Shutdown Fullcast - 40 FOR 40: The 2025 ReliaQuest (OUTBACK OUTBACK OUTBACK) Bowl

Episode Date: December 30, 2025

WWWWWWWWELCOME to the return of 40 For 40, our bowl preview series where every bowl game gets its own episode and each episode is exactly as long as that game deserves.Who decides what “deserves” means? We do! Thank you for askingNow through December 31, 100% of proceeds from all PTKU merch sales will be donated to Trans Ohio. Visit preownedairboats.com to purchase BRAND-NEW BLUE SHARKS GEAR #EXCLUSIVEThis episode was produced by Michael Ray SurberFullcast theme 40 For 40 intro arranged and performed by Russell PowellFullcast theme 40 For 40 outro arranged and performed by MattDID YOU KNOW: Spencer and Holly write Channel 6, a year-round newsletter that is mostly about football, until it’s notBefore the world ends (again), treat yourself to Jason’s critically praised novel and other workTravel in your mind palace to Phantom Island, Ryan’s new show with Steven Godfrey, which is not a college football show because another simply cannot existCheck out Surber’s band Killer Antz and his new show Podcasterino

On January 1st, 2022, America woke up to the Outback Bowl for the last time. Everyone then, who was 26 or younger, had grown up with one rock-solid promise to start every new year, free coconut shrimp or a free bloom and onion at Outback, depending on the winner of the bowl game they sponsored. That promise has gone unfulfilled for three bowl seasons now, and it will do so again this year. Weeks after that final Outback bowl, perhaps sensing an imbalance in the food-based universe,

singer and actor Meat Loaf passed away. A few months later, Joe Buck and Troy Aikman left Fox, where they had worked for 20 years to go to ESPN. In the NFL draft, only one quarterback was selected in the first round. That's Kenny Pickett going 20th to the Steelers. And the final pick, of course, had the 49ers taking Brock Purdy. Serena Williams, one of the bedrocks of her sport, retired from women's tennis this year. And in September, we lost two absolute foundations of Western culture.

you feel about them. Queen Elizabeth II and Coolio. These are but a few ways the world has become unmoored since the end of the Outback Bowl. If you just want to focus on the college football bits, consider what's happened to every coach who has won the disgustingly named Relia Quest Bowl. Zach Arnett, interim coach, gotten a full-time gig at Mississippi State, canned before he could complete a full season.

Brian Kelly stumbled through a nine and four season the year after his RelyQuest win and then oh right everything that happened this season and the winner of last year's Relya Quest Bowl Sharon Moore Bringing the Outback Bowl

won't fix all of our problems and it might not fix any of them but we owe it to ourselves to try and that's why I'm asking you gentle listener to do one thing the day after this game go to your local Outback Steakhouse if Iowa won

order some coconut shrimp. If Vanderbilt won, order a bloom and onion. Enjoy that food and whatever else you choose off the menu. But here's the important part. Refuse to pay for these items. Politely but firmly explain that this is not a promotion. It is a promise. And if the powers that be in college football and maybe America itself won't keep it,

you sure as hell will. Yes, you are committing a crime. but what jury could see you as anything but a hero. God bless you, and God bless authentic Australian grub as only the people of Florida can't imagine it.