Andy & Ari On3 - New Florida State QB DJ Uiagalelei is ALL BUSINESS | Could the SEC move to nine conference games?

Episode Date: February 15, 2024

Today's show is brought to you by PrizePicks, the easiest way to play daily fantasy. All first time users who deposit and use the promo code ANDY will receive a 100 percent instant deposit match up to $100. If you deposit $100, PrizePicks will give you $100.Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/ivHR/ANDY(0:00-4:21) Intro - Florida State(4:22-15:58) Texas AD Comments on SEC 9 Game Schedule(15:59-32:02) Florida State QB DJ Uiagalelei Joins(34:03-36:59) Dear Andy Intro - Champions of Big 12, Big Ten, SEC.. Newcomers?(37:00-48:34) Craziest Coaching Carousel Ever?(48:35-52:26) CFP Media Rights Bid?(52:27-55:54) Bowl Games at the Start of the Season?(55:55-1:01:00) So close, yet so far away teams?(1:01:01-1:05:12) Is UCLA an "Unserious" Program?(1:05:13-1:09:04) What’s the best Redneck Riviera town?(1:09:05-1:09:31) Conclusion - See you tomorrow!Andy visits new Florida State quarterback DJ Uiagalelei in Tallahassee to talk about Uiagalelei‘s wild journey through college football. He started at Clemson, thinking he’d be a three-and-done pro. He wound up transferring to Oregon State just as the Pac-12 blew up. Now he’s at Florida State trying to help the Seminoles keep their momentum going after an ACC title season. He discusses what it will feel like to play the Tigers, what he’s learned through four-plus years of college football and why he didn’t mind that Florida State took its time before offering him a scholarship.Before that, Andy breaks down the comments from Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte about the SEC possibly moving to a nine-game conference schedule in 2026.Later, you take over the show with your Dear Andy questions…Was this the craziest coaching carousel ever?Why the College Football Playoff re-sign with only ESPN?Could UCLA have handled the Chip Kelly situation differently?Why not start the season with bowl games?What’s the best Redneck Riviera town?Want to watch the show instead? Wake up with us at 8 am et to watch live! https://youtube.com/live/zJMwPtzSJI0

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. We have a big, big show for you today. The new starting, well, we don't know if he's won the starting job yet, but we think he's going to be the starting quarterback at Florida State. DJ Uyunglele joins the show. I visited with him in Tallahassee. He is a very happy dude in Tallahassee. His third college team, he's back in the ACC. And I think he's got some big expectations for this year. And it was an interesting situation because this is a guy who went to Clemson as the number one recruit. He became the starter right after Trevor Lawrence. He played well, but not as well as they would have liked. And then he ends up going to Oregon state has a very good year with Oregon state last year. But of course, before that season even started, the PAC 12 blew up. And so had to figure out what he wanted to do. He could have gone to the draft, decided he wanted to do another year of college football and looked around and Florida state is the one that he wound up in.

And it's interesting because he talked to Jordan Travis, got some advice. He had some friends who'd played at Florida State, some friends who'd played against Florida State, and really had just a good idea of what he wanted. He had worked out with Taylor Kelly, the former Arizona State quarterback, when he was growing up. And Taylor Kelly played quarterback for Mike Norvell at Arizona State. So DJ, you did a lot of research going into this situation. And it's interesting because when he committed to Florida State, I thought I was kind of lukewarm on it. After being in Tallahassee, talking to DJ, seeing how his teammates react to him,

I tell you what, it feels like a very good fit. It feels like this is going to work very, very well in Tallahassee. And this is, it's a situation where Florida state is, they're not rebuilding because the build to get to last year, to that 13-0 ACC championship season, was extensive. And it was a program-wide, top-to-bottom build. Because what Mike Norvell took over was pretty dire. It was a bad situation he took over from Willie Taggart. And so even though they lose a lot of really good players, including Jordan Travis, Keon Coleman, Braden Fisk, Jared Furse, they've done a really good job and kind of quietly improving their high school recruiting, developing those younger guys. And then they're also, again, them and Ole Miss are the best at the portal. Florida State, I think you could argue,

has been the best at using the portal to fill holes in the roster, to put exactly what you need when you need it into place. And I imagine they're not done. I mean, remember last year, they didn't get Keon Coleman until after spring practice. So I would imagine there's probably more moves to be made for Florida State, but they've done a really good job of constantly evaluating their own roster. And for the most part, they keep the guys they want to keep. They'll lose players, but they don't usually lose players they want to keep or that they feel are going to be important for them in the coming season. And I think they've done a really good job of roster management there. So I don't expect much

drop-off from Florida State. And now having seen DJ in that environment with the Seminoles, I'm actually pretty excited for what they can be this season. I was not as sure because I just didn't know how it was going to work, how it was going to fit. But he definitely seems really comfortable. And you'll see that in the interview with him because it is clear that he's happy where he is. It's going to be an interesting year in Tallahassee for sure. We will get to DJU in a few minutes. Also,

dear Andy, later in the show, you have some great questions. Our guy Nathan, who sends in the video questions every week, he has a doozy, this one. And I had a lot of fun doing the research because he has a hypothesis and it's a good one. But I think I found a better answer. So I cannot wait to see what you guys think. If Nathan's right or if I'm right. But before we get to DJ, I want to talk about a comment that Texas Athletic Director Chris Delcani made on Wednesday. He was in a town hall with Texas fans, and he was talking about scheduling. And obviously, it's very important to Texas as they move into the SEC what the schedule is going to look like.

And as you know, there were some arguments about what the schedule would look like once Texas and Oklahoma joined. And it didn't go the way that I think the leadership in the SEC expected it to go. Initially, I think there was a big push to move to a nine game schedule. And then as you had some resistance from the teams that want to schedule for bowl eligibility. But then as it went, you had a lot of teams looking at, okay, this is going to be really hard. And also it didn't seem like ESPN was going to kick in any extra money for the tougher games that are better products for ESPN. And so they kind of cooled on that and wound up going with an eight game conference schedule this year. Well, Del Conte

got asked about what that means going forward, because for Texas, it's pretty important because the eight game schedule gives you one fixed opponent every year. For Texas, that would be Oklahoma. Now, obviously it's very important in the state of Texas to play Texas and Texas A&M every year if they're going to be in the same conference. You can't do that unless you go to that nine game conference schedule. So remember that, remember that that's where the Texas folks are at. They want the nine game conference schedule. The A&M people want the nine game conference schedule. So here's what Delcani said on Wednesday. We have eight games scheduled right now. We're working on going to a nine game schedule, but we have a ways to go with that.

I would say this year we have an eight-game schedule. The following year, 2025, we have another eight-game schedule. Then we'll look at going to a nine-game conference schedule. Now, this makes sense. When they initially built the compromise to do the eight-game conference schedule in 2024, that's what I said I thought would happen. I thought that they would play this schedule and then whoever played at one site this year will flip to the opposite site next year. So in this particular case, Texas and Texas A&M play in College Station this year.

They would play in Austin next year. Florida comes to Texas. Texas would go to Florida, that sort of thing. It's probably the easiest way to do it because you don't have to rebuild a bespoke schedule from scratch, which is what they did to do for this 2024 schedule. So it gives them a chance to kind of breathe a little bit and then figure it out. But then you get to 2026, you're going to start missing Texas, Texas A&M games, Auburn, Georgia games, Alabama, Tennessee games. Those fan bases for the most part, don't want to miss those games. Now, Alabama and Tennessee, well, Alabama was one of the ones that came out against the nine-game conference schedule, even though Nick Saban said he didn't mind playing nine or 10.

But when it looked like it was going to be Tennessee, Auburn, and LSU as their three permanent opponents, suddenly it didn't seem so great. But here's the thing. This was taken on Wednesday as Del Conte saying, this is going to happen in 2026. I don't know that it's going to happen. I think it's what a lot of people want to happen. I also think it's probably what the leadership in the SEC wants to happen because it gives them a better product going forward.

There will still be resistance because I tweeted out what Delcani said with, with the explanation of, I think they just kind of flipped the schedule for 25 and then, then go to nine and 26. And immediately got a text from somebody at one of the schools that would like this to be reconsidered and maybe like you to stay at eight. Hey, this isn't a done deal yet. And I said, I know it's not a done deal, but I also think the teams that are against this, and especially with Alabama being against this, the SEC schedules were made boring for 20 years to protect Alabama-Tennessee. So by God,

you're going to play Tennessee every year. Everybody else had to sacrifice variety in their schedules for that series. So by God, you better play that game. Auburn, Georgia, same thing. Play the damn game. And Texas and Texas A&M. Again, I've said this all along. This is my stock line. I will say it over and over and over again. If you have Texas and Texas A&M in your league and they do not play in football every single year, you are doing it wrong and it is stupid and you need to fix it. So I don't think they're going to get to a year where they skip a Texas, Texas A&M game. I have too much faith in the intelligence of the people running the SEC for that to happen. You can't do that. You have to play that game every year. You probably have to play Auburn,

Georgia and Alabama, Tennessee every year too, but you have to play that game every year you probably have to play Auburn Georgia and Alabama Tennessee every year too but you have to play that game now there are solutions that involve still playing eight games and playing those important games every year the Big Ten is doing something like this now the Big Ten's not moving to eight games. They're staying at nine games. But they're saying basically, if you've got rivals that are very important to you, historically important, we're going to schedule them every year for you. But everybody's not going to have the same number. And so we'll just make it work. The SEC could do that too.

Because some of these games don't, or some of these teams don't have three natural rivals. Some of them have more, some of them have less. So you could do it that way, but I just don't see the SEC schools being okay with that. Like the big 10 schools are, I can't imagine. Cause they're always looking for a slight. They're always like, well, they got a better schedule than me this year, so I better get a better schedule than them. You're screwing us. The conference office is screwing our team. That's how SEC schools and fan bases operate.

So they're not going to be okay with a non-standard system. So it's either going to be eight games with one fixed opponent, the dumb one, or it's going to be nine games with one fixed opponent, the dumb one, or it's going to be nine games with three fixed opponents, the smart one. Because the reason that works is the math works out where everybody else who isn't a fixed opponent, you play every school twice every four years. So you play home and away every couple, you get them at home once every four years, you get them away once every four years. It makes mathematical sense.

But again, the eight-game one is stupid because you don't get Texas and Texas A&M or Auburn and Georgia or Alabama and Tennessee every year. And the nine-game one is smart. So the question is, come 2026, will they pick the stupid one or will they pick the smart one? That's really it. That's what it comes down to the other part of this and it's interesting as we move into an interview with a Florida State player in 2026 we don't exactly know what the conferences are going to look like because this time last year we were sure that USC and UCLA were going to the Big Ten we did not know

that Oregon and Washington were going to the Big Ten. We did not know that Oregon and Washington were going to the Big Ten. We sure as hell didn't know that Cal, Stanford, and SMU were going to be in the ACC. So all of this could change. It's entirely possible that at some point between now and a year from now, something happens with Florida State and the ACC. Perhaps the Big Ten expands again. Maybe the SEC would take more. I don't see the SEC moving to take more unless the Big Ten does. But if somebody gets freed up from the ACC, and that would be Florida State, obviously,

because they are the ones suing and being sued by the ACC, but North Carolina would be in that mix. Clemson would be in that mix as well. Then I think there would be movement. There would be changes, perhaps alterations of TV deals where you say, okay, we now want nine conference games. But at that point, the math doesn't work out either. You're going to have to do the math differently as the Big Ten has had to figure out with their 18-team schedule. So it could be that that eight-game, nine-game, stupid choice, smart choice I just outlined, maybe that doesn't even matter because the number of teams is different.

And I don't know. It's one of those, I cannot say anything with any certainty after living through the last year. And I think DJ Ouyangole would agree because he played at Clemson for three years. He graduated. Cade Klubnick was becoming the starter. We knew that. He had to move on. So DJ goes to Oregon State, which was coming off a really great season and expecting a really great season. And then in the preseason, the conference explodes and Oregon State is not left with a dance partner other than Washington State. So Jonathan Smith moves on to Michigan State, the coach from Oregon State who'd done an incredible job in Corvallis. And DJ's in the boat all season looking at, okay, what's going to

happen? And he had to figure out, do I go to the NFL? Do I do another year in college football? Well, at that point you realize you probably got to go somewhere else if you want to play in a quote unquote power conference. So he went looking around and Florida state was not necessarily all in on DJ at first. Remember there was was that weekend where he had a scheduled visit. Cam Ward, the former Washington State quarterback, had a scheduled visit. And DJ didn't have an offer yet. DJ takes the visit, sits down with Mike Norvell. They go through some games. And Mike Norvell, after careful consideration, winds up offering DJ.

Cam Ward decided to go to the NFL, changed his mind. Now he's at Miami. A lot of movement, a lot of pieces moving around the board. But in DJ Uyengle, you've got a guy who's been through a really just interesting college football experience. I think if you went back and told him in 2019 when he committed to Clemson that this was going to be how it was going to go, I don't think he or anybody else would have believed you. Because at that point,

Clemson was just rolling with their big-time quarterback recruits. Deshaun Watson had gone three years and won a national championship and gone onto the NFL and been a first round pick. Trevor Lawrence had played three years. He'd won a national championship. He'd been the number one overall pick. So it seemed like this was just destiny. Well, life has a funny way of not letting you make plans. So DJ Uyungle had a very different college experience, and now he is the hope going forward in Tallahassee.

Here's DJ. DJ Uyungle, Tallahassee. Sir. Do you ever think when you left Southern California, you'd be here other than the occasional road game? Honestly, brother, man, the way my college career has gone, I have no clue, man. My career, I don't think I've ever thought it'd be like this.

I didn't think I'd be on my third school in my fifth year. If my college career, I thought I'd be done in three years. But you know what? I think that's just the beauty of life and the journey that God's given me. And for me, man, I'm just blessed to be able to be here at Florida State, be able to be a Seminole,

play for Coach Orville. I heard you talking in another interview about you wake up every day. And you say, thank you. And you say, thank God for waking me up. Thank God so I can walk. Thank God that I can breathe. Is that something that you did when you were a freshman in college or is that something this journey has kind of taught you? I think for me, man, Jesus Christ, he's my heaven,

Lord, and savior. I thank him each and every day. For me, man, I feel like my faith has grown tremendously over my five years going into my fifth year in college. I think for me, God has always been number one in my life, but he's tested me in ways in college that has helped me to be able to grow my faith in him and be able to lean on him more. So I wouldn't say I've always been thankful of everything I've got in my life, but I feel like growing, I feel like I've matured and grown in my faith and learned to be able to lean on him more and be able to appreciate things in life a little bit more than I did Maybe my freshman year. Yes, and you've seen Yes, you've gone from you know growing up in Southern California to to rural South Carolina to Pacific Northwest

And now it now you're people don't realize Tallahassee is the South. It's not like South Beach. No, that's what I heard. I heard it's like the southern part of Georgia almost. It's somewhat. You've got suburbs of this city that are actually in Georgia. That's exactly. That's what they said. But I love it so far.

I mean, I like it. I enjoy Tallahassee. I enjoy the people. And I enjoy everyone here. It's been great. So when you're deciding what to do, because you could have gone to the draft. You could have gone to the draft, you could have gone to the portal, could have gone to a lot of different schools,

what was it about Florida State that drew you? I think Coach Norvell. I think what he stands for as a man, what he stands for as a person, and also as a coach. I think the testimony of what he's done, be able to develop quarterbacks and be able to the way he's transformed Florida State back to where everyone knows that Florida State's always been that powerhouse program, program with incredible athletes, incredible coaching staff and a rich tradition of winning and a rich tradition of the great fan base. So for me, that was the main thing.

And when you came on your visit, you guys sat down and looked at three games from Oregon State last year. And so it was basically a film session yeah uh how how different's that from say the first time around getting recruited when you were looking all the schools and ended up picking clemson how different is the third time through from the first time through i think it's totally different i think um the biggest thing is like what you don't know back then is kind of what you do know a little bit and then being in college for a while for me man the fluff And all you know like the photo shoots and different stuff great facilities for me man I still doesn't matter to me like for me. I'm all about ball. I'm about winning I'm about getting developed so I like that stuff

I don't need to do like I don't need to go and do a photo shoot anymore Like I don't really care about a photo shoot or how I look in the jersey But we are in the room where they do the photo shoots with the high school kids in the background so for me man i don't like that stuff doesn't impress me anymore like i want to be able to sit down be able to build a general relationship with my head coach my office coordinator the coaching staff there and i want to know hey what makes what makes this program great and how can you guys develop me and this is how i can make the program do you talk to young guys like when they come through on visits you tell them this stuff yeah when they come through on visits?

Do you tell them this stuff? Yeah. And they don't believe you, I bet. No, they probably don't. But for me, like I got a younger brother. Yeah. And probably the coolest thing, some of the coolest things I had last year was I was in the portal and ended up going to Oregon State. And for me, the whole month of December when I was home, my brother was choosing a college

where he wanted to go to. And he was choosing between Oregon, Ohio State, and USC. So I got to be there for all the in-home visits, talk with the coaches, and talk to him about, hey, this is where I've gone, been through my college for three years. This is what you should be looking for and the place you want to go to. So it was cool. I got to tell him my insight, and he listened to me while I was trying to figure out where place I should go.

And he helped me alongside. So it was vice versa. vice versa it was pretty cool though and Mateo picked Oregon and I heard you talking about there was a situation last year where you played a game in Corvallis and got to his game in Eugene by like the second quarter yeah it's pretty amazing yeah so that I mean honestly like God works in mysterious ways and for like for me and my family my mom and dad and my brother and a lot of our family members it was pretty cool for us to be in the same state and be able to play against each other. But yeah, I played a game at noon. My brother's game was at 5 o'clock. Shoot, my game got done 3.30.

Shower, and by that time, I'm on the road at 4.30. And Gene's only 50 minutes away, an hour and 50 minutes, like 50 minutes to an hour away. Oh, I've made that drive. Yeah, so it's cool. A little bit of Pinot Noir if you want to have some. Well, not all the way. You can buy some at the grocery store. And then once you get there, you're good.

But, yeah, it's a totally different and such a different vibe than Clemson was. And then you're back in that environment again. And you've actually played here once in 2022. One of your better games as a Clemson Tiger. I gonna be like because I I've been in the stadium a bunch of times and I can imagine on that visitor's sideline when that the marching Chiefs are up there in that end zone just blasting out and everybody's doing that chop yes sir it's probably a little intimidating what's it gonna be like when it is they're they're your side? I think it'll be a surreal moment.

Like you said, yeah, it definitely is. I mean, for me, man, growing up, I know about Florida State, know about the rich tradition that this program has and the legacy that these players play with and the fans have for Florida State. So for me, man, it's something I want to be able to live up towards and just be able to be someone that puts just someone that puts the hard hat on and work for each and every single day puts their best foot forward but it's gonna be amazing man like when i played here with clemson 2022 the stadium was rocking the tomahawk chop and it was amazing even though we won it was just it was just amazing like that was this was the coolest place i played

at in college so when you got to clemson the culture was was really good there they had just gone to the playoffs two years in a row. I think four of the last five seasons they'd gone to the playoffs. You get to Oregon State. They're coming off one of their best seasons ever, and Coach Smith had a really good culture installed there. And then you come here, and Coach Norvell has done what he's had to do to get this program back.

What's it like trying to blend in to a culture that's already pretty good? Yeah, I think the biggest thing, trying to blend in, for me, man, I'm just trying to be myself. You know, like I'm DJ at We On The Lay. You know, I'm not going to change for anybody. But I feel like, for me, man, I would be my authentic self. And I feel like, at the end of the day, I feel like I fit well with individuals. I can adapt and stuff like that. But I wouldn't be me, man, I would be my authentic self. And I feel like at the end of the day, like, I feel like I fit well with individuals.

I can adapt and stuff like that. But I wouldn't be me, you know? I wouldn't be, for me, man, I'm a guy that works my tail off, works my butt off each and every day. Puts my best foot forward. Someone that wants to go in there and be a great teammate. Wants to be someone that wants to be a leader. Be a great friend to people. And wants someone on the team that people that can count on

be able to trust. So that's what I feel like I bring to the table. So when you were looking at the destination after Clemson, you said that the offense mattered a lot and going to play for Jonathan Smith and being in a situation where you might be under center or you're moving receivers in for protection purposes and that sort of thing.

How much did you get out of playing in that offense? And now when you talk to Mike Norvell and your quarterback's coach, Tony Toker, how much more confident are you talking about concepts, talking about all the different things you have to do in the offense? I think a lot more confident. I feel like I learned a totally new offense

than I've never ran in my life. You know, I've got to work, understand I ran a pro-style offense, what they do in the NFL. And for me, being able to learn that, I feel like that just enhanced my game of football and my knowledge of football ten times more than I ever have. And it is great.

Coach Smith and Coach Langren and Coach Boyer, like, those were all my coaches there at Oregon State and they instilled a lot of confidence in me, instilled a lot of knowledge of the game of football with me, and I feel like I bring a lot of that here to Florida State. How strange was that situation? You grew up on the West Coast.

Yeah. You're a USC fan, right? Yeah, I was a diehard Trojan fan. So you watched a ton of Pac-10, Pac-12 football growing up. Yes, sir. You get to Oregon State. You have this season with these huge expectations. Before the season starts, the conference blows up,

and then you get done with the year. Coach Smith's looking around. How do you decide what to do at that point uh it was crazy man like like you said like no one knew like that would be the last year of pac-12 football and i think i said on many interviews for being a kid growing up in southern california a west coast kid um be able to play in the pac-12 has always been a dream of mine yeah and be able to play in this last year was amazing but like yeah when things happen you know the conference is not no more pac-12 which is really sad and then coach smith ended up leaving and taking the job at michigan state which he was an amazing coach and i'm super happy for him and i think he's gonna do great there um honestly kind of like oh shoot you know like you gotta you gotta look at kind of way

my options. What's the best thing for DJ at this time and point? I feel like the best thing for me was to look to find a new home. And I'm glad that everything worked out in God's favor. And he's able to lead me to this wonderful place in Tallahassee, in Florida State. So when you're older and you look back on that year, you're like, you, Pennix, Bo Nix, Caleb Williams,

all playing in the same league. Noah Fafita was great last year. Yeah, Noah Fafita. Cam Ward. Cam Ward. Shador Sanders. All playing the same league at the same time. Shador Sanders. There's a ton of quarterbacks in the Pac-12 last year.

I mean, for me, man, the Pac-12 was elite last year. It was great to play there. It's interesting because I was looking at the schedule this year. There is nobody better equipped for his new team's schedule than you because you've played everybody in the ACC, but like y'all have Cal, which is now an ACC member, and you played them last year too. That is true. I did play Cal last year. I forgot about it. Yeah, I forgot that. 52 to 40, that was a shootout. Yeah, it was a shootout. Yeah, no, Cal was a good game. They made it tough on us, man. It was a shootout, though, for sure. So with this group, you're with some guys that have been winning now a little bit,

and it kind of took them a little while to get to the winning part. But they are where Clemson was when you got there. They were where Oregon State was when you got there. Do you feel like it's easy to just sort of pick up where you left off and then or how long does it take to get to know these new guys and understand how everybody ticks i don't think it's easy because i think like the biggest thing is like winning doesn't come easy you know being a good team like florida state was 13 and 0 last year until they played georgia but like they have like that's not easy and i think a lot of people take for granted how easy winning it like how

Hard winning it's yeah, you know like when it's not hard like winning a game of football is not hard There's a lot goes into it from the preparation to the standpoint of everyone has to be on the right Right page and that starts in and starts in January. Yeah early winter and it starts in the spring So for me man, the biggest thing is you got to be able to put the work in, starting now. So, like, coming in, like, yeah, I think the biggest thing is for me to be able to understand the offense. First and foremost, to be able to be a great teammate, to be able to be a great teammate to the quarterbacks,

to everyone here on the staff, to all the players, to everyone in this building. I think you got to be able to instill your trust in all your players, to be able to trust you that you're going to do the right things at the right times, and then that you're not just a guy that's just, hey, you know, like, I just want to be able to jump on the ship. But I want to be able to bring some type of talent to this or whatever that is. If it's talent, the way you work, the way you prepare, the way you come out there on the field. And it's the way that you show yourself as an example to the program.

And you've been through all these. You guys play at Notre Dame this year. Sir. You started at Notre Dame as a true freshman, threw for 400 yards. You've been through all this, but will it be a little weird when Clemson comes to town? I think, yeah, I think because that was somewhere I played at.

That was my first place I played at. That's the place I graduated from. A lot of my friends are still on the team. A lot of the coaches I still know, and I still have a lot of love for Clemson, and they did nothing, but it was an amazing time I had at Clemson. You know, granted, my journey ended up taking me somewhere else, but I loved my time at Clemson.

Coach Sweeney was an amazing coach. All the guys there were great, and every single staff member there was great, and I loved it, and I graduated. Like, my best friends still play there. I still talk to them to this day. Like, my brothers are still on that team. But, yeah, I guess when that time comes, it'll definitely be different.

Well, now you have to talk trash to them. That's the difference. So, when you call Mike Norvell to tell him you're coming... Yes, sir. ...what's he say to you? Man, he was super excited. He was ecstatic. He was like, man, let's do it. Let's get to work. He was just excited, man.

I mean, I was, for me, I was super excited when he when he asked me if i offered me uh to be able to come in and i was i was electric man i'm like let's do it was that the same conversation when he offered did you just did you accept or did you say i got to think about this for a minute or two uh yeah it took me it took me like a couple hours like uh he called me and like later on the day and i ended up committing the next morning yeah so it didn't take very long, but I knew in my head. Well, it's interesting because I imagine a lot of the schools you were looking at probably, there's the offer. Let's go.

Yeah. These guys made you work a little bit for it. Yeah. Ain't nothing wrong with that. Yeah. At the end of the day, they told me they were looking at guys, and they wanted to do the homework. Coach Norvell, he was honest and open, which that's one thing I can appreciate.

Coach Norvell, he was openly like, like, we're not offering anybody right now. Like, we're going to do our homework. Like, we're going to look at it. He's like, position of quarterback, like, I want to make sure it's the right fit for this program. And then, like, the guy, whoever we take, is going to be the right fit for this program. So he told me, like, hey, this could take a little bit.

But for me, man, I knew in my heart that this was where I wanted to be. And if God led me to this program, he was gonna open up this door for me to be a Florida State Seminole. Now there was no looking back and I was ready to be a Seminole. Well, you're now a Florida man. Yes, sir.

Traditional honorary Florida man. I know, man, I know. Yeah, I'm sure the family makes fun of you for that. You hadn't shown up in any weird stories yet, so you're good. Yeah, exactly. So we'll see. Appreciate it, DJ. Thank you so much. Man, you so much your time brother thank you for having me on

dj ui uncle a and i am i'm excited after talking to him i'm very very excited to see what he can do at florida state because again i just wasn't sure when he committed how that was going to work. But I think just seeing him in that environment, he, he looks really comfortable. He looks like, and I think a part of it is he's kind of seen everything in college football at this point. So it's like he was talking about, he doesn't need any of the BS in the, in the visit. He doesn't need to, to know what the bells and whistles are. He just wants to know, how can I help this team win? What do you need from me? What can I give you? And I think that probably helps. And, and I think Florida state's had a lot of that kind of all

business mentality from these transfers they've brought in. And that's why, you know, even though they brought in a lot of transfers, it feels like the culture of the locker room has stayed consistent. And I'd say that's a good job of scouting because it's hard to do, hard to do. I was talking to a coach the other day about this. How do you find out in the very brief process you have to recruit these transfers, if they will fit your locker room, if they will help it come together rather than tear it apart. And it takes work. It takes relationships and you got to work fast to figure that out. But with DJ, it definitely seems like everybody's enjoying his time there. He's figuring out what's going on now. He has not found his Chinese food spot yet. He had a, he had a one in Clemson that was in a strip mall that was kind of handed down

from quarterback to quarterback or that that was their spot. He found one in Corvallis call. I think it was called like yummy, yummy. Uh, but he's still looking for one in Tallahassee. So if you have suggestions, send them his way. He's got to say, he's got a good Mexican food truck already, but he is not, it's not found his Chinese spot yet. So that is your DJ Uyengle food update. Now we're going to talk prize picks. My friends at prize picks, I did well, thanks to the punters in the Super Bowl.

But you need to sign up for prize picks. Download the best daily fantasy platform in America. The referral code is ANDY, and they will match your first deposit up for prize picks. Download the best daily fantasy platform in America. The referral code is Andy and they will match your first deposit up to a hundred bucks. And there's always something going on with prize picks. No, no power slap this week. So I don't have to do any power slap scouting for you guys, but Tiger's playing. Tiger's playing later, later today. He's teeing it up at Riviera. So will he have more or less than three and a half birdies in his opening round at Riviera? Will Bronny James go over more than six and a half points or will he have less than six and a half points for USC against Utah. Always something going on. They got Call of Duty, League of Legends. They got the eSports. There's NBA, obviously, NHL, darts. There's some darts

going on. If you can play it, PrizePix probably has squares for it. The more squares you pick, the higher the potential payout, also the more difficulty. So it is a challenge, but if you've got a few that you feel really great about, like I did with the punters in the Super Bowl, you got a really good shot. So download that PrizePix app today. Use the referral code ANDY and get an instant deposit match up to $100. All right, now it is time for Dear Andy. And I was going to start with one that got sent in earlier, but I got a really interesting question from Andrew in the chat that I think we

should start with this one because I had not thought about this, but this is a distinct possibility. Andrew says, Hey Andy, what are the chances of the champions of the big 12, the big 10 and the sec all being newcomers to the conference? That's a great question because let's think about this. I think Utah is probably going to be favored to win the big 12. If they're not favored, they will be co-favorites probably with Kansas state. So that's one Utah definitely feels like they have a shot. I think if Jed fish has stayed at Arizona, you'd probably feel good about Arizona's chances. Arizona didn't lose that much when Jed left Brent Brennan's a good coach. So perhaps they got a shot too, but Utah with cam rising, coming back with Brent Keithy, coming back, with Kyle Whittingham being one of the best coaches in country, I think they have a really

good shot in the Big 12. Obviously, Oregon is going to be one of the favorites in the Big 10. Now, Ohio State is probably the favorite in the Big 10, but Oregon in year one, they're going to be very talented. They're going to be good enough to compete with the best of the teams in the big 10. That's a possibility in the sec, Texas and Georgia have the highest projected wind totals. If you go to FanDuel, it's, it's 10 and a half for both of those. So everybody's expecting Texas to be one of the best teams in the sec. Uh, we'll see about Oklahoma, but Texas coming off a college football playoff appearance, bringing back a lot of talent.

Kelvin Banks at left tackle. Quinn Ewers obviously coming back. And then what they've done in the transfer portal, they went and got Isaiah Bond from Alabama. So that's another one that could be possibly. So, Andrew, that field, you know, prize picks only does the players, but if they did teams, it would be fun to have the, the squares like more, you know, more or less 0.5 conference championships. I would, I would really enjoy that because that would be a fun trio of squares to pick

on prize picks. But that is a great question. I am, I have not thought of that. But I do think we need to think about that going into the season because I can see Utah in the Big 12, Oregon in the Big 10, Texas in the SEC. That is certainly in the realm of possibility. And I would say, not with absolute certainty, but I think we're

going to get at least one of those three outcomes happening. I think at least one of those conferences is going to be won by a newcomer this year. I don't know which one, but I think it's going to be at least one of them. All right, let us move on to our question from our guy,athan who always sends in incredible questions this one is awesome over dear andy with the recent coaching carousel more or less being over we had 30 head coaches changed we had big name coaches retire shocking moves from one school to another off-field drama causing coaches to be fired and everything else. And with all of this, my question is, when was the last time we had an off-season that was this crazy in terms of coaches? I know in 2012, we had one or two more coaches change than we did this year. But even when Lincoln Riley went to USC, that didn't

seem nearly as dramatic as this season did. So have we ever had a coaching carousel that was this bizarre and crazy in every conceivable way? So I think this one is incredibly weird nathan one because you have mick saban retiring and jim harbaugh leaving for the nfl but also because of the other stuff that's going on in college football that has caused a couple different chain reaction things like having jeff hafley leave boston college to be the Green Bay Packers defensive coordinator, that hasn't happened. And then you have Bill O'Brien, who was going to be an offensive coordinator at Ohio State, takes the Boston College job. Chip Kelly then leaves a head coaching job for an OC job in the same conference. Now, we'll get into why all that happened in another question, but that part was really strange, but I don't know if

it's the craziest one ever. I think one, so Nathan mentioned the tooth, the one after the 2021 season, which was my craziest one, probably going into, to this year, at least that I've covered, but there's one down here that we're going to talk about that I didn't cover because I was I was just coming out of college but the 2021 one let's think about this so LSU opens when Edward Orgeron gets fired that that set things off USC opens when Clay Helton gets fired that set the table and Nathan mentioned this that Lincoln Riley going to USC big that Lincoln Riley going to USC, big deal. Lincoln Riley went to USC and Brian Kelly went to LSU on the same day. Think about that. Lincoln Riley left Oklahoma to go to USC. Brian Kelly left Notre Dame to go to LSU. Like the idea of anyone leaving either one of those schools for another college job was unthinkable prior to that day. It totally changed our perception of what jobs are in college football. The idea of those two leaving then are, and it's just, it's nuts, but here are some of the other jobs that were open in that cycle. So obviously LSU, USC, Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Florida fired Dan Mullen

after the, after that season, Washington had an opening. Oregon had an opening because Mario Cristobal left. Washington had fired Jimmy Lake. TCU had an opening because Gary Patterson had retired. Virginia Tech was open. Texas Tech was open. And Tennessee was open. Because remember, Jeremy Pruitt got fired.

And remember, they used the NCAA violations to fire him for free. And then they got investigated and then they had to sue the NCAA or have their state sue the NCAA. Everything comes back around. So that one was really weird. Let's throw another one in there. Let's go back to the end of the 2017 season. This was another crazy one. So Texas A&M fires Kevin Sumlin to hire Jimbo Fisher. We knew that was going to happen. So that opens up Florida State, which in turn opens up Oregon.

Meanwhile, Jim McIlwain got fired at Florida. Mike Riley got fired at Nebraska. Dan Mullen left Mississippi State for Florida. That opened Mississippi State. Jim Moore got fired at Nebraska. Dan Mullen left Mississippi State for Florida, so that opened Mississippi State. Jim Moore got fired at UCLA. Brett Bielema got fired at Arkansas. Arizona opened. So there were a lot of jobs open in that one. And remember, where the balls tend to pop up a lot in this,

that was the one where you had Shiano Sunday, where Greg Shiano was hired by Tennessee and then unhired after a fan revolt. That was a, I mean, that was probably the wildest coaching search I can remember that particular Tennessee search, because you had Shiano Sunday. Then you had Mike Gundy communicating with John Curry, who was the athletic director at the time. You had Dave Doran. It looked like Dave Doran was going to be the guy for a minute. Then there was an interview set up with Mike Leach, who was the Washington state coach at the time. The interview was set up in, in, in the LA area. And John Curry kind of, depending on who you believe, the Tennessee administration painted it like John Curry had gone rogue at that point.

I don't think that's exactly how it went down. But basically, when they find out John Curry's interviewing Mike Leach, they're like, come home. And then they fired him. And then they promoted Philip Fulmer. And then Philip Fulmer hired Jeremy Pruitt. That was a weird coaching search. That was a weird coaching search year.

Think about, the Jimbo Fisher move to Texas A&M was obviously earth-shaking. Florida State then hires Willie Taggart, who had only been at Oregon for a year. And so Oregon's thrown into chaos. Scott Frost is hired from UCF to go to Nebraska. That's the slam-dunk hire of the year. He ends up getting fired a few years later. I mean, that one was nuts. But I want you to go back, think back the turn of the century. So after the 2000

season, there was a coaching carousel that I think if it had been in the social media era, it would have been considered one of the wildest ones ever because of so many teams. But also, now that we have the benefit of hindsight, there were so many hires that were complete slam dunks in this one. It set the table for the next decade of college football, basically. So in 2000, remember Ohio State's open. John Cooper's been fired. They hired Jim Trestle, who's been kicking butt at Youngstown State. Miami opens when Butch Davis

goes to the NFL. He goes to Cleveland Browns. Now they hire Larry Coker. He wins the national title in 2001, but is probably not the guy going forward. But that was Mr. Right Now because the players wanted him. And so that one worked out temporarily, but not permanently. Alabama opened. They had fired Mike DuBose after the 2000 season. Dennis Franchione gets hired. That obviously didn't work out. He didn't like the pressure of the Alabama job, so he ran to Texas A&M, where there's no pressure whatsoever.

Wait, there's tons of pressure at Texas A&M, but maybe not as much then as now. Georgia opened. Jim Donovan had been fired. They hire Mark Richt, which obviously a great hire, not the perfect hire because Richt got them to a certain point, couldn't get them any further, and then they hire Kirby Smart, who got him the rest of the way. USC, in a very controversial hire at the time, the USC fans were big mad about this because they wanted Mike Riley for this job. They hired Pete Carroll. And it was like, this NFL retread,

he's been terrible in the NFL, why in the world would we hire? He only has one of the best decades any college football coach has ever had. West Virginia hired Rich Rodriguez. TCU promoted Gary Patterson to head coach. Missouri hired Gary Pinkle. Maryland hired Ralph Regan. Those are great hires. Holy cow, this all happened in

one offseason. And oh, by the way, it wasn't called the Group of Five back then. We didn't have a name for it. Oh, we did. We called it the non-BCS conferences. But in the MAC, Bowling Green hired a young Notre Dame wide receivers coach named Urban Meyer gave him his first head coaching job. So that 2000 post 2000 going to 2001 coaching carousel was the wildest. I think if we'd had the same level of coverage that we have now, I think we would look at that very differently because look at those guys. Oklahoma State hired Les Miles. Simmons left or resigned and they hired Miles. That was a big time coaching carousel with some big time hires. All right, back to 2017, because it was

pretty crazy. Our producer River with a tweet from my friend Ralph Russo, with Chip Kelly leaving UCLA, there is now one FBS head coach who was hired in 2017-18 with the school that hired him, and it is Rice coach Mike Bloomgren. That's exactly right. That is wild because that was one of those when, remember Chip Kelly had the choice of Florida or UCLA. I think he wisely chose UCLA because he would not have wanted to recruit the way you have to recruit at Florida. Dan Mullen gets Florida at that point. If you'd have said that neither of those would be

there by now, at that point, people would have thought you were crazy. Especially after Mullen's first year or two, the idea that Mullen was only going to be there for a couple more years would have sounded insane. Chip didn't start off that hot at ucla it took him a little bit to get rolling but yeah i that there have been some wild ones this one will go down as a very strange one just because the saban and harbaugh stuff alone but i just think it is a at 2001 when you look at look at who got hired i've said we are a gary pinkle appreciating podcast and we are he was awesome at missouri gary patterson dominated at tcu richard almost got west virginia the national title game and then again what what trestle did at Ohio State, what Rick did at Georgia, what Carroll did at USC, that's incredible. What a great question from our guy Nathan.

All right, let's move on to Mickey. Why didn't the college football playoff committee let the meteorites go out for bid? They could have had an NFL-type model and had four networks televising games, two CBS, two NBC semis on Fox and ABC and ESPN, the championship rotated. Wouldn't this grow the sport more? The TV networks would sell ads for all the games. True. But here's the thing. They did put them out for bid, not for the next two years, but for 2026 on, anybody could have bid on them. Everybody thought the price was too high, except for ESPN, which didn't end up paying the original asking price. But the idea was to sell it like the NFL does to four different

networks if they could and make the most money possible. But your NBCs, your CBSs, your Foxes looked at it and like, eh, a little rich. And a lot of that is because other things have happened in the sports rights market. You know, it's, if you don't follow the NBA or major league baseball, you might not know about this, but this is, it affects it because, you know, if you, if you watch, like if you have a favorite NBA team or favorite major league baseball team, you know what an RSN is, a regional sports network. And it's basically the kind of locally based cable network that'll carry a bunch of NBA regular season or major league baseball or NHL regular season games in your market. And those things were some of the most expensive things in cable.

You know, they're like ESPN was charging seven bucks a month per subscriber. Like some of those were charging in the, in the $7, $8 a month range. The most famous of these is the Yes Network that televises the Yankees. But the RSNs that were run by the Fox Regional Sports Network at first, then they became Bally. Those going under softened the market for sports rights quite a bit. So it was not a great year to be selling sports rights. And so when the CFP said, here are the games, we'd like this much per game. This is what we'd like you to pay. Those networks looked at it and were like, eh, I don't know if we need to do this because we think we might be able to get some other stuff elsewhere, or we're pretty happy with the amount we have. ESPN, on the other hand,

desperately needed the exclusivity of this because it needs to be able to sell its own product to cable networks and justify the high carriage fee it charges cable networks. And also because it's starting this new streaming service, which we thought it was going to be just ESPN, but it looks like they're going to go into business with Fox and with Warner Brothers Discovery. So that will help them. Now, I mentioned this the other day, the Athletic reported when

they reported that the contract had been agreed upon that ESPN can sub-license these games. So it's not entirely certain that you will see all of these games on the ESPN family of networks. You might see some of them on Fox. You might see some of them on CBS or NBC if they sub-license the games because they are allowed to do that now. So if ESPN finds it more profitable to sub-license a couple of first round games and a couple of quarterfinals, they'll do it. But I don't know if they'll do it right away. But that's the thing. It wasn't a case where they said, no, we just want to go with ESPN. They tried to get everybody else involved. They tried to get

everybody in there to drive up the price as much as they could, but the other ones just didn't bite on it. That's what happened. Next question comes from Kevin. Why don't the bowl games start the season? All the players will play, the stadiums will be full and who cares how many bowl games there are? You have nine months to talk about them and plan trips. No worries about portals or recruiting. The post-season would be playoff only. I was not a fan of this idea

when it first started getting floated a few years ago. I have come around on this. My problem is I love the December bowl games. I love watching those games. And I think this would be ESPN's problem with it too. That is very reliable holiday season inventory that doesn't cost them very much. And I think that would be a great way. I'm almost tempted to say, make it a double. Like if you qualify for a bowl game, it also means you qualify for a neutral site, good non-conference game to start the next season as well. And you could just make that one of your non-conference,

just make that one of everybody's non-conference games if they want to. But that would be, that would be a lot of fun. And I do think Kevin's right. I think the attendance would be pretty good because these games would be in, in probably late August, early September, pre-Labor Day, or maybe Labor Day weekend, depending on how you want to do it. People would either have three-day weekends or people wouldn't be in school yet, or kids wouldn't be in school so families could travel easier. I think that would be a lot of fun. I don't want to see the December inventory go away, but I do think you're right. You get everybody playing and it would be a lot more interesting. So Into wilderness, which I think is our guy,

Nathan. So spring games need to be scrimmages between schools, especially between FBS and FCS teams. They would rock. That's true. That's exactly right. So if you did spring games, put your FCS versus FBS game in the spring take those out of the equation and then add another non-conference game or that what you would have used on your fcs game or on one of your other non-conference games add that as a quote-unquote bowl game in the summer i'd be all for that and also you don't have to have, maybe you don't do the double. Maybe you don't worry about whether anybody was quote unquote bowl eligible. You just have everybody play. So like all the power conference teams would play some sort of neutral site game against

somebody fun in a fun destination. And the thing is the destinations, the palette expands because in the northern cities where you better have a dome if you want to do a bowl game, although Boise manages to pull one off, then you're not worried about weather. Your weather is actually probably going to be pretty nice. The Florida games are going to be miserably hot, but that's okay. We're used to that down here. I think that would be a lot of fun.

The more I think about it, the more that down here. I think that would be a lot of fun. The more I think about it, the more that might work. I wish there was still a way to do that. And maybe there is. Look, if you can pay the players to be in the games, which I think they might be able to, you could have both if you wanted. So I, Hey, I'm all for both. I'm I like more football, especially if, if guys are going to get paid for it. So that is a, that is a great question. Let us move on to a question from Dave in Chester, England. Dear Annie, long time listener from across the pond. What are some of your favorites so close, but yet so far teams of recent years? For me, I think about the 2020 Florida Gators who were arguably three plays away from finishing

the regular season as undefeated SEC champions. Had it not been for the Malik Davis fumble against Texas A&M, Marco Wilson throwing a cleat against LSU and the non-targeting call after Trey Dean's interception in the championship game against Alabama. Can you think of any other teams that have seemingly come so close and yet ended up so far away from what could have been? So that is a really interesting example. The shoe throw is at this point, kind of the albatross hanging over Florida football. Like what could have happened without the shoe throw? How different might things have been? Because what would the SEC championship game have played out differently or been different if

Florida had been a one loss team going into that? And again, like you mentioned the A&M game, if Florida won that one too, if they were undefeated and it was undefeated against undefeated, Florida, Alabama, does that change the result of the game? I don't know. But that team for sure is one of those. I'll give you another one. 2007 West Virginia. What if Pat White never dislocates his thumb in the second quarter of the Pittsburgh game? It's a 13-9 Pittsburgh win in that

backyard brawl. Obviously Pittsburgh's defense was playing great in that game. That was Dave Wanstead was the head coach. Paul Rhodes was the defensive coordinator for Pitt. They did a great job, but if Pat White's healthy the whole time, like, I don't think it meant like Pat McAfee missed two field goals. He's talked about what that, what life was like for him after missing those two field goals in that

game. But if Pat White doesn't get hurt, I don't think that matters. I think, I think West Virginia's offense works well enough that they grind out that game. It probably wouldn't have been a blowout win by any stretch because, again, Pitt was playing really well. But that would have set up a West Virginia-Ohio State national championship game, which I think West Virginia had a very good chance of winning.

So that is an all-time what if. Here's another one. Wide right two between Florida State and Miami. So that is an all-time what if. Here's another one. Wide right two between Florida State and Miami. Remember the series of missed kicks. So this is wide right two in 1992. Wide right one was later in the season, and they were both undefeated when it happened. But Florida State lost to Florida the next week.

Now, you can argue that maybe Florida State would not have lost to Florida in 91. Had they beaten Miami right before that, but in 92, they had another wide, right? That costs in the game and Florida state would have before state ran the table after that. Now would Florida state have fared any better against Alabama, the sugar bowl than Miami did? I don't know, but I would have been interested in seeing that because that was a Charlie Ward team. You know, Charlie Ward ends up winning the national title in 93 with Florida state winning a Heisman trophy, but that 92 Florida state team was really good too. That would have been a fun matchup with that Alabama team in the Sugar Bowl in 1992, after the 92 season. 2004 Auburn versus USC. This is no fault of Auburn's. Auburn just got screwed by the system. They were undefeated. They won the SEC, but USC and Oklahoma were picked

to play for the national title. USC just crushed Oklahoma. I would have enjoyed an Auburn-USC game. Like it would have been fun if they were in front of 14 playoff and we got to see that after USC and Oklahoma or that would have been the first game to get to Oklahoma versus somebody else. I just, it was the, that was the situation that caused Mike Slive,

who was then the SEC commissioner, to crusade for a college football playoff. So that one's another one. Also, 2013 Alabama. This is the team that lost on the kick six to Auburn. They've not really been challenged that year except in that College Station Texas A&M game. The Johnny Manziel coming off the Heisman Trophy Mike Evans just having poor Eddie Jackson was playing corner he ends up moving to safety becoming a great safety but he's I believe he's a freshman at the time playing corner and Mike

Evans just abused him in that game but Alabama kind of always stayed two scores up and ended up winning that game 49-42 and then they kind of rolled through the rest of the schedule and they get to Auburn, lose the kick six game. This is an Alabama team trying to three-peat. They won in 2011 and 2012. And so the kick six took them out of that. Nobody feels sorry for Alabama because they won all those national titles. But I bet that team against Florida state would have been a ton

of fun. The Auburn Florida state national title game in the Rose bowl was awesome. But if you'd have gotten Alabama against the Jameis Winston Florida state team, that would have been a fun game too. So those are, those are a few that I would have really enjoyed. Let's get a question from Travis. Is UCLA an unserious football program? The Sean Foster could end up being a good hire, but with no coordinator or head coaching experience, it's clear this hire was made because he would have a lower salary and wouldn't have to pay a buyout. It's clear UCLA wanted to move on from Chip Kelly and Chip had no interest in being a head coach of UCLA. I get that they saved around $9 million in avoiding paying or receiving a buyout,

but was there not a way the AD and Chip could have come to an agreement to part ways? The way it played out looks bad all around. I don't think they could have come to an agreement to part ways because I think if you're Chip Kelly, why would you say I'm just going to leave with no other job and you give me some money, but not all the money that you have to give me to fire me. Because they were in the process of raising money to fire Chip Kelly after the Arizona State game. And then that got stopped from above. But of course, Chip Kelly knew the writing was on the wall. So that's why he started looking for other jobs. Is UCLA a serious

football program? Not as serious as some of the ones in the conference they're joining. They're certainly not as serious as Ohio State or Michigan or Penn State or Oregon, but they can be a good college football program. The Deshaun Foster hire, it definitely feels like they have sort of said, we'll see what happens with this. Again, we need to see details of the contract, the finer details of the contract, but I suspect it will look somewhat similar to Zach Arnett's contract in Mississippi State. Maybe not as lopsided toward the school as that Zach Arnett contract was, which basically allowed them to get out of it in year one. And if he'd gotten a high paying coordinator job, the buyout would have been basically free. So this one, UCLA ends up making some money off

Chip Kelly leaving. Now, I don't know if Martin Jarman wanted to chase Chip Kelly, if he thought that would, I think he, I think at some point they wanted to fire Chip Kelly. That was not feasible because someone said, no, we're not paying this money. But that sent the message that got Chip out of there. So I think they ultimately got what they wanted in terms of not having Chip Kelly in charge anymore. Now they have some flexibility because at this point, I don't know who the ideal candidate would have been for UCLA. This way, they get to figure out what to do now. And if Deshaun Foster happens to be awesome, then you just pay him and you keep him.

And that's really what it is. But obviously, this is not what UCLA fans want to hear. Because they thought when they got Chip Kelly, okay, this will steady things. It's going to be stable. He's going to be good for a long time. We've got our guy. It didn't work out that way. And I'd say you kind of knew from the beginning that it wasn't going to.

Chip Kelly started off so slow. And his recruiting style, once you knew you were moving to the Big Ten, you probably knew that wasn't going to work. Because if you want to be successful in the big 10, you've got to deal with Ohio state and Michigan and Penn state and now Oregon and Washington, who you always had to deal with before and USC, who you always had to deal with before. But the problem is when you throw the Buckeyes and the Wolverines on top of that, it becomes darn near impossible if you're recruiting the way that Chip Kelly was recruiting. So that's the situation they're in. I hope Deshaun Foster kills it there. I don't like it when people get hired and the first thought is, wow, they just hired him to fire. I hope that's not the case. I hope he's

awesome because you never know in this situation. As we were talking about with that crazy coaching carousel following the 2000 season, UCLA's crosstown rival hired a guy that nobody thought was going to be any good. And he turned out to be awesome. So hopefully that's what happens for Deshaun Foster. Because again, I don't like it when people just assume

you got hired so they can fire you and hire somebody who's a bigger name later. Let's, let's see. Let's give the guy a little time. Let's see how he can do. All right. One more from Brendan, the Notre Dame fan in Philadelphia as a connoisseur of college football and food. I wanted to seek your advice on a travel related matter. The family and I are looking for spring break trip ideas. And we're thinking about going to one of the 30A beaches. So 30A is a road that goes through the panhandle of Florida. It goes through a bunch of cool little beach towns between Destin and Panama City,

and one of my favorite places on Earth. We've never been to the area before, but it gets great reviews. We'll be going at the end of March, and while that might not be the ideal swimming weather, all we're looking for is warm weather, pool, ocean access, and the ability to keep kids distracted with shopping, bike riding, possibly surfing. I'm going to have to tell you this about the Gulf of Mexico, Brendan. You ain't surfing in the Gulf of Mexico.

At least you better hope not. You better hope you can't surf. Do you have a favorite 38 town or other recommendation for a family spring break trip? I do have a favorite 38, 38 town, Brendan. So this one is not, not a lot of hotels. You'd have to, you'd have to rent something. You'd have to Verbo or Airbnb this one, but Greaton beach. And again, you don't have to stay necessarily right there because they're all so close together. Grayton Beach, if you just asked me to draw my idea of heaven, it would be Grayton Beach. So it's this funky beach town in the middle of all these other beach towns. And all of them have kind of their own little personality.

But you've got like Seaside where they film the Truman Show. That's a lot more crowded. It's very bougie. A lot of frat boy, sorority girl, kind of that crowd. But Grayton Beach is a little more funky, and it has a restaurant that has my death row meal. So there's a place in Grayton Beach called the Red Bar. Now, I will tell you, the beach at Grayton Beach is beautiful. There's a state park protected area.

It's just the purest white sand. It's gorgeous. And you can sit out there while you wait for your table at the Red Bar. And what is the Red Bar? It is a restaurant that has a six item menu. It was five items. There was a six that was always the special that finally they just put on the menu. And it's my favorite. Again, if I'm ever on death row, this is the meal I will ask for. So it is a blackened grouper served over a fried grit cake. And it comes with a side salad. And of course, you're going to finish it off with a slice of key lime pie. It's's amazing just incredible and great vibe in there very cool place it burned down they rebuilt it that's that's the spot but there there are lots of cool beaches along 30a so you got like blue mountain beach you got santa rosa beach and they all again have their own

flavor personality you can decide which one you want to stay at. You can get very easily between everything. And it sounds like a pretty fantastic vacation to me, Brennan. If you need somebody to help Sherpa you through there, just let me know. I'm sure my family wouldn't mind if I just came up and helped your family learn how to 30A correctly. One item I suggest only because the first time I ever saw this particular item of clothing was at the bar, at the red bar. There's a belt that you can buy that has all the SEC team logos on it. It's something ridiculous, like $160, but it is the perfect 30 a accessory. Absolutely perfect. 30. Like you, you rock that with your J crew polo and shorts. You will fit right in. Even as a Notre Dame fan, just do it for a night. They'll welcome you. They'll welcome you to the club. But yeah, that, that is, that is how you redneck Riviera, Brendan. And that is a great question.

Thank you for all the great questions. That was fun. Got a fun show for you coming up on Friday. New Mississippi State coach, Jeff Lebby will join us. Been a fun week. Move to mornings going well. Hope everybody's enjoying this. I am.

I'm becoming a morning person. Time for another cup of coffee. We'll talk to you tomorrow.