Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Lane Kiffins Greener Pasture Jerry Jones Was Right And The Chiefs Last Chance

Episode Date: January 11, 2026

Geoff Schwartz and Gabe Goodwin take on the biggest football story this week: Lane Kiffin's dramatic departure from Ole Miss. What does this move say about the college football landscape? Would LSU have gotten their man if it wasn't for agents pulling strings? Is Juice Kiffin an industry plant? Plus, some NFL quick hitters: Jerry Jones was right to trade Micah Parsons, Mike Tomlin is cooked, the Ravens are in trouble, and so much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, welcome to Jeff Schwartz-Smartney. Jeff Schwartz-Smarty, been by Draft Kings, Draft Kings, the Crown is yours. Today is Tuesday, December 2nd. We made it to December, and I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I'm Jeff Schwartz alongside Gabe Goodwin. Gabe, welcome back getting to our cultural regular season on the field has been concluded. There is lots of noise around college football. We'll talk about all this coaching cycle stuff.

Lane Kiffin will be a big part of the discussion. We'll talk about agents and they're involved in all this. It's been so gross, Gabe. And then we'll get to National Football League because there were games on Thursday they matter, game on Friday they mattered, obviously games this past weekend. And the New England Patriots and Chicago Bears right now are atop their respective conferences. How are you doing, sir? How was your Thanksgiving weekend?

Nice weekend. Nice to end the USC season with a rivalry win at home. But yeah, all of my brain has been used up on this Lane Kiffin news. You say, we'll get to the pro, the pro side of the sport. next. We have to start with the amateurs. This is just, you know, good amateur athletics. That's what it feels like. So,

for those under a rock or maybe not call it, you know, follow college football, the season ended this weekend on Saturday, right? There's a final, final plays of our season were ended. There are a bunch of coaching opportunities that were available because coaches have been fired and those rules are starting to get filled. And the most

high-profile job out there was the LSU job. And Lane Kiffin, who was the coach of Old Miss, was up for this job for a couple weeks now. There was no surprise on where this was going to end, except as usual with Lane Kiffin, it was done in the worst way possible in a way that really was embarrassing for all the parties involved in a way that we have now come to know this is how Lane Kiffin leaves anywhere, Raiders, USC, FAU, anywhere he's been, he leaves in the most, you know, just the most Lane Kiffin way, the most messy way possible, Gabe.

And LSU finally has their head coach. And there's so many ways to go about this. But just from the perspective of LSU, excuse me, Old Miss and Lenn Kiffin, the sticking point here was essentially that Old Miss is a playoff team. And Lane Kiffin wanted to have his kicking it to. He wanted to be the LSU head coach and then also coach Old Miss into playoffs. If I was Old Miss, I would have told him to kick rocks, kicked him out the door, the door behind him and told him to get lost.

He didn't want to be the coach anymore of your team. You can't do both these at the same time. Now, people would argue that the old Miss Athletic Director had to sort of play it it the way he did because he can't fire him, right? Then he would owe him all this money. And then he also, you know, can't really let go before he figures out what he's going to do. But they lost out on the candidates they probably wanted to hire because they took too long

to tell Lane to leave or Lay took too long to make his decision. We knew for weeks he was going to LSU. There was no, there was no, I did the back. We knew for weeks he was going somewhere else. Florida or LSU, LSU won in the end. And the whole thing was gross. Look, there was cryptic social media posts by Lane and his dog that supposedly he just uses for cover and left behind.

There was the family going to visit Gainesville and Baton Rouge out in the open. There was no like, no like undercover, just like, here's a private plane. We're going to visit these places and we're going to see what they have. And the whole thing gave to me was just perfect for Lynn Kiffin, but just embarrassing for all the parties involved. You cannot coach your playoff team when you go to a rival school. This is not the same thing as Tulane or North Texas coach leaving from a group of five school to go up to a power four school.

And they didn't do it, and they didn't do an ugly way. They took the job very quietly. They had the press conference, and they're going back to their schools to finish out their rest of their season, whether it is a conference championship game or whether it's a conference championship game, or whether it's future to the playoff. The other part of this game, before I talk here, are you represented by CEA, by any chance?

Or by Jimmy Sexton? Jimmy Sexton's not my agent. Okay, this part to me was the worst of this all. Okay. So. I thought we'd wind up to this, but here we are. No, no. We're going to, let's do it.

Now, look, we all have agents, okay? Our agents represent mostly people that are in the industry and all over the industry, right? My agent represents people that are coaches, broadcasters, social media content creators, people on TV, like everywhere, right? You have an agent, same thing, right? And most of the time, I would say, Gabe, that it's not so out there in our faces that agents represent the same people in the industry.

But in this case, it was straight in our face that clients of Lane Kiffin's agent that are also on television on ESPN are pushing the narrative that Layton Kiffin should be able to coach Old Miss and coach LSU at the same time. And then you come to find out they have the same freaking agent, Gabe. I've never seen it so blatant where an agent very clearly told his clients to go on television and tell the national public that we're jackasses and the way that things should go shouldn't actually be that way because I said so because my agent said, hey, you need to cover for my guy here. And then come to find out, by the way,

that Nick Sabin, one of the guys who went on TV and said Lane Kiffin should be able to coach LSU and coach Ole Miss at the same time, privately told Lane Kiffin, he should take the LSU job. It's all, dude, this industry does this, right?

Like, we know this behind the scenes, Gabe. But this was the most blatant nonsense we've seen, I think, where agents controlling what people say behind the scenes makes it out in public. and on national TV and on ESPN. Okay, so this was the part of it that interested me most. I want to stay here.

We're going to circle back to a couple on-field questions just about what this means for each of these teams, and there's a couple other angles I want to hit. But, all right, let's clarify a couple things. The person you mentioned, Jimmy Sexton at CAA, is agent to many high-profile coaches in college football. He's not necessarily the media agent of other people who appear on television and talked about this, right?

So his agency represents some of those people. But Saban and now Rex Ryan are the two guys who have obviously over the years had relationships with the same agent and where I think everything you said is valid. There's a couple other guys where it's a little less clear. They're represented by the same agency. Are they texting with people? Are they getting talking points from people? Of course we don't know.

But that's where guys like Orlovsky, Herb Street, Booger McFarlane, those types of guys come in. I do think it's worth analyzing that a little deeper if you're a sports fan of like, how are these people formulating their opinions? Where are the information coming from? I don't think that we should suggest there's a giant conspiracy and that they're all saying it because they're in cahoots between the college football playoff and ESPN. I don't think we should be doing the Charlie Day thing, but I do think we should be asking how are their opinions formulated?

Why do they think the things they think? So I'll ask you, why do you think this is about, Lane Kiffin and not about the college football calendar, which was the argument that several of them made on the air. Okay, so because the college football calendar is something that these coaches wanted. They wanted this calendar. So signing day is tomorrow, Gabe, the first signing day,

National High School sign a day. It used to be in mid-February, but coaches want the players to come in January. They want the players to commit and be there for winter workouts, to be ready for spring ball, to be able to play in this upcoming scene. So the coaches wanted this calendar, right? they won this calendar.

But more importantly, this is something that I know that we are moving away from this being about a student athlete and more just about being an athlete, right? Which is fine. That's always sort of the way it's been, but there's always at least been to talk about being a student first. And look, and for 90% of the guys that are playing, the student part of it is very important still, right?

They're not going the NFL. They're not pursuing professional athletics afterwards, right, Gabe? And the reason why the calendar is what it is, is because to transfer or to come as a high school recruit early, you have to be eligible, academically eligible, to play in your sport. You only do that if you go to class game and classes start in January for the winter semester or winter quarter or whatever you have or whatever you're like Oregon's on a quarter school. So Oregon starts like immediately in January.

Early January, Oregon starts the winter quarter. And so this has to be done now. So players who are in the portal or high school, players that want to be there in the winter can get to class and be eligible to play, Gabe. That's why the calendar is what it is. It's the academic calendar that football has to follow

to make all of this work. If you want to change the whole thing, you would say essentially, I think you move it to the summer, and that would be when recruiting start, basically the commitment period starts in the summer. We used to commit Gabe in February and show up in the summer. That's what used to happen. But again, that's

not when freshman played. That's before I was the third Oregon offensive. to Lyman to play as a true freshman in school history in 2004. Like young players did not play before my era. You just didn't play. Now true freshman play all the time and you play because you show up in January and you go through the entire winter program, you go through spring ball and you're more prepared to play in September.

And so the academic calendar matters here. And people, the same people, by the way, would argue that the student athlete, the student part of it still matters. the same people that want to argue that the calendar is the reason why this whole thing is a mess. It's not it. Those have to. So if you want to turn this into again, the student part doesn't matter at all. Sure, change the entire calendar. But also too, the regular season is over right now. And people argue that I see the argument that the NFL waits to the regular season is over. The regular season ended. It's done, Gabe. The reggae season is over. It's done. It's done.

Now there's a playoff still to come. But in the NFL, if you're a coach, who is, has a team is in the postseason. There are rules about, like, you're not leaving your team. You can, you can agree to a job, but you're not leaving your team. That's the same thing in college football. So I think the calendar is like the boogeyman

and uses an excuse for the inappropriate behavior that happens this time of year with this whole coaching cycle at times. But the calendar is something that coaches wanted and that it has to revolve at academics. Okay, so then let's zero in on Coach Saving. It went on game day and I think a lot of people had their eyes opened

to everything you've just talked about when Coach Saban chimed in, right? Now, remember, he and Lane have a weird relationship. Yes. He hired Lane, probably upon suggestion from the same agent, had him for a couple years and then didn't allow him to coach

in a national championship game. Basically was like, get out of here, and then off went Lane, and then the rest is history. So presumably they know, each other well, how they feel about each other is unclear. Sabin made a very impassioned case about this being about the athletes, right? And then he said all the stuff he thinks about the calendar. So if we're going to give Nick Saban the benefit of the doubt, or we're going to give Louis

Reddick, who offered a couple suggestions on how he might change the calendar, if we're going to take the calendar idea seriously, even though you just explained how it's tied to the academic year, are there tweaks, like, could we satisfy that argument in good faith if we thought any of them we're trying to be productive. Yeah, but you have to basically move the entire thing to the summer, which is the only solution that you're proposing. I don't know. Well, how else do you do it during the academic?

If we still agree that academics matter and that this is. We're stipulating that we're pretending they do. Okay. Then you have to either do it. Dude, the problem is like you have, you still have quarter schools. Like, they're not even on the same calendars. Oregon, UCLA, like they're not on the same calendars. The rest of the schools on the West Coast.

USC's a semester school, right? Like, they're not on the same calendar. So you have to find a time to, to like get the player in either in January or I guess when second semester starts, which is when, I don't know when second semester starts. Well, I mean, right now, just to be specific, my understanding is the transfer portal is currently January 2nd, January 16th. That checks to you. When you can enter, correct, yes. Yeah. Right.

Right. And then some Riddick, for example, is proposing we just tighten that and. slide it back to make it about a week instead of about two weeks, and then begin it after we've already gotten into bowl season. So basically give us more time. This is his suggestion. I'm just, wait.

Wait, he wants a transfer portal window to happen to move. I'll just read you what he tweeted. Move portal back and shorten it from January 2 through 16 to January 8 through 16. Players on teams and national title game have additional three days following national title game. They already have that in there for players. that play in playoff games okay yeah so make me smarter here does that does that logic work what what

no that doesn't change anything it wouldn't change anything you're saying about the academic the the window for the portal is just to declare that you're leaving your school yeah you can get signed anytime after that game so the portal can be one day you can just do it all in one day that's not the that's not really the issue um and and teams that are on a they may be changed in this new iteration of the window, which they closed more this year. They was bigger. They closed it a little bit.

But previously, if you were a playoff team, your season ended December 21st, you had five days to declare. It would actually be the opposite. It would be the later. Let's say you finished after the window was closed, which is possible if you played in a championship game.

You had five days after the championship game to then declare, like your window was still open, essentially. So that's nothing new to the portal. The portal is not even like the problem. I mean, the problem is high school recruiter. Again, today is the second. Tomorrow is the first signing day.

So all these schools that had openings have to get a coach in to at least have a warm body in the seat. Penn State, as if we're talking right now, has no coach. They're going to expect players to commit to their school tomorrow without a coach. Yeah. So to me, it's a high school recruiting window. that makes this much worse.

Put it back where it was, Gabe, or at least move it back to maybe January, and say, we just don't need to have these kids on campus so early. Now, I'm almost against that, by the way. I don't think that kids should cut their high school years short. Enjoy being a kid for a little bit longer before you go to college. That's my opinion on that.

I enjoy being a senior for five months before you show up to college, but that's everyone's own personal decision. But if you move this back a little bit where you don't have to run, to get classes signed tomorrow. I mean, Will Stein, the Oregon head coach got hired yesterday as the Kentucky head coach. He's got to get a class, like put together in 24 hours. That part of the calendar, to me, needs to be fixed.

The portals have to be fixed as much. But it also, Gabe, if you moved everything back two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, LSU is still going to do the same process to hire Lynn Kiffin. It's not going to change. It's not going to change. change like the process. You want to get a coach immediately in place to start the recruiting process, to start the staff hiring process, to start getting boosters excited about, you know, the program moving forward to keep the players you have currently right now. No one's going to wait

an extra two weeks because the calendar moved to hire Lane Kiffin. It's not going to happen that way. It's fundamentally not going to change what I think what happens. The issue is that there's so much money invested now in recruiting in the portal and being good that there's always going to be a thirst to do it faster, quicker right now. I'm not sure changing the calendar three weeks or four weeks will change much. I think if you make it in the spring, which seems silly to wait to hire coach of the spring, but basically you move portal and high school recruiting later, like really later, like after the season into the spring, maybe there's not this rush.

Maybe Lane Kiff can continue to coach Old Miss for another month, and then you don't feel the pressure to get in there right now and make this happen. But it's a rival too. Like, Lane's a bad example. The better example would be, you know, a group of five coach moving up that feels the pressure to have to leave their school, which none of them are doing.

They're staying and coaching the schools they have. So, like, Lane feels like the outlier here. Again, Eric Morris in North Texas went to Oklahoma State. Two lanes. Their coach went to Florida. Their coaching gets to this weekend. They're both promised to stay on through the playoff. JMU's head coach went to UCLA.

He's staying on through Apostle Playa Birth. Orkin's offensive coordinator went to Kentucky. He's staying on and calling a plays through hopefully a long playoff opportunity. Oregon's defensive coordinator, potentially to taking the cow job. He's staying on to coach through the playoff game. Everyone else is doing it except Lankific. Because he went to a rival of Old Miss. So we can't just use this one really massive.

messy situation to say the rest of it is messed up because the rest of it's going how normally had gone, which is you take a job, you stay where you're at until you finish that job and you move it along. But Lane Kiffin went to arrival and made it supremely messy. There's a tweet today with like 10 different things that Lane did like during this process that are just the reason why Old Miss Tom, their fans are angry. Like he tweeted like daily devotional ambiguously teasing whether he would stay or go, which he did. He had other school's airplanes fly into Oxford during rivalry week. He tweeted out Lane 2026 Kiffin hats in Old Miss colors.

Like he did he went on these interviews and said dumb stuff. Um, his dog's Twitter account was like sub tweeting stuff about SE championship stuff. Like all this stuff like he did is a lane problem. It's not a calendar problem. It's a lane problem. Okay. Good. So we're back to him.

There are a thousand other creative suggestions for how to fix the calendar. if you believe the calendar is the problem. But we're saying on this show, we're focused on him. So talk to me then about what this means for this Ole Miss team. Because, you know, look, I've rooted for a team that he was briefly a part of, you know, that didn't meet expectations and he was fired on the runway, allegedly. Plenty of people have rooted for a team that Lane Kiffin has been the coach of and then left under bad circumstances.

What does it do for this Ole Miss team, which feels very much like a title contender. I mean, really. Well, I mean, I don't think they're winning a title, but they are a playoff team. Their defense is not going to have to win it to a championship. So here's a question. So I was on Bear Betts yesterday, my other podcast, go check it out as well if you like this one. And we're talking about the point spread without Lane Kiffin. And people suggested like two to four points difference. And that's probably right, game, but it feels a lot more than that, right? So you're losing your primary play caller in Lane. And I think they lost their

offensive coordinator as well and maybe another offensive coach. So you're losing all of the offense of brainpower with a quarterback that was a division school to last year who's now playing in a playoff game. And it just walked out the door. That's a big deal, Gabe. That's a big deal. There's not enough people right now, I think, to replace that knowledge and that brain power when it comes to designing an offense.

Also just a relationship, right? I would imagine that when their quarterback comes off the field after a bad play or bad series, he talks to the two guys that left, like that left the building. And they're certainly going to be in us against the world mentality and an FU, we're going to show everyone that we can do without lane. I know what they're going to say in the building. But I think that's really difficult to actually show on the field. Like I'm even concerned about a little bit.

It's fair, I think, like Oregon's offensive coordinator is going to Kentucky, okay? and he's going to still call plays for Oregon in the playoff, as he should. He's going to spend the next 10 days doing Kentucky stuff as he should. We don't have an opponent yet. There's no playoff opponent yet. You won't play that opponent. It's December 2nd now until the 19th or 20th, I believe. So he has plenty of time to do Kentucky stuff and do Oregon stuff.

But there's a little bit of me that's like, is he going to be focused enough on Oregon stuff during that week of preparation? You know, like that's fair, right? He's going to have his phone on. And he's not to deal with recruiting and hiring staff of Kentucky. and all that stuff. He's going to be there, and I trust Will Steyn.

Again, this is nothing into Will Stein. I love what he did. Good for him. He should be able to do both jobs. But there's a little bit of me that as an organ fan. It's like he probably will not be 100% without distraction,

you know, that week of preparation. Now the coaches aren't even there for Oldness. Like, they're not there, Gabe. So I think it matters a lot. Now, do you dock them? Do you don't allow them to have a home playoff game? I think that's unfair. I made the argument in Florida.

they lost their quarterback that you should be able to keep. There should be a playoff team anyways. I'm curious what they do here as far as the playoff committee and figuring out where they should be in the postseason. But I think it's a big deal. I don't know, again, if it matters two to four points, whatever the point spread should say. But they also look, their defense is,

I think the lowest rate of any of the playoff teams right now. So now you lose your OC, you lose your play call, use your offensive identity, and now your defense isn't great. they're in a bad spot. They weren't going to win the championship anyways. But I mean, like, Lane Kiffing cheating,

like cheating on his wife and then saying, I want to stay in the house through Christmas. Like that's the same. I can't believe that that was a thing that people suggested that should be allowed. I can't believe people went on ESPN and made those. And then another comment, like,

I know we're going along with this. I don't care. Another comment was made. I got a lot more. Keep going. Like on ESPN yesterday. Of people that know, they know better said yesterday morning.

Well, why did old miss offer him more money? They did offer him money. It's not about money. Like, he gave us all the money in the world. It's not about money. It's about situation. He wanted to go to LSU because he thinks he won a championship there. Why are we talking about this?

Like, we're five years old. This is from, it's from Adam. You don't know the business, Adam. You don't know the old miss offered him just as much money. Everyone reported that. Why are we doing this? Why are we saying dumb things on TV that you know are not true? Just for some sort of talking point.

I don't understand it, man. Well, that's the point of this show, is to cut through some of the dumb talking points. Again, all of us are in group chats. All of us get information from a variety of different people. If your network of people happen to be a bunch of folks incentivized to spread a talking point, they can say it and believe it. Again, it's not a conspiracy. There might just be this underlying feeling that, oh, man, it's the calendar.

That's the problem. That's what they're all chatting about. Oh man, this guy's not motivated by money. There was, Lane, apparently, doesn't know what he's being paid. Left it all to his agent. Didn't care about the money. That's the report.

Look, I know, no, no, that's what he said. It's not the report. It's what he said. Do you, I mean, do you buy that at all? No, of course I don't buy that at all. I didn't either, but you just said he has all the money in the world, and this might be about wanting to win a title somewhere else, and he obviously burned the bridge,

as he left Oxford. So I guess I have to ask. He burned the bridge while he was still standing on it. Could it be? I don't know why I'm taking this position, but here goes. I'm going to try to defend Lane Kiffin on that quote. Could it be that he said,

hey man, if you get me to 90 million and anything above 90, I'm good. I don't even care about the details. I don't care if you get me private jet access or luxury box or this or that. I don't care. Just get me 90 million or better and I'm in. and then he genuinely didn't know any of the other details that have since been reported.

Is that possible? I mean, are you going to sign a contract that's $90 million and not read the contract at least a little bit before? I've signed contracts for no millions of dollars and not read them. So, yeah, of course. But, no, I mean, like, how much does it, is this about winning a title at the next school? And how much better are his odds at LSU than they would have been at Ole? They're better LSU to win a championship. Please explain this to me.

I mean, I think I know why you feel that way, but let's walk through that. Why is it so much easier to win at LSU than Ole Miss? Okay. So a couple of things are worth doing here. I'm going to ask you this question. Do you know the last time a team won their first championship in college football, what year that was, the last time a team won their first championship? That's a fun question.

The last time a team won its first ever title. Inconventional, yeah. Most of the titles I remember recently have come from what we would call Blue Bloods. No, I mean, I'll save us time. I don't know the last time. Okay, it's Florida in 1996 was the first time a team won their first championship. Got it. I mean, they've won since, but you're saying that was the first time Florida had ever won.

Okay. And that was the last time a team won their first championship. So my point is being the sport has typically been won by teams that have always sort of won. Okay. It's why what Oregon's doing, by the way, is like near impossible, like to win a championship for the first time out of nowhere. That's another topic for another day. If they win a championship, that would be the number one topic I will talk about. Nonetheless. Now, Old Miss won championships back in the 60s game. That's so long ago, right? Like, they're not a team. When they were called New Miss instead of Old Miss. Yeah, exactly, yes. I like that. I like that. Ha-ha. When, when they... I'm just saying. So, like, people... in the industry and recruits, don't look at Old Miss's championship caliber, right? They do look at LSU that way.

Now, they won in 2019, of course. They do look at Florida that way because they won with Urban Meyer. And so that's a big, and it's a big thing when you need just a player that is just a little bit better at Old Miss, you're not going to get that guy. That guy's going to LSU, right, Gabe?

And that's a different thing between Old Miss and LSU. You get Old Miss won championships, I think in the 60s, but so long ago that it really is inconsequential to football nowadays. And that's, I think, the difference here is that at LSU, you're going to get a little bit better player because they view that program as A, a championship caliber program, and B, a program that puts guys in the NFL at a higher rate.

And I think that's the difference between this job and the old miss job. And specifically, I think, on defense. Like, you're going to get better players on D.S. defense because you're the state school of Louisiana, you're right by Florida. I know Mississippi is there. I get it. I know the map. But just the fact that LSU has sent some of the NFL on both sides of the ball, impact

pro bowl, all pro players. The brand name is bigger. You've won championships recently. That, I think, is the difference between the LSU job and an old miss job. Is there more NAL money to be had as well? And that feels like the only thing we need to be talking about. I don't know. I don't know. I mean.

Okay. But so. So the NIL thing, dude. So continue. Well, we've, we spent time earlier this season talking about how it's not really working at UNC because the kids that,

you know, Bill Belichick's trying to recruit, barely know who he is. Yeah. So I guess I'm wondering like, okay, but how, I mean,

isn't it just about the money at this point for the five star guys? Like, why, Why does anyone care if it's Lane Kiffin or any other guy like him? There's only 32 five stars, by the way. That's only 32 of them. So there's not, I think we think there's a lot, but there's not. For 24-7, there's 32.

So I made this case for a long time, Gabe. I don't think a majority of kids go to schools for the money alone. There are certain kids that do. That's fair. I'm not dying that. I think that that's part of it, but also the coaching staff is part of it, development's part of it,

the city you're going to, the atmosphere, all those things we used to think matter, I think still matter. Because I know, for example, people think Oregon pays the most every kid. They don't give. I know the people that give these contracts out. They don't give the most money to every player.

Otherwise, they get every player they wanted. You know, like that's not the way it works. There are certain players in every cycle who go for just the, money. And that's fine. That's their choice. But a lot of players are choosing a lot of money, right? It's a lot of money and equal and most often contracts from schools that are about equal, but then the other things still matter, right? The coaching development, the personal relationships with the coaches, the city you're in, like all those things that they still matter, Gabe.

And so that's why at LSU, I think you're going to be able to sell players that this is LSU. This is a program that won five years ago. It's a program that has all these professional football players. It's a program that has this long history of being successful. And maybe that a kid takes $100,000 less to go to LSU, that $100,000 is spent elsewhere. If you do that for 7, 8, 9 players, you get yourself a big war chest to go get more players, Gabe.

So that, I firmly believe that. I've been told that. That's the way it works for the most part. And that's the sell of LSU over Old Miss. I think Old Miss you have to pay the players more to come than you would have LSU. Okay, but again, we're going to talk about 18-year-old kids here. Yeah.

Who didn't, don't know anything about any of these old coaches, right? Then like, Lane Kiffin, you and I still think of as a younger coach. He's not young. Right? Yeah. Yeah. We'll get into why that's weird in a few minutes. But the, um, the question I guess I'm asking is like,

if you kind of didn't really know the history of any of these coaches, and then they show up at your door and they're, sitting next to mom or grandma or whoever and they're trying to tell you about all the great things that are going to happen in their program. And all you've heard on TikTok lately is about this guy Lane Kiffin and how much of a slime ball he's been with all the teams he's ever coached. And that's the narrative. Yeah.

Why are you like, man, sign me up. Give me that guy. Like doesn't this actually have an impact on his ability to get the next class? I would think. Well, that's, that's the question, right? is like, is this going to be used negatively in recruiting for everyone around him? I imagine it is. How would it not be?

But that's what LSU has to deal with. And I don't know how that's going to matter. I don't know how that's going to matter, Gabe. But it definitely will be used against him, which is like every, it should be, right? That's the way this, this, this, this, this, this beast works where that's used against him. And so, um, you look, the money thing about the sport is blowing up like crazy. I mean, I don't know if you follow the BYU, Sataki, Penn State thing that's happening right now.

But so BYU's Penn State, by the way, looks like to have completely botched this coaching thing. They fired James Franklin so early in the cycle. And they're going after BYU's head coach, Kalani Satakki, who played at BYU. And the amount of money pouring in to keep him, the CEO of like Crumble cookies is getting involved, like publicly. There's another like billionaire,

associated the BYU program was supposedly pouring in money. The church is getting evolved there as well, apparently. And it seems like Stock is going to stay, I guess, Gay. But the amount of big money players that are making themselves known during this process, even though BYU sneakily is one of the most

and best highly funded NIL departments in the country, it's just to watch this play out, man. It's entertaining. I'll tell you that. Well, let's take a quick break because the red string connects between everything we've just discussed and B.I or Penn State's coaching vacancy. Those two intersect if you read the internet closely. We'll get to that after the break and then a million other college football on NFL topics. All right, Gabe. We're back.

More college football to get to. What do you want to go next? Well, I think we have to close the loop. on this theory. So we talked about him earlier. I don't mean to put any name on blast, but Jimmy Sexton, pretty public figure and this whole conversation around Lane Kiffin, there are corners of the internet who believe that the reason Penn State has not found its replacement coach is because when they fired James Franklin, a client of this agent, he got pissed and has made it very, very hard on the school to find their next guy, allegedly. Now, I don't know exactly how those mechanics work, and this is

coming from, you know, people on Reddit. But it kind of stands to reason that agents who have all of the top coaches and who can leverage, you know, the scale of their client list against every university could make life hell for a school that crosses them. So do you think that might be a factor? Okay. I saw this as well. I'm the truth of like, why would, where would matter?

Like, who do they miss out on that you could have gone? So the couple of ideas are that Chesney, right? The GMU coach who went to UCLA. I don't know who his agent is. We was talking about Kaelin Dabor going to Penn State. I'm trying to think of the early names. Oh, Eli Drikowitz, right? Well, Kailin Dibor is a relevant one.

Kailin Dabor is a relevant name. Sorry to cut you off. It's because, allegedly, the vacancy created at Alabama was sort of a seat held by the same agent. And that's how Dabor ended up at Bucson. Bama. And so sending Dibor to Penn State. Why would DeBore leave Bama, though?

We don't even know that that was a real thing. He wouldn't unless he had lost the Iron Bowl. Right, but he won the Iron Bowl. He did, but. There's just not a lot of evidence that that's the case, that a lot of his, that sexton guys were like lining up to be Penn State head coach. And so, look, is it possible?

Yeah, it's not possible, Gabe. I don't think you argue otherwise, but I just don't see a ton of evidence publicly that that's been the case. Okay. Well, Todd McShay is telling Bill Simmons. He thinks that might be the case. Well, Todd McShay also does a lot of stuff about things that, I don't know, man. He called out Oregon's tight end, and it just hasn't gone well since he did that.

I don't really know why he did that. All the reports have been to the opposite of calling out a player for his work ethic and the way they use him. And then they just, and then he wouldn't apologize. guys. And it is, he also says something about like some other coach going somewhere else. I don't know, man. There's a lot of people that, not just him, that just, they hear things from agents and they just report it as fact. And I just don't do that. I, I hear stuff too. I don't, what, what benefit do I get from making this stuff public? None. I don't need the internet clout to tweet out rumors and talk about rumors.

But we'll see what, what Penn State does. They don't have a guy right now, which is kind of wild. Everyone sort of has a guy Again, signing days tomorrow and Penn State is still without a coach. Last on the coach stuff, do you think Lincoln Riley was seriously considering other jobs

like the reporting was like out there that he wanted Florida and other stuff? I mean, I'm not ruling it out. Look, there are three guys who I would, if I hadn't had, you know, experience rooting for teams that they were connected to, I wouldn't be able to tell you the difference

between these three dudes. Cliff Kingsbury, Lane Kiff, and Lincoln Riley. Truly. Like, I think if you're just some guy who kind of likes football and kind of, you know, kind of pays attention, but doesn't really do this,

what we've been doing this whole time. Can you really confidently distinguish between those three guys who kind of just always seem to just skate above the club? You know, they're just, Always like just barely missing the bumps and they keep getting new chances and they're known for offense and they get the Heisman guy and they do this. And right when you were like, I don't know, man, I'm not sure this guy's got it on to the next job.

Every time with all of them. Yes. It's been a little less messy with Lincoln and with Cliff Kingsbury than Lay. Of course. And dude, I'm telling you the lane stuff. I haven't tried to avoid some of like the internet like rumors. stuff that old miss people are tweeting about but stuff's going to come out man it's not it's not going to be good it's as messy as possible the you know the yoga stuff he was very famously going

like to hot yoga and the yoga instructor started tweeting stuff out and their instagram and thing about his dog like the dog that he supposedly had might have been like a rental dog or not his own dog um yeah like he left supposedly that it's not his dog yeah it's not his dog wait hold on so herbie's dog is on band list. Elaine Kiffin's dog's not on the band list. What the hell are you talking about? He has a rental dog. So he is a dog named Juice.

I think of his name. And he was tweeting from his account. And I think the, I think Juice is not his dog or like, it's a rental dog or like not really, I'm going to find it for you right now. I think it's not his dog. So, yeah.

Yeah, I think we're going to, I'm going to have to enlist our pal, uh, Pablo Torre here. I just, I'm not following what a rental dog is. I've owned a dog. I've owned a foster. So I mean, I shouldn't say,

I have not owned a foster dog. I have cared for a foster dog. I mean, would we call that a rental dog? Supposedly that's what it might have been. Like, that he just, he just fostered a dog that pretended like it was his own dog,

but it wasn't actually his dog. And now that dog's not taking the journey? No. Oh. Yeah. Apparently. They did not live in his house, yeah. By the way, nice, that first thing I've heard about Lane Kiven today that I respect,

having a dog that doesn't live with you sounds perfect. Like, there's a dog down the street. My kids can go play with it. We love the dog. We go, we take it for walks. It occasionally comes to the house and plays around. But at the end of the day, like, that dog doesn't live here. Sounds great.

You're the first person I know that doesn't like dogs. Like I just said I kind of like dogs On occasion Like it's fun to play with a dog I love when my kids are around a friendly dog But I don't want to care for a dog 24-7 The dogs are sleeping right there in the corner

He's listening to you know he cares So okay so We're gonna move to some other topics shortly And I'm with you We don't really need to get into all the other rumors That are swirling about Lane Because he's now an enemy in Oxford Probably a lot of it's BS

I, I, uh, maybe. I, I, I, I, I think that Lane, um, you know, he's, he's divorced, right? Divorced and he, he, I think, I think some of those, some of those things are probably true. But, um, they're going to come out and they're going to be, you know, for a couple weeks. I'm sure those stories will make its way around the internet. They're hard to find, though. They're hard to verify. Didn't Coach O get fired because of, uh, being, there were some issues with how he was

treating his personal life? Isn't that why he was like a... I think Coach O got fired because he actually is probably not a great head coach. He's a great motivator and he hires good staff. But like as soon as it goes bad,

I feel like they're like, there's no reason to even keep this guy. Like, what value does he bring? It's not like you keep him because he can just rehab out the offense with better players. It's just, dude, Coach O's awesome.

He, I saw him at the Super Bowl, was it two years ago? him and his guy Derek. And Coach O' Pretended to remember who I was. It was awesome. He's like, oh, I remember recording you at USC. He'd been a big kid, man. We wanted you a lot.

I was like, thanks for remember me, Coach. I appreciate the pretending to know who I was. He did recruit. I'll tell you what, man. Coach O 2004, 2003, was recruiting me, right? Fall 2003, USC. Now, as you know, I despise USC. But they're in the middle of like this historic run.

Dude, they didn't lose a game. I think they lost maybe early 03 and then didn't lose a game. The rest of 03, the entire 04, and not to the final game of 05, right, to Texas. Like they didn't lose a game for nearly three years. So they're recruiting me. And of course, if USC offered me, I was going. But USC only offered the exact amount of kids they could offer because they knew as soon as the offer went out, you were going to commit. and USC was one of the most honest schools I dealt with.

Ed Orgeron told me the exact situation. He goes, we're waiting for one player. End up being Jeff Byers, who was actually Colorado player of the year. His high school film was incredible. He was a center. If Jeff Byers commits, you're out. If he doesn't commit, we'll probably send you an offer.

So they were recruiting me. He called me every Monday at 7.20 in the evening. Every time, like I was on the list. I talked to him for 5, 10, minutes like I don't know five whatever it was I came I went to a USC game I did all stuff and then he won October morning or night he called me was like hey man Jeff Byers committed and you're out I was like okay there like thanks for being honest and then never talked to him until I saw him 20 years later at a Super Bowl party in Houston it was Houston wow where's

Jeff Byers these days uh I don't know Jeff was a short NFL career but uh he does his high school film was incredible he made even getting a great player the year he just was murdering dudes at center i think he played senator in uh in in uh high school as well but uh usc was super honest man like super it was uh it was great thank you we run an honest program um all right well there'll be more chances to talk about this saga i suspect there'll be a lot more reporting on how this whole thing went down obviously the pen state vacancy all of these things will will give us more chances to talk about this and i i'm with you I suspect that because the target is on his back now, deservedly or not,

more stuff about Lane Kiffin's conduct and, you know, behind the scenes of this job and the money he's being paid or not, all of that's going to become a topic. So let's come back to that. Let's go back to the NFL now. Can we do one more 30 seconds? Do whatever you want, baby. Let's do it.

Does this end messy with Lane Kiffin at LSU? Yes or no? Of course, yes. Yeah, of course it does. Yeah. Does he win a championship there? I would say no. I have no idea.

I mean, if supposedly he has better chance now than he did before and he already had a pretty good chance. So, I mean, that I don't know. But my guess is as soon as the walls start closing in, you know, he's being rumored as the Raiders next coach or whatever. Like that's coming. Yeah. Some crap NFL team is going to get told that he's the solution before he turns. and 60 and he'll still be considered like an offensive genius who can turn some ship around and that he's going to bring the quarterback and you know we'll be given the same thing we've

been given about every other pretty good college coach who didn't quite make it like it's coming i just don't know if it's one year or five years yeah lasted longer at old miss than pretty much anywhere else i totally agree well we'll see what the timeline is here's a guy ready for a guy who's lasted longer than anyone in the NFL, guy who we spend a lot of time second-guessing, guy who we won't bet on, guy who we love to make fun of, guy who probably nailed it this off season,

Jerry Jones, the Cowboys, are better without the best defensive player in football. They added pieces as a result of that trade, they picked up picks, something is working. it's time we're more than halfway through the season. It's time to be honest. Colin Cowherd, you know, I'm a big fan of Collins' takes. Colin basically said it, and I'm saying it to you,

like it didn't seem like a good idea, but it sure it worked out. Do we have to give Jerry Jones's flowers or whoever the hell made that decision for him? Because it seems like the Micah trade went in favor of Dallas. How did it go in favor? Micah Parsons just had like a eight sacks

in the last two games. It's one of those rare circumstances. where both teams get better from an enormous trade? Yeah, it's entirely possible. But the Packers are going to be in the playoffs, the Cowboys are not. So I don't really know, like, what, is that, how we base this on the wind.

Are the Cowboys in the playoffs and Michael Parsons played all season for them? That's the question, right? Like, their defense is atrocious. It's a hard thing to prove, but, like, they pick up two defensive linemen who are both good, neither as good as Mikea Parsons.

but something is working. They just beat your chiefs. They beat the Eagles. They don't suck as bad as we thought they would. So I think we just have to be honest and say maybe, maybe the old man was right this time. Maybe they did something smart. The subsequent moves, I think, have been bright, right?

Quinn and Williams was a good trade. The Pickens trade was good. And, you know, they got overshone back, which certainly helped them defensively as well. But I think in this discussion, we're taking away the credit from probably where it deserves to be, which is, which is Dak Prescott. Because Dak Prescott, whenever he has been healthy game,

he has been a really good football player. Now, I know people want to rank, where's he ranking the NFL? I don't know, who gives a shit when he ranks? Every time he's healthy, everything's healthy game, the Cowboys' offense is good. They've been good. Every year he's about it. The problem is he's not been healthy.

This year is healthy. The offense is incredible. Yes, the pick and's trade certainly has helped Dak Prescott out. Absolutely. But Dak has executed it. He really has. And look, I mocked the Brian Schoenheimer higher. I think we all did.

And it seems to be going well. Look, when you have a new coach, new coordinator, it can be the same, right, coach coordinator, new de-coordinator, and quarterback, right? When they're all sort of new together, it takes about eight to 12 weeks to start seeing the fruition of that, of that play caller and quarterback connection or defensive play caller or defensive play caller

or defensive connection. And in two places we're seeing it go up, right? Dallas, right? We're seeing it get better. Chicago, we're seeing it get better. On the flip side, Philly offensively, right? Straight down. And the Lions missing Ben Johnson, right?

Starting to trend down about week 12 or 13. This is time we start seeing that either improvement or downward trend. And the Cowboys, it looks like to me, and give Schoenheimer credit, are on the upward trend. The thing about Dallas, it's so fun to discuss game, is we always talk about peeking at the right time, right? We talk about this, everyone else,

peaking the right time. It's great to peek at the right time, all right? But you have to win games early in the season for it to matter, peaking at the right time. We often ignore early season results and say, ah, the teams are figured out.

Maybe the Patriots would or the Chiefs would, but when you lose to the Panthers and the Cardinals, and the Bears are in the season. That doesn't give you the opportunity now to peek at the right time and make the post season. Yeah, the Cowboys are playing good football game. They got to win out to make the playoffs.

Like they left themselves no opportunity because they lost games they shouldn't have lost. So all the games matter, but peaking at the right time does matter if you're going to be in the playoffs. And the Cowboys might miss out on that opportunity because they weren't playing good ball to start the season. And part of that was their defense sucked

where they could use Michael Parsons. Okay. You brought it full circle. I ran a marathon when I was 25. My fastest two miles were mile 25 and 26. And you could say, well, that's pretty good. But I didn't peak at the right time. And I always was upset because I was like, man, if I just pushed a little harder or about mile 18, I could have really shaved some time.

So same point. I'm just like the Cowboys. You mentioned a couple other teams, including the Bears and the Lines that I want to talk about. We have about 10 more minutes in this show after this break. Let's take the break. Let's do real quick hitters, not quick hitters that take forever. And then we'll wrap it up. All right, we're back on the show.

Very, very, very quick hitters, Gabe. Go ahead. Travis Kelsey, podcast time. Are we up to just podcasts and album releases? Are we focused on football still? He seems to be focused on football. He's playing well. I'm kind of just teasing him.

What about the team? We good, Chiefs? No, we're not making the playoffs, which I told you guys weeks ago. Sticking with that. Why? Look at their schedule. They have to win out, essentially,

and they're not going to win out. They're not doing anything that makes you think they're going to win out. Okay. All right, well, then we'll save time on the Chiefs this week and maybe forever. They're not on the band list, but they're teetering. You said Ben Johnson a little bit ago. You know, I'll like to bring Caleb Williams into the conversation. I know that a lot of these wins seem a little goofy.

I know that you're going to tell me like, eh, you know, these are coin flip things and they're just getting lucky. But like, you're talking about when to peak. Like, I've even seen their peak. How do we know that these guys? aren't really great. No, I think it's worth mentioning. They're doing a good job, Gabe. That was a validating win on Friday night.

And I know that the Eagles have their issues. I get it, but they beat him up the line scrimmage. It was very impressive. And look, we'll talk about the playoffs a lot the next couple of weeks. But right now, the Bears are number one in the NFC. It's a little fluky, sure, sure. But the Eagles win was very, very validating for that program. And so I give them a lot of credit for getting it done.

done like that. Okay. Do you have concerns about either of these teams? And if so, who are you more concerned about? The Ravens or the Eagles? The Ravens. Go on. Oh, I just don't think they're very good right now.

I just, I don't know what about the way they play that makes you excited about, about what they are. And the Eagles, look, the Eagles, I think, just have to get better play calling it. I hope next year, he steps in. He's the head coach. He's got to figure that out. The Ravens have just, they're just, just, just combined really. this year. It's just not very good. And Lamar's not 100%, which really, I think, hurts their ability to just be as good as they need to be offensively. His legs are very

important to them. Yeah. Okay. I'm not taking the bait on Joe Burrow. Okay, he's back. Cool. Whatever. Let's talk about the Panthers. What? Like, what is this team? Even my son was like, wait, they, huh? They're kind of good, aren't they? But are they? I thought they stuck. Nobody can figure them out. Why would you ever bet on them? What are the Panthers? Who knows? But they beat the Rams. I mean, look, they're, so the last month, I'll top of my head, right?

They beat the Packers, beat the Rams, lost the Saints by 10, and then we're uncompetitive in my NFL against the 49ers. I think it's just an example of a young team with a young coaching staff, just figuring things out. You hope to get that base after the end of the season to get

to next year where you feel really good about where you are. Bryce Young's getting better, man, look, we kind of counted for dead. I don't know if he's ever going to be a franchise type guy. They'd have to pay him probably, but McMillan was a good draft pick. Like they're doing some good things, Gabe. Okay. They're like every year, there are dumb people trying to talk themselves into, you know,

the Steelers got to move on from Mike Tomlin. Yes. What are we doing? Yeah, it's time. They've won six their last 17 games. You're with the, you're with to get rid of Tomlin crowd. Buffalo ran the same play the same two run plays

from the same formation I think it was 30 times against Pittsburgh the other day Pittsburgh was unprepared for that They won six or less of their last 17 games are not a good football team

It is time to move on from Tomlin it happens You run your course and he's been there forever and won a Super Bowl time to move on nothing wrong with that All right LSU should have hired him then

that and no one is ever going to convince me that you're better off with somebody else over Mike Tomlin. Do you know the last year he, Mike Tomlin won a playoff game? I don't care, man. I mean, that's important, right? Pittsburgh's a team that strives to win playoff games.

I'm just, do you know when that was? Yeah, I don't know, but they've been in the playoffs almost every year of my life. So, I don't know. Was it five years ago they won a playoff game? Six, seven? What are we talking about? 2016. Would you, would you rather have a team that, like,

the Rams that won a Super Bowl or the Bengals that made a Super Bowl or like the Steelers that just sort of aren't ever competitive in the playoffs. Like would you rather root for a team that can make a Super Bowl and maybe win it or a team that just gets in the playoffs

and loses every year? You're talking to a guy who grew up in a city where his choices were the Jets and the Giants, okay? You chose the Jets, I know. Always irrelevant or exactly what you're talking about. Every five or 10 years out of nowhere a Super Bowl and then shitty again.

So I don't know how to answer that question. I just know, Mike Tomlin's a good coach. Speaking of the Giants, real quick here, my group chat fell for a Wesley Steinberg tweet about Abdul Carter. Yeah.

I think it... No, but he's like, Abdul Carter, though, was benched for the first quarter last night, but not for the tweet. I mean, maybe this is the reason why, but not, I don't think so. Okay, so that was not even the dumbest thing

that came out of that Giants game against the Patriots, who are now, what, 11 and 2? Can we cancel kicking? If who is missing kicks by literally missing the football, he kicked the ground, can we just be done with kickers? We can. We have 30 seconds left, Gabe. I want to bring up one thing before we go here. Did you see the video of the Waymo car driving through a police stop with a suspect on the ground with guns pointed at him?

Did you see the video of the Waymo car doing that? I've seen Waymo's drive-through accident scenes and cluelessly just drift. right through, but I have not seen that video. Gabe loves Waymo's, and so future sponsor here. I was hoping you had seen that, and we could discuss this to end the show, but clearly you have not. I will send it to you to enjoy for your morning, over your morning coffee. By the way, guys, we moved our Wednesdays, our Thursday show to Friday now.

Moved this is a Friday. Just FYI. We're going to make picks on Friday now. Hopefully it does better for us. I think it will, instead of making them on Wednesdays. Hope you guys enjoyed the show. We will be back on Friday. Matt and I Friday, making picks.

Have a great couple of things, everybody. Unless LSU offers us more.