So Washington comes in there as well. Sandwich spot. And then they go to Penn State on October 10th. That's probably the next time you'll see them. But they get Ohio State at home as well. They go to Indiana in November, on my sister's birthday, no less. So it's not an easy schedule. But here's the thing. We're 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 years in now. This is the University of Southern California, okay? This is not the kind of outfit that should need a navigable schedule. They shouldn't need nine layups and then kind of hope the Coin flips go their way. This USC should be a problem for other folks because they're on their schedule. That's how it should be. Half a decade in to the Lincoln Riley tenure. Now, there are a lot of context clues. Not context clues. There's a lot of context piece that needs to be put in here. Like two years ago when he kind of did the program reset. This is old hat. Now, we've talked about this a lot on the show, but like I said, if I'm a USC fan, I'm making my decision right there. And I'm either saying, nope, I'm giving this dude no leeway. He screwed up. He should never have brought Alex Grinch with him. He should never have had that bad a defensive staff here. So he doesn't get to hit reset in year three. I either need to think that or I need to say, okay, he made some imperfect moves. I'm going to grant him the leeway. I'm going to give him the equity. He's saying that he's going to reset this program. He's going to redefine the identity of this program. I know that's not going to happen overnight. So if I'm going to grant him this, he's got to get a minimum two more years. Runway, if you're in the latter camp, this is the year where you got to get your result. Now, if you were in the former camp, you've already just boycotted and stopped watching. But if you're in the latter camp, which I think most reasonable people would have been, it is totally fair for you to have high expectations this year. It is totally fair for you to say if USC does not make the playoff this year, this guy has failed as the head coach here. I don't think that's unfair. He's got a third year quarterback. They just landed the top recruiting class in the country. And while that's not immediately indicative of how this year should go on the field, it is a sign that the energy's changed there. Everything off the field is very buzz worthy. Everything off the field feels pretty good off the field. Doesn't matter if the on field results don't follow. So this is the year. It's time. Lincoln Riley's gotten the payday. It's time for the fan base to get the payday. And that is how we conclude the USC Mood Tracker. That's also how we conclude the show tonight. Look, there's a lot of stuff you could be doing in March. I appreciate you taking an hour or so to watch the show. Listen to the show. Please make sure you are subscribed to the channel. Many of you are. Thank you. Many of you aren't. Please do. Many of you think you are and I ask you to check and make sure that you are. And if you're not, it's just one click and then you set it and you forget it. It's like a Ronco Grill back in the day. You never have to worry about it again. Doesn't cost a dime, doesn't sign you up for anything. Just helps us. Thank you so much. We'll be back here Sunday night. Until then, for director Bradley, producer Jesse, I'm Josh Pate. Have a great start to your weekend and God bless.
- [73:32]
FanDuel Advertiser
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- [74:17]
Josh Pate
You know how it's never really about where you're going. It's about who you're going with. The right people can turn any drive into a great memory. That's something Toyota really believes. They design vehicles around real life and real people, the ones who make plans happen and bring everyone together inside. Everything's built with passengers in mind. Comfortable seating, smart layouts and space that actually works so everyone can relax and enjoy the ride. There's room for the people, room for the stuff, and room for the moments that happen along the way. Because when people are the destination, your ride is important. Learn more@toyota.com and find the vehicle that fits your people. Janice Torres here, and I'm Austin Hankwitz. We host the podcast Mind the Small Business Success Stories, produced by Ruby Studio in partnership with Intuit QuickBooks.
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Josh Pate
some incredible small business owners. The big thing about working at tech is that it's ever evolving, ever changing. Everyone's a rookie. That's how fast the industry is changing. So what I'm really excited about is to be part of that change. So listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Josh Pate
I'm U.S. transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. The sound of a seatbelt.
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Josh Pate
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