Shutdown Fullcast - Shutdown Fullcast 3.17.0

Episode Date: August 26, 2015

This week's Shutdown Fullcast covers the Big 12, a conference of such astonishing depth and interest we didn't have time to get to reader questions. We'll double down on them next week, but we apologize: Iowa State is JUST that fascinating. Topics covered: --The least coordinated intro to the podcast ever, and an analysis of the Jade Helm defense Texas Tech will use this fall --Rage-inducing sports video games (helllloooooo FIFA) and the time Ryan's friend threw a controller so hard that he flooded his apartment after a controversial MarioKart ending --Why playing in Ames on a Thursday or Friday night is...is fine, actually. --How you should just not watch Texas this year and come back in 2016 --Did Oklahoma fix the wrong side of the ball? (By asking that we're pretty much saying yes, yes they did) --Texas Tech is the most ideologically pure team in the Big 12 --Why TCU will just try to average more points on offense this year than the New York Knicks --WVU, the ruiners of all ruiners (again) --A brief discussion of the way Charlie Weis stole money from another team and left them bereft and more broken than Kansas football usually is Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome. God damn it. That was awesome. That stays in the show. Welcome to the shutdown forecast. No, it's my welcome. Oh, my God. No, tie goes to Jason.

Yeah, no, I'm going to give it to Jason this week. Jason, you go right ahead. There's that alphabet. Welcome to the shutdown forecast. I'm Spencer Hall, editorial director at SB Nation. And I'm Jason Kirk, college football editor. at SB Nation. Actually.

Joining us in the frozen hinterlands of Brooklyn, New York, or some other part in New York. I'm Mike Prada, NBA editor at SB Nation. In Queens, New York, where there is a car lot of all things in New York City, the last thing you'd expect to see, there's a car lot. What's up, Queens? Yeah, go Mets. 50 cents from there.

Go 50. It's Ryan Annie. Ryan, how are you, web, the conditions up there? It's not great, because Spencer, I think, tweeted this morning that down in Atlanta, he said something to the effect of, I'm outside, and it feels super nice, and I don't know what to do about it. And for some reason...

It was the weather today? It's the best fucking weather possible. It's like the weather where you're like, is there a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico or something? It's just so much wind. Actually, Jason, you're correct. There is actually a tropical depression in hurricane. We have this effect in Georgia. We have this effect in Georgia where you can tell the weather in Mexico.

And when it's really good, that means it's really bad in Mexico. Yeah, so for some reason, I just assume that because the weather was really good in Atlanta, it was probably going to be good in New York as well. And it was pretty close. It was hot as shit today. So whenever... It's almost like I should have done my own research and not relied on Spencer's tweets for the weather. Not relied on a single deranged tweeter for my weather forecast.

From like 900 miles away. like Mexico and New York have the same weather. But I think why I, yes, that's correct. And I think why I listen to Spencer is that I suspect Spencer is like me and that he just runs super warm all the time. All the damn time. Just like a like a refrigerator that's totally broken. Spencer just chalked up the virtue of keeping, of like having the shoulder towel and

dabbing. Maybe you should try that. Wow. Is that really a thing you're doing now? Dude, no, I'll do that on hot. days you gotta do that no we got dudes in high school who did that no when you get oh listen when you get over 200 pounds and you live south of a certain point yeah you're gonna go ahead and and carry a shoulder towel you're just gonna do it because that's all dudes doing around atlanta and i thought

oh that's a bit much nope now it's your life now it's standard god well geez no you should totally do that it's a lifesaver is it like a white gym towel or is it have a pattern or a color yes You're not going to go, like, beach towel, and you're not going to go, like, fancy, lacy towel. Right. Just something that would pair with a white tea. I see. So this is sort of the Atlanta version of carrying around a handkerchief. Exactly.

Yeah. If you slap someone with it, then you're in a duel, and you have to compare your cars. Wow. Or your mixtapes. Spencer's mixtape is pretty fire. It is. It's way better than most dudes with other towels. It's mostly Michael McDonald's.

It's most... towels the dudes with towels circuit that's all we do is we get together snap each other with towels and then compare mix tapes and we're like respect i assume i assume trooper taylor is the leader of this particular warriors gang uh he is our pope he hopes to establish a caliphate for the dudes of towels one day oh super taylor super taylor we worship you the taliban Jesus Christ This is a good start This is a great start

This is our Big 12 preview episode It is sour Hey listen Is there any part of the nation That's more concerned about being invaded by foreigners Than the middle of the country Than the well-armed, extremely scared And not all that aware, middle of the country

No, it's perfect Jade Helms A big 12 Jade Helm's a four-start recruit that Auburn's doing real well with last I heard. That does sound like the name of a, yeah, some three-star somewhere named Jade Helm. I want Cliff Kingsbury just come out and say, yeah, we're running the Jade Helm defense this year. We're going to take over Texas. It's where you worry about.

We're going to take over Texas recruiting. Oh, that's fantastic. defense is where you walk around worrying about the wrong things. And that's pretty much the Texas Tech defense. Just facing completely the wrong way to your actual threat. Flow to the wide receiver. The thing about the Jain Helm defense is that all the threats are from within. So the secondary is just looking at the linebackers.

Like, I know you're going to pull, motherfucker. And I'm ready for it. I'm ready for that block from the safety. It's coming. The thing I wanted to actually open the Big 12 podcast, and this is my first one back after a festive trip to Mexico, where I did not climb a volcano. I climbed most of a volcano. You climbed like 80% of a volcano, 85. Oh, yeah, like well over 80% of that volcano.

That's a B-plus. Dude, that's pretty much my GPA, yeah. Go Gators. About a B-plus. Go Cater's. But this is my first one. So I wanted to go ahead and break in with an easy discussion. Today on Twitter, a discussion with M.D. Brown.

Hi, Miles. He's not listening to this. There's no way he's listening to this. He's an NBA fan. He was wondering what game, what sports video game, had inspired the most rage. Because he thought Madden had ruined the most lives. And he still might be right about that. Because Madden is huge.

I know that the three of us are primarily college football fans. we do not do a whole lot of playing of Madden. It happens from time to time maybe more often now that there's not an NCAA game, but it's an obsession for a lot of people. It's probably cost more sex, sleep

and productivity losses in this country than I think a number of drugs. Like certainly Quailutes. Like Madden, because they don't make quailutes anymore. Way ahead of that. Yeah, I agree. Agree. But

the one game that I thought needed to be mentioned for being the sports video game that is the most rage-inducing, the one that has angered the most people and the one that has the most frustrating dynamic and has caused the most forcible ejections of PlayStation's, Xboxes, controllers, TVs, furniture, and the most fistfights is FIFA. Yeah. I mean, assuming Mario Kart doesn't count as a sports game. Because I do have a friend who in college had a running Mario Kart showdown with one of his roommates. And I think he was leading the matchup something like 370 wins to 298.

But he lost that day in a way that he thought was bullshit. And he chucked his controller across the room into the little standard half wall that separates an apartment kitchen in college from the apartment living room. Unfortunately, he punctured that half wall, hit a water pipe, flooded his apartment and the apartment below it. I'm going to win. That dude played his Mario. There's no way he's not a Mario Mario Kart player. He was a Mario in college, too, in a lot of. ways.

He won. That's what you're telling me. He did. He won. He farted pure thermonuclear fire, and he won. Wow. Other than him, I think you're probably right about FIFA. A game I have not played, but that's only because it doesn't seem fun based on everybody

else. It doesn't make people happy. No. No, there's no. I mean, it's, I will say FIFA is perfectly designed because it is a lot like soccer. There are these build-ups and you can get right in front of the goal with nothing in front of you and your

guy will burr, he'll just bork the ball 45 degrees the wrong way or you'll hit the wrong button and pass. So you can outplay your opponent for like 85% of the match but still lose by two goals? Easily. Oh, easily. And if you have the difficulty

set to anything spicy at all, then you could be up 2-0 with three minutes of injury time left and it can all come crashing down around your ears easily. That's all pretty realistic, though. It is realistic. I'm telling you, that's the worst.

People just don't like soccer. Yeah, the worst part about FIFA is that I think it accurately renders soccer. Soccer doesn't make, so. That's the biggest mistake. Soccer doesn't make people happy either, so. Soccer doesn't pull no fucking punches. But you can't punch. You can kick, though.

No, no, no. And it'll cut your head off at any point. You can dominate the match and suddenly, boop, own goal. my personal frustration with FIFA comes from trying to be worldly and actually play it once a year and then like try to kick in like the demo tutorial mode and it like lands on top of the stadium and like oh man this game's hard i'm good i'll try again next year so i mean my my personal time with it is like literally 100% frustration so i'll agree with spencer here although i will also state that a game of great frustration for me was a Nintendo game

all the way back to the NES RBI baseball because they used to play with my dad and he'd have some like broke dick shortstop who was batting ninth or batting eighth in the order or ninth in an AL game and he was always the Tigers and they had this guy Tom Brookens Tom Brookins was like a guy who only hit home runs

he was like you know one of these like I batted 22 and I hit 24 home runs and had 28 hits on the year, like that kind of dude. And I don't know what it was about that game, but the programming ensured that the person who had the guy who only hit home runs

and literally no other hit, if you actually played that person over 162 games, he'd hit like 90 home runs. It's the best hitter in the damn game. And I would complain about it, but Spike Owen, for some reason, I cleaned up with Spike Owen off of the Boston Red Sox in that game,

and he only had one home run in a 231 average. So, like, was this game just racist and, like, all the little white guys are awesome. It was. It was the most racist game. Gritty. They were just gritty, man. There's nothing wrong with that.

All of, like, the apparently Japanese programmers in the 80s were just as susceptible to the gritty white guy narrative as sports writers. Because if you had a gritty white guy, like, Dykstra in that game, it's unstoppable. Kurt Schilling in that game. Oh, my God. And he throws up the one-armed salute after that home run. So classy. Yeah, but those are like the most rage-inducing games

I've never like NBA 2K NCAA I've never had a problem with those Tiger was okay I got to go with the golf games God Jesus Okay I just took that back Yeah it's the golf games The golf games are not held by the fact that at some point you're like Holy shit I just played a golf game for two hours I played it for 10 golf game

I didn't even get to go outside. What's wrong with me? I didn't get to stand in the sun. What's wrong with me? You didn't spend $150, though. The golf games, the amazing thing, is it, like, massively tones down the frustration of playing actual golf. Yeah. Still make you want to sell all the electronics in your home.

I will say, too, the original NASCAR game for Xbox playing that, I would be in the lead, and my dad, jackass of jackasses that my dad is. would attempt to wreck me on the final which was funny like you know maybe seven out of ten times when he would you know miss hit the wall burst into flame but on those like three out of ten times when he managed to actually wreck me on that

because leading Bristol one time and he put me into the pit wall cut my car in half that was all right I'm going to move that up to like the three spot it wow so like in the NASCAR game he's somehow got the Mario Kart purple shell yeah yeah like where he's tailing you and the point of tailing you isn't to win,

but to wreck you so that neither of you win. Now, I am going to speak out in favor of NCAA on the frustration scale. It's probably the sports game I've played the most, maybe, as a series. But, like, it won't have that, like, steady, consistent, frustrating thing about it. It'll just every couple years, something will pop up that's just horribly, horribly broken. Like, how did they not? How? How? How did this slip through?

Like, I think it was like 2012, 2013, it was at least a couple years in a row where the linebackers do these superhuman feats whenever you throw over the middle, sometimes not even over the middle. You throw it to the sideline and the middle linebacker somehow picks it off. And then you also have like the defensive back does like the Willie Mays catch like as if you passed it to him and picks off your pass. And like it shouldn't be that frustrating because the game is, you know, really easy and you can put up 85 points. But it's those key interceptions that just are completely. impossible that like to this day I'm mad and it's just a video game and it was like five years ago yeah if you you go ahead Brian you know the sports sports video game that has never given me any any frustration whatsoever and that would be deaf jam fight for new york

that's just good times it's just i don't you can right now if you said hey uh would you like to be Exhibit and beat the shit out of Sean Paul? Yeah. Like, where do I sign up? I'll do this right now. Would you like Red Man to say some stuff about putting your eyeball on his knee? Yeah. Absolutely. He's going to say a lot. The only frustrating part is when you get to Snoop and he's really strong. Yeah, it is. Which is total visual disconnect there because like, no, he's not strong and also he's not going to be motivated, motivated enough to move quickly ever. Ever. But other than that. But they got Bubba Sparks in this damn game. You can use Bubba Sparks and fight Eric Sermon. And in real life, that would be one of the weasiest battles. Ghostface has his actual giant eagle bracelet. There is a story going around that Ghostface was fucking impossible to work with when they made this game because he was like, yo, what if the eagle came to life and like pecked out my opponent's eyes? They're like, this is grounded in some reality. This is a wrestling game.

This is not, this is not like a Lord of the Rings game, which I would also like to play as Ghostface him. Oh, yeah. Seameless. The Hobbit, fight for the 36 chambers. The man with the giant eagle bracelet. I would also put one of the original fight night games in there. I don't know if you ever played the fight night games in terms of stress-free living. They were pitifully easy on the right difficulty, and you could knock your opponent out by hitting him in the balls, which is great.

Oh, really? Oh, yeah, it's great. Did you get yelled at for it? Oh, yeah, you can yell that for it. But, you know, he's still knocked out. True. Yeah, you can't undo that. We're going to take a point away from you.

The pros, cons of your opponent being on the ground. After you knocked a dude out. And it was great. His face was animated. It was just, you know, like, it was a different face. It wasn't like, oh, you hit me in the stomach. It was, no, you hit me in the nuts. Yeah.

Yeah. This is the Big 12 episode. So we actually do have to discuss the Big 12 at one point. I did get to do what I hadn't gotten to do the entire summer, which was sit down with with my previews, with my Bill C's.

With a little bit of Phil Steele because I tend to go blind after reading like three or four. Oh, that's old school. I like that, though. I like that you're like, hey, you know, Bill C's out here making fine, excellent cuisine, but sometimes I want a hungry man. It is definitely, it is sometimes I want to look at a damn racing form.

Sometimes, sometimes I want to read the Dr. Brunner's soap label of college football previews. And much like a hungry man, Phil Steele's previews made eight months ago. You got to reheat them. They've been in deep freeze. And they all weigh exactly one pound. That's what we give to the astronauts when they go up to the International Space Station. Eat this preview of Virginia Tech. It will give you life.

So I was looking down at Madagascar. Asker, and reading about how Michael Brewer is going to win the Heisman. Which we got a question about. Somebody asked if we would buy them cookout if Michael Brewer won the Heisman. Dude, I will buy you a cookout that Michael Broughman is. Because it ain't happening. Sure, I'll buy you an entire cookout franchise if that happens. I will not do that.

We will come to your house and cook you a cookout. Yeah, legal department of SB Nation just allows the statement. Yeah, I did actually get to read and sort of catch up and, like, confirm and or deny thoughts based on data. And am I insane for thinking that the Big 12 is actually pretty difficult, top to bottom, if we take out Kansas? It is difficult in the sense. I mean, there are probably some other teams I might take out of there, too. Who else would you take out? If we're going to go ahead and just take...

You know the name you're thinking, and you know why it's wrong. Okay. I'll just say it. You'll tell me why it's wrong. Iowa State. Go. Because you've got to go to Ames, brother. Ooh, you're not ready for all this clean water. I like that that's something that people actually be like, dude, you got to go to Ames. Yeah, people didn't go to Ames. People been going to Ames for a while. Yeah, I'd love to look at like Iowa State's actual record in Ames, and it's probably just like, oh. Oh.

Yeah, because we've really built this up. 326. Yeah. Because I'm guilty of it too. Like, oh, I don't know. It's a Thursday night names. Yeah, people have been dealing with those pretty well. It has achieved the level of urban myth that is based on true events where we're sort of like, oh, yeah, you know, families move into that house every year.

And they leave, screaming and covered in blood. And it's like, it was just the one time. And it was because there was a feral cat. Yeah. And they won two games last year. Farrell Cat is on the hot seat, though. That feral cat? Starting quarterback.

Yeah. They were sending animal control after him. It might get ugly. That and this, they haven't really been improving over the last two years. Three years. They're running out of Sam Richardson's, among other things. Mark Mangino can only do so much with this clay. He wants to sculpt.

He wants to sculpt. But unfortunately, it's that, like, foam. that play foam? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just springs right back. It's cool with. Yeah, I don't think I don't think you're looking at a team

that's going to make a bowl. I don't think you're looking at a team that's going to be a competitive. I don't think you're even looking at a team that's going to steal a game that it shouldn't. They might beat Iowa, but that doesn't mean anything at this point.

But yes, outside of that, there are not a lot of matchups where you look and say, oh, the favorite here should be, you know, given 16 points or something like that. outside of those two teams that make the whole nine-game schedule thing kind of eh yeah everyone else is everyone else is at least potentially challenged something right you know something you do

whether it's texas offense texas defense presents potential stress of some sort and the big argument for them being good this year is this that they they don't have to they don't have to do a lot of learning on offense and they can be i think what people hope is efficient right i don't know if hoping on efficiency is really your best bet right Like when they're like, yeah, we hope that you're efficient. You don't turn the ball over. Ever? Because that's not going to do it.

That would be kind of... Which team is this? That'd be Iowa State. That was he... I sort of couldn't believe that we were still talking about Iowa State. That would be kind of amazing if at the end of the season we were like, holy shit, Iowa State only turned the ball over twice, and they won three games. And like, somehow they were both in the Texas game, Big 12 refs.

Those damn Big 12 refs Just taking checks from those big cowboys Another one of my favorite Big 12 things That Texas's dominance extends to Actually getting calls on the field Like individual custom calls Let me say this If Texas boosters are paying off Big 12 refs

And all they're getting from it is Eking out wins over Iowa State They need to demand more for their money Way more. Like, the ref should be throwing you a 30-point win over the cyclones. Dude, the ref should be detailing your car. Yeah. Actually, Steve Patterson doesn't allow Texas employees to have cars anymore.

Yeah, that's true. Let's not forget, there is footage of a Big 12 ref celebrating a Texas touchdown on the field as it happens. Hey, man, it was just inspiring. It was a really good play. It was a great play. I mean, I would have celebrated, too, if I were a normal person and not a ref. being paid by Texas booster. I mean, of all the conspiracy theories in the sport,

this is the one I am not in a hurry to debunk. When people say, oh, Texas always gets the calls, I just say, that's an interesting theory. I am not going to try and steer you away from that one. Texas gets a lot of calls. Yeah, well, they did get one. They did get a second. They did get a second.

Hey, there's one. that one was probably right but I mean like Oklahoma State two years ago the player that turned the game was totally wrong Big 12 basically had to come out and apologize for it I believe

I mean I ain't saying I'm just saying Hey we're talking about the Texas Longhorns Another team I think you can just take Out of the like influential and important this year What is the goal for Texas this year To be the

Fifth best team in the conference Fourth Like, what is the achievable ceiling? I think fourth would be pretty good. Fourth would be pretty great, right? Fourth would be, I mean, if you're fourth, then you're like sort of the best of the... The second group? The best of the everyone but the three teams that are actually good.

You're the JV. MVP. I mean, if you come out and you're better than Oklahoma State, K State, West Virginia, I think that's pretty good. That is pretty good. You're right. I mean, you're only the richest program of the country. I mean, if you're better than Kansas State. Wow. I mean, we'll have to paper over the fact that you lost the Cal, but here's the sick, like, here's the sick thing. Take Texas and then look at Texas and offensively. Who, if you were following the Texas Twitter sphere this week, observers at practice were saying things like this.

Yeah, I think there's only two or three teams who are offensive people would start on in the conference. That's good. Yeah. Or, yeah, we've only got one or two guys who really should be like FBS caliber and offensive. Listen, they're just Texas, though. It's not like we're talking to Iowa State here. So, like, seriously, if you're taking teams, like, Iowa State and Kansas, you just put down there, but offensively, just offensively alone. Because defensively, they're going to be fine.

I think they'll be able to, I mean, even with depth concerns and even with, like, Charlie Strong shuffling people in and out of the lineup, they're going to be okay. I think they'll be acceptable defensively. but offensively like there's kansas there's iowa state and then everyone else texas is looking up at in terms of offensive quality right uh you can make that case i mean case state probably isn't going to score a billion points this year but you at least sort of know what they'll do and they'll do it you kind of believe they actually like their quarterback you know yeah even though i'm sure he's like a converted janitor even though no one no one has ever heard of him this is a stray dog I found.

He's going to have 2,000 at 1,000 this year. He's going to be a Texas Lake. There was a lawsuit about who's the offensive coordinator and I don't think

anyone knows. And the lawsuit focused around denying There's two guys in court saying this is not my fault. I mean,

this is actually happening. We're not making any of this up. We've never told the lie on the program. There was a lawsuit over who was Texas is OC. And in

As far as I know, not settled yet. Oh, boy. Everything is fine. Yeah, it's August 25th, and you don't have a quarterback, but it's cool. That's fine. He did name a starter today. I think. Yeah.

Did Charlie Strong name him, or? No, no, no, no. He just pointed out of a picture of him. That guy. That one. This young man. Number 18. This young man right here.

See, Charlie Strong. I have a lot to say about this young man. Charlie Strong is so worried about the O'Bannon lawsuit that he's refused to use players' names at all. Any names. These are just generic. I don't even recognize him. I got face blindness. The depth chart I put together just happens to resemble some of these players, but we're not using their likenesses.

It doesn't even have numbers. Purely circumstantial. We have all the players wear this silk mask of a face. I've told them to gain 40 pounds before game one. so that we can claim that it's not the same player? We're taking the names off the back of the jerseys just we're all about teams and also Steve Patterson's afraid of getting sued. Yeah, also Steve Patterson's like,

if you want your name back, that'll be $23 a person. Steve Patterson, he's one of them fucking video games or you've got to pay $7 to level up. That's that dude. He's the Kim Kardashian game, right? Like, would you like the lipstick? That'll be 18 credits. Yeah, I don't know.

That game, we don't respect him, though. Yeah, at least that one's creative. Can you name the likely starter, by the way, for Kansas State? You can't. I could. Hell no. No? Jake, Josh, Derek, Clint.

I'm impressed. Clint? Both first string and second string. Both start with a J. It's Joe Hupner. Joe Huber. Jehosephat. And Jesse Ertz is the back.

Jesse. Joe and Jesse. Jesse Tuesday's on ABC Gerald McRaney in Joe and Jesse Joe and Jesse Two guys living together

Trying to make it in the little apple I'll give you a head A highlight here Apparently Joe Huber played in seven games last year And he threw 17 passes And he's gonna like seriously He'll be like a 2,000 8 Like 2,000 yards passing

800 yards rushing He's a He's a former walk-on Who is a tough physical runner with a strong arm Oh, that's some Kansas State right there Yeah Mm-hmm Ship it

Yeah Oh finished fifth And a Kansas State Track meet in javelin Yeah Wow Cannon Oh and his

Joe's got the fifth strongest arm on campus Is that what I'm gathering? He's from Columbus He was born in Columbus This gets so much better his younger siblings are Justin Jonathan and Jason

Oh, one of those Yeah It sounds like he's a family that Laura Ingalls Wilder Encountered At some point in her childhood Joe was a good boy Slow but kind Pa gave him

Five barrels of corn You know everyone in my immediate family has Jay's So I can't really talk He survived typhus Typhus survived him, some would say. That's why he's a starter. Looking to here, the other plot line in the Big 12, besides depth, because it's tricky. Like, I think this is a fairly deep conference, right?

I might argue, I wouldn't argue that it was deeper than, it's deeper than the ACC, whatever that means. Sure, I'll go with that. You can say deeper than the Big Ten. I think you'd say third deepest conference. conference it's deeper in the way that you look at a public pool and you're like well that that part says seven feet but that part says eight and a half right so i'm going to dive in eight and a half yeah but i don't know how well any of this is measured right right and the pool doesn't have water by the way yeah one one thing about depth is it only has 10 teams so true that that's sort of because like you could have an acc schedule that's like really hard you know if you if you have bad luck which i should point out if they had boise state and and BYU in this conference this year, we would probably be like, this conference is good.

Yeah, I think I think that would help. I mean, I think you could say that anyway. I just think it's a little slept on because of what happened last year. Right. You know, but you do know what's going to happen this year, right?

Hmm. Like, last year was all about the fight between Baylor and TCU, one true champion, et cetera, et cetera. But in many ways, deciding who is better between two teams is not that difficult.

And it's not like it was difficult for the playoff committee. They just weren't impressed by the team they thought was better. What's going to happen this year? We're going to get that sweet three-way tie. Baylor, TCU, Oklahoma. It's going to fuck everything up. It's going to be beautiful. Which has happened before.

You've had that, like, the Big 12 is very good at going into November with people where you're like, they could all end up 11 and 1. Yeah. There is, there is, I feel very good. about like a bizarre disastrous three team tie at the top of the conference and i know that oklahoma by hiring lincoln riley uh has allegedly fixed its offensive problems but i don't think that's the totality of what you're looking at in terms of what's wrong with oklahoma are you trying to say having defensive backs like flee the line of scrimmage is also a problem yeah maybe and

never adjusting, never, like, as in the Baylor, Oklahoma game, where you watch guys just bailing and bailing, and then when they started to creep a little bit up, Baylor did the most obvious thing and just started running vert behind it, just running nine routes all the way down the field. Yeah, and never adjusting and never playing intelligent football. But defensively, the same people are still in charge and the same philosophy is still there. And in their losses, like their wins are, you know, Exactly what you think they'd be, like, you know, 45-33, 34-10 over Tennessee. But their losses, their losses are all just hemorrhaging yardage and points.

So, yeah, they might have fixed things offensively, but I don't know if that's going to get them real far. Yeah, but they were also, they were eight points away from winning 11 games instead of eight. like there was there was there was there was a degree of hey how did we how did we lose to kansas state oh that's right our field goal kicker just forgot what he does how many how many of their losses was it you know they didn't score like they got they get clemson totally ate up their offense but how many other games was it where it was like you know oh the offense just couldn't get off the ground baler baylor that was that was that was a that was more of the defense's fault than the offenses

right? Yeah. They only put out 14 points, but Yeah, that's true, that's true. They lost 30, like losing 31.30 to Kansas State. That was, that was brutal. That was what, like, the first conference home loss in three years or something? A while.

It had been a while. That sucked really bad. Or at TCU, they lose 3733 to a really good TCU team. Like, I don't know if they fix the right side of the ball yeah to me switching from like this burly running offense to the air raid and i mean they fucking change their offense like every two or three years at least like think of how many different oklahoma offenses there have been like

since you know stoop's hired mike leach to bring like the the the full-fledged raw uncut air raid over and then that's sort of morphed through the mangino kevin wilson stuff and then you know a few years later they're trotting out like tim tibo junior at quarterback and then you know they flip to the like we're just going to hand it to this guy any times and it'll be fine and now all of a sudden they're the air rate again like to me it's just shuffling the deck when the real issue is the other side of the ball who uh who coordinates who coordinates that again uh he had the last name he has a last name that for some reason it's soups stops it's stoops is what's coming to mind but that's the head coach's last name it's not the same is it i don't know is it his brother no man's his brother that'd be weird yeah

who'd do that who'd do that he'd hire your brother and then keep him when like he's getting called out by former players on national tv and on twitter i think i think bob just is hoping mike will get the hint and that he doesn't have to be the one to drop that axe because they like i think almost every position coach on that defense is new this year or damn you're supposed to it gigantic overhaul on the coaching staff. And they even reassigned, like, I think Stoops was, what was he, secondary coach and D.C., and now he's just D.C.? Yeah, it was something like that. He switched around which position group he's in charge us in addition to defense. I think he's just hoping Mike will glean the information

from what's going on around him, but man, it's not happening. It's just not happening. And they could have a good defense. Like, maybe all that, maybe all that shuffling will help. I don't know, but it's just, what a weird way to go around it? He said supremely confidently. I know. It's just weird that you look at Texas, Oklahoma, and you're like, okay, so there are these two sick old men of the conference. Make out. Right.

Why don't you all? Well, sure. Yeah. You look at that. Like, if we had said three years ago, four years ago, gone, okay, so Baylor and TCU, those are Givens. Right. You know. It can't be overstated how weird this time in history is.

yeah it's a very odd time in the conference you know and like what are we worried about with baler um well they're going to have a baler quarterback that's literally their only question mark is we don't know how baler of a quarterback he is like tCU their question is they lost some linebackers oh god where's gary patterson going to find some linebackers who are better than like who are good enough to shut down a couple big 12 running games he has no track record of developing that talent yeah he's literally never had a good defensive player but oklahoma I don't know if they can play any defense. Oklahoma.

Yeah. I mean, like in a lot of ways, like the givens that you're looking at, Oklahoma State has a few more than Oklahoma. I do like that West Virginia has taken more defensive strides than Oklahoma has. Like Virginia, West Dana Holderson, West Virginia might have a better defense than Texas or Oklahoma. And Texas' defense is going to be pretty good. Even Texas Tech was like, yeah, we'll try something new. Yeah, I actually really like that higher.

I mean, it's not like they've got any, it's not like they've got a whole lot more talent. No. But they're playing a style of defense now, which after the mysterious firing of their defensive coordinator, what, mid-season last year? Did he fire or did he quit? I thought he quit. That was one where there was all sorts of rumors and no one ever really got to the bottom of it. Yeah, can we put it this way?

He was departed. He was gone. And then I think he started consulting with other big 12 teams that were. going to play Texas Tech? Sounds right. It was some shady shit. And then what they replaced him with was the guy from Houston, whose whole thing is just, hey, we're going to give us some points

where we're going to go get that ball. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Like they've now got, I believe it was David Gibbs, their new defensive coordinator, basically playing the smash and grab defense. They're playing the air right on both sides of the ball. Exactly. It's a totally coherent philosophy.

Give me the ball. Give it the ball. Just give me the ball. Get the ball. Like, I don't think Texas Tech is going to be. mediocre enough to get I think Cliff in any real trouble particularly because of the investment they've made

in him but at the same time they're sort of I think they're one of the big 12's most like at least this is going to sound weird they're one of the most ideologically coherent teams they're trying to do the same thing in every single phase of the game which is give me the ball

just give me the ball just move the ball somewhere the ball has to be moving at all time just get the ball my ball official activity is based on movement The ball is a shark and we can't let it die. Yeah. Just keep it moving. Just give it all.

It's a crank is what it is. Right. Yeah, it's crank. Crank the team. Give me those battery cables. Put them on my tongue. Let's go. I know this is.

This is a good for me. Yeah. I'm into Texas Tech. Yeah, no, I mean, it might not work, but I respect the ideological purity at work there. Right. Yeah. Like, none of this, like, we're going to play lockdown and don't break defense and we're going to try to score 60 points you don't get to do both of those no no they're pretty they're pretty

honest about they're like yeah this is arena ball we're we're very very very much aware of exactly what we are we're not good enough to do that so what we need to do is send like nine guys into coverage and try to snatch the ball or just do a bunch of like cover one or cover zero blitzes yay let's watch that it's going to be awesome i don't i don't think it's going to go great against arkansas personally but no But this is That's one of those early season Intersectional games where you go

Yeah, this means nothing. Yeah, we scheduled this a while ago. Yeah. Arkansas is out here apologizing for it. Yeah, I delayed, this is the delayed jury service that you're like, oh, they said I got to show up this time. I put it off three years ago. The one thing I do totally trust Texas Tech to do

is be really competent on offense. Like, I just do. Like, Cliff is good at that. That staff will score points. They will. And I mean that even on the Big 12 curve, I mean, even in the Big 12, they will put together an offense that you'll look at and go, yeah, I'm kind of legit terrified of them. Yeah, last year they had, they were kind of disappointing on offense last year,

but I think they've, you know, they've got in like their eighth identical quarterback of the Kingsbury era already. And like that'd be Pat Mahomes, right, settled with this guy. And they return a whole bunch of weapons. And so, yeah, sounds about right on to me. Can I ask the question that I have no answer to? Whatever. Sounds perfect.

What do we think about Oklahoma State right now? That's like, speaking of rifling through quarterbacks who seem the same. Because I'm looking back at last year, and in some senses I'm saying it's not as bad as I thought it was. Like, they hung with Florida State early in that neutral slate game. They beat all of the teams that they were supposed to beat, probably with the exception of Texas. They got hammered by the good teams that they played, but then they beat Oklahoma in kind of a stupid game, and they looked pretty good in a bull game win over Washington. But I just, I don't know.

Is this a good team anymore? Or is this just like a so-so team? I guess we don't really know what to expect this year, but the thing going into last year, if y'all recall, was like, how can a team be this inexperienced? It was like you look down the two deep and it was like red line, red line, red line, red line, red line. It was little rascals. There was nothing coming back.

It was like a from scratch team. And yeah, they hung with the defending champs and they turned in what, seven wins and they beat their rivals. They beat their rivals. They beat their rivals. But they beat their rivals. They beat their rivals in a kneecapper.

That was the worst game that I watched most of last year, other than those Thursday night ACC games. Do I remember, yeah, do I remember this correctly? And then it was three quarters of sludge. Yeah, and then it was like, holy shit, this is hanging off. Somehow I knew this would come through. I want, by the way, I want an app that just alerts me

to when nothing has happened for three quarters in a rivalry game so I can flip over to the fourth quarter because that's what it always happens. You mean, yeah, yeah. If there's just three quarters of garbage, that fourth quarter is going to be fire. They're like, oh, George just came back from 20 down to be Georgia Tech, sorry.

Yeah. And then onside kicked or or did the Squib case. That's what it was. Yeah, sorry. I'm talking to ACC. That's cool.

That, by the way, can I also say, I think Devin Lauderdale for Texas Tech. Devin Lauderdale for Texas Tech is going to be fun to watch this year because he's a fast young man

who can catch the football. He'll be real good. But going back to Oklahoma State, I have, like, I have no idea. None. That extends to whether Mike Gundy has like, I have no idea what his job security is right now. He could be relatively fine. He could be on the brink of death.

Yeah, they could build a statue of him and then fire the statue. Right. And I don't feel like either of those are contradictory. I don't. I feel like they'd be like, man, you've done so much of this program. But you've got to go. Yeah, here's a check for seven mill. Get out.

Like he wins the title and it's like contract extension fired. Good news. We're building a statue of you. Bad news. You will be inside the statue. Bad news. It has replaced you. It is a carbonite sitch.

Sorry. I want to remember you this way, coach. We've also made a statue of Bobby Petrino. Who is here doing our salute? He's learning it right now. Yeah, here. Won't you do it? No, that's not it.

That's good. Good, just shoot something. That's good, Bobby. Bobby Petrino with a gun. We're going to get you the Dallas Cowboys job in no time, buddy. Can I just say this, though? Oklahoma State's best prospect is that their quarterback passes my rule, that their quarterback has a name, which has two first names,

and it makes equal sense either way. Mason Rudolph. Rudolph Mason. So congratulations. That's like eight wins right there. Yep. I would also point if we are looking to, I mean, we're like, I don't want a yada yada, Baylor and TCU.

Like, yeah, yeah, they're going to be great. They're going to be really fun to watch. They're stocked. They're playing a really, really, really, I think, efficient brand of football for what both teams are. And if TCU's defense, if TCU's defense is like as good as I think Gary Patterson can make it by the end of the year, oh my God. Don't look directly at them. I'm also excited because I think coming off of last season and feeling both equally bitterly disappointed that they didn't get a playoff spot, both of these teams are going to be going to every game thinking, well, let's win by 45. Oh, yeah.

Let's get like real 2002 Bob Stoops with this and just margin of victory the hell out of this schedule. I hadn't even thought about that stuff right now, but yeah. There'll be no let up. Yeah. It's just extra, like, extra gas and ordinance the entire season. Because they want, when you go back, they want it to look like, they basically wanted to look like really lopsided, like, AFL matches, right? Like, mm, 6315. Goodness.

The Warratura Cucaburros really put it on them there. Like, that's what they want it to look like. They're averaging 74 points a game. How are you going to lead them out of the playoff? That, that's when people start. Oh, the Big 12 was down this year. Then they can go back and listen to our podcast and go, oh, no. It was deep. What thoughtful depth?

Baylor's averaging more points per game than the New York Knicks. Who's the ruiner in conference? Like the one, because I mean, I have an answer for this. I'm asking to hear what you think. Who's the team that is the ruiner? The one that, you know, you're probably not like, oh, okay, they can win. But the one where you're like, no, they can fuck someone's entire universe. up. Guess who Baylor plays last? Oh, who? It's Texas. Ooh. I actually like Dubby for this

spot. Yeah. I like Dubby a lot. Like, they are, they are, have a fairly young quarterback, but they have some skill talent around him. And they have like a fairly competent defense returning, or at least a defense that showed flashes of competence, if not being pretty good last year. They should have a legit, not even like good for West Virginia. They should have a good defense. Right. Like a top 30? Top 35 defense. If they struggle to score for like a month or so, they'll put it together. They'll start score at some point. Yeah. So I can see West Virginia being the team that, I mean, they kind of did this last year. That's just like, oh, well, there goes your season. Sorry, buddy. All right. Can I show you West Virginia's position in the schedule of

the contenders in conference? Yes, please do. Baylor rolls through nothing. Like, they go to Texas Tech. Eh, eh, great. And then they run, on October 17th, they run into the wall that could be West Virginia. Admittedly, that's at home. But sometimes I think being at home, you just get relaxed and fat and happy. And then suddenly you're like, oh, we played Kansas last week, and now we're playing a football team.

This is also a football. I don't know. For Baylor, that's a revenge game thing, though. Yeah, there is the revenge thing. You say that. Waco Hive's going to be lit. I mean, it'll be lit. It usually is.

It'll be lit, but they still have to play them. And they still present the same basic problems for them. True, true. And then West Virginia, like, TCU plays no one. Like, they play a long slag. They play Texas on October 3rd. Minnesota is the best team they play. The first two months of the season.

I would argue at Manhattan, which is an underrated road spot. but they play at manhattan they play at iowa state and then they play west virginia west virginia is just the speed bump in both of these schedules uh that's said that west virginia game it's on a thursday thursday okay that's a loss just chalk it up no unless joe tessitore if we can get joe tessitore calling it but they they do both get west virginia at home so it's true but yeah that's our uh that's that's That's my pick for the ruiner of worlds as far as a team in here. Jason, how many scholarship players does Kansas have? Well, based on some math by a Jake Trotter story today,

let's just say they open with South Dakota State, which is a really good FCS team, and they have fewer scholarships in that team. I think the number was 63 based on Charlie Weiss's Juko Heavy recruiting and so forth. Actually, if you look at their roster, on a lot of rosters, there's like a column where it lists previous school. And like for most college football rosters, you know, if you go to Bamas, there might be like five, ten players. For Kansas, it's like every third player comes from somewhere else and they still don't have very many players. They got a guy from school, the America's on here.

Seriously, go look at their roster right now and sort the roster by the previous school column and then, like, scroll to it. It'll fill up your whole screen. can I give you my favorite if you search Kansas football and you search news like just search Google News right like Kansas let's search Google News

Chiefs no no no no these are the top headlines dismissing Tyler Patman and other ways Charlie Weiss ruined Kansas football Tulsa World five hours ago

how Charlie Weiss left Kansas football in ruins 10 hours ago. Kansas football program made it a priority to visit every high school team in state. Yay.

So in case you wonder where it's, oh, I'm a bit further down the page. I'm sorry, I don't want to leave this out of here. Kansas football on Weight Watcher plan. Wait. Wait.

from from kusports pardon me is that a charliege white's joke uh i think so wow wow the best the best part about that jake trotter article was that it starts with after uh

the season where they're deciding who they're going to hire when they eventually picked charlie weiss you know who they were thinking about getting Gus Malson Gus Malson And do you know why they didn't go with him? Because Charlie was a bigger name

I want to give you a quote Is that even true? I want to give you a quote from that article For Kansas, The Malson match made too much sense Oh Man can you imagine him with some Texas ball players

Because like say what you will about Notre Dame, another program that paid Charlie Weiss a ton of money to not coach their football team. They didn't have a lot of warning. Yeah, there wasn't a body of work. There wasn't a precedent. But Kansas, there was a reason Charlie Weiss was a big name, and it wasn't because he had won national championships. Kansas, there were two precedents. I don't know if I mentioned this on here, but I was with Spencer when their news came out that Kansas had taken Charlie Weiss off of Florida's hands, and, like, like, we were out. Oh, we were out. We were having a meeting. We were all out.

And like, soon as the news comes across, he's, like, demanding everyone show him the headlines on different phones just to be sure that, like, no single person is tricking him, like, such unbridled joy once it was finally confirmed. Is this? Did Kimmel do this? This is real, right? They actually did this. Because you're wondering if people are fucking with you. Yeah. That they're going to take this dude who's like... You've been hurt before. I've been hurt before. And you're wondering if you take, like, those.

the most negligent football coach I have ever seen. Ever. Like, Charlie Weiss coached the worst football game I have ever seen. Like, the single worst coaching job I've ever seen. That was the season opener against Georgia Tech, which is the worst loss in the history of the program to that point. Where he decided,

Oh, just install a spread option at the last minute. Like, you can put it in in a week. And it looked like it, too. It looked like I had done it, right? Like, I don't know. You hold the ball. And then you fake it to this guy. Then you spread?

I don't really, I didn't, I just sort of skimmed the manual. You just stand farther apart. These IKEA manuals aren't very clear. Let me give you a quote from this Jake Trotter article, which really should win a Pulitzer? Shitting on Charlie. Meanwhile, the summer after his first season at Kansas, Weiss famously referred to his team as a pile of crap

before turning the program into, well, just that. my favorite thing Charlie Weiss did at Kansas was when he took that when I think they were practicing at Arrowhead Stadium and he took a picture of like essentially an empty section down near the field because it was open to the public and without any wink or nod just tweeted out great crowd we got out here supporting Jayhawks football it was just yeah it was some kids camp thing with like nine people in the arrowhead stands that was when you knew the man had had had all fucks that he once had yeah it was pretty cool and he's i mean like the amount of money the amount of money that man like i i hope that i hope he shows up to the bank with a ski mask on are you robbing this bank no this is not it not this one No, I just feel comfortable in this. Yeah, it's just habit.

He, yeah. And now they have David Beatty, who's a perfectly fine coach, who's going to have to coach Kansas now. He says he sees the whole thing as an opportunity, and I just want to hug it. Just pet him. That's the kind of thing, like an optimistic dad says, after a wildfire burns down your house.

Well, it's stage two. You know, we had to clean out the garage anyway, so in some ways, this was a blessing. The doctors caught it early. I'm really reevaluating my relationships. They caught it early. It was an arm. Yeah, it was an arm. Lost like 10 pounds.

Yeah, I don't tell you this about cancer, but man, it's slimming. I think you should know, Spencer, this is the second time you've made a cancer reference about a big 12 team in the history of this podcast. The other was Mac Brown in Texas, so congratulations. That bodes well for you, Kansas. It did take several years and was painful. That one, it really sunk its claws in. It did. And the damn pliers to get that thing out.

And the cure might have been worse than the disease itself. Yeah, but you know, cancer's pretty good on TV when it's all said and done. I'm saying, man. Tell you, he says, he doesn't say much bad about anything else. Like, Mac Brown and Phil Steele, I don't know. know this team could surprise me this year man this is a really really mean episode big 12 brings out this damn sass well it's it's he listen it's texas we got some texas this is all texas straight talk texas you got you got to bring you got to bring your honesty here you know you're

walking here with your boots on you got to be ready to kick some shit they'll burn them right between the eyes if they bring that bullshit around here hey you get on that horse man them range don't pull themselves i got i got terrible news it's 56 minutes into this podcast that we have not done a single reader question. That's fine. We don't have to do them this week. All right, so here's what we're going to do. Next week, just don't even bother sending us questions. Jesus.

These will keep. Oh. You know what we'll do? Big 12 is dry. What we're going to do is go out to that mesquite tree. We're just going to put a little bit of vinegar on them. We're going to hang him there. I'm going to put a dog under him.

I trust him. He's not going to eat it. And then when we come back, going to be questioned jerky. This is awful. Yeah, I feel, I feel terrible.