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1:27

to the Solid Verbal. The Solid Verbal.

1:29

Come after me. I'm

1:31

a man. I'm 40. I've heard so many

1:34

players say, well, I want to be happy.

1:36

You want to be happy for a day?

1:38

Eat a steak. It's that whoop whoop. And

1:40

now Dan and Ty. Welcome

1:43

back to the Solid Verbal. Boys and girls,

1:46

my name is Ty Hildebrandt. As always, that

1:48

fine gentleman over there, the one, the only

1:50

still the comparable Dan Rubinstein checking in from

1:53

the heart of the Midwest. We will have

1:55

a very special guest with us momentarily. Don't

1:57

forget wherever you listen, make sure you hit.

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subscribe or follow so that you don't miss

2:02

any of the episodes all off

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season long. Also go

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on out and check verballers.com. That

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is our patreon where you get

2:11

ad-free episodes. Bonus content, Discord access,

2:13

much, much more Dan Rubenstein. Sir,

2:16

good sir. How goes it out

2:18

there in the heart of the Midwest? Really

2:20

well, Ty. It goes really well, really good,

2:22

whatever it goes. I took

2:24

a long walk today because I had to drop a

2:27

car off to get a tire changed and felt

2:30

the breeze, felt the cool. Flat tire. What was the

2:32

deal there? Tire

2:34

shot. It's okay though because

2:36

I was reintroduced to the act of

2:38

walking for 25 minutes and

2:41

it felt great, Ty. It was invigorating and

2:44

I'm ready to roll, Ty. It gave me something

2:46

a little extra, a little bonus. I'm going to

2:48

welcome in our guest, Ari Wasserman from The Athletic

2:51

with a very important question kind of on the

2:53

heels of that. Ari, how many times

2:55

in your life have you changed a tire? Zero.

2:59

Zero. Dan, what about you? Dan knew the

3:02

answer to that one before. I've

3:04

contributed to a tire changing but

3:06

I was not the sole changer.

3:09

I helped remove a

3:13

flat tire and jack up the car

3:15

and change the tire. If you were

3:17

on a deserted highway, do

3:19

you think you could figure out how to do it if

3:21

you blew the tire? If I were given a tire iron

3:23

and a jack and a spare and everything, I've taken off

3:26

whatever it

3:29

is, nuts, bolts, whatever those are on

3:32

a tire. Unlimited

3:35

time, nobody watching. This

3:37

is like Indy 500 pit

3:39

crew style. You just need to get it

3:41

on there so that you can get to

3:43

point B. If it weren't

3:45

me on the amazing race in 4K doing

3:47

it and having that kind of pressure, if

3:49

you gave me a solid five hours in

3:52

the middle of like a 71 degree sunny

3:54

day, yes, I could. You could do it a lot

3:56

quicker than that. It is not that difficult. I'm just

3:58

saying I would need that. to feel comfortable and

4:01

no pressure. That's all. Ari

4:03

Wasserman, how are you my friend? It's been a while.

4:05

Good. Sweating a little bit,

4:08

thinking about the scenario of being caught in

4:10

that situation. I would probably just die. I

4:12

don't know. You

4:14

know, 4K or 5 hours, I don't know

4:17

what scenario I would need. But yeah,

4:19

I'm doing really well and you know, it's January

4:21

31st is recording this today and I'm still waiting

4:23

for the college football offseason. But that is kind

4:25

of what makes this sport great as it continues

4:28

to evolve and I'm happy to be here. The

4:30

title of this episode is February Heat Check.

4:34

February Heat Check. So we're still waiting for

4:36

that offseason as well. But

4:38

we're kind of at the precipice

4:40

of hopefully that moment in the

4:43

quote unquote offseason when it actually

4:45

starts to feel that way. So

4:47

we pondered together, Dan and I,

4:49

this episode a little bit earlier.

4:52

And what exactly is this? Dan

4:55

Rubenstein. So what we're doing is

4:58

we're going to take a number of schools

5:00

or situations within schools, teams, whatever, and say

5:02

here's what happened during bowl season. Here's what

5:04

has happened early on in the offseason in

5:06

January. And we're going to

5:09

do a BTU check. So that's bowl thermal

5:11

unit. But it's really bowl and offseason because

5:13

I think it's what British thermal units is

5:15

what the actual BTUs are, a measure of

5:17

heat energy. And

5:20

so Ty and I each have a handful of

5:22

these. We're going to discuss it amongst all three

5:24

of us. The scorching level

5:26

or maybe it's just a candlelight. Maybe it's

5:29

a healthy fireplace fire. Maybe it's, you know,

5:32

a roaring blaze, a

5:34

forest fire, who knows? But we are

5:36

going to we're going to go through

5:38

a number of scenarios and figure out

5:40

where the heat is during these cold

5:42

months. Before we

5:44

get there, though, here is my question. I don't

5:46

want to dwell too much on either

5:48

of these two stories because frankly,

5:51

we don't have all the information yet. We still

5:53

don't know what the full Michigan staff is going

5:55

to look like under Sharon Moore. We still don't

5:57

know what the roster is going to look

5:59

like. When the transfer window closes

6:01

for the michigan roster right who knows

6:03

right a lot can happen between now

6:05

and then also we still

6:07

don't have all the information about the ongoing

6:10

now. Assuming the

6:12

ongoing tennessee investigation by

6:15

the nc double a into n i l

6:18

and fire sports group

6:21

and nico yam. E

6:23

of my lay of the i get that i

6:26

think i got that somewhere in there you got

6:28

the first eighty percent i think you can i

6:30

fell apart there. I have a fanatics felling and

6:32

i think i didn't know judges were not impressed

6:34

with how you got the landing which

6:36

of those two stories to you are wasraman

6:39

is a bigger deal the tennessee deal. Or

6:42

sharon more taking over jim harbaugh bigger deal

6:44

and staying power i think are very different

6:46

in the scenario because i think that you

6:49

know it is possible of the michigan story to get

6:51

thrust back into the main picture of. The

6:53

nc double a comes out with more information

6:55

as regards to the connor stallion situation i

6:57

don't know that i'm on high alert for

7:00

some big paradigm shifting

7:02

revelation there. But i

7:04

think that the tennessee stuff is a bigger deal not

7:06

because of what happens to tennessee. But

7:09

because of what this lawsuit and similar

7:11

lawsuits like it are going to

7:13

mean for the framework of the sport moving forward because

7:15

we're not really arguing. The

7:18

tendency break the rules of the use of private jet whatever blah

7:20

blah blah we know. You

7:22

know how to kind of interpret what they

7:25

did and whether or not that was right it's whether

7:27

or not it's a sustainable model and

7:29

rules that are in place that can be. You

7:32

know restrictive of what people are able to earn

7:34

and when they're able to earn it thus maybe

7:36

putting it into any nil regulations at all. Which

7:39

then puts us into a completely different scenario

7:41

at least above board i think

7:44

there are people that are still kind of navigating

7:46

that in a way where there are no rules but. You

7:49

know saying there are no rules might change it even

7:51

more so to me i think the one that staying

7:53

power. The one that's more

7:55

influential would be the tennessee one just based on what

7:57

this means for not just tennessee but the entire sport.

8:00

Yeah, and the Chancellor of Tennessee

8:02

came out and ripped the NCAA. I

8:04

mean, speaking of BTU, it's coming out

8:07

hot, Ty. I mean, talk about firing

8:09

the take cannon. Quote, instead, two and

8:11

a half years of vague and contradictory

8:13

NCAA memos, emails, and quote-unquote guidance about

8:16

name image and likeness has created extraordinary

8:18

chaos. The student athletes and institutions

8:20

are struggling to navigate. In short, the NCAA is failing.

8:25

Between this, between what happened recently at Michigan,

8:27

it seems as if the powers that be

8:30

are not afraid to go back at the NCAA,

8:32

which maybe should have been the writing on the

8:34

wall that the power of the institution is not

8:36

what it once was. But the news

8:38

came out, I guess, shortly after all of this

8:40

news broke, or at least some of the rumors

8:42

broke, that now the attorneys

8:45

general of Tennessee and Virginia have

8:47

filed a joint suit against

8:49

the NCAA in the Eastern District

8:51

of Tennessee claiming, quote, that the

8:54

NCAA is enforcing rules that unfairly

8:56

restrict how athletes can commercially use

8:58

their NIL, name image and likeness,

9:00

at a critical juncture in the

9:02

recruiting calendar. So, yeah, a

9:04

lot more to come on that

9:06

front. Dan, you're married

9:08

into a Michigan household. It's

9:11

an Oregon household, but yes, continue. You married into

9:13

Michigan, right? I know. Yeah, yeah. What

9:16

was your take upon hearing that

9:18

Sharon Moore was handed the job

9:21

at Michigan? Like, it wasn't a huge surprise. We talked about it

9:23

on the show. We, I think, assumed as much. But

9:26

now that it's official, now that the portal window

9:28

is open for guys on that

9:30

roster and they're trying to figure out what the

9:32

staff looks like, Jesse Minter has left, the strength

9:34

coach has left. Ben Herber, yep. Like,

9:38

has your opinion of that changed at all? I

9:41

like that you're connecting this higher to

9:43

the reaction to my household, as if

9:45

my wife, who watches no Michigan football,

9:47

was like really hoping Ben Herbert stuck

9:49

around and like

9:51

maybe Junior Colson would rethink his NFL decision or

9:53

something. Sure. There wasn't a

9:55

lot of pushback either way With

9:58

the decision to keep Sharon Moore. It

10:00

was. They hired more. I know, I guess I'll go. And

10:02

then it was onto something else. Look.

10:05

My opinion of it given missing him

10:07

proximity. I guess because they do of

10:09

Michigan friends who do care about this

10:12

and ah, It.

10:14

Seems reasonable it seems like the move obviously

10:16

for continuity sake when you're a national championship

10:18

caliber program. Even with whatever Michigan going to

10:21

lose on both sides, the ball which seems

10:23

to be considerable, says he would say to

10:25

Mccarthy declaring for the drafts he looks like

10:27

an Alex or team in this moment. By.

10:30

It. But. It was thrown more as

10:32

an able to do on the recruiting trail,

10:34

what he was able to do as the

10:37

head coach for half of the regular season

10:39

ah for what he will likely be able

10:41

to do in terms of kid keeping the

10:43

remaining younger promising players guys like Kenneth Grant

10:45

and Will Johnson Mason Graham on this roster.

10:49

You. We We've seen what happened with

10:51

Alabama. We saw it happen with

10:53

Washington when a prominent head coach

10:55

leaves this late in the game

10:57

And so. Michigan. Was.

11:00

Probably. Looking at this like we can't

11:02

go back down to the the studs with

11:04

how difficult the Big Ten is becoming and

11:06

so it seemed like throw more did a

11:08

good job proving himself in that role is

11:10

under forty and so. You. Know it's

11:12

it's energy, it's promise, it's potential. He doesn't

11:15

cost a lot, so especially at this point

11:17

in the calendar Kind of seem like a

11:19

no brainer ari one I wanted. Ask you

11:22

this because you fall recruiting a lot closer

11:24

than Down and I. One of

11:26

the things that comes up frequently

11:28

whenever a very successful coach leaves.

11:31

His. Okay, he's leaving it. They

11:33

just won the national championship. The.

11:36

Continuity We as I think. Focused.

11:38

In on that was thrown more now

11:40

taking over and arbor. What in your

11:42

mind is the risk for Michigan of

11:44

longer term this guy being able to

11:46

sustain that? The doesn't have a name

11:48

recognition of Jim Harbaugh but the dance

11:50

point from a couple episodes golf he

11:52

has sort of been recruited this roster

11:54

like in his own way since. at

11:57

least beginning of the season because he has had

11:59

several by to the to coach this team. And

12:01

you mean that current player staying in terms

12:04

of that? Current players staying recruiting new talent

12:06

to kind of keep the train rolling. The

12:09

thing with Michigan that's kind of been interesting to

12:11

me in general is how they

12:13

were able to win a national title without really

12:15

ever signing a top seven or eight class during

12:17

the previous four or five cycles. So

12:20

the recruiting of new talent there has always kind of

12:22

been a hot button issue because I've always maintained that

12:24

I believe that they could be doing better. And

12:27

I don't know what the reason that they

12:30

don't do better considering, you know, the academic

12:32

institution that it is, how cool Ann Arbor

12:34

is, the storied program, the winged

12:36

helmets, the facilities, I mean everything that you

12:38

could have to sell, the

12:41

money is all there in Ann Arbor.

12:43

And I always felt like Michigan could

12:45

be one of those perennial top five

12:47

recruiting, you know, programs that

12:49

just dominate and they just never have. So

12:52

from that standpoint, I'm very curious to

12:54

see what like the infusion of like

12:56

a young less weird version of

12:58

Jim Harbaugh would look like. And

13:00

I don't know if Michigan's

13:03

recruiting results are

13:05

kind of predicated

13:07

on how awkward Jim Harbaugh is as a

13:09

human. And I think that like even

13:11

people who love Michigan can acknowledge that. And I'm very

13:13

curious to see like what Sharron Moore would be able

13:15

to do in that regard. But I

13:17

think there's no question that the continuity of the

13:19

current roster, you know, was at stake here because

13:22

they are going to be losing some pieces, but

13:24

they're also bringing some key pieces back from a

13:26

national championship. And,

13:28

you know, I did find it kind of

13:30

funny that Jim Harbaugh probably was outspoken,

13:32

at least behind the scenes about how important it would

13:34

be for Sharron Moore to take over and

13:37

how important that would be for Michigan from a continuity

13:39

standpoint. And then he proceeded to just raid the entire

13:41

program of all the key pieces that kind of helped

13:44

run it. And that's kind of

13:46

just like life in the big city. But yeah, they

13:48

didn't have to go with him, right? You know,

13:50

they didn't. No, Jesse Minter chose Ben Herbert

13:52

chose Jay Harbaugh chose. Yeah. Yeah.

13:55

But it's not like from a continuity standpoint,

13:57

when you ripple apart the entire, you know,

14:00

roster of coaches, including

14:02

the strength coach who people have a lot of respect

14:04

for, and obviously he's a really good at his job

14:06

because you don't have a roster that doesn't recruit to

14:08

the same Alabama-like level to win a national title if

14:10

you're not doing that piece right. I

14:13

think they lost quite a bit, and I think

14:15

it's going to be an uphill battle for Michigan to ever get

14:18

back to this point here in the next two or three years. But

14:20

I do know that Charon Moore was a

14:23

very steadying piece to the

14:25

puzzle there through pretty traumatic times,

14:28

and won some pretty critical games when Jim Harbaugh

14:30

was suspended and did a very good job

14:32

of kind of steadying the ship but running

14:34

a program and having to rebuild the coaching

14:36

staff and the roster is going to be

14:38

a huge proposition and somebody who's under 40

14:40

at Michigan, it's going to be an interesting

14:43

thing to track for sure. More

14:45

to come on the Michigan coaching

14:47

staff roster situation, obviously as

14:49

we hear more about Tennessee and

14:51

this ongoing investigation. Tennessee

14:54

under investigation again, which is sort

14:56

of its own story altogether, but we'll do our best

14:59

to kind of keep tabs on that. I'm sure it'll

15:01

be in the news here in the quote unquote off

15:04

season. Dan, should we get to the February heat check?

15:06

BTU, I don't know if you run warm, I run

15:08

warm, I'm ready to do this. Can't

15:11

play more than that. We don't own the copy, right? We don't. I thought

15:13

we'd say like in one second. That's

15:16

all we got. Insid, Anil. Dan,

15:18

as you look through what transpired this

15:20

bowl season, we've had people asking us

15:22

via social media last couple of

15:25

weeks, Hey, guys, into a big like bowl recap

15:27

episode. We talked about the New Year six. We

15:30

obviously talked about the playoff in the national championship,

15:32

but we've been sort of collecting

15:34

some of these tidbits, these

15:36

nuggets over the course of the

15:39

last month or so to do an episode

15:41

like this where we could just pull out the highlights

15:43

and talk about the things that we just

15:45

want to know what is the

15:47

BTU? What is the bowl thermal

15:50

unit on some of these items

15:52

that transpired during bowl season? So why don't you

15:54

kick things off? I'm going to start

15:56

with a topic that's very near and dear

15:58

to Ari's heart. my first

16:01

heat check is gonna be actually related

16:03

to the fact that did you know that

16:05

bodies don't really decompose if they are found

16:08

in a peat bog Ty

16:10

did you know that a peat bog like

16:12

a bog like a marshy bog if a

16:14

body is decomposing if there's a cadaver under

16:17

that bog the

16:20

the peat Maintains like

16:22

the muscle tissue Because

16:24

of the acidity of the water and that oxygen can't

16:26

get in Yes, the peat bog

16:28

and the reason I bring that up is because part

16:31

of the reason is the moss Keeps

16:34

the body intact keeps

16:36

all of everything intact which brings us

16:38

to Miller Moss watch Oh, I

16:40

had that I didn't know where we were going but sounded

16:45

serial killer II and we're going we're going

16:47

with the journey for each of these so

16:50

What is your heat check on the

16:53

USC football program as they enter the

16:55

Big Ten? Specifically as it relates to

16:57

Miller Moss throwing six touchdowns and emphatic

16:59

win over Louisville in USC's bowl game

17:02

Mackay lemon was a highlight Zachariah branch

17:04

was a highlight. Do you

17:06

think USC? now with

17:09

more promise From Miller

17:11

Moss than I think we expected as they went

17:13

into the portal time of year and they were

17:15

looking at Will Howard they're looking

17:18

at all these guys Do

17:20

you think USC has more heat than anticipated

17:22

after Miller Moss? And his

17:24

bowl performance. Um, are we a

17:26

hundred percent? Sure, like is it is it like just

17:28

over that Miller Moss is the starter? Like

17:31

so because as opposed to somebody who enters the

17:33

portal app in like the spring period or even

17:35

jaded my Ava Yeah, I came in

17:37

so like I don't know He

17:39

was really really good and very young and

17:42

like I just don't know if I'm ready to Get

17:44

on the jump to conclusions Matt that Miller Moss is a hundred

17:46

percent the guy I think that like part

17:48

of it is That

17:50

way because they weren't overly aggressive or

17:53

successful with the name brand quarterbacks and

17:55

the portable They still did bring in a quarterback and

17:58

a quarterback who played last year. So yeah I

18:01

don't know if that's 100% in the books, but

18:03

I am very curious about

18:05

USC's functionality as a program. I don't think

18:07

I'm going into the off season this year

18:09

guys, like viewing USC as a

18:11

legitimate national championship contender, like I may have two

18:13

years ago or the year before, and

18:16

I was very much fooled because I have

18:18

a high profile wager with my friend Andy Staples that

18:20

they would make the playoff in the

18:23

first three years of the Lincoln-Reilly era, and

18:26

that was before the 12-team expansion, so maybe I can back

18:28

door there and it'd be right. But

18:30

it's just been kind of terrible. Like when you

18:33

think about it, the first year was good. They

18:35

were almost, you know, half

18:37

a football away from making the college football

18:39

playoff, but last year's defensive breakdowns and

18:42

meltdowns were just so terrible

18:45

that it's hard to even take them

18:47

seriously at this point as a program.

18:50

Now they went out there and they

18:52

got Danson Lynn and they restructured their

18:54

defensive staff and all those

18:56

things. So like I'm more kind of concerned with whether or

18:58

not they were going to even just play functional defense next

19:01

year, even more so than Noah Moss. So I think

19:03

USC on the BTU is pretty high

19:05

just based on the interesting nature

19:08

of the program, but I feel like for the

19:10

first time, and it's kind of weird

19:12

to say after losing Caleb Williams, that I'm more concerned with,

19:15

are we going to show competence and growth

19:18

in a truly awful, I mean, honestly,

19:20

I think that the Washington game last

19:22

year was the worst

19:24

defensive effort I've ever seen with my own two eyes, like

19:27

ever. It was bad. It was horrible. Well,

19:31

look, there was a USC assistant

19:33

coach at when he was a

19:36

head coach at Texas Tech in

19:38

Cliff Kingsbury, fielded some pretty awful

19:40

defenses there. Yeah. I've

19:42

watched some Don Pelham and Brady Hope defenses

19:45

at Oregon that I was pretty disappointed. What

19:47

about Colorado this year? They had some moments.

19:50

Colorado had some terrible moments. I just remember

19:52

watching that Washington game thinking there

19:54

is no chance they are not scoring

19:56

on this possession. That's true. They literally

19:59

did every time. I think. I

20:01

don't know, there might have been a stop or a turnover

20:03

that I'm forgetting, but like it was just awful. All

20:06

this to say that Lincoln,

20:08

Riley and Ryan Day even were in this position two

20:10

years ago where they were considered two of the, you

20:12

know, if you would have had a top seven list

20:15

of best coaches in college football, both of them would

20:17

probably have been into the top seven just based on

20:20

where they were, their offensive minds and being

20:23

just young, smart people. Lincoln,

20:25

Riley probably more deserving than Ryan Day in the sense

20:27

that he made the college football playoff three or four

20:29

years in a row and had all those Heisman winners.

20:31

But now they're kind of both in the same position where it's

20:34

like, whoa, wait a minute. Did we overestimate what these guys are

20:36

capable of? So like the notion of

20:38

USC and whether or not he's a good

20:40

enough head coach to maybe fix

20:42

what seemed to be irreparable damage to the

20:44

defense is far more

20:46

enticing to me as like something I could chew

20:48

on with some BTUs going into the off season.

20:50

Sure. And whether or not Miller Moss is going to

20:53

be very good because I think we're all just anticipating. It's

20:55

just a major step back at quarterback no matter who gets it. I'm

20:58

all in on Miller Moss. I'm ready. I'm

21:00

pushing the chips in. Ty, have you seen

21:02

USC schedule? It's kind of okay. Yeah. I

21:05

mean, this is sort of your moment because I think the Miller

21:07

Moss watch that we started on this show was

21:09

done more tongue in cheek, but then we saw him in the

21:11

bowl game and I was like, holy crap. I'm in touch. Six

21:14

touchdowns against a good Louisville team. Like that's that's

21:17

workable, right? If you need a quarterback in

21:19

2024, he might be a guy you want to look

21:21

at. I'm in. I'm

21:23

just saying it now. I'll say 7.3 out of 10

21:25

on the BTU scale. L

21:29

V Miller Moss goes into the bowl game,

21:32

obviously throws with six touchdowns. So

21:34

that was always going to be interesting. It was just, I

21:36

think a function of who are the names going to be

21:38

because is it will Howard? Is it somebody

21:41

else? Like we didn't, we didn't know. Honestly,

21:43

I expected maybe that they'd be a little bit more active

21:46

on the portal side of things on at least at the

21:48

quarterback position, but that kind of being

21:50

its own point of intrigue. You couple that with

21:52

the defense USC has got a lot of BTUs

21:54

on it. Can I can I just butt in

21:56

here and ask a question guys? Please. You

21:58

mentioned something about their schedule. being manageable. Yeah.

22:02

It's... Oh, no. What

22:04

are you talking about? No, no, no, no. Listen,

22:06

listen. USC opens with what still might be

22:08

a catastrophic LSU defense and a new quarterback,

22:10

right? It's not an easy game by any

22:12

stretch of the imagination, but yes. Does USC

22:14

miss both Big Ten favorites on this schedule

22:16

in Ohio State and Oregon? They

22:18

do. That's right. They

22:20

get a kind of rebuilding Michigan team. Right? Michigan

22:23

Road. On the road in their first Big

22:25

Ten game ever. It's on the road. It's a very difficult

22:27

game. All things considered, like would you rather have got Michigan

22:29

the last two years or this year? Of

22:32

course it's this year. Right? I'm

22:34

just saying, circumstantially, this USC

22:36

schedule isn't horrible. Road

22:39

games at Michigan, I

22:42

think we have a neutral site game against

22:44

LSU, and I guess those could be helmet games, your

22:46

point. They could be helmet games. But

22:48

then you're also playing Wisconsin and

22:51

Penn State at home. You've

22:53

got to travel to Washington. You've

22:55

got what could be a much better Nebraska... Will

22:58

Rogers Washington? No, I understand that,

23:00

but I'm just saying these are typically games that they struggle

23:02

with in the Pac-12 area. So

23:05

it's not like they have the entire

23:07

Big Ten West for a six-week period.

23:09

Every two weeks they're playing against

23:11

a team that they could conceivably lose to, and

23:14

all the things that you're saying to neg the teams

23:16

that we're talking about also apply to the team we're

23:18

discussing. Of course. Of course. But

23:20

what I'm also saying is there's a lot of change

23:22

in a lot of these places, and USC weirdly has

23:24

continuity for the first time in a while. Yep.

23:28

Okay. That's all. Here's

23:30

one. I'm not going to be as flowery in

23:32

my descriptionary, but I'm

23:34

just going to call out that Arizona

23:37

forced six turnovers of

23:41

Oklahoma in the Holiday Bowl

23:43

and won by 1438... Alamo Bowl? What

23:46

did I say? Holiday Bowl? Alamo

23:49

Bowl. Alamo. Yeah.

23:51

38-24 was the final. I

23:53

think we've come to expect at this point, but the

23:55

defense stepping up in the manner that it did. Now,

23:58

new coach, it's not a... Jed Fish

24:00

Arizona going into the 16 team Big

24:02

12, but on the topic of schedules.

24:06

Oh my God. Arizona's schedule in 2024.

24:09

This isn't a, this isn't a brand new show

24:11

bias. That's what it meant. Like that's a dream

24:14

schedule. I was like comparing it to USC. Um,

24:17

but yes, I, your point was right. This

24:19

is not a preview episode, but the schedule

24:21

is very front loaded and extremely workable because

24:24

first five weeks of the year at Kansas

24:26

state at Utah home against Texas

24:28

tech. There are some other landmines a little

24:30

bit later on this season or a little bit later on

24:33

in the season, but all that being

24:35

said, it sets up pretty well for a team

24:37

that hopefully retains a fair amount

24:39

of experience going into 2024. And

24:42

who the hell knows where this

24:44

conference shakes out with all of the change

24:46

that it has to endorse. So heat check

24:48

Ari, how many BTUs are you

24:51

at on Arizona after the bowl

24:53

with the changes going into a new conference?

24:56

I think it was like a seven and a half, probably

24:58

like in the midst of it, but probably now I'm like

25:00

a three or four going out of it. Um,

25:02

and I think the reason why is just national interest. I

25:04

don't know if people are as bought into that

25:06

program as maybe I was with my past. And let

25:09

me tell you guys, I have my head up in

25:11

the clouds a lot, you know, in this job where

25:13

I'm just kind of focused on what I'm working on

25:15

and, you know, but to have like

25:17

the group chat experience where a lot of my closest

25:19

friends that I went to school with there, uh, were

25:21

complaining about it and me getting a front row seat

25:23

to it, it was like the raw nature of how

25:25

those people were feeling. Um, when

25:27

Jed fish left was like a nice refreshing,

25:29

um, you know, front

25:31

row seat for me of like, this really matters to

25:34

people, even if you think it doesn't. So the fact

25:36

that they were able to retain

25:38

the two best players on their offense. Uh,

25:40

one of which is a quarterback who showed a lot of

25:43

youthful promise and T Mac, who I

25:45

believe will probably be a first round pick in the draft, you

25:47

know, it could have been a complete nutter dumpster fire

25:49

in the sense of everything that Jed fish

25:51

built got torn down in a

25:53

one week period, and he did

25:56

take some things and they lost some players,

25:58

but it wasn't nearly as catastrophic. as

26:00

it could have been and I think that it is

26:02

still possible that Arizona goes into the offseason as

26:05

one of the two or three favorites to win the new Big

26:08

12. That schedule is really,

26:11

really easy and I think it kind of, you

26:13

know, maybe I'm speaking your language here Dan, but

26:15

like for Pac-12 fans who are so used to

26:18

what the Pac-12 used to look like, was

26:20

kind of a bummer. You know, they feel

26:22

like, you know, they escaped to the Big 12

26:24

before the whole thing exploded. They thought they were

26:26

safe. Then you look at the

26:28

schedule and it's like there's no USC and there's no

26:30

UCLA, there's no Washington or Oregon. It

26:33

really does kind of take the flavor out of

26:35

it a little bit if you're accustomed to playing

26:37

in the schedule that has those teams on it.

26:39

If you're strictly going on a BTU scale of

26:42

the best and hottest quarterback

26:44

receiver tandems in the country, proven

26:46

quarterback receiver tandems in the country,

26:48

are there two better? Is

26:50

there one better? Like where, right now, and

26:52

like you can look at a number of

26:54

schools and say like, oh, that could be

26:56

interesting, right? Like DJU to Florida State's guys

26:58

or, you know, Dylan Gabriel to Evan Stewart

27:00

or whatever. But when

27:02

you look at like the proven nature of

27:05

Noah Fafita and TMac, like that's 10

27:07

out of 10. Together too.

27:09

Because even though it's a common eight, yeah.

27:11

That's one thing. Tandem BTU heat from quarterback

27:13

to receiver, I think is one

27:15

of the best three in the country, if not

27:17

even better. Yeah, I'm with you

27:19

on that. Okay. You

27:22

ready for my next BTU heat check, Ty? I am. Remember,

27:25

for Arizona? I was one

27:27

of the things I want to call out, and I think

27:30

it was your colleague, Stu

27:32

Mandel, in his way too early top

27:34

25, Ari, had Arizona as like a

27:36

top 15 team. I

27:38

was like, whoa, okay. USC not ranked Arizona

27:41

up there, but you get it. And provided

27:43

they can retain some of the talent. That

27:46

doesn't change. I guess there's time. Yeah. What

27:48

Jetfish did was actually bring players in there

27:50

for the first time ever. Yeah. Like

27:53

Arizona, it wasn't a miracle job. They got top 50

27:55

players in recruiting who came in and actually hit, and

27:57

they were the types of talents that Arizona just never

27:59

had in the past. And they're still there going into

28:01

a weaker schedule with a with a new coach that

28:03

people have a lot of respect for so I Think

28:05

they could make some noise. I think I'm like a

28:09

5.7. I don't think the big 12 has a

28:11

lot of beats to use in this. No. Well,

28:13

I like the talent that Arizona brings back Yeah,

28:16

I think it's an interesting situation going into a

28:18

new conference And I think it's especially intriguing that

28:20

in a school in Arizona that for

28:22

let's be honest a while was kind of a doormat Now

28:25

has built up with a coach that has

28:27

since left goes into a new conference and

28:30

suddenly is one of maybe three favorites That's

28:32

interesting. If nothing more Preseason

28:34

again, not a preview show, but that's pretty damn

28:36

interesting to me So I'll go five yeah, and

28:39

they could make the playoff right come in I

28:41

think I'm just saying that sentence is exciting. Yeah.

28:43

Oh, yeah. All right My next one is well

28:45

in just looking at this one I I learned

28:47

that bears happen to be very good swimmers and

28:50

rely on finding Brooks and bodies

28:52

of water to cool down they can shed

28:54

their under fur as well as you know

28:56

They try to deal with the heat and

28:59

I learned that because there might not be

29:01

a a higher level BTU situation That what's

29:03

happening in Oxford, Mississippi Bringing

29:06

the players that they brought back minus quench

29:08

on Judkins bringing the players that they brought

29:10

in You know to swells

29:13

Walter Nolan guys like that Right

29:15

now in terms of where the SEC is in

29:18

terms of where there is New

29:21

hype right Texas has been

29:23

developing hype Georgia has been

29:25

maintaining hype Alabama has lost

29:27

hype Texas A&M starting over

29:30

again LSU is a wild card Oh miss

29:33

has like kind of proven BTUs

29:35

and I think it was sort of emphasized With

29:37

their with their win over Penn State in the

29:40

bowl game even with the Penn State defensive players

29:42

who weren't there Old

29:44

miss look good. They look confident. They

29:46

look prepared They looked enthusiastic which is

29:48

not always the case for even good

29:50

teams in bowl season I'm

29:52

feeling a lot of the BTUs with Ole Miss right

29:54

now What say you tie

29:57

in Ari? I mean, I don't

29:59

we talked about Ole Miss a couple episodes

30:01

ago and we did did

30:03

our portal eval and Like

30:06

if they don't make the playoff, it's kind of a failure You

30:09

got it. You got to make the playoff with this roster

30:11

now. I'm looking at the schedule The

30:14

schedule may beg to differ The

30:17

deeper you go into this thing. I think

30:19

the harder it gets at LSU. They've got

30:21

Oklahoma on this slate They've got

30:23

Georgia on this slate. They've got Florida on this

30:25

slate to close things out Who knows what state

30:28

Florida will be in by that point in the season

30:30

I might well I have a pretty good

30:32

idea at this point, but I don't

30:35

want to draw too many conclusions again It's still

30:37

January a time of recording first half

30:39

of this thing works out really well back half

30:41

definitely toughens up in a pretty significant way so

30:44

Look, they've got the ammo on

30:47

board to make the playoff They

30:49

should make the playoff if Lane Kiffin

30:51

is Halfway as good of a

30:53

coach as we would expect So I

30:55

think there's a lot of heat coming off

30:57

of Ole Miss as well You know, it's

30:59

gonna be one of those interesting scenarios I

31:01

think in the SEC just because suddenly we've

31:03

got this vacuum Nick Saban is gone Yeah,

31:06

right He drove all the other programs crazy

31:08

trying to match him and now he's gone and

31:10

now suddenly who like who is going to step

31:12

up And kind of fill that void if not,

31:14

Georgia, and I think I think Ole

31:16

Miss wants to be that team They they fashioned themselves

31:19

a playoff roster We'll

31:21

see if they can do it what where we're like

31:23

nuclear and hydrogen bomb tests atolls the

31:25

small islands that were completely That's what

31:27

I have BTU eyes with Ole Miss.

31:29

I have a toll level why use?

31:31

Yeah, I'm like an 8 1 Yeah,

31:34

I'm 9 7 when you said it. My first

31:36

thought was in the nines I'm more leaning towards

31:39

Dan on this one because well, I mean it's

31:41

good to write like I Think

31:44

that things in college football Become

31:47

more interesting when you start like zooming

31:49

out a little bit and not necessarily just on

31:51

how good is Ole Miss gonna be But

31:54

the case study of what Ole Miss could do

31:56

in terms of a roster building strategy like the

31:58

notion of returning players or

32:00

I mean a bunch of players from a 10-win

32:02

team the previous year looking at

32:04

the schedule and saying hey well we don't

32:06

play Alabama we don't have to play Georgia

32:09

till mid-November we could really

32:11

really do something here so why don't we take

32:13

all of our money and allocate

32:15

the resources in order to try to build

32:17

the best roster that we can and just

32:19

literally go for it like buying at the

32:21

trade deadline and creating this notion

32:24

of like hey you know

32:26

when the opportunity strikes we might

32:28

not be big NIL players every year

32:30

we might not be able to load a roster this way

32:32

but when circumstance and schedule and

32:34

roster all match up the year before and

32:36

you see that window are we

32:39

gonna see teams go on a spending

32:41

spree or a resource spree the

32:44

year before and then go all into a

32:46

season like so the notion of all-in to

32:48

me is very fascinating Ole Miss

32:50

is coming into the season with a playoff and

32:52

not just a playoff appearance I think win a

32:54

few games in the playoff even that's

32:57

what the expectation is and even without Judkins on

32:59

the roster the players that they brought in you

33:01

know put you put them in a position where

33:04

they should be able to do so especially considering

33:06

the fact their schedule is very manageable for it

33:08

being in the in the new SEC

33:12

I don't see Alabama or Texas on this on

33:14

this on the schedule so not only

33:17

will Ole Miss make the playoff or how many games

33:19

can it lose and still make the playoff and will

33:21

it make a playoff game is Ole Miss gonna be

33:24

the new blueprint for how middle-tier programs

33:26

dying to win big actually approach

33:28

their roster building in the future

33:30

is fascinating tight you you watched

33:32

the bowl game closely I did

33:34

and unfortunately the defensive players that

33:36

were out what was there

33:39

anything in that specific bowl game where you're

33:41

like I think this can continue especially

33:43

given the players that they added now I mean most

33:45

of my hot takes are on the Penn State side

33:47

you know that's right most of my hot takes are

33:49

on that side of it we expected that Ole Miss

33:52

was gonna come in there and was

33:54

was gonna look good on offense I don't know

33:56

if I quite expected they'd look as

33:58

good as they did throwing the football And

34:01

that that was sort of my point of

34:03

contention with that game But Penn State was

34:05

without some guys and look we've we've talked

34:07

ad nauseam about their problems on offense and

34:09

a lot of that Stuff still kind of was

34:11

there. So yeah, I I'm

34:14

excited about Ole Miss I'm excited to see what they

34:16

look like and and how they fit kind of in

34:18

the pecking order in this new SEC

34:21

the Saban list SEC that I'm sure we're

34:23

gonna be blue in the face talking about

34:25

all offseason long. Are you seen a

34:27

black bear in public? Uh,

34:29

no, but I've been to the black bear diner. What?

34:33

Where is the black bear diner? It's kind

34:35

of like I think it's like

34:37

a southwestern diner chain very. Oh, it's a chain

34:40

Okay, I've never been heard of it. Yeah. Yeah,

34:42

it's uh, I've seen it in mountain towns Ty

34:45

have you seen a black bear and I have seen the

34:47

rolling hills of PA. I have yeah Oh,

34:49

okay. I saw one in Canada once. Yeah,

34:51

it was far away Editors number

34:53

one irrational fear in life is encountering

34:56

a bear in public bears Yeah,

34:58

and he it's so irrational

35:01

that like he will avoid hiking trails and stuff

35:03

because he can't and I find that

35:05

to be very funny Just like picturing him actually

35:07

being chased by a bear It's like the odds

35:09

of that actually happening are very very slim But

35:12

you know just like I have a friend who's afraid to

35:14

go on cruises because he's afraid of pirates like that's another

35:16

one Oh a pirate not even falling off Yeah,

35:19

and I was like and he said the word

35:21

Gatling gun and I've never in my entire life

35:23

laughed or harder than that Wait

35:25

a guy in reference to a grappling

35:27

gun or grappling hook We're just like

35:29

like those are two very different things

35:31

if you got like I'm at a

35:34

couple hook. It's both Well,

35:36

he would only go on a cruise

35:38

if it were equipped with grappling hooks

35:42

He's afraid that they are gonna use

35:44

you grappling hook to go on board

35:46

board in guns Yes

35:49

While he's on the cruise I gotta believe

35:51

that carnival has heard about the elephant hoses

35:53

that you can use to sort of yeah

35:55

Yeah, I'm just saying like

35:57

a 35 year old man being afraid of

35:59

that It's a very

36:01

funny thing to think about. Not falling overboard,

36:03

not like the entire cruise

36:06

ship coming down with some sort

36:08

of bacterial infection or something that

36:10

spreads quickly. It's much more

36:12

the threat of pirates, even off like

36:14

British Columbia, if you were to twist

36:17

the Waziken cruise. Great. And

36:20

how common are they? Are there pirates out

36:22

there? You don't hear about them anymore. That

36:24

much with cruises. It's just orcas now, man.

36:27

The orcas though. Pirates? Is

36:29

pirates in the ocean in industry

36:31

still? I assume so.

36:33

Yeah. But I think it's very specific

36:35

to like certain areas of the

36:37

Indian Ocean. I think

36:39

that's where it's been most prevalent.

36:41

And they're just stealing like from cargo

36:43

ships? I don't think they target

36:46

cruises that much. So maybe I'm wrong. It's

36:48

usually cargo ships, I thought. Your

36:50

editor took Captain Phillips' movie very

36:52

seriously. That's great though. Yeah, the

36:55

editor was the bear. My other

36:57

friend. Yeah, but yeah,

36:59

either way. They're both adults. Fair

37:01

enough. Fair enough. All right. What's

37:04

your next heat check? I've got a two-way heat check here centered

37:06

around the pinstripe bowl, fellas,

37:08

the pinstripe bowl. Rutgers

37:11

beat Miami in the pinstripe bowl 31 to

37:13

24. The

37:17

Rutgers schedule, we're talking a lot about schedules here again.

37:20

Episode not a preview. Yeah, I don't think there's any heat

37:22

on Rutgers, but you can continue. There's heat on

37:24

Greg Schiano's bank account. That's good. Schiano's

37:27

bank account. But there should be

37:29

at least a little bit of heat on Rutgers

37:31

because of the schedule. The schedule to me is

37:33

fascinating. It is like a total 180 from

37:36

where it's been, right? We're accustomed

37:38

to Rutgers playing Penn State, Ohio

37:40

State, and Michigan. This season, they

37:42

play none of them. They play

37:44

none of them. No big pennies, powers. None

37:47

of those teams. They do have to travel

37:49

to USC. They I think get UCLA and

37:51

USC back-to-back weeks. It's still Rutgers. Okay, I

37:53

don't mean that as a pejorative, but they're

37:55

still trying to build this thing up. But

37:59

in the new Big Ten, Rucker's

38:01

recruiting class relative to newcomer

38:03

Washington was like point seven

38:05

eight points worse so pretty

38:08

close to where Washington was. Well

38:10

I don't think Washington has a recruiting class anymore so

38:13

that might be like dividing something by zero

38:15

continue. And should be a lot

38:17

more experienced than they've been in the past

38:19

they I think return a fair amount on

38:21

their defense as well. Kalmanan guy their big

38:23

running back is coming back for another season

38:25

so this is not to say that Rutgers

38:27

is going to be in contention for the

38:29

Big Ten but looking at the schedule I

38:32

say okay maybe a little bit of heat

38:34

there. On the flip side Miami. I

38:37

don't know what to make in Miami

38:39

guys. Miami is almost an Ari Wasserman

38:42

Petri dish right it's the extent to

38:44

which Ari will stand by like

38:46

the his ethos because this is

38:48

a Miami team that recruits really

38:51

well. Stars matter right. The

38:53

roster is talented and they're

38:55

a situation where like at a certain

38:58

point it's got to matter but

39:00

then you also see how they lose games you see

39:02

how they go into games how they're unprepared for games

39:05

and you're like well maybe stars don't

39:07

matter in the way they do maybe

39:09

Miami is like a very specific test

39:11

specific to Ari Wasserman. When Mario Christoval

39:13

left Oregon and you were able to like watch

39:15

that last 30 second clip if I could have

39:17

just showed it to you then would you have

39:19

just been tickled pink? Yeah

39:22

of course. The

39:26

thing about the the Petri dish. Except he won the

39:28

conference and won a rose bowl at Oregon. Yeah the

39:31

Petri dish thing is funny because it

39:33

exploded in my face when Michigan won

39:35

the national title. Right. But also to

39:38

Miami isn't the first case of recruited really

39:40

well and never is good either. Right. My

39:43

thought process when it comes to the recruiting

39:45

thing is is that having a

39:47

X number of players or a certain number

39:49

of talent on your roster is a pre-req.

39:52

Pre-req excuse me it's winning a national championship but

39:54

it doesn't guarantee mean good. It guarantees

39:56

that you won't win one if you don't. So

39:59

that to me. even is now kind of in

40:01

question after what Michigan was able to do and

40:03

what Washington might have been able to do had

40:05

they won that game. So Miami

40:08

is always interesting to me because every

40:10

single year when they sign these crazy

40:12

good recruiting classes you

40:14

always think to yourself like is it finally gonna

40:16

happen you know is it finally gonna

40:19

happen at a certain point if you you know because they've

40:21

done a really good job and what Mario did at Oregon

40:23

was bolster the lines and then the

40:25

ACC that's a really good thing like I think they've

40:27

gotten a lot of good line talent in both

40:31

the portal and in the recruiting

40:33

ranks so I am always on high alert

40:35

for Miami just showing up and being good

40:37

out of nowhere not out of

40:39

nowhere but being good and better than we expect as

40:41

a result of some of these players kind of growing

40:43

up and having a good offseason and Mario coaching well

40:47

so that's always the case but if they just

40:49

stink again like that's just gonna be status quo

40:51

and as it pertains to Rutgers like

40:54

if they won nine games next year if they

40:56

actually if everything you said tie

40:59

comes true and they like win nine games like

41:03

cuz like they won seven this year but I don't think anyone noticed

41:05

so like if they win nine like what is it what

41:08

would it take for people to notice Rutgers it's

41:10

who you beat it's who you beat and how you beat them because

41:13

they were just sort of boa

41:15

constrictors last year when they were

41:17

competitive but they weren't flashy they

41:19

didn't upset anybody big they just

41:21

chipped away in a pretty down

41:24

conference so but then when

41:26

they did beat Miami people didn't notice that

41:28

a little people didn't know Miami to me

41:30

BTU eyes is like an 8-3 just because

41:32

I'm prepared for anything any given week with

41:34

Miami now that they've added Cam Ward who's

41:36

like the ultimate wild card the best of

41:38

Cam Ward is crazy impressive and then he'll

41:40

just disappear randomly in late October early November

41:42

for two and a half weeks so I'm

41:45

fully ready for Miami to like demolish

41:47

Florida State and lose to a new

41:49

Duke or I don't have their schedule

41:51

in front of me but they beat

41:53

the heat wise they are going

41:55

to be incredible to watch they're gonna be the most

41:57

entertaining team in the country to me because quarter to

41:59

quarter half to half week to week. I

42:01

think they're gonna be like six different teams. They

42:04

open up in August, August 31st, I think it's

42:06

a week zero game at Florida. And

42:08

if they win that game, like Miami could legitimately get

42:10

the six or seven and oh. They

42:12

play for Florida A&M, Ball State, South

42:14

Florida, VOTEC. I heard,

42:17

I learned this week you can't say VOTEC,

42:19

it's VT. I don't know if you guys

42:21

knew that. There's- I didn't. Yeah. At Cal

42:23

and then at Louisville who I

42:26

think is gonna be pretty good too and then Florida

42:28

State in late October. But they have a chance to

42:31

do that and if they won the ACC it wouldn't

42:33

be surprising would it? It would just be like oh

42:35

it finally happened. It would be

42:37

surprising because if you look at the math

42:40

doing it once in 24 years is a

42:42

pretty low percentage. Like Florida State was kind

42:44

of surprising to me last year. Really? Florida

42:46

State showed- well I mean when you look

42:48

at the roster and the players that they

42:50

had like Jared Vers and Keon Coleman and

42:52

Jordan Travis and all the Johnny Wilson and

42:54

Benson all the guys they had it always

42:57

added up to that but it had been so

42:59

long since we saw Florida State be so awesome

43:01

it kind of got into that no man's land

43:04

of is this magic lost? Are

43:06

they gonna be able to do it again and then they

43:08

finally did it again? It was

43:10

kind of like wow they actually not only just beat

43:12

the crap out of LSU on national television but they

43:14

did finish their season unbeaten and like I'm

43:16

with you Dan I don't know like if they beat Florida

43:18

they don't know that that necessarily means that

43:20

Miami is back. So if Miami were to end

43:22

up doing it it would be surprising but the

43:24

pieces at the end of the run much like

43:27

Florida State it would make sense if they did. What

43:29

is the what is the BTU ranking

43:32

on both these teams? I'm assuming Miami is higher

43:34

but it was of note that they played each

43:36

other and of course that Rutgers won the bowl

43:38

game. I have a 3-1 Rutgers

43:40

3.1 for Rutgers 8.3 for Miami yeah. Tim

43:46

Ward brings Miami up probably into the 7th like 7-3

43:48

for me. Rutgers

43:51

is it's pretty low but that doesn't mean

43:53

I think Rutgers maybe like 2-8 just

43:56

because of all the emerging story lines

43:58

and the Big Ten out of I don't know if that's one

44:00

that people are gonna get amped about. That

44:02

said, it's not too long ago

44:05

that Rutgers was a complete dumpster fire of a

44:07

program that shouldn't even be like people were making

44:09

fun of their inclusion in the conference. And

44:11

like Greg Schiano was probably the only coach

44:14

on the face of the earth that

44:16

truly understood like how to make Rutgers

44:18

at least like semi-competent. And

44:21

he speaks the language and every single high school coach in

44:23

New Jersey loves that guy. And

44:25

like the fact that they're like win total next

44:27

year might be like over under seven and a

44:29

half or six and a half. It's

44:32

crazy. I don't care what their schedule is.

44:34

The fact that he was able to accomplish that

44:36

is a hat tip to Greg Schiano for doing

44:38

it and being willing to do it. The

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wait. AutoTrader. Ari,

46:10

if Out of the Shadows emerged

46:12

a billionaire booster at Rutgers, the

46:14

cake boss? Is that what you're

46:16

saying? The cake boss. If the

46:18

cake boss suddenly finds two billion

46:20

dollars of discretionary income,

46:28

how much of that money would

46:30

the cake boss need to put into

46:32

the Rutgers, NIL infrastructure, what have you,

46:35

in order to turn Rutgers into an immediate

46:37

playoff contender? Can I guys tell

46:39

you like what I've always thought though about

46:41

Rutgers before I answer that? I

46:44

always thought if they were New Jersey State that they would

46:46

be better. I think they've got

46:48

a branding issue. Yeah, I don't

46:50

think I don't even know what it means.

46:53

Like if they were New Jersey State and they had like

46:55

a really cool, maybe even if there were still the Knights,

46:58

and they had a really like black and red

47:00

uniforms that had like the outline of the state

47:02

on the thing and people like acknowledged and knew

47:04

where it was and made it, they would have

47:07

a chance to make it cool. I just don't

47:09

know if you can make the name Rutgers cool.

47:11

It was originally named Queens College. Okay.

47:14

And it was renamed Rutgers

47:16

College after Colonel Henry Rutgers

47:19

in 1825. He was a Revolutionary War

47:21

hero and the son of colonists from

47:23

the Netherlands. There you go. That's good

47:25

to hear. And that was way before

47:29

the birthplace of college football. Yeah,

47:31

they were there for it. They were there for

47:33

it. So

47:35

I don't know. I think that if you took

47:38

20 million you could make a really good roster

47:40

anywhere because you know I mean I guess like

47:42

also too with Greg Schiano, still the head coach,

47:44

he was an NFL head coach, he was a

47:46

coordinator at Ohio State. He's got a pretty extensive

47:48

resume of working with football players. It

47:50

wouldn't be like a joke of an institution to like

47:52

be like hey go play there. And

47:55

I think money talks. I think people would go play anywhere if

47:57

you threw enough money at it. I think you

47:59

know you see a lot of bogus NIL dollars flying around there

48:01

but they won seven games with what I

48:03

assumed is close to nothing or

48:06

not anywhere near what other teams that are in the Big

48:08

Ten were paying. If you maybe turned it

48:10

to 20 or 25 I think you could make the

48:12

playoff pretty convincingly at that point. That would be my

48:15

number. We talked on a previous

48:17

episode about perhaps that method

48:19

for a G5 school because of course as

48:21

you know group group of five team gets

48:23

in the playoff and if

48:26

a G5 team finds a rich booster that's willing

48:28

to spend a lot of money, is

48:30

that not the path of least resistance? It might take

48:32

a bit to convince people to come there but if

48:35

money talks as you say it does and

48:38

of course if you could put together an interesting G5

48:40

team that wins all its games that seemingly

48:42

is an easy way into the

48:44

playoff with perhaps a lot of visibility for the school.

48:47

The question I have for you guys and I don't know the answer to

48:49

this I mean you went to a

48:51

school then that's got some pretty wealthy people

48:53

around it. Why has no billionaire

48:55

like upset football obsessed billionaire just like

48:58

on scorched earth yet? Like

49:00

you would think that like because like when

49:02

you think about how much money a billionaire

49:04

has or like what Nike is worth right

49:06

or what Apple is worth like Tim Cook

49:09

and Auburn. If you really really really felt

49:11

like like a billion dollars

49:14

is like putting together a top three

49:16

class as a drop in the bucket

49:19

of a billion. Like why has nobody

49:21

do you think it will ever get to a

49:23

point where like a T-Boon pickings god rest his soul

49:25

decides I'm 83 years old I've

49:27

got billions of dollars the last thing I want

49:29

is my team to win a national championship and

49:31

then actually just like pays

49:34

every single member of their class five million

49:36

dollars to come there. My guess is there's

49:38

something in the optics of it right that

49:40

you're spending so much money on something that's

49:42

seen like internationally as pretty frivolous

49:44

even though we love it we're like they

49:46

spent how much money so that they could

49:48

win three more football games when that money

49:50

could have fed 300 million people right that's

49:52

the when they're when they're in the spotlight

49:54

like that and I think Phil Knight might

49:57

be a little bit different because he made

49:59

his money in. sports.

50:02

So maybe there's a difference there. And also it would be the

50:04

easiest thing for him to do too. If you're,

50:06

I would say, if I were Phil Knight,

50:08

I would say if you're a top 100 player in the country

50:10

in the 247 sports composite and

50:13

you come to Oregon, I automatically give you a 10

50:16

year Nike deal and

50:19

X number of dollars, whatever that comes out to be.

50:22

And it actually could be kind of

50:24

used in the same vein that NIL was

50:26

intended for, which is you are a Nike

50:28

athlete, you wear Nike clothes, you post Nike

50:30

things on your Instagram, you tweet about Nike

50:33

and links to sales on your thing and you're

50:35

actually an ambassador for the brand that exists right

50:37

there. Like why don't they do that? The Oregon

50:39

difference is at this point over the last whatever

50:41

20 or 30 years is it's been a

50:43

proven place that develops NFL players that wins

50:46

a ton of games. So I think money

50:48

gets players in the door. But

50:50

like you're saying like, why doesn't, you know,

50:52

a billionaire at Iowa State or Minnesota or

50:54

something spend $40 million? That's fine. But you

50:56

can make a bunch of money going there.

50:58

But if you're thinking even medium term, are

51:00

you going to become a better football player?

51:02

Like what are your odds of becoming an

51:04

NFL quarterback if you go to Minnesota or

51:06

Iowa State as Iowa State has an NFL

51:08

quarterback? Starting in the second. That's a great

51:10

example. I'm saying, put the track records specific

51:12

to those schools, right? That like, it's one

51:14

thing to get players there. It's another to

51:16

say, okay, now that you're here, we're going

51:18

to develop you into an NFL, you

51:21

know, top three. But if a billionaire became

51:23

maniacal about it, he could also

51:25

hire a new staff. Can hire the new staff, can hire

51:27

the new. I just think it takes time. I

51:29

just think it takes time to build

51:31

out that infrastructure. And it takes commitment,

51:33

not just financial commitment, but like, it

51:35

takes your time, right? You need to

51:37

convince coaches that this is the place

51:39

for you. You need to build

51:42

out like the NIL infrastructure of like how the deals

51:44

are going to work and hire a bunch of lawyers.

51:46

Like it's just, it takes a good amount of your

51:48

time. I don't think it's like a turnkey, write a

51:50

check, succeed kind of thing. Tim

51:52

Cook makes $83 million a year. Great.

51:55

And Auburn has infrastructure. But Auburn has had money

51:57

forever. Okay. I'll use that as a cue. and

52:00

talk about a G5 school that has

52:02

a mascot that actually has some fertility

52:05

issues when it gets hot and stressed

52:07

out. I'm gonna talk

52:09

about the G5 school that finished with

52:11

the highest recruiting composite rank and emphatically

52:15

won a bowl game. That would be the

52:17

USF Bulls. How about that

52:19

Ari? How about that for a transition? So

52:21

when they're very hot, they have a hard

52:23

time reproducing? When they get very hot

52:25

over the summer, Bulls get very stressed out and

52:29

the fertility issues start

52:31

to grow. Like

52:34

Bull Seaman according to

52:36

Vitafirm, which is

52:38

a company that makes mineral

52:40

rich vitamins for Bulls to

52:42

keep their stress levels down.

52:45

Not a sponsor, I suppose could be. If

52:49

Vitafirm wants to come through with a bag

52:51

for the solid verbal. Solid verbal sponsored by

52:53

Vitafirm. Yeah,

52:56

apparently Bulls need a mineral rich

52:58

diet in the summer months to

53:00

keep their stress levels down that

53:02

helps with fertility. USF though

53:05

absolutely demolishes, I believe Syracuse,

53:07

right? Yeah. 45-nothing Alex

53:09

Golash first year as head

53:12

coach bringing a

53:14

couple of notable transfers, not a huge transfer

53:16

class. I don't think the win and final

53:18

score means a ton at the moment because

53:20

of what Syracuse was going through in an

53:22

interim situation. But

53:26

USF has a lot of work to do on defense.

53:29

Had a promising, I don't know, two

53:31

and a half, three quarters against Alabama early on in

53:33

the year. But certainly took some

53:35

lumps on defense, but there seems

53:38

to be a good amount of heat. You

53:40

know, Alex Golash getting in front of microphones

53:42

talking a big game, which I love. USF

53:45

obviously geographically in a good place.

53:48

Schedule looks pretty decent moving forward.

53:50

What is the heat and BTU level with

53:53

USF in this moment? I'm

53:57

still trying to like shake off the words Bulls even.

54:00

Yeah, of course. You'd

54:04

be amazed at how often it comes up on

54:06

this show. Yeah, I mean it would be a really

54:08

funny sponsorship too. Yeah. And the thing that I

54:10

think about too, sorry, I'll get to that in a

54:12

second. But like somebody is a millionaire because of those

54:15

vitamins. Like you have to think about like how

54:17

awesome it is like these people who come up with

54:19

these like obscure ideas that nobody in like regular

54:21

modern society would ever think of. Who now like have

54:23

a house on Laguna Beach because they came up with

54:25

bull vitamins. He is the bull semen

54:28

king. Bull semen king of Chicago.

54:30

Yeah. Chicago. Yeah. Yeah, that's

54:33

I think it's the I mean I

54:36

think it's more Texas that has the issues with

54:38

the heat and the in the cattle. Okay. Why

54:41

are we worried about bull anxiety again? Like what's

54:43

the actual? USF there's a bull.

54:46

No, no, I know. It's heat, right? The heat causes the

54:48

stress and this is the heat episode. I think that's an

54:50

incredible fact. I just mean why are humans concerned

54:52

with the stress level of bulls in real life?

54:55

Because they make money off of the cattle. Come

54:57

on, are you? You're in Texas. Yeah, I don't

54:59

I am NOT a Texan. I live in Texas,

55:01

but I'm not I haven't been indoctrinated yet. Okay.

55:03

I mean considering the fact that UCF was like

55:05

one of the worst teams in college football years

55:07

ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What did I say?

55:09

You said the USF. Sorry. I

55:12

think they lost all but one game in

55:14

2022 like to me I could probably get to

55:16

like a 2.4 on this just

55:19

because I think that every program in

55:21

Florida I don't think that

55:23

any program located in Florida should ever stink under

55:25

any circumstances. Agreed. So

55:28

the fact that they have some momentum again you

55:30

can't take a 45

55:32

nothing win over Syracuse considering what

55:34

happened there. Overly

55:36

serious, but what you can do is you can see a

55:38

nice tangible

55:41

piece of growth there that can continue on into

55:43

the following year and I'm old

55:46

enough to remember when USF went like 10 and 0 that

55:48

one year. I think it was like 08 or 07 when

55:50

they got they got killed by Oregon in the Sun Bowl,

55:52

but yeah, that was a fun year. Oh,

55:54

but they had a really fun year and I

55:56

think that everybody in Florida with the proximity of

55:58

talent that they have. Is

56:01

entitled to at least one fun year every six seven

56:03

years and I think that goes back to how weird

56:05

it is that Miami's Been not very good for as

56:07

long as I have So

56:09

yes, I mean I think I can it can I think I

56:11

could put it up there with next to Rutgers in terms of

56:13

you Know BTU's I have it above

56:16

Rutgers because of the location in Florida

56:19

Because of the juice because of the recruiting young

56:21

promising quarterback Byron Brown. I'm

56:24

there I'd like a 5-4 for USF

56:26

right. I for yeah, absolutely I

56:29

mean, especially with the bull fertility element.

56:31

Yeah, maybe you're just like yeah, you're

56:33

just like gotta Yeah,

56:35

the the bull thing that

56:37

was unexpected Dan. I'm not gonna lie

56:40

What's it though tie after all these

56:42

years? Maybe not maybe not as unexpected

56:44

as people who are new listeners would

56:46

would expect me to say Yeah, um, I'm

56:49

not higher than Rutgers. I don't think I

56:51

gave my number for Rutgers. I'm like a 5-3. Oh, wow On

56:55

Rutgers. Yeah, I'm just how you prove to the people

56:58

that you're just a big college football guy, you know,

57:00

I guess I mean, I'm I live

57:02

in this part of the world. So maybe yeah, I'm

57:04

a little bit more interested for me

57:06

the USF thing It's like it's

57:08

more of a bigger picture heat check because

57:10

they're building the stadium and I wrote about

57:12

it a lot in our Inner newsletter that

57:14

we sent out Towards I

57:17

guess the fall of last year, you

57:19

know, there there was some strife there

57:21

with do we actually want to build a 340

57:24

million dollar stadium at the risk

57:26

of leaving academics behind and

57:28

they said yes, let's do it. We're going

57:30

Yeah, we're going for it. We need to

57:33

you know, some of the Rational

57:35

behind that decision was we don't want

57:37

to be left behind in the football

57:39

world Like we we see that we're

57:42

in Florida. We see where this thing

57:44

could go It's a brave new

57:46

world in college football. And so we're gonna build the stadium. It's

57:48

gonna open in 2026 It's gonna

57:50

have a big freaking bowl Dan. I don't

57:52

know if it's gonna be sponsored by vitafirm

57:54

Maybe it could be of course on one

57:56

of the amount of vitafirm exposure on this

57:58

episode. Yeah much They're gonna have a

58:00

big old bull, at least in the renderings, a one half of

58:02

the stadium. And so I just

58:05

think there is a lot of heat there

58:07

on that program. First,

58:09

the first two FBS programs that

58:12

South Florida plays this fall, Alabama

58:15

and Miami. Yep. I'm

58:17

just saying, you buy low now, the heat's gonna be

58:19

through the roof if anything crazy happens. The heat's gonna

58:21

be through the roof and they wanna get into a

58:23

power conference. They're making these investments

58:25

because they wanna try and pave their way into

58:28

the playoff at some point in the foreseeable

58:30

future. And so that's why they're investing as

58:32

heavily as they are. As

58:35

for what USF looks like this year, I agree

58:37

on the quarterback thing, not a

58:39

preview episode, I need some time with that

58:41

one. But I think overall the momentum around

58:43

the program is there. And so that makes

58:45

it interesting, not more interesting than Rutgers, but

58:48

I'll go 5-1. How's

58:50

that? What's your next heat check, Ty? I don't know how

58:52

much time, I've got time for a couple more. Kyron drones.

58:56

Ooh, specific. Yeah, Kyron drones.

58:58

So Kyron drones, Baylor transfer

59:01

is quarterback at VT

59:03

Virginia Tech, Ari, is that right? That's

59:06

right. Don't say FOTEC. Don't say Louisiana last

59:08

year. VT. Don't do it. Came on

59:10

strong last half of the season, won the

59:12

military bowl, beat Tulane, a good group of five

59:14

team in its own right. I

59:16

think finished in his last five games with something like

59:18

an 11 to two touchdown interception

59:21

ratio with the exception of the

59:23

Louisville game. Yeah, Louisville. He did

59:25

at least one good thing in

59:27

all of the final five

59:29

games, right? Whether running or passing. The

59:33

schedule next season, speaking of beautiful schedules,

59:35

is beautiful. It works out

59:37

really well for Virginia Tech. They're at

59:39

Miami, they're at Syracuse, they're home against

59:41

Clemson. So there's some name brand teams

59:43

on that schedule, but this

59:45

is a team to me that felt like it very much

59:47

got its act together and was trending up in a good

59:50

way when we last left them

59:52

at the end of the season. So that's not to

59:54

say this is a nine win Virginia Tech team, but

59:57

I do think after a first

59:59

season. for the

1:00:02

new coaching staff trying to figure out who is

1:00:04

going to play where. A lot of like positional

1:00:07

changes, which was concerning last season, it

1:00:09

seems as if they put things together in a

1:00:11

really substantial way. And now going

1:00:13

into 2024 with a good schedule and I

1:00:15

think a lot more experience coming back. I

1:00:19

don't know, like I'm pretty high on Brent Pry

1:00:21

and where he's got that program pointed. I

1:00:24

think that's right. I'm okay with this. What

1:00:27

number do you have for Kyron drones? Ah,

1:00:30

six two. Six

1:00:33

two. Yeah, I like I really I think

1:00:36

we saw flashes in limited

1:00:38

action at Baylor. And when you

1:00:40

and I remember when you and I remember that he was

1:00:42

on the roster for Virginia Tech and then when he started

1:00:44

playing, it was like a couple weeks into the year, we

1:00:46

got more regular time. It was like, okay, this

1:00:49

could be interesting to follow. And then they went

1:00:51

to a bowl and then they won the bowl. And

1:00:53

now I'm talking myself into Virginia Tech in

1:00:55

a way that I lost to your precious

1:00:57

Rutgers Scarlet Knights early. This

1:00:59

is true. This is when they play again next year.

1:01:02

Yeah, but I'm pretty high on him. Yeah,

1:01:06

it was the second half

1:01:08

of the year more so than the

1:01:10

bowl to me was what I think

1:01:12

up the BTUs in February, January, February.

1:01:14

So yeah, I'd have them mid tier

1:01:17

BTU in a I think a

1:01:19

conference still desperate to to get a little hot

1:01:21

when the SEC and Big 10 seem to have

1:01:23

all the juice right now. So

1:01:25

yeah, Virginia Tech has a fun home field.

1:01:27

The schedule, as you mentioned, looks nice. A

1:01:30

younger head coach who seems to be seems

1:01:32

to have an upward trajectory. Kyron drones is

1:01:34

fun. Yeah, I don't know what the

1:01:37

receiver room looks like. I don't know what the offensive

1:01:39

line room looks like in this moment. That's an August

1:01:41

conversation. But in terms of like, where

1:01:43

they stack up in terms of just

1:01:45

general vibes right now. Yeah, I

1:01:47

would say they run pretty high. The most important

1:01:50

thing for Virginia Tech is not the

1:01:52

number. It is not whether we're at a 6'2 or

1:01:54

a 6'3 or 4'1. That

1:01:56

they're just on the show at all? Well, the fact that

1:01:58

they're on the show is important. that if

1:02:00

we were to have done this show a year

1:02:02

ago, that BTU number is definitely a

1:02:05

tick up that's all you want,

1:02:07

right? If you're starting over in the way that Virginia

1:02:09

Tech was starting over with that roster, the

1:02:11

fact that that number is objectively

1:02:13

higher on this episode is meaningful.

1:02:17

I'm no expert on Virginia Tech's

1:02:19

roster numbers right now, but

1:02:22

it is funny that you mentioned this, Ty, because

1:02:24

on our show, we had

1:02:27

somebody call in and say, why don't

1:02:29

you guys talk about Virginia Tech? I've heard Ari say

1:02:31

that this is a dead program. And if

1:02:33

you actually look at their schedule in drones next

1:02:35

year, there's a legitimate chance with the returning production

1:02:37

that we have that we can make

1:02:39

the playoff. And I kind of looked into it a little bit

1:02:42

and I saw their schedule before the show and

1:02:44

I kind of put two and two together. I'm like,

1:02:46

well, drones is somebody that I too also noticed

1:02:48

at Baylor. I know that he wasn't always a starter there,

1:02:50

but there were there were spot starts a few years ago

1:02:52

where he came in and did some

1:02:54

things that are like, oh, this guy's got a flash

1:02:56

of athleticism here that could be special. And

1:02:59

if you get a quarterback that kind of figures it out and you have a

1:03:01

lot of returning production

1:03:03

plus a favorable schedule, there

1:03:06

is a chance that Virginia Tech could go

1:03:08

win nine games and move that BTU meter

1:03:10

up my mind. I'm higher than you. I

1:03:12

think I'm closer to seven, maybe

1:03:14

six, eight on this because I'm always excited about

1:03:17

like what new can happen. And as we found

1:03:19

out this past year, like new teams pop up

1:03:21

all the time. Um, that

1:03:24

is an exciting proposition for me. The thing I don't

1:03:26

understand is and I remember vividly

1:03:28

when I was covering Ohio state, we went to, um,

1:03:32

Blacksburg for the 2015 game. That was the Braxton

1:03:34

Miller spin move game. If you guys remember. Yep.

1:03:37

And I remember writing a huge feature, uh, before

1:03:39

that game about like what happened to Virginia Tech?

1:03:41

Like why don't they recruit the DMV anymore? The

1:03:43

way that they used to, why don't they get

1:03:45

like if Michael Vick was born now or was

1:03:49

18 now, he never would go to Virginia Tech the way

1:03:51

he could have gone. And I think it's kind of a

1:03:53

sad story that like one of the name brand places that

1:03:55

was competing for national championships when we were kids kind

1:03:58

of just like went into no man's land and stopped. recruiting

1:04:00

they weren't a factor in their own territory

1:04:02

anymore and you know Penn State was eating

1:04:04

up a lot of the best players in

1:04:06

the DMV area and like VOTEC does... VT...

1:04:10

V-T... Even a... Come on now... VOTEC for

1:04:12

20 years now it's gonna take a minute

1:04:14

for me to get out of that habit.

1:04:16

They're probably one of the

1:04:18

big losers of national recruiting, right? That

1:04:20

they are close enough to interesting talent

1:04:22

but now everybody can watch YouTube, everybody

1:04:24

can watch huddle, everybody can look at

1:04:27

max preps or whatever, wherever tape is

1:04:29

that everybody can get to regional clinics

1:04:31

and camps and everything like that where

1:04:34

that it's cooler if you're a top player in

1:04:36

Virginia to go to Alabama or Penn State or

1:04:38

any of these things. Has anybody been a victim

1:04:41

of that more than Virginia Tech though? Like

1:04:43

I'm just trying to think of like which teams used to be

1:04:45

high like if you

1:04:48

think about the Virginia Tech... I mean

1:04:50

USC recruiting ground has been rated pretty

1:04:52

significantly, right? It has been but they've

1:04:54

never they haven't dropped from like top

1:04:56

15 program in America to like in the

1:04:58

70s. True. You know like it's

1:05:00

like they like Virginia Tech has been pillaged to the

1:05:02

point where it's like not even visible or or

1:05:06

similar to what they were. I mean they

1:05:08

were once one of the top 15 programs

1:05:10

in America and now they can't... I've been

1:05:12

able to explore the opportunity to go elsewhere.

1:05:14

Yeah I just can't even remember the last time

1:05:16

Virginia Tech played in a nationally relevant football game. Virginia

1:05:20

Tech... Well look they beat Ohio State

1:05:23

in the year that Ohio State so it's 2014.

1:05:25

They had an interesting stretch

1:05:28

with Jared Evans, Gerard Evans, it's what

1:05:30

2016? Is that Fuente's first year? The

1:05:32

JLC transfer who probably should have stayed.

1:05:35

So I guess it's really been 2016 since they

1:05:38

were playing in. So we're getting on a decade

1:05:40

now. Yeah we're getting on. Been a couple of...

1:05:43

Okay here's my final and this is there's good continuity

1:05:45

here. Here's my final heat check, my final BTU and

1:05:48

actually the phrase I'm gonna use here was

1:05:50

in ties vows. Quivering muscle

1:05:53

fibers. Quivering muscle

1:05:55

fibers are how this animal

1:05:58

stays warm. You

1:06:01

might think to yourself it's a bee, technically it's

1:06:03

a wasp because a yellow

1:06:05

jacket is a wasp. Okay?

1:06:08

Also fun fact about wasps is a female

1:06:11

decomposes in every fig that exists.

1:06:14

Did you know that? A female in every fig.

1:06:17

In every single fig that exists,

1:06:20

there are the broken

1:06:23

down proteins of a female wasp. How

1:06:25

on god's green earth did you find

1:06:27

that? I don't know. I just

1:06:29

found that out one time that figs are

1:06:31

dead wasp fruit. Wow. And it stuck with

1:06:33

me. Wait, do they go into the fruit

1:06:35

as it's blooming and then die? As it's

1:06:37

blooming and die and the wasp carcass breaks

1:06:40

down into a protein that's within those figs. That

1:06:43

allows it to continue to grow to where the

1:06:45

fig turns into a bee? Correct. So if a

1:06:47

bee doesn't die in the fig, then it can't

1:06:49

be a fig. Or a wasp, excuse me, then

1:06:52

it can't be a fig. I believe so. You

1:06:55

can look it up, I can be fact checked, I'm wrong. Continuously.

1:06:59

But the fact of the matter is, Georgia

1:07:01

Tech had a nice win over,

1:07:04

I believe, UCF. UCF in their

1:07:06

bowl game and became

1:07:08

kind of a wild card last year. Hanes

1:07:11

King threw far too many picks but made

1:07:13

a ton of plays. They were probably an

1:07:15

average, even below average defense away

1:07:18

from beating, what, bowling green open

1:07:20

the season with a win over

1:07:22

Louisville. The offense certainly did enough in that game. They

1:07:24

get the win over Miami. They

1:07:27

make changes, much needed changes on

1:07:29

their defensive coaching staff. They hire like a

1:07:31

long time Mike Elko guy, Tyler Santucci, to

1:07:33

run the defense. He was at Notre Dame,

1:07:36

Wake Forest, Texas A&M, Duke, Edger and Cooper

1:07:38

is now going to be like a top 20 pick. He was

1:07:40

one of his linebackers at Texas A&M. So

1:07:42

I know it's easy

1:07:45

to be seduced by the ceiling of

1:07:47

recent Orange Bowl champion Georgia Tech. They've

1:07:49

had some down years. But

1:07:53

in terms of heat check, in terms

1:07:55

of BTUs, in terms of vibes in

1:07:57

this ACC, another Tech, I

1:07:59

don't know. I think they're pointed in the right direction.

1:08:03

I think there's some flames here. The

1:08:05

problem with Georgia Tech, I agree. Yeah. Schedule

1:08:07

is an S minus, minus, minus,

1:08:10

minus. I was going to say, we have

1:08:12

to talk about the Delta, all right, if

1:08:14

you want to get scientific. We have to

1:08:16

talk about the difference in the BTUs around

1:08:19

the program and the trajectory and

1:08:21

the vibes BTUs versus what

1:08:23

I think is reality next season. Because I'm

1:08:25

looking at the schedule now. They open with

1:08:28

Florida State. They're also on the road at

1:08:31

North Carolina, at Louisville. They're home

1:08:33

against Notre Dame. They're home against

1:08:35

Miami. They play NC State on what NC State's going

1:08:37

to look like. They close out the season on the

1:08:39

road at Georgia, who, by the way, should still be

1:08:41

pretty good. So ceiling there could

1:08:43

be seven wins. Could

1:08:46

be seven wins with that schedule. Again,

1:08:48

not a preview episode, but it seems like that's

1:08:50

pretty difficult. I feel

1:08:52

really good about where the program

1:08:54

is at, though. And I think

1:08:56

we alluded to this frequently when we talked

1:08:58

about Brent Key taking over that

1:09:01

program as a whole. It just felt like they played for

1:09:03

him. They were in games, and

1:09:05

that carried through to this season

1:09:08

as well. They beat UCF in the

1:09:10

Gasparillo Bowl. They got to seven wins.

1:09:12

That's a huge deal. Because again,

1:09:14

they had a pretty tough schedule this season. The fact

1:09:16

that they got to the Bowl, that they won the

1:09:18

seventh game, I think, is meaningful. They

1:09:20

should have a very experienced team, again, in 2024.

1:09:24

So that in and of itself against a tough

1:09:26

schedule, who knows how things shake

1:09:28

out. Maybe they pull an upset or two and make things

1:09:30

a little bit more interesting. But

1:09:32

that is my cap on the BTU

1:09:35

meter. I can't go higher than like a

1:09:37

5'5 on Georgia Tech, if

1:09:39

only because I look at the schedule and we

1:09:41

have to be somewhat realist in

1:09:44

our analysis here. So I like them. I

1:09:46

like where they're at. I like Brent Key. I like Haines King. But

1:09:48

I don't see them. Even

1:09:51

if everything goes right, they're not going better than seven

1:09:53

and five. OK. Can

1:09:56

I ask you a weird question? Because it's late

1:09:58

January, early February. Is it bull famous? No,

1:10:01

nothing related to cattle and reproduction.

1:10:04

When you look at the roster of ACC quarterbacks,

1:10:07

I'm not going to declare Haynes King

1:10:09

like the alpha atop this list. I'm

1:10:12

not going to go as far as doing that. But

1:10:16

who is? Right? Like

1:10:18

you look at this list and he's like, is

1:10:20

it DJU? Is it Cade Klubnick? Is it Max

1:10:22

Johnson at North Carolina? Like Malik

1:10:25

Murphy at Duke? Is

1:10:27

it whatever the, you know, maybe it's Cam Ward at

1:10:29

Miami? Who would you pick? Right. If

1:10:31

you had one here, I think I know who I

1:10:33

would take. Like Haynes King

1:10:35

put up a lot of interesting numbers. Obviously one

1:10:37

of them was 16 or so

1:10:39

interceptions, but he ran well. He

1:10:42

was a gamer at the end of game. Like he

1:10:44

made plays. I

1:10:47

don't know what if Miami is going to start. He

1:10:49

has beaten Alabama. He's beaten Alabama. Well, no, that was

1:10:51

Zach Calzada. Wasn't it? Oh, Zach

1:10:53

Calzada. Yeah. And is he not

1:10:56

starting in the ACC? Because I feel like every

1:10:58

former Texas A&M quarterback is a starting quarterback. Yeah.

1:11:01

Sorry for getting those confused. And I don't know

1:11:03

what's going to happen with, where was it? Albany's

1:11:05

quarterback? Skeeter McDuffie, whatever his name is. I

1:11:09

think it's something different. But I'm buying stock

1:11:12

in Jamal. I mean, uh, uh,

1:11:14

Malik Murphy. Sorry. Oh, Malik

1:11:16

Murphy at Duke. Sure. Yeah. Is

1:11:19

that your answer? Who is the number one? I don't know if that's

1:11:21

who I would, if I could build my entire team,

1:11:23

like these are two, like who would I take

1:11:25

as like the best finished product right now or

1:11:27

who would I build my program around? I think

1:11:29

our different questions. You've got a what? Grayson McCall

1:11:32

NC state. I probably take

1:11:34

Cade club Nick right now. Okay. Just

1:11:36

based on, on ceiling and I've like watched him camp

1:11:38

in person and I know that he's got red. But

1:11:41

yeah, there's some risks, but I think

1:11:44

physical attributes and star potential. Kyle

1:11:46

McCord Syracuse. Kyle

1:11:48

McCord. Yes. That's another

1:11:50

one. Malik Murphy, just based on like

1:11:53

the Anthony Richardson school of freak

1:11:55

athletes, like who figures it out

1:11:57

and could be a first round pick one day. Hanes

1:12:00

King probably the most accomplished if that's the

1:12:02

right word you're really selling Hanes King Even

1:12:04

Hanes King is listening to this and rolling

1:12:06

his eyes a little bit. I'm again I'm

1:12:09

not going as far as to suggest Hanes

1:12:11

King is the alpha in this list.

1:12:13

All right. I'm just saying in terms of

1:12:15

accomplishment He was

1:12:17

more fun that like DJ You definitely took a

1:12:19

step forward for Oregon State and will accomplish

1:12:21

things at Florida State in this offense but

1:12:25

Hanes King is frisky in the top group

1:12:27

at least I would say this episode brought

1:12:29

to you by a bull semen company or

1:12:31

whatever They do and Hanes King's people and

1:12:33

his quick quivering muscle fibers. That's right. That

1:12:35

was in your vows. Yeah, that's right It's

1:12:38

great. I would give Georgia Tech

1:12:40

independent of the schedule because I don't think a lot of

1:12:42

people look at the schedule And I don't

1:12:45

think Georgia Tech has a lot of buzz. No pun intended

1:12:47

at the moment, but I'd

1:12:50

be high fives low sixes. I think you have to have

1:12:52

a real conversation. Maybe this isn't the day Can I come

1:12:54

back in the summer? Of course, like

1:12:56

what actually is like as you mentioned it

1:12:58

to is like Georgia Tech's high ceiling It's

1:13:00

like I don't think that the ceiling at

1:13:03

Georgia Tech is as high as other people

1:13:05

do. Yes It's in Atlanta and then that's

1:13:07

it like that's where it stops Like it's

1:13:09

just hard because it's actually like apparently a

1:13:11

very difficult academic. It's an excellent school Yeah

1:13:13

to get into and to exceed expectations

1:13:15

in grade wise I

1:13:18

just don't know if this is a program that's

1:13:20

gonna be winning ACC titles Even if

1:13:22

things go their way in the near future. No,

1:13:24

I think I think I think

1:13:26

that the relative BTUs would be

1:13:29

around consistent eight ish Consistent

1:13:31

eight ish, you know, maybe nine if

1:13:33

everything breaks correctly Between

1:13:36

seven and nine wins a year consistent ball

1:13:38

team. I think would would generate a good

1:13:40

amount of quivering muscle fibers Yeah,

1:13:42

I'm with you on that. Okay. All right,

1:13:44

Ty Um BTUs

1:13:47

I didn't keep track of them. I'll have to

1:13:49

go back. I'll jot these down. Ole Miss is

1:13:51

the atoll BTU for me Yeah, I think the

1:13:54

top Ole Miss is up there on pretty much

1:13:56

all of our lists. Ari Wasserman What are you

1:13:58

working on over at the FL? I know

1:14:01

you've been very busy writing. You've been very

1:14:03

busy of course at your show until Saturday.

1:14:06

What is what's new in your world? Not

1:14:09

much really new in my world I'm going to

1:14:11

be running a story heading into signing day next

1:14:13

week Have been talking to a

1:14:15

ton of college football staffers about recruiting rules. They

1:14:17

find stupid and would like to change It's

1:14:20

kind of a way to you know Preview

1:14:23

a national signing day that used to mean something but

1:14:25

now is actually relatively boring but

1:14:27

other than that no just until Saturday podcast at

1:14:29

the athletic and Enjoying what

1:14:32

I thought was gonna be an offseason that you don't

1:14:34

know Pain until you're packing for

1:14:36

a trip to Santa Barbara Nick Saban retires as

1:14:38

you're putting it on That

1:14:42

wasn't fun And I went

1:14:45

to a Tina Turner musical with my wife

1:14:47

and my wife's mother I was

1:14:49

on the way to that when Jim Harbaugh retired, so I'm just kind

1:14:51

of hoping to get some normalcy back and Next

1:14:54

time I come on the show we need to have like at least a 25 minute

1:14:57

Block of time schedule for just a grab-ass topic

1:14:59

that has nothing to do with cultural sure because

1:15:01

I love I love Picking

1:15:03

your guys's brains, but I appreciate you having me on it was

1:15:05

a fun as always Awesome Ari Washburn

1:15:07

go and check him out of course over on

1:15:10

the athletic until Saturday is the

1:15:12

name of his podcast Ari Always

1:15:14

fun. We will bring you back again at

1:15:17

some point soon in the meantime for My

1:15:20

normal co-host Dan Rubenstein for our guest of

1:15:22

honor Ari Washburn We appreciate everybody stopping on

1:15:24

by downloading listening supporting the show make sure

1:15:26

you hit subscribe or follow Wherever

1:15:29

it is you are listening to us now We'll

1:15:32

catch you all soon. Stay solid peace