This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jay Gonzalez Son Fox Sports fourteen fifty powered by Nova Insurance Services. I'm sure your most prized possessions kat Z R two, SAG and iHeartRadio Station.
But good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to Eye on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera partner Jay Gonzales right here, got a guy Ryan with us. We got that name right, thankfully. Welcome to Thursday.
Show is messed up like the last three?
Right, Yes, you call you Kevin. I'm you with bris Kevin. We're here on Thursday because we have to be.
That doesn't you know?
That doesn't give us our listeners a lot of day Let's they know six stupid stuff.
Confidence in us. Right here, We're just here to just be here.
To say wait, wait, are you gonna be here tomorrow?
I Am not gonna be.
Well, there's that. There's that.
Really, it's a family thing. It's a family.
No, don't I don't need excuses. You don't need excuses.
You No, don't don't even go there, Steve, don't even go there. Just don't tomorrow and say we're here here you don't have to be apparently welcome everybody.
Yeah, welcome.
Did you get shut out today?
Did I get shut out? No?
Whatever, poor guest did. Yeah, not a good thing. But you will say that for breaking news. Okay, it's not good news. It's not good news. Just just a surprising news, you know.
I guess I am a little surprised, and yeah, I'm very.
Do the girls play today?
Do you know?
I want to try to get the coach on.
No, they haven't played all day against do that.
Let's do it whole. You won't be here tomorrow, star maybe maybe if they don't.
Put everything out there. Got the first round of the golf tournaments in North Carolina that that got canceled as well. Betty Debbie, Debbie Debbie Hurricane Debbie one of those women I won't marry.
Yeah, yeah, okay, Uh, and then we have a good guest. We have a couple of good guests. Today. We're gonna catch up on football finally again. Yep, with Brian Peterson here at the early hour, right at fifteenth th seventeen. See what's going on because he's there at the practices. And then uh track down Jeff Skirten. He's doing some of his usual drive, you know, for shoe drive and for the needy in Mexico. See all the work that he does for that. And then I kind of wanted to ask him, how's life.
Yeah, he's not coaching this year.
Over all these years, I think he's maybe sat out a year.
I think he sat out a year a while back before he went over to Rio Rico.
Yeah, and then we'll see how is this really?
Yeah? Is he you know, he you know, does he need like, yeah, some counseling. Does he need to go to a you know, a ten step thing, you know, Kevin hang On, Yeah, exactly, Yeah, you know, I mean, because he's been doing this for so long.
Right, right, And then you know, talk about things that we talked about, some of the things that high school kids go through because this so psychology, psychology stuff, you know, do they deal with the same stuff that that the college kids do. There's still pressure? Are you gonna the money?
Right? And where's the pressure coming from?
Right?
Is coming from? Did you see? There was a thing with a couple of coaches at a very prominent Alabama high school, one of the top and and the coach who just got hired is its first year and his defensive coordinator. They both had to resign because some video came out of them beating up their players. Really, there's the video that you see. It's an overhead video and I don't know who would have shot that. It almost looks like it's from a from a drone, but there's
a there's obviously alignment drill happening. And so this lineman, kind of a defensive lineman kind of gets you know, he gets man handled, and one of the coaches, I don't know which are the two coaches it was, races over to him, pushes them and as he's pushing him grabs his face masks, so the face mask, so the helmet comes off and he falls through the ground and then he throws the helmet at because you got beat Yeah, because he got beat on the on the in the drill.
Well is this did you read it? Was there a story that went yeah? So is the coach a past coach too? He was hired? Do you have coaching experience?
I should say I'm presuming he is. He did, because you know how you know this is this is Hoover High School and somewhere in Alabama, which you know again one of the top football high schools in Alabama's You don't get that job if you weren't coaching somewhere else.
So he must have been a very good coach who.
And maybe this has gone on elsewhere, but there's no video.
Right Well, the thing is, that's funny unless they tape their practices with a drone normal, why else would it be there unless they thought maybe something.
And some somebody got ahold of the video and it got.
A well that's how kind of the beginning of the end for probably night they use.
The practice that he got the guy by the neck right.
Read I think it was read where you know they had that thing put away and then someone brought it out.
Yeah yeah, so you know. But anyways, so you know, I mean, is that is that a Is that a product of coaches feeling pressure? Is it a product of
coaches dealing with players who are feeling pressure? But here's the coach who obviously went off in a way that you can't and now he's not a coach anymore, and he you know, being when when you read about this high school and what it is, you know it's probably a place where you know, you can get a college job out of there, and now his coaching career is probably over or close to it, right, He's not gonna
be coaching high school anywhere. No, No, So I mean back to your point, there's a lot of pressure and expectations, and it's creeping down right from well pros to college to high school.
Well. No, we talked even we talked about the youth football, the youth football little league by baseball, where the kids and the umps are fighting with really, I mean really really trying to prove especially like the kid who got his butt kicked for the buddy ump and the and the and the pace mask. I mean, come on, what what what the coach wanted to prove that the guy was safer out he's a nine year old kid.
Yeah, yeah, I don't know. Here. Let me ask you this, because you know your kids played sports. They were playing soccer, right, and one of them went to college for soccer, right.
Did you put pressure on your kids though? Never, never, I think, did.
You look at your kids and say, I want my kid to be a professional athlete. No.
I wanted my kid to be good at what he did, happy with what he did, both of them because because they were No, my dad wasn't like that. My dad was not a helicopter kid. My dad supported me, went to everything. I went to everything I went to. IM rarely missed a game. So I was that same guy, supportive. I was more not entangled with the other guys because and I told you the story with some of the Hispanic dads in soccer, because there's a lot of us, a lot of them, and they would cuss out kids
and coaches and refs in Spanish. They didn't have a clue to know that I was that I knew what they were saying because because they didn't know, and I said, come on, guys, enough he said, oh you know were saying, yeah, what you're saying, No, it wouldn't. It didn't stop me. So the coaches and Cosgrove was a coach cause we'd have to have meetings with the guys, and he bought everybody instead of the people who needed to be talking, which which is an issue.
I mean, you know, all three of my kids played a bunch of sports through high school. Two of them were three sport athletes and one of them was a two sport athletes, so they played everything and to me and even you know, Little League and all that stuff, to me, the most most important thing was for them to have fun.
To have fun enjoyed. It was supposed to be fun. Kids should be kids should be kids, and if you're good, even better, even better. There were days there were pressure because Cameron played at the highest level here and in the West. It was yeah, you know, and he was the goal. He was like, oh god, please, But it was never get on him or because what's the point. There's no point.
I mean, I you know, I yelled at a refer to just for bad calls and things like that, but you know, but not in a way, not in a threatening way like you know, just may have said something or you know, all coma ref, you know whatever, stuff like that, but not in a way that right, not a way that the ref is going to turn their head and look at me and like go, what the hell are you doing? Right? Just you know, just normal, you know, part of the game. But I wanted my
kids to have fun. I wanted sports to be fun because I saw watching them grow up in Little League and stuff like that. I saw kids that weren't.
Having fun to get out of the gate.
Yeah you know, my son. Uh And I bring this up because the Little League World Series is getting ready to start right the baseball you know, they're showing all the regionals and stuff like that. And our all star team at Sabina Canaan Little League was really good to the point of you know, uh uh. I was an assistant coach on it, in the head coach, and we had breakfast one time and he said, we were talking. He said, we're really good. I said, do you think
we're Little League World Series good? He says, I don't know, but we're really good. We really you know, I can see it's going quite away. So we The main thing you have to have there is pitching, and you have to have more than one really good pitch three before and we had that. We had these pictures who could just through gas like the kids that you see. This was Adam's twelve year old years. This was nineteen or two thousand and five, okay, okay, And we were really good.
But most of the kids, now my son just played little league, all right. Most of the kids on that team also played club ball all right. And we get into we get into our practices, you know, for little league. They no, they didn't give one crap about it, and they didn't care about the games. There were just more games to play, and we flamed out in the district. We didn't even get out of disc you know, and
we lost a game that that eliminated us. Basically, my son cried and the other guys just didn't give because they were playing all kinds of baseball. They just didn't care. This was just mortal. This was just more baseball than This wasn't a dream of And those kids go on, well a couple of them play high school. That's as far as I know. I don't know if they played it beyond that.
So how did that go?
Yeah, exactly? And I remember this one time, uh we were at my son was that we went to the bat There used to be this batting cage out on the east side, and I just took them over there, you know, just to hit. And we were hitting. And about five of those kids from that All Star team who were playing on a club team together, we had another batting cage with their coach and they looked miserable. They were not having fun. And my son, he was just there to hit. He just wanted to hit because
you know, I can't throw. I couldn't throw the way these you know, we just took to hit, to have fun to hit. And those guys were over there, work and work and work and work, completely miserable, standing around making fun and not having fun. And we, you know, we saw them over it, and like, those guys aren't having fun, they're playing, they're doing something that somebody's making them do that they don't want to do.
Well, there's such thing as burnout.
You did you?
Did you play burnout? Did it come to you? I mean when I got to high school, it was it was kind of like, all right, you know, I didn't make my high school team.
So I just kind of like, oh, yeah, you just stop playing. Stop playing. I wanted to I wanted to play. Third show. You played baseball, Okay, I played hockey.
That's what you're gonna tell me you You were a linebacker as your Texas I have ran over here. You're a whistle the guy I saw, of.
Course, but you know, but that that's the thing. And so you know, we're playing in high school and one of our pictures, Okay had a sore arm the whole time, and then we find out that while we're in season, he's taking pitching lessons. I'm like, you're throwing your arm out, what are you gonna do? Right? Just stuff like that just throw me nuts. And it does. When I hear stuff and see stuff like this, like who's to blame on all? It's it's usually the parents, often the parents.
Oh yeah, the worst thing to happen to kids and parents. Yeah, because I mean, he is gonna make me a lot of money, right right, Well, get me to college or you know whatever. Yeah, that's understandable. It's understandable think that way. But guess what, what's the percentage one percentage of the kids.
It's very small. It's really small, you know. I don't know. It's just one of those things that struck me seeing this thing with it with these high school coaches saying what are you doing? But then also seeing it, you know, every time this year rolls around in the Little League World Series, you got ready to start. I think back to this team that we had that had had the
talent to be really good. Now I'm not saying this team was going to go to the Little League World Series, but it was something that we had in the back of our minds because that's how good we.
Thought everybody and everybody thinks that when you put together.
Yeah, but that's how good we thought this team was.
I mean, who would think this team from Wilcox Wilcox for for but Steve sometimes you know, right, you know there are teams that are really damn good. Yeah, well yeah, but that was on the basketball.
Yeah, I know you're gonna go to that other.
Yes, example, because you think you're really good, and you are really good, but then you have to go do it. You got to go do it, right. You don't understand that Clemson's pretty damn good.
Right, but there's probably nothing more disappointing than knowing how much talent and ability you have and you're not even coming close to realize. No, I did it in high school.
We did in high school the four years, number one in the state going in and we didn't get to the semi finals.
It was just yeah, I mean, come on, it's just the way it is.
Yeah, you know, because you think kindly of yourself, you know what, the other guys don't give a crap.
Right, and then you go to the flip side. My Adam's a freshman team at Saint Gregory. I was an assistant coach on the team. We were just having fun. We were not you know, we didn't. We thought we were okay, but we didn't. You know, we had one really good pitcher. All of a sudden, We're finding ourselves in the state semi finals. I'm like, what the hell are we doing here? How did the hell did we get here? And I think a lot of it had
to do with how much fun these kids were having. Confidence, because if you get if you get to win a game, I'll send you win another game, and then I'll send you here you are. And we had a blast with that team. That was the most fun I ever had on any kind of a baseball team. You know, I was an assistant coach on this team. Yeah it's great. Yeah, No, it's that's That's just what it is.
Okay, enough about us, Yep, We'll take a break and then go to Brian Peterson.
Peterson talk.
Was back on the fields after doing stuff this time. I just read through got a past cot and Justin's notes.
I didn't you didn't even say anything about t Mac. What's your name? Well? Ryan, not Ryan? Right? What Troy? Troy? Oh my god, I'm telling I'm texting Troy right now. There isn't a Ryan. There's one right there that's Ryan, right, there. I'm telling I'm telling Troy that you couldn't remember, and Troy loves me. I'm still gonna tell you. Okay, all right, We'll be right back with Brian Peterson from No Asy Desert Swarm.
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Steve Prepira and Jacin Solids they have their eye on the fall on twosons Sports stay shat Fox Sports fourteen fifty.
Hey, welcome back to wind the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve, He's Jake. Now in the phone we have Brian Peterson from Agdesertswarm dot com. Brian, how you doing great?
Thanks for having me back.
You working on that ten.
I'm working on staying in the tiny little piece of shade that still exists throughout football practice. Nice with my big floppy hat and all that.
Very nice, very nice, because it's so your cage. You better and you should know that better. You're right, you know all about that. How's it going so far?
I think it's fine. I mean, this is the first fall camp under this regime, and to see how it compares to what Jed Fish had done, there's not a lot of differences. Maybe some of the individual drills look a little differently. You're still hearing Duyna Kina be very loud out there, which is something that we heard last year. But otherwise and with so many of the same players back, it does feel a lot like it was a year ago.
I mean, that's the thing, right, I Mean, we see practices in you know, camps, and a lot of times we don't even really know what they're doing, right. We know that they're on passes, catching passes, blocking, yeah, yeah, yeada, but we don't know what's behind all of that, and so it all kind of looks the same. I mean, I remember watching Kevin Somemlin's practices, except for the fact that Kevin Somelan looked disinterested. They looked like a lot of other practices that you saw.
Yes, I mean, it's just what is so unique as especially nowadays in college, when there is a coaching change, there's usually a mass exodus of players that the roster goes and overturns. Jed Fish is dealing with that up at Washington Kylin de boor at Alabama and so many other places. And the fact that Arizona has at least half, if not more, of the people on this roster were here last year with a new coaching staff is what just kind of makes it so unique?
Got it? Can you?
And you could tell that the new coaching staff has their full attention and they're bought in.
I sue yes, And I think a lot of that comes from the fact that, particularly for the returners, they have tried to keep things as much the same as last year as possible. That this isn't like a Kevin Summons situation in twenty eighteen when he did bring back a fair amount of people like Colotate, but they changed
a lot of stuff and it backfired. They've kept a lot of the verbiage the same, and maybe not the schemes are exact, but just so much that is trying to stay familiar that the changes feel more like compliments than rather than supplements.
Right, So, who's got your eye out there? There's a lot of talk about Kean Burnett. We've seen some stuff on him the last couple of days. Who else I mean talk about him here than who else?
I mean? He Ken has really had a great camp and he made this finally is his opportunity to break out. I mean, he didn't do as much those first two years as was expected, but that a lot of that had to do with Tanner McLaughlin right, and how great
he was at that position. The two transfer receivers that they added, Jeremiah Patterson and ray Melo Murphy, have both looked really, really good, and with iMac not in the main mix for these practices so far, it's really allowed so many of these other receivers to get opportunities, and both of those should be a big part of that. The defensive line has so many of these new guys on it. Trey Smith from San Jose, Chuba Mai from
UC Davis. They were here in the spring, but they continue to fill that in there on the defensive line, and how that rotation works out is going to be a big key to it. We're also seeing a lot of new offensive linemen. When Raymond Palito find out right camp begins he's not going to be available this season, that opens up left tackle and Rhino to tie. I probably said that really badly, but I know how to
spell it. That's all that matters has been holding down that left tackle spot and if he can, if he can hold his own in that position, then it helps solidify everything else on the line.
I think we may have buried the lead to so t Mac got a pass today, That's.
What I've heard. Yeah, yeah, so it's watching what he's been doing at practice. It's not a matter of like if there was a game on Saturday, he'd be playing. But they're they're being careful with him because there's there isn't a need to put him at risk when they
know that he knows everything. And I had asked this of Bobby Wade a couple of days ago at practice, of how do you make sure you're keeping a guy who's off on the side up to speed, especially when you're installing essentially a new offense with Dino Babers and
all these new callplays. And he said it like that Timak is still involved in all the meetings and all the film and everything, and when he would be off on the side and what we've referred to as rehab island doing his individual stuff with the strength and medical staff, when they would do actual team periods of seven out seven or eleven eleven, he'd come over and watch it so he can see exactly how it works and he can just instantly figure out where he's going to be
in there. So I don't have any concerns about him being fully one hundred percent for the season.
All right, defensively, again, the ones that we want to know about, right, what does Jacob Monu look like? What does Justin Flow look like? And then the whole crew in the backfield.
Well, yeah, the secondary is by far the strength of this team, with so much veteran experience, Gunnar Maldonado, Dalton Johnson trade and Stukes Genesis Smith being almost like a grizzled vet as a sophomore with the amount he played last year as freshman. Some new additions like Mark Heath grows Kill abrew a transfer who could be one of
the starting cornerbacks. It's a very strong group back there, and if they're able to make sure that they go six, seven, eight deep on there, they can continue to do those dollar packages that Johnny Nansen liked to do. That was a suggestion of Duyna Quina, so having that be available, it really just it comes down to how that offensive
excuse me, defensive line fits in with everything. And they spoke today about the coaches and players that the mindset for this group is trying to really disrupt the backfield a lot more than what Johnny Nansen had done. Johnny Nansen's defensive line was more about hold up those offensive linemen and keep them from getting the push and open the holes for the linebackers. This group is trying to get into the backfield and really create the chaos themselves.
Yeah.
So you've gone to most of them most of the practice. Yeah so in your journalism, I how good you think there could be?
You know, I'm making my win total prediction at eight for the year, which is above what the Vegas lines are saying. I think that's seven and a half.
Right.
Their toughest games are all on the road, and so you never know what you're going to get in terms of playing in these road atmospheres. Having the experience they do on both sides that played on the road and one games last year should help. It's just a matter of will that be the same in these different environments
in the Big twelve compared to the Pac twelve. I mean the Kansas State game Week three, even though it doesn't count towards the Big toastandings, how they perform in that, even if they don't win, will kind of be indicative of how the whole season goes as far as if they can be in the hut for the Big twelve and get a playoff spot.
Yeah, I mean that Looms is a huge game for what for the reason you said, because it not being a conference game, but it's where I think we're going to find out a whole lot about them in the you know, in that game, and then they got to go to Utah after that. We were talking to the Texas tech writer yesterday and you know, they think that, you know, they've got a shot to be decent. And that's kind of what it is across the league right probably eight teams that are going to be really hard to be.
Well decent by saying they could go five and zero, yeah, in the first five games.
Yeah, I mean the preseason at Pole is going to come out on Monday, and either like Utah is probably going to be the highest ranked team in the conference, and if they are twelve, that would be high for them, But then there's going to be four or five other
Big twelve teams that could get ranked. So to see that many number in there, but kind of all bunched together, and a lot of the early computer rankings have six to ten different Big twelve teams kind of in a lump in a twenty or thirty spot thing right there below the first tier. That just kind of gives you indication of how deep the league is, and then it comes down to who you're playing and who who everyone
else is playing. Arizona has an advantage there because they don't have to play Kansas, Kansas State, or Oklahoma State or Iowa State in the conference in conference play, and those are some of their top competitors. The first game against Utah will be a big one, but then and the Texas Tech one for the first home game will be but then they they play one of on paper, the weakest schedules in the conference. So if they can be competitive, that votes really well for them down the stretch.
Do you think they do you think they win to lose to or split the Kansas State and Utah games, you know, both on the road.
I have them losing both of those games just because those are going to be the toughest for right now. I mean, who knows what's going to happen from it
that Kansas State game. If they lose that game by a touchdown, then you can still gain a lot of value from that, But if they just kind of get whooped in it, then you have to reassess and see how they're going to be and Utah while they have familiar with that program having played them in the Pac twelve, that that's on the road to start league play and be right back to back on the road, that's a
very tough sell there. Then you have your buy if they had their buy Actually no, the buye is before that, but still just having those two in consecutive could be really tough.
So I think you asked Desire this question about the season tickets. It may have been somebody else. What's your thoughts on the fan base they bought in. Have you got an engauge from your site?
I think they are bought into the extent that they're going to give it a shot. But like we all know this fan base, all it takes is one bad result and they can start searching for the lifeboats. Having New Mexico, which I believe they're supposed to be favored by close to thirty points as that first game and then NAU, it does provide this opportunity for the fans to get a really good feel about how this is
and get some excitement. But if they were then to lose the Kansas State and Utah games, then the single game tickets for that Texas Tech game could suffer just because people get very very there's so much recency bias. I mean, I see it even too in all sports.
The Diamondbacks last year started lost the first two games at Philadelphia in the National League Championship Series, and next thing you know, they were selling their game three tickets for seven dollars on stuff huck because they thought the series was over. It's just people overreact.
We're talking to Brian Peterson Asydesert Swarm dot com. Brian, you know these expectations that are around for the program is like you said, you know, fans they may lose their minds if Arizona comes in at two and two or whatever. But you know, we never get this right. You know that we've had some ten win seasons and they've been high expectations. It's it's a whole lot different, especially with as long as it's been since, you know,
there's been any hope for this program. From a writer's standpoint, how do you balance all of that right, Because you've got a fan site that you want fans to be excited about this program. But on the other hand, if you start saying things you can lose credibility or whatever. Right, you know what I'm trying to get at you. You're trying to be straightforward, but you're.
Worried about that part. And if I don't have people hating me, I'm probably not doing the job right. But yeah, I'm never going to sugarcoat things and not point out
the possibilities of how things can go bad. And at some point here before the opener, I'm probably going to be writing about just the season after the really good seasons in Arizona history and that we've experienced, I mean, even most recently as twenty fourteen when they go ten and four, when the Pac twelve South make the conference title game and play in one of the New Year's six Balls, and then the next year, what do they do? They lose to BYU, like right out at the gate
up in Glendale, and it's a disappointing season. And that has happened pretty much every time football has had a good season. Right that you have to understand that one season does not dictate the next. While there are you know, on paper, this team should be very good because of the people they bring back. The other teams could be good too, and things change, and you know what, it just doesn't carry over anymore.
So we've got a couple of minutes left to what's going to happen to or for the football program to do really well, the defense has to step up, or the offense has to do what it needs to do.
The defense has to do enough to make it so that this isn't a team that they can't be a team that has to score every time they have the ball, because that just puts too much pressure and then you force things. You look back at Patrick Mahomes' final season at Texas Tech, and he was incredible, but he would then throw three interceptions in a game while throwing for five hundred yards because his defense gave up points every time, and they'd lose games like sixty eight to fifty five.
You need your defense to just be serviceable. And last year the defense did far better than expected. They could have given up a few more points each game and Arizona was still able to win because of how well the offense developed, but the offense didn't feel pressure to score every time because the defense was holding its part. So I think the defensive side just has to be in a case where they are not just guaranteed points every time they're on the field.
How different does duayna Quina look out there? You know, he was a defensive backs coach last last year. Now he's the guy more visible. We always hear him, right, but you see him?
Is he more?
Do you hear him more? I guess is what I'm asking.
You know, I think he's really using that coordinator part of the title uh perfectly and that he's he's overseeing the defensive backs more than anything else. But like he is deferring to Lyle to Uh, to the defensive line coach, he's deferring to the linebacker coach and letting them do their things with his suggestions of how he'd like to see things. But he's not sitting here saying this is how you're going to do it. Figure out a way
to make it work. I mean, he'll be the one calling the plays, but he's calling the plays based on what those assistants are telling him work best, and that's what a coordinator should be doing.
Well, Brian, I hate to say this, we like you. We don't want to hate you, even though you liked us, or something like that. So you know, unless you're talking just a bunch.
Of readers, Yeah, it's it's good to be hated, you.
Know what a lot. He must feel really good.
It's better to be hated than ignore.
Hey, there you go.
Yes, then we'll catch you next week.
Thanks, Thanks Brian, thanks for having me.
Guys it Jay, I hate you, I hate you, I love it, I love it, I hate you. Jim.
Thanks for hating me right and I think we hate you too. Let's take a break. We'll be right back.
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Slash Someday, Steve Bravera and Jake and Salez they have their eye on the ball. On Tucson Sports Stage, Jet Fox Sports fourteen fifty, Dreaming Live, I Mean iHeart Radio.
Hey Welcome back to Iron the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve. He's Jay. We got our guy Ryan with us fifteen minutes. You'd like to call Bland's work five two four one, six, seventy four forty.
Give us a call.
We have about three weeks left here about before foot US season, before we.
Move or before we move. Yes, yeah, amphis.
There's a game tonight?
Is there an NFL game? There's a bunch of NFL games tonight. The preseason pretty much get started tonight with a whole bunch of stuff. All right, So, hey, did you see that? It looks like the UFA has its president.
Oh did they get one? I know they get the second guy.
It's a strange note thing is that they're only going to interview one person. The Border Regions is only going to interview one person, so they knew who there's like, this is what, this is what we're presenting the Border regions. Of the Border Regions will vote on him, which that doesn't make me feel great.
Do they say who it is?
Yeah, a guy named si esh Garamella. He's the current president of the University of Vermont. I was I was on the I was on the search committee for that hired Li Likens. And I'll just say I'll just say it this way. There were three candidates that that got interviewed by the search committee and they were all they all had to be public and stuff, and I remember going into that one one of the one of them
was where was she at? But anyway, there was a favorite among the three right that people thought, Okay, this is going to be the one, and she turned out to not be the one that got hired because you did these interviews and you met them all and then we ended up with Peterkins, who was a very good president in Arizona. So this worries me in that they're only giving the border regients one person to uh who's the search committee there? There's there's a there's a search
committee that gets put together, right. It's usually a bunch of community members and then and then they present them to present that recommendation to the to the border regions, and the border regions makes the hire. So if this and usually there's a region on the committee.
So if this person does not fly, they got to go back to the dragon board.
It sounds like it, right, I mean that that's what sounds like there's just this one person. So it's like, Okay, who are you and why are you know? Why are we only getting you know? I mean right, don't you? I mean you go to you go apply for a job at McDonald's and they interviewed three or four people for a job at McDonald's.
You think that it's like though that we talked about this. Uh, there's a job opening, and I'm sure you've gone through this. I know I've gone through this. There's a job opening, and the people who are doing the hiring already know who they're going to hire. U they just kind of go through the formalities of having people in whether it's a woman or man, but they already have somebody targeted.
But to be fair, they open it up right and you know, I'm sure you've lost the job that way, but yeah, there's should be more.
Well, well, I remember because one of the tests that I had on that on that committee was I had to actually call a couple of potential candidates. But we we were.
A search committee, right, We were going out and you were the.
Yeah we were looking. Yeah, we were looking for people. So I remember calling this one university president and I won't say who he was. But you know, and I spoke to him, he said, he said, Look, he said, I'll, I'll, I'll be considered. I don't mind being considered, but I don't I don't want to be considered unless I've got a real shot at the job. And I said, well, I can't tell you that. I can't. You know what
I can tell you. What I can tell you is that as a member of the search committee, there isn't like a favorite in the clubhouse. Okay. What I can tell you is that if you agree to an interview, you'll get a fair shot job.
And you're going to him because you think that he's worthy, right, Whether he whether he passes the snuff is the question. Yeah, so you're going he would think. So you tell me this, go ahead and tell me. We think we like you. We want to talk to you. Uh. And I'm thinking to you, well, you're calling me because you think I have a chance.
Yeah, and that's worthy. Yeah, And that's what That's what I'm saying. I saying, Look, I wouldn't call you if you didn't if we didn't think you know, we're calling we're calling one to one to see.
Were you what were you was that guy. Did he have a shot?
He did? Yeah, No he did. And that's what I was telling him, I said, I said from I said from my standpoint. I said, Look, I'm not gonna let you know that the search committee had I think it had twenty people on it. Oh okay, right, some people knew who they wanted. Others like me, Sure, okay, here we go. Take this. Hi, you're on the air and I on the ball.
Hello, Hi, I have a question though, why do I listen to you guys?
This podcast?
Uh?
The podcast? You can go to the iHeart website iHeartRadio dot com. You can go to some Apple podcasts or Spotify, but where our podcast is on all three of those, do a search for Eye on the Ball and you should be able to and you'll be able to find could he just go on the ball. He might be able to just Google Eye on the Ball and he can direct you to one of those. But search for but Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and the iHeartRadio website.
Okay, okay, because you're gonna have my coach uh up to you. I don't know I he's talking to he or somebody else, but you're gonna have him around four o'clock.
Oh, Jeff Skurrn, Yes.
Yes, yes, he's my son's quarterback coach.
So yeah, yeah.
What capacity I mean? Is he helping him out because he's retired of course?
Yeah?
Okay, oh no, he he does a private coaching for him, more than one coaching with his Uh. My son is a quarterback and we live in Taravisa, so.
We traveled to Touthson for him to play football, got it?
Because he's current playing with a tooth On.
Raiders and coach Jeff he's his personal one on one coach for quarterback training.
Okay, okay, I just I just googled Eye on the Ball and the first thing that comes up is our uh link to our site on the iHeart website. So just go there and uh that that'll get put up about an hour or so after the show.
Oh not afterwards, okay, Yeah.
If you want to listen to it live, you can go to the iHeart website and look and look up a Fox Sports fourteen fifty in Tucson and you can listen to it live on your phone or iPad or something.
All right, what was that? What was her name?
To listen it to life?
I I on the Ball to us and live. Yeah, Fox Sports fourteen fifty that's our radio station. You can always listen to us on the radio fourteen fourteen fifty. AM.
Okay, okay, thanks a bunch, Thanks so much for appreciate it. Yes, thank you. So So the guy, the guy had a chance.
To get so he ended up not being a candidate, but he said yes to your interview. Well, he said, he said, you know, I'm really happy where I am. I'd rather you know, I'd rather know.
I mean, that was fine, especially if you don't want you name.
To be right. Yeah, I'll just the other thing. I'll say he was from one of the California state schools. Right. But you know the point of this conversation being though, is you're going to bring us one guy and that's it.
Yeah, no, I get it. Let me ask you this. Okay, So you have this guy, do you want him to be like, uh, the doctor Robbins sports wise or not?
Well, you want him him or her, whoever it is. But in this case of him, you want whoever is
university president. They're going to be the university president at a power for school now, to have an affinity for sports, to like sports, to understand how how how athletes are you know, can be and as they always say, the front front porch of an institution like Arizona, you certainly hope that there's some sort of a commitment to that because if they if there's not, let's say, Michael Crow maybe doesn't have the commitment that that up at AC
that people want up there. And we've seen what's happened to their their overall program. Yeah, and wea were heart right, you know that was that was a tough go for in athletics for Arizona for a period of time. You know, Robert Shelton was you know, not president for very long, but he you know, he was you know, he he loves Peterkins, you know he was you know, I got to ask the sports questions at his interview, which is
funny sports former. He was a wrestler and and uh, you know so I think you you hope that whoever they hire has a has a true understanding of how important this is. Two alumni to that that you get so much. There's a benefit to having a great athletic program at a at a university like Arizona.
Yeah right, yeah, we'll see, but within within touching distance, but leave a lot of the.
Decisions to the people who know sports. See and I think people you know, your people will probably say that maybe Robin's got a little two hands on, a little two hands on with sports. But I knew that was coming when I heard that he played quarterback in junior.
Right, and he was very I saw him. You saw him at everything on the road and things like that. Uh yeah, and and he was well he could be the guy or was the guy hired someone hired, fish hired Tommy, you know, and and Dave was the guy in the silence.
Some good, some bad. But I think and he's stuck.
By Miller longer than he probably should.
Have, longer than a lot of people wanted him to.
Yeah, well he was you know, over my dead body quote.
Yeah, so I I don't know, it's it's.
We gotta have him on. We got to have him on before he goes Robin Robins.
It says, now, this guy, he was an executive VP for Research and Partnerships at Purdue, so he's been at a you know, at a big school. He's actually from India. I don't know, uh, you know, we'll see.
Okay, okay, anybody else want to call please.
Do the story it's in there is on a Daily Star who wrote, who.
Wrote, yeah, I saw I saw that out publicly?
Who put it out? Ali Wolfe wrote that all eighteen members of the search committee were unanimous in the recommendation to the board to pick Garamella.
So so they did hire the second in charge? I think, didn't they yesterday at a lower rate?
Oh? I don't know.
Yeah, they hired somebody yesterday, the guy who who's active, Oh, John Arnold. I think so if they hired somebody, yes, I think he was interim. Now he's now the second guy in command or second person in command.
All right, So oh Arnold was with the Board of Region.
I don't know, well, you know, I think, but I think he took a job. But I think he took a job and then just for the interim, and then he decided to.
Just It says that he says there was no formal timeline for the search, though at the beginning of the process of a discussion about moving quickly yea of YadA, yadda. It doesn't say. It says Darrimela is not expected to start right away if the regions vote to offer him the position on Friday, there's a Border Regions meeting on Friday. He was still needing to negotiate his departure from the University of Vermont. Sources told The Star that he will most likely begin his tenure closer to October.
Okay, yeah, so we try to get maybe uh, doctor doctor Robinson before he he likes.
To come in here, you know, the new studio. Yeah, yeah, because yeah, well we don't want him to be Yah, we went on to come here. Your corner is a real mess over there.
No, no, no, I'll clean up if my corner is the problem in this place. You've got your priorities all messed up. You know where we're at, right.
That's like my daughter's room. Have you been outside and it's a little dungeony up there, little dungeon.
That's kind of nice.
What about the people, man, Our boys might be listening now, Stephen meeball might be listening.
They know, Exac's why we're we're going to higher Red District.
They got to finish that McDonald's before we get started over there, though it's not done yet. Then on the corner out there, all right, anyway, Okay, that's it. I brought that up because it's an important piece, right, I mean, you know there's already discussion on social media, but no, do you just guys care about sports. It's not you know, all that kind of stuff. And how important it's gonna be. I mean, again, it was part of the interview process
when you know, when I was on the community. We have to we have to find out what they think about about athletics, and it has to be a big piece of what they do. So hopefully, I don't know. I don't know if they're this thing with the border regions on Friday that because they're gonna they're gonna talk to him, and if it's gonna be a uh something public where we get to meet him or not. But I don't know. I'm not I guess I don't.
I know.
Yeah, well to start, so start been a while, been a while, but seven months eight months uh since you know, since all this stuff started to happen.
Yeah, okay, And again, I don't want anybody to think that I'm like, I don't know this guy. Is he good? Is he not good? I have no idea. I'm not making any kind of comment about that. I just think that we have some expectations. President ought to be and we hope if this is the guy, that he's the guy.
Well, do you think that the committee bettered everybody? Or maybe they did that everybody and then they just said this is the guy.
Well, and if they did and we missed it, then I apologize if I made it seem like this this process wasn't as public as it needed to be. I just remember again being on the committee when the committee interviewed candidates. The interviews were public. Now, if those things happened and we didn't see them or hear about them, then that's on us. If they didn't happen and they just zeroed in on one guy and they're bringing that one guy, that's that's where I think. I feel I
have a little bit of an issue. So maybe we'll find out from Alio.
Send your letters to Jay if he has an issue attention issue.
I have a tension issues.
I was with somebody today. I won't say whom that Jay, he really holds gredges donet.
He said that, come on, man, I don't have a lot of them. I said, I just have some good, juicy ones, that's all.
Aren't all grudges juicy? As long as I don't see you an ID or dateline.
Yeah, no, you don't see me on dateline. I'm not you know, I don't go that far.
That far, Okay, I said, I'm sorry, you're right, but I don't. I'll stop there.
Okay.
Cool.
So we have we have Jeff score in as as a color called to say, and we have at four seventeen. We'll have breaking news, a lot of stuff going on, even with the quarterback from Arizona. I'm sure you saw that. We'll talk about that break. You do what I'm talking about, okay, Yeah, not apply to your jersey. So we'll take a break.
Yeah, he walked up, and I'm like, really, what do we do? Well? Nothing else to word, Tom Brady jersey, right, you find you find it under your spare tire in your truck, figured up, as.
Long as he's not wearing your Montana jersey. Okay, we'll take the break and then come back with breaking news.
Sounds good,