Welcome to the Solid verbal call that for me.
I'm a man, I'm for I've heard so many players say, well, I want to be happy.
You want to be happy for dake Ado State?
Is that whoo whoom?
And Dan and Ty.
Welcome back to the Solid Rubber boys and Girls. My name's Ty Hildebrant. I am joined as always, but I'm a good friend, colleague and co host over there in beautiful New York City. My man Dan Rubinstein, Sir, how are you?
I'm good?
I both had a good and bad sign as I was walking back to the CLO office from the office, and I don't know what it portends for this show, but I'm willing to hear you out if I tell you.
Yeah, please, what's the show about? Honesty? As you know, I was thinking about the show.
I was thinking about my answers to this sort of very specific and non college football Q and A. And as I'm walking by a subway station, out of the station emerges I'm a perfectly lovely looking woman wearing an.
Oregon Dux hat.
Okay, And I said, I said, hot, damn, this is gonna be a good show. What a great sign. I'm walking home to do this podcast with tie in my clofice, my closet office. That's a great sign that we're gonna do a good show. And then on my way home and I walk by a popular butcher here in Brooklyn, Okay, and I was I was like, oh, I'm grilling tomorrow
for the fourth of July. We're recording this on Wednesday, the third, and I'm thinking about going full time butcher instead of getting my my ground meat, my sausages, steaks, whatever I'm going to grow from, you know whatever, Trader Joe's or a local grocery store here, and they're fine, but you might as well support a more local business and higher quality. They're they're grinding the meat right there on the area.
It's very pro butcher continue And so I'm like, all right, I'm gonna I'm gonna pop in and get some some meat for some burgers tomorrow. And it's it's basically, if you've ever seen a subway in a very very crowded rush hour international city, people are like pressed up against the tour yearning to breathe free the day before the fourth of July to grab their their are sorted grilling meats.
So I'm gonna have to go out later, and the butcher's gonna be closed to some grocery store and slummet with grocery meat instead of fresh, locally butchered ground meats. We've got We've got a I don't know about, I don't know fifteen twenty minutes from here called Dietrichs Meats. And I took solid wife Cayden there. Oh gosh, must have been two years ago, and she was mortified because
on the walls it's like Deliverance. You've got a lot of things hanging that, a lot of local taxidermy on display.
They do do they do sort of obscure meats.
Oh, they'll do anything, anything you can imagine. There's a counter all the way in the one corner where you can find pretty much whatever you're looking for.
This place is offering camel patties. Yeah, okay, maybe not camel patties.
You can get rattlesnake at this place. Okay, Now, maybe maybe that's a Brooklyn thing.
Yet it might be, well, it doesn't sound like a Brooklyn thing. Perhaps Here's here's what I'm going to say. I'm going to say it's a good sign people are enjoying the outdoors tomorrow. People are gonna enjoy grilling meat and that all wraps together with a nice little bow into college football. And we have a very specific Q and A that we're I don't know what the title is, but basically we asked people to fit their circular questions into this this little peg or the peg into the
hole whatever. We said, what'll it take for blank to happen? And you got to fill in the blank. Yeah, and we have all sorts of great fill ins here from everywhere, fans of every Witch team. You know, we have NJK saying what's going to take for Cincinnati to get national respect? I know you've been deep diving the Bearcats for a few weeks now, so.
The floor months on these Yeah, you're no, it's I mean, we talk about Cincinnati if you'd like to.
But what'll it take for We've We've got an astounding number of questions here that we're going to delve into moments.
Do you have time to really get to you know, we also have a bunch of non college football.
I'm gonna wing this one tonight, Dan, now.
I know, but do you have you do you have a heart out at any time?
I don't have a heart out. No great, okay, you think a three hour show? What are we doing here? What are we doing?
I'm good if you are, I'm gonna have to take an intermission and get some water at a certain point.
But otherwise all right.
Well, before we get into yeah, this wonderful assortment of questions that have been sent to a a few very important housekeeping things that we need to discuss first and foremost. If you didn't get the newsletter, if you didn't see the newsletter, if you haven't been listening to our show or following us on social media, surprise, surprise, We are doing our next live show, or I should say a live show a of August, August the eighth. It's a
Sunday night. The show starts at seven point thirty. The doors open at six at a place called Union Stage and Awesome Venue on the Waterfront in Washington, DC. So we would urge everyone to get out there solidverbotickets dot com is where you can go if you want to get in on tickets. We've got it posted a number of different places out on social media. Very excited. Tickets the first day went like hotcakes. There are still some left.
We would urge you that if you're going to be in the DC area, if you're close to the DC area, if you can get to the DC area, it's going to be a fun show Sunday, August the eighteenth.
We're really excited about it. We're going to do fantasy things.
Yes, I mean we're it's still unconfirmed Big twelve location, still working on it.
Yeah, but yes, at least for now, we've got one live show that is locked up in DC. So if you got any questions, hit us up. But in the meantime, DC show is happening August the eighteenth. Please get your tickets. We'd love to meet you and say hello.
As an addendum, tie a phrase selling like hotcakes originated in the eighteen hundreds when simple cornmeal versions were sold at church bake sales and snapped up by the congregation.
Before they went cold. Thank you, Daniel, no problem. Random factoid.
Secondly, we've got t shirts out there, which you can find at solidverbal dot com slash store, four of them to be exact. We're still working on getting some of our older favorites activated, but that's going to happen in
very short order. As we said on our last show, We have changed up the ordering process a little bit, and instead of having to wait weeks on end for the pre order to finish up and then for the shirts to be printed, we now do it differently and if you order, you're going to get them in like one to two weeks or somewhere in that vicinity.
So yeah, on demand printing, on demand printing.
If you order it now, you'll have it in time for the season, which all too often has been a sticky point, no longer a problem. Get on out there, go to solid verbal dot com slash store for more information on what we've got to.
Be a no. I think that's it.
We hope to see you, know if you ended up in DC after college or for work, or because a loved one brought you there, we hope to see you and bring your loved ones and pals who enjoy college football and weird college football shows to the what is the Union Stage, Tye Union Stage on August the eighteenth. We are quite excited to do a show in a new locale and so this is our our annual show
that we have a ton of fun doing. It's multimedia and tie is so much taller in person than you think I am so don't pass up that opportunity.
All right, Dan, where do we want to start here with these questions that were sent in?
All right, let's start that. Let's start with.
Bup up, up, up up.
Let's start with Kevin. Okay, what'll it take for the full back position to make a comeback? Let's start here with the forgotten fullbacks of.
Your the forgotten fullbacks of your Yeah, college football, well sports in general, but especially college football, it seems very cyclical.
Disagree, I mean a little bit.
Even though offenses have changed a great deal and gone in entirely different direction than they were when fullbacks were still a very prominent position within college football. I would expect, and I've said this forever, at some point in time, with everyone going smaller and faster and more versatile and taking better advantage of space, eventually, at some point it's going to swing in the other direction and there's going
to be this renaissance back to the future. At that point, potentially the fullback could make a comeback.
Is there anything?
And I understand that teams have used concepts that you harken back to the single wing or the veer and stuff like that that are inspired by, but at the same time it's almost injecting those concepts into more modern frameworks. It's hard to imagine seeing programs dead kate a position to blocking to help open up lanes and occasionally sort of squirt out for third and three passes kind of thing. It's hard to imagine that we are going to revert
to that kind of athletes. That said, the H back is taking a lot of you know, in spread systems, the H back, which is more of a fullback tight end hybrid, you know, on those sort of wham running plays, going out for passes, leading the way in sort of power sets, even if they're even if a team is playing the spread. I don't I can't imagine full time fullbacks are going to come back everywhere.
So you think that the modern fullback is a guy like Jalen Samuels.
Yes, I think you're going to see guys you need to be able to offer me two or three quality things with speed in twenty nineteen, twenty twenty, twenty twenty one, because that's just that's where high schools have gone, that's where colleges have gone, and that's where more and more pro I mean, we see a lot of fullbacks. I know the forty nine ers I think just paid a ton of money for a fullback weirdly, but mostly where
you see where the sport is going. It's hard to imagine saying I need that five two and twenty pound guy who's not super fast, who doesn't offer me much as the game goes out open wide. But here's the caveat. I think you're right that defenses will continue to evolve to play against these spread and guys that are offenses
that are using the full width of the field. I imagine that we're going to see more two way players that aren't necessarily fullbacks in the way that was it Owen Mari Sick for Stanford played linebacker and full back in a couple of games. I don't think we're going to see that kind of full time two way play.
But more to what Ian Boyd talked about way back when on this show, where we see four minute offenses to just ram the ball and use up clock, give the give some of the defense some rest, but bringing
an outside linebacker, bringing a defensive end. All this you're playing with heavy sets, you're draining clock, and you're just trying to get five yards at a time, and I think guys like that will start assuming some of the responsibilities of fullback without dedicating a scholarship to generally a guy named Joe.
So you're thinking more Miles jacks out there, more Miles Jackson, not necessarily carrying the ball, but yes, all of a sudden, it's you know, three guys in the backfield, two of whom are sort of an h back positions and one of them is Christian Wilkins.
That kind of thing. And it's not just in the red zone. It's not just on the goal line, but it's, oh, we're up five with three point fifty two left and we want to kill clock, but we still want to be aggressive about it and creative about it instead of just going straight at defenses. And maybe there's misdirection, and maybe there's misdirection with power. I think I hope, My hope is that we see more of that to get more of the best athletes on a team, not just on offense, on the field.
So in conclusion, yeah, Moose Johnston ain't walking through that door anytime soon.
It's tough to see that. It's tough to see it.
It's either going to require a dramatic slow evolution of college football back to its power roots, let's say of the old Nebraska days three yards and a cloud of dust, or it's going to require some hybrid version like the h back, two way players something like that to take hold in college.
I mean, is there is there another sport in which all of the sudden, somebody who is not offering an advanced athletic option making like are we going to see baseball players that look like kent Herbeck ever?
Again? Probably not? Probably, I mean the NBA is a good example.
The NBA's are great, Like, are we going to see power forwards just like settling for ten footers and playing with their back to the back.
Everyone can shoot now, everyone can dribble. It's it's a different game. Things have changed.
It's and I understand, you know, size in every sport, and I understand, you know, the sort of quote unicorn nature of different players in different sports. But it's hard to imagine we're going to go back to seeing many teams say we're going old school and succeeding doing it.
Kent her back, Okay, is that guys? That is a twins he was.
I don't mean to slander in's first basement Yeah, he was the first like nineteen ninety three player I could think of who's probably not built like a god. He pulled a guy off the bag in the World Series, if I remember correctly. Okay, we got to move on here. Yeah, we've got a question from someone named Jet. I'm just going to assume that Jet is Jet Toner former kicker Stanford.
Yes, I believe.
Okay, he says, and that's thematic here because he said, what will it take for DoD the PAC twelve to be relevant again?
Dan?
So, yeah, I did have a chance to deep drill this one. My guess is that my opinion is in as turbo charged as yours. I vary with mine, but continue in the short term. The thing that has really haunted the Pac twelve is they just they need a team with a lot of credibility coming out of the regular season and to perform better in the playoff. You need to get a team in the playoff, and Washington has been that team in recent years that hasn't performed as well as maybe we hoped coming out of the
regular season. But they need they just need a team to go undefeed it and that's a very easy starting point.
I think that's correct. I don't know. I don't know.
If people look at the PAC twelve and say, oh, Oregon went undefeated, Washington went undefeated, that conference is in good shape. I think it's a good thing for the conference, and I think it's a good thing financially for a team to make the playoff and to have you know, as many teams as possible playing playoff games or New Year's was New Year six games. That's great. That's wonderful financially for the financial health of the conference and payouts
to other teams, you know, rising tide, et cetera. I think in terms of when I see the word relevant, I think I think about reputation. I think about what somebody in Ohio thinks, somebody in Florida thing, somebody in Texas thinks, somebody in New Mexico things. Shout out to all our New Mexicans. You got to win big and the winnable September non conference games. Last year, we saw Washington come close but not beat Auburn. That game came down and probably a questionable no call on the Jake
Browning hit. Oregon has Auburn to start the year off at Jerry World. They need to win that game. For the PAC twelve in terms of talking about relevance and reputation, they need to win those games, and they need to win the winnable games. You feel like, can't lose to Cincinnati. I know it's Cincinnati's good. I know it was Chip Kelly's first game that was a winnable game that they lost. They need to win all of those games. They can't lose dumb games, and they need to win the big games.
I know that might be asking a lot, but this is a conference with resources, good quarterbacks, with good coaches, and so they need to establish that early on. So in week five you're thinking to yourself, you know what, Yeah, I will watch Oregon Arizona.
Because Oregon beat Auburn and I want to see what they look like.
Now here's something else that I think could be important. Yeah, you're talking about PAC twelve real events. Let's look at USC. Sure, a lot of people who aren't in PAC twelve country. Maybe you're just moonlighting as PAC twelve fans watching a game late night on a Saturday, they look at the PAC twelve, they think of USC.
Yeah.
USC has been very so so over the last couple of years. Now, if USC can rise under Clay Helton or anybody else, really we rise and more become a threat in the PAC twelve and on the national stage. I think that helps. That helps the reputation of the conference.
Again, totally true. I think the two teams who have really branded themselves well in terms of success in the PAC twelve or USC in Oregon, even though Washington has been really good recently. I don't know how much national interest there is, and maybe I'm wrong here is if USC is the bell Weather, which I think is a pretty good case, they open the season Fresno State at home ten thirty pm. Kick Week two, Stanford at USC, which it's a pretty light week in terms of games
that potentially could have natural national interest. I'm not saying Stanford USC is at the top of that list the same week as Texas, LSU, and I think A and M Clemson, but Stanford USC the premier game in the conference that week.
Ten thirty pm Eastern.
So if the case is to be made that USC is the bell weather of how the conference is doing health wise, that's how they're opening the season. You taught USC week four, nine pm Eastern. I think it's a Friday night game and then other random games early on that just to me sound interesting, like I would want to watch that if I.
Liked college football.
Texas Tech Arizona Week three, ten thirty pm kick Khalil Tait new coach for Texas Tech, but you know, returning quarterback British comedy legend Alan Bowman, and then Wazoo Houston Mike Leach Dana Holgerson Week three, nine to fifteen pm Eastern time kick. I think it's in Houston, but not at Houston. So that's Those are all interesting sounding games to me, potentially, and if you are living any in Central time East Coast time, probably not seeing the end of potentially a really good game.
Oh well, Joel writes in what will it take for Adrian Martinez to win the Heisman Day? And Adrian Martinez, Yeah, exciting quarterback. Young quarterback for Nebraska was really the first big recruit that Scott Frost was able to capture after he took the job in Lincoln.
By the way, did you see Bruce Feldman's piece today about Nebraska's quarterback coach? Really good? Go go to the Athletic and read it. He's just like a sort of mercurial. Interesting dude, not in fully Mike Leachway his name I forgot, I don't have his name at the top of my head. But really good piece about the development of Adrian Martinez and in line if you're interested in Joel's what'll it take worth reading?
We know the Heisman Trophy generally goes to a quarterback. Mm hmm, all right, so he's got that going for him, which is nice. We also know he's a dual threat guy, so presumably if he gets things going in the right direction, he's going to rack up both passing and rushing yardage. He needs Nebraska to genuinely challenge for that big ten West. That might not even be enough.
Yeah, I think that's right. It's hard for me to look at I think JD. Spielman's back, Stanley Morgan's gone at receiver. He might be asked to do a lot. I think the defense will take a step forward, but there's I still have a bunch of questions with that defense. Nebraska has to win games, and they have to beat Colorado. They have to make up for last year. I'm trying
to get their schedule in front of me. It's going to take a super star year from him, because I just I don't see Nebraska at the very very high end winning eight games, and he will have to be okay, I have their schedule in front of me.
They go to Colorado.
I mean, he doesn't say this year in his question. He just says people would take for him to win the Heisman and that probably doesn't happen this year. But moving forward, what is it take to win? What does it take to get in the conversation. I don't know if it's all that complicated Joel it it just needs to happen.
Right he gets Ohio State early on in the season this year if we are talking about this year, which who knows. So he has to have another killer game against the Buckeyes and to close like he has a tougher November Purdue, Wisconsin, Maryland, Iowa and has to finish strong. If if they are flirting with nine wins, I don't think the context will be good enough. But that's going
to be crazy impressed from Nebraska and Adril Martinez. And if it's a down year and he's putting on you know, if he has thirty eight touchdowns to three interceptions at a certain point. My favorite phrase it's going to be impossible to ignore a player like that.
All Right, what will it take four.
Florida State to return to the top of the ACC consistently?
Yeah? How do you feel about this?
Kendall Briles is going to have to be everything advertised and that he's been these you know at Houston and what he did at Baylor.
On the field.
I think they're going to I mean, the incoming class is quite good. They're going to have to put together top five classes for two. They're gonna have to put together two and a half like top five classes, especially along the lines, because they look very good at skill positions right now. On offense, their incoming class has a
ton of promising defenders. But if we're talking about returning to the top of the ACC, so we're matching and getting past Clemson, we're talking about somehow surpassing the gold standard right now nationally. So it's going to take huge classes, and it's going to take retaining coaches. Taggart hitting on this latest defensive coordinator higher. I it's going to take more than I can see happening. But I can see them returning to competing for the top of the ACC.
Right It's it's gonna take all of those things that you said, quarterback, recruiting, all of those things that you just said, plus some sort of coaching turnover at Clemson. Yes, and maybe maybe it's reventable as leading.
I don't know.
Clemson right now has so much momentum in the right direction. It will I think require something to change that. His question again says top of the acc consistently, you could do that two years from now, even a year from now with great recruiting, with a well coached game against Clemson that you just happen to win by like three points. That doesn't seem too far fetched to me. Clemson could be gettable, sure, but consistently, consistently you need some sort
of ce change right now. That's that's the only thing that comes to mind, because they've got that program loaded for bear for years to come. They've just done so well on the recruiting front. They're not going to be recruiting all duds at Clemson. They're too good for that at this point. So I think you got to look
at coaching turnover. That could be Dabo Obama. Dabo Obama, Yeah, Dabo Obama help, Daboa Obama helps or Dabbo to the NFL or whatever helps uh and then yes, hiring somebody at a coordinator spot that always gets the grown for good reason, whether it's Andy Ludwig or Scott Leffler or Ted Rue for any of those types where they're just like keep getting jobs and keep putting out below average units that you know Dabbo has some sort of personal
connection to. I just can't see that specific scenario happening. He's just too good at hiring and too good at iding coaching talent. But yeah, something.
Like that where I don't know, he just really really whiffs on three crucial hires and something changes within that program. But right now it's you're not surpassing Clemson the acc outside of something dramatic.
In that same vein, Mark says, what will it take for someone other than Clemson or Alabama to be ranked number one at any point in this season? This is another question that to me doesn't seem all that complicated.
Right. The rankings are stupid.
We've come to that, Kik, I've done a full line. They're fine, but we were in some agreement here that rankings to a large extent are kind of dumb. So really, if Clemson loses a game, if Alabama also loses a game, they would both have to lose. It stands to reason that they would drop them because when a team loses, they almost always drop. Someone else would bubble up and it wouldn't be long before Clemson or Alabama found their
way back to the top. But it would really require both of them losing in somewhat close proximity throughout the course of the year and for there to be a team with a better record below them.
Well, we see fluctuations in September, right, We sees that sometimes people overreact to result the time, all the time, and so I could see I don't believe Ohio State has anybody huge early on. I mean, I'll due respect to Cincinnati and your bear Cat's deep dive since it's Florida Atlantic, Cincinnati, Indiana, Miami of Ohio early on in their non conference schedule. So Ohio State is probably not
going to beat anybody. But what if LSU goes into Austin and beats Texas forty seven to fourteen, and they're ranked number four or five in Week two, they just completely obliterate Texas in Austin, Maybe.
That they just leap frog.
They leap frog a Clemson team who say struggled with Texas A and M. So, yes, Clemson has a very losable game in Week two. Alabama, I think they're fine early on in terms of opponents that seem like a threat. But what if Georgia is number three in the country and undefeated Clemson and undefeated Alabama ahead of them, and I think it's late September, you would probably know better than I. Georgia just demolishes Notre Dame. They demolish a big time consensus top seven to twelve team, and Georgia
beats them fifty five to ten. They're gonna get votes.
They're gonna get votes. They're not gonna jump both though, No, they could jump one of them. They could jump one of them, but they're not jumping both. I still think it takes well. Maybe in a scenario like that, let me let me rephrase. I think if it's that flattening, if it's if it's a situation where one of these two teams has a loss and Georgia has a great flattening like that, potentially there could be a jump up.
I still think we're just talking early September. But the most likely way to.
Do it is both teams have a loss and someone like Georgia just lurks.
Well, yes, I think the only way to jump one of those teams without them losing is by a statement win early on. If we're talking specific to early, let's go you want to do South Carolina? Yeahs are South Carolina next? Okay, so we have how does South Carolina get to? This is from Andy? How what'll it take for South Carolina to ascend to Florida levels? Which is sort of a very vague and up for interpretation quality. What does Florida levels mean? What does government mean to you?
What does Florida mean to you?
So? What does that? What does that mean?
That means like a threat, a significant threat to the to the SEC East, but not a favorite.
I would assume. So the last time that.
I would say South Carolina was truly a threat in the SEC, truly deeply a threat to like win.
The SEC, truly madly, deeply. You got to go back to the Steve Spurrier days.
He told us not to set to bring up Steve Spurrier, But yeah, I apologize, It's okay. Steve Spurrier had three straight seasons where he won eleven games, right, was that was pretty good. They haven't quite gotten back to that. They had that one nine win season with the Bowl win and the outback ball under mush Champ.
I guess two years ago, but.
You know, I think you can see you need to start by consistently getting to nine wins. Yeah, that will help, and that regular season build regular season wins, yes, thank you. That will build momentum moving forward. The problem right now for South Carolina is they've got to contend with both Georgia and Florida in the SEC East and that makes life really difficult.
So if we're talking specific to Florida, what we currently believe about Florida as a significant threat to the SEC East, South Carolina needs to probably and they've recruited well under will Musham, but it's consistent. I want to say top twenty classes if you're good, they've been twenty four to seven. The problem is that's like ninth or eighth in the SEC that there's just so many recruiting heavyweights ahead of them,
both in their division and their conference. So they need to probably start recruiting on a Tennessee Auburn type level, which are a couple of the teams just ahead of them. So that's adding two, three, four or five more blue chips to each class, which is tough because recruiting locally. South Carolina has a good amount of talent. But that's not a regional brand. I hate that word, but I'm
using it anyway. Like the other team, you know, competing against Florida and Georgia, and you know, Tennessee is a bigger name, Auburn's a bigger name, and Florida State and obviously Clemson in their region. So they're going to need to really get aggressive and however, you gotta do it. You got to do it. And then they need to lift their floor on the field. And last year they
take a really impressive step forward on offense. You know, they give away the Florida game, Texas A and M was within their grasp, but defensively they just took such a huge step back that they can't be any worse than average on either side of the ball, and on special teams, they can't give things away because of being just well, we can't stop the run for these three weeks.
They just can't happen.
If they're going to threaten the division, especially with now Florida, presumably improving from where they were under Jim mcawain. So they have to raise that floor, and they have to they have to take another step forward and put together, you know, because of a rough November means depth top thirteen twelve classes, I've maybe even top fifteen classes, and I could see them as being that threat because we
saw them against Georgia last year. Threat would not be one of the words to describe South Carolina's twenty eighteen game against the Dowgs.
What about Kirby smart deep fakes.
Kirby smart deep fakes. Yes, if we're going negative, if we're going opoh, always really.
Strong misinformation campaign could help the game Cocks. Just throwing that out there.
I could see Will Muschamp wanting to do the voice himself though.
Ye, this is.
Definitely Kirby and not Will must Champ. Yeah, it's not going to work. Let's do Yeah, I think it's possible. It's just it's gonna be a lot.
Let's do a few more of these here, we got so many good ones. How about Andrew Joe moorehead, your guy, Joe Moorehead. Okay, he says, what will it take for Joe Moorehead to have a big second season at Mississippi State.
How did you feel about year one under Joe Moorehead.
High ceiling, low floor. There were really impressive moments That defense had such a high ceiling that that I've always liked Bob Shoop. I know we had a rough time at Tennessee, but going back to where what he did at Penn State and what they look like up front with Jeffrey Simmons and Montes sweating with Jonathan Abraham who was great, uh, sort of playing center field for Mississippi State, what they look like on defense had me convinced that they're going to be a really tough out and they
should be. They should have a ceiling of nine probably nine wins under Morehead. And so this season specifically, a lot of variables replacing a lot on defense, especially up front. I like their receivers a whole bunch. I think Kylon Hill is one of the more underrated names at running back nationally with how he played last year and some of those bigger games for Mississippi State, Basically they need to start four and oh this year. That includes Kentucky.
I believe in Starkville they need to split LSU at home and they go there against A and M on the road. They had a real rough time with LSU last year, but under Dan Mullen, always competitive, won some loss, some generally close split the road games Auburn, Tennessee both on the road.
That's fine. I think that's totally respectable.
The need to beat Arkansas, Ole Miss and Abilene Christian, all of this sounds realistic and all of that. If that happens, if those splits and those wins at the end happen, they go nine to three. Okay, I think it's probably Tommy Stevens. Yes, that was gonna be my
point here. So before Tommy Stevens came onto the scene and grad transferred away from State College and pick Starkville, it seemed like it was going to be between Keyton Thompson, who we saw a little bit last year when Nick Fitzgerald was out, and Garrett Trader, who's a freshman.
That would seem to be. Yeah, that seemed to be the quarterback battle.
But now through Tommy Stevens in the mix, I don't know if Tommy Stevens is going to be the guy or not. Joe Morehead will make that decision. But I do think it helps.
That would be a weird transfer.
If it was a transfer, wouldn't be the first time that something like that's happened. I like the fact that Tommy Stevens is familiar with the Joe Moorehead system because last year points in the year for Mississippi State just seemed like the offense was out of sync. So to bring in a guy like Stevens who knows what Morehead wants to do, He's got a lot of familiarity with it,
that certainly benefits them in the short term. I think it's going to take someone Stevens to be the starter to really have a good grasp with what more Head's trying to do to give them a chance to have that big season.
But do you think if he were good and he had a grasp of that system, just at least big picture wise, he would have kind of easily won the Penn State job. I don't know what this is that much experience and familiarity. Obviously it's shifted.
I don't know what the system looks like now.
It doesn't seem like it'd be night and day.
It doesn't seem that way.
But keep in mind there's been a lot of turnover with a personnel at Penn State. Yeah, on the offensive side, so sure, you know they like Sean Clifford and state. He's younger, Yeah, yeah, he's younger. He maybe he gives them more upside with what they're trying to do. Stevens saw an opportunity to go to a place where he's familiar and took the opportunity. So I think it's win win for Joe moorehead time will tell what it means
for Tommy Stevens. I think though his grasp of that system could help Mississippi State if they want to try and become, you know, a better entity in twenty nine ten, if they want to have that quote unquote big year.
And here's the other thing that should be remembered about Tommy Stevens and the Mississippi State offense, Nick Fitzgerald completing pastes downfield against pretty good teams was ugly twenty eighteen, and so the bar is very low right now that even if Tommy Stevens is fine, even if he's Joe Burrow, which is not supposed to be an insult, and I
know it's what it sounds like. That's great because there's a lot at Mississippi State right now to be excited about both from the coaching I know there's a little bit of turnover on offense and the coaching staff. But if he's fine, they're probably better than they were last year with a good amount of defensive experience in the back half of that defense. So yes, even if Sean Clifford was clearly the guy at Penn State, Tommy Stevens can very well be a fine guy.
Yeah, what's your definition of a big year?
They made it up to like fourteenth or fifteenth in the AP pole if memory serves. Yeah, it was one of the best, probably eight defenses in the country, finished eight four with the regular season, really good defense. So he was starting from a point where he had a lot to work with. The offense was obviously a bit of a work in progress. But now as we move forward into twenty nineteen, a big quote unquote year is relative.
It's one hundred percent true. And if you need a reminder, the worst passing team in the SEC was probably Mississippi State last year. I mean it was Arkansas, but after that, of teams that were competitive, it was Mississippi State, and they were competitive in spite of where they were at quarterback throwing the ball. So it's a good position to be in.
MJ writes in with a very interesting question, what will it take for Oklahoma to not make the Big Twelve Championship? Let me this as well. Will it be enough if the Jalen Hurts experiment explodes to keep Oklahoma out of the Big Twelve Championship? So you're saying that he's just okay, what if he shows up and he's just a total flop, He's a disaster.
I don't think that's all.
He's a disaster. Oh no, I don't think that'll I think that's highly unlikely.
But what happens if he shows up he's not good in the offense, the whole experiment goes bust. Is that, in and of itself enough to keep Oklahoma out of that game, knowing that they've got a ton of talent behind him?
Yeah?
Because the Heisman winner was at times pretty bad against Texas last year, threw a couple of bad picks early on and they lose that game. The Heisman winner, Jalen Hurts is not the throwing quarterback that Kyler Murray was, and I don't anticipate he'll be particularly close. But yeah, it's turnovers, and not that Jalen Hurts is a turnover prone quarterback. But yes, I think I'm basically I think
we can break it down even easier than that. They lose Bedlam in the shootout because the defense by then is stressed and even though they're improved, that's the I think it's the final game of the year this year. So they lose Bedlam and then they lose red River. That's a second loss, and things get weird against Iowa State again or I mean the road stuff is actually
really nice. Bedlam's on the road, but otherwise it's Baylor with an improving Baylor, a brand new Kansas State and Kansas so road wise in the Big Twelve, it's a pretty ideal year for Oklahoma. But they lose red River, they lose Bedlam, and they lose some sort of toss up to Iowa State or TCU.
I don't know. All right, two more of these dan only only two more? Run along?
Man, we got a well, you agreed to do a mega show tie.
What will cake for a team like Alabama, Penn State or Clemson to where it alternate uniform for a game.
Well, what qualifies as an alternate uniform, Dan.
I have breaking news here for Okay, our question asker, Okay, Penn State is actually going to wear something they call the Generations of Greatness Special Throwback uniform.
Oh, on October the fifth.
I'm looking it up now, which includes numbers on the helmets. Okay, they did back in like the late fifties and so bold.
Yeah, I know, I know. There are a few other tweaks here and there.
I could see one of those schools if they were honoring some kind of legend who passed away, and they were saying, Okay, this person had such a great game against Auburn that for the Iron Bowl, we're wearing this look. Or this guy had such a good game against Michigan he just passed away, this legend, we're wearing this look for this game to honor him instead of just a decal, instead of just you know, putting his initials above the
Nike swoosh. I could see that it would have to come together pretty quickly, or that person would have to be honored months and months in advance, if it happened over spring or something like that, for the following season. I could see that, like what Michigan did, and horrifically so with those the windowed uniforms, the windowed numbers, or the giant M when they played it was the giant M was under the lights. I believe I could see a more subtle version of that for one of those schools.
I'm not counting on it, but it could happen.
Dan, What would it take for the Big Ten to kick out and or replace Rutgers.
It would have to be some sort of off field scandal that they would use as an excuse.
Rutgers is of course, it's an official school of New York City.
It's a Rutgers town for sure, and this place would be shut down with anger. But it would be something off field. I can't imagine that the Big Ten would want to do that.
It would you know, what it would have to take.
It would have to take some sort of complete reorganization of the posts eason so that you know, I don't know when this has happened. It would have to be you know, another round of realignment when TV deals are up or whatever, where there would have to be some sort of complete rejiggering of the sport where we're saying, okay, we're we're doing five super conferences or three super conferences or four super conferences, And like, who's gonna be left
standing when the music stops? Well, friends, it's gonna be Rutgers. Well, it's gonna be Rutgers and probably a couple other schools.
So it happens.
If Rutgers gets really good in basketball and is extended an invite from the ACC, they become like the twenty eighth team in the ACC?
Could they be coach?
Are they approachable candidate if they get excellent at basketball?
Probably not, because just not generating enough revenue. I'll go to the Big East.
The Big East just added Yukon, Right, Yukon is no longer an AAC school, I think football wise, I think that's so it'll just be like that. What will Okay, So what'll it take for Purdue to win the Big Ten West?
So here's what I have.
I don't think it takes as much as people might think. Okay, what do you have?
So Iowa has a double body blow ahead of Purdue. It's it's in Iowa City the Purdue game. I think I have Michigan and Penn State leading up to it. Northwestern definitely has a tough stretch and a new starting quarterback in Hunter Johnson or Johnson. So Hunter Johnson leading an offense that at times was disastrously bad, but they did find Isaiah Bowser and then improve things. And then Wisconsin also has a tough stretch leading up to the Purdue game. It's like in Madison, but you know, is
Jack Cone good? Is it Graham Ertz whatever? Graham Mertz. I believe it's a tough, tough name to blend into each other. So yes, Wisconsin has the best running back. It looks like in college football if everybody's putting nine in the box and Wisconsin struggles again and they have to deal with injury issues and offense of creativity issues, producing a pretty good place the defense will it has to be better than what it looked like the last
time we saw them against Auburn. I want to say, Jared Stidham threw for like four hundred yards, possibly all to Darius Slayton.
I was very very against the grain going with Purdue in that game, and they got It's okay.
Yes, and that's I mean, you're at Jared Stdam's now an NFL quarterback, Darius Slayton's in the league. There's a tough team when they're on. So I don't think anybody's going to have an offense like that.
In the West.
So yeah, they have potentially the best weapon in Rondelle Moore outside of Jonathan Taylor touchdown. So yeah, they could get lucky with some body blows and get better on defense and have things work out.
Whether it's I think it's Cindelar is probably the guy and have him improved. That's the time in.
The system, board, the Cindularity, the singularity, So yeah, I don't think it's crazy. No, We've got another question here, Dylan, what will it take for mel Tucker's first year in Colorado considered a promising success? So if you take to the side the great run that Colorado had maybe two years ago, three years ago, I found Oh it's more than that. Yeah, it's the year under my back and tire. Yeah, it really has been since two thousand and three.
Yeah, a bunch of great dbs.
Yeah, since two thousand and three, we've only seen that one winning season for Colorado Buffalo. So to start, he's got to get a young core of players assembled. You've got to feel somewhat hopeful about the future of the program. That might not happen until after his first season. In the interim, you need to feel like the team plays hard. You need to feel like they improve from start to finish. I don't think it's more complicated than that. In the short term, there's a lot of room to grow in
the PAC twelve, a ton of room. So you got to start so where. You got to establish your roots by recruiting well, but you also need to establish a culture by fielding a team that looks like it is playing hard and hungry every single down.
What a way to live, live hard and hungry.
God, But that's it feels like you're doing sidework for Mountain Dew, the new energy bar. I don't know what I'm going to say. Okay, their schedule's fine. The road stuff is not the best.
I think they're at Oregon at Wazoo, but they have Stanford and Washington at home and they miss who do they miss from the north? I think they missed Cal which is fine, and unfortunately they miss Oregon State, so that would have been nice. But if they start three and oh that include a win over Nebraska at home, which they did it last year, they have If if Leviska Chhanault is not the best receiver in the country.
It's Jerry Judy and it might still be Leaviska Chenault. Otherwise, you start three and oh you go two and two at home. So that's splitting USC, Stanford.
Washington, Arizona.
So say they beat I don't know, Stanford and Arizona and then they just they basically have to win when Steven monte excuse me, Stevie Montese is good. Last year, they start out undefeated, Colorado fans get upset at us for not respecting them, and then what do they lose their final seven and he was really good against teams that weren't all that good, and they still managed to
lose that Oregon State game in the Arizona game. So they win those two games, they're making a bowl that's something, and so make a bowl that's that would be considered successful. They weren't bad at anything last year. They were bad at not being better against bad teams. They were fine on defense. They got healthier than where they were the year before. They you know, Leviscus Channault's injury definitely hurt them in terms of offensive momentum. But I think the
staff is fine. If defense is about effort, I think melt Tucker's probably going to get a little more effort out of this this team, and so maybe they finished in the fifties or forties instead of the seventies and they make a Bowl. I think six and six is a wildly successful year for this Colorado team given the sort of upheaval these past couple of years.
All Right, you get to pick out our final question before we move on.
Okay, we already talked about the Big Ten West a little bit. We talked about Jeff Brohm. What'll it take for you to believe that Matt Campbell is staying in ames long term?
Long term?
Okay, So that means in football ease, in college footballs long term. As we do this in early July twenty nineteen or five years, I was gonna say, if he's if he is the coach of Iowa State in twenty twenty two, right now, that feels long term. At the end of the twenty twenty two season. So that's for full season. I don't believe it.
So what course of actions will make you a believer?
I will be made a believer if they make him a top five highest paid coach in college football.
Okay, do you think it's about the money for him? Doesn't cost a lot from what I understand to live healthy and hungry or what did you say, hard and hungry? Hungry and hard in ames Iowa.
I don't know if it's about the money, but the money is there.
I mean, that's a pride thing. Money is a point of pride.
It's right, it's the only one of the only ways to show respect, unfortunately in the sport. So I think that's got to be a component. But within five years there are certainly a lot of jobs that could come open. We've had this discussion about Matt Campbell before in the past. I think there's a chance he could leave for the NFL. That's a possibility when you're a coach of his magnitude, of his caliber. At this point, he's going to be building up his brand enough where the NFL might be
an attractive place for him. So it's not just college football that I always say it has to contend with. I don't see it happening, But if it's gonna happen, they're gonna need to pay him handsily.
Sure, So.
If in the next three years, both Michigan schools, Notre Dame, and Penn State all open, and they come and go. In terms of Matt campbell interest or his interest whatever, I'll be a pretty firm believer. Here's here's my sort of my sub question that goes against a lot of the logic and common sense of coaching hires and coaching lives that we've seen, you know, since the dawn of college football.
Basically, if he.
Ends up making I don't know whatever, four or five, six million dollars, he keeps going to bowl games, he you know, keeps recruiting well, developing quarterbacks, putting together exciting offenses, developing guys and putting them in the NFL. Do you think we will ever get to a point where guys like Matt Campbell and Jeff Brahm, We've seen it with some coordinators like Brent Venables at Clemson are just to themselves.
I like it here, family likes it here. I believe Matt Campbell is mayor with a bunch of kids, three or four kids, that you know what, I've got it good. I don't have the pressure i'd have elsewhere. I know that these guys are crazy competitive and they want to win. At the biggest places over the biggest places. And I know that's what the fallacy is in all of what I'm saying. But do you think that there are people other than Brent Venables out there who basically will say
to themselves, life's pretty good. Can win the Big twelve here. I'm making a lot of money. Family likes it here. It's a fun it's fun to be at Iowa State and beat Oklahoma.
Are there people out there like that? Sure?
Sure, I don't know if Matt Campbell's that guy. Yeah, I think he is. I don't think Jeff brom is that guy. Jeff Brohm had an opportunity to go to Louisville and decided not to for one reason or another. But Louisville's a probable upgrade over Purdue, but not a Oh yeah, Louisville is definitely light years ahead.
And I understand the personal we have.
I don't think we've gotten to a point yet with either of those guys where there have been really high level programs that have come after them, And we probably can't make that assessment right now. But until someone like Matt Campbell turns down Notre Dame program like that, it's tough to say.
There are some and this is a this is kind of a flawed example. Who's who's the star of ncis Mark Harmon?
Does that sound right? Yeah?
Who are the people on like CSI We're talking Mark Helgenberger that are on these long, long running shows. David Caruso, Well see David Cruso's goes against it. David Caruso left NYPD Blue after the first season because he thought he could be a movie star. He was the one who had the ambition. So what I'm saying is, are we going to have more Franz Dennis Franz than Caruso at any point? As it's a very volatile profession, I just don't think.
So, it's not it's not where the coaching world is at right now. Well, I mean it's it's the coaching world is at. You go to one of these top places, if you don't win within three years, we fire you. There's a golden parachute at the end of that. Usually, so financially they're going to be in a good place. I just don't But what if they're happy and making money, what if they want to Fronzi? If they want to Fronzi by all means Franzi. Yeah, I just don't see it happening as a commonality.
It's a flawed example because NYPD Blue was like a top five or ten TV show ratings wise on ABC, a huge one of the three huge networks at the time. So, but also Dennis Franz perhaps knew that he would not succeed.
As a movie star.
Is I just wonder I wonder if Jeff Brown is secret Dennis Franz without the butt stuff, because Dennis Franz did show his.
He did and he did do that.
All right, before we move on, Yeah, I want to do about fifteen minutes of okay, college football, Okay.
Before we move on.
Another quick reminder, because we always read for other people in this spot. We've got a live show in DC. We said it at the top, I'll say it again August the eighteenth. It's a Sunday night at Union Stage, Washington, d C. Come out meet other verballers. We've been getting tweets from people. If you've purchased tickets, please.
Let us know.
We want to know who's comment Yeah, right to us at Soliverble on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram, all the usual hotspots go on the subreddit at reddit dot com, slash our slash soliverbal talk to others who are going to the show. We're excited about it. You can buy tickets now. Just go to soliverbletickets dot com. We'll hook you up with the official website where you can buy the tickets. Awesome, Daniel hit me Happy July fourth. Yep to you as well. Are you tired of your credit
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Do it all right? Dan? Give me non college football? So do you want to?
We got to We have a string of food questions because it is the fourth and people have food on their mind. Do you want to start with a string of food questions or do you want to conclude with them?
People are going to their July fourth.
Picnics, barbecues. I know people get upset about the Thursday or Friday, or Saturday or Sunday, I don't know, probably all weekend, long weekend. Let's start, but we got to go rapid fire. We got a lot of these questions. That's fine, that's fine, a bunch of them. Let's wrap it fire, let's do it.
What'll it take for tater tot nachos to supplant the traditional tortilla chip nachos.
Oh, I'm protat tots, protat tots absolutely, but I'm more of a traditionalist when it comes to nachos. What will it take Probably a clever marketing campaign from some chain restaurant.
I like tater tots, I like dipping tater tots. You get tater tot nachos, it turns into one giant mess of fried potato and gloppy toppings. I would say we need to turn the traditional shape of a like a McDonald's style hash brown, which you can you can pictures like the size of like a big belt buckle tie yep. Turn that into like a smaller surfboard shape. We dress each one of them individually with whatever charizo, cheese, onion, salce or whatever, and you get a much better vehicle
for whatever toppings you're interested in. I'm totally pro the fried potato and especially a hash brown type mini surfboard as a nacho replacement vehicle. It needs to be crispy. I think that's one crispy, a deep golden brown. What food do you not like what wish.
You did for me?
It's sushi? Okay, I'm not pro sushi. It seems like everyone in the world is.
I don't like it.
Have you had sushi outside of the Greater Allentown, Bethlehem Northampton area.
Okay, I'm not gonna it may be too strong for me to say that I don't like it, Okay, but it's just it's not something that I ever look at and say, oh, I have to have that. Like, I'll eat it if I have to, but generally it's not something I'm going to order.
Are you open to the possibility that if you and solid wife Kate ended up in Osaka that you would be fully mind changed.
When in Rome in Osaka?
I'm sure you try it, but are you open to like, oh wow, this is Yes, this is spectacularly good.
I get it. I'm I'm open to that. Yes, I wish I liked raw tomatoes. I just don't.
I really wish that that umami natural MSG. You got the brusquetta, you have, salsa's you have. You know they add to burgers definitely, But I just, for whatever reason, rubs me the wrong way.
All right?
Next question, when hankering for a fish taco, what's your fish of choice? I don't like life is allergic to fish tacos. I like a white fish. I don't it can be blackened, grilled, fried, whatever. I want a non gloppy batter for my for my fried fish taco, and probably either a thick corn tortilla or flour, not a thin corn. It's got to stand up to a heavier,
heavier protein like a fried fish would be. Okay, Yeah, I'm not a fan best dessert item to bring to a pot luck style barbecue or cookout party.
So when they say pot luck style, dam what is that means?
Everybody brings a separate dish. Somebody's in charge of cooking the meat, and they're probably the host. But then, okay, why don't you bring chips, Why don't you bring fruit salad? Why don't you bring dessert? Why do you bring drinks? Kind of thing where the host is not responsible for everything?
Okay, I like a good strawberry shortcakes.
I mean, let's be specific to summer, because I mean you are right now strawberry shortcake.
I like strawberry shortcake. It's usually it's usually light enough that will.
You make the shortcake though? Oh well, I mean in the past, I haven't.
There's no saying that I couldn't, right, But if you've got to take something and you're maybe not in the mood to bake it, I think that's a good option.
So what would you make if you were tasked with actually preparing something homemade?
If it's for the July fourth holiday? I think it's got to be something cool. Yeah, and I mean that literally got to be something cool. So by is there some sort of like.
Ice cream dessert that we can You would make ice cream, I'm not.
Making it, but you can buy ice cream to assemble as part of a larger dessert item.
I'd go with a berry crumble. They're really easy. You don't have to like make like a pie crust type thing. You just mash up a bunch of berries, or you can do peaches something like that, a fruit crumble, peaches or berries, and then the crumble is just generally like butter, flour, some some oats, sugar. That's what I tend to do. Can we just put it on top?
Can we get rid of this question the same way we got rid of coach questions? Why every time this question comes in? I never have an answer for it. Well, you gotta start cooking, man, I do cook. You gotta start baking.
I don't go to enough picnics where I've got to do this thing. I never have an answer for it. You have to you have to have go to recipes for dessert, cookies, whatever. I don't know.
Let's get you going, get that. It's science. Tw you love science. I'm done with this question, okay, Menophic. Next topic, best road trip car snacks.
I gotta say combos here, Dan combos, Okay. Why you like the variety? I like the variety.
I don't like the ones that have the crazy spices on them, because if we're talking long car trip, the crazy spices could have other plants for your stomach.
Sensitive sensitive tom tum.
Just the plain old fashioned combos gives you the nice variety of the pretzel. Get your carbs, get some of that cheese flavor in there.
M m yeah, That's where I'm going with it.
Give me some somehow altered pretzels, you know, seasonally, whether it's like a honey pretzel, whether it's some some sort of seasoned pretzel for savory and then sweet. I'll just if I can get a big old chilled bag like I would chill it the night before, put in the freezer or the fridge of Reese's pieces, I'm pretty happy. Also, just a giant water yeah, some sort of giant water. I'm not going with the I'm not going with some sort of juice because that'll make it pee quicker, more sugar,
But yeah, giant water. I have some sort of altered pretzel in Reese's Pieces, and I think you can probably get both in the same package. Now, next question, I think we're out of food questions. Which big relief. Wife and I just bought a house and we'll move in in September. It's a three bedroom with an open concept kitchen, dining, living room. Ooh, fancy my wife. My wife doesn't care
about football. Should I A turn the office into my football viewing room complete with couch, whiskey cabinet, mini fridge, giant coffee table, or b dump that extra money into the actual living room to take advantage of the large entertaining space and watch games in there. He feels like a no brainer to me.
Be feels like it's probably the no brainer.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because football season is pretty finite.
Right, That's my point. If you dump the extra money into the living room and really make it into a cool place to view anything, it seems like you're killing two birds with one stone.
Mm hm oh yeah. Somebody asked about a good surround sound. I think what's the new Dolby? Is it at most Atmosphy?
Yes?
Yes, Do you have a surround sound movie recommendation?
Uh?
No, because you got you got all fancy set up there.
No, I've got the Saunos soundbar and two Saunos play ones that I have synced up.
Are they behind the couch?
They are not behind the couch. No, they're on either side. They're in either corner of my living room as you look towards the television. Okay, that's been my way of achieving some kind of surround sound. I know it's not as deluxe as you're doing one eighty. Yeah, but that's where I'm at right now. I don't have any recommendations for it, is the same movies anything?
Yeah, I don't know.
I will say that would be good to watch on it. The Our Planet series on Netflix is pretty damn cool.
Question surround sound? Yeah.
The best thing I think I've watched in surround sound might be Band of Brothers the HBO. I could see that it was terrific and surround really. I mean, it's already an incredible mini series, but with that sort of experience, it was it was something else. When on a business trip and sharing a room with a colleague, do colleague, do you a try to go to sleep as early as possible, even to the point of faking sleep. B stay up and have the good night conversation with someone
you don't really know. I've had that conversation. I know exactly what he's talking about. Or see, stay at the bar drinking much later than you normally would to make sure your roommate will be asleep by the time you return.
What kind of business trip is it where they're making you room with a colleague?
Oh, Ty, you've never worked for a startup? Have you rooming with a colleague?
Yes? Absolutely?
Wow, Ti, technically our live shows are business trips and we've roomed together. This is also true. Okay, like we know each other quite well. He's sort of saying he doesn't know this person.
Wow.
All right, so you've clearly been in this situation. Dan, Do you have a recommendation here?
Go to sleep? Yeah, go to sleep.
Well, now, I don't sleep nearly as much as i'd like to because of the solid baby, so I would take every opportunity and use it as an excuse. Hey, I'm going to turn in early. I don't get a full night's sleep basically, ever, so I'm doing that, so use that as an excuse. I would also say, as a backup, maybe try and get to know the person at the bar instead of when the lights go out, so at least you are having a conversation. Maybe they become a new friend.
Yeah.
I think I'm with you. Cashing your chips as early as you can. Yeah, at all costs, avoid the awkward conversation.
Have the good night conversation at seven pm the hotel bar, over dinner, whatever. Next question will be, Okay, this will be our final one? Is this is really steering into you? I would love to hear tis thoughts on the US men's national team. Oh boy, super appropriate now that the women are the story and have like the best selling jersey ever very Nike.
When is the Championship Championships on Sunday?
For both the Sunday who play in the Gold Cup presumably provided a win tonight, they'll be in the Gold Cup final against Mexico.
Okay, and the women who play I believe earlier in the day over in France. How is the game?
Last week in Philadelphia? You watched the US team take on Kurisou.
That's right?
Is it ridiculous? How expensive tickets are? Are the current players good enough? Songs? Pulisic and maybe a handful of others. Is the system bear Halter, Burholter, Yeah, Burhlter is a system. Bur Halter is trying to install working, going to work.
Wow, this is a loaded question.
Is the us WNT the best American thing we currently have?
This is a loaded follow a loaded, loaded question from top to bottom. Okay, what's your current state of the USMNT.
Well, so here's my thing with soccer. Okay, and I've said this before. I did not play soccer at any point in my life.
I'm terrible.
I learned pretty much everything I know from playing the FIFA video game and getting interested in international and professional soccer with that as a starting point, and then reading and researching and learning about it from that point forward. I believe Will Leech once referred to this as hipster patriotism, and I think that's about right, at least for me. I'm very into it. I follow it as closely as anybody. I can't speak much to the tactical elements of the
international soccer scene. I'm just not knowledgeable with that, but it does seem like what I saw on Sunday evening in Philadelphia was a very lousy, uninspired effort. Whoa by the US team, especially in the second half, did not look good.
They were lucky to.
Escape that game against Cursow as of one nil, one nil, Yeah, first goal early in the game. Header from Weston McKinney. I'm excited about a lot of the young players that the United States has not the least that is Christian Polissic, who is a native Pennsylvanian here. But there are plenty of young guns that I think could be really good
by the time the next World Cup rolls around. But at least in the short term, they need to turn in more inspired efforts for me to feel good about what Craig Berhalter, the new coach, is trying to install on the team, because thus far it hasn't been all that promising.
Do you ever find yourself involuntarily moving your thumbs like you're holding a PS four controller while.
You watch the US? Okay, no, I've currently quit FIFA again. I know, oh you quit again. I was back into it for a while, but I've since quit again. I bumped the difficulty up. I'm just not good at it.
Can we bring the show full circle at our conclusive at our conclusion time. Yes, I'm pretty bullish on Cincinnati this year. Ah, I'm pretty bullish. I know they go to Houston its first year, Hulego trying to retool a pretty bad defense of the Cougars. They get UCF with your guy, your notre Dame QB. They get Yeah with Wimbush, they finished out. You know, Temple could be tricky. I know they have a new coach. I'm just I like Mikey Warren, I like Desmond Ritter. I like the back
half of their defense. I like how much better they got going from twenty seventeen to twenty eighteen. That I can't help but feel very good about Cincinnati going against an American schedule with a lot of questions Yukon is going to be terrible, I'm not. I don't feel particularly great about South Florida again, Temple first year coach, Memphis, they get Brady White's ninth year whatever however long he's
been eligible. I'm it's a good year for Cincinnati to have a lot in place, even traveling to Columbus to play Ohio state early on, and I think you is going to look a lot better than they did last year, in which you which sincey snuck out a win to open the season, I think they're still going to threaten double digit wins and if things break right, be a top twenty five team.
Wow.
Okay, how about that good way to bring things full circle. So again, thank you to everyone out there who wrote in. Soliverble at gmail, dot com, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, all the usual hotspots. If you haven't already, please do go to soliverbletickets dot com dan do we have that redirect in place.
By the time people are listening, it will be in place.
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That's all I have enjoy.
By the time you're listening, it might even be a but hope your long weekend is going well. Hope you get some sun, Hope you get some sleep, Hope you hydrate, and generally just hope life is all.
Right with all of you.
Absolutely, have a safe, have a fun, have a happy July fourth, wherever you may be. Dan and I will be back in a week. In the meantime, thanks as always for downloading. Enjoy the rest of your week, all your weekend.
In the meantime, say summer peace.