The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - Joel Klatt's Top 5 Performances he's ever called & more mailbag

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

FOX Sports’ lead College Football analyst Joel Klatt dives into the mailbag to answer your questions! Klatt reminisces on some of the favorite performances he's ever called from the booth including fan favorites like Aidan Hutchinson, Travis Hunter, Baker Mayfield and more. Klatt also answers why playing at home is such an advantage and explains the purpose of college GMs in the athletic department. Lastly, Klatt addresses a fan's disappointment in Lincoln Riley's last few seasons at USC and shares why he's optimistic in Riley's ability to turn things around. 0:00-1:46 Intro1:47-15:30 Best performances in a game Klatt has called15:31-24:21 Why is homefield advantage so important?24:22-30:06 Where do GM’s fit in college athletic departments?30:07-33:47 Could Lincoln Riley find himself on the hot seat if this season doesn’t go well?33:48-38:00 What have you learned about yourself since becoming a father? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

My top five best individual performances. Aiden Hutchison gave the sideline belief, the stadium belief, in a lot of cases, the entire state belief that Michigan could end the eight game losing streak. That was the birth of Hollywood Brown. When Gus calls like, where did this guy come from? I couldn't say anything, right? Because Gus is calling the play, and I was like, no way. I was like, ow!

Every time his fingers touched the ball. It was remarkable. He played 152 total snaps in 130 degree heat. I'd never seen anything like it. College football has never been better. Interest has never been higher. Believe that we are at the dawn of the golden age of college football. Welcome in, everybody.

This is the Joel Clatt show. I am Joel Clatt. This show, as always, is brought to you by Hampton, by Hilton. We thank them for their support. Folks, we've got more off-season content. Can't wait for today's show. We're going to have a mailbag episode of the show and some really good questions, including best performances I've ever witnessed,

home road differences, GMs. what's their place in college football, maybe some Lincoln Riley talk. So a lot to get into in the mailbag here today. But first, subscribe to the show on YouTube. Make sure you're there. You can hit the notification button and then you're going to know when all of our content drops. You can go check out everything that we've done in the offseason, including some of our interviews that we've done for Big New Conversation.

Those are up. And then on social media, you can check out our content as well. Wherever you like to social media, we're there, agile class shows where you can find us. So let's dive into the mailbag. Offseason is great time for reflection on like how great college football has been. I think it's easy to forget some of the great performances. So I saw this question. And I was like, man, this is incredible.

This is an incredible question. Roy L chimes in. He says, Joel, big fan of you and the show. Thank you. Love when you and Gus come to Madison. I love coming to Madison as well. You've called so many games, but I have to ask you if you could only pick one, which player had the best performance in a game you've called. That's so difficult.

I loved the question, Roy, but I can't just mention one because there's so many incredible performances. So here's what I wanted to do. My top five. My top five best individual performances that I've seen, and I'm going to give you a little bit of context of what was going on that maybe you didn't realize at the time. Now, truth be told, there's a couple that I I couldn't get on this list. So I want to mention those first real quickly. Kyler Murray in the Red River game. Texas ended up winning that game,

but he had a run down the left sidelines that was incredible. It's still probably the singular best play I've ever seen on a college football field. I couldn't get that one on the list. And then J.T. Barrett and Ohio State coming back against Penn State in that game against Saquan, Barclay, Barclay took the opening kickoff back. I couldn't find the spot because these. other five are like insane. They're absolutely insane.

So let's start. I'm going to go five to one. My best individual performances. And truth be told, number five is actually a dual performance. Two players, same team, same game that absolutely were incredible. So number five is Marvin Harrison Jr. And JT. Tuimolo at Penn State in 2022. So the stat lines tell you a lot about what was going on.

Marvin Harrison Jr. had 10 catches for 185 going against Joey Porter Jr. Now, context to that. going into the game, this was thought to be like, hey, these are two first round guys. Like, this is going to be difficult. This is going to be very difficult for Marvin Harrison Jr. A lot of us thought he was the best wide receiver in the country. And so, like, that was the matchup we were all watching.

And listen, like seven for 80 would have been a good day. But he went for 10, 185 on 12 targets. But here's the most impressive part. All 10 catches went for first downs. It was remarkable sitting in the booth and watching him. him go to work. They were trying to hold him. They were trying to body him up. And he just kept fighting through four of those catches were on third downs or fourth downs. He was sensational. And so that matchup leading in and then the way that he performed, he totally dominated a player

that we thought was also going to be a first round player. And the enormity of the catches, it was at times like he was putting the offense on his back and they were moving the chains. in the same game, JT Tuo and Moloow went like full Thor on Penn State. He was incredible. I have never seen a defensive player wreck a game to the extent he did for a portion. He had two interceptions. We're talking about a defensive end. One was a pick six to seal the game.

He had two sacks. One was a strip sack that he recovered. He also had a tip at the last. line that led to another interception. He was basically a threat to score on every offensive play for Penn State. I'd never felt like that about a defensive end before in my life. But there were moments during that game and I was just like staring at JT2 and Molo out because I was like, what is he going to do next?

He was so dominant on the defensive side as an individual in the same game that Marvin Harrison was so dominant as a wide receiver on the offensive side. So that's number five. Number four, best individual performance. Aiden Hutchinson against Ohio State in 2021. Michigan had lost eight straight against Ohio State. And backstory and context to this is like covering not only that game but Michigan leading into that game. I don't know how else to say this other than like Michigan Stadium was a nervous crowd.

That's the energy that they had during that entire time, late in the teens, so like 2016. 2017, 2018, 2019. COVID obviously is a little bit different. But I'm looking up.

And during that game, it felt tangibly different because Ohio State was so good that year. They were so good. Stroud was on fire. They had maybe the greatest wide receiver room in history.

They have Garrett Wilson, Smith, and Jigba. They have all those guys. Chris Olavé. I mean, just like players. And yet, the crowd never devolved into this nervous energy. Why? Because of Aiden Hutchinson. Aidan Hutchinson gave the sideline belief, the stadium belief, in a lot of cases, the entire state,

belief that Michigan could end the eight game losing streak. He was sensational. Three sacks, 15 quarterback pressures, 15, most pressures by a Big Ten player in the last ten years. And he did it in the biggest game against the best team when he had to. Hutchinson had to be great to stop that Buckeye offense. And by the way, here's the deal. Covering that Buckeye offense in 2021, I just remember always talking about the avalanche of points that they used to put up, like a run in college basketball where all of a sudden it would be like,

score, score, bang. And then all of a sudden they're up multiple possessions and you just couldn't come back on them. And they could never do that against that Michigan team in large part because of Hutchinson, in particular on third down. Like he was, as an individual, he was sensational. Stroud still went off. He threw for 394, throwing to Alave, Wilson Smith, Smith, and Jakeba that day. They never got on a run, though, because Hutchinson made it difficult on him.

So that's number four. At number three, one of my all-time favorites was Baker Mayfield in Bedlam against Oklahoma State in 2017. This was an incredible game and incredible environment. That was one of my favorites that I've ever called. It's on the road. It's at Oklahoma State, and they are just trading absolute haymakers. The game ends up being OU62, Oklahoma State 52. Just wild offensive game.

And for the first time, I can remember just experiencing the full Baker-Mayfield swag. And it didn't matter what Oklahoma State was doing. He would just, like, roll out there almost like Connor McGregor, you know, Like he's just, and then he would just drop bombs. He wasn't picking them apart. He was dropping bombs. Here's his stat line. 24 for 36.

Doesn't sound great, right? But in those 24 completions, he threw for 598 yards, six total touchdowns. He averaged nearly 25 yards per completion. 24.9. I've never seen it that high. Never. Never in my life. I'm just talking about absolute haymakers. By the way, I believe that was the birth of Hollywood Brown. I believe that was the game when Gus calls like, where did this guy come from? And I was like, he's a junior college transfer from, you know, whatever it was, College of the Canyons or something along those lines. But man, Mayfield was dropping dimes.

I just remember like almost every offensive series for Oklahoma, he would drop back and like my hands would go onto my head. I couldn't say anything right because Gus is calling the play and I was like, no way. I was like, I'm screaming in the background. At one point during that time game, I had to hit my mute button because I was just like, no way.

So that was one of the like great performances that I've ever witnessed. Gus went crazy. You've got nicknames out of it. He goes on. he becomes a Heisman trophy winner. It had everything that you wanted right there. It had everything that you wanted. All right.

Number two, best performance that I've ever witnessed in a game that I called. Okay. Travis Hunter against TCU in 2023. You've got to understand the hype going into that game surrounding Dion Sanders and Travis Hunter. So this is their first game at Colorado. Some context to this game behind the scenes. And I don't know if anyone will admit this.

But I basically went to the mat behind the scenes with, not with our executives. It's not like we were arguing. I basically pounded the table with our programming department to take that game with a high pick in the Big 12 draft. I believe I told them like, hey, like the second pick in the draft. If Red River is number one, I think the second pick of the draft, which was ours, I was like, I think you should take Colorado TCU. And they were like, really? And I was like, yes, two reasons.

One, I knew that the hype train was so real that everyone was going to want to watch and see what it looked like. When Dion Sanders was at Colorado and then Travis Hunter got to be there and it's like they're taking on the defending national runner up. TCU had just gone to the national championship game. And I thought it was way better to select Colorado early that season because I had no idea how they would finish. You know, which, by the way, ended up to be true. But that was the backstory. That's the context. is I kind of pound the table and stick my neck out for that game and the game selection process to say, like, we should take that game.

And the game ends up being insane, insane. Great football game. And then all this hype surrounding Deon manifest and all the hype surrounding Travis Hunter manifest. We'd heard all these things about whether he can or can't play both ways. Well, you can do it at that level, but can he do it at this level? And this is the heat and this is Fort Worth. And it's the first game of the season. and it had to feel like it was 130 degrees on the field.

And this guy went out there and was incredible. And from that day forward, I knew immediately that this guy was a star, that he was one of if not the best player in college football, and that he was going to have as bright a future as anybody in this sport. He was incredible. Eleven catches for 119 on offense. In and of itself, in 130 degree heat, very difficult to do. One of the best interceptions that I've ever seen in the low red zone

when he comes off of his man and dives in front of the flat defender and ends up intercepting that pass. Unbelievable. What you won't see in the stat sheet is that on that series, he ran down the TCU running back on a 74-yard run. It looks like this guy is broken away. He's gone. And from the opposite side of the field, Hunter runs him down. He played 152 total snaps in 130-degree heat. He's got 11 catches for 119.

He's got an interception. he's chasing people down. I'd never seen anything like it. Never seen anything like it. By the way, he actually dropped a ball in the end zone, kind of lays out and the ball goes off of his hands right before halftime. And then Dion gave one of the great pre-half time interviews with Jenny going into the locker room. She's like, man, that was an incredible half.

What do you think? And he was like, well, Travis dropped the ball or else he would have had the Hysman at his crib resting. And I'm like, that line epitomized Dion Sanders and his swag. And now what was the swag of the collar? out of program. So everything that led into that game, you know, kind of reverberated through college football, but specifically Travis Hunter's performance. And the number one performance that I've ever witnessed in the booth, I've got to go into the wayback machine because no one's going to remember this, but I remember that night. I remember this night like yesterday.

Tavon Austin from West Virginia against Oklahoma in 2012. Davon Austin wasn't even a running back. He was a wide receiver. And because of injuries, here's West Virginia, who's welcoming in big, powerful Bob Stoops and Landry Jones and the Oklahoma Sooners and they're rolling. They're winning Big 12 title after Big 12 title. And we go to Morgantown and it was a night game.

And we did this game and all of a sudden, Tavon Austin starts lining up a tailback. And I'm like, well, this is kind of strange. They hadn't even really mentioned this to us in the pregame production meetings. And here he is. And guess what Tavon Austin did against Oklahoma? 21 carries for 344 rush yards and two touchdowns. By the way, he also had four catches as a wide receiver for 82 receiving yards,

which means Tavon Austin that night against OU, 25 touches for 426 total yards, two touchdowns, 17 yards every time his fingers touched the ball. It was remarkable. I just remember coming out of my skin. they end up losing the game, unfortunately, because Landry Jones went off. He threw for 550 yards and six touchdowns. Oh, you won at 50 to 49. It was an incredible game, but that performance, Tavon Austin has stuck with me through it all.

And those are my top performances. So just to recap, those are my top five performances that I've ever witnessed firsthand. Marvin Harrison, Jr., in conjunction with J.T. Tuimolo against Penn State in 2022. Aiden Hutchinson against Ohio State in 2021. Baker Mayfield and Bedlam against Oklahoma State on the road in 2017. Travis Hunter and his opening game at Colorado against TCU in 2023. That was on the road in the heat. And then Tavon, Austin at home against Oklahoma in 2012 was remarkable.

So there you go. That's my list, and I'm sticking to it. I will always remember those performances. Tell you what, that got me very excited. I'm going to take a quick sip of water. because I start going fast when I'm excited about things. All right, let's go back to the mailbag. Thomas Y, he asks,

Homefield Advantage is obviously a pretty big deal in college football. Maybe it seems less important than the NFL. I don't know about that, but what exactly makes it so difficult to win on the road? Is it just the crowd noise? I never played college football, so don't know what it feels like in that environment. But you played in call games every week. why does it matter so much?

It's a great question. This is a great question. And let me start with kind of a phrase that I believe encapsulates playing on the road. Playing on the road can feel like a death by a thousand paper cuts. There's no one thing that is insurmountable. But when you are playing a game that has small margins, begin with, when you start giving an advantage in a lot of little areas, little advantages over little areas over time become pretty big. And that's what playing on the road feels like.

It just feels like a weight. Okay, so that's number one. Next would be, I believe that home field advantage is actually a bit of a fallacy. And bear with me here. I believe that we talk about home field advantage, generally speaking in big games. That's the only one where we're like, oh my, these are good teams and they've got to go to this location or they've got to go to that location. Like, we don't really think of it when a good team goes on the road against a very average team. We don't think to ourselves like, well, it's tough to win on the road.

You know, I know that in some conferences, they'll, they will just like constantly bash that over your head. but it generally is about good teams. It's just tough to beat good teams in college football, period, even tougher at home because they get those incremental advantages over a lot of different spaces. And we can go through that. And by the way, the numbers bear this out. Over the last 10 years, top 10 teams have won 89% of their home games overall and about 70%

when it's a top 10 matchup. It's nearly, not totally, but nearly impossible to beat a top 10 team. in their home stadium unless you are a top 10 team. And even then, you're winning three out of 10 times. So the odds are not very good. And generally speaking, we talk about home field advantage more so when it relates to great teams. Okay, so that's number one. Now, let's talk about some of those little areas and spaces where those margins and incremental

advantages happen. Number one, you mentioned is crowd noise. For an offense, it's very difficult to do a couple of things. but number one, you can't control the defense with your cadence. Let me give you an example. As a quarterback, one of your main weapons or tools in your tool belt is the cadence. How are you, this is why I despise the clap in college football. This whole like everyone just sits there and they're like, so dumb.

You are throwing away a potential advantage that you have, which is the cadence. Let me give you an example. Okay, kind of back away from the microphone here. Because we would have things like a dead color. So, like, our cadence was color number, color number said hot. Or said hut, hut, or set hut, hot, or set hut, hot, three, you could go on first sound, which was like, go. You just come up and go on first sound.

So, but the color and number became important because that's how we could check plays and communicate at the line of scrimmage via live colors. or you could use dead colors. A dead color meant that I could say hut as many times as possible, and we aren't moving. Okay, so if there's no crowd noise that you're at home, I can unlock what's going on on the defensive side just with my cadence.

Here's how it sounds. Let's say the dead color is yellow. Come up, go. Yellow 50. Yellow 50 said, hot! And now all of a sudden, guess what happens? You get movement on the defensive side. They're trying to disguise.

But now the safety steps in one direction. You see a rotation. You see a corner maybe sink. You see some sort of movement up front, whether it's the linebacker starting to, you know, eke over into a gap in order to blitz or something along those lines. And you've studied this on film. Obviously, you know the sets or the blitzes that they like versus that particular formation. Let's say we're in Trey Wright. You know, they like the blitz to the strength in particular from the field.

They like the blitz to the one technique. And so all of a sudden you're getting these and then you give a dead color. Yellow 50 yellow fidget, that hot. And then you get the guy by and you're like, boom, got it. Because I have a check player. I have a kill play. And now I can go to a live color. Let's say this is red.

And I've got two plays in the huddle. So we had 92 power, which we want to run into a pressure because of the way that their zone pressuring. Or we can run, you know, two jet zebra shallow cross. Now I've got two plays, depending on the game plan. And I can bait them into switching or showing. I shouldn't say switch, showing their hand on defense, and now I can get us into the perfect play. Okay. So that's an example of without crowd noise, how I can use a cadence to my advantage.

Now, I'm playing at Penn State, at Oregon, at Ohio State, wherever, at Death Valley in South Carolina, or, excuse me, Clemson, or LSU, or Georgia, or Alabama, or Texas, or Kyle Field, which I had to play at. And you come up, guess what you can't do? you can't use a dead color because everyone's like, I can't hear a thing. So they're just looking at the movement of the football, nor can you really communicate the kill play. So what you end up doing in those cases is you tend to operate more out of tank plays. Tank plays meaning we're not going to check. So we're just going to call to Jet Zebra Shallow Cross, even if they have a defensive structure that that might not be advantageous to play against. That's the biggest advantage that you have as a home field is the crowd noise.

This is why it's so important and coaches constantly lament like, hey, we just need our crowd. We need our crowd. That is the tangible example. Another thing that it does is with crowd noise, it elevates your heart rate. I always experience this on the road. You tended to be a little bit more rushed. And offense is about rhythm and timing. Timing in particular in the passing game because timing plus spacing equals completions.

okay timing plus ball placement equals yards after the catch these little types of equations are important and if your timing is is rushed and I'm ready before the wide receivers are ready or the wide receivers are ready before I'm ready and now the entire offense is not going to run what I would consider at an optimized rate. Why? Just because your heart rate is up because it's loud because it's hard. Whereas at home you're familiar and that's the last thing would be familiarity. When you're at home, everything is familiar. You know the hotel that you go to. You know the pattern of the locker room.

You know what your locker is going to feel like. You know what the grass is going to feel like or the turf is going to feel like, what the football is going to feel like. This was a big part of playing quarterback at Colorado, which I didn't anticipate before I started playing and starting at the University of Colorado as we play at elevation. Well, why is that important? Well, because when we took our footballs on the road, guess what they did?

They deflated. I didn't like a deflated football. So I would have to sit there in the pregame and check the footballs and be like, nope, this one needs a little bit more air. Nope, this one needs a little bit more air because of the air pressure. Everything feels a little bit different. The humidity would be different from one to another. The altitude would be different from one to another.

We played at Iowa State. There was a tornado warning before the game. We had to sit in the locker room, which, by the way, if there's a delay and you're on the road, you're not at home. So guess what? You don't have all the resources in space to sit around. All of these things become little small margins. And you add those up, all the small margins become big.

And in a game of small margins and small margin outcomes, it becomes a huge deal. That was a long answer. I feel like that was a really good question. And I don't think people really articulate it to that extent. So I wanted to give you that longer answer, Thomas. Thank you for the question, buddy. All right. Ricky Kay chimes in.

He says, are college GMs replacing the need for athletic directors? I've seen several longtime ADs step down after being at the same program for decades. Is this good or bad for college football? Man, there's a lot going on in this question, Ricky. So first of all, because of the changing environment in college athletics, not just football, but in college athletics, via the house settlement, which obviously happened this summer, you've heard a lot about. But the House settlement, if you don't know, is basically this,

that Intercollegiate Athletic Departments can now share revenue with their athletes. They can share it up to a certain percentage of revenue based on the average of all these different television contracts. It's coming out to about $20.5 million. A lot of estimates estimate that the football program in each program is going to be $14 to $17 million of that. and then the rest will go to the other sports. What you then have outside of revenue sharing needs to be legitimate NIL opportunities. Okay, so in order to govern that,

the newly formed college sports commission is going to be headed up by Brian Seeley. Brian Seeley was the head of investigations from Major League Baseball. So now he's coming in over this college sports commission. And now a true NIL opportunity is going to have to be registered with the college sports commission. they hired Deloitte in order to basically look at all of these deals and say, is this market value?

Is this market value for this deal? And is there an actual business dealing that they're paying for the name, image, and likeness? Is there requirements rather than just a handout for these players? So that's a very generalized structure of what they're trying to do in college football right now. But what it does is it moves it more towards this model where you're going to have to navigate the revenue share. And in order to navigate the revenue share, I think that you're going to need an entire personnel department. And more specifically, you're going to need someone that understands how to evaluate talent and evaluate talent. I don't know if that's a word.

Is that a word? Value and evaluation. These are now both vital, not just the evaluation, which is what it used to be, which is what scouting departments could do and coaches could do. and you would recruit. Because remember, the lifeblood of any program is still talent acquisition. So you've got to go out there and you've got to get the best talent. But now you've got to value that talent because you can't spend money after a guy that's going to turn into a turd. Right?

You spend money and that's essentially going to be like dead cap space. Man, we're spending $3 million on guys that don't produce. That can't happen. So you're going to have to have a very strategic arm of your athletic department and maybe more specifically your football program that is going to be headed up by the GM. Okay. I believe that this is not the same as an athletic director because the overarching enterprise or business of an athletic department is going to be needed to be headed up by a CEO type. I think that they should also have a C.O.O. type. There needs to be a front facing executive or an athletic director. And then you need someone that's really good in operation because of everything that's going on not only with the house settlement, but just in intercollegiate athletics writ large. That is different. from a GM, which is specific to a football program, and then you get into what's the structure per program. Because now you've got two different models. You've got models where longtime coaches who have

earned essentially this status as the most powerful man on campus and within the athletic department that are hiring their GM to head their personnel department. Then you've got other situations where, like let's say Stanford, where Andrew Luck seems to be over the head coach. that's a different structure. I don't think that you're ever going to be able to just all of a sudden take a coach that has had success that has been in a school and put a GM over him. In order at that university to have a structure where a GM would be over a head coach and maybe in charge of even hiring and firing that head coach would be in a coach transition. These are all good questions.

You know, basically, I believe that athletic departments need to operate. like businesses, like Fortune 500 businesses, a CEO, a C-O. And then the football program, aside from that, needs to operate like we would see in the National Football League, a GM and a coach. Now, whether that GM is under the coach or over the coach remains to be seen. And that's something that will be negotiated and fought for just like it is in the NFL. Remember, there was a time with Mike Holmgren and Mike Shanahan and Bill Parcells and Bill Belichick, where coaches would fight for the GM role and the head coach role because they wanted to say, I'm responsible for the roster and coaching that roster. And then teams and organizations wrestled that power away from

some of those guys. So the same is going to go on in college football. I personally believe that a GM is an absolute must. I don't think it matters whether he's over the coach or under the coach. That just, in my estimation, depends on how good is your coach? How good is he? Is he set? Is he firm in what you're doing, what you believe in as an athletic director and others? It's an interesting dynamic. There's no doubt. It's going to need to continue to morph as the structure of the sport morphs, then the structure of the athletic department and the structure of the football program is going to have to morph with it. Good question, Ricky. All right, Kelly chimes in. Kelly says when Lincoln Riley was first

tired to be the Trojans head coach, I was super fired up. But all I felt the past three years is disappointment, could he be on the hot seat if the Trojans have another lackluster season? Let's not, okay, Kelly, like, I get it. Okay, I get it. I think that you've been disappointed lately. Let's not be revisionist in our history because the first season, Lincoln Riley, was there. They were basically Caleb Williams having a leg injury away from going to the college football playoff in the four-team era, not the 12-team era, the four-team era, the four-te-te era. He won a Heisman trophy. You won a Heisman trophy and you were right there at the top end of the sport. So you can't tell me that you've been disappointed every single year.

I think that first year was too early. I think even that success surprised Lincoln Riley. Having said that, last year was a disappointment, large part due to all the close losses. You can't lose as many close games and not be disappointed because they felt like I'm sure. that they were in a lot of those games and could have or should have won those games. I think about overtime against Penn State. Penn State had to, I believe, if my memory serves me correct, they had to convert two different fourth downs

in order to go down and score. They had them. USC had them dead to rights and it didn't go their way. They have a great chance at Minnesota. Don't get it done. Great chance against Michigan. don't get it done. So you get where I'm going like this,

I know it was disappointed or disappointing. I do believe that it can turn around. Now, if he goes seven and five again, then there's going to be talk. There's going to be talk. Riley's buyout would be probably around 70 million. But then you have to look at like, is that worth it? My suspicion is no.

And here's why. He has a track record of success. You know he can do it. He's also right now, at least, in the offseason, putting together what is the number one recruiting class in the country? It will not end up there, but it will be high. I think a top 10 class. Maybe it winds up being number one.

But in terms of like the average ranking of player, you have to kind of look at that number of commits. I do believe it's going to fall down. I think it'll be in the top 10, probably top six, pending a couple more commitments. So he's done an excellent job in terms of talent acquisition. That's still the lifeblood of college football, talent acquisition. He's doing that very well now.

They just hired the GM from Notre Dame to come in. They've got some stability there. They've got these close losses. If those turn into close wins, now you build momentum on the field. And then you have to think about if you fire your company, coach, everybody's out. So talent acquisition leaves. You don't get that class, which would be a top six class in the country, and everybody on the current roster is probably going to leave. So you talk

about really starting from zero. There's a reason why, for the first time in a long time, there was no SEC coaches fired this last off season. Why? Because it is almost impossible to rebuild your program once you start that clock, fire a coach, and lose all your players. You're starting from scratch. Nobody wants to start from scratch. And so for those reasons, even if it's seven and five, although there'll be conversations, there'll be murmurs, I don't think that they would actually pull the trigger on Lincoln Riley. Last question. And then we'll get out of here. What's one thing that you've learned about yourself from being a father? I love these types of questions. Please keep them coming. First and foremost, I will tell you this. I had no idea

what I was doing, and now I feel like I know even less. It's hard. It's hard and beautiful all at the same time. I consider it my greatest calling on this planet is to be Henry and Sam and Theo's father. I consider it my greatest responsibility. And because of that, there's an enormity to every day and every interaction.

I think about every interaction. How did he take that? Did he not take that well? How can I build into him? How do I build into them grit and work ethic? How do I build into them truth? I have a very strong faith in Jesus Christ. How do I build into them the truth of Jesus Christ?

That's my number one goal in life. So there's this idea that it's like, there's nothing that can prepare you for this. And so immediately, I felt totally inadequate. And I've felt inadequate almost every single day since. And I'm just trying to do my best. And I'm trying to lay out those goals. I feel incredibly blessed to be their dad.

There's no doubt. But I don't take it for granted. Because, again, this is my greatest calling. You know, if I don't call another college football game ever, that's fine. As long as my boys know that I love them. Right? So that's the way that I truly feel. And hopefully that's the way that you feel.

And then a couple of other things, I've learned that I would literally do anything for them. Anything. I immediately knew the first time I heard Henry, who was my oldest, he's 13, 13 years ago, a little over 13 years ago, the first time I heard his scream, I realized that I would willingly and joyfully lay down my life for him. immediately. So what have I learned? It unlocked this place in my heart where there was an abundance of love and compassion immediately. You know, that's what I've learned from being a father. I've learned that being a father is hard, that it's not perfect, that anyone that thinks that they're good at it probably aren't, because you need to be selfless and you've got to continue to every single day, think about what do I want my kids to learn?

What do all my kids to think about me? You know, I think about a lot of times I think about like, what are the virtues the world wants versus the virtues that would be great at like your funeral, right? It's like they're different. They're different virtues. The way we view success during life versus at the end of life is different. And fatherhood can bring that into perspective

because you boil it down in that sense. Last thing I've learned. I didn't know what busy was. was before I had kids. Right? So this always draws the ire of all of you that don't have kids. And you're like, don't tell me I'm not busy. You're not busy.

Period. You have no idea what busy is at all. And I have no problem saying that. No problem saying that. I appreciate the question, Ernest, and hopefully you're a father. And even if you're about to be a father, good luck. It's your greatest calling. Do it well.

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