The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - Justin Fields is a legit Heisman contender, Big Ten back in Klatt's Top 10

Episode Date: September 23, 2020

In Joel Klatt's latest top 10 reveal, he gives you three reasons why he's excited for the SEC to return this weekend and tells you WHY he ranks Ohio State over Alabama. Matt Leinart also joins the show to break down his top Heisman contenders. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome into breaking the huddle. I'm Joel Clatt. This show, as always, is brought to you by Dr. Pepper. We appreciate them. And remember, it is the official drink of Fansville. Lots to get into and a big week. Can you feel it? The SEC is right here at our doorstep as college football continues to start to roll along. We've got the Big Ten back. Their announcement last week that they will start October 24th. We are expecting the Pack 12 and potentially the Mountain West to announce soon that they will. will be back. So listen, by the end of October, early November, we could be going full steam ahead with college football, which makes us all happy, folks, because college football is the absolute best. Here's what's going on in breaking the huddle this week. I've got my top 10 reveal, and then I've got the three reasons why I am so excited to see the SEC back and playing football this week. That's right. Noted SEC hater, Joel Klat, telling you the three reasons why I can't wait to watch the SEC this fall. That's coming up here in this segment.

Then we're going to join Matt Linerd in our next segment. We're going to talk about Heisman Hopels and what this list looks like right now, how it's comprised. Is it going to be all quarterbacks? Is there going to be some running backs in there? Again, our resident Heisman, Matt Liner, will join us. Then I'm going to break down Justin Fields for you. And Fields is an incredible athlete.

And I'm going to show you why he is right up there at that top of the Heisman list. before we get to your feedback more at the end of the show. But let's dive in real quick, because it's a top 10 that now I'm including the big 10. And so there's a lot of changes in my top 10 this week because as we start to roll through it, Notre Dame is going to get bumped down just a little bit, not for performance, but the fact that there's going to be some teams jump into this, one of them, Penn State at number 7. Georgia is at number 6. Florida drops back to 5-0, you back to 4, Alabama, back to 3 because the Ohio State,

University jumps in there at number two and Clemson still at number one. I think that the class of college football are those three at the top. Clemson, Ohio State, and Alabama, I think that they have separated themselves out a little bit this year, even though we haven't seen Bama and Ohio State play. And the reason I have them in the order, Clemson, Ohio State, and Alabama, is because we just saw Trevor Lawrence beat Ohio State in the semifinal. Justin Fields is back, and Alabama has to replace Tua. So it's going to be Mack Jones at quarterback. It looks like for the tide with Naji Harris in the backfield, but that's why I have them ranked right there in those, that order one, two, and three. Let's get to my top three reasons why I'm so excited

to see these SEC teams. You see a number of them here in the top 10, get back to the field this year. And there's three reasons, and they're very clear and obvious, at least in my estimation. The first is, I don't think that we're going to have the stops and starts that we're seeing in some of these other conferences like the ACC and the Big 12 where you're seeing postponements, game cancellations. And there's a few reasons for it, but really two reasons. The first is that they're not trying to play out of conference games. So you're going to have the like protocols with every team that steps on the field.

What I've seen in some of these other leagues is that the lower level teams from the group of five who maybe don't have as stringent a level of protocols or testing, they come out there, they play, and then all of a sudden there's a bit of a spike in those bigger conference teams, in particular in the Big 12, we've seen this a couple of times. and then all of a sudden they have to postpone games. So that's one of the reasons. The second reason is because I think Greg Sankey has gotten this absolutely correct. Greg Sankey has turned himself into the most powerful man in college football.

And the reason is because he has navigated this offseason as well or better than anybody in the sport. I think postponing until the end of September was brilliant. And we're seeing that with some of these postponements that we're seeing out of the Big 12 in the ACC, as they were trying to play through, kids coming back to campus. The normal population coming back to campus, you were going to get spikes, and then inevitably that was going to bleed over into your football team primarily through the freshman class, who is on campus in those dorms all over the country.

They're not going to have that in the SEC because they've waited. We've seen the wave come back to campus, and now it subsides, and I think that they'll be able to play through it. So Greg Sanky, with that in mind, I thought he made some great decisions. The decision to stay league only, I think is a really good decision. And when you look at what's happening around the country with the ACC and the Big 12 having postponements, with the Big 10 and the Pac-12 having to totally reverse course in terms of what their initial plan was for the season, again, Greg Sanky's going to come out of this looking like the most powerful and smartest man in college football,

because I believe, at least to this point, he's navigated it as good as anybody. The second reason I'm really excited to see the SEC, they have so many good football teams. I know you're saying like, yeah, hey, and the sky is blue, class. we know that they have good football teams. But I think it's even deeper than what we've seen in the last couple of years. Think about it from this standpoint. The SEC has always had three really good teams. I would say great teams and maybe even four if you throw Auburn in there with Bama, LSU, Georgia, and maybe Auburn.

Like really good playoff caliber teams. Now you're starting to get some depth. Florida went 10 wins, 11 wins. Now Kyle Trask and Kyle Pitts is back on that offense for Dan Mullen. I think they're a great team. I think they could win the east. I think Auburn with Bo Nix as an experienced quarterback should be very good. And then a couple of teams that we haven't seen a lot of in previous seasons,

but I think are getting so much better that they could make some noise, A&M, Tennessee, and maybe even Kentucky. So again, the depth of the SEC is, I think, better than what we've seen even in previous season. That's number two for why I'm excited to see this conference. And finally, and this is the big one. Folks, you know why I'm so excited. So we finally get to see the SEC tested. They're finally playing a schedule that's similar, and in this case, even tougher than what we've seen other conferences play in previous seasons.

These 10 conference games are going to be an absolute bear for some of these teams. Just to give you some perspective, Alabama, the last two seasons, the most consecutive weeks that they've played power five opponents, most consecutive weeks, is three in the last two seasons. They're going to open with six consecutive SEC games. Unprecedented for Nick Saban. They've never had six straight weeks of even Power 5 competition, much less SEC competition since he's been there. Just to give you some sense of how interesting that is, in 2012 it was one of the rare seasons that they even played five SEC games

in consecutive weeks. The fifth game of that five-game stretch was Johnny Mansell and Texas A&M when they went to Tuscaloosa and beat the tide. So think about what we're going to see now as we see all these ranked teams face each other. Think about Georgia or Florida. They have five ranked teams on their schedule. Georgia has five ranked teams in a six-week stretch in the middle of their schedule. It's going to be absolutely awesome to watch these teams tested in a meaningful way throughout the entirety of the season.

And fans from all over the country have been waiting to see something like this in the SEC, and we're finally going to get it. So those are my three reasons why I am so pumped to watch the SEC start this weekend and get going on this 10-game stretch. And now joining me are Heisman, Matt Liner. What's up, dude? How are you? First of all, are you standing up right now? No, I'm sitting. Why?

Oh, you look like you're standing up. Do I? Well, it's just good posture. That's all it is. Sit up straight, kids. Sit up straight. Thanks for having me, man. Appreciate it.

Dude, I'm used to seeing you in person, but this is... I know. I know. Well, different times here. So this is the socially distance version of our Heisman hopeful list. So, hey, I'm going to give you the floor. You won the award. Who are your top five right now looking at this college football season? All right. So this is, it's obviously interesting because we've had, you know,

the Big Ten hasn't played yet. The Pac-12 may have a couple guys. And clearly Justin Fields is going to be right up there. I have him in my list. I will get to him in a second. but, you know, we've only had a week or two of football. So as we both know, this thing changes. But let's get into number five.

I'm going to start with Spencer Rattler. And I know you are really high on him. I'm sure you probably have him higher than I do. And I think this, I think it'll change. But probably like you, when I watched that film against Missouri State, I know it's Missouri State, I rewound a couple past plays, Joel, because I was like, there's no way he just made that throw. And there's that one right there that you're like,

looking down the screen and this touchdown pass, he throws 50 yards off his back foot. So I just, he looked like a seasoned vet. You know, there'll be some bumps in the row, but he's, he comes in at number five. I was really impressed with him and he's only going to get better. Number four, I got Sam Ellinger from Texas. Have him above Rattler, really, just because Utep was a better opponent for me. His numbers were great. You know, Texas got a shot on pretty high on them this year.

I think Sam is going to have to kind of take this team on his vet. and see if they can out dual Rattler and put themselves in a position to get to a big 12 championship. But this kind of feels like, I mean, Sam's a senior, this kind of feels like this is the year for them. Number three, who I'm really excited about is D. Eric King at Miami. And remember a couple years ago at Houston, he was right up in the mix. I mean, he had that big year. Obviously last year he transferred in two games, especially in the spotlight last week against Louisville. He was really good.

We know he's a dynamic player, but I thought his accuracy was on display. He made good decisions. I think offense, according to Rhett Lashy, has done a really good job with what they have as an offense, with the tempo they're running, kind of fits to his style. They play Clemson here pretty soon. I think that's going to be a great match of somehow, some way of Miami can beat Clemson and King plays really well. That's a guy that's going to continue to kind of move up the charts. Number two is Fields, and again, he hasn't played, but I just felt like I couldn't leave him off this list because he's so damn good. And, you know, we asked Coach Day last week on Big Newmunkoff, just what could he do to get better?

And really, the only thing he said was become a better leader. And we know he's been a great leader off the field for not only his conference, but for college football, but on the field. I think anytime you're now, he's a year experience at Ohio State, you know, the reps, all of that matters. So I think we're just going to see a much more locked in and focused field, which is really, really scary. Penn State, week two. I know you'll, I think, I don't know if you're calling that game. No, we've got Nebraska there week one and then, of course, Michigan, but I can't wait to see him play against Nebraska.

I'm with you about Fields. I think he's right up there top two. Yeah, and then number one is Trevor Lawrence. And, you know, the numbers are ho-hum because of who they play. I mean, he threw the ball nine times against the Citadel last week. But in his last 10 games, he has 33 touchdowns, zero interceptions. You know, we both love this guy. I mean, there's not a lot left to say about him and what he's been able to accomplish

and what he's doing on the football field. I just mentioned the Miami matchup here coming up pretty soon. You know, Notre Dame toward the end of the year. You know, those are kind of going to be it. You know, he doesn't, I mean, because the ACC, we just know how poor they are as a conference from top to bottom. There's not a lot of opportunity on the schedule to really make a stand, but because perception of how good he already is, I still think he's, he in fields,

of the front runners this year. But there's some other guys. You know, this is going to be an exciting race. And just a different year. You just bring up quarterbacks and I'm not opposed. Listen, I'm an elite as just like you about the quarterback position, right? Like, I'm quarterback-centric. There's no doubt about it.

But if there were other guys outside of some quarterbacks, who are your guys that could creep into this and maybe win it that aren't quarterbacks? Well, I love Najee Harris at Alabama. We'll see him this weekend, you know, just what he did last year. You know, two is gone. I like Mack Jones. Personally, I don't think this offense is going to skip a beat.

I think they're going to still throw the football. But Najee Harris is a guy, just a bruiser. You know, I think he reminds us a little Derek Henry, but probably maybe a little faster. Keep an eye on Najah Harris at Alabama, especially in that type of schedule where they're going to have to grind weeks, you know, grind through games and maybe lean on the run game.

Chuba Hubbard is a guy. I know kind of got off to a slow start last week, but they edged out the win. still had 90 yards and a touchdown. You got to feel like he's going to get going, obviously, at some point. Travis E.N. and Clemson is another guy. Those are all running backs. So, you know, one of those guys will be in the mix.

But as you said, we're an elitist fan, so we like our QVs. It's the most important position, so they should probably win the award. Now, I'm with you on all those running backs. I would say I think it's really going to be tough for E.T.N. to outshine Lawrence, right? because they're on the same team. So that's going to be difficult for him to win it. And then Chuba, with this week one performance against Tulsa,

I'm not so sure. So I'm with you on Najee Harris. He's got now that Bama backing, and he will be the offense. No one's going to sit there and be like, hey, Mac Jones is really making this thing go. They're going to be talking about Najee Harris. So that's why I'm with you on him. And then the only other thing I would say is,

you're right about me loving Spencer Rattler. Some of the throws, you mentioned this. Some of the throws he made were out of this world good. Like they don't happen. Back foot throwing the ball 52 yards through the air. Guys don't do that. I certainly don't think I ever threw the ball 52 yards in the air in a game ever. I don't even know if I could. Patrick Mahomes only did it one time last year. It was in the Super Bowl to Tyreek Hill. Like that was effortless. So watch out for Rattler. I really think that that he's got something special there at Oklahoma. And by the way, we're going to be in Norman this week, Maddie, a little big noon Saturday with the Oklahoma Sooners on the air. So that'll be fun. Just one more thing on Rattler. I thought, you know, the poison composure.

And again, we can't get too carried away. That's what we do because of who they play. But listen, anytime you're going into your start your first college football game, I don't care who you're playing. You know, there's nerve. You know, you might get off to a slow start. He was, he just looked, he looked like a veteran. And he threw, I think it was a sluggo, a slant and go.

and he threw a back shoulder, I think some point in the second quarter, or maybe the end of the first, where I literally rewound it like three times. I'm like, it was just a dime. Yes, yes. You make that pro, it's like, like, God, dang, man, like, that's impressive. So he was really good. He exceeded my expectations. I was, I don't know if I was questioning him, but, like, you know, like, you've got big shoes to fill.

Really big shoes to fill. Three years in a row. And he answered those questions, and I think he's going to have a great year. My man, I appreciate you, join me. And we'll do this again during the course of the year and keep up on this Heisman race as college football moves along. So I appreciate you, man. Have a great day.

Thanks for joining me. All right, buddy. Thanks, man. I want to break down one of those players that Matt and I were just talking about in the last segment, and that is the Ohio State quarterback, Justin Fields. I saw him way back last spring, so two springs now ago. And there was some trepidation about whether he was going to be ready, in particular as a passer.

Ryan Day and I sat there on the sidelines, and he said, yeah, he's got a ways to go. And then by the time they were playing Michigan and playing Wisconsin, the Big Ten championship game, and in the playoff, this guy was a polished, refined product at the quarterback position. I want to take you through his development. So I'm going to show you first what we've always known about Justin Fields

and how he can affect the defense. And then I'm going to take you to where he developed. the most during the course of the year and why that was so important for Ohio State. So three clips all against Michigan. Let's start with what we've always known about Justin Fields. And that's his ability to affect the defense. Here's just an easy, you know, goal to go situations. It looks like a regular handoff.

Oh, Dobbin scores. But what actually happened? Well, what you'll see is there's eight defenders for Michigan and only six blockers for Ohio State. So Fields, he's got to occupy at least one, maybe two defenders. Let's see what happens. Can he even out the numbers? He fakes and goes left. Watch that.

Two defenders stop. And that little pause allows hats for hats on the front side. So now it's six for six on the front side. Dobbins finds a lane and he's able to score. There's fields and what we know. Now let's go to where he's developing. This looks like just an easy little crossing route. Oh yeah, big game for Ohio State doesn't look too difficult.

But here's a guy who's not panicking in the pocket. Mistake up front. Two offensive linemen blocking one. defensive alignment. What does fields do? He doesn't panic. He doesn't try to run away. He calmly backs up with the defender right in his face and he flips the ball to his little shallow crossing route right on target so that he can run. He knows he's going to get hit. And yet he still completes the ball. Eyes up. Eyes down field. Boom. Completes to Garrett Wilson. Big game for the Buckeyes. That is great development. And then the explosive plays down the field.

And this is where I thought that he really took a real big jump during the course of the season. There's so much room in front of him there that he could run for days, but he finds a touchdown pass to Chris Olave, right? I think early in the season, he probably would have taken off right here. He's got all sorts of green grass. But look, his eyes are downfield. He's still working himself in the pocket with his foundation. And what does he find a wide open man for an explosive play?

And it ends up being a touchdown as Chris Olave is in the end zone for Ohio State. That's why he was so good and why Ryan Day was. so excited about the way that he was playing late in the season. And that's what I'm expecting even more so from him during the course of this season when we see Ohio State back on the field October 24th. So Justin Fields, great play last year. I expect even better this year. Now it's time for some Clatt back. Let's get to your feedback. Remember on social at Twitter, I'm at Joel Clatt. Instagram, Joel underscore Clat. Bring all your snort because that's what makes the show better. Let's get to it. Here we go. We're going to go. We're going to go.

John Carlton. And John Carlton says, hey, thanks, that Joel Clad, although I don't know if playoff sleeper is that high of praise. This is in reference

to the fact that I said UCF is a playoff sleeper this year. They look pretty good. I'm like, hey, maybe this is the year in a weird COVID year. They're ranked 13th in the country,

and apparently that's not high enough praise. You're ranked 13th in the country. Like, you're not imminently in the playoff. We've never seen a group of five team in the playoffs. Being a playoff sleeper is the best I can do for you right now. I can't give you some sort of preseason a national championship ring to go with your ghost national championship banner from a couple years ago.

Like, this is the best I can do. John Carlton Jr. should just be JJ, but I digress. Let's move on. Let's go to Storm Lindbergh. Storm Lindberg says, so if Alabama and Ohio State played today, you're going with Ohio State? Interesting.

This in reference to the fact that I had number one, Clemson, number two, Ohio State, number three, Alabama. Storm. Roland Gardner. putting Ohio State one place above Alabama is the definition of if they played today, I think Ohio State would win. I cannot be any more clear. But thank you, Rosen Gardner, for your feedback.

Moving on. Let's go to Matt. Because you know what, Matt, Matt Gray chimes in. He says, shouldn't allow Scary to Cat Big Ten teams until they actually play a game. Then, when they do finally play a month from now, make them earn their rankings. Thank you, Matt. We did some research on your profile.

You're a Kansas fan. Hashtag rock chalk. Kansas is so bad they make me want to rub my temples. Two straight years you lost to coastal Carolina and you're going to chirp the entire Big Ten? Matt, Matt, Matt, Matt. Oh, it hurts sometimes. It hurts.

Social media hurts. Hey, Saturday, I'm going to be in Oklahoma, folks. Gus, Jenny, and I are going to be in Norman to call Kansas State at Oklahoma. That's Big Noon Saturday, 9 a.m. Pacific, noon eastern on Fox. Check us out because I can't wait to see that Oklahoma team play. That'll do it for us today. This show, as always, is brought to you by Dr. Pepper. It is the official drink of Fansville.