Andy & Ari On3 - Donald Trump, Nick Saban and an oil billionaire walk into college football

Episode Date: May 8, 2025

President Donald Trump is forming a commission on college sports, and he’s reportedly tapping former Alabama coach Nick Saban and Texas Tech donor (and oil billionaire) Cody Campbell to co-chair it.(0:00-10:05) Intro: President Trump forming Presidential Commission(10:06-21:16) Will there be a super league?(21:17-30:39) Watch us LIVE on YouTube, Wrapping up Presidential Commission(30:40-34:30) House v NCAA Settlement Update(34:31-42:08) Story Time, Ari would be a terrible criminal(42:09-46:24) Future for smaller schools(46:25-1:00:01) An honest look at USC(1:00:02-1:05:30) Are we too big on Oklahoma?(1:05:31-1:10:21) Georgia Tech, toughest non-conference schedule?(1:10:22-1:14:52) David in the 2025 Chicago Marathon: https://fundraisers.hakuapp.com/david-gillaspie(1:14:53-1:16:26) Conclusion  What will the committee do? We don’t know. Will it change anything? We also don’t know. But we do know what Saban and Campbell have said publicly, so Andy and Ari will break down what the committee’s likely goals are. Later, Andy and Ari answer your questions… Will a school like Arizona State get into a Super League? Are Andy and Ari wearing “John Mateer goggles” when it comes to Oklahoma?  Does Georgia Tech have some of the toughest non-conference games in the country in coming years? Is Andy’s USC take lazy? Listener David is running the 2025 Chicago Marathon to benefit the Pat Tillman Foundation. Here’s the link to pledge to help him reach his goal. https://fundraisers.hakuapp.com/david-gillaspie  Watch the show LIVE, Monday-Friday at 9:30 am et! https://youtube.com/live/-s6GZH_6i-4 Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari WassermanProducer: River Bailey Want to partner with the show? E-mail [e-mail]

Welcome to Annie and Ariane three and yeah, we're getting political today. We have to. Politics is invading our space here. Politics. Politics. President Commission, a blue ribbon panel to talk about the future of college sports. So Donald Trump creating a commission co-chaired by Nick Saban. You all know who he is.

You may not know who he is, but we've actually talked about him on the show before. He is a Texas Tech former player and donor, current donor who made billions in the oil and gas industry. And he is he's been very outspoken about all of this stuff, saying that there needs to be a congressional solution. He's got a lot of ideas. I don't think his ideas are the same as Nick Saban's ideas, which will make this very interesting. The thing to remember about all this stuff

is all politics are local. The other piece to remember about this is we don't really know how this is going to manifest itself. Is it going to manifest itself in a Donald Trump executive order? Is it going to manifest itself in them trying to get Congress to pass a law or to create legislation that would govern college sports? We don't know.

Is it a case where like a lot of times in college sports, somebody forms a committee and then nothing happens? That's also a possibility. I do feel like somewhat amused, but maybe it'll be healthy that the thing that Nick Saban probably wants to stop is also on the board. With him. What is that oil baron money building a roster by throwing cash around but that's not what Cody wants. You gotta read what Cody's written. Yeah, Cody's written several essays on this topic. Now, it's all again. All politics are local. I don't think what Nick wants and what Cody wants are the same thing. What Nick wants is to go back to 10 years ago,

which is great for Alabama is not great for Indiana or for even Tennessee. But he, he, what Nick Saban keeps saying is he wants to bring back competitive equity. What he's ignoring is that there's more competitive equity now than there was 10 years ago. Like the rules that were around 10 years ago basically allowed the best players to cluster at the same three or four schools. The open market now makes them move around more and makes them spread out more. I guess the question is, is there such thing as competitive equity in a place in college

football where players are restricted from moving because they're because it's more rational. The movement is sort of a requirement for competitive equity. And that's the part I don't think they understand yet. Now, should it be unfettered and should they be able to transfer like eight times in an off season? No. Like, I think everyone can agree that that's silly too. There's a happy medium.

So it'll be interesting to see what where it goes like Cody Campbell is an interesting one. So yes, he is actually funding Texas Tech buying all these transfers, but he says he doesn't want it to be like that, which I don't understand because that's really the only way Texas Tech can get into that club. Well, it's also more expensive for him. says he doesn't want it to be like that. Which I don't understand because that's really the only way Texas Tech can get into that club. Well, it's also more expensive for him.

That's what I was saying earlier, Andy, when you're like, I think that like what Cody Campbell is doing right now is what Nick Saban does not want, right? Like that's, that's, it's what Cody Campbell doesn't want either. Yeah. Well, uh, if, uh. If we are to believe what he says over what he does, how expensive. Uh, you know what this must be or

would continue to be for him if this is just the way the world worked. But I also can't imagine that if his best interests are Texas Tech that he would want to do anything differently. That's the thing I can't. I can't wrap my head. That's what I can't. I can't wrap my brain around. That's the thing I can't wrap my brain around that either.

But if you read what he's written about it, I think I understand a little better. What he wants is a massive reorganization of college sports. He would like college sports to be included in the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, which is what allows NFL teams, major league baseball teams, NBA teams to pull their television rights and sell them as one and be a single seller, which

Cody's absolutely right. If college football, major college football all got together and sold their rights as one, they would make a lot more money than they make now. Like the total of the money coming in from TV contracts would be significantly more because they could command a higher price by being the only seller. Now, if you were to tend the seller, the SEC is a seller, the big 12 is a seller, the ACC is a seller.

And what you would be doing in that perfect warm and cozy world is eventually going to trickle into the most valuable properties getting less. That's right. And that's where this will be interesting to see what happens because what Cody wants, now he claims he wants it to be for everybody, not just the power for. But I'm sure he would like Texas Tech to be involved in any sort of Super League

that's coming because here's the thing. If you put college sports under the umbrella of the TV broadcasting act of 1961, then that's a license to make a super league. It gives you cover. Basically the super league can form and then the schools that are left out can't sue because the super league will have an antitrust exemption. That's essentially what would happen. the Super League will have an antitrust exemption. That's essentially what would happen.

And so it is assuming that Texas Tech gets in that Super League. But what if they don't? Yeah. Or if like in the perfect rosy world, like everybody is in that agreement together. And then there's a way that they could tier the income based on conference and school, maybe that could work. I don't know if that's a fantasy thought or not.

And what Cody says is he'd like to reorganize the conferences by geography. Another thing, I'm not sure that's gonna happen. Here's the part that that misunderstands. The big 10 in the SEC didn't spend a hundred years building this advantage to just give it back. Right. And what he's saying is, look, the Cowboys and the Packers are in very different markets. The Cowboys are still going to make more money because they're going to have a bigger stadium. They're going to sell more tickets. They're going to have a bigger stadium. They're selling more tickets.

They're going to sell them for more money, but they're going to share their TV money equally. And that is going to help the entire NFL. And he's right about that. Like, if you look at the NFL's economic model, that is definitely working. And he'd like to see that in college football. And I got to be honest with you. There was also no, you split between the Cowboys viewing, right? Like I'm sure there are certain NFL because of the way they do it. If they did it differently, like if the NSCE East had been its own conference for all these years

instead of part of the NFL, it might be different in In terms of like must watch properties is so much more fluid than it is in college. Like seven, ten years ago, the Chiefs weren't the number one game in town. And now people have to watch the Chiefs because that like it changes. It doesn't change in college because the universities are different size. The alumni bases are different. The fans, the geographical stuff, like it's like Ohio State is the number one viewing property every year because Ohio State is a massive school that is always good and has built a following that traverses things. There's nothing you could do from a television revenue split to get Rutgers

to be as valuable of a television property. It just cannot happen. But if the Browns, if Shidore Sanders turns into the next Tom Brady, the Browns will be must watch television when they're probably the ass wipe of the league right now. Like that, that is so much more cyclical in the league. It doesn't work that way in college. rules for competitive equity don't actually create competitive equity. A draft creates competitive equity. Yeah. And they're not gonna be able to do that. A hard salary cap that actually is adhered to helps create competitive equity. If they could do that. I don't think they're gonna be able to do that either. Because what would happen if they created a hard cap based on how much money you

could actually pay out everybody on your roster, people would have to go to atypical programs to get max contracts because they wouldn't be able to offer them out. Right. Theoretically, that's, and theoretically that would work if you had rules that you could enforce to keep the Ohio States and the Georges and the Alabamas from just who bring them all up? Ohio State, Bama, Georgia, Clemson, you know, and all the big time schools had,

they were, you know, got a bunch of early commitments and committed to pay money and they were up against the cap. And then you had like, here are the like lists on on three that were the seven teams that are nowhere near their cap. And here are the eight five stars that haven't found a home yet. It's like all of a sudden sudden Purdue becomes the most coveted spot in America because they have the most to pay. Like that would be like crazy. Yeah Purdue's got a lot of cap room this year. Yeah Purdue has that one and that actually would work. That actually would work if you could if

you could put which which we've said if you do aBA, you could do that. What these guys want is not a CBA. They want them to be declared, declared never employees that they're just students, ignoring the fact that colleges pay their students all the time. But it's going to be interesting. I don't know that it's going to lead to anything. I really I'm not even at this point. I'm not even going to try to log a prediction here because. I don't know where they're going to go with this. The thing that is interesting too, and I think you have to. There are things that might be solutions that these committee members come up with that

have been struck down in court already. But here's the thing, they're trying to get an antitrust exemption that would keep it from being struck down in court ever again. It's not a case of them trying to follow the law, it's them just trying to get either executive or legislative cover to break the law. And it's not, again, if you get legislative cover, if you get an exemption, you're not breaking the law. Yeah. Yeah. That'd be a pretty good grip. Isn't it? So we'll see what they do. But here, look, like Cody Campbell's utopian world that he's outlined

actually looks pretty cool. I just don't know that you could get to it because it would be a super league that probably would be the realistically the four power conferences that exist now. So those 65 or so schools, like I could live with that. I would have, I think that would be fun. And his argument is if you do it as a single seller, the SEC and the Big Ten schools make more than they make now or make as much as they make now from television. And then everybody else rises

because they would then be sharing equally in television money. That's the utopian view of it. My suspicion is the Big Ten and the SEC people who have spent these last few decades trying to widen that gap would not just give it away because it's not just about the money, it's also about the power. Yeah, it's super fascinating but too, like you have people who are on this presidential commission who have arrived at their opinions based on what is best for the institutions that they're from or coached at, right?

Would you mean Nick Saban? I'm saying like what you think that Nick Saban's opinion is formed based on the greater good or what's good for Vanderbilt or do you think? No, no, because his idea of competitive equity is the thing that would make Alabama, Ohio state and Georgia, the only teams that can win the national title again. What you want to do 10 at Thursday. He's trying to get a presidential commission going here to get things back

so we can return to coaching and dominate again. Yeah. Vance in the chat says the saving doing this to prevent prevent a college football version of Manchester city or Paris Saint Germain? i.e. the Saudi royal family becomes a big Vandy guy and puts five billion into NIL. Everybody keeps saying they're afraid like Dave Ubbin. What is Oregon doing now? Like it is and they didn't win the national championship.

Like I think that there is this outside alien unsolved mysteries episode out there where if somebody worth five bill. Right. We're going to win like that hasn't happened. Vance is right. That did happen in soccer but and what Vance is saying is like Manchester City. So Manchester City was Auburn and Manchester United was Alabama. And suddenly a bunch of money flowed in from the middle East that allowed Auburn

to buy better players than Alabama had. That's, that's I think what Vance is getting at here. Tim Cook went to Auburn, right? Am I remembering that correctly? He did. You're right. The CEO of Apple went to Auburn. Tim Cook annual income real quick here. Let's see here. He makes 74 million a year,

which includes- And imagine his stock options. Imagine what they're worth. I think that compensation includes 58 million in stock, but also to stock awards, pay the dividends over time and whatever. But he's probably worth almost a billion dollars at this point. If he decided Auburn is going to win the national title and I don't care how recklessly I have to spend money, I'm gonna do it. I wanna see this before I die. Phil Knight is worth more than him. He's already decided that an organ has yet to win a national title.

But Phil Knight hasn't gone insane, has he? Like write blank checks to everybody. I'm saying if somebody went absolutely bad. I mean, we could argue that it's what Cody Campbell's doing this off season. Yeah. I mean, I wrote checks so big that players would have nothing to think about.

That's what I'm saying. Like you go through a recruiting process and you sign 25 of the top 50 players in the country because you wrote checks so big, it would be insane to say no. Like just like, I'm not saying people, there are nobody's done it. I know everybody thinks that's going to happen. It could happen one day in this current system could happen. Theoretically. I guess, I guess, but we'll see if they can create a system

where that won't happen. I have my doubts. I have my doubts, but. I would be kind of a fun walk out with it. If the ideal world version of Cody Campbell's, the one, like if you go read what he's written, like four essays in The Federalist about this, there's one, the one that breaks down the TV Act.

If you read that, if it could work, because he's not anti-paying players. Clearly, he's writing big checks to them right now. So the players would be getting paid. There would be some freedom movement, but it would be a more organized system. It would keep some of these schools from getting cut out of the big time, which you and I have both said we like the variety of college football. We don't want it to be a 30 team super league or a 40 team super league. We would like it to be larger than that. Like that sounds cool. Yeah, I mean, if you could make it happen, it would be cool. I just don't I just don't know if the I got to ask if it's going to be possible.

You know, I'm a big hypotheticals guy. If I could say, because we both think that the Super League is inevitable. We don't talk about it a lot because we don't want to be sad, but we think it's inevitable. Right. If you could make a deal or no deal scenario right now that locks in a Super League that includes every power conference team that we currently would you take the deal right now? Sign me up immediately. I'll take it right now. And now because I don't want to see like half the or well three quarters of the big 12 fall to the wayside and three quarters of the ACC fall away. So I don't

want to see that. Like you would be loading up boats on the Titanic for the rich people and sailing away while the poor people stayed on the boat. Like that's what that would be doing still. Right? I guess but like are the group of five really the same thing anyway? That's what the rich people on the boat said. Yeah.

I mean, that's more sad because there are people, but like it's well, yeah, right. But you have to draw like you have to put a line somewhere. There's a line there now at 135. Aren't the FCS people people, too? Yeah, so let me ask you this. Do you think that there is a world where the Super League with the current power team? I would like it if they can get Oregon State and Washington State in the mix somehow too.

I feel bad for them. But if there's a line or a world out there that exists where if the power for us, it's currently constructed as the super league leaves the group of five behind at the group of five could find a system that would actually make it more enriching. It's called the FCS. They'd waste a lot less money and they still play football that people care about. And then people and then they could actually play in a system in a league where winning

and winning a championship is actually possible? Yes. That's the one thing that I think is always interesting about it. And it's like, it sounds condescending and people get mad at me and it's always happened since the beginning of my career. But like, listen, I'm even gonna use a power school.

Okay. I went to Arizona and I used to say this when I was in college and used to piss people off. But when people would be really hyped up in Arizona football, they're hyped up when they're an eight-win team. You know, like when they're winning games. But not great. Just good. Like, you know, the expectations in different places are different. And it always confused me as a, because like this is my first beat. Like I was the Arizona beat writer for the student newspaper. And like I remember like writing

articles and I wasn't a seasoned or knew what I know about the sport now. But I remember thinking in those press boxes, it's like, you just beat Oregon State to go five and four. Why are people excited? This is a joke. But I would think, be thinking that in my head. And like, I've never understood how you can get enjoyment out of sports if your team isn't winning championships. Like that, if the pursuit of championships doesn't exist. Like if you're an Arizona fan who's bought, and I'm talking to you,

who's bought into Arizona football, you're on the message board. You're listening to our show. You're a big wild cat. What is the source of enjoyment for you to see how good it can get? Like, is that what, like, I, cause I just, I've never understood. Like if, if winning a title is a 0% proposition, then how can you invest so much of your own personal thought into that?

Like that's always been a thing to me. So giving giving the group of five its own system where a Mac team that is assembled great, like at the Toledo's of the world could actually go to a playoff of their own and win a championship. Doesn't that give them the pursuit of something that doesn't exist right now? Or is playing on the bigger stage and trying to knock off the big dog in a singular game more exciting to them? Like I don't know the answer to that. I didn't go to a group of five schools, so I don't know.

But I was always, I even had that question when I was at a smaller power school. Well, I kind of wondered that about like Appalachian State. Like you're winning national titles in the FCS. And you go to the Sunbelt where you can win a Sunbelt title, but you're never going to compete for a national title. But is winning a Sunbelt title and making the playoff and playing close against Texas in the first round more gratifying than winning a championship at the lower level?

I would, I would, that we probably should ask that like if there are any Appalachian State fans in the chat, I'd love to know what was more gratifying to you. Was it winning multiple FCS national titles or was it beating Michigan? Because maybe it's beating Michigan because beating Michigan was something that the whole world saw winning FCS championships is something that most people don't know. Exactly. Hey, Ari, before we go on, I want to tell everybody who's watching on Twitter right now, time to move to YouTube. The link for the YouTube stream is right below the one you're watching on Twitter.

Come over here, subscribe to the On3Sports YouTube channel and hop in this chat because we got the smartest, best looking people in the world in chat. They're awesome. And we want you to join them because the discussion here is always great. We're going to be answering dear Andy and dear Ari questions, which came from the people in the chat. Again, awesome. So come on, join us, join the hive right now. We'll see you over on YouTube. Yeah, sorry, go ahead, sorry. Let's ask Arizona State fans.

Yes, right, good question. Arizona State fan, big school. Like, but the thing with Arizona State is I actually think that like, if they struck it right, they could conceivably win a title in the next 15 years. Like, I don't know where it's going. Maybe this new system has given newfound hope to programs that were once hopeless. But and like maybe my my Arizona thoughts from when I was a student reporter don't exist anymore because we live in a world now that's different and the

sport is flattening and players are going to new places and a five star kid like Bijon Robinson who grows up in Tucson might have a higher likelihood of going to Arizona than he would have in the past. I don't know. Um, but is if you knew last year during your run that you weren't going to win the national title was it gratifying or is saying that you weren't going to win a national championship last year, just inherently wrong because they did almost beat Texas. So like, I don't know.

Right. Had they beaten Texas? What happened next? It's a great question. Jackson White in the chat with a really good comment. It is similar to the premier league and lower levels of English football. People will continue to find things to root for with passion at every level. That's exactly right. That's why it annoys me a lot. The arguments about a lot of this stuff. Well, if we can't, you know, if we're not in the super league, then then why should we even do it? Because you like it and a group of people cares about it. Like,

there are a lot of things people care about that are not cared about by millions of people. It only matters if you care about it. And so like When people say all they're gonna have to cut all these sports and to do this another one They won't cut the things they care about if enough people care Nothing's getting cut like everybody acts like this is so hard to do like division 2 and division 3 sports in college don't exist They exist. They don't make big money. They don't make any money. Yet people keep doing it.

Because they like it. Because the players get satisfaction out of it. The coaches get satisfaction out of it. The fans get satisfaction out of it. It still exists. So. That's the part I think that this is the most disingenuous part of all of these arguments. We spend a lot of time talking about teams that are in the championship mix,

and I think that the pool of teams that are in the championship mix, even though it used to be, like, you know, six years ago, five years ago, when we would talk about going into a year, there were maybe five teams that could win a title in a year based on the way they recruited. What do you think the actual pool of teams was that had a national championship ceiling in that era? Would you say 20? No, we're talking about the super team era, the Alabama Ohio State.

No, I think there might have been eight. Okay, like because like so you're saying I think there were more than eight. I think there were five every year that we thought we're going to win the title. That would be Bama, Ohio State, Clemson, Georgia and who am I forgetting? There's one LSU sometime. LSU some years. So that's five, but then like the Florida, Florida State, Miami, Michigan, you know, Penn State, Penn State, like it'd probably be 20 if you did that. But it didn't mean that they were in that bucket for the individual years, but their fan bases still were competing and expecting to be competitive on that national championship plane. Now, do you think that

that has expanded to the entire every single single year you might only have 20 teams that could conceivably do it in an individual year, but how many people are in the pool for could conceivably be good enough one day to compete on that plane? Everybody? Do you still think, do you think everybody in the power five is on that level now?

Cause I think that you could make the case that maybe, yeah. Like is Texas Tech on that level now? Texas Tech wouldn't even- To win a national championship? No, I'm not saying in this individual year, but I'm saying if you're a Texas Tech fan, it is not absolutely insane to wake up in the morning and go with Cody Campbell on our side in our system as long as he doesn't tap himself, which he

seems to be trying to do. In theory, I think that like everybody could go watch what ASU did last year and be like, hey, that's something that is, we can duplicate if we hit on the right tour. Like it's not in, like if you would have said Texas Tech is going to win a national championship in 2019, you would have been put into a loony men. If you want to play it right now, you could come up with a scenario that is quasi realistic where they could actually do that. I can put them in the playoff pretty easily. I can say they're going to win the big 12 and go on the playoff easily. Three or four players away from winning a national title now and that was never the case. So what I'm saying is there's probably

more fire to root for Kansas State in Houston and Baylor and BYU and Tech and all the other teams that were existing on this plane, but weren't really a part of the picture. Cause we pick on the group of five and the FCS and say, Hey, well, there are people too, but you got to also acknowledge the fact that even in the power conference, there's probably 70% of the teams that aren't even thinking about national title on a year. So if that, if that number is expanding, then that makes it fun. But I just don't know if it's harder to answer

the questions that I'm posing right now because I think an Arizona fan's temperament is much different now than it was in 2019. Yeah, and I think that's one thing everybody's gonna have to come to RIPs with is what they expect from their team. Because the all those expectations are gonna have to be adjusted here and whatever comes next. I don't know. Like I said, you and I have pretty much resigned ourselves that there's going to be a Super League. I'm afraid it's going to be less teams than it should be. And the worry I have is like,

Cody Campbell going into this thinking that he's going to get Texas Tech into the Super League. But the thing is, if you give college football the cover of an antitrust exemption to sell its TV rights as one, which I don't even know if it needs because the conferences already do that. Like you have groups of schools selling their rights as one. So,

but if you give them cover and give them an antitrust exemption and the SEC and the Big Ten say, sweet, we're going to get together. We're going to add Clemson and Florida State and North Carolina and a couple schools from the Big 12. And, uh, yeah, the rest of you, go. We got an antitrust exemption now. Thanks suckers. Because I think that's what they're going to say. Yeah. Well, you're more seasoned with the politics world, so I'll let you, uh, you know, I don't

know. I don't know what's going happen. Nobody knows what's gonna happen. Yeah, I don't even understand how executive order works. So like we did the civics test. The president says do this. And everybody does it. Now it's supposed to shape future legislation and be kind of an emergency situation. But that sort of depends on how the legislative branch acts and how the judicial branch acts. So like, just go back to your schoolhouse rock everybody. So it'll be it'll be very interesting Vance in the chat again,

why do I feel like the people really driving the push this push to regulate NIL or private equity groups who learn their lesson from soccer regarding controlling players costs? Vance, you're incredibly cynical and probably correct. Vance is smart. Yes, yes. Vance is very smart, very cynical. Yeah. And I am, I am not, I wouldn't be surprised if that's what it is, to be perfectly honest. Like, it's, the real push behind it is the money that wants to get in on this thing

and just wants to control its costs. The schools wanna control their costs too, by the way. That's pretty much the entirety of all this. So, we'll see what happens, but it is going to be utterly fascinating. The president has jumped in, Nick Saban, who we've often talked about as a potential commissioner of college football, now he's got a little juice there.

So we'll see. More government intervention in college sports. We got a house settlement update. So when last we left, had a house versus the NCAA case, federal judge Claudia Wilkin had said, hey, these roster caps, like you don't have to kick your walk-ons off the team.

Like let's grandfather them in. And when they're done, then we'll have the roster cap numbers that we agreed on. And the plaintiffs are like, yep, sure, sounds good. The schools are like, no, we'd like to continue to be jerks about this. So they have amended it. Now they're saying schools can grandfather players in if they want to.

The judge was fairly clear. It needs to be schools must grandfather players in. Don't screw this up schools. Don't screw this up because if Congress doesn't save you, if this presidential commission goes nowhere and you wind up going into court against the House plaintiffs, you're going to get your asses handed to you. So get this thing done. But the objectors have until Tuesday

to file their next objection. Then the schools can do it right after that. Then Wilkins probably gonna rule. I'd say we probably have an answer on this thing in about a week. So we'll see what happens. But my guess is if it comes to the settlements gonna blow up if they don't grandfather in the walk-ons, they're gonna grandfather in the walk-ons because I can't believe that they would be that stupid. But again, they always surprise us. Yeah.

Do you imagine like thinking like in the past? Because you wouldn't because you wouldn't keep like 12 lock on to your football team. Like the whole thing. It's like so stupid. I can't even I can't even like contextualize in my own brain. It's amazing. It's like so stupid. I can't even I can't even like contextualize in my own brain It's amazing It literally amazing trying to sell my house and needing to sell my house To remain afloat financially and the person who's buying it says I'll give you a thousand dollars apart and you won't watch

No, no, it's even worse than that. I think they're there. I will give you full asking and we'll pay cash No finances no contingencies, but I want you to pull the oranges off the tree in the backyard. I said no. It's exactly what it is. That is like, yeah, yeah. Like, you got to keep these 12 lock-ons for two more years. Oh wow. My wall. Yeah, that's the other part. It's not you're not even being difficult. Like you're you need to save yourself. Right? Right. You're it's like we brought back debtors prison and you're going to go to debtors prison if you don't sell a house. Was that a thing? Oh my god. That was a thing. That was a thing back in the day. Yeah. You was a prison if you didn't pay your debts. Yes. Dude, that would be a really, really tough proposition for us as a country if that happened again, there's a lot of people out there that, uh, that aren't paying their debts. Yeah. I don't think I would have taken out as many credit cards.

Think about like, would like Chanel as a company be completely defunct if you went to prison for not paying your Nordstrom bill. Probably yeah, the luxury brands. I was in the mall the other day and I felt like the baby Gucci store and like how about student loans? Do you think anybody go to college if they had to pay student loans back and get in couldn't? What would be more expensive forgiveness of student loans or

funding the prisons to put people in when they're in debt and not paying. This is the kind of politics we're not getting into. We got forced into the other politics. The thing that I'm curious about because I want to like bring you into what's happening in my life right now. Okay. Okay. Okay. We've had a leak in my house and I thought it was a window wasn't sealed properly. You could call it for 100 bucks. Um and you know, dry out the wall and then repatch the wall up and it would be just a thousand or 2000 bucks to fix. Annoying but

not big. So anyway, we've been trying to figure out the source of this leak Andy and you know this for um I've been complaining to you about it since the Super Bowl. And we finally opened up a wall upstairs where the leak was coming from and the entire wall is rotted out. So now like we're, we're talking like a major stucco failure leak scenario here, which could be a massive, intrusive, expensive repair. Okay. This is an insurance claim is what you're talking about. That bad. Right. But the house was built in 2021. expensive repair. Okay. This is an insurance claim is what you're talking about. That bad.

Right. But the house was built in 2021. And by the way, guys, we're all friends here. We're family. I'm telling you what's happening in my actual life. That makes me want to vomit in the toilet. So there's a warranty on structural. And I'm trying to go through the warranty right now, but it's possible that the person who built the home

doesn't actually have a warranty and might be financially responsible for it for himself. Which he might not have the money for which means you should go to prison in your prison system. But you I did my debtor I did not I was not here in the prison system. That you brought. I did, my debtor, I did not, I was not here in the 1700s. I did not create the debtor's prison system. And luckily, we have homeowners insurance,

so we're not gonna have to pay for it, but it would be much better if we didn't have to pay the deductible, which is probably- That person would have to go to jail instead. Yeah, either fix my wall or go to prison, then I would be like, go to prison. Then I would be like go to prison because like what's actually going to happen is he's

not going to do anything and I'm finding that home warranties are a scam and if you. So we're just gonna have to end up paying the deductible and deductible on homeowners policies like 10 grand right? It's a lot. Yeah debtors prisons abolished in America in 1833 in case you're a. 1833. What are we coming up on the 200 year anniversary? Now? Yeah, let's let's let's fire that back up.

Jeff says both of us don't know squad about college football. No, we don't know squad about debtors prisons. We're pretty good about college football. Which brings us to dear Andy and dear Ari. Your questions answered. Andy, one last thing. And I have to yes, go ahead. I'm sorry. To dear Andy and dear Ari, your question's answered. Andy, one last thing. I have to- Yes, go ahead. I'm sorry.

Debtors prison gets brought back, but then unreasonable interest rates on loans go away. Deal or no deal? That's actually not a bad idea. Like, I think the unreasonable interest rates would go away. Because people wouldn't take them. Well, no, people are stupid. They would still- People would be less incentivized Because I think the unreasonable interest rates would go away. Because people wouldn't take them. Well, no, people are stupid.

They would still do it. People would be less incentivized to take out credit, to use credit anyway. So like credit card debt actually is, if you don't make the minimum payment, you are, or whatever your balance you're carrying, you pay 2.5% instead of 17%, which then allows you to get out of debt easier. They make their nut. But then if you are also so irresponsible with the money that you can't pay back your balances with the with the interest rates that are manageable, then you go to prison.

Wasserman 2028. You your administration is going to be wild like maybe maybe Nick Saban and Cody Campbell's just wait and here's the last part You're a milk until you're in charge if you're a million dollars or more in debt Alcatraz See it's all coming back Full circle love it With with Sean Connery Yeah, you know what the winners do. All right, that's a terrible terrible Sean Connor. I don't even know what what accent that was.

Andy, I think that like I don't know. Do you know how much credit you actually have? Like in terms of like if you maxed out all your cards right now? Um, no. I'm not sure what the limits are. Between me and my wife, like we have a lot of credit that's unused.

Like I think we could conceivably take out hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. What's to stop us from maxing out everything, selling all that stuff, not paying it and then moving to Mexico? Or what's the recourse of maxing out cards? I don't we have extradition with Mexico? No, but no, hear me out. This doesn't involve leaving the country.

What if I maxed out all my cards and overextended myself to the point of obscene nature, sold everything for 70 cents on the dollar, cashed out 300K, had those assets in cash, and then didn't pay anybody back? What's the recourse there from the credit? They can't guard it. they take a civil court. Okay and then on paper I've got nothing but I sold.

Right and you don't at that point you don't have a job where the wages. Wages to be garnished and all the assets that I bought on my credit card without paying it back or just in a duffel bag somewhere. Yeah you just have to continue operating all cash. You know You're moving off the grid in that decision. Yeah, I'm just I'm just trying to think here. Okay, I'm sorry. Okay, so you need an all cash business, you basically become a money launderer if one last one for being real here. Last one questions, we're gonna be here all day. What's to stop

me from using my Amex to buy 100 grand worth of gold and then selling the gold in cash and then paying off my Amex to accumulate points? Nothing. There's got to be like a provision on your Amex card that says like if you buy X, Y or Z with AMP, like, like what's because you can you can deposit into gambling. I don't think they can stop you from buying a certain a certain thing. can deposit into gambling. I don't think they can stop you from buying a certain thing. I know, but I don't know that they would be, they could stop you from awarding points if you bought it from a treasurer. But like if you went to a pawn shop, I don't know how they would even track what you bought. Hey, stay tuned for more economic loophole. This is what I think about before bed. Some people like, I can't wait to see Ari just walk into

a pawn shop with an Amex. Do you know if you spend a gold bar, please, you spent a million dollars a year on your Amex, you would probably have enough points to sustain your life. And if you did that by buying and selling something that doesn't fluctuate in value all that much, and you were able to cash out that money that you spent immediately and then pay off your card with it, you could accumulate out a lot of points and do a lot without your points. You couldn't sustain your life like your cash back. Like 2% cash back on a million dollars in purchases is 20 grand.

Yeah. I mean, maybe if you could, if you're the type of person who spends a million dollars on an MX, you can't live it on 20 grand. But if you're anybody can spend a million. Let's say you better not become a criminal, you would be screwed. Exactly. Yeah. Maybe we're not all mastermind criminal mastermind. Ari Wasserman was like depositing into he went to New York for a wedding

this week and he deposited into one of the gambling things out there and he was allowed to pay with his Amex. So it's an Amex charge and then the money goes into the account. You can cash out that money without playing it and then pay off your card. So if you get points for depositing into the account for the cash, then you can just do that constantly and get a bunch of I think I think probably there's a limit on how many

times you can do it. I'll have to read. Theremex Terms of Service. Okay, sorry for bringing you off Alcatraz. Somebody, here's the thing. Whatever you're thinking of, somebody's already thought about it. There was an incident and they came up with something. If you have any fully legal ways to accumulate points on your Amex, let me know.

All right. Now we get to dear Ari and dear Andy. This question comes from Devin. Gentlemen, I need some help from a lot of you. As the scary realization of a Super League is looming, I really need to know how this situation will affect smaller schools. As you boys know, I'm an Arizona State fan, but it seems like schools that are smaller than ASU will get left out of the Super League. Is that correct? What will that mean if they're left

to the predations of the NCAA? Do they lose access to money that these schools will get if they're left out of the Super League or just get a smaller TV deal if they can cobble together a league and get one? I understand that it seems like this is gonna be an inevitability, but I don't understand what happens to the teams that are left out.

It's my hope that we won't see schools drop their programs. Devin, I think we've already answered some of this. Yeah, they won't drop programs if they care. Like the FCS exists. And FCS football teams are not dropping their programs in mass. Division two exists, division three exists. There's a place. Now, Devon is assuming Arizona State's in the Super League. That's a big assumption. I would think it would be. I don't think you want to leave a metro area as large as Phoenix out.

I didn't want to say it, but I don't know that you have you have like Sleep like a baby nights if you're scared of this if you're an ASU fan Correct, correct It really would depend on the size of the league of whether you should feel safe or not But I actually also feel like if you made a super league that was smaller the not Including of ASU and programs of that size would help sustain whatever other league existed as a result of it. If you took- They become the big dogs in the other league.

But what he's not even talking about, he's talking about not the big 12. He's talking about, I would assume he's talking about group of five schools. Yeah. And they would keep playing football if they care about football. They just wouldn't waste a bunch of money trying to compete with Alabama. Like everybody wants to make it more complicated than it is. Appalachian State and Georgia Southern are always going to play football. They like football. They like having a football team. So they're going to have a football team.

Whatever happens above them financially is not going to change the fact that they're going to have a football team. Yep. So, how much people care, public cares and all those things will change maybe, but that doesn't change the existence of the team. Right, right. The perception of it, where you can see it, and yes, everybody's got a way to see their games. Some people are streaming on the internet.

Some people are on CBS Sports Network. Some people are on Fox. Some people are on ESPN. Like the Pac-12 is creating a new TV deal right now. The Pac-12 that is Washington State and Oregon State and the schools that they've added. So everybody has, and that's the thing that I think people have the hardest time wrapping their brains around

is that not everybody has to be at the highest level and not everybody gets to be at the highest level and not everybody gets to be at the highest level. Like Ari, we do a sports show on YouTube. I want to make the same amount of money as Pat McAfee. Guess what? We don't. Like, that's life. So I'm Arizona is what you're saying. And I'm Arizona State.

Arizona State was awesome last year. Arizona State was awesome. Yeah, Arizona's been awesome way. I mean, maybe one day we'll get a we'll get a crash the run in the playoff and get to that point, but that's why we show up every day. Maybe that's the answer to the question. I've got.

So next question from Jerry, I'm a regular listener and enjoy practically all your discussions with Ari. I have to say I was disappointed in your lazy take on USC's 2024 season. You mentioned the Trojans, many close losses, but like all college football observers, you failed to note they had an equal number of close wins, including their bowl game. USC went seven and 6 with five one score losses and five one score wins. Why look at only one side of the ledger? Is there some sportswriter rule that

says look only at the close losses? This is a very fair question from Jerry. Also, I was not at all Jerry. I love you buddy. I was not positive at all about their season last year. Not your fault. No, this is me. This is me saying

If you reverse some of the close losses, we're not looking at such a bad situation for USC Yeah And that we shouldn't be so down on them going into this season because I feel like You and a lot of other people are very down on USC going into the season But jerry's not wrong Jerry's not wrong if you had an equal number of close wins, those results could easily be flipped too, and you're in the same situation you were in last year. You have essentially the same year over again. Yeah, when you have close wins and close losses, and that's your entire schedule,

then you ended up what you probably should have been. I agree with that, like the notion of like, well, they could have been 10 is a very fair criticism of of my argument. Well, I think that the reason why you do this is if you win a game, even if it's by one, you won and you get to it to use that win as a I mean, you won. You like you can't relitigate. Well, here's where I would have a better leg to stand on.

So the Penn State games, one of these games, that game actually went to overtime. Penn State was obviously very good, made the final four. USC was that close to Penn State. If that, if all of their losses were to teams like Penn State and they were close like that, then it would be, it would help my argument. But were Jerry's correct and all of the losses weren't to teams like Penn State. There was one in Maryland, there was one in Minnesota. The version of Michigan that they played when they played

them, let's be honest, they shouldn't have lost it. So Jerry's right. Jerry's right on this. I I I probably did take a lazy look at that. But I don't even know that's you. I think that's everybody. I think that when you get a win, you don't like think about well, what if they would have lost that one? You think about the losses like that. Just natural human nature. Yeah, that's human nature. But but he's right. From a like, from a mathematical standpoint, from a probability standpoint, we need to take a look at both. Yeah. And I also think too, that like USC being what they were last year was exactly what they should have been because they got the benefit of winning close games and they had the unfortunate reality of losing a bunch of close games.

But if you're in a bunch of close games, any team who plays one possession games every week is probably going to find themselves on the wrong end of the spectrum half the time. Like that's just math. So, you know, that unless you're Nebraska all those years and you lost all of them. But that was a mathematical anomaly that people at casinos are still studying. So I apologize, Trojan fans. I was trying to blow some sunshine and Jerry got me, which is crazy because like you picked a hell of a time to use that question because USC fans are not happy

with us right now. Oh, they're so mad at us. They're already mad. So like now. But they don't even understand why they should be mad. Like they're mad because we left them off the best jobs list. And then they start giving reasons

for why they should be on the best jobs list. And I'm like, those aren't reasons. Ari, in the past 60 years, USD has had two coaches that have led them to what they expect to be. John Robinson and Pete Carroll, two Hall of Fame level coaches. What does that sound like to you? In fairness, though, when Lincoln Riley took the job I would put him in the top ten like that summer

Okay Well, no, we probably would have incorrectly put it in on the list because Lincoln Riley thought it was a better job than Oklahoma right really probably he was running away from the SEC and By the way USC being in the big 10 makes it a different job too. Look, unpack that stuff too though. Like is USC a harder job than Lincoln Riley thought it was or is Lincoln Riley doing a bad job?

Well, USC priority is one of the people who got mad at us. Just stop speaking on us in general. You guys don't care about the West or trying to stay up to date. Up to date? You guys went seven and five last year. That's up to date. Recruiting class is good this year.

Recruiting class was good this time last year. USC priority. Please, you can't look me in the eye and say I don't care about the West Coast. I love the West Coast. It's my favorite place in the world and my entire life goal is to live there. And USC was like the epitome of cool when I was growing up and I tried to leave the Ohio State beat multiple times to cover USC in my professional career because of my desire to want to be around it and be there. So that's just just because you like them and we're saying things that you don't like about the thing that you like doesn't mean what amazes me is the people getting mad at us saying their job is

hard. The jobs hard. If the job was easy, Lincoln Riley would have already gone to the playoff a bunch of times and already wouldn't have had to pay me 1000 bucks. I had to pay $1,000 because I agreed with USC priority when Lincoln Riley was hired and I was wrong. Yeah, that's money jobs hard. I could be putting that into my rotting wall right now. USC in Florida are the same job. They've been in the modern era of football.

Fairly mediocre when they haven't had a Hall of Fame level coach. Also, too, can we? We didn't say this, but it has to be said. The USC job has become increasingly harder because of the emergence of Oregon. And because they're in the Big 10 now, I know what I'm saying like they used to be the king and badasses of the West Coast and one of

the coaches that you mentioned got them to where they wanted to go. Did it before Oregon was even a thought. And one of the coaches that you mentioned got them to where they wanted to go. Did it before Oregon was even a thought. Oregon wasn't even a thing back then. So you had Pete Carroll who you might, and it was Oregon. What was Oregon? It was good when Pete Carroll was there.

Good. But they weren't, that was like the Mike Bellotti years where they were good, but they weren't like, they weren't there yet. Yeah. And like in Oregon recruits the hell out of California. So not only do they have a harder time recruiting their own state, there's a question of whether or not the talent in that state is even as good as the other states

in the country. Let's talk about that for a second. California has a bunch of really, really highly rated players all the time in the top 100, and it doesn't hit at the same rate as Southern players do. So there's question of whether or not the California players that they use to subsidize their entire roster are good enough. How many five-star players in USC signed during the Clay Heldner that turned out to be dog shit?

Like it happened all the time and I don't know if that was a developmental issue or but like the California like they're the best players in the country thing I think is not true right now. There's a lot underneath the hood about USC that you have to acknowledge is difficult and because you're a fan of them, if you don't want to do that, that's fine, but it's right in front of your face. Oregon, California talent, harder schedule, different time zone, everything is less advantageous than the 10 schools that we had on the list.

It's not that difficult. It's not that difficult to put together. Yeah. And like, I don't understand like the getting mad about the job thing. Like California players, we said your job's not easy. We weren't insulting you. Like your job has challenges. Yeah. It's not an insult. And if you don't think your job has challenges, then you actually really need to take a hard look at what's going on at your school now. Like this is my what I want to ask all the USC fans who are mad at us.

If you think it's a top 10 job, then give me your honest appraisal of Lincoln Riley's performance in it. Because you can't say it's a top 10 job without saying he's failed. If you think he's failed, then I'm fine with you saying it's a top 10 job. If you think he hasn't failed, then it's not a top 10 job. There might not even be a top 20. Because at a top 10 job, what he's done would not be acceptable. Yeah. I thought that-

I got LSU on this list. If Brian Kelly goes eight and four, they're going to view him as a failure this year. Yeah. Like they're gonna view his entire tenure as a failure if he goes eight and 40. How many of the jobs on our list would have not fired their coach with Lincoln

Riley's first three year performance? All of them would have fired the coach. Well, Oklahoma maybe not has fired hasn't fired Venables. Well, how many years did he have a 10-1 season? He was in the same boat though and they haven't fired Kelly yet. But LSU did, LSU similar to, I guess similar to USC because they they had the best year time and they had their best year in the first year and they've gotten progressively worse. Now LSU has also had a Heisman, well USC had that, I mean they're kind of virtually the same. They both had Heisman players. They were saying really awesome offenses with bad defenses. And the difference between LSU and USC on this list is LSU's won national titles with three different coaches

in this century and USC's won national title with one coach. We just like unintentionally stumble on is Brian Kelly gonna be on the hot seat. Is that what just happened here? Ari, have you been paying attention the entire off season? Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I'm the one who was on the hot seat last year. We had a whole show about that like two months ago. But like, should he be on the actual hot seat this year if they don't make the playoff?

I mean, I don't, in terms of if they're just going to pay to fire him, they're not going to do that. Yeah, I mean, both have also offered obscene guaranteed contracts. I can't get out of it. Yeah. Maybe you was in dollars and was, that was the issue. Like you could want to do it. Yeah. I don't know if you're going to do it,

but yeah, for USC, you have to, you have to decide, is it a top 10 job or is Lincoln Riley failing? Because they can't both, both of them have to be true if it's a top 10 job. Yeah. And also beating another team that's on the list doesn't mean that it's not like that's how ranking it's not like a ranking of how it works.

It's one game. But also to USC priority we understand based on your loss to Minnesota and Maryland. So do we throw a Maryland race? What kind of races it like? I don't know. Yeah, but I understand his passion. And I understand that he loves his team. And like, honestly, lists are very shiny and pretty and fire you up.

But when you actually like pull back the curtain and like, listen to the context, it's like not an insult. So my favorite is the people and this is not the USC fans. Is this is this is everybody. Your list is so biased. Your list is completely subjective. No shit, Sherlock, it's a list. I also wanna know.

Of course it's subjective. Like here's the thing. There are certain jobs on my list that I think I would rather have the USC job over because of who I am and where I'd want to live. Because where you want to live. Yeah.

I mean, you just saw the Lincoln Riley Zillow page and like you remember, like I pissed off the entire city of Norman, Oklahoma. And I said, who would want to live in Norman over there? Remember that whole fiasco? Yeah, I remember well. Like honestly speaking, I'm trying to think of like, if, if a, let's just say, Nick Saban wanted to return next year or something. And there was a hot shot coach who could get any job in the world. Like all these jobs are the jobs that he would consider. He wouldn't, I mean, USC would probably be in that mix too. And like, they're probably in between 10 and 17 somewhere, right? Like on both of our lists. Yeah, but he'd take all of these over. Yeah. I know that I've got a weird one on there. I know A&M's

on there. But again, I mean, USC did offer Lincoln Riley $100 million of guaranteed money. And they gave him a housing allowance by a house with a view of the Pacific Ocean in a resort style backyard so if you want to take all the football stuff out of it and just say what do you get to do if your USC said coach that's probably a pretty good thing but I read somewhere that he's like sleeps in the USC building half the time because that's what these guys like none of these guys enjoy where they live like I don't care where they live I just thought that LA was different traffic wise for him to try to commute home I don't think that Ohio State coaches sleep at the Woody.

They drive home at 930 PM with no traffic. And I guess there's no traffic between Columbus and Melbourne. I think if you live in LA, driving from USC's campus to your beautiful resort style Pacific Ocean front house would be a pain in the ass every day. He's got a great life. Lincoln Riley's doing fine. That'll do it outdoors. We're talking about football, not going downtown for the movies and clubbing. Exactly. They're football coaches. I lived in California. Those aren't the things I'm talking about. That's why you'll never be a top level football coach, Ari.

Alright, next question from Eric. Long time listener, first time writer. Love you guys, but your John Matier driven OU hype for this upcoming season is driving me up a wall. I know his highlight tape can be impressive at times, but I feel like you've lost sight of the other guys Oklahoma has brought in. When you finally put down the Matier Kool-Aid, you'll see they replaced their 30 plus transfers with a bunch of guys from the Group of Five slash FCS level. It has been proven since the beginning of the portal that the FCS transfer hit rate at the Power 2 level is about the same as a hit rate on a lotto ticket.

As a lifelong Texas fan and recipient of much heartbreak at the hands of the Sooners, I try never to count them out, but I once remember how much money I've lost on lotto tickets in my life and I feel a lot better about their prospects to be terrible. When you couple their lack of talent and brutal schedule, this is shaping up to be the worst year in the history of their spoiled program, God willing. Love the pod, keep up the good work, but please put down the mature Arbuckle goggles and look deeper into what this team really is outside QB. Eric and Austin. Oh, oh wait, he's not done. PS, I proudly listen to the Sooners Scoop post-game show

every time they lose. I'm sure Eddie and Kerry and George are very happy about that. Go back and listen to the show after the Navy game when you have time. I can't imagine OU's off-season moves have changed the points they were making at that moment. That's a while back, but.

You know what I think is amazing about the show is that I can tell who someone roots for based on the question. And how before they say anything. Um, yeah. I think that too, that Oklahoma last year was like competitive in every game that they played and like their entire rock estimated by injuries. So the hope is that that won't happen again too. I think you have to take that

into account. Well, exactly. Also, they punted on the offensive line classes of 21 and 22. They did better in 2324. Like I do think they're going to be better. But there's a reason I didn't have him in my top 25. Like I think Mattier is gonna be good. I kind of need to see their offensive line before I really want to make before I really decide what I think they're going to be record-wise because Eric's not wrong.

The schedule is brutal. Yeah, I also think too that they can be six and six and like twice as good as they were last year. Like you're right. Be true. Like I don't know that they have to go win the national title for them to be a much better team. I think they're going to be a much better team this year. Yeah, now. Well, they do have it's true. They do have to hit on a lot of the. The transfers. But also like what if David Stone just gets a lot better in year two?

And also too is hitting on a group of five transfer actually a lot of ticket. I don't know if I agree with that. I don't think so. Now maybe FCS and I think that he's talking about Giovanni Gibson, the receiver from Arkansas Pine Bluff who was before Arkansas Pine Bluff and Arkansas Monticello Bull Weevil, which is just tremendous. I love these schools. No, I think you can get a very good productive power player from the lower levels. Maybe you don't find Caleb Williams, but you know, there's plenty of linemen and linebackers who have come up from

those low lower levels that have been productive college players that have held their teams win games. I don't know if I view that as like a lotto ticket center. Like was Jared verse a lotto ticket? Maybe, you know, like, but I don't know. Lotto tickets is soccer bet. That's what Eric's saying. And he's right. Lotto tickets is soccer bet. If you have a casino nearby, go play a hand a black jacket using basic strategy, you have a casino nearby, go play a hand of blackjacket using basic strategy. You have a much better chance of winning. You're not paying $2 to win the lottery. You're paying $2 to fantasize for five hours about what it would be like to win it.

I know Ari. It's still a sucker bet. You know what I think is funny? You of all people should understand that. No, I know it's a sucker bet. I also like buy them all the time, I know it's a sucker bet. I also like buy them all the time because I love it. I love you know, they have the phone app now where you can just buy 20 lottery tickets

and I'll go into the gas station and feel like a loser. So I do that sometimes but I like to I like to go to bed. It's funny though, because that phone app could help me not because I buy lottery tickets. It could help me if I could avoid standing behind the person who's got their lottery booklet out. Oh, that's the worst thing in the world. And it's and spends 25 minutes when I'm just trying to buy a soda. Yeah, but you know, that person is never going to use their phone to buy lottery tickets. Never that person who stands over the counter and like what is like looking at the scratch offs

of like, yes, I want that one. And I want that when I was like, can I just please buy my Coke Zero and get the fuck out of here? Yeah, that's me every day. Yeah. Thank bless you to the gas stations that have come out with the automatic checkout, where you just put everything in a little box and it scans it immediately and you just tap to pay and you're gone. I love you. They just have the lottery scratch off tickets.

Like, you know, the vending machines that they have in grocery stores where you can like put the money in it and hit it yourself and then it comes out. And then it's always the scanning of the lottery ticket. Also too, when I buy a scratch off, so I don't even scratch it off. I just have them scan the back.

I don't even waste the time. I'll buy it at the counter and I'll just be like scan this and see if it hits. And if it hits, then they give me the money. And if not, I don't even at the counter and I'll just be like scan this and see if it hits and if it hits and they give me the money and if not I don't even do the order thing. All right. Next question. This is from Chris. You talked a lot this week about Notre Dame and Clemson scheduling agreement I couldn't agree more with Ari more that scheduling these big games as an opportunity to get a quality win instead of potential for a loss.

I'm a Georgia Tech fan and taking a look at our schedule over the next few years, it seems like R.A.D. agrees. This leads to the questions. Does Georgia Tech have the hardest upcoming non-conference schedule in the country? 2027 might be the hardest I've seen on paper since the 90s. And since we all have rankings, how would you rank the hardest non-cons in the country? So 2025 this year at Colorado to start, which I think is a fun week one game.

They also have Gardner, Wetman Temple, and of course they end with Georgia. So that one's not that bad. Next year Colorado, Tennessee, Mercer, Georgia. That's pretty rough. 2027, Arkansas State at Tennessee at Notre Dame, Georgia. And then of course, 2030 and 31, you've got Alabama, Holman away, and Georgia both those years too. So yeah, the Yellow Jackets are loading up there. I mean, I do think we probably should like have a show and rank who has the toughest non-conference schedule.

I don't know. Let's do it. I mean, the I don't know. Let's do it. I mean, the one that jumps off- Let's do it in these next few weeks. Florida State. Yeah. You have to play Alabama to open the year and at Florida close it. Like that's a pretty rough- Right.

I think like last year, Florida's on paper was the hardest going into the season because we didn't know what Florida State was gonna be. So their non-conference last year was Miami, UCF, Florida State, I'm blanking on the other one because it was not, oh, Sanford was the other UCF, Florida State. I'm blanking on the other one because it was not, oh, Sanford was the other one. But yeah.

So yeah, I mean, I think it's probably always going to be some mix of Clemson, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Florida, Florida State. I think if you have two- Because, or in South Carolina, because of those rivalries. If you have two non-conference games that you could conceivably lose, that's very difficult.

Yeah, like South Carolina always has a hard non-conference game because they always play Clemson. And now that South Carolina is good again, Clemson always has a hard one. Georgia Tech always has a very hard one because they have to play Georgia. Florida and Florida State, when they're both good, always have a hard one. Georgia Tech always has a very hard one because they have to play Georgia. Florida and Florida State, when they're both good, always have a hard non-conference game.

I used to have fun with the people when they'd say, you know, Florida never leaves the state. I'm like, yeah, but you know, they played a team that finished, they played a non-conference game against a team that finished in the top four of the AP poll 14 years in a row.

Name me another school that did that. And they're like, they didn't do that. I'm like, yeah, they did. Florida State. Like, Florida State was top four every year for 14 years. Yeah, but let's go through this year and see who's... Well, I say we'll table that for next week because I think that's a fun topic next week. I mean Clemson opens with LSU and closes with South Carolina so they've got a pretty tough

situation too. But let's do that next week. Let's I know we should do a written one too of like here are the toughest non-conference schedules you'll find. Oh one more question from from Chris. He said where did you eat during the national championship? So that would be the night before the national championship game. Heard Ari references being a dynamite meal in a previous episode. Never heard the actual restaurant. Next time you're in town, check out Fred's Meat and Bread in Crock Street Market. The Korean Philly is life-changing. We ate at Les Sparrow, which was fantastic. Everything on the menu was outstanding. Because we tried to order as much of the menu as we could so everybody could get a taste of everything.

It was spectacular. Yeah, we went with Bruce Feldman, Stuart Mandel, one of Stu's friends. And then Nicole and her coworkers from NBC, Nicole Auerbach, happened to be at a table across from us at the same time. Oh, and Ralph Rupka was there. They were giving me fries.

It was amazing. So we had, yeah, we basically ordered the entire meal and everybody were giving me fries. It was it was amazing. So yeah, we basically ordered the entire meal and everybody was letting you eat up. That's the best type of meal, isn't it? Where it's not a family restaurant, but then when everybody at the table agrees, let's do this family style and like I got a burger. You got some lasagna dish and we're all cutting it up and giving it to everybody else. That is so good type of meal though, isn't it? Because you

know me, I'm a oh yeah. I'll read also that slice that we got in Atlanta that pizza slice. What was the the shopping center that was in Ponce City Market I can't remember the name of the place yeah I can't remember the place there's a there's a New York pizza place by this that sells by the slice in Ponce City Market that we went to that I thought was electric too. Yeah. All right.

That just gets me pumped up by getting on the road again because we were making some plans for the future for preseason camp tours and that sort of thing. Being away from you is very advantageous for my belt line though. Yeah. Yeah. I get in trouble when I have friends that I can take to though. Yeah. Yeah. I I get in trouble when I have friends that I can take to places. Yeah, that that gets it gets me in trouble too. So we'll be in the best shape of our

lives when we get back together and unfortunately, last number. Yeah. Have you like go one more like my face in the replays of the of these this coming Augusts episodes and then look at my face like at the playoff reveal and tell me if there's a difference. Side by side is gonna be incorrect. Wait, we should do a side by side on the year anniversary. So on September 1st, we'll do a side by side of Ari when he joined on three and Ari now. We should because like the picture that on three uses for me in all their graphics, I'm like 35 pounds heavier than I am right now and it kills me. Come come see Ari and Andy at the Culver station at the NFL draft and people don't.

What's that gremlin that's on the on the billboard? Well, we had a we had a listener come by who's lost 250 pounds. No, it looked great. It was incredible is that my face looks rounder when my beard gets longer. So I've got to be a better, like I look different, don't I, than that? Yes. Yeah. You've slid down considerably since that photo. I don't like that picture. Look at the man tit on the right there. Okay. We'll take new pictures.

Okay. All right. Speaking of people who are in great shape, let's talk about David. Long time listener to the show, dating back to the athletic days. To this day, my favorite, at least most memorable show was in fall of 2023 when Andy ate an entire bottle of Bichon Mustards. And yeah, that was delicious while happening pretty rough 45 minutes about three hours later. Just saying, uh, if you like mustard, you know, use it sparingly. That day I was in the throes of training

for the Chicago Marathon and was in the middle of my 20 mile long run, which if you've never trained for a marathon before, that's the long one, the longest of the long runs. You guys helped me through that long run and many runs since then. I'm so glad you all reunited on three. This is a long shot,

but I figured you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. I'm running the 2025 Chicago Marathon with the Pat Tillman Foundation. I'm sure you guys know Pat Tillman's story, so I don't need to go into detail about that. But being from a family full of veterans, it was really important for me to run for a charity that benefited vets and also had a college football tie-in. I would absolutely love it if you guys wouldn't mind tweeting out my fundraising link or dropping a mention of it on your show. I paid my marathon reservation out of pocket already. So every penny donated through my fundraising page goes directly to helping veterans and their

families. Here's the link if you decided to do so if you're listening to this show or you're watching this show. The link is in the description on the YouTube page. It's also in the description on your pod on your Spotify or Apple podcasts. And you can just click it and you can help David out and help Pat Tillman Foundation out as well. And I just think this is so cool because I've done one marathon

and I remember the training runs. And I remember this was back pre-podcast. Podcasts didn't exist when I did this, it was 2006. It would have been so nice to have podcasts for those long runs. And I'm so glad we could help David with those. And this is obviously a great cause that he's running for. I'll tweet the link out as well.

But if you can help David and help the Pat Tillman Foundation out, that would be awesome. And any of you other guys, if you're doing stuff for a good cause, let us know. If we can help, we'd love to help. Yeah. Also, I envy you people who are able to run like 17 miles while just like gracefully listening to a podcast. I'm like panting and can't breathe. I don't know how you do it. On your on your 17 mile runs are my 17 mile runs are in a car.

River River's got the the QR code up on the screen now if you're watching on YouTube. That QR code will also take you to David's link. Yeah, I exercise. But I don't know how people are listening to podcasts while they do. It's like I'm jealous. I wish it. It was Greg McElroy who told us he listens to us while he lifts. I can understand that.

At least you're sitting at the edge of the bench recovering you know or like you have like recovery periods where you're like we're great recovery talk but we're not great like yeah like if you're in the middle of under the bar when in the squat rack I don't want to hear me squawking while I'm trying to squat yeah but all of you who do listen while while you out, God bless you. I love you. I am so impressed. That's all I'm saying. Ari, been a pleasure.

Got a couple things tomorrow. Our friend Tyler Shoemaker is coming in. We had a suggestion in the chat to have a show or even a set of shows explaining how to gamble on college football. So Tyler Shoemaker from VeeCin, the Vegas Sports Information Network, is the guy that Ari likes to follow when he's looking for action. And Tyler's going to explain how the system works, how you can take advantage of that, how you can find the best value lines. So it's a great conversation.

Also, not guaranteed, we're hoping, we're hopeful. We're confirmed. So we're hoping. Maybe Ole Miss quarterback Austin Simmons, who's graduated or graduating? I can't remember when Ole Miss is graduation is. But he's like 19. So yeah, he's going to be almost

the starting quarterback. He's also super genius. Can't wait to read us in our jaws dropping when we saw him do that drive in the Georgia game. I can't wait to have him. Yeah, I'm sure nobody ever brings that up to him. Ever.

I'm sure nobody's ever like, man, I saw you guys Georgia. Yeah, no, I'm sure he'll be living that again for the first time. So I'm super excited. Can't wait to get on the horn with him and, of course, present it to you guys. Thanks for being here, and appreciate you guys so much. We'll talk to you tomorrow.