← The Bill and Doug Show: Ohio State Football Talk
The Bill and Doug Show: Ohio State Football Talk
Nick Saban is wrong and the SEC is a Ponzi scheme; Penn State candidates; Ohio State RBs: Rants
00:39:53
It's time to rant about college football as Doug Lesmerises tackles three topics on The Bill and Doug Show.
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Welcome back to the Bill and Doug Show. Doug Les Maurice here for a Monday edition of Rants. Three Rants about Ohio State football. College football. We don't normally do this here. We're not like a serious news show. We're here to talk about college football and kind of entertain you guys and have a good time. Come up with interesting ideas, but, you know, supposed to be fun. Unfortunately, there's a little bit of news that I do need to talk about as it relates to college football. And it just, it just came out across my desk here. The sec, the Security securities and Exchange Commission has announced that it is investigating the sec, the Southeastern Conference, as a Ponzi scheme. This investigation is focusing on two co conspirators, Paul Feinbomb and Nick Saban, who have been deceiving the college football public with discussions about how deep the SEC is. There are not any indictments yet, but we do expect agents to be moving shortly. Potentially an unindicted at this point, co conspirator Greg Sankey, the SEC commissioner who has A bunch of charts that could also be, that could potentially be used as evidence against the SEC because they are a bunch of frauds. And we're going to talk about that as the first rant. We're then going to talk about Ohio State running backs and breaking tackles. We're going to talk about candidates to replace James Franklin at Penn State. But I would like to announce, also coming across my news desk, that I am officially changing my stance on how I view college football. If you guys have been with us for a little bit the last couple years, we've been talk, talking a lot about Northern college football, Big Ten, college football, north versus South, Big Ten versus sec. And what we have been saying for the past, we're in the third season of saying this now is that what we've been saying is that the north is now as good as the south, the Big Ten is as good as the sec. Obviously, the idea that Michigan and Ohio State have won the last two national titles supports that. But the thing that I have also gone out of my way to not say is that the north and the Big Ten are better than the south and the sec. And now I'm saying that the north is better than the south, the Big Ten is better than the sec. So what has happened is that we have moved from a discussion about the best teams in the sport and sort of debating that to accepting, absolutely accepting the fact that the best teams in the Big Ten are better than the best teams in the sec. There is no conversation about that anymore. The SEC shrugs its shoulders, accepts Ohio State as the defending national champion, number one team, now, accepts Indiana as a team that just went and beat Oregon. We thought Ohio State, Oregon and Miami were the three best teams. Now it looks like it might be Ohio State, Indiana, Miami. And I still think you put Oregon in there. You know what? We don't put in there an SEC team. I think the four best teams in college football, none of them are SEC teams. And if you want to have like a Texas Tech conversation, you can get to 5 without the SEC very quickly. So what they have done is change the conversation. They just accept that. And they want to talk about depth and they want to talk about it, I think, in a disingenuous way, because that, unfortunately is what they do. Nick Saban on TV last week on the Pat McAfee show said, I don't think the Big Ten is really that deep. It's not like the SEC where you've got eight or nine teams that can beat you. There might be three or four teams in the Big Ten that can beat you. I guess he was debating with A.J. hawk. I don't watch it. A.J. hawk said the Big Ten's deeper now. And Saban said, big deeper. By what? By who? I mean Penn State. I mean, tell me the good teams, maybe Michigan. A.J. hawk mentions USC. Nick Saban says, We'll see about USC. They're all right. But all right is not really what I'm talking about. I mean, you think USC is going to beat Ohio State? You think that would be a game if they played? You have Oregon, Indiana. I mean, Illinois got beat like a redheaded stepchild down in Indiana. So are they legit? I mean, come on. Saban acknowledges Ohio State is great. And then he goes on to say SEC teams. A M is good. Georgia's pretty good. Ole Miss is pretty good. Alabama's got a chance. Missouri's got a chance. There are a lot of good teams. Tennessee is pretty good. So he's lying to you because a big part of the basis here is that Indiana destroyed Illinois. Is that. Do you really think USC can play with Ohio State? And the argument that they are using in the Ponzi scheme is that the strength of the Big Ten at the top somehow means that automatically the SEC is deep because Tennessee should have beaten Georgia because Missouri had a shot against Alabama on Saturday. And so the idea that Missouri played Bama closer than Illinois played Ohio State, let's say that to them is proof of SEC strength when it actually is only confirmation that Ohio State is significantly better than Alabama right now and Indiana is better than Georgia and Oregon is better than either of them. And so that conversation becomes a spin and it becomes a Ponzi scheme because you prop up these teams in the middle that then when they get beaten by the teams in the. In the top, that adds strength to their conference because they. They are tricking you along the way into thinking that, like, Vanderbilt is good and that Missouri is good. And then when Ohio State and. And Indiana and Oregon handle business through the rest of the Big Ten schedule, which I think they will, they will use that to say, well, that means nobody in the Big Ten is that good and it's all false. So I'm going to break it down a little bit. First I want to remind you to go check out our friends@roback.com r h o b a c k.com great college football gear. It's the game day collection. It's. It's this time. I was just outside. My gosh, the fall is like beautiful fall days. No jacket yet. But like a hoodie, a quarter zip. Go like bump up your collection. We know you love your teams. Go bump up your collection. R H O b a c k.com Ohio State, all kinds of other teams. I'm going to give you 20 off your first order. Put in bad 20 as the code. Bad 20. You'll get 20 off your first order of a quarter zip, a polo, a hoodie. Just like a cool good looking college football shirt. @roback.com I broke down the SEC in the Big 10 into a couple categories and one of the things that drives this is college football rankings. And I am not here to belabor the point about the AP poll. That's, that's cheap, that's not good content. That's not telling you anything because it's not what it's about. The AP poll is a reflection of perception. Does, I think affect perception to some degree. I do not think it affects the committee, but I think it's more about shows how we talk about the sport. So I think it's valuable. I think it's a shorthand for how we talk about it. But to come on here and be like, oh, the AP poll so stupid. That's, that's beside the point. It's at. The discussion is that people like Nick Saban are wrong and people like Paul Feinbaum are wrong and a lot of people that talk to you about college football are just wrong. And I don't know if they're ignorant or if they're trying to trick you. Right? That's the whole thing. When somebody is wrong, it's like are they evil and they're lying to you or they just, do they not know any better? So we're going to try to shoot you straight here because the discussion at the top is clearly Big Ten. But then in the middle it's close and I can give you points where it leans Big Ten, there's points where it leans sec. But the idea that the SEC is deeper is fraudulent, driven a little bit by this top 25 AP poll. Right now, 10 of the top 25 are SEC. Five of the top 25 are Big Ten. Now the Big Ten also has 26, 27 and 28 with Illinois, Michigan and Washington. But still there's nine of the top 17 teams are SEC teams. Three of the top 17 teams are Big Ten teams. So you have Ohio State at one, Indiana at three and Oregon at eight. And again like should Oregon be eight just because they lost to Indiana when actually it looks like Indiana is awesome? I'm I don't want to, I don't, I don't want to, like, nitpick here about that, but the idea that you think there are sec teams at 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 14, 16 and 17, that you think there are nine SEC teams better than the fourth best Big Ten team, that I think, again, not to call it the AP poll, but it's a reflection of perception that is absolutely, positively wrong. SP plus, this is Bill Connolly at ESPN who, who helps the case here a little bit. And just so you guys know, whenever there's people doing power ratings and things like this, this is Brian from O at the Fermo Index, which we really like. This is Tyler Shoemaker, our guy who does a lot of great things with his power ratings. There's some preseason stuff that's baked in. And so when there are preseason things that are baked in, the more you get into the season, the less the preseason stuff matters. But that's like how that formula works. But a lot of times those power ranking guys will then say, well, if you just went by what happened this season, here's what the rankings would be. And I'm not saying that's what they should do because they are not doing an AP poll, they are doing their, their version of power rankings. And it, I mean, it gets more difficult because how much do recruiting rankings matter? How much does last year matter when you have so many guys going to the NFL and so much happening in the transfer portal? But I get why they do it. But every now and then when they drop, if you only went by this year, this is what you would have. Bill Connolly did that with SP plus on Monday. And then you get this only going by this year. So AP poll in the top 17 teams in the AP poll, 9 sec, 3, Big Ten, top 17 in the Bill Connolly SP plus rankings only by this year. 7 sec, 6, Big Ten top 25, SP plus only this year, 9 sec, 9 Big Ten again in the AP, it's 10 to 5. And you look at it, the Big Ten has number two, number three, number four, number five. For the top five teams in the country going by just this year are Big Ten teams because Bill Connolly has USC in there with the other three Big Ten teams we talked about. The SEC has 7, 8, 10, so they don't have one until 7 and then but the, the Big 12, excuse me, the Big Ten also has number 12, but also has number 16. There's more respect in the middle there, right? So I think that's more reflective of reality. And I'm not asking Nick Saban to use SP plus. I'm not asking Paul Feinbaum to use SP plus. I'm saying that is a reflection of what is actually going on. And I would like them to be a little more aware of that because otherwise your depth perception is 100% wrong. Because you start doing things like this if you really, if you're not careful. The primary thing in the SEC depth discussion is that Mississippi State beat Arizona State and Auburn beat Baylor and Arizona State and Baylor are both four and two right now. That was a nice win for Mississippi State. That Arizona State game was kind of nuts. But it's not like Arizona State's. They're the Big 12 champ from last year. They're not the best team in the Big 12 this year. And Baylor, they're a little nuts. They're all over the place. They have some good wins. But Auburn also, by the way should have beaten Oklahoma and Georgia this year. Except the SEC refs are working against Oklahoma. They like we already. I'm not going to cover all of that, but there's basically an illegal play that Oklahoma ran against Auburn that they allowed. And then the Auburn Georgia thing from last week, Auburn scored a touchdown. They said he didn't score a touchdown because they said the ball wasn't over the plane before fumble. It was clearly over the plane and that whole game shifts afterward. So like this is so like if you're gonna prop up and say, well Auburn beat Baylor, well then I'm also going to say that Auburn should have beaten two of your top two of your teams that are ranked in the top 14 in the AP poll in Georgia and Oklahoma. So now you want to move up Auburn, then we got to move down Georgia and Oklahoma because the SEC's game in the system to let their better, their higher ranked teams win. I'm not saying like it's a, it's a. I'm not actually saying they're gaming. I'm just gaming the system. I'm just saying their refs stink like hot garbage and the result is Auburn's gotten screwed twice. So like you like just, just be careful.
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If you want to come on here. If Nick Saban wants to come on and say Auburn beat Baylor, then we can play the game. Because I'm gonna have a lot of other stuff here because otherwise it's just absolute garbage. Okay, here we go. I have at the top, a group of three at the top for each each league. So we have two blue bloods and like the best upstart. So for the big tenants, Ohio State and Oregon. The upstarts, Indiana. For the sec, it's Georgia and Alabama and the upstarts, Texas A and M. I know Ole Miss is fifth, but I'm going to destroy Ole Miss in a second. I don't think Ole Miss. It makes sense for anybody to think that Ole Miss is one of the top three teams in the SEC right now. I don't care what the AP poll says. Okay, so for those top three Big Ten teams, their only losses to each other, the only loss is Oregon to Indiana. Georgia lost to Bama, but also Bama lost to Florida State. And at the time, people were like, oh, Florida State is back. I told you Florida State wasn't back. Florida State's an absolute freaking fraud. They've lost three in a row to Virginia, Miami and Pitt. But I think we're holding on to what people thought in the moment. Oh, Florida State's back. They're not back. That was all about Bama blowing it. But somehow, like, we're just gonna ignore that? Like, are we gonna ignore. Can you imagine if one of the three best teams in the Big Ten lost to a three and three team that's on a three game losing streak in the acc? But I, I feel like we're ignoring it. Why are we ignoring it? But if you want to have this conversation at the top, there is no Question that the three top teams in in the Big Ten are better than the three best teams in the in the sec. Georgia should have lost to Tennessee. They won in overtime. They threw a miracle touchdown down, they got a miracle 2 point conversion and then Tennessee missed a field goal at the end of the game that would have won it and then Georgia won an overtime. So I don't know. Do you want to give Georgia credit but like can you imagine if Ohio State or Oregon had played a game like that? It's like well Tennessee's tough. Is Tennessee tough? We'll get to that in a second. It's the Ponzi scheme of propping everybody up like this. Listen, Texas A and M is pretty good. Now they also beat Notre Dame. Who? I think Notre Dame's pretty good. Texas A and M beat Notre Dame with a game winning touchdown in the final minute on a play where there was a clear holding on game winning touchdown pass that the refs didn't call. And again I'm not going to go all through that right now but everybody acknowledges it. So I don't know does that, do we have to just pretend that didn't happen? I'm not saying Texas A and M's not a good team, but I'm just saying one of the three best teams in the sec, their best win is because the refs blatantly blew a call. Blatantly. So Georgia should have lost to Tennessee and Auburn. They did lose to Bama. Texas. Texas A and M probably should have lost to Notre Dame and Alabama lost a three loss Florida State. Meanwhile Ohio State rolling Indiana rolling Oregon. Roland only lost to Indiana. All right, you good? Because here's what Bama is. Bama beat ul, Monroe and Wisconsin. Wisconsin stinks. Wisconsin might be the worst team in the Big Ten and they beat puffed up Missouri and puffed up Vanderbilt. And I'm going to show you how puffed up Vanderbilt is. Right. So like what are we actually talking about? So then the only thing Bam has done is beat Georgia, but Georgia's puffed up Ponzi scheme. All right, there's no doubt that the top three in the Big Ten are better than the top three in the SEC. Let's get to the neck. The next three for this group by the by the AP rankings they have number five Ole Miss, number 10, LSU, number 11 Tennessee and for the Big Ten by the AP rankings I have number 20, USC, number 25 Nebraska and Washington who's 28th and is criminally underranked by the actual SP plus rankings. Just based on this season, USC is 5, Washington's 12, Nebraska's 16, Tennessee's 13. Old misses 15, LSU's 22. So who's better? The AP poll will say no doubt about it. We're talking 5, 10, 11 for the SEC and 20, 2528 for the Big Ten. But let me tell you this. Washington's better than Ole Miss. Trinidad Chandlers all the attention he's getting at Ole Miss backup quarterback who's coming Demond Williams Jr. Is better. Give it give more attention to Demon Williams Jr. The Washington quarterback. Ole Miss six zero nice win over two lane. We'll acknowledge that that's a good win over one of the maybe the best team in the American. That's a good win for Ole Miss. You've also beaten Georgia State. Ole Miss has three one score wins in the SEC over LSU, Kentucky and Arkansas. They were tied with Kentucky at 2020 in the third quarter. They won 30 to 23. Kentucky is 2 and 3, stinks and wants to fire its coach. Ole miss beat Arkansas 41:35. Arkansas was driving in the final two minutes, fumbled at the Ole Miss 25 when they were trying to go in for the winning touchdown. Arkansas is 2 and 4, lost at home 56:13 to Notre Dame and has fired his coach. So how's that Arkansas win look to you for Ole Miss? Ole Miss is propped up by beating lsu. Who's in this group group? Ole LSU is also a fraud. Okay, we'll get to LSU in a second. But Ole Miss this weekend beat Washington State 24 21. Washington, who's 5 1, played Washington State and beat Washington State 59 24. So Ole Miss again in this group is number five in the country. Washington's number 28. They have one common opponent. Ole Miss won 24 21. Washington won 5924 and also North Texas beat Washington State 59 10. Now Washington is 5 and 1. Ole Miss is 6 0. Because Washington played the number one team in the country and only lost to Ohio State 24 6. Because I have a feeling if you're going to talk about, well, it's Ohio State, like if somebody from the SEC wants to say, I don't know, Ohio State actually, how good is Texas? They only beat Washington 24 6. Then give me the Washington side of that argument too. If you want to say Ohio State absolutely handled Washington, then make sure we're talking about how good Ohio State is. You can have it either way you want it. Sec, just be honest about it. Washington beat Maryland, which is actually a pretty Decent road win. They had to come back and win that. Maryland is in the top 25, ranked ahead of Alabama and the SP plus rankings. That's a road win for Washington when they didn't win a game on the road last year. They also beat Rutgers. It has a pretty good offense. So we're talking about like Washington versus Ole Miss. I just, I, I do not know. Ole Miss does not have a ranked win. Oh, excuse me. Ole Miss has one ranked win against lsu. But LSU is a fraud. So. And, and they had the common opponent. Here's why. LSU stinks. LSU beat Louisiana Tech and South Southeastern Louisiana. LSU has a win over Clemson. That somehow is the thing that is propping up lsu. Even though in every other context we talk about how bad Clemson is. So they beat Clemson 17 to 10. Clemson's three and three with losses to Georgia Tech and a 13 point loss to Syracuse. So I should be Clemson. They beat South Carolina. South Carolina stinks. South Carolina got blown out by Vanderbilt. Now it was with the backup quarterback for South Carolina, but South Carolina is 2 and 5. It was beating Virginia Tech in the opener 10 to 8 going into the fourth quarter before beating Virginia Tech. Virginia Tech lost to old Dominion by 19, fired its coach. So South Carolina is propped up by a winner of Virginia tech. South Carolina's 2 and 5 blown out by Vandy, lost to LSU in Missouri. That's like lsu. That's a good LSU win. But South Carolina stinks. So South Carolina is worse than you think. But South Carolina is helping prop up lsu. Who's helping prop up Ole Miss? Another LSU win over, over Florida. Oh, they beat Florida. Well, Florida lost to usf, right? Lost to South Florida, lost to Miami. Lots of Texas A M. Florida's 2 and 4. But Florida's propped up by beating Texas, who when Nick Saban wants to talk about is like, I don't even know how good Texas is. So how good is that Ohio State win over Texas. Okay, but it's the thing that's propping up Florida. So Florida beat Texas. So this is what the SEC wants to say. Texas isn't that good, but that's a good Florida win over Texas, which makes it a good LSU win over Florida, which makes it a good Ole Miss win over lsu. It's a house of cards. It's all a Ponzi scheme. So like that's like, so that's what we're talking about. So who is LSU really beaten? And how impressed are you about Ole Miss? I know LSU was number four at the time when Ole Miss beat him. I don't care. LSU's mid. I don't think LSU is better than Nebraska. And the SP plus rankings say they're not. I don't think LSU is better than usc. The SP plus rankings say they're not. USC has a loss on the road to Illinois on the last play of the game. They have a win over Michigan. They just, they just like kind of steamrolled Michigan at home. But they did that. They took that Michigan defense to the woodshed in a way that, that has not been done in the last couple years. So listen, they don't have a lot of other great wins. They beat Purdue, they beat Michigan State, they have a couple lousy they wins over lousy non conference teams. But I have no idea why. USC is 20 and Ole Miss and LSU is 10. Why is USC 20 and LSU 10? And the SP plus rankings, USC is better. And then Nebraska at 5 and 1 has a neutral site win over Cincinnati. That's pretty good. It's Cincinnati's only loss. They have a good road win at Maryland again. So like what are we doing? Like Maryland's a pretty decent team. Check the SP plus rankings. Washington went and beat Maryland at Maryland. Nebraska beat Maryland at Maryland. So I think those are pretty solid wins. But I, I think, I think Nebraska is probably better than a team like Tennessee. So Nebraska has the Michigan State win. The Maryland when they lost at home by three to Michigan. Tennessee should have beaten Georgia, but didn't. They're 5 and 1. Their wins are Syracuse, East, Tennessee State, UAB who fired its coach, a three point win over Arkansas who again stinks and fired his coach. And a seven point win over Mississippi State. And again Mississippi State is propped up by beating Arizona State. I'm saying I'm taking that second tier of the Big Ten. The rankings would say, oh, it's much tougher. Ole Miss, LSU and Tennessee are tougher than Nebraska, Washington and usc. I don't think they are. And I really would ask you to investigate inside. Why do you think those SEC teams are actually good? Then we get to the next group. I have Illinois, Michigan and Iowa in here. Illinois is 26 in the AP, Michigan's 27, Iowa's unranked, Oklahoma's 14, Missouri is 16, Vanderbilt is 17. By the SP plus rankings, there is an edge here for the SEC teams. Missouri's 8, Oklahoma's 10, Vanderbilt's 14, Iowa's 23, Michigan's 33, Illinois is 34. So Oklahoma beat Michigan head to head. That's real. That matters. It matters. In this discussion for sure. Now it was at Oklahoma. It was a second start for a Michigan freshman quarterback who they didn't let run and they've let him run since then. But I'm not going to make excuses for it. That's a good win for the SEC there. Illinois in this group has two losses to two of the three best teams in the country. Now getting steamrolled by Indiana I think is looking a little different after Indiana goes and wins at Oregon and they had every injury in the secondary. Whatever. Right. It's a bad loss. But also Indiana is pretty awesome. And then they just lost to Ohio State at home. Like didn't exactly. They would never threatened Ohio State but didn't lose by 50. So we're just be careful. Just like which, which way do we want to go? Do you want to count as a good Ohio State winner? Do you want to count as Illinois hanging around sec? You decide. Just make sure you're fair about it. And they have a ranked win. Illinois has a ranked win over usc. Iowa has a three point loss to Iowa State and a five point loss in the last two minutes to Indiana. They were leading much of that game. So I was 4 and 2 with two close losses to pretty good teams including a close loss to a great team. Okay. Vanderbilt 5 and 1, ranked 17th in the country. Inexplicable. This is Diego Pavia mania. This is a residue from Vanderbilt beating Alabama last year. Their wins are Charleston Southern, Virginia Tech, who stinks and fired their coach. We covered that before. Virginia Tech is propping up both South Carolina and Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt beat South Carolina, so South Carolina is propping up Vanderbilt. And by the way South Lenora Sellers didn't play for South Carolina in that game. And then they beat Georgia State and Utah State and they lost to Alabama. So their best wins are Virginia Tech who stinks is 2 and 5 and fired their coach and South Carolina who's 3 and 3 and didn't play their starting quarterback. Their other winter Charleston Southern, Georgia State and Utah State. Why are they 17th and if Iowa played Vandy, I'd take Iowa. I'd take that Iowa defense that just that held Indiana to 20. You can like go take your little Vandy story. Give me Iowa. Missouri, their best win is Kansas who's 4 and 3. Kansas lost to Cincinnati who lost to Nebraska. Why is Missouri 16th and Nebraska 25th? Missouri just played with Alabama. I think because Bama is still not that great. Missouri's win, Central Arkansas, UMass, South Carolina who's propping up everybody, right? Why why is Missouri viewed this way? So I. And then Oklahoma, Oklahoma, like everybody thought was great. Everybody thought Texas stunk. So then now Texas beat Oklahoma, but now Texas is actually good again. Because if Texas is good because they beat Oklahoma, then that Ohio State win over Texas has to be good. It's all a Ponzi scheme. We mile Michigan, I get it. They lost at Oklahoma. They have a win at Nebraska. They just got steamrolled by usc. Michigan is competitive in a given week. They're not great, but they're okay. And I think Illinois is pretty good. I know they got steamrolled by Indiana. I think that's a little bit of a one off. I think that USC win is real and I just don't think there's anything that Missouri has done that's any better than what Illinois has done. But Illinois is not the top 25 in Missouri is so like that next group I think is close. As we talk about where Illinois, Michigan and Iowa are compared to Oklahoma, Missouri and Vanderbilt. But I'm just saying like in the AP poll, it's not close. And then we can talk about Penn State and Texas, two blue bloods that both fell off a cliff. I don't know like is is Texas lost to Ohio State and Florida, but like maybe nobody else. And then they had like, because the SEC only plays eight conference games, they had three gimme games to get to get well after they lost to Ohio State. Meanwhile, like Penn State, I don't know. So like Penn State stinks. But UCLA and Northwestern, they had to play Big Ten games and ucla, Northwestern got James Franklin fired. So if this was the sec, we'd be spinning that about how good the bottom of the Big Ten is. So I'm just saying Penn State and Texas might be more similar than we think, except the Big Ten was more able to take advantage of Penn State's flaws. Where the sec, Florida beat Texas, but they've only played two SEC games. And the other one is Oklahoma, who couldn't do it in a rivalry game. Here's my point. It's a conversation in the middle. I say the top group. It's clear. Big Ten second group, Big Ten not as clear, but Big Ten third group, close, maybe sec. And then if we want to get to the bottom, Maryland's down there again. 25th ranked higher than Alabama in the SP plus rankings. Maryland is UCLA. I know they're 2 and 4. One of their losses is UNLV, who's undefeated is actually pretty good. One of their losses to Utah, who I think has a decent chance to win the Big 12 and they found themselves. So they beat Penn State. They just handled Michigan State. UCLA is pretty competitive. Minnesota not bad. Loss at Cal. I get it. Minnesota's got some stuff. The Northwestern beat Penn State. So I don't know the bottom of like if you want to go like. And then there's a bunch of teams in both leagues that haven't won anything. Kentucky's not very good. Wisconsin's not very good. We get it. I think it's a disingenuous argument that the Big Ten's not deep. So no doubt about it, the Big Ten's better at the top. I think the Big Ten is as deep and I think it is a lie. I think it is a lie to you. When you think about what Tennessee has really done, what Vanderbilt has really done, what LSU has really done, what Missouri has really done, what Georgia has really done, what Bama has really done. Ask yourself how real it is, because I think it's a Ponzi scheme all right, that's a long rant.
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Second rant is about Ohio State's run game and and I think you know Landis and I have talked about this. I think a decent chunk of it is they just don't have backs who are getting yardage after after contact in a way that they usually do every year since 2014. According to PFF every year except 2018, they've had backs who get the ball, who, who get it average at least three yards after contact. And in 2018, when their run game was a mess, Mike Weber and J.K. dobbins did not. But that was a whole thing that year about. They started running, running RPOs. The offensive line was confused. J.K. dobbins was in his own head as a sophomore after a great freshman year. Like, if you want to talk about years when Ohio State couldn't run the ball, 2018 is where you go. They ended up chucking it all over the place. They had no balance offensively, really. So 2025, Bo Jackson, their freshman's averaging more than five yards after contact per carry. James Peoples is 2.85 yards. CJ Donaldson is 2.25 yards. It's. It's pretty bad. And when you think about, like, Ezekiel Elliott, you think about J.K. dobbins, you think about Trey Sermon in 2020, you think about Trayvon Henderson, Quintron Judkins. Act like last year actually wasn't great. Part of that, I think, is because a lot of it was goal line stuff. I just think it's a decent chunk of this. And if you think the run game isn't quite good enough, it's. I think it's just a large part on running backs, not, not getting stuff on their own. And I just. I'm not going to read all the stats to you, but I think if Ezekiel Elliott or Carlos Hyde or J.K. dobbins or Travion Henderson or Trey Sermon or Quinshawn Judkins was part of this running back room, I, I think everybody would think the run game is fine. And I think when it's Bo Jackson and he's healthy, I think you'll think the running game is fine. And I think that's what it will be when it matters. It's just not that now. So he tweaked his ankle a little bit. Like, this is an example of, like, why they're not giving him 25 carries a game. It's just a little bit of a downturn in the running back room. And they're saved by a freshman here. They're saved by a freshman. But I know what a lot of people are talking about is like, well, then why are they running the ball so much? I. I think they're gonna maybe come to the realization that James Peoples and C.J. donaldson just aren't that. And so maybe they'll stop doing that a little bit and maybe it'll be Jackson and more of. Of a throw game. But. And this is like, what is the point of this? There's nothing wrong with this Ohio State run game that Ezekiel Elliott wouldn't fix, which is a ridiculous thing to say, but I just don't know that. But if you think there is something fundamentally wrong, I just think it's the guys carrying the ball when it's not Bo Jackson, which I think you probably think a lot of that, too. The last one is mostly about the media, because coaching lists make me crazy whenever there's an opening. Because one of two things happens to me. It's either agents are putting names on lists and reporters. Some reporters are putting names out there to do a favor for the agent. So. Because it's good and you can then, you know, get some information from them down the line. But I think it's like, it doesn't make it actually true, or you're just. Everybody's connecting the same dots. So Matt Rule worked for Pat Craft, the current Penn State ad, at Temple, and Matt Rule played at Penn State. So everybody has Matt Rule, the top of list. I get it. Like, of course, Kurt Signetti's from Pennsylvania, and he's doing a great job. I get it. Right? So it. It's. What am I calling out? What am I ranting about? I'm ranting about, like, anybody acting like, your coaching list is cool. And I'm not here to call out the media. But there was. There was, like, a media guy on Twitter the other day who was like, here's my short list. And then he listed 11 names. And then he came back later and added two more. And one of the names he added was Matt Rule because he didn't have him on the first list, which is like. Like, what are you doing? And the second name was Urban Meyer. And it's like, okay, like, we're just gonna. Urban Meyer and Jon Gruden our way through, like, every coaching list until they both are, like, 90. Like, that's just how we're gonna do this. It's so silly, because what happens in the end is right now, people think Penn State should hire Kurt Signetti. That's like, your great move. Let's park Kurt Signetti on the coaching list. You know what? Kurt Signetti wasn't on mostly the coaching list when Indiana fired Tom Allen that every media person in the country put out. So, like, that's the point. I don't think there is a style of hire that is worth discussing. Should it be a sitting power for coach? Should it be A coordinator, like a rising coordinator? Should it be a group of five or FCS coach? I don't think there's any kind of information that would tell you a particular style of hires the right way. You just have to find the right guy and then support him and give him resources. So like that's. It could be any of those things. But actually the best hire that Penn State could make, there's like a 70 chance that it's a name that nobody is talking about right now because we all just do the same thing. And I get it. It's kind of fun content. I just want to make sure because the most of the time to listen lists that people make just like, ah, this is what I think versus that lists that people make after talking to industry insiders are the same thing. And then you read quotes from industry insiders that are like, Pat Kraft loves Matt Rule and Matt Rule loves Pat Kraft. It's like, I know everybody knows that, but do we actually think Matt Rule is the best hire for Penn State? I. I wouldn't say no, but I'm certainly not for sure. Yes. Because I think athletic directors and boards of trustees and search groups, right. You hire an outside search firm. It's the ingenuity there to find the person that nobody is thinking of to find the next Kurt Signetti. Because here's the point I want to make. I was looking back after what people wrote after Tom Allen was fired at Indiana. I would do want to shout out Mike Nyselek who covers Indiana for the Bloomington paper and website. He I think was the only person that I found who had Kurt Signetti on his list right off the bat. Here's a list from a group. And I don't want to call out people injury individually, but here's like people's names. When Tom Allen got fired in Indiana, here were some. This was some per one person's list. Justin Fry. And we were like, I did this at Ohio State. It's like Ohio State offensive line coach Justin Fry, who played at Indiana, we always said like he's coming to Ohio State. He was the offensive line coach at ucla. Were like he came to Ohio State to set himself up to get the Indiana job. And now he's the offensive line coach for the Arizona Cardinals. He's not the Indiana head coach. And Kurt Signetti was a thousand times better hire than Justin Fry could have been. Here's a list. Justin Fry, Pat Fitzgerald fired Northwestern coach Sharon Moore, who wasn't yet the Michigan coach yet because Jim Harbaugh hadn't Left Jason Candle, the Toledo coach. Ryan Grubb, who's now the offensive coordinator at Alabama. Kane Womack, who used to work at Indiana and then was the South Alabama head coach at the time and now the defensive coordinator at Alabama. He was a hot name. Jake Dicker at Washington State is now the Wake Forest head coach. Charles Huff, who was at Marshall. Chuck Martin, who was at Miami Ohio. Antoine Randall, NFL assistant who was a receiver at Indiana. So that was one person's list. Like, here's the no Kurt Signetti. Here's another list from when Indiana fired Tom Allen, Sharon Moore, Ryan Grubb, Justin Fry, Tommy Reeves, former Alabama offensive coordinator Dylan McCullough, who once worked at Indiana as the Notre Dame running backs coach. Jason Candle, John Sumrall at Tulane, Kane Womack, Charles Huff, Chris Creighton at Eastern Michigan, Jake Dickert and John Gruden. No Kurt Signetti. Right. So let's just make sure that we're not being ridiculous and that we're not being obvious and thinking that we're cool. That's really it. And so we also don't have to play the game of like, I have the secret name that you haven't thought of yet, but actually there's a decent chance that's who's going to get the job. My secret name is always Mike Tomlin, the Pittsburgh Steelers head coach. It's like a Pete Carroll situation, right, to come down from the NFL. And now Pete Carroll was fired, right, from the NFL before he came down to be the head coach at usc. So it's not exactly the same thing, but it's just like the, the best hires. And again, like, we probably aren't giving enough respect to those consistent winners at a lower level. Lance Leipold at Kansas, Jim Trestle. Once upon a time, from Youngstown State to Ohio State, Lance Leipold was winning at Wisconsin, Whitewater and a Buffalo. Kurt Signetti talking. I mean, he wanted, Elon wanted. He's sitting there after beating Oregon and talking about how this road win was similar to road wins he had at Elon and JMU at James Madison. It's crazy. To him, it's the same thing. Winning is winning. Beat one of your peer institutions that you aren't expected to be at their place. It's all the same to him. So if you want to give me like an awesome FCS name or an awesome group of five name, I know people have brought up the Memphis coach, like, great, I'm here for that. But I'm just saying shortlist shouldn't have 11 names on it. You don't have to talk to insiders all the time to get the same list that everybody is is handing out. And there's probably a decent chance that the Penn State head coach, the next Penn State head coach might be a guy that is on nobody's list right now. So hot list. Good luck with your hot lists. That's it for this. In addition to Rants, we're going to have more stuff coming on this YouTube channel on our sub stack where we talk and and write about Ohio State. We have a couple shows there each week that are only for Substack subscribers. We have a bunch of stories rewrite there. Bill and Doug o issue@substack.com we do a playoff show every Tuesday night. We do national picks every Friday. We do Ohio State picks every Thursday. That's here on this YouTube channel. And we're just grateful that you guys allow us to hang out and talk college football with you. So look for the SEC to crack down on the SEC because the whole conference is a Ponzi scheme. For now, I'm Doug Lemurice and that was Rants on the Bill and Doug Show.