Andy & Ari On3 - The College Football Coaches Poll is All Guesswork | Dear Andy Answers Your Questions

Episode Date: August 8, 2023

Want to watch the show instead? Head on over to our On3 Youtube Page! Like and Subscribe!https://youtube.com/live/zYxEaAfwgb4It's that wonderful time of year when the sports information directors and operations directors across the country first fill out the coaches poll ballots for their school's head coach. Will this look anything like the final poll? Of course not. Is it fun to talk about now? Absolutely. (0:00-13:25)Arizona president Robert Robbins explained his reasons for the Wildcats leaving the Pac-12 for the Big 12. Among them, he equated needing to sell Apple TV premium subscriptions to "selling candy bars for Little League." (13:26-21:07)In this week's Dear Andy, you asked some great questions:Do the coaching defections from Notre Dame mean Marcus Freeman has a problem on his hands? (21:08-26:00)Florida State is dealing with a possible private equity to raise funds, what does this mean? (26:01-30:12)Will Texas or Oklahoma win a national title first? (30:13-37:00)What is the future of the Pac 12 and what will the 4 remaining schools do? (37:01-45:15)Could the biggest brands in the sport all go independent? (45:16-51:56)What Week 1 winner and which national title winner will create the most havoc? (51:57-57:36)For today's Extra Point, Andy pays tribute to the coaches' poll by revealing his Random Ranking of the top five 80s cartoon theme songs. (57:37-1:05:26)

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. It's a big day. It's one of those benchmark days as we move toward a new college football season. The coaches poll has been released. That's right. Sports information directors and observations directors across the country have filed votes in their head coach boss's name. And we get to argue about it. Now, I think as we hurdle toward a 12-team playoff, we're probably almost done with the silly arguments about how you shouldn't release a poll until October, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. First of all,

the only poll it counts, the college football playoff rankings aren't released until October. And as we can tell, like this poll doesn't affect anything. You know, I went back and looked at last year's, I don't see TCU in there and it didn't keep TCU from playing for the national title. I didn't see Kansas State in there last year either. They won the Big 12.

Texas A&M was number seven. Things didn't go that well for the old Aggies last season. Wisconsin was ranked number 20. They fired their coach. Kentucky was 21. They had a bad year. So it's just guessing. It's just for entertainment purposes.

It is not to take very seriously. What it is is a chance for us to talk about actual football in a time when we don't quite have it yet. We've had one NFL preseason game. We've got more of those coming. We've got week zero coming up, but we still have a couple tough weeks to get through, two and a half tough weeks to get through before we are just awash in real games. So let's enjoy this. Let's enjoy this and let's see what it means so Michigan at number two I find that

interesting because this is the coaches saying okay fine we do believe in Jim Harbaugh so this is Michigan above Ohio State Michigan above even Alabama just behind Georgia I don't blame them for ranking Georgia number one so again we go back to last. Michigan was coming off a Big Ten title last year. They were coming off an Orange Bowl loss to Georgia where the talent gap was exposed pretty obviously. But they were number six. They were four spots behind the Ohio State team they had beaten. And it was clear.

It was, okay, that was the blip, and then we'll see what happens. This year, it definitely feels like the belief is with Michigan. And I think when the AP poll comes out, we're going to see the same thing, that Michigan will be ranked ahead of Ohio State. And look, they earned that on the field. So I don't think there's any problem with that. Ohio State, obviously still in striking distance. They're number four.

So nobody's saying the Buckeyes are bad. And let's be perfectly honest, the Buckeyes are one defensive stop in the fourth quarter of the Peach Bowl away from probably being the defending national champs right now. So there's a lot to digest with this thing, though. I was looking through the various spots. Florida state above Clemson with the coaches. That was an interesting one to me because usually coaches favor the incumbent, the one that's been there. And that is Clemson. That's Dabo Sweeney. They won the ACC last year after not winning it in 2021. And I'm not ready to give the ACC to Florida State quite yet. And obviously, they're one spot apart.

So it's not like all the coaches are saying, Florida State's definitely going to win the ACC. This is probably a pretty close race here. But I'm just not ready to see that yet. Perhaps if they beat LSU week one, they play Clemson week three. Could be the first of two meetings. So we'll get a chance to really figure that out. Maybe it was week four.

I'm sorry. It's in September. But we'll get a chance to figure that out. And Michael Palmer, Clemson should be behind Tennessee. Well, they did just play. They did just play and Tennessee won. But we're supposed to also treat this as a new season, which I realize we're probably treat this as a new season, which I realize we're

probably not treating as a new season because a lot of teams that finished strong last season are going to get a bump from the way they finished. Tulane gets ranked at the beginning of the season coming off the win against USC in the bowl game. The Notre Dame bump is here. The Texas bump is here. The belief in Texas. Now, I think if you look at the talent level of Texas, the actual NFL, like outgoing people who are going to go play in the NFL, talent level of Texas, it's significantly higher than it has been. So I'm not as concerned that Texas is just getting crazy overrated. In fact, I feel like they use a little restraint at 12

because some of the hype you hear about Texas, you'd think they'd be a lot higher. But Notre Dame at 13 coming off a season where they lost to Marshall and Stanford, I kind of need to see it. I love Sam Hartman, obviously. Thought he was great at Wake Forest. But I need to see that on the field.

I'm not quite ready to anoint Notre Dame there yet. Oregon State at 18. I think they're going to be fine. They're probably going to be better than that. That was a 10-win team that brings a lot of people back. K-State at 17. Kansas State, you're defending Big 12 champ, returning four starting offensive linemen.

You heard from Cooper Beebe on this show last week. I'm sorry when there's a good, disciplined, well-coached team that returns a bunch of really old offensive linemen who are also good. I believe in that team. I will believe in that team preseason. And so I might have had Kansas State a few spots higher than 17. Interesting in the also receiving votes section. So who received the most votes in the also receiving votes? So the essentially the number 26 team in America,

that'd be the Iowa Hawkeyes, the butt of all our jokes last year. But the more I thought about that, I thought about who Iowa reminds me of in this situation. And I remember sitting in Pat Narduzzi's office when he was the defensive coordinator at Michigan State. And this is between the 2012 and 2013 seasons. And Narduzzi's taken me through all the stats from his team or his unit the year before. And I'm looking at it like, man, this is a dominant, dominant defense. They brought back a lot of that. And I thought, oh, that offense was almost non-functional, the 2012 Michigan State offense. It didn't really pick up until the bowl game,

and that's where they realized Connor Cook was their guy at quarterback. Iowa just needed a barely functional offense, and it would have been playing for the Big Ten title last year. Iowa could definitely be ranked much higher than this when the season ends. Because I realize we get off all our jokes about Brian Ferentz and his contract that says they have to average 25 points a game or he's basically going to get fired. But you look at what they've done in the offense.

Cade McNamara comes in to play quarterback. They've added some other transfers. The line, which was banged up last year. Kirk Ferentz talked about it at Big Ten Media Day. They feel a lot more comfortable with those guys and their experience now. That's the one, if you were to ask me, who's going to be halfway up these rankings by midseason. That's the one that I think could be up there.

And we won't be getting all the jokes off if they do have a functional offense. But I do think that's not a bad choice for the number 26 team. Now, also in the also receiving votes, you notice Georgia's number one, Tennessee's there at number 10. But you've got South Carolina with 89 votes. Florida was 63. Kentucky's got 34. Guys, somebody in the SEC East has to lose. And Vanderbilt beat Kentucky in Florida last year. So I don't think Vandy's going 0-8 in SEC play. And I don't think Missouri, which by the way, also got some votes. They're not going to own eight either. So somebody's got to lose in the SEC East.

So this is awfully optimistic. And it's basically coaches saying, we don't know which one of these teams is going to be the third best in the SEC East. And I'll be honest, I don't either. I think Kentucky could be better. South Carolina, we've talked about that with Spencer Rattler coming back with the way they played at the end of last season. And then Florida, you know, the Vegas doesn't like the Gators very much, but you talk to Billy Napier,

he seems to be pretty confident about this group that they can win more than projected. I don't think anybody's pretending they're going to win the east but somebody has to lose those games and so that that's another one where I feel like everybody's just pumped right now or at least somewhat optimistic and then there you go so I I do love this Tim Gibson Tennessee overrated again. But let me find it. There have been a lot of comments already in the chat. But Michael Palmer, the Tennessee team we saw in the Orange Bowl was basically this year's team minus the added depth. So he's saying Tennessee is not overrated

because Michael said that Clemson should be behind Tennessee. So there's your deal. Nobody really knows what they want this to be. Everybody has their own opinion. This is to get us going, get us talking, get us lubed up for the season. And I'm glad. I'm glad because I've just spent a week talking about nothing but realignment. And I'm ready to talk about actual football. I'm ready to talk about games. I think this is a nice palate cleanser. And it makes you think about, okay, who could come out of nowhere? Who are we overrating? Who are we underrating? Now, I mentioned Wisconsin ranked number 20 in last year's preseason coaches

poll. They fired their coach. The coaches didn't see it coming. The AP voters didn't see it coming. Hell, nobody saw Paul Chris getting fired in the middle of the season coming when the season began. But I'm going to throw this out there. Wisconsin is at number 21 right now. It's basically kind of near where they were last year. They were number 20 last year. I think they may be a little low this year.

I'm excited about what Luke Fickle can do. I'm excited about what that offense with Phil Longo and Tanner Mordecai can do. They're calling it the dairy raid. And so it's going to be crazy. Now, Chris Callahan clearly didn't watch my interview with Tim Watts the other day. Overrating Bama has a 9-3 season written all over it. When's the last time Alabama lost three games? When's the last time?

I'll tell you. It's 2010 are they gonna lose to are you gonna say Texas LSU and Tennessee I don't I don't see it I don't see them losing that many maybe they lose one of those maybe two oh Elias Gray with one I had actually noted down when I was going through the poll. Illinois feels wildly underrated. I think that team is going to be very solid like they were last year. If they're a little bit better offensively, a little more consistent offensively, then there's a good chance they might win the Big Ten West title before the Big Ten. Well, I keep saying before the Big Ten West goes away. Now I don't even know if the Big Ten West is going away this year.

I have no idea because they've added two more teams. Now they have 18. And you don't want to play divisions necessarily with all the at-large berths available in the playoff because you don't want a kind of mediocre team knocking off a bad team and and becoming your champ and causing all sorts of problems maybe costing your league a playoff berth but 16 teams with a nine game conference schedule made sense 18 teams i i'm not sure how you organize. You might need to do pods or divisions or something

like that. So perhaps that's going to be different, but I do think Illinois could be pretty good. You're going to hear from the law firm, two of their defensive linemen who are just fantastic. Both of them back this year. You're going to hear from them later this week i i just i like illinois i like brett bielema he knows what to do in this environment again i don't know what happens when when it's not the big 10 west anymore i think they probably need to maybe change identities a little bit but right now they have the right identity so that's that's your poll right now we'll do this again when the ap poll comes out it's all guessing nobody knows anything don't take it seriously just have some fun with it and then

look at it for what it is a way to get us talking about football and that's okay nothing wrong with that so i did say i was tired of talking about realignment, but I'm not entirely that one. I want to talk about a little bit more. One, because there's a little bit of news regarding realignment. But two, the Arizona president, Robert Robbins, talked on Monday. And, you know, we've heard from presidents already. We heard Washington's president, Oregon's president. We heard from Arizona State's president. Those people all kind of acted above all this. The athletics is just

something that they have to deal with sometimes. Robert Robbins is a little bit different. You can tell he cares deeply about sports. He's been involved. They had a future of college athletics forum in Washington, D.C. that the University of Arizona put on a few months ago that he spearheaded. So he's involved in this stuff and clearly pays a lot of attention to it and understands it very well. Kind of came to Arizona unusual path for a university president. He was a heart surgeon and then he ran a big hospital in Houston and then became the president of the University of Arizona. So a little bit different background

and probably looks at things a little bit differently than his fellow presidents. And when you heard him talking on Monday, you could tell they were the ones who wanted to move. They were the ones that thought, hey, we have a future maybe somewhere else. You heard Michael Crowe, the Arizona State President, yesterday. And he clearly sounded like he was being dragged out of the conference and into another conference. Who was doing the dragging? If you listen to the Arizona President and the Arizona AD David Hickey, it was Arizona doing the dragging. And we'll set this up because Robert Robbins got asked about when he got to know some of the big 12 presidents, and his answer is really telling. When I got to know him really well was a few days after Oklahoma and Texas announced they were leaving

because they were in the same situation. They were looking for a home. And, you know, I thought that would have been a great idea to take the eight remaining schools, bring them in, we'd be the Pac-20. It didn't turn out that way. But I started developing relationships with those presidents and chancellors then. And I think you all know that Bob Bowlesby is one

of the, you know, most respected leaders in athletics, I would say, in the last quarter century. And we happen to be long-term friends. And so I started talking to them then. But I think for this particular, you know, flip the table, we're, we're going to them now. Uh, I, I would say over the last, uh, six months, um, there have been, there have been people reaching out who I have good relationships with. I think I only talked to our new commissioner

one time. I think at the final four was the only time I remember actually sitting down and talking to him. I've been consistent in what I've said in the press. I can't think about entertaining an offer from the Big 12. I don't even know what our deal looks like. And I want to give that my full attention and see what the deal looks like. The Pac-20. Think about that. After Texas and Oklahoma left the Big 12 for the SEC. So a year before USC and UCLA left the Pac-12 for the Big 10 or announced that they were leaving, he took the Pac-20 to them and didn't get anywhere with it. Now, I don't know if they would have taken all eight

that were remaining in the Big 12, but if they would have taken all eight that were remaining in the Big 12, but if they'd have taken some of them, they still have a league. And the Big 12 isn't the one doing the pilfering. The Big 12 would have been picked apart. But this is the part about realignment that I keep coming back to. The Big East and the ACC, this happened. It happened again with the Big 12 and the Pac-12. At a certain point, it's kill or be killed between two conferences, eat or be eaten. Robert Robbins went to the Pac-12 and said, we need to eat now. They didn't, and they got eaten. And now Arizona is headed to the Big 12. And Robbins also elaborated a little bit on

the Pac-12 deal with Apple. Dr. Robbins, what details can you give about the deal that Commissioner Kleolkoff presented to the CEO group? I think the things that I've seen in the press reported are pretty accurate about the deal that Apple provided. I think the keys were the 23 million dollars a year per school and no games on linear access. I think those were the two things that were problematic for people when they were evaluating the long-term sustainability of the contract, and of course, that it was subscription-based. So you heard the same thing from Washington President Anne-Marie Cossé

about the no linear, like nothing on ESPN, nothing on a broadcast network. And so that was a big problem for Arizona as well. He got asked again about it and elaborated even more. And the comparison he makes here is one, funny, but two, explains a lot. Parts of it were very, very compelling and exciting. And it was Apple. And it was, you know, in our backyard. But I think the base base price the guaranteed price the fact that there

was no linear and that it was subscription based none of us you know we were trying to think well it's going to be like selling uh you know candy bars for little league or you know girl scout cookies uh i don't know if girl scout cookies or you can say that anymore. But you get my point. You've got to convince three to five million people every year to sign up for $100 a year to watch on a streaming-only app. Selling candy bars for Little League. If that doesn't explain everything, what does? Three to five million subscriptions to make the big money.

Guys, Sunday Ticket in the NFL, which is the most popular sport in America, the last time that the numbers were released, it was $2.4 million, or 2.4 million subscribers. So you're not, as the Pac the pack 12 going to get more subscriptions than sunday ticket you're just not you're not nearly as popular so it was not going to happen the numbers that they were trying to reach were a pipe dream and the decision when you really boil it down was so easy it's surprising surprising that people like Michael Crow in Arizona State

dug their heels in for as long as they did. There was no other option. This had to happen. So we'll talk a little bit more about that in the Dear Andy portion of our program, but we are going to get back to football with some very good questions when we come back. All right, welcome back.

It is Dear Andy time. And some of you guys have taken the idea of sending in your questions on video very seriously. And that includes Sam. And Sam sent not only one great Notre Dame question, but also a Florida State question. And we're going to answer both his questions because, let's face it, when you wear a hat like Sam's in your video, you get your questions right. Hey, Andy, back with a Notre Dame question.

Is Marcus Freeman becoming too hard to work with? With key departures of the strength coach, obviously we struggled what looked like to be a buyout issue, but may have been more of a personality issue with the offensive coordinator position. Is Marcus Freeman starting to get that stink on him? So I'm not ready to assign stink to Marcus Freeman just yet. It's year two as a head coach.

I'm not ready to assign stink to Marcus Freeman just yet. It's year two as a head coach. I'm not throwing everything out. This could mean one of two things. So the Matt Bayless resignation on the eve of fall camp, not a great look, not what you want. But if it was a personality conflict or, you know, basically a disagreement over how the players should be trained between the coaching staff and the strength staff. Then you had to make a change whether you like it or not.

And then Tommy Reese leaving to be the Alabama offensive coordinator, I mean, you're going to turn down that job where they keep pumping out first-round quarterbacks? I don't think that's necessarily a knock on Marcus Freeman, but here's, here's the thing about Marcus Freeman. This is his chance now to show what he can be. Cause remember he took over for Brian Kelly, much of the staff remained the same. And so this was him working with that staff. Now we've seen that before and we've seen it work really well. Ryan day at Ohio state, Lincoln Riley, and he took the job at Oklahoma. But the difference is Marcus Freeman was not a long time assistant or even a, a, an established

assistant necessarily at Notre Dame. He was in his first year as defensive coordinator. He'd come over from Cincinnati. Remember LSU and Notre Dame had both wanted to get him as their DC. Notre Dame got him and he finds himself replacing Brian Kelly at the end of his first year. So this is his chance to figure out who he is, what works for him, and what he is as a head coach. Now, offensive coordinator, we saw that they trotted Andy Ludwig around. They brought him in from Utah and took him to a basketball game, and they ended up not hiring him because there was a buyout situation that I guess they didn't know about beforehand, which again is its own problem.

But Marcus Freeman has a chance to erase all that with a good season this year. And now he's got a chance to hire the guys he works with. Now, the strength coach thing is really interesting because Bayless is a very accomplished strength coach and had done a very good job under Brian Kelly. But I almost think as a new head coach, you've got to make sure from day one

that you and the strength coach are on the same page. That's the one guy in the organization you have to be on the same page with. And so you don't usually see a lot of people work with the inherited strength coaches. Mickey Mirati's still with Ohio State after Ryan Day, but Lincoln Riley changed him at Oklahoma. It's not always going to be smooth and seamless. So this is Marcus Freeman's chance. You can chalk maybe a lot of what happened last season up to first-time head coach, but you can't have losses like Marshall

and Stanford. You just can't. And at Notre Dame where Brian Kelly set a pretty high standard and showed what you can be in this era, which a lot of us weren't sure they could be that again in this era. Then I think you're going to have to produce if you're Marcus Freeman because they know what they can get out of their program. And if you fall below that standard, they're going to move on pretty quick. So we will have to watch that one closely. Again, first-year head coach, coaches learn just like players learn. So I try with Marcus Freeman, with Brent Venables,

not to just say what we saw last year is the only thing we're ever going to see. This is all it's ever going to look like. All right, I promise that, Sam, when you wear a sweet cowboy hat, you get all your questions answered. So here's another question from Sam. Hey, Andy. Question on Florida State trying to take JPMorgan Chase money. How does that work for the players? Do they really think the players won't fight back and sue them, that they Florida State is essentially trying to raise money from private equity. JP Morgan is the banker involved, not necessarily the source of the funding that

they're looking through some various private equity groups. I know our friend Bud Elliott over at 24-7 has joked about the Saudi NOLs. It's not the Saudis. It's not the PIF. They're looking at American-based private equity firms. But Sam brings up a very interesting point. When you get private equity in, they expect to get a return on their investment. That's the whole point. They're not doing it as part of a charity. And I will say, as someone who used to work in the newspaper business in a place where private equity came in and did a lot of slashing and burning, they're going to try to make a profit any way they can. You know who doesn't do that? College administrators, college athletics administrators.

They're in a tax-free environment where they have to spend all the money, and they usually spend more than all of the money because nobody tries to run it efficiently. Nobody even knows how to run it efficiently. So if you do that, you're going to have a, you know, P coming in expecting what, eight to 10% return on investment, you know, eight to 10% margin every year. How are you going to do that? People don't do that in college sports. And then if you do it, how do you, how do you break that off for them? I mean, if you're a private university, I get it, but you're a public school, you're in the private universities are nonprofit, but if you're a public school, how do you do that? And yes, I know Florida State has reset its athletic department as a direct support organization, but still, it's going to be complicated.

And as Sam mentioned, are the players not going to take you to court for a share of that? Because they're going to say, well, if so-and-so capital is going to get 8%, we should be getting a certain percentage. So it is very complicated. Florida State obviously wants to raise capital to get out of the ACC. They want a war chest in case they have to try to buy their way out of the ACC. I don't know that this is going to be it. We've actually seen this floated before. And when you hear who floated it, you might feel a little bit differently about this. So Larry Scott floated this in the Pac-12.

Remember Larry Scott, the predecessor to George Klyavkov as the Pac-12 commissioner Larry floated this several years ago trying to sell an equity stake in the Pac-12 networks which at least that part made sense because it wouldn't be any different than the amount of the Big Ten network that is sold to Fox the arrangement between ESPN and SEC and the SEC or the ACC to run the SEC or ACC networks that would that would have made sense this is a little more complex so I think you're going to see a lot of ideas coming out of Tallahassee as they try to figure out a way out of the ACC but I'm really not sure what happens I you know I is there is there bullet yet? No. If there was a magic bullet, either Florida state or Clemson or North Carolina or Miami would have used it. But at this point, we don't know what that is. So I imagine all the folks in Tallahassee going

to keep trying to figure it out. All the folks in Clemson, all the ones in Chapel Hill, all the ones in Coral Gables, they will keep trying to figure it out. But this one, this particular idea, it does seem somewhat risky. So we'll see what happens. But it is again, Sam with those questions. Fantastic. Everybody send those questions in on video. And I'm telling you again when the games start i want your reaction to your team's games be it celebrating a win or lamenting a loss i want them on videos like that if you got cowboy hats wear them you'll be in all right now we go to a very good question John. Andy, who wins a natty first? OU or Texas? Boomer. Don't mess this up, Staples. If you're listening in podcast form, you already know how John feels about this, but he also nodded after he said OU and shook his head after he said Texas.

So that is what he would like me to say. And guess what, John? I'm going to make you happy. Even though Texas has won a national title more recently, it's weird because we make fun of Texas so much, and Oklahoma has been fairly consistent up until Lincoln Riley left. But Texas actually is five years closer to his last national title than Oklahoma. This is Oklahoma's played for one more recently and has made the college football playoff and Texas hasn't. So I am still going to place my bet on Oklahoma here because Oklahoma

is consistently good. Look through their history. Last year was not what they wanted, obviously, but they do not accept mediocrity, at least not for long. The mid-90s, late-90s is really the only time you can go back and look where it wasn't good for an extended period of time. You had the weird Howard Schnellenberger situation, John Blake, who brought him a lot of good players, but didn't coach them very well in the field. And then you get Bob Stoops and all of a sudden it's just remarkable consistency until he hands it over to Lincoln Riley, who just wins the big 12 four years in a row, his first four seasons. So it is, it's hard to bet against Oklahoma in that situation

because one of those two has been remarkably consistent and one has been wildly inconsistent. Texas, with the exception of the Mack Brown era, has been very up and down. And so I still think it's safer to bet Oklahoma. Now, am I betting Venables versus Sark? I don't think I am. I don't know. Because if Venables doesn't get it done this year or next, they'll make a change and they'll go get somebody who can.

We know Texas will make a change too. We've seen them make changes repeatedly. But it feels like Oklahoma, if they make a change, probably not going to get it wrong again. Texas, we need to see them get it right. Now, I will say, Sark's recruiting, especially that 2022 class with those offensive linemen, and then they get the quarterback of the future they want, Arch Manning, in 2023.

I like what they've done. They certainly seem to understand the talent level required to win in the SEC, which is where they're going. But Oklahoma, you say the same thing. They've upgraded their recruiting ability with Brent Venables, who was a great recruiter at Clemson, who, even though he wasn't in the SEC, had to build defenses to beat teams in the SEC. They had to be able to beat Alabama. They had to be able to be better than Georgia. They had to be better, better than LSU. They had to be better than Ohio state. So he understands what type of players you're looking for. They've got their quarterback of the future that they love. And if you ask the, you know, the coaches around the country,

Jackson Arnold was the other QB in the class of 2023 that everybody just fell in love with. So it feels like they're recruiting to the right places. I just need to see with both of them that you can get it done on the field. I mean, Sark, two previous head coaching stops. I realize there's quite a bit of a way station between those and a life change and everything else because of why he was fired at USC and then recovering from the alcoholism and coming back in this new place as Alabama's offensive coordinator

and then as Texas' head coach. So I feel like we're kind of evaluating him like a first-time head coach as well. But you can't have games like the Texas Tech game or the Oklahoma State game. You can't do that. You're not going to ever win national titles if you can't win games like that. Forget beating Alabama.

I know you can get up for those games. We saw Texas get up for Alabama and play them tough last year. You've got to be able to win the games you're supposed to win. Oklahoma, again, first-time head coach stuff, you've got to be able to teach your defense even if it's hard to teach your defense.

If you got a bunch of players, maybe you had some injuries and you had to put some new players in who aren't capable of dealing with all the complexities of your defense. It doesn't matter. You got to figure it out. You can't have guys running wide open

like against TCU. You can't have a situation like the Texas game where you didn't get a backup quarterback ready to run a functional offense. That cannot happen. So in those particular cases, I'm not sure either one of those coaches is going to be the guy who gets him there. Venables, because he actually was a first-year head coach, again, like I said with Marcus Freeman,

I'm going to give him some grace. If we start seeing the same thing over and over, that's a different story. But he has a chance to fix those things. Sark, we'll see. Sark is third stop as a head coach. You can say he is what he is, but we'll see. I mean, this is the most talent he's had.

So how does he handle it when he has a team with talent and big, big expectations? That's what this team is. So I'm still going to bet Oklahoma just because history tells me that Oklahoma is more consistent. That's all. That's the only reason for that bet. So hope John likes that. I'm sure he's happy that I, that's all, that's the only reason for that bet. So hope John likes that. I'm sure he's happy that I said that. And I'm sure there's a lot of people pissed off that I said that, but

of course I go to the comment and none of, none of you guys think either of these guys are going to win in the sec. I get it, but I think they probably both eventually could those programs. Certainly eventually we'll be able to. But the question is, do they have those guys right now? And I don't know the answer to that. Let's go down to Bo with a really interesting question about what happens next in the Pac-12. Dear Andy, if the Pac-4 merge into the Mountain West, but they change the banner and work under the Pac-12 banner,

wouldn't this new merged league still have an auto bid for 24 and 25? And wouldn't that be super cool? Like, wouldn't this be Boise State's chance and San Diego State's chance to make it? And if so, if you're like Oregon State and Washington State, what do you know about Gloria Nevarez? Like, it's reported George K. met with him and said his number one priority was finding them a landing spot. Wouldn't you say, no thanks, George, you've helped enough.

Toss her the keys to the Pac-12 office and say, here, see what you can do with this. See if you can rescue us can do with this see if you can rescue us what are your thoughts if you talk to people who knew Gloria Navarro's at the West Coast Conference and who have watched her in her first few months as the Mountain West Commissioner they'll tell you she probably should have been the Pac-12 Commissioner instead of George Klyavkov and maybe could have guided them through this but Bo brings up a really interesting point. And I'll take, he had a couple parts to that question. So I'll take it point by point.

The first question really is about automatic bid 24-25. So those bids, the automatic qualifying conference champion bids are not assigned to any particular conference. There's a reason for that. They didn't want any sort of antitrust scrutiny there. So it is the sixth highest ranked conference champs. So let's say that the Pac-12 and the Mountain West would emerge in some way, shape, or form. And there were nine FBS conferences at that point. The top six, according to the contract, would get an automatic bid. The highest six-ranked conference champion.

So we could probably pretty safely assume the Big Ten champ, SEC champ, ACC champ, Big 12 champ, they're getting them. So that's four. Now, that mixture of the Pac-12 and the Mountain West, I think, would be a heavy favorite to have its champ be one of the other two highest ranked conference champs, but it wouldn't have to be. It could be the American and the Sunbelt. It could be the Mac and the American or the Sunbelt and the American or Conference USA could get in there. So it's not designated to that conference that they would have to get it. But realistically, especially if you add Oregon State, Washington State, Stanford, Cal to that league with Boise State, San Diego State, probably that champion is one

of the six highest ranked conference champs. So that's probably getting into the playoff. In fact, even if you only have one outside of the power leagues available, there's a really good chance that league's champ gets in. Now, about how you would merge the two if you did it. So what Bo is saying is, do you go under the Pac-12 banner, but have the Mountain West run it? That's actually what I think if you did that would happen. Now, Eric Prisbell from on three reported on Monday that the American is interested in adding those teams that are left over from the PAC 12. So that's a potential landing spot for them. You've also got a meeting with the ACC, according to Pete Thamel from ESPN, talking about Cal and Stanford. Cal has a board meeting

scheduled for 7 a.m. Pacific time on Tuesday morning where they're going to talk about conference affiliation. The ACC thing, they've talked about this multiple times. They talked about it after USC and UCLA left the Pac-12. You can keep talking about it. It's never going to make logistical sense. It is never going to make logistical sense for a league where the Western most team is Louisville to add two teams in the San Francisco Bay area. It does not make any sense logistically. It also doesn't necessarily make sense financially. I don't think the DSPN is going to bite on that. They're not going to want to pay them a pro rat a share of what the ACC teams make because Cal and Stanford don't bring that to the table. They

don't bring that kind of audience. That's why they're not in the Big Ten right now, because believe me, the Big Ten presidents would love to be rubbing elbows with Cal and Stanford. Cal, Stanford, Oregon, and Washington, that was the original group that they were talking about last week, but they ended up only taking Oregon and Washington. Fox is basically running the conference, and Fox is going to tell you Cal and Stanford don't bring the same viewership, eyeballs, brand value that Oregon and Washington do. And that's why they're in the situation they're in. If you were to do the Mountain West, which of the Pac-12 presidents and how they felt about potential expansion candidates in other schools, they don't want to do this. They think they're way too good for this. that makes the most logistical sense and probably works the best competitively

is you take those four, they go into the Mountain West. You rename the conference, the pack, whatever. I'm blanking on how many teams are in the Mountain West right now, but add them all up. That's your number. But it's not,

because the pack add a number IP is more valuable than the mountain West IP, but what's not more valuable are the teams. So the mountain West would be in control, but I think you'd want to rebrand as the pack. And then you'd want the mountain West people to run it. And listen, you say what you want about the Mountain West. That's a conference of survivors. You know, Craig Thompson, the former commissioner, he had to deal with attacks on all sides.

He had to lose teams over and over and over again. And they figured out how to keep going. There was a point where there was a plot involving BYU and members of the WAC to essentially steal half the Mountain West and destroy the Mountain West. And Craig Thompson was in an airport

and just destroyed the whole thing and basically destroyed the WAC in the process because they tried to come with the king and they missed. So Mountain West Conference of Survivors, Gloria Navarez, she ran the West Coast Conference. That's obviously not a football conference, but ran it well and seems to be doing fine. And again, the group that worked with Craig Thompson,

choosing her says a lot. So yeah, I'd say give her a shot. I'd say let her run the thing, see how she does, and perhaps you get a better conference out of it. I think competitively, it'd be a great football conference. I'd love to see Boise State and Washington State and Oregon State and San Diego State all playing each other. I think those would be good games. Now, I feel bad for Washington State, Oregon State, Cal that have done these huge capital projects with the thought that there's

going to be all this money coming in from being in a power conference. It's a horrible situation financially for them because they've accrued debt. Now they've got to deal with it. And there's nothing you can do about that because right now there's just not another option unless the Big Ten wanted to throw you a lifeline if you're Cal and Stanford, but I think they already would have if, if that was an option. So it was a great question from Bo. If we're just using common sense, but again, I realize common sense is not ruled the day in all of this stuff,

but if we were just using common sense, that would be the most common sense way to handle this. So hopefully there will be an answer to that soon and we will know what happens next. Let's go to a question from Ian who's been watching all this realignment and asked me something I've been getting a lot, but in a very different way. So what Ian asks is, do you think there will come a time when the top brands in the sport, like Alabama, Ohio State, USA, or Texas, will seek to go independent like Notre Dame? Wouldn't their value as standalone assets be worth more than an equal share of a large conference?

That's right, Ian. So what you've asked is a very different version, or I guess the funhouse mirror version of the question I always get. When's the Big Ten going to kick out Indiana and Northwestern? And when's the SEC going to kick out Vanderbilt? I think Ian is looking at it in the more realistic way. Now, is Alabama worth more than its share in the SEC? Yes, it is. Is Ohio State worth more than its share in the SEC? Yes, it is. Is Ohio State worth more than its share in the Big Ten?

Absolutely. So is Michigan. So is probably LSU. So is Georgia. So is Penn State. So if you're wanting to get to the Super League, which everybody thinks you're getting to the Super League and it's going to be the Big Ten here and the SEC here

and one's the AFC and one's the NFC, the more realistic way to go about that Big Ten here and the SEC here, and one's the AFC and one's the NFC. The more realistic way to go about that is the biggest brands break away from their own conferences and say, we're going independent. And then lo and behold, they form their own thing. Now, I do know that there are worries among the people who lead college sports that there'd be antitrust problems with that. And maybe there would be. But they also could point to the other divisions in college football at that point and say, that's our competition. We're not choking them off. We're just, we're the good ones and we want to play together.

I don't know if that would hold up in a court. But that is the way you'd probably do that. You know, we haven't really talked about how that would happen other than people asking, when's the SEC going to kick out Vanderbilt? I think it's harder to do that and probably gets you dragged into court more easily than if, say, Alabama, LSU, Tennessee, Texas, Oklahoma, Georgia, Florida, Auburn, all just said, okay, we're independent now. And then like six months later, oh, we're not so independent.

We're going to merge with Ohio State and Michigan and USC and Penn State. And yeah, we're going to do our, we're going to do our own thing for, have our own TV deal. That's how you get to a super league. Really? That's, it's interesting because, because Greg Sankey, the SEC commissioner recommended a book a few years ago called the club, which is all about the formation of the premier league and the history of the premier league in England. That's kind of how the premier league formed. So we'll see if that comes to pass, but I do think Ian's onto something there. Ian also had another very good question. If the super conference model is going to elevate 40 to 50 programs into a top tier, is there any chance there will be more parody in the sport? Will the

on-field talent be more evenly spread across 40 to 50 teams or will it continue to remain largely concentrated among the top teams in each super conference if i don't think it'll be the structure of the conferences that changes that the one thing that i think might actually change it is an il because or or some sort of salary thing if they're employees but but money to the players i think is is the way to change that i'll give you an example kj bolden committing to florida state over the weekend that's the number one safety he had the usual suspects recruiting him at georgia ohio state alabama they wanted him to but he went to florida state which is not a place that's been getting that type of player lately.

And immediately Howell's, oh, it's NIL. Okay, maybe it is. Maybe NIL's what got Nico Yamamealaba to Tennessee instead of an Alabama or an Ohio State or a Clemson where they've been getting those kinds of players. Maybe that's what happened. Well, guess what? Every time that happens, that's what happened. Well, guess what? Every time that happens, that's one of those players that one of those teams doesn't get. I've told you a bunch of

times how I think Kirby Smart going to Georgia changed how Alabama operates because Kirby Smart would get four to five guys head to head that Alabama wanted and if those guys are on Alabama Alabama wins the last two national titles but they were on Georgia so Georgia won them and that's but if that happens where you're taking them away from Georgia and you're taking away from Alabama because they're going to Tennessee or because they're going to Texas or because they're going to Texas or because they're going to Oklahoma, then yes, there is a chance that more people can actually compete for the national title. It's going to, it would be nice. It would be very nice because right now it feels like it's like maybe five or six programs.

I would love if it were realistically 12 to 15, 15 to 20. I think that would make for a much more fun season every year. It'd be very similar to the NFL. The NFL, all 30, I realize they have all the rules for parity. All 32 teams can't win it because some of them have really crappy owners who aren't smart, but they still have probably 15 to 20 that in a given three or four year period can have the right mix of roster to compete for a

national or for for a super bowl that's what i'd love to see in college football because i think it would make the whole regular season more interesting it would make the postseason more interesting all that power consolidated at the top is what's made things boring and it's what has caused people to try to make all these wholesale changes. But really, if you can distribute the talent a little bit more evenly, a lot of the problems get solved. And unfortunately, you don't have a CBA, you can't have draft. So you got to figure out ways to do it. The free market might be the way to do it. NIL might be the way. So we'll see if that happens. It's obviously not going to be a fast process

because I mentioned that the number one safety committed to Florida State, but Georgia in the class of 2024 has the number one quarterback, the number one linebacker, the number one running back. So they're still getting most of the guys they want. It's going to take a while for it to all filter around,

but that feels like the way that it gets a little more even in terms of the talent distribution. All right, we go now to a question from Truck Cat on Twitter. This is a fun one. Awaken Loki, one of my favorite Marvel characters, by the way. You, the college football god of chaos, have been awoken from a 16-year slumber by the insanity of last week and you are starving to satisfy your hunger for chaos and utter confusion you have the power to decide the outcome of just two things with the goal of maximizing the resulting havoc you can pick any team to win their week one game and here's the real kicker any team to win the national championship, what teams do you choose?

Okay, I put a lot of thought into this. So the week one one is going to be a game that we're all watching. I know you're thinking I'm going to say Florida State, LSU, but the truth of the matter is it doesn't matter who wins or loses that game if it's close. Both teams would have a chance to reach all their goals, no matter what. I'm talking about Duke Clemson on Monday night, Duke Clemson would be a lot of fun. If Duke wins that game, first of all, it would vault Mike Elko who won nine games in year one at Duke to the top of every coaching hotboard. So whoever fires their coach, they're going to want to hire Mike Elko.

So you got that. You got Clemson losing a game that you'd never expect Clemson to lose. And if they lose to Duke, you can reasonably expect they're going to lose to Florida State. Well, what if Florida State lost to LSU? And what if Florida State beats Clemson

in the regular season game, but then Clemson comes back because they've been playing well and beats Florida State in the ACC title game. Well, they got two losses. So they're out of the playoff. So that potentially opens up a playoff spot that Clemson might've got.

Now, we don't know what happens everywhere else, but I'm gonna pick the national champion. And I'm assuming from what Truck Cat is saying that it will then backfill the chaos to make this happen. And so I have cleared that one playoff spot. I guess this means the big 12 will cannibalize itself and not produce a playoff participant.

And that the big 10 is only going to produce one or maybe two. And the sec is going to produce one or maybe two, and the SEC's going to produce one or maybe two, but it's going to leave a spot for the undefeated Oregon State Beavers. That's right. Nothing would bring more poetic justice than one of the Pac-4, one of the left behind,

winning the national title. So yes, I want to see Techno Beaver in Houston winning the national title game because that means a whole lot of hell is broken loose along the way. And the Beavers stand there with the trophy and say, what conference would you like us to join? We'll be there very soon. That's what I want to see. I think that would be amazing. I think Jonathan Smith, by the way,

would be the instantly, he would vault over Mike Elko, but Jonathan Smith and Mike Elko would be the two highest paid coaches in the country the next year because the bidding wars would be insane for them. So if I had to wave the wand, and those were my two choices, Duke beats Clemson in the first week of the season on Monday night,

Oregon State wins the national title. That would bring about all manner of chaos. So what great questions this week. I think you guys have outdone yourself. I'm so excited that people are embracing sending them in on video. This whole doing the show all on video thing, it is an adjustment for all of us. And I've got to think more visually. I love it. And I love being able to see you guys. And I love that you can be a part of the show. And again, I'm going to keep hammering this because I can tell you right now,

if we can pull this off, you can make this your favorite segment every week. Not just Dear Andy, which we're going to do Monday nights, but after the games, just flip that camera on yourself, 30-second video, send it to me at andystapleson3 at gmail.com, and we are going to have some fun

because I can have your reactions in basically real time, and we can play them on the show because we're going to be doing this is i'll give you a little programming note for how this is going to work down the road we are going to have live reactions after each window on saturdays during college football season so when the noon game's in, we're here. We're talking. We're going to talk for maybe, I don't know, 20, 25 minutes and get our feelings out.

And then we're going to get back to watching football. And then when the next round of games is over, we're coming back. We're going to talk some more. And we're going to get our feelings out. And then we watch the primetime games. And then we come back. So I want you guys to be sending your reactions to these games in because I know what I'm going to be doing. I'm going to be screaming and yelling along with you guys.

But if your team pulls off a monster upset or just chokes, you're going to have the best reactions to that. So andystapleson3 at gmail.com. Send those submissions in. We are going to have a lot of fun this season. And as you can tell, I'm very excited about games. But I'm also excited because in honor of the coaches poll coming out, my extra point today is another random ranking.

For those who didn't read the old dear andy column at sports illustrated or at the athletic i had a random ranking in there because when i got done as an associated press poll voter after the 2013 season i'd i'd done it for five seasons i was so tired of ranking college football teams and getting yelled at by people who thought it really mattered who was 23 and who was 24. There's no difference really between teams 15 and 35. They're all basically flawed the same way. So it drove me nuts. And so I decided to rank other things, which sometimes equally controversial, but at least it was more fun. So my friend Billy Gamilia wrote in and he said, with the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie out, how about 80s cartoon theme

songs? I think that's a fine choice. So new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, good reviews. Gotta say, the original theme song, not great. That turtle power't didn't do it for me so i'm going to give you my top five 80s cartoon theme songs a couple honorable mentions as well now here's one slight problem so i am new to this job i'm new to this company on three has been nice enough to to let me go live on its youtube page but those of you who produce stuff on youtube you know you gotta gotta watch out you can't be using the copyrighted material and get in trouble that way might have to pull your video down so i don't own the copyright to any of this i don't think some long ago now defunct production company would issue a copyright strike if I

throw a theme song up there, but I do know Disney owns a couple of these and they're very litigious. So I'm going to not do that. And this is where, this is where you may want to turn this off. I'm going to have to sing these for you. That's all there is to it. But that's okay. Because really it's a test of whether I can remember the lyrics to these. Because I did not look them up beforehand. So we're going to see just how embedded in my brain these songs are.

But we'll start off with the honorable mentions. So, Inspector Gadget, great song, not quite great enough, but do-do-do-do-do, Inspector Gadget, do-do-do-do-do-do, fantastic, but not quite there. Alvin and the Chipmunks. This is not the Christmas song, the one that was around forever. This is the Alvin, Simon, Theodore. That one, honorable mention. Jim and the Holograms. Truly, truly, truly outrageous. I'm not even going to try to sing that one. I don't think I remember how to sing that one, but it was an earworm. Didn't watch the show really, but every time it came on, you did hear the song. So, all right, let's get into the top five and we will see how well I remember these things. Number five, this is a Disney one, so I'm probably gonna have to sing it so out of tune

that they don't sue us. Duck Tales. Life is like a hurricane here in Duckburg. Race cars, lasers, airplanes. It's a duck blur. Might solve a mystery or rewrite history. I'm getting way too high here. Duck Tales.

I cannot believe I remember that. That song slaps. That still goes very hard. I might have DuckTales a little too low. Number four. Now this one I can't really sing. There's not much to sing with it. But it started out.

Lion-O holding his sword up to his eye. Thunder, thunder, thunder, thundercats. And then just into the instrumental. And there's a little, you know, thunder, thunder, thunder, thundercats. And they're playing electric guitar. Tremendous, tremendous. So number three, if you're a boy in the 80s you watched this show you had all the figures they did wrestling matches against each other gi joe gi joe a real american hero

i like how they changed the words in that song because at one point it said fighting against cobra and destro and in another one it said fighting against Cobra and Destro. And in another one, it said fighting against Cobra, the enemy. The Cobra and Destro one, though, when you think back, you realize, oh, yeah, Destro was more of an independent contractor. He wasn't really all the way down with Cobra. Like, he was the first person to point out how incompetent Cobra Commander was. So where they kind of separate those two in the song,

I feel like they were giving away a little bit of the plot there. So maybe that's why they changed it to Cobra, the enemy. Number two, Transformers. So that would be, you got to get your robot voice on. Transformers, robots in disguise autobots wage a battle to destroy the evil forces of the decepticons that had the sweet electric guitar solo coming in which i think that just ratchets up the 80s but number one is a show i'm sure a lot of you don't remember. And a lot of you who are, you know, in your 30s, in your 20s, you have no clue the show even existed.

So I was about seven years old when the show came out. And it was one of those times when we didn't have the number of outlets available to us. We didn't have streaming services. Sort of like Michael Crow, where if you'd have shown us all the apps we have now i'm like oh star trek stuff so you watched what was on and this show came on with the cartoons after school so it is Disney's Adventures of the Gummy Bears. Terrible show. Great theme song. So let's see if I can remember it.

Dashing and daring, courageous and caring, faithful and friendly with stories to share. All through the forest they sing out in chorus, marching along as their song fills the air. Gummy bears bouncing here and there and everywhere high adventure that's beyond compare they are the gummy bears yes i remember that second verse too with all the stuff about gummy berry juice i remember that too i am not going to suffer through singing that and i'm not going to make you suffer through listening to that but if you were a child of the 80s that was your favorite cartoon theme song I guarantee it guarantee so that's that's been all there is to it

that was all from memory. Big show tomorrow. Wake Forest head coach Dave Klaassen joins. And who knows? Maybe something crazy will happen at a Cal board meeting. We'll talk to you tomorrow.