The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Cowboys Embarrassed and a Brady-Belichick Legacy Update, Plus Jesse Palmer Talks Biggest SEC Takeaways, Recruiting Stories, and Ryen on 'The Bachelor'

Episode Date: October 14, 2024

Russillo starts the show with his NFL Week 6 awards (0:48) and reveals his updated College Football Playoff rankings (21:15). Then, Jesse Palmer joins the pod to share his thoughts on the SEC thus far..., reveal his favorite recruiting story, and talk about what's next in his career (33:08). Finally, Life Advice with Ceruti and Kyle (68:33)! I’m 47… should I become a stand-up comedian? Check us out on YouTube for exclusive clips, livestreams, and more at https://www.youtube.com/@RyenRussilloPodcast The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Ryen Russillo Guests: Jesse Palmer Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's podcast, we dig into week six in Dallas, getting destroyed at home by Detroit. We'll talk best win. I think it might be Baltimore. Maybe it's a little San Francisco. We'll talk about Chargers. We'll talk a little Broncos. We're just going to try to as much of it as we can. And we brought it back.
Starting point is 00:00:28 Bill Belichick, Tom Brady, legacy update. Jesse Palmer, more on college football. After I give you my top 12 rankings, deep dive into the SEC because that's what he covers. Also some stuff on his career. We've got life advice from comedians. So enjoy and our Monday night lean for Fandl. Miller Lite. The light beer brewed for people who love the taste of beer and
Starting point is 00:00:54 the perfect pairing for your game time. When Miller Lite set out to brew a light beer they had to choose great taste or 90 calories per can. They chose both because they knew the best part of beer is the beer. Your game time tastes like Miller time. Learn more at MillerLight.ca. Must be legal drinking age. It's the Ryan Ruscilla podcast presented by Fandule. Football is in full action and Fandule's highest rated sports book is the best place to bet at all. Here's why I love FanDuel. I love in-game odds.
Starting point is 00:01:30 I love it. You love a side, you haven't bet it. They get down, you're like, oh wait, this spreads this now? Done. There's some new markets out there. Just to catch a pass, same game parlay's, highest scoring. You know what I love about college football
Starting point is 00:01:45 is you can get a line on Texas, Georgia. You can get a line on Ohio State, Michigan already. Like if you think the number just doesn't make any sense based on early season perceptions. And also Nico Iamaljava plus 1000 right now. He's behind a few other names there on the Heisman odds. So if you want to get the hookup, visit vandal.com slash Ryan RYE to get the hook up visit fandle.com
Starting point is 00:02:05 slash ryan ryen to download America's number one sports book. The ringer is committed to responsible gambling please visit rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available and listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Must be 21 and older and President-elect states gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. older and President select states gambling problem call one hundred gambler or visit RG dash help dot com. NFL week six, let's do it. Headline Detroit stomps Dallas forty seven and nine. Doubles them up on total yardage.
Starting point is 00:02:34 Golf after a slow start to the season. Dig through those games a little is now posted back to back. Perfect passer rating games. Detroit is actually the five seed today because of Minnesota's 5-0 record. The NFC North is the best division, the Norris in football with what Green Bay is doing, which is worth paying attention to, stomping Arizona. Chicago is in last place in the division at 4-2. We could talk a little Caleb Williams improvement now. Next-gen stats, you want some? I'll do it to you. Even you can listen to these, not just your kids.
Starting point is 00:03:07 If you look at success rate for quarterbacks, which is based on the yards needed, based on down and distance, so you need a certain percentage of yardage on first down, then second down, then a hundred percent of the yardage needed for third down to keep the sticks moving, right? Makes sense, really good stat. First three weeks, Caleb had the fourth lowest success rate amongst quarterbacks the last three weeks. He has the fifth highest success rate amongst quarterbacks. Yes, I know the teams are very good. Let us have this. All right, back to Detroit. Losing Hutchinson is brutal. He had Sandow shout out here, a 24% pressure rate through the first
Starting point is 00:03:44 part of this season. If you go through this part of the season or I think like the first eight games, the highest pressure rate for any single player in the NFL since 2019, he was just wrecking everything. So with all the attention on Garrett, on Watt, on Parsons, and all of these edge guys, and then you started looking at the numbers and just the impact from watching him, he was now in that conversation of not potentially even passing some of those guys. So you can't replace him, but it'll be interesting to see how aggressive they
Starting point is 00:04:15 get with which available edge guys may be in play before the trade deadline, which is beginning of November. But the positive back to this is that Detroit is following up last season where it felt like a real thing. And they're also following up on all of the preseason hype, summer hype of what they're capable of doing. And without Hutchinson, it certainly hurts the defense that is the weaker of the two units, but they've put so many resources into the secondary. And there was no reason why the offense was gonna struggle with the exact same personnel and so many young players just only getting better.
Starting point is 00:04:50 So the only loss against Tampa, again, when we talked about that game, it was very important to point out, it was a weird loss on top of everything else. They went to the red zone seven times, only had one touchdown. Again, Gough statistically wasn't exactly lighting it up, but he has been terrific the last couple of weeks. Let's stay on Dallas here a little bit. This is the worst home loss of the Jerry Jones era,
Starting point is 00:05:08 also on his birthday. Awesome. The first half numbers for them at home this year, they've given up 35 to New Orleans, 21 to Baltimore, 27 to Detroit yesterday. So on average, they're giving up 27.6 points per half at home games. You can even throw the Packers game from last year in there if you wanted to. That 27.6 they're allowing in the first half would be the fifth worst scoring defense overall per game in the NFL.
Starting point is 00:05:38 Not great, Bob, right? So we could go with excuses, back-to-back prime time games versus Detroit coming off a bye. The injury part of this is definitely real for this Dallas front that people thought was maybe a little light in the britches when they were actually healthy.
Starting point is 00:05:52 But are they still talented enough on offense with Dak to go, all right, I can't, like the easy thing to do today is just completely write them off. I feel like that's still be a little dismissive because of Dak, but at the same time with Dak, and I'll just admit to you, come clean on this one. I have struggled with who he is and who he isn't basically since the beginning. Now in the beginning, it's mid-round pick, Mississippi State, yeah, good college football
Starting point is 00:06:19 team, but if all these other teams pass on them for three rounds, how good is he going to be? Oh wow, this is a really good story. He's going to be really good. Big athletic, has all the throws, all that kind of stuff. So it's from that point on to when he became the guy and was putting up some really big numbers, which he has, I actually was wondering too in this game, it's like, is that going to end up like 360
Starting point is 00:06:39 because they're down by 40 points? But then they yanked them because they'd thrown another pick. And it was just pointless at that point, but I was like, is he going to end up? Because he has, I believe the third, yeah, he does. He has the third most passing yards in the NFL this season. But I feel like Dak is going to be Jay Cutler, where it was Jay Cutler's 10th year and we were still trying to figure out who he was
Starting point is 00:06:59 or who he wasn't. And the people that liked him were like, well, you know, there was a little of this or a little of that, or this was a little bit better. I also think there were some years where he could have actually like charged the Bears with. Like. Negligence, there were certain games of that offensive line where he was with the Bears. I'm like, is this guy going to make it through the game? So it wasn't always on him, but it was a decade of him playing Cutler.
Starting point is 00:07:22 Where I think a lot of us were still kind of lost about who he really was. And with that, the high end stuff and the numbers, that one MVP finish, was it last year? And yet, you're like, yeah, but is he ever really like a tier one guy, that five or six quarterback group that we talk about all the time? And he hasn't been, but maybe the hope that he would be. But look, it's also on the defense as much as it's anything here with Dallas, but maybe the hope that he would be. Um, but look, it's, it's also on the defense is as much as it's anything here
Starting point is 00:07:46 with, with Dallas, but it just dawns on me more and more that I'll watch Jack. It's, you know, they're on all the time. You can't, if you watch the NFL, you can't avoid them. And yet it feels like it'll be a 10 year thing and we still will not have a definitive answer to who Dak Prescott is as a quarterback. So yeah, he's third in passing yards, total passing yards. He's also 24th in QBR. Continuing here. Yeah. So I think Dallas is the worst loss. If I'm going to do best win, worst loss, I don't think there's much question. Although Philly, based on the way they looked in a win,
Starting point is 00:08:24 I think we used to do that where somebody won really ugly against a bad team. We had all these expectations to be funny. We would, we would give a team a, a worst loss that actually won Philly. Kind of feels like that. I mean, going up into halftime, they're lining up for field goal to make it 13, three it's blocked return for touchdown. It's 10, 10. And you're watching that game.
Starting point is 00:08:42 If you're an Eagles fan, remember that win against Green Bay in week one where it's like okay hurts new offense the whole thing taking shots mixing things up all of this talent everywhere defense can the pass rush win and now I think I continue to feel worse about Philadelphia even though they got this one on the other side for Cleveland like which Watson number do you want because everybody has a million of them we're getting dead cap updates daily now on Watson's contract and what the cap is going to mean. Although I would say if you really want to dig into that, there's certainly
Starting point is 00:09:11 some workable options. All of them are really ugly because the contract is guaranteed. So I also thought that Mitchell Schwartz has been on the pod, former chiefs offensive lineman had a really good tweet and I'm paraphrasing here because the fancy was asked about whether or not Watson would be the starter moving forward. He said, absolutely. But I think that's a directive from ownership through front office to the coach, I don't think that's on him alone making that decision.
Starting point is 00:09:34 I don't care what anybody says about that one with the money. They're probably hoping to salvage this or hope it turns around, but it's been so bad, but Schwartz essentially saying this sucks for everybody else on the team that's working and getting their ass kicked because Watson has been this bad. And it been so bad. But Schwartz essentially saying this sucks for everybody else on the team that's working and getting their ass kicked because Watson has been this bad. And it's so bad. Every number that you see with Watson, it's like 20 years historically bad. I even looked up one because Cleveland never converts third downs. Well, they do, never as low, but they're converting them at 19%
Starting point is 00:10:00 of the time. So how bad is that? Well, it's the worst in the NFL. So meaning one out of every five third downs, you're converting less than one of those at 19%, you already understood that. So basically one. So I went back for 20 years and tried to find a team that was worse than 19% third down conversion rate.
Starting point is 00:10:15 I could not find one enough to 20 years of all tabs. I just got sick of looking at it. Usually the lowest is like 30, 31, 34. There was one season where I saw a team at 25%. Again, Cleveland is at 19. Best win. We could go all the way back to Thursday, San Francisco, getting it done to go to three and three at Seattle, which helps them in the division race.
Starting point is 00:10:39 They lead the NFC West at three and three tiebreaker over Seattle. And with the way Arizona is at three and three, tie breaker over Seattle. And with the way Arizona is going south and the Rams injuries and Seattle's defense, even with the boss start kind of going in the wrong direction here a little bit. That is on the table for best win. Baltimore going to four and two.
Starting point is 00:11:02 Let's go over their QB opponent resume here again now. So the Ravens have faced the number one, two, and three quarterbacks in QBR to this point of the season. That's Josh Allen, Burrow, Daniels, the fourth quarterback, some guy named Mahomes who's way down the list right now. There's an argument to be made because some of the defensive numbers are not very good. Second worst passing yards allowed per game, better than only Jacksonville, but that is opposing quarterbacks. That number is going to come down.
Starting point is 00:11:30 So if you see somebody on TV talking about the Ravens as a contender and dumping on their defense, their past defense in particular, maybe it's an issue, but there's no way it's going to continue to be this bad because they've played incredible quarterbacks so far. And Daniels was so good yesterday, I thought for the most part, you know, keeping your game in it, giving you a drive when you needed it. You know, I know it didn't happen there at the end, but I mean, what are you asking this guy's a rookie, not even halfway through his first season. But you can make an argument.
Starting point is 00:11:56 The Ravens offense is the best in the league. It's number one in yards per play at seven, almost seven yards per play. Every time they run a play, they're third in yards per attempt Lamar. They had a 93 yard touchdown drive yesterday, another seven yards per play. Every time they run a play, their third in yards per attempt Lamar. They had a 93 yard touchdown drive yesterday, another 94 yard touchdown drive. Lamar seems to be just at another level here. Zay Flowers, a huge first half, and then Derek Henry to close it out.
Starting point is 00:12:14 I'm worried what Henry's gonna look like at the end of the season, but as of right now, he has been even more than I would expect from him. So yeah, it's a defense that has some bad stats, but there's a very specific reason for why that's happening. And I can't imagine that's going to stay that bad all season long. So yeah, let's give it to Baltimore best win against Washington. Uh, I look at records, well, we all look at records, but every now and then
Starting point is 00:12:35 Atlanta had this for a bunch of years where I just thought Atlanta was terrible. And then I go to five and four or they're four and five. How are they seven and six? And I kind of written them off after a few weeks in. Denver being three and two going to the Chargers game yesterday and now being three and three of the season. Like how? They've got the Tampa Bay win, which is nice.
Starting point is 00:12:54 The Jets 10-9 beat up on the Raiders 34-18. But when you watch the Broncos play, I cannot believe this team is three and three. It's a wild game. So they lose yesterday in Denver 23 23, 16, the score is misleading. It was another one of these Bo Nicks. Bo Nicks is giving serious late night window, not late night, but second window sun coming down, Philip Rivers vibes running for his life.
Starting point is 00:13:18 Bo Nicks is taking that on very early here. There's just all of these plays where Bo Nicks is just running around. Trying to figure out who he's going to throw the ball to. Um, when you look at past attempts on the season, there's just all of these plays where Boeniks is just running around trying to figure out who he's going to throw the ball to. Um, when you look at past attempts on the season, he's eighth in the NFL because he's back there chucking it all the time. So I think Denver seven and 10 at best.
Starting point is 00:13:36 The defense has obviously gotten better. Um, but I, whenever I watched like the full Denver. Experience that team was three and two. And I'm never gonna forget that. I'm gonna remind us of it every single week, maybe not. On the other side, charge of defense. From 28th in defensive EPA to number one going into this week.
Starting point is 00:13:55 And Herbert looking like maybe one of the eight Pro Bowl alternatives. That would be an alternate. I probably the way I should say that. 237 yards yesterday yesterday his first game over His first game over 200 yards of the season and look if you go total pass attempts by all the teams this year pass attempts per game The LA Chargers are last
Starting point is 00:14:19 I know he lost but we're gonna do a little this Tampa Bay I know he lost, but we're going to do a little of this Tampa Bay, Tampa Bay at New Orleans, New Orleans was up 27 24 at the half because they scored 27 points in the second quarter and scored zero points in quarters one, three and four. So a 50 spot for Tampa Baker fighting through the interceptions. That's the positive Bucky Irving. We tried to tell you, exciting player. Running backs, are they back?
Starting point is 00:14:47 Potentially. But I'll say this about Spencer Ratler, who's in for Derek Carr. He's not afraid. And for a young quarterback getting the chance to go out there, they're all going to make mistakes, but I'd rather somebody make mistakes being dangerous than somebody who's going to make mistakes because he's so scared and you can tell right away with Spencer Rattler, it is not, he is going to try and even I think it was at the second pick where he tried to get it up over the defensive back.
Starting point is 00:15:21 It wasn't the safest throw you're going to see on a Sunday, but it was a great play by the defensive back. Maybe not, but it just, look, my, my expectations are low for most rookie quarterbacks, but that you're not going to have a check down guy with Rattler in the absence of Carr tells me the Saints actually have a little bit more to work with here than just the later round draft pick at that position stepping up when he wasn't really expecting to play this season. We were going to do a this tweet pissed me off. We may rebrand that as this tweet was annoying, but I didn't see anything this weekend. So good job by all of you. Pat yourselves on the back. So a little New York Giants prime time update. I have an Epic rant from, I don't know how many years ago, maybe seven or eight
Starting point is 00:16:08 where Epic and that it held up. Um, not that it was the best thing you're ever going to see on television, but I just couldn't do it with the giants anymore. It was me 20 plus hours in a football Saturday, Sunday, living in New England, cold basement, Luna pizza, which was sort of the highlight of all those Sundays. And by the time the giants came out, I was like, Saturday, Sunday, living in New England, cold, basement, Luna pizza, which was sort of the highlight of all those Sundays. And by the time the Giants came on and the game wouldn't be over until like 11 to 30, and I'd be starting my week again, I was starting to get really miserable.
Starting point is 00:16:35 Right. And the Giants made it worse. Not that I don't love football, but you get the point. Like 20 plus hours solo, note taking, just football. Heaven for others, but when the Giants came on in those prime time and couldn't score any points, I'd be like, this sucks. I hate it. So I started getting really mad about it
Starting point is 00:16:53 and I shared that with America. I'm not gonna do that to the Giants after last night against Cincinnati, no neighbors. And honestly, Danny Dimes, maybe. I thought for sure, like, Hey, here's your apprenticeship one more year in this contract. They'll move. They still might do those things, but there was a
Starting point is 00:17:10 moment at certain times, I'd say many moments, not many more than one moments where I thought of Dana just going, what if he's actually kind of a long term guy for the giants or at least a couple more years still in play. Uh, but they scored seven points last night. So prime time tabulation here, 15 against Dallas. They had neighbors to that game, seven last night.
Starting point is 00:17:29 So 11 points per game during prime timers. I looked ahead just to warn everybody. There's one more prime time that's officially on the schedule. That's Monday Night Football against Pittsburgh week eight. I'm going to go ahead and tell you to take the under in that one. And there's a last, I think it's the last game of the season. They're playing Philly. So maybe they'll just do the NSE East ratings bonanza
Starting point is 00:17:50 and slot that into something else. I don't know if the game will mean anything, but like, there's a reason why those teams are on all the time because of the markets. People seem to watch a lot more. But yeah, it's this is not a redo of that Giants rant. But 11 points a game in those two. Okay.
Starting point is 00:18:06 We haven't done this in a long time because I needed more data. Bill Belichick, Tom Brady, legacy update. It's been a bit. When we last did this, Tom was one, Bill was two. Pretty simple. Bill got rid of Tom and then went to Mack Jones and Bailey Zappi with a little Cam Newton sprinkled in, wanted to establish the future and not have Tom get old. Tom went to another team and won a Super Bowl for one of the greatest revenge
Starting point is 00:18:35 stories in the history of sports, modern sports at least. But things have changed. Things have changed, both on the media side of things. Bill works more. Bill puts in the reps, you see him everywhere, multiple platforms. You know, I know Tom has the money in the prime time, but he's not, he's not working as much. Bill is dating. I don't know if Tom is, uh, went to Pinehurst this weekend, golf trip, 16 of us, a lot of the UVM
Starting point is 00:19:09 guys, some guys we haven't seen in years, still wondering about your boy. I think what's his deal. And the guys that I would say are in the secondary orbit and not like directly within the same, like not my moon friendships, but just other things where I just, you know, still friends, but I haven't seen the guys in a long time. And then they're gonna go like, yes, you never got married, huh? You never even have, you know.
Starting point is 00:19:33 Then it would end in the like, Hey, you'll find your someone. And then the guys that knew me were like, yeah, I don't know if that's so I don't even know what Tom's deal is, but I hope he does find somebody. So as of right now, I've got Bill one and Tom two, but if Bill gets back into coaching and fails on the media, do we bump Bill up or down? I don't know yet. That's week six.
Starting point is 00:20:01 Get ready to tackle the NFL action with Fandl, America's number one sportsbook. Because right now, new customers can bet $5 and get 300 in bonus bets. If you win, the Fandl Sportsbook app gives you everything you need to place live bets on the NFL all in one place. Here's where the script says, share your favorite upcoming bets. I hate the line for tonight's Monday Night Football game with a passion. Uh, here's where the script says, share your favorite upcoming bets. I hate the line for tonight's Monday night football game with a passion.
Starting point is 00:20:33 It is, I don't know, man. I may just say, breeze hall over receptions. That's what I'm going to do. It gets three and a half receptions. So there you go. They've got the, everybody scores a touchdown one. That's plus 33, 24, um, $10 wins you $332. But the line on this, as soon as you saw it, I was like, I know this line is going to stink and it does, it's Buffalo minus one and a half at the Jets.
Starting point is 00:20:53 It's, Hey, the Jets aren't any good. Buffalo is really good. The line is so bad. I can't, I can't even do it. Like I want to pick Buffalo minus one and a half, but I know that the line is so bad with everything that's going on with the Jets. The line is so bad, I can't even do it. Like I want to pick Buffalo minus one and a half, but I know that the line is so bad with everything that's going on with the Jets that you just can't, you can't in this spot. Monday night football, 90% of the money is on Buffalo. I'm surprised it's that low.
Starting point is 00:21:19 Teams coming off of Europe without a bye, eight and seven against the spread. So there's nothing there. Rogers is six and one against the spread as a home underdog. If you take out the win from last season where he got hurt the first series. So maybe that one doesn't count for him. If you want to, it's seven and one. The amazing thing about that number is you're telling me he was six and he's seven times he's been, he's been a home underdog in his career. Um, so look, I think Breeze Hall has, there's been, he's been a home hunter dog in his career.
Starting point is 00:21:51 Um, so look, I think Bruce Hall has, there's a prop where he's over three and a half catches if you look at the way the bills defend that very well could be the case. Um, so I, I just can't, I can't with this. I have to, I have to take Jets and I don't want to. So there's no, resaw, there you go. So when you get a hunch in the middle of the game, you can check out the latest stats,
Starting point is 00:22:15 view live play-by-play and so much more on the same page where you place your bets. Just visit fandual.com slash Ryan RYE and to join today. You'll get started with $300 in bonus bets. If you win your first $5 bet. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with FanDuel, an official Sportsbook partner of the NFL. Must be 21 and older in present and select states
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Starting point is 00:22:53 This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember, you'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl, but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention,
Starting point is 00:23:11 and prostate and testicular cancer research. And if you don't wanna grow a mustache, you can still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. Week eight in college football,
Starting point is 00:23:29 we'll run through the top 12. We've got Jesse Palmer, so we're gonna dig into a lot of SEC stuff because he's on the SEC calls throughout the season. So let's go to number one, Texas. They've received 56 of the 62 first place votes. Oregon got the other six votes. I'm gonna keep Texas at one. I would not argue with you if you want to go with Oregon. They smash Oklahoma.
Starting point is 00:23:45 They're giving up a nation leading six points per game. Yours is back. They have everything. And on top of that, their freshman receiver Wingo is terrific. Freshman linebacker Simmons is awesome. They've got a backup who might be the best quarterback option for every other team in college football, except for a handful of teams. I guess we could argue Oregon, except for a handful of teams.
Starting point is 00:24:06 I guess we could argue Oregon, Georgia, Miami, whatever. I don't feel like arguing it. It feels like they have everything you need. So I've got them one still. Oregon. This was huge for Dan Lanning to get this done against Ohio State. The beginning of the year, we were worried about the offensive line. Stats said it's not that big of a deal.
Starting point is 00:24:26 They're running the football. They're not giving up sacks. I think for them to physically match. Ohio state where I left this game going, this game could have gone either way. So I'm not looking at it as like, well, Ohio state certainly has some questions they have to answer. And maybe you will locally and be upset about all these things, but I really felt like this game could have gone either way.
Starting point is 00:24:46 But if you look back at Lanning short resume in Eugene, you've got the Georgia thing in 22, both Washington losses where, you know, if you listen to this part, I could not believe they lost the rematch. I thought they were the better football team. It did not happen. Washington goes to the play up. If Oregon were to lose this one, then it would have been a very annoying. And I feel like even though the results tell you it's accurate,
Starting point is 00:25:05 I would feel like it doesn't mean anything and be an inaccurate argument of like, so what do you think? Like Dan Lanning is incapable of winning the big one, although that exactly like that would have happened to him. So I think this part of it is enormous for them. And without Jordan Birch on the front for them to match up physically, like you didn't feel at any point that Ohio state was some mismatch for them physically, certainly not talent wise.
Starting point is 00:25:28 I think like Ohio state might be the most talented team in the country. That's the way we felt about them this summer. We could get in arguments about different rosters, but I still don't think there was some massive gap talent wise, but you wondered if those first couple of weeks, things that were happening with Oregon, we're going to show back up again. In this game, I thought they would split, um, the regular season matchup and then what a likely be conference championship. But then we got to get to Penn state.
Starting point is 00:25:54 Uh, and don't worry, we will get there. So, uh, just physical play from Oregon that Jordan James blitz pick up my running back, my favorite running back in all of college football. Um, so there you go. Oregon's too. Um, what do you do now? I'm keeping Ohio state at three. Well, I'm moving them down to three.
Starting point is 00:26:12 I'm not going to drop them behind a bunch of other teams. Uh, it's a tough place to play. It's a one point loss. And the other thing I'm just in a positive mood today. The other thing I feel really good about is Will Howard. Uh, he answers some serious questions for me. We can get to that last possession that was disaster. He falls down, he doesn't manage the clock right,
Starting point is 00:26:28 and then on the last play he runs it out, game over. You wanna beat up on him that, fine, go ahead. I think the positives in this game from him were outweigh that last possession so much that I feel better about Will Howard today than I did, say on Friday. He had a 14 and 15 stretch, some downfield shots, getting the ball out with some real like conviction. So I thought he was
Starting point is 00:26:52 terrific. Number four, Bama. Just kidding. Just kidding, Penn State. You thought I did it too, didn't you? I didn't do it. Speaking of quarterbacks that I've been wondering about, Drew Aller became a quarterback on Saturday. Penn State's down huge at USC, comes all the way back, wins it in overtime. This was a big boy game from Drew Aller, the game that all Penn Staters have been wondering. Is this ever going to happen with this guy?
Starting point is 00:27:29 Because he looked like he was shot mentally at the end of last year. His confidence was shocked. We know it's the new OC. It looked different. It was more fun. Multiple things they were thrown at you. But I think all of us, all of us Penn State fans
Starting point is 00:27:43 deep down were're wondering, okay, what's it gonna look like when it really, really matters? There's a couple throws in this one. The throw he made to Evans at the pylon before the touchdown tied it up at 20-20. He had one like six inch window to throw it into and he got it there. He converted a fourth and seven, a fourth and 10
Starting point is 00:28:05 to tie the score at 30, 30. Aller was fantastic. Whatever I said about Will Howard, let's multiply that by whatever you want, infinity. That's how much better I feel about Aller today. Now, was it a Calzado performance? You're like, remember that guy? I don't think so.
Starting point is 00:28:24 But man, doesn't it feel great, Penn State? Doesn't it feel great? Like this is why this guy was so hype. This is why we made fun of Ohio State for him coming here and not going there. Big boy stuff from Tyler Warren. Like Shane and I put him on your radar. And FBS records 17 catches.
Starting point is 00:28:42 He did everything. So yeah, this is the kind of game from Aller where I look at the Ohio State matchup differently than I did on Friday, because I'll admit I'll be totally transparent again when they were getting their ass kicked in the first half. Although, you know, it wasn't really an ass kicking. It was just massive play here, massive play there.
Starting point is 00:29:02 Next thing you know, you're like, I thought, yeah, see, this is why you doubt them. This is why you have them there. But what I didn't do is post a video about it. All right, number five. I don't love this because it really spits in the face of the head-to-head rule, but I'm gonna go with Georgia. Weird game against Mississippi State.
Starting point is 00:29:21 I don't love ignoring the game of head-to-head, as I mentioned, but look, Mississippi State's terrible, except one ignoring the Vama head to head as I mentioned, but look, Mississippi State's terrible, except one of the Van Buren boys jumped in and started dialing up all over the place. Uh, the coaches have Ohio State four. So behind Penn State, Penn State is three, but the coaches and AP both have Georgia ahead of Bama. So I guess we're all breaking this rule collectively.
Starting point is 00:29:44 Uh, the coaches do have Nebraska at 25, which reminds me of the old coaches poll, Nebraska joke that went on for years during the Polini era was that every time you'd look at the coaches poll, they would be in the coaches poll, Nebraska. And they wouldn't be in the AP because for whatever reason, the coaches just love Nebraska all of those years. Even though that Nebraska team wasn't really that good, but they always had a decent record because of their non-conference and because they played in conference and the coaches would be like,
Starting point is 00:30:08 Nebraska, what are they? Seven and two. Let's make them 16th. Okay. So number six, Miami. They've played zero ranked teams and they may in fact play zero ranked teams for all 12 games. Maybe. I mean, some things could happen there.
Starting point is 00:30:27 Clemson, speaking of some of these ACC schedules, which again, is another reason exhibit 412, why all of this expansion sucks, is that you have some of these teams skating through their own conference schedule, where you have no idea. So you have this Miami part of it, where I'm just putting them at six and I don't know, maybe they're the 16th best team in the country. Clemson probably should have them six because of the UGA rule.
Starting point is 00:30:55 Right. So let's do it because even though Clemson has the loss of Miami is undefeated, if Clemson had just decided to play the Citadel again, which would be weird to play them twice. They would be undefeated and then we'd just be able to put them in front of Miami based on the record part of it. So let's see here. Clemson has one ranked game against Georgia.
Starting point is 00:31:16 Four ACC wins or NC State, Stanford, Florida State, and Wake for the six worst teams in the ACC. So now that I've said that out loud, let's just go back to the original Miami six Clemson seven, sorry. Sorry for wasting your time. Where's Bama dude. We're getting there.
Starting point is 00:31:32 You had him last week. You loved him, Rossello. They won SCC game. You love South Carolina. Where's Bama? Don't worry. Iowa state at number eight, both AP and the coaches have them at nine. They have LSU eight.
Starting point is 00:31:44 I'm not a hundred percent sure what to do with Iowa State. They're six and 0 the first time since 1938. They were seventh and 21. They were ranked eighth in 2020. So Matt Campbell has been in this region before. Strength of schedule is not atrocious. It's 76th. Whereas the Hoosiers who are 16th in the AP have a strength of schedule of 112 with wins
Starting point is 00:32:05 against UCLA, Maryland and Northwestern in conference play. So Iowa State has their ranked win against Iowa, which is, you know, okay. Balance across the board and all the stats, 26th in yards per play. They convert their third downs, their 20th in opponents yards per play. Rocco Beck is a pretty good quarterback for them, young guy. They don't ask a ton of him, but he's really good The receivers are really good Beck's father also Pass interference on me in a celebrity flag football game in the end zone was not called fifth and turnover margin
Starting point is 00:32:40 Fifth and turnover margin per game for Iowa State So you wonder is that something that's going to hold up all season long? But look, the West Virginia game, West Virginia kind of falls into the South Carolina, Kentucky category for me, maybe Cincinnati with the NFLs, like whatever the record is,
Starting point is 00:32:55 you get to show up and play them. It's Saturday night where Beck, his dad was actually honored. Just like, were they trying to mess with the kid or something? I don't know. West Virginia just marches right down the field, 75 year touchdown touchdown, places going wild, Morgantown gets after it, and you think, okay, well, this will make sense that Iowa State could lose this game, and then they respond. So a lot of respect for that. So I've got them eight. Nine, I'll go with
Starting point is 00:33:16 LSU. Ole Miss OT, a night of deep shot after deep shot after deep shot. I think LSU defensively is a sign and like reminding ourselves that coaching throughout the season can get units to play better as opposed to just thinking everything that we see week one, week two is gonna be the same all season long. LSU's linebackers have really stepped up. The secondary scared the shit out of me in this game, this matchup against Ole Miss early on.
Starting point is 00:33:42 That's exactly what I thought was gonna happen. There was throws. I'm like, okay, well Ole Miss is gonna win this game. Ole Miss probably still should have won this game, this matchup against Ole Miss early on. That's exactly what I thought was going to happen. There was throws. I'm like, okay, well, Ole Miss is going to win this game. Ole Miss probably still should have won this game if you really want to go there with it. But LSU's loss against USC, sure, fine. It looks worse now. But I think that's, look,
Starting point is 00:33:59 the polls like them even better than I do. Number 10. All right, finally, Tuscaloosa time. We got to it. I want to ask Todd or Mel if Milro still QB one for the 25 draft. better than I do. Number 10. All right. Finally, Tuscaloosa time. We got to it. I want to ask Todd or Mel if Milro is still QB1 for the 25 draft. South Carolina is good. Like we've said throughout the season, but still the week after the Vandy loss to be at home and to have this be a game where you have to pick it off in the end zone to hold off this South Carolina surge late touchdown on sidekick recovery.
Starting point is 00:34:25 Milro, the pick in the end zone tough, running out of bounds to the clock, just some little stuff with him. So look, Vandy was not on him and maybe the defense leaking here for Bama is more alarming than anything that's happening at quarterback. Because again, Milro fine and Vandy terrific against Georgia. A couple of things here with this game that I didn't really love. Number 11, BYU. They've held Arizona SMU and Kansas State to 43 total points. I still think Kansas City, or excuse me, Kansas State's a tough out and they destroyed them. The AP has Tennessee 11. I'm off it. Why? Maybe TBD on Tennessee, but to this point, more deserving teams. And the head-to-head comes back into play here at number 12.
Starting point is 00:35:05 Notre Dame is number 12 in the AP. I'm going with A&M. I know they lost the head to head at home. If you want to, if you think it's ridiculous, that's fine. I don't think there's 12 teams better than A&M in college football right now. As the world's population grows, so does the need for resources like Potash to support sustainable food production. This is why BHP is building one of the world's most sustainable potash mines in Canada.
Starting point is 00:35:33 Essential resources responsibly produced. This is what BHP has committed to Canada. The future is clear. It's happening now at BHP, a future resources company to discover how visit BHP.com slash better future. I'm excited to do this. I don't think we've ever had them on the podcast before, but from ESPN ABC, it's Jesse Palmer, who is here on behalf of Tableau, which we will get to a little
Starting point is 00:35:59 bit later, pretty cool device for people like us that like to watch a lot of sports. Good to see you, man. What's up? Good to see you, bro. That's great seeing you, bro. How we doing? Uh, I'm good. I'm good. I know that, you know, throughout the season, looking forward to those SEC games with you and Tess, uh,
Starting point is 00:36:13 it's kind of where we'll focus on most of this, but I just want to start Oregon gets it done at home against Ohio state. Texas continues to roll. I was talking about them earlier. I'm like, Texas feels like they have literally everything you need. If you had to to today pick between Oregon to Texas, who would you go with? It's so tough, bro But I think you just said it right honestly, I just don't see a weakness on Texas at all right now I think all across the board on all three phases really but certainly on offense defense at every level I think they're they've got dudes and they've got NFL dudes everywhere It hasn't mattered this year who plays quarterback, whether it's yours,
Starting point is 00:36:45 whether it's Manning, uh, the offense is playing at a very high level. And they've got balanced offensively to run it and throw it, uh, playmakers all over to me, just the most dominant team from an eye test standpoint. And you know, you go out in the red river rivalry this past weekend and you, you know, you're kind of waiting to see if there's a, if there's a moment where they look mortal and they don't, they just, in every situation, they just jump about just jump out on people. To me, still one of the most
Starting point is 00:37:08 impressive performances I've seen individually this year probably was Quinn Ures at Michigan way back at the start of the year. Against that defense with all the different pressures that they bring, just his ability to handle that environment and play at that level and that caliber was tremendous. And then kind of evaluating through Manning and the almost three games he played, I mean, there's virtually zero drop off. I mean, the talent level from the first team guys to second team guys all the way across the board to me is what makes Texas unique right now. And obviously Oregon, super impressive what they were able to do this past weekend against Ohio State and Dan Lanning has put together an unbelievable roster.
Starting point is 00:37:46 I would just, just based on the dominance, I would just put Texas right now one. Yeah, I don't really have any argument with that one, but obviously very impressive with what Oregon did. So let's talk Bama. You had the South Carolina game and I was really looking forward to that for obvious reasons.
Starting point is 00:38:04 After the Vandy loss, they're at home. You fear they're going to come out and look, South Carolina is good. They're not, they're not great, but they're a tough out. If you've watched them this year, as I know you have, I even like their quarterback who was kind of, you know, a coin toss every drop back, but we know how good their talent is on defense. There's so many guys on the defense that I really liked, but I think it was an alarming game.
Starting point is 00:38:24 Like it's as much as it was to lose to Vandy who was much better and who knows could maybe even sneak into getting some votes here in the polls to come out like that. And then just towards the end. So, you know, the storyline production meetings leading up to it, what is your sense of where Bama is right now? You know, going into that game, I really expected Bama to be an angry team after what happened against Vanderbilt, obviously. And I thought they were going to try to come out and really make a statement in that game. And I think you're absolutely right about what you said about South Carolina. I think they're a much better three and three team than people think.
Starting point is 00:38:58 They probably should have beaten LSU. They beat what's ended up being a pretty good Kentucky team now and they smashed them early in the year. And they certainly could have won that game in Tuscaloosa. South Carolina is a good team. That is a really hard out. And after getting beat down by Ole Miss at home, they came to play. Bama's defense really worries me right now and just their ability to get off the field
Starting point is 00:39:21 and against Georgia, you saw that in the second half when they, Georgia converted five for five, I think on fourth down was just able to keep drives going. Vanderbilt went like 12 of 18 on third downs and they were able to just stay on the field. And in South Carolina, again, in just critical moments, third and longs, whatever it was, just allowing big plays, big touchdown pass in the second half on a third long situation, they give up. And just things that can't happen, it doesn't feel like playoff caliber defense to me when you have those types of issues.
Starting point is 00:39:56 And Ryan, it's crazy because when you look at their roster and you look at the dudes they have in the front seven, especially in the depth they have, the linebacker position, that might be the best linebacking unit in the entire country. It does make you scratch your head a little bit. And I think the secondary right now for me is probably the one position on that team that I focus on more and worry about more. I know that was a huge question coming into the spirit because you lose Kuwait McKinstry and you lose Terry and Arnold in
Starting point is 00:40:23 the first two rounds. And you lose your safety to Ohio State. I mean, these are, these are all big time guys, a lot of new faces and a lot of true freshmen right now, getting a lot of reps in the back end and they're giving up big plays. And when you look at the schedule coming up now, you got Tennessee with Thornton and with Brew McCoy, and then you got Luther Burden in Missouri coming in. And then you've got LSU with Kyron Lacey and those guys, even Auburn's receiving group with Kandre Lambert Smith and all those guys are so much better than they were last year.
Starting point is 00:40:52 The secondary might be a real issue for this Bama team. And you just wonder if they have enough on that side of the ball to hold on. Yeah, the linebacker part of it, like, I kind of was like, what is up with this defense in the first half against USF? But I think USF's quarterback is just so tough that, you know, if you're not ready for them, they button things up in the second half. And then once the Wisconsin game I have, you know, happened, you can, you can say whatever you want about Wisconsin, but it looks like they've
Starting point is 00:41:17 figured some things out here too. But like that Wisconsin game, okay, all right, here's Bama's defense. Here's the front. Here's four. Here's zero. Here's 20. Like, okay, all of these guys now, there's just a hybrid of all of these different dudes attacking and it's not going to be an issue. And then I felt the same way in the first half against Georgia. Milro was fantastic against Georgia. I really didn't think he was the issue whatsoever with Vanderbilt. Like those guys were exhausted mentally trying to figure out where the handoff was going against Vanderbilt and Diego just worked him for three and a half hours. But I would say like there was so much Millrow hype post-UGA. And as anybody who's ever listened to this podcast knows, I'm not
Starting point is 00:41:56 necessarily like the biggest fan. I think he might be the best running quarterback in college football. I think Avery Johnson, maybe Kansas States in the conversation as well. There's certainly other guys you could pick from that, but there's just moments in that South Carolina game where my Milro doubt is confirmed. Uh, it's not both picks. It's the pick in the end zone. It's stupid stuff like running out of bounds and they're trying to run
Starting point is 00:42:14 clock a couple of different times. So the defense is the main concern here, but I felt like the Milro post UGA hype was out of control. And I still think there's a limit. There's just going to be moments against certain defenses where I just don't know that he's going to be seeing it the way you need him to. Yeah. Well, it's interesting too. And listen, I mean, for people that haven't watched South Carolina play it, especially on defense, that is legitimately one of the best past defenses in college football. Forget just the SEC.
Starting point is 00:42:39 Like, Kennard, Stewart off the edge, those are two future first round picks coming off the edge. And that's going to be a problem for anybody. But I will say, man, like, and just listen to what you were saying, like watching film on Milrow this year and watching the Georgia game, which was tremendous. And I thought he was outstanding as well in the Vanderbilt game. But one thing, and we called the USF game earlier this year,
Starting point is 00:43:00 if you hit Jalen Milrow early and you get a few sacks early, the eyes come down a little bit. And he stops kind of focusing so much on what's happening in the second level. And he kind of starts worrying about what's going on immediately around him. And he misses some stuff. And I thought in the South Carolina game, you mentioned the interception in the end zone, even the interception at the end of the first half, just floating balls over the middle of the field. Like that's not first round stuff. I certainly think Jalen Milrow has that. I think he's going to be that. I really do. I believe he has the talent to be that. But you know, it's, it's just part of the game where I still think if you're
Starting point is 00:43:34 an NFL evaluator, I think there are question marks with Jalen Milrow with respect to that. You know, if you hit him early and you hit him a lot, can he keep that ice water in his veins, keep his focus downfield, which is brutally hard to do. And so like you said, he's going to play some good defense, obviously, in the SEC coming up. He's lucky he doesn't get Texas in the regular season. I mean, he's not going to get Ole Miss' front in the regular season. He's not going to get Texas A&M's front in the regular season either. But this is, that's a question mark, I think, for Jalen Milro moving forward, no doubt.
Starting point is 00:44:06 Yeah, and you're right. I mean, once those edge guys start getting to you from South Carolina, like it just it wrecks everything you're thinking about. And he's not going to be on the quarterback that you'll see this season that goes through that. So let's talk a little Georgia, you know, the expectations of them are through the roof a couple weeks in, it's like, hey, there's a tier, it's Ohio State, it's Texas, it's Georgia. And then, you know, the Kentucky game, the Bama game, and, you know, the Mississippi state game is just weird in general because they're maybe the worst team in the sec, but they bring
Starting point is 00:44:33 in a freshman quarterback who puts up some numbers and maybe it gets a little loose. Maybe Beck has, you know, finding that breakout game, but we've been talking about their guys in the outside, maybe not being elite and then not having the, uh, the tight ends that they've had talking about their guys on the outside, maybe not being elite, and then not having the tight ends that they've had in the past. I would not say like, okay,
Starting point is 00:44:49 I have to reclassify Georgia here, but it's pretty clear that it's not Georgia in a gap and everybody else in the SEC halfway through. I agree with you, man. It does not feel like Bama and Georgia and everybody else. To me right now, it feels like Texas and everybody else, honestly. And watching Georgia, yeah, you know, with their offensive line and bringing in Trevor Etienne in the portal this
Starting point is 00:45:10 year, I really thought this was going to be a running game that was going to generate a lot of explosive plays and be the perfect way to balance Carson Beck and what they were trying to do throwing the football. I don't think they've really been able to establish the physicality I don't think they've really been able to establish the physicality, uh, that Kirby smart wants on offense. You mentioned the tight ends, man. To me, no Brock Bowers is the biggest thing. I mean, that guy was such an X factor. And I think obviously, you know, when we used to watch them play, you're like, yeah, he's a really good player. He's going to be a first round pick. The Raiders are going to love them.
Starting point is 00:45:39 There's all this stuff you can do with them. But like that was such a unique player in a unique position. And the way the Bobo and the way that coaching staff was using him at running back and jet sweeps and screens, he could just do so many different things that just defenses had no idea how to handle. I don't know if you could pick another dude. Just thinking off the top of my head around the country where you take him off the field and all of a sudden now everything they do from a schematic standpoint is, you know, is different and the way defenses play you is different.
Starting point is 00:46:11 Normally it's like Caleb Williams. Like what do we have to do to stop a quarterback and take away the things he does? How often do you say, well, we got to take away the tight end and all the different things they do. The first utility I thought he gave them on offense was really unique and special. I know, and you know, and you know George's got the NFL talent and the guys if they play their a-plus game or their a-game a minus game That's gonna be a that's gonna be a hard out for anybody
Starting point is 00:46:35 It regular season playoffs, whatever but they don't look nearly as dominant as they've looked the last three years. That's for sure. I Went to LSU USC. I left thinking, Hey, both these teams are going to be good this year. Um, but some of the things with LSU were kind of funny. The way the story is gone is you were worried about the defense. You were definitely worried about the secondary. If you've liked the talent in the secondary, you have to imagine by week eight, they're just going to be better based on reps alone.
Starting point is 00:47:00 Um, the linebackers have gotten a lot better, uh, even though Perkins goes out for the year, which sucks. But that win against Ole Miss, man, after that was over, I'm like, man, Ole Miss should have won that game. And early on, Jesse too, there was a couple of shots. There was a deep shot at the center of the field where it looked like he was fair catching it for Ole Miss and all of the secondary was just watching it happen. It was one of those pass plays that was so alarming for a defense where you go, I understand somebody's open, but how- Oh, really bad. Right. How does that happen with three guys watching one receiver just in the middle of the field,
Starting point is 00:47:38 30 close yards down the field? However, Saturday night Baton Rouge, we know it's a horror story for a lot of visitors and it happens again and the AP polls reflect that. So I don't know that we write off Ole Miss, but they don't have the win that they need after the Kentucky loss on top of everything else. And now LSU is back in the playoff conversation. Yeah, man, it's crazy.
Starting point is 00:47:58 And we were calling an LSU UCLA game a few weeks ago. And at the time, the big question of course was the defense and the secondary. You remember DBU? Like did that, is that not happening anymore? I mean, we're not, like that's just. I want to actually go through this. You'd be good at this.
Starting point is 00:48:17 I was thinking maybe Stanford Steve as well. It was just going through every school that says, we're this, we're tight end you, we're linebacker you, and then say whether or not they're worthy of having it. You can't just have like a couple down years for, I know Texas for a while was trying to say they were DBU and then I think Miami's claimed like seven different
Starting point is 00:48:34 positions where you're like, I think that's a lot. Yeah, I like what you said, but yeah, you're right. I mean that UCLA first half, I'm thinking, is this gonna be just an awful year down there? Like what is up with these guys? With the talent? You can't throw post routes down the middle of the field and have a dude fielding a fair catch like in the middle of your secondary. You can't. Derek Stingley Jr., Tridavious White, Honey Badger, Patrick Peterson, those guys are like freaking out at NFL locker rooms
Starting point is 00:49:01 right now based on what they're seeing. And it's not just coverage to run it's tackling as well. And it's coming downhill, you know, like in the secondary, you miss a tackle. That's a house call. And so, you know, as bad as it's been defensively, I think on offense, I do think they picked it up. I'll tell you a guy that I don't think enough people are really talking about is Garrett Nussmeyer and just how well he's played at the quarterback. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:49:24 That throw to the middle of the field for the touchdown on Saturday night was just the anticipation on that throw. That's the NFL stuff people get excited about, even though the entire night was just deep shot, deep shot, hoping one of the four connects. And then everybody, obviously, you lose Jaden Daniels and everybody's like, well, what's this off? It's going to be boring. It's traditional.
Starting point is 00:49:43 There's going to be handing it off and he's going to have to try to make it, get it done from the pocket. He has been playing so incredibly well and his ability to anticipate throws. Like when you watch the film Ryan of Garrett, so many times in games, he's able to get it out. I mean, he doesn't have Jayden's escape ability. So he has to rely on the clock in his head and just throwing balls way before receivers are out of their breaks and just understanding coverage, picking spots downfield to lay the ball into is remarkable. I just as a former quarterback myself, I can tell you anticipation is something that I think sometimes is inherent. It's not easy to teach. It's not a thing that you can rep it in practice and you can talk about it all you want. I think some guys got it. I think
Starting point is 00:50:23 some guys don't. Garrett Nussmeyer has it and every single week, like, and his offensive line is really good. They may have the best combination of offensive tackles and Campbell and Jones in the entire country, but he's under duress a lot. He's got to get rid of it early. Um, and he does it every single week. It's remarkable. Like his NFL evaluation, watching him play, he's got a lot of stuff that a lot of NFL teams are going to want. I also think he deserves credit too, Ryan, because we're in this era now of college football, especially as a quarterback.
Starting point is 00:50:53 If you lose the competition in the off season, or you get benched in a season, portal. Like automatically. And how often do we see quarterbacks jump twice? Sometimes three times? We've seen dudes go four times, just hopping all over like Emory Jones, like DJ, we see guys just like moving all over the place. Garrett Nussmeyer has stayed loyal to LSU through two head coaches, lost the job. Remember he lost it to Max Johnson back in the day in the off season.
Starting point is 00:51:22 And then Jaden Daniels happens, you get him in from Arizona State. So now, now you're out of luck. And he's, he's stuck it out at LSU believing that's his best opportunity through two different coordinators and offenses. And now he's paying dividends. Like I think Garrett Nesmeyer is one of the most unsung players right now for a lot of different reasons, but the Ole Miss game was like the icing on the cake. And hopefully in a big, in a big audience, in a big window, people got a chance to finally see that. Do you like LSU more than Bama today?
Starting point is 00:51:52 Today, that's a great question. I think I do. I really think I do, which is crazy. But based off of the way, where I think LSU's offense is trending, I think, I think like head to head and they're going to play, they're going to play at death Valley, I think in a couple of weeks coming up. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:52:15 I mean, I, yeah, I would take LSU right now based on how Alabama's looked the last two weeks. Yeah. What do you like better today? Tennessee or Missouri? I'm going to go just Tennessee. Missouri's game against Texas. What do you like better today, Tennessee or Missouri? I'm going to go just Tennessee. Missouri's game against Texas A&M scares me a lot.
Starting point is 00:52:32 Just, you know, a couple of weeks ago, you know, like that was, you can't be a top 10 team and go let that happen. Um, and so it makes me feel great about A&M, like A&M, that was such a brutal, tough game opener against Notre Dame. Could have gone either way. I thought they stole back all the momentum, all the credit to Notre Dame for figuring out hyped up beginning of the season, that place, uh, prime time, the whole deal, but it, it was a quick, you know, a quick, like right off of them, Wigman goes down, but then Reed steps up who was incredible against
Starting point is 00:52:58 Florida and kind of kept it together. And now the way they've been playing. They, there's such an afterthought because of how top heavy the rankings were with SEC teams that I put them 12. Yeah, no dude, you're right. It's funny in all the playoff projections, you don't see Texas a and M anywhere in the first round. And that, that's like the one outlier people are kind of forgetting about. You're right. Just because of that Notre Dame game, I think a lot of people wrote them off,
Starting point is 00:53:23 um, wigman back in, and by the way, Coach Elko's decision to put Wigman back in based on how Reid was playing, you know, for those three games was a gutsy move. I think Wigman kind of paid it off and kind of showed you that in the Missouri game. He does a lot of great things. I also, just as being like an exes of no nerd,
Starting point is 00:53:40 Mike Elko's third down defense stuff is like NFL stuff. It's amazing. Like that defense is going to be a problem for any college. What is it? It's it's versatility and changing things up over and over again. You remember how like in college football, oftentimes there's a lot of defenses out there. They just have a cheetah package, meaning they'll take four defensive ends. They throw them on the field. They're like, deal with this. We've got four pass rushers now, and we're just going to lay these guys out on the field and they're like, deal with this. We've got four pass rushers now and we're just going to lay these guys out on the field. And that's our third down package.
Starting point is 00:54:08 Mike Elko every single week is lining up in a different personnel in a funky, crazy radar type formation at the line of scrimmage. You can't tell who's blitzing, who's not blitzing. And he doesn't just like run one third down and then another third down eats a different one. And then the next third down, it's a different one. And then those are his three and he's just going to rotate those. He's got like a new one every single third down and then he changes it the next game. So when you're game planning for Texas A&M offensively on third down, you can look at
Starting point is 00:54:40 some of the old stuff, but that's not anything you're going to see in the upcoming game. And that's the NFL mentality I going to see in the upcoming game. And that's the NFL mentality I'm talking about. That's why NFL teams take half a day of practice every week on Friday, just focusing on that one down because it's so critical, obviously, to your ability to win games. And so I love what they're doing on the field. Texas A&M obviously in defense and getting Skorton in from Purdue as a transfer was great. Um, but just like schematically too, man, that's, that's a tough
Starting point is 00:55:09 defense to get ready for every week. Okay. Let's go back to a young gunslinger. North of the border. You're, you're putting up big numbers. Were you playing for your dad was dollar bill. Yeah. Dollar bill was dialing him up. It was dialing him up at Minto Field,
Starting point is 00:55:29 Nepean, Ontario. Okay. So you're starting to get calls. Our boy, Jesse, there's some interest down south to get him down there to play college ball. What's your best recruiting story? It was probably the first. it was actually surprisingly not Steve Spurrier, which is probably surprising to a lot of people. You can only imagine what, you know, everybody's listened to his press conferences and you can just imagine. I think, I think the most memorable recruiting story was my first phone call that I got. I'll never forget it. It was like August 15th. It was like the first day coaches were allowed to
Starting point is 00:56:03 call you in the morning. coaches were allowed to call you. In the morning, I get a phone call and I had this little terrible like little red and black phone with like a cord. It was just brutal. And I pick it up and it's Nick Saban at Michigan State. And he comes on the phone and I'm super excited. So amped. I just can't wait to get into it. I just want to have so many questions I want to ask. Like I'm just out of my realm as a Canadian kid. This is like the dream. And he gets on the phone and he literally talks for like eight minutes and 47 seconds, completely monotone the entire time. And it was like he wasn't breathing. He literally gets on the phone and he's like, we really think at Michigan State is a great opportunity for you on the field. It's a pro style offense. So we'll give you an opportunity to throw the football down,
Starting point is 00:56:51 feel vertical and really show off some of your passing ability. And you really highlight that here, the big 10s and outstanding conference with great competition. You'll play good defense and at all value. What is your region every week? Lots of friends in the NFL right now that could help figure it out for you. once you get done here too. Also academically, Michigan State, fantastic. You can get a degree that you need. It'll help you at the next level. East Lansing, very safe place to live.
Starting point is 00:57:11 We get you great housing here as well. And it was literally like eight minutes and 47 seconds. The pitch was unbelievable, but I just, it was so much volume. I just couldn't, I don't even know what he said. And that was it. And we little like, and like, and imagine like, if you had said to me like, by the way, dude, that guy's going to win seven Natties, just so you know, the guy that you just, you
Starting point is 00:57:33 just spoke to, that's, that's, that's seven Natties. I would have been like, I don't, I don't know. So why was it Florida then? Like who did you, who did you stay with? So it was, well, Florida was on their way to winning the 96 national championship. Werfel was on his way to winning the Heisman Trophy. And listen, I went down for homecoming against LSU. Like it was like October something. I'm down in Gainesville. It's sunny. It's warm. The scenery. And like in Canada Canada in October, it's like minus 12,
Starting point is 00:58:08 and it was pretty good. Like the Gators like work through like six TDs and it was like fifth, I don't know, they just smoked LSU at home and it sold it pretty easily for me. If the transfer portal was as prevalent then as it is, or as prevalent as it as now back then, would you have been like, okay, this splitting reps bullshit?
Starting point is 00:58:29 I'm going to cause it. Cause I think, did you have, did you have the Mertz-Lagway game? Yeah. Where they were, yeah, right. So they were splitting up series and then we know in the other game against Mississippi State, I don't know if you had that one where they were going to give him like three, six and nine or something. Right. Every time I think about it, I think of you because I never played the position.
Starting point is 00:58:53 I would despise that. I would despise. So I think you, 2024 Jesse Palmer would be like, Hey, let's, let's start planting the seed that I want out of here. I did it twice. Like I was doing with Doug Johnson and then Rex Grossman like two years later. It was it was crazy. I was all about that.
Starting point is 00:59:10 You know, it's crazy, though, man, because because, you know, my buddy is my boys on the team back then. We talk about it still today. Like in the late 90s, like I that was an era where I feel like if you transferred, that was like that was like a. Red flag Red flag. Yeah, I was gonna pick another word. But yes, that was a red flag. That was that was a That was I know what the other word is yeah, it was like you could pick it you could pick a few it was
Starting point is 00:59:39 It was just like dude like back then like just compete Figure it out. get your job back. Like you're trying to go to the league, like figure it out, get back out there, practice better, play better, and just deal with it and just seize the moment. If you had transferred back then, everybody in the locker room would have lost respect for you. And so, yeah, I mean, I mean, easy to say now, like, absolutely. I've been one of these guys, like I was just talking about the guys that transferred through
Starting point is 01:00:05 three or four times. I would have done that. I would have gone where the most money was, by the way. I would have been like an NIL. Yeah, I would have been all about the NIL for sure. But I don't think I would have. I just think back then my headspace was like, I got to like, we had four NFL quarterbacks on our roster at the same time.
Starting point is 01:00:22 And it was just like, I got to beat these guys. Like, that's it. And I just just like, I gotta beat these guys. That's it. And I just gotta get on the field and I gotta get drafted and get into the league. That's kinda how I thought about it. And you don't see that very much anymore, I don't feel like. And look, you got to the league
Starting point is 01:00:36 and without your mentorship, Eli Manning may not be Eli Manning. That's true, that's true. Eli Manning would have, yeah, he would have missed so many, that's a good point. That's not talked about enough. Basically, forget Plaxco Burris and all these other guys that made him. Jeremy Schocke, I made Eli Manning. That's a good point. To be totally honest, and I don't think you'll mind me sharing this, we were talking about it once. You're like, it was probably the best thing ever that they got me away from them.
Starting point is 01:01:03 at once, you're like, it was probably the best thing ever that they got me away from them. The best day of my Giants career, my worst day was the day that Eli moved into the same building I was living in Hoboken, New Jersey. That was great news and that was bad news all at the same time. I want to talk about your career a little bit, a few minutes to finish up on this, because it was somebody who would walk the halls at Bristol. I think all of us that were there like five days a week, you know, we would hear from like the other people that worked in the ESPN umbrella, like, this is how it is. And be like, dude, you live in like a major city. I don't want to hear about you,
Starting point is 01:01:36 but there'll always be like a new person on the scene. And your first year, I hope you're gonna, I hope we're good enough for you to understand where I'm going with this, but your first year you were on TV, it was like, oh, yeah, Jesse Palmer's here, like he's working here. And then the second year you came back, it was like, hey, you know what got hot this summer?
Starting point is 01:01:57 Jesse Palmer, you were so much better. And I don't know if you remember it this way or not. I'm not saying you were bad your first year. Again, this is kind of a weird question to even throw out in an interview or a discussion, but it felt like once you figured out what the job was, you came back that second year. And then I remember a couple of times with Van Pelt,
Starting point is 01:02:15 different guys, especially all the guys that love college ball, be like, you know who's just fucking awesome now is Palmer. Like he's awesome at it. Do you remember the timeline that way from the early days at ESPN? Yeah, dude, it's, well, first of all, I appreciate you saying that. But it's like, it's, it's kind of like a quarterback too. Like I always felt the biggest jump you made as a quarterback was like your first year. So true freshman year to your, to your sophomore year,
Starting point is 01:02:41 or a rookie to your second year in the league. It's just when things start to make sense. And it's like the game slows down. And I feel like there was a little bit of that at ESPN. Maybe it's like first year, it's like college football live on Monday, and then you're doing deuce wraps on Saturday. And that's kind of like, you know, you're driving up from New York and you're going back and you're watching all these games. But you just have to figure it. You have to figure it out. You have to figure out the logistics of it. Like you're learning, like all the minute things of like, okay,
Starting point is 01:03:12 I got to talk in 45 second sound bites. You know, it's like how to, how to bridge to like, you know, and all these different things, how to, how to talk over telestrations. What's a SOP VO? Like how to look at a rundown sheet. Like I had no idea what was going on. And I was lucky because I got to work with people like you and SVP, and I got to work with, you know, a lot of great people on the college football side and just sort of watch other people do it.
Starting point is 01:03:37 And then it just kind of started to make sense. And I think like in anything we do too, I think you just kind of find your own style. You kind of find your own way of doing it. And so it was definitely, it's crazy now that I've been there 18 years. I feel like it's been a long time, but the biggest jump definitely I think was between that first and second year. Bro, I was getting lost on campus like first year,
Starting point is 01:04:00 couldn't find a calf. I was showing up late to my half time, trying to figure out how to get back to like the, the, the media room or wherever that was where we used to do the, the raps with Stan Barrett. Like it was just like trying to like make up all that stuff. No idea. So it was, it's crazy. I still kept my badge by the way. It's like the picture that I took my first year. That's like circa 2007, like sweating from meat sweats, maybe a vodka soda the night before. And it's just like, I still have it as a reminder.
Starting point is 01:04:34 Pete No, I still have mine. And every time I would lose it, they'd be like, do you want a new picture? I go, no, I want to capture that excitement and hope that's in that picture. But the last thing I'd ask on it too is that you're just a natural on television. And I think there's certain demeanors that work that are like applicable to different fields. And obviously you've done the work with The Bachelor and you've done the cooking stuff and you've done the little travel like cooking things. Like where do you want this to go? Because you're so good at the football thing, but like we have, we have friends that are in the business that go, you know, if you can get over to that network stuff or you like, is that what you, you know, again, maybe you don't
Starting point is 01:05:10 want to answer all these things too, honestly, because who knows if your contract's up or not and the leverage play of all these different things. But do you aspire to continue to like branch out into different stuff because of career or just interests? I think it's, it's what I'm trying to do right now at this point is just try to do things that I enjoy, I think, and just balancing it as long as I can. I feel like I have a pretty, a pretty good balance now between the bachelor and food and then football. Like football is just so is, it's just in my, in my blood. It's just who I am. It's, it's a
Starting point is 01:05:40 passion. It's something I never want to stop doing. And I always have to be able to find time to fit that in and do it. Like an international travel food show would be like a dream show to do for me, you know, down the road, like a la Anthony Bourdain somehow. You know, the real kicker now though is being a dad and, and, you know, I have an eight month old and you know, my wife was super cool with me, like shooting off and doing all these different jobs for awhile. She's not going to be so cool with that anymore. And so I have to like,
Starting point is 01:06:12 I have to find a way to sort of, it's like a Tetris puzzle. Like you're just constantly trying to like fit things together. But I really, I really liked the balance. Honestly, I love the balance I have now and it's just a matter of trying to, trying to keep that up. I think. Yeah. I can't imagine you not doing college ball though, because you really are terrific and what's, I think the best compliment that I can give you is that all the excitement is genuine.
Starting point is 01:06:33 The excitement matches what's happening on the field because there's guys that are hyper and pumped up because they're like, Hey, I have to have energy for, you know, these four hour broadcasts that we have now with all the time stoppages. But it always feels like your energy and excitement is matching the moments that deserve it. And that's what I really like. Well, look, maybe you get some network gig and you don't have to do any of this stuff in New York City full time and it's not a big deal, but love having you on Saturdays, man. So thanks for doing this. Yeah, I appreciate it, bro. Thanks. I thanks I mean I'm lucky too like Joe Tessoss and Katie George awesome Josh Ochman and Evers and everybody that we work with like everybody cares so much about college football and that that helps like you know
Starting point is 01:07:13 like whenever you're doing something you're doing with passionate people then it helps you be that way too. Yeah and it's just a fun deal like hey for this many weeks we're going to travel through the south we're going to see all these places it's going to be kind of circle for you too, you know, playing in all these stadiums and everything and having some, some point of reference. Are teams still not willing to meet with you if they're playing Florida? No, uh, you remember everything. It's amazing. I remember like now I think it's good.
Starting point is 01:07:39 I think 18 years people have figured out that I'm actually finally thinking I'm not taking the answer the coach is giving me and like literally texting what they said to the head coach for the University of Florida, which I really appreciate. I ran into a couple of hurdles early in my career with coaches that didn't believe I wasn't gonna tell Steve Spurrier
Starting point is 01:07:57 what they were telling me, which would have completely blown up my credibility in the industry. So of course I never would have done that in the first place, but thanks for asking. I think I finally have, I finally have crossed that hurdle in my career. Okay. Before we let you go, tell us about Tableau
Starting point is 01:08:14 because this actually, when I get the promos and I read, I read the description and then I read it a second time because I'm thinking, okay, this might work for me. Yeah. So I'm really excited about this going to work with Tableau. Tableau essentially is a device that allows people
Starting point is 01:08:28 to record or watch live or re-watch their favorite live TV or the free stream programs on any device in the house. So for me, it's whether it's news or whether it's sports, reality TV, what have you, it's something that we news or whether it's sports, reality TV, what have you. It's something that we use here in the family. There are no fees. There are no contracts.
Starting point is 01:08:50 Emily and I have saved so much money using this. And it's great because I'm obviously busy. We talked about just how much I'm working now with college football or being away with the bachelor or anything else. Now with our daughter, the only time Emily and I get to watch TV is at the end of the day. So we get to kind of post up together. And when I get back on Saturday, like yesterday or a couple of days ago from calling South Carolina BAM, I can kind of catch up on some of the college football that I missed. And we do that together. So it's
Starting point is 01:09:20 great for families, especially better busy. And the fall is the perfect time to for sports fans out there. You can watch your local NFL team, obviously college football, and you get all of that free. You get all that subscription free without any contracts at your leisure and I deaf. And it's for me as a fan of football, it's a, it's a no brainer. Who do you have this weekend? Uh, actually not working this weekend. Uh,
Starting point is 01:09:48 bachelor duties overseas, which is a whole other thing now, dude, figuring out the travel, uh, the last two falls with bachelor and college football is crazy. Last year I did an Auburn game. I had to leave Jasper, Alberta, drive six hours to the airport, fly six hours to Atlanta, drive two hours to Jordan hair stadium, call the game and then go reverse and Walk in live to a row ceremony That's that's reading a lot of defenses all at the same time Would I be better as the main bachelor or as a guy competing for the bachelorette
Starting point is 01:10:20 No, you would be better in the house competing because you could stir it up. You'd be good for the drama. I would leave immediately. No, you wouldn't leave. No, no, no, no. I feel like I don't I don't like her enough. I'm not doing this. No, no, no, no. You'd go on the two on one date. You'd be on the dreaded two on one. You'd get a good guy sent home. That's what would happen. You would get like a guy that maybe she could end up with and you would find a way to just kind of like just get it around the house and you'd win the two on one and, and he'd go home. Not if it was Chad, you lose.
Starting point is 01:10:52 So you're a matchup nightmare. I mean, just anywhere we put you. Like, like it's just, you're just, you're just a mismatch problem. Maybe years ago, you keep offensive coordinators up late at night. Now they'd be like, where is he? Like he's barely on camera. I think he's reading again or something. Thanks, Jesse, you're the man, appreciate it.
Starting point is 01:11:11 Great to have you, bro. What does possible sound like for your business? It's the ability to reach further with access to over 1400 lounges worldwide. Redefine possible with Business Platinum. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Terms and conditions apply. Visit amex.ca slash business platinum.
Starting point is 01:11:32 You want details? Fine. I drive a Ferrari. 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you can possibly imagine. And best of all kids, I am liquid.
Starting point is 01:11:47 So now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Life advice, rr at gmail.com is our email. Feel free to fire up. We gotta go through a ton of these right now. Someone from Life is Good reached out. If you guys want free hats, let me know after the fire.
Starting point is 01:12:02 That's exactly why we do this. Yes. We're like, you know, I really like our, our full size V eight land rovers. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I'm into. Hey, those line around. But the guy that drives that what's his talk about cool guys.
Starting point is 01:12:18 Yeah. Yeah. That guy's the coolest. There's nothing cooler. All right. Uh, let's see. Work as well as a hat or a knife. Okay. Let's nothing cooler. All right, let's see Work as well as a hat or a knife Okay, let's do this staff or students basketball game 35 years old 510 160 no gym stats
Starting point is 01:12:33 I will be playing a basketball game against teens What part of my game do I need to train so I can dominate to clarify? I'm a good athlete, but my game is lacking as teacher We encourage to play against the rising high schoolers in a staff or student game during our final pep rally. I've played in all the other sports against the kids in dominate, but playing in basketball hasn't worked out this year. The kids are talking shit. I want to shut them up, but I don't have easy access to a hoop to
Starting point is 01:12:58 practice on little ones to take care of. So what's my plan? Do I spend my time locking kids down on D jump lanes, collect steals? Do I become a cyst guy? I know this isn't couch to 2K, but there's going to be something I can do. Right. Thanks for your help. Um, there's probably nothing you can do.
Starting point is 01:13:13 Basketball. You can't just crash. Like you can't. Yeah. It's not like a Spanish test. Yeah. This is not, those skills are not developed during your mid thirties. So if you can't dribble, you're not going to pick it up this week.
Starting point is 01:13:26 If you can't shoot your shots, not going to look good. It's going to look terrible. So I do think that your tenacity and your attitude from this email tells me that you really should focus on defense. You should just be using all of your energy on defense, fighting for rebounds, get the ball to somebody who can dribble, don't shoot unless you want them to make fun of you. Um, cause you're not going to be able to, you can't shoot is my guess and you're never going to be able to. It's too late.
Starting point is 01:13:50 So, uh, don't, don't try to be that guy because it might actually be more embarrassing. So I would say any dude that has the ball that you're on. Just stare just above his belly button, get the hands out. Can't fake it with the hips, right? Right. Right. God, my ass.
Starting point is 01:14:11 Right. Just start anticipating, you know, figure out his dominant hand, overplay the dominant side, filter him to the, to the sideline, filter him to help just make all those kids' lives miserable by being super. Cause every guy that I know that's an athlete that sucks at basketball will be like, Oh, I'm so good at like deflections and I'm so good at this. It's like, yeah, cause you stink at everything else. So like, thank you for your effort, but that's, that's the only way you're going to impact the game.
Starting point is 01:14:38 It's too late. Yeah. I'm not going to do advice. I just want to say these games are fucking awesome. Best part of a pep rally, maybe the best part of spirit week right under the, right under the game, the homecoming game or whatever it is. These games are awesome. And yeah, you really don't, you don't want what people remember to be you
Starting point is 01:14:54 air balling, you know, your first seven shots and then, you know, welcome to history class on Monday. So, uh, I think you're right, but I just, there's a big, there's a big responsibility. These games are fucking incredible. Yeah. I think you just have to be like the, there's a big, there's a big responsibility. These games are fucking incredible. Yeah. I think you just have to be like the Ben Wallace of, of the faculty team and you know, hope people respect you for it.
Starting point is 01:15:11 But that does, I have noticed like, you know, you probably noticed this too, Ryan, when you play younger kids and pick up, whether it be at the wire or whatever, they don't like defense. They don't like when people actually lock them up and play defense. So like, you're going to really,
Starting point is 01:15:22 if you're looking to like get off a little bit and have a little bit of fun and on your own, like you don't need to be hitting shots to have fun. You're gonna see it in the rise how annoyed they're gonna get at you. So I actually think you may not think that's fun. It is going to be fun. You're gonna have a great time.
Starting point is 01:15:36 And look at me hooked. It sounds like you're allowed to get a little intense in these games too. So like, if you see a guy you don't like, who you just know is like destined to be a shit head, you need to see him around town at like 25. Like, I didn't listen to anybody. You know, maybe you get a back screen into him when he's going backwards. You know, I think 16, 17 years old is old enough to do this. I mean, if there's a 14 year old, maybe you take it a
Starting point is 01:15:56 little easy on the 14 year old. Um, but yeah, I mean, look. You do the Kobe and the, what was that? The 08 Olympics where you just run right through Pau's chest. Send a message right off the bat. Yeah, no was that? The Oh eight Olympics where you just run right through Powell's chest. Yeah, no, that was super impressive by Kobe. He said a really hard screen and the guy that didn't fight back in him when Kobe yelled at him his entire time, he was at the Lakers, never stuck up for himself. And then he's like, I'm going to set a screen on how and set this tone because I know he's never going to do anything else.
Starting point is 01:16:19 And all the other players are going to act like it was just huge fucking turning point. It's like, Oh yeah, no, that was amazing. Uh, anyway, um, yeah, look, I had not mad games. Yeah. I had one of these games where, uh, I look forward to an entire year. And if you want to hear that story, you can hear on the Hoosiers rewatchable where I was Jimmy Chitwood back at home.
Starting point is 01:16:38 Um, and, uh, and bill, I told the story that went a little long and bill hated it so you can listen to it there. You'd be the judge. You can, I told the story that went a little long and Bill hated it. So you can listen to it there. You'd be the judge. You can, I will say, you can hear someone's non enjoyment without anything they do. Is there a video of that? I'm gonna have to go back and watch that. I, uh, I do remember speaking of the, we had a, we had a dodge ball version of this in high school and maybe,
Starting point is 01:17:02 maybe very embarrassing to admit this, but like I crushed it. And it was, I still get highs thinking about that because I was like the last guy and the teachers and I was, we ended up losing, but it was like five on one at the end. I was the only guy and I think I got it to like one on two and I was like a ninja out there. I had like dudes that I didn't even know, give me high fives afterwards. Like it was a, maybe a top five sporting mode. Electric. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:17:26 Yeah. What's your greatest sporting moment? Well, they called back a fumble slash pick behind the lot of scrimmage in high school. And that was devastating, but everyone saw it. It looked cool. And I saw the video. I don't know.
Starting point is 01:17:40 I think intramurals was pretty, pretty good. College intramurals dudes weren't ready. Dudes weren't ready. Which sport? Oh, football. Sorry. Yeah, football. What did you play? Pats? No, no. So it was full. It was like kind of this weird full contact on the line, but it was, I'm talking intramurals in college. Yeah, I played, you know, tackle football in high school, but
Starting point is 01:17:57 that was really good. And when I first got to college, it wasn't intramurals, but it was like open gym. And I've always been pretty bad at basketball, just coordination wise. I'm always hurting my ankles, stuff like that. I can see that. You know, told you I got crossed out by a drunk guy like in high school, was new kid, that sucked. But I just, I was like, you know, it's college,
Starting point is 01:18:16 you can be a new, be whoever you want, right? So I was like, yeah, I'm a basketball guy. And my first like two showings, I mean, everything went in, everything, weird like hook shots that I would never take. Everything was going in and then some, I don't know, like the, the, the flubber, uh, you know, stopped working and I just became terrible again. But for those two weeks, everyone's like, dude, that guy, Kyle's fucking awesome. You didn't play in, in schools.
Starting point is 01:18:37 Like, no, I didn't play. Um, so that, I had two weeks of like a real, a real high there. And then I don't know, it just wore off. Just think of the three of us. I was the one too soft to actually put on the pads for real. You were late bloomer though. We've been over that.
Starting point is 01:18:50 Sure. No, I think it was one year returning kicks and then the other kid was more scared than I was. So anything that was like middle over. That's about the scariest thing you could do in high school. Yeah. And he would like, you guys, you, you, you.
Starting point is 01:18:59 And I'm going, Jesus Christ. It's like on your hash. Who's it? Who's expendable? He was, he was just, it was two guys back there going, I don't want to do this either, but I guess we're apparently fast. Well, that's the, yeah. My, my, I don't know if I remember I've told this before, but my senior year, I
Starting point is 01:19:17 returned kicks the opening kickoff of the season. I got it, but it was like a low short kick. I dove in, caught it kind of on the roll and then a bunch of dude piled on me, broke my ankle and barely played the rest of the season. So I don't know if I deserve too much credit. I don't know if I deserve a lot of credit or no credit because I barely played. You got on the ball though, dude.
Starting point is 01:19:32 That's good. Yeah. It's a game didn't count either because it was raining. I agree. They restarted it the next day. Yeah, but you went back out there once things healed, right? I walked off, dude.
Starting point is 01:19:44 I walked off. Nobody cared about me on the field. Harder zone, own power. Good for you. Yeah, but you went back out there once things healed, right? I walked off, dude. I walked off. Nobody cared. His own power. Good for you. Yeah. Right. Okay. Um, let's see here.
Starting point is 01:19:52 Uh, okay. This guy wants to be a comedian. So here we go. 47, 47, 47, 217 pounds spent the last year eating healthier, hitting the Y three times a week, down 34 pounds, have a solid core, can do a wall squat without it. Feeling like my quads are about to detach from my kneecaps now. NBA comp Leo Rountants, unknown white Canadian. Everybody knows Leo. League pass, Leo. You kidding me? I actually thought his kid had a chance. I hope this message
Starting point is 01:20:20 finds you all well. I'm seeking your wisdom, guidance, and maybe some reassurance that I'm not crazy. At the ripe age of 47, when most people are considering normal, sensible steps in life like retirement plans and sending their kids to college, I've decided to seriously pursue a lifelong dream of mine, stand-up comedy. My wife and I, no kids, will be relocating from our northern Ontario city about three hours south of downtown Toronto in early 25. You're probably asking why I didn't follow my dream 20 years ago when I had youth and significantly more hair. Good question. The answer
Starting point is 01:20:46 involves a mix of procrastination, mortgage payments, how little you actually make as a standup in Canada, a quick bout with cancer, cancer free now, and a misguided belief that I could find true happiness without pursuing this dream. But now here I am older, wiser, question mark, ready to embrace the heckling masses. Our move isn't based primarily around the pursuit
Starting point is 01:21:08 of my dream. Like many people during COVID, we decided to move to a quieter, slower, more peaceful area of Ontario from the suburbs of Toronto. Turns out it's not as great as we all thought it would be. My wife is getting tired of remote work and would like a job that's hybrid, which is not available up here.
Starting point is 01:21:21 Plus there's only one monthly open mic night in town, which barely counts as standup comedy because I'm usually the best we got. Oh, all right. For transparency, I'm not going into this pursuit raw. I've performed about 200 standup sets since the age of 31 and have crafted some pretty good material. Okay, yeah.
Starting point is 01:21:38 Like this, now this email, like this isn't waking up one day post pillow talk and nudging your wife. You know what I never did? Yeah. Yeah. I'm pretty funny in the group chat. Maybe I should try this out. Everyone's telling me.
Starting point is 01:21:52 Yeah, like there's a real, there's a real chance that you're not just going out there. You probably have some of the pacing down and, so all right. I've performed about 200 standup sets since 31. Honestly, the high you get from pulling off a really good standup set is so much better than any of the drugs I've ever done.
Starting point is 01:22:11 Now 200 sets may seem like a lot, but over 16 years, that's only about one set a month. I'm hoping to be performing three, five times a week. With this move, the dream will not impact me financially as I do have a solid regular career as a registered massage therapist. There's some material right there, which affords me a lot of flexibility
Starting point is 01:22:31 and pretty generous income. So am I crazy to want to start grinding it out as a stand-up comedy at age 47? Any advice about moving to a big city like Toronto? I do plan on taking some classes through second cities such as improv and comedy writing. Are there other creative avenues you'd recommend looking into?
Starting point is 01:22:47 I'm a ludite, but I should learn how to use TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, et cetera. I'm really excited about finally doing this. I'm going with no delusions of grandeur, but ready to grind. Ultimately, I'm in for the high in happiness. Anything beyond that's just gravy. Okay.
Starting point is 01:23:04 First things first, start a podcast, right? I'm kidding. Yeah, you have to. You have to. You have to. And then the clips can live and then everyone would be like, man, that thing's doing really well. Like, is it? I just see the clips a lot. Look, you have, you've already, I don't even know
Starting point is 01:23:15 what you're asking us for. I don't know that there's a ton of advice other than I'm really proud of you and I don't know you. I think it's brave. It's clearly something that's been gnawing at you for a really long time. I would tell younger people that you probably won't be able to understand this, but there's a certain age that once you get north of, you start thinking like, I probably could have used this time a little better or what if I had tried this?
Starting point is 01:23:38 And it was a driving force for me, at least in what I was trying to do, you know, 20 years ago when I decided, I was like, if you don't ever try, you're going to be kind of fucked up about it. I mean, that was me, you know, I, however I am, I knew how I would be later on in life if I'd never felt like I was like, you didn't really get a chance. And you know, this sounds a little weird, but you know, life can be really cool. If you try to maximize the opportunities that are out there for you, if instead you are wired in a way, it's like, why do this? Why try that? That'll be embarrassing. Oh, I'm going to fail. I'm not going to happen.
Starting point is 01:24:05 Maybe that's a pairing thing. You know, I feel bad for people that kind of look at the world that way. I wouldn't exactly say I am the happiest person you ever met, but I know the difference between, you know, fulfillment and not being fulfilled. And again, there's different areas of fulfillment. So I think it's great. Um, and I think you're probably going, there's different areas of fulfillment. So I think it's great. Um, and I think you're probably going to feel so much better and know who you are
Starting point is 01:24:30 and know who you aren't with that many reps and maybe it works out, uh, and then maybe it doesn't, but at least you'll know. And I think that's really the most important stuff when you're trying to pursue some of the things that most people would be afraid of doing. Yeah. I mean, I like this. It kind of reminds me of going to college being whoever you want to be. Like I'm a basketball guy now. The one thing I, I don't know if I missed this in the email,
Starting point is 01:24:52 but did he say how his wife feels about like five nights a week? I'm doing this, right? He said, he's got a job and his wife's interested in getting out of this suburban, rural place they're at and finding a new job and finding a new balance. Does she know that you're bound? I mean, I'm sure you would have. This isn't like a big secret, but he didn't mention, like I talked to her about it. She's happy for me or anything like that. I'm just wondering if you're saying five nights a week and then if I'm lucky, maybe I'll go out of town on a Saturday gig.
Starting point is 01:25:22 Is that something she's expecting in this new life you're building or is that just like, oh, and I can also do this? Like you said, the move wasn't really just so he could pursue his dreams and stand up. So I would just, you were very thorough in your email, but I did not hear you mentioning to your wife, this is the plan. That's a good point. At the age of 47. Because it did seem like they were both bored. And that's the, that's the, basically the reason they're moving Toronto so I would assume they have the free time and understand they want to be experimental. We're all bringing our
Starting point is 01:25:50 spouses out you're like come on you know I'm at the funny bone yeah but how cool would it be if she brought them to your show yeah yeah you know I'm not it's a good thing to it's a good point to bring out Kyle because yeah like I mean if she's like hey like I need you to do some stuff around there. Like maybe not, but I would, I would assume that's hashed out already based on. I would think so. Cause he didn't. What if she hates it?
Starting point is 01:26:10 What if she hates the idea of, she wants to move so bad. Yeah. That's what she's just like, okay. And they both think they're moving to like, she thinks that they're moving for this, you know, new life balance and he thinks they're moving cause he's going to start a podcast and do five minutes a week. I don't think that's what's happening.
Starting point is 01:26:24 I don't think so either. You know, it just was sort of a funny line to throw out there. But I mean, I don't really know what he's asking us other than we have. Go for it. You know, like there's no doubt. Who cares? Yeah. The best part is, is a new place, right? It's not like this guy's always at the one comedy club.
Starting point is 01:26:41 You know what I mean? He's like, he's he's going to be able to move around Toronto. That's cool. Should we give him Adnan's number? You know? Yes. What is that? Just look it up right now. Give it out on the pot. Yeah. Hold on. Yeah. I'll tweet it out later. Yeah. I think I don't really have much more to, like, what do you want to ask us how we're all living in a big city?
Starting point is 01:27:05 Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Try to find find trying to find a place with parking okay uh we'll end on this because it's another comedian uh your home for comedians 32 six foot five 165 built like texas kevin durant but shorter whiter and significantly less talented my new job comes with a gym membership but that's not the point. I am a stand up comedian and two things that Ryan has said have stuck with me. Number one, I'd rather be alone than annoyed is a great one liner.
Starting point is 01:27:33 Number two, 80% of us kind of get it. It's the 20% that fuck it up for everyone. It's a great premise. Some situations we are in, the 80% some situations we're in, the 20% the moments you realize you messed up, you're in the 20%. Using the word steel was click bait, glad it worked, but I'd like to ask permission to use these in my set. Well, it sounds like you want to steal them. Well, you can properly credit it. Hey,
Starting point is 01:27:52 I listened to this podcast. He's not going to credit. He's not going to. It's going to kill the whole bit. Nah. It'd be like, hey, I heard a guy on a podcast say this, this was his line, so now here's the rest of the joke. The 80-20% is not that original. Yeah, I'm gonna push back a little bit on, I'd rather be alone than annoyed. Because I think it's- Goal, dude, I don't blame you. That's a good idea. Yeah, it's really good, and it wasn't like anything that was happening.
Starting point is 01:28:13 Van was over the house, we were watching the LSU game a couple years ago. He was talking to me about something, I was talking about something, and then I just said, I'd rather be alone than annoyed. I was watching football with him yesterday, he mentioned it, it's great.
Starting point is 01:28:23 Yeah. We all talked about it. No one said anything for like 30 seconds, and then he just turned to me, it was like, that'd rather be alone than annoyed. I was watching football with him yesterday. He mentioned it. It's great. Yeah. We all know what said anything for like 30 seconds. And then he just turned to me and was like, that shit just hit me so hard. You know, I mean, look, I'm not, I'm not saying it's on par or on the level of Napoleon's love is the distraction of the warrior, which is fucking serious business right there. Um, but here's what I would say about anybody that's like performing or on air
Starting point is 01:28:44 or whatever, like there's some people that just don't care where they heard it. Like I've heard one of the rants that I did on ESPN that was very specific because I was the only one that was saying it and it was really, it was funny. Like whatever, it was a funny thing that I'd said. And I saw a stand up comedian do it like a couple of years later. Like I actually saw the clip and then I saw that he followed. And I thought like, do you think you're killing it? Because to me that's, I'm not telling you everything I'm doing here is the most, I'm not And then I saw that he followed. And I thought like, do you think you're killing it?
Starting point is 01:29:05 Cause to me that's, I'm not telling you everything I'm doing here is the most, I'm not radio head. Okay. But if I heard somebody make a great sports analogy to like regular life or whatever, I wouldn't go, oh, that's so good that I want to use it. I just, I wouldn't want to do it. Like, here's a funny story. One of the first segments that I ever did at ESPN that really popped was
Starting point is 01:29:29 something based on the premise of like in the year that it was happening was 2007, 2008, we'd had all these moments where there was like 10 things in a 12 month window where everyone was proclaiming that was the best thing they would have ever seen. So I was like, well, that doesn't make any sense. Like, could we really be this lucky that in this one year, we had 10 of the greatest achievements in sports? So I went through all the things that were proclaimed the best, I wrote out the segment index cards,
Starting point is 01:29:51 was waiting for my next fill in shift, and then on air hosts, I was surronding. Did I just recently tell this story? Because I think you're looking at me like, oh. No, no, no. So I, maybe I told it to somebody else or something I was at, but, um, I, like a lot of the hosts would kind of workshop shit with each other.
Starting point is 01:30:08 Like I'd see Colin, I go, Hey, what do you think of this or whatever? By the way, it wasn't Colin. And I ran through the index cards of like him. Here's the kind of headline. Here are the examples. Here's why it's wrong. Here's my summary. Boom.
Starting point is 01:30:20 There's an open segment, eight minutes. Good. And the host was like, that's really good. And then he came over to me like a little bit later and was like, can I have that? Because I was a film. And I was like, no, you what? Like I just, I just wrote it for myself for my next shift.
Starting point is 01:30:37 And I'm hanging on by a fucking thread here. So like, how would you feel knowing that somebody else wrote all of that stuff for you? Now I understand comedy is different. There's comedy writers, actors, the screenwriters, we can get into how things are different or whatever, but I don't know. I don't hear somebody else do something great and go, that's so great.
Starting point is 01:31:00 Now I'm just gonna repeat it because I know it's a different audience. So yeah, I think you can do whatever you want. You probably's so great. Now I'm just going to repeat it because I know it's a different audience. So yeah, I think you can do whatever you want. You probably already did it. And I mean, it doesn't really, it doesn't really matter. And now I feel like I've gone on too long where I'm being like oddly protective of just a throwaway line
Starting point is 01:31:16 to Van, but I would ask anybody that's like in performance, there's some people that are just like, cool, like comedians are like like some of them are out of control where they're just bite shit from everybody else. Notorious, like there's certain comedians that are just notorious about it. And I always wonder, like, didn't you want to do this to be creative and the fulfillment of coming up
Starting point is 01:31:37 with something that works as opposed to the fulfillment of somebody else came up with something and it works? So yeah, that's how I feel. You can do what you want. But now this got way too serious. I feel like angry comedians are one of the scariest things. I mean, even just crowd-burning comedians, my heart starts beating.
Starting point is 01:31:56 I'm like, come on, not me. There's enough people in here. So you're not a comedian. I guess if he was stealing from comedians, he might be under a little more fire. So maybe he just feels like, how bad can he really hurt me with his words? Yeah Certainly, I don't have much on it. I think I I think the 80 20 thing is not
Starting point is 01:32:16 Like you put it very well and concisely and that sounds great. I think that's a thing that's out there So I don't really have an issue with that. I agree. I think you're being protective of, I'd rather be a let alone them. Then I know it is like, that's a uniquely you line. That's a uniquely you line. What, how did I screw it up? What'd I say? No, you just, you were fumbling around.
Starting point is 01:32:38 Come on. You weren't confident though. Bad delivery kind of trampled trouble that part. But like here's. We're talking about this though. Like we about merch yesterday. I think we were, we had, we had a call about merch. Yeah, we had a merch con. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:32:58 And that's, I did think about like that would be, you know, dudes walking around wearing that shirt probably do pretty well. Um, if we wanted to go that route. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know if I want to get into the merch business where I'm selling shirts and say, I'd rather be alone than annoyed. Kind of a nice business card.
Starting point is 01:33:13 I don't know how it would work, but I like it. Like, you're like, oh, what did he just hand me? And you're like, holy shit. I don't know. I like that. I don't know what purpose it would serve, but I do like it. You better be pretty established. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:33:24 To be doing that. Well, if dudes come up to you asking for advice, that's a good one. You better be pretty established. Yeah. To be doing that. Well, if dudes come up to you asking for advice, that's a good one. You just hand them that card and walk away. I had business cards made with just my name. Nothing else? Nothing else. Not an email, not a contact.
Starting point is 01:33:35 Zero. Just the name. How old were you when you did that? Way too young. I wasn't even 30 yet. Okay. Yeah. They were the guy that made it was like, are you fucking serious?
Starting point is 01:33:55 And I was like, if I could have that kind of ruffled finish on them, yeah. Let's go with the, um, Syrian font and, uh, you just center that right there. The guy was like, you don't, he's like, we want just a phone number in the bottom, right? I was like, nope. Was it, was it about the confusion about the E and Ryan that you just want to be like this way? You just saw it somewhere else. It wasn't a movie.
Starting point is 01:34:13 Didn't Danny ocean do it or something like that? Somebody did it. So that wasn't original at all, but I also, it wasn't part of a bit. I would just, I guess it kind of was a bit. I think about it. So, you know what I stole too. Fuck it. I'm guilty.
Starting point is 01:34:24 Go for it. Go for it. But yeah, like look, and I'll end here. I remember like the stealing thing in content is weird in the way the rules work. Like I remember, again, there was this group that worked on the Sports Nation side with Colin and I filled on Sports Nation and I asked about something and I go, this seems to be just like this. And they go, yeah, to be honest with you, a lot of times we'll just watch Fox News or watch CNN or we'll watch some other thing and we just think, okay, we're just going to do that, but we're going to do it here. And then there was another time where I was working on something where I was like, well, I can't really do that.
Starting point is 01:35:09 It's too similar. And then he was like, you can steal from this guy. And it's like the most disrespectful thing you could say about like anybody that's on air in common to opinion people. I, I'm not going to say who it was, but the person was behind the scenes and we're trying to map out something we were doing. And he basically just dead panned me was like, no, you can steal from that person. What do you get?
Starting point is 01:35:32 Right. You can't steal from like Colin. You can't steal from like a bill, you know, whoever you think of, like the last 10 plus 20 years of just being at the top of the content game, like they're too popular, but if it's somebody less game, like they're too popular. But if it's somebody less popular, like at that time, that guy would have said, Hey, you can steal from Rosilla. Like, fuck.
Starting point is 01:35:52 And it's really like, you know, you want to talk about just feeling like worthless. You're going, I am so unimportant, unimportant on like the register of who is somebody that like if I said something great, you guys would just go, yeah, we're just gonna steal that from you because you're not somebody yet. That's tough. That's kind of how it works though in anything, right?
Starting point is 01:36:17 Like, I mean, how many like musicians and writers, like people are always accusing other people of stealing their stuff. Wasn't there something, didn't somebody just accuse like, I mean, this is getting into muddy waters, but didn't somebody just like accuse Taylor Swift's merch of being ripped from somewhere else? Like everything I feel like now there's like, it's just used from something else. There's so much, I mean, I always wonder that with music, like how, like there's only so many notes you can play, right? I mean, God, what the hell?
Starting point is 01:36:40 If you're limited spiritually, sure. I guess, I mean, but how many different kinds of, how many different kinds of guitar riffs are there before someone else has done it before? I don't know. I mean, weren't dudes mad that like Bill or you, somebody was drafting something at a fantasy draft style and it's like, that's our thing.
Starting point is 01:36:57 Like I even admitted after the fact that he sort of lost his mind. So we'll give him, I'm not going to name him because we, but it was, it was insane. It was like, you think you invented the draft in 2019? And the funny thing is then I had like 10 other people saying they invented the draft and all of them never invented the draft. Cause I remember the first time I ever heard the draft on a talk show.
Starting point is 01:37:18 And I think it was Tony kind of who Tony Kornheiser's radio show. And I think it was in the late nineties where they were doing a draft of desserts. And then somebody called in and said, this dessert had the greatest upside. It was the pineapple upside down cake and the crowd went fucking bananas. Cause it was such a good pick. That was 25.
Starting point is 01:37:42 That was the first time I ever heard anybody do it. And then I just thought like, it just makes sense. Just do drafts. People love listening to them all the time. I don't know who was doing drafts on radio as often as Van Peltor I were, but I also, yeah. 2019, 2019 is like you have to be the 11th fucking hour and delusional to like, that's like, you know what, hour and delusional to like that's like you know what you know how there's like music that's real like it's so old but it doesn't like this isn't there's no royalties I think a happy birthday is one of those like that's like drafting on a podcast or a radio show no one
Starting point is 01:38:15 owns that it just is a part of culture yeah nobody nobody owns it and who knows maybe there was somebody before corn corn Heizer why can't I say his name twice all right that'll do it for the pot today thanks to Purdue Oregon owns it and who knows maybe there was somebody before Kornheiser. Why can't I say his name twice? All right, that'll do it for the pot today. Thanks to Purdue, Oregon. Thanks to Saruti and then this guy, Kyle, who's got his Red Storm gear on. Do you have a subscription to St. John's gear?
Starting point is 01:38:39 I'm just checking the different things. I mean, shout out Home Field. They just came out with a new thing. Somebody tagged me on Twitter. I was like, I'll take a look. Got three shirts. I may have to. I may have to take a peek myself.
Starting point is 01:38:48 Saw the exhibition schedule just the other day. Go Johnny's. All right, that'll do it for us. Hold on, Kyle. Have fun at the Dodger game today. Oh, thanks. It's going to be a great time. 1 o'clock game.
Starting point is 01:38:56 I was telling Saruti that is my type of window right there. Little day baseball. We go shortstop at 1130 if anybody is milling about there. And then see you at the game That's a public appearance call you got You got an hour 45 minutes better get your bells on. I'm already showered buddy. Let's fucking go We're gonna better get this pot out so we can get people down there Yeah, holy shit. Let's say goodbye now. Hopefully it's posted and you know, you can meet Kyle and
Starting point is 01:39:21 shit, let's say goodbye now. Hopefully it's posted and you know, you can meet Kyle and who knows. Good luck. Who knows? Yeah. Who knows for those that want to Pinehurst recap, uh, we'll just do it another time, spend four glorious days playing four courses and the cradle twice, um, 16 dudes. It was incredible, but, uh, don't have time to recap it today.
Starting point is 01:39:43 Check out our YouTube page. We'll have a YouTube only no podcast Wednesday. So we'll be back for Cillapod on Friday because we're doing like a two or three part or the NBA over-under with Simmons and house. Uh, we're taping that tomorrow. So, uh, with the schedule of his release, I'm not going to release one on Wednesday. So we'll talk to you on Friday. Please subscribe to the pod.
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