Andy & Ari On3 - Is Arch Manning too big to fail at Texas? Will John Mateer play vs Longhorns? Why Ohio State could be College Football's New Dynasty

Episode Date: October 7, 2025

As the Red River Rivalry at the Cotton Bowl is just days away, there are plenty of storylines to follow in this Oklahoma vs Texas matchup on Saturday. On Tuesday morning, ESPN's Pete Thamel reported that Oklahoma QB John Mateer is making a push to play. What could this mean for the Sooners if the Washington State transfer can suit up at the Cotton Bowl? On the other side of the coin, Andy & Ari dive deep into the Arch Manning conundrum in Austin. What do Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns need to fix to turn this season around? Find out here as Andy & Ari go DEEP into the Red River Rivalry and both teams in this episode. (0:00) On Today's Episode(0:16) BetMGM(1:55) Intro: Will John Mateer play on Saturday?(11:11) Is Arch Manning too big to fail?(25:41) Rhoback(26:50) Arch Conundrum - Recent Past of QBs(31:45) What Steve Sarkisian thinks(43:10) Wrapping up the Arch Manning discussion(46:05) PaniniAmerica.net(50:03) Ohio State, how dominant are the Buckeyes?(56:06) Ohio State at Illinois preview(1:07:20) Conclusion: See you tomorrow! As Andy & Ari wrap up the Red River discussion, the fellas turn their sights towards Champaign, Illinois, where the Ohio State Buckeyes will travel this weekend to take on the Illini. In week 6, Ohio State knocked off Minnesota by a score of 42-3, and PJ Fleck had some high praise for OSU. How good can this team really be? Andy & Ari discuss. Our show is presented by BetMGM! If you haven’t signed up for BetMGM yet, use bonus code CFB and you will get up to a $1500 First Bet Offer on your first wager with BetMGM! Here’s how it works: 1. Download the BetMGM app and sign-up using bonus code CFB.2. Deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game.3. You will receive up to $1500 in bonus bets if your bet loses! Just make sureyou use bonus code CFB when you sign up! Make this college football season one for the history books. Make it legendary. See BetMGM.com for Terms. 21+ only. US promotional offers not available in New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER (Available in the US). Call 877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY). Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP (AZ), 1-800-327-5050 (MA), 1-800-BETS-OFF (IA), 1-800-981-0023 (PR). First Bet Offer for new customers only. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in 7 days. In partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Our show is sponsored by Rhoback, the most comfortable clothes on the planet! Use the code ANDY on Rhoback.com for a generous 20% off for all new customers through the end of this week. That’s 20% off all Performance Polos, Shorts and more with code ANDY Join On3 today and get one full year of access to The Athletic included! https://www.on3.com/subscribe/C Watch our show on YouTube! https://youtu.be/1MzBjDjA-6Q Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari WassermanProducer: River Bailey Interested in partnering with the show? Email [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On today's episode of Andy and Arion 3 is Archmanning too big to fail. Also, are the Ohio State Buckeyes so good that they're boring? We'll talk about it all on Andy and Ari on 3 presented by BetMGM. We've teamed up with BetMGM this season. We will be using BetMGM lines to make all our picks and we'll have special offers for our listeners each week. When you join BetMGM, you'll get access to a variety of Parlay selection. features like same game parlays, live betting options, and more. If you haven't signed up for Bed MGM yet, use the bonus code CFB, as in college football,

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Make it legendary. See bedmgm.com for terms 21 plus only U.S. promotional offers are not available in New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler in the U.S. Call 8778 Hope N.Y or text Hope N.Y. 467369 in New York. Call 1-800 next step in Arizona.

call 1-800-327-50-50 in Massachusetts, call 1-800 bets off in Iowa or 1-800-9-81-00-2-3 in Puerto Rico. First-Bet offer for new customers only, subject to eligibility requirements, rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in seven days in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Don't forget, if you haven't signed up for bed at MGM yet, use the bonus code CFB and get your $1,500 first bet offer today. Welcome to Andy and RN3, presented by BetMGM, the news Tuesday morning, Ari. ESPN's Pete Thammel reporting that John Mateer, the Oklahoma starting quarterback, pushing to return against Texas. And oh my, that could change this game considerably. We were already scheduled to talk about this game.

We were going to talk about Arch Manning and is he too big to fail and we will have that conversation. But this would change the math if John Mateer can. come back. Remember, he injured his thumb against Auburn in the first quarter, played the rest of the game, did not realize what was going on. He had to have surgery. The thought was the earliest he could come back was against South Carolina next week, but he dresses out for the Kent State game. He's wearing a brace on the hand, and now it appears he's trying to play if he can't. I don't know if he's going to be able to, but, oh, man, that would add to the legend of this game, which is already legendary enough as it is. The Dr. Stephen Shin legend, I should add.

Let's not forget. The future governor of Oklahoma, Stephen Shin. Man, I'm happy you're coming. I'm happy you're coming. I cannot wait till be in the press box with you on Saturday with a turkey leg looking down through binoculars to see if he's warming up, if that's what we're headed. I think that Oklahoma has a chance to win this game without him. If he plays, like, I think they're going to win. You know, if he plays and he's physically capable, like we saw against Auburn and all the other teams.

My 100% viewpoint, or sorry, my viewpoint of this is that he should not play unless he can play at a high level. Like, I mean, you know, if he plays, my assumption is that he'll be able to perform the way that we've expected him to perform. throwing them out there at 50% and unable to throw or whatever, I think would be a mistake, and Oklahoma knows that. You know, Michael Hawkins isn't the greatest quarterback in the world, but I think he's serviceable enough at the time in his career

that he's in to play a good enough game to win. But if you can put some... And remember Michael Hawkins played in this game last year, but played behind a much different offensive line and didn't have healthy receivers. Like, even if Michael Hawkins starts, the Oklahoma offense is going to be considerably better than it was in the Texas game last year.

Yeah. And I don't know. I didn't go to medical school, and I certainly don't want to question the genius of Dr. Stevenson. But I don't know what you can do between Tuesday and Saturday to push to play. I think it's just kind of like, can you do it or not? I'm assuming that he's going to have to start trying to throw the football now. I don't know if he has yet. But, you know, that seems like a pretty complicated thing to do with a brace or whatever. But you know what? The fact that he has a chance to play adds to the intrigue. And that's what we're all about, man. the legend of the rivalry. Yeah, I'd wonder, you know, it might be Friday night. We just know that it's not going to be him. But it could be one of those deals where it's Saturday morning and the teams are, you know, getting to the stadium and we're just sitting there watching him get off the bus. Like, is he going to do it? Is he going to do it?

I hope we know one way or the other Friday night because I don't want to leave the carnival to, like, scout him getting off the bus. I just like, I don't want to do that. I want to be easy. you want the you want the corn dog in hand you do not want to be staking out the buses but we may have to stake out the buses are you i think we need to accept this you know you know you can stake out the bus i'll meet you inside with my frito pie you know can you can i get two turkey legs to hold like can i double fist turkey legs while i stake out the bus uh yeah i mean i could be

the the the uber eats guy for you too you tell me what you want i'll go get it uh just don't stab me when I come back. Well, no, you would be stabbing me in that scenario. Yeah, that's right. Sorry. Just don't try to stab me with the turkey. Like, that's all I ask. So, Ari, the other piece of this is like, John Metz here is already more than paid off,

what Oklahoma paid for him. Yes. Clearly, he was the right choice to come in as the quarterback. Ben Arbuckle is the right choice of the offensive coordinator. The fact that he's even trying to do this. just further cements his legend at Oklahoma. And look, we don't know what's going to happen the rest of the season. And that's the thing.

If I'm Brent Venables, I'm looking at this game and going, you know what, my defense may be able to win this game. If we've got Michael Hawkins Jr. starting, like, I want to make sure John McTeer can play the rest of the season. Because if John Meteor can play the rest of the season, this could be a truly special season at Oklahoma. So if I'm Brent Venables, I'm saying, don't do this unless you are sure you're okay.

But you know what? I'll say this. And we spend so much time talking about how much money is he being paid and where is he coming from? His offensive coordinator got poached so they could bring in all these like business like spreadsheet, you know, numbers in our head. And it's like we sometimes forget that John Matere went to Oklahoma to play football. And what's the number one selling point outside of having a nice car playing in this game?

Like I think we lose sight of that sometimes. And this is a guy from Texas, Little Elm. Texas. So he probably grew up watching this game. This game is probably the pinnacle of football existence for the people of his hometown. Like this is a huge, huge game. And probably something he's dreamed of his entire life to be able to play in a game like this. And so I get it. And I I kind of love that because we do spend so much time talking about the money, the transactions, this guy doesn't give a crap about that right now. And I play a freaking Red River shootout because he's there.

I want to see Mateer Manning. I want to see both these teams at full speed. I want to see high level football in one of the coolest, not one of the coolest environment in the entire sport. And I like love this. I love that we get to anticipate that. This is what rivalries are about. This is the most unique rivalry in where it's played on the calendar and in where it's played

physically. And I understand somebody who has a Texas background growing up there wanting to do this. So I don't care how much money he's being paid or what the motivation was for him to go to Oklahoma. What I do know is that their team is off to an incredible start. They're a top six team in the country when everybody thought that they would stink again because they stunk last year. Things are rolling. Brent Venables looks like a new man. And their quarterback who's being paid a lot of money to transfer in wants to play in this game. And I think that's special and I think that's exciting so i can't wait to see um uh what happens here and and i'm a quick update our guys at sooner scooters saying he has thrown saying he's thrown so that is a higher proposition

for uh for this actually coming to fruition and i can't wait to go is out so Oklahoma has learned some things since a few years ago and some students in the dorms could look out their window and see on the practice field that Caleb Williams was taking first team reps over spencer Rattler they were in the indoor on Monday but sooner scoops Eddie Radosovich was on campus Monday night trying to slew this out yeah Eddie Radosovich reporting live just kind of hanging out seeing what's up with John Meteer today oh you practicing indoors 85 and sunny out oh you practicing indoors today again 85 and sunny out.

I'm going to stay here. I'm going to be camouflaged. Not at the bus stop bitch quite yet. We might have to be there, though, if, you know, things get scary. So, oh, you practicing indoors today, though? 85 degrees out, sunny. Soonerskub.com will be on the story. People from up north are like 85 and sunny.

Of course you practice indoors. Why would you practice in that heat? Everybody from the south is like 85 and sunny. That's a winter storm. like what do you do that's a perfect fall day what's going on it would be great uh if the weather broke at some point in this area of the country i don't know you obviously are a little bit different maybe john meteer will take the field at the cotton bowl and the temperature will plunge to 73 degrees and it will officially be fall this car i want to drive with the top down and not bake well

worry about that later worry about john mature now i just want to wear a hoodie with john meteer in the building. Like, is that too much to ask? Ari. This is going to be so much fun. This game's going to be so. There's so many subplots to this game already. We're about to talk about Arch Manning and what this means for him, because Texas is in desperation mode. If John Mateer can play, it only adds to the drama. I cannot wait. So let's talk about Arch Manning. as we prepare to cover the Red River rivalry, Red River Shootout, whatever you want to call it, the game in the Cotton Bowl in Dallas between Texas and Oklahoma,

is Archmanning too big to fail? Because that is the question that is dominating this season. I notice a story in The Athletic, not by one of our former co-workers, but by Will Leach, the original Deadspin guy. He asked if Archmanning is college football's first flop. Of course, that's a very New York Timesian way of looking at things, you know, basically ignoring all of history and the thing you don't really

know much about. Because there have been many, many flops in college football history, lots of stars who didn't fan out. Dude, you're taking shots on our former employer, man. What a day. It's Tuesday morning. Let's ride. Wow. I mean, come on.

You wouldn't have let that headline pass. In fairness to you, you took a shot at the New York Times, not the athletic. Okay. Correct. Correct. When I worked there, it was just the athletic. Yeah, like, likewise. So, yeah, that is hilarious. I was thinking when you, I hadn't even seen that headline, Andy.

And when you read the head, I was like, that's not true. First, first flop, what? Listen, I wrote the Bobby Sablehouse story back in the day. Like, the real ones know, like there have been flops way before Arch Manning. Also, also, Archmanning probably too early to declare him a flop. This weekend, he could actually. redeem himself completely by leading Texas to a win against Oklahoma. Based on what we've seen, I don't know if that's what will happen.

I think if that happens, it's probably more because of Texas' defense, shutting down Oklahoma's offense. But we have to have a deeper discussion of Archmanning because this is getting very complicated for Texas and Steve Sarkeesian. And if they lose to Oklahoma this weekend, Ari, the flop label is very much in play because they will be out of the college football playoff conversation. And we've talked about the potential of a 9 and 3 SEC team getting in. I don't think this would be one of those SEC teams

because even though they did play Ohio State, they lost to them. And they have one of the easier SEC draws. This is like they're not playing Oklahoma's SEC schedule. Just when I think you couldn't get dumber, you go and do something like this and totally redeem yourself. Andy, so I think that the question on the, that's like on the banner here and that's going to lead the show probably is kind of going to make people crazy because like when you read that, you might misunderstand it as like, he will succeed. And I think that we have to put into context what failure looks like. And I think from our standpoint, failure looks like being benched or not playing anymore.

So the question is, is he too big to be benched? I think is more in tune with what we're talking about. And, like, as you look through college football in general, Arch Manning's name carries more weight than anyone's name because of, you know, obviously his family. But I wonder how many other teams, I want to focus on Texas, but later on I want to touch on how many teams are going to marry a quarterback financially, like what would have happened if Nico was terrible when he got to Tennessee?

How many times are, what if Dylan Rayola was? terrible when he got to Nebraska. You know, those, that didn't happen for either place, but you're going to start getting to a place where you are financially invested so much in a high school quarterback that they also might be too big to fail. So with Texas, there are two questions here. One is, are you starting to think or do you think that Archmanning is not very good, period? Like, this is who he is.

And secondary, if he is not very good. And I mean like just not good at all. What do you do? And that's a very complicated question because I don't know what you do. Like if Steve Sarkesian thought that the backup quarterbacks on the roster gave Texas a better chance to win games. And he bench Archmanning. Can he? I think he has to.

I think he has to because I'm the level of mine. I'm in the heart. Herm Edwards camp. You play to win the games. And I don't care what the politics say, and I don't care how much money you're spending. And I realize there are people out there who say, but you're spending all this money and you've invested so much. I don't care. The goal is to win games. I think because you pay so much, you can do whatever you want with that person. You can sit them on the bench and pay them. You can play them and pay them. You're paying for it. You can do whatever you want with them. So I do think you have to, but I know where you're going to go with

this because you're going to talk about the greater political ramifications of it, and you're probably right. I may be viewing it a little too simplistically. I think what you're saying is true. And you and I have had philosophical conversations about benching players over a myriad of different things in the past. We've also talked about, I mean, back in the day when you and I first started podcasting, remember the big debate about whether or not playing Sean Clifford the last year and Drew Aller's freshman year was smart and whether they should have just played Drew Aller from the beginning to give him an extra year. Funny enough, should have just played both your fuel from the beginning, just like we said

all along. Just like we didn't said. But we've had these discussions of what do you do with your quarterback? And I think what might be interesting about this is at what, let's just say he's not very good. Okay. And this is all hypothetical Texas fans. Don't go freaking out.

We're just talking through. Oh, no, Ari, they're already freaking out. They should be freaking out. Just don't freak it out at us. We're not saying he's not good. I think they're asking that question. I don't think you're going to enrage Texas fans by asking the question that they are asking themselves.

So here are the two things that come to mind. Because as you put it, Andy, benching him if you think you have a better chance to win an individual game is probably the way to go because all Texas fans ultimately care about is winning. But there are two questions. One is when, like if you invest this much money in an asset, how much of a runway does that asset have to grow and develop like everybody else? Like if his name was something else, it always comes back to if his name was Smith.

Because we have to do that in the context of this, because the entire discussion about whether or not he's too big to fail is predicated on his name. He's not the first five-star quarterback ever. He's the first archmanning. So like that, I think we cannot separate those two things, as much as we want to. But if you invest, so even if separate his name, how much. if you invest a crap ton of money in an asset, how much more games does he get to prove himself

than somebody who isn't being paid this much? And then secondly, if Steve Sarkesian were to throw in the towel and bench him after the Oklahoma game, which means they are what, six games into their season, what does that say about his decision-making as the program's leader in how he handled Quinn Ewers? Last year, we were bashing him,

or at least questioning him about whether, they made a mistake by not getting Arch Manning, who is a better runner than Quinn Ewers, more involved in the offense from a package standpoint earlier on. They might have been able to beat Ohio State, especially down at the goal line, had they done that. Now, we don't know about his concussion situation in that game, whatever, but there were hypothetical discussions leading into the playoff about whether Arch Manning should be playing more because he gives them another element offensively. And now we've completely flipped.

It looks like he's been vindicated in that regard of playing Arch Manning against Ohio State last year for any extended period of time would have been a big mistake. But now is his handling of Quinn Ewer's wrong. So, like, you have to, it's not just like, what's going to happen on Saturday and are we going to win? There are, how are you running your program questions that reverberate off of that decision? Well, and I also think this is a bigger than Arch Manning discussion, but Arch Manning's the perfect mascot for this discussion.

And you mentioned it at the top. how does this change how quarterback recruiting works and how you're planning your roster over the years works because Matt Caldwell is their backup. We were scrambling to look up things about Matt Caldwell

when he came into the game against Florida. And he told me this story about when I had you edit my Texas column and I had a graph in there about nobody know what his name was and I had his name wrong in the story. Yes, Ari had his first name wrong. He had Michael Caldwell instead of Matthew Caldwell. and like it because we he's a transfer from Troy it's weird because we always would have known

the name of the backup quarterback at Texas before because it would have been a former four or five star recruit because they stack them every year but in this day and age if you have the high dollar quarterback who's clearly going to be the guy for a period of time then the five star four stars don't come behind him like that's just not how like oh Ohio State, I think, in the 26th class, they've got a situation where they've got a quarterback in the class, but it's not a major, you know, top 10 quarterback recruit because Tavian St. Clair signed last year. Which then opens another trapdoor, Andy, because if you don't have the depth at the position

that you used to have, then when your bust, quote unquote, bust occurs, you don't have other options that are good enough to play at that level either. Yeah, and you also don't have backups who want. to come play right behind that person i mean like the reason the trinidad shambliss thing is working out so great at old miss is because old miss was the only program willing to recruit trinidad or try to recruit trinidad shamblis as a backup like a lot of other ones shied away because they assumed he wanted to go start because he started at ferris state so he was just going to go to temple and old miss is like okay we'll pay you to be a backup but you're going to be a backup like

They were honest with him because Austin Simmons was the starter. And it's just kind of dumb luck that it worked out that way. In a lot of places, it's not going to work out that way. You're where the guy you picked up out of the portal as depth as, I mean, that's it. It's, it's depth. It's not you pick that person up to be your quarterback of the future. And so that's the part that is so weird about all of this because in the old days, Texas would have had some five star guys just sitting there yeah so this adds i'm the question man you're the answer man

on this show um i don't know about that i don't know if i'm going to throw you know i'm going to lob some questions at you and then we'll do our best to answer them but i think like when you start talking about this the second i knew that this topic was on the docket today i knew this was going to be the show because like we this isn't a five-minute discussion but if you if you don't recruit quarterbacks or you're not willing to pay quarterbacks out of high school. If you as a philosophy, as a staff,

say, we're not paying anybody big bucks who has yet to prove that they can produce that X level at the college level. We're not paying you. Can you exist in competing at the highest level in the sport? Or at least at the quarterback position. Like, can you just say, we're not doing this? we'll pay big money we have the money we have the boosters we all know well that texas can

make you right as a player but if they're like we're done with this shit we're not doing this anymore we'll pay you eight million dollars over the course of three years when you've had a good year or when you've already proven beyond the shadow of a doubt yeah it's it's going to reduce you it's going to reduce what they can get out of high school but i would say that's the smarter play because it's still such a crap shoot going from high school to college like that may mean you can't sign any of the top 10 quarterbacks, but it may be that the 19th ranked quarterback in that class turns out to be the best quarterback in that class.

So it's probably not a bad move. Like what you should do probably is if you're going to pay giant money, if you're going to pay $3, $4 million a year for a quarterback, then pay the best group of five quarterback every year. Or when a group of five quarterback blows up as a freshman, pay him for the next two years to come play for you and then go to the NFL. That's probably the smarter move because at least then you've seen them against a level of competition that you can understand and extrapolate how they might work in your offense.

Andy, you want to hear what you just said? And I don't know if you just talked this into existence, but what you just said might have been money. Oh, I'm going to name in the 2023 class because that gives us enough time. Okay. This is this is Arch's class, right? This is Arch's class. 203's recruiting class, top 10 quarterbacks in the on three industry rankings.

Yep. Arch Manning, number one. Dante Moore, number two. Now that's working out. Okay. That is working out, but not for the school assigned him. Yeah, not for the school to sign him. Nico Iamaliava, three.

It might actually be working out now, but, you know. Yeah, it worked out last weekend. And I think it might have worked out long term had he stayed at Tennessee, but very interesting career. Number four, Jackson Arnold. maybe in the process of I'm floating again. Malachi Nelson playing at U-TEP. Six, Jaden Roshada. That story's been told a million times.

Okay. Seven, Eli Holstein. Didn't he just get benched? He did just get benched for a freshman, yep. Eight, Christopher Vazina, has yet to really see the field yet because of, you know, the roadblocked there, acade club nick at Clemson. Nine, Avery Johnson, and 10, Austin Novosad, who is backing up Dante Moore at Oregon still. Now, I'm going to scroll down.

to the 18th, 19th, and 20th rated quarterbacks in the class. Are you ready? Please do, please do. Number 18, Lenora Sellers. Ooh, he's turned out okay. Number 19, Austin Simmons. Okay. Number 20, Marcel Reed.

How about that? How about that? And since you mentioned Marcel Reed, I think it's time to do to a rowback ad because Marcel Reed is a rowback athlete. This is not meant to rub it in Texas fans, but Marcel Reed is playing very well, and he is a Roeback endorser. Archer, you know, he endorses a different brand of athlete leisure, but Roeback is the best brand of athlete leisure. I am wearing the Hezzy hoodie right now. It is my favorite piece of clothing.

I've told you a million times if you order one, you better order two because somebody is going to steal yours because it is that awesome. Go to Roeback.com, R-H-O-B-A-C-K, use the code Andy and yet 20% off your first order. Hoodies, Q-Zips, Polos, the work. out shorts that they have. Awesome. But the campus collection, like the, the Hesi hoodies from the campus collection, you're looking at the Nebraska one on screen right now. I think we got the Tennessee one to show you. Yeah, the Tennessee one's beautiful. Like, they are so cool. And dare I say, much cooler than the gear from the official team apparel supplier. Roeback stuff is just awesome. The Notre Dame Q's it that we're showing. You got to get that if you're a Notre Dame fan. So go to

rowback.com, R-H-O-B-A-C-K-com, hoodies, polos, Q-Zips, and more. Use code Andy for 20% off your first order. Okay, Ari. You're right about that. And I believe you can go way down on that list and find Dary and Mensa if you'd like to. Yeah. Now, you know, you can't pick and choose because I'm looking at some of the names down here. And like all the names from 25 to 40 are people that only recruit Knicks have heard of.

So you can't just be like, you know what? We're not going to pay the best players at the position. We're just going to pay the guys that are in the middle of the three. But if you're Texas and you offer reasonable money, like the number 20 quarterback in the class is signing with you. Right. But the odds of the number 20 quarterback in the class being very good are much more of a crapshoot than they are at the top. Now, that this 2024 class is kind of weird because, you know, you look at the previous year, and you know it's kind of the same deal but like cade club neck number one jury i guess is still i mean

the jury is not out the 2022 class going back a year kade club nick was number one tie simpson was number two uh drew aller number three and then you have connor weggman devon brown walker howard brady allen nick evers and then gunner stockton um at number nine so which is what i'm telling it's a complete crap shoot so if you're investing that much money i would invest that much money in someone who has already proven himself at the college level. Like, I would hire the Darien Mensa from Tulane. I would not hire the guy out of high school. If I'm doing the hiring and I'm spending that level of money, plus I don't have to spend

as much or maybe I don't have to guarantee it over as many years because that person is coming, planning to leave for the NFL in two years. And the other person is going to say, I need a three or four year deal. If you do this every year, though, you will miss on the truly generational players. And you have to go into that accepting that. Now, I don't know. But you might not, if you're still signing somebody between 10 and 20 at a high school, you could still get a generational player doing that.

If you trust your evaluations. If you're signing, I think the idea is to sign in between 18 and 25 out of high school and then pay big bucks if it doesn't work out for a guy like Caleb Williams, who's transferring. Now, that's an isolated incident because he followed his coach. He's following a coach, yeah. Quinn Ewers was number one in 21, Caleb Williams was number two, Kyle McCord was five, Jackson Dart was seven, Drake May was eight, J.J. McCarthy was nine. So like if you, you're going to like miss the good years too, you know. That said, quarterback seems to me to be the, like, it's funny because I have a group chat, Andy. I don't know. Are you too old to have group chat with your boys? Do you have, do you still have the group chats or no? I we never had group chats because text messaging didn't exist when I was in college so I didn't know if you guys like joined the group but like anyway I have a bunch of group chats with my friends and they listen to the show or one does shout out Mike and they know how I feel about Arch Manning and DJ Lagway they know how I felt about them in the off season so every week when they do bad or you know whatever ha ha Ari how about Arch or how about DJ you dumbass like.

I get that. Like, my Twitter mentions are also in my personal conversations. And I'm, like, thinking to myself, like, the standard that I have to be right about what quarterbacks are going to be elite is pretty high because of what I do for a living. But the people who are actually investing the millions of dollars around these players are getting it wrong before. They're very bad at it. And part of it is the quarterback industrial complex. Like, you go to the elite 11. Who cares who wins the elite 11?

You're playing in your underwear. Like, look at who plays better on an actual football field and judge it that way. That's one thing. I think part of it's, but it's hard to do because sometimes the level of competition is not, not as good as it should be, or it's harder to tell how they'll react when they move up in competition. Like, it is a very inexact science. So I think the coaching the coaches for it is unfair too. The elite 11 thing is kind of a misnomer, though, because you have to play at a high level on the games to get invited to the event.

So, like, it's kind of like, you know, you do have to play well in camps to get invited to the event. That's the structure. But the people who are invited to the camps that are the satellite camps to get you into it are all very good prospects. But I don't, but like people go crazy over who plays the best at the elite 11. Who cares who played the best at the elite 11? That's not football. Yeah. I think that that's true in the NFL draft, too, right?

Where you're so, but I'm like looking at the elite 11 winners. and I'm trying to find them in the past. So can you just vamp for a second? I can. Let's actually, we'll take it back to the present for a minute. We're going to hear Sark talking Arch, and is he holding the ball too long? Is the question that Sark gets asked?

Sark Arch was under a lot of pressure, sacks and hurries. What have you seen from him in that game under duress and still able to make some plays and all the microscopic view of him? And how is he handling all that? I found out he's a tough dude. He fought his ass off Saturday, and those were not ideal conditions for a quarterback to perform under. Is there a couple throws?

I'm sure he'd love to have back, of course. But he stood in there, and he showed a lot of contact courage, taking hits, delivering the ball. There were some really impressive throws in there, and he battled until the very end. And so I think he learned a lot about himself as much as we learned about him, you know, that this guy's got a lot of courage he's got a lot of toughness i think he gained a lot of respect from his teammates saturday which is a great thing um does he need to play a little better sure do we need to play a better around him no question you know and so uh that that's the goal for us on that front so arch manning and then the spin on the florida game is he took a bunch of hits

and and got up and kept on ticking which is good but also Not ideal. And here's, here's Arch talking about that last drive in the Florida game where he got sacked on the first play. Matt Caldwell had to come in and throw a pass and then, and then Arch came back. Arch, broadly speaking, are you getting rid of the ball quickly enough right now? Credit Matt Colwell for coming in, cold on the sideline and getting a completion, the first play. And that got, I think we got a penalty there with more yards. And I got a, I can't take a sack in that situation. I got to be a situational master there. And we got to have a shot of getting a ball up in the end zone at the end of the game. So that was on me. Situational master, that's a

McVe thing. That's a that's McVeigh. And then I think Liam Cullen has stolen it in in Jacksonville. But yeah, that's that's a McVeigh thing. Arch was asked if he's holding the ball too long as well. Arch, broadly speaking, are you getting rid of the ball quickly enough? Yeah, I think, honestly, a few of those sacks, I could avoid, get rid of it, switch to protection. But you've got to continue to get better each week and get completions, get the ball to our playmakers. Ari, are you almost done, or should I have Sark talking about what might be the bigger problem? Okay. There's 2000, I'm back down to, I'm to 2013.

And like, I think that this was such an interesting conversation because as we're having it, I find myself going back and forth. because it's like, yeah, why would you spend all this money on a bus? But then at the same time, it's like the elite 11 MVP from 2025 to 2016, which I'm doing it manually. But here's what it is. Diabelle, we don't know yet. Keel and Russell, we don't know yet. 2023 was Julian Sayan. 2022, Jackson Arnold.

2021 club dick, 2020, Caleb Williams, 2019, C.J. Stroud. 2018, Spencer Rattler. 2017, Justin Fields. 2016, do a tago, Viloa. and it's like five of those guys are starting in the NFL right now. So it's just like, I see what you're saying because I think that the camp situation is overdone. But the thing is, like when Tua was winning the elite 11, you didn't have the option of going and getting the guy who bawled out at Memphis last year. Like, you didn't have that option.

Now you do. And I think there's another problem. And I think we even fall into the same trap on the show sometimes, which is the elite 11. is a bunch of NFL dudes, right? So you are looking at quarterbacks that have and illustrate NFL traits, quality of skill set and size. And I think a lot of times we get so bogged down in rating players based on the projection of what kind of NFL prospect they'll be. And we lose track of the site, like you're trying to win college football games and being an elite level college, like Diego Pavia, for example. Like that guy wouldn't sniff an elite 11 trophy.

and he wouldn't sniff a first-round draft pick. But fuck, man, I would love it if he was on my team. Like, you know, he's a great college quarterback. And like, you only need it. Stets and Bennett's a great college quarterback. Sets and Bennett may never wind up playing meaningful downs in the NFL. It doesn't make him not a great college quarterback. He was perfect for that Georgia team.

If you can put the talent around in which Texas can put the talent around anybody, although I will say, perhaps Texas is not putting best talent around arch i said this on the show yesterday and i'll say it again where i messed up and it's where texas messed up even more but i messed up in thinking that because texas didn't go into the portal to get an offensive lineman that they felt like they were in good shape and you know i felt like they their their view of that was probably fine because what did they just done they had just taken a bunch of good offensive linemen out of high school they just developed them and they just sent them on their way to the nfl so i was like oh

they feel like they're just going to do that again with this next group. Well, they felt like, but they turned out to be wrong. And here's Sark on the offensive line. Steve, the offensive line, obviously it was a struggle.

Do you make any other changes on the line personnel-wise this week? And, you know, what else can be done, I guess? Got to play better. Got to coach better. Got to play better.

Steve, with the information that you have now, do you think you and your staff made the right decision not to pursue an offensive lineman in the portal this offseason? You know, I think inevitably you can play the hypothetical and the what-ifs, you know, it's what's available and then what do you have. And, you know, I think our guys that we have are more than capable.

Like I said, we've got to coach better and we've got to play better. Isaiah World was available, just so, you know. Well, Isaiah World, why am I blanking on his name? at the starting tackle at Ohio State, who played down the road at Rice, seems to be, seems to have been available. His name is Ethan O'Neonwa. Ethan O'Neanwa, that's right, correct. So, yeah, Pat Coogan was available, the starting center from Notre Dame last year, who now starts at Indiana, because Ashton Craig was coming back at Notre Dame, so that job was his, and so Pat Coogan became available. So, yes, there were

players you could have got but they what what sark is saying is we thought we had the right guys and now we're definitely wrong because the answer to that first question where chip brown asked is there anything else that can be done and sark says just got to play better translation no there's nothing else that can be done um yes which brings us to another topic within the same umbrella a lot of our analysis andy at least mine i'll speak for myself and then you can agree if you if you see this is that we look at what coaches behavior indicates and we use that as a metric for evaluation. I do that. You know, I've said this on the show a hundred times. What is the coach doing? Not what the coach is saying. So when we

are evaluating in July, the offensive line for Texas returning, we knew that they were losing Kelvin Banks and some of the studs that were on that team last year, but the actions indicated that they were comfortable with what was happening. When you look at Florida and when you look at Texas and what they've done in terms of designing their programs around their quarterback talent, they retained their head coach in Gainesville because of their quarterback talent. They let a NFL quarterback go in Austin because of what they had on their roster. Like when we're evaluating that, when people are like, how on earth could you pick DJ

Lagway to be good? or how on earth, what did you see on film from Arch Manning that makes you think millions of dollars were moved around. Yeah. Because people thought these two guys were really good. And I think that the millions of dollars that was moved around is independent from the coaching staff, but is guided on how the coaching staff feels.

If you think that I'm an idiot for thinking that Arch Manning would be good, then what does that say about? Steve Sarkesian and the entire Texas staff that's getting paid more than $10 million a year to assemble the roster. So like I'm not trying to say that he is dead or that Steve Sarkesian is dumb for doing this. I think it's still relatively early in his development and I don't know that I'm 100% ready to let go of the idea that he'll be good. I think also you cannot have a good faith archmanning discussion without also acknowledging the part that you just played, which is he's not being blocked for his receivers aren't producing at the level that you would have expected

and he's not really being helped and they can't run the ball and they're not running the ball here's stark on that you pride yourself on being able to run the ball but through five games archmanning is your leading rusher you haven't had a carry over 18 yards so what's going on is it is the byproduct of the offensive line or does something need to be happening with those backs it's not working that's for sure that's what's going on you know that not to that to put it as simple as that. It just hasn't hit. And, you know, we've, we've been roll of decks and running backs. I think that's a little bit of an issue. You know, a lot of times when you, when you have a runner, which traditionally for us, we've kind of got that lead runner and then a second runner,

the lead runner starts to find a rhythm with the timing of the blockers. And we don't have that right now. And we've got to fight to get there as fast as we can. Because I do think there's something to be said about a runner getting carries. And I know you guys have been mad at me before. Why is one guy get all the carries and then there's a number two guy? Well, there's a reason for that. I think there's, there's rhythm and timing into running the ball. Now, do we need to block better? Yes. Do we need a game plan better? Yes. Do we need to break more tackles? Yes. All those things add up to. We don't have a run by running backs over 18 yards. We've been spotty from a consistency standpoint in the run game. And that's what

we're fighting for you know and so it's easy just to put our hands in there and say we can't run it and let's go throw it every down i just don't believe in that that that's not who we are so we're going to continue to work at this thing hopefully we're better on saturday we'll find out all right we're about to talk about a team that has answers for everything that when something doesn't work they or well everything works so when you take something away they can just do something else Texas doesn't have a something else you can do. And that's the issue. Brent Venables will try to continue to take the runaway,

try to force them to throw vertically. They talked about, you know, do you want to do more quick game? They may have to. I mean, that's probably your best shot is get some of those receivers open in space and hope that they can make some plays. But I don't, Brent Venables is probably licking his chops,

thinking about this offense right now. Yeah, yeah. I want to go back to the box score from Texas and Florida. And I know that if you look at it from like Arch Manning statistical output, it's not terrible, 16 for 29 for 263 yards. But then when you look deeper into the box score, their leading rusher was Arch Manning, 37 yards. Wisner had eight carries for 11 yards, which is insane.

And then you look at their receivers. And their top two receivers, DeAndre Moore and Ryan Wingo, combined for seven receptions, 150 yards pretty good but seven total catches an entire game from your top two receiving options isn't what you need they hit some big plays but that's it they hit a couple big plays that's where the artage comes from but there's no consistent moving the football and getting those guys into space and turning a eight yard gain into a 20 yard gain it was one or two big chunk plays over the top and those are good a good offense needs those but that can't be the entire statistical output

of your team against florida on the road right because a good defensive coordinator like Brent Venables is going to take that away, and what are you left with? And you have to have more answers. And so that's what Texas needs to do. Now, if they do, and if they can beat Oklahoma, they're still alive. They still got a chance. Arch Manning, if he can win this game, it goes a long way toward rehabbing him. Sorry, I will give you one more piece of Arch Manning video. And it is it is something that gives me at least a modicum of confidence that maybe he can get out of this because he answered this question correctly here you go you do corn dog guy or a turkey leg guy uh probably a turkey leg guy corn dog guy or turkey leg guy arches a turkey leg guy that's the right

answer i'm out oh you're done with him i mean like you i don't understand maybe this is the reason why i've never been like skinny before but i cannot get get an idea of how somebody could offer you something with deep fried carbs wrapped all over it, you would just pick the meat part. Because you can have a giant hunk of meat. A giant hunk of meat is better than

everything. It's the best thing you can... That is only true. Again, maybe fat guy mentality. It is always true. Always true. And the meat that is the option is red. Nope. Giant hunk of meat is always better than anything else. The only thing better than a giant hunk of

meat is a giant hunk of a better meat. or a bacon-wrapped giant hunk of meat. Did I take a bite of that last year? That's a bacon-wrapped turkey. I didn't let you take a bite of my bacon-wrapped turkey leg. I ate that all by myself. That's a... Yeah, see, what I have is better.

I'm going to get that this year. You get that. I'll have two bacon-wrapped turkey legs. All right, Ernie. Let's talk a little pinini because we got to move on to Ohio State and how they're so great that they're boring. But what's not boring is Panini has a new Ohio State box. And you got an Ohio State box in the mail the other day. You can visit Paniniamerica.net to start collecting your

favorites. What did you pull out of that Ohio State box? So I don't know. I haven't even comp the values of these cards. But I got these. So basically, they send you an Ohio State team set. and you can get football there's like women's volleyball players in it there's all sorts of stuff in it but obviously you're chasing some of the super short prints of jeremiah smith and julian san so i hit a contenders campus legends jeremiah smith numbered to 199 and we're talking about somebody who doesn't have cards really and i think that's what's awesome about pinini is that they have the nil cards so you're starting to get branded licensed cards of some of the best players in the sport. And I don't know what these are worth yet because there's not that many of them.

You have to get them in the box set. And then I hit this one too, which when it was printed might not have been a big deal. But, you know, considering how he's playing, Panini Contenders, Ohio State NIL box set of Arvel Reese. And he's been- I love Arvel Reese. We'll talk about him in a minute. Yeah. Linebackers in the country. This is also numbered to 199.

And like I have an entire stack of Ohio State cars. I need to go over there. But like the box, if you're an Ohio State fan and you like cards, like you cannot afford not to buy these things. And they have the color blasts in there from Jeremiah Smith. That card might be a four or five figure card at the moment because it's the only thing that you can hit them in. I'm super short print.

I was praying to the heavens above that I would hit that. I did not. But I did hit Andy in one of the other boxes that they sent two pretty big cards. They sent 2025 Donrus, which now they're rolling up at 2025. rookie class in the 2025 cards for the first time and Donris is one of the first products and I hit at Travis Hunter downtown

Oh yeah. Here is one of the the downtown cards out of Donris and Donris Optic are some of the heaviest chased cards in the entire hobby. So to hit Travis Hunter played great down the stretch as the Jags were beating the Chiefs on Money Night Football. And I would hold that up. I would hold that up right now

but I already put it in a box to get it graded. Yeah, you know, it was one of those deals where when I saw it in the pack, I put the pack down and I laid it on the table on top of the cars because like I don't even want this to even move. And I put it in the top loader like a surgeon. I mean, look at that thing. It's clean. I think it's going to have a chance of that jamming. And then out of the contenders, 2024 contenders optic, I hit this Marvin Harrison. If you put that up, this is a red, red and like his prices were down a little bit for a week because people thought he stunk.

and then he returned to being really good. This is number to 13. This is one of the ultimate chasers in that product. So I hit two pretty big cards in the boxes that they sent, and I'm so happy, and I'm going to hold on to both of those for a long time. If Travis Hunter, like, I don't know what you think about Hunter's production in the NFL, but if he starts to play in the NFL the way he did at Colorado, and I don't even know if that's possible in the NFL, but is an explosive,

just makes, you see that one play on Monday Night Football last night, he caught a pass in the flat and you guys missed like that like is or jumping over the two guys to catch the underthrown ball like he he he's awesome he he will be a legend if he can do anything close to what he did at colorado in the NFL but we shall see i i've got one of those ohio state boxes when i get home will rip a pack on the show if you hit the jeremiah smith color blast i'm resigning from on three just so you know well i'll miss you i'll miss you i'll miss it's dineamerica dot net to start your collection today. Let's talk Buckeyes, though, Ari.

This team is probably proving us wrong. Remember how we said the super team era was over? And maybe it's not. Maybe they're just another super team at Ohio State. This team's really freaking good. I've been kicking this around, like workshopping. I'm going to write a few columns this week. I'm getting bubbly.

I want to write one from Miami off the question I asked. I'm probably going to do that when we're done here. But I want to workshop this with you. And I thought that this discussion would be the perfect time to do it. And by the way, we are 41 minutes into this episode and you haven't had to correct my syntax once. How about that? Isn't that great? I say that with the intention of saying, this is a really good football team.

Okay. Andy, the thing that I'm thinking about writing is this preamble couldn't be any longer is that like when Georgia was at its peak. We didn't talk about them much because they were boring. It's just, oh, who did Georgia play? Oh, they won. Okay, great. Like, they've got all the best player.

And I don't know if I'm overreacting to this because it's still very early in the season. Are we in the midst of watching Ohio State transform from really great team, one of the five best, to the unspoken best program in college football? Are we on the verge of, and this kind of hit me, I was even listening to Bill Anderson, Doug LaMaurice, so I give them credit after the Texas game on the drive back. And they were talking about how do you view the Texas loss? Do you view Texas losing to Ohio State as, oh, well, they lost Ohio State, no big deal, everyone will.

Or do you view that as Texas is broken in some way or Texas isn't good enough? And I think that at the time, this hasn't aged well, it was Ohio State's just really good, that's going to happen. And I feel like we're transitioning to a period. If Ryan Day can beat Michigan this year and finally put that whole thing to bed, that you might have a case that he is the best coach in college football at the moment while also mastering how to maintain high levels of talent in an arrow where that's incredibly difficult. Talk me off the ledge.

Am I overthinking this or do you think we're seeing a transition of the new super team? Not super team, but the new dynasty is the better than work. You're not overthinking this. if they can keep this level of talent together for a few years, which is probably the trick in this, in this era, then you may see kind of a dynastic run. And is it possible to do? I don't know.

But this is the most talented team in the country, it feels like that there are other talented teams. I think Alabama has a ton of talent. I think, you know, Oregon has a ton of talent. But this one seems to operate at a higher level to use its talent, to maximize its talent in the best way. Now, maybe we just haven't seen them play the best competition, which is crazy because we assume Texas was the best competition.

But so far, they've passed every test. And I want to play what PJ Flex said after the Minnesota game to help you understand what we're dealing with here, what we're talking about here. Because we could play clips from Ryan Day or from Matt Patricia talking about this team. I don't think that matters because they're going to, They're going to be humble.

They're going to be nice. PJ Fleck just got his ass kick by this team. This is minutes after the game. This is what he said. Yeah, I mean, that's one of the best defenses I've ever seen in 13 years. And I mean that because I never met Coach Patricia. I got a chance to see him after the game, but it's not just the players and the deaf. That's exceptional.

I mean, that's off the charts. Some of the best I've seen. but it's the schematic pieces that make it so complex where every single play is a different front structure, blitz structure, coverage structure. Now, on the second half, they went more to, you know, one rat, and they could do that. We weren't able to create any separation,

and they could stop the run. So, I mean, but it was, that was pretty dominating, that's for sure. They got really good players. They got a really good scheme. They complemented you under very well. They put you in that phone booth. I mean, we knew that's why I went four-out four-down. was 14-3 at the time.

I mean, fourth and one, guys. I could pun it, but would you rather have a 90-yard touchdown or a chance to get a first-down? That's it. That's the what the dilemma. And PJ Flex is a good coach. And Minnesota is not a bad team. Like, Minnesota is going to beat a lot of teams down the stretch.

PJ Fleck is telling you, it's easier for me to go for one yard against this impossible defense because if I punt, they're just going to march 90 yards on us because we can't defend all their playmakers on offense. I have another clip where he talks about their offense. It's the same thing. Like, I could play it, but it'd be the same thing. Like, they have everything and they know how to use it.

Do we have the picture of Matt Patricia that I sent, River? It's coming. The fact that that Matt Patricia. Well, I was going to say an extra in the legend of Bagger Vance, but either one. There's Matt Patricia. But he's been amazing. And it's interesting as we watch Bill Belichick flail down in Chapel Hill.

Matt Patricia, who was part of the Belichick Mafia, who was his defensive coordinator with the Patriots, he is having an excellent season with a bunch of top-end talent at Ohio State. But he's done a great job. And we just saw Jim Knowles who left Ohio State. He just got flummoxed by Jerry Newheisel, who became offensive coordinator at UCLA on Tuesday. of last week. And so Knowles is at Penn State. They haven't dropped a bit. In fact,

they might be better defensively than they were last year. This team's scary. And they're going into Illinois this week. It's a noon game. And, you know, it's interesting. So Brett Bilema got asked about this situation. And Ari, you and I were both at the game that gets referenced in this question of Brett Bilema. And it's the 2010 Ohio State at Wisconsin game or Wisconsin beat Ohio State. Let's hear Brett talk about this and then we can we can kind of do a mini preview about why maybe that's not as similar as people want to think. Your fifth year at Wisconsin, you played number one in week six. You were 18. They were one. Like this is an identical scenario. Do you draw on that at all? Do you, you know, try to reduce the mystique of number one for

your players? How do you look at that? Yeah, we definitely are going through a process. You know, I think anybody that knows me or has been around me. anybody that's, you know, played for me, we have a way of doing things that is very guided. But, yeah, I actually referenced that team to this group back in fall, in fall camp. So to have this moment, yeah, there are a lot of things, more to show them that this is something that, you know, if you come to college football, these moments really don't happen all that often. I've been head coach 17 years, and the amount of times where I get this moment have been very few. So to realize the moment you're in and take advantage of it, like I've said, you know,

I told it to our players yesterday, you know, a special memory is created for moments, right? And what you do with that moment makes that memory. So I'm super excited for our guys. I'm really excited for our fans, you know, I say it to our players, and I want people to understand where I'm coming from. This is no disrespect to anything that's happened in the past year, right? But like, these moments just don't happen. They're created over a long time, you know, the Michigan moment a year ago,

created a memory that lasts a lifetime. I still have people coming up to me this year that, and then that USC game last week was really, really pretty awesome, right? And obviously to have number one Ohio State coming here is awesome, but there's a lot of really good players that are playing on both sides of the ball. So, you know, that was a night kickoff, so it was a little bit different. And that year, we had lost to Michigan State earlier in the year, kind of knocked us back. You're right, I think we were number 18. But that was pre, you know, playoffs and all that stuff, right? So the rankings weren't there. So, but yeah, I think the fact that, you know, not many

of our guys have been in these type of games. So the good news is they've been in a lot of big games they've done well. What game? I love that. Was it the Juice Williams game? No, he's referencing the 2010 Ohio State Wisconsin game. Oh. You and I were there. They rushed the field. I was there. Jim Russell's doing his postgame press conference and they announced the over the loudspeaker, please get off the goalposts. And I like the difference. And you notice Brett Bilema, filibustered like crazy there because he is not going to for one second insinuate that they're going to do to this Ohio State team what his Wisconsin team did to that Ohio State team because that was a deeply flawed Ohio State team and Michigan was and Wisconsin had

JJ Watt the highly underrated Scott Tolzeen was the starting quarterback on that team I believe this is this is a different situation like this is Brett going we just got beat by 53 by Indiana boys like let's not not get crazy here. Yeah, I'm looking back at the box score of that game. I was there. I don't remember it. I remember that was one of the 12th prior kind of imploded in the second half.

It was just Ohio State was not one of it. It was not one of Jim Tressel's better Ohio State teams. And it was a very, very good Wisconsin team that, you know, it was kind of their night. And they just bullied Ohio State down the stretch. This is not that because Ohio State. is better than that. That was the year where Ohio State, yeah,

that wasn't a very good Ohio State team, but they went, 12 and 1, that was the Tatgate year. That was the one that ended up a Tatgate, yeah. Yeah, it ended in that, but it was a situation where,

I think if they had to play a lot of really good teams, like remember, they played the Arkansas team at the end. They let the Tatgate guys play because the Big Ten needed a BCS bowl win. They were tired getting embarrassed. So, very different situations here. This Ohio State team is immensely more talented than that Ohio State team.

Brett Bilemon knows that. Brett Bilema is not going to give them any bulletin board material whatsoever, even though he's a notorious troll and would do that if he thought he could. The thing that is so interesting about this Ohio State team is, I spent so much time last year talking about the death of the super team and they lost so many players from a team that won the national title

and it feels like they didn't lose anybody somehow. And I think because people like Arvell Reese, who we knew, like we knew of him, but I don't think we realized what he was capable of. In Ohio, he's incredible. Signs seven to 11 top 100 players, top 150 players every year. So from math standpoint, that's going to happen.

And I've been aware of that since, I mean, you don't know who the next one's going to be, but the next one's on the roster somewhere. And I think that Ohio State is still the perfect illustration of how you need to build a roster if you're Georgia, you're Alabama. And I think those guys are doing it too. You have to still sign elite level recruiting classes

after a 45-minute discussion about whether or not you should pay a quarterback out of high school. I still think that you need to sign 15 dogs every year at a minimum. And by the way, they do have a five-star waiting in the wings behind the current five-star quarterback. Like if Julian's saying does not work out or something happens and next year they need a new starting quarterback, they have Tavian St. Clair sitting right there. So they've done this in the more traditional way and managed to keep doing it this way.

And guess what else is on Ohio State's roster? A five-star receiver named Quincy Porter who signed last year. Yeah, we don't talk about it all because of Jeremiah Smith, Colonel Tate, and Brandon Innes. And guess who else Ohio State has on the way? Have you seen the tape from Chris Henry, the 2026? Oh, yeah, five-star receiver that's committed? He's committed.

So they keep getting these guys. And then on top of it, they bring in really good players in the portal. Yeah. And the portal players, I think, Nathan Oni Hanwa, who we mentioned in the Texas segment. Here's basically my thesis on how to create a dominant year-over-year success in college football now. Believe it or not, stars still do matter. You need to recruit at a top 7 to 10 clip or higher on an annual basis,

and you need to get to a place with your roster where you have good enough retention, where the players you take in the portal are not out of necessity, but out of luxury. and Ohio State did that last year. Like, did they need Quinn Sean Junction's last year? Probably not, right? But they had him and it worked. Do they need to go out and get some of the players that they've gotten across the board? You know, in some cases, maybe yes.

But in most cases, Ohio State, like Will Howard last year, maybe was a yes, right? But I don't know how many teams in college football aren't hitting the portal and being like, we need to get this person or we have a gaping hole in our roster. If you look at this Ohio State team and you compare them to some of the other elite level teams in this country and I, you know, I think Oregon maybe might be in this conversation too of like, which position group do they have a major hole at? And I think maybe you could say the running back position, but then Bo Jackson, the true freshman or the freshman.

As I say, he's doing fine. He's doing really well. You know, like, and that's a nitpick. Like, I'm trying to come. I'm trying to pull home. I don't know what their overt weaknesses. Their secondary is really good. They have five-star freshman players all over the field.

Their defensive line has turned out to be very good, too. And that's one that they were replacing basically every starter. Yeah. And they've turned out to be great. So they've done a really good job evaluating. They've done a really good job developing, which is hard to do in this era, hard to keep those guys there. So let's give Ryan Day and his staff some praise for doing it,

because it's not that easy. I think Kirby Smart will tell you it's not that easy. I think Kalin DeBoer will tell you it's not that easy. They've managed to do it. So that's our way of saying we're sorry we haven't talked that much about the number one team in the country. And it's probably because they're so good that they're just rolling over people. That said, look, they're not unbeatable. There are teams in the country that can compete with Ohio State on a given day.

So that's what makes this interesting. I don't know if Illinois is one of those teams. We'll find out. You know how many players in Ohio State's starting lineup, Andy, are transfers into this year out of the 22 players? Well, one tackle. We know that. Ethan O'Neanwa.

Is it two? It's three. Three, okay. Yeah. Well, I mean, we sat down with Ryan Day at the beginning of last season, and he said everybody talks about how heavy we were in the transfer portal. He's like, we have nine transfers on this team. that was last year's team and yeah this year's team is is mostly homegrown and they've done a

good job with it it's it's sort of the fun house mirror version of the texas conversation where texas felt like the homegrown parts of the team were fine they didn't need to go out and get something but they did yeah ohio state interestingly enough went to a group group of high school in texas and got a player at a position the longhorns could have used yeah and their best player was a transfer, Caleb Downs, but that was, the best player is Jeremiah Smith. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. So, sorry.

Sorry for the oversight, Caleb Downs. It's, it's very hard. It's very hard to deal with. It's a lot. So, yeah, there's a lot of players in their starting lineup, the point I'm making that they recruited out of high school. Brandon, Ennis, Jeremiah Smith, Luke Montgomery, Carson Hinsman, Tegra Shabola. Julian San basically counts.

I don't know if you count that. Carnell Tate's a high school recruit Caden Curry, Kenyatta Jackson, Sonny Stiles, Arvel Reese, Jermaine Matthews, like all these guys came from high school recruiting. So like, you know,

if you can retain your good young players, and I think Ohio State's probably done that better than anybody, right? They have figured out a way to recruit high-level players and keep them. And then they accentuate the roster with high-level transfers, and then they put it all together and they make the best pizza. of a team you can possibly imagine. Now, can you do it for 10 years, Andy? Can you do it for five years in a row?

I think it's the question we're going to find out. Yeah, and that's a different question. But unfortunately for Illinois this week, I don't think it's changing for the rest of this year. They're really freaking good. So can't wait for that game. Can't wait for Red River. It's going to be such a fun week.

Megaboard Wednesday tomorrow. I imagine there will be a few posts about Bobby Petrino making his debut for the second time. as the Arkansas head coach. That's going to be a wild one. Arkansas, Tennessee, Bobby Petrino's back, baby. We'll talk about it tomorrow on Indian R on 3.