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Foreign.

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Welcome to the Audible, presented by Trader Joe's. I'm Stuart Mandel, joined by Bruce Feldman and Ralph Russo. We got some news to hit this week, especially involving Michigan and an investigation that's been going on there for a while. Mainly, we want to talk. We want to start turning our attention to the field and some of the best storylines of the season that's coming up. Guys, it was great to see you in Vegas last week for our athletic CFB off site. And that's really what got me wanting to start doing more on the field talk because it was really our first chance as a staff to really start planning for the season.

C

Yeah, it's the.

B

The.

C

The preseason is here. Talking season. Right. Big 12, Big 12 kicked off last week. Media days, ACC, where I'll be later in the week. Media days, SEC and Big 10 both next week. I'm a little confused. Everybody in our staff except me is going to the Big Ten. Big Ten's one more week.

B

So this is the first week time I can remember where each of the power four is getting their own week, their own week in the spotlight. Yeah, that's good.

C

That's good. Yeah.

B

So.

C

And plus, it was just nice to see you guys in person. It's nice that we're all here in person for the first time in a little bit. And that hasn't been the case for a lot of the summer as we go in and out. And of course, I won't be here on Wednesday, so.

B

Whoops.

D

Yeah.

B

Already setting the scene for that. Bruce, you. You know, when. When the Sharon Moore thing happened in December, which was really jarring and serious, obviously you and some of our colleagues did a lot of reporting on that. And almost immediately the attention turned to the AD Ward manual. Like, how could this have happened? Is his job now in jeopardy? Well, here and then it kind of went to the side and Michigan won a national championship in basketball. Seems like all is going well.

E

But what.

B

Where are with news breaking on Sunday that this investigation that the school hired a law firm to do and apparently paid $11 million to do it, is probably going to be released this week.

E

Yeah. So it's been an interesting situation with Michigan where you've had a weird, you know, deal with the president who's running the school. You know, go back to Santa Ono, who came and went and there was an interim, and then somebody else took the job briefly and then was sick. And anyway, so that's on the side. You also have from the reporting that we've, um. The don't Big Big money donors are kind of split on. On what to do with Ward Manual. Keep in mind, he is known as a really, really good fundraiser. But beyond that, this whole thing from our reporting has been toxic and has been toxic for a long time. Initially, Michigan did what one source there told me was kind of a sham investigation. It went through HR and they kind of didn't find anything. And then eventually, and what I was told was they did not have access to both Sharon Moore's personal phone nor his executive assistant Paige Shiver's personal phone. They had their work phones, but it was just. They had very limited information and it seemed rather dubious. And then this thing really came to a head. They interviewed a lot more people in this. As you said, it's very extensive. It's very expensive and extensive. I was told they've interviewed tons of people for this. What's going to be interesting. And our colleague Austin Meek did kind of a reset of this at the Athletic on Monday in a story. I think what's going to come forward, I, you know, are they going to be public with what they found in this report? I think one thing that he had mentioned in there, and it kind of caught my eye as it relates to Ward Manual, because the people I talked to dating back to the winter were like. Like, he's not going to survive this. There's just too much. And in April, this is what Ward Manual said. Look, my record. I don't know a place in America that doesn't have issues. Quote, I, I don't know a household, I don't know a family. I don't know a company that doesn't have issues. That may be true, but these issues, that's not like a whataboutism from. From everything we've been told. This is way beyond that. And obviously the Sharon Moore thing, the way it blew up, that was his hire. There was a lot of people inside the Mich. Athletic department, including players, who knew things were very, very sketchy, was what was going on. So, Ralph, I don't. I. You know, again, this is the latest in a series of really embarrassing scandals because there's just been. And it's plural with Michigan, whether it's hamburger gate or. Or sign stealing or so many other things that have happened, really, on Ward Manual's watch.

C

Yeah, it's been such a weird ride for Michigan. And in some ways it's been astounding that Ward has made it through this long, frankly. You can go back to before Jim Harbaugh turned it around right after the 2020 season. And they gave him a pay cut. I think it could be argued even back then there was tension between Harbaugh and Ward Manual. The president back then seemed to be a little more of a Harbaugh guy. And I think even back then we were wondering how's this Harbaugh Ward relationship going to work out? So we, I feel like we've been thinking about like, how, how, I wonder how Ward's doing up in Michigan since 2020. And it's only seemingly gotten worse so far as off the field scandals. But meanwhile, national championship in football, national championship in basketball. So it's been fits and starts in terms of like there have been accomplishments on which I think have helped bolster him, got him a contract extension. He definitely stepped up during the sign stealing situation and sort of fought for Harbaugh, fought for the school. I think that helped win over some people there. But I also, I mean, I think that we've all been anticipating that. Wow, once this report comes out, is he going to be able to survive that? And there's already been some reporting that like there's some work being done on a contract buyout. We don't know anything quite just yet. And Ward apparently texted Ross Dellinger, our colleague from Yahoo, that hey, I'm still good for the near future. So I don't think anything has been 100% decided. But there's so much uncertainty in the president's office, so much uncertainty sort of in the board at Michigan. You just find yourself wondering who is making decisions. But when a report like this comes down finally and we don't even know if it's gonna released because another Michigan thing, who knows how much of it they're going to release. You just look towards like whose head is on the block and I think no one will be surprised if it's Ward Manual.

B

The comment he made to Ross was the president and I have had several great conversations over the past couple of days. There are no plans for me not to continue to be the athletic director for the near future. Who knows what

C

day and a half, Like, I don't know, Thursday is a long way away.

B

I mean, if they don't make, if it is, if the reports are accurate that Michigan is spending $11 million in legal fees for this report, you better release it publicly. But they might pull the Baylor Pepper Hamilton thing, right? Like, here's our summary that was not put in writing but was just dictated to us.

C

You know, Stu, though they will be able to make some excuses here about like, well, privacy and the nature of some of these allegations. So they're going to be able to hide like they might legitimately be able to h behind some of that.

B

They might be able to adapt.

E

There's another part of this too. Like a couple of weeks ago, Paige Shivers filed a lawsuit to sue Michigan. So you have other lawsuits that are going on that are involved in this. And I'm curious how those affect the disclosure of some of these things coming forward.

B

Is the investigation from your guys understanding either of you can take this? Because when it was announced at the time it was stated as it's an investigation into the culture of Michigan's athletic department.

E

Right.

B

Do we think that is as wide in scope as it sounds, or is culture of the athletic department code for Ward Manual's job performance?

C

Well, isn't that both, though? I mean, the biggest sport they have

E

and it's the biggest sport they have, it's the one they pride themselves the most in.

B

But does it go beyond the Sharon Moore situation? Is it just.

C

That's what I'm saying. Like, I mean, if culture of the athletic department, the person who runs the athletic department obviously is going to be. Have a big part of setting that culture.

B

I should have phrased that differently. Yeah. Not. Is this just about the Sharon Moore situation or is there other things going on in the athletic partner we don't even, frankly don't even know about?

C

Yeah. Chris Partridge has filed a lawsuit. The former Michigan linebackers coach who was fired, One of the. I think he was one of the only coaches fired during the. During this. The cheating scandal. So there's just so much that has gone on and gone wrong at Michigan over the last six or seven years while they were also having success on the field. Like, I can't imagine that it's not a broader scope than Sharon Moore. But also understand that like Ward Manuel hired Sharon Moore. And you can tell me I didn't see some of these things coming. There were red flags that were only revealed after he was elevated to head coach. It still falls on your plate. So again, I don't think any. I think we would all be probably fair to say, Bruce, if this weekends and Ward Manual still has his job, that will be some more surprising than if he doesn't have his job.

E

It will be, especially if more stuff comes to light. Again, as I mentioned, Paige Shiver has a lawsuit. Now, if a lot of the things that we have reported and you know, going back to last winter, things I've been told by sources inside Michigan about documentation of things of scrutiny, screenshots from. From Sean Moore's phone and text messages, those kinds of things. Again, I'd be stunned if Ward Manuel is still the AD at the start of the football season. I just. Based off of what I have heard from people who are, you know, were inside Michigan who have talked to the investigators, I just again, this. He's the highest person up at. At Michigan football. And again, you can't plead ignorance on a lot of this stuff that so many there claim they knew what was going on. Maybe they didn't know all of what was going on, but they knew a lot of inappropriate behavior was going on with Shrone Moore.

B

The board didn't authorize 11 million in legal fees to come back with everything's fine. You know, like, you can usually tell where this is headed when they, when they do the. The third party investigation.

C

If everything's not fine, somebody has to pay.

B

Right. So we were. You were at Big 12 last week. Bruce and, and Ralph and I did talk about Dion and some of his quotes, but we were curious you were there and some, you know, what you may have learned about him, but also maybe some other takeaways from Big 12 media days.

E

Yeah, I think the biggest thing that if he's like, I was there last year, was there this year. Dramatically different Dion. I don't know, like, if you guys were there, you know, if you see it, it's stark. He was so frail last year. I'm not saying anybo forgot this, but, you know, he had. He had been gone for like a big chunk of the off season last year, three months. He was dealing with not just bladder cancer, but he had to have his bladder removed and then essentially replaced. He was, you know, wearing Depends and he was just. It was just a different Dion. The guy who's always the most dynamic person in every room he walks into wasn't that way last year. He was this way last week in Dallas. I thought what was interesting to talk to some of the players, including one of the guys they brought, Ben Fineth, who is a. Has actually been at Colorado longer than Dion has. He was a walk on from in State. He was a, you know, he's a good player. He's a definitely a leader on the team. Was very strong in his comments to us about how they recruited differently in the Portal this year. And I think Deion and some of the people I talked to inside the program echoed that. Right. They really valued guys who are leaders and guys who have a lot of playing experience as opposed to maybe pedigree. And we're at Blue Blood programs they have a few of those guys, but it's a lot of guys who've played a ton of football. So the Danny Scuderos of the world who put up big numbers at the group of six level and some of those other guys I think they really talked about. Now the big key is going to be Juju Lewis. He was a 17 year old quarterback last year who, you know, skipped his senior year, was not ready to be in the middle of it and now he's got a different offense. With Brennan Marion, it was kind of funny at one point I think Dion called him Brendan Maran.

C

Yeah, we mentioned that last week.

E

He is going to, he is going to have a footprint on, on this offense and it just, it's going to be interesting to see because they have a ton of experience. One of the people there said, you know, basically the money that they, that they saved by not, not paying so much to try to keep Jordan Seaton, they were able to get like four offensive tackles who have in the acc, the Big Ten, in the sec. And so, you know, Brennan Marion told me this is the best offensive line he's ever been around. He was at Texas a few years ago. He was at Pitt. Considering how bad the offensive line has been, it'll be fascinating to see. There's optimism, but there's always, always optimism this time of year going forward with them. But it was, it was kind of interesting to, to talk to the, the Colorado players about just how different the dynamic is. Guys who now have a real chip on, they've never been at this level and how much does that translate?

C

I, I think it's just, it's just interesting that like, you know, you mentioned Deion and his health and how much he's around. Like you're right. I think if you're, if you weren't at Big 12 media days last year and this year, you don't really see that. And I do think you, we can maybe underrate how important it is for the coach to be engaged in the off season. We talked about their rebuild being a little different, the roster makeover and, and how the is different in types of players they have in. But I do wonder if like maybe we overrated how much or underrated. Excuse me? How much Deion's health and him not being fully engaged in a round last year impacts the team.

E

Yeah, I just, I just think it was stark to see it because again, having, you know, been around that team a decent amount over since he's been in Colorado and to see what he was like Last summer when he came and then, you know, I think it didn't even come to really light the depth of his bladder issues until at the end of July. Like he came to Big 12 media days. But then it was the end of July where he had a press conference and really detailed it and he had said even the people close to him didn't know the depths of his health issues again. So I think that's, you know, like that's a big difference this year coming into it as opposed to last year again. That doesn't mean he's got it. They're going to go from being in the top 25 to 3 and 9 to back to the top top 25. I mean, I think there's going to be a lot of pressure on Julian Lewis. He was a big recruit, but he's still really young. He's 18, you know, how mature is he? How is he going to handle it? One interesting comment among the many, and I have this in a story the athletics going to run this week on CU was Brendan Marion who was at Texas, compared him a lot to Quinn Ewers. You know, in terms of arm talent, in terms of personality. It's, it's kind of interesting because they were both big, big hyped up quarterback recruits coming up through the system. Neither one's like a dynamic runner, but they are, you know, that's, that's big shoes for him to step into. Obviously.

B

Hopefully that works out better for Brennan than his big, his big quarterback in the portal last year at Sac State.

E

Who was that?

C

It's Jaden, Jaden Rashada who ended up

B

losing the starting job at some point in the season.

E

They did go from three wins to seven wins last year though, so I mean even let me throw one more

C

quarterback in the Big 12 at you. We didn't mention this last week and I am fascinated. Like DJ Lagway moving from Florida to Baylor in a situation where Dave Aranda. Absolutely. We'll maybe touch on this later, but he, you know, is, is in a, is in a tricky spot. He's definitely in a winner, get off the pot spot. DJ going to hit his ceiling. Like I mean it, it's huge pressure on him in some ways but maybe it, it alleviates some of the pressure not being the, the five star savior at Florida.

E

Yeah, I got to spend some time with him in, in Dallas. He's interesting because I remember seeing him come up through Elite 11. Big guy, he was like 6, 3, 2, 50. But he's kind of got a low key personality. He doesn't kind of walk in and everybody kind of of feels. Him sort of obviously was up and down at Florida. He played some, but like last off season, you know, he, you know, he wasn't. Didn't seem like he was 100%. Like, was he healthy? Was he fully healthy? And then obviously, you know, Dave Aranda talked about that. It was kind of like a straight jacket for him, being in the, you know, the toxicity of having that situation where your coach is constantly on the hot seat. Now he goes to a program where his coach is on the hot seat. One of the things that Lagway and I talked about a lot was, and this came up from one of the staffers who kind of tipped me off to this. So Jaden Daniels, a big part of him breaking through and being this Heisman Trophy winner and having a great second act of his college career at LSU was he really embraced this technology that LSU and Jack Marucci, who's, you know, the guru of all kind of sports science and performance as it relates to college athletics, had brought. Had partnered with some folks in Germany with this advanced version of like a virtual reality that they had started to do with soccer players. Well, it was a lot of time on task, you know, in the VR and the headset that Jaden Daniels did. And so when DJ was on his visit to Baylor, that was something. He was like, oh, they have this cognilance, cognizant.

C

Don't worry about it. We don't. Nobody, nobody will be looking for it online anyway.

E

Don't worry about getting the company. Yeah, this is a. So this is something. And if you want to go find out more about it, our colleague at the Athletic, Alec Lewis, did a really good story on it a few years ago as it relates to Jaden Daniels. But he was like, this is something I want to work with and this is something I want to really take advantage of. And from what I'm told by folks at Baylor, he's. And you can log how many, you know, how much time somebody spent with it. There's a bunch of schools and teams, including in the NFL, that have it, and he has spent more time on it than anybody but one other player, I guess. And so he's really embraced it. Does that mean he's going to win a Heisman and have a second act like, like Jaden Daniels? No, but I think it bodes well that, you know, he is really serious about being the best he can be. And again, you know, he's in an offense. We saw that they put up big numbers in the, you know, in the last couple of years. Certainly Sawyer Robertson played well. I'm fascinated to see how he does by this. But, you know, it was really interesting to talk to him about it because he is all about the technology and trying to unlock everything he can about how he sees defenses and how he reacts to things.

B

Quick news item out of the Big 12 last week, Jamie Pollard, Iowa State's AD, announced his retirement. He will be staying on for this next coming school year. And then he's retiring and he's been there since 2005. I think he's generally considered one of the best ads. He's certainly the most candid to the media. Mr. Possibly to his own fault sometimes. You know, he's made some really good hires there over the years. He obviously brought in Matt Campbell, who led this, you know, unprecedented era of success for Iowa State football. I will say I'm a jury. Jury's out on Jimmy Rogers, who he hired basically within minutes of Matt Campbell announcing he's going to or telling him he's going to Penn State. But our colleague Scott Zocterman, who lives in Iowa, knows that place. Cole is, you know, wrote a column about what a big loss this is for Iowa State. We're going to take a break, and when we come back, let's talk storylines for the 2026 season.

A

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C

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C

Welcome back to the Audible presented by Trader Joe's. All right, storylines for the season again we are so we're finally we can see it. It's not it's not way off in the distance. It's kind of almost right there the season we were talking about cool things about football season last week at the at our get together our vertical get together for the Athletic in Vegas. It was very hot in Vegas, by the way. No surprise there in July. Anyway to we were bouncing around which who we think is like the biggest storyline. We each picked a few and you were at Bloomington checking in on Signetti. What does he have for an encore at Indiana?

B

Yeah, I mean we've got a lot of interesting stories to go over here, but Indiana was the biggest story of 2025. I think we can agree with that. And so therefore in my mind the big story going into this season is I won't say whether they can repeat, although that would be an amazing accomplishment if do but just in general, like is Indiana here to stay? You know, given given the core of players they lost from these last two seasons and of course Fernando Mendoza and the number one pick. Is this is this a moment where Kurt Signetti's program comes back to earth a little bit or is this the moment where we say oh they really are the next Ohio State, Georgia, Alabama to some extent still program that just reloads every year. And a lot of that that a lot of that will have to do with the quarterback Josh Hoover. You know, he's Kurt Signetti loves to tell us about how many quarterbacks in a row he's coached that went were like conference player of the year or in the case of Curtis Rourke, number one qbr. It's a convenient stat. He likes to throw around. You know, Hoover was good at tcu. He threw for a lot of yards as Sunny Dykes let us know. Also a lot of turnovers. When I was there in the spring, he definitely was not anywhere near a finished product yet. But the people there were quick to point out if you had seen Mendoza this time last year, he did not look very good either. It's a process that Signetti does year after year where they learn what they can in the spring, they get better over the summer, they get better over the preseason, they're ready to go. So very, very curious to see what kind of team they have this year.

E

Ralph, I would ask you this. So as sue was saying that it was like, do they come back to go come back to kind of normal? Well, normal for them, as we've talked a lot about, was like they were the losingest program in the history of college football.

B

They're not going back to that.

C

Yeah, they're never going back to that normal. There is a new normal.

E

There is a new normal. But I think the expectation is. Does that mean they're considered. Let's say there's like four tiers of what we think the Big Ten is now. Right now there's that Ohio State and Oregon maybe superpower that right now that they're in because they won the national title and they beat those teams games last year. And then there's that next tier which you know, you have some version of. It feels like there's a drop up, but like Penn State's up and down. Certainly USC is up and down. They haven't been that way in the Big Ten yet. Michigan up and down a little bit. Before we get to the tier below that, which is good, programs like Iowa would be in there where they're more consistent. You know, maybe Minnesota, you know, maybe Washington. Right. Like where do you think they land in the next two years? Not just this year.

C

That's a great way to frame it because that's where my mind is going with Indiana. Right. There's a new normal. Right. But we don't really know. It's going to take a while to figure out what your new normal is. Because normal isn't one season like the greatest season in the history of college football going 16. Oh, that's not normal. Right. That's never going to be normal. But we also, we all got burned last year going well, they won 11 the year before. They'll probably tail off a little bit. Maybe they'll come back down to earth. So this is not us saying that the thing was built on a house of cards and now it's all gonna come tumbling down. But what is that new normal? I don't know if they're the Ohio State normal. Cause Ohio State's normal is different from everybody else's. But it does seem like, like I would guess something in that Penn State, Michigan normal, which is we can rise up and absolutely make a run at a Big Ten championship and be in the mix nationally. But maybe that's not necessarily our every year. They certainly look good again though, Stu.

B

Well, let's just go around the panel real quick, guys. Starting with you, Bruce. Is Indiana making the playoff this year?

E

Yes. I'm not all in on Josh Hoover, but I like what they have back, especially in the trenches. Yes. I think they make the playoff and I love Signetti. I think he's a terrific coach. Can't deny it.

C

Yeah. I mean now you're, you're, you're boxing me in here. I haven't really done my like playoff predictions and like figured out where they're going to slot in. So I will in a wishy washy way say no, they will not. But I don't know if I'm totally feeling that. Like I, I'm going to guess I'll lean toward no. But with the option to change my mind when we get a little deep into this off season.

B

He's picking up right where he left off last season, guys.

C

Sure. Okay. All right, I'm going to go with the next storyline.

B

To me, I never gave my answer.

E

Let's.

C

I'm sure you're going to pick them. You fell in love with you. You were making googly eyes at Signetti when you went up there to Bloomington.

B

They're going to make the playoff. The only thing I'll say is they probably have to go 11 and 1. Their schedule is light again. So if they go 10 and 2, that might not be good enough.

C

All right, so next storyline. Speaking of schedules, we're going to hear a lot about this, folks. We already got inundated with everybody is SEC bias because last week the ESPN put some rankings out and it was a lot of SEC teams and strength of schedule and all the SEC teams have the toughest strength of schedule. Well, that's because the SEC now plays a nine game conference schedule. And we're going to put aside our whole strength of schedule, whether it is the tough, whether they are the toughest schedules or not. I'm just saying nine game SEC schedule. We've alluded to this before on the pod, that that is absolutely going to change what these records look like in the sec, which changes the conversation around what an SEC playoff team should be, which creates even more angst about SEC bias than the special treatment the SEC gets and whether the SEC deserves special treatment anymore because hell, they haven't won a national championship or even played for one in three years. So the dynamic of, of a nine game SEC schedule is going to be fascinating to see play out is going to have a huge impact, I think, on the playoff race. And it's probably going to have some impact on where the playoff goes when it comes to expansion. But we'll try to keep it on the field. Like I just, I just think that like it's going to be hard to keep certain nine win SEC teams out of the playoff this year. I think there is very possible that we're going to have a nine win SEC team with a new enough what looked like quality victories and that'll send everybody in, you know, who's not an SCVC fan in, in a, in a blithering rage.

B

Yeah, I mean it's, you almost had a nine win SEC team make it in the first year of the playoff in 2024 and that was with the eight game schedule. So there's no question, I mean that you're just, you're gonna. This happened when the Big Ten would this happen? Well, way back when the Pack 10 went to nine games, the Big Ten goes to nine games. The teams don't have as good records and you got to fill it out somehow.

C

Man. You're just sprinkling nine more losses over the, over the, over the conference. It's just math.

B

Now if it's, you're down to the last spot and it's okay. So last year BYU lost in the conference championship game and was 11 and 2 and missed the playoff for. Well like technically they lost for 10 and 2 Miami.

E

Right?

B

It was Miami, the last at large team. Yeah, yeah.

C

Because of the two spots.

B

But the more controversial one was having, having three loss Alabama in there. So if the Last spot was 11 and 2 BYU versus 9 and 3 Alabama. I mean as of this moment I think probably 9 and 3 Alabama.

C

But yeah, I haven't looked at all the schedules to see the ones that are especially loaded and to have like good non conference games. I'm sure that you know, again Texas is going to come up out of this. I think their schedule ticks up a little bit this year in terms of within the sec. And that's the other thing too. We talk so so much about conference schedule strength vis a vis one conference versus the other. You know, I've been hammering away on this where it becomes a major problem is within the conferences the schedules can be so varied where you know, one team has a much tougher schedule than another. Texas A and M kind of rode a good draw last year to playoff contention. Losing to Texas and then making the playoffs. So there's a whole bunch of folks in Texas that I'm sure have been complaining about that all year. So as much as we belabor the Conference versus conference, strength of schedule. I think another place where this is going to have a huge impact because it's going to amplify what's already been happening is the difference between conference schedules and how that plays out over the course of an entire season. All right, what's your storyline, Bruce?

E

I'm going to stay in the sec, Ralph, and it's to me an obvious, the most polarizing figure in college football. He is Lane Kiffin. He is now at a program where until Brian Kelly was there, you know, every coach had been there in this decade, in this last 25 years, has won a national title. He is very well positioned to do that. He is. Lane Kiffin left Ole Miss right before they went to the playoff and went on a run, made it to the semifinals and got close to making the final. He's got really good resources right now. He's got very good alignment. It was kind of a storm to get there. You know, he's got his quarterback in Sam Levitt, who's already been in led a team do a playoff when he was at ASU a few years ago. He's got his like franchise kind of left tackle and Jordan Seaton. Recruiting wise, they, they have like three, you know, stud defensive linemen who are going to be big time players. The one thing I don't think he has is like that elite running back that LSU normally does have. I don't know if they have that, but all eyes are going to be on Lane and they're really going to be on him early because week three they got to go to Oxford and they play Ole Miss and it was contentious in the exit and everything else. Later on they go to Tennessee. It's not as contentious that it used to be with him in Knoxville, but I think he is going, he and LSU are going to be the storyline that is going to be there throughout the out this season. I think they will be a playoff team. I think they're. I think they are really good. I think he's. The question is going to be Stu. Do you think Lane Kiffin can get out of Lane Kiffin's own way to let this program become the best that it can be, which is a legit

B

national title contender as Lane Kiffin ever gotten out of Lane Kiffin's own way. I mean, but it didn't stop him from getting Ole Miss to the playoff last year. Yes, he got them there. He didn't coach them there. I mean, I guess the question for this coming year, guys, is what's considered success? We've heard all about the $40 million roster. We know how highly ranked these players coming in are, but we also know that first years are tough and they don't always go smooth or flawlessly. And so you just said, Bruce, you think they're going to make the playoff totally reasonable success.

E

That would be my success. And they don't have to win the playoff. But if they don't get to a playoff, I think it would be a disappointment giving how they've gone in the portal and what he's put together, I, I think they can, they should be a playoff team.

B

If they get in the playoff, but they're like the 10 seed and they lose in the first round, is that still success?

E

I don't know. I, I think they get year playoff.

C

Ralph Yeah, I mean, in year one to just I, I yeah, you're right. The bar is sky high there. Their schedule has like an interesting thing you talked about early in the season with Ole Miss. They also play Clemson to open the season on a bad, on a, you know, a week one without a lot of meat on that bone. So they will be in a prime spot, maybe prime time. In fact, I think they're in a prime time spot in terms of where they played that game, played Texas A and M, I believe two weeks after Ole Miss or a week after Ole Miss. The week after Ole Miss, they play Texas A and M. So that's so what I'm saying is you're going to get a lot of lane early in the season. The first month of the season is going to be lane is going to be lane month. September is all about lane. And then they're going to go and then they're going to go quiet for a little while. Right.

B

Two of the first three ABC primetime games are lane, so you're going to be all over your screen. Yeah, I mean, I think in a vacuum, just making the playoff as a success, the only counter would be, well, if you have one of the most expensive rosters, possibly the most expensive roster in the country. Country, shouldn't you contend for the national championship? I don't know that that's, I don't think it's fair to have that as the end all be all in year one.

E

By the way, they do have a stretch later in the year where it's they play Alabama, Texas and then go to Knoxville. Three weeks in a row, three heavyweight games.

C

Yeah, a lot of lane early, a lot of lane late. It'll be interesting to see.

B

We're going to take a quick break and when we come back, each of us gets another another bite at the apple of big storylines.

C

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E

All right, and we're back. Staying in the SEC. I'm going to hit on one other big storyline that I'm very intrigued by and that is Texas and Arch Manning. This is Arch Manning 2.0 after his first year as a starter. A lot of inexperience around him on the offensive line. Bring in Cam Coleman, an elite receiver, a go to guy. Bring in a couple of really good running backs. The offensive lines, more experienced. Expectations should be really high. The schedule is not favorable right now. You do get Ohio State to, to come to Austin at least, but you go through it at Tennessee. They obviously got to play Oklahoma. I think Florida's pretty good. You got to play Ole Miss. They should be really good at LSU and at Texas A and M to end the year. I am a. I'm a believer in Arch Manning and I do think that coming off of another off season, I'm, I'm very optimistic about Texas, Ralph. I think they should be a national title contender. I'm close to saying they should win the national title right now. I'm going to pull back because I'm going to stick that on a Big Ten school that I'm going, that I'm leaning to right now as we're doing this.

C

We'll get to your national championships picks later.

E

But I think they are that good. I think they will be that good. I think this is a huge year for Steve Sarkeesian. He's done a good job at Texas. Last year was a little disappointing. I don't want to call it a bounce back because they thought they should have been in the playoff last year. I think they will definitely be in the playoff this year even with a tough schedule. How bullish, how bullish are you on Arch and how bullish are you on Texas right now?

C

No reason not to be bullish on Arch because he played well at the end of last season. We saw him play very well in the second half of the season. He was among the best quarterbacks in the country, if not the, at least in the sec, if not the country at the end of last season. So we saw it get better. They improved the skill positions around him at least I think they did. Maybe a little low on depth, but they improved the star quality at the skill position. So that should help. Yeah, listen man, I'm, you know, I'm told you I'm going to go through this existential crisis here where I picked Texas number one last year. Got a little burned and do I go back to that? Well, this year it doesn't seem like that's good process to be worried about what happened last year when picking this year. If I think they're the best team, maybe they should be number one. I don't think I'm going to have them number one. But there's no reason to think that this shouldn't be a team that contends for a national championship. You know, again, I understand they started number one last year and they didn't make the playoff. But this idea that they Were so far away. This wasn't a Clemson, Penn State collapse. This was a team that could very well by the end of the season made a case to be among the top 10 or 12 teams in the country even. Even though the way they played all year kept them out of the playoff.

B

Deservedly lot of revisionist history about that Texas team last season.

C

All right, here comes Stu to just dump on Arch in Texas like.

B

And I'll be honest, I had forgotten this, but there was a stretch in the middle of the season where they got taken to overtime by both Kentucky and Mississippi State teams losing records. They had a good win over Vanderbilt and then they lost 35 to send to Georgia. But it was like, but they had a huge win over A and M. I was there, huge win. They beat up on Michigan in the bowl game and now I was like, oh, they weren't that far.

E

I want to pick one thing on you, on you, Ralph. I'm Stu though, and I think Ralph will echo me on this. But Ralph, you're so wildly unpredictable. I never know. There was a part a game Ralph and I were both watching, I think it was the bowl game. And if you're watching some of the things Arch is doing, it's like you are really impressed. I think you might have been watching a different bowl game. You looked at his stat line, you were like, are you really this impressed? And it was like, no. He is playing, he is doing some really high level stuff in the way he's operating and sometimes the stat lines. I'm not talking about in the early part of the season, but I think later on if you watch some of the playmaking and some of the stuff he was doing, I don't know how you wouldn't have been like, oh man, I see it. I'm bought in on him.

B

I think that you guys are still blinded by his last name. I think he could be a really good quarterback. I do. I think the question is, is can we finally accept that maybe he's not the second coming, that he could just be a really good quarterback and like I like a, like a, like a first team, all SEC kind of quarterback. And wherever he gets drafted, he gets drafted. Instead of this bar of like, man, he threw two great passes in the bowl game and now I think he's, he's going to be, you know, the next Patrick Mahomes. Because that seems to be. There's a discount. You talk about stats. Like the most impressive thing he did in the A and M game was his running. That's. That's what he had an awful first half and then the second half he really ignited them with his running. But his stat line was 48% completions, 179 yards, one touchdown. So passing.

C

Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. We, we've, we've had you in terms

B

of Texas as a team though. They're loaded, they're loaded. You know you're doing something, you know you're all in in when you say, you know what these receivers we had were okay, but let's go get Cam Coleman. You know, the running backs we had weren't quite that great. Let's go get not just Hollywood Smothers, Hollywood Smothers and Relique Brown. Talent wise, they, they really do have no excuses and I don't think Arch has to be a, you know, Heisman winning quarterback for them to have a good to have for them to contend for the national championship.

C

Let, let's get back to another punching bag of stews. Go to your next storyline there, Stu.

B

This one's a little bit of a less controversial punching bag if we're being honest. So one of the, you know, we, we had a lot of cool side conversations with our colleagues and I got ended up in a, a long conversation with Brennan Marks, who is primarily a basketball writer, but he's based in the triangle and he's well versed in Billich and Unc football and we were talking about him. We don't know if they're, we, we think they might be worse than last year. I'm, I don't think there's a scenario where Bill Belichick shocks us all and goes 10 and 2. It's more like is it going to be really bad again or he shows some progress. Like what's the scenario where he, where he actually does get a third season? Ralph?

C

They are so committed to giving him a third season that he gets the benefit of the doubt after getting the team to a maybe six wins. That between Bobby Petrino coaching the offense, that gets better.

B

Better.

C

Some marginal gains. The problem is like it's hard to see this roster getting substantially better because they leaned into this high school recruiting model. Maybe they did a little better in the portal this year because they just had a better idea of what's a good college football player. But the schedule also gets a lot tougher this year. So last year they had an accommodating schedule which I think led into a lot of the optimism of Belichick. Year one. This year that goes away. So I don't know, Bruce, whether they're worse or better than last year. I don't know if they can make a big enough step forward with the roster construction to now also handle the step forward. It looks like they're going to take in competition.

E

Yeah, it's the pivot in terms of like what they're doing evaluation wise and roster building. That's the part to do it in year two where the guy in his mid-70s coming off the debacle. I mean they've got to be more

C

competent offensively just because Petrino's there. Right? Petrino is generally competent offensive corner.

E

I would agree with that. And maybe you win some of those 50, 50 kind of games and that gets you to six or seven wins and you can show improvement. That's a stretch. I mean look Petrino was at Arkansas last year and again granted in a tougher league and had a freak quarterback and a really talented running back and they would they win like three games last year? I don't know man. I, I hate to keep harping on this but man St. You know Stu's best prediction in 25 years in was his sniffing out the Belichick disaster that it's been in Chapel Hill. And credit to you Stu. I mean you can do all the victory laps you want. I, I don't think it's going to go the other way now. They, it's possible they could get to six wins. I mean again that wouldn't shock me. It would surprise me though.

B

I would feel better if they had gotten some big splash quarterback in the portal. They're riding with Billy Edwards most the of likely former Maryland, briefly Wisconsin. Now Petrino. He knows quarterbacks. He's developed a lot of great quarterbacks. Maybe he gets something out of him that we haven't seen before. Real quick guys, top of your head. Guess where their, their Portal class was ranked on 24, 7 this year.

E

77.

C

I was going to say top fifth, top 30, 52nd. Oh totally.

E

Kind of. They didn't take that many guys and I'm surprised.

C

The problem again like I understand pivoting to recruiting high school players. If you think you have a five year tenure here.

B

They took 2020 portal guys. Like it's not huge but it's not nothing but like they're just, they're just not ranked that high. So basically once again we are to believe that Mike Lombardi just out evaluated everybody else.

C

All right, so mine. Speaking of coaches who may not be there in 2027. Again the thing with Belichick, I'll go back to. I'll sum it up here I go back to what somebody who I think has a pretty good grasp on the state of North Carolina, all things North Carolina college sports said when I asked him about like will Belichick get a second year? And this person said, well, the people who put Belichick in that position think they are very smart. These people think very highly of themselves and are very unlikely to admit a mistake that quickly. So I still think there's a little bit of that. So if there's a little bit of progress in North Carolina, I could see these same people going, well, I guess we gotta ride this out. Like Bill got us better this year. I think that's the one reason why there could be a year three of Belichick more than he's actually made real progress and suddenly things are looking great at North Carolina. But who, who is pre fired this year? We had a bunch of pre fired going into last year and there was like four coaches that were fired. And then before October 1st, I think last year or before the second week of October last year. And then James Franklin went, Billy Napier went. A lot of early activity. I don't know if we're going to get that much early activity. Man, Mike Norvell, it just doesn't look great at Florida State. There's none of the signs are good. Now listen, if he comes out punching and all of a sudden that thing comes out clicks down there and he wins eight games, completely different story. They still owe him a lot of money. So I think that they were trying to save some money last year by not pulling the plug on him this year. There is also, again, there's the vibes aren't great, the roster construction doesn't look like, man, they just sunk 30 million in and look at all these great guys that they got. Boy, they're really good. Like nothing about the situation in Florida State looks like Mike Norvell is like ready to turn it around. But we'll see him this week in ACC and I'll get to hear from him and talk to some of the players and we'll see if they got better vibes. But boy, like if we're talking hot seats and storyline being hot seats for the 2026 season, Mike Norvell sort of leads off that, that, that group. Bruce.

E

Yeah, I mean the biggest thing, I think he's a good coach. You look what he did at Memphis, what he did early on. Um, but the alignment there is dreadful. It's been that way for a while. I think they made some bad calculations in how they put the roster together. And that certainly hurt. And then it's like this kind of vibe about. I don't want to say dead man walking, but it's really hard once it feels like a lot of people are checked out around the program to get it turned. Like, Billy Napier was, like, treading water for a lot. A lot of while with the shark swimming and eventually, eventually, it's almost hard not to get got in this day and age, especially when you're at a place like that where it's like, people expect you to be really good and you. Especially in that conference, especially when, like, your biggest rival in the league now all of a sudden is going full blast towards competing for national titles and you are. You've gone the other way. I gotta admit, like, it's not that long ago that, like, Greg Burns, the AD at Alabama, and he's looking at two guys. He's looking at.

C

Sure.

E

He's looking at Kalyn DeBoer and he's looking at Mike Norvell. And, man, it just. It's. You know, we already have done, like, Matt Baker and I did like a deep dive on kind of how they plummeted the year after.

C

I just thought they were 2 and 10 year.

E

Yeah, I thought they'd bounce back, and it looked like they were gonna.

B

Right.

E

They get out of the year, that gate with a. With an impressive win over Alabama, and then it just. It just falls apart. Um, what would it take? What do you guys think? Not. Not, like, to get to eight wins. I'm saying, like, what does he need to do to get this turned around onto solid ground? Ralph, I know you're probably closer to it than Stu is. Like, what do you. What is the Hail Mary that has to come through for him?

C

So I will say this, and I'll. I'll toss it over to Stu. I. They did. I know you're going to hate this, Bruce. They played better than their record last year. Right. If you look at their sort of underlying metrics, there's a bunch of games that they outgained their opponent, and you're like. Like, to me, the game that sort of epitomized, like, oh, boy. Like, what are we doing here? If you remember the North Carolina State game, I think it was a Thursday or Friday night. They had a lead, I believe, and, like, the same punt returner, one bounces off his face and they, like, lose the ball and they make a turnover there. It's just. They were a disaster waiting to happen last year. So when you, like, what can they do like they can clean up the mess. Like they stay are such a self destructive program over the last couple of years and especially last year where like the Stanford game comes to mind where you're just like, how are they blowing this game? So maybe, maybe there is a way in the margins to turn around some of these close games in the acc and it's not even so much roster construction and this guy hits and that guy hits, hits. It's just, hey man, how about clean up around the margins here and win some of these close games. But because they seem to lose those games so much and there were so many of those ugly games last year, that's where it's deflating. And you kind of look at like, oh, I think that's coaching, right? If you can't, if you can't close the deal in some of these games, that feels like coaching. Stu.

B

I don't, I don't know that there is a way out. Bruce. I just, just think, you know, the donors are done with him. They clearly didn't have money for their portal class. This year. They're riding Ashton Daniels as their quarterback. You know, I remember last year everybody was a little like, really Castellanos is your guy. Castellanos was like Peyton Manning compared to Ashton Daniels in his career so far. I mean he just hasn't done anything. So I don't, I don't. It's interesting though, like, I think we all know the only reason he's still a coach there is because his buyout was tough, too expensive. And I think that's probably the case also with Luke Fickle at Wisconsin. But at least with Luke Fickle, like they beat two ranked teams toward the end of last season. Like they showed up, they showed a pulse. People are excited about the quarterback they got from Old Dominion. Like they feel better about. Right.

C

They did spend, spend. Right.

B

I feel better about his chances of salvaging things than I do Norvell.

C

There's also like a pretty decent schedule. Wisconsin had all the tough draws last year in the Big Ten and now they have a lot fewer of the tough draws in the Big Ten. So yeah, I think fickle kind of goes into this. The other thing too is like fickle has a new AD now. I know sometimes we think, oh, new AD wants his guy in there. True. Also new AD often thinks, do I really want to hire a football coach in my first six months on the job? Like, that's so hard.

E

I think it's depends on the, on the ad Ralph. Because like two similar situations in the Big Ten were like that. The AD at Maryland, new AD did not want to go through the hiring process. The AD at Michigan State who was there for about 25 minutes, J bat did he got his guy out and then he left.

C

Yeah. But also different vibes. Right. Jonathan. Jonathan Smith was never vibing with people at Michigan State. But at Maryland a lot of people like Locks and think that he has a good base down there. He's on this list too. I'm looking at my list of possible hot seats. Listen, I think Locks has the ability to do some things with the, with the quarterback Washington and some young players there that might be able to create a turnaround. But I don't think he's going to get a lot of leeway if he doesn't. Right. Like I think he could play his way off the hot seat but I don't know if he's going to get another year from that ad. Again, if he can't get himself into the off the hot seat. We mentioned Baylor, Dave Aranda. It's probably the time to make a decision on him. Especially again with the new ad.

E

He has a better shot of surviving of these two guys. Dave Aranda at Baylor, Shane Beamer at South Carolina.

C

I'm going to say Shane because I think the nature of that program has been very up and down and I think that they are set maybe to have another bounce back season. Whereas I think we've been doing this for a while with, with Aranda at Baylor.

B

South Carolina I think could surprise some people this year. They still have Lenore Sellers. I know he didn't have a great year last year year but he's super talented and some other things went wrong for them last year real quick.

E

He's recruited pretty well too. He's still, he's still punching up compared to what South Carolina used to get. And I do think that there's some high level talent. I just don't know if there's enough of it. But I'm with you guys on that too.

B

Bruce, do you expect, I mean last year's coaching carousel was about as active as it gets. Everybody got fired for the most part. Start. There were some surprises on top of that. Who would have guessed Kyle Whittingham would be at Michigan now do you expect. I feel like usually if one year is that active, the next year is a little slower. Is that what you're expecting?

E

Yeah, because the year before was remember like Barry Odom did a terrific job at UNLV and about the best he could do was Purdue, you know, I think it's, it, it is a very cyclical thing. I would expect it not to be as robust. Some of the things Shron Moore had off field issues, you get certain things. You get Chris climate, you know, you get GU who are stepping down.

C

James Franklin getting fired midway through the season. I mean, that was a bomb, but

E

that was a real firing. I'm just saying it's like it's not a job change because the guy was retiring or, you know, whatnot. So I, you know, I don't think it's going to be as robust. We say that a lot in, you know, two years ago there wasn't a lot of, especially at the, at the power four level, there was very little change and that's what I would expect. I mean, Ralph, do you think it's any differently?

C

I think it will probably tamp down a little bit. I think the USC situation with Lincoln Riley is always feels a little volatile only because it just doesn't feel like everybody's totally bought in there. So I just wonder, not necessarily that like Lincoln's going to get fired per se, but you find yourself wondering like if, if dominoes fall and another good job opens, is that a path for maybe. And then of course, you know, again, USC is the type of job domino's kind of fall. But yeah, I mean, I've got a handful of others. Cincinnati is one to look after. I do wonder if Rutgers with a new AD there, if Greg doesn't get it turned around, if that's one that becomes a little volatile. Our guy, Fran Brown at Syracuse, it's been one good year, one terrible year. I don't know if he's on a hot seat, but I think it is a year where we're gonna have to see what happens at Syracuse. But there's not as many as last year where you think, boy, that's scorching hot. And it's going to be pretty obvious that if coach doesn't get off to a good start, we're going to be from day one. That's Mike Norvell. Mike Norvell is what's. Mike Norvell's buyout gets googled starting from like the first quarter of the first game. Some of those schools every week is a referendum.

B

And speaking of buyouts, some of those schools you mentioned, and we talked about this last year during the carousel, like, given how much the roster costs are going up and how quickly they're going up and rev share like, I just think some of these schools are like, if I Don't have to. If I could just avoid doing, doing the buyout for at least one more year, I'm going to try to do that. Right. That's really what Wisconsin and Florida State did. But also, but like, I don't know, even like Syracuse or, or some of those other schools you're mentioning. Like, man, If I have $10 million to play with, am I doing that to buy out my 5 and 7 coach or do I need that because we want to get a $30 million roster next year instead of 20 million?

E

Can I give Fran Brown a pass here like Ralph? Because, like, he had, he's had two good years. One of them was fantastic. The other one is. Gets injured and gets decimated. Like, it's only been two years. It's Syracuse. You're not.

C

Yeah, absolutely. I'm just looking at places where, like, I feel like this is an interesting, pivotal year. So, yeah, I think it's probably a stretch to, to put Fran on a hot seat. But, you know, again, when you start going down of your list of, like, possibilities, I kind of threw him in like the. Him and a couple of other relatively new coaches in that bucket.

B

All right, we're going to wrap. We're going to be back later this week. At least Bruce and I will be back later this week. This week. That's our, that's our mailbag episode. So please send your questions to the Audible pod gmail dot com. By the way, I don't say this enough. If you love the Audible presented by Trader Joe's, please go on your favorite podcast service, give us a five star rating, maybe a nice little kind written review to go with that. And if you haven't already subscribed on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts, please do, do so right now. We'll see you next time.

F

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