The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - Klatt’s 2023 NFL Draft Steals plus USC and Michigan make Recruiting Statements

Episode Date: April 3, 2023

FOX Sports’ lead college football analyst Joel Klatt reveals the players in the 2023 NFL Draft who he believes will outperform their draft position and become “Draft Steals” for their new teams. Joel then dives into the big college football recruiting news of the week and breaks down the impact of USC landing the final 5-Star player in the 2023 Class, Tight End Duce Robinson and Michigan finding their QB of the future in 2024 5-Star Jadyn Davis. To finish, Klatt goes into the mailbag and answers listeners’ burning questions including his thoughts on airplane apparel choices and his favorite airport chain restaurants. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome in, everybody. It is another edition of the Joel Klatt show. I am Joel Klatt, and I'm thrilled to be with you here today as we, man, rolling into April, it's draft month, can't wait for the draft, going to be in Kansas City. And so we'll be getting you ready for the draft all things right here on the Joel Klatt show throughout the course of the next month. Listen, if you have not subscribed to the program, please do so, obviously. When a new episode drops, you'll be able to know it. If you want our content in smaller form, go to social media. Any of the social media is out there. You can find us at Joel Clatt show. You can follow me, at Joel Clatt on Twitter, at Joel underscore Clat on Instagram. You can catch up on everything

that we've got going on throughout the offseason and specifically in this draft time as we get going towards the end of April. I'm really excited about this show because we're going to be talking about some guys that are a little bit under the radar, some draft steals. And the reason that we're going to talk about that is because we've got some great questions in the mailbag. I teased the mailbag last week. We got some great questions from the mailbag. And so I'm going to get right into it right away with a question from Trent. And Trent Randall, he wrote in and he said, hey, Joel, love the show and your Big Ten work. My question for you is, who do you think is the most underrated or not talked enough about player in this year's NFL

draft. And that got me thinking, I was like, actually, there's a lot. And there's kind of guys at every position group that I feel like are a bit underrated. And forgive me, Trent, I'm going to reword your question just a little bit because these are guys that I think are going to have a lot of value, i.e., they're going to be draft steals. And it's hard to be underrated as much as it is to be a guy that can essentially give great value in particular in the middle of the draft or maybe even late in the draft as well. And at some of these positions, there are guys that are really good players that are being overlooked right now. And because of that, they're going to be draft steals. I'm going to give you a reason why I think each of these guys might not be getting the hype,

and then why I think that they're going to be a good steal and a good pick for somebody come here, Kansas City, end of April. So here we go. Let's start with the quarterback position and a guy that I think is going to be a nice draft steal. And that's Jake Hainer, the quarterback from Fresno State. and I know that there was a lot of talk about Jay Caner early in the draft process, and everyone was like, hey, you know, he's the guy that you want to go after. He's the guy that's going to be the next Brock Purdy. And listen, you just got to go be Jay Caner. And the reason that you can do that is because Jake's really good and he's a good football player. He's being overlooked a little bit right now because he doesn't have really the top end arm that you're going to want to see. like maybe at the top of the draft, but let me tell you, you overlook this guy at your own peril, because here's what he does have, toughness, competitiveness, he's a great leader, he's very instinctual in the way that he processes information on the field. He understands the system very well. He gets the ball out quickly. He's accurate with the ball. He can throw on the run.

And when you watch this guy play, and in particular in games in which you would feel like Fresno State was a little overmatched, he generally plays his best football. there was one a couple of years ago in particular. I talked a lot about, and rightly so, Hainer was unbelievable against UCLA on the road a couple of years ago. He threw for, what, was it, 455 yards in that game? He had a couple of late touchdowns. One of those touchdowns, he didn't get the ball until there was like 45 seconds left

in that game. He has all the competitiveness and toughness that you need. And this is the type of guy that comes in. Immediately, the coaches love him in an NFL lock, because he's going to learn the system. He's going to keep his mouth shut. He's not a distraction. And he's just going to get to work. And then when he gets out there, guess what? He can operate the system. He can do everything that you need to. He anticipates well. He understands information and processes it very quickly from the pocket. And so for those reasons, he's going to

stick. I just think Jake Hainer is going to be a steal at the quarterback position. I don't know exactly when he's going to get drafted, but someone in that fifth, maybe sixth round, I think that they're going to take a flyer on Jay Caner. It's not going to surprise me a bit if he has to go on to the football field next year in the league and potentially play. And I think he's going to do a nice job. So Jake Hainer, my first draft steal. All right. At the running back position, my next guy, and there, you know, I haven't done a show yet without talking about the running back position. I think there's some really good players at running back, specifically at the top of the list, right? you know who I'm talking about. Bejohn Robinson from Texas, Jemir Gibbs from Alabama.

These guys are versatile, they're explosive, they're everything that you want. And I think Bejohn's going to get taken in the first round. I think Jemir might get taken in the first round, in particular if you're looking at the end of that first round. So what does that leave? Well, it leaves us with a number of good players. And when you've got a number of good running backs, and then people and organizations looking at the middle of the draft or maybe later to potentially take those, guys, you've got some really good value picks. I really loved TCU running back, Kendry Miller. I thought Miller was outstanding. When I was preparing for their game against Texas Tech, I loved watching his film. When I talked with the coaching staff, they loved his work ethic.

He was a team first guy. Everything about him, I thought screamed, he's going to be a really good player at the next level. And yet he hasn't gotten the hype that I thought he would get. And the reason is, is that he doesn't have like that burst, right, that eye-opening home run ability. And I understand that, although I will tell you this, when you turn on the tape, here's what you see, high productivity. It doesn't matter if he's inside the tackles, outside the tackles. Could he run the outside zone a little bit better? Yeah, maybe.

You know, does he always read it perfectly? No, not necessarily. But here's what he's got, great instincts and feel for how to move the ball down the field. He runs very physical. It's very rare that the first defender brings him down and he can catch it out of the backfield. He's got to get some work in past protection, but what running back that's a middle round guy doesn't? Right. So when you look at this guy, it's productivity.

So you overlook maybe like, hey, does he have that home run step? Maybe not. But guess what? The dude produces, he's big. He's over 210 pounds. And he's the type of guy that can come in there and play right away. he's also not afraid. And I'm not talking about afraid in the sense of just like running the ball between the tackles and the physical sense of the game. He's not afraid of competition. So it doesn't matter where he gets drafted. When he gets drafted, he's just going to go in there and methodically go about his business to try to get on the field. How do I know that? I know that because he chose to go to TCU, even though TCU had just signed its highest recruit ever in Zach Evans. And so now, Zazzo, Zach Evans is a running back and guess what, Kendry Miller, he's like, I'm going to go there too.

Because like, hey, I trust myself. That mentality is going to pay huge dividends for him moving into the NFL. He ain't afraid and he's going to go out there and he will produce because the dude is a really good football player. You watch his film, he produces and he will at the next level as well. All right, my next group will be the tight end group. And this value is established via the depth of the overall group. Okay, so there's some of these players that there's like a little, I won't call it a red flag, but there's something that the programs and organizations are going to get hung up on. And that's why these guys might, quote, fall, right? Or become valuable later in the draft. Others, it's more a result of the overall depth of the position group. And I think that's

the case with tied end. I mean, look at some of the tight ends that we have in this draft, Michael Mayor from Notre Dame, Dalton Kincaid, Darnell, Washington, Musgrave, the Oregon State guy. Like, there's a number of good tight ends, and not every team needs a tight end. So guess what? That means later in the draft, you're going to have a chance to take a guy like Sam Leporta, the tied end from Iowa. He's going to be a draft steal. He might be overlooked and not get selected maybe up with those other tight ends because, well,

he doesn't have that burst speed. Well, guess what? He gets open. He's again, highly productive. He's got great hands, and he can do a lot of things in the passing game. Remember, Iowa's offense was not good. We've all talked about that at length. And yet, if you were an opposing defense, you knew, you knew. If they needed a play, they were going to Sam Laporta. And it was still tough to stop him. He was highly productive, even being the focal point of the defensive game plan. So he understands what it's like to operate in tight spaces. He's a smart player. And I think that this guy is going to be a really good pick, a good value pick. There's only been one tight end selected in the first round of the last three drafts combined. Kyle Pitts. He went number four to Atlanta.

He was a joke of an athlete, an absolute unbelievable athlete. So the chances are, these guys are going to fall down the draft board, right? That means that later in the draft, someone's going to take Sam Leporta, and then all of a sudden he's going to get into camp and they're going to be like, hey, this guy's really good. A lot of coaches and I'm going to get, you know, my teammates are going to call me up after this and be like, I can't believe you use that term, but I'm going to use it. He's a football playing Jesse, right?

Like, you go out there and it doesn't matter if you're in the parking lot or the school yard. If you're selecting teams and it's just your peers out there, guess who's getting taken fairly high in the draft? Sam Leporto. why he's a football playing jesse you just want him on your team he produces he's a good football player and this is going to be the case for him in the national football league might not get selected high because of some of the like quote unquote measurables but when he gets to a team they're

immediately going to see the value of what sam la porta brings in particular in the red zone which is where i think tight ends make a lot of their money all right next position group and and this is another one that's really deep but um i'm going to go with Charlie Jones, the wide receiver from Purdue. And I know what you're thinking, Iowa fans. You're like, oh, we almost had two in a row. Yeah, but Charlie Jones made maybe one of the best decisions ever in terms of a transferring player and created value for himself this last year, transferring from Iowa to Purdue.

He and Aiden O'Connell were a great connection with Purdue. Win a division. Go play for a Big Ten title. in large part due to his production. He led the nation and catches last year with 110, second in yards with over 1,300, and he was fifth in the country with 12 touchdowns. I mean, he's a really good player.

What I love about his game is that he's got this ability, without blazing fast speed or quickness, he's got this ability to understand how to pace and tempo his route in order to create spacing. And I think that that's a real instinctual thing for a wide receiver, and he's got that. He just kind of understands it. He's a very smart player. He's a guy that catches the ball in contested areas, and he's not going to get bothered if he's covered, and if he's covered tightly.

There are some players that come into the league that have been so gifted throughout their lives that they do not understand how to make a contested catch. That's not the case with Charlie Jones. can make the catch, and he did it very often for Purdue last year. I think he adds value not only as a wide receiver, but as a return man as well. He was the return specialist of the year in 2021 at Iowa before he transferred for Purdue. And while he's not blazing fast, he's still timed pretty quickly. He was sub four five in the 40. So it's not that he's slow. It's just there's this misconception that maybe he doesn't have those special attributes that other players

have at that position. But guess what? Again, you put him on the field and he's going to produce because he's got the instincts and the intellect to process information and to go out there and make catches. All right. Let's go to the offensive line now. The big guys up front. And this is where I think that organizations really make themselves better when they can find value on the defensive or offensive line in the middle of the draft. And when you can find starters and not have to waste first-round draft picks on them, that's when you're really making yourself better as an organization. And here's a guy that I think can and will be a starter in the National Football League.

And he's not a guy that projects super high into the draft. Therefore, I think that this is a draft steal. and it is the Remington Award winner, Outland Award winner, Olu Oluwatemi, the center from Michigan. So obviously I did a lot of Michigan games this last year. And I will tell you, they were not just pleasantly surprised, but they were blown away by Olu, Oluwatemi, as a transfer, coming in from Virginia. and the way that he integrated into the locker room, that he became a part of the team,

became so well-loved, became a leader on the offensive line. It was seamless. It was seamless. And that only happens when you have a guy that is selfless, that is team first, and that is really good on the field. You see, that's the currency in the locker room, right? Is talent.

And then the next bit of currency in a locker room is your attitude and your work ethic. And when you have all of those things, talent, attitude, work ethic, guess what? You can make it in any locker room. So he transfers in from Virginia. And remember, this was a team that had just won the Joe Moore Award with the top offensive line. There were some thought that they were going to take a step back on their offensive line. And yet they knew that they were going to have to run the football. They were bringing back Blake Corman.

I'm like this was a run first team, a toughness-oriented team. And now Olu steps in and he's the center. He's the quarterback of that offensive line. And they didn't miss a beat. Not only did they not miss a beat, they got even better running the football. They were even tougher at the line of scrimmage. And a lot of that was due to Olu Olu with Timmy. I will just tell you that I've spoken to Bronco Mindenhall, who coached him at Virginia.

I've spoken with John Harbaugh, who obviously coached him at Michigan. I've spoken to Sharon more. Everybody speaks glowingly about Olu Oluatemi. He's smart. He works hard. He's talented. Now, is he going to blow you out of the water with his physical ability or his pancake blocks or amazing strength that's going to make him a first rounder?

No. But what does that mean that you've got a fabulous football player that will be overlooked early and you're going to find value with him in the middle of the draft. That is a really good draft steel right there in the middle of the draft at center. I think you can play guard as well, but Olu Oluwitemi from Michigan. All right, let's move to the defensive side. That was a lot of offensive players. And again, I loved this question. If you are a fan of the NFL, you know that the way that these teams, there's really two ways. You've got to develop depth or just be great at quarterback. And how do you develop

depth, you've got to find these starters in the middle of the draft, and that's what we're talking about here. All right, this one's not necessarily in the middle of the draft, but because of the depth at his position, I do feel like there's going to be some great value, even when you're talking about the second round, potentially, where I see him getting selected, but edge rusher from LSU, BJ Ojolari, he's a really good player. Okay, when you look at his career, you see first team, All SEC last year. Good production over the last couple of years. You know, seven sacks a couple of years ago, five and a half sacks last year. And remember, he goes through a coaching change and defensive switch.

It's hard to be productive when you're changing systems. And BJ was. Now, can he be inconsistent against the run at times? Sure. Yes. And guess what? That's why he's not one of the top edge rushers in the draft. But if you're not one of the top edge rushers, guess what?

There's going to be value where he's slowly. elected because he is disruptive. And in a passing league, when you get to third down, when you need a stop on a third down, you've got to disrupt the timing of the offensive system. What do you need? Pass rushers. What can he do? He can get to the quarterback.

He can bend. He's explosive. And then he got what I think is a great seal of approval. When I'm talking with coaching staffs in the SEC and I'm talking with guys and I'm like, hey, who are some of the better players that you played against? And your name keeps popping up. in particular when I talk to places like Alabama, and they're like, hey, you know who is really good? One of the three best players we played against all season long, they named really three guys.

They were like, hey, Jalen Carter, that's obvious from Georgia. Jalen Hyatt, he was tough, wide receiver from Tennessee. Oh yeah, B.Jolari from LSU. So it's like, okay, you get the seal of approval from one of the best programs and coaching staffs in America. Guess what? You can play. And you can be disruptive. And for me, that says a lot.

As a guy that's not going to be the first edge rusher taken in the draft, he's probably going to fall into the second round just because of the number of edge rushers that there are in this draft. It's a deep draft at that position. And here he is, this is the type of guy that I think is going to be disruptive early in his career, getting production, probably even on third downs at the NFL level. So he's a guy that I really love as a draft steal because of the depth of that position. Let's move to the secondary now. and I'm going to pass linebacker because I didn't, I didn't, I mean, candidly, I didn't love a steal at linebacker,

but I had a couple of secondary players, namely safeties, that I thought to myself, you know what? These guys are tailor-made for a conversation like this. They might not hear their names all that early in the draft, but I would be pretty surprised if both of these players aren't, not just making Rossers, but like starting in the NFL. Starting in the NFL. Let me start with the safety from Alabama, Jordan Battle. Battle is a guy that I really love watching on tape. You fall even more in love with him when you talk with people around the program,

when you talk with coaching staffs that played against Alabama, all-American third team the last couple of years. I don't think that he's got the natural ability that maybe some of the, you know, Bama defensive backs have in the past. But here's what he does have. Great instincts. He's highly intelligent. He can play center field. He understands how to get after the ball and has good ball skills for the interceptions.

And I think it's his intelligence that is going to make him such a good and productive player early. in his career. Because, and this is what happened when you talk with people around Alabama, they're like, oh, he's going to know the system immediately. In fact, he's probably the type of guy that in the first couple of weeks will be able to teach even veteran players about the system. That's how quickly he processes information. That's how quickly he learns defensive systems.

And it's that type of player that you can rely on to be dependable, in particular when you're talking about a deep safety. He's also a guy that will come up and hit. He's not afraid of that. He can cover decently well. I think he's a versatile player. I think he's a really versatile player. And as a versatile player, you can get categorized as a hybrid player.

Well, guess what is valuable in today's defense and the modern day football? Hybrid-style players. So here's a guy that is really intelligent, really instinctual. He can be productive. He's a great team guy. He's a great worker. But, man, he just probably doesn't have like the high-end skills that maybe some of the former Bama secondary players have had. What does that mean? Draft Steel. What does that mean?

Probably going to start in the NFL. I love Jordan Battle. There's another guy that I really love that is very much in the same vein at the safety position, and that's Jair Brown from Penn State. Love this guy. Got to meet him a couple of times in covering Penn State games. He's an excellent player with tremendous ball skills. Remember two years ago he led the country with what was it, seven picks. He had another four or five. I think he had 11 interceptions over those last couple of years. And that's, I think it's the most in the country, 10 or 11 interceptions. But it was more than that. He was involved in so many takeaways, right? It was like even when it came to fumbles, he's near the line of scrimmage. He's getting after it. He's forcing fumbles.

He's a guy that has worked for it his entire life. He's a bit undersized. Again, so he's going to be overlooked at the top of the draft. Had to go to junior. college, went to Lackawanna Junior College, then made his way to Penn State. And here he is, what is he? The defensive MVP of the Rose Bowl in their win this last year over Utah. I love his background, was really raised by his mom in New Jersey, and his mom worked a couple of jobs, was a school bus driver just to make sure that she didn't lose her kids to the streets. And guess what? Like he wasn't lost and he's a hard worker and he's a team first guy. And I think this is the type of player that immediately goes onto a team and starts.

They're going to love him in the locker room. He is the type of guy that I think can be relied on right away in his NFL career. And these, both of these guys, Jordan Battle and Jire Brown, they call him TIG because he's short for Tigger, even from when he was a little kid and he was bouncing around like Tigger and it was like TIG. And so they called him TIG his whole. life and he's gone by it. They remind me a Jordan Fuller from Ohio State from a couple of years ago. Was he the best player on that Ohio State defense in 2019? No. What'd you do? You looked up in

2020. Who was the starting safety for the Rams? Jordan Fuller. That's Jordan Battle and Jire Brown. Those two guys are perfect for a draft steals category. I love both of their games and I think both of those guys are going to have really good NFL careers. All right. Let me change gears just a little bit because I want to get back then to some college football news here. There was some recruiting news over the last week or so. And I feel like we need to dive into it because there was the last domino, the last highly recruited five-star player to commit in this last cycle, the 23 cycle, that bow had not even been tied yet because Deuce Robinson,

the tied end, had not committed. Now, Deuce Robinson from the Phoenix area, really good baseball. player, kind of a mini Aaron judge in that respect because he's so big. He wants to explore his baseball career as well. His recruitment has taken a long time. It's been a lengthy process, but Deuce Robinson committed this last week to USC. So now USC, their class all of a sudden crept inside of the top 10. So now USC in the 2023 class is the number eight class in the country. they've got three pass catchers in the top 50 recruits overall in the country. And I got to tell you, I saw Lincoln Riley up close and personal for a long time,

covered this guy for a long time. When he has a dynamic, athletic, tight end, his offense is at its best. Think about some of those tight ends that they had at Oklahoma. And then you start looking at what their offense could be at USC. I think Deuce gives them that ability early in his career. He's physically big enough to go play right away. I think he's like 6'6. He's a big dude.

And I think that he can make them dangerous right away. To me, it's interesting. Now, I will say, when I saw this, I thought to myself, my immediate reaction was, well, he can't play defense. And at USC, that is still the question. So as great as this is, right, for Trojans and Trojan fans. And yes, will it make their offense better? Yes. Does it fit exactly what Lincoln needs and what Lincoln needs to be at his best?

Yes. Does it help USC become better in the area that they desperately need to become better in? Not really. Okay. So this is great. It's a feather in the cap. It's icing on the cake. but there's still questions about whether the cake is baked right in the first place at USC.

I think that that's fair. After what Lincoln Riley has done in his career, after the way that he's tried to go about winning championships, and then continues to try to go about winning championships with subpar defense, that's a fair question. So as great as it is to get Duce Robinson the last five-star commit in 2023 to get into the top 10, have three of the top 50 players in the country, all pass catchers. That's great. That is great. They need to get better on defense.

That needs to get better on defense. Some other recruiting news this week. And this is for the 2024 class. Huge announcement from a five-star quarterback, Jaden Davis chooses Michigan. And so now Michigan's got their quarterback for 2024. And in the exact opposite way, why this is interesting. well, let me just say, like this is exactly opposite of USC. And the reason is is because Michigan desperately needed this to transition from what was a disappointing year in 2023, a year in which they did not sign a five-star player, a year in which they were outside of the top 15 in terms of national recruiting rankings.

And now all of a sudden, they are capitalizing on the momentum of back-to-back Big Ten championships, back-to-back wins over Ohio State, back-to-back playoff appearances. And now in 2024, they've got the number three class so far, which if they can keep that up, that would be a huge win. Remember, last year in 2020, they finished third in the Big Ten in recruiting because they didn't even beat Penn State in recruiting. Penn State had a better class. Ohio State had a better class. And that was surprising after back-to-back Big Ten titles. And so now they're putting a flag in the sand. And they're saying like, okay, we are going to compete in this recruiting landscape.

And Jaden Davis is a guy that seems very firm in his commitment. He seems like a guy that will now go to work to help Michigan recruit other top players in 2024, which is important. You need that kind of cornerstone piece of your recruiting class that will go out there and help you with other guys. And maybe more importantly, they have a better quarterback recruit committed for 24 than Ohio State does. And that's the first time you can say that in a long time. But here's Michigan, and they're sitting there, and they've got a better quarterback committed than Ohio State for 2024. They're third in the country right now and overall recruiting for 2024, next year's class. This is a big get for Michigan, and it's something that they can build on for the future, and they've needed this.

They've needed a big recruiting win for a long time, and they finally got it with Jaden Davis, five-star quarterback. I believe he was number four ranked in the site that I was looking at for number four-ranked quarterback in the country. All right. So there's some recruiting news. I did ask for mailbag questions last week. And we got to Trent's question already. And Trent, thank you for your question. You obviously kicked off the overall topic for the whole weekly pod. So we appreciate that. And obviously it was a good question. But there were a couple of other questions, non-draft related, non-college football related. But I thought that they were just really fun. And I'm always looking for, opportunity to bring everybody into the fold. So Kat, our producer, Catherine, who's getting married this summer, by the way, not a fall wedding. Good job, Kat. She's always wondering like, hey, where all the ladies sending in emails? Well, guess what? Natalie. Natalie threw in an email, and so Natalie, you get your email on the show. So Natalie says, I'm curious, do you and your family enjoy any hobbies outside of sports? With three boys, I think it's presumed that your life is

all sports 24-7, but I've found that to be stereotypical thinking. I'd love to hear about your experiences with sports slash work slash life balance. Thanks in advance for your consideration. Cheers. By the way, Natalie, that was the nicest email. So thank you very much for chiming in. And yes, we do enjoy other things outside of sports. So a little peek into the Clat family. My wife and I have been married almost next May, this May. It's going to be 18 years. We got married young, I know. Listen, probably far too young.

But you know what? We grew up together and I wouldn't have it any other way. We have three boys. I've got three boys. 11, 9 and 6. Nine almost. He'll be nine next week. And so, yeah, like it's easy for our life to revolve around sports.

My boys love sports, not all the time. My oldest is into a lot of other things, by the way. My oldest loves to read. He loves science. And so there's a lot of room for other things. So work slash family slash life balance in our house looks like this. First and foremost, and this is maybe not what you're looking for, Natalie, but I really believe as a father that my greatest ability as a father is availability. So I go by the mindset. If I can just be available, then it doesn't matter what we're doing. We can be playing Pokemon cards. We can be playing, you know, Switch, Nintendo Switch and be playing Mario Kart. And the more times I can just be available than the better.

And I think that that will impact my boys in a positive way. because I do know this, and I heard this a long time ago, great families happen on purpose, right? Like it doesn't just happen by accident. You've got to be available. And so that balance is important to me. Obviously during the fall, it's extremely difficult because I work long hours and I'm traveling. I love my job, but it's difficult in the fall. So when it's not the fall, listen, we love to have game nights, right? Whether it's on the Nintendo Switch or the Xbox or we're doing something as a family, We love to play board games, right? Play Uno or there's this one like, what's the meme game that we love playing that one. We love having movie nights, love going on bike rides. But again, I would just emphasize this.

I know Natalie, you asked the question, but a little advice for dads out there. Listen, your greatest ability as a father is availability. Just be around your kids and good things will happen. All right. And my last email came in. Really, it was in the same vein, two different emails in the same. same vein. So I'm going to read both of these emails. First, we've got an email and these were both centering around travel, right? So I think this is Veer, Veer meta. And so I hope I'm saying that

right, Veer. If I'm not, I very much apologize. Maybe it's a verb, but I think it's veer. He says, hey, Joel, you're on the road a lot. So how about some travel tips and tricks? A long time ago, you put me on the best pants to wear for travel. They were the ABC pants by Lulu Lemon. Any other tips for the best travel experience would be appreciated. We got another one centering around travel. So this one came in from Drew. And Drew says, Joel, you travel a lot during the football season. Can you please rank your top five airport restaurant chains that you prefer to eat at? Thanks, Drew. I thought to myself like, well, I can answer both of those questions because they're all the same things. And here's the thing about travel. If any of you travel, you know this to be true. You've got to be comfortable.

Whatever you're comfortable in, you've got to travel that way. With one exception, and I'll get to that in a moment. So I don't wear the ABC pant anymore because guess what? I found some pants that were a little bit more comfortable. I go with two different pants, okay? Not at the same time, obviously. That would be uncomfortable, clearly. So I'll wear if I need to be a little bit more dressed up, the commuter pant from Roan, R-H-O-N-E.

and this is not sponsored or advertised with. So this is just like, I'm just telling you, the commuter pant from Roan, really comfortable, looks good, doesn't wrinkle. So travel, that's great for me. I can wear them in the plane and then, you know, step off and go into a coach's meeting and I feel fine. I feel confident in that.

If I'm just going to travel and I don't have a meeting that day and I just want to go for comfort, then I wear the Sunday jogger from Viori. That's really comfortable. So I go with that. but the pants for me are like really comfortable. And then here's the other thing. I get cold in airplanes, so I always have a hoodie.

Like at least even in the summertime, if I'm wearing a t-shirt, it doesn't matter. I'm going to have a hoodie at least available in my backpack in order to throw on. Because for me, comfort, it has to be there and I've got to be warm. So that's that. As far as airport eats go, I'm pretty simple. And I don't eat very healthy. So here's the bottom line. It depends on what time of day it is.

I think that that's clear. So I'm not just going to rank, you know, one to five because for me, it depends on if it's a morning flight or a noon flight or evening flight. And guess what? I'm not very fancy. But if I'm hungry and it's not, well, let's just say it's like not breakfast. So it's either lunch or dinner and I'm hungry. I can't pass Panda Express. So any Panda Express, like, I'm going to stop.

And it's delicious. and I get a lot of weird looks from people and they're like, oh, Panda Express? And I'm like, yep, you know why? It's delicious. The other one is in the morning, if it's early and I'm taking an early flight and I'm hungry,

I cannot pass a Cinnabon without stopping, right? You know what I'm talking about. And by the way, all these airports trying to go fancier and healthier and like, we're going to renovate and bring in, please, please don't. please, like, Cinebond in Houston, please don't close. I connect in Houston a lot. I love having a Cinebon. I don't care to be healthy when I'm flying around,

and I can't pass up a coffee and a cinnamon roll. Who can? Who can't? Like, can you honestly tell me like, oh, that sounds gross. You're weird. You're weird. So you can catch me on any given weekend, in particular around, you know, morning or late morning, catching an early flight, you know, connecting in Houston before I go someplace, probably, you know, in the Midwest, probably into the

big 10 area, probably going to have sweatpants on, maybe my own commuters. I'm going to have a synabone and a coffee, and I'm going to be so happy. Last thing that I'll say about travel and just tips and everything like this, stop taking off your shoes in an airplane. It's disgusting. It's inconsiderate, and it makes me want to vomit. I don't care if you have socks on. I don't want to see your socks. And by the way, this leads me to my last take, wearing flip-flops traveling. is disgusting. Please stop wearing your flip-flops. We know you have to take them off and walk barefoot through the security and then you just got your toes staring at me in the plane. I'm out. I'm out. I'm out. Some people think that this makes me a germaphobe, makes me rude, makes me mean. You know what?

That's fine. I like to be available for my family and I don't want to stare at your manicure or pedicure or excuse me, your pedicure below the seat. I don't want to see it. I don't want to see your toes, right? Like ladies, guys, any of, especially guys. Guys and flip-flops on airplanes, barf. That's going to do it. That's going to do it. That's all I have to say. You got all of my opinions this week.

Next week, I cannot wait. We have got my first mock draft of this NFL draft process. That'll drop next week on Monday, my first mock draft as we get set for the NFL draft at the end of April. You can follow us anywhere at Joel Clat Show on social media. Remember to subscribe, rate, review this podcast. And as always, thank you for listening. Enjoy your week.