Andy & Ari On3 - Michigan STUNS Ohio State | Is Ryan Day John Cooper?

Episode Date: November 30, 2024

You’ve had Wendy’s Nuggs dipped in sauce. But have you had them covered in sauce? Wendy’s New Saucy Nuggs take the Crispy and Spicy Nuggs you love and turn them up to 11.Choose between flavors like Buffalo. Honey BBQ. Garlic Parm. Or, if you’re a real heat seeker, try Spicy Ghost Pepper, only on Wendy’s signature Spicy Nuggs. This show is brought to you by Panini America, makers of the most collectible sports cards on the planet. The Luminance football card series features NIL autographed cards from players including Arch Manning, Quinn Ewers, Cam Ward, Jalen Milroe, Dylan Raiola, DJ Lagway, and Luther Burden. To start collecting, visit PaniniAmerica.net. Michigan stunned Ohio State, and maybe Ryan Day is just cursed against the Wolverines. Or maybe he’s just John Cooper. Andy and Ari break down what happens next for a very weird situation. Ohio State is going to make the College Football Playoff (but not the Big Ten title game), and the Michigan problem has now extended beyond Jim Harbaugh’s tenure.   Does something have to change? Or is that crazy talk? Watch us on YouTube instead! https://youtube.com/live/4n0TcvSCbXA Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari WassermanProducer: River Bailey

Welcome to Andy and Ariane 3 presented by Wendy's. We are in College Station, but we have to talk about what happened in Columbus, Ari. I didn't believe it could happen. That guy didn't believe it could happen. That scared me. You know what scares me? I think I think Ryan Day is John Cooper. He's cursed. What gave it away? Andy? He's cursed. It has to be a curse. Well, you know what? There's two ways of looking at this one is you're cursed or two There's something about your temperament as a coach in this position in this situation where you don't do it, right? and yeah, you know the the thing that stands out to me is that You know the the shots of him on the sideline throughout the game the fans in the stadium

There was a tightness around Ohio State whenever they play this game and it accumulates and it gets worse year over year over year. And I was going to write a column and I talked to you about this when I first got hired and even this past week about how it doesn't matter what the situation is for the spread or the talent gap or all these things that if you are mentally tight, yeah,

that this could happen. And I didn't write it because the spread was 20 points. And I did not expect for the biggest upset in the rivalry since 1996 and all the way back to 1969. And Andy, there's a lot to unpack here in terms of what this means for Ryan Day, what this means for what you have. First, let me apologize to everybody. I could not have been more wrong. There's a clip of me on the internet saying, oh, I'm normally a throw out the record books kind of person. I'm normally anything can happen in a rivalry game kind of person. But Ohio State's going to clobber Michigan. They're going to take out three years of frustration.

I could not have been more wrong. Holy crap. Yeah, no, it's a question that you have to ask here is how does Ohio State move forward with a coach with a Michigan problem? You know, and the thing that's interesting about this new playoff system, Andy. Because this is the worst version of Michigan they're going to see. And this is supposed to end your season. And a lot of people in Columbus probably feel like it is over, and rightfully so, if you

lose. You know, there's not a lot of thought that they're going to go on and do new things, but they've got to regroup now after missing the big 10 championship game and try their best to, you know, put themselves in a position to regroup. But like, I don't know how you do it, man. I don't know how you do it. And like, what does Ryan Day have to do from a coaching standpoint to even win this team back, this program back, this fan base back, like, you know, and I know that they were close after losing to Michigan a few years

ago, beating Georgia and potentially moving on, but like, they couldn't even get a first down in that game. I don't even know how you can begin to even think about whether or not they can salvage anything. I tweeted when they threw the pick, but Michigan's backed up on their own goal. And I'm like, just, just keep thinking what would Kirk Ferentz do? Like, that's all you gotta play And and the Ohio State fans point out. Yeah, just play Trestle ball. Yeah, they couldn't even do that

Yeah, you know and it's like you're playing against the team That isn't good like last three years Ohio State lost to Michigan teams Ohio State was very talented and very good too But so what you lost to the Michigan teams that were also very good And of course one last year went on to win the national championship. So you can wrap your mind around it. That was the worst team Ohio State has lost to during his leadership period. Yes. Like period. Right. Not just Michigan games. Like that team was not a very good team. So like that is a, that isn't like, well, what can they do to make their roster better? How

much money can you go spend on NIL or what the repair is? Like that is like, well, what can they do to make their roster better? How much money can you go spend on NIL or what the repair is like that is like what is rotten in the building? Why can't you do this? What is this game? This team have over you? What does it have? And I'm not like, is it crazy talk? Because I don't know, I've always said, Ryan Day's fine, whatever. It was just a bad stretch. But now I'm looking at it like this is a real problem. This is not going away. This version of Michigan is the worst one. He's going to see the rest of his career. Probably Michigan is dead serious, deadly serious about an IL. Right. So what do you do if you're Ryan Day? What do you do if you're Ohio State? Like I'm and the thing is what makes this weirder is Ohio State is going to make the playoff. Yeah. They've beaten Penn State. They've beaten Indiana. They're a two loss team.

They're going to make the playoff. They're not going to make the big 10 championship game. No, no. Penn State's going now for those keeping score at home. And that's the thing. It's like, there's nothing's going to happen tomorrow. They're going to play out their season and we'll see how it goes. But you know, they just went from potentially being the one or the five seed to maybe the nine seed. Because if you want to start, like I was telling Andy- Oh, they're on the road now. Yeah. I was telling Andy during the game that I'm having a hard time like compartmentalizing what the playoff picture looks like with all these floating results. Yeah. But if you want to start scrutinizing Ohio State's resume against some of the other teams that are,

uh, you know, out there with two losses, like I, that's fair game at this point. Now they have two wins against Indiana and Penn State that'll probably make them safely in at this point. Yeah. No, if they're out, but in terms of seating, they might be down in the eight, nine, 10 range. So, you know, that, that is inexcusable. We just watch you on Texas Roadhouse. Like there is no like people want answers for me. Let me look at you in the camera. Let me look at you in the camera. Sometimes in this sport, it doesn't matter how many hours I think about it, how many hours

I analyze it. We talk about it. Yeah, I study it. I gamble on it. I think about it. I play the video game. It's literally the thing that I think about most of my entire life outside of my wife and kids. I gamble on it. I think about it. I play the video game. It's literally the thing that I think about most of my entire life outside of my wife and kids. I don't know what the hell I'm talking about sometimes. Like you watch that game and it's like what analysis can I have given you before I tried level of certainty that I gave you on Monday about this game, the level of certainty because how

in the hell could that have possibly happened? Think about how many assumptions that we make on a day toto-day basis about what's going to happen in these games and it's like the only analysis I could offer you earlier in the week is they get tight. If they get tight and the team starts to take on the temperament of the coach and the fans get nervous this can build on it. That's what happened. I didn't think it mattered how tight you were when you're that much more talented. That's what I'm saying. And then the other thing too is like Michigan scored 13 points. Can we talk about this?

Yes. Ohio State did not score points. Well, and remember the stat they threw up in the middle of the game. It was probably in the third quarter. Like Michigan scoring drives at that point had encompassed six plays in five yards. Now, Michigan did start to move the ball and that's that's the crazy thing. This could have been worse. Like imagine Davis Warren puts a little bit of arc on that ball when they had the perfect play call on a guy wide open in the end zone and he just

threw it a little short and it gets picked. Like this could have been way worse. Yeah, yeah. So you know you saw those shots of him on the sideline of day. Yes. He, like this could have been way worse. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, you saw those shots of him on the sideline of day. Yes. And the look like he'd seen a ghost. He was just died. Yeah. I don't like, I don't know. Like it was just a person who is in it. It reminded me and I was a kid during the nineties. So like I, but I've been on the beat for 10 years. I've gone back and watched a lot of those nineties. If one more person does that, get used to it. You're a celebrity now. Yeah. I don't think that's why they're honking Andy.

The temperament of John Cooper on the side, you know, that, yeah, it's like a ghost, but it's like they're making the game bigger than it is. The hiring of Chip Kelly was supposed to help with stuff like this, where you have the experienced, you know, old head guy who's been a head coach in all these big games who you can lean on. Did we think the play calling was spectacular in that game? No, no, no. And like, I don't know if they should have ran the ball less and thrown it more. But like Andy, even with the game on the line, 45 seconds, I keep saying to you, what did I keep? I kept saying, oh, here's where they keep saying to you? What did I keep?

I kept saying, oh, here's where they throw it to Jeremiah Smith or Emeka Buka, and they shake a tackle, and they run 80 yards, and it never freaking happens. Because that's the game I played with myself for the last three years. Hell, here comes the big play. How are they gonna cover Jeremiah Smith?

Camera's not working. Oh, hold on. Is it because the computer went? Oh, hold on. Is it because the computer went? Okay, we're back. We're back. It's not just the thing that is interesting is I'm going to write a column when we get to the Kyle field, which by the way, is going to be electric. I'm going to write a column about this. And I've been trying to think about it, piece it together in my head, Andy.

And there's no punt call that they should have gone for it. No, there's no dropped pass that there's not one play because you could, it was the entire, you can't blame the kicker for missing kicks. It's just like the entire game was just one big sleep walk days of, of, of being afraid. And like, that is a reflection of the coach. There's no NI deal, uh, NIL deal to be made. There's no assistant to hire. There's no, like last year, it's like, okay, well, we'll bring everybody back. We'll do everything that Michigan did and we'll put ourselves in a position to be really good next year. It's like, how much better

in this era could you make a team from a talent perspective? I've been calling them a super team all year. There's nobody else. You called them super team this morning when we were driving down here. There's nothing else to do Yeah, what do you do? So like the thing is well, okay So let's ask the question because now we've said it's not crazy talk If you are Ryan day should you look for something else after this season if you are Ohio State should you? Encourage him to look for something else after this season So here I know that sounds insane but yeah and I need I need to make some calls probably but Ryan Day does 90%

of the job right he gets players he puts together a staff more often than not they make the playoff I don't know if you can fire him now. You can't fire him. The only way this works is if he decides, I don't want to do this anymore, he gets another job. So if he wants to take another job, maybe. Ryan Day is a very competitive person. Yeah.

I don't know that, like, for the temperament that he had in that game, like knowing people in his family and where he grew up. And I've known the man for a decade. I can't imagine that he would just be like, I quit. I don't want to do. I agree. Like, I don't think you would want to go out like that. But what if you're if you're Ross Bjork in Ohio State, do you say, listen, they also have to make this painless for all of us.

Well, Ross Bjork is new here. He was here. It was just here that set buyout records. So, you know, I don't know that he's afraid to make a drastic switch. I also don't know if six months into your tenure, you can fire your head coach when they're so I just don't think you can fire Ryan Day based on what he's done. But I just wonder and I know it sounds stupid, but I just wonder if this isn't the right thing for him.

Yeah, no. And maybe he goes somewhere else and he's ultra successful because he doesn't have this one thing looming over him, 365 days a year. Yeah, so there's really no game to break down. It's temperament and coaching and all that stuff. Yeah, it feels like it all happened over the week. Yeah.

It didn't happen this afternoon. Over the last three years. Yeah. You win the first one in 19, okay. You lose the first one in 2020, okay. Or 2021 after COVID. Yeah. Okay, it happens.

You can't win every single year. Then when you lose the second one. Yeah. That's when it becomes a problem. And now that team owns real estate in and around Brian Ryan Day's brain. So how do you fix that? He's going to have to look himself in the mirror and try to figure that out. But it's so strange because he, he worked for urban Meyer and urban Meyer is interesting because a lot of coaches

have the nameless faceless opponent philosophy. Most good coaches tend to have it. Urban Meyer was very different among good coaches. He was like, no, rivalries are special. We will treat rivalry special. But he always treated them special in a way that made his teams better in the rivalry game. Yeah. And it's, it's almost like you, you can't do that unless you're him. Yeah. Kind of have to go nameless, faceless opponent. If you're somebody else. Yeah. Well,

like also too, you don't win the game being nameless face. That's not how Ohio state works. So you know, if he, if Ryan Day would have been on his opening press conference, what do you think of the Michigan game? Uh, we just going to treat every game like they would have ran them out of town. The second he said that. So like, I don't know, if he, if Ryan Day would have been on his opening press conference, what do you think of the Michigan game? Uh, we just going to treat every game like they would have ran them out of town the second he said that. So like, I don't know, it didn't bother. It didn't bother Alabama fans, but Nick Saban said about Auburn. Yeah. I don't know.

Uh, I don't think they care if you win the game. Yeah. If you don't win the game, they care. Maybe he should try that next year, but like at the same time too, we're going to be here in 365 days, Michigan, maybe a 10, maybe we'll be there. Maybe we'll be in Ann Arbor. Because it's like that was the thing too of like where we're deciding where to be today. I think this is the only option. We never thought about going to Columbus because we never assumed it would be a close game.

But yeah, like that's the real tricky part is how do you even fix that? And that there's no real answer to it. So yeah, I can't wait to cook. I can't wait to get over to Kyle Field. That was a really good game. We had Texas Roadhouse Rolls, not a sponsor, wish they were. Yeah, now's your chance, Texas Roadhouse. Get on board. Andy got to my house last night. We went to Heim Barbecue. I thought we were going to have a nice leisurely night. Eight overtime later. What? Writing columns about the SEC at midnight, waking up at 6 a.m., forgetting about losing my wallet. Like all these things have happened today.

Think about this. We have the eight over time Georgia Georgia Tech game. We have the Ohio State Michigan game. There's still two windows left on Saturday. I can't wait. I can't wait to get over to Kyle Field. It's my first Kyle Field experience. I think it's gonna be a really good day to experience it for the first time, but I'm

going to be buried in the laptop when we get there for a few hours. It's going to be electric. Electric. We'll talk to you soon. Thanks for being here, guys.