Wednesday Night Raw

Welcome to the solid verbal.

I'll that for me. I'm a man, I'm forty. I've heard so many players say, well, I want to be happy. You want to be happy for Dake Edith State is that whoo whoom?

And then and tie Welcome back to the solid verbal, boys and girls, Monnayme is Ti hilden Brand joining me as always my good friend. He wasn't with us last week. Dan Rubinstein, sir, how.

Are you back from the dead. I'm great, Ty, thanks for asking it. I was in Where was I last week? I was in Charlotte Shore. Yeah. I don't think I can talk about why I was in Charlotte yet. It was really fun and mysterious but fun. And then I went to Nashville, which was not fully planned, but Jody with and I had a work trip to Nashville and

I went to Nashville, anyway, did you do anything cool in Nashville. I've heard good things about Nashville.

It's a great town. I ate and I walked around a ton. I walked like ten miles according to my phone. I went to the Country Music Hall of Fame, which great. I went to three different overpriced coffee places and got crazy caffeinated.

Okay.

I went to Husk for lunch with our pal Travis Haney. Yeah, that's cool. He's doing really well. Good sa our pal Stephen Godfrey Nashville residence.

So this is like the Dan Rubinstein Goodwill Tour now that you're sort of out there and trying to promote promote your fine services. The good will it was.

It was a whistle stop ty. Is that what Truman did? Is that what they're called? Uh? Yeah, so this is great in the past couple of months.

Yeah, all right, Well, thanks to everyone for tuning in. Dan and I are back in US. We've decided to call this show. Actually I made the call earlier today on g chat to call this show Wednesday night raw. That's true, which, of course implies some sort of a controversial show programming this evening.

Would you say, ty that we are going to go we're going raw and we're going to go deep on topics without the protection of editing.

I would not go that far, but okay with say sure, I wouldn't go that raw with the labeling of the show.

But are we not going deep on topics without the protection of editing?

That is correct, Dan, There will be no editing this on this ba mak if we screw up, if we make any mistakes whatsoever. It seemed to resonate quite well when you did it a couple of weeks ago with your interview with Bruce, when you said We're not gonna do any editing. I'm not gonna cut anything out. No, it's just going to be us raw, unfiltered. So we're

Yeah, that this is down from about nineteen or twenty. We got a ton like we just only asked today and we got probably five times more questions than we could.

I don't know, it's it was like a verballer repression of some sort that we just vented. And now we got all these questions that came in about college football and grocery stores and god, you name it, in addition to a few news topics that we want to discuss at the top. We've got more than enough to cover here. And it's going to be you and I shooting from the hip for most of it.

I'm ready to go. We have questions about big teams, medium teams, little teams. I asked for questions about grocery shopping and clothing and I don't even remember what else. But you know, I think it tickles a part of people's brains. It doesn't always get tickled listening to sports podcasts, hopefully, I don't know. Maybe it does.

It does tickle the inners again. We're at Solidverbal at gmail dot com. We're on Facebook, We're on Twitter, We're on Instagram. We're on Reddit at reddit dot com, slash our slash Solid Verbal. You can also find the podcast out on Apple, Google, Spotify, stitch Er, you name it, if you can find a podcast there. The solid verbal is also there. We're a college football show. We broadcast year round once a week in the off season, which,

Yeah, Corona, California's own sort of deep into Orange County.

Didn't he win the Elite eleven way back when maybe I think I think he won the Elite eleven. If he didn't win it, he was in the finals of the Elite eleven. Blake Barnett, noted five star quarterback prospect at one point I think was going to go to Notre Dame, then decided he wanted to go to Alabama instead, started his college football career at Alabama. Well, clearly it got a little bit clogged in terms of the depth chart, YEP.

Makes sense.

Blake Barnett has now decided that he's going to transfer away from Arizona State, and if reports are to be believed, he's going to go to USF.

Okay, he'll have also kind of makes sense.

It does make sense. Blakenett, Dan, for those keeping score at home, has twenty four career pass attempts, two career touchdown passes at the major college level, and now two transfers.

Two trans technically more than that. I think he has been at a JC for a little while, so technically more college enrollments than touchdown passes.

So then we got fun and we got the thinking. Is this a Blake Barnett thing? Is this a California slash San Diego area quarterback thing? Dan?

Yeah, I mean Orange County is slightly north of San Diego. Corona's I think it's by Irvine. I had thought for a long time Blake Barnett was from San Diego, but I was mistaken. But yeah, Tate for Cia with his three, four, five different, Oh though he was another one right, he's from the San Diego area. There is something definitely strange and varied about top blue chip high school recruits from

There are a lot of stories, and if you pull on the threads, perhaps, I mean, it's so interesting. Perhaps we should focus our attention at some point, not on the coaching carousel, but the California quarterback carousel.

Can I make an A plus transition?

Go for it.

This was all in the context of talking about grad transfers, right, and we were talking about Blake Barnett and transferring another guy California didn't work out, transferring away Keller christ Tennessee. Oh right, this isn't recent, mind you, Right, we just haven't been talking about grad transfers, and there have been many of them.

It's not gonna it's it's a thing, and it's a it's a California quarterback thing. They cannot be monogabous with their first their first signing for some odds.

So what is interesting to me in terms of the national scope of college football too, is you know, there was there's the big Alabama situation, which is now it's sort of double prong because the ECU quarterback Gardner Minshew was going going to Alabama and now he's going to Wazoo, so he's coming west. Jalen Hurts. His dad was talking about how Jalen Hurts if he were to transfer because he didn't get the Alabama's starting job, he was going to be the most sought after free agent in college

Very very much.

The thing.

We've got a big paragraph almost of names here that are going to be going through their own grad transfer process. Travan McMillan, m mag just a back name for Colorado, Yeah, running back, Yeah, going to Colorado.

I saw Kenny Bigelow.

Another name here that we know from USC going to West Virginia. Quinton Dormody amid some of the transition at Tennessee will be transferring away from Knoxville going to Houston. You mentioned Keller Christ going to Tennessee. Who else do we got here of Noe.

Brandy dawk Ins Indiana from Arizona.

Brady White, another quarterback at AMU, a very highly recruited quarterback at ASU going to Memphis. Yeah, there are a number of names here. We already talked about Wilton Space going to UCLA a couple of weeks ago, So this is the time here we start hearing more and more about this. We talked a little bit with Stuart Mandel a week ago about how all that impacted shape Patterson up at Michigan and the Michigan situation as a whole.

I do feel bad. There's a Temple going to Alabama, Alex Jones, which is totally fine, like that is. It is a definite step up to go from Temple to Alabama, But damn is twenty eighteen a bad name, bad year to be named Alex bad.

Yeah, yeah, got great, could do better. Go by the middle name maybe.

And a totally common name. Just ended up screwing you, just ended up getting you. So yeah, there's I think there's a website that has all This is a.

Cool transfer tracker dot com.

Go to there and learn because there are a lot of very familiar names and entering your conference of choice, exiting your conference of choice. They do a great job. That's all. I have.

The other name here, it's not a grad transfer. Oh who Joe Burrow? Oh that's right, Yes, Joe Burrow transferring out of Ohio State.

I think he actually did graduate. Okay, that's relative excuse. I think he did.

Yeah, it is a grad transfer. He is reportedly drawing interest from LSU Cincinnati, where I think you might be visiting or along with LSU.

Obviously, Luke Fickle connection is robust.

Also Arizona State. Obviously Arizona State would love a quarterback to stick around.

And who wouldn't want to go to Arizona State. I mean, aside from the uncommon situation there at the moment, but I mean it's great to hang out in Phoenix while everywhere else is.

Cold Arkansas and Wyoming two other schools that, okay, have sort of throwed their hat in the ring here.

For Joe Burrow, No, it definitely feels like because he hasn't played significant time, but he's well regarded and was recruited to Ohio State and just isn't as good as prospects at quarterback with more tantalizing talent. Perhaps it is funny that he came up through that system and everybody is just sort of looking at him like, well, he might be good. Who's to say, we know our guys aren't. So yeah, if he ends up at LSU. I think he's visiting LSU either this coming weekend or shortly thereafter.

All right? Well, before we get into our vast and I do mean vast list of questions here, yes, raw and unfiltered, on this Wednesday evening, I have one important ad that I must must get out here into the ether. Dan. Okay, this weekend is Mother's Day. Oh, very true, FTD, you've heard of them? They can help you express your feelings for Mom through a floral work of art that is delivered straight to her door. He could send the text message.

I mean, you're a look at you, ty, How could she not be nervous? Look at me?

How could she not write? I was a little concerned how this was going to go over in the Hildebrand household. Mm hmmm, A beautiful vase, a beautiful bouquet of flowers. We brought it in. We looked it was from FTD.

Yeah. Now I got an email from my former apartment company because they had an old address, which is fine. We just recently moved down the block and they're like, you have flowers here, and I was like, I don't think so. Yeah, I don't believe in like they're made out to you. And I went and picked them up,

Pro the prone figure for both of us, because it was a beautiful bouquet of flowers right.

Absolutely, it was overflowingly beautiful.

The pro move would have been to claim it as oh honey, I ordered this for you.

Yeah, let's see the card.

I ordered this for you. I couldn't pull that off right anyway. It is Mother's Day, so get on it. You can get twenty five percent off a florist styled bouquet for Mom this Mother's Day. Go to FTD dot com slash Mother's Day.

They'll lock you over. They're great.

FTD dot com a trusted name slash Mother's Day. All one word. FTD can arrange whatever you need for Mother's Day. That's their slogan. We can arrange that. They will hook you up twenty five percent off if you use that url. Send Mom something nice for Mother's Day. Okay, it was.

It was the Clemson defensive line of bouquets. It was everything you could possibly want. There was, There was beauty, there was message sending sold very solid, all out winner. Absolutely So here is.

What we did. M Dan sent out the bat signal to send in soliverbal questions. Send in college football questions. Send in questions on a variety of different topics. You did so on Facebook and Twitter, on Reddit. Is there anything else? I'm leaving out another place where you posted questions FTD flowers okay, great to their shop.

Yeah, you posted all.

Over that We were seeking questions about college football and other topics. We've got pages upon pages here, let's just let's start going through them. Dan, where do you want to start? You put this document together today.

Let's start here. As everybody is anticipating, will Northern Illinois ever fire Rod Kerry? That is amazing And I'm going to answer that question as earnestly and genuinely as I can. Okay, go for it. I don't know why Northern Illinois would fire Rod Carry.

Rod Carry is under fifty. He is thirty two to eight in conference in five full seasons as head football coach. Yep, that's a good number regardless of what conference you play it. So if you take that number on its face, I don't know if I'd ever be inclined to fire him. As long as he wants to stay around, it's a successful program.

Yeah. I don't know if that question was genuine But and I use a really good story as they went from that like huge, crazy, fun offense where they went to the Orange Bowl a few years ago and now their defense Sutton Smith is ridiculous. They lose their defensive coordinator Kevin Kane to SMU and Sunny Dyke's but they put up a top what fifteen to twenty defense nationally

Where are we going next? Uh?

We got a question about Georgia Tech and Chuck and I like the phrasing of this question. Will Georgia Tech's more aggressive defensive scheme because he got a new coordinator? Yeah, I mean, and he's not wrong though, work better in concert with their offense than the bend and then break scheme they were in the last few years, obviously with well the ted roof.

The operative phrasing here is bend and then.

Break, bend, and break little variety.

So with that in mind, I think anything, anything on the Georgia Tech defensive side of the equation will be viewed as a success. Now. I like it because I had the more attacking, aggressive mentality on the defensive side of football as my Fantasy Things selection either last year or the year before. I'm all in favor of that. I think anything on the defensive side, any kind of change in mentality from what Tech was doing previously, should

Oh? Yeah? And Nate Woody has been a very good defensive coordinator. Yeah for app State these past few years. They've only been on this level for I think four or five years, and so after year one of a bunch of disappointment, he's put together top forty defenses, if not top twenty twenty five defenses. They've been excellent versus the pass in the ACC that seems to be especially early on Right now, Florida State will be improved through the air. We assume Clemson will still be solid through

Sure can't go anywhere but up that's yes, all right? Where we going next?

We I think was it Juice? Somebody named Juice as something? Yeah, No, this wasn't Juice, but I got if we want to talk Juice Williams for the rest of the show, we can. No. This is from I'm going to try to get this right. I promise you I'm doing my very best. I'm going to say Sikhar Gupta, Okay, s H, I k H.

That looks right.

Sikar is my guest.

It's better than what I would do.

Who are your top five breakout players of twenty eighteen? And I ask you this question both in terms of who your top five ish players are that fit that and what breakout actually means to you.

Breakout to me means that the player becomes more known on the national stage, a household name, more of a household name. Yeah, that to me is breakout. Now. I don't know if this is a top five per se, but this is at least five names that I will be watching very closely in twenty eighteen.

Steve Hank DeMarcus, She's gonna be five random names.

Let's first start with Kyler Murray.

Oh, a no good one.

Kyler Murray, of course, had some acclaim coming out of high school, right somewhat known, transferred away. Now playing in a wide open system with Lincoln Riley at Oklahoma, he stands to take over for Baker Mayfield. I think the world is his oyster. I'm excited to see what he can do in that system. So an athletic kid, not the biggest of quarterbacks, but should be a lot of fun to watch in again, a wide open system.

Kyler running game alongside for Rodney Anderson.

Kyler Murray is my number one. I'm also going to throw out some other names in here. DeAndre Swift, the guy that we had the pleasure of meeting, great name down at the National Championship. We're down there, DeAndre Swift. You know, I don't want to say it was crowded out by Sony Michelle and Nick Chubb in the Georgia backfield. He's certainly got a lot of premier work, but this year he's going to be the featured back. He's a local guy to me up here in Eastern PA, and

Me, oh, okay, okay.

Is an interesting name now. Adrian Martinez true freshman. If you believe what people have reported about Nebraska spring football and spring practice as a whole, he has impressed. It would seem as if he might be the early front runner to take hold of that quarterback job now under Scott Frost. Mm hm. I am excited to see what Scott Frost can do with the true freshman quarter who comes in with a lot of a lot of talent, a.

Lot of expectations from you.

Adrian Martinez to me, is of interest in the Big ten west of Nebraska on the Big Ten quarterback front. Dwayne Haskins.

Ah, he's on my list too.

Dwayne Haskins. Now, look, he's playing at Ohio State, so he's clearly got all of the tools around him to succeed in a big way right out of the shoot. But Dwayne Haskins will have his opportunity now that the stage is cleared. He can step foot into that role as the head signal caller at Ohio State.

And we think, are we following? Are we falling into a trap?

You're always falling into a trap when you put a brand new starting quarterback up here. But I think he's got the skill set and certainly the tools around him, the support network around him where it won't all fall on his shoulder, and whatever he brings to the fold is going to be viewed very nicely. I will work out very well.

For Dwayne Haskins, I'm more saying, are we following falling into a trap that he is one of two candidates most susceptible to Beckmeyer syndrome in that it appears that the world is his oyster. And then how State plays Michigan State in its close game and they run him twenty four times and lose by three. That is my concern that we forget about BMS in mid May. But he's on my lost here, Dan, I'm going a loss,

Dylan Moses. Dylan Moses for Alabama at the linebacker position is going to be a monster. He's eventually going to be a first round pick, probably a top ten pick at some point. Gonna be an absolute monster, a one man wrecking crew on that Alabama defense. Again, embarrassment of riches. It's Alabama. But if he didn't know Dylan Moses's name yet, it'd be a good time to familiarize yourself with what he brings to the table. So those my five for now.

I will run through my four quickly because I've already mentioned Dwayne Haskins, and I am confident I really liked what he was able to do in limited action last year. Donovan Peoples Jones at Michigan has a full on, real life decent quarterback now in Shaye Patterson. And we saw Shaye Patterson's connection with AJ Brown at least the first half of last year, and I think he should be able to buy time even behind a suspect offensive line, to allow Donovan People's Jones to get behind any and

Yes, there is definitely.

Are they without their most talented running back who is no longer there? And Akrom Wadley he's gone, he's gone. Are they without their two best offensive linemen from last year? And certainly those guys developed from a point as well, Yes they are. Are the receiving options robust and varied? No, they're super not And I do have a tough time. The Big Ten West year over year is going to change. I don't think Wisconsin's defense is going to be nearly as good as it was. I still think it'll be fine.

Year, so yeahst likely. Yeah. So in the end my answer is yes, I like their defensive line. I think their defensive line should hold up quite well against a conference that we know likes to pound it out on the ground. And I think their schedule actually sets up pretty well. They don't have to play Ohio State, Michigan or Michigan State from the east. They do travel to Penn State, which will be a tough a tough game, no doubt. In Antenne Plain State College that's the case.

They had weapons to go deep.

Yeah, yeah, they got the weapons too. So I'm I'm excited about Iowa football in twenty eighteen. And I know that might be a bit of an oxymoron, Dan, because Iowa football isn't all that sexy, But I liked what I saw from them a year ago, and I think there's a lot of reason to be optimistic. Twenty eight Team.

Kyle wants to know when will the new shirts slash hats people want hats. Yeah, we just recently learned this. When will they be available? We're recording this on May ninth. Do we have a an acceptable answer? Do we have a target date? Because we have not fully discussed this off air, so let's just talk now. Do we think we can do this by June first?

I think we can realistically expect that we're going to have new offerings in place by to say it, mid to late June, mid to late June.

I'm gonna try to June first, but yeah, it'll be in the month of June. And I will say right now, we have designs plural that we are very excited about. We have products plural that we are very excited about, both as it relates to the show and beyond the show that I think people will appreciate and want to be a part of. If you know, if you got some cash laying around you want to support the show, we'd be more than happy to outfit you in soft, comfortable shirts and hats and other products.

I will tease by saying the following, Yeah, we have had we have had a teasy right. We have had a really good response to our solid verbal designs over the last two two and a half years, and now given that we have a good way to do it, we're going to be expanding upon that. So Designs Plural is really our effort to expand a bit on the merchandising front. There will be more than one T shirt.

Now that's my famous, my favorite Paul Thomas Anderson movie. There will be hats. There will That's right, there will be hats. His second question is what single game are each of you most excited about this season. I have a list of like six, but I've picked one. Do you have a game?

I'm assuming your number one is Oregon versus UCLA on November three.

No, well, this is he just asked about, you know, any game. I'm going to say no Oregon games for this question, the Notre Dame game.

Can I please say that mine is Oregon versus Ucla. Because of that, you can requisite anguish that I know will take place on your side.

It's going to be running into an X. You guys have both moved on. You guys are both thriving, but at the same time we're like, what if?

What if?

So that's fair to say that's your answer.

Is that if I'm not gonna go Oregon or Ucla out of spite, I probably say, and I know it's gonna be a tired answer here, but I am genuinely curious about Michigan Ohio State this year in a way that I feel I haven't been in previous years because of the shape factor.

Okay, they have two new quarterbacks, technic.

Excited to see which direction that one goes. I'm also interested in Penn State Michigan for obvious reasons. But are we not allowed to pick like headliner games here?

I have I have new matchups that we don't usually get.

What are your new matchups?

So my two or maybe two and a half, I have Auburn Washington, which turns out Auburn is a place in Washington September.

What second in Atlanta?

Yeah, that's that's week one. I can leave in Atlanta. I don't think that's in Texas. That's They're are not that many quarterbacks going into the Seas and we're like, he is going to definitely be good, and this game has two of them.

Auburn has a ridiculous schedule this year, by the way.

Yes they do. It's they very much do. But this this is basically you get all summer of Gus Melson Chris Peterson planning things. I love both of these teams defenses, especially Washington's secondary. Jake Browning is excellent when healthy. They you know, Miles Gaskin is one of the more underrated, although if everybody is saying he's underrated, then at a certain point he is the most properly rated underrated running back in the country. But I like Washington a whole

That makes sense. Yeah, all right, where are we going next?

Next question? I don't like, we're just banging time. Let's just go man Wednesday night, Rod just banging through. Right, This is the juice question. The three best overall position groups in the country. By the way, somebody did notice. I don't know if it was Twitter or an email or comments whatever. They're like typical Dan fashion. Somebody asks for one, he gives four and a half. Somebody asks for three, he gives five and a quarter. I just like a lot of things.

Oh well, hold on back to this question here, Yes, overall position groups. So is that then to ask, if you take all of the wide receivers in the country, is that the best position group in football? Are we doing per conference, per team? What are we looking at here?

I think when he says overall, he means which position groups on a national scope, so not necessarily, this is a great year for receivers, which you know, which receivers on a certain team are so good that they have to be considered the best in the country at any position. Okay, so like last year you could have said Oklahoma's offensive line.

Okay, this year you could say Clemson's defensive line. That's exactly right, Clemson's defensive line, I think, I think that's right. The most obvious answer here, right.

Mm hmm. I've got a few because I'm bad. Yeah, I'm a bad boy. I really like Michigan's defensive line with Rashaun Garry, Aubrey Solomon, Chase Winovich, a ton of experience and anger. I like Bama's running back corps. That's too easy an answer, but sometimes you just got to please the butt Bama people because they have Damien Harris and naj Harris and Josh Jacobs. Here's the one that

Him and Ryan Finley are like I've olt on retirement benefits.

Ryan Finley may be our age and that's fine. But West Virginia's wide receiver corps is great, and they have a what could be a very very good situation at quarterback. And Will Greer if he is able to come back and stay healthy all year long. I think that is That is my answer, at least for you know, the non obvious Clemson defensive line, Washington secondary is right there, Bama's linebacking corps is right there, but I really like what Dana Holgerson has out wide.

All right, I'll go with that. Clemson's defensive line, to me, I think is the most obvious answer. Can I can I pose a question here?

Get in there, ty one that I saw.

I saw this question here from a gentleman named Anthony, and it is a Notre Dame related question. I do apologize, but I thought it was an interesting dilemma that he posed. Since you're talking about Michigan, He says, does Notre Dame have a better chance of beating Michigan the first game of the year or USC the last game of the year. Dan Okay, better chance, I see what he's alluding to, A beating Michigan, better chance of beating USC. I sat and I stroked my chin thinking about this for a

You weren't expecting it, were you.

Thank you? I could tell that you were up to something. Normally you'd respond a little quicker. I think that I am more worried about the Michigan game me first week of the year than I would be USC last game of the year for a number of reasons. I think that because of Notre Dame replacing the left side of their line again, losing two guys top ten of the draft, Quentin Nelson mcglinchy both going pro. I think they lose

Yeah, I think the answer is probably Michigan. It's week one, and there's less certainty after fall camp just what the team is actually going to look like against a good team right off the bat. That's why a lot of coaches like to schedule down a little bit. That first week of the season. USC is on the road, albeit USC I think has the UCL game the week before, so there's there's letdown potential there, just as we look

So you're agreeing with me here essentially. All right, let me ask you another question might be a little personal. I'm this is what I cherish. Have you looked lately at your interest rate? I'm hearing a long pause here, Dan. Let me tell you you don't have to wait any longer.

Let's talk about well. As soon as you said interest rate, I was like, oh God, there's gonna be math.

Let's talk about Mathstream new sponsor and their credit card consolidation loan. Dan. With light Stream, you can get a credit card consolidation loan of anywhere from five thousand to one hundred thousand dollars with no fees, a fixed interest rate as low as five point four to nine APR with auto pay, and because light Stream is a division of sun Trust Bank, you can be confident you're working with one of the nation's strongest financial institutions out there.

I would consider and look up further information.

Ty, yes, of course, as always, all right, anything financial?

Okay, absolutely, I will take this conversation to yo Wifey's fave DJ.

Whoa, whoa, Whoaha? Where are we on the dock? Here?

Follow the leader? Oh as an Oklahoma state fan? Okay, which, by the way, this got me thinking about something else. First of all, does your wife like DJs?

Not particularly? I like, doesn't have anything against them as people, right, Like, if you're a DJ, solidwise's okay with that. Okay, I'm not gonna.

Judge you for doing that, but I don't a lot of people wipe and sweat off their.

Brow, right. I think she would be more inclined to find something else on the Spotify playlist than whoever she would consider her favorite DJ.

My wife texted me this morning and she said people at work are making fun of me because I've never heard of Kaigo Hi who k ygo kaig?

Okay? Yeah, yeah, yah, yeah, yeah, I got are you familiar with I'm familiar, but only vaguely.

Okay. I wasn't, And I was like, I we are a good pair because our Chigo knowledge as a couple does not exist. Apparently he is a Norwegian DJ who is quite popular.

I didn't know that, Yepkay.

As an aside, Yeah, now I'm an Oklahoma State fan but also a Bengals fan. How should I feel about Mason Rudolph and Junkyard Jim Washington going to Pittsburgh. I just have a very simple thought about this, But the floor is yours.

I really like Mason Rudolph as a pro prospect. We had Taj Boyd on the show.

But he's asking about emotions.

Well, I'm getting to that, Dan, Okay. I we we had talked to TODJ Boyd, and part of what we edited out because he included so much good information was actually how he felt about the upcoming quarterback class. And he said in that interview that Mason Rudolph was his favorite pro prospect at the quarterback right. Of all the big names that you heard, Mason Rudolph was his favorite. Ever since that moment, I took Mason Rudolph and his NFL prospects a little bit more seriously, and I gotta say,

No, it's not like they said to themselves, where can I cause the most damage in the NFL? And just tear off the lid off this league. Pittsburgh, that's the answer. I can't wait to beat up on Cincinnati. Who are They're probably both from the Southwest if they went to Oklahoma State. So I'm thinking as an Oklahoma State fan, root for them to be excellent, Root for them to make a ton of money. Root for them to stay healthy.

Almost Oklahoma State in a positive.

Wade you the next Mason Rudolph, Look how we prepared him for the NFL.

Another similar example here is Saquon Barkley. Because there are a lot of Penn State fans who are also diehard Eagles fans, and when the Giants took Saquon with the second overall pick, a lot of mixed emotions on this side of the state.

Not gonna lie he chose to go to Penn State, he didn't choose to go to the Giants.

Now, as a Penn State alum who has hated the Philadelphia Eagles, his entire life and strangely rooted for the Giants. This could not have worked out any better for me personally, but that's neither here nor Yeah.

Okay, where are we going next? Same guy Sikar wants to know. Can y'all do a live show in Socow please?

Okay, dan Ah, what do we think in terms of live shows? We've already spilled the beans on our plans to do a Chicago live show at some point early to mid August. Correct fantasy things draft. We're gonna blow it out. It'll be all sorts of fun. We have, according to our survey, a number of hotspots around the country where people will be very excited, very motivated to come and see a Sliverbal live show. One of those is Washington, d C. Which we will get to m hm. Another one of.

Those is the event on any city's social calendar, of course. Another one of those live show is Texas. Somewhere in between. It'll be Austin. It will be Austin. It's going to be Austin, lied to the people.

Okay, so Austin. But we had a lot of interest from Houston, from from Dallas, the Fort Worth area, as well as Austin, and then we had a bunch of places out on the West coast. We had San Francisco throw its name in the ring. We had La obviously, La throwing its name in the ring. Seattle had a pretty strong showing on our survey that we conducted about a year ago.

We'll see you soon. Let's split the difference. What's up, Bakersfield?

The question here is can you all do a live show in southern California? You're from this or dan? How do you feel? I have this?

I would love to. Yeah, there would be nothing more fun than to do a show for me in southern California. I don't know where we would do it, somewhere Central, Culver City or something, but yeah, hell yeah I would. I would. That'd be a dream. I want to go all those cities at Austin, whatever, DC, Chicago, but yeah, southern California.

Would you would you do the following? First off, did you have any enemies in high school?

Yes?

Would you somehow try to get it back to that person that, Oh, by the way, I'm doing a live show in your back.

I think fences have been mended.

We'll get where I'm at now.

I'm trying to think who that would be specifically, Yeah, I think so. I don't think I would reach out, but I would. I would somehow try to make it publicly.

It's sort of like passive aggressively, like, Oh, Danny's coming to town and he's doing a live show thing really cool.

I'm doing a live college football podcast that a bakery turns out. My life turned out better than yours. Yeah, okay, you don't know how I do have an enemy.

We're gonna try to do more live shows this year.

Can we stay with food because we asked for groceries questions? I love this question so much, and I'm so disappointed that we haven't delved deeper when we originally talked about you advising, I believe it's meg More, Damn meg On. You know where she should try to find love in the real world. Robbie wants to know what sections of the grocery store are the most prime for picking someone up? Wow, and what are the signs that a man slash woman is that there are the receptive to your attempts.

So we must add here that Robbie kind of addressed this question to me.

Yes, told disclosure.

I've never actually done this.

Yeah, right, Come on.

I was shooting from the hip when I answered the question. I thought it might be a good idea. Now, in fairness, it didn't have legs initially, but then after the show was released, even you came around on that, you said it was a sneaky good answer.

It's not a bad answer. It's just so tricky. It's basically likeicky.

Yes, but it's a good answer. I stand by that answer wholeheartedly.

You know, in action movies where there is a very select team and they're tasked with an extraction, whether if it's like an antiquity or if it's they're rescuing a kidnapping victim, where they're like, here's the blueprint, here's the plan, here's if things go wrong, the exit strategy. It is such a specific thing, and you don't have you know, you won't have control of the objects of your potential desire, right, and so your plan both where and how and why

Because they're cereal and crackers.

That's why.

Right.

It's just sort of like, oh, we're out of corn flakes, we're out of you know, lucky charms, we're out of frosted flakes, we're out of you know, grape nuts. That doesn't do anything for the synapses in your brain. Same with wheat thins, triskets, whatever, soda, crackers. I would stay away from the meat slash butcher now hold on, oh ty.

George Costanzas said that pastrami is the most sensual of the cured.

But that's when you've already sealed the deal. Okay, that's a complimentary meat. There is nothing sexy or at least, you know, riveting in some sort of social way about chicken thighs, raw meat, ross.

Brown, Salmonella E coli. I'm with you, it is with you on this.

Yes, it is not a visual that you want to associate with new love. Sorry, that's me.

I mean maybe that's your thing, but I tend to agree you can't assume. Yeah.

I would also say bread is sort of a no fly zone. That's just like, are we out of bread?

Oh?

I guess I should get more read. How many grains is too many grains? What? It's just it is a boring, non sexy part of a grocery store.

Okay, I think now that's actually in agreement so far.

Here Okay, here's where I would focus. Yeah, because you want conversation starters. You want somebody's the synapses once again to be tingling in a positive way. I would say frozen food is dicey because nobody really spends a ton of time there. It's an in and out kind of thing. Like and also desserts great, yes, converse station starter. What's your favorite flavor of this? Have you ever if you see that they have a new flavor of this? Have

Here's the sort of here's the thing about that aisle as well. Yeah, you've got a lot of machinery with the freezers. Little buzz, little buzz not always the clearest conversation takes, but little breeze ryle. Yeah, it's cold. People are uncomfortable. Yeah, they're looking to get out of there as quickly as possible. Get what you want. It's a search and destroy mission. It's not a great place to just hang around and start a conversation with the stranger. So I agree.

It's it's it's got to be dessert area, not frozen French bread pizza area. It's high risk, high reward because it's either exciting and titillating or it's sad and solo.

I agree.

I will say your your bakery great smells. A lot of the time it's oh, I'm getting cupcakes for a friend. Ooh, I'm feel like something sweet and naughty. Tie get that bakery gone.

Okay, bakery is not a bad answer.

Busy deli people waiting around with their number.

Oh, so they can't.

They're not in the middle of buying something or looking at a nutrition label at a.

Little impatient and maybe more receptive to common chit chat.

You know what I would do, tie this is me, and it would almost assuredly fail. I would walk up to somebody waiting there looking like they were in a pretty good mood, and I would say, let me guess pepper jack and see where that's a Seinfeld move, right there is? That's one percent, Yeah, Seinfeld move. Produce isn't bad because you can say, like, how do you actually know if avocados are ripe? There's entry points. Pet food

Okay, it's tough.

I'm not gonna say it's easy, but I'm just telling you that's an option. And my final one would just be whatever you consider your brand strengths to be. If you have lots of what you considered to be fun, clever, witty thoughts about hummus, spend some time in the hummics area.

See Dan, I think you missed the boat on this.

What did I miss all the.

Years we've been doing this show. Usually you have a very creative answer that I haven't, that I haven't thought through that I don't think I can go toe to toe with. I think I have the answer here.

What is it?

We're two gentlemen who like to cook. What is your go to recipe? What would you cook for somebody if you were taking them, you know, on a date.

They were coming over, if they were coming them dinner.

Yeah, So I'm thinking maybe you've got an Italian dish, maybe you've got some other kind of dish that you're very proud of. Why not hang around lurk?

Not not.

Just hang out? Go casually in the Italian section, you know, talk about some some spaghetti sauce, talk about use that as like your entry point to talk about Yeah, I use this in my spaghetti sauce and it's really good. Try to build on that and see where you go.

I think that's too ordinary. Not that Italian food is ordinary, but I think the idea of cooking pasta is like, oh, I don't have anything else left, but I have these like shells and marinarias. I'm just fine.

Kind of along the same lines as your pet food commentary. Right, see if you can spin that off into like a future engagement, not literal engagement. But you know what I mean. I know I'm thinking along the same lines, but just in a more human sense.

Dan, what do your cross we jars? Don't? It doesn't get me worked up? Ty?

What do you do well? And can you spin that off into something okay down the road?

I'm okay with it if you have lots of clever thoughts about dried pasta and jard Marin AA sauce. If you do, that's fine. But I think it's a It's tough because I don't think a lot of people do my spaghetti sauce about it? With starting out there, how Kate ever landed on you, I will never know.

Where are we going? Next? Good question, Robbie, thank.

You, amazing question. Let's go to I like this question a lot. It's from chance. I can't all these questions. It's a really great name. I love that it is a good name. As athletic departments continue to invest in graphic design and video production, how much do you think that the quality of a team's media affects the perception of the program to recruits media members? And fans. How

Right, So, Dan, wouldn't this be essentially chances question? Here a more superficial application of what we saw go on at Oregon over the sort of decade and a half.

I think it's under the same umbrella.

Yeah, I think it all kind of classifies. Oregon was able to rebrand itself essentially, or brand itself for the first time as the coolest program in college football, and that paid dividends. It continues to pay dividends. Oregon built itself up now into one of the top fifteen college football institutions in America. I think anything that you can do to enhance the packaging of your program is usually

These schools have full on vlogs now.

I know. I'm big on how that packaging can help can help elevate the brand of your program. And so I'm trying not to sound too much like Darren Ravel here, but I do think branding goes a long way, and it can certainly enhance the way that your program is viewed by potential prospects. That's what it really comes down to. I don't know how much it truly enhances the fan

I think it's incredibly savvy to be to invest in this kind of stuff, and I don't think it's for like Darren Ravel reasons. I think it's for like the most basic human reasons of when you were this is not that personal, even though it involves your personal life. When you were dating Kate and things got more and more serious, and you were just thinking whatever about the relationship and where it was going. Essentially what you're doing, and this is what I did. I'm not going to

To a man and woman, but to a person, to a college football fan. Most people that I've kind of informed on this matter talk to them about the infrastructure that takes place, that goes on, that is in place behind the scenes, that takes care of this sort of thing. People are always a gas by it. They always sort of roll their eyes, like, oh my god, it's ridiculous. The longer you think about it, the more it makes sense though, and to your point, the more savvy it becomes.

And obviously schools are showing kids what they want to show them. They're not showing them any ugly side of anything or anything realistic necessarily. But if Ohio State is showing the kid from Georgia, this is the entirety of the Ohio State experience in as much as we can put into a weekly vlog. And then I don't know, Purdue is saying trust us Purdue and were great. You're going to say I have a much better concept for

All Right, Dan, we got time for like, let's say three.

More, let's bang time three more. Where we going these questions? Let's go to have we done a lot out we have? We had a couple Willy Tagger questions. Let's go to Matt Brown not one of at least the two Matt Brown's working in college football media, okay, but a separate Matt Brown, Jeff Robin Perdue need to do what to consider this year a success? The schedule looks light to start the year, which maybe, but this is a Purdue

They finished strong last year, didn't they?

They did?

They finished strong last year and we had a lot of fun in this program talking about the singularity.

Mm hmm.

You remember that they've got to build their defensive front seven. They lose a lot on the defense.

That was the strength of that team.

That was the strength of the team. So I think to some degree success will be measured by how well the defense performs. If they get run over by the competition, that's going to be an issue. But they got to find some way to rebuild in a hurry and keep themselves respectable on offense. And it's not just front seven, like they got issues at cornerback too. It's sort of a defensive shit show. If I can curse a little

If p Due makes the ball game, it's a successful year. Totally, it's a totally successful year. The problem is if Purdue does win eight games again or gets to eight games.

He's gone.

Yeah, I don't know. Well, he's in West Lafayette.

He's gone.

I mean there was, there were conversations last year, and he's too good for his own good or for West Lafayette's own good. But yes, I would be for as long as he's there, I would be optimistic that he has done a good job marrying a lot of pro passing concepts with understandable looks for eighteen and nineteen year olds, and has thus far done a very good job defensively, bringing Nicolet with him and taking advantage of returning experience talent.

One up debt.

I to put it on a percentage basis, I would say less than one percent. And who in the Big Ten West poses the greatest threat to Wisconsin over the course of the next five years? And why is it Purdue slash Minnesota and not Nebraska.

I don't think it is Perdue or Minnesota, Dan.

Okay, I have a very convoluted answer. No, it's the answer is Scott Frost wins the Big Ten in year two and takes the job with whoever in the NFL, and Purdue recruits well and manages to keep Jeff Brahm, and Minnesota recruits well and manages to keep PJ. Fleck, and they're able to find diamonds in the rough quarterback, and Nebraska has to hire Ba Polini back. I don't know, but then then Nebraska's a threat. Yeah, Bo Polini was totally decent in Nebraska, but that would be a mess.

Keep your keys, your eye on the Big Ten West this year.

It's going to be better and fun.

It's gonna be better, It's going to be sneaky good sneaky entertaining to watch. Anyway, let's leave it at that.

What questions intrigue you? You want to go to lemons Est, We can go to lemons Es, Dan, Do you want to go to We've got a lot of good questions here we did. Oh, I know what you want to go? Do you want to go to Gilgamesh?

Gilgamesh? Yeah? I do?

Okay? Will you guys pick a team to follow in the Japanese X League. A Sahi Soft Drink Challenger sounds awesome or the Licksil Deers.

Yeah?

So, I will admit ty, I did not know what the Japanese X League was.

Did you look it up?

I did look it up.

According to Wikipedia, the X League is the top level American football league in Japan. Founded in nineteen seventy one as the japan American Football League, it changed its name to the X League in nineteen ninety seven. Here's what you need to know. There are three divisions in X one, an X two, and an X three, which, as college football fans, that kind of sounds familiar, right m M. Teams in the three tier league are split into East

So, when I saw that this was a mix of different types of players in Japan playing American football and was called X, I was really hoping it was a play on the word ex And I was really hoping that it was only open to former college football players who were not good enough as essentially or had flamed out or decided to start a comeback at an older age. And it was those players playing with Japanese players, Japanese college aged players. So I was hoping for Nate longshore

There is very much a Homer at the bat slash Springfield Nuclear power Plant element to this that I love. They also have relegation and promotion, which is a famous concept here among US college football nerds as to ways they could improve college football. I love everything about this, So I feel like we need to pick a team now.

So you have IBM Big Blue, obviously, the Chess Master, right, you have as or as one Black Eagles.

I like this one. I'm thinking Gladiator. I'm thinking Russell Crowe yelling as one.

The Nojima Saga, Mihara Rise, Okay, the All Mitsubishi Lions, one of my favorites. Bowls just called bulls Bowls, the lakom Kobe Finney's. Yeah, okay, there's the Panasonic impulse. We've all had that.

What about Club Hawkeye.

Club Hawkeye is pretty good, It is pretty good. They they're head coaches, Nozomu Nishimura, and so obviously that's a loaded conversation we'd have to have if we support it, if we became Club Hawkeye supporters. But this it mostly was just useful for me because I got to remember, like, there's a seventy one percent chance that Cody Hawkins is in this league, right, he almost assuredly. Cody Hawkins and John Parker Wilson are like the Big Ben and Aaron Rodgers and Tom Radio this.

So does this mean that if you want to play in this league the company Mitsubishi has to hire like Nate Longshore.

Yes, he has to work for them, and like the offseason.

Just tremendous, by the way, breaking news, Blake Barnett has just transferred to the Asahi Soft Drink Challengers.

I think it's a great fit.

Ty Oh my god, this is I think it's I think.

I mean he'll he'll be in a battle with Riley Skinner Chandler Harnish might have something to say about his prospects, and don't count out Tyson Lee, Hi, dark Horse.

I need to know more about this league. I really need to know more about this league. We do have listeners that are in Japan who I'm sure are aware of this, so please email in more details in Layman's terms so we can understand exactly what's going on here. But right now, right now, I think the as one. Black Eagles are the.

Black Eels are. That's a strong name. Can we close out with a very quick question, yes, please tie this from Josh? How do you feel about Lacroix as a beverage?

I have one in front of me. What? I literally have one in front of me.

What flavor?

Lime?

And just you go straight up? Is it cold?

Is it in a glass with ice cold? I'm drinking it straight out of can dan because I'm a brute.

How many cases of Lacroix do you keep on hand?

Why would somebody ask this question?

I don't personally love Lacroix. I think it might be a heated sort of opinion that people have.

So here here is the genesis of me with Lacroix. I have been to family gatherings where they've either had Lacroix or there's like another brand, Bubbly basically the same thing. Okay, And I was at Wegmans the other day looking to get some drinks in the house, saw Lacroix was on sale and decided I'd pick him up because we just recently had it at a family gathering. And since we picked it up now the solid wife said, hey, that's that's pretty good, looked at it. No, no calories, sodium free,

Okay, I just it's for whatever reason, don't care for it. Drink it at a like a cookout once or a barbecue for you people who speak English. It just made me thirsty, or I'd rather just have water.

I will say, if you're expecting something sweetened when you drink your Lacroix, I think you're more inclined to have a negative impression of what it is, because then it just sort of shocks you, like, oh, this is the worst sod ever.

Do you know about our pal Stephen Godfree's invention, his invention, his invention. No with Lacroix. Oh you're not really a coffee drinker, But apparently to Lacroix enthusiasts, mixing a cold brew and I don't know the ratio. Mixing a cold brew coffee, so essentially a more dense iced coffee with coconut flavored Lacroix can be quite refreshing, and he calls it a pensacola.

Interesting. Yeah, he was a creative and dapper gentleman, Stephen Gostrol. So on this topic, it has been a while, and if you're listening about an hour and fifteen minutes into this monstrosity, maybe you'd also be interested in a Lacroix related secret.

Verbal Oh okay, So first of all, how do you spell Lacroix.

You spell Lacroix capital la space capital c r o i x Lacroix, Lacroix as a French say, mm hmm. We need a secret verbal subject, Daniel.

So that the subject will be Lacroix, and some kind of like is it true that you're creating your own flavor in the lap of Lacroix, Like how how did you get involved with the Lacroix people? You know, what are your early impressions of what you ever your flavor is going to be?

Anything Lacroix related for that matter.

Yeah, anything, I think Lacroix create flavor, creation, but yes, okay, I can go. I think it needs I think it needs to be specific, because then it'll make it seem like there is this very specific rumor about me creating a beverage for this beverage company, and it's not true.

We need a target that we haven't previously secret verbaled.

Okay, uh, I'm looking, I'm scrolling through. Ty I've got it. Okay. So we're gonna have people that are listening right now, you beautiful, wonderful people. You're going to tweet something about I didn't know you're getting your own Lacroix flavor. What's the what's the backstory behind you getting your own Lacroix flavor? How do I get my own Lacroix flavor like you are getting for yourself to be very talented? Mike Gollick Junior, Notre Dame related. Yes, yes, So do not indicate why

Not leave a trace. It's an off season secret verbal. Here, let's talk a little lacroix with Mike Golick Junior.

M Golic Junior, fifty seven Jr.

All Right, Dan, well, fun show. We've got pages upon pages of questions. Perhaps we can save this doc and come back. Oh my god, it later on in the month. So here's the deal. I am moving. I will be moving next week and won't be able to record, So you're going to be back on your own.

Okay, that's fine. I have some ideas maybe Mike Golick Junior.

And then hopefully I'll be back the week falling from the new studio.

That's amazing.

So there you go. Thank you to everybody who emailed in. We're gonna hold on to this document and come back to some of these great questions at some point in the very near future. Don't forget. You can find us always at soliverbal dot com. We're also on Facebook, on Twitter, on Instagram, on Reddit, on Apple podcasts, on Google Play, We're on Spotify, We're on Stitcher anywhere where you can find a podcast, you can find the Soli Verbal. We will be with you talking some college football and a