Shutdown Fullcast - Shutdown Fullcast 4.19.0

Episode Date: June 8, 2016

SO after last week's debacle where our readers accidentally selected the worst slate of teams possible to preview for 2016, we took matters into our own hands. This week we preview five teams that could not only be very good this year, but who could also theoretically win things and be fun to watch and stuff. Also, Jason is not broadcasting from the middle of a driving rainstorm this week. He's in a car, which sounds way better than you expect it to, really. Topics: -- How Spencer got a forty dollar go-cup, and why it's effectively worthless -- Speaking of things staying cold for extended periods of time: TENNESSEE FOOTBALL, PREVIEWED. Did you know the only interesting game the play after mid-October is against Will Muschamp, the ultimate obstruction? Isn't that potentially hilarious, especially now that he doesn't coach Florida? That's potentially hilarious. -- Ryan calls for Michigan to go 12-0 and it seems fairly reasonable? Particularly with their schedule, a spread so luxurious that it features a bye week before playing Illinois. -- Virginia Tech will have offense and defense at the same time, allegedly, per reports, hypothetically, maybe. It's different now, and we'll all have to watch Bud Foster look real confused as his team scores unheard of "points" without intercepting the ball or forcing fumbles. -- Arizona! They're definitely a team that will play this year? (We did very little research on Arizona before working with them, much like Rich Rodriguez did.) -- Washington could be very good this year if they do not do the thing a lot of Pac-12 teams do in dropping the weirdest conference games imaginable. Washington is a Pac-12 team. They will probably drop a weird conference game. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the shutdown fullcast. Recording a little bit late because one of our co-hosts, Ryan, you didn't have internet at your house. I don't want to talk about it. In the most wired influential city in the world, New York City, you didn't have internet. Don't move to New York, but definitely don't move to a different apartment once you live. If you are going to move to New York, just stay wherever you are and never leave. I think this is a good approach anywhere, actually. just don't move don't ever move so to be clear i have no internet at the place where i live jason kirk

you have internet where i am in the parking lot at uh at my daughter's gym i'm sitting in my car because uh i i first it came outside and then i was like well this is pretty weird sitting on a bench talking into my computer so i said i'll sit in my car that's uh maybe like one percent less weird I don't, so far, it seems to be just as weird, but there's really strong Wi-Fi here, so that part's good. You know somebody's going to walk by your car and assume that you're looking at pornography, right? Well, what I am looking at is even more shameful because it's just a bunch of football schedules for months and months away. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I guess the concern here is if I'm arrested, you know, during the middle of this, probably wouldn't be the first time

so you guys know the protocol yeah that's true and we know who to call it's true because remember all all arrest in Georgia are negotiable yeah just a what's what's our

what's our currency here it's not money sweet tea or something I don't know it's like a monopoly you just got to roll doubles and you get a Yeti cups

that's a five that's a five Yeti cup bond you got a post there yeah we are We already got one of those now, don't we? Yeah, we do. I got one in mail because my wife heard me making fun of them, and she bought me one.

She's like, oh, I'll show you, and she forgot so many important things that are basic and true about me and doing this in order to dunk on me and burn me, okay? Can you try doing this with other products? Can you be like, oh, Xbox One is terrible? Yeah, yeah, I really should. Now, keep in mind, by the way, like, I ultimately paid for this, right? Yeah, like, but I will say this, I don't, it's a useless product because it's basically, it's predicated on the notion that you need a liquid to maintain its temperature over an extended period of time. That implies that at any period of time less than, or over 15 minutes, I would not have completely destroyed the beverage because I drink like, I drink like a dog does, right? They see it, and they're like, I'm going to drink everything in this bowl.

Yeah, I have never looked at you and thought that you are more Turner than Hooch, so. Right. We all fall on one side of that continuum, right? Either you're the Turner or you're the Hooch. Brady Hook, you were a hooch. Man, he's so a hooch. You're more of a Turner. Yeah, I probably am more of a Turner.

Yeah. This product we're describing, is a thermos is what it is? Correct. It is a $40. I'm from Georgia, so I feel like I'm supposed to know what Yeti is, but I really do not at all. It's expensive camping stuff. Yes. Yeah, I think that's right.

Yeah, it's basically like it's high-end camping. It's not even camping, really. It's high-end coolers. It's tailgating stuff, right? Allegedly. Or if you're going to say camping in the sense of like, me and the brink. rows are going canoeing. Exactly.

We're outdoorsy types. Oh, that means you like drinking outside. So we're talking like, you have the big green egg of cups. That is, I was trying to explain this to somebody else. And they go, is this the big green egg of cups? To which I say 100%. Yes, the overlap between the big green egg crew and the Yeti crew is one to one. Like just take those two circles and lay them on top of each other.

This makes me sad because I feel it's cutting into the market for. I forget what that giant, like, it looked like a very small keg, but it was the classic, oh, dad needs a lot of coffee in the morning on the way to work, and this doesn't fit in any cup holder because it's too extreme. That bug, yeah. And they're like, oh, it'll keep your eyes tea cold for three days. Okay. I would like to review.

You know, in case your arm gets caught in crevice. I would like to review the insanity. behind every degree of this sentence, which people have said to me on multiple occasions as if this were a talking point thrown out to gaslight me into thinking this was a necessary consumer product, okay? First, who drinks tea voluntarily?

Tea's crap, okay? James Bond was always of the opinion that tea was the downfall of the British Empire, that coffee kept them going, that's true. Coffee's a more productive beverage, it's better. Tea is garbage. It's like drinking water that's been sitting in a perfume holder too long. That's what tea is.

It's garbage and sweet tea is even worse. Fuck you, Todd Starns, okay? Sweet tea is like, sweet tea is like the most entry-level southerner bullshit possible, okay? It is like the Redbird Reading Group, easy reader. I'm southern, so here, I'll drink sweet tea. That's awesome. That's awesome. So I'm so glad you managed to like enter the like Duplo level.

Southern isn't there. Sweet tea. Sweet tea had to be invented on accident. Like, somebody asked for tea with sugar, and somebody just, the waiter or waitress got way too wild with the sugar. I was like, uh, no, this is, this is local specialty. It's called sweet tea. It's supposed to have a whole cup. Yeah, we meant to dump that entire cup of sugar in there. That's not at all some sort of elaborate tax dodge we have on sugar subsidies. That's energy.

I always thought I was the only Southerner with this opinion, but it's good to find out there are others. Sweet tea is terrible. Sweet tea is trash. I do like regular tea. If you want to eat a candy bar, you're allowed to do that. I will say the coffee shop near the place I just moved to does have an advertisement on the door that explicitly suggests you can have a breakfast consisting of coffee and twicks. That is sweet tea, coffee and twigs. Yeah, that's basically it.

Also, by the way, like, sweet tea to me is the candy. Kevin Spacey's accent on House of Cards of Southern beverages, right? Yeah, yeah. I do declare. I do declare. I love my sweet tea. It's one of those things that I don't want to say

people are insincere in their choice of beverage because sugar does stimulate parts of the brain that give you positive endorphins and whatever, but come on. It's not it's not like this sacred heritage, you know, sugar in dirty water.

But, I mean, I, I guess now at this point we've talked about weird things that Southerners like way too much and things that Southerners invest way too much money in and symbols of sad southerners. Over-hyped symbols of sad Southerners. So we might as well get into Tennessee now. Tennessee football. Also, by the way, I also want one other note on this, by the way.

Like, who the hell's, like, keeping a beverage around for three days? I'm drinking it. Like, if I drink it in half the allotted amount of time, that's a day and a half. Yeah, I mean, especially you with kids, you can't just leave a beverage laying around. No, you know, every child is DJ Paul, okay? If you leave your drink around them, your drink going to get drunk up. Don't get drunk up. And in my house, it won't get drunk up, but it'll just get tipped over or moved or something.

They're tipped over. She drinks like a tiny bird. Tipped over. I mean, I have two children who both will drink, like, pond water. So you can't leave anything, and they will both knock it over. And, I mean, every parent has this nightmare, which is, where's my wine glass it's been enjoyed one of the kids yeah one of the kids is eating it right now and nothing good can happen either they drank it or they spilled it or they broke the cup and then spilled

it and uh now i have an injury on top of parental negligence it's great or they or they or they like swashed it around under their nose and wrote a blog post about it yeah so hey why don't we just take all this optimism tennessee and we'll just we'll just put it into uh We'll put it into a $5,000 cooler. 5,000. You put it on layaway for you. You can put it in hell and it'll stay cold. You know what?

You put it in hell. You mock the Yeti, but you know where they're going to be a shit ton of them, that game at Bristol. Oh, my God. Like the only larger concentration of Yeti products would be Old Miss Bandi. Yeah. Like, old Miss Van der. Yeah, but the battle at Bristol is going to have, I would estimate, you can probably build like a sizable igloo out of Yenai. jetty coolers there.

That'll be done. That'll happen. That yeti cooler? Easily larger than the GDP of the state of Mississippi. Like when you add up how much it would cost. Is this going to be the kind of thing where like VT fans show up with their yetis and they're so super proud of them and then here come the vols with their even bigger and more compensating yeties?

And then VT is like shamed and has to, that's when VT embraces the lunchbox feeling. Oh, yeah, small, the new cool. Yeah, yeah, exactly. They're like, listen, this is a $700 lunchbox. And you know what? It'll keep your sandwich cold for seven months. Oh, yeah, Tennessee.

Check out this keychain. It'll keep your tick-tech cool. As opposed to Tennessee football, which will keep your heart cold for decades on end. Jason, I've already told this to Spencer, so he doesn't get to guess. but how many days do you think Bristol Motor Speedway has to turn a NASCAR facility into a football field? That time of year? Is it five?

It's 20. They have 20 days. They have to work around the clock. And one of the things they are doing is hanging a jumbo-tron over the infield that weighs 700 tons, and it is called the Colossus. And it looks like the thing from Star Trek, isn't that Star Trek, the big square spaceship? Yeah, it looks like the Borg. Yep.

So that'll be fine. Yeah. So, and, you know, the Haslums are associated with this game. So I'm confident there are no kickbacks or illegal contracts or schemes being run here whatsoever. And the big space cube is hung by a bunch of suspended cables. So I'm thinking, are we saying, the third quarter that there's like Tennessee fans racing to the middle and Virginia Tech fans shooting at them or second quarter?

Yeah, that sounds right. That and this, this Tennessee team for, is this the second year running? I mean, is this two years in a row or is this the third year running that they're going to turn the corner? This is my, I love running gags. I think this is one of the better ones. I think this is only the second year.

I think this is the second year. Last year it was sort of fluctuating, like, enter the offseason, like, oh, no, I think Tennessee's going to be overrated. Wait a second. Tennessee is actually kind of under, oh, no, nope, Tennessee's overrated. This year, I hopes are high, but because it's Tennessee, that's a bad sign. It does not help that they have a severely backloaded schedule in terms of easy games, I should say. So it's a front-loaded schedule. They got to play

There's the Virginia Tech game We've been talking about Florida, Georgia, A&M, Alabama They have to play all of those teams In their first six games So this could very much be a replay of last year Where the first half of the season Is full of anguish and despair

And the second half of the season Has improvement that nobody cares about Outside of them. No, oh, oh, improvement Half a season of Tennessee improvement Are you saying 2017 SEC favorites? I am saying 2017.

not even division favorites whole damn conference national title favorites i i say folks right now if if if butch whichever butch is the head coach there no one remembers his last name because it's one of them if he if he doesn't get this team to 15 and oh in 2017 it's time to move on out on his ass setting the pressure high the pressure is on the balls out on his ass get rid of fire him now for that they did they did uh they did manage to do something that uh you wouldn't think a tennessee coach could pull off with great ease but on the back end in a roundabout way they hired vanderbilt's defensive coordinator that is that is that is one way to describe what happened yes that that is the way i'm planning to look at it okay okay cool i'm going i'm going to

ignore that hey listen when the government says you bought a keel cocaine okay right you didn't just bring it from Columbia nope nope it came through somewhere there was a transit point but guess what you still bought that kilo cocaine okay and the contraband in this case Penn State the the Canada of college football you know that's it laundered Bob Shoup they laundered they laundered a Shoup they're and he's real good he's real real good at his job they used to run shine now they run Shoup do you think somebody will have in the Vol Navy will have

have a boat called the Shoup Slope. Yes. Already. Done. And second question. After they give up 30 points in some game, immediately remained. I was going to say, will they... He's a good defensive coordinator, but these things happen.

Will that sloop, the Shoup Sloop, suffer a mysterious accident in the Tennessee River and be recovered for the insurance money? Maybe. Who's to say? Accidents happen. life's funny that way that's why you buy insurance right right here's one thing they didn't fix

which was Josh Dobbs not really sort of the thing you sort of expected to happen didn't happen and they got conservative late in games and did that cost them last year either of you just answer

did they get to leads and then blow them did that happen I think I recall that happening maybe like four times yeah I mean, yeah. So that's several.

It's true. Just a reminder, who is their offensive guy? Who's their primary offensive coordinator and strategist? That'd be Mike DeBoard. Right? Debrard. Yeah, Debrdard. Debrd, kind of conservative, right?

DeBaud. Debrot. Debrot. Debrot. Debrot. Defensively, they should be better. don't really sort of, I just don't sort of see Josh Dobbs being the kind of guy who can pass them in anything but like a run for his team with the occasional like, you know, scramble out of the way,

make a few plays down field, uh, they'll have to be a lot better on defense if they want to make up those kind of margins because they lost a lot of close games. And I know what people always say, which is oh man, those games are so close. We could just, you know, like, we just turned it around. Okay, that's a big. Yeah, yeah, you sort of assume just looking at the scores that luck will regress, but last year was

not luck. Not so much. Tennessee tried really, really hard to lose to, I believe, Oklahoma, Florida, and Arkansas, and maybe another. They barely beat... That's not luck. They barely beat South Carolina, so... Ooh. Yeah, yeah. I'm usually with Josh Dobbs, I don't know, he's...

Is he overrated? He's definitely not underrated. He, you know, he definitely is definitely smart. Has the skills and all that, but hasn't put together the kind of see. season that you would expect to see based on the hype, but we live in a world in which Jared Goff and Carson wins their first rounders, so obviously I don't know a thing about quarterbacks. How many of these first seven games does Tennessee need to win for us to get to a place where

we're not like, oh, Butch Jones going to get fired? Well, keep in mind, Butch Jones might get fired before a game is played. Okay. that's entirely possible I think it is we're just going to put that on the table okay okay let's assume that's not the case

let's assume that he is the coach as of September 1st when they host Appalachian State from that game all the way through the Alabama game does he have to go 5 and 2 let's see are we saying

the last 5 or 5 I know because that's South Carolina line of Tennessee Tech, Kentucky, Missouri, and Vandie. I honestly don't think he can lose any of those games and be in good shape. I mean, maybe if Missouri... I will say, if, you know, Missouri is resurgent or Kentucky comes out of nowhere and is what, you know, we can get to them eventually, maybe those become excusable losses down the stretch, but where we sit now, those are not, none of those are losses that you look at and say, oh, you can survive those unless somehow you start, well, even if you started the

season 7 and O and beat Alabama, if you turn around and lose to Kentucky or Vanderbilt, you're screwed, right? So if we go ahead and say sort of, assuming, assuming we, there's a 5 and 0 finish here. Yeah. I mean, I think 4 and 3, he's still back for 2017. 4.3? Yeah. Even 3 and 4, because then we're still, we meaning you, this isn't my problem, you, you

the listener who likes this team for some reason. You're still finishing on a five-game winning streak. It doesn't matter who you lost to in November, you know, in like, you know, March or whatever, you're mad about that. But I don't know. You finish on a five-game winning streak. The coach is back. Yeah, especially if one of those wins is over Florida,

because psychologically that's a huge deal. I don't know if they really. I don't, like, honestly, would we remember? Florida or Alabama? Yeah. Would we remember, I mean, they're going to lose to Alabama, and then they're not beating Alabama, so they're going to lose Alabama.

And like, even if this, even if they flake out and they lose to Virginia Tech and A&M, if they win one of those big games in conference and then sweep the rest and finish like eight or nine wins, he's fine. I think that the number where you start getting kind of hedgy is seven, especially if in that last five, in that last five, if they lose any of those,

that's a problem. and I'm kind of looking at Kentucky. Looking at you, Kentucky. Especially because three of those last five are at home. Yeah, and the other one's at Vandy. So really, the last five, if you go, where could you be completely blindsided? Like, like, oh, hey,

you see, these always seem to come back to our guy, Will Must Champ. Tennessee. You want to know who could completely ruin your day. Oh, he's ruined many of mine. Will Must Ham. Tennessee. only has to play outside of the state three times all season.

So, yeah. I would like to. If you're 4-0, say you get past Florida, say you're 4-0 heading of the game at Georgia, at that point, expectations and hype and tensions are so high. Yeah. And then if you drop that Georgia game, well, I don't know, we'll get there. I would like to say, my wife found out we were doing. doing Tennessee on the podcast this week.

She briefly asked if she could be a guest on the full cast. But then she said, well, I don't think I want to because I might say something wrong or not funny. And I realize that that is literally never stopped us. Never. Congratulations on being smarter than us, Caitlin. 90% of the job showing up. And we're here. Sort of.

Done. We're late. In cars. Late. But we're here. So what's our number? What's our number? I'm going to start us off at 10 and 2.

Wow. I'm going, I'm going to call for, I'm going to call for 8 and 4. Okay, I'll split. I'll split at 9. 9 ones. All right. Bang. Compromise.

8 and 4 with the 8 and 4 with the 4 selected ever just so correctly is one of the funnier stories in 2016. I think we've put Tennessee right in the dead center of the, how do we feel about this zone. Yeah, yeah, it's perfect. Spencer, what are you wearing today? I'm currently wearing a pair of, let's see, gray mesh gym shorts and a kind of aquamarine v-neck t-shirt. Incorrect.

You're not wearing a Dion Sanders jersey. You're disqualified. Jason, what are you wearing today? I have an Atlanta Hawk shirt. It's the new vault green. All the kids like it and cargo shorts because it's a day after, like, February. That's pretty good, but it's not the rare Rashid Wallace Hawks jersey, so you're also disqualified.

Real men wear jerseys, and that's why we're here to talk about Michigan. Oh, Michigan. Yeah. So Michigan plays football? No, they wear jerseys. It's different. I mean, they're not just like a content-generating thing for websites. It's like the difference between being a superhero and going to Comic Con, you know?

Jim Harbaugh is the dopest college football cosplayer in the world. This is almost to the brand extent, right? Hold on, I have a Sailor Warren Moon joke in here somewhere. Keep going. Wow. Wow. Yeah. This is almost to the like brand that exists without a point.

product status, right? That's where we're at. This is almost going back to Yeti. It's almost this thing you see on the back of cars without being able to attach what actually the thing is. Jim Harbaugh's Michigan is Entertainment 720. I was trying to get to. What do you do?

Well, you know, we have a synergistic approach to marketing across multiple levels that really gets consumers excited about what we are and what we do. Man, when is Jim Harbaugh going to drop detox? What are you about? We're about clean lines. We're about boundless enthusiasm. We're about getting after it. Clean lines.

We're about updated marks that connect with our audience. And we're about, we're about, in today's, today's social landscape. And we're about going after Rutgers full fucking force. That's our brand. That's Rutgers's brand also. We really have to, we have to move. They've already claimed that territory. that is well tried friends this is this is our lean two you go to your own lean two over there

but yeah your michigan will actually play football thank christ oh man can i just give you this by the way michigan i want to skip to the schedule jesus oh it's a beauty oh my god they can just tee the hell off oh my for like two months it's um i just want to point out that they play arguably the worst team from at least four different conferences. This is the game. This is the game genie of schedules. They have Hawaii, UCF, Colorado, and Rutgers. And

how many of those games are on the road? Just the Rutgers game. Free trip to New York. Yeah, they're not going to Hawaii. Oh, God. They get Wisconsin at home. They get a bye week before. This is my favorite. Oh, God, I'm cracking up. I couldn't even say it. You're going to have to say it. Brian, finish my sentence or something. They get it by week before Illinois and home.

So they get a buy week before Illinois, which is the buy week before the Michigan State game, which is their first big road test in East Lansing. It's their first big test. Like, I mean, Wisconsin might be a decent team this year, but... Yeah. Yeah, I mean, the Penn State should be pretty good. Okay, sure. Wisconsin won't be anything all that special.

But, yeah, October 29th, season starts. I mean, if you looked at this schedule, and I told you, there are only four teams on here that make a bowl game, would you believe me? Yeah, yeah. Rough, roughly. I mean, they're going to make a bad bowl games. Maybe five, but, oh, God, Michigan, this is, you know,

for all the chess thumping you do about the AP courses you're taking, this is some summer school schedule right here. Oh, yeah, this is that remedial schedule. Yeah. This is amazing. Like, if they, I, like, this is, on the face of it, it'd be fun to go into, like, you know, oh, hey, here's what they got coming back. And, man, we got, we got some, some real interesting personnel here.

Without looking, this is 10 and 2 at worst. Well, and now, and now we get to watch Michigan fans continue to do the thing they previously hate, because whenever an SEC team has a weak schedule, or a weak non-conference cross-divisional schedule, SEC fans say, well, you know, every week's battle in this conference. And now Michigan gets to do that. Congratulations. Oh, no.

It's even beyond that. They get to say, well, here in the Big Ten, as of this year, we play nine conference games. Oh, thank God. I was working. You added a game against Illinois. Good. Because that's your other cross-division game. Glad we got Indiana in there, thank God.

I think that's going to make the difference to the playoff committee that Wisconsin game at home in 2016 I would also point this out like personnel wise bad they need a new quarterback okay not that you know they've got some good options there they also they also turn Jake Rudolph into yeah yeah I mean we're hearing stuff like

how are they going to move on from Jake Rudolph like hang on Iowa just went to the Rose Bowl without Jake Rudolf. So just hang on a second here. Yeah, and the upside of that, by the way, is that their offensive line is bad ass. They have a fantastic offensive line. They'll be the highlights out of the ball.

So they're set in a lot of ways before they even have to unfold any of the schedule. And then they get a great offensive line. They actually have people who can catch the ball. Yo, Jake, butt, you coming back. Butt back. Lot back. Lots of talent on defense. I think one of, the only other question is kind of the edges up front on defense where, hey, you're bringing in the number one recruiting the nation to put them in the middle of all that, spread things out a little bit. I mean, if Michigan doesn't go 10 and 2, we all get to point and laugh at Harbaugh for a long, long seven or eight months. I just, yeah, you're right. There's no other way around it.

now i will say i will say conversely yeah uh this might be the team that if they pull the wrong if they pull the wrong draw at the end of the year oh swan dive yeah yeah i mean they might look like a nine-win team you know in any other conference people will say well they wouldn't do that in the cc no no this is this is a real good team and by the way that argument doesn't quite work as well as it once might have so um you know the record might be kind of illusory like it might be kind of inflated via the absolute badness of the rest of the Big Ten, but they're not alone in that.

There are many conferences where there's going to be some Rican football being played, like kind of the entire bottom of the SEC. I don't think Michigan is the best team in the country, but I think there's an easy case that Michigan is the safest playoff bet, largely because of this schedule, and also because they return a lot of talent and all that. But, you know, Ohio State might be a better team. Lose a ton.

I don't know. They're probably about even, but Ohio State has to play Oklahoma. You know, every other team is just tested so much more often that if Michigan is just, I mean, at 11 and 1, 12 and 1 big 10 title, that would get you in the playoff. And I mean, if you get past Ohio State, I think you're in. I'm also excited to see when Michigan State, Ohio State, and Michigan all go one in one against each other. and totally just throw everything into shit. Michigan State loses a lot too. So there's another team that is probably not quite as scary as it might look.

Like every single, I mean, the three best teams you play here are what, Wisconsin, Michigan State, and Ohio State, and those are the three of the teams in the country that lost the most. Fuck it. I'll say it, 12 and 0. All right. Do it. 12 and 0. I like it.

Do it. Yeah, let's do it. I'm going to call 11 and 1. Boo. outvoted 12-0 That's fine That's how we do it I am excited

Let the record show That Spencer had mercy This is going to be the reference point Every time somebody accuses us Of being Michigan haters We'd be like We picked him to go Undefeated dog

I will also state I'm the only member of this podcast That has the Maze and Blue On their actual corpus So hey That you know of Spencer's being

A common responsible Michigan man does not leap boldly into 12-0, not with the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors on the schedule. No. Let's talk about the other half of the battle at Bristol, Virginia Tech with a brand-new head coach. That's a weird thing. For the first time. Since the 1700s. Yeah.

It's amazing. Yeah. The Highlander himself retired. I'm tired. Frank Beamer, gone. Replaced instead by Justin Fuente out of Memphis, the fine, fine Memphis coach. And just remember when you're like, oh, man, like, what did he do to get this job? I'm just catching up. It's crazy.

Who's Justin Fuente? He made Memphis good. He did. Yeah. He made Memphis real good. Beat old miss, had an outstanding year last year, got a. quarterback into the ranks of the NFL draft in Paxton Lynch, a guy from the TCU coaching staff sliding up to take the place of Frank Beamer, but not really to move the entire coaching

staff around. They did keep a dude who will never, he's not leaving Blacksburg. I don't think, at this point I don't think he knows how, or he has some sort of crippling fear. Or he's limited by some sort of shock collar. Maybe he has object permanence problems where he's. He's like, if I leave Blacksburg, it'll disappear, and all those people will die. I care about these people.

I don't know that that's not true. Try proving it. We love you, Bud Foster. That's also why he carries the lunch box, so he can see his lunch at all times. Got to keep an eye on your lunch. Oh, no, no, no. Fridge, things disappear in the fridge. They go away forever. The hill banshees will take your lunch.

That's where, but, listen, Bud Foster still is up in those hills. And when it stops turning out the finest corn shine at eight kitchens, counties. That's when he'll leave Blackford. That's when he'll fucking leave. Yeah. Virginia Tech they do have East Carolina for homecoming. And I know this is not the same

East Carolina team in years past. And maybe this is actually setting up to just be a brutal whooping of the pirates to avenge for past transgressions. But I look at it and I'm a little worried on behalf of the Hokies. Just in theory? Just in

concept? Yeah, except this. They don't, they don't even, this is going to be interesting to me because this is a defensive-minded team that's managed to like, you know, eke out points despite having absolutely no ability to move the ball offensively for, I don't know, 10 years running, something like that at this point. It feels like it. 10 years running like a VT quarterback.

Yeah. More like 10 years standing still. 10 years drifting indecisively to the right looking for an open receiver 10 years stumbling So now you're maintaining all that defensive tradition And you're adding a coach Who seems like he knows what to do with quarterbacks

And how to find them Because Jordan Lynch Or excuse me, Paxton Lynch He plucked him out of a state that I can't recall to mind the name of the state It's near some big football programs one of which could have certainly used a quarterback like him recently. I don't know.

What state was that? I'm familiar. I believe it was the state of Florida. But anyway, that's neither here. I'm not familiar with that at all. Yeah. But yeah, yeah, found that guy. Actually, I believe he did find that guy and developed him. And if you can do that at Memphis, you can do that literally anywhere.

So if the offense, you know, it should take a small step forward this year. But in future years, you've got to feel pretty good about it. Also, remember that Virginia Tech, most interesting when they have a gigantic lumbering quarterback, right? Huge, massive, oftentimes, under-equipped, under-prepared guy throwing out there. They have one of those. He's a juco guy, Gerard Evans, and Fuente had been recruiting him at Memphis, and he's just a big old lug of a dude who also can play in a spread offense. So guess what?

They're running a spread. Got a big old quarterback. they will, they're a little short on skill position stuff, but they have a good tight end, good fullback, et cetera. So it won't be a game-breaking kind of offense, but it'll definitely be something I think better. Like they've just been so much better at quarterback. Anywhere Fuente's been than anything Virginia Tech has turned out that, and they get to keep Bud Foster's defense. So in theory, that should work better. That's not always the way that goes in coaching transitions, but in theory, it should look a lot better.

What does their schedule look like? Across the vision, they play Boston College and Syracuse. And they also draw Notre Dame at Notre Dame. They do do that. They have that. They have road games at Pitt and Duke and North Carolina. It's sort of a mix. It has its stumbling blocks.

It has its games they should win. It feels outside of Tennessee. at Notre Dame you're not going to be more than what a three or four point underdog in any of these games at worst probably I guess North Carolina on the road will be an interesting question just to see

what they look like replacing their quarterback that could be that could be a potential place where they're not looking as competitive but other than that yeah I think that's right I'm kind of yeah I mean the offense I don't know if it'll take a huge

leap forward, but you can definitely see explosion potential here, because in addition to those big six, eight tight ends and whatnot, they do have a guy who's being considered one of the ACC's best receivers. I cannot recall his name right now, but surely I could look it up,

but no, no, I can't be bothered to do that. That's unnecessary. Yeah, there are, I mean, there's only one game on here. They have to win, right? That's the Virginia game. Sure. Frankly, that's one I'm going to, I don't know what happens there.

I have no clue what either one of these teams are going to look like at the end. But that is the way to start your tenure off in the worst way. It would be to lose to Virginia at home. I mean, that's not happening. But I don't know what it'll look like. Okay, okay. It might be 17-16. It might be 70 to 16, okay?

I don't know. It's just not going to end with UVA winning this year. Can you imagine one year ago being able to say, Bronco Mendenhall owns that ass, Virginia Tech. I mean, I could. It would just be in a bowl game context. What alternate universe are we talking about? Also, important to note, Mendenhall and Fuente,

worthy head coaches of the legendary BYU, Memphis, Miami Beach Bowl, brawl. Oh, wow. So. Oh, re-back. We fight you. Any hopes of this rivalry finally having, legit in-state hate tension. There was a shoving match a couple years ago, but that ain't cutting it.

Let's see if these two coaches can inject some of that. I don't fight. I don't argue. I just hit that who with the bottle. Yes. I would also, as a side note, watch UVA this year. They're going to get way nastier. You're going to be like, oh, man, they're just going to be the, all of Bronco Men & Holt's

BYU teams were just the nastiest. It'll be so... bunch of mean dudes and just a bunch of ruffled collars and and and and and and and cumberbuns and all that with blood on them no I'm not I don't know but we're not talking about UVA on this podcast powdered powdered wigs getting tore off for for the fight basically the confusing thing about the virginia tech schedule is that it is peppered with teams that could go could win five games or could win eight or nine games. Yes, it's an ACC schedule.

It is an ACC schedule. God damn it. Stupid ACC. All right, I'll say seven and five. Hmm. So you got seven wins? I'm counting, I'm counting manually three, four, four. Yeah, I can find seven on here.

I feel good about that. I'm going to say nine and three to bump us up to eight and four. I will shoot that gap and I will take 8 and 4. Okay, I feel fine with that. Go Hokies. We got two more Pac-12 teams to do. Somehow we have not done all of the Pac-12 teams on this podcast yet. I think we have 19 more to do.

There's a damn lot of... I was going to say, little known fact. The Pac-34 has been a reality for seven years. I'm really looking forward to our San Francisco 49ers preview. Chip Brown was right all. along. Would you rather do Washington or Arizona? I would rather end

on Washington. All right. So, because I'd like to go in alphabetical order. Let's talk about Arizona then. Next. Sure. They're there. Rich Rod. Scooby Wright is gone. They also play Hawaii. I have

very little to say about Arizona. Yeah. I feel badish about that, but. Defensive coaching staff overhaul, which, yeah. It needed one of those. Yeah. That should be better.

They're recruiting a lot better, not that that really matters for this season, unless they find an amazing loophole. But, yeah, a lot of the same stuff as last year, minus Gooby. A new Solomon is back. They got to play Stanford. They got to play Washington and Wazoo.

You got BYU out of conference in Arizona, and BYU is outselling your fans for tickets. So a fan, fan expectations are pretty high. Honestly, here's what I'll say about Arizona. Wait a month, and then come back and decide how you feel about them. Yeah, but let's take just a quick look at the first month of that schedule. Yeah, yeah. Parse that out.

They get BYU in, for some reason, they're playing that game in University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, the Cardinals. So they can fit more BYU fans. Yeah, that makes sense, actually. They host Grambling State. they host Hawaii, man, Hawaii, y'all just racking up those miles. Good for you. And then they host Washington. So they don't have to leave the state for the first month. They're playing the equivalent of four home games, and they have two. You know, BYU is sort of an open question with Bronco Mennon Hall leaving. But the Washington game is going to be the first time where we have any meaningful sense of where Arizona is in 2016, I think. think.

I'm going to recommend we wait two months before we're saying how we feel about it because check out this run of six games, Washington at UCLA at Utah, USC, Stanford, at Washington State. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. After that, after that you come down. Wait until January. January, we will definitely know where Arizona was. You can into this program one year from this date. And we will tell you how Arizona did.

We will definitely have a better sense of Arizona as a 2016 team. Uh, yeah, this is, this is tough. I just don't know. I just don't have meaningful feelings about it. Uh, my, my feeling is this, that's, that's a burly, that's a burly-ass schedule. Yeah, early. Yeah. I mean, they could start, like, in theory, they could start like, like, what, two and four?

Like, sure. It's hard to find, like, wins where you go, yeah, that looks like, that looks definite. Like, does even Washington State, does that even look like anything definite at all? That's at Bowman, brother. Nothing's definite there. I mean, even Oregon State is your easiest game in conference here. And that's really far away. Yeah.

Yeah, this is, I think this is an extremely difficult year schedule, anything. I think an opener against BYU, there in a much. better position, I think, the BYU at the moment. What does this year mean in terms of Rich Rod and his tenure at Arizona? I have no sense... I'm asking that in an open way, because I have no sense of

if Arizona fans are happy with him, if they think he's leading the program in the right direction, or is this just turning into, hey, we already saw Stoops do this, thanks. I mean, it seems like they're pretty happy with him. They've fought South Carolina for him and were

very excited to retain him. Well, either that or South Carolina was just cheap, according to some rumors, so. There's that. I mean, if you're less cheap than South Carolina, that's not saying much, granted. But South Carolina Gamecocks, they throw a lot of money around. That's fine. But, I mean, it feels like he could absorb a bad year just fine, a little rebuilding year in a tough conference with a tough schedule. I don't think a four and eight would get him fired or anything.

This looks like, if I'm being real optimistic, this looks like six and six. yeah to me just thinking about the team and the schedule it's like four or five but rich rod it's hard to argue for rich rod having a losing record i can't think of anywhere he's ever done that before um in his in his previous stints no if he did that place must have been awful and impossible to win that i can't i can't imagine a entire institution being you know a complete mess i can't imagine a situation so dysfunctional where he couldn't succeed and they'd have to eventually hire psychopath. It just doesn't seem like the kind of thing that could happen.

Well, you know, there's a step in between that. But we don't have to get there. We don't have to do that. It's fine. Yeah, if you want to say six and six, I guess that reflects the quality of the Pact 12. And I mean that more in question mark noise, not the home improvement noise. I heard, I heard Tim Allen is coming to fix this defense. What do I do about all these touchdowns were giving up?

It just needs more power. I don't think so, Rich. The other thing that you need to factor in here in the Wacky Pack 12 is there's going to be at least one or two other teams that completely collapse. Yeah, you do get to play Arizona State. I mean, you see, I was going to say UCLA just gave

Jim Mora a contractor. extension so that seems destined to turn south just because of that jonah the nine and three okay good it just like does todd graham is todd graham even the coach come their big game in november yeah i thought you're going to say today can i get a proof of life of todd graham please just a lot of his hair um i i i still can't go higher than six and six i just because i have no idea it's a cop out but i don't care yeah i mean i thought getting the six and six required a break in that sort of five game stretch it might but that jason was talking about but those are also those are also teams that

are known to give you a break so yeah no it happens when you're dealing with when you're dealing with pack 12 and all 37 teams that it throws at you i mean i mean pack 12's got a lot of firepower and sometimes those guns just just don't shoot it's fine all right so uh we're gonna sit at six and six Yeah, that's not that sure. All right. All right. Bag it. And we finish up with, speaking of enigmatic Pac-12 teams.

The most, I think the most interesting Pac-12 team this year. Agreed. Washington. Washington is not going to play a lot of interesting football to start the season. They will host Rutgers. They will host Idaho. They will host Portland State. And then they will go to Arizona.

And that's September for them. Oh, no, they do have, they do host Stanford on. a Friday night to end September. So it goes from Dull to interesting pretty quick. Yeah, and that's the thing. Chris Peterson has not been able to build an offense there. That's kind of been the thing that has not happened. They were real good defensively at times.

They definitely did not have what you would expect to be a good record in conference. I think they were four and five. in the pack 12 which that's not good that's not what they expect but this is the team where you go okay we kind of had this with Sarkesian too

you kind of go all right we've got them to a good like 7 and 5 8 and 4 like boil can we roll this over in a double digits can we have something where you look at you know if you look at everything and go okay is Jake Browning going to continue to

mature as a quarterback like he did over the last couple of games, right? UW Dogpound had a great article on this showing, but yeah, he got way better over the course of the season. And that's, like, promising. You don't want to believe in momentum. I don't. But there was definitely sort of, okay, this is like when the light turned on

for Kevin Hogan at Stanford. Like, oh, look, he understands what he's doing. Oh, and he's only a sophomore. This could only get better. So, and having Chris Peterson do that, somebody who's talked time and time again about being super methodical with quarterbacks and bringing them along, like, from this set of concepts to this one,

it's really cool to watch what he could do at a place as large as Washington. So is it schedule time? Can we look at the schedule? We can. We can. I think there are four solid wins on here. And probably, and those are the Rutgers, Idaho, Portland State, Oregon State games. And then there's the coin flip games.

That would be, I'll say, at Arizona, at Utah, at, Cal, Arizona State, and Washington, at Washington State. And then there's USC, Oregon, Stanford. I think the coin flip in any Apple Cup is always a great call. Yeah, yeah, merely because of what it is. Which is, no one knows. No one ever knows. No one ever knows.

Maybe one of my favorite rivalry games strictly for that, and that it's always this bizarre, it's like the bad. battle that happens, you know, rivalry week is this grand theater of conflict. And it's like the battle that happens where afterwards you go, what? No, yeah. The Apple Cup is the theoretical animal fight that could never happen. It's like, what if a shark battled in orangutan? And it's like, well, that just can't. I mean, there's not a situation where they can even exist. But what if it did? But it's what if a drunk shark and a drunker. Right. Right. Yeah. They got into the booze crazy things happen so looking at washington this year to me i get why they're being

hyped why like bill c's numbers had them as early had them as high as number 10 in the projected ratings and you can see like the uh the the poll people are starting to bring them up toward that level because you look at the pack 12 north which is probably the most interesting division this year since any of the six teams could win it um Washington state feels like a long shot but i mean look at what else is here there's not a clear favorite at all. And it's easy to talk yourself into Washington being the favorite based on how much they return, how young they were.

The way the schedule sets up, I don't think, is all that scary. I think Oregon is probably your own, Oregon and Washington State are your hardest road games. And, you know, other than that, in your division, not that tough. You might be favored over Stanford. You might be favored over USC. Honestly, I have them at 9 and 3 myself. and you look at that like that feels really, really high, but

is it? No, I don't think that's high at all. Yeah, I think that's fair. Like my worst possible scenario for them is 8 and 4. If you just look at, you know, okay, here's the talent you have on staff and here's, you know, on roster, and here's where you're playing. And yeah, 8 and 4

is like the worst. I think 9 and 3 is, 9 of 3 is realistic. The question, I guess, is going to be, can they, like, they have, they have, They have this maddening inability since Peterson got there to string together wins in any meaningful way. They are definitely the team that just sort of flip-flops, win-loss, win-loss, win-loss, win-loss, win-loss, and I don't think they can get away with that this year

and finish with anything meaningful. I think last year Washington was the team that you kind of can't look at in a binary way. They're kind of like Arkansas the year before because their losses, I think, at least half of them were by a single score, which that might not sound all that impressive. But all the losses were really close, really competitive against good teams. There might have been one that got away from them. But they were a lot better than a seven and six team should have been. Yeah, that's fair.

And they also didn't beat – I mean, they beat USC. That was an ugly game. Other than that, they beat nobody of consequence. That's the other flip side of this is they are kind of in the Tennessee boat of improving, encouraging signs, et cetera, et cetera. They really have to go beat somebody that will cause other people to stand up and take notice. Yeah, and the thing about their wins, they weren't beating good teams, but they were stomping out decent teams. Right, right.

I just, if we get through that Stanford, Oregon back to back, and they lose both of those games and don't look competitive in either, I think we'll probably collectively close the book on them for the year. Sure. They'll probably, I mean, around that point, we'll probably have a clear Pact 12 North favorite. Yeah. But as it is, it's a really fun division to think about. Yeah. And I say that as the Internet's number one Stanford football fan. Uh-huh.

True. Live tree or die. Live true or die. I know. You're messing with the whole thing from the roots to the branches, to the cones. Mm-hmm. You mess with Ryan Annan's love. To the needles.

To the needles. He's the Stanford fan to the. very sap of the man. Conifer air. That's what we call it. So, yeah, I guess we call 9 and 3? Yeah, 9 and 3 works.

I need a little more ringing endorse than that. You feel better with 8 and 4? No, no. 9 and 3 works. I just, you know, I think, I really do think the St. For Oregon pair is going to be where we have a sense of where if Washington's more hype or less.

So if Washington goes 9 and 3, that means they split Stanford in Oregon, that seemed about right, which means there's a very good chance they win the Pact 12 North. No one in the Pact 12 South jumps out especially more interesting than any of these North teams in any way. So let's say Washington beats, you know, USC or whoever. So Washington's in the Rose Bowl now, by the way. Hey, congratulations. So, I mean, I guess that's what, when I think 9 and 3 Washington in this Pac-12, I think we're talking conference champion Washington, which I guess that's the part that feels like,

whoa, whoa, hey, wait, wait, wait, hang on. But I don't see an outstanding argument against it. Oregon's starting over in some ways. Stanford loses a ton. A lot of dominoes have to fall for us to get three ACC teams in the playoffs. and this is one of them. That is a reliable gambit to play in your team's road to the playoff

is this, I need the Pact 12 to cannibalize itself. Okay, okay, okay. After this, we need to replace Jeff Long with Bud Elliott. We're so good. Okay, you know what? You might be right. Frankly, the validity of that argument

is blinded from any analysis because the Pact 12 does actually, you know, they do actually play each other a lot and they scheduled pretty well at a conference, however, y'all tend to do this, too. So if you want to take the humble brag off that, right? Like, oh, man, listen, the only reason I haven't been more successful is because I give so much a way to those I love. Okay, cool.

That's fine. But, you know, take the brag off that, if you like. Playoff rep, but Elliot is pretty special. And I want it to happen now, just so he can be like, well, if skinny legs were a metric, the Pac-12 would be in. Ha, ha, ha.