Andy & Ari On3 - How will Texas adjust after C.J. Baxter's injury? | How the FIU-Pitbull deal came together

Episode Date: August 9, 2024

Texas has big expectations this season, but the Longhorns will have to play without their projected starter at tailback. Sophomore C.J. Baxter will miss the 2024 season after injuring his right knee this week at practice. Joe Cook of On3’s Inside Texas joins Andy to explain how the Longhorns will deal with Baxter’s absence.(0:00-1:59) Intro - Previewing the Show(2:00-4:29) Jelly Roll to be the voice of the anthem of CFB in 2024(4:30-5:39) Kirby Smart's son hits DINGERS(5:40-7:19) Can Georgia Tech Land a 5 Star?(7:20-9:00) USC and the QB Position(9:01-10:08) QB Draft on Monday(10:09-32:23) Joe Cook from Inside Texas joins(32:24-34:46) Help on QB Draft(34:47-53:57) FIU AD Scott Carr joins to detail Pitbull move(53:58-1:01:04) Conclusion - Naming the Chat?Who gets the starter carries? Who moves into a more prominent role?Joe also discusses who has impressed coaches in camp and which players we can expect big things from in 2024.Next, FIU athletic director Scott Carr explains how the Panthers’ stadium naming rights deal with Pitbull came together.Dale!Want to watch the show instead? Join us on YouTube LIVE, M-F at 8 am et! https://youtube.com/live/wDDgh60i6tIHost: Andy StaplesGuests: Joe Cook, Scott CarrProducer: River Bailey

Welcome to any staples on three. Happy Friday. We got a lot to talk about today. We're going to have Joe Cook from inside Texas on to discuss what the Longhorns do post CJ Baxter injury. That's another one of those ones we talk about every preseason. We're talking about it with Notre Dame and Charles Jagus earlier in the week. CJ Baxter, the presumed starting running back at Texas. He's out with a knee injury.

He's going to miss the whole season. So what do the Longhorns do from here? We're going to talk to Joe about that. We're going to talk to Joe about Texas camp, who's impressing, who needs to step up. Because obviously Texas under a lot of pressure this year, lots of expectations. They made it to the college football playoff in their final year in the Big 12. They won the league. They made the 14 playoff.

All of the things that we talk about that could Texas get over that hump. They did get over that hump, but now they go to the SEC. And now, of course, a few weeks out from the first game, they get very bad news, losing their best running back. Later in the show, we've got Scott Carr, the athletic director at FIU, to tell us how that deal with Pitbull for the naming rights on the stadium came together. It's a great story. Just one of those situations where everything fell into place, and we were talking about FIU more than we ever have. And we're still talking about it today because it really is a great, just kind of a good business story, if nothing else. But I'm very interested to watch and see

what happens from here on out, because maybe some people copy this deal. We'll see what they get out of it. What does Pitbull get out of it? But we'll talk to Scott Carr about how that deal can be very beneficial for both parties. Got a couple little nuggets, though, to talk about before we get to Joe Cook and Texas. We got a new song that we're going to be sick of because espn has announced its college football anthem for 2024 it is jelly rolls get by i'm very sad that it's a jelly roll song because i love jelly roll and i know how this works i will be sick of this song by week two. How can we forget Centuries by Fall Out Boy in 2014, 10 years ago? I like that song, but I was done with that song after about a week and a half.

Walk on Water by 30 Seconds to Mars in 2017. Do you believe that we can win this fight tonight? I never want to hear those words again. And I never wanted to hear them again after probably like the second week of September. That's how

much they played that song. Now, I think it depends on the song how much they just ram it into the ground because apparently last year's was a Post Malone song. I don't even remember it. but this is a good jelly roll song. I loved it. If you haven't been turned on to jelly roll yet. He's from Tennessee.

Started out basically as a rapper, but has a beautiful old soul voice. Lots of good songs. This one, you're going to like it first, but it's going to, you're going to tire of it quickly. That's exactly what Christopher Jordan said in the chat. I actually really liked the song, but I will get tired of it quickly. Yes. I just, I don't know.

I know ESPN probably has to pay the artists for these things and there's a significant cost attached to it. I wish they would have a rotation because I, you know, the, the video gamers, like the, the ones who play Madden,

they usually have like six songs on a Madden soundtrack. So you don't get sick of them quite so fast. I wish there was a rotation for the college football anthem. We could, we could, you know, hop genres. You can have a country one,

you'd hip hop one, you have a pop one. I think that would be the better way to do it. But I'm prepared to be sick of this song and I hate it because I love Jelly Roll. I don't want to be sick of this song, but I know I'm going to. And it's just,

that's the way it goes. Other college football adjacent news. Watch out. Budding baseball scouts. I think this kid plays some other sports too, but Andrew Smart. Kirby Smart's son did not make the little league world series. He's not going to Williamsport,

but was mashing home runs in the Southeast Regional Tournament for the team from Oconee County, Georgia. They did get eliminated by the Nolensville, Tennessee team, but Andrew Smart was destroying the baseball. So watch out for this dude. I heard his dad was an all SEC safety once. Probably a pretty good athlete. So watch out. But yeah, it was fun watching that and Kirby just being the proud dad instead of being the coach. It would have been interesting if they

had made it to Williamsport because I'm sure Curry would have tried to find a way to get up there, but it is camp. So how do we do this? How do we do this? But alas, the Tennessee team heading to Williamsport. The Georgia team will be home. Staying in the state of Georgia, though, a little bit of interesting news from our friends Steve Wiltfong and Chad Simmons. Georgia Tech and Brent Key in the lead for a five-star interior offensive line. Josh Petty from Roswell, Georgia. Really good player. Plays for

John Thompson, who used to be the East Carolina head coach. He was the defensive coordinator at South Carolina and at Florida and at Arkansas. Josh Petty, according to Steve Wilthong and Chad Simmons, RPM prediction they put in yesterday, they are predicting he will commit to Georgia Tech. That is a big get if that happens for the Yellow Jackets because this is the sort of thing that schools at that level don't normally do.

They don't normally get the super highly rated offensive linemen. Those guys typically all go to the same schools. And if this happens, pretty big coup for Georgia Tech. He's also being recruited by Tennessee, Florida State, Ohio State. So this is a guy that everybody wants. But that would be a big one for Brent Key. By the way, offensive line coach by trade and Georgia Tech. So just a little taste, a little recruiting taste as we get ready for,

remember, Georgia Tech will be kicking off the season for all of us against Florida State in Dublin. Two weeks from tomorrow. That's right. Two weeks from tomorrow. Another little piece of news from our friend Steve Wiltfong. If you watch the Wiltfong Whip Around this week, you know this. If you're not subscribed to the On3 Recruits channel and not watching the Wiltfong Whip Around, what are you doing?

Get yourself subscribed to that On3 Recruits channel. Hopefully you're also subscribed to the On3 channel here. But on Wilt Fong Whip Around, Steve was talking about Hussan Longstreet, who is quarterback, class of 2025, who is committed to Texas A&M. He's now talking to USC. And Steve explained that the reason for this is USC is looking at a plan B at this point, because Julian Lewis,

the quarterback who has been committed to USC has not shut down his recruitment yet. Basically what, what Steve says is if Juju Lewis shuts down his recruitment, then USC will stop pursuing who's on long street street. And he will definitely be at Texas A&M. But if Julian Lewis is still looking at Colorado, still looking at Indiana, still looking at Auburn,

then game on, game on. Because you've got to have a plan if you lose the guy. So that is a recruiting battle to watch. Speaking of quarterbacks, I may need your help. So in the chat, feel free to help me out here. Remember last year, we did the quarterback draft with Jesse Simonton, where he and I went back and forth picking quarterbacks. And we made it basically a team of quarterbacks.

And one of our viewers, Cornwit on Twitter, did the scoreboard for us every week. And I destroyed Jesse. I destroyed Jesse because I had Jaden Daniels, I had Bo Nix, and I had Dylan Gabriel. They were the one, two, and three point scorers in the whole thing last year. I also had Joe Milton. I had Tanner Mordecai.

He got hurt, missed a lot of games. But I ended up winning by a lot. We're doing that again next week on the show. Very different situation this year. Last year, it was like, okay, whoever wins this coin toss is taking Caleb Williams. We know that. That was Jesse. This year, if I win the first pick, I have no idea who I'm going to pick.

No clue. So if you know who I should pick at quarterback, because I honestly, if Jesse wins the first pick, I'm not sure who I would pick after he picks. Let me know. Let me know in the chat who I need to take. Joe's probably going to tell me to take Quinn Ewers, but we'll see. But let me know because I really do not have my draft board worked out. Producer River just went to a shot of Shador Sanders and Noah Fafita.

Those are pretty good choices. Those are pretty good choices too. So we'll have to figure out what that's going to be, but that's going to be next week. So a little tease for next week. Right now, we got to talk Texas Longhorns, though, because there was very big news, sad news earlier this week that C.J. Baxter will be out for the season with a knee injury.

Joe Cook from Inside Texas joins us. Joe, Texas obviously had high expectations for C.J. Baxter. He was a freshman last year. He was the one who stepped in when somebody else got hurt last year. What happens now? Yeah, it's kind of the same story all over again. Jaden Blue is going to become the number one. I think entering this season, there's an expectation that Baxter and Blue would be 1A and 1B.

And now Blue is going to be that number one. Six foot, maybe a little bit shorter than that, 200 pounds, but extremely fast. Someone who, if you go to, I think it's our analytics on Twitter, they always do the thing where they check clock miles per hour on that 69 yard run against Texas Tech. I think he was almost to 23. So he's got a lot of speed. Someone who can run between the tackles isn't like a gadget guy, isn't like a speed back he'll he'll have to do everything um and he had to do that last year against iowa state to to ice a football game um was a big part of texas and in their uh college football playoff game plan uh the real question is now when you think about

uh the running back position at texas you know you're going to need more than one uh we saw that last year uh we're seeing that already through one day of full padded practice. That's when that injury to Baxter occurred. And the candidates are Trey Wisner, a sophomore from DeSoto, Jarek Gibson, a true freshman from IMG Academy, and Christian Clark, a true freshman from the Phoenix area. So this is why days like the other day are why Tashard choice recruits two running backs every single cycle. They have two committed in this 2025 class. They're going to probably take two in the 2026 class. It's just what he does. And you know,

when, when you go to a position that asks a lot you know, physically and schematically, you need to have a lot of different guys available to you. And so this is going to be a test of that depth. But Jaden Blue is going to probably become the guy who gets more carries now as a result of Baxter going down. Yeah, it is, especially Steve Sarkeesian's offense, because they're going to throw those guys out of the backfield too. They're going to do a lot with them.

But it is interesting. It almost feels like you need three or four in this era of college football because like you said you can have the catastrophic thing that happens this week but you could also have the week-to-week banged up you know lose a guy for a couple weeks and that's that's how we saw cj baxter andaxter and Jaden Blue so much last year. Yeah. And I mean, when Jonathan Brooks went down, that was a little bit of a surprise, too. Because just C.J. Baxter, he was, I think a friend, Danny Davis over at the Statesman found this, the first true freshman running back to start his first career game at Texas since Ricky Williams in 95. He got banged up in the Rice game, got banged up in the Alabama game. Jonathan Brooks took his

opportunity and then obviously became RB1 in the draft. So they've had high expectations for Baxter. It's just unfortunate now we won't be able to see him this year. And even Steve Sarkeesian lamented, you know, you're losing a guy. Like you're losing someone who everybody in that locker room really likes. I even wrote about him, I think, a couple weeks ago, just at the fact that he seems really comfortable. Like he has that type of personality and persona that you think, wow, you know, everybody's going to look at Quinn Ewers as being the face of the program. But this is somebody who could eventually be that recognizable face

of the burnt orange football team. And it's unfortunate we're not going to be able to see him this year. But Texas has recruited really well over the past couple of years. Running back position is no different. There's a lot of weapons on that offense, but Baxter's still a loss, no doubt. So question about the rest of the offense, because there's some transfers that we've been talking about and they're fit at Texas. Cody Blair and I did a show where we were talking about the most impactful transfers this year, and we both thought Isaiah Bond and Amari Nyblack, who came over from Alabama, just kind of fit perfectly into what Texas needed,

especially Nyblack kind of filling that Jatavian Sanders role. How have they looked in camp so far? Yeah, Isaiah Bond has been obviously first team guy, kind of at that boundary wide receiver position, someone who brings a lot of speed. They don't think he may not be running a 4-2-1 at the combine, but they think he can fill that similar role to Xavier Worthy and do a lot of different things.

Nyblack, there's some good competition at the tight end spot. Gunner Helm is kind of perceived as that first guy, but he's the one that you put in line most of the time. Nye Black's a guy who maybe you have offset. That's what Jatavian Sanders did a good amount of last year. But he's looked good, but there's a senior who really hasn't done a lot in his career named Juan Davis from the Fort Worth area.

And he drew a lot of praise from Jeff banks and Steve Sarkeesian for playing with a little bit more physicality than they had seen in, in recent years. So there there's a good competition there at tight end with receiver though, specifically bond has his days, but every receiver at Texas seems to be having one of their days. Eric Nalene had some info on Inside Texas the other day

about how it was DeAndre Moore, a sophomore from, I think, St. John Bosco. He had his day. Silas Bolden, the Oregon State transfer, who I've compared to Jakeem Grant, the old Texas Tech wide receiver. He's had a lot of really good days. So narrowing down that rotation

that Steve Sarkeesian has said is going to expand um finding the top i guess five guys you want to work with for this 2024 season it's becoming a little bit of a a chore but in a good way just because each receiver seems to be having a really good day at practice and one you didn't mention that i know the the chat will kill me if I don't ask about, Ryan Wingo. Because we were at SEC media days, like Luther Burden, he's shouting out Ryan Wingo. Obviously, they're both Missouri guys. But Quinn Ewers singing Ryan Wingo's praises.

How much of an impact has this guy made right off the bat? Yeah, he was the talk of the offense during the spring just because Silas Bolden was still finishing up at Oregon State. And he shows up and rolls early and just steals the show. He's someone who's probably, I think height and weight wise, maybe the biggest receiver on the team at like 6'2.5", 210. Really good body control, right amount of speed for a Steve Sarkeesian offense, and just making plays. Right now, we get a little bit of a media window during practice. He's been with the twos, but again, this is a rotation or a receiver room, rather, that's going to have to figure out how to get the best three on the field from a group of five guys. He's definitely

within that group of five. He's a really exciting player because he's from a group of five guys and he's definitely within that group of five so uh he's he's a really exciting player um because he's doing a lot of work with with the twos he's been a favorite target of arch mannings throughout spring summer and fall as we've heard but also uh growing growing rapport and chemistry with quinn ewers as well to where we expect wingo to get a good amount of playing time look at joe just you. Just tweaking that YouTube algorithm a little bit. Arch Manning, Ryan Wingo, Arch Manning, Ryan Wingo. I'm just going to say it over and over again. I'll let the AI take it and just push it into everybody's feed.

But it is fun to think about. And it's also interesting to think about, Joe, because these guys play Michigan week too. Michigan's going to have an incredible defense. Everybody talks about Will Johnson, maybe the best corner in the country. So, yeah, we're going to find out who Texas' wide receiver one is, because it's going to be whoever Michigan sticks Will Johnson on. Whatever Texas thinks about those guys, I'm more concerned. Who does Michigan worry about the most in week two?

That will be very telling. Who do they stick Will Johnson on? Yeah. Is that someone that you're willing to put on an island against people like Isaiah Bond, like John Tate Cook, even like Silas Bolden. I would be pretty surprised if Sharon Moore and Wink Martindale weren't that confident in Johnson just because of the quality of player he is, but it's going to be a fun battle to check out. I think there's a lot of different dynamics with that game. Obviously, it's still just under a month away, but Michigan quarterback battle, Texas O-line versus Michigan D-line, like all the different things going into that game. Sharone Moore being a former Sooner offensive lineman,

like there's so many different storylines that we get to talk about. But yeah, what the receivers and how, you know, we talk about it with basketball and teams building basically entire rosters from the transfer portal. A lot of that was done with this Texas wide receiver room. There is only one ball. I hate that phrase sometimes, but sometimes it's applicable. How do you make it all work and how do you get that chemistry together even with some of these new wide receivers? Well, I think in a week like this where you have a bad injury the only one ball thing makes more sense because look something may happen you may need all of these guys at some point to to contribute i want to flip the other side of the

ball one guy we were talking about a little bit on the show this week was Trey Moore, the transfer from UTSA. This guy had 14 sacks last year in the American. Texas's edge rusher group was not necessarily the star of the defense last year. It was the interior D-line last year. But it feels like you add Trey Moore to what they already had, and you're talking about a very formidable edge group. Yeah yeah and man i've been covering texas for inside texas since about uh 2016 and this is without a doubt the best edge group i've been able to watch uh on the on the 40 acres and it's taken a while for it to get there

uh you think about that defense that under Tom Herman that Todd Orlando ran with basically three defensive tackles and no edges on the field. Well, that has an effect on recruiting to where really primetime players, think of someone like Caleb on chase on. He's from the Houston area, goes to LSU as part of that national championship team because he looks around and sees, man, my position is it playing a whole lot joseph osai had that standout 2020 was an all-american and became a high draft pick that was kind of the the blip on the radar they had tried to make them work at middle linebacker the year before because they didn't use that position like it's just and then when steve

sarkeesian shows up he brings ben davis, Ovia Gofo, Ray Thornton, like three guys who I don't want to say they washed off other rosters, but they weren't first string players where they were at to revitalize that position. It's taken a lot of work to get to where it's at. And now they have some older players, developed players really starting to make some moves. And then you add in Trey Moore, who's really cemented himself on that boundary edge position. Baron Sorrell is probably going to be the starter opposite him at the strong side. For some reason, for a team that's going to be in the top five, Bruce Feldman, and I respect the

hell out of his list, but he's only found two freaks on the Texas roster in the past two editions of the freaks list. And Sorrell was one of them. Byron Murphy was one last year. Yeah, but they have depth. They feel good about Ethan Burke. They feel good about Colin Simmons, the five star. Colton Vosick is a local product. Like they feel like this edge room is the best that Steve Sarkeesian's had

since he arrived at Texas. And I also think it's probably, not probably, easily the best one I've seen since, you know, 2016 year three of Charlie Strong. Well, so the, they also would use Anthony Hill occasionally in a rushing role. Will we, do you think we'll see that or are they so deep that he just kind of stays

back in the second level? They're going to put him in a lot of different places. He's going to be the middle linebacker. That's the role he's been training for, taking over for Jalen Ford, who I believe got drafted by the Saints. But that's a position that asks a little bit more of pass coverage, playing to the field a little bit more. Pete Kwiatkowski, I'm paraphrasing, he said the other day when he was talking with Anthony Hill, who is also going to wear the green dot, he said, you're a pretty good football player,

but you weren't that good of a linebacker last year. Now he feels like he's a lot better linebacker, will be able to do stuff in the middle, reading and reacting and dropping, but they would be foolish to not use him a little bit off the edge and use him in situations where he can really put his five-star athleticism on display. Yeah, it's just sort of shades of Harold. When I hear that, I get the little look at what happened to Harold Perkins situation, but you realize that's going to be different for everybody.

It may be different for Harold Perkins this year at LSU. I remember when Ford would line up on the edge last year is like, oh, a quarterback's in trouble. So that's the one I am curious about, because you're right, they do need him. I'm sorry, Hill, not Ford. But they do need Hill to replace Ford there. So it's going to be very interesting to watch. You know, I was watching your show that you do with, with Ian Boyd, the inside Texas live on Thursday. And y'all were talking about,

you know, the SEC is talking about doing these injury reports and availability reports, similar to what the NFL does. It's, it's adjusting to, to how common sports gambling is now. And this is an interesting week to talk about that with you guys, because you saw the reports about CJ Baxter trickle out.

The school didn't acknowledge it for, I think, about a day. If that's a game week, how do you think that's going to get handled at a lot of SEC schools in the age of availability reports, which seem to be coming according to Greg Sankey? Yeah, I guess there's the devil's in the details a little bit because with the Big Ten, it's not released till Friday, right? Or the day before the game or game day. And I know in the NFL, they base questionable, doubtful, all on practice reps. I have a feeling SEC head coaches aren't really going to want to tell how many reps somebody took, but they may not have a choice. That's

kind of where we're going with this as well. And I think Steve Sarkeesian, he got asked about this at SEC spring meetings. He got asked about it again the other day. And it's like, how do you make sure that nobody tries to go around the rules or tries to play with the availability reports and just says, fine us, take money out of our pocket. That's a good way to prevent us from trying to undo this. And I think that's a pretty good strategy. It's weird talking gambling in Texas a little bit, just because legalized sports gambling isn't legal in the state of Texas. You have to go to, I think, literally any state touching Texas in order to get one of your apps out. There's a thriving industry right across the Red River to the north. I know that.

Or the Mountain Time Zone. Basically, everywhere else you can go, but not somewhere within the state. And but, you know, I remember a couple of years ago when the Iowa and Iowa State thing was was just coming out and the women's basketball coach at Texas, Vic Schaefer, I asked him about it and he had a really good line. He said, as soon as you put on a burnt orange uniform, like you're on the board in Las Vegas. And so I like this idea of not just for, you know, coaches and players to, to protect them and, and make sure that, you know, they don't step in something they don't need to step in. I do like the idea of this as just, you know, informing the fans, like let's, let's kind of have an understanding of who's going to be out there and not have coaches be like, well, we'll see how he looks in practice. And when you say we'll see how he looks in practice,

but he's in shorts and a T-shirt and doesn't even have a helmet, that doesn't irk me, but I'd rather just be upfront about it. You're still going to have people at 3 a.m. like they are on Sunday morning breaking the news for whether players are going to be available or not. But I like this idea. I think if you ask any of the Big Ten people, it seems like it's worked pretty well for football and basketball. I like it there. And I think it it helps the sport and it secondary effects helps other industries that don't need a ton of help either. Well, and it also takes the takes some of the people because remember, at all these schools, there are students that help out the various like the students that help out the training staff. They're in a fairly compromised position here because they probably have information that's very valuable to the gamblers.

And they're not being compensated in a way that if they lost this gig, they're done forever or they lose their livelihood. So they are potentially vulnerable. So if you do put that information out, it makes it easier for them and also you know for the players themselves but it'll be it'll be interesting to see how they actually handle because i remember when the acc did this a few years ago the coach is just like they're like no we're not giving you anything and i was that nick saban had an interesting way to like if a guy might play, Nick Saban was pretty cagey about information. But if the person was out, either for the season or for an extended period of time, he'd be like, here's the injury, here's how long he's out.

And they seem to win a lot of games there. So it seemed to work for them okay. Well, you know who Steve Sarkeesian used to work for. That's right. So it seemed to work for them. Okay. Well, you know who Steve Sarkeesian used to work for. So, uh, that's right. A lot of, a lot of similar, uh,

applications over in Austin as you did in Tuscaloosa. Hey, he, he seems to be one of the ones who's taken the right lessons from Nick Saban. It's, it's interesting that the guys who used to work for Saban, some of them took the right lessons.

Some of them cough, cough, Jeremy Pruitt, cough, cough did not. So it just, cough, did not. So it just, with Sark, he definitely seems to have figured out, okay, this is the roster building piece of it.

This is the management piece, the week-to-week management piece of it. And yeah, I think that's why we're so excited about what Texas can be because it did seem like they finally got over that hump last season, started winning the games they were supposed to win instead of dropping them. Do you think that's something that can continue as they move into the SEC? I really do. I actually talked about this with our buddy J.D. Piquel the other day, and I think he may have mentioned it too, in that he talked with Jaday Barron. You may have done it, too, at SEC Media Days. And the reaction that everybody has kind of gotten from Jaday when talking like, oh, so are you all excited for this year and building off what was a successful season last year, Baron who came back for his fifth year goes like, I mean, we didn't get what we wanted last year. They won the big 12.

They won 12 games. They made the playoff, but they remember that ball falling incomplete on the, you know, whatever end zone that was in the Superdome. Like they thought they were good enough to play for and possibly win a national championship. And if you make the playoff, yeah, you're that good. But they expect to be there. That's what the mentality in this program is. And a few years ago, the mentality of this program was, boy, I hope we make the Big 12

championship game. So it's a lot different. They feel like they have the right mentality to approach things. Obviously, the players with those recruiting classes and portal are doing, you know, great things. And then you combine that with, you know, Steve Sarkeesian, the play caller, doing some innovative stuff on offense. And the Longhorns feel like they are they're the force to be reckoned with, not not much of a newcomer. And they really want to make it known that they expect to be in the playoff, competing for the bye in the SEC championship or a high seed in a home game and playing into January. Because you hear Steve Sarkeesian talk about, okay, if we're going to play this many games, here's what we have to do. I's, I mean, that, that just shows that he's planning on being able to play deep into January.

So there's, there's a mentality shift that's happened at Texas to where they, they feel as if this is, this is where they're at now. They're in this elite station of the sport and they want to continue to prove it on a year over year basis now. And we will find out if Texas is indeed, I'm not even going to use the B word. They're fine. They're good.

We still haven't. We still haven't. We'll let people decide. Yeah. It's completely subjective. I don't even know what back means. Joe Cook, Inside Texas, thank you so much. Thank you, Andy.

If you are a Texas fan and you are not yet subscribed to Inside Texas, thank you so much. Thank you, Andy. If you are a Texas fan and you are not yet subscribed to Inside Texas, now is the perfect time to do it because if you use the code ANDY1 at checkout, you get it $1 for your first month. But it's not just Inside Texas. It's our entire on three network of sites. So maybe you're a Kansas State fan, K-State Online. Maybe you're a Penn State fan, Blue and White Illustrated. Maybe you are a Florida State fan and you want to peruse the message boards at War Chant.

Maybe you're a Georgia fan. You want to hang out at Dogs HQ. Maybe you're an Alabama fan and you haven't subscribed to them online yet. Now is your time. $1 for your first month. Use the code Andy1 at checkout. It is the best deal going. Join us. Hear it on three. All right. I've gotten some good tips in the chat as I prepare my board for next week's quarterback draft. Todd in the chat says, Dylan Gabriel, Caden Salter, Byron Brown, Jackson Dart. Caden Salter and Byron Brown, great choices. Now, part of the rule is each of us has to have a group of five quarterback on our roster. There

may be more than one group of five quarterback on each roster. Todd just mentioned two really good ones. Caden Salter at Liberty, Byron Brown at USF, Jackson Dart at Ole Miss. I don't believe he was on either of our teams last year. That was a huge oversight by us. I had Dylan Gabriel on my team last year. I picked him fairly low in the draft. I think he's going to go very high in the draft this year. We will find out next week how that all shakes out,

but just know I'm going to kill Jesse again. That's pretty much how it's going to go. Now we transition to a little bit of sports business. The most fun story so far this offseason, I think, is FIU selling its naming rights to its stadium to Pitbull. I've never heard of this. Never heard of a person buying the naming rights to its stadium to Pitbull. I've never heard of this. Never heard of a person buying the naming rights to a stadium. Well, I do happen to know the guy who runs FIU's athletic department, and he was kind enough to join us to explain how this deal came together. So now, let's talk to Scott Carr, FIU's AD, about the Pitbull deal.

Dale, we are joined by FIU Athletic Director Scott Carr, who just made himself a deal with Pitbull to have Pitbull Stadium. That's where the Panthers will be playing this year. All right, Scott, we got to talk about how this how this deal came together how did you guys and pitbull wind up in the same room going you know your name should be on our stadium yes well thanks thanks andy uh uh paws up dale that's how that's how we uh that's how i roll nowadays right right? But yeah, so I'll give you the background. Hopefully, it doesn't take too long. I'll try to move quickly to let you know. This has been going on for over a year, right? I haven't done the math on exactly when, but it's been over a

year when we first started the conversation. And really, it probably started even go back a little bit further when I first got here two and a half years ago, knew that we needed to generate more revenue, knew that we needed to have a strategic plan. So we were having a lot of those intentional conversations here as a staff and, you know, really saying, what are our strengths? Right. I mean, I can easily tell you what our weaknesses are, but what are our strengths? Right. And and, you know, we need to lean into those. Well, a strength that FIU is we're really young. We're a young university. We're a young athletic department. We're a very young football team. When I got here, we were 20 years old. We didn't we couldn't even go to the bars and have a cold beer. We were so young. Right. So we were we wanted to lean into that. Right.

That means we can we can be more creative and innovative, innovative and unique and not, you know, rock the rock the boat right with with with the fan base. And so we wanted to really lean into those types of factors. We knew that we were in the city of Miami. Amazing city. You know, what could we do to lean into to the strengths here? And what are the strengths here? Well, there's a lot of famous people that live down here. Right. And so so we were leaning into all that. And so, you know, really challenging the staff here that, hey, in the next 12 to 24 months, the biggest revenue opportunity we have here right now is the football stadium. We really need to attack that and figure out what we can do there. So Alex Kelly is our chief revenue officer and he's a local guy, right? So he knows the Miami vibe. And he just said, he knows the, the Miami vibe. And, and, uh, he just said,

Hey Scott, what about looking at celebrities, right? What about a celebrity to name our stadium? Right. And, and I said, sounds great. And of course, then the next thing was, let's start, you know, from him, what about Pitbull? Let's, let's try to start with Pitbull, right? So, you know, we started the process and we're partners with Van Wagner here. They, they got our multimedia rights and have since 2016, they great partners and and one of our sales guys here one of the van wagner sales guys um alfred caballero he had a connection with with somebody that uh with one of the upper management folks uh that with armando and so connected with him uh through the van wagner folks had an initial meeting with just him

and he loved the idea right now we had done a lot of homework a lot of research we knew that slam academy um that's that's some charter schools that armando started it's up to 14 schools now and and they really um sports is a big emphasis there they kind of they teach the kids using sports and so uh we knew that would be a big deal to Armando and we're, you know, education was really big to him. Obviously we're, we're higher education. That's K through 12 with slam. So we, when we started putting some things, you know, in a working document, Hey, here's what, here's some things FIU could do for slam. Right. And then, you know, looking at, you know, what are some ways we could sweeten the pot? Well, we were smart enough to know that if we had someone like Pitbull on our stadium,

we'd get a lot more money for sponsorship, right? So let's use the on-the-field sponsorship. If FIU goes out to sell that two years ago, we'll get a little bit of money, right? If it's Pitbull Stadium and we're selling that, what is that, triple, quadruple, you know, what somebody's willing to pay. Right. So we packaged a few of those elements together. So just so you know that you may not have seen that yet from any documents that have come out. But like the naming rights. So Kia of South Dade is the field sponsor. Well, their money is technically. In the naming rights partnership. Right.

It's not simply coming to FIU right so that's part of the 1.2 million right but we wanted to be creative like that so um to show hey guys there's ways that you can actually chip away at the 1.2 million because people are going to want to get on board because it's you right because it's people. Yeah, and I was gonna ask about that because part of the deal is also, he gets to use the stadium rent free for 10 dates. And I mean, a 24,000 seat facility is not easy or cheap to come by. Right.

So that obviously is probably a revenue generating opportunity for him where it may just be a wash. Yes. A hundred percent. Well, and so those 10 opportunities just, and we need to clarify for people, I don't, I'm not in his business, right? I don't see him having 10 concerts in a, in a calendar year, right? In our stadium, right? You got to move those around and all that. But to your point, the stadium rental is not cheap and it's certainly not cheap right? Everything costs m

Um so it's an opportunity concert, whether it's uh he is mentoring that's in it's something that's not right? Because one of the don't realize is Armando and businessman. I mean, I've been blown away at all the relationships he has just in the business world, right? So it may be something out there. It could be, you know, he's got a partnership with NASCAR,

right? I don't know what you would do with NASCAR at our football stadium, but, you know, creative minds, right? So there's 10 events and it's great for him because to your point, he technically could make his money back, he may make money o Um, but at the same time people onto our campus to right? People know F. I. stadium. It's great for F we worked it in there. He

set a number because if i it will be one number. If it'll be another number. match or's a NASCAR event, it'll be another number. If it's a boxing match or a MMA fight, it's another number. I mean, who knows, right? What could go on in there? Or another musician, it's another number. But they've agreed to set aside some tickets that our students could purchase at a discounted price, right? All to be negotiated depending on the event, of course. And then it'll also, for our season ticket holders, they'll have the first right to buy tickets to those events.

So it's another, it's a sweetener for our season ticket, right? So I mentioned it yesterday, Andy, that this is not a naming rights sponsorship. It's a partnership. It's a friendship. It's a relationship. It's gone much deeper than just, hey, I get this and you get that.

I mean, it's really been a great a great start to to an incredible partnership. And, you know, Armando's even, you know, text me this morning and said yesterday was out was amazing. And, you know, here's to making some history. And this is going to be fun. Right. You know, let's ride. I mean, like, it's great. So you came from ucf before you became the ad at fiu and that was another young school young athletic department where there weren't a lot of sacred cows that you had to worry about too much does that make it easier to to be creative think big 100 andy 100 so my background real quick. I was at Southern Miss. They've been playing

football for over 100 years. I was at Auburn. They've been playing football for well over 100 years. And then UCF and FIU, right? And in the history and tradition, you know, if you're at one of those first two schools I mentioned, don't even change the size of the font on the nameplate on the back of the jersey, right? Or you're going to run into a buzzsaw, right? Whereas at UCF, you know, UCF is young, but, you know, their football program started in 79. Here at FIU, we didn't start till 2002. So a lot of similarities, right? I mean, that's one of the reasons, you know, we've gotten super creative with, with our uniforms down here with the vice uniforms, right? I know you talked to Dan for sell best uniforms in the country last year. Yeah, right. I mean, and, and by the way, you know, little, little breaking news for you. We'll, we'll have some new ones for for this October that are in the works, right? So we'll have some new ones that will be launching in a couple couple months, right? But you can be a lot more creative. I wore this shirt for a reason. This

isn't navy blue or gold. Those are our traditional colors at FIU, right? This is Biscayne blue. You can do Biscayne blue at FIU. You try to do a Biscayne blue at Southern Miss or at Auburn, you know, you may be getting your buyout in your car. Can't do the Opelika orange at Auburn. It's got to be that color orange. Yes, 100%, right? So you can certainly do that. And so I knew that coming in here that we could be really creative

and push the envelope and the fan base and everyone was going to give you a lot of leeway on that. And so to me, that just really helps your creativity and your innovation where you can, you know, you just, you can do these types of things. You can think this way. You can think outside the box, shoot it. Some of those other places, they may not even want you to name the stadium after a Fortune 100 company. Right. So, you know, here we can name it after a international superstar right so it's um it's been great no you and and i appreciate you just allowing me to to name different stadiums after rappers i i spent the entire day on tuesday doing that so that was uh

that was nice but i just from a business standpoint, marketing standpoint, I find this fascinating. We talked about this on the show on Wednesday, rarely do you see a deal where somebody is getting paid and then also getting a massive amount of publicity for that. Usually you have to pay for that level of publicity, but I would venture that's the most we've talked about FIU maybe ever in terms of the football program in one day. Yes. Well, that's part of the mad genius behind it, right? I mean, I can't tell you how many conversations Alex Kelly, again, our CRO, how many conversations he and I've had over the past year, year and a half as we've been working on all this. And I would always say it, so I'd love to get your thoughts, Andy, you're a sharp guy, is what's more valuable to FIU, the 1.2 million or the brand building? And I say that knowing that we need 120 million more dollars

annually than we're getting right now, not 1.2, but what's more valuable to us? One point two million or partnering and starting a relationship and a friendship with Pitbull and his brand and his 52 million followers on Facebook and his 24 million followers on Twitter, et cetera, et cetera. And I think FIU, for the most part, owned the college sports space for an entire day yesterday, right? I mean, you know, that probably wasn't on a lot of people's bingo cards last week, right? So what's more valuable? Well, you couldn't buy that for $1.2 million. You couldn't buy the amount of time you had on ESPN or on like all of our various networks. And if you wanted to buy, like if you wanted to buy ads on this show or ads on Josh Pate show, and then you wanted to buy time on ESPN, it would cost you more than 1.2 million to get all that you got yesterday. Yes. Yes. Well, and understand

too, I agree wholeheartedly. And like I said, can't tell you how many times we've had that conversation here. Right. And, and you know, I never wanted to come down off the 1.2 million dollar number right we're trying to negotiate but you're sitting back going i mean what the brand value alone is worth the 1.2 million right and and again we're doing co-branded merchandise we just saw that it's already available it's already available and here's the deal i just found out this morning uh that we're not sold out of everything, but there's certain sizes that are already sold out. And understand this. It's being sold in our bookstore, but also online. The students aren't even on campus right now. I mean, we're in that that period in between final exams and summer school start. And there's no students. It's a ghost town on campus. And some of the sizes have already sold out.

Right. And so and he's and he's going to sell this co-branded merchandise at his concerts, right? I mean, so FIU brand, whether somebody buys one or not, the FIU brand is going to be at the merchandise stands at Pitbull concerts, right? So it's amazing. I find it so interesting. Let's go back to your last stop because I watched this happen in real time at UCF.

And it was, I grew up in Orlando. So I remember when UCF was very much a pure commuter school. You would go to campus and you'd see people walking around in Gators and Seminoles t-shirts. And really, in the past 20 years, it has become a very much, this is our campus. This is Orlando's, you know, this is Orlando's big university. And especially like when you guys went undefeated, the amount of school pride and the idea of a school identity kind of forming around it, like you could feel it. And UCF feels like a different place now.

For FIU, how important was it to try to do something that might establish or start to establish, this is the identity. This is what the program is going to be yes well i'll answer that question by uh by giving a tip of the cap to to you andy uh because i i quoted you many many times here over the past year okay we'll see if you remember this quote, right? I don't remember when Louisiana state became LSU, but I remember when the university of central Florida became UCF, right. And it was, I don't remember if you said December 31st of 2017 or January 1st of 2018. Right. So give me a little grace there. Yeah. It was whatever the bowl game was, whatever that peach bowl was. Yeah. Right. And I told people down here, I said, I said, we're going to have to get Andy to write an article and put that out there and say, I don't know. You know, but I know when when Florida International University became FIU and it was August 6th, 2024.

Right. And it's so funny that you mentioned that. So that actually came from a discussion with my editors at Sports Illustrated because we we had a thing where on first reference, you said Central Florida instead of UCF. And it's the same thing with FIU because the thought is not enough people know what that is. But like LSU, USC, TCU, we assume everybody knows what those places are or what those letters mean. So we did that. And I did a little experiment where i didn't tell my editors i was doing it and i didn't i nobody bothered to check to correct it before it went out and published i didn't call it central florida on first reference i called it ucf and wanted to see would anybody say anything would anybody email would anybody go who's that nobody said who's that yes yes exactly and again you know we can we can be cute on the on

the show here a little bit and go you know right now if you said to somebody FIU they may not say FIU and they may go Dolly right and you go okay well then you know us right out of work right yeah you know you know who we are right when when I when I tell you spell FIU, on Monday, you may have spelled it WHO, right? On Tuesday, August 6th, you're going to spell it FIU. And you may add a Dolly or you may add a Pitbull or you may add whatever you want to add to it. But we're on the map, right? People know who we are now. And I've told everybody, I said, now, and we've been putting the pieces in place the past couple of years.

Now we got to go win. Right. We go win now. Right. I mean, it's marketing is great. But but you got to win. You got to be competitive. And I'm excited about Coach McIntyre and our football team and all our other sports as well. Right. But we're talking about a football stadium right now. But I'm excited about about where we're going and the pieces we have. And knowing where we were in December of 2021 to where we are now, it's a much different situation, right? But we're excited about that. How much will this help for Mike McIntyre, your head football coach? When he and his staff start reaching out to recruits outside of Dade Broward, Palm Beach County, when they start reaching out to people in the transfer portal,

will this help ID your school? Will it make it easier? Do you think? I have not had this specific conversation with Coach McIntyre, so I won't speak for him. But from my perspective, absolutely. Again, we're on the map, right? And we have someone who, although he's an international superstar, he wants FIU to elevate, right? And so I'll use an example not of a current recruit, but just of I can remember the first time I met Armando. He brought up Keewon Jenkins.

Last year, he was a freshman quarterback. From the Opa-locka neighborhood in Miami, yeah. Right, right, from where Armando's from, right? I mean, right? And so Armando knew who he was, knew of him. I mean, they hadn't met before, right? But I mean, he's like, he goes, basically, you know, basically what he was saying is that that was me.

Right. You know, I mean, that he he he grew up. He grew up as me. Right. And and one of the things he said to me was he said, hey, when we get this deal done, you know, I want to make sure I meet him. Now, understand that's the international superstar saying I want to meet your quarterback. Right. That that's that's who Armando is as a a human being I know when people think of Pitbull the first word that comes to mind they may not say humble because they just go man this guy's worldwide who doesn't know him right the the the kindest most humble person ever I mean I was blown away right he's telling me he wants to meet a an 18 year old freshman quarterback of ours when we get the deal done and I'm sitting there going I have a feeling he probably would like to meet you too right you're going right and

so yeah so that's where i mean and he wants to uh you know he met coach mac yesterday right like in in you know armando's he wants to have conversations with the team and conversations with guys and and um and talk to them about what he thinks about the city of Miami and about FIU. And, you know, I just I think it's going to be huge because because he wants us to he wants us to go to another level. And and as he mentioned yesterday in the press conference, he's not trying to have us go to another level because we just did a really cool thing that nobody else has done and name a college football stadium after a musician. It's not that it's no, I want FIU to go

to another level. So, um, so we're excited about that. Well, I cannot wait to see what y'all do with this and Scott, thank you so much. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me on, man. It's been great. I appreciate it. We had some more suggestions in the chat. I made a few suggestions myself the other day. We definitely want some Pastor Troy Field at ATL in stadium. I like that. Christopher, following Nathan's suggestion yesterday, Pitbull should have asked FIU to remascot to the Pitbulls. Nathan, by the way, sent me some more suggestions for if someone were to

buy the mascot name, like Geico buying a mascot name and you change the mascot name to the Geckos. But again, does that advertise Geico as much as you want to advertise Geico? I'm not sure. We know they advertise a lot during college football, so it's possible. AJ, Gucci Field at Luda Stadium in Atlanta. Well, Ludacris did mention the Georgia Dome in one of his songs. Of course, the Georgia Dome is now a Mercedes-Benz Stadium parking lot, so I don't know if that's necessarily going to work either.

The problem with Atlanta is there's too much. There's multiple stadiums because you've got Georgia Tech's stadium, you've got Bobby Dodd's stadium, you've got Georgia State's stadium, which I think I... Didn't I already rename that GZ Stadium. We're going to call it the trap. I think TI is going to want to have a say in this, too. I mean, listen, TI is getting played before every kickoff in America.

Bring them out is the song you play before every kickoff and tip-off at any sporting event. Just so many in Atlanta. Pastor Troy, I think if Josh Brooks, the athletic director of Georgia, ever wants to get fired, he could sell the naming rights to Sanford Stadium. We call it Pastor Troy Stadium. I'm all for that. But it is, like Scott's saying, there are certain things you could do at FIU

that you cannot do at Auburn or even at Southern Miss. I think that was a good point that he brought up because Southern Miss has been playing football for over 100 years. They are as tied to their traditions as Auburn or Penn State is. Like, you just don't have that flexibility at an old line school, whether it's, you know, Penn State or Georgia Southern. Like, if you have a deep tradition, you're going to have an issue if you're trying to do something a little bit outside you back to the dark times about 10 years ago.

Remember when Dave Brandon was your AD? Remember the Coke bottles? Dave Brandon would definitely sell a Michigan, like create a Michigan mascot and sell the rights to it. So like, of course, with Dave Brandon, it would have been like a dancing Domino's pizza box. There would have been like a Domino's pizza box just cavorting around on the Michigan sideline. Does Michigan need a mascot? No. Would Warner Manual do this?

No. Down for Pastor Troy Stadium. That's right. Jordan should come out to no more play in GA. I think that, I mean, Sanford Stadium's in the video. We can make it happen. The business says,

I subscribed to On3 to hear the blonde kid. I feel like I got the bait and switch. Listen, I am not as handsome as JD Piquel. I accept that. I do not have an Ivy league degree like JD Piquel does. I accept that, but you'll see JD plenty.

Don't you worry. The hard count is live Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. And of course, whatever news happens, JD will come. And of course, whatever news happens, JD will come in with his own flavor. So yeah, you got to deal with the brunette old guy

every once in a while. But don't worry, the blonde kid still here. Still here. How many, ooh, this is a good question. How many J.D. Piquel fans are there that are as fervent about it as to business? I think J.D.'s got some folks. We got to find out what J.D.'s fan club is called. What are we calling them?

The Piquel Jar? The Blonde Bombers? We've got to figure this out. River, Super Producer, send this clip to JD. I need answers. I need to know this. So next hard count, I need his chat to name itself. I need his fan club name.

Because JD is the type who could develop a cult following. And not just because he spent time in Waco. Willie likes the Piquel jar. Goat dog pickle party. I think we're going to avoid that one. We got to name our chat too. That's another thing. That's a weekend project for you guys.

Who are, what are we calling you guys? We've never thought about this before, but we do need to formalize the relationship here. Stapletons, Christopher Jordan says. I love it. i love it i love it ferris khan i believe that jack tuttle seventh year michigan qb is older than jd i believe you are correct so yeah listen i gotta go i want you to enjoy your weekend I have to get my draft board ready for the QB draft with Jesse Simonton from On3. Hold on.

Go Dawgs. He wants the Staples Center. I like it. Also, not take it anymore. Everyday Staples for Maliti. I like that, too. Okay. So you have your assignments for the weekend.

We got to name our chat you get your own quarterback boards ready in your mind for the quarterback draft i'm going to get mine ready in real life i'm going to smoke jesse again i'm just not exactly sure how i'm going to do it so i'm going to work on my draft board and we will talk to you on monday