1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - One-On-One with DP: November 11th, 3pm - Things need to be fixed within this football program

Episode Date: November 11, 2021

One-On-One with DP: November 11th, 3pm - Things need to be fixed within this football programAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

You guys going to Happy Hour? Live from the couple Chevrolet GMC Studios in the heart of Lincoln America. Yeah, maybe I'll come for a couple. Here are your hosts, Nick Sainert. Did you understand anything I just said? Yeah, I got it. I'm good at that. And Enrique Alvarez Cleary. It sounds like we are like we're on path.

Yep, we're on a path. On 93-7 The Ticket and The Ticket FM.com. Welcome in. Happy Thursday. This is the happy hour, 937. The Ticket. The Ticketfm.com. Nick Sainert and Enrique Alvarez. Cleary with you today. Hello, Rico. Hello. How are you doing? I am well. Just well. I am well. Not fantastic. Nope, not fantabulous. All right. Well, I am well. I am here. I am ready to do a radio show with you, good sir. Why are you just well? No reason. I just am. Okay, that's good. As always, 402, 464-5685, the Honda-Lincoln hotline, the Sartar-Hamondt Text Line. Both of those open for you all hour long as well as on the Sartar-Haman Jewelers video stream, Facebook, Twitch, and YouTube. We will kind of touch on Jojo Domen, his announcement that came out a little bit ago.

We'll touch on that briefly and kind of what that means for the defense going forward. And then we will also ask Aaron Sorenson about it when she joins us today at 2.30. and then later in the final segment we are going to give away a care basket courtesy of Beatrice Bakery I contacted the winner or the people that were nominated today and they are

all on board so we are good to go with that we'll announce that here in the final segment on a Thursday Rico yes I haven't I haven't been able to talk to you about this

I told you that I went to the dentist today yes why do people not like the dentist? Because people don't like hands in their mouths and your teeth are getting messed with and it's a strange feeling and sometimes it's painful for some people. Probably my guess is a lot of people don't take care of their teeth and they don't want to be told that they don't take care of their teeth. Yeah, that could be, I suppose. Because, like, I got my teeth clean today, and I'm just, like, sitting here, and I keep feeling my teeth and how clean they are. And I'm like, this is fantastic.

I kind of wish I could go back every month and get my teeth cleaned. You only got to go, like, every six months. Yeah, that's what they told me. You just take care of your teeth. All right. That's all it is. It's not, I mean, I don't know, man. I was expecting more reaction from you out of that.

No, I'm not going to lie to you. No, I've been in the dentist multiple times. I've been told that I have fantastic. teeth, but my molars are very deep, so I got to, you know, can't really clean them with a toothbrush. So I found out that I have to get my wisdom teeth taken out. I only have two. I have the top two. And they keep telling me to do it.

And I should do it before the end of this year. Yeah. But I just haven't scheduled an appointment for that yet. This is going to be kind of, this is going to be. Yeah. Shocker. This is going to be kind of outing you a little bit. They told me that they really recommend people to get them pulled or get them done before age 26.

Mm-hmm. And how old are you? I am turning 12. 28 this month. Okay. So you're not so far away, I suppose. Well, as I've told you before, I had not gone to the dentist until last year since I was like 10. So it had been a while.

Yeah. Have you ever had braces? Nope. I got great teeth, bro. I had braces in second grade because I had an underbite. So I had braces in second grade had. Yes, exactly. No.

No, no, no. Oh, I thought you meant had braces. Had braces. because so I had my braces off for a week and my buddy in third grade after I just got my braces off comes around the corner scares me I slam my head into a wall

and I chip my front tooth how do you get scared and slam your head into a wall did you like go to turn away and he like he like pushed me but not pushed me but he like grabbed yeah like my shoulders and I freaked out slam my head against a wall and chip my tooth

and they had to spread my two front teeth apart to fix it. What a tragedy. A week after I got my braces off. What a tragedy. And at that point, I was done with the dentist. Just, yeah. Ryan says this. I got my wisdom teeth pulled at age 33 and I'm still alive. Well, you're fine, Rico.

I'm not saying you die. Are you sure, Ryan? I'm not saying you would die. Are you sure you're alive and you're not texting in from the grave? I don't think he would. Spooky. So, Rico, let's touch on Jojo Don't. here a little bit. Jojo announced if you are just now kind of joining us, I can pull up his

official statement. He says this in a graphic that he posted on Twitter, 40 minutes ago for the past six years, I've been honored to play for Nebraska. I'm eternally grateful for the opportunity to be a part of a special community and program. I will always be a Husker, Jojo, Joe, Joe Domman. So he is out for the rest of the year, and you kind of feel like that concludes, well, you know, it concludes his Husker career. Let's talk about this. And we kind of touched on it with Tom and Bach. I just think when you're looking at the draft ahead,

and we get this off the text line, Corian Lincoln says he's getting drafted. Obviously, it's a big matter of how you test out and how you kind of talk about to, or how you kind of talk to potential teams and organizations in the NFL. However, I think age has a big factor in this, unfortunately. Okay. Because you see all these rookies that are getting drafted, H21, H22,

and now you're going to have, and this is going to be the case for a lot of programs, not just Jojo Domen, not just Nebraska, but you see the case where he's going to be 25 when it comes draft time. And in terms of that with also being from, a program that he really, we said he worked his way into the draft conversation in the later stages of the season, especially last Saturday. He played really, really well last Saturday. And he's a high motor guy. And I think Nate Gary is a really good comparison as to not necessarily where he's going to be drafted, but to where his NFL future may lie. The ability to do many

different things at a single position. Where it may be, where it may be the, um, he, a fringe guy. like a fringe day three to a priority undrafted free agent. One that fights for a spot on a roster. He may be like a Seth and Carter spends a long period of his first couple years on a practice squad, then finally gets the call up a little bit later into his career. It might be something like that, but he finishes his sixth collegiate season includes 72 tackles. He had nine tackles for loss, two sacks, two force fumbles, three pass breakups, and he actually had his first two INTs in this last season through 10 games for Nebraska.

So definitely a big loss. Now, how does this make you change your thoughts about this defense? Does this change your thoughts over about the black shirts heading into, not necessarily this week, but next Saturday, when they're losing a guy from the lineback room that they're used to be in there? Despite, put the productivity aside, whether he was productive, which the last couple games he was in terms of how many tackles he he had and recorded in those games. But just they're losing a guy in terms of depth at the linebacker position.

Well, I mean, I don't think any less of this defense at all. It's going to be rough losing a, as you said, a high motor guy who is kind of all over the field. Seems like he's in on just about every tackle at the linebacker position. He's fantastic in the cover game. He can, you know, he can cover some of the slot guys. guys or you can put him outside on maybe some guys that usually are in the slot, but they move them outside for some reason. He's really good in coverage, tackling, rushing the quarterback, just about everything. But I was talking to Happer in the hallway about this, and I kind of asked

him the same question. He said, you know, against these next two opponents who really are run heavy, replacing him is, I mean, obviously you don't, you hate to replace somebody who's been very productive for you this season, but replacing him against teams who are very run heavy and aren't actually looking to pass the ball all that much. You can slide one of the run of the other linebackers, one of the outside linebackers, into his spot when you're not asking them to cover a wide receiver in the slot all that much. And, I mean, you'll lose a little bit of productivity,

but it won't hurt as much as you're probably thinking. Now, if they, if the last two games were against Purdue or an Ohio State, that would be kind of problematic because, again, as I said, a great linebacker, pass rushing and covering the pass, and then you would have to slide somebody like Felderius Payne who's really good at rushing the passer, but in defending the pass, he's a little lackluster that way. So the fact that you have two run heavy teams that you're going up against defensively, it doesn't bode well because you're losing somebody very productive, but it shouldn't be that difficult. So I wanted to just kind of wrap a bow on Jojo Domen.

as a Husker there. And so he's not going to be playing in the rest of the season. He's done. His Husker career is finished. And we'll see what happens come next spring and the NFL draft. I want to stay with Husker football, though. Obviously, it's been an exciting week or exciting because it's been an interesting week. I think it's okay to say that it's been an exciting week, though.

Because it's... Has it been exciting? You would hope that the steps... because you hope that the steps that the program that Trev Albert, Scott Frost, and the rest of the staff that are still there are taking is making this program better. So I think in that situation when you're talking about it that way. I just don't know if exciting is the right word I would use. I mean, it's been, it's been an interesting, it's been a news-filled week. It's been a week filled with, with, you know, hope or or interest towards the program.

But I don't know if exciting would be the right word I would use. To some people, it's very exciting because they get the head coach who, they've wanted back for so long, and they want him to stay with the program, and they think he'll be the one to turn it around and all of that. And they got rid of, to some people, they got rid of the coaches in areas where they have been very problematic, and they're opening up the needs for the offensive end of things.

So to some people, this has been extremely exciting, and they feel as if the resigning of Scott and the departure of the four coaches is something that they can get excited about. And it kind of goes back to that whole thing that I kind of touched on yesterday that Rico and I both agree on is that this is an opportunity for Frost to really show that he's growing as a coach. It's an opportunity with the people that they put around him, the people that he chooses to put around him. Now, Rico, I'll ask you this, are you skeptical of the fact that Scott Frost claims that he wants to give up more of the offense, being the, like an integral part of the offense, I should say.

Are you skeptical skeptical that that will actually happen? Because I've heard that that's a big, not complaining necessarily, but a big worry going around through Husker Nation right now. I do not believe he will give up that much control of the offense. I want to believe that he will, but I don't believe, I truly do not think that a man who has been so involved with the offense is a very offensive-minded head coach, was involved with the offense everywhere that he's been, will give up that much play-calling duties to somebody else,

to somebody new within his program. I am hopeful that he does allow his new offensive coordinator to take more control of the offense and to do whatever that person wants to do with the offense and that Scott Frost will still keep his input with the program going, but keep his input with the offense going, but I'm not really sure. Yeah, I think it's going to be a huge, huge idea or factor of who they decide to get.

I think we're going to know also if they bring in an offensive coordinator, if Scott Frost brings in an offensive coordinator that has offensive coordinator experience, I'm not saying because I don't think it's going to happen, but if it was a Tom Herman like that's had offensive coordinator experience, I don't think Tom Herman's going to come. If it's a guy that has experience at coaching and running an offense, I have much more hope. in it. I have much more hope. Now, if they go get a analyst from the Big 12 or wherever. If they get a position coach from somewhere to... A position coach? I'm a little more hesitant to believe it. And... Makes sense. Possibly for good reason. Because maybe... I mean, obviously, Scott Frost will have some, a certain amount of faith in the guy that he brings in to run the offense, because that's why he's bringing him in. However, if it's the, if it's an analyst or a wide-receipt position, you kind of feel like there may be some, some, a reason to be skeptical that it's going to be

the offensive coordinator's offense at the end of the day. Now, let me ask you a question. Do you, do you want to see more of the, more of the jobs divvied up, or at least divvied up in a different way, as opposed to how it was where your offense coordinator was your wide receivers coach? And maybe your offensive coordinator just focuses on being the offensive coordinator. You know, maybe you have your running backs coach being the run game coordinator, you know, your offensive line. And, you know, do you want to see Scott take over the quarterback coach or do you just kind of want to see that? You know, depending on how that goes, see that position, either go to Scott or go to an analyst role and bring in, you know, some type of, I mean, everybody wants a special teams coach who

believe that they should probably get a special teams coach. But, you know, if they don't do that, what other position group do you think they would bring in as a coach? See, and okay, before I answer to that, I don't think they need a special teams coach. You don't? I don't. Do you think they need like a kickers coach, like a specialist coach? I don't, I just think they need to get a guy that can return the football and a kicker and a punter.

I mean, you need somebody to, I mean, do you need somebody to coach up your kickers to make sure they're doing the right things, to coach up your punters to make sure they're doing the right things because right now you have somebody splitting his time between linebackers and special teams. Do you need somebody that's just working on special teams who can get to know everybody on the roster and find out what everybody is feeling and what they believe they can do to help on special teams as opposed to somebody who is working with a certain position group? And then I don't know how they divvy that up his time between that and the special teams. But let's just say, you know, the free time he gets from working with the linebackers, he goes over

and he just talks to the kickers and kind of sees what they're doing, but for the most part, the kickers are off doing their own thing. Do you need somebody who is around them during practice to make sure they're doing the right thing and they're doing things correctly where, you know, if they're doing one thing, one small thing and they keep doing it over and over and over again, then it becomes muscle memory and then they keep doing that wrong thing and it's something that'll mess them up down the line. So you made an interesting point there, and I'll get back to that about how,

I think that they need to worry about a court. I think they need a, I should have a quarterback's coach. Because my whole thought on Scott Frost wanting to step back and not be so concerned about running the actual offense, if you give him a quarterback, if you put Scott Frost in charge of quarterbacks, yeah, it's not as much demand every single day for just the quarterback's coach. However, it's still something else that he has to do besides being the head coach. and to be fair, developing development has been lackluster.

And if you have a good quarterback, your offense can go. And here's the thing, is one thing you mentioned about having the kickers go off and doing their own thing. That speaks to accountability. It does. And if you don't have accountability within any of the groups, not even just specialists, but if you don't have accountability in a program when you, as a staff, you can't trust guys to be doing doing the right thing, doing the fundamentally sound thing, when you're not watching, then that's a whole bigger problem that your program has.

I mean, that can go for any position. Exactly. And I don't think Nebraska has that issue. However, you know what? Let me backtrack. I don't think every position at Nebraska has that issue. Okay. There may be a couple where accountability isn't the number one focus point. You need to be, you need to be,

held accountable, whether it's coaches holding players accountable, whether it's players holding other players and teammates accountable. And then also, as a player yourself, holding yourself accountable. And realizing that you can't just go out there and give 50%. Well, as I understand that. And you know, you want to have the players holding each other accountable and talking to each other and making sure everybody's doing the right thing. But at the same time, if you have, if you're, you're the starting kicker and you've got the backup kicker and a freshman kicker there with you and they're trying to tell you, hey, you know, your plant foot is a little off here. Hey, your, your kicking foot is a little, you know, slid to this direction or whatever. I don't know. I don't know the nuances of kick,

because I'm not going to pretend to. But if they're trying to correct, they're trying to correct the starter. What's to say the starter is just like, dude, I'm the starter for a reason. You can't tell me, like, what I'm doing is right. And then, you know, you go out and you miss a couple kicks. Like, yeah, there's one of those things where you might need somebody there to make sure they're doing the right thing. And I know, you know, you don't have to have it all the time, but splitting your time between two of those different things is a little, is very time-consuming, and it kind of, you know, in the span of one practice, you know, you've got to go from helping out on the defense to helping out with special teams and helping out with this and helping out with that.

But off that topic, the offensive coordinator and the quarterback, would it almost be better for the offensive coordinator to also be the quarterback's coach? Because in that vein, you would have the quarterback who has to know the entire offense and the offensive coordinator who was calling the plays for the entire offense working together to make sure the quarterback sees the right things and they're doing the right things, the offensive coordinator they go over plays more often. Would that not be the right mesh possibly for an offensive coordinator

and a position coach? I think that's interesting. We saw it with Lubick where he was the wide receivers coach as well. You can kind of be in charge of both positions. But how much easier would it be to call the plays to your quarterback and then after the play, you're talking about the play and you're telling him, hey, this is what you need to do here. Your feet need to be here.

Your eyes need to be here. You need to look over here, et cetera, like doing that kind of thing as opposed to, I don't know how Lubick did it, but you know, you call the play and then you go over to the receivers and you're like, hey, this is, you know, you need to break your route this way. You need to get your hands in here to block this way

and et cetera, et cetera, where Mario Verducco is sitting back there. And then he's telling the quarterback something that maybe Lubick thought was good and maybe Verducco's changing it or something that Verducco thought was good that maybe Lubic did. like in the quarterback. So it's just one of those things. And to be fair, and we've touched on this before, obviously we've had a long time to kind of talk about this and weed through everything. If the whole offensive staff is on the same page, then you minimize the amount of problems

you can have. And you see it with the defense, where Mike Dawson is technically working with special teams and linebackers, right? Linebackers have not, have not, um, gotten worse. They've gotten better. They've gotten better. And so that tells me right there that it is possible for a coach that wants to take on the

job of managing special teams and another position group, whatever that is, if that's Mike Dawson next year. That's great. However, when you're talking about a guy being an offense coordinator, whether he's a wide receiver's coach

or a quarterback's coach, I feel like you can just minimize a bunch of problems if you are all on the same page and speak in the same message. And it's not Adrian hearing one message from Mario Verduzco at one time and then going over and hearing a whole other message from Matt Lubick. I just feel like you can minimize a lot of problems that may be the turning point in a game.

Obviously, a whole three points, I mean, you know, a field goal is crucial in some situations. However, at the end of the day, touchdowns are worth more than field goals. Nebraska's red zone offense, atrocious. In Nebraska's red zone offense, wouldn't, be as bad if they could kick a field goal. That's absolutely right. However, they wouldn't be pressing as much to score, so they wouldn't have somebody.

Well, they're not, I don't even know if they're pressing there. They're super conservative when they get into the red zone. It's run the football, run the football, and then they can't make a field goal. Which is weird because you would think if you're in the red zone and you're scared that you can't kick a field goal, you would be pushing more to score a touchdown because you're not confident in your kicker. But yeah, you're right. What it seems like is there, it seems as if their confidence in their kicker is pretty

high because they're like, oh, we don't need to try and rush things or push things into the end zone. We can kind of run it. And, you know, if we don't get the first down to push farther into the red zone, we'll just kick it. I just think that being able to having a whole offensive staff, offensive unit, similar to what the defense is. You kind of look on the field and you watch how the defense plays and you feel like they're all on the same page. All the coaches are speaking the same message. And that helps towards quality play. Guys are embracing the rules. However, offense, there's been times where things are spotty. It's sluggish.

There's no sense of urgency. And you wonder why that is. And it's got a fix. If Scott Frost wants to stay here more than one year, it's got a fix. And I think everybody wants it to work. We've had that conversation till Kingdom come of that how bad Nebraska fans want Scott Frost to work here. All right, let's take our first time out when we come back. We'll be joined by Aaron.

Sorenson of Hill Varsity here coming up in a couple of minutes. We'll be back soon. Follow Nick and Enrique on Twitter at Nick underscore Senert and at Radio Rico AC. More of happy hour is next on 937 the Ticket and the Ticketfm.com.