Set.
You're only thirty days to kick off for Utah football right here on your home of the Ute, ESPN seven hundred and ninety two one FM, presented by Camclad.
All Right, sports fans, welcome back.
It is the Drive with Spence Check. It's here on ESPN seven hundred and ninety two to one FM, Proud to be a part of Utah's ESPN Radio network.
I'm Scott Mitchell filling in for sent today and the rest of this weekend.
So it's been here all week and I feel like I have a lot. I feel like it's home now. If you missed part of the show, don't worry. Just go download the ESPN seven hundred Sports app or go to ESPN seven other sports dot com and you can get You can live stream this, you can catch the podcast version. You don't want to miss a moment of what we talk about, because we talk about the most important things, the things you care about, the things that are interesting, the things that move the needle.
We're doing it all right right now.
Speaking of doing it, we have none other than former Ute and BYU wide receiver coach Guy Holiday joins the program.
Guy, how are you today?
I'm great Scott, How are you doing? Man?
I'm living the dream and it's not a nightmare, so I cannot complain.
I am. I'm a happy camera.
You.
So tell me what are you up to these days?
I own a a sports training facility actually twenty six thousand square feet down here, and so that got my health back good. So, uh whatever, So.
Do you know, because it's fall camp started, you know that the juices are flowing and uh, and your facility looks amazing, and you know there's something about that. I would love to do myself to just kind of work with athletes and develop and train. But so it sounds really cool. But uh, do you do you miss coaching? Do you miss when it gets to be this time of year and you're you're finally starting up again?
You know that that's I go back and forth. I certainly I missed the camaraderie of being around you know, fellow coaches. I miss I missed the players. Uh, but you know, the grind of it. I think you I miss it, but uh, you just want it kind of controlled, you know. And quite honestly, the last year and a half when I was at Utah, I got ill and it just wore me down it, you know, and and it goes that way sometimes, but no, yeah, of course
I miss it. I think there's nothing better than a Saturday night football game, and uh so, sure you missed that and the ability you don't have the ability to compete anymore, but that competitiveness you can pass on to your to your players, and so that part of it. Yeah, I do miss that. I'm not going to say I don't.
Yeah, So who is your favorite player that you coached?
Oh, that's that's tough. I have a lot. Greg Jennings was the one that comes to mind. Uh, Reggie Barlow. Love Reggie Barlow, I love Tim Patrick. I think Tim formed a really good relationship with Tim Raylan Singleton and I'm going back to Utah days. Of course, it's hard to say, Uh, you gotta include Jordan Leslie considering he's my stepson, and uh so you all that comes. It's been so many good players that I've been fortunate enough
to be around. But you know this, and being a former player, it's I think what you really take pride in is what they become as men. And that always meant something to me. I mean, Sampson, the Corps, you know, I love coaching Samson and he was a character, so you know, you love I used to always say the ideal thing is to have characters with character and and and I think that those are the guys I missed.
And uh, but it's so many through the years. I mean, I think one day I sit down, I think it's like thirty four or thirty five NFL players that I coached. So hopefully I made an impact on those guys when I had them. And and you know, you go from there.
It's quite a list. You just let you just named. I mean, I throw all those guys, I'd be happy to do that. So they're great players. I just remember. I don't know why I remember this, but when I was when I was recruited to go play in college and I was recruited by b why you and h and Lavelle Edwards And we had a conversation one time. It just stuck with me, and it was and and
he actually told me who his favorite players were. And I just I just found that, I don't know, fascinating, that he actually he actually had favorites and that he was willing to tell me who they were. And and that was it was a short list too, But I don't know, it was just it was just fascinating.
And then.
I was just going to say, you know, I coached, Uh, you know, I coached at my high school and and I had never thought anything could be as satisfying as punt being a player, like it was the coolest thing in the world, you know, to go play football and play it at the level I did.
But man, you talk about having.
An impact on these these young men's lives, and it was really it became really satisfying and really cool to me that you could go back and uh and actually teach someone else something and they get it, and then to watch them succeed at it and and excel. I was like, I don't know that this is less than being a player. In a lot of ways, it's even more satisfying.
I think for me being a coach and having played at at every level, being a coach was far more rewarding. Which you know, once you get to college and then in the NFL, it's a job. It's the rewards, Uh, once you get to a certain level really comes in winning and uh, when you are a coach, the rewards is watching someone develop and and helping them become not only a good football player, but a better person, you know, And that's that's been fortunate for me. I left one
person off the list. One of my all time favorite tape to go back, Grick Covey. But anyway, Yeah, I mean he's when you talk about I think the thing is a coach that you love the most. Yeah, it's fun to coach talented guys, but it's probably funner to coach a guy who maybe not have as much talent, but he puts in so much work and you just watch him get rewarded for the hard work. And I think that's so pleasurable for me.
Yeah, I could totally see that now. I also know that these young men are still young men. Brain's not fully developed, and it comes with challenges. What was the most challenge, because it would just drive me nuts, What was the most challenging part of coaching these young men and knowing that they're going to just do stupid things from time to time.
I think the first thing that's most challenging is getting young people to understand that football is not a right, it's a privilege, and understanding all the work that has to go and to be successful. And I don't know. You know, obviously social media was influential when I was when I was coaching. Now it's it's worse. And so I think one of the most frustrating things even now, that I see people look at a thirty second clip
of glory and they never look at the story. They never look at how hard it is to be successful, and that that was nerve wracking. And of course, you know, being in in the NFL and college, one of the toughest groups to coach are receivers when it comes to managing egos and this whole class thing going to class, and so those were the things that you struggle with and you you knew that you just had to stick with it long enough to where the light bulb came on.
And I think that when you say about rewarding, that's the most rewarding thing. When they find they wake up that morning, they walk in and it's like, who is this guy? This? This is the guy that I wanted him to be. And I think that that so the frustrating part is watching him screw it up over and over again, no matter how many times you try to
tell him, uh. And I'm a parent, so that's just like your kids, and and then watching that light bulb come on, and then and and maybe the most disappointing thing are the ones that you couldn't reach or they made a poor decision that affected the rest of their lives.
Uh, you were born in Baltimore. Did you grow up in Baltimore.
I grew up born in Baltimore. Spent a big part of my time in California, between Baltimore and California. Most people know, my dad was something owing, my mother was Cuban and so came from a totally different background, and so I, you know, spent so much time in California, in the Bay Area, and then of course southern Californi and then but most of my life that I can recall, I went to some school in California. But back to Baltimore. Yeah,
so on the West side of Baltimore. I always try to tell people to ask me where, and I tell them exactly where the wire happened. I grew up in the Murphy Home Projects.
Actually, my agent is from Baltimore. I spent a good deal of time there and I've had crabcakes. That's what I want to talk about. Have you ever had crabcakes? I lost crabcakes.
If you've never had a Maryland crabcake, you haven't had a crack cake.
It is.
It is different. It's no filler, it's blue crabs straight from the Chesapeake Bay and it's it's to die for. And I actually have crab meat ship out and I make my crack cakes.
Here, So I have done that before, believe it or not, I actually have. H So why was it like? What was it like at USC?
And I ended up there? Obviously the summer and tradition helped me being my first year at high school in California health and it was at that time USC recruited the East Coast pretty good. I mean when you the Chip banks from Augusta, Georgia. You know, when Pete Carroll got back, he started going back to Jersey. So I it was a natural for me. I would go down to the camps every summer because they wanted to get
me out. The house didn't want me hanging around, and so my uncle would flop me out if I wasn't already in California and go And that's how it ended up.
Wow, what was your What was it like?
It was at that time probably that some of the most talented people I've ever been around, whether it's Kobe Brenner, whether it's coming in when Marcus Allen is leaving, you know, there's uh leaving and seeing Junior say out come in. I mean the players were and you know back in that time, you weren't transferring. I called home and told my mother I wanted to come home, and she asked me, did I realize how long the greyhound bus ride was back to Baltimore? So that didn't go well for me.
It was great. The tradition was great, you know Jr. The first year and then Ted told the b why guy? Uh So, I wouldn't trade it for anything.
Honestly, Yeah, I find I just like, to me us he is like the standard bear.
Like every kid, that's the first place they want to go.
And I and and then if they don't, you know, then they go somewhere that you know, like a lot of kids Utah gets, they want to play USC every year, you know, if they can't join them, they want to play against them every year, and and and and I just I was just curious to what, you know, what it was like to be there and uh so interesting?
Well it was it was a ball and like you said, I think every kid. Hell, when I got to Utah, that was the one game I circled on the schedule every year. You know, I know Utah b y U is huge obviously, but you know, for me personally, it was always Utah. I see.
So, speaking of U b y U and Utah, you coached at both of these schools. Uh, tell me a little bit about that, Like what was similar about these two schools?
I think that there there is because and Kyle will probably kill me for saying this, but there are a lot of similarities with Wit and Bronco menden Hall in the defense and the high effort. I think, how can I The big difference for me, and I always try to describe this like b y you is I've never coached a place like that where if you are walk outside, everybody knows you. If you go, you know, did something, and everyone knows you. So that was tough, and that
was that was challenging. It was somewhat like that at Mississippi State, but you know that was different. Uh, certainly, Uh Utah. What I loved about Utah the people, the people were great. It was you know, a little bit more diversity for me, not being LDS a lot more diversity. But I think I had the george of being under two two really good head coaches and two defensive minded head coaches and two people who don't will never realize
how similar they are from a football philosophy standpoint. Uh So, I mean, I love with With is my guy. You know, I don't have a not close to Bronco. We we communicate every now and then. But I mean Utah is just for me. That was going to be my last job, just because of the I came to Utah for one huge reason. I told with this, you know, to me, Utah was everything that FS was. It was punch you in a face, defense, run the ball down your throat, and make some big plays. And it was about toughness.
It was so much about toughness when I first got there, and I just that's who I am as a person, you know, coming from humble background, underside and you know, you just gotta be tough. And uh So, I really loved that culture. Both both the universities are very unique, you know, being down in as uh and and UH and Provo, it's it's different. I mean, everybody's so they're really not you know, all the time and that's not my reality with with people. And then but just coming
coming to South I love Salt Lake City. I think Salt Lake City is one of the most under valued cities in the country. As far as I had a great experience that I love being close to Park City. Uh So they were both very unique experiences. And if someone asked me, you know, would you go back to either one of those? Yeah, you know, I think with Kliney being there, and then you know, always with with is.
I love Kyle Whittingham. I can't say enough about him, and I think people are don't expect much from Utah, but I just like, I don't know how you can know Kyle Whittingham and think that he was going to walk away last year.
There's no way that is.
I've worked for two people that hated lou as much as as much as any two people I've been around, and they wore it on that sleeve. Kyle Whittingham and Jackie Sheryl. You love winning the boy when you lost, you knew, you knew that freaking Sunday meeting and that Monday meeting and just get through Tuesdays practice and it's like, yes, you know, and but that's what you love about him. He taught.
He told me that.
He says, he said, I get after my coaches on Sunday he goes, he goes, I get after him.
No, you can't be a meek individual, you know, and worked for Kyle Whittingham. What I loved about with he asked your input, He asked honest questions and if you gave him honest answers and if he got after you and you were up to the challenge, he always respected that. And that's what I love about him. It wasn't He's not the people have this say only beat you up. No, I never. He never wants to beat me up. And he was always when he came at me, he always
wanted feedback. And that's what I will always respect about him. Uh.
He's just He's a tough minded, just straightforward, honest person.
That's who he is and that's what he wants. So I'm I.
I have been perplexed by this for ages and and I do the color for the for Utah and half for the last year eight years, you know, alumni all that stuff, and watched.
This for years and we threw the heck out of football.
When when I was at Utah and and and they don't throw the heck out of the football now and then. I'll be honest, it's a little hard to watch, but but I I work through it. How do you get your receivers where there's so many they're so limited in their opportunities, you know, I mean just just they warm up before the game, they're catching the ball and it might be two hours of actual time before they see
their first pass. I mean, you know, I think that's hard, and you know, and to stay focused and then to actually make a play, and usually it's like on third it's a critical situation, you know, And uh, how do you keep your guys focused when when they're their opportunities to catch the football kind of are limited.
I think what you have to go in is be honest with them and just really sell the point that it's not how many balls you get, it's what you do with the ones that you do get. And if you pout and you're so frustrated, I can promise you and my experience, when the opportunity comes, you're not going to be able to perform because you're in your own mind. And it's certainly I think when I when I first got there. It was certainly a lot easier with a rod.
We did throw it around a little bit. I think if you go back my first year with Luod, we did throw it. I think a lot of people forget University of Washington game we had five two or three receivers close to one hundred yards. I think it was three. So I think you do throw it. I think what people misunderstand about Kyle Whittingham, he is not anti throwing the football. He does not walk in and tell a coordinator you got to run the ball. He walks in
and he's all he wants is success. And you know, I was there with Troy Taylor and Troy we I think we were together two years and we threw the hell out of it. But you know, the hard thing in football is understanding your offense and defense, and teams have to compliment each other. And so I think people misunderstand with Witt wants to score points. And I can
tell you that, and Wit has no problem throwing the ball. Now, what he doesn't want to do is go for a straight series of three and out right you know which is And you know when Lud came, Lud was very much from coaching a receiver standpoint. I think that's when it got a little challenging because, and you know, being in the NFL, you're zipping down receivers to go dig out will backer or going up to the strong safety to make the key block on power. And I never
lied to a kid when I was recruiting them. I never would never tell a kid, hey, we're going to throw it a hundred times, you're going to be the starting receiver. I never did that. So I think you got to sell them on the fact that this is how the NFL plays, and you got to be able to take advantage of it when you get your opportunities.
I love it, I love the conversation, really enjoyed this. Appreciate your time today and wish you all the best of luck with your adventure you got going there.
It sounds sounds really exciting. And take care.
Hey, I appreciated Scott. And I'll tell you who I ran across about. I was in Atlanta a couple of months back, and I ran across Robert Torche and I'm sure that you remember. Oh yes, that's right, brother. I appreciate it.
All right, he be good here, All right, there you have a guy Holiday, former wide receiver coach at Utah.
Very fascinating stuff, really cool. Love love the interview.