The following presentation is brought to you by The Pride of ODU, the official NIL collective of Old Dominion Athletics. Be a Monarchist. Join The Pride. Hey Monarchs, we're back. Old Dominion loses to James Madison. 35 32. We're all bummed. That sucked. But, uh, Aaron, Gary, otherwise, how are y'all feeling? Yes, I need it. Is that sufficient? Gonna tell us a story.
For those listening on Spotify, that was Jameson and beer for Aaron and I. I will say it is the, uh, I know it's hard to see, but it's the Monarch Afterglow Brewing Official beer. Of the pride of ODU collective can't be enjoyed after a win or a loss. I will note, uh, talk to Josh. They, the new Monarch batch is in the stills right now. They're hoping it'll be ready for the Marshall game, but we're not sure yet. All right. So where do you guys want to start with this loss? There's a lot to cover.
Yeah. I mean, I think I know we don't have a call from Garrett today, but it'd be a good time for the Duke of discipline to call in. Um, four first downs given by being off sides, a couple of those plays, they weren't even gonna snap the ball. I don't think we had really done that at all this year in some of the situations. But for some reason last night, I don't know if it was the way they're using their cadence or if they were moving and the refs couldn't see or what.
But, uh, that that's just purely unacceptable to have those kind of penalties to extend drives. And you saw it show up in the defense late when they were gassed and beaten up and couldn't make stop. Gonna say we only had eight penalties, 59 yards, but so many of them were just Backbreaking penalties. Yeah, they they heard tremendously. On those obvious snap hard counts that they're not going to really run a play. They're just trying to get us to jump off sides. I'd almost prefer the deal.
I just stand up like, don't get the penalty. You can't you can't do that. Also, note, we were one of 11 on third downs. And I'm going to get it done. No, I think that has a lot to do with how poorly we play on first and second down to. We didn't have many third and shorts. There were a third and 10 plus on almost every time. And it was just brutal, but yeah, one of 11 is. that make your stomach turn.
Yeah. And Ricky, Ricky has actually talked about that earlier this season is third down is kind of like the, uh, what would you say? The illness. But the symptom is really what happened before. Or maybe I've got that backwards. But, you know, it looks like third down is the problem. But Really, it's not. It was the stuff before. And he talked about that in the post game presser of like 1 of 11 on 3rd down.
And he's like, when I see the efficiency for 1st and 2nd down, I bet that that looks pretty terrible too. And we kind of put ourselves in a bad spot. Um, but I, I don't know, I think just like starting the night off, Ballard was dead. It was a library to start that game. You could feel it on the sideline that the guys were flat. The crowd, the entire crowd, JMU fans included, were flat. Like, I didn't really feel like that place came to life until Mario Easterly blew up.
Then it was like the crowd woke up and realized there was a football game going on. And it wasn't like there was anything terrible going on with ODU. Like we, we gave up a touchdown on the opening drive. We came right back and scored a touchdown on our opening drive. Like good football game. But man, you could hear a mouse fart in there. It was, it was awful. Um, speaking of that Easterly block, that gifted us a nice touchdown. Short Aaron Young, three yard rush.
Um, thinking about what this game would look like without that block kick. We'll I don't want to think about that. That's a very ugly picture. We have a lot of things going for us there in that first to second quarter range. Like one, the way the TV timeout stacked, I think we had eight plays on the field with book ended with four TV timeouts. So just kill the momentum, kill momentum.
But the good side of that is we were able to, like, go down and score a touchdown and there's no time out and kick off, get a stop, do some more things. So I feel like we had the momentum and like no more TV timeouts. Um, I think the worst thing that happened to this team was that we had halftime because a very different team or at least a very different offense came out of that locker room in the second half.
And I, once again, we're sitting here talking about how an opposing defense made really good halftime adjustments and we had no answer for it. We just looked more confused out there in the second half. So, yeah, second half was brutal until that garbage time touchdown drive. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, let's start, let's start at the very beginning of the second half. Go ahead, Mike. First drive, three plays, zero yards. Second drive, five plays, 25 yards. Punt. Third drive, five plays, 43 yards.
Punt. Next one, three for eight. Three for negative two. Three for negative seven. Uh, just brutal. I mean, you, you pointed this out in a text message to us last night. Opening play of the game. We ran like a stretch play, like an outside zone. I don't know if it's outside zone or stretch. And Aaron got like 13 or 14 yards. And Jamie, you look confused by that because they were kind of loading the box. And then now they have to go and respect the outside lanes as well.
Colton took advantage of those outside lanes, but we never really went back to anything that wasn't Between the tackles running. And if you saw the adjustment that Jamie made, they put more guys in the box. They pressed more on the receivers on the outside to make sure we didn't get burned by a quick hitter. And they just laughed as we continued to try to run into the teeth of their defense. I mean, we have one of those drivers you were just talking about.
We ran the ball up the middle three straight times and got like two yards. Like, well, what are where have we gone with the offense to where we're not trying to stretch the field and spread the field and get in between those guys? Like Jamie just loaded the box. They were right. We could have taken the end around on multiple occasions for for six. And the times we did do that was when Colton kept. And you saw what happened. Good things occurred.
So speaking of the offense, um, obviously we have an issue with pass blocking last night. Their defensive line outplayed our offensive line. I think that's safe to say. Right. Um, but we didn't see many designed quick throws. We didn't see any quarterback rollouts to kind of maybe extend the play a little bit. I think the only one we saw that was the, was the two point conversion. Right.
Yeah. Only when I remember, um, And these are all things that we were criticizing early in the season and we seem to have fixed around Bowling Green and that's when the offense kind of came to life, right? I mean, Colton was a part of that, but it was playing better with Grant even in the game. Um, but the last two weeks we reverted back to what was plaguing us early this season where we're taking too many deep shots.
We're not getting to outside the tackles on runs and the middle of the field isn't used really at all. I don't know. It's just like we figured out what was plaguing us. We fixed it and then we decided, uh, that wasn't what fixed. We'll just go back to what we had all along and I don't get that. A lot of, a lot of head scratching from the offensive side of the ball. Um, coach Rahne talked about the communication issues, mainly in the protection.
There were several plays that I think were probably like RPO type designs or like play action. Something where there's action to the running back and there's guys running routes where half the offensive line is blocking one way and the other half is blocking the other and they leave the wrong guy open or they just let a free rusher come in.
So it was just, it was just a mess top to bottom, especially in that second half of like basic fundamental things that have not been a problem for us this year. All of a sudden they're like, just killing us on, on every drive. Like this sacks are brutal on the first and second down. Cause you end up in those third longs and you don't convert them. Yeah. And I'm thinking to our, like excluding the last drive that we have, or we went down and scored and got the two point conversion.
The only real big pass plays we hit were to Isaiah Page to the middle, like post routes or deep crossers, something like that. Isaiah Page made one hell of a catch. By the way, that ball coming straight over the top of him, they dove and made the catch in double coverage. And the other one was on that first drive when we were driving down. That was the big chunk play pass. Um, but I mean, outside of that, we, we didn't have any success in the passing game, Mike.
No, um, I think I looked earlier in the second half, we were one of eight passing before that last drive. That includes drops. There was two drops in there, but overall, that's just, that is brutal. Mike, where were those two balls dropped? What route and where in the field, little skinny posts, little seven, 10 yard posts to the middle. I guess an eight man box. I mean, if he catches those, this game probably looks very different, maybe. I don't know. Maybe. We don't block a punt.
Like you said, we don't block a punt. This game looks different. There's a lot of stick attack stuff, but like we, we did not execute or game plan well enough to win that game. And it, it's just so frustrating, man. Yeah, I can't disagree there, but there's one ploy that I still don't understand how they did. Colton was running, he went to go slide, but he's still on his knees and the guy comes in leading with the crown of his helmet, hits Colton in the side, knocks, tackles him.
They don't review it at all. And then I went back and watched it today and it still looked like a targeting to me, but the announcers from ESPN were like, yeah, that's not a targeting. He didn't lead with the crown of his helmet. It was like, He was literally leading with his helmet. That's the crown, right? I don't, I don't know, but I don't want to blame penalties or lack of That's not what lost us this game. Um, we lost this game.
There were, there were two non calls on pass interference for us in that second half. But, like, okay, we might have gotten a pass interference call on that. But neither of those receivers were open and neither of those balls were very well thrown. So it's like, we cannot be depending on the officials to pull a flag out for a pass interference. Like, especially an under thrown ball to the end zone, the one with Vines.
He could have made more of an effort to come back to it, but then again, he's looking for the ball to be in front of him. So I think Colton's consistency with his deep ball is something that's going to have to really improve in the offseason. Like I, I, it's becoming like kind of a thing with him. Like some of them are beautiful and they're perfect, but got to just have more consistency there. If we want to truly stretch the field down like that. That was a shame too.
Cause we started the second, that second half off JMU pulls a Bobby Walter goes to the onside kick. We have, we recall, we, you know, we recover it, which could be a. I wouldn't even say a huge momentum shift because we really had the momentum going out of the first half leading, but we pull a stinker there. I mean, that, that, that mispass interference was on that drive. I think it might even have been the first play. Is it the first or second down? Yeah. Neat. None of them were on third down.
Um, yeah, I mean, you got, you just took the lead going into half. The light show comes out and the crowd is actually cooking. Like student section again, showed up in a huge, huge way. They were loud. Everybody was loud. We're in midfield. We just cut the field in half in a three point lead. We go up by two scores and then I just don't know what happened from there. It was just like. Watching somebody play mad and picking the wrong plays constantly.
Yeah. Yeah. But while Colton is on discussion, I need to give him credit. Last week we talked about him stepping back when pressure comes and not into the pocket. And that kind of helped lead to some of those fumbles against App State. Uh, yesterday he stepped up into the pocket once that pressure started coming to him really well. He got hit quite a bit yesterday and we did not see those fumble issues. So this kid is learning on the job.
He is still a freshman trying to find his way, but it's nice to see that immediate change of someone learning Yeah, learning and implementing, it's easy to learn something, but when the game's going and things are happening fast to actually do what you've been taught and put it into practice, that, that is encouraging. And I hope he doesn't get discouraged on that because there were a couple of times where he stepped up in the pocket and it kind of became a cage on him and he couldn't run.
But in those instances, he did the right thing with his feet, because if he drops back or rolls out, he's probably going to lose a lot more yardage against that four man front. So I don't want to be discouraged because he was much better with his footwork in the pocket. Yeah, I just felt like that needed to be mentioned since we did call it out last time. Um, another great game from Aaron Young. He's been really good for us this season. Career high and rushing yards for him.
Uh, last night, I will say we, I know I sent my note when I had no voice of established the run and stick to the run. I actually like the fact that we did that, especially in the first half, we were able to find some space. Uh, wasn't really there for us in the second half, but we didn't just go and air it out, three and out. Like we continued to try to run the ball. It just, you have to adjust that a little bit to see, just look up, like, where is that defense at?
What are those linebackers doing on every play? They're cheating in the middle, lost one outside. Um, but at least we, we did stick to the run. We were fairly balanced in that aspect. So it was a good approach. Just, I don't know. Passing game fell apart, man. Yeah. Nine of 21 with a pick five sacks. Not good enough, sir. Yeah. And there's not one person and there's not one person you can blame for that nine of 21. It was. All hands on deck.
Yeah, uh, we could absolutely be a lot more crisp in route running too. Like I feel like we kind of got a little bit lazy, a little not clean. There were some times where they could have snapped some routes to break off from some coverage and give some bigger windows for Colton and we didn't. Uh, at the same time on his end, the interception he threw was because he didn't throw the ball away. And then there was a play in the second half. I can't remember if it was first and 10 or second and 10.
He rolled towards the home sideline, ended up going out of bounds for a seven yard loss when you had plenty of room to throw it away. Those are little things you're talking about being a freshman. You you've got to do those things because they start to stack up and become problems for you. So still room for growth, but he's a freshman like that's we should be able to overcome some freshman mistakes from a quarterback when he's doing a lot of other really great things on the field.
Yeah, it just burns me. We missed a massive opportunity yesterday. That cannot be understated. So we get a great crowd in Ballard for the first time in a few games. Awesome crowd. Didn't see many open seats. It was, there were some good JMU turnout, but there was a lot more ODE fans than there were at that Tech Game. Would you guys agree? Oh yeah, that's fair. So we, we bring a great crowd in and this is a chance to earn their trust and be like, come back. You had fun. We won.
Uh, we lose out on our opportunity to control our destiny with the division race. Now we're completely out of it. Um, we now make our bowl hopes much, much, much more difficult. Like that's a long shot now. Got to win both. We're probably going to be what? Yeah. Nine, 10 point dogs against Marshall. Gary, I don't, I haven't looked. We somehow, for some reason, opened as two point favorites against Marshall.
And I want to get in my car and do the rest of this podcast, driving to colonial beach to go hammer the herd at plus two, like that line. I think the interns, the interns screwed up typing into the system. I don't know. This is as bad as Hawaii being a two and a half point favorite on Saturday at Utah state and losing 52 to 10. Like, Oh, they fixed it. Uh, Eight and a half point dogs. Yeah. Okay. So circle just got smoked by a bunch of sharks.
They, I bet they lower the maxes early on for the sharks, the sharps. So. I imagine they aren't taking that much. But yeah, that that number had to swing drastically. So I was pretty good with that ten that I threw out there. Right. Yeah. Yours is yours is more believable. This is a very good martial team. It's come to town and we're going to have to beat them just for a chance to be six and six. Yeah, that's.
I don't know how motivated anyone is to get to six and six and go to another bottom tier bowl game, like especially when you had so much like going to the game yesterday. We could have won the Sun Belt East and because Louisiana lost, we could have hosted the championship game. Like, this wasn't just like, Oh, we lost one to JMU and that sucks. It's like, no, we just lost like all of the big goals we had that would elevate this program to like the next tier, right?
Where the six and six is not the seal. And we just go into it, Mike, before we get too much into Marshall, we still got to talk about this game. So you're good. OK, well, I don't know exactly where you want to go with this game. I got a couple of things that I want to throw out there just in case. Because I made notes. I'm going to start with the things that annoyed me a little bit, and then I'll end with the positives, because that's kind of how we roll.
The first thing that frustrated me Was I, I purposely try not to hydrate too much 'cause I don't like to go to the bathroom at games. I'm afraid I'm gonna miss things. Um, but I had to yesterday, so I ran down to, to go to the bathroom. And when I was in there, the game. I should say a game was on the radio. It wasn't the old dominion game though. Uh, Gary, I think we were talking about before you say it was the USC game. Yeah. USC game. All right.
So we already know that there's discussion amongst the fan group about there's only bathrooms on the first floor. So people who live up top, you know, it takes a little longer for them. So why would we be not playing? The radio broadcast of the game in which we're at the stadium for that's frustrating to a lot of me. That makes me wonder if it was worth game. Our game is supposed to be on 94 one, right? On ESPN radio. I assume so.
I'm wondering now, like, did that get bumped off for that USC game? It might have, but if that's the case, then why aren't you pumping in Ted's YouTube live stream or something, find a way to have the game on. So people don't feel like they're missing out. That was frustrating or the ESPN you feed. Yeah, something. So that, that was one, the second one. And at first it didn't bother me as much, but after the fourth or fifth time, it really did.
When a player is injured on the ground and we don't know how seriously, I think it's extremely terrible taste to have Atlantic orthopedic product placement on the jumbotron every time there's an injury, I understand someone can sell that, but it feels pretty shitty. I don't like it. And I know people around me thought it was pretty crappy. I mean, I would be upset if there's a PA announcement, this injury timeout brought to you by so and so orthopedic.
When you go down on the field, we've got your back. And we got our income. Yeah, it just felt shitty. Well, if we're talking about that, that race, that priority race, they had to cancel and bring back, and then it screwed up the pump up video for the fourth quarter? Yeah. If there's one, I mean, I understand, you have to get your donor The corporate sponsors, you have to take care of them and follow through on what you did. Cause you're, it's hard to get those corporate sponsors.
And if you miss out on it or mess up with it, it's going to be hard to find a replacement. But if there's one sponsor that's going to understand, Hey, We messed up. We don't have time for this. We have to do this pump up video. So priority week, we're going to, we'll get you back. Right. If there's one person who's going to understand that it's Dennis Elmer. You're talking, this is the family. This is the family race. Like the, the relay, right? Is that what you're talking about?
They're going to pull them on to do it earlier. They didn't have time. So they brought it back and because they brought it back, they didn't have enough time for the pump up video. So it'll get cut in half or whatever. But what was, what was the best part about that race? We almost had another orthopedic timeout. Old dad smoked his son. He's running. I'm expecting them to blow out a hammy, but he's not, he's good. He's good. But then there's not a clean pass of the baton or the football. And he.
Just tackles a son, almost a head plant into the turf. I mean, give it to the kid. I thought he was going to get hurt, man. He popped up like a champ and he had a smile on his face, but it was brutal. The second biggest, second biggest hit of the night after, uh, Jaleel and Koa laid that dude out, but that was, I would have seen that on a loop, man. Cause they were going to win too. And then boom ball game. Yeah, that, that was, uh, That was pretty sweet.
Um, but that was not the first promotion that had the problem. Like, I don't know if you noticed the women's basketball T shirt toss. They had them in the end zone. There's 30 seconds left on the TV timeout. They hadn't started throwing those shirts yet. So I'm just glad we didn't end up with like a 15 yard penalty because refs blew the ready for play whistle and they turned around and saw, you know, 40 people standing in the end zone. Still, they were not exactly in a hurry to get off either.
And because and because they only threw through those T shirts into the suites. There's people, people online picked off about it. They were on a James's Facebook group complaining that they were just targeting the sweet people. Wheels came off last night. Fellas, the wheels fully came off last night. Now, now, now the wheels did not come off. On the toys for Todd's truck. That was awesome. Um, we got a text message from, from Harry McBrien earlier.
I'd like to thank people that were really instrumental in that. Uh, we will do it on social media also, but Alan Myers construction conquest USA for helping to transport. And some of the other things, Alpha Company, 4th Amphibious Assault Battalion, obviously Hampton Roads, Roads Toys for Tots, and then Hampton Roads Naval ROTC for going around with the Marines to collect a bunch of cash and to be able to take all those toys, get them in the Humvees and everywhere.
And then footer sport pub sports pub for catering the tailgate. Um, thank you to all those groups who really helped make this a reality. Uh, I don't know if you've gotten a message Mike, but last night during the game, Harry had told me that at that point they had collected over 7, 500 in cash. So last year was a record breaker at 5, 000. So Monarch nation and, uh, the JMU fans that came. And you guys increased this by like 50% on the cash side.
And based upon what my eyeball showed me, we probably did the same thing, at least on the toys. So thank you to everybody who came out to the game. Whether you're wearing purple or you're wearing white yesterday. Thank you so much. Aaron. What kind of vehicle was that parked over by us. That like Jeep A Humvee. That Humvee was, was packed full That, so that Humvee, we packed it up so quickly. Filled it up so fast. They left an hour before the tailgate lots closed.
Yeah, it was awesome We had people still bringing gifts long after that. Uh, I have a box. I have a box Uh here at the house of folks that were I was walking into the stadium So walk past two two dudes wearing monarchist podcast baseball hats don't know you guys but if you're listening to this Thank you very much for your support. Uh, one of which had a bag of toys and was asking where he could drop them off, pointing them towards where the AAVs were.
So hopefully they were still there, but, um, yeah, it was, it was great, man. So exciting for all the kids in Hampton roads. And while we're on the subject of positive things, um, thank you to ODAF and ODU baseball for throwing a great golf tournament this week. Me and Aaron had the pleasure of playing in it. Um, got to meet some fellow fans that were pretty cool. Russ Turner, I think Roy Connor, um, just, it was a great event. Uh, food was awesome. Weather was, could not have been nicer.
Um, so credit to Coach Finney and John Vellines for throwing a great tournament there. I'll add for some positivity here. I was back in Chartway on Friday for my first men's basketball game of the season. They won a squeaker? We'll just say they wanwonsqueaker by two. But it was good to see Mike Jones get his first career win at ODU. So I was glad to be there for part of that and also keep my streak of not seeing them lose in Chartway since twenty nineteen.
So I mean, they're just not going to go to any more games or I'm going to have to come to all of them, one of the two. Oh, I think we should have you come to more. So I know you're getting ready to jump on a plane, but you might have to jump on a plane to come back Tuesday since that's when the next home game is. Just do a daily commute. Exactly.
So those of you who are listening, uh, if you didn't get a chance to watch it, that post game presser of Mike Jones first win is on the YouTube channel. He had Devin Cesar with him, so if you haven't seen that yet, you can get it over there. Yeah, that was my first missed game in like a decade. But I got to see Sturgill Simpson rip the roof down at Hampton Coliseum, which is awesome. Um, glad you were able to see that first win, Gary and Aaron. Um, do we want to talk more about this game?
I think I just want to like zoom out and think about how this, we should not have lost this game. This is a game we should have won. If you think about JMU coming into this season, right? Their coach leaves, go to Indiana, right? Gets a better job. Takes a lot of the talent with him. Uh, other talent goes in the portal like Sun Belt Player of the Year, Jordan McLeod ends up at Texas State. They lost something like 95 percent of their offensive production from last year's team.
We get them at home after a bye and we can't win that football game. When you really like zoom out and look at it from like that high of a lens, like where are, what are we doing and where are we at? Like if JMU can put it together after losing 96 percent their production and come to our house and beat us after a buy, like we got to think long and hard about like what this program is really trying to do going forward. Because that's, that's one of those games.
You just, you can't lose from a program standpoint. Like that sets us back more than just like this one particular season. That that's, we're going to feel that loss for like two or three more years. I hate to say that, but it's the truth. Yeah. I mean, we talked about this last week, Gary, winning this game was important on so many different levels. It's important for the team, you know, as.
Being able to control their own destiny, just from a, you know, a mental aspect, but maybe even more important for the fan base. I mean, whether we want to accept it or not, Jamie has been really good at a lot of stuff for just say a decade and grabbing a win yesterday. Would have been a nice way to kind of stop that momentum and try to take it for ODU side. Like it's our time now. Our time now. Just punching back. Now we've lost three football games in a row.
I don't remember the last time we won a basketball, men's basketball at least. Um, yesterday would have gone a long way to moving that. And now, now we're gonna, you know, be dependent upon basketball to turn that tide. You know, we, hey, we love the tennis team. We don't want to have to depend on them to do it all the time.
They're carrying their weight and I'm glad that the women's tennis got recognized during the game too for four straight Sun Belt titles So they beat their rivals Your rivals so it's uh, it's frustrating. So that streak also exists in women's basketball as well I think it's all three major sports. Oh my God. No, no, let me, let me, let me get, um, if you give me a second, I can find the numbers, look at baseball, don't look at baseball, baseball. We did okay last year.
So except for the tournament, I was thinking of the years and the season. Oh yeah, that's right. Yeah. Um, yeah, but it's, it's not good. Like, I mean, I know they have some financial reckoning coming their way with the lovely Kirk Cox bill, but I mean, maybe we're going to really depend on state law, like what if that gets changed, what if a lot of state laws change now? We gotta also think about enforcement. We've never heard them even threaten to enforce that law.
And then, when it's enforced, they get a waiver period to fix it. So it just extends how long they can do this. Where'd the AG go to school again? I'm not sure where Meares went. He went to JMU. Oh, did he? Ding ding. I can't find this. We don't, we don't need to know the numbers. We know it's not good. I think we do. I think it's important to know how bad it is. Because they've been kicking our tail in the, the three sports that people have season tickets.
I don't know that I can count that high on, on my fingers. Yeah. All right. Here it is. Oh, I, I just have hoops and football. It's Oh, and three in football, obviously. Oh, and seven in basketball. Okay. I, I'm in max capacity. Take your shoes off. I'm not flexible enough to put my toes in the screen. We don't want to see that anyway. Don't worry. There's a better form for that. I think it starts with an O. We might be there to fundraise some more NIL, too.
Yeah, that's that's just like one of those wins that could have been one that launches the program. Like, can you imagine what the crowd would be like us and Marshall playing to Sun Belt East next week? And now on TV. On ESPNU, 730 kickoff, last home game, senior day, all that pump up. And now it's like, you know what those stands are going to look like next Saturday. Like I'm going to be there. My family's going to be there. You guys are going to be there.
We're gonna be rooting like hell for them, but I can't get mad at the rest of the fan base if they're not super interested in coming back for another weekend. I hope they do. But because there's a, there's a shit ton to play for. Yeah. It'd be nice to just beat Marshall. Can we talk about getting dominated by a team? That's our rival in the Sun Belt. I mean, I don't know. Remember the last time we beat them? Uh, I don't think we've ever beaten Marshall in football.
I think we're one in six or one in seven. Was it the 10 win season that we beat them? Probably so. It's been a long time. Um, yeah. We just, eventually, we have to win a game like that if we want to elevate. And we keep swinging and missing on those opportunities. Not by a lot, but we're missing. The most common thing I heard in the tailgate lot yesterday was, Our fan base needs this win. Yeah. Yeah. We needed it.
We needed to, we already mentioned the division stuff and the bowl stuff and all that, but our fan base needs something good to happen against our rivals. And that's not happening right now in the three biggest sports. Yeah. And that's not great. Not great. All right. Darkness washed over the dude. That's how I felt. When they punched in that last touchdown, that's exactly how I felt. By the way, that 58 yard pass in the third quarter by the, did you guys watch that on replay at all?
I could only, I couldn't bear to. Yeah. Our defender got caught flat footed in the back pedal. I just ran right by him. Yeah, I think we were in a zero blitz too. So it was straight single man to man. Yeah. We, we did really well last night on the defensive side when we blitzed and got pressure and made him move. 'cause he missed like probably four or five other open receivers because the pressure was on him.
But man, when it was just the three man front, he was back there baking cakes, getting his tea ready and then he'd still had time to look downfield and find open receivers because there, there's just no pressure. And you compare to that, to them when they just rushed their four man front, you know, we were, you know, two and a half, three second pocket and that was it. That's a big, big difference when you have that extra body. Did you go and charge? I'm depressed. I am too.
You know, it's going to depress you more. It's going to be freaking cold at the next game. It'd be sunny though. Yeah, I'm not worried about the cold. I know you got your heated jacket though. So damn straight, damn straight charging up both batteries. You better test that thing not inside your house before you wear that again. Cause you know, I thought that thing was gonna catch on fire last year. Yeah, that's like an EV, an EV charging in the garage.
Yeah, if those battery packs are swollen up, please don't wear them. Just put them outside in your yard and walk away. Such a big game next week. Yeah. Do you guys, do you guys think this team gets up for Marshalls? I'll ask you. Well, let me, before we answer that question, I want to ask you a question. Do you think this fan base gets up for a game against Marshalls? No. No. In the diehards, maybe. Maybe.
The diehards will be there because that's what diehards do, but the rest of the population, no. And, and I'm concerned about that. Not that we have a bunch of official data, but one data point would be we didn't get a single call this week, and we haven't had a week where we've never gotten multiple calls. So I'm concerned that fans have gone from like, uh, being upset, disappointed, anger, to apathy. Like they've, they've passed that step. The normal step is to be mad.
You know, and that will last a specific amount of time, you know, but I, I'm worried that people just pass that stuff. Yeah. Um, you could use a meme from GTA of, uh, the guy walking and goes, Oh shit, here we go again. I mean, it does feel like that. We're going to have to rally to win the last two games of the season to make whatever bowl is available to us. Possibly the Hawaii bowl on Christmas Eve. I'm sure thousands will make that trip. Um, I don't know.
I I'll be like totally honest with you. I, I am not excited to go to a bowl game at six and six. I'm not, and you all know I'm, I'm a diehard just like you are, but like that just doesn't, I'm going to go to the game. Cause I go to games and I'm going to root like hell for him. And I hope that I'm wrong, but I don't, I'm not going to get any juice about. Going to Birmingham, Alabama, and playing in a bowl game in front of nine people when it's cold.
Oh, Mike, you know, I had, uh, had never seen seen that before. Shout out this one. Oh, shit. It was more with me. PTA San Andreas. Such a great game. All right. So if you're listening, don't be like that, dude. Show up and make some noise next week. It really. Hey, this game. Yeah, we didn't win. We're all. Not happy about it. But if we win next week, good things can happen. I think that didn't sound very convincing. And I obviously get your look on your face, Gary. I did not convince you.
I'm actually less convinced now. So I need to know this for, there's a. Growing consensus on the board that, uh, and on Twitter, I'm seeing a lot of people are just ready for a new head coach. And while I'm not going to comment on how I feel about that, I will say, whatever your feelings are regarding the head coach, your feelings are valid and hurt. That's all I'm going to say. It's a understandable reaction to the game, the season and the last few seasons. Understandable.
Yeah. That being said. Whether you're in that camp or you're not, please go up next week, cheer for these players. They're working their asses off. They obviously, you know, they they want to win. Um, as a fan base, we can do our part in going out there and trying to make as much of a home field as damage as possible and beat Marshall. We beat Marshall. We've got a lot to cheer for at that a state game. And I'll say this at the FBS level.
This is going to be our first senior class that went to two bowl games, right? Other than last year's, I guess, other than last year's, but these guys have accomplished a lot here. And, uh, those seniors deserve a lot of support for when they're honored next Saturday for senior day, uh, guys like Santana Saunders, that guy's battled here all four, all of his playing time. So at least show the respect to the seniors. Come out, support them.
Um, I know how we all feel right now, but we still need to honor these guys that come here and play their hearts out for us. Yeah. Got to take care of the players for sure. Cheer them on. Cause they're definitely working hard. Um, and some of them it's last time, potentially last time they're going to play football. Definitely last time they're going to play at home. So I do.
I'm trying to think of anybody else who's really been around for quite a while on this roster, like Santana for sure been here for forever. Sure. There's some other ones I'm missing out there. Some clear guys. Oh, I will say, Seamus Hall, you, you're a player of the game, man. I mean, you've absolutely bombing some punts, burying inside the five, like. What's this game look like without Seamus Hall bombing some of those punts downfield? A lot different. He had eight punts on the night.
I was thirty nine and a half, but four were inside the 20 without a single touchback. It's pretty impressive. Gets my he gets my Jameson player of the game award. So, OK, and he simultaneously wins the pride of. Odu, the monarch, afterglow beer, award of the century. Of the century, damn. That was a really good punt. It was. He got right down there and I hung a left. I mean, if you're on the home side, I hung a left. If you're somewhere else in the field, it made a different turn.
But whatever turn it made, it was good. Yes. Hey Aaron, I think this is a good time for the The mid roll at, I think it is right. You hit the button. I'm going to go join you guys with a drink. This episode of the monarchist podcast is brought to you by the pride of ODU collective. Their mission is to elevate the experience of student athletes through name, image, and likeness, while also elevating the fan experience.
If you or your business are interested in getting involved, you can reach out to us directly or go over to the pride of ODU. com. That is the pride of odu. com. Thank you for listening and go Monarchs. So I picked this bottle Penelope, the architect. All right. And do you have something you're pouring it into? Are you going straight from the bottle? What's up? Letty? No, straight to the glass. This is a fantastic bourbon. If you guys haven't tried it, I would, uh, it's a goodbye.
It tastes better after a win or does it not matter? Everything tastes a little bit better after a win, but uh, this is really good bourbon. So you know what? I'm i'ma blame this loss on on Eli. What is that? He smoked his victory cigar at the tailgate. That's gotta mess with the football gods. In Eli's defense, he smokes a cigar every day. So it's not a uh, a victory thing for him like it is for us. It would have been weird if he wasn't smoking a cigar. Good point.
Yes. Okay. Thank you for calibrating me. Maybe we change from Fireball. We change from Fireball. We, you know what? Maybe we retire Fireball and we move to the alternate. My doctor has agreed with you. I'm ready. Fireball has been officially retired from the Monarchist tailgate. We barely need more architects. Yeah. Ugh. Ugh. Yeah, I need to shut up Motley. Justice. He hooked us up with some moonshine that did not leave the tailgate again, but this time it was two bottles.
We had a pineapple and watermelon and neither survived the tailgate. That's right. And you and Tasha looked like a couple of kindergartners eating fruit cups at the, at the kindergarten snack. Yeah. That pineapple was on the bottom of that, that fresh cut pineapple at the bottom of that moonshine jar is pretty good. It was holding in all the goodness that had been, uh, fermenting in there too. Yeah. So shout out to him. Um, I guess we need to retire the moonshine streak cause it's dead.
That's right. I guess we've retired Gary's monopoly on the postgame presser streak too. Yes, I'll just be getting hammered at the next game, so good luck everyone. Enjoy the postgame, Aaron. You're back. Yes. Oh, it's going to be a late one next week. I can see this one turning out like Georgia State last year where it just, it's not looking good at all. And everyone just migrates to the beer garden, both for warmth and for comfort in the alcohol.
And then, Hey, maybe we get some magic and get a last second touchdown again. But I just remember being really cold until we got into that beer garden and about eight or nine deep and I was in good shape. Well, if you're chilly, just get to my left. Or am I right? If I'm gonna have those batteries fired up and turned heat on to medium. The human torch. Oh, snap. Hey, I just, I just got a text message from my wife. I guess she can hear me through the walls telling me.
That, uh, that we can't retire Fireball until I get rid of these two bottles in our pantry. Maybe we retire it after the season if we don't win next week. That's why I'm bringing Fireball to the tailgate. We used to add a shot of Fireball to our apple cider, so Did you hear that, Gary and Erin? Fireball and apple cider? It's a good mixture and it's going to be a cold one on Saturday.
Hard cider with a little bit of fireball in it makes a lot of sense for Saturday I think to knock those bottles out and change our tradition of fireball shots to something better. We don't have a Wilford Brimley drop, but if we did, I would be playing it right now. Very nice. Alright, well, I'm going to, uh, grab those bottles of Fireball so I don't forget and pre stage them for next Saturday. Oh, I'll make the apple cider, I guess. How do you keep that hot?
You gonna throw that on Harry's grill, the side of it or something? Um, I think we plugged it in last time. I don't know. I don't remember what we did. Put it on the radiator. It'll be fine. Yeah, I think we'll be okay. Oh, we're definitely winning now. Yes, we, we've got all the mojo now. Our apple cider fireball that will be returning back onto the field in like the second quarter. All right, Gary, so talk to us about Marshall. Um, they're good. Um, they have figured things out.
I know I clown them a lot to begin this season talking about this air raid style of offense when they're really built for more of like a power running attack matches their defense pretty well. They've done a really good job of adjusting their offense to be really, really balanced in both the passing game and running game. Uh, they've also figured out their quarterback situation.
Finally, it was Pennington for a while, and then it was Stone Earl for a while, then it was a combination of Stone Earl and Braylon Braxton. Uh, but since Braylon Braxton has become the full time starter, their offense is, is pretty electric. Uh, he's got 13 touchdown passes this year. Uh, he can burn you through the air, but he's really, really effective on his feet. He's got 83 carries this year for 457 yards and three touchdowns. Uh, he really has been the backbone of their offense.
Uh, but you're still going to see all the air raid concepts of spreading out the field, trying to attack the defense's weaknesses with your strengths. A lot of those old Mike Leach air raid principles you see a lot throughout this offense. Uh, they can put up points in a hurry. They can also shift gears and kind of go ground and pound on you to run out the clock. Uh, and they are just now kind of starting to peak offensively. Like where I think we probably peaked in that Georgia Southern game.
They are just now starting to build upon their peak. Defensively, they are a defense you would expect from Marshall. Maybe not as strong as the, the defense they've had in the previous two years, but still easily top half. Of the Sun Belt. Uh, they're going to hit hard. They're going to cover well. They don't make very many mistakes in their coverage, uh, and they will get to the quarterback, uh, if you don't account for them there at the line of scrimmage.
So then I think that they are a better team, the JMU, just from what I've seen and what I saw from Jamie last night, they are, they have become the class of the Sun Belt East. Like they are the best team. They're significantly better than Georgia Southern. And, uh, even though they did lose to them down in Statesboro with a crazy comeback, but they're.
Probably the most complete team in the Sun Belt East and they are going to be every bit motivated to come down on Saturday because they beat us, they get JMU to end their season and that will, that could decide the East if they lose this game. So uh, looking at PFF, Marshall's defense is rated very well. Second highest in the Sun Belt, uh, to JMU, JMU's number one, but they are by far the best coverage team in the Sun Belt.
Has to do with Pash Rush being good, but Uh, that's not a good, uh, recipe for us after a game where we struggled to pass a ball against a similarly talented JMU defense. And they have not played a soft schedule at Marshall either. Like they've played Virginia Tech, they went to Ohio State. Uh, they got Western Michigan in the MAAC, who's a really good team. I think we remember their quarterback's name. Uh, but they're a really good team. Um, so I mean, they've, they've played a tough run.
Like even the cross games, uh, they had ULM and they had Southern Miss. So not the strongest, but this isn't like a team coming in. That's played a cupcake schedule to pump up those stats. They're doing it against good offenses. All right, Gary. So if I'm a Monarch fan, who am I more worried about? Braylon Braxton, AJ Turner, or Christian Fitzpatrick? Braylon Braxton. I've watched him on a couple of games now, and he's special. Like he's, he's going to be good.
And, but I think if, if you can get to him, And somehow contain him. Like, I don't know if someone like an AJ Turner can carry a game. I mean, he can run the ball really well, but those two together, the problem, you just got to knock, knock one of them down. And if you were to say, what's the one or two things that we really have to do well, this game to win that D Establish the routing control, the clock and pass block. Yes, that was my other one.
They're really good at getting to the quarterback. They just, they do such a good job disguising their blitzes. Like you just, you don't know where it's coming from until you snap it. You know, we will have some advantage if we're in our no huddle and we're not letting the other team sub, we'll get a little bit of an advantage 'cause they'll have to show something. But they do a really good job the last few seconds of the play clock sliding guys up and down from the, the line of scrimmage.
I get the, the no line and I think the running backs. Are going to have their hands full picking up blitz coverages. We did not do a good job of blitz pickup against JMU. What was the interesting, you, you mentioned that, um, JMU was doing a lot of pre staff movement of, you know, I think it was more of their linebackers probably than, than their line coming up, going back, shifting, like trying to just make the line and Colton. Think, you know, distract them.
So I guess we're going to see more of that, huh? Yeah, I think so. I mean, we did a good bit of it on our end, too, but we just couldn't get home with it. I will note one of our favorite monarchs, his brother plays for Marshall and he's one of their best defenders, Mike Green. He's got 15 sacks on the air, eight quarterback hits, 29 hurries. The dude's balling out. Yeah, that's significant. Yeah, you identify the mic and identify him on every single play. He's causing havoc every game.
Sacks for 126 backyards. Holy smoke. Yeah, it's, they always have a good defense and this year's no exception. Like, they're, they're legit. So, they have a total of 31 sacks. He's got half of those. I mean, is that, is, is, is that the outcome of a particular scheme? Or is that, that dude is just so talented? That he just repeatedly beats his guy. I mean, I think they probably scheme really well for him and he's a absolute talent freak. Like he's in that.
The crazy thing is he has those numbers and you know, that teams are doubling him or they're at least chipping him or they're trying to go away from him and he still has those kinds of numbers. And he's, he's forced three fumbles and recovered one at the same time. I'm going to share something real quick, taking that ball. Like it's lunch money, Aaron. Let me see if you can figure out what I'm seeing here.
You're going to look in this column, the defensive column, that's his overall defensive grade. Does it look like he's getting better as the season goes along? Or is that just me getting a lot better? Oh, yeah. But like, look at his grade even against Virginia Tech and their good old line at Ohio State and their good old line. Like he's still at 65, 67 for grade. I mean, but 92, I mean, in the middle of the season, like week seven, week seven and eight, yeah.
Week seven and eight, there's a, you know, just a little bit of a, took a little bit of a break. But the last three games, man, it's been by far the best of the season. That dude is, he's on fire. And he's doing it in multiple ways. He's doing it as a rush defender and a pass rusher. Yes, it'll be a problem for us. There is, there's no doubt about it. But I mean, we've, we've played good defensive guys before and we've been able to kind of shut them down a little bit.
But the problem with Marshall is the other side is also just as good. So it's not like you can just completely run away from them all game. You can try to, but maybe we got a family dinner the night before and just, you know, banana and tailbite. So a couple other names I want to mention J. J. Roberts safety. He's playing off the charts this season.
Josh Moten at corner off the charts like these are guys are rated highly across the country, not just the Sun Belt that are just having phenomenal seasons. Those three alone are all around 90, um, which is not easy to get on PFF as a college player. No. And I feel like you get dinged being a group of five school in those ratings to some extent, too. You guys happen to know how they've defended the tight end this year? Are we still throwing to him? That's a valid question.
Only on two point conversions to cover the spread. So we gotta score touchdowns first. So to put how good those three guys are having a season, we all know how good Jahron Manning is. We've been singing his praises all season long. All three are rated higher than Jahron this season. Man, and imagine if we had three guys better than Jahron on the team. That's wild to think. It must be nice. Fantastic.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, the other thing that stood out with me about Marshall is they do an elite job of mid game adjustments, like from first quarter to second quarter, especially on the offensive side of the ball. They have figured out what you're doing on defense and they are going to go and attack it before you even know what happened. Uh, just to give you some perspective in the first quarter, Marshall has scored 58 points this season.
In the second quarter, they've scored 114, uh, third quarter this year, another 58 points, fourth quarter 76. And there were some games in that fourth quarter. They were just trying to run the clock. So their ability to make in game adjustments between quarters and utilize those iPads the right way is really, really big. So we, we need to be in the lead at halftime. Um, and we need to be thinking of what Marshall's going to do because they will adjust better than we will.
And we need to cut the internet feed. So there's no iPads on either side. No, we need to spam link those things as fast as possible. That's right. Cause the crowd already doesn't have cell service. So we got that covered. So you guys need on field. I'm trying to share something else with you. So this is past blocking in order of highest to lowest. Anything you guys notice? What that order looks like? These are for linemen who've played at least half of the snaps.
The teams are evenly divided at the five. Oh, I thought it was just, yeah, it's in alphabetical order from Z to A by team. No, that's not, that is not good. Yeah, it's not no bueno. No. So, that Now, you switch to rumblock and we look a little bit better, because, Zach Barlev. This is awesome, but it doesn't look a whole lot better. Why are we Dominion? I guess it's better than old Dom or just old old Domi. Yeah, it looks like it's going to be a tough game.
Yeah, it's this is not the team we want to face after a game like that. Like this is when we need our FCS game or something to come into play to kind of get right. Um, you do not want to be trying to get right against a team as good as Marshall, especially since they figured out the offensive side of the ball. Now, like if it's just their defense, all right, we'll all line up our defense against theirs. We'll go toe to toe. But now they've got their offense figured out, too.
Like your margin for error is evaporated. I'm going through all the positions now just to see how it stacks up. Yeah, I'm going to find one that stacks up well for us right now. Other than. They've got a good podcast too. I was going to say podcast versus podcast, but those guys, these guys are good. They are. Well, they all have the highest rated receiver and it's dead. And he got one carry last night. I think he got injured again. Yeah, you guys are bringing me down, man.
We're trying, uh, Marshall is only allowing 31 percent of 3rd downs to be converted. Hey, well that's a lot better than we did last night, so that's, that's a positive. On the season, they are losing the turnover battle by about, uh, 2 minutes. The turnover battle by 2 minutes? I don't understand that stuff. Oh, the time of possession battle. Okay, I got that one. 28 22. We took a big regression on that one in this game.
We've been more balanced recently, but last night it was not balanced at all. Yeah. Uh, 5. 2 yard total team average per rush. They're averaging two hundred and a half yards per game in nets. Yeah. Yeah. Him and Braxton, because Braxton's got almost as many yards. Well, Norfolk's got better restaurants than Huntington. That's true. We got a lot of things better than Huntington. I know. I'm trying to focus on the positive right now. We have better schools in Virginia. How about that?
Have we really gotten to that point, Mike, our schools better than yours? Cause we don't have any NID deals with Biscuitville though. We get the handsome biscuit on board or something. Yeah, they got tutors over there. They talk about how great it is all the time. I've never had it, but I would stack up handsome biscuit against them. Um, yeah, this is going to be a tough game. They are a very talented team and we just had a heartbreaking loss.
And we're, we're continuing to take on injuries and guys getting beaten up. Like Koa is, he's so tough to be out there. Like he's limping around. He, he was struggling to even get into the media room for the postgame presser, and he's still getting up, going out on that field, like. There are definitely a lot of guys that in no way, shape or form have quit and they are continuing to put their body on the line out there each and every play.
So I have nothing but respect for those guys doing that, especially some of the ones that I know have injuries that they are playing through and they probably shouldn't and don't need to play through them, but they want to play and they're getting well enough to play and training staff is getting them squared away. So I'll be there for them on Saturday, 100%. And that's, that's the reason why we've got a chance in that game. Because those guys do care. They didn't, they wouldn't be playing.
I do got this for you, Aaron. You want some positivity, right? Let's do it. Especially if it has all the receivers from Marshall and old dominion that I've had the minimum targets, 20 percent of one 51. Isaiah Paige is the highest rate of receiver in this game. by almost four points. Uh, Christian Fitzpatrick is second, but Diante Vines is third. So we have two of the best receivers of this game. Um, that's some positive. Gotta get the rock to him. We used vines really well on that final drive.
Like the 510 yard outs, the corners like letting him go use his quickness and agility to stop and turn and break the coverage, but we really didn't do that. I mean, I think he had a career high in yardage on Saturday, but pretty much all of it came on that last drive. Like he was the guy there getting open and that was that was kind of there for us all game. We just couldn't get the ball over there for one reason or another. Yeah, his previous high was against coastal.
where he had 73 yards last night. He had 89 on four catches six targets. Um, that was his highest yards per catch all season as well. Three of those were on that final drive. I think you have one prior to that. Well, we only completed nine passes. How many did we complete on that last drive? Uh, at least four, because Vine's got four. It's pretty rough. Alright, time to, time to flush this one down the toilet, I think. I'm all for it.
Toilet's clogged, it might take a couple, but we'll get it out of there. Yeah. That just rips, I, it's, it's, It sucks to lose basketball games and baseball games, but the way football just rips your heart out is just, it's different. It is, man. Anybody that is fully invested And the Friday Night Lights television show knows that. Right, Gary? Clear eyes, full heart. But we still lost.
It's just, it's harder to, like, take away a lot of positives from this one because so much just got knocked off the board for us in that one game. Yeah. I think that's why. Like, the only, the only carrot we're dangling right now is, We went two in a row. We go to a bowl game. That's that, like when you're crossing off your, your goals this season of like, what do you want to accomplish? We are down to the minimum bar for entry getting six and six.
No, it is the minimum bar, but it is also an important bar for this staff with only one season left on their contract. Um, it's a lot easier to justify. Keeping a staff that has been a two straight bowl games versus two and four years. I don't know. That's, you're not, you're not wrong, but I just, I feel like. We put enough resources into our football program that six and six should never just be the bar.
Oh yeah, we said it all preseason and that we are ready for that next jump and this team is talented enough to make that next jump and we've shown it. Uh, I pointed this out to Aaron earlier, if you look at our points for points against 261, 262. Yeah, I don't know if I've ever seen a team that balanced. in those two categories in my life. Do you have what that is in the first half and the second half or just the total? I haven't done that yet. Um, obviously yesterday was bad.
I know how it feels, but I don't, I don't like to go by feel because emotion isn't. So the average, I will say the average, our average points in the first half are 15. Our average in the second half are 11. I know that. But I don't know what the total points in the first half versus the second half is. I just know the average 15 and 11. We could have used four more points than last night, huh? There were chances to go get them too. Um, are you talking about points per quarter and Aaron?
No, I was talking per half. But the quarter would give us the same answer. Yeah. I mean, that would require me to do more math. So first quarter, Gary has it up. So yeah, 1st quarter, 58 points. 2nd quarter, 68 points. 3rd quarter, 47 4th quarter, 56. Yeah. So we're playing, we're scoring better in the first half of the second. Yes. 3rd quarter coming out of the time, halftime. We're, we're just as bad as we think we are. We let them off the hook.
Yep. And our defense has allowed 96 points in the first half and 131 in the second, which makes sense. Especially if you go up and look at time of possession, we're at 2743 versus 3217. So that, that all tracks. Luddy is not liking this. She said, she said quit talking. No one's listening to y'all right now anyway after you brought them all down. Let's just get it out of the way. Oh no! We suck again! We did. Yeah. Alright. So predictions, guys.
We're, uh, all three of us agree we're ODU's gonna win this game, right? I predict that my 7 and 5 preseason prediction will not hit. Yeah, I'm alive at six and six. I had the seven and six was my prediction, but that is on Defcon one. That's a uphill climb. Unless we get, you know, five and seven rice, I think is going to make a bowl game because there aren't enough six and six teams this year. So if you go by APR, I think rice is number one. If they get the five wins.
Oh, and then the governor will be there. They're gonna play that game in like Guantanamo Bay or something. I'll bite my tongue on the governor part. Um, I only say that cause he's a, a rice. I gotcha. Oh, wait, we forgot the best thing that I saw this weekend. Was Mike Tyson's ass. That was the bad knees. That was the funniest thing I saw this weekend. You go from an interview with a boxer. It's a son interviewing his dad. You're like, man, this is cool. Like Tyson's on there.
He's going to fight. His son is interviewing him. They have like a nice embrace afterwards. assless chaps and the cameraman pans down. And I don't think I've fully stopped laughing since that moment. I did not see that. I missed that interview. Oh, yes. It was, it was great. And Netflix was just having a fit trying to host it live. So like half the country had their stream freeze on Mike Tyson walking away. I mean, just amazing. Amazing. Yeah. I have a lot of thoughts on that fight.
None of them are very positive. I mean, what a grift he's running, dude. What a grift. It's a good one. It's a good moneymaker. People just keep on tuning in. And he keeps saying he's, he's the best fighter alive. I'm surprised that the books are still putting lines out for it because right before the fight, I got Jake Paul on points going the distance, like plus 275. And like you could tell by the conversations, that's how that was going to end. Unless Tyson somehow knocks him out in the first.
I'll keep my money in my pocket. Yeah, I don't know. Sergio was not a fan either. He made sure to point that out that that fight was a battle between truth and anti truth. And if Jake Paul won anti truth wins 2024, man. TikTok. Yeah. I didn't, I hate to see Mike Tyson lose. I'm glad I didn't get knocked out though. Yeah. Yeah. Fight someone real.
And there's some discussions of what the odds would be if he was fighting like some of the current like heavyweight contenders and champions, and you'll never see it. Like plus plus 1200. Yeah, so let's call him Canelo. He's calling out Canelo next. And how much does Canelo weigh? I think a lot more than 225. Oh, he's a smart guy. Oh, that's right. Yes. Paul is a lot more than he is. Yeah. Which, by the way, there's no way he's 225. Again, he's going through this whole thing of fighting.
That would be a legitimate fighter, but you have the weight on them by that much. That's not a legitimate fight. Fight a real heavyweight fight. Canelo weighs 168. Yeah. He'd just do what he did with Tyson and stay away from him the whole time and then throw long bombs. All right, well, thank you guys for tuning in to Monarchist Fight Night. Um, sorry, Miranda Maverick will be on the card. Did Shadasia, did Shadasia win? She did. I had to make it Monarch related somehow, so way to go, Shadasia.
Um, predictions, Aaron, kick us off. I predict that I'm going to be wearing my coat. I'm going to be warmer than everybody else. I'm going to be tearing my ass off. And Ethan Sanchez is going to keep our season alive. 50 yard field goal, win by three, go Monarchs. It's back, baby. It's back. Maybe it's been what we've been missing. I don't know. I will know this is the oyster bowl. It's a great fundraiser for the Shriners each year.
So if you do come to the game, Make sure you pitch in with the Shriners because it's going to a good cause. Um, I'd have to be crazy to pick Marshall here or to pick Old Dominion here. So I'm going to, I'm going to ask Gary for a minute. I need a minute to think about this. All right, share your, uh, your prediction with us, please.
Yeah, so I will tell you, as we speak right now, in books not in Virginia, you can still get Marshall as an underdog of about a point and a half, so I don't know who's swinging lines to eight or nine or what, but I'm seeing it right now outside of Virginia, you can get Marshall plus the points. Um, I, we're going to know in the first quarter how this game is going to end. If we come out flat and Marshall's up by two scores, this, this game is over.
Uh, I am really hopeful that we see our guys come out, fired up, hitting hard, shutting down the run, shutting down Braxton, doing all those things. Uh, make this a competitive game and fight to the end. I do think they're going to fight. Uh, but I do think that ODU is going to, going to lose this one, uh, to Marshall kind of in the bowl hopes about a, probably about a seven point game.
Um, I, what, what just cannot happen is fully have the wheels fall off where guys are just kind of quitting on the sideline, quitting on the field. I don't think they're going to do that. Um, but I, I think if they keep fighting, it'll be a touchdown win for Marshall. All right. So I said, it had to be crazy to pick Old Dominion in this one, but we've been doing this podcast for a while and it's proof that I am a little crazy. You so crazy.
I feel like we're going to get another six and six season, but it's just kind of is what we do here. It's not good enough. We need more, but Old Dominion wins. Who cares what the score is? Bowl hopes are alive. We go to Arkansas for our chance to go to our second straight bowl game. Let's go. And laundry's done. I hope you're right. I hope you're right. I'm gonna be rooting for you to be right. I promise you that. Yeah, I just, uh, I don't know.
I also feel bad I wore Kelly Green on this, this episode. I didn't even think about it until just now. It's the reverse jinx. But you know what? You know what? Oh, hold on. What do we got? Oh, yeah. Jags lost. Raider's lost. Commando's lost. Hey, I am rooting for Raider losses at this point. Oh, okay. So that was We need a quarterback. And we're not gonna get one if we win games. We'll, we'll send to Trevor Lawrence just as a mercy gift to Trevor. Hey, one thing we totally missed.
We can never speak of the undefeated Return to sender, Gary. We can never speak of the undefeated record after a buy anymore. No, it's dead. It's dead. But, it's still a statistical probability. Oh yeah, it's a great record. He's still undefeated after his first bi week of the season. There you go. And most actually going forward, we're going to have two bi weeks, right? Isn't that the new norm? I think so. Just the way the weeks line up. And we should lobby to have that rescinded.
So there's only one bi week and that way we'll always win. Doesn't matter. Won't matter when they're out. Yes, there you go. Our dinner just got here, so I think it's a good place to wrap this up. Thanks for listening. If you made it through all of this, props to you. Thank you for your support. Uh, sorry, we are feeling this way, but it is what it is. I'm guessing you feel the same way as we do right now. So thank you for your support. We appreciate you. Go Monarchs. Go Monarchs. Go Monarchs.