Bussin' With The Boys - Ryan Day Speaks On The Ohio State Michigan Rivalry, 12 Team CFP + What He Thinks The Future Of The NCAA Is

Episode Date: April 3, 2023

Recorded: March 28th 2023 | In our third stop of our Spring Tour, we are at Ohio State and we sit down with Head Coach Ryan Day. He talks about the Ohio State vs Michigan rivalry and how "The Game" has been renewed with Michigan winning the past 2 seasons. We then get into his path to becoming a head coach and what it was like taking over after Urban Meyer had left. Day talks about what the 12 team College Football Playoff will look like. He then gives his opinion on the future of the NCAA/BIG 10 and what it will look like in the coming years with conference realignment and conferences getting bigger. Coach Day gives us a glimpse of what is really going on behind the scenes that you aren't going to want to miss, enjoy. 0:00 Interview starts 1:25 Is he happy that michigan won the last 2 games 2:39 Michigan winning the last 2 has made the rivalry better 4:02 message to the team after losing “The Game”, then getting ready for Georgia 7:35 how do you keep the consistency in recruiting 10:02 Philosophies that he has picked up along the way and people that have helped him 13:01 The pressure of taking over after Urban Meyer 16:53 Have to get the national championship back in the BIG 10 17:35 12 team playoff talk 18:11 if michigan beat TCU, would he have rooted for Michigan in the championship 19:26 the addition of USC and UCLA into the BIG 10 21:25 Where does he see the NCAA going 25:00 How do you sell Ohio State 27:23 What does he want his players to walk away with 28:26 What BIG 10 coach would he want to fight/beat in a fight ---- SHOP: https://store.barstoolsports.com/collections/bussin-with-the-boys FOLLOW THE BOYS Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bussinwtb Twitter: https://twitter.com/BussinWTB Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BussinWTB Website: https://www.bussinwtb.com ---- SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS CHEVY - EVs for everyone, everywhereFor more, visit barstool.link/bussinwtbSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of the Bus and the Boy Spring Tour. We are with Coach Day at the Ohio State University. It pains me to say that before we go into, we need to talk about Chevrolet. Chevrolet is a trusted company that has been innovating for the past 100 years. Up till now, most electric vehicles have been either too expensive, too small, or too limited in capabilities for most people. Chevrolet is committed to making EVs available for all Americans. There is a growing network of public charging stations.

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and think about something real. I didn't even hear what the hiccary. And it's crazy. It goes back to like maybe the eyes aren't always on me. Yeah, yeah. You know, maybe other people are doing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, hey, we're here.

We finally did it. Coach Day, thank you for joining us. Look, I'm sitting in between these guys for a couple different reasons. One, Taylor likes to sit on the outside. Two, we got a Michigan boy and an Ohio State boy over here. I feel like there might be a fun question. There might be something that you want to ask because I feel like we have to kick this thing off with some sense of the rivalry that happens at this place. Yeah, I got a couple questions for sure.

I think one of the first questions I'll go with is, do you feel happy that the University of Michigan has won the last two. And the reason why I ask that is because... The rhetorical question out of the game? No, it's not rhetorical. We, we, Michigan, when I was in Michigan, we barely won once. And you guys have dominated the tens. You guys dominated us in the 2000s.

And it's kind of nice to get the rivalry backwards going. So I'm kind of leading you into a possibility of giving Michigan some flowers here. Are you happy that Michigan's won the last two games? I mean, I know you're coming out with that question. I can see you coming on the side door with that one. I get you. I see what you're coming out. It's, you know, this.

you know, this, this is year seven for me, and this is, you know, we played that game five times and, you know, lost the last two, and it hurts, I mean, quite honestly, you know, I mean, you know how much it means to so many people, you know, in both states. And so, you know, when I first had my first press conference, the first thing I said was that, you know, you got to win that game. That's the number one thing, most important thing. When you don't do that, it hurts. It hurts for 365 days. And so, so it has for the last two years, you know. And so, yeah, I mean, it's something that we think about every single day. But that's what makes the rivalry great.

You know, and certainly, you know, when you play, the rivalries back and forth as well. So it's something we think about all the time. The rivalry is bigger than ever now because Michigan finally has a couple of Ws in the column. You needed that. Otherwise, it was truly turning into a game. It's like, hey, what's that? We didn't need that.

No, no, you guys didn't need that. But we definitely didn't need that. It stinks being on the wrong side of it. Like, as a fan of the game, it stinks being on the wrong side of it. but there is like a, you know, the game is like, the game. It's kind of like back a little bit. I know it's like, oh, yeah, I'm excited that the game is back, but obviously you want to come out. And if rules were reversed too, like let's say Michigan was dominating for that long and you guys won the last two, obviously as a former player, I'd be upset.

But I've, I've been out of it for so long that I've zoomed out and been able to be like, okay, that is, thank God we got a rivalry again. I mean, that is the kind of maybe a good approach for Ohio State because like you guys have dominated for so long to kind of be like, well, let's give them some flowers here. Well, it's the first thing that when you come here as a recruit, and you walk right in here and you go look at the rivalry video. You know, it's one of the first things you have to do when you're a coach here is understand the rivalry, you know, and what it means. And so, yeah, I mean, it's everything and it goes back a long time, right? And I mean, think about all the different games and all the different coaches

and teams that have come through and it means so much. And that's why, you know, when you go through the hallways here, you see all the different teams. And one of the first things you ask is, what was your record in the game? The facilities, by the way, are incredible. Yeah, they're really nice. Really incredible. Asking about that game, because you guys are a hell of a team year in and year out,

and when you have it be that close at halftime, and then the second half goes the way it does, what's the messaging after that game when you reflect back on it? Like, what were some things? I'm sure you've probably already talked about in press conferences, but also in the same question, what is your messaging to get them boys ready for Georgia? Because you guys even, you busted your ass that game, too.

Obviously, didn't come out of the war. won that game. But still for them guys that come out and perform the way they did after you take a loss to Michigan and stuff like that, I just think it also speaks to like getting their head back right and everything else. Yeah, it may just a range of emotions. You know, we think about the way that weekend went down and then that week following. And then we, you know, get selected for the CFP. And all of a sudden, you know, there's life again, life in the facility.

And then we just went about the business of getting after it all the way to the bowl game. I think we went, it was like 1,500 snaps. during bowl practice. I mean, we got after it. Bull practice was really, it was violent. It just, and we prepared to play in that game. And I think when you think about those two games in particular, you could probably grab out, in those two games alone, 10 plays that cost us both of those games. And like you said, you know, you look at the game, you look at, you know, the scoreboard at different times of the game, and you can just look at like, you know, really five plays in each game that cost you. So one of the things we've been talking about during

our offseason, our eight weeks leading up to spring practice, now we're in. into the third week of spring practice. You just don't know when that play's going to come into play. As you guys know, you played the game. You can play 70 great snaps, but, you know, if five of those don't go your way, it can caution the game. And that's, when you're playing match-up games, that's what happens. We've got to own that.

And so you don't know when that play's going to come. You don't know when that day's going to come. So we need to be consistent in our offseason. We need to be there every day and just find those plays on a daily basis. And as we go into spring practice, it's the same way. When you're sitting at five, you're watching the Bay 10 championship, all the championship games happen. You see USC lose.

You're probably thinking, okay, we're going to make it in this college football playoff. When before that time and when you guys officially made it in knowing you're going to be the four seed or you guys went to the three seed, right? How did it work? Yeah, so we were the four. You guys were the four. Yeah, so we played Georgia. Was there a part of you that wanted Michigan again right away?

Or would have been better to see a national champion? Yeah, so I remember that week leading up to it, It was, I think it was around Tuesday. We got together. And, you know, by the time Wednesday came, it was like, all right, we got to stop feeling sorry for ourselves. We've got to move on because those couple days were awful following the game. And so we brought everybody in and we said, guys, you know, we have to believe that, you know, there's going to be something that happens over the weekend that allows us an opportunity to play in the CFP.

And so we can't let this week just go by. So, you know, I said of the guys, somebody's going to lose here and we're going to be in. So we have to be ready when that happens. So we went about practicing on Wednesday and Thursday leading up to that weekend. And then when it happened, there was just a lot of life injected into the whole facility. And we really didn't care. We just wanted an opportunity to play because, you know, like I said, we were on life support there for a week. And we just wanted life again.

We wanted an opportunity to play because we always, last year, we felt like we could play with anybody in the country and beat anybody in the country. And, you know, it didn't work out that way. But that's kind of how it all went down. You guys definitely are that team with a level of prestige. And you've gotten to the point where it's truly a factory, especially in the skill position category. You guys is wide receivers.

It seems like every year you have like a sophomore that's like the best wide receiver in the country. And it just keeps getting better and better. Like from a recruiting standpoint, how do you keep that consistency going at a place like this? I mean, there's a whole bunch like the college football landscape is changing. And keep rooms together. All right.

And keep rooms together. You got guys who might have to wait. Especially with all the transfer portal. Yeah. It is, it's a, it's a wild deal because it's hard to recruit when recruiting is national now. It's not like people are just recruiting regions. The only people that still recruit regionally is Texas, you know, because they got, they're in the state of Texas. But like, you have to recruit against everybody. You have to recruit against schools like that are in nice tropical areas. And it's year round. Year round.

You recruit somebody here and their year. How do you keep that consistency, consistency level going? I mean, there's a lot that goes into that. I think when you look at Ohio State, half a million alumni and just the power of the brand of Ohio State, we're able to recruit nationally. And so our first priority is the state of Ohio and the Midwest, you know. But when you look at our roster, we have. of guys, like you said, from Hawaii, California, Seattle, Texas, Florida, throughout the country. You know, there's Buckeyes everywhere throughout the United States, and so we're able to have an impact throughout the country. So that's good. Our foundation is here in Ohio, and that's always going to be that way. But we want to go recruit guys who want to be elite. So although there's people from all different parts of the country with different backgrounds, we want people who think big here at Ohio State. So like you said, you know, a loaded wide receiver room, a loaded dealer, line room, offensive line room.

You know, sometimes, you know, when teams recruit against this, it's well, they have a loaded room. You know, why would you go there? You come over here and play. Well, we're recruiting you because we think you can play. And if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. And I think that's going to be the mentality. And it has been because, you know, guys come here and they want to compete every day.

And when you're going against really good players every day, that's how you get better. So, like, for instance, one of our defensive ends, who's here now, Kenyatta Jackson, He was on a Skel team last year. He's from South Florida, Shamanamadana High School. Every day in practice, he went up against Parris Johnson. And when they got done after practice, they'd sit over in the bench and they'd talk about what went on that day. And Paris kind of put him under his wing and talk to him about that.

I'm willing to bet that when Kenyatta is all sitting done and he moves on, he's going to do the same thing for somebody else because he was going against a really good player every day in practice. And that's the idea is that, you know, JTT was going against DeWan Jones last year. And it's not just the 12, regular season games it's every day in practice you're getting better and that's a big part of our development i want to talk about you for a second and ask kind of about your philosophies or things you've picked up along the way because you you grew up in new hampshire which is barely i don't even

know if it's a state anymore in the united states you went to school there as well he's just he's just saying it's small i'm sure you went to you went to new hampshire there as well and hey obviously some flowers here coach was a gatorade player the year a senior year but there's been a lot of adversity along the way. You had mentioned your father passed away when you were nine years old. You go on and you play college ball with Chip Kelly. You're a Gatorade player of the year. You cut your teeth in the game as a GA for three years, if I'm not mistaken, which we've been around, we've seen the GA life. Like, that's not an easy life. You're putting about 15 years worth of work before you become a head coach. What are some philosophies that you've picked up along the way that's kind of molded you

and maybe there's a coach or somebody that could be listening that might not have known that they influence you in such a way? But kind of talk about your philosophies and kind of coming a lot of those adversities. Yeah, I mean, I think the first thing is like adversity, you know, our tests along the way, and you can do one of three things that can either crumble you, you can get through it, or it can make you stronger. And adversity is coming somewhere along the way. And, you know, we just had someone speak to the team the other day, and I thought it was really,

really good what he said. He said that, you know, finding balance in your life is building high ground for hard times. And that's hard. Yeah, it's really cool. And the way you do that is by investing your faith family and friends. And so adversity makes you stronger if you allow it to. And so we're all going to face adversity along the way. And I think for me, if I didn't lose my father at a young age,

I don't know if I'd be in the position I'm in right now. Because, you know, it just had that, you know, chip on my shoulder growing up and wanted to prove a lot of people wrong and prove a lot of people right. And I had a lot of great mentors along the way. And I think that's a big part of this profession is that you don't really go to school to become a college football coach. Now, when I got recruited, you know, Chip Kelly and I sat down,

he said, what do you want to do after you're done playing? And I studied business administration. I told him I wanted to coach. And he said, well, I got you. And he did. You know, I coached with them in the NFL. I coached with them in college. And, you know, the same thing with Irmaier,

you know, he took me along the way and certainly gave me an unbelievable opportunity here to Ohio State. I think a big part of this profession is apprenticeship. But there's a lot of sacrifice that goes along the way. And when you grow up in New Hampshire, like you said, A small state. A small state. You don't have the privilege of going right to the front of the line.

You know, you have to move around a lot. You know, and then I did. And, you know, my wife, you know, and I have had to move 11 times, you know, to even have an opportunity to be at a place of Ohio State. And, you know, a big part of that is your family, you know, and kids being the new kid in class. And so that's one of the reasons why I fight so hard. It's two reasons why I won to win games here is to continue to have an impact on young people.

and then two, you know, for my family, I don't want to have to move them again because I know what that's like and that's part of this profession, as you guys know, and it's the same way being a player. When you brought up Urban Meyer in this situation, Urban's obviously had an incredible career as a college football head coach.

And when you take over for him at Ohio State, what was your process of like, Urban Meyer is a legend. And so for you to take over for him, how did you earn the respect to these players as quickly as you did? well it was very difficult to you know

following someone's footsteps like that I remember one of the first weeks I became the head coach here I walked down the hall right here and there's pictures of Woody Hayes and Jim Tressel and Earl Bruce and John Cooper and Irmaier and then there's a picture of me and I'm like what in the hell is this you know I mean I

you just like pinching yourself you know but I've always kind of had the mentality and you know a coach of mine Dana Bible used to say well why not you why can't it be you that kind of has to your mentality. But when you're in these type of situations, you know, you live in the moment. You just try to do the best you can in that moment. You can't worry about what's coming tomorrow. You can't worry about what happened yesterday. You just do the best you can right then in that

moment. And you trust the people that are around you. And so there was a lot of infrastructure in place here, you know, and a lot of people said, you know, how are you going to follow up with Erb Meyer? I mean, 7 and 0 in the rivalry game, you know, won a national championship, unbelievable success. And people kept saying, you know, what if you lose? What if you do? And I always said, what if I don't? This is an unbelievable opportunity to coach you to play in Ohio State. And so just tried to be myself the best I could, you know, kept a lot of the same things that he did here. But then over time, you know, put your own spin on it and your own flavor on it. You have to be yourself, even though there's a lot of things, you know, people in place,

culture, core values, philosophies that we continued through. And so it's very different than if you were to start your own program. If I was to become a head coach tomorrow at another school, you start from scratch. You hire everybody from scratch. It's a different transition and something that, you know, quite honestly, I had to kind of figure out on the run a little bit. And, you know, because that all kind of happened fast. Yeah, the 2021 Nebraska Cornhuskers, are they the greatest three-win team you've ever played against? Because if you remember correctly, I remind you, I think we were on a game-winning drive and the refs kind of stole the game.

But we were kind of set to beat you guys a couple years ago when you came to the way. Yeah, I would say it was probably the best three-win team, maybe that I was around in the Big Ten. That was a good team. I mean, on defense, I thought they were very good. That's all we needed, boys. Yeah. I mean, how many? I'm really upset you.

You answered it like that. It were. We were a solid team. Yeah. I mean, how many games they lose by a touchdown or less? I mean, the score differential throughout the entire season was zero. Yeah. So every loss that they had all nine, they were.

within one score. That was a hard game. That was a hard game. Yeah, we didn't play well. We, we had, we just played in an emotional, tough game. And, uh, yeah, that was, that was, you know, Jackson, I remember he made a huge play. He made a guy miss and scored a touchdown. Yeah. Um, and then that was a battle. Yeah. I mean, that's the thing about the big 10, especially when we play in nine conference games, you know, there's no gimmies. They're hard. Well, there's a couple. Ruckers. Maryland, Michigan State. There's a lot of, good coaches. I do.

Iowa. Hey, are they? I'm just telling you. Nebraska. Hey, are there's some gimmies in the, in the big den?

I'm telling you. I'm telling you. I'm telling you, there's good coaches and good programs, you know, and I just continually see these, these programs getting better and better and better. I just, maybe there were a few years ago. I just don't see that as much anymore.

I think there's really good coaches. And we get together on calls or we get together at some of our coaches' meetings, really good minds, really good coaches. They're really sharp in how they handle their business. And I got a lot of respect for everybody in the conference. We've got to get the national title back to the Big Ten. It has to happen. It has to happen.

We were trying to bring it. Legitimately, you guys were in it. We were legit like we were going for Michigan and Ohio State in the national championship. When Michigan lost the TCU, I was watching us, hoping you would win. Because the SEC is getting too full of themselves. It makes me sick every day to think about it. You know, and just going back through, you know, you think about 19, about this last game.

I mean, you just go through. Brother, I know you guys would have beat the brakes off of TCU too. Well, you know, I just, you know, it's one play here, one play there, but it doesn't happen. And so, you know, you have to own it. And it's hard. It's hard to take. But you got to regroup and learn from it. And like you said, keep swinging.

I think that the 12-team playoff will be interesting. You know, yeah, I think it's going to be, you know, interesting to see how that all plays out. you know, if the first four teams get a buy, second four teams, and get a home field advantage. That's cool. Playing the Big Ten, you know,

that could be a, you know, that could be, you know, so there's a lot to be determined here. Now, that's, that's two years away, but looking forward to see what that looks like.

You, I think you were about to ask a really good question, but I forgot what that question was going to be. I think I forgot it too. Because I could see it lighting up. You talked about, it wasn't going to be like a really good one. I think it was a,

okay, okay. If Michigan beats TCU, Yes, that was the question. Would you have rooted for Michigan in the national title? No. Okay, hold on.

Before you elaborate, before you elaborate, this is what you need to think about here. We need to take, put our swords down for a second. Because if Michigan wins that game, it's not Michigan. We're thinking now Big Ten conference-wise.

That's conference in the country. It's kind of like a game of throne situation. Like, let's ally up for a second. You watch Game of Thrones or did you? I've watched some. Okay, so you ally up for just a touch. Make sure we get the trophy in there

and then we can all go back to our Civil War within our conference. However, like the SEC is so damn full of themselves. So like, we're balls guys. We're Bama guys. We're South Carolina. It doesn't, everyone's fighting for their own fight down there. We need to band together as a conference and say, like, if you guys were in it, I'm rooting

for Ohio State. I want Ohio State to win because ultimately, ultimately, I want Michigan to take it from you, right? You could somehow get around that being like, you want Michigan to win the national championship if you guys weren't also in it because ultimately you want to take it from Michigan. Can we agree on that? Do you want us to be the best conference in the country? That's all. That's all we're asking.

That's what you're asking. I think if you say that for sure, we have to be the best conference in the country. And I do think. Yeah, but could you just say it? Because of the situation, I would root for Michigan.

I cannot say that. I literally... We need the clips so bad. Please, God. I physically can't say it. Yeah. What were you going to say? Well, no,

I just think that adding UCLA and USC really is really a game changer in so many different ways. You know, it's so much different than certainly when you played, you think about like, it's just not natural, right?

It's not a natural rivalry. It's going to be very. very untraditional. But those are two very good teams. And so as you think about adding those teams and then in 24, you know, they haven't finalized at all yet, but going away from the divisions and then, you know, think about it, you know, we could play the rivalry game. You could play Penn State. You could play USC all in one season. That's quite a schedule. You know, it's just very different now. And so I think we had the capability of being the best conference in America. And I think the addition of those two teams, you know, based on how things play out, we'll move.

and forward. And then with the 12-team playoff, getting more teams into the playoff, I think it gives us a great chance. Does adding the two California teams open up anything recruiting-wise that you think about, like recruiting better in California? Because obviously you guys have the brand of Ohio State, period. You know, I think right now probably, probably it's about the same. But I think as we start to play games out there and, you know, they start to travel out this way, I think it will. Yeah. I don't think that the recruits quite yet feel that, you know, now we've played, in the Rose Bowl twice in like the last five years, I guess. And so a lot of those guys are familiar with us.

But the more I think they see the Big Ten teams coming through the California area, I think it'll open up. But I still don't think that that's going to be like a, you know, a recruiting hotbed for the Big Ten. I think it's still going to be, you know, the Midwest area will still be our foundation, you know. A lot of cats up here. Ohio in particular. How is it, Ohio.

Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania. Missouri. Missouri. Missouri. You get some like diamonds in the rough in Missouri. Oh, yeah. Fair.

Fair. Yeah. I wouldn't say it's a hotbed for football. Not like Arizona. When you say hotbed, and I think about it a little bit more, I can say that's fair. That's big of you. That shows growth with Will Compton. Yeah.

With you guys adding UCLA and USC through the conference in 2024, where do you see the NCAA going? Because this is what I see. I see SEC making an ultimate conference. You guys making an ultimate conference. And then essentially branching away, getting away from the NCAA. and becoming your own league and in return kind of becoming like this is where you want to go if you want to go to the NFL conferences. You know, I think that there's so many different discussions that are happening right now of things like that.

You know, and it's like what's coming next, you know, I think as we just sit here right now, I think we all know if things are going to continue to change because of everything that's going on in America, right? Whether it's the NIL, the transfer portal, this conference realignment, we know that if there's going to continue to be lawsuits down the road, so things are going to change. Where it goes, I really don't know. I do think that the way that college football is right now, there's nothing really you can compare to it, right? There's nothing else out there.

You'd be like, okay, follow this model because it doesn't exist. And I think if we can find a way to look more like some of the models that are out there, I mean, obviously the NFL is a model. It's different because this is collegiate. It's not the professional. But the more we can find something to grab onto it to say, okay, let's run college football something like this. So we have more comparisons because what happens now is there's just a lot of hard feelings

between fools, there's inequities, whether it's the players, you know, and different folks and lawsuits about, you know, all the things that go on across college sports. Where in other sports like the NFL, you know, they have rules in place. They have players associations. They have collective bargaining agreements. They have all these different things in place that you can look. look to say, okay, there's precedence here. Right now, we're in a world where there's no precedence. It's the Wild West. It's wild. And so that's what creates hard feelings. And I think for all of us,

sometimes as, you know, coaches and even our players, you're not too sure what to think. And I think that's probably the hardest part right now. So I think any of that stuff is possible because we don't really know what's coming next. It seems as though the lines getting grayer and grayer. Because when I was, when we were playing, back in our day, back in our day, there was like dumb rules like you could have a bagel but you couldn't have cream cheese like there was all these crazy things that the NCAA would put in and now every other conference basically gets to do what the SEC did and that's pay players one way or another and so you kind of just see it going over and over eventually like

we're essentially turning into a minor leaks of the NFL are we not there's in there yeah right now because again I also yeah there's nothing to kind of police it literally tomorrow if they want to like binding True binding agreement. I know we're kind of just talking to each other. That's what the best podcasts are. Anyways. Do you think from an NIL standpoint,

I know the team itself can't be involved with that, but you guys got a pretty good NIL situation set up? Got this guy some accountants and stuff like that, 401Ks. Well, so, yeah, the great thing for us is the city of Columbus. There's two million people here, 30,000 business. So we're really positioned well to be able to have our guys take advantage and name image like this business right across the street. There's so many things in place here.

And then certainly with the fan base and people throughout Ohio and throughout the country, there's a lot of people that want to help. And so our guys are very visible. And so there's a lot of opportunity for them. The way that name image of likeness was designed for, you know, and I think a lot of our guys have benefited from that. When it comes to, I think it's a good segue way, like, how do you sell guys?

Obviously, Ohio State's a big brand. Yep. I'm willing to lay down the store on that. It's a massive brand. How do you get guys from a California, from a Texas, from a Florida, and sell them on the idea of Ohio State? You know, kind of what we were talking about before. You know, a big part is you come here to win championships

and you come here for development. You come here, you know, to have an opportunity to not only develop as a football player, but also life after football. You have so much, you know, such a network out there that you can tap into. That's a big part of it. It's finding out what, you know, what else do you want to do when you're done playing football?

I talk to our guys all the time about that. You guys got done playing. You're not just going to sit on the couch and hang out. You've got to figure out what's next. You know, and you probably had no idea. It was going to be a podcast. And, you know, you wanted to get into broadcasting. Maybe you did know that.

But I think we talked to our guys about is they actually have an opportunity to figure that out while they're in college. Where, you know, a lot of families, I'm sure, you know, you guys had family members where they had to do something out of necessity. They didn't have the opportunity to think, oh, this is what I'd like to do. You know, obviously you guys enjoy doing this. So you get an opportunity to do it after, you know, careers in the NFL. Well, that's the goal. They come in with careers in the NFL and then what do you want to do when you're done? Hopefully you can find your passion and that way you don't feel like you go to your family, people in your family, people in my family, they had to go to to work because

they had to pay bills without a necessity. The goal is for them to be able to find their passion so that they don't really have to work a day in their life. They're finding something that they like to do. So that combined with obviously the football platform that you have here and the ability to play for national championships. You know, when you walk in the building right here, you enjoy being in the building every day. You enjoy grinding, getting after it every day, competing, but also being part of a family. And then also the developing part,

being able to develop and be in a environment where there's a lot of similarities to being in Columbus to being in the NFL. Yeah, it's an NFL factory here. It is. You know, playing the big lights, you know, the expectations, you know, our guys walk downtown. I mean, they're going to get noticed. Yeah. So you have to move a little different. And you learn that at a young age when you're here in Columbia. Mitch, you are a massive Ohio State fan.

Do you have anything before we let Coach Dego? Mitch asked when his players leave, what do you want them to walk away with? I'm sure you do. Well, I think the first thing you want them to walk away with is, you know, a feeling that they miss it, that they want to come back because there was a brotherhood here. You know, when you leave, you're like leaving a family. and, you know, our goal is to maximize these guys and help their reach their dreams and goals,

but at the same time, like, love them and our arms around them, helping the best they can. And so you want them to have a great experience. Know that they got challenged, they got pushed, you know. And it's our job to make them see things they can't see, do things they wouldn't do on their own, hear things that maybe they can't, don't want to hear, but that's part of coaching, that's part of parenting, that's part of, you know, mentoring.

But also know that they maximize themselves on the field, had a great experience and want to come back and give back and be part of the program. I think it's time. In the Big Ten, there's multiple coaches in the Big Ten. If you had to fight one of those coaches, what coach would it be? You've got to take me down this road. And why is it Jim Harbaugh? What did it even be?

Who would he fight? And why is it Jim Harbaugh? I don't know. I can tell you our culture is, you know, if you say fight, you see fight all over the facility. it right there. Fight, fight to become the best version of yourself. So we're fighting every day. We're fighting against every opponent. You take Matt Rule? You know, I work with Matt Rule. He could take Matt Rule. Hey, he could take Matt Rule. Oh, Temple. At Temple? Temple. Temple, the first year in 2005, it was Al Golden's first year there. We won one game. Oh, yeah? I think we're the only

team to ever lose back-to-back game, 62 to nothing. Oh, my God. Is there anything we have to look forward to? Is the coach ruled in Nebraska? He's great. He's a really good coach, really sharp. You know, he'll do great things. You know, he's a lot of respect for Matt. He's a really good coach. So I haven't fought him before, so I'm not sure how that would go.

On the fighting thing, who do you think you'd have the most trouble with in the Big Ten? Just on stature alone. Because you got some shit to you now. Yeah, I would say probably, you know who would be, PJ would be hard because the guy's got so much energy. He's got a high motor. Guy would feel like he would just keep going, coming at you. You have to plan to like, you got to joke him out or something.

You have to end him. Yeah, that's hard. Because he's going to keep coming back. Keep coming. Next day, day and day out. He's got a lot of energy. Yeah, yeah. He's another great coach and a great guy.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Thanks a lot, man. Yeah, thank you for sitting down with us. Yeah, I appreciate it. Yeah. It was awesome. Hopefully, hopefully we did all right.

All right, good deal. Oh, you guys. We got the thumbs up. We got the thumbs up. We got the coach this is awesome. Good luck with everything. Yeah, I appreciate you. All right.

You got it, man, of course. Hey guys, it's us The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast?

Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it out. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen.

We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. The story I told myself can then shape my behavior, and that can lead me to sabotage the possibility of connection. This Mental Health Awareness Month, tune into the podcast Deeply Well with Debbie Brown. If you've been searching for a soft place to land while doing the work to become whole, this podcast is for you to hear more. Listen to Deeply Well with Debbie Brown from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get to. your podcast.