Season Kickoff Special + CFB’s Biggest Unknowns & Show Updates

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We were not going to be kept out of here, 'cause it's Sunday, August 2nd, the year of our Lord, 2026, and we need to talk. Jam packed, high atop a pulsating, downtown Nashville, Tennessee, and we need to talk like old friends who haven't seen each other in a month. And who know that college football is either four Saturdays or five Saturdays away, depending on how you're interpreting week zero, whatever, try it around the corner. Camps are opening up, we got coaches at the podium for press conferences. How about the quality of Lincoln and Riley's camera situation out there in his new building? So we've got a jam packed show. We're three nights per week, pretty much until they crown a national champ from here on out. You know, there are a lot of unknowns, which is beautiful. You got to find beauty in the mystery, but there are a lot of unknowns around college football, and so as we kind of dive into August, I wanted to talk about that. And I wanted to let you know where my mind's at. I've listened to a lot of you. I know where your minds are at. I got some big 10 SEC stuff. I made my way down to media days for a couple of days. I knew what that scene was going to be this year. Didn't love it. But there's some hard truths that have to be accepted. There's some realities that have to be faced. I want to talk about Marcus Freeman tonight. I want to address some rumors and some things that have been said about the show, but also just about me in general, about the future. There's always a fair amount of fear of mongering out there, Jesse. Fair amount of people saying this and that. Well, we are the source on us. It's good quote, by the way. And so I'll address it all. We got a whole lot to get to. And we'll try and do it in a responsible amount of time. They're watching us in Baluxi, Mississippi. They're watching us in Seattle, Washington, Columbus, Ohio, Albertan, Georgia. It's just so good to be back. Oh, it's so good to be back. I just want to encourage you. Subscribe to the channel and let your boys know. And your girls know that the show's back. Strap in. It is going to be one of the more unpredictable wildest college football seasons that we've seen. I'm going to talk about some of those reasons later, but man, massive season ahead for us. No other way to put it. No other edge to use. Massive season ahead for us. Can I wait? So many unknowns in college football this year. I just want to start talking. I just want to start rattling these things off. I've been sitting around in July. I went to the beach. I went all over the country. And I'm just sitting there with time on my hands thinking about what people like us think about in July. And that is, man, how big or small is the college football playoff title bubble this year? Like, how big or small is that window? You remember we played a game last year? I think it was cubly, Jesse, that we had on. And I told him, hey, create a bubble. And put as many teams as the bubble in the bubble as you need to to make sure the national champ is in there. But if the national champ comes seasons in as outside your bubble, you die. And it was all theoretical, obviously. Cubely did not agree to the actual terms. But like, think about that. I mean, if your life was on the line and you had to take all the teams you think could win the national title and put them in a bubble. But you want the bubble as small as possible without having the eventual winner be outside the bubble. I think a lot of us would have perished, by the way of Indiana winning it all last year. So who would I have in there? Well, I'd have Ohio State. I'd have Notre Dame, Oregon, Texas, Georgia, Indiana, Miami, pretty much those big seven. So to speak, in some shape form or fashion, most people agree on that right now. It's Texas Tech in there. It's Ole Miss in there. Bama, Oklahoma. Are they in there? Is LSU going to be in there? I want to know if we get to mid-November, how big that bubble looks. Because on one hand, you get to have a team that just runs away with everything. But I think that's more and more unlikely by the year in college football. There's another more likely scenario where two or three teams, four teams, or so, start to separate from the pack. But it's kind of one of those modern age deals of, even though it's like Ohio State last year. Even though they're a clear number one, they're still reachable. And they were. And Indiana got 'em, and Miami got 'em, and they were done. But those kinds of teams could emerge. But friends, what if the third kind of season starts to emerge? Where at one point in a year, do you think Notre name's the best team in the country? Then you think Miami's the best team in the country? Then you think it may be Indiana again, and then Texas starts to surge, and we get to December, and you realistically looking around and say, I can see nine of these teams winning it all. How big is that bubble? How many bids does a conference like the ACC get? The big 12. If I were to put the over under it two and a half total playoff teams for the ACC in the big 12, would you go over or under? And you're thinking, maybe Miami, maybe Texas Tech, is there another one? There's Louisville sneak in there. There's Bring Me Young sneak in there. Do Miami and Texas Tech do what they're supposed to? By the way, does anyone have Indiana potential? Is there an undefeated season out there? These are the sorts of things that are on my mind this time of year. Speaking of Notre name, think one of the other big unknowns right now, it's a big boy question. This is an adult question here that we got to ask about Notre name. Is Notre name a big time program? Is Notre name a big game program? That is still an unknown. 'Cause as much respect, as much belief, as much willingness as I have in me to maybe even rank Notre name number one in the preseason, if you wanted to be a skeptic, you could throw out the schedule thing, but move past the schedule thing for a second. If you wanted to be a skeptic, if you wanted to be an Irish hater, or if you wanted to just sell me on the fact that there are valid doubts about this team and maybe Marcus Freeman's ability to win a national title, you could say something like, well, what did they really prove last year? They had a shot against Miami. They lost, close game, but they lost. They had A&M at home, back against the wall early in the year and what they do, they lost again. What other big games did they really have? Go back to the year before. And someone like me would say, what are you talking about? Just one year before they played for the national championship. You could say, yeah, but they lost that game handedly and they had this perfect runway to get to the national title game where they beat Indiana a year before Indiana was really premier Indiana. They beat Georgia without their starting quarterback. They beat Penn State, which was also a non-big game program under James Franklin, so one of them had to win it. Point being, you could deconstruct the concept that is Notre Dame, the national title contender, if you really wanted to. And I would push back on it, but ultimately Marcus Freeman has to push back on it. Ultimately, Notre Dame has to push back on it. So yeah, I guess that's kind of an unknown right now. The true nature of the SEC's tier one is what? How many teams? I think the working theory out there is, oh, Josh is Texas in Georgia. That's what the odds board says right now at Fandall. That's what the. media in the South says, and I'm not necessarily here to push back on it, I just am wondering. It's called unknowns. It's not called doubts. It's not called affirmative statements here. It's just an unknown right now. Is it really that simple? Is it really Texas and Georgia? Then a little bit of a separation. Then this huge like hodgepodge of LSU and Oklahoma and Texas A&M, Alabama, whoever may end up being in there. Is that the way it works out? Or is there some other combination? It could be a world where Texas is just head and shoulders above the rest of the conference and come late November. Texas is buzzed on the entire league. And Texas is in root to going undefeated. And the next best team's nine and three. And we look in November and say, why do we overthink the room so much in July on all this? Or Georgia could do that. And Texas could falter and underachieve. And there could be all sorts of uncomfortable conversations to be had about Steve Sarkiesian. Or this is probably the more fun of the three possibilities here, not that there are only three. What if Lane Kiffin just does it in year one at LSU? What if all the ifs become green checkmarks at Alabama? What if Austin Mac starts, gives way to Keelan Russell. Alabama takes advantage of a soft early first month of the season and then they round into form. What if Texas A&M lost all that NFL talent and still got better? What if Oklahoma can run the ball and play good offensive line this year? What if one of those things falls into place and one of those other teams elevates? What if the tier one table is more crowded? What if it's not crowded? What if there are still two teams like you thought there would be? It's just a different combination of those two teams. That's kind of fun to talk about. And then in the big 10, I don't so much care about tier one. I got no doubts about tier one there. What does the tier two table in the big 10 look like? If we are to assume, which I do, that some combo of Oregon Ohio State and Indiana make up your one, two, three in the big 10, I don't know how you look at it any other way coming into the year. But if we're to assume that, it is my belief maybe the biggest story in college football coming into the 2026 season is the tier two situation in the big 10. 'Cause this right here our first paper popper stat of the 2026 season is an old stat. But that's the way it be sometimes Jesse. Do you understand that out of those big three, Indiana, Oregon, Ohio State, they are 48 and one against the rest of the big 10 the last two years. So there has been such clear separation. Now a lot of folks are gonna clip that out of context and claim I said what I didn't say. I didn't say anything, the stat didn't say. The stat is the stat. So my whole point there is Texas was one of the best teams in the SEC last year, they lost to Florida. They got taken to the limit by Kentucky and Mississippi State. That stuff doesn't happen in the big 10 and that's due to a couple of factors. Number one, the top of the big 10 is better than the top of the SEC. But number two, because of number one, there's a lot more separation between tier one and tier two. It's nice and neat and clean in the big 10 or at least it has been. So what does Lincoln Riley have to say about that this year? What is Kyle Whittingham? Or Matt Campbell, have to say about that this year. Does Jed Fish have something to say about that this year? Kurt Ferrance, Kurt Ferrance, Matt Rule. So you're gonna say something about that this year. Maybe even Luke Fickle? I could have made Wisconsin their own big unknown here. My point is, is there a little more mixing at the top of the big 10? Or is it still just this nice, neat, tidy, compartmentalized product which has been great for the league? Although I would argue maybe from a pure television, watchability type standpoint, it hasn't been great because the TV numbers struggle just a little bit on that front, but the big thing is not struggling, much at all here. I just wonder about that, but that pales in comparison to how exciting maybe the overall quarterback picture in the country could be this year. Which quarterbacks meet or exceed preseason expectations? I've been consuming this game a long time. Most of you watching this show have watched College Football your entire lives. You've seen some years where the quarterback picture was really loaded. You've seen somewhere, maybe a little more sparse. I would put this year's preseason quarterback picture up against almost any preseason quarterback picture that I remember in my lifetime. The depth of potential quality quarterbacks in college football this year is utterly insane. And you can get past the lead pack. So of course, CJ Carrott, Notre Dame, Arch Manning, at Texas, Mensa, Miami, Trinidad Chambles, Donald Ole Miss, Julian Seyam, Dante Moore, Josh Hoover, is headed to Indiana, Gunner Stockton's at Georgia. You can get through that group. And then you've still got my ava at USC. Whoever wins the job at BAMU, 'cause they probably have two guys that could end up playing at a high level. You've got Sam Levitt having transferred to LSU, Byron Brown goes without its goalish to Auburn Rocco Becht, Ditto with Matt Campbell, to Penn State, Bryce Underwood is in his second year as a starting quarterback. We didn't mention Kevin Jennings at SMU in either of those groups. We didn't mention Noah Fafita. Austin Simmons, man, like this time last year, it was Lane Kiffin proudly, like hitching his wagon to Austin Simmons as his starting quarterback. And now a year later, Eli Drinkwitz has done the same thing because Austin Simmons transferred to Missouri. That's not an exhaustive list. I didn't even get through it all. We, man, I'm trying to think there are some guys that we haven't even listed, like, Lenora Sellers wasn't even listed here, Jesse. I feel like I just listed 20 guys. And I didn't even say Lenora Sellers, so the point there, obviously, is not everyone's gonna deliver here. You'll have some guys get hurt because it sucks, but it happens every year. You'll have some guys just underachieve. You'll have a couple of guys come out of nowhere to make up for the guys that underachieved, but just think of a critical chunk of those names. Live up to or slightly exceed whatever the expectation is. You're talking about an insane year because that leads to a lot of volatility, 'cause if you're getting pretty good quarterback play, a lot of teams could beat a lot of other teams. You don't have this, like, defined class system down the stretch, like we do some years. And then the other part, which is not fun to talk about for me, although I think some of you, and a more sick kind of way, I think some of you have a lot of fun talking about this anytime of year. The hot seat had a real quick trigger last year. I mean, Hugh Freeze, who else? Billy Napier, Brian Kelly. I think, obviously, when you look at what happened with James Franklin at Penn State last year, those guys not only lost their jobs, they lost them early. By Halloween, it was a disaster. And a lot of athletic departments had a quick trigger. So what happens at Wisconsin this year? If it goes bad early, which I, by the way, have some different theories on what maybe in the cards for Luke Fickle and Wisconsin this year and then the rest of America does. But let's say I'm wrong. And for the time being, let's say you're right. And let's say they lose some games early. Is there a quick trigger there? Is there a quick trigger at Florida State? What about Dave Aranda at Baylor? What if it goes bad early for Lincoln Riley at USC? Again, you could differ. You could think one or more of these guys are gonna make the playoff and therefore it's a point. But I'm saying worst case scenario. What if it goes sideways? What does Shane Beamer were to get off to a really, really bad start? What could theoretically happen if we have an off the rail season like we had with Clemson and Penn State and LSU last year? Like some stuff that was really hard to see coming. What if that happens this year? What if it goes just really bad for like a Tennessee? I think it's irresponsible to even talk about. I don't even like talking about this 'cause this gets into the lane where if you ask me who would be most likely to be this year's James Franklin, I don't think there's an answer to that. 'Cause the answer last year wasn't James Franklin up until the point where it actually happened. The whole crazy part about that is it's impossible to see coming. So if there was a this year's James Franklin by saying that you're insinuating, oh there's a preseason top 10 or top five team that's gonna lose its coach for merit based reasoning by Halloween. I don't know how you find that. So I was trying to come up with the craziest scenarios like the Sarket Texas or something like that where no one would have seen it coming. I don't even know how you responsibly talk about that and therefore we will not. Those are some big unknowns for the year. I'm Lacey Mosley, author, actor, stand-up comedian, creator and host of Scam Goddess Podcast. The True Crime Comedy Podcast, all about robbery, fraud and those who practice it. Each week I bring on incredible guests like Conan O'Brien, Iowa Debris, Lamor and Morris and Nicole Byer. Ooh, I scam them. What? I could talk to you for an hour. You're a generational yapper, like me. That's why I had to make yapping a job. And the scams run the gamut. I'm talking about scams from the 1800s. All the way up to today. I also warn you and keep you safe against scammers. Call your grandparents, tell your parents to stop clicking on links, please. And now you can catch full episodes of my show on YouTube. If there's a scam, I'm here to protect you. And I'm also here to laugh with you. So if you like fun, if you like comedy and you like learning and protecting yourself from criminals, Start listening to SCAN. I am goddess on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. ♪ I am goddess ♪ - Hi, this is Kylie breakman, Angel Jaretana. - Jeremy Colhane, Patrick McDonnell. - Join us for a panel of wellness influencers. - What I try to do is foe journal. I don't know, have you guys heard of foe journaling? - Yeah, it's reading, it's called reading. 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This season on my podcast, here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policy makers, and performers like actor Stephen Root. - I think for me to be any good or for any character actor to be any good, you gotta put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it. I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the drain, though? Yeah, I can use that. - Open igloo co-founder, Alia Muhammad. - I love staying on top of what is going on in our city, what is going on in city politics, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. - And actress and singer Melissa Erica. - Partnership took on a whole other meaning when I started making my own work. It's like you with a great actress or actor. It was best to come out of your trailer full of life and just face another person who's full of life and don't talk. - Listen to Here's the Thing on the I Heart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. - So another unknown, which will be known in the not too distant future, I hope is some of the rumors, Jesse, you've seen this, you got internet. I assume I don't know what you're doing on vacation, but you look tan, well rested, different hair. But a lot of people were talking while we were on break. This is what happens when we can't address our people every 48 or 72 hours. So Nathan and Stanford Connecticut hit us up and he said, great appearance on the bus. Thank you, busing with the boys. Hit him up last Monday. Will Compton was strep positive and couldn't be there. Oh, but he got the vaccine. So he is fully vaccinated against strep now and he's back. He's back on his feet and happy to report that he's back amongst us. But in the absence of Will Compton, I went and filled in on busing with the boys. I think we went like two and a half hours. It was pretty crazy, it's like a time warp. So Nathan said, great appearance on the bus. Thank you, Nathan, he continues. Can you comment, this is where he gets a little murky. Can you comment on the whispers and rumors about you guys and ESPN or is it just a fun rumor you guys are starting? Look, as I always say, when I can talk about such things, I'll talk about such things. All I'll say right now is the same thing that I said back in January and February. We kind of talked about this a couple of times. I liked what we did with ESPN last year. We got a really relationship with ESPN. There has been motivation on both sides to broaden and expand that relationship. Now, here has always been my stance. I am not someone whoever calls an agent or something that says, go get me this 'cause that'd be stupid 'cause that's asking someone to force feed the audience something that the audience is not asking for. So on the other lane, if you feel like the audience is asking for something or if you feel like there's an absence in the marketplace for something and you've got a good idea or someone else has a good idea and you think it'd work, that's a different thing. So yeah, we've had some conversations like that and I'm sure in the not too distant future we'll be able to talk more on it but broad strokes purposes, Nathan, through the paper now already, I think it's gonna be a really good year for college football content this year and my general 30,000 foot view on this has been for a long time. If this is the number two sport in the country, my number one, it needs to be covered and discussed accordingly. And I have felt for a long time on the national landscape the college football has not been covered appropriately. They've done a great job broadcasting the games. But college football itself, just as an entity, as a as a Sunday through Friday concept has not been treated nearly the way it should. So that could change one of two ways. It could be covered by the wrong kinds of people or hopefully it could be covered by the right kinds of people. I, in some small way, hope I'm the right kind of person that can help broaden and expand the horizons of college football conversation for the better in this great country of ours. So I say all that to say, stay tuned. I think some stuff's coming around the corner, Nathan. We move on. Oh boy. Again, July, interesting month. Some stuff happened. Jesse, some media days happened. Some press conferences happen. So our buddy, Jackson in Chicago, he was just asking me about the shots back and forth over the past month or so between the SEC and the big 10 and did I have any thoughts on it? And I gotta tell you guys, yeah, I've got thoughts. None of the thoughts are particularly new. I'm tired of talking about it. But since I haven't spoken to you in the better part of a month about these sorts of things, yeah, I guess I got some thoughts about it. My thoughts are until further notice, the big 10 gets to say whatever it wants in the SEC needs to keep its mouth shut. Those are about the long sort of my thoughts on this whole situation. I don't really care what your hypothetical scenarios are. Hypothedicals only matter in the absence of reality. But we've got reality. We got results on the field. I watched the Rose Bowl last year. And I don't care so much about non-playoff bowl results, by the way, and I've always held that stance, including when the SEC used to dominate. Like to me, the SEC could prove they were the premier conference in college football for a long time without using bowl results as a bad faith weapon in their argument. Big 10's the same. The big 10 does not need to tell me that they beat Vanderbilt with Eli Stowers opting out to prove they're the best conference to college football right now. You prove you're the best conference to college football very simply because you've got the most championship caliber teams in college football right now. Well, Josh, now I guess that boils down to how you define best, doesn't it? Yes, I guess it does. So I guess I owe it to you to define how I define best. And mine's very simple. My system is not too complex. My system for defining the best conference college football is simply which one of you has the most teams that can win the national title. And if you choose to view it a different way, you can choose to view it a different way. That's fine. That's why it's kind of subjective here. I would just say if all of a sudden, you live in Jonesboro, Arkansas, or you live in Montgomery, Alabama, and you're deciding to judge conferences based on overall depth, rather than championship caliber teams, were you singing that tune in 2016 or '17? And if you were more power to you, it doesn't really matter, does it? But since you asked me, Jackson, I will tell you that I look at Ohio State, I look at Michigan, I look at Indiana, and then running off boom, boom, boom, and Oregon being very much in the mix to maybe make it a fourth unique team in four years in the Big Ten. I look at that caliber team, actually teams, plural, and I say the SEC doesn't have that right now. By the way, there's no guarantee that changes this year. And so I was down at SEC Media Days for a couple of days in Tampa, I think Sabin got some headlines for talking about schedule, and there's this whole debate right now about strength of schedule. Oh, by the way, is that the same thing as strength of record? No, it's not, spoiler alert, what should we go on? Should we go on strength of schedule? Should we go on strength of record? You know my thoughts on that, or if you're new around here, I will say, I have thoughts on that that are nuanced, and you can never know what they're gonna be until the seasons played out. I read, "Lashley, I was having some fun with him the other day. I was talking to him 'cause he spoke up and he said, "Why aren't we talking about preseason FPI and strength of schedule "when no games have been played? "This is just poisoning the well." And I texted him, "Jesse and I said, "I don't care what you think right now. "I'm counting on your full endorsement "when the J.P. poll drops, "which will happen in the next couple of weeks." He did agree to still endorse the J.P. poll. But his point was taken. And his point was, how do we know how strong someone's schedule is in July? Maybe we have a best guess. But doesn't that best guess also serve to unfairly pre-shape what the narrative will end up being once the games have actually started to happen? And the answer is yes. And the answer is maybe you're gonna get preseason credit in the SEC for some teams that have historically been really hard to play, being on your schedule. But then at the end of the year you look back and you say, "Wow, that team kind of sucked this year. "Remember when we thought it would be a big deal "that so-and-so was playing them, "but then it turned out it wasn't." That's there on one side of the coin. On the other side of the coin, I 1,000% believe the average league schedule that you'll play in the SEC is unequivocally tougher than the average league schedule you'll play in the big 10. But here's where that's irrelevant. Here's where that's totally irrelevant. If Alabama plays a tougher league schedule by a moderate amount in the SEC and Indiana plays whatever schedule they play in the big 10, which is still gonna be pretty tough. And they play in Indiana Rips Alabama spyin' out, it doesn't matter. Indiana was the better team. That's just like if I took the Seahawks and I had them descend to college football and play in the Sun Belt this year. They'd still be the Seattle Seahawks. They'd probably go undefeated. Their strength of schedule wouldn't be all that great. What kind of quality team would they be? There is also, and this is again in the nuance, the devil in the details here. I think there's a little bit of validity to not talking so much about how strength of schedule slash strength of record impacts whether or not you can win a national title, but rather the fringe of the playoff bubble. To me, that's where the rubber meets the road more on this. 'Cause to me, really what it boils down to is there a nine and three team from the SEC or maybe even the big 10 that we think played a really hard schedule and they're being compared to an 11 and one team that played an infinitely softer schedule and we're trying to figure out who's gonna be the nine seed or something like that. Like we're always, I say we. I've noticed a lot of people automatically attach the whole strength of schedule debate and if you play in the SEC, does the body blow theory catch up to you? And they immediately attach that to the national title. That to me is not where the rubber meets the road on this. And I don't know that it meets the road period, but if it does meet the road, it's Texas last year. I happen to disagree with their argument, but the Texas argument last year was we went nine and three. We voluntarily went and played Ohio State, hard fought game early in the season we lost and then we played a league schedule that was difficult, eight games, but still difficult and we lost a couple of more games and had we just scheduled a cream puff instead of Ohio State we would have been in, that's our gripe. I disagreed that they should have been in, but that was their argument. If you wanna make that argument that at the end of the year you got a nine and three Texas and then you got like an 11 and one team. Like last year, I think JMU, we were talking about how their strength of schedule at the end of the year, they had lost against Louisville, right press, they lost against Louisville and we didn't have them in our own internal metrics having played another team in the top 50. And yet you had the whole win loss vultures out there that were like, well, you're what your record says you are. If you wanna talk about it in that context, okay, but I don't wanna really attach it to whether or not you're capable of winning a national title, it'll happen with Notre Dame this year. I guarantee you if Notre Dame plays the schedule that they're set to play this year and they play Miami and South Bend and they were to lose by seven. You'll have some folks argue Notre Dame shouldn't be in and or that proved that they're not capable of winning a national title and they don't deserve to get in because their schedule did not meet the minimum baseline resistance that you should have to face to go to the playoff. There's conversation to be had. You gotta watch the season play out though. The worst part about all this and why I hate talking about it is 'cause it doesn't matter what you say. There is a pretty sizable vocal group out there who just doesn't listen. I had this happen to me twice last week 'cause I listen to a lot of college football content in July 'cause it's the only time of year that I really have to check out what other people are doing. And there are a couple of different shows. In the past week that we're discussing me, I don't know how I came up, I've had my mouth closed for a month, but Point Blank said, man, he's running around talking about how the SEC superior to the Big 10. And Jesse, have we not sat here? I'll do it one more time in just a second. Have I not sat here and said the exact opposite? Month after month after month. I'll do it again. Here's what it sounds like. The Big 10 is superior to the SEC right now. Period, was that pretty clear? But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what you actually say, which is why I kinda hate talking about it on the show, but I will say this, week two is coming this year. So I go back to my point that I made a little while ago. There's no guarantee that this is gonna rectify itself for the SEC. It's probably more likely than not. The Big 10 ends up being better than the SEC at the top again this year. It may be more likely than not that the SEC, let's say has one national title caliber team, maybe. We'll just see. And the Big 10 has like three or four or something like that. Now of course, it could go your way, but I'm not looking towards the end of the year. I'm interested in week two because week two, it's not a press conference. Week two is not media days. Week two is not a war on Twitter. Week two is when Ohio State goes to Texas. Week two is when Oklahoma goes to Michigan. And you know what else happens in week two? Very interesting game no one's talking about. Mississippi State goes to Minnesota. I don't care about bowl games. As it relates to measuring conference against conference, I love watching bowl games. I don't learn a thing about conference superiority in bowl season. Not now, not back when the SEC dominated it. Like to me, you can tell which conference is better before bowl season, but if you need the cross-conference analysis, if you need this cross-conference data points, they need to be regular season games because the dynamics in regular season games are obviously way different to bowl games. There's a game outside of those big two, which are obvious there's another game that happens in week three or week two. It's Mississippi State at Minnesota. These kinds of games fascinate me 'cause we don't get a whole lot of them. I'm a big believer in SEC Big 10 challenge week should happen every year, but I'm not the commissioner yet. But think about this, the reason I don't care about bowl season is there's unequal motivation, there's opt-outs, and it's not equally seeded. So if the Big 10's number four team beats the SEC's number eight team by three, I didn't really learn anything there. Similarly, if the SEC's number three beats the Big 10's number seven by three, I didn't learn anything. But if you could ever get me roughly equally seeded matchups with equal motivation, no opt-outs, that'd be wonderful. We kind of sort of have a little version of that here. Now Mississippi State will be ranked lower in the SEC than Minnesota, but still, they're lower half teams in their conferences. And it's on the road, it's in a Big 10 venue. That kind of game's just interesting to keep an eye on is all I'm saying. But Ohio State, Texas, no Oklahoma Michigan, of course. Bottom line, win some games on the field, man. Then you can talk in the SEC until then, I don't really care about the rest of the excuses. Okay, I don't know what you guys did in July. I had a fun July. The way my July works is I put everything off until that month. So starting in January, basically, when everyone requests a meeting or an appearance or, hey, can we record this? I always tell them, hit me up in July. And then July gets here and I realize, uh-oh, like a million different obligations. That passed most of them off to Jesse. And then I do a few of them myself. And I did one of them last week. People saw that I was flying to Chicago. They thought, oh, going to Big 10 media days, psych. But I did go to Chicago on business. And I can't pretend that I haven't seen this. So those of you who were perusing social media, a couple of days ago, I let you know, 'cause I want to be honest and transparent with you guys. I let you know there's something coming. I wanted you to hear it from me first. I don't regret it, but I may one day. And that is my stance now. And the thing has since become public. I went to Chicago the other day. I marched right into bar stool headquarters. And I sat down for the better part of two hours with what some are calling Burger King brand. And he's brand of Walker to me. And we recorded. We just hit go. Took a bathroom break in the middle. But we recorded. The first time we've ever sat down together, period, much less to record anything. I have never appeared with him before. He has never appeared with me before. Been kind of a cold war, so to speak. Think a lot of people see the optics of this and they think man we got played the whole time someone even said k-fabe is dead Jesse, I'm gonna let you guys be the judge This will air tomorrow night Brandon Walker's college football show brought to you by Josh Peyton Brandon Walker will debut Tomorrow night Monday night. So if you're listening Sunday. It's tomorrow night I'll let you judge for yourself You let me know if k-fabe's dead after this It's pretty spirited. I'll just say he screamed multiple times Stopped his feet multiple times. I Don't think I did either of those things. You know cuz I'm a full grown adult with a you know fully functional life and stuff like that But it was it was fun. I think it's very productive and it was the first half of a home in home And that's all I'll say on that matter other than we really need to work We need to really work on our furniture situation here before the back half of that home in home is is fulfilled From one You know from one situation is a little regrettable to another situation. That's a little regrettable I was gonna say some other things, but I'm gonna be nice I'm not gonna start the season throwing shots at everyone Jesse. I'm gonna be nice What's happening at North Carolina had an inbox full of this last week? And I said look if you think I'm breaking into our vacation month to talk about Michael Lombardi being placed on administrative leave you are high So North Carolina football is in a state of disrepair right now most predictable thing in the world There's a new athletic director in charge Steve Newmark who inherited this it won't be his mess for long But it is a mess right now. He does have to clean it up I got to tell you and I forgot to tell this story. I think I don't remember telling this story on air Few months ago. I was talking to someone Pretty important in the media world who has a kid who had toured some of the schools and he had toured North Carolina and he had also toured some of the other big-time schools and He was just talking about how dysfunctional the visit was at North Carolina how unorganized the visit was compared to these other places and The way he summarized it so perfectly fits what pretty much everyone has heard who knows anyone in North Carolina and it is they almost acted like it was doing you a favor to have you there even though They're supposed to be the one trying to recruit you and convince you to play for them There was a fundamental disconnect from the word go from not only Bill Belichick But also the people in his camp about what it was ever going to take to winning college football They didn't win last year. They're not going to do any better this year In fact their shot was last year if you understand schedule making but Just want to remind everyone as we get into this how Badly they screwed themselves and the opportunity they had we talked about this at the time So this is not this is not sour grapes. This is not revisionist history I'm gonna play some sound for you in just a second, but I want you to remember When Mac Brown got fired They could have had John Somerall and John Somerall had a quarterback down there named Darry and Mensa who was about to transfer to Duke but in this world Where North Carolina is able to get out of its own way and let a coaching search be run properly John Somerall is hired Darry and Mensa and a best number I've gotten is well over a dozen two lane players are Coming with Somerall to North Carolina now that's option A option B is a pile of crap you have in your lap right now So understand what we could be talking about right now We could be talking about entering the 2026 season Somerall entering year two with Darry and Mensa as he's starting quarterback at North Carolina You could have had that or you'd have what you have right now, which is a complete torpedoing of your brand, which is resilient and will still survive, but also This this sort of like freak show Experiment, I don't know how else to describe this. It's like a star Doing everything it can to implode in on itself in the twilight of its career and doing it on your dime It's like North Carolina or enough powers that be at North Carolina decided we want to take our brand our IP our platform and we want to pay you a bunch of money to do this on Our dime crazy. So remember Mrs. Really important Remember I'm not telling you this now I told you this during the search the day Bella check got hired as a matter of fact We came on the air and I had been as transparent as I could during the search But once the search wrapped up I was trying to be really transparent and explaining why I didn't think it was gonna work Let's take you back to that day. This was a massive power struggle in Chapel Hill massive I think you saw some headlines out there I think some some of the national guys reported that at various points Those that were involved on the coaching side in the search didn't really know who was running the search They're right about that because there were multiple searches being run You had the administration bubble cutting hand the AD there and the administration Running a search and then you had board of trustee members and big money folks on a bunch of them But a few of them running searches and the latter got their way and the former did not So it was an embarrassment from day one and now there's no reason to really hide anything anymore Bubba Cunningham's not the athletic director there It was just so stupid to see Bubba Cunningham on stage with Bill Bella check at that introductory press conference knowing full Well, Bubba Cunningham got like hip-checked out of the way because rogue board of trustee members and administrative types at North Carolina We're running a congruent like ghost search under the cloak of night to try and hire Bill Bella check who Had no other options out there by the way Jesse you know the NFL market better than I do. I don't think there was anything there and so you could have had John Some were all but instead we choose Bill Bella check. We're gonna be the 33rd NFL team Well I'm gonna say again North Carolina's mess notwithstanding like it it should have never been allowed to happen But it was allowed to happen but even on the other side of that once it's allowed to happen What's blown my mind the most is not that North Carolina screwed up their search and there were too many cooks in the kitchen Because that's kind of the way college athletics and college football and basketball searches happen sometimes what's blown my mind is Let's give credit where it's due Bill Bella check has one of the great wikipedia pages in history One of the great legacies in the history of coaching the sport may never be matched And so if I were to get this grease board There's one right over here in the studio if I were to get this grease board and I would have Bill Bella check go to work Explaining defensive football to us explaining organizational structure to us explaining psychology of the game to us It would make your head spin and a guy that smart So badly miscalculated the situation of what it would take to win in college football It blows my mind because I saw it and I think to myself if it's football related and I could see it and most everyone else could see it How is Bill Bella check blind and I'm not saying oh Bill Bella check Shouldn't have taken the job if someone's gonna offer you the job of North Carolina if they're stupid enough to do it Yeah, take it My point is I can't believe they were dumb enough to think winning in college football was gonna be easier than winning in the NFL But I think that's the arrogance a lot of guys who coach in the NFL for a long time have when they look at college football They think well, this is professional football. That's college. That's that's like a light version of what we do those in the minor leagues down there I'll tell you this if you go to Georgia you go to Ohio State you go to Notre Dame you go to Texas Yeah, yeah, you could certainly make the argument. It's easier to win there because relative to whatever the baseline is You're above and beyond from a resource standpoint So you're coming from a world in the NFL where everything is built to cram you into the middle and all the resources are equal And no one really is working at a disadvantage from or an advantage from the jump to a world in college where There is huge disparity between halves and halves not even in the Portland and IL era There's huge disparity So yeah, if Bella check were to have come to Texas He would have been right to think it's gonna be easier to win in college than the NFL But he didn't come to Texas. He came to North Carolina where relative to the haves he was gonna be working at a Disadvantage So everything about his logic was actually working against him and then they thought to themselves once they got here they thought man We're gonna have to beat kids off with a stick think about our reputation and think about how Invisible little B to play at North Carolina and that's just not the world. It was never gonna be the world I can't believe they thought it was gonna be the world and the arrogance and the hubris and stupidity I guess it's a better word to to throw around the 33rd NFL team. It got laughed at guys It got laughed at from Pretty much everyone who's opinion I even remotely trust in college football from day one I remember just getting immediate feedback In some cases from guys who were gonna have to face him or get to face him and in other cases Just people who have been around the game a long time and every one of them to a man was he he doesn't have the slightest clue what he's getting into. And that was pretty prophetic, not hard to see coming. And it's an experiment that's happened on North Carolina's dime and they ought to be ashamed of themselves for letting it happen, but I will say this, it hasn't wrecked the brand. I got asked yesterday, last night I was at an event down in Fairhope, Alabama and someone said, does this just wreck North Carolina for the future? No, nope, it doesn't. I think they will wash their hands of this entire experiment at some point this year. I think that'll happen and I think the North Carolina job will be open. I don't know how else to tell you this. I know some people who would want the job right now who would probably be on the short list. It's still a desirable position. In fact, it's probably gonna be looked at as a position that is really desirable for the first time in a long time because you flushed some of slash a lot of what needed to be flushed out of the Athletic Department out. I don't mean Bubba Cunningham. I mean the entire mess that prevented him from doing his job effectively. And I think also this was the medicine that was needed. A lot of people needed to have their eyelids staple to the top of their forehead and forced to watch this play out. This is your freak show. Okay, we did it your way and this is what we got. Now we're gonna do it the right way and watch what happens. North Carolina can still be a winner. North Carolina is one of, I've said it for a long time and I know it gets old. I've said it about A&M for a long time and I still believe it. You can win a national championship at this place. It just takes alignment. It's as easy and as complicated as that. - Hi, this is Highly Breakman, Angel Jaretana. - Jeremy Colhane Cash McDonald. - And we're the hosts of the Artisan Artisan Artist Podcast. I don't know, I think I sort of foe journaling. - So you're, so we don't like to use that word anymore. - Okay. - A panel of New Yorker cartoonists. - No! - I'm so sorry. I'm seeing a reading of Sadako in the Thousand Paper Cranes by Audrement Donald at the Wonderland Bookstore, 14. - That's crazy. I went to the Wonderland Bookstore yesterday and I heard Nora Jones do a reading of Zero Dark 30. - No way! - I'll have to come to the last bookstore though. Kim Katrol is reading the guitar tabs of yesterday. - He, he winks on a loin. - He gets rid of next to the microphone. - You can, I hear him, you can almost hear the eyelashes hit each other. - He's never seen Italy so quiet. As when the Pope gets up to wink on Halloween. - Listen to artists on artists on artists, on the I heard radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. - I'm Lacey Mosley, author, actor, stand-up, comedian, creator, and host of Scam Goddess Podcast, the True Crime Comedy Podcast, all about robbery, fraud, and those who practice it. Each week I bring on incredible guests like Conan O'Brien, Iowa Deppery, Lamor and Morris and Nicole Byer. - Ooh, I scam them. - What? - I can talk to you for an hour. That's why I have to make yapping a job. - And the scams run the gamut. I'm talking about scams from the 1800s, all the way up to today. - If there's a scam, I'm here to protect you. - So if you like fun, if you like comedy, and you like learning and protecting yourself from criminals, start listening to scam goddess on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. ♪ scam goddess ♪ - Hey, what's up, I'm Tony Gonzalez. I hate that job. You're probably just gonna meet some rich guy, and he's gonna whisk you away, and I'll never see you again. - Ooh, ooh, ooh. - Oh. - This is awesome. - Would you say a dealis actor? - D. - (laughs) - I don't even know there's such things D. - No, no, no, I mean like-- - I didn't get on the sea list. Like I'm not even average, I'm not even passing, I'm failing. - Listen to No Safe Words with October and Tony Gonzalez, part of Michael Tour Podcast Network. Available on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Alex Baldwin, this season on my podcast, here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policy makers, and performers, like actor Stephen Root. - I think for me to be any good, or for any character actor be any good, you gotta put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it. You see that guy going down the drain though? - I love staying on top of what is going on in our city, what is going on in city politics, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is gonna make New York City better in the long run. - And actress and singer Melissa Erika. - Listen to Here's the Thing on the iHeart Radio App Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. - They're watching us in Austin, Texas. Waterloo, Iowa, Jackson, Tennessee. Thank you guys so much. I gotta remind everyone. You may be joining throughout the stream. We're back. We're back. So happy. This is all we do around here. We don't cover any other sport. We don't cover any other topics. We just college football year round, except for July, and we're back. So we were sitting around earlier today trying to make sure all the equipment worked. And then after we were trying to make sure all the equipment worked, we said, "Hey, we've got room for one more thing probably in the show. "Even though this is not the end of the show, "but we had room for one more thing." I'm just sitting around here and here's a good endpoint for you, Pres. I'm just sitting around thinking like, you know, awesome Saturdays are. I feel so bad for people who don't love college football and they don't really know what we're talking about. And maybe that's you, and maybe this is the year you dive in, and I'll sell you. I will recruit you for college football by explaining to you the magic of Saturdays. There's nothing like a college football Saturday. The entire concept of what it is, that doesn't exist in American sports, anywhere else, pro, college, whatever. The feeling of waking up on a Saturday. You know this feeling now. You know going to bed Friday night and then waking up, first thing, first five seconds are what day is it? The next five seconds are, oh, it's Saturday. And then that 10 to 15 second period after you're aware that you just woke up of realizing, oh my goodness, it's Saturdays week four. We got four top 25 matchups today. We got that game that I've circled as an upsettler all week. How am I structuring my morning? Maybe you're going to a game? Maybe you've got errands to run. But the morning buzz, just the energy you have about yourself on a Saturday morning. When I was not going to games back in my youth, I would go work out. I would say, I got to get myself to 10 o'clock. And this is Eastern time at that point. And then from 10 to 11 30, I'll be good. If I can get myself to 10, it's basically kick off. 'Cause working out feels like kick off. And then 11 30, it takes me 15 minutes to drive home. I'm gonna get food on the way. And then I don't blink for 12 hours. Or more, if Hawaii's playing a home game that night. I can't put that in context, vivid enough for you to feel until you feel it yourself. But I want to tell you, if you can ever get to that point, especially on that first Saturday post September cold front, happens every year, happens every single year. The first couple of weeks is still hot. But eventually there's gonna be a real broad sweeping cold front through like the Eastern 2/3 of the United States. And it sometimes happens late in the week, fingers crossed. And you wake up, it could be Friday morning, but maybe it's a Saturday morning. And you step outside and you can feel it. You can feel college football in the air. The dew point has plummeted. Are those leaves changing colors? Wow, I've actually got to put a coat on to walk out here. It's an unbelievable feeling. I wish everyone could experience it. There's some people who are really sad in life right now. And they think, man, if I could just get a better job, man, if I just had more friends, don't forget that. Your job's fine, a friend of need is a pest. Know what you need, college football. That's all you need, that's all you really need. Urgency, it's a word that we use a lot in college football. And those Saturdays, the urgency that I feel, that most people who love this sport, the urgency that you feel on Saturdays, again, it's unmatched. Anywhere else in the American sporting landscape? Then I'm talking mainly to people who can't relate yet to what I'm talking about. Kind of trying to invite you to experience this. You talk to someone who has lived college football their whole life. Most of them watch other sports. I do, I watch the NFL, believe it or not, I even dabble in some NBA. Told the Knicks had a great year this year, Jesse. Major League Baseball. baseball grew up as my favorite sport next to college football growing up. So I know the flavor of all the other sports. I know that there's nothing like a college football Saturday, specifically the urgency. You can wake up utterly terrified on a Saturday. You remember when Oregon came to Penn State last year? Yes, you do, Jesse. You remember the feeling you had that morning? You remember? You remember, hey, man, it comes down to one or two games for us this year. We think we got everything we need and it's like you're you're holding the little balancing rod and you're looking at the tightrope in front of you and you know you got to walk that thing today. And the thing about it is a tight rope walk with a giant safety net under you and whatever. The college football is a tight rope walk in a lot of cases where there's either no safety net or there is a safety net but it's like a hundred feet below you. So you're going to get hurt no matter if that thing catches you or not. And the way that makes you feel. It's so exciting. It's so terrifying. It's like riding a roller coaster for the first time. It's like I don't know how else to describe it again because there's no other comparison. You have to live college football to understand what I'm talking about. That's also why some of us get really really aggressive when you talk about expanding the playoff because you're talking about doing it at the expense of taking that word and devaluing it urgency. I think the campus scene obviously if you can get to a campus or camp by which is the plural of campus get to several of them on a Saturday. That's that's amazing and I don't really think if you've ever experienced that I need to sell you on that that much but it's it's also the specific things that happen above the sites and the sounds and the smells and the community and the relationships all of those things the coming together of people with radically different political views religious views but yet they're all wearing the same colors on Saturday and so it's cool we just put all that stuff on the shelf for a day despite all that which is magical believe me but despite all that if you've ever been on a big time campus on a big time Saturday you're at lsu Texas is in town it's a 7 30 eastern 6 30 kickoff think about what it's like 2 15 in the afternoon telegate scenes already packed but you know any given Saturday you're going to have some big stuff that happens that you didn't expect it's always funny if you're on that campus to to watch how the word of an upset alert kind of reverberates around campus it's like word of mouth like you guys seen what's happening in this old misgame you can get seen the score in his USC game and watch how that just kind of makes its way around a huge packed 50,000 deep tailgate scene I always love that I always also love the clearing of the mechanism this may be my favorite aspect actually this is what I always sell people on clearing of the mechanism happens on fall saturdays in games on fall saturdays I'll say what I mean by it it comes from for love of the game which is a baseball movie Kevin Costner's 19th baseball movie all of them are good he's pitching billy chapel pitching for the Detroit Tigers he's in the ladder stages in the twilight of his career and he is narrating his own game and there's a point where he's pitching in Yankee Stadium and he's trying to lock in and he's telling himself clear the mechanism clear the mechanism and he can't he he's hearing crowd noise there's like an individual guy just roasting him on the second row above the first base dugout and he clear the mechanism and finally all the ambient noise stops it's totally silent and that's you hearing what it's like in his mind as a as a big league pitcher once the mechanism's cleared once the mechanism's cleared all the outside noise is cut out and all that matters is him and the batter 60 feet six inches away from him on college football saturdays there are moments there will be a moment in week one of this year where all missus playing Louisville or ls use playing Clemson or Auburn is playing Baylor and it'll be a tight game this is how you know whether college football still college football or not you'd answer this question for me it's ls u Clemson it's the middle of the fourth quarter it's 26 to 23 ls use up Clemson's got the ball it is fourth and fourth on the ls u 31 yardline new offensive coordinator Chad Morris and debbaus when he have opted to go for it games on the line here comes chris faxine into the line of scrimmage change into play tiger stadiums at full throat it's a prime time game saturday night in death valley welcome back to college football play clocks at eight seven six five four are they going to get the playoff three two hit pause right now are you thinking about a senate bill are you thinking about nil or the portal are you paying attention to how much any of the players on the field are making are you concerned with rule changes conference realignment all the stuff you get so sick of in the spring and summer are you thinking about any of it the answer is no because your mechanism is clear and you're fully locked in college football features that unlike any other sport in the world to me which is why i love it there are pinball windows about saturdays it happens multiple times per year i won't say it happens every saturday because i'd be taking it a little bit too far but they're going to be like six seven eight saturdays out of the year where i call them pinball windows and that's like a 30 minute chunk of time on a saturday normally it's it's when a bunch of games are ending at the same time and the pinball window is the window where like five things happened in the span of 25 minutes that just put your jaw on the ground and you can't even keep up with it all and your your phones going crazy if you're doing you know the thing where you scroll social media constantly it's going crazy some of the worst places to be when this is happening are in stadiums because you don't know because i think for all the advancements and technology most of these places still are terrible at keeping you updated what's happening in the outside world which is an easy fix by the way it's kind of inexcusable but those pinball windows see this happens in the NFL it happens a lot because the NFL is built to do this every Sunday the NCAA tournament the first two days of march madness they provide pinball windows a college football pinball window especially in a year like this where there may be no defined preseason favorite there may be a bunch of high level quarterbacks i think our pinball windows are going to be at a premium this year actually not at a premium i think they're going to be plentiful this year and then well after the pinball windows it comes the aftermath window the pinball windows cousin the aftermath window is the feeling that you have it's probably one a.m. eastern standard time after the last games after the late window games have come to a close and the dust is settled and you have had sensory overload for 14 hours you have not moved there's there's food all over the place your living room is a disaster and sometimes you're sitting by yourself because your loved ones have gone to bed good for them you need to be left alone anyway and you're just kind of like you're just kind of in a coma a little bit and you're just you're just lean back terrible posture sitting on the couch and you're just trying to process what just happened this isn't every week thing it's so beautiful the pinball windows are beautiful the aftermath window is beautiful the campus scene is beautiful urgency is beautiful the clearing of the mechanism Jesse is so beautiful and it all starts with waking up on a fall Saturday guys we only get 12 of them per team guaranteed and if you want to know why we take such a strong stand against fall weddings on this show it's because I have never been to a fall wedding that delivers those things pres is just sitting over here that's why I randomly looked over there I if I go to a fall wedding that delivers that I'll be happy to endorse fall weddings none of you are capable of that don't try don't try get married in the spring or get married on Friday don't don't try and put people through that don't put your friends in a position where they got to choose your wedding not your marriage your wedding or this because this is going to win every time and if they tell you otherwise they're lying to you they're their undersecret protest better than me you know we're going to be on the road every Saturday this fall some say we're going to be on the road before Saturday this fall but who knows at the very least we're going to be on the road on Saturdays this fall Jesse ever since 2021 we didn't go on the road during 2020 I don't know something happened they tell me but 2021 2 3 4 and 5 we've gone on tours we've named those tours there was the every given Saturday tour we had the fall no lie tour last year the once upon a Saturday tour I was big in the fairy tales for a couple of years there people were asking me as recently as today we're going to have a tour this year oh friends yes oh we're going to have a tour this year and I am going to say Jesse what about Thursday this week let's announce it on Thursday this week tentatively we got a tour name it's my favorite tour name of any tour name we've had it's my favorite logo of any tour logo we've had I'm going to tell you Alex is working feverishly to get the T's uploaded in the store paidstatematerial.com My suggestion is just go ahead and set some money aside. 'Cause I know our audience and I think very few of you are going to look at this concept and say, "Nah, I can do without that one." This one's gonna be pretty universally praised. So we got a tour name. We'll debut it later this week, probably Thursday, I would say. The Truth Teller series continues. It's something we like to do on the show. You know, tell the truth. But what we like to do is we specifically like to point out someone, something, oh, let's tell the truth about this someone or something. Tonight it's Marcus Freeman. I think the truth about Marcus Freeman is pretty clear. I think he's a top five head coach currently. I could easily see us calling him the number one coach in the country in the not too distant future. Gonna have to win a national title, I think, obviously. But everything that needs to be done to win a national title, all the ingredients that we know it takes to win a national title. They're all there. And so there's certainly headed in the right direction. I think two things stand out to me about what Marcus has done at Notre Dame. Firstly, it's just that he's the right guy they needed at the right time. And that sounds so common, sensical. But really if you think about it, they were really good under Brian Kelly. They were in a good position. They were rattling off good solid seasons. I don't know what they were winning on average. It felt like nine and a half or 10 games per year on average for a stretch there. Now, the trade off was, we understood they were beneath that of a national championship caliber winning program. But they were good, they were really good. And then Brian Kelly left. And the messaging from him on why he left, even though he disputes this today, but I think everyone understood at the time was, I think I've done all I can do here. And that wasn't him saying he can't do anymore, read between the lines. It was kind of him saying, I can't do anymore with Notre Dame. So I need to go to LSU. LSU will afford me the opportunity to do more than I could have ever done at Notre Dame. And good can be the enemy of great sometimes. And it would have been, it would have been, it's a huge fork in the road moment for Notre Dame. You knew it at the time. You don't need the benefit of hindsight. But I think the fork in the road moment at Notre Dame, it could have gone so radically a different way. But instead, they did not let good be the enemy of great. They had greatness. They had it in their own building. And then they elevated him. And Marcus lost them inexplicable games early too. Stuck with him. No one even talks about that stuff anymore, by the way. And now he's unequivocally elevated. The program, he's elevated the standard. And it's easy to elevate the standard when the standards crap. But that wasn't where the bar was there. The bar was it really good. And he took it and just said, nope. We're gonna make it greatness. That'll be the standard around here. And then I think after that, so we're a couple of years later now. After that coming out of last year, it was really important. 'Cause they had a year last year. I don't really, I don't wanna relitigate what you thought about whether or not Notre Dame should have made the playoffs. Everyone has spoken their piece on that. Some people thought they should have been in. Some people didn't think they should have been in. Whatever. What's important to me is what they did with it. They thought they deserved to be in the playoffs. They thought the committee shafted them. They had every reason to think that because of the way the committee handled the entire process. But that's neither her nor there now. What I wanna remind you about is what the reactions been there. And I think it's been very mature and I think it's been very beneficial. And we were up there a couple of months ago. I talked to him about this. Here's what he had to say. I try and envision you walking around this building at the end of last year. You're mad 'cause you didn't make it to the playoffs externally. Internally, I picture you walking around saying, that's what you get when you leave it in the committee's hands, right? You can't leave it in their hands. You gotta leave no doubt. I think at first, my default was the same as many other people. You blame somebody else. That's what default is. You're just gonna blame. It's not my fault. It's the committee's fault. It's somebody else's fault. We should have been in the playoffs. And, but if you continue to have that mindset, you can't use that negative experience. In order to learn from those inside lessons and improve and be better, you have to own it. You have to own the failures. You have to own the situations. You have to own it. You sleep in the bed, you mate. And that's how you learn from that. If you blame somebody else, you lose it. And so, my job is every day is to remind everybody in myself that everything that happens to you in life, you have to own it. So we can use it to improve from it. I always often say like, the pain of a loss is tough. It's hard, but it's there to help you grow. It's no different than the pain from a physical wound, right? You have pain, you want to make the pain go away. Well, the inside pain from a loss or a failure, it's there so you can grow from it. You want to make it go away. The only way to make it go away is continue to learn from it and grow from it and use it. And so, I don't want to lose some of those negative experience. Yes, not making a playoffs is one, but there's plenty of them in our past. There's ones that we all have as individuals and some of these that we have as a team in a program, but I want to use them to make us better. That's it. You can't do anything about last year. All you can do with it is weaponize it for this year. I can easily see him win a national title this year, but the thing about it is he's in no rush to leave, which is refreshing. He had an opportunity last year. He's been very transparent about that, which I appreciate. He's going to have opportunities. That's not going away. I think Notre Dame, one of the most underappreciated aspects of what's happening there is he's given Notre Dame everything he's got, Notre Dame's given him everything they're willing to give to. And full credit to Notre Dame. They have been over as backwards as Notre Dame's going to on things like academic calendar, admissions. Again, it's not going to be a diploma mill, but Notre Dame has been pretty rigid about this sort of thing in the past. And maybe they've shaved the corners and the edges of the rigidity off a little bit. That's good. It needs to be mutual. And that's absolutely I think the situation, that's one of the reasons. Well, it's like a whole new frontier up there. Certain things out of Notre Dame's control have changed to their benefit. And then the things within Notre Dame's control, they're also changing to their benefit, but he gets it, they get it. I don't know in my lifetime that there's ever been a better period to be a Notre Dame fan over the next five years than where we sit right now. So that's the truth about Marcus Freeman. Few years ago, oh, there's so much good news in the stack of papers tonight. Few years ago, we were starting to get some attention from brands that wanted to advertise on the show. And I just said no to most of 'em 'cause what they wanted to do is they wanted to purchase some time and they wanted to put a piece of paper in my hand and read this 45 second ad read. And I thought to myself, when that stuff happens on shows I listen to, I just fast forward. And so I'd rather just not have that kind of partnership. But I did say, if you guys want to be unique and you guys want to integrate yourself fully into the show where there's no separating us and you will talk. And then gas station recruiting wars happened. And if you're new around here, I think it's time to refresh your memory. It's just, I wanted to set the tone for what partnering with our show was gonna be. We really embed brands. We don't get in bed with many of 'em, but the ones we do partner with, we partner with. And there is no separation between your brand and this show. And we had gas station recruiting wars because I thought we had three of 'em that were really picking up what we were putting down. And so we did exactly what it sounds like we did. We sort of had a reverse recruitment where we allowed these massive companies to recruit us. 'Cause truthfully we had like three of 'em that wanted to be on the show. And I went through an entire recruitment, met with each team, and then it came time, decision day. And we, I don't know how it's to explain it, I'm gonna show it to you. Here's what it ended up looking like when I committed to conclude gas station recruiting wars. (audience cheering) Okay, Josh, can you hear me? Hey, hey, why'd that shut up? Yeah, I can hear you. I can hear you. Okay, this has been one of the wildest recruitments that I personally can remember in the modern era. Knowing you like I think I do, this cannot have been easy for you. It hasn't been easy, Josh, it has not been easy. In fact, this is one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life. I haven't lived a very hard life, you know? I gotta thank God, I gotta thank my family. I gotta thank racetrack and quick trip and pilot flying Jay and loves for even making this possible. We wouldn't be here today without them. It's amazing to be recruited. It's just amazing to be able to be in a position to give everyone gas this fall. If we can give everyone gas this fall, then our mission has been accomplished, you know? Couldn't have said it better myself. If you've always had a way with words, I appreciate that about you. Okay, moment of truth. Someone's life's about to change. Who's it gonna be? It's a big moment. We've waited a long time for it. I got four really great companies here in front of me. (sighs) Mmm. Oh. It's quick trip. We've only quick trip. It's quick trip. Well, Miss Di, I get emotional thinking about it, Jesse. Quick trip is back. That's the whole reason I teed that up and I showed it to you. Quick trip is back for another season like they ever left, like there was ever a doubt here. We just needed to update the graphic, basically. So we're going to be on the road a whole lot this fall. Quick trip is there. They've been with us every step of the way. I am still talking to Quick Trip Joe about what we can do, about fully functioning cold brew machines, mainly because I want one in the studio. There are some codes and regulations that we're trying to get around and who knows how much red tape there is on that. But Quick Trip is back. We are happy that they're back because they get it. They get it and we appreciate it. James and in Knoxville, Tennessee, can you tell me what's happening with the Senate bill? First everyone's saying it won't happen. Now maybe it will. I need you to weigh in. Yeah, so here's what I'm going to say about this. My calculus on this is when something major changes, I'll be willing to do a segment on it on the show. Now I know over the past week a lot feels like it changed, but it really didn't for me because I expected the SEC in the big 10 to come around on this and I expected this thing to get on the floor of the Senate and I expected it to pass the Senate. I told you this months ago, nothing's changed in my mind. So I think it is going to pass the Senate the challenge. I will say since they've pushed this thing to the 11th hour is make sure it gets on the floor, but I don't think they fought this hard not to get it on the floor. And I think it'll pass and I think it'll pass comfortably, like 75 plus votes comfortably need 60. I've always thought that and I still think that. And if it does that, I think there'll be immense pressure on the house. So my best guess is still that it passes. Apparently I'm still in the minority on that, but I think it'll pass. If something changes, that's when I'll do a segment on it, but frankly, this is not may anymore. Okay, we're not eating up precious time on this show talking about a Senate bill that frankly should have already been wrapped up one way or the other. I want to talk about college football. So it's here. I mean, we're looking at, I'm looking at the board right now, actually, now I'm looking at the board over here on Fandall. The futures market is incredible. We've got games of the year over on Fandall right now. You've got whether or not teams make the play off. You've got Heism. You've got all this stuff. I want to put a timeout on all that. None of them want to remind you guys as a lot of you start to refresh your accounts, start to replenish your accounts this year. You put deposits in there. We have a partnership with Fandall where I entered into it with them and I said, you're going to have to give me some rope to do some responsible gaming stuff every now and then. So tonight's one of those nights. There's been some stuff just in the past six months in college football where we've had really uncomfortable conversations and really uncomfortable headlines related to, in this case, illegal sports betting. But even if you're doing it legally, if you're not doing it responsible, you're setting yourself up for failure and maybe even worse. And I'm just begging you guys, don't do that. Please don't do it. Please be responsible with this stuff. And here's how you can know if you're being responsible with it. If you have even the slightest question about whether or not you can afford to bet on a game, the answer is you can't, so don't. And I would also strongly encourage you guys, if you're on Fandall, make sure you look at the MySpend dashboard. It's a really good tool. I use it every week. It's no different than looking at your bank account. If you're halfway responsible financially, you're looking at that every time and if you see more cash coming out, then going in, something's got to change. Something's got to change now in my bank account. That means something's got to change, I'm in trouble. In this world, it means you can just take a break. You can hit the break pedal. So I don't want you guys getting in that situation. So please make sure you understand the difference between entertainment and desperation, the difference between the entertaining nature of this and the addictive nature of this. And don't skirt the line. Just like rule number one, about any kind of matters along these lines that we talk about on this show. We have fun with it and you can have fun with it. Please have fun with it. Please be responsible with it. Sign up for Fandall at fandall.com/cfbpromotion must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas, Starkicino or 18 plus and present in Washington, DC. Just online real money wage or only $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued is nonwithdrawable bonus bet that expires seven days after receipt. Do you have a gambling problem? If so, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit fandall.com/rg. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8HOPE-NY or text h-o-p-e-n-y in New York. I wanted to wrap up tonight with this thing I asked you guys a little while ago. I kind of said, if you had a time machine and you went to January and you kind of saw what was going to happen this year. And you came back to tell us, what do you think the craziest, most unbelievable thing is that you have seen in January and the future that you can come tell us? And three of you submitted things and look, again last year, James Franklin got fired before Halloween, Indiana went 16 to no and killed everybody and so yeah, there were some unbelievable things that happened last year that if you told people that, if you told people, Brian Kelly was going to be out of a job before Halloween. Like it would have been pretty unbelievable, he was a preseason top 10 team. We got some here, set, we think a set, C-E-T from Florida. One of his that he came back from January and told us about was John Someral, one coach of the year and Florida was in the playoff and that is notable, very notable. I guess if they get good line of scrimmage playing anything's possible there because there's pretty good skill. I think obviously if this happens, that means the QBOC combo. That means bringing Buster Faulkner in and having Aaron Filo who I assume started at quarterback in this scenario, having them there, it just immediately was a rocket ship. And then you got to ask yourself, well, if Florida made the playoff and Someral was coach of the year, who did they do it at the expense of? I mean, they played Georgia in Atlanta inexplicably this year. You know that Jacksonville games on hold for two years. So they had the opportunity to play a home and home naturally like we do with every opportunity scheduling wise and college football, we screw that up and we're not going to play in Athens and games, but rather Atlanta and Tampa. Awesome. So did John Someral beat Kirby in year one here? Did he beat Pete Golding in Ole Miss? What did Florida do? Who is Florida victimized? I think John Someral's got a coach of the year and his future at some point. Is it year one? Don't know. How about this one? One of the three I think this would be the most shocking. Will Hammond won the Heisman and Texas Tech won the national title? So I was talking to someone about the Texas Tech situation the other day and I said, you know, everyone's assumption is, well, once Brennan Soresbees out of there, Texas Tech is beneath that of a title caliber team if they ever were one. But I remember last year, if I were to have told you Austin Simmons, he ain't going to be the guy for Ole Miss. You would have thought Ole Miss was cooked. You wouldn't have even known who their backup quarterback was. It's not your fault. Half the team's on their schedule didn't know who Trinidad Chambers was. But then Trinidad Chambers happened and it was the best thing to ever happen for Ole Miss. And my point is, you could have never predicted that. So just cause it sounds crazy that Will Hammond takes Texas Tech further than, for instance, Bear and Morton took him last year. Maybe he's capable of taking them further than Brennan Soresbees was going to take him this year. Just cause that sounds crazy doesn't mean it's impossible. That's the entire nature of unpredictability. But Texas Tech went in the whole thing. Look, I'm not going to shoot it down. There are no crazy predictions. But that would be back-to-back years of the most unbelievable college football stories that I've seen in my lifetime. We had Indiana last year win it all, which you could sell me on being the best story ever. And then you have Texas Tech lose the one key piece that we all thought they needed to get. They got to upgrade a quarterback. We all watched the Oregon playoff game. They got to upgrade a quarterback or they got no shot. Then they upgrade a quarterback, but then he's gone. And now Will Hammond, if he is healthy enough, is going to be a guy that probably is not good enough. Well, they'll probably be good enough to win the big 12, but nothing more, and whoops, wrong, miscalculation. They just go win the whole thing. What a story that would be. I don't know if you think it would be good or bad for college football in different. But if Texas Tech Jesse puts on the heel mask in spring, and then they go win the whole thing, I don't like character arcs, I don't like talking like that in sporting terms, but buddy. That would be one of the great heel runs in recent memory. And then lastly, does. Dustin said he just came back from January and Lincoln, Riley, Florida state, or so USC, Florida state and Tennessee all have coaching changes. I assume he means they all got fired, but technically we have to leave room for something else to happen here. Tennessee would be crazy to me. I can see USC, I certainly see Florida state. What had to happen at Tennessee? Did Josh Hype believe, did he just quit? Was there some extenuating circumstance? Was there scandal? Or did they just fire him? Now again, we're talking about crazy headlines here. And I will admit to you, certainly this time last year, if you said, "Hey, I've seen the future." You know James Franklin? Yeah, yeah, what about him? Is he going to win a national title? No, no, he's going to get fired early in the year, by the way. No scandal, no, anything is just not good enough. I would have said you're crazy. I would have said there's a 0.1 percent chance of that. And then if you said, "Oh, that's not all. Kelly's gone too. Frank Kelly's out too." I would have said like 0.01 percent, yet it happened. So I guess technically it could happen. I just don't know how I feel so good about Tennessee in 2027. Don't do it, guys. Now USC, Florida state, Florida state would just be Mike Norvog getting fired. USC, peculiar. Of course there's a world where they go eight and four, seven and five and they're done with Lincoln. You can easily see that. Is there any world where he leaves? I don't know because Dustin didn't tell us all that. Guys, it feels so good to be back. I'm so happy. I ask you, I implore you. Do this one thing for us. Subscribe to the channel because it's free and it doesn't sign you up for anything until every one of your friends who complain about lack of college football coverage and there's no good shows to watch. Well we do this one Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, every single Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday from now until well into January. We're here. This is all we do. We're so happy to be back. We appreciate it for producer Jesse. I mean, press had to be in studio today. Mitch has a huge task on his hands. Bradley is shockingly easy job today for technically related reasons, which will hopefully we'll have rectified Tuesday, but it doesn't matter to you. We're back. We made it. Take care. We'll see you Tuesday night. Until then, God bless. Must be 21 plus in present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas, Starkisino or 18 plus and present in DC. First on my real money wager only, $5 first deposit required. One is issued as non withdrawal bonus bets, which expires seven days after receipt, restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fandual.com, gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit fandual.com/rg. Call 1-888-789777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut or visit ndgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-32750 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-8778 Hope NY or text Hope NY in New York. I'm listening to scam goddess on the iHeart radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, this is Kylie breakman, Angel Jaretana, and we're the hosts of the artist on artist on artist podcast. The improvised character comedy podcast where each week a new panel of artists discuss their craft. Join us for a panel of Eurovision participants. And we do a little Halloween sometimes. Does the Pope dress up? Yes, he winks on Halloween. It's right up next to the microphone. I hear you get the elbows here. The eyelashes hit each other. You never seen it least so quiet as when the Pope gets up to wink on Halloween. Listen to artists on artists on artists on artists every Thursday on the iHeart radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Amy Brown in every day on front page podcast. I help you make sense of the stories shaping our world. And it is trade fight with the U.S. just escalated again and Americans could fill it in their wallets. And when a story deserves a deeper conversation, I'll sit down with experts, news makers and thought leaders to help you better understand the issue behind the headlines. Listen to front page from the Black Effect podcast network on the iHeart radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. On big lives, we take a single cultural icon. People like Jane Fonda, George Michael, Little Richard. And we pull apart the story behind the image, discovering forgotten interviews that change exactly how we see these giants of our culture. We're here for the messy, the brilliant, the human version of our heroes. I'm Emmanuel Jocci. I'm Kai Wright. And this is Big Lives. Listen to Big Lives on the iHeart radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.