Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - BIG 12 SQUAD - The Big 12's NIL ARMS RACE | How it's impacting Kansas

Episode Date: April 23, 2026

Big 12 basketball’s NIL arms race intensifies as Oklahoma State and West Virginia surge past BYU and Texas Tech with headline-grabbing transfer portal moves. Can Oklahoma State’s spending power and West Virginia’s strategic recruiting vault them into the conference elite? Jake Hatch spotlights BYU’s portal strategy and lingering questions at center, while the squad debates if any team can keep pace with the league’s escalating competition. Off the court, rumors swirl around Cody Campbell’s son and the potential for seismic shifts in Big 12 football power dynamics. West Virginia baseball’s electric offense and pitching depth push them into the national conversation, even as BYU battles pitching concerns and Oklahoma State scrambles to rebuild a depleted staff. From Houston’s uneven portal rankings to the drama of Friday night games, every team is fighting for postseason position. Is a new Big 12 baseball hierarchy emerging—or will traditional powers reassert control as the season heats up? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It is a nuclear arms race, except replaced nuclear with NIL, and it's Oklahoma State versus West Virginia at the top of the Big 12. Move over, BYU and Texas Tech. This is the Dose Grande Squad. You're talking ball with the Big 12 squad. From Oklahoma State to Utah, from Kansas State to BYU, from Houston to Texas Tech, it's the local experts of the Lockdown Podcast Network, bringing you scoops, breakdowns, and the most most comprehensive preview of the upcoming Big 12 weekend.

Buckle up, it's the Big 12 Squad, and we have a seat for you. Know her feelings and thin skin allowed. Squad up, you're part of the Big 12 Squad. Happy Thursday night, everybody, and she does say in the intro we're previewing a big, big 12 weekend. I guess we'll talk some baseball again today. We will start with Mountain Earpull, Locked on West Virginia. Jake Hatch, Locked on Cougs, talking all things, BYU,

Locked on Cougars, because locked on Couges is Parker Ainsworth, Houston. Cody Stovell, Locked on Oklahoma State and Drake Toll. I'm locked on Big 12. Thank you for making our shows your first listen every single day. Before we get to the baseball, we're recording on Monday night. So at this point, I still have my DeBanza Peterson tracker up as we speak. And there are even, like, Cody's got a few. There are examples across the board of guys who haven't declared for the NBA draft yet.

Maybe they have, maybe they haven't. My crystal ball doesn't show me that. What it does show me is Oklahoma State, the men, the women, the children. Something about what's happening in Stillwater right now. It's kind of insane. Cody Stovall, now near Paul, move over BYU and Texas Tech. It seems like you two are in a massive NIL arms race. That's right.

Move over, BYU. You ain't got the dollar dollar bills to compete with the cow poves down in the middle of America. Watch it. Watch it. They'll come after you, Cody. Oh, there he is. He's alive. No, realistically, this is great.

It feels nice. I don't think we have VYU money, but what we do have is more money than Utah. And that feels really, really good today. Really good. Polo, I want to get to you next, obviously, because I'm calling a kettle of West Virginia, Oklahoma State. I've crossed over with both you guys recently. And look, it is, the grass is very green in both of those locations right now.

Hatch does it feel like you look across the, the side of the conference, like, oh, man, I'm jealous of those guys because the portal hall out of BYU is right up there with a master law. Well, sure, the portal hall for BYU is pretty good so far, but they have a glaring hole at center, and I'm just not 100% convinced what they're going to do because they're chasing this Italian center who could wait until the week before the NBA draft before he decides really anything with regards to his future. And at that point, the portal could be picked over three times at that point.

But yeah, hold on, Hatch, you say in regards to his future. And again, this is Monday night at the time of recording, but there is. still a belief that there's it actually could happen to boston comes back i drake i love you but a jubonzo's not coming back sorry i i i i would love the idea of it trust me it'd be great for business but the amount of money he's in line for endorsements including the NBA world b yu can compete with that for one year but they can't compete for with it for the four years he'd be getting as a working out in the NBA and go as we as we outlined before he'd also be a year delayed to his second contract which would be impossible to match.

Like that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, we're talking hundreds of millions of dollars at that point. So that's that that's kind of the rub there. But to your point, Drake, BYU is doing a good job in the portal. But I actually like the fact that Oklahoma State West Virginia, like these programs are stepping up and step into the plate because you mentioned the fact, we beside BYU and Texas Tech. Well, they, let's be honest, the Cougars and the Red Raiders have been kind of carrying the, the, the banner in terms of being the big money programs in the conference. It's good to see other programs stepping up. because it only ups the competition level across the league.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't, I don't, I, was that me? My hands dropped, I'm sorry. I dropped the weapon. I don't, I'm on your side, Jake. I'm on your side. I'm on your side. I'm sort of flexing his wallet, talking about competition,

like Kevin Young's beating Calvin Samson one time. Hadn't happened. Won't happen. There he goes. There he goes. Won't happen. For the locked on Big 12, the locked on Coogs listeners out there,

who aren't up the code to what West Virginia is doing right now. It does feel like that is up there with Oklahoma State for one of the brands in the last month who are making the most noise both on the court. And I would say even on the football field. Yeah, we're excited. You know, I think what Oklahoma State is doing right now may be a cut above what most everybody else is doing.

I mean, obviously the usual suspects, but as far as momentum right now, Oklahoma State's doing really well. West Virginia is coming in right behind there. specifically basketball. Obviously, we feel really good about Len and Mozilla. I think a lot of people do. We were very lucky that we had a relationship there to kind of get that one sealed up, as well as being a former teammate of incoming five-star Miles Sadler. That was a big deal for us to get that. Another Bella Vista guys on campus today as well. So we'll see if we can wrap him up. And then we are obviously, as I reported earlier, very luckily because of Ross Hodge and the relationships he's been up a forge. Because we finally got a coach for two years in a row, we can actually go meet up with more than, you know, just that prayer donor, like Pat McAfee had to do for Rich Rod in year one. You've actually got some relationships where you can come up with an X amount of dollars, right? So West Virginia has been

able to kind of do that, get some momentum here to finish strong in basketball. And yeah, obviously football, the spring game, our festival just happened. Jake Owen was there. Your guy, Charles Wesley was with Ren Baker and company after that singing. So it's always been well on that front, obviously. And the word out of the spring festival was West Virginia is miles and miles better than they were last year. And they really, really are. Yeah. I. I I think the problem is Parker is taking really deep breaths after everyone's sentences. Like, all right, great. And then does nothing.

We can't operate like this. You want to talk about it? Okay, here's the thing. Yeah. We're all talking about money spending and this and that and a whole lot of thing. And I love it. Power to you. Spend it if you got it, guys.

That's awesome. On 3, Houston's 6th in portal rankings on 24-7, they're 11th. That's second of the Big 12 on one side, first and Big 12 on the other. and look, that's adding to what was already a program in the championship game, the three years we've been in this. Spend your money. I think you got to catch up, guys. Yeah, I'm like, okay, let's hear about it.

Yeah, I'm taking a deep breath. Yeah, I am. I'm like, okay, yeah, okay. It sounds like you guys should have easily got the number one ranked basketball player in the state of Utah then. Yeah, that's what we wanted. We had number one said in America. Yeah, number one centers is a good from Guinea.

I guess I say in America. Actually, it's funny you mention that by the metrics Mozilla most compares to him as far as returning centers next year. If he does what he did over the 16 games last year, your guy, he's like one percent. Your guy's in the 99th percentile,

he was in the 98th percentile. Yeah, but Arifon's not going to start for us. That's what I'm saying. Like, I get him. What's his name? I maybe thought, maybe it was your guy last year, the center. Arifon Deion. as the incoming freshman.

Jojo Tuggett played last year. But that's the thing I'm talking about. It's like I, um, there's so many good players. It's a really deep conference. I think that the thing is like, you need more than just talent in this conference. And I think that's like having good players is not enough.

Like this is a league where like 10 teams have good players. That's the deal. That's the reason it's so hard to win this league. Yeah. I'm killing it today, Jake. I'm killing it. it's so good yes to to to to book end it there is a big difference in a really good kansas basketball off season and a really good oklahoma state basketball off season there are two programs in

different spots therefore the same applies in my opinion to houston there's a difference in a hughston off season where we open the show be super excited houston is one of the best programs in America, if not the best program in the last 10 years, certainly the best program or not win the title, not to rub that part in. But Houston's expectation, unlike the Baylor Bears, Houston's expectation is at a different level than a West Virginia or Oklahoma State, as it should be until those two schools are in final fours or knocking the door down perennially as Houston and Kelvin Sampson have built. Coming up, where is Cody Campbell's son going to college? That's a real question. And it battered.

Bigley, this is the Dose Grande Squad. Okay, today's show is brought to you by Indeed sponsored jobs. Indeed is exactly where I go when I need to hire for Locked on Big 12 and I hire an intern. I actually got a text. I have a couple interviews on the books this week. Come on. Workplace chaos, deadline stacking up. Your inbox is full. That's where Indeed sponsored jobs helps you reach the people who actually fit your job description, exactly what you're looking for.

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Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire. This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs with Indeed. Okay, this is a bit facetious, but there is a piece of this where we used to have fun. to run and play on the on the big 12 squad and then one day we got all serious and started talking about sports i we all need a cody campbell i think we're barking up the wrong tree here man you can get his son who's being recruited by probably every college in america to play football for your school and if you do so you have unlocked pandora's box but cody's got enough money to support two

programs that much i know and you know who's got a very similar name to cody campbell Cody Stovell Conspiracy I think not As Jake Hatch would say Yeah Rumor has it The Campbell family may have a liking in Stillwater

Do we have the new T-moon Pickens taking over in Stillwater? Is that what we're getting out of here? Oh Cody It's more than that though I would love nothing more than to pump this to the end of time And as you already mentioned it, there's a lot of teams in the Big 12 that are recruiting Cody Campbell's son, right?

He's a viable candidate to in a lot of places. I asked him to be locked on Big 12 intern, by the way. I've also offered Cody's a little son a job. You mentioned you've got a callback. He can only be so many places at once. And he was in Stillwater. Why is he in Stillwater? Now, he's a businessman, right?

He's got a suite. He's got business people. He's probably talking business in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Yeah, it's probably business related, but it could have something to do with his son. Either it's about business and Cody Campbell is a businessman or Cody Campbell's son is going to make the most intelligent decision ever and come down the road to Stillwater America. Where's Chris Lovell when you need it? He's a business man, but his son is a business man. Okay.

That's very good, Hatch. So, Cody, you can connect the dots from me, though. what is there are a bunch of ties between Eric Morris and Lubbock that I've always known are there and I don't know the full details and all of them but Cody played at Tech I don't know if there's some crossover there too

I know Eric Morris had but well loved in Lubbock and I wonder if there's also some of this like hey my son can go play for my friend in a lot of ways that almost gives them a leg up versus every program not named Tech also right there is some advantage to the Cowboy I think yeah there's no doubt

and again I fully accept the that Cody Campbell's just, you know, he's politicking, he's networking, he's doing what a businessman does. But it's at least fun to speculate that his son likes orange and black better than red and black. Can we, like Drake said, can we not just have fun? Do we have to be serious all the time nowadays? Do we have to be talking about how good Houston is all the time? And like for me, I'm, that, that quote will never, never. So good. But the funny thing about is I'm looking at it from the BYU protective. Why haven't we offered his son?

Like, BYU is not done that. What's going on here? Like, what are we missing? Like, why not get in the sweepstakes? Baylor, Missouri, Colorado. Duke's in there? Why not? Like Duke basketball is going to be unlocked. Yeah. Paul,

where's West Virginia for this one? And that's how Mel Gibson came up with the passion of Christ. Chris Lovell would probably confirm. firm. I'll be honest. You want to jump in the sweepstakes here? Well, I'll be totally honest. I was thinking about baseball whenever you guys were going over all that.

I was baseball. You know what connects you and I and has offered Cody Campbell's son either or neither you or I have? Dana Hogerson and Nebraska have offered Cody Campbell's son. Absolutely. I mean, is that not a great? Wow. Biden, Dana.

Do you that work? If I trade haircuts, what do we, hold on, put it back on the screen. Can you get it back? Yeah. If I, like, give him the front of my hair. Okay, back to me, back to me. And then we, yeah. Oh, my gosh.

Does that mean you have to take the front of his hair? Oh, yeah, exactly, Drake. That's the problem. You might have to trade. That's sad. Oh, yes. That's so good. I mean, how do you not do that every show?

Holly Bravo in the bill. Why do you wear the world to say me? It's not just a phase, dude. It's a way of life, sir. This is great. Don't want to be an American idiot. Look how shiny my face is. You know what it's from?

I put some lotion on my face earlier. It puts the lotion on its head. It absolutely lit me on fire. I was like, what in the hell is? He's just rubbing the hair. Nar, gnar. Yeah, I don't think that was lotion, Paul. That's part of the problem.

Definitely wasn't facial cream. That's rich. Yeah. Well, Paul, we'll get you in there. We'll see if Saturday's a Morgan. Just somebody's going to win the sweepstakes. It's probably Texas Tech. And the other thing about it is, is that you mentioned the fact that he can support two

different programs. I do wonder how that would go. because he is the sitting on the he's the president of the board of regents for tex right right right is a vested interest in the interest of texas tech university itself but then when his son goes somewhere how much of that gets diverted to wherever he ends up and if he ends up in texas tech obviously all all everything's good but right i i do wonder how loyalties that way not that it's the same investment because his kids aren't athletes but the fraterita family is actually doing the same thing with houston and lSU right now where he is a houston alum the basketball gym's named after him right

But his sons and LSU owe him, so he will like, they cozy up to him as well. And it really kind of drives a wedge, I think, between the fan base is more. I think he's got enough money to go around. I think it's the it's the fan base that get the wedge between them. Now, obviously, LSU has more than just a Furtita, whereas Houston's got a Furtita. But that's part of the deal, right? Is that like we kind of wish all of it came this way. Bertita, Tostata.

Did that land or no? Fratata, you know. Yeah, frittata. You had to keep it going. It landed. Coming up, the women's big 12 tennis tournament decided in a shocker. Baseball. It's baseball time.

This is the Dose Grande Squad. Oh, he had me. It is the Dose Grande Squad for everybody who is an everydayer of any of these shows. You can go to locked on cougars. Dot supercast.com. Locked on West Virginia. Supercast.com. Locked on insert show name here.

that supercast.com to flex that every day or muscle and get ad free locked on shows by joining the everyday or club. It is the Doseigranti squad. And we had a base. We settled into baseball. And this weekend was awesome. It kind of ripped like UCFs come back down to Earth. TCU's a good baseball team again.

West Virginia, Paul. Good at baseball. Yeah. Oh, better than Kansas, you think? I think we're definitely in the conversation. I really do. I mean, you look at where the rat right now or ranked 12th, 12th and 1, 15 to the other.

I really love this team. You've got five guys that are close to a 1,000 OPS. That's an insane number, right? Gavin Kelly, obviously the star of this team, hitting 418, 56 hits on the year. He's five home runs. His on base percentages, 0.500 or something. So, you know, I really love him because he's,

He's the heart of this team right now. And this is a team right now at 27-9 that is really obviously, sorry, we just destroyed Houston. Hey, Houston won the first game at the series. They got a Friday. They got a Friday game. Yeah, it's true. We still won the series. New York Mets is just called up your entire lineup, MP.

That's the, they need. Oh, no. Yeah. Not the Mets catching us for a day. But I think this team will be obviously, and coach. he had talked about it with me before the year. This team is going to be decided probably like on the pitching, right? We lost one of the best pitchers in the Big 12 to start the year

and still have a really good staff. Obviously, Max Yale is the ace of the staff. He's 5 and 1, 2.4 ERA, Chanson Cole is probably the playing the best right now. He's got a 1.5 ERA and all his Sunday starts. As of right now, Ian Corne is also one of the best multi-roll pitchers in the league. who has been really good. He pitched five innings against Houston. He pitched two schools the other day against Penn State.

And then the bullpen has been incredible with Reese Bass, Basinger and company. You know, I think at the end of the day, this is the team that's got elite top end hitting. The lineup depth is really good all the way down the lineup. They've got three series wins in a row. And I think this team is really the only thing you can talk about is, unfortunately, Yale is hurt right now. and we can't seem to win on Friday nights. That's really it.

But we win the series. We lose the first game of the series for whatever. So I was going to ask because Houston's had this deal with like they beat good teams and lose to bad teams. And I was going to ask what happened there because clearly they couldn't beat you the rest of the weekend. But Houston kind of did what they want with the bats on Friday. I scored 10 runs. That doesn't typically happen for us. That was kind of odd to me.

Also, I really don't want to interject because Ian Korn might be the best. the most West Virginia name. Yeah. That's awesome. Like that's a great West Virginia baseball name right there. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's weird, but he's one of the three,

uh, all American D2 guys we brought up, right? West Virginia went out in the portal and got three division two, all American guys. Um, that seems to be a strategy that, that we're using a lot. I don't know how,

you know, I'm not as well versus Cody to know. Is that something that's used a lot in college baseball or is that just a more of a West Virginia thing, going down to D2 and getting their All-Americans and bringing them up. Is that pretty commonplace? Yes. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. So that, because that's, that seems to be what they do a lot the last couple of years. And it really pays off. It seems like it translates really well, at least obviously when we do it. But yeah, the Houston series was fun that, you know, I don't know, it's that Friday night game for us. We just can't get over the hump with it. But, yeah, that was a sigh relief, you know, because when. to keep going.

We're nine and one in the second games, the series this year. So obviously, then you've got Chance in Coles three and one. Like I said, on Sunday starts with a one-five ERA. So you feel really good about Saturday and Sunday. You can just get that Friday taken care of. But I think West Virginia's got to make sure they lock up Steve Savants at this point, right? It's pretty obvious. If you can get West Virginia, a cold place that most people don't feel like is a baseball.

all place, right? To be at this level. I mean, we just had it with the Super Regional's last year. We may actually host one this year. It's quite a jump. I think you just gave Drake his new thumbnail, though, because now you're arguing that we need to bring in more teams from your area to the conference, because clearly the problem is going back and forth to all these places, right? Hit, little, yeah, if you play local teams, you wouldn't, I think we just gave Drake a whole show. I think we just gave Drake a whole show. Yeah. It's not clickbait. Stop saying it's clickbait.

I did not say the C words. Do not put that evil on me. I said it. I said it. I said it. That's my C. Dropics off the court. Judd Happentow was out of Savannah bananas game this week,

which is the most random thing hanging out, man. Just get, shut out. Like, all right. You tracked all types. I love it. Salon quality hair and read the news, man. That guy got some all-timers. Brick,

Where'd you get a hand grenade? Like that? It's just an active at the end of the games. Awesome. Hatch, you guys are in a really weird spot where it finally cooled off.

Everything, it did a lot of momentum. There were even Twitter, like national Twitter account saying, okay, well, BYU could make the NCAA tournament can't play on Sundays. What does the NCAA do?

I still think that BYU has as good a shot at getting DeBonsa back as they do, getting in the NCAA tournament and baseball, sorry. But, yeah, it was good while it lasted. Maybe it maybe it does catch on

toward the end of the year. year. Well, that's the thing. They've got a kind of tread water here because, yeah, they came back down to Earth against Arizona State. They started off. He scored 19 runs in that first game. And then they're like, hey, wow, the offense. But then, yeah, that came right back down to Earth. I do think that if they can, like, what you talk about Mountaineer, Paul, if you can win two out of three games, you can win series, you're going to find yourself on the right side of the regional. The problem for BYU is they've gotten above average pitching all season long to this point. My concern is, are those arms going to wear out here in the later

stages of the season because they don't have a super deep pitching staff and they've gotten a lot of work out of the guys that they have. I just get concerned that the workload's going to catch up with them here in the final month. Yeah. Good, Cody. Hey, you guys have baseball. Don't forget. Come on now. Our pitching staff is cook. I, that's, that's it. Like, there was speculation that we'd maybe get a couple of our, you know, top arms coming back. That speculation has been smashed. And we've since lost another pitcher on top of our regular closer, who was leading the Big 12 for half the season in closed and saves. But yeah, we just don't have a pitching staff left. We're rolling out freshman after freshman after, you know, somebody that, you know, had been sitting

for two years. It was never projected to be much of an arm. It's just, we're grilla-gluing the season back together. We hit a lot of bombs still. We hit a lot of bombs. Chicks dig the long ball. the strikeouts are kind of boring anyway. That's right. Parker, I think the only saving grace for Houston as it pertains to the Big 12 is that yes, they suck, yes, to the worst team in the Big 12.

But Arizona was supposed to be really good. So the fact that they're not, makes them the biggest disappointment. You're exonerated by the lack of success by the Wildcats. Well, and yeah, I think also locally people kind of wanted this year to tank because they kind of went the coach out. I think the reason

the environment of Yorgo was because they were paying. early pick they're trying to jostle for drag. You say that, but firing the coach early means you can kind of get first dibs. I think that, like, honestly, we can bring back up the, the Calvin face that I think that Houston's baseball program

probably needed a new coach a year ago, but is still paying Dana Holgersen buy out and new coach it. Like, they're just, they're waiting to the right time. Why don't you just hire Dana to be your baseball coach? You get the same product. It wouldn't be different. You might as well put Dana on putty protocol.

You know what I mean? If you're going to do that, just put him on Pruddy protocol. Gundy's nipples were not on my bingo card for tonight. They should always be on your on your bingo card. Hear me out. Could she coach both? Could she coach both? Just Arizona State basketball, Houston baseball.

Molly Miller can do it all. There's no doubt. The real question is it's Kansas States coach as hot as Molly Miller. Cody, would you like to answer this on the national? I know nothing. It's just lips closed.

That's Cody. Rich Rod. That's a great boob. All right. I was doing an episode. The depth chart has been released. Dept chart revealed. That's great.

Mountain Hill pool. Locked on West Virginia. Cody stillball locked on Oklahoma State. Parker, Rainsworth, Locked on Couges, all things Houston. Jake Hatch locked on Cougars, all things hot, older ladies,

and locked on them. All of us with you. Thanks for making our shows. Your first list in every single day. This has been it always will be locked on the Tosacrante Squad.