TRANSKRIPTIO 🔗
00:00:02
Speaker 1: Welcome to the solid verbal. Call that for me, I'm a man, I'm forty. I've heard so many players say, well, I want to be happy. You want to be happy for a day?
00:00:12
Speaker 2: Ato steak is that woo woom?
00:00:14
Speaker 1: And them and tie.
00:00:18
Speaker 3: Welcome back to the solid verbal. Boys and girls, my name is Ty Hilton Brand. That's five gentlemen over. They are the one, the only, still, the incomparable, the proud organ grad always amongst us.
00:00:28
Speaker 4: Dan Rubistein, sir, how you doing today?
00:00:30
Speaker 1: Good?
00:00:31
Speaker 2: I have no idea what's going on. It's signing day, is it not? It is early signing day. It is early signing Day. We've got two of them now, it's correct. We have Early Signing Day, and obviously the maybe the biggest element of what we've called the December of flurries, the December to remember. We got the portal, we have bowls, we have Early Signing Day, and the school I root for, the school I attended, appears to be making a bunch of noise today. But Alabama's had a terrific week. All of your usual suspects. But it's one of those things. And you're gonna use the word lifeblood. At least two or three times. As we get to Brandon Huffman, you know me too well. Interestingly, though it does unlike the SEC, it just means a little bit less because of the portal, because rosters are more fluid than ever. So whatever your class looks like, it probably won't be as good or it probably won't be as bad as it appears to be today, this week, the next six weeks, just because of the fluidity of rosters now.
00:01:33
Speaker 3: But it's just like the first week of the season, right, You can't read too much into it.
00:01:37
Speaker 2: Rosters are a living, breathing thing that can change at any moment. They can grow, they can retract, whatever. So very excited obviously in a little bit here to get to two four seven twenty four se whatever it is, Brandon Huffman two four seven sports. Who is longtime recruiting consigliary. I think of the solid verbal is that Okay, how are you feeling today, ty, Well, I'm feeling good. I wish you didn't poach Peyton Bowen away from Notre Dame up there in Oregon, but you know I made him. I made him a number of pizzas.
00:02:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I think I'll be okay. Notre Dame's done quite well, and Brandon can maybe shed some light on not just Oregon and Notre Dame our teams or Penn State, I guess for me as well, but some of the other teams throughout the top ten.
00:02:22
Speaker 1: Really the teams.
00:02:23
Speaker 3: I'm always interested in the teams and the coaches that exceeded expectations, the teams that fell short of expectations. Maybe the teams sort of like Florida State last year with Mike Dorvel, how they lost Travis Hunter, some of the programs that maybe lost the most on signing day, surprises, things of that nature. Brandon is always an encyclopedia for all things recruiting, especially on a daylight today signing day. So recording this interview a little bit later, it's just going to be you and Brandon because it's a little bit later outside of our normal schedule. But we had to make sure that we tracked it with him because he again knows the life lot of this sport better than anybody. He knows recruiting. He knows what to expect as we project these guys forward. I want to know who the plug and play guys are, Dan, I want to know who the guys are that can step in right away and offer some much needed relief to the rosters and teams that need it most.
00:03:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh, absolutely no, That's that's the fascinating thing because when you are sort of judging what's available in the portal and what's available on the recruiting trail, the traditional high school or even junior college recruiting trail, it's who's helping us immediately, Because as coaching jobs, for better or worse, disappear quickly. You have two years, you have three years, or whatever your offense disappoints your coordinator, you're out. And so a lot of these guys head coaches wise, are looking at the portal and saying, these are just known commodities. I know how he's going to see a defense. I know how he is going to operate, you know, as a safety and cover three against decent college offenses. And even though he's been beat up, and even though his career up and down, I know that he's physically ready to step onto the field tomorrow. And so whether it's for job security, whether it's just for confidence in knowing what you know instead of what you don't know's that's the reality. And those are the judgment calls that a lot of these coaches are making.
00:04:16
Speaker 3: This episode, all of our episodes driven by our good friends over at Geyico. Don't forget folks, if you're going to be in the LA area soliverblelive dot com. We mentioned it every show, but we are doing a live show out in LA at the world famous Troubadour January the seventh, in the evening. You can get your tickets at soliverblelive dot com. Reserve your space.
00:04:38
Speaker 1: Now.
00:04:38
Speaker 3: We're going to talk about New Year's six and playoff matchups next week when we preview some of the upcoming Bowl action. But again, after those playoff matchups are played and we know which two teams are headed out West, we expect those fan bases are going to gobble up these tickets.
00:04:55
Speaker 1: So get yours now.
00:04:56
Speaker 3: If you're in the area and you know you want to come, don't wait, because that's when it hits the proverbial fan.
00:05:04
Speaker 2: Yes, oh my god, I cannot wait for this show. It's a legendary venue. You get to meet Tye. We'll figure out a bar and food situation after the fact, only available to people who attend the show. Of course, that information the show's gonna be unbelievable. And I just think you need to stop the episode right now. Hit pause, Hit pause, right now, hit pause, soliverblelive dot Com. Grab your seats and bring a friend, bring four friends, whatever you
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00:05:31
Speaker 3: Without further ado, Dan, should we just jump right in. You're not here to hear us, so you want to hear Brandon Hoffman Brandon Hoffman, twenty four to seven Sports Recruiting Guru knsigly area. Is that the word you used earlier?
00:05:43
Speaker 2: Yes, great word.
00:05:45
Speaker 3: All of the words apply.
00:05:47
Speaker 4: Here's your interview with Brandon.
00:05:50
Speaker 2: And with that yes or no. Tie is not here, tied to the introduction, and we'll do the conclusion to this episode. Brandon Hoffman four seven Sports. But he's not here. This is all me. So I am. I am the orchestrator, I am the conductor, I'm the maestro. Here it is early signing day. Brandon Hoffman two four seven Sports. How you doing?
00:06:13
Speaker 1: You know what? As I from my dog Bargie and annoying the heck out of me, I'm doing great because we are wrapping this day up. I was up the five am Pacific time, which doesn't sell that late, but it is and my voice is frazzled, and I am doing something that I do just about every year, and that has talked to you about recruiting, and Dan, I gotta did kind of bummed that ties on here because there's been some tension Duck on Irish on signing day.
00:06:43
Speaker 2: Okay, so I suppose we can start there because I don't want to come off as too much of an Oregon homer, because it's obvious that I am. I root for the team. I'm a proud alum of the Oregon Ducks. But it seems like among the bigger early signing day stories it's probably Oregon and the flips from I mean a couple from Notre Dame, although I don't know as of the time we're recording this if the paperwork is in for Peyton Bowen, but flips from LSU from Notre Dame, some big names heading to Eugene, obviously a flip from Baylor to start the day at quarterback. Let's start there with the biggest stories of the day thus far.
00:07:23
Speaker 1: Well, obviously Oregon started the week maybe in a position they didn't want to, and I was seeing Dante Moore, the five star quarterback commit from I think what June July he committed Oregon flip to Ucla. So what does Van Lanning do to bounce back? He goes on an absolute tirade on Wednesday on the recruiting trail. Unlike some coaches who lose recruits so they just want to tyrate in their press conferences, he got it done on the recruiting trail. Flip Austin Noson. Now, why I think that significant is the fact that Oregon kind of knew that Dante Moore was in a continuous position when he took the official visit to UCLA. So all last week they were working behind the scenes to get Nova Sad to take the official visit to Eugene. He went up on Saturday for the trip. Now, why is that also significant? This is the guy who's been committed to Baylor for over a year. Ohio State came in on him, Notre Dame came in on him, LSU, Texas say to him. All came in on him over the last year, and he's stuck with Baylor. Will Stein gets hired at Oregon. He's orchestrating a lot of the work behind the scenes. They get novasad and a committed that looker he was never going to stray away from Baylor turns into Oregon, bouncing back to the top one hundred player. But that wasn't done. You get Peyton Bowen. A lot of people thought Peyton Bowen was not going to end up in Notre Dame, but they assumed he was going to be Oklahoma. Instead, he doesn't have an Oklahoma table or hat at the table. He ends up committing to Oregon. Then the big one mateo Juandalelei Thount of the Crown Jewel in Southern California, that the highest rated uncommitted player on the West Coast down to Ohio State, down to USC, down to Oregon. Most people thought, after losing DJ a few years years ago, that USC would not lose another Huyanga. Instead, not only did they lose them, they lose into another pack full team in Oregon. Then they flipped Dale and Austin from another stronghold of USC, historically Long Beach Poly commit to LSU, and then for good measure, they go back to the Notre Dame well and they flipped longtime noted day running back Jade Lamar. So how do you bounce back from losing a quarterback and a player like Dante Moore, You go flip five other guys later in the wind, or four other guys later in the week and add mateo to that.
00:09:30
Speaker 2: Next who else had a good day? Who else had a good week? Across the country, obviously the headline programs are going to headline for good reason. Be at Georgia, Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, all teams who have done really well texts obviously put together a terrific class. But who was able to for whatever reason, close especially impressively this time?
00:09:51
Speaker 1: Well, what, yeah, what Alabama did on on signing day was you know what we used to see, you know, in a day and age where more elite commits make their decisions earlier rather than later. There were still some big fish left on the board, and Alabama seemed to clean up with those, getting James Smith, the defensive live of the commit Quaver saw they got him to commit. Those are the two big ones, you know. And there's still I'll be done. There's a couple of guys that are going to be announcing later in the week that Alabama firmly entrenched as the top class in the country. But it only got stronger. They end up signing six of the top twenty five players in the country. The bigger thing was, you know, I hate to pick on time, but he's not here, so I'll do it anyway. Notre Dame had a commitment from Kean Keeley for a long time defensive end edge from down south, and when he opened it up from Notre Dame, Ohio State thought they might get him, but Alabama got him. Caleb Downs, a number one safty in the country, long time commit to Alabama's brother Josh, plays at North Carolina. George was making a push. Ohio State thought they were going to get him, brought him in for an official visit for the Michigan Gang. He siled Alabama. And then the big one that really kind of ship things up was Caden Proctor, the number one tackle in the country, was
committed to Iowa to play for the hometown school. He visited Oregon last month for the Washington Game. There was a lot of buzz at Oregon was going to be the one to pull him out, but Alabama got him down for a visit this weekend closed the deal with him. Six to the top twenty five recruits in this class. You know, it's just good to see that Nick Saban and Alabama are finally able to just bound back, bounce back for some diversity and maybe pick up a few good recruits.
00:11:25
Speaker 2: Was there any other storylines either today or in the last couple of weeks, because we're what we're in the wake of a number of players entering the transfer portal or committing to new schools after entering the transfer portal. Obviously a number of new coaches getting their bearings for their new places, either trying to hold on to commits or bring in commits from their previous stop, or try to forge relationships very very quickly. To you, in terms of the scramble of the last two to three weeks, what storyline stood out?
00:11:55
Speaker 1: Well, I think it's what is Colorado going to do over the next four weeks, the next six weeks. When you look at the shock her around the world last year when Deon Sanders flipped Travis Hunter from Florida State to Jackson State, I think people thought that there might be possibility that he could do that this year. Now he still may get Travis Hunter, which would be just like getting Travias Hunter a year ago. But I feel a lot of people thought maybe he would close well in this first one. That's not the case. The recruiting class was so late in the cycle that even Dion couldn't resuscitate it to the extent that maybe many thought he would. But he's going to be really diligent and working hard to get that portal up to speed. I was texting with Jeff Schwartz earlier. We were talking about, you know, hey, Colorado's gonna have a lot of spots, and he said, Hey, they're gonna be seventy five guys. I'm like, you watch Colorado this year. They went need eighty five guys. You get that program to where it needs to be, and he's going to be doing five. But here's one to keep an eye. Ont Corwani McLain is the number two overall player in the composite, the number one quarter of the country. Wadfield thought he was going for him, then he picked my in October. On Wednesday, his mam put out a tweet saying that he was not going to sign today. Immediately, the buzz started at Percolay, Hey is he gonna go to Alabama? Is he gonna go back to Florida? Like most people thought, or is there another school that just happens to have an elite corner of his own running the program? Who pulled off of Shoker could be Colorado pulling Kurwanam Clay and Travis Hunter. We'll have the wait to see this entire narrative now because oh no, what's Deion going to do when he has a full year? But I think that was the big storyline. People thought that Dio were closed like he did a year ago. That might have been a little bit optimistic. I think it's a little bit
more realistic to see him have a big bump in the twenty twenty fourth last. But I don't think that people thought it was going to be as quiet and Boulder. And then again they did flip a four star and they were running back from Notre Dame again Keith in year Dylan Edwards flipped to Colorado a couple of weeks ago, and they were able to get another Adam Hopkins a receiver down south, a four star receiver, but it just wasn't quite the same Pauzaz as he had a year ago.
00:14:03
Speaker 2: When you look at the current twenty four to seven rankings for the class of twenty three, Obviously it's quite fluid because we have another few weeks left and there's still a number of guys who are undecided or for whatever reason, having committed yet you know, maybe at an All Star Game whatever, waiting for portal and new coaches to shake out that kind of thing. Where is the movement that intrigues you? Where is the team that you know shut up ten twelve thirty spots or shot down eight ten twelve forty spots that you're like, wow, that's not something I saw coming at this point.
00:14:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's not hard to believe, just because we've seen the success they had on the field this year. But you know, TCU is a lot of school that we typically find in the top twenty in the recruiting ranking. Gary Patterson was there. He was the the Kyle Winningham with the big twelve, a guy who did a great job in development, got a great job in evaluation, and then once he got them there, they out out punched their wait. When you look at this class as a top fifteen class, top or top twenty class, but we've said this for years that you usually have a big season and then you get the big recruiting bond in the following cycle, DC's playing in the playoffs and they're going to have a top twenty class. That's not a school where you used to see now there if we're going to say, like who is this year's Texas A and M A school that's had top ten, top twelve classes, that should be a top five recruiting for every each and every year. It's the team right now, that's the number four class, and that's the University of Miami. We had Mario Crystal Ball in our county for seven Sports Recruiting show and he even said, you know, nil is a part of recruiting. And I don't think there's been any secret to the fact that Miami has had a presence in social media with certain boosters, certain NL collective members really touting what Miami can offer. And this class was evident of that. Flipping some key guys, even losing some guys down the stretch like Jade Reshada, they bounced back by going to getting a Samsungokalola, you know they have for wanting to clay with. Everybody thought he was going to Florida yet yet, but that's one of the track colins and chiefm you know who was committed in Michigan, he flips to Miami. So Miami kind of having that that meteoric rise that they always should have been able to have, but for whatever reason under Manny Diaz and Mark Rick and al Lolden and Randy Shannon didn't really exist. And so you're seeing the way that Mario crist of Wall has been able to recruit. You're no stranger. You know, we saw what he did at Oregon in these last years, but now he's coming in an office season where they went five and seven. It's almost like he's even pissed off more. Where the twenty twenty four flast may even be better, but Miami's not messing around it comes of recruiting, and yet they still find themselves in kind of an unusual position of being a top five class even though they should always be a top five, top ten class.
00:16:47
Speaker 2: Where's the strength of this Miami class? Obviously I can say whatever I'd like to say about Mario Christobal, but his resume and his bona fides, especially with top tier offensive lineman on the trail, is sort of unquestioned at this point. Is that the strength of this class or is there somewhere else that Miami really cleaned up it is.
00:17:06
Speaker 1: They got two of the top three offensive tackles in the country. Even though Caden Proctor is going to Alabama. They were able to get Francis Mauigoa out of IMG, originally from Samoa. They got hit the commit back in July and then held on to him. A lot of people thought Tennessee was going to be able to make a push with Nico Yamoliava, but it was Miami that not only God has committed, but then held on to his commitment. And then Sam Slaclolo, who was down in Miami and Florida with a late run from Michigan State to try to get him. They were able to get the kid who's officially titled the Pancake Poncho and had one of the coolest press conferences with paycakes for everybody. So they get those two guys, they end up signing five really good offensive live they in this class, you know, and it's not just local kids, you know. They've they've been able to really recruit kind of across the country in this class on the defensive side of the ball. Now a couple of these guys are at IMG, so I guess they're you in consider them in state kids. But Jayden Wayne's from the Pacific Northwest. He's the number four player in their class, a pass rusher out of Iron g originally from Tacota. Francis Baigou, like I said, played his freshman year he in California, went back to Saloa, then spent the last two years at IMG. But these are guys that grew up in the Sunshine State. Samson Upolas from Massachusetts. The only kid that they have in their top five that's actually from Miami is Ruby Bain, who's a top ten pass rusher. So they didn't just get it done on the offensive line, they got it done on the defensive line as well. And then again making kind of the northwest where Mario had some ties, they got one of the top tight ends in the country out of Central Catholic in Portland, who again went to IMG and Riley Williams. So you're seeing a geographical kind of spreading of the net by Mario. Give it his time on the west coast where he's not just going to focus on Florida, He's not just going to focus on the southeast, but he went into
the northeast, went up to the northwest and kind of everywhere in between.
00:18:57
Speaker 2: Two schools. Curious to me that the usual top five, top eight somewhere in there and they're in the teens. That given recent success and a lot of recent success those two schools, Michigan's out of the top ten, they're fifteen or sixteen and seem to have a good big class, but doesn't seem excellent at the top. And then Florida State and now obviously it seems like it'll pay dividends a year after the success. But obviously they come on strong back half of the season. But are those two fan bases disappointed? Should they be should they be pumped? What is the state of recruiting for those two programs, one of which about to play a playoff game?
00:19:34
Speaker 1: Yeah? I would say that there's probably more pessimism coming out of ann Arbor than there is out of Tallahassee. And here's why I think Florida State. You know, they didn't have the new car smell this year that they had three years ago. They went to the lean Willie Tagger years after you know, Jimbo had left, and then Mike Murvelt took a couple of years to get his legs under hamp but really hit the portal hard, did well in the portal, and quietly had a top twenty class. We're used to Florida State having top ten classes, so then being down as low as they are has maybe something different. But they kind of did it with you know, blue collar guys without a lot of gulls and whistles, which is kind of a Florida state he needed to do, while Ford and Miami seemingly had their collectives and their boosters in and never ending sniping with each other over who was writing bigger checks, over who had more support. You know, you look at all the battles. Jade Marshada was originally committed to Miami flips to Florida. Samson up the Lola Florida Miami from wanted to play at Ford in Miami, while Mark Mike Norvela and his stat just finally sat by. Let those two kind of you know, beat each other up. And yes they both have good classes, but I like the Florida State has done him this class. And again, they didn't just go into the state of Florida, they went out West, got one of the best all around football players in California and Blake Nicholson. He'll be a candidate from California's mister Football. He's coming in to play linebackers, but he also was second in the state and touchdown for the second consecutive year. They're getting workman like type guys. Michigan, on the other hand, everything kind of fell apart when they didn't get Dante Moore. They had really kind of sold the farm to get Dante Moore, the in state kid. You know, some people say he's the best player from Detroit since Jerome Bettis, or at least he had the story career as a high schooler, maybe the best one since Jerome Bettis, and Michigan wanted to keep him in. In the process, they also got a head start on making people that for twenty twenty four, because not only did they lose Duntey Moore this year, but they ended up losing CJ. Carr, who is the grandson of the former Michigan coach when they won the last national championship, Lloyd Carr. He went to Notre Dame. So not only did they suffer some damage this year, and then there was the collateral damage for next year, and then there were some key guys that they were in it for down the stretch, then losing Collins at chimpongk to Miami. So you look at Michigan's classes for a school that is now in consecutive playoffs, who won the Big Ten two straight years, you would have thought we'd see him up in this class compared to a year ago, and you didn't, and you see him the top. So maybe though, go get their you know, luster back next year. But coming off of the twenty twenty one season where they made it to the Orange Bowl and won the Big Ten and exercised those Ohio State demons, this class kind of left a little bit of meat on the balls that I think fans are, you know, wondering what happened?
00:22:16
Speaker 2: Do you have a theory? Do they have a theory? Is it the Harbor NFL stuff? Is it you know, staff turnover with new coordinators and not having sort of the continuity there for Michigan. What is the prevailing theory for why Michigan is not building on on field success.
00:22:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, it's interesting because they actually had a decent twenty twenty teen class. They did lose their director of player Personnel, Courtney Morgan, who was in Michigan all up. He went to Washington this year. If you look at Washington, they have greatly recovered from the Jimmy lakeare I mean era, So you look at what he get there, but what he was doing as all a lotter. Then it just seems like this year, losing d'ante more kind of started a little bit of a ripple effect with recruits. I think there was a lot of, you know, questions, was last sheer of flute? You know the year before that, and they pandemic shortened season. It wasn't a great year. Now I think they're showing not only was it not a flute, but as we saw the days after they played Ohio State and after they beat Ohouse Date that Michigan is back to being the premier program. So maybe that stability And yeah, I do think there is some to the Harborugh NFL rumors of the year ago. It was after signing day with the twenty twenty two class, but that started to cost some of the questions with this twenty twenty three class early on. Is he really sticking around for the long holour? Is he going back to the NFL? With the way that they played this year, you're kind of feeling Arba's not going anywhere. And at this point, you know, you go back ten years ago when fifteen year of every long was when there was the rumors every year that this is the year Pete Carroll was going to the NFL. Recruiting never slowed down for USC. It always stayed strong, just because even when Pete was dabbling with the idea of going to the NFL, they still recruited well Michigan. It almost feels like when Harbor doubted with it, they kind of forgot to keep focusing on recruiting. But they're still
getting the results on the field. And now with I think his ability to show he can win the big game, complete compete for national championships and more importantly beat Ohio State, I think you're gonna see him, you know, maybe permanently residing in Ann Arbor and not making the NFL jump anymore. And I think that's Boligan health posses.
00:24:24
Speaker 2: You mentioned USC, and USC certainly used to even good or bad top five, top seven, top three type classes because of the abundance of talent in Southern California and the strength of the USC brand. They're sitting at number eleven. Is this something that has USC internally. Has USC fans worried or is there something to the fact that, you know, what they've done in the portal recently, obviously bringing in Mario Williams, Caleb Williams, Jordan Addison last year and seemed to be very active this year. Are they taking a more of a hybrid approach or are they just taking swings for big fish and not connecting Where where's USC standing at the moment?
00:25:04
Speaker 1: You know? I think if it was December of twenty twenty one and they were signing within a week last year, right around this time, Lincoln Raley got Alachai Nelson and makay Lemon and zach Rya Branch all to announce. The problem was they announced in December of twenty twenty one as opposed to December of twenty twenty two, right three flive star guys, the number one receiver in the country, a five star quarterback, a five star athlete. But they almost committed too early in the process where it was maybe the buzz had worn off by then, and then today the only guy that they really were in the mixport on signing day was Mateodali and then they lose him to Oregon. It was kind of an unremarkable day for USC. But you can't ignore the fact that Lincoln Riley when he got to USC, they signed nine players in the high school ranks in twenty twenty two, not not even double digits. At one point on the morning of the early signing period last year, they were in the hundreds overall. Raking ended up getting Delmana Jackson back in the fold flip the leak round from Oklahoma, but they were heavy in the portal, and obviously to their benefit, they got a Heisman Trophy layer out of it. This year they got nineteen recruits. They'll probably go into the portal now for twenty guys, but they'll probably go five to seven to ten. But I think that this year showed over the course of that year that USC still wants to win with high school recruits. Even when Lincoln Riley was at Oklahoma, they didn't really hit the portal all that hark. He wanted to go with high school development, and I think that that's the other key. There was still for probably some people wondering, Okay, well, you know, how is Lecoln going to do with USC? What is he inherited from play health and are all these portal players going to work, and then they end up being a top five team by the end of the year, going in the championship weekend. I think that's only going to enhance the recruiting efforts in twenty twenty four. But this year a top fifteen class, a top three class in the PAC twelve. But I think just because so many of those elite guys committed a year ago, it's not as exciting assigning aid as. I think USC fans got us too underpeak Carrol.
00:27:01
Speaker 2: Let's go to an older USC coach and Steve Sarkisian, I think I don't know what Texas is at right now. Are that the number three class right now in the two four to seven rankings. This is a program that does this every year. They figure out how to feel the top five recruiting list whatever, and sometimes it works out well and guys pop as we've seen, you know, most recently be Jean Robinson, really I mean five star kid and surpassed that somehow with what he was able to do on the field. Where is Texas strong in this class? Why is this class different? What is it about the Texas brand that is still resonating so strongly even though the results on the field don't necessarily align.
00:27:40
Speaker 1: I'm not going to say that, you know, Steve Sarkisian's Charlie Weiss. But Texas's best win this year was the loss to Alabama in Week two. You know, it was like, he got this ridiculous extension that will keep fifteen generations of Sarkasians employed for or at least rich for the rest of their liede. But that was kind of what Texas Fians wanted to see. Yeah, they lost some games that they probably shouldn't have. They did beat Oklahoma badly, but it was that game against salabam and that show this is what Texas can do. This is what they can be, and what else can Texas be? They could be back if they can continue to get players on the defensive side of the ball. Obviously getting Queen Ewers a transfer in last year held he was the number one player of the country when he reclassified at twenty twenty one, But this year, one of the I guess the best way to describe the guy is he's not a mystery, because everybody in the freaking world knows who Archmuny is. But he's also maybe the most interesting man in this spots because he doesn't do camps, he doesn't do seven on seven, he's not doing any of the All Star games. But he's the number one player in the country, has all the pressure, all the attention, and everyone's wilted it under it. When he committed to Texas, that was huge, Christine Sarkis, and you already had Hudson card there. He got Queen viewers. But then he was able to get BArch Manny and that was big. More importantly, they were able to hold off schools that kept trying to flip him down the street. Georgia was making a big push. They got his signature, but then what do they else do they do? On signing day? Tasie Theaconna is the number one player in the state of Utah. He's a top thirty five player nationally. On Saturday night, his sister served match point in the Texas Louisville National Championship game. She was originally at Nebraska. The longest time, did it look like Oconno was going to end up at Oklahoma, maybe at LSU, but Texas wouldn't go away.
Saturday night, she serves match point. They won the National championship. Four days later, her brother annalysis for the University of Texas peaked Kakowski. I don't think any coach, even though he played in Utah, he's from Hawaii. He moved to Utah when Hawaii canceled football during the COVID year, went back to Hawaii after the football season ended. I don't think any coach had gone and spend more time in Hawaii when he was allowed to in the last four weeks than peaked Baikowski and Jeff cho And it paid off because Oklahoma looked like the favorite. They got him today and that was big for them because we know Texas school. We know Texas's offense can move the but as great as a defensive coordinator as Pyakowski was when he was at Washington, when he was at Boise State, there was some defensive holes that he inherited and that Stath inherited from Tom Herman. So they'd made it an effort to really get you know, we watched Sark when he was at USC when he was at Washington, they never lacked for offensive fireworks, and he would get a elite defensive player or two every year, a Shaq Thompson, a Danny Shelton, Anadri Jackson, but it never was collectively like it needed to be. Now Texas realizes we could score with anybody. We got stop people, and getting a guy like tass cv Acada was huge for them, and I think it was big because, you know, it's also showing that the Texas brand, which has always been so prominent in the state of Texas, and maybe expanded. They got two players that are originally from Hawaii, including their first player ever from Hawaii as a high schooler, Leoneo Lafoule, who was best friends with Toss Seeley high school teammates when they were originally starting out. Then he goes into Utah. So Sark uses some of those west As in the ads, not just focusing on the state of Texas, but really focusing national and letting Texas be the national brand. And it's starting to work out that way. And now they had the number three class in the country and.
00:31:10
Speaker 2: How do you talk Texas without talking Oklahoma who. I don't know what the ranking is at the moment, it's somewhere around the top ten. I think it's inside the top ten. They seem to be headlined by a five star Ish quarterback and Jackson Arnold, but not a particularly exciting signing day, which doesn't mean anything obviously, if you put together the class well ahead of time, how do you evaluate Oklahoma's class, especially given that warm bodies are needed on that defense, because you know, Brent Venables needs those playmakers after what was put on the field this year.
00:31:41
Speaker 1: So you know what we talked about how Marcus Freeman had a rough day, I would say that brand Venables had any of the rougher day because we know Notre Dame defense is strong. We know that Marcus Freeman is a great defensive mind, and I think that that defense this year, you know, showed a lot of town, a lot of promise outside of the Red River are not the river, what's what they call
it, the bednet? Outside of the Oklahoma State game, Oklahoma was defense was definitely lacking in defense. And this year they looked like they were gonna be able to solve some of the problems by going and getting Peyton Bowen out of Texas even though he was committed under Dame. A lot of people again thought he was going to flip to these swers today. There was a lot of talk that that was going to happen, and they were the leaders for a kana And not only did they lose Bowen to Oregon, but they're losing a kana but not just losing Akanda, to lose him too Texas. That hurts because those that defense needed help. That defense needed young, playable talent, and Peyton Bowen, with his size and skill set at the safety position, would have been a hell of a flip for brand Venables. But Akanda, with his size and athleticism either an off ball linebacker even playing it as an edge, was definitely going to be Now you got to see him go to your arrival, Oklahom was going to have a top ten class. It's a very good class, a very promising class in brand Venables full year, first full year there. But like we saw with another Dame, and like we so with you see, you know, there's a lot of things that happen on signing day that didn't necessarily go in their favor. So it tastes a little bit of the luster, even though if you look at it from start to finish, this is a strong flast. They just would love to have added Bowen or O'Connor or even just one of the two.
00:33:14
Speaker 2: What percentage of the text conversations or in person conversations or however you're communic hating conversations involve the word.
00:33:22
Speaker 1: Bag a Let's see, the old phrase of oh, we got this guy in the bag has been replaced with he's chasing that bag or depending on how big the bag is depended on how many letter a's were in the word back because there was bag and then there was bag. You know, this is going to shock everybody. Recruits is to get money before nil ever existed. I know it's going to blow people away. But now it's just out in the open. And the thing is that there's a lot of schools that they're now using that as their crutch when they lose the recruit. There are some schools that, let's not ignore it, let's not make a mistake. They are was a nil to their advantage, but they're doing it kind of inside the lines because the NCAA never really set a parameter, and they tried to, but it was too late at that point. There's some schools that are using it in the way that it was intended to be by the letter of the law, in you know, actually using the nil for the players on campus already. Then there's other schools that are like, hey, nudge Ledge week week, We're going to take care of you. When you get here. You can go show up at you know, Joe Smith, Kiev, Tuscaloosa or Birmingham or wherever it is. I'm not picking on Island down, hands up, just the first random Birmingham's yeah, exactly. Hey, I either be in Auburn and I'm in the state of Washington, so I could have said that. But there's a lot of schools that you know, are hard doing it the way it was intended. But that's the problem is they're not going to end up elite classes if they aren't getting out ahead of it. And I think the reality is this is college school. When I keep reading about oh Man, this is ruining college football. I've been following college football since nineteen eighty two. I've been covering it since two thousand and three. Every other year there's a new thing that's going to redestroy college football. Every other year there's something that is ruining the game we love. And then every year you get the ratings and you see the radis through the roof. So college football is not being destroyed. It's just evolving at a different pace than maybe he used to next thing you're going to tell me is that college basketball players at the AAU basketball is ruining college basketball, and college basketball players are getting money under the table, and yet the NCAA Tournament sees me just as exciting as it enter was. So if you know it's as bad as everybody says, why do the ratings keep going out, going through the roof? Why are we, you know, continue to talk about college football to the point where you have millions of people that tune in just to watch a bunch of athletic directors sit in a conference room in Arlington to tell you a bunch of braptics on a screen. And every Tuesday night, people get ready to be mad before two hours before and then are mad for the six days afterwards because college football isn't going anywhere. It's just in the evolving of college football that I don't think people were prepared for. And what it is, it's a threat to those schools that have been the status quo big dogs, and now the new school schools come along and they're kind of shaking things up. And people wanted to be back to the seeing five teams that were good every year like they were in the eighties and nineties.
00:36:15
Speaker 2: Part of me wonders, and you can speak to this more accurately. Of course, part of me wonders is it's not the money as much as it is the organization and structure behind the money. That if you sit down with a prospect and a prospect's parents or a prospects coach or something like that, and you can lay out on paper that this is a professionalized operation even though we're dealing with quote unquote amateurs, that suddenly a prospect is going to say, okay, school X presented things like this, and school why said no, We'll make sure you're taken care of. And it's not the money thing, because a lot of schools have money, a lot of schools have rich boosters. But it's almost the presentation of how everything will unfold. Does that make any sense?
00:36:58
Speaker 4: Oh?
00:36:59
Speaker 1: Absolutely, it's all the presentation. That's why you have Twitter beefs like we saw during the summer between various collectives about hey, we're spending more than you are. Well, you're spending way more than us, so you're dirty. Well no,
we're just spending more money better than you are because we have more of it to spend. And I think there's a big reason why you're seeing the rights deals the instead of the pollege football rights deals becoming so important to athletic directors because now they can't go to their boosters and say, hey, we need buy out money to get rid of this coach that we ridiculously overpaid and signed in the nine years. But we don't have ninety million to make him go away. They need that money to come from those TV deals because those boosters are now saying, hey, if you're not going to fire him, we're not giving you another cent made him out. You guys are the dummies that wrote that contract. But what it's collective out because this might get us Joe Smith or Bob Jones to come here and that might be the difference that puts us over the top. Our coach might not be good, but if we give him the talent, he can be good. And I think that that's the only thing is that it's like you said, it's the present. It's some are doing it a lot better than others. Living in Seattle, you know, being from Los Angeles, being from the West coast, people say, well, how is you know, University of Washington not flourishing? And I'll do when you got Boeing and you've got Amazon and you got Microsoft, Well, yeah, those three businesses are global brands. They're not going to stake their claim to Michael Penny. They're not gonna put all their time and energy into Jalen mcmill and they're going to go to the NFL player, the Seahawks, the Mariners. They're gonna do the big thing. Amazon pays all this money for an arena and they don't even call it the Amazon Arena, they call it Climate Pledge. They have that much money, but they're not going to direct it to college sports. Then you go to the smaller towns. How do the smaller college towns have inspective? Because that's what's important to that town, that's what's important to that market. And that's why you're seeing the big city the big market teams, the Stamfords, the Cows, the UCLA's, the Northwesterns, the University of Washington's, of those schools that are in big, major markets. They're not getting the nil backing because those big corporations don't care about college sports. And so then the natural reaction is, well, everybody else is doing it this way. No, they're just smarter on how they present it and smarter in how they get it, and you're not mad that these schools are doing NL. I go back to the Jimbo Fisher Nick Saban's spat this summer. You can never convince me that Nick Saban was intending to take a shot at Nick Jimbo Fisher. What he was intending to do was tell his boosters, y'all better get with the times. And this is a call to arc. When Ryan Day does an interview and says you need twelve and a half million dollars to build a class, he's not just thrown out a number, He's doing the map, and it says so that an NIL collective in Columbus says, okay, guys, now we know we need to get to These coaches are calling their own boosters to the arms and saying this is what we need to do to be competitive, because this is how college football's going. The other thing, I know a long win on this, but it's been such a passionate subject that people keep talking about is don't believe that everything you read. If I saw the numbers, and that some of the numbers that you hear and you speculate on I mean, what we're talking these guys are getting Patrick Mahomes like deals. According to social media, it's like the worst game of telephone ever. These deals are not nearly as lucrative as social media as saying, but it becomes they you know, hey, we're our thing is bigger than your things, So we're going to show you how much money we're spending to show you what a poverty program you are. But the reality is is it's humorous. It's not really as lucrative as they're saying. It just makes you look like you're in the game. If you keep saying we have this much more money.
00:40:35
Speaker 2: To spend, the money grow from last year to this year.
00:40:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, it absolutely did. I mean I would say in probably triple digit percentages. Wow, Because you have a guy like John Ruiz at Miami who was basically said, hey, I'm going to support this program. I mean, in one of the most damning with faint praise tweets I saw all week, he was defending a Florida Collective head. He was taking some shots from Florida Booster and it was almost his nice civil flexus saying, yeah, you know, give him a break, he's had a rough you know, let's support it. But it's also like his way of saying, like, Okay, everything's gonna be okay Florida fans, but you're still not gonna have as much money as iety. People aren't hiding it anymore.
00:41:16
Speaker 2: Right, makes sense of the the top two four seven?
00:41:20
Speaker 1: Uh?
00:41:21
Speaker 2: How does the how does the attitude toward the that towards nil that the players have? Is it out in the open on a visit? Is it a parent?
00:41:32
Speaker 1: Is it? What? How?
00:41:34
Speaker 2: How is that broached? How is that conversation broach? Typically like this is what I expect? Or does the school say? Or does the school say via representatives of the collective and the representative the collective contacts? Like what is the actual transaction and conversation back and forth?
00:41:49
Speaker 1: Like so remember the old days when it used to be about how great your facilities were? Did you have a barber shop in the locker room? Did you have, you know, a great training table? Nobody cares about that anymore. The first questions out of these kids' mouth after we have a scholarship offer for you is like, hey, tell you about that nil deal. I've had coaches telling me that on their official visits. They never even got to the things that they really wanted to show the kid, the academic advisors, the campus, the nihlight, because right off the bat the kids said, Hey, this is what I'm giving from this school. What are you guys going to do? And immediately
it soured the coaches on that kid as a recruit. Now, those are a lot of those property program schools that aren't willing to pay, But even the schools that are really good at nil, they're getting tired that the first thing kids you're asking for is nil money and what kind of deals they're getting elsewhere to kind of up the ante, to wet the beak a little bit and try to stay in it. And it's replaced facilities, let's replace training table academics. Not at every school, but at a lot of schools. The other thing that you're finding out is that the coaches are saying, we had guys coming in and these are schools that have top twenty recruiting classes. We got twenty guys coming in in all twenty three. They're getting an nil deal. We got walk on kickers that think they're going to get the same nil deal that the five star pass rusher is going to get. And all these kids are asking for this, and coaches like, dude, your NIL is the NLI we're sending to you to give you one hundred and fifty thousand dollars worths of education for the next four years. If that's not good enough, go find somewhere else, because you're not good enough to command those kind of resources and that kind of funding. So it's definitely taking a turn where even the coaches are annoyed by aiding, upset with it. But you know what, guess who's the one that let the genie out of the box. Who's the ones that open Pandora's boxes. It's those coaches that keep having those poison pills in their contracts that basically bankrupt athletic departments and hold them hostage. For Peter, I was reading something this week. I can't remember if it was in the Athletic or where I was reading it, but there was an article this week about the business practices that if you lost X amount of money in a business that you ran, you would be bankrupt and know he would ever hire you to run their business. And yet college coaches are given all their money to or are given the collectors money, and if they hit on half the class. That's a successful class, But I mean's fifty percent of the money just got wasted. You're not going to stay employed if that's what your return on the investment is. So these coaches are the ones that are complained about it, But like, hey, do you really need ten to fifteen million dollars a year to coach a team? Probably not.
00:44:21
Speaker 2: So who's billy bean? Who is who's playing small ball? Who's playing smart? Who is getting more with less? Not in terms of perceived talent level on recruiting rankings, but who's budget whose salary cap seems to be you believe to be extremely low, but they're getting the most out of their roster.
00:44:42
Speaker 1: I would probably say Utah. And here's why it's not just because Kyle Whittingham is in my opinion, the best coach in the Pac twelve and has the best eye for talent and does his best job developing. But if you look at Utah, they're not playing the portal game all that heavily. They get returning missionaries, they get some guys that maybe went to by that ultimately transfer there. Yeah, they got, you know, a linebacker from Florida. This year, They've done a couple of transfers. Cam Rising was.
00:45:07
Speaker 2: Gonna say, maybe their best modern quarterback as a transfer, but.
00:45:09
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly, they're their best quarterbacks a transfer. But he wasn't a guy who was able to go have a great season and then going to the Cortland command thousands or millions. He was a guy who was buried in the depth, try to Texas and now he's back. Can we just talk about the fact that he was once originally committed to Lincoln Riley and now he's right, yeah, this year against Lincoln Riley. So there's another funny story there. But I think you know, you taught bydu made no bones about the program that they had last year, nil wise for the walk off where they were essentially having an energy bar or breakfast part company paying for all the walk because you taugh is not out in front like that. They don't have a giantflected, they don't have a very deep pocketed alumni base it's willing to throw money at it. And yet here they are, for the second year in a row, playing in a new year six bool. So I think that it's not just what Kyle Whittingham does on the field, it's how he handles that program off the field that has them punching above their way in. Yeah, they're they're like the A's in the sense that, you know what, they may not have the sexiest roster left to right up and down, but everybody else seems to want their players when they get to the NFL kind of like everybody gets to the trade diveline, they want those Oakland A's. And I think that, you know, given the market that they're in compared to some of the other cities in the Pac twelve, what they're doing is pretty remarkable because they just don't see me playing on the same playing.
00:46:29
Speaker 2: Field that other schools are interesting. Okay, so then let's look across the country. Now, across the country. You've been to camps, you've been to games, You've seen I assume ninety nine point nine percent of the bigger prospects that are signing or are about to sign. Which guys that you've seen, were you confused that they were still in high school? They are physically because of their you know, their height, their weight, their speed, their ability where you're like, that's not fair. This is already a freshman in college. This is already a junior in college. Who are those you know, the the ready to just step onto a college field immediately and be good guys.
00:47:06
Speaker 1: I mean Samson opin Lola. If you would have told me that he was in the scene graduating class as Cam mc cormick was, I would believe you. Cam McCormick will probably be still playing college football by the time Samson ok Loola's college career is out of eligibility. But he's had a beard that I can't even try to grow if I wanted to. He looks like, I mean, he's the pancake contract. You can call him whatever he wants to be called, because he has
that look of a guy who's thirty five years old, Francis Maligo. It's funny because you look at him and he still has his baby face and he kind of won like, what's he going to look like after a few years in college? Samsonofalola could walk into a bar and probably buy a round for everybody, not saying he does, but he's got that look to him like he is a old man. And it's so surprised that Mario likes to go get a big offensive lineman like that who he kind of reminds me of Balanced Leatherwood. I've received holluse Oleatherwood the opening one year, and I mean Alice oather would look like he was thirty seven years old and was dropping his kids off with the Y and go and playing it a little bit of pick up basketball. Samsony is the is the I mean he might be as old as the original and has the ability right.
00:48:13
Speaker 2: It's not just the look his his physical ability is he's ready to step on the field and contribute next year.
00:48:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean he's got bold man's strength because he's an old man, but he's got ability that he's going to be able to play right away. And you know the other guy who's probably the most just biggest freak of nature, maybe it doesn't look like he's thirty five, is Nicholas Harbor. I mean, this is a guy who's a pass rusher and he's running ten four ten, five hundreds And I know, you know you're you're a big track sand Dan And you look at the track guys that were used to see and they're the size of a Devon Allen and and Dori Jackson not the size of Nicholas Harbor. Hand boy, he can do physically. I mean he is the freak of all freaks in you know, three years from now, he will definitely be on the first page of Bruce Boldman's long form on the biggest Freaks in College Football.
00:49:00
Speaker 2: Anybody else that stands out to you? How about quarterbacks? Because this class is specifically and you've talked about this, the most impressive quarterback class at the top that you can remember, just in the last few years anyway, obviously Arch Manning, Nico to Tennessee, Dante More to Ucla, Malachi Nelson to USC Who am I forgetting at the top? Jackson Arnold Oklahoma?
00:49:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, neok Nico, Jamoliava, Dante Moore, you know, Jade Rashan and yeah, yeah, you know Christazina. You know, it's funny because you look at this quarterback class and the top three players in the country are all quarterbacks, and then you look at a guy like Malachi He's the number seven rank overall player, but he's the fourth best quarterback. Like it's a razor thin quarterback class. We kind of wanted this debate in twenty twenty when we had Rice Young number one, just by DJ being ranked ahead of the majority of the year, and then this late charge from CJ. Stroud from a three star before his spring of his junior year to a five star and a top three player. The quarterbacks this year, they had been bunched up, were like any given Wednesday, somebody might have a new favorite quarterback. I mean, you and I have texted a bunch
like, hey, how would he Hier rank your quarterbacks? And it always kind of fluctuates. I have still been of the mindset since the beginning that Nico, to me is the best quarterback in this class. You know, I've been a big Jayden Rashata guy. I've always had in kind of that top two or three. But you know, Archie has always been the name everybody talks about. Do I think he's overrated Number one? No, you can convince me he is the number one guy. But I think that all five are so interchangeable. And then you get a guy like Jackson Arnold, who's been a little bit like a CJ. Shot, except he had more attention early on his senior year. Play has put into that conversation with Malachi Nelson, Nico and Dante More and arj and Ra shot At. And you look at this class and you see that you know there could be five or seven top fifteen type of quarterbacks in this class. It's a quarterback heavy draft year, or even when the quarterbacks aren't that good, we still see a lot of quarterbacks they drafted. This could be one of those year where there's five or six guys in twenty twenty six, twenty twenty seven. A lot of these names are going to be green room guys. Who's ready, who seems to be the most advanced intellectually, emotionally Obviously, these guys physically have the arms, they have the tools, They're athletic. You know, they can go downfield. You've seen them playing games, You've seen them play at camps. A lot of these guys were at Lead eleven.
00:51:29
Speaker 2: Guys who is who is like the advanced silicon processor, who just seems like he's like, oh, he's going to get it quicker than these other guys.
00:51:39
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's a cop out to say, but I'll say it. The most college ready of these guys is probably Art. You know, this is a guy who's just been under the microscope for so long. You know he's got ice water in the veins, just a steely demeanor, and you know he's going to be one of those guys and it's going to be easy to understand the offensive playbook. It's going to be he's either to read defenses. You know, physically he's a little bit still on the skinnier side. You can probably cut all a little bit. Wait, but there's not going to be I don't think there's going to be the push to have him play as a true freshman. Not with Queen you was there, I would say Dante Moore is a four year starter in Michigan. In Detroit, He's walking into a great situation where Dorian Thompson Robinson is finally graduated. I think he was in that same class with Camil Ornick. He's going to probably have the best chance to play just on a pure depth chart. Standpoint Nego another one of those guys. He's just he's got this relaxed, cool demeanor to him. He's a beach volleyball player. He's an indoor volleyball player. You know football is important to him, but he spent the summer playing on the Junior Olympic Volleyball Tour. You know, he just likes to play sports. He's athletic. And you talk about somebody who's been under a microscope, arch might have
been under it for four years. But ever since the words started trickling out about the first big nil quarterback, it's been Nico and he hasn't shot away from it, and I think he's embraced it. Malachi is probably he got the best position that he's going to be going and backing up a Heisman Trophy winner. And you're looking with leaky Riley did at Oklahoma, where you know, after he started getting his legs under him with after the transfers, he would stagger it. He'd get Spencer rather the two yars later he got Caleb Williams. Two years after that, malachiwas committed to him at Oklahoma. There was not a reason to rush him in and play right away. So he might be the safest bet of all those guys because there's the least amount of pressure on him to play next year. But the one wild card that I want to throw in there as a guy that I think, you know, has a chance to come in and play that I think is going to be kind of an dynamic player, really fascinating to watch is Avery Johnson. You know he's out of Kansas, He's going to Kansas State. You know, it's funny you look back at Kansas State and calling Klin ten years ago was playing in college football. Now he's coaching there. Time flies, But there's not the microscope under Kansas State's quarterbacks like there are at Ohio State, like there is at Oklahoma, like there is a Texas, like there is a Florida, like there is a USC But Avery Johnson might be that guy. He's a freak athlete, he's all around athlete, he's a hooper and just there's something wired about him that it makes you think he's going to be that kind of that sneaky guy who is a highly rated player, but it's going to just quietly have the player cup. From a physical standpoint to Jared GoF isn't fair because he's a far better athlete than Jared Goff. But I don't think anybody in the world, even though we had Jared Goff is a four star, nobody foresaw him being the number wockle overall pit. And yeah, Jared Goff may not have had the arm as Matt Stafford, but he's been so steady in his career. Avery Johnson's that guy that I could see him just kind of slipping under the radar, being effected and playing early on, maybe as a true freshman, and just as he gets better each year, Kansas State stock continues to soar. They won the Big Twelve this year, but I could see them being a playoff contender in these next couple of years with Avery Johnson running that offense.
00:54:53
Speaker 2: Who's going to have final question, who's going to have the best January, who's going to close, who's going to grow, Who is going to be the story of the next five weeks.
00:55:01
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with Colorado on that one, and that's largely because Dion just needed a little bit more time. I think the balancing back and forth between Jackson State and Colorado, you know, just kind of dealing with the initial excitement of him taking over the program and then the fallout of having to get rid of a bunch of players in that class and just a sperialistic we're Power five level players or Pack twelve level players, but then trying to find the bodies they're going to be big with portal guys, and if he gets a number of these Jackson State players that are expected to come with them, but then remember the portal open the day after the playoffs were announced. But I think you're going to see the portal really start to blow open over the next ten to twelve days as the playoffs get here, as the rest of the after Christmas Bowl games get going, because that window still exists in the January, and I think we're about to get ready for the second wave of transfers out of the program and guys that are playing, Guys that you wouldn't expect to go out.
00:55:55
Speaker 4: Of the portal.
00:55:55
Speaker 1: Jordan Addison like players that aren't, you know, part of a coaching change, not happy that they're not playing. These are the guys that are playing and playing at a high level, but they're looking to make that move once the ball games are done.
00:56:07
Speaker 2: Interesting, Okay, I'd lie. The last actual question is even though Ty's not here, even though Notre Dame had disappointment during this last class with Keon Keeley, I believe his name is the edge rusher obviously, Peyton Bowen, Jade Lamar. They've had some flips. They were the number one class, top five class for a good stretch of time. Talk to me about what Notre Dame does have and still what appears to be a very impressive top ten caliber class.
00:56:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think when you know, watch the lider Name's offense this year. I mean, you know, Drew Pine had his he had his issues. The offense was just not that. I was out of the Notre Dame Stanford game in October, and you know I watched maybe the worst Stanford team I've seen since Buddy Tevens or Walt Harris was there, beaten in South End. Because Notre Dame could not move the ball. They needed some help at the skill position. They had Tobias Smiriweather. It was a true freshman catch a touchdown in that game. But other than that, they they don't seem to have the explosive receivers we got used to Notre Dame and habit like they did under Ray Kellis. So what do they do this year. Well, they make it a priority to get pass catchers. They've got Raylan James, who's a very fast electric receiver out of Texas. They went back into Texas, down into Austin. They get Jayden Grayhouse. The Texas really wanted big body guy, very physical receiver. They bring him. And they get Rico Flores out of Fullsome High School in Sacramento, a guy that's been a part of one of the best office A systems. Speaking of Stanford, Troy Taylor, the new head coach of Stanford, used to the head coach at Fulsom High School. So it's a program that's been putting up numbers and throwing the ball for a ton. Rico Flores is one of the best receivers in California. And then they got Kayla Smith out of Frisco, Texas, so they've made Texas kind of a priority this year with some of the receivers. And then they also got you know, your
classic typical Notre Dame tight end at Cooper Flaming Game, Like how typical is he? I swear every tit? And that's played at Notre Dame and at some point played lacrosse in their background, and he was a lacrosse player going up and now he's going to go to Notre Dame and play tight end. The last great tight end from Dalla Cell High School was a guy named Isaiah Foski who ended up being an All American pass rusher for the Irish Cooper Flannagay will be a tight end there with Mike Mayer Levan. There's going to be the opportunity to come in and play I don't know that he starts right away, but I see him getting playing time already, a plus blocker playing in that Dala cell vaunted beer office that they ride. But a guy that really shined on the camp in seven on seventh Circuit to show that he could be a bass catcher. So Notre Dame realizing that while they had any elite tight end in Michael Mayer, they needed an upgrade at the receiver position. Chancey Suckie's come in and done a fantastic job in year one at the receiver position. Start giving Tyler Buppner if he's sell thy next year some key targets.
00:58:42
Speaker 2: Brandon Hoffman two four seven Sports, thank you so much for all of your time, your insight, and all of your let's call it texting off the record things that are incredible for me this cycle.
00:58:58
Speaker 1: Dan, anytime I can just give you some context, yes, as he would be prepared for this show. That's what I'm here for. Well, thanks again, thanks a lot. All right, Dan, there you go. Brandon Hoffman. Wow, we obviously are pasting this interview in between our intro.
00:59:13
Speaker 2: And I'll peel back that on you and that curtain that kimono.
00:59:17
Speaker 3: So I'm not going to act in this moment before the interview that I know what was said during the interview.
00:59:22
Speaker 2: Okay, I won't do that. I'm not inauthentic like that. You can take in different takes. You can do different takes and then just use the one that is most appropriate, that requires work, that does require work. I'm editing this late at night, posting it to the feed late at night. We're not gonna We're not gonna go that route. So the one thing I can say with utter confidence is that Brandon as always spectacular.
00:59:46
Speaker 4: I'm sure you.
00:59:46
Speaker 3: Would agree, even though.
00:59:48
Speaker 4: Technically a time of recording you have yet to speak.
00:59:51
Speaker 2: That's true, and I uh, I'm always grateful for his time, even though as we record this, I don't know that I will be now, of course I am all right, Ty. We still have five or six more weeks of recruiting stuff because of new coaches and kids holding back on signing until they you know, taking a visual official visit and meet the new staff and new co whatever. There's All Star Game announcements, there are going to there's a going to be another wave of transfers after Bowl season. Kids who are like, you know what, I feel obligated, especially maybe because my team is in a big bowl, my team is in the playoff that I want to contribute. I want to see where the season ends, but I feel like I want to play somewhere else next year or however many years. And so there's gonna be a new wave of portal entries and a lot to talk about these next few weeks.
01:00:40
Speaker 3: Yep, keep it right here. We will be continuing the podcast train all throughout bowl season and then deep into the off season as recruiting continues to ratchet up. No shortage of college football news ever. Really, at this point in time, it's turned into a year round sports So hope you can join us. Tell your friends to make sure they hit follow or subscribe whatever it says in your podcasting app of choice. One more time before we let you go, CELLI rubblelive dot com. Come see us in La if you'll be in the area, if you know people in the area. Again January the seventh, that The Truebadour are going to be a smashing good time code named one True Champion. Could be our last show ever, I don't know, could be our last live show ever. We turn into the Beatles and the only time you're gonna see us outside of the studio is a random rooftop in London and that's impromptu ty as you know. So this could be our last last show ever as a duo. Who knows for that guy over there, my good friend Dan Rubinstein, for myself, Tie Hildebrand, Thanks again for downloading, for listening, for playing along at home. Make sure you hit subscribe, make sure you hit follow.
01:01:44
Speaker 4: We'll talk y'all next week. In the meantime, stay soft peace,