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Less than an hour away from kickoff. We have the college Football National Championship game on our radio station between Ohio States and Notre Dame. Let's bring in our next guest, because I've misbehaved with the clock and I hate to keep him waiting. Pleasure to spend some time with Rick new Heisel last week here in Park City, and Rick joins us now on a Monday, Rick, Happy Monday, sir, How are you?
I am fantastic Spence. How you doing man? And that was that song that you brought me back with? Is that just trying to explain to the listeners how old I am? What the heck you're doing?
You know, I hate to blame my producer, but Porter decided to play it must just been the California Ties. It's a wonderful song, Rick, is it not.
It's a great song. It was written in the sixties, performed in the sixties, and so am I a video product of the sixties. So there you have it?
Okay, fair enough? Well, I wanted to bring some of the because I thought it was so fascinating listening to you discuss the future of college football last week during the daunt List Capital event that we did, and people really enjoyed what you had to say, and I actually it kind of gave me some hope, so I wanted to bring that conversation on air. We're, of course, in Salt Lake City, where the home of the University of Utah Brigham Young plays their college ball about forty forty
five miles away. In the hypothetical I kind of posed to you. I indicated it felt like we're headed towards a pro model, and you kind of pushed back a little bit on that, and I thought your answer was well thought out and very well articulated. So for our listeners, who of course didn't have a chance to hear it, the Rick new heisil take on the future of college football and specifically where you think Utah and BYU could fit in well.
Currently, if you subscribe to the theory that, as the old man said to his son one day, the answers money, Now, what was the question. If you subscribe to that theory, then we are headed to super late and that is going to be incredibly successful. And there's going to be a little bit of a kind of a gumball rally as to which teams make the field and how big the field. Actually, is is it the SEC and the Big ten? Are they going to take some you know, folks from the Big twelve and the ACC that are
currently positioned well? And really, if you choose to do that, which the big money people might very well and the television executives might very well, you're basically just saying it's it's all a product of timing, right, Stanford ten years ago would have been in the Big ten, but ten ten years later after they didn't, you know, keep up with the Joneses with admissions, they're now in the ACC. Utah given their amazing rise from Mount West to Pac
twelve now to the Big twelve. And I know it was an off year for the Utes given the injuries, but Utah could very well be on the right side of the line, as could be why you've given a ten win season. So these are things, But why would we do that? Why would we limit the amount of opportunities that were providing young people? Remembering that only three percent of these kids and that's a high number, are going to get a chance to play professionally, So why
would we do that? Why would we limit educational opportunities? I would offer that we can keep everybody. There's currently one hundred and thirty three teams in Division one. We can keep everybody. What we have to do is make the smaller leagues, those who aren't as attractive as television attractive.
And the way you do that is you borrow the European soccer model of promotion relegation, So you get these smaller conferences able to win their way into the big conferences, and the big conference seller dwellers who are just raking money off the top, they have to go to the other leagues and earn their way back. And I think
we'll get a competitive model. We'll have way more popular television inventory, and my fingers across, that'll be the choice because that will keep as many scholarships as is possible, which is exactly what the whole enterprise was created for.
And I love your anecdote about you being a walk on ultimately needing to kind of maintain the space for people to have the same experience you did. Right.
Yeah, Rick Kuhuisel doesn't exist in the future. I mean he doesn't get to play at UCLA. He can find his way to Division two and so forth, but to get a chance to run out on the field and see that rose in the center of it, and to be the MVP of a Rose Bowl doesn't happen. That's not fair. There are guys out there that deserve that chance, that have worked their tails off, and I got my
fingers crossed that we'll do the right thing. And the leaders, more importantly, the leaders of college football who are going to be offered extravagant sums of money, will be willing to say, listen, let's push a little of that back in the table and remember who this is really for.
So perhaps the role of private equity and venture capitalist funds in college football isn't as topical or interesting to
certain listeners as it is to me. But I find it fascinating that we could be moving into a space, Rick, as you know, where college football teams at some point and we're seeing a little bit because college football teams have general managers, some of them have cap experts and a ton of lawyers to make sure they're following the rules, but ownership structures could potentially eventually look like the NFL. Do you feel like that's also becoming closer and closer to a reality.
Well, in certainly the Big Twelve where Utah resides and also the ACC it's a reality because their face right between the eyes with this proposition of the House settlement, which is going to cost them some measure of twenty million dollars a year annually to pay their players. That's just going to happen. And if it doesn't happen, it's even worse news because we're going to lose that lawsuit. That number will be exponentially high higher and will lose programs. Again,
the goal for me is preserve all the programs. So what has to happen is we have to keep looking at how we're going to provide the resources for the enterprise. We didn't look in the future. We kept breaking off the table, even though the golden goose was even getting more golden and fatter. And at the end of the day, now the Supreme Court has realized that these are employees, These kids are working hard, and they're not getting enough
of the proceeds. So now that they're going to we've got a restructure, and in restructuring, I hope that private equity will be included. That doesn't make it bad, that doesn't make it professional. It just means that we're borrowing some money for a good return that will make this all make sense. And again, if you don't think of this through the eyes of how much am I going to make, but how many scholarships I'm going to retain? And I know that sounds Pollyanna will be better off for it.
I wanted to move over to a conversation you and I had about the Pac twelve because when we got on the phone, you were good enough to give me some time. We discussed you know what I perceived to be and look, I know it's yesterday's news, but I don't get a chance in view you on the show
very often. And I'm still sad about it because as a student at the University of Utah in the late nineties, I understand how the past twelve changed, not just the athletic department but the school that I attended, and when it collapsed, I just I was pretty bummed out. And it's a new day, it's a new world Utahs on
the the Big twelve. But you have kind of a little bit of a different take, and I don't want to speak for you, but potentially George Klaoff cough kind of falling on the sword and maybe a bit of an unfair way. Is that a fair way to to kind of articulate your your sentiment.
I think it's too easy to point at the commissioners Larry Scott and George Klayoff Cooff as the villains here. Maybe they made some four decisions, and retrospectively, I think they would both agree that they have. But at the end of the day, it was the president's of the PAC twelve that overvalued their worth, that overvalued what television
was going to pay for them. The time zone on the West Coast isn't as valuable as the time zone on the East Coast, and because of it, they kept saying, well, we're worth the same as the Big ten, going back to the days when you know, the PAC twelve would kind of dominate the Rose Bull and how in the world are we going to take less money than the Big ten. They turned down a deal just the year previous that would have been the equal of the Big twelve,
and did so because of their ego. And I think therein lies the problem, not really an educated understanding of what the economics were in television, and the presidents need to be held accountable for that.
All right, before we get to tonight and that will be where we end. I wonder what the Rick new heisill take is on the new expanded twelve team CFP now that we're about to see it culminate with its final game tonight.
I love it. I love that we've shared the wealth in terms of opportunity. I love that Boise State was in it. Never mind that they didn't win. They played a big time game if they don't turn the ball over, and how many football games can we say that about. I love that SMU in year one, taking no money from the ACC for television, got in. They proved that, you know, it's exciting for fall can be played by teams that were in the last year or in a
group of five. That's wonderful stuff. Indiana is a wonderful story. We talk all the time about the Cinderellas of college basketball and what makes the college basketball tournament so fun. That's exactly what we see. And when the scores were an insighted everybody said, well, it's we were wrong to do it. Look at the NFL playoffs in Week one. They were one sided except for the Commander Tampa game. It's just the way it is. It doesn't always turn out to be, you know, a final minute finish, but
at the end of the day, it was fantastic. It will absolutely keep the parody and recruiting from sea to shining sea. People will know they can get to the playoffs from any portion of the country and that's great news for the game of college football.
So we move over to tonight with two blue bloods and I'm sure the power Brokerson.
I'm here in Atlanta. I'm here in Atlanta, and you know, my mom and dad are from the Midwest. Their names are Dick and Jane. I was this close to be a named spot, but I am in with a bunch of Dick and James from all over the Midwest. They brought the Midwestern weather to Atlanta. It's about twenty five degrees. They were having the time of their life. It's like I'm watching a group of people that are at the Elks Club having Friday night fish rye. It is the
greatest thing. And I am enjoying these two brands getting ready to go to battle.
I love it. Do you have a feel for which fan base will be better represented tonight.
I'm going to guess Ohio State's going to be probably sixty forty in the majority. A lot of red jerseys around here, a lot of excitement about their first national championship since twenty fourteen. They have the opportunity to be the first in the CFP to win the championship and the first in the twelve team format to win the championship, which is wonderful. Notre Dame's trying to get their first championship since nineteen eighty eight when Doctor lou was their coach.
Who'll see if they can get that done. If they can get the game to the fourth quarter, they're in it. But I'm picking the Buckeye.
All right, my friend, will since you're there and you're busy, we will set you loose and I will say a very big thank you for not just your time today but your participation last week. It was fun to see you, Okay, it was a blast.
Your dad was a blast as well. Please giving my best and college football fans enjoy the evening. It's a great night for the game. The game always delivered.
Yes, it does. The great Rick new Heisel played high level quarterback when he was playing his college ball at UCLA. Spent a little bit of time in the pros as well, probably better known as a coach at a very high level where he won a Rose Bowl. Spent time coaching at Colorado, spent time coaching at you dub where he won his Rose Bowl. Was with the Ravens for three years, then took over at UCLA, and now he's doing the
broadcast thing with CBS. So we appreciate his time. And we have the College Football National Championship coming your way in about forty minutes from right now, so stay tuned.