Andy & Ari On3 - The spring transfer portal window did not destroy America | LSU still needs help on defense

Episode Date: May 7, 2024

The transfer portal is closed, and the last of the entrants are finding new teams. On3’s Pete Nakos joins to break down the action.(0:00-5:49) Intro(5:50-25:44) Pete Nakos Joins to Breakdown Transfer Portal(25:45-37:48) Future of College Football, Court News(37:49-41:19) LSU Intro(41:20-1:04:10) Billy Embody from the Bengal Tiger joins(1:04:11-1:06:10) ConclusionAmorion Walker is the latest Boomerang transfer. Walker played at Michigan last year, transferred to Ole Miss in January and now has decided to transfer back to Michigan. Meanwhile, Alabama DB transfer Peyton Woodyard committed to Oregon. San Jose State CB transfer Jay’Vion Cole, the top remaining DB in the portal, committed to Texas.The landing spot for Oklahoma QB transfer General Booty remains unknown.Andy and Pete also discuss Pete’s story on the possibility that athletes might collectively bargain with schools or conferences even if they aren’t employees. This is what the schools would prefer, but it may not be possible because of a variety of factors.Next, Billy Embody of On3's The Bengal Tiger joins to talk LSU. First, he and Andy put to rest any J.D. PicKell-created debate over the nickname for Tigers quarterback Garrett Nussmeier.Billy explains what LSU does now after missing on several key defensive line targets in the spring transfer portal window. He also offers some insight as to how LSU will replace the production of first-round receivers Malik Nabers and Brian Thomas Jr.Want to watch the show instead? Join us live, M-F, at 8 am et! https://youtube.com/live/zavjRpVgV2U

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. As the title suggests, the spring transfer portal window did not destroy America, as was breathlessly predicted in other places. We might have made some breathless predictions to probably in January, probably coming off that first transfer portal window. We might've said spring could get a little bit wild. And then as we got closer to it, it became apparent, maybe not. There's some reasons for that. Probably your high school economics class explained it best as markets just tend to figure themselves out as time goes by. And that's, that's really what happened is, is for the most part, the players that the schools wanted to keep got locked down

in that winter window. They, they either, the players either decided they were leaving or got the deal they wanted and stayed. And that was pretty much it. Now there were a couple cases where somebody bounced around again. We're going to talk to Pete Nacos very, very shortly. And we've got a couple guys, one guy who boomeranged, and then another guy who has transferred and now is on the market again, looking for a different school. And that's happening, but it's rare. But we'll talk about which schools came out on top,

which schools did not get what they wanted in that spring transfer portal. Plus, we're going to talk to Pete about the next thing, the next big thing. As he transitions from keeping track of all these folks in the transfer portal, they're about done. Now he's got to keep track of what is college football, and by extension, all of college sports, going to look like in the next couple of years, because there's some stuff happening very fast. And a lot of people trying to figure out what to do. And it will make big changes. But what's crazy is we still don't know exactly how that's going to look. So we got that.

Plus, of course. Booty, booty, booty, booty, booty, rocking in the transfer portal. That's right. General booty's still in the portal. So we'll get an update on that. Before we get to Pete though, I do want to give a shout out to one of our regular listeners in the podcast version, Brad Register, former Georgia Bulldog, who sent me a great picture because I did open the show the other day with booty, booty, booty, booty rocking in the transfer portal. A great picture of a bunch of former Bulldogs and Bubba Sparks partying before Georgia played Alabama in the national title game in Indianapolis a few years ago. For those who don't know, Bubba Sparks obviously is a Georgia guy, but he was friends with one of the 90s era Georgia

defensive linemen and so was very much in the social circles of a lot of mid-90s Georgia linemen. And so this picture, I don't think I'm talking out of school. This guy's talked about this thing a lot. Matt Stinchcomb, College Football Hall of Famer, great human being, incredible impressionist. He's in the photo. Brad's in the photo. It's awesome. There's Bubba Sparks.

I've been introducing the classics to my 14-year-old. Miss New Booty and Ugly. We've definitely covered in our classes on the classics. So if you are confused, and I don't think you would be, but because we all appreciate the classics on this show, but if you're confused about why I keep saying, booty, booty, booty, booty,

rocking in the transfer portal, let go listen to Miss New Booty. Because if you don't know Boba Sparks and the Yin Yang Twins, what are you even doing? What are you doing? A man who definitely knows Bova Sparks and the Yin Yang Twins.

Probably personally, because he knows everybody. Pete Nacos joins us now. What's up, Pete? I think Pete's muted. Uh-oh. Don't worry. We got Pete. He's coming back.

He will be with us. We will vamp until then. We will find out what happens with General Booty. Because I know you're all waiting with bated breath. We're also going to talk about winners, losers in the transfer portal. I don't know if anybody really lost, but we'll find out.

Hi, Pete. Still no Pete. Huh. Wonder what happened. This is the joy of the live show and the curse of the live show and the curse of the live show. But here's the deal. When we evaluate the transfer portal, the spring window especially, it's hard to say this school didn't get what they wanted.

Because like we said, what you wanted probably wasn't necessarily available in the spring. There were, there was a very limited supply of the things everybody needed, which would be defensive linemen, offensive linemen. So like we talked about Dominic Williams committing to Oklahoma the other day. Well,

everybody wanted him. We're gonna talk to Billy embody later in the show from, from the Bengal tiger. That's on three's LSU site., everybody wanted him. We're gonna talk to Billy embody later in the show from, from the Bengal tiger. That's on three's LSU site. LSU wanted him to LSU's wanted most of the guys with starting experience, D lineman in the portal, and they didn't get him. He went to Oklahoma,

Texas also wanted it as just as a competition was pretty fierce for this stuff. That's where a lot of these schools are at. They're still looking. There's still guys in the portal. Pete, let's try again. What's up? I'm here.

What's up, man? Yes. What's up, man? How are we doing? I'm good. I love that intro two minutes ago. My mic didn't work. It was fantastic.

We were going to have you rap. We were going to have you do the first few bars of Ugly, which I'm sure you know Bubba Sparks first hit by heart. But it's okay. It's all right. We got to talk this portal because you and I talked about this before it opened. It probably wasn't going to be massive supply. It turned into a really good seller's market if you were a d lineman or an

o-lineman with some power five starting experience and is that i mean is that like dominic williams those types of players are those the guys who truly won the spring transfer portal yeah the defensive tackles won the spring transfer portal and there's still a few out there who are completely dominating the market at this point um but you look at it right like simeon barrow derrick harman um dominic williams are all big names that have come off the board and then you look at who's left there's the kent state defensive tackle cj west and then there's also wrote about him real quick yesterday, the Wyoming nose tackle, Gavin Meyer, who's from Wisconsin, has, I believe, 69 career tackles as a grad transfer. And really, for some of these programs,

you've missed on the Barrows and the Williams. I mean, he provides a pretty viable one-year stopgap if you need a guy to kind of just jump in and make an impact right away yeah and that's that's what people are looking for well and we'll talk to to billy embody later because lsu's certainly still in that market where if you are a big body they need some depth on the defensive line that's that's really what we're talking about now i'm trying to think of the teams that that came out maybe a little bit. Peyton Woodyard, who's an Alabama DB, jumped into the portal.

He's going to go to Oregon. It seems like Oregon really kind of got everything they wanted. If we combine the winter portal and the spring portal, that they really did kind of address the needs they needed to address. I'd say Oregon's the biggest winner of the spring and winter window combined. And the reason why I would say that is because they need they knew they needed a quarterback they got dylan gabriel probably one of like the top three available in the winter and then i mean dan lanning has continued to recruit at oregon at a really high level so when you pair probably one

of the better portal classes with a roster filled with four and five stars. I mean, Oregon has so much depth heading into 2024. And I think that this season is, you and I have talked about so much already is really going to show what roster construction is going to look like in the future because of the 12 team playoff and what it takes to make a run. Yeah. And that's, I'm so curious about Oregon. We talked to Justin Hopkins last week because it felt like they've kind of been

building to this. They probably had the best roster in the Pac-12 the last two seasons, did not win it. Now they go into the Big Ten where Ohio State's got the best roster. Let's be real about this. And then obviously Michigan's is very good. But Oregon does look like they can compete. And like you said, it is a good mixture. Like their offensive tackles. You've got Josh Connerly, who was Dan Lanning's first big out-of-high-school recruiting win when he got hired. And then you've got a Johnny Cornelius, who's kind of the classic transfer portal story of he was at Rhode Island, blew up. Now he's played a season at Oregon. He's got that experience under his belt too,

and he's clearly an NFL guy. So, yeah, I can't wait to see what that roster looks like against the Ohio States and the Michigans. Yeah, that's going to be exciting. Other teams, so I think have done a really good job in the spring and winter combined would probably be Ohio State. I think Texas has done a really good job. They got some quarterbacks and defense tackles they needed

and also retooled the wide receiver room in the winter. I think Callen DeBoer has done a really nice job of keeping that roster together. I know there's some really big pieces who left, but at the same time, they still have a pretty solid that that is going to be able to compete in the fall um there's a few others too but those are those are a few of the ones that kind of like jumped to the top of my mind right away yeah uh ryan in the chat so we had peyton woodyard for one spring yeah there's a lot of that there's a lot of that i mean guys who lot of that. I mean, guys who, and I think, it reminds me of Brew McCoy,

who Tennessee fans are well aware of, the receiver at Tennessee now. But it reminds me of when he initially was going to go to Texas, like he was committed to USC, then he signed with Texas. He goes to Texas for spring. He's like, yeah, I'm going back home to LA, going to USC. Now you can do that and you don't have to sit out a year yeah and we've seen so peyton he's a west he's a west coast guy right and he's from uh uh bellflower yeah yeah from california yeah so you know he's he's headed

back to the west coast uh you know you you saw uh i'm blank jason and and i'm gonna butcher his last name but he he was at usc for the spring yeah yeah and he's from florida is coming back to play at florida so you you've seen a few of those this spring too yeah i mean what history shows us is the the portal is always a great time for guys who want to get closer to home to get closer to home. I mean, Brian Kelly did that in his first year at LSU. You look at his portal hall like two years ago, and it was a bunch of Louisiana natives. So I think that's one way to look at it. I guess the other thing, too, Andy, that really pops out about this was talking to someone about it yesterday.

And I know we've someone about it yesterday and i know we've thought about it before but i want to bring it up again like i think until we're going to talk about this later but until we get into like the next era of college sports we're definitely going to have a winter and spring window and i had the spring spring window will continue to be this interesting time where maybe not the most talent jumps in, but you also have some surprises who have realized that they can leverage their market value in the spring much better than they can in the winter when there's a rush. Yeah, and I think it's like for the players

who have smart advisors, and advisor can mean a lot of things in this day and age, but some of them have just pure agents guys who will who also represent nfl players some of them still you know have somebody from back home who helps or maybe if it's even one of their parents or maybe it's their high school coach doing the helping but i i would say like if you are a an all-conference group of five linemen, you should not enter the transfer portal in the winter. Like, you should wait. Not only should you not enter in the winter,

you shouldn't even enter at the beginning of the spring. You should wait until kind of the middle of the spring and then pop in, and then it's just feeding frenzy. Like, you're going to get overpaid. I mean, last Monday, that would have been, like, perfect. Yeah. But on the flip side of that like if if we're not advisors here but i i do want to say like if if you're starting

quarterback looking for a new home or like even if you're a backup trying to find a starting job you gotta go in in the winter like yes like quarterback's a different different animal yeah like i there's a lot of good backups in right now, but odds are they're all going to go land in other backup jobs because all those starting jobs are locked up. John in the chat says, Andy, after yesterday, I think we should refer to anything bad that happens this season as Mariah Carey asks.

Pete, you probably missed most of me and Phillip Duke's discussion of Deion we had a comment or call Colorado's defense Mariah Carey ass we can't figure out why that's bad uh but that that may be a new term that was a great show by the way I did I did watch that yeah oh it was tremendous it was tremendous but we're we're gonna see what happens happens I I don't want to go to the Dion well too often but I do feel like when when there's stuff to be said we we can talk about it but let's let's talk about Colorado actually because this is germane to this discussion because Colorado's been very active in the transfer portal since Dion got there as the head coach they were making changes Dylan Edwards the running back leaving who went to Kansas State

I would say is probably the only guy they lost in this in this cycle that that they really wanted to keep but I'd have to agree with that yeah who'd they bring in who who can actually help them right now I like the addition uh I think they did a good job in the running back room i really like the addition of down hayden the ohio state tailback and then you um also brought in rashad amos who was at miami of ohio and rusher over a thousand yards and was committed to mississippi state before colorado other guys who really jump out um i think the addition of peyton kirkland that the texas offensive tackle gives them another young uh lineman who has a lot of upside um other guys i look at uh they added some

you could argue maybe underrated defensive tackles they brought in the ohio defensive tackle ray and buell who had an outstanding 2023 we'll have to see how he meshes in the big 12 but that's one that pops out um i think they did the right things on the defensive side of the ball andy and now i guess we just have to wait and see how it all plays out but the offense has all the tools it needs to be really good except maybe the line we'll see yeah they're starting left tackle into the portal but again that was not one I was that worried about because my assumption was Jordan Seaton has been as advertised,

the true freshman who is the highest rated offensive lineman in the class of 24. My assumption was he's been as advertised. He's plugging into that spot. So it made sense. But that's the only thing i worry about and like you mentioned the the one from texas coming in with four years of eligibility like that's the one thing because my thing with dion is it doesn't feel like they're trying to develop anybody it feels like they're

just turning them through on the in terms of the backups but if if you're going to take somebody like that and you do want to develop him like that could pay big dividends in a couple of years they also brought in the clumsiness offensive tackle uh yes owens who was a four star and i believe a freshman um let me check real quick yeah he was yeah he was a he was a registered freshman so he's got four years. Another guy, 6'5", I think. Yeah, 385. I mean, another guy was a ton of upside. And how does the development go? I mean, how does everything go?

I know Deion has shot down all the rumors this spring that he's only going to be around for Shador and Travis and Shiloh and then leave, but this is going to be the true test of can he develop an offensive line? Yeah, and if they can, then it's a different story. Phil Lodehold is their offensive line coach now, former great Oklahoma Sooner, and kind of studied at the foot of Bill Biedenboe the last few years, helping him at Oklahoma.

So, yeah, there's a chance that that works out. It's just we got to see it because what concerned me was basically everybody they brought in last year who was a backup. They were like flush here. We're getting a whole new set of backups now. And that that makes you worry about, OK, how's your depth? Have you tried to to have any continuity? We'll see. Again, with Colorado, we need to see it on the field and we won't know until

the season starts but miami is another one that i feel like did from a personnel standpoint plug the spots it wanted to plug i think damian martinez the running back coming from oregon state might be the highest impact transfer they wind up having i don't know other than i mean i'm talking about this i'm saying i don't know well let's see where tyler baron goes i mean oh that that's the other one i'm gonna ask you about yeah usc this weekend he's been to miami all missus continued to talk to him i'm not saying anything's a done deal anywhere but i think miami's definitely still in the mix and you talk about a guy who i, I think he's the number two available player on the board right now for the on three industry ranking.

And I think Tyler Barron brings a lot to the table. And I mean, yeah, I mean, when, when he's, when he's on, he's on. Yeah. He was the edge rusher opposite James Pierce at Tennessee last year. Yeah. Transferred to Ole Miss. Now he's in the portal again. Like you said,

Ole Miss is not out of it yet, but could wind up somewhere else. Yeah. The Miami thing is, is very interesting. Cause you, if you, if he,

let's say he's on and you put him opposite Reuben Bain, cause Reuben Bain could be the guy we're talking about the way we talk about James Pierce now. Yeah. So, and that's the thing about Miami that I find interesting because all the things we just said about Colorado where it's like, okay,

who are you developing? It does feel like Miami has developed some of those homegrown guys. Yeah. We're going to see Samson Okunola move into a starting role in the offensive line. We saw Francis Malinoa start all last year. Ruben Bain, obviously is the guy they recruited

who was awesome right off the bat so that's that's one where you just again prove it on the field but it does feel like you have the pieces in place it's funny because miami is sort of like a step behind developmentally oregon which is where mario christophe came from funny how that works yeah you you know who another homegrown guy is who who probably became ward's top target is xavier restrepo yeah i mean he he could have a really big season and you bring sam brown in another option too makes it a little tougher for secondaries to to try to defend and campboard's gonna have plenty of targets so it should be fun to watch well to try to defend. And Cam Ward's going to have plenty of targets, so it should be fun to watch.

Well, we got to talk about a boomerang too. I love when we have a boomerang. Phillip Dukes, our colleague, add-on three is the one who came up with this term, boomerang transfer for somebody who leaves a school and then comes back to that school. Amorian Walker from Michigan is your latest boomerang transfer. So he's he's

tweeted twice in the last four months one to say committed Ole Miss in January and then one this past weekend saying he's back yep yep uh big big pickup for Michigan uh he transferred to Ole Miss as like a quarterback I believe but when he was Michigan, he was also seen time as a wide receiver. It's unclear at the moment, which position he's going to play, but either way, I think it's a, there's, there's a need at cornerback at Michigan right now. Um, and there's a need, a wide receiver too. So a guy who can do both is probably going to get some playing time and definitely be used this ball.

I feel like Travis Hunter has inspired a new generation of two way players because you're hearing about that a lot more of, of guys that are coming in and maybe they're one, maybe they're both, but maybe, maybe, maybe you play the both. Yeah.

I mean, Memphis is trying to pitch, was trying to pitch. I'm not sure how active that is now, but they're willing to tell cormonie mclean hey if you want to play wide receiver we'll uh we'll let you well and and look why not if you have ball skills if you're like if you're the the type of corner that we're talking about you know the six foot six foot one rangy guy and you have ball skills you can definitely help it receiver

too that it's and plus you understand what the guys defending you were trying to do. Cause that's what you've been playing. So yeah, I, I definitely think, I think it's hard to do what Travis Hunter was doing where you're playing every snap, but in certain packages, why not? I mean, if you've got the person in the athleticism, just yeah. Give, give the other team something else to think about. And he clearly has a knack for finding the ball right i mean he i believe he led colorado and interceptions or he was up there and then yeah i mean he's a great wide receiver too so maybe we'll see more of it

this season it'd be something to monitor for sure yeah i i always like that that's a little i mean look that's what won charles woodson the heisman yeah that the playing the receiver the returning of the kicks and and all that but oh it is it is going to be fun we didn't see as much hand-wringing over the amorian walker boomerang as we did over caden proctor i know i did find that funny pete like a lot of you'd see criticism of caden proctor going back to alabama like wait a second aren't you the same people who said the grass isn't always greener should not we should we be celebrating someone for realizing that yeah i don't know like everyone's like oh you shouldn't

be it's like these are the rules kate and proctor's taking advantage of the rules there's nothing wrong with that uh yeah at all and you know good good for Caden Proctor for not dragging it out more. Almost like he realized that it was kind of a no BS. Like, yeah, this didn't work. I'm going back. Yeah. It could have been a lot more dramatic. Yeah.

I mean, we could still be covering where he was going right now. But I mean, he basically like was like, OK, I'm going in the portal and I'm going back to Alabama. And it was I mean, we knew it was happening. It was all predicated. But like okay i'm going in the portal and i'm going back to alabama and it was i mean we knew what was happening it was all predicated but we knew on day one of the portal he was going in and he was going to go to alabama well catherine in the chat you underestimate the people's dislike of alabama andy that is that's spot on if that's if he had been going from south carolina back to iowa back to South Carolina, we don't have that discussion. It's not, how dare you? It is, Catherine's right, it is more people going, oh crap, Alabama's got another good player again.

Yeah, good point, Catherine. One more Transfer Portal update, because the people demand it, before we move on to our to our next topic conversation what is the latest on general axel booty all right so here's the is it the booty list ish lish booty list ish yes okay so i talked to exchange some text with general booty on friday and he did confirm that he's talked to Iowa. He's working on lining up some visits for this weekend, from my understanding. But I also think we have to note here that Iowa's also going after other Porto quarterbacks, so by no means is it like a done deal.

The Hawkeyes are hosting Northwestern quarterback Brendan Sullivan on campus today. And Brendan Sullivan was probably going to be a Northwestern starter. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe. Yeah. So I guess we'll have to see how it all goes.

The truth. Oh, yes. CJ West update. I've heard a lot about Wisconsin. I mean, not Indiana and Rutgers, excuse me, but don't have any updates as of this week. I think that CJ West is a guy who hasn't made a decision. There's a lot of market need for him,

so it won't surprise me if he ends up somewhere that wasn't really on our radar. Katie in the chat, if Proctor took an aisle and then left, he should be sued to recover it. That's all been covered he didn't get he had a lease truck that he gave back like and he made less than six figures from a business that he didn't endorsement work for yeah so you can't sue somebody who did the work you you contracted them to do i mean you can sue anybody but then that's not going to win.

That's not going to be a winner. Speaking of suing and lawsuits and all that jazz, look at that transition. Yeah, I know. That is a smooth transition right there. Everybody's trying to settle the House versus the NCAA case.

It is scheduled to go to trial in January. The thought is a settlement needs to be reached at some point here in the next few months part of that settlement could be a new structure for revenue sharing with the athletes pete you wrote a story on monday about how one of the leading athlete advocacy groups which let's be completely transparent here this is one of the groups that hopes to become the union essentially uh has said that they would support even congressional action to allow the athletes to collectively bargain even if they're not employees and this feels like a pretty pretty big concession to the schools or you know willingness to compromise we've seen it

with some uh jim cavalli who's got another similar organization said the same thing last year jack swarbrick the the former notre dame ad said this is a potential path last year what is the latest on that and how like what are the steps to that becoming possible you know i had some interesting phone calls yesterday and i think the biggest takeaway we need to have from the association the the cultural players association backing that isn't that it's like some new novel idea it's just another association who who wants rep athletes, who has backed this framework, which would be for athletes to earn a share of revenue without being employments, but with other assurances that would be as close to employment, but without having employment. And this is going to have to go through Congress just because of how unique the the framework would be um no secrets here though congress hasn't done anything uh to help courts in in the in recent years we could also see a collective

bargaining model come about um and i think when how that would really take shape is if there's a settlement in house first the ncaa there's some leaders who believe there's going to be this six month time span where the judge needs to ratify the settlement and we could see a full-blown battle between players associations to be the union because let's be clear and we're only talking about college football at this point there's not going to be multiple unions right like there's not multiple nflpas there's not going to be multiple unions, right? There's not multiple NFL PAs. There's just going to be one college football players association. So there's athletes.org.

There's the association that backed this idea yesterday, the College Football Players Association. There's a few others as well. And, I mean, I don't know this for a fact, Danny, but I'm willing to bet that we're going to see a couple more try to take shape in the next i don't know two to four months and we've seen we've seen existing unions put money into this where they they are trying to because they want the college players to be part of their right umbrella organization so it is there's money as usual

there's money in this and And so, and so people are circling around it. Yeah. Plenty of money. I mean, we're talking about 20 million in revenue share per year at the moment. Yeah. And that, that number goes up as the, as the years go by. Well, and that's the thing, cause I've had people ask me and I talked to some people, you know, in the business yesterday about this. They say, okay, why would they not want to be employees? Well, one, the schools don't want them to be employees. That's very clear.

The schools, and here's why. When you have an employee, you have workers' compensation. You have to put them into the retirement system. All of the benefits that go with an employee, there's a lot of backend costs to that. And if you are the union and you're looking at it from a purely revenue sharing standpoint, you can tell those people, we can increase the revenue share percentage and you still save money because you're not paying all that backend if they're employees. And the other thing I mentioned when we talked about the employee talk like i've talked to athletes about this i have not talked to every

college athlete but i've talked to enough athletes where like i don't think being an employee is something that they really want to check off uh during their college career like i i talked to one athlete who's had a lot of nil success and i think they were a little confused about what employment would look like and they're like oh like having a job at like the local starbucks when i was like no like being in it she's like i've never thought about that it's like yeah it's it's it's a really it's a concept that i don't think a lot of people can wrap their head around and i don't know if it would work with the way college athletics just like the the amount of time people gave them, things like that.

Yeah. And what's interesting is the gig economy is so big now and people are so familiar with that concept that being a contractor, I don't think is going to be that confusing for people if that's how it works out. Now, it may not because you've got these cases before the National Labor Relations Board and they may just simply say, look, they with it it just common sense tells you they're employees but if they say they would prefer not to be then then perhaps there's a way to do that but yeah it's it's interesting because i had somebody i are they gonna have to pay tax of course they're gonna have to be every uber driver pays taxes like that's not the hard part here they're already paying taxes yeah exactly well and and that's it's funny how everybody becomes a tax law expert when all this happens because they're like well you know they need to start paying taxes on their tuition well no the tax code says that

tuition scholarship money that pays for tuition is actually not taxable. They actually can be taxed now on their room and board. Just depends on whether they make enough money off of it to be taxed. So all of that stuff is, is already kind of baked in that part. Doesn't need to be figured out. What has to be figured out is can you do this? Can,

and unlike you said, there've been a lot of entreaties to congress now this is the first one where it feels like the schools and some of the players are on the same side yeah this is i mean we talk about these associations they don't have all the power in the world but it seems like one of the first times that they're all aligned um yeah so you get the schools kind of aligned you have the associations and you definitely have some athletes too so does congress make i mean i wrote about this yesterday andy we get a presidential election coming up there's plenty of international affairs to take care of is is congress gonna find time to make a move in the next six months? Like, I don't think so. I'm not saying it's the odds are just low.

And I mean, Congress takes its recess in the summer and things like that. We'll see how it plays out. Yeah. It's I will continue saying what I've been saying all along, solve your own problems. Do not beg the federal government to tell you how to run your own business. But I, I understand if this is whatever,

if this is actually what everybody wants, may need some some help uh ryan says i'm going to show my ignorance are there no title nine issues that's another kind of up in the air thing we don't know like and and title nine's changing like we we really don't know and i think that's that's part of the other problem with this, Pete, is everybody wants a definitive answer. There's so many balls in the air. Like the people we just talked about, the schools, the athletes, the organizations that represent the athletes, they can all want the same thing. Let's say they all want collective bargaining, but the athletes aren't employees but if if the courts decide if the the nlrb and then by extension the courts decide that they are athletes then they're at that or that they're employees then they are employees and you gotta figure that out you

gotta work with reality yeah yeah i mean and the other reason why the ncaa wants to go to congress and maybe i should have made this more clear. They want the limited antitrust exemption, which basically gives them free reign to do whatever they want. Except as we discussed last week, even actual antitrust exemptions that exist now don't do that. So they're going to have to bargain with the athletes at some point and make deals. That's what,

what the reason they've not gotten any traction at all in congress or one of the reasons i think the the laundry list of things you just mentioned is a bigger part of it but another reason they've not gotten any traction in congress so far as previously the schools would go and say well here's what we want and it's basically please make the old system law so that we can make whatever we can collude to make whatever rules we want and not have to ask the athletes about it. And, you know, stop all this athlete freedom. Well, Congress is not going to do that. There's also something called politics and Democrats and Republicans don't exactly agree.

Yes, don't always agree on things. And the other problem is in this particular case, like there were there were things that Democrats and Republicans actually agreed upon. That went against the schools, like because the schools essentially want a price fix. Republicans tend to like open markets. They ran into that with Justice Kavanaugh in the in the Supreme Court, realizing Court realizing, oh, he's not going to help us. In fact, he hates us more than anyone. That's bad. There's even some more divisive things too, right? Like Democrats want revenue sharing put in bills.

Yes. Republicans aren't a fan of that. Republicans, most Republican bills have included language that would make sure athletes are not employees. Democrats aren't a hundred percent behind that either. I mean, it's, it's, yeah, it's the odds are not high. Yeah. But I will say this is the first thing that we've seen that looks like compromise. So I'd say that's a good sign, whether it ends up in anything, you know, from Congress that, that helps them reach that compromise, or if they just reach it on their own, at least they

are starting to move together rather than just exist on these separate poles. Because yeah, until all this gets figured out, we don't know what, and and this is like i realize this is a very dry topic for most people but it's not to me because what happens next determines what everything looks like after this like which teams are in the top division you know i had a texas state fan tweet at me yesterday like well this doesn't help everybody in the fbs i'm like it's not supposed to help everybody in the fbs it's supposed to help them comply with the law, and then everybody figures out what level of competition they need to be at. There's a reason why sources continue to tell Andy and I

that the big time in the SEC would love to just have a 40-team super conference. Yeah. Yeah, and they already got, I'm bad at math, but they already got 34. bad at math they already got 34 yeah that's a six more the odds aren't ever in everybody's favor unfortunately so and there will be a hunger games to get to the rest of that but yeah that's we're gonna find out and pretty fast what's gonna happen so well pete i realize you've had a lot of fun in the spring transfer portal window there are probably still some dominoes to fall a few but but get ready for uh for even more house negotiation house settlement negotiation drama that should

be fun it should be fun i'll talk to you soon. I appreciate it. Thanks, Pete. See you, Andy. The great Pete Nacos. I don't think you should take your Nacosifications off your phone yet. I'm just going to tell you that right now. I think all this stuff,

again, not the most juicy, sexy topic for internet discourse, but how this all breaks out and shakes out will give us a lot better idea of what it all looks like in a couple of years. And like I said, when they said, we're going to do this playoff format from 2024 and 2025. And then 2026, we might be moving to something different. I said, don't get wrapped up in that because they may be moving to something different because everything looks different in 2026. The way things are moving, the speed at

which things are moving, I do think that still remains a possibility that things look pretty different. And in terms of, well, they look dramatically different. Yeah, they could here in the next two, three, four or five years. It's a matter of, of how they get to this, but it's happening so fast. This is one of those things that years ago like in 2011 i wrote about how you could rewrite the ncaa rule book to to pay the athletes and essentially it was this system that they have now and i was like maybe by 2040 they'll get to something like that no it happened in 2021 and then when it happened in 2021 i was like okay well okay, well, clearly I didn't think this through, and they didn't think this through, because there's some glaring holes in this thing,

and I thought, okay, but it's college sports. They won't get to the next thing until 2040, 2050. Nope. They're probably going to get to the next thing like 2026, 2027. And it's fast. So we'll just have to see how that shakes out. Those negotiations are ongoing. The plaintiffs in the House case have a ton of leverage right now. They're going to be able to extract a pretty big dollar figure. And the sooner, the better for the NCAA, for the schools, because they've got to do something because the price tag will go up if they wait too long. And that's always a very powerful motivation. One school that always has a very powerful motivation to win is LSU. The last three coaches before Brian Kelly won national championships. I think we can probably all agree that Nick Saban kind of

unlocked the blueprint for LSU to be a consistent national power. And Brian Kelly in his first two years there, 10 games, first year SEC West title. They win 10 games last year. But last year, incredible offense, horrific defense. They lose a Heisman Trophy winner, two first round receivers, but they have a quarterback waiting in the wings. But is the defense going to be any better? That is the defense going to be any better? That is the question. So we talked about that

with Billy Embody from On3's The Bengal Tiger. First though, we had to clear up a very important pressing issue that is affecting the On3 community and the LSU community. We are joined now by Billy Embody of The Bengal Tiger that is on three's LSU site. And Billy, we covered this on your show a couple weeks ago, but I want to, I want to, anybody who needs to hear this, I want them to hear it. Because here at On3, we've had a little internal debate about what to call Garrett Nussmeier. J.D. Piquel, the esteemed J.D. Piquel wants to call him the gumbo gunslinger. I'm not sure I can get behind that. First of all, Garrett grew up all over the place. Dad, Doug was coaching at various stops around the country.

So I realized the family is originally from Louisiana but I'm not sure we're gonna attach gumbo to the man's name and you on the message boards have uh I believe put this rest among the LSU community well I I think I got to give a lot of credit to our Bengal Tiger subscribers they jumped kind of on JD a little bit there, fairly or unfairly. JD's trying to help out Garrett build his brand. NIL these days always need a little bit of extra there. But the NUS bus has rolled around the country for quite some time now throughout his childhood into his high school career. But it has stayed parked in the garage at LSU for the most part for the last few seasons. And now it's ready to get going on his SEC tour and becoming the starting quarterback at LSU.

So the NUS bus makes a lot of sense. There are a lot of people who have hopped on the NUS bus train. And it's been rolling for quite some time. And, you know, I love Garrett. He doesn't seem like he's really packing in all the different ways you can have gumbo either. So he is very much carrying the torch for LSU by way of the bus. And good. I like this. Plus, Eric Musselman has moved on to USC from Arkansas. So there is no must bus in the SEC. And you kind of need a new bus. So there's no Gus bus in the SEC and you kind of need a new bus.

So there's no Gus bus in the SEC anymore since Gus Malzahn got fired at Auburn. That is in the big 12 now. So yeah, I mean, it has to be the NUS bus. Good. I'm glad we settled that. I'm glad we got that taken care of. I feel like that's been hanging over our heads for a while. What else has been hanging over LSU's head?

Oh yeah. They had maybe one of the worst defenses in the history of college football last year. So how do they fix that? That's one thing we've talked about, but now post-spring practice, you've gotten a chance to see what the roster is going to look like. How do they get better defensively? Now it's about finding the best available defensive tackles and just getting them on board and look there is a sort of a scholarship crunch in a way for lsu as they try to address this position that really needs two defensive tackles to come in and just give them good quality reps and so there are still options out there they need to work quickly quickly before summer begins. And these guys start to make those decisions.

We've seen Dominic Williams. We've seen Simeon Barrow end up elsewhere. They've been linked to different guys throughout the spring portal window. But the reality is, is now it's about finding guys who can give you some snaps at 100 percent. And you have a complimentary guy next to him or coming off the bench who can give you snaps at 100%. And by way of quantity now, maybe that would make LSU's interior of their defensive line better. There's also a thought of moving Savion Jones, who's a defensive end inside, kind of bulking him up, maybe trying to figure that out. There's a lot of different ways

they're going to have to address this, including walk-ons like Preston Hickey. They moved offensive lineman Kimo McIneola over to the defensive line. They're just trying just about everything to make this work. But LSU, at this point, you've missed on the big fish, Dominic Williams, Simeon Barrow. You got to go out and just address the position however you can with numbers. And maybe it's an Aiden Huntington from ULM who's gotten some good burn in the portal since entering. He was all Sunbelt. Maybe it's another player, but they have to just go out and quite honestly, at this point, take whoever's got some starting experience and some production, no matter the level,

and just bring them in and get them on board. The defensive line is first. The cornerback room would be the other. Okay. Well, before we get to the cornerback room, let's talk about the D tackle search in the portal. Cause obviously that's a, everybody needs them. You know, we talked about Dominic Williams last week. It came down to really Texas and Oklahoma. And eventually it sounds like basically Texas said too rich for our blood. Oklahoma said, no, we really need defensive tackles. Let's go. How hard is it to balance that? Because that's one thing that Pete Nacos and I talked about the other day is when you, when you want to bring a guy in, you have to be careful because you have to watch what you have everybody else

down for NIL wise. Because if you get, if you bring in somebody and that number's out of whack a little bit, you set the number out of whack for everybody else too. And then you have a problem. And this is the, for lack of a better term, salary cap debate you have to have when you manage a roster and LSU just probably couldn't get up to the number that Oklahoma ended up giving Dominic Williams, which I don't think it hit seven figures, could be wrong. Don't know the exact number, but I know that was rumored at one point for Dominic Williams, all three teams in need of defensive tackles and all three in the SEC. But when you look at what schools have to balance is when you need to

address positions, do you go out and get, if you can, that tip top blue chip type of transfer that is going to command a heavy six figure NIL deal? Or do you go out and you say, okay, we've seen a guy like this or a guy like that start in spurts at a school or contribute for multiple years as a veteran? I look at some schools around the country that are bringing in quantity and a good enough level of quality to address positions and build depth. Because especially along the defensive line, you can't just say we're going to bring in one player and it's going to fix our issue because these big guys, the way offenses are now these days, they move and they can tire those guys out. If you don't have somebody competent behind them to give you some reps, I mean, there are going to be opportunities for offenses to take advantage of that. So

the balance to walk is, yes, you can make a splash. You can make your fan base happy by bringing in a Dominic Williams, a Simeon Barrow, some of these other guys from the winter portal window, but it would have helped LSU's defensive tackle issue. It might not have overall fixed it because they just don't have the depth overall. They brought in Sean Washington from Georgia. He still needs to develop. They've got some freshmen, they've got some other pieces, but they really need quantity until Bo Davis can address that position like he did in high school recruiting for Texas. And that takes time. And Brian Kelly. The other good thing about Bo Davis though,

is Bo Davis inherited Byron Murphy, inherited to Andre Sweat, turned them into very good college defensive lineman, first and second round NFL draft pick. That probably helps, too. I mean, he should be able to work with what's on the roster a little bit. But, you know, you mentioned corner is another one. and this one baffles me a little bit Billy somebody from the outside who spent basically decades watching LSU just plug in corner after corner after corner always having somebody either ready or some true freshman who's ready to just pop in there and play that was the most bizarre thing of the last two years is watching them struggle at corner and this is where Brian Kelly took some time to adjust along with his staff that he put in place for that LSU

defensive staff the seal or the floor excuse me was so high for defensive backs when Corey Raymond was there and and continuing on that legacy of DBU that when you miss, you really didn't miss badly on players. I mean, there were defensive backs that caught some grief at LSU for not being that level that they expect of a DBU caliber. Even if they go start at Alabama. Yeah, yeah, exactly. They don't pan out, and then they go start at Alabama or they, you know, what have you.

Now the floor with Corey Raymond being back can at least be built up to a level. I mean, LSU for a while didn't take many corners that were under six foot. I mean, that was kind of Corey Raymond's MO, was six foot long, can run, just need to add some weight to him. That was kind of what they looked for and they hit on him, whether it was blue chip guys or whether it was developmental players. And so that floor and kind of that expectation recruiting wise just kind of went away for a couple of years. And then you factor in missing on some portal takes like Denver Harris and a couple others. And then you're in a complete nightmare situation at corner.

And even now, there's a lot of buzz around PJ Woodland coming out of the spring as a true freshman or moving on Michael Turner, who's a signee to defensive back and letting him go. There's a lot of kind of hope, but not many of these guys really look like what we're used to seeing at corner for lsu so they're gonna have to prove some of us wrong yeah and that's it it's interesting having corey raymond back because he definitely has a type that he goes and recruits so like what we just talked about i can imagine our conversation a year from now sounding very different. The problem is they got us to play some games in between now and then. Now, so

what it sounds like is the offense may have to pick up the slack again for the defense. We talked about Garrett Nussmeier. It's weird because it is such an unusual circumstance now to have this sort of quarterback ascension where you have a pretty good player he waits his turn behind another really good player and then he winds up being the starter that's how basically everyone worked in the 80s and 90s and early 2000s but now it's like what it's like seeing a unicorn yeah and and it's a pretty cool story for Garrett Nussmeyer I mean he, he does claim Louisiana as being where he's from out of all the places he's lived. He leans into being LSU's quarterback, and he's very excited about it. And he's got a group of receivers that you have Kyron Lacy coming back. He's talented. He was the third option last year. Can he be a true elite number one? We'll have to find that out. And he's got tools to be consistent and a good option for him. But that's why they went out and grabbed CJ Daniels from Liberty, Xavion Thomas from Mississippi State. They've got a Chris Hilton, an Aaron Anderson,

players like that coming back. And they have some freshmen who maybe could emerge or redshirt freshmen, second year guys that they could look to a little bit more as they try to find the right group because C.J. Daniels is going to have to make that step up in competition from Liberty. It's not an easy one, but he's productive. He looked good in the spring. You look at Zavion Thomas in a bad Mississippi State offense, was able to be productive on top of what he can do in the return game. And so they have some depth, they have some pieces, and it's probably going to require a little bit of feeling out when the lights come on in the games. But that's also why they've got to lean heavily on a Mason Taylor at tight end and some of these other options to step up as well, because this offense is just going to

look a little different. And I mean, the running game should be improved, in my opinion, too, because they've got two good backs there as well. Well, we had Cortez Hankton, the receivers coach from LSU, on the show a few weeks ago. And he was talking about, you know, just how Chris Hilton and Kyron Lacey got to watch Malik Neighbors and Brian Thomas and how they worked. Because I think we were having this conversation last year. We knew Malik Neighbors was year we knew malik neighbors was good we knew brian thomas was good but i don't know that we would have said both of those guys are surefire first rounders this time last year so there is room like for development and and i'm with you on cj daniels that's a guy who was very productive at liberty you talk to the people at liberty they

seem to think that that he's going to be able to make that transition fairly easily yeah and I think I remember Brian Thomas coming out of high school and I said to one of my friends or one of our subscribers I said he's either going to be a first round pick and going to wow everybody or he's just going to be a complete bust and you know kind of end up you know just kind of uh withering away at lsu or moving on and boy he obviously bust uh you know or uh boomed big time and ended up being a first round pick malik kind of had that competitiveness from the get-go that you said okay if they can continue to find ways to get jayden daniels to push the ball down the field he's gonna make plays and so we saw those flashes there was a little bit more,

and I don't want to say there's not hope going into this year by any means, but there was a little bit more hope that that would happen and thought that it would with those two receivers, as well as Kyron Lacy being that third option. This year, you have two new guys coming in. You have Kyron Lacy coming back who battled some drops early in his career. It's almost, it's a different way of putting together this group of receivers. I mean, you look at Kyron Lacy being a transfer, Zavion Thomas, CJ Daniels. It's not as much homegrown LSU talent. They're honestly, outside of Chris Hilton, you look at the top five on paper, they're all transfers. So it's a little bit of a different way of putting it together for LSU this year. Doesn't mean it can't be successful, but it just seems like as far as pure game breakers, they have some guys that have that potential, but they need

to just show it a little bit more. Well, and you mentioned the running game and we've talked about LSU's offensive line. And when Cody Blair and I did our ultimate teams, I had Will Campbell on mine. He drafted Emory Jones on his. Garrett Dellinger, their left guard, is the guy who started with them for the past two years. He'll be a third-year starter as well. It feels like this is a group that can, we know they can protect the passer, but it feels like they also should be able to open some holes in the run game. And, you know, again, I realized this, this sounds like nostalgia almost, but like, remember when LSU always had two or three great backs and could just ran the

ball down your throat? Like, is it possible that they move back a little bit toward that? Yeah, I think Frank Wilson is doing a really good job recruiting that position. And we've seen, we kind of saw kind of that COVID time, some of the freshmen off that 2019 team, like a John Emery, four or five started, didn't pan out. They took Armani Goodwin from Alabama at one point, and he had some problems with battled injuries. They just, they had different backs that all could do different things and showed flashes at times, but could never be consistent. Alabama at one point and and he had some promise with battles and battled injuries they just they

had different backs that all could do different things and showed flashes at times but could never be consistent now it seems like Frank Wilson has that room at least quality wise on a very good level they don't have much depth this season it seems but I was talking about it on another podcast I'm really high on what this run game could do. I mean, Caleb Jackson has a chance to really break out this year. And Josh Williams is a steady veteran. If Caden Durham could come in and give them some good snaps, they will have a chance to have one of the best backfields in the SEC,

in my opinion, because they also have that offensive line who does return four starters. But also DJ Chester, the center. I mean, a lot of people think it's going to be addition by subtraction. And it's not as much of a slight to Charles Turner, the outgoing center, as much as it is that DJ Chester is that well thought of by many people around LSU's building. So I'm really excited about DJ Chester. I remember seeing him as a high school player.

We played tackle. We showed the athleticism. When you plug him into the middle and you've got all those veterans around you, it might end up working out even better than LSU realized in that sense as they put together this group through the years that is now, I mean,

they're going to have a lot of work to do for the 2025 offensive line, but enjoy this 2024 group. Cause they're all really, really good. Well, and that's the thing. It feels like this is now you have to capitalize that it's so rare to be able to have this type of veteran presence on your offensive line, this, this much accomplishment already, like guys that, that have played, you know, they're good. This is as experienced as they're going to be while they're playing for you. they're good this is as experienced as they're going to be while they're playing for you like that's as good as it gets but what is the realistic expectation for LSU like what among the LSU fan base like the folks on your message board what

do they feel like is the ceiling for this team I I mean, the expectation obviously is to be competing. Yeah. Yeah. National championship getting there. I mean, the only higher expectations around LSU are for the baseball team. And so, I mean, right or wrong, that's just the reality of it. But LSU has a team that if they can be coached up better, and we talked about that with Bo Davis coaching up that group at Texas on the defensive line. Blake Baker is obviously taking over as defensive coordinator, and they've got a really good staff on that side of the ball. If just schematically and putting it together better and more organized can help them improve into the, let's say, the 70s of college

football defenses, that would be a win. And then it's say the seventies of college football defenses, that would be a win. And then it's about the offense holding up its end of the bargain that they have, you know, the last year, especially, but even when Jaden Daniels was still kind of learning, uh, as LSU's first year starter, they were showing some flash and some promise and had some good games as well. but you could see this team honestly going anywhere from eight wins to to running the table i mean look at how close they were last year to doing it with a historically bad defense and that is so hard to do i mean and and you know lsu fans kind of got a taste of what, you know, an A&M with Johnny Manziel or a Patrick Mahomes, Texas Tech.

I mean, that's them having to score so many points to have a chance. And they still won 10 games. So Brian Kelly has a good floor for this program year in, year out because of how he prepares his team six days of the week leading up to Saturday. I mean, he has an analytical approach. He has a good feel for his team. And you see them be able to capture some big wins. You also have seen them miss out on having really, really good teams because of some things that whether you can pin it on Brian Kelly because he's in year three or whether

you can in certain instances look back at the past and say they're in this position because of all the things prior to Brian Kelly arriving. It's been such a fluid rebuild. You know, each each spot has. OK, they got to go out and address quarterback. All right. Bring in Jayden Daniels. Check. All right. Offensive line. Wow. Brad Davis has really made that better. But defense, it just didn't work out after hitting on their transfers year one the way they did. It kind of blew the expectations even out of the

water for years two, three, years four, where they didn't have the same luck in year two hitting on defensive transfers. And so we saw that defense suffer because of it. And now they're in the same position of trying to rebuild that defense. And there are certain spots that they've been able to continue to develop with guys that they already have, but they also have not gotten to the point where they're feeling comfortable yet with other positions because it still takes years to rebuild the way Brian Kelly would prefer to, which is really through the high school ranks. Well, so LSU, if you go to FanDuel, the odds to make the college football playoff to be in the 12 team field, yes is plus 116, no is minus 142. So we're essentially talking even money, almost even money, 50-50 proposition. And I think that's

about right because like you said and it's interesting to use the word rebuild because i think most programs when they use the word rebuild are not thinking along the lines of double digit wins and division championships and lsu has a division championship in two double digit win seasons during this rebuild so yeah i i am fascinated to see how this winds up because it really bounced to the ball one way here or the other. I go back to last year. The Ole Miss game could have been an LSU win very easily. The Missouri game could have been an LSU loss very easily.

And so that's kind of how it's probably going to go in this year. Yeah. And who knows? I mean, UFC is a wild card. You know, UCLA has a new coaching staff. You've got to take care of business in those types of games, but ultimately,

I mean, let's say they're, they go through growing pains and they're figuring out a new defense or they're Garrett Nussmeyer is not playing as well as he can. Then you look at the SEC slate and it's really not that bad in my opinion at South Carolina. Nah, it could be worse. It could be a lot worse. And LSU has to capitalize on the games they obviously should win. And then they've got to capitalize on their home games. I mean, Ole Miss, Alabama, Oklahoma stand out to me. But then you look at the road games at Arkansas.

I mean, a lot of people saying Sam Pittman could be on the way out after this year at A&M, brand new coaching staff, who knows? Billy Napier, probably a must-win game in the swamp for him. Then you've got Vandy in South Carolina in there. I mean, it's a manageable schedule for LSU. That's where you've got to capitalize and you've got to find a way to get to Atlanta. All you need to know about the back end of that Florida schedule is, is LSU coming to town might be the most winnable game. And that's not a slight to LSU. Oh, Billy, it is going to be so much fun to watch this rebuild.

Double digit win rebuild. Hopefully for the Bengal tiger message board it is it's gonna be some fun thank you billy anytime thanks for having me that is billy embody talking lsu tigers and we put a poll up will lsu make the playoff right now running 53 no 47, 47% yes. Very similar to our Penn State poll yesterday where it just sort of slightly veered toward the negative, but it was basically a 50-50 proposition. So this brings us to the topic of tomorrow's show.

We're going to have a series of ceiling and floor evaluations. We're going to tell you what is your team's ceiling, what is your team's floor. We're going to do it conference by conference, power conference by power conference. Me and Cody Belair on three's National Scout, we start tomorrow with the SEC. So we'll say Tennessee, what is Tennessee ceiling?

What is Tennessee's floor? And we will examine that. And I'm fascinated to see where we wind up with this because look, everybody's ceiling isn't going to be the playoff, but I imagine when we're doing the SEC and the big 10, we're going to have a lot of, a lot of teams with a ceiling of playoff. I imagine when we do the Big 12, we'll have a lot of teams with a ceiling of playoff because they're all fairly evenly matched. And the team that wins the Big 12 is going to the playoff.

So it's going to be a very different discussion than if we'd had it two three years ago but it's going to be fascinating we're going to dive into schedules dive into rosters dive into schemes this will be so much fun it starts tomorrow with the sec and we will see you at 8 a.m. Eastern time tomorrow.