Andy & Ari On3 - Does everyone just hate Deion? | Does James Franklin HAVE to win a national title at Penn State??
Episode Date: May 6, 2024Thank you to Gametime for sponsoring today's episode! Gametime is the best place to buy last-minute tickets to sporting events, concerts and comedy shows. Making plans to follow your team on the road ...this college football season? Gametime has tickets to every game. Download the Gametime App and enter code: STAPLES for $20 off your first purchase, terms apply. Last Minute Tickets, Lowest Prices, Guaranteed.(0:00-5:27) Intro - Colorado, Dukes the Scoop Intro(5:28-27:44) Dukes the Scoop joins LIVE(27:45-43:06) Deion's Recruiting Style(43:07-49:03) Comparing Deion to Dabo(49:04-54:14) Wrapping up with Dukes(54:15-57:07) Penn State Intro(57:08-1:18:14) Sean Fitz from Blue White Illustrated Joins - Can Penn State make the 12 team playoff?(1:18:15-1:19:53) ConclusionOn3’s Phillip Dukes joins Andy to talk Deion Sanders. Dukes released a video over the weekend that attempted to make sense of why everything Sanders does is such a hotbutton topic.Andy and Dukes also tackle the closing of the transfer portal and discuss which teams got better.Next, Sean Fitz of Blue White Illustrated joins to help Andy answer a question that popped up during last week’s Dear Andy episode: Is Penn State on the list of schools where the job description of the head coach simply reads “win the national championship?”Want to watch the show instead? Head on over to YouTube and join us LIVE, M-F, at 8 am et! https://youtube.com/live/eLcXN4p5Dj0
Transcript
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Welcome to Andy Staples on three.
Happy Monday.
Happy day after the roast of Tom Brady day.
I don't think I can handle a roast of myself.
I really don't.
I know that's the thing everybody's talking about because even my wife,
who does not care about football at all,
was having me replay moments of Nikki Glaser's roast of Tom Brady. So there will be
a push. This is going to usher in a new era of roasts. And maybe we'll get the roast of Nick
Saban at some point or the roast of Deion Sanders. Although a lot of you probably think the roast of Deion Sanders happens here pretty much every day, but this is going to happen. The Nick Saban roast is
probably bound to happen after the Bill Belichick roast, which we know is going to happen because we
know Bill Belichick can handle himself on stage now. We know he can take a joke because Julian
Elliman just crushed him, just crushed him last night. So just get ready.
Get ready for a new era of sports roast because we're not particularly creative people here in
the media. And when things work, we drive them into the ground. And that worked. So you're going
to see a lot of that. Of course, the current college football coach,
most ripe for a roast because, well, he's not best known as a college football coach. He's best known
as the greatest cornerback of all time. A guy who played two major professional sports at once.
Of course, it's Deion Sanders. Our guy, Dukes the Scoop, Philip Dukes, the host of the five-star flex on the On3 Recruits channel.
He put out a video this weekend about Coach Prime and about Colorado.
And basically, the title says it all.
Why do we hate Colorado?
We're going to talk to Dukes about that today.
I'm going to play you a little bit of that right now.
We'll get you set up.
And then we're bringing Dukes on. We're going
to have a genuine discussion about do people hate Dion? I don't know if it's all hate,
although I think some of it may be. And why does he just make everybody feel
some type of way? Why is it him and not somebody else? Because there have been
great athletes who became coaches. There have been coaches who became
larger than life. There've been all of that. But for some reason, he pushes our buttons
better than anybody else. I think Dukes has some good ideas as to why, but let's hear
Dukes talking about that in the video he put out this weekend. Let's talk about the most popular
teams when it comes to college football. You got Ohio State, you got Georgia, you got Bama,
you got defending national champion Michigan.
Teams that are winning at a clip that their media coverage is 1000 percent justified.
So how is Colorado arguably the most talked about program in college football right now. I think that it's not just the love that these teams have that makes them talk about, but it's the hate.
What's stronger than love?
What is the yin to love's yang?
And I think the hate is what has Colorado here.
So that begs the question, why do we hate Colorado?
Let's dig into it.
Did you hate Colorado years ago?
Did you hate Colorado during the miracle at Michigan?
Did you hate Colorado when Eric Biennium was tearing it up?
Did you hate Colorado when Rashawn Salam was the guy? God bless him. Did you?
Or did you just start focusing on
Colorado when Deion Sanders got there?
Now we're getting to the nitty gritty. So the relevancy
that Colorado has right now is directly tied to
Coach Prime and everything that comes along with
him. So now today we're going to dive into why people hate Colorado and Coach Prime Deion Sanders.
The biggest reason, hold up, before I even go there, this is a very special topic to me. Why?
Because I'm not supposed to be here in a lot of people's eyes.
I shouldn't be on the screen in front of you.
My slang-talking, College Park, Georgia, gold Cartier glasses wearing,
double chain, double ropes, ice on my neck, saying what he wants to say,
not playing by the rules.
He doesn't have a journalism degree.
He hasn't been 100% on his predictions.
This guy was on a message, boys.
I shouldn't be here, right?
But I'm here.
So this resonates well with me because Deion Sanders and a lot of people's eyes
shouldn't be in that role.
And I'm going to get to why.
And it's part of the reason why people hate Colorado.
Well, let's bring on Dukes to Scoop.
We're going to get to why.
What's up, Dukes?
Uh-oh, I think Dukes might be with me.
What's up?
There we go.
What is up?
No, I was enjoying that.
I was enjoying that because when I saw that first video,
I was thinking about what you were saying, the yin and the yang.
And I'm like, oh, yeah.
Why does everybody, every time I mention Notre Dame, just light up?
It ain't because they love Notre Dame.
It's because they hate Notre Dame.
Right.
And Colorado, same thing.
Yeah, I mean, when you think about it, like, in my opinion,
what else would you want?
Why do people talk the way they talk and have so much conviction and passion?
If you go and look at right now,
the biggest thing on Twitter is Kendrick and Drake.
And Drake.
There are more people talking about or defending the reasons of why this other
guy shouldn't win than why a guy actually went or won.
If it's over.
So I think it's a,
it's one of those things where I think people buy into their points of why
they believe something.
And if it's,
and if the point is contradictory
towards love then of course it's hate it's it's it's politics is what it is we're not going to
get into politics on the show but it's it i i'm glad you brought up the the kendrick lamar drake
beef and if you're not aggressively online you may not be aware that these two rappers are going back and forth keep
dropping diss tracks aiming at one another but somebody and i don't i wish i could give this
person credit but they put this out this this weekend and i thought it was really appropriate
they said if you can't argue about who won based on the quality of of the lyrics or based on the quality of the lyrics or based on, like we were just talking about the roast of Tom Brady.
When we're trading diss tracks,
it's really the quality of the burns contained within the diss tracks.
So if you can't argue the merits of those,
and it's just, I like this guy better,
then I don't want to argue about it because all that is is politics.
That's my tribe versus your tribe. And I think you're right. It's, it's with,
with Deion Sanders, like we try on this show to get into the merits of it. Like,
here's what he's doing. We think is good. Here's what he's doing. We think is bad, but nobody wants to hear that people have their minds made up about Deion Sanders.
By the way, Kendrick won.
Kendrick won after, I think, 6-16.
Kendrick won.
If we're even talking about this as a competition, it's not.
I don't care one way or the other about either one of these people.
It's not even close.
So at least we settled that one.
Right, right.
I'm good with that i can go with it
so but what dion it is like he ignites this passion in people and i i you haven't i got
another clip from that video where you were explaining why and i again i had not thought
about it this way and i i really appreciate because you grew up with the, like you were in
Atlanta when he was with the Falcons, like you're a kid. So you were, you were kind of ground zero
for, for Dion. Like I was in Florida when he was at Florida state and we both got to watch him as
kids. I think we both kind of felt the same way about him as a player, but I had forgotten how my parents felt about him as a player.
Okay.
And you reminded me of that.
One of the biggest reasons people hate Colorado is because they cannot separate Deion Sanders,
the player from coach prime.
There's a difference and that works in his favor and against him.
But right now, we're going to talk about why it works against him.
See, Deion Sanders told the NFL that nobody was going to have enough money to pay him
outright, that they were going to have to put him on layaway before he even stepped
on the field.
That's my kind of talk.
But a lot of people don't believe's my kind of talk. But
a lot of people
don't believe in that type of talk.
They don't believe in high-stepping
into the end zone. They don't
believe in playing
a game for
the Braves and the Falcons in the same day.
See, Deion Sanders
was a different type of guy.
He never marched to the beat of the traditional drum. Deion Sanders was a different type of guy He never marched to the beat of the traditional drum
Deion Sanders had MC Hammer, the biggest star in the world, on the sidelines
Where do you think Drake gets all that from?
Every team that he's going to support
Ain't nothing new under the sun
He got that from Deion
That's what MC Hammer was doing
First time we ever saw it
Falcons were back in black.
So legit to quit. D-Dun all in the video.
Hammer all on the sideline at the playoffs.
Damn.
That was D-Dun.
So for everybody,
for every kid like me who loved it,
who at College Park,
Little League Field, Bill Badger Field
where legends are made, where we're
high-stepping into the end zone, where the first time we take the helmet off and we see that steam come off, it's not a bald head, it's not a fade, it's a bandana like Dion.
So for the people like that, right, that's our kind of talk.
But there's a whole other section of people who don't subscribe to that.
That would be my parents.
Right.
And you go,
you're not supposed to talk like that.
You can't show up the other team.
I know.
Like,
right.
I want Dion at the bottom of the hill,
telling the Clemson players to come down.
Like I was good with that.
Like I,
I haven't, I don't know come down. I was good with that.
I don't think I've told you this theory,
but I don't trust corners or receivers who don't talk trash.
I think there might be something a little off there.
O-line, D-line, that's fine.
You can be an introvert.
It happens.
I think Deion created all of this.
I mean, to your point, It's hard to be on an island by yourself and perform without believing that you're 1000 percent better than the guy in front of you.
OK, on the flip side of that, let's say, you know, you aren't better than that guy.
Well, the only chance you have is to try to get in his head.
So I understand what you say when you say, okay, you know what?
Maybe a little trash talk can get it going.
But Deion trash talked at a clip, and they say, I see something.
Deion's Eric is that's a player at work.
I get it, right? And then as a player coach, it may be different.
People don't feel like you should talk before you've done anything.
And that's why people feel like Deion isn't the guy.
Because how is he talking already?
Where does he get the audacity to say that he thought Colorado's goal should have been to make the playoffs last year when they were a 1-11 team?
Why would you put that type of target on your back?
But if I'm Deion Sanders, that's on brand for him.
That's what he does.
He believed that.
And that's what I don't think people understand.
People think that he was talking trash.
He believed it.
And so it's like when kids believe in Santa Claus.
The fifth graders can't wait to go tell the third graders, hey, you were wrong.
And they're going to sit there and they're going to wait until Christmas comes and they hope that kid has a bad Christmas.
So they could come on January, on January 4th when everybody gets back to school and they can say, hey, guess what, dummy?
That wasn't Santa Claus.
They can't wait.
And for whatever reason, you hate on Santa Claus.
But hey, people do it.
People definitely do it.
And again, I don't have a problem with saying our goal is to reach the playoff.
I think everybody's goal is to reach the playoff.
We get that my thing with deon is and i've seen p i posted one of the comments up here that said you know
he doesn't respect the game you got to win something first and i think here it is this
is spare room films deon's arrogance as a player works as a player coach no win something first
then be respectful to the sport like kirby or it after doing so. He has zero class.
I don't think you have to win it. I think Deion has done enough in the sport of football to be
able to say whatever the hell he wants, but I don't think he's immune to criticism.
And that's where I get sideways with the Colorado fans because they think we should just treat him
with kid gloves and be like, oh no, you're this cute little story. No, no, no, no, no. You get all this attention.
You get the smoke too. Like you can be criticized. Like my problem is you could be the greatest
recruiter of all time. You won't even do an in-home visit. Like imagine Dukes, if Dion recruited like
Fran Brown, the new coach at syracuse the guy who just got
hired from georgia fran brown in the class of 2025 he had 18 commitments 18 you know why because he
knows he can evaluate better everybody else people are going to cheat off his paper he's going to
get some dudes flipped dm is three right now three like. Like, Fran Brown is preparing for 2025, 2026.
Deion didn't do any of that.
And, like, that's my thing.
And it's not necessarily a respect the game thing.
Well, you're a dad, too, so you understand this.
Like, I've been practicing my I'm not mad, I'm disappointed.
Like, I'm not mad.
I'm just disappointed.
Like, you could be.
Deion's the only guy with Nick Saban gone who could get the NIL discount.
Like, a guy would come play for Deion because he's Deion.
All you got to do is try like these other guys try, and he won't try.
Yeah, I think it's one of those things where Deion, at his point right now.
So we brought up Fran Brown.
Okay, cool.
I love Coach Brown, right?
You know, came up into the Georgia system.
He was one of those guys. And he really laid the groundwork.
If we want to keep it a book, he laid the groundwork for Georgia
to land K.J. Bolden last year.
That wasn't spoken about a lot, but he's an ace recruiter.
And he also got a guy that Deion identified that gave him an opportunity last year on the field,
and Nick Williams, the outside linebacker's coach guy.
He got him in Syracuse with him now.
So a shout-out to Syracuse.
But Fran Brown and Deion Sanders have two different things to accomplish this year.
Fran Brown can plan for 2027 or 2028,
because even though there was a great job done by his predecessor at Syracuse
in getting them to more of a competitive level, that wasn't enough.
But Fran Brown has a lot more leash or a lot more leeway
when it comes to being successful at Syracuse.
No, he doesn't.
No, Deion Sanders can be colorado as long as he wants
how many press conferences have you seen about syracuse
yeah because they didn't hire deon sanders fran brown we don't know who he is
but but here's the thing deon can lose and colorado's not gonna fire him
like fran brown if fran brown goes four and eight his first two years he will get fired
i'll tell you what okay i'll tell you this if fran brown makes a three win improvement
his first year he doesn't get fired it well if fran brown makes a three win improvement
they're a nine win team so yeah they're pretty good. I think most teams will take that.
Okay, I'll tell you what.
They won six last year.
Actually, no, they beat a 10-win team.
They won their bowl game.
Okay.
Now, look where Fran Brown started from, right?
Let's say they lose two, three games this year.
Let's say Fran Brown for kicks and giggles.
And I hope this doesn't happen.
And I'm pretty sure that it won't.
And I think Syracuse
is going to be pretty good.
And if Syracuse did not
perform at the rate that they wanted to, Fran
Brown would still have a job.
Fran Brown has been planning
for the future
with his recruiting.
Deion Sanders
has to take a win-now approach.
Deion Sanders, another reason why this is an Apple tool.
All right, well, I'm going to stop you here.
I'm going to stop you because he's not the only person.
Oh, go ahead.
Go ahead.
Watch this.
Watch this, Andy.
Okay.
Apple tool orange.
Pun intended, right?
Right, right.
Look at the level of talent that Fran Brown inherited.
Mm-hmm.
A seven-win team, right?
Mm-hmm.
Now, I'm about to toss you a softball.
Here you go, Andy.
Go.
Now, Andy, tell everybody, because I know you know this.
Who else started with a 1-11 team in 2023?
You set me up for this.
Yeah.
Okay.
So there were three 1-1 fbs teams in 2022
colorado northwestern usa okay okay okay all terrible horrible teams northwestern wasn't
going to fire its coach but they did it right before camp so the worst possible situation
where the guy who was supposed to be the defensive coordinator ends up having to be the head coach, David Braun. Right.
He won eight games. Seven win improvement.
David Braun got the permanent head coaching job because of that. Alex Golish takes
over at USF, former Tennessee offensive coordinator. Right.
They won six games. Seven games. I think
they won the bowl game. Yeah, seven games. I think they won the bowl game. Yeah. Seven games.
So they had a six win improvement.
So Dion's actually the worst of those guys who did that.
So the three win improvement,
which is good when compared to the other apples is actually not that great.
Oh, I'll tell you what.
So maybe it's not the reddest apple of the bunch,
but it is still a red apple.
Is a three-win improvement still good?
Now, when it's Deion Sanders who's playing now,
who's openly talked about where his expectations were for his program.
Right. Yep. It's going to sound different.
We should be talking more about Alex Golding.
We should be talking more about my guy at Northwestern who came in late, did a heck of a job in a really tenuous situation.
We don't talk about them because
they're boring. No offense to Alex
Golis. I like
Alex. No offense to David Braun. I think
David Braun was like, I want to be as boring as possible
in this first year.
Let's just
ignore all this stuff.
Here's the thing.
Three-win improvement is fine.
Okay.
Actually, I don't...
We'll see what USF and Northwestern do.
Because Northwestern,
because of the way the Big Ten schedule works out,
may take a step back.
USF, they should take another step forward.
But Colorado,
we're expecting another... Another three win improvement be great that'd
be seven and five they're in a bowl game that would be exactly where i need to be my thing with
colorado and again i'll be happy to admit i'm wrong if this doesn't work if this is not how
it works out but the way deon dumped a bunch of the guys he got in the portal last year this year
suggested me that same thing's
going to happen this year they're going to be roughly the same team my guess is one win
either side of the equation different probably about the same and that that's where it comes
like and here's the thing he ain't getting fired over that because they got Dion. They're selling tickets. Now, he may not want to deal with it, but they're not going to fire him.
Like Dion's not being held to an unfair standard.
In fact, he has more leash than any of these guys at these types of programs.
I think it's not just the leash from the program.
What I think it is, our leash is what the media puts around them.
And the media could show the media is so important in politics because they
shift the ideas of the people.
When you hear people say,
Hey,
you know,
such and such,
this channel has fake news,
depending on what part of your own people literally watch TV based on who
they believe in.
They don't care about each perspective.
And what I mean, and I bring that up to say this.
If Deion doesn't do what people think he's supposed to do,
it's going to be the number one story in sports, win or loss.
Win or lose, it's going to be the number one story.
It'll be the number one story.
Let's say they lose to Nebraska week two.
That's going to be a huge story,
but if they keep losing,
like if you get to Kansas state and,
and let's say,
okay,
so North Dakota state at Nebraska at Colorado state,
Baylor,
central Florida,
Kansas state,
let's say they are three and three at the end of the first half of the
season.
They're not gonna be a big story anymore.
Like we're gonna stop.
We will stop talking about them if they keep losing.
If they keep winning, we will talk about them more than we ever talked about them.
And Deion will be able to say, I was right.
Y'all were wrong.
The haters can shut up.
They won't, but he'll be right.
But if they keep losing, we will start to ignore them
the way we always ignored Colorado.
I can't say that.
And the reason I don't agree is because if –
how much more losing do you want to do than what they did
at the end of the year last year?
And they were still –
But I'm still giving him the benefit of the doubt
because he took over a bad roster.
Right.
I want to see it because that's my thing is I thought by this year, because of the way things were working, the rules changes and the way you can bring.
Like they would probably have one of the better rosters in the Big 12.
And we'll see. We don't have the talent composite out yet
because rosters aren't completely done.
Transfer portal's closed,
but guys haven't picked their places completely yet.
So we'll have the talent composite out.
I'll be curious to see where Colorado lands
in the talent composite.
But I don't think
they're going to be the number one team in the Big 12.
They'll probably be close.
Yeah, I think they do
have a roster that's
more competitive
of a
P5, P4 team this year.
East Coast Cavs
says Prime didn't dump anybody. The majority
of those kids just quit. Most of them hit the portal without trying to compete.
This is a case of you listening to who you want to listen to.
Of course, Prime and them are going to say they all quit.
But they cut some guys.
They cut a bunch of guys that they missed on last year.
Every team does that.
This is another thing.
You explained, Dukes.
We do hold Prime to a different standard as far as this goes
because every team cuts people.
We just only talk about it when it's him.
Yeah, I mean, if you go down and you look in the SEC of guys who missed on guys,
there were a ton of them, and a lot of guys were able to secure NIL deals
that may not have been worth the bang for that particular collective's buck
because, A, they didn't fit the system,
or, B, when they did their evaluation,
they didn't take into consideration the level of competition they were against.
And when they got these guys against these real guys that they had
in their own system, they didn't play.
Auburn had about four.
Off the top of my head, Auburn had three to four guys
who barely played last year who I know for a fact made over six figures in collective funds and i am going to collect them
i know for a fact like it's not even this is a conjecture anything yeah no one talks about these
guys they talk about the guys that are reloaded there are some guys who didn't feel like they got
a fair shake when they went in there i get it it. But the athletic isn't looking for a story, right,
from guys who came from schools at SEC schools.
They're looking for a story that's going to move people
because they care about it, because they want a reason to go.
They would like people to read the story,
the same reason we're talking about Deion today.
We want you to watch this video.
And you know what what I get it so now and this is just my opinion on what needs to happen now if I'm Deion if I'm coach prime I lean into it I create a me against the world mentality
and I get these guys to focus on fundamentals and I know for a fact Deion Sanders watched that video I had the other day.
And at the end, I said that I thought
that Coach Prime's secret weapon
was going to be that he's going to
pull off an in-home visit this year
when nobody expects it.
And it's going to be absolutely like a movie.
I think he's going to do it.
He didn't tell me he was,
but he definitely did say
he had some things to say.
He had some critiques about what I said, and he also had some praise,
and he corrected me on a few things that I keep between us.
What I will say is he didn't say I was wrong when I had my own personal message
to what I thought it should have been.
And I do think from talking to people around that program,
I think they understand how heavy the situation is
and what it doesn't just
mean to Colorado,
but what it means to every guy who grew up with that bandana on his head that
does things a little bit differently,
that colors outside the line a little bit.
It's something for everybody.
It's not just Colorado,
it's the culture.
And I think that it's pretty much going to continue to be the most polarized
story college football. Well, if he's, if he's going to continue to be the most polarizing story in college football.
Well, if he's going to do some in-home visits, that's good.
Because he's going to get some dudes that Colorado wouldn't normally be in on.
And that's my thing.
I don't care if you do stuff different.
I was happy with the way he was coming in last year
because what he was telling you is you don't have to go through this meat grinder approach to become a head coach necessarily.
You don't have to go be a GA and make 10 grand a year working 100 hours a week.
If you are a great football player, you got something to add.
You have value that you can bring to the table and you don't need to, you may not need to take all these steps, but there are certain things that you can do that are different, that are better,
where you can innovate. And then sometimes you're just being different and not doing things that
other people do. And it's a mistake. Like the not doing in-home visits, the not going to schools,
that's a mistake. Like the reason people have been doing those forever is because it works.
Sometimes things become traditions and get embedded into the culture
because they work.
So if he starts doing the things that we know work,
that's only going to help him.
That'll be good for him.
And even if he doesn't, I don't foresee coach prime doing it at the clip that other coaches do.
He doesn't need to.
And,
and,
and,
and from where he started at,
he had an immediate need to flip their roster.
And so if you had,
if there wasn't a transfer portal,
then I guarantee you he'd be doing it because he wouldn't have another
option.
We're going into transfer portal,
finding guys who have already played for his brand of coaching,
guys who have already been coached hard,
guys who already understand the standards that go along with being a college
football player,
those are the type of guys that he needs in order to be successful for how hard
the program is at colorado
a lot of guys who the guys who did stay not everybody had to go from colorado there were
a few that stayed right they can tell you the difference there are guys who have been coached
harder and scrutinized more but also loved on more than they've ever been so when you get guys who subscribe to that type
of coaching and program those would be georgia players or alabama players because that's what
they get saying that they say where you kind of want a guy with a mustache you need you need a
guy with a little mustache in your room in order to get to where you want to be that's not just
the colorado saying that's what coaches say across the country.
When you talk about a guy who's able to handle more and has more maturity.
So I think that Coach Prime decided to tackle that and say, I can flip my forges on the field faster if I attack the transfer portal.
Because let's say he gets Julian Lewis.
Julian Lewis could be committed to Colorado right now.
How many wins does Julian Lewis help you get this year?
None.
And maybe not next year either as a true freshman.
So, yeah, no, I – yeah, I get it.
I get it.
And every coach who takes over a team has to figure that out.
But the question is, is Deion trying to win?
Because Deion is not going to get fired.
Like, he's not on the, like, Billy Napier, Sam Pittman,
those are guys who are going to get fired if they don't succeed.
Right.
Deion ain't getting fired.
Deion can go 1-11, he won't get fired.
So he could build it however he wants to.
He's choosing to do it this way.
So right now, are people talking about
the blueprint
for what
to be built in the future?
Or do they have more of a problem with the architect?
And I think that's been my whole point.
It's the architect for sure.
It's the architect for sure.
That's been my whole point.
We haven't seen the building.
Yeah, but I... Here's the thing.
I've watched enough buildings get built.
I know what happens when you build them one way
and I know what happens when you build them another way.
I'll tell you what.
If this architect thinks he knows something
that every other architect who ever existed
doesn't know, congratulations.
If he's wrong.
That's the very point that I was making.
When you look at guys, Andy Staples, you have to be one of the most knowledgeable guys in the entire sport.
Not just in the media.
We're talking about the entire sport.
The respect that you get from people is is incredible now and this for basically your football knowledge you've seen it so many times that you know that if this doesn't change in your opinion from based on the fact that you know
it's not going to end well so you're one of the guys as a a cautionary guy, because, Andy, I heard your takes. You were a Colorado, not supporter.
Oh, I was like, this is going to work.
He's going to be awesome.
Yeah, no, exactly.
Right.
So now when you start to look at what the architect is doing, you're like, hey, hey, hey, no, I don't know.
And it kind of reminds me, and this is how to break it down.
It kind of reminds me of, in my 20s, I may have been dating a female.
And I may have said, who tried to cook for me?
And I'm like, no, no, no, no.
That's not how my mama do it.
But I don't know how her dish is going to turn out.
But because my mama didn't do it that way, and grandma didn't do it that way,
I think that she's automatically
frying chicken the wrong way or making pasta or spaghetti or whatever whatever here here's the
thing i don't just know how my mom did it i know how aaron franklin smokes a brisket
i know how uh mr french laundry thomas keller makes a foie gras. I've never been to the French Lingerie. I can't afford it.
But I know how all these great chefs cook.
I've seen it.
I've also been to some really crappy restaurants, and I know how they work too.
So I'm just using that information right now.
I'm not going just on what my mom made.
Because let's be honest, my mom made the best chocolate
chip cookies in the world i have improved on that recipe okay you come to the house you'll find out
but but yeah i mean that's my thing is is it's not it's not a disbelief in dion for me at this
point it is a disbelief in this method, which I have seen tried, you know, who actually tried something like this.
Charlie Weiss at Kansas.
It ruined Kansas.
Okay.
Like it.
Now it was with Juco's.
It was a different era, but this is not that dissimilar.
The churn and all that.
Now, fortunately, it won't ruinado because now you can bring in as many
players as you want every year like kansas you can only bring in 25 they got in that that roster
hole like that won't happen in colorado and the thing is it can be fixed immediately all he has
to do is start recruiting in a way that uses the portal but also builds a little bit through the high school.
Like, uh, we've seen Mike Norvell do it at Florida state.
Like he's doing, he, he set the new blueprint of how you do it. Like when get guys through the portal, start winning.
Now you're getting better guys through the high school ranks.
Like, you know, we, we haven't talked much about his high school classes.
In fact, I think the, probably the biggest story of Mike Norvell's high school recruiting
is Dion flipping Travis Hunter away from Florida state.
So that, but they had more top 200 guys at Florida state last, last recruiting class
than any year they've had since Jimbo Fisher left.
Like that is a big deal. That helps them going forward,
but it ain't like they've stopped in the transfer portal.
So there is a model similar to what Dion is doing that works.
It's just not what Dion's doing.
So yeah, I can't.
Now we have a comment here from JD
that I've been sitting here looking at
for the last 10 minutes.
I'm hoping maybe you can explain it to me.
I don't know.
I feel like this is just unnecessary.
But all I'm saying is Deion's defense was Mariah Carey ass last year.
I don't know how much better they'll be.
Why does Mariah Carey have to catch a stray here?
Like, I mean, Mariah Carey.
This is a 55-year-old woman, by the way.
Yeah, and I'm wondering, like, when I think about ass, Mariah Carey is not first.
No.
But, yeah, I mean, was it high-pitched?
Maybe. It was a high-pitched? Maybe.
It was a high-pitched defense.
It had a large vocal range.
No, I just – that comment's been sitting there staring at me like,
what does it mean?
Yeah, I mean – but, yeah, okay, the defense did leave a lot to be desired,
right?
And I think one of the biggest problems with the defense was pass rush and
they're a bit and dip i don't think they had a lot of quality dip and the reason okay so they
got a five-star the high school kamarney mclean who i think had all the tools to be one of the
top cornerbacks he i mean he's athletically gifted and he's a guy who had pretty much all
the intangibles that you needed in order to be a really good cornerback.
And you would think that a five-star guy rated as highly as him
by pretty much every recruiting ranking site,
you would think a guy like that could go in and play,
especially could go play in the Pac-12.
Well, he couldn't.
And I think it was the thing.
I don't blame Deion for Cormani.
I think Deion tried for Cormani. I think Dion tried with Cormani.
That's one of those things that you have to, like, you understand this very well.
You cover recruiting very deeply.
Like, you know these guys.
You weren't surprised by that, I imagine.
I think a lot of people who covered Cormani's recruitment weren't surprised by the way this worked out.
Yeah, and it's not a wasn't surprised thing to jump on the kid, but I think that for a guy out of high school, if you don't find that fit, that perfect fit, you've got to be 1,000% finding the perfect fit to be successful in Power 5 football, Power 4 football.
You've got to find the perfect fit to be successful in power five football, power four football, you've got to find a perfect
fit to be successful year one.
And I think that, I mean, the one thousand, nothing can be off.
When you look at the guys who were successful last year, everything worked in their favor.
Let's talk about a guy who was really successful at Auburn last year, Kane Lee, who was a cornerback
that came in, who played, he was a high four-star guy who flipped from Ohio State at the end,
but he was one of the more highly rated defensive backs
that Auburn had had in years.
Well, he ran into the perfect storm at Auburn.
There were injuries in the secondary.
He had a secondary, a cornerbacks coach that was able to speak his language,
that was able to get to him, and then he played in the system
that allowed him to play fast because there were a lot of concepts
that he ran in high school.
So all of this had to happen in order, and then his talent took over.
Well, there was a lot that had to happen for that.
So when we talk about guys like Kermani McClain,
who weren't able to turn that switch on, going to a program like Colorado
versus guys who, let's talk about a deal in networks.
Yep.
Dylan Edwards, I feel like he had a successful season.
I think he's somebody that Colorado would miss,
and he's somebody I don't think that Colorado wanted to let go,
but that's part of the transfer portal.
I don't think anybody at Colorado told him to leave.
I think what happened was he was a guy who liked 75% to 80% of the transfer portal of Power 5 guys or Power 4 guys who go to other P4 schools.
Those are the guys you focus on.
The guys who get other opportunities at those type of schools where you kind of get a litmus test on what's going on with your program. When you're losing a ton of P4 guys that go to other P4 schools
and successful, then you've got to look around and say,
well, how much of production did you lose last year?
And I'm not sure if people have really focused on that when it comes to,
like my man said, like, hey, well, they were A-double-S,
so they were ass on defense last year.
How can they afford to lose so many people well how much did you actually lose well and okay that this is this
is a good question because you're right i i always look at where your offers coming from when you hit
the portal are they similar schools are they better schools there were schools and yet they
did not lose anybody for the most part dylan edwards is the is the one i would say that they were schools and yet they did not lose anybody for the most part dylan edwards
is the is the one i would say that they didn't want to but they didn't lose a lot of guys that
they wanted they didn't want to lose but a lot of the guys they lost were guys they brought in from
the portal last year and it's just like we're gonna replace like you were here for a year we're
gonna replace you with another guy who's just here you don're going to replace, like you were here for a year. We're going to replace you with another guy.
Who's just here.
You don't build depth that way.
Like the problem comes in, like when they have some injuries, I actually think they're probably pretty good on their first 22.
Right.
I don't know how good their offensive defensive lines will be.
Skill position wise.
They're very good.
Um, my concern is you have a couple of injuries and now you've got now you've
got real problems because how you build depth is through high schools is through developing guys
who've been in your program and when you churn them that fast it's very hard to be able to plug
somebody in and and have them be able to perform but we'll see
again i may be wrong uh ryan in the chat this is very astute observation i hadn't thought about it
this way prime is bizarro dabo he is he's the mirror image of dabo like okay so dabo won't
use the transfer portal, right?
Dabo's great at getting dudes out of high school and developing them,
but he won't use the transfer portal.
So they'll have these positions.
Wide receiver's been the one lately.
Offensive line occasionally.
They'll have these positions where they have a weakness,
and he won't just go in the portal and fix it.
And you're like, all you have to do is get like three guys,
and you can play for the national championship.
What are you doing?
But he won't do it.
Right.
Prime's the same thing.
Like, all you got to do is get some like high three-star,
low four-star guys who are going to come and be in your program
for a couple of years.
And that's going to be your backbone going forward.
And then you bring in these dudes from the portal,
especially the higher profile dudes,
like when you can get a Travis Hunter,
obviously he came with Deion, but like that type of player.
Like that's when you do it.
If you could just be the happy medium between these two guys,
you know who you'd be?
Who would you be?
You'd be Mike Norvell.
You'd be Lane Kiffin.
I could go for that.
But as we both know, he doesn't want to be the medium.
No, he wants to be coach prime and i know and that's here's the thing though like this is the beauty of this is if being coach prime in the
way you originally conceived being coach prime doesn't work do something else. Make it work. Like, don't be stubborn about it. Right.
I think where we are now, we'll find out how the building looks.
We'll find out how the foundation really stands up this year.
I think last year they raised the talent level at Colorado last year
because they did get four wins.
Maybe they didn't raise it as far as Northwestern raised it.
Maybe they didn't raise it as far as Northwestern raised it. Maybe they didn't raise it as far.
And really and truly, how much talent did Northwestern add
from that 1-11 team?
None.
They actually got worse.
They had dudes leave.
East Coast Kev says Northwestern didn't beat anybody relevant.
Bad example.
They almost lost to Howard.
Colorado didn't beat anybody relevant. Bad example. They almost lost to Howard. Colorado didn't beat anybody relevant.
They also lost to Stanford.
Ellicott-Lumner just made another catch.
And if you look at some of those games, some of those games, I mean,
a couple of those games they shouldn't have lost.
Like, absolutely not have.
They shouldn't.
So I think that there's something that comes with being a second year.
Like, let's take the K-pop, Deion.
Let's take everything off Coach Prime.
Let's just talk about –
Right, we just make him another coach now.
Yeah.
We're making him another coach right now, just for this second.
Every experience comes with every coach.
I don't care what it is.
If you do something repetitively, you will get better.
The more I talk on this microphone, the better I will get.
Andy, the more you make those chocolate chip cookies,
the better they'll get, the easier it'll become.
They can't get any better than they are now.
I've achieved the pinnacle.
I just think that from Coach Prime being the second year
as a Power 5,
Power slash Power 4 coach, his second year, he's going to get better at some things.
There are going to be some game management situations.
There are going to be some second-half adjustments.
When you see some of the things that we saw last year where you couldn't get a guy blocked
who was standing in Shad should do his face scheming him
having those conversations watching that film finding the holes in the roof and plugging them
i think that he gets better just by being able to be a second year coach now this is just me
and i wouldn't care who it was i think you freeze gets better this year he's been doing it for a
long time this is the same thing i said about kirby smart remember kirby smart can't win the big one after after 2017 2018 i'm like the dude
is new with this he just started and now we don't we don't think about that anymore with kirby smart
he's been doing this a while and then you know it's a slippery slope because then they say well
deon shouldn't have had the job because what did he win to get the job? He was the greatest cornerback of all time and he sold a bunch of tickets.
See, that's where I disagree with people. I understand
exactly why he's got the job. I have no argument with that at all.
Nobody was talking about Colorado. Nobody
was buying tickets to go see Colorado. They are selling out.
He has done what he was hired to
do look at what it did at jackson state now i know they said okay what's hbcu football but
there are great coaches in the hbcu league and they're all and and dion in the FCS had a great record.
He did.
So it's not like he's getting his job without merit,
but he also got the job.
There was everything that you get with him.
If he was losing at Jackson State, he doesn't get that job.
Period.
No, no.
He had to win there.
Yeah.
If he was a horrible coach, what if he goes one to 11?
Like you did, he could have went one to 11.
He didn't, but nothing, nothing would have happened at that point.
Cause again, he could go one 11 this year.
He won't get fired.
He's if Dion doesn't win by year three,
I think they're going to have to have a serious conversation.
I think he would leave first.
I think he would leave before anybody would do anything to him because he is still – that's the part –
I don't think – because there was a comment in the chat earlier about it's a results-based business.
Yeah, but results mean different things.
Right.
Deion fills up your coffers.
Deion sells out your stadium. Right. Dion fill Dion fills up your coffers. Dion sells out your stadium.
Right.
And there's,
there's the,
there's the comment from crunch time sports advantage network.
The method won't matter for Dion.
If the results aren't there,
this is a results based business.
I disagree.
Like he will get more time than anybody else because he sells tickets.
He keeps your,
your athletic department flush.
Like he keeps you in the news.
Like we have spent Dukes. We've spent 47 minutes talking about this today.
We had other things we were going to talk about.
I had Auburn questions.
I can bring you back on later this week to ask you the Auburn questions I had for you.
Because we still got to talk a little Penn State with Sean Fitz.
But this is the power.
This is the power. Talk to all TV. I'm not sure if this person's talking about the people in the comments or us. I'm afraid it might be us.
Bunch of old senior citizen MFC, you're away from death in here. Hating on Prime is crazy.
Yeah. I ain't that close. It can't be me, man. I don't know. I don't know i don't know dukes so that video you made you explain the
whole tim mccarver situation if you don't know about deon and tim mccarver you can google it
but this is a this is an event that happened in 1992 i was a freshman in high school i was on team
deon and that one pretty pretty squarely but as i was watching you talk about that, I'm like,
Dukes is old.
Me.
Dukes is old.
We old.
Yeah.
Yeah, man.
I mean,
I think in that,
uh,
92,
I was in fourth grade.
Um,
and not understanding.
East coast.
Kevin's back.
Why don't you pull up Northwestern schedule from last year and
compare it to who Colorado played?
They both played Utah, and Northwestern beat them.
Right?
Yeah.
Am I wrong on that?
Did Colorado not play Utah?
Northwestern lost to Nebraska, and Colorado beat Nebraska.
So we got that one in Colorado's favor.
Northwestern did almost lose to Howard.
That was 23-20.
Northwestern did beat Minnesota, Wisconsin, Purdue, Illinois.
None of that's particularly impressive, but I don't know.
They're all better than Stanford, which Colorado lost to.
So...
See, Purdue was four, Nate.
Yeah. And Ryan Walters did was four, Nate. Yeah.
Yeah, Ryan Walters did not have a great first year.
What did Illinois do last year?
Illinois was not that good either.
Illinois was – I want to say they were five and seven.
Yes, five and seven.
So –
I mean – and this is to East Coast Kev.
East Coast Kev, I get what you're saying, and I respect it.
Yeah, do I think it could have been differently?
Those are one of those things that we'll never know, right?
But what I do know is that Deion and Coach Prime in Colorado,
they had higher expectations for themselves,
and I really truly believe that if dion was okay with how that season
went then that same coaching staff would be in place now that's gonna be a fun one though
say it again that's gonna be a fun one though because the the sean lewis thing now look sean
lewis probably leave anyway he ended up getting a head coaching job.
But the panic move of demoting him, changing the offense last year,
like they're changing the offense to something that's going to require
the line to give Shador more time.
The line didn't give Shador any time last year.
He got sacked a ton.
So now you go to an offense that's going to require him to have more time
to throw?
I mean, but on the flip side of that, yes, because of the play action part of it.
But by going to a more traditional pro-style offense, you create more time because you're
taking that safety from six yards back to 11.
So now when you take that guy out of the box, are you able to run the ball more consistently
where you have a little bit of a guessing game and you're not just keying in because you have guys who are able to –
I don't think it matters what they do with the safety if their four can beat your five at the quarterback.
And that's the problem.
Yeah, it does. But if the four can beat your five by pinning their ears back
because they know there's no repercussion if they get caught up field.
And that's what I think happened last year.
There wasn't any penalty for getting caught up field
or overrunning your rush lanes.
You were able to pin your ears back against Colorado every game
because you knew what was coming.
From first to third, you could do it.
And if you could create some type of multiplicity in what you do on first down,
then can you make them pay on first down?
And I think that's what it boils down to.
Now, to your point, to your point, pass protection isn't just about having guys.
It's about gelling as a unit.
And it's about having depth because
one guy can make an offensive line bad
if he's out of sync. You got a
terrible guard, well, he impacts
everyone.
I've been that terrible guard
before.
I said I've been that terrible guard before.
We got to help Andy.
Somebody help Andy.
That is 100% true. We're going to see it. guard before we got to help Andy somebody help me so no that that that is a hundred percent true
and we're going to see it that's that's the beauty of all this we're going to see it on the field
this is a lovely thing to talk about in May we get fired up but ultimately he will either prove us
correct or incorrect on the field and I cannot wait and dukes i had so many
auburn questions for you you mind coming back later this week man bring me back anytime andy
all right dukes appreciate it philip dukes the great dukes the scoop if you are not subscribed
to the on three recruits channel do it now so you can watch the five star flex if you liked what you
saw today and i know you did i'm looking at the comments right now.
You're going to love seeing Dukes day in, day out.
Dukes, we'll talk to you later this week.
All right.
All right.
Did not think that was going to go as long as it did, but look,
we get fired up.
We get fired up.
But first I got to tell you about game time before we talk
Penn State. Like if you want to see all these new Penn State opponents, like they are playing USC,
they're playing UCLA. They get Wisconsin this year, which was an old Big Ten opponent,
but that wasn't a year in, year out opponent. You want to follow the Nittany Lions.
Use that code staples on the game time app. Get 20 bucks off your first person. You want to follow the Nittany Lions. Use that code staples on the game time app.
Get 20 bucks off your first person.
You want to watch Colorado.
Colorado opens with North Dakota State.
Then they play Nebraska.
Then they go into,
they play Colorado State.
They get a big 12 schedule.
Like they're going to Orlando to play UCF at the bounce house.
You want to go see Coach Prime
and go to Disney World same time.
You can do that with game time.
They have tickets, last minute tickets too.
So I was in Jacksonville over the weekend.
I had to go to my kids game.
They were playing up there.
I'm having dinner before the game and I see all these people dressed up like they're going
to a country show and I'm like, wait a second, what's going on here?
Oh, Luke Combs is playing at the Jaguar Stadium.
This was like 45 minutes before the concert started and I could get in for 67 bucks on game
time. So if I hadn't had to go to the game, I could have just gone to the show with a game time
ticket. So download that game time app, redeem the code staples, get $20 off your first purchase. I'm telling you, it is the best
way to get your tickets, especially last minute, especially when it's those highly sought after
sold out events. Go to game time, redeem code staples, $20 off your first purchase.
Now, the question I was going to ask Dukes about Auburn, and we're going to talk about this later in this week, is I have a thing that I say pretty often where I say this coach may or may not realize that their
job is to win the national title. And I say that about places like Auburn, like Georgia,
like Florida, like Texas. We made a list during Dear Andy the other day, and we were trying to figure out what is the list
of these schools? Who's on this list? Who's in the group? Which coaches should feel that pressure?
And I'm not just talking about from the fan base. I'm also talking about from the administration.
So the one I couldn't kind of figure out, the one I just didn't know where to put was Penn State.
So we're bringing on Sean Fitz from Blue White
Illustrated. I'm going to ask him that question because he understands that situation a lot better
than most of us do. And so I want to see like, what is the real pressure on James Franklin?
Is it from the fan base, from the administration? How does that all work? So here is Sean Fitz. We welcome Sean Fitz from Blue White Illustrated. And I said we had to have
Sean on the other day. We were doing the Dear Andy show and I got asked to explain something I say a
lot. And it is, I'm talking about a certain coach and I'll say this guy's job is to win the national title,
whether he realizes it or not. And I said it a lot when Brian Harsin was coaching at Auburn.
I've said it a lot about Billy Napier at Florida. And I realized those guys weren't about to win
the national title, but their fans think they should be. And their administration tends to
go along with that. And they'll, they'll fire coaches for that and so we made a list and i said i gotta have sean on because i don't know if i should put penn state
on this list like i think i know where the fans are at sean but i don't think the the penn state
administration is the type of of group that's gonna be like well your job's to win the national
title if you if you don't start making progress you're out of here like i i don't i don't get that sense am i where am i off i don't think from an administration standpoint
by the way thanks for having me on again love the show um i don't think that from an administrative
standpoint that the penn state's there it's it's never been the ruthless cut them up type of you
know if you don't win this x amount of games then then you're out of the door. And to be on James Franklin's side here, he has won X amount of games.
He has won 11 games four times and 10 games last season.
So to me, it's more about the currency changing in terms of wins.
Like with the playoff, it's very different than it ever has been.
From an administrative standpoint, I don't think so.
You look at what Penn State has done, and they've been through the muck, obviously, after the Sandusky stuff.
They've switched presidents.
They've switched athletic directors.
Pat Kraft there now, I think, is a big Franklin ally.
And I think Neely Bendipudi, the new president as well.
There's a lot more alignment, and that's something that James Franklin –
and actually, if you talk to all of his – all the people in that building, it's just, it's easier to get things done.
And for the longest time, Penn State has been an administrative bureaucratic nightmare in terms of getting stuff done.
Joe Paterno was able to do what he could do, like in terms of making phone calls, making guys, you know, do just get the job done.
Very few questions asked. Obviously you have the Sandusky stuff. You have
the, the, the post Sandusky stuff where they have to jump through all the red tape and then there's
more red tape at the other end of that. And then all of a sudden it's, it's very different. It's
very different to get things done. You went through the, uh, the, the facilities arms race,
which I don't know if it's dead, but it's, you know, it is moved to a different battlefield in
terms of NIL. And, you know, that was really hard for Penn State to deal with and navigate those waters.
And, of course, the money that comes with it.
And now you find yourself sort of in a similar situation with NIL.
And they're kind of struggling in terms of, you know, finding the whales and finding the right people to foot that bill.
And we can argue all the time about why the system is not the optimal system to get that done, to have fans pay that bill, which is not.
But Penn State is still, you is still struggling in that aspect.
So I think from an administrative standpoint, they're better than they've been in a long time.
And I think that that's okay and that's in the right direction.
They're pretty well aligned, but I don't think this is a situation where
if Bo Pelini wins only nine games, he's out the door.
This is not that situation.
Well, and I've got some good news for you on the NIL front,
because that house case settlement probably means all of this is coming
under the umbrella of the athletic department.
So Pat Kraft and company will be in charge of that from, from now on.
It probably will make that part easier,
but I like that you pointed that out because I know I'm not sure I like,
I'm sure most Penn State fans understand this.
I don't know that the average fan of somebody else who watches a lot of Penn State football on Saturdays understands this.
It was the bureaucratic nightmare is the right way to describe it.
Like James Franklin lost a beloved director of football operations because they would not give the man a title.
Not extra money, just wouldn't put a title on his name and like now it seems like under pat craft it they operate
a little more similar to michigan ohio state you know the sec schools on that front well you came
out of the sandusky stuff and it was the penn State will do anything to win at football mantra you know nationally that was the the thing that they had to overcome and because of that you saw I don't
want to call it equality but you saw Penn State draw back football in in favor of some other
things to make it appear as if football was not the king this is college football like you this
is this is why you have the show college football is is the cash cow. College football is king, and you have to treat it as such,
and you got to treat it with NIL facilities and all that kind of stuff
to pour in the money, to make the money, to, you know,
Penn State's got a ton of varsity teams that they have to support with football.
And I think that this administration is kind of on board with that.
And I think that that, I'm not saying everything is in the past
because it's, you know, it's never easy with anything anything really but uh everything is much easier than it used to be fewer phone calls need
to be made fewer uh papers need to be filled out Etc um and it's and it's and I think Penn State's
kind of gotten past that win it all cost above everything you know that they had to deal with
in the last 10 years yeah and the thing was that that came from a very
specific thing they were not acting like that in terms of how they spent their money and that's the
difference and now i i will say it seems like those schools i've had on my list they have for
a long time basically given the coach whatever the coach wants and they expect results
from that. So that might change the administrative view of things as, as they go forward, but also
it's a different world, expanded playoff, expanded big 10 different schedules. I saw one of the
sports books came out with, with lines recently for, for some different Penn state games. There
looks like they're gonna be favored against usc and favored against wisconsin and not that far off from ohio state which is i mean ohio state
maybe the most talented team in the country and i that one kind of shocked me a little bit
there's such a base here in terms of like you feel like if you don't win double digit games
it's a failure but also there's that you feel if you don't make the playoff and win 11 games, it's a it's very like I said, the currency of wins has changed so much, especially here, because it's it's I'm not saying it's never good enough.
But like when you lose coming out of the Big Ten East, when you lose to Ohio state and you lose to Michigan pretty much every
year for the last several cycles, it's going to wear on people. And that's fans. That's,
that's coaches, that's administrations, that's players. And that's, you know,
recruiting is going to, you know, not, not take a hit for it, but it's going to pop up.
It's going to be apparent. So I think that that's really what you're coming up coming against is
like, uh, I liken it to, uh, Clark griswold at the grand canyon he gets there there's
beautiful majestic the grand canyon and you put your arm around uh ellen and you look okay great
and we got to get to the next thing it's the next thing it's the playoff it's a national
championship and you know wally world the four-man playoff is it wasn't there for penn state and
we've talked on the show before about how the 12 team playoff is it wasn't there for Penn State. And we've talked on the show before about how the 12 team playoff can probably benefit Penn State or would have benefited Penn State more than any other program in the country. So I think that's kind of where things are there. It's just just waiting for that next thing. I mean, Penn State's national championships. The last one was 1986. I was two years old. I turned 40 this year. That's a long time ago. And you can argue obviously 1994 should have should have been a national championship for them as well. But we're not doing that show today.
We can re-litigate with the Nebraska fans. They're all in the same league now.
Sean Callahan, man, he's a great dude. I know you love to have him on.
I would love to have you guys debate something that happened when you were
each eight years old. it would, it would be tremendous.
But yeah, so I guess the 2016 probably qualifies as getting to Wally world and it's closed. I think that's, that's probably the, we're going to torture that analogy a little bit more,
but let's talk about where Penn state's at right now, because the transfer portal is closed. They
had a little activity there, a little flurry there at the very end uh it seemed like in that that group that jumped in uh Malik McLean
London Montgomery uh Golden Israel achumba King Mac it seems like King Mac the the safety is the
one that would would sting the most yeah that's the one that I look at and not only 2024 he's the
fourth safety Penn State's gonna play a lot of three safety looks this year.
So, you know, you got a guy that gets a stinger or something,
and all of a sudden he's a starter.
That one hurts because I think looking at the potential that he had to come in
and, you know, not only play a role this year, but also start in 2025,
that one really hurts.
He's an aggressive player.
I think he's going to, wherever he ends up, he's going to be a player.
Like, this is not one of those ones.
Like, we have this thing where a guy leaves and the previous sites, fans, message boards, whatever, says, ah, it's not a big deal.
I think this one's a big deal for Penn State.
They were not happy to lose King Mack.
It's a tough one.
He's a South Florida kid.
So, like, we're in central Pennsylvania here.
It's a long way from South Florida.
And, you know, things are,
things are different here. And from a football standpoint it's going to hurt
Penn state. It's going to be tough to sort of sort of visualize like why that
move was made,
but I think you'll see him land in a good program and be a really good player.
You know,
I think the people who really follow Penn state closely understand that.
And I think when, when people see a guy who didn't play,
maybe you don't always understand how important that depth is.
Because it seems like that's where this era is hurting the good teams.
It takes that depth away where if somebody got hurt,
that's the first person who would have been in.
And I look at Florida State's roster,
and it is full of those guys from Georgia and Alabama. And like, you wonder what's the injury for Georgia or Alabama
that would really make that sting. And, and with Penn state, it's, it's obvious if they lose a
safety and go, Oh, here's where King Mack would have been in Malik. McLean's an interesting one
to me because I remember his first spring at Florida State. I thought he's going to be the biggest impact guy in that class.
He's going to be awesome.
He didn't really do much at Penn State and hadn't done much at Florida State.
So he's moving on.
The receiving core, the Keiondre Lambert-Smith transfer, I do want to talk about that because he was the leading receiver last year.
He leaves after they get Julian Fleming in from Ohio State.
How did that decision-making process go down?
How much time we got?
Keandre has always been a case study here in terms of what we're looking at.
Very physically talented. There's a lot that came along with it as a number you know a number one receiver kind of fizzled out during the during the end of the 2023
season uh just uh three catches in his last four games i think it was um and that was that was
tough and then penn state goes to the transfer portal as we knew they would um goes to the
transfer portal gets julian fleming um fleming i don't think he's a number one receiver at penn
state but um there's you know it but it's kind of a shallow pool.
Trey Wallace, I think, is going to be that guy.
He's a really talented guy that just hasn't been able to be healthy.
But you look at what's in that room, and they needed some sort of reset.
I know my colleague Nate Bauer said this winter that they were probably going to essentially blow it up.
It didn't happen in the winter transfer portal.
It did happen in the spring transfer portal,
but Keandre went through spring ball,
you know,
and these guys talk,
these guys know what,
what other figures are floating around and things like that.
And I think it was a,
a bit of a,
a jockeying there.
And Keandre thought that he was probably undercompensated for what he was
trying to do.
And,
and maybe thought that other guys were,
were being treated better.
And I think that that's where he found himself.
And,
you know,
it's,
it's tough once you cross the line,
it's tough to come back from that once you've convinced yourself of,
of those things.
So yeah,
it's going to be interesting to see how that one comes together at
Auburn.
Like I said,
all the physical talent there,
like he's got,
he's got a lot going for him there.
It's just gotta,
gotta turn some things around in,
in other areas and,
you know, we'll see what happens.
I think a lot of us have felt like that at jobs where you feel like you're at the place you've
been for a while. Maybe you moved up the ladder there and everybody kind of still views you as
that guy who showed up. And then you have somebody else come in, they make a new hire and it's like,
oh wait, they're giving that guy all this and but i've been here doing this all along and then you go to the other place and you get the
recognition and the the money like and i've had it situated where you get the money you wanted
and it's like okay oh wait now you better perform like they are they are counting on you they have
they've made this investment like you better perform perform. So yeah, I mean, he's going to have to do that at Auburn
because now that he's the new shiny object
and probably Julian Fleming was the new shiny object
at Penn State.
And it's amazing how like the dynamics of this
are not any different from the dynamics of us at work.
The difference is we're following it so closely.
We have message boards. Yeah, it's going to be very interesting to follow that one
because, you know, as, as you know, it's, it's more, you know, it's, it's more expensive to go
out and bring somebody in than it is to retain. And that's, you've got a certain budget where you
try and keep your guys happy and you try to keep everyone, you know, individually, you know, just
sort of motivated in that sense, in that sense. And then all of a sudden you bring in a guy that's going to
cost, uh, twice as much as, for instance, twice as much as, as, as retention costs. And that's,
that's tough to get over, man. Like, and, and I get it. There's a lot that there's a lot of play
here and there's a lot of, uh, respect, disrespect, all that kind of stuff. But yeah, when it comes
down to it, it's, it's, it's going to be football and it's going to be very interesting to see how Keandre can, can, can put it together
in that last year. Like I said, I've, I've always been a fan of his physical talent. There's a lot
that goes with it. And if he can put it together, Auburn could have something there. And it's,
it's just a matter of, of finding the right to turn it over the right stones. So I don't know
how it's going to work out down there, but you know, more power to him for, for, you know, going to him for going about it and getting it the way that he wanted to get it.
So that's what happens.
On the subject of receivers with physical talent, you mentioned Trey Wallace.
And that's a guy that comes into this season with big expectations and big hopes.
Because it feels like if Penn State can develop a dynamic passing game or at
least a threat of being able to beat you downfield it changes everything for that offense yeah the
hope is that Andy Kotelnicki the new offensive coordinator can do more with less he's done that
at Kansas he did that at Buffalo so you've got plenty to work you know plenty of of track record
to work with but you know this is this is. On the field, we're going to see what happens with that.
You've got Trey Wallace, who I think is a really talented athlete,
just does everything right except stay on the field.
Like, he's been hurt a lot, and that's something you can't overlook
when you're talking about depth and consistency.
And consistency has been the word for Penn State's receiver group
because they've gone through, I believe, four coaches in the last six years.
You know, it's not something that's just turning the corner right now.
This is something that's been bubbling because of recruiting, because of development, because
of just everything that comes down at receiver.
So you've got those guys.
You've got Fleming.
You've got Omari Evans, who's another talented, really, really fast kid that can work in there.
Liam Clifford, Caden Saunders.
So you've got pieces.
It's very interesting to me how the dynamics of this room will work because you brought in Julian Fleming not only to be a productive guy and he's a, you know, he's a what I would label possession guy.
Like he played the third or fourth receiver role at Ohio State and played it fairly well.
But like he's also going to teach your young guys how to work.
And I think that that's very important.
That's the important thing in terms of Omari Evans,
in terms of Caden Saunders, to develop these guys
is putting them in a mindset of how to develop them at Ohio State.
And, you know, you don't want to say that out loud
from a Penn State perspective,
but that's the best room in the country over there.
They're pretty good at receiver at Ohio State.
So any tips they can get would be handy would be handy. Now you mentioned Andy Kotelnicki and his offense
at Kansas was, was a blast to watch. Now watching the spring game, which did not include multiple
Penn State starting offensive linemen, like they weren't going to show us anything in that game.
What do you, like whose role do you expect to be a little bit different or, or how, how do you like? Whose role do you expect to be a little bit different or how do you expect things to be different, say, for Drew Aller in this offense under Andy Kolnicki?
I think even though with all the turnover that they had in the offensive line that they're going to try and run the football quite a bit.
They've got Nick Singleton. They've got K-Tron Allen. And they can also use those guys as receivers.
You can put Singleton in motion, put him in the slot and, you know you just play your matchups a little bit better it seemed like penn state was very cookie cutter in terms of last year and you mentioned
that andy kodelnicki's offense was very fun to watch at kansas they haven't had a fun one a fun
offense to watch here for a while like and that's just from an entertainment that's joe moorhead
really yeah yeah i mean it's been saquon barkley tends to make things fun yeah he does he did those
things he still does those things uh but trace mcsorley, Mike Kosick, just the guys that they had in line.
And I don't know that they have that receiver to make it as fun on a consistent basis.
But they've got some talent to work with all over the roster.
The tight ends are pretty good.
Tyler Warren's a pretty good tight end.
You've got the running backs.
And still, this team is going to be defense-focused.
Tom Allen is going to be the guy that sort of steadies this.
It's going to be different than Manny Diaz,
but it can be productive.
We know Tom Allen's pretty good football coach.
So I think that you're going to see more of that.
And it's just how much out of the shell can Andy Kodelnik,
can Kodelnik take them?
I don't know.
I think that,
you know,
you take the spring game,
you throw it out.
Not only did you not see an offense,
you also had 40 mile an hour winds that,
you know, it was, it was not, it it was a it was right garbage day just a terrible
day the next day was 70 degrees and sunny it was ridiculous um same things with luke luke combs was
here two weeks or last weekend it was the same exact thing crappy day on saturday great day on
sunday that's what we get in central pennsylvania in april it's that's part of the deal that we
signed up for that's br that is brutal. I I was in Jacksonville
for a a lacrosse game this weekend. The same time Luke
Combs was playing the football stadium there and they got the
perfect night. They they got the perfect night for that one.
Unfortunately, I was I was a few miles away but you know,
you mentioned and and I will because Penn State does have a
personnel grouping that that is intriguing here. Because what
Kotelicki would do at Kansas, they had Jalen Daniels, obviously very dynamic quarterback,
but they played Jason Bean a lot too, because Jalen Daniels frequently hurt. So when they were
both healthy, Andy Kotelicki had situations where he would put them both on the field at the same time and i realized that drew allard is not
a jaylen daniels type quarterback but broke perbula is and i could see it you definitely
could see it um and i think penn state fans they're a little scarred because they tried to
do that a couple years ago with tommy stevens in the lion position and it was very interesting for
a couple plays and then it became the same thing it was kind of like how the t formation evolved and t formation was
deadly and then all of a sudden last year they kind of you know it kind of got stifled so the
evolution of the offense at Penn State seems to go up and then plateau and then that's what you've
had um but yes Bo I think Bo is a better fit for the system overall just in terms of his athleticism
doesn't have the talent doesn't have the arm't have the talent, doesn't have the arm.
He has talent.
He doesn't have the same arm talent that Drew has.
But it's very interesting to see how that's going to work.
And I think Penn State fans so scarred by that, as you often get.
This is kind of the theme of our conversations here.
Penn State fans scarred by X.
You're going to see Bo on the field.
You're going to see him sort of bring that playmaking ability. But from a down-to-down basis, you're going to see Bo on the field. You're going to see him sort of bring that playmaking ability.
But from a down-to-down basis, you're going to stick with Allard.
And I'm very curious to see what the short to intermediate passing game gives you,
because I don't know that I look at this roster and see that anybody's going to
just kill you down the field or, you know, be, you know,
you look at those Joe Moorhead offenses.
Mike Kosicki was such a threat because he could beat you down the field,
even though he wasn't, you know, he wasn't a 4-4 guy or anything like that. more head offenses mike kasicki was such a threat because he could beat you down the field even
though he wasn't you know he wasn't a 4-4 guy or anything like that but like his size and that
thing and then that combination really you know put them over the top and made them dangerous
um so you're gonna you're gonna have to find those guys is tyler warren that guy i don't know
is uh you know are any of those receivers that guy i don't know but i do think we see more in
terms of a passing game with through the running backs that can make things work.
Well, I cannot wait to see it.
Sean, thank you so much.
And now I know that Penn State does not have to be on that list.
Maybe they win some games, go to some playoffs,
and they do get on that list.
But right now, James Franklin, enjoy.
Breathe, because you don't have to deal with that.
As a college football coach, they don't breathe.
That's something that went away for about 15 years but that is true
Sean thank you so much my pleasure so we put a poll in the chat do you think Penn State will
make the 12 team playoff this year uh 42 yes 58 no it's actually closer than that like if you go
to the fan duel odds they're close to 50 50 in terms of it you can you know you can bet on yes
they will no they won't and it's it's basically even money at this point for Penn State in the
12 team playoff and that's really the question,
because it feels like they've been on the cusp.
Had there been a 12-team playoff,
they would have made it a bunch of times.
Does it make a difference when they're getting in?
That's the question.
Like, do they get in and win some games?
Do they get in and they still don't beat the teams
that are actually competing for the national title.
And that's kind of where the rubber meets the road for Penn State.
So we're going to find out this season
because they should theoretically be able to make the playoff.
Now the Big Ten's deeper, tougher this year, so maybe not,
but we're going to find out.
On Tuesday, join us.
Pete Nacos will come update us on the stragglers,
the last ones left in the transfer portal,
trying to find that new home.
The portal is now closed.
You don't have to have picked your team yet.
Still a few guys out there, including General Booty.
Where will General Booty's booty land next season?
We'll talk about it tomorrow.