4th and Wrong
New College Football Podcast covering all things CFB, SEC, and more from hosts Chris Marler and Tyler Huck.
4th and Wrong
House Settlement Arrives, Wild NIL Contracts, and Jeremiah Smith's promise to CFB
Chris and Tyler are back for another episode of 4th and Wrong. In this episode we talk the first day of the new era in college football, Jeremiah Smith's strong promise about the team up north, June's hot (and cold) recruiting teams, the Pac-12 expands again, and much more!
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Ready to go. What's going on, everybody? Welcome back to Forth and Wrong. Today is July 1st, 2025. Today's episode, we will discuss Jeremiah's bold comments about Michigan, Florida State's aggressive NIL contracts, the college football's new rules regarding injuries, conference realignment, recruiting, and much more. I'm your host, Tyler Huck. We've got my co-host, Chris Marler. How are we doing today, Chris?
SPEAKER_00:Can't wait to talk about Jeremiah, Florida State, NIL. Um... Yeah, I didn't know about the injury report stuff. I am fired up. Nobody's as fired up today as you. You have been just buzzing like a bee today.
SPEAKER_01:I have been. I had a small window between meetings where I just chat GPT hooked it. And we got a lot of info to go through today.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah,
SPEAKER_01:I'm pumped. Today is the first day of the house settlement, which we've talked about it before. No echo. Evan Grimes in the chat says no echo. So that's a great start. Got to be happy about that. We've talked about this in the first couple of pods of the summer, but it is now officially in place. Schools officially can cut out the middleman if they so choose and pay their athletes directly. You're already starting to see some schools, Georgia notably, go ahead and just dump the NIL collective, get into something that's more run by the school. I think Georgia's running theirs through Learfield, which is their marketing arm, which makes sense. Obviously, the numbers are known by now, but the limit for schools, athletic department in general,$20.5 million per school, and we'll go up 4% annually every year for the next decade. Split it how you want. CBS Sports writer John Talty said he thinks the majority of schools will go 75% of that budget to football, 15% to men's basketball, 5% to women's basketball, and then 5% to all the other sports.
SPEAKER_00:Did you just credit John Talty with that information?
SPEAKER_01:It was in the article that I read, yes.
SPEAKER_00:Tyler, I said that on this last week.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, well, let me go back and credit...
SPEAKER_00:I actually said it twice because there was the echo, for one. Also, I'll be honest, I'm a little bit salty about John Talti because I didn't know this, but apparently he was in my current girlfriend's DMs right when we first started dating, which I did not like.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. So, if you're out there and you're on Twitter, go find him and shoot him a couple of DMs yourself. Let him know how Chris feels.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, I've been doing it every day for two years.
UNKNOWN:Um...
SPEAKER_01:Obviously, this is going to be an interesting dichotomy with some of the... Obviously, SEC, you'd consider most schools would probably do that 75% towards football, but take a Kentucky who traditionally cares more about basketball. Maybe they're going to be a little bit different. Does that mean that they have a fall-off in recruiting? Although, I did see they stole a recruit from Auburn today. We're
SPEAKER_00:going to talk about that for sure. This is one of the things I think is most fascinating about it because... like a year before this even happened, the NCAA put on their own website, it's like ncanil.com or something. And it was a breakdown of how they expected every athletic department would most likely allocate the money. And they were gonna allocate it in this model by all 18 to 22 teams or however many each school has, which is ridiculous. That's not gonna happen. You already heard different ADs like Greg Burns say that they're gonna split it between football first, basketball, men's basketball second, baseball, women's basketball, and then whatever sports actually make like a profit. So what's most fascinating in my opinion is some of the schools that are either more well-rounded and good at like several sports or really, really good at a second to third tier sports in like terms of like importance to like the masses. Like if you're really, really good at softball, like Texas Tech is trying to be, if you're really, really good at like I don't know. South Carolina, LSU are really good examples because they want to be really good at a lot of things. And they are at women's basketball, baseball. And you're already seeing like a more, I guess, like reinvestments, a bigger reinvestment into some of the sports that are lacking.
SPEAKER_01:So a couple of interesting things about the House Saddlemen before we move on. Most people know, but if you don't, now there's basically no... It used to be that you had like 85 scholarship limit for football, for example. That has essentially gone up to 105 players, so you can just have 20 extra players that are on your roster officially, which sucks because, I mean, fewer spots for walk-ons, which some coaches historically have really appreciated the walk-on. Dabo. But... Dabo, yeah. Bobby Bowden was a big one. You've got this newly, I don't know, constructed thing called NIL Go, where basically anybody that you get an NIL contract to that's over$600 has to be reviewed by this NIL Go. That's Deloitte, which is an auditing firm, will come in and look at it. And then there actually is a CEO of NIL Go. I don't know. This is new. I didn't know this, but he's a former MLB executive, Brian Seeley, and he's heading up this whole NIL go deal. So again, I don't really know how, how much that's really going to affect NIL deals, because I think that once you start to hit that cap of the 20 and a half, I think people will just start giving money in McDonald's bags. Like Jeremy Pruitt used to do. I got
SPEAKER_00:it. I don't really mean we're going to go back into the under the table stuff for sure. And like, like, that's just become like expected. You talk to anybody that's like from like the national media, that's talked to different programs. Like that's a thousand percent what's expected. And not just in like football, but like men's basketball, especially if they're not feeling like they're getting enough of like allocated money. Like Louisville is a good example. Like, I mean, they want to put a ton of money into their roster between eight to$10 million. You know, it's like, I think that'll be interesting. The other, the other part too, the Deloitte thing is super, super interesting because it's, one it's super weird that they're involved at all and when this news is broke they they came out and they're like oh no we're actually not going to be that that much involved at all like we're like after they were listed by name and and like basically also detailed exactly what they would be doing like with their role in their job like like helping out the nil but from that meeting and talking about how they were going to oversee what was above the board or like lack of better words, like legal or illegal for an NIL deal. Anything over$600 gets reviewed. They said between 70 and 90% of the deals that they looked at from last year would have immediately been nixed, like right off the bat. Because they're all just collectives. You're just paying them money out of pocket.
SPEAKER_01:It's pay to play. It's like essentially exactly what they said they didn't want NIL to be is what it has been so far. Yeah. We'll see. I mean, you know, there's... What is his name? Sealy? Brian Sealy. According to Rob Manfred, who is the foremost expert on integrity and fairness, did have a quote that said during his time at MLB, Brian demonstrated unparalleled integrity, a commitment to fairness, and the ability to navigate complex challenges with precision and care.
SPEAKER_00:They're going to figure out a way to get the Dodgers in the 12-team playoff, and I'm going to kill myself. It's going to be awful. Just awful.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, man. How about Otani, a linebacker?
SPEAKER_00:I would love to see Otani play football just because he would be one of the first people to get in massive trouble for gambling on himself during games, just without hesitation.
SPEAKER_01:Speaking of that, how about former Noel Malik Beasley? Just all these clips coming out on Twitter now in the NBA. He's under investigation for betting on props and different spreads and games that he was actively playing in. And now everyone's going back and finding these clips where there's like five seconds left and he's like rushing down the court. Did you see the one against the Hawks?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. They were an eight and a half point favorite. And then somebody asked for the Hawks to do three throws to go up nine. And he is just by himself sprinting down the court, sprinting down the court. All right. What do you want to talk about? Do you want to talk about Florida State or do you want to talk about recruiting? I feel like we should do recruiting.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, let's go into recruiting. The recruiting cycle has completely changed from what we were used to five years ago, and especially 10 years going back. I mean, of course, they introduced the early signing period. That was probably back in like 2017-ish, where they moved one of the dates up to December, completely taking away the February signing day that we all used to love.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Get out of work for free every Wednesday. First Wednesday of February.
SPEAKER_01:Right. Now, it seems like all the commitments... You still have to sign in December or February, but it seems like pretty much all the biggest players are committing by the end of June. I think there's a dead period that starts for a while where kids can't go on visits and stuff like that. I mean, that's even different. You can just take unlimited official visits now. So... We're going 10 official visits. It always used to be fun sitting around drinking with your buddies. If you had five official visits, what would be the five schools you'd go to? What
SPEAKER_00:was your answer for that, by the way?
SPEAKER_01:Texas was always up there. I originally thought USC until I found out that it's not exactly the nicest area. So UCLA might have been the better one. I think Oregon would probably be on the list for me. Yeah. Let's see. Those are three that initially come to mind. Maybe like a Ohio State, you know, just for the I don't think it's like the best campus in the world, but it is the Ohio State. And then I throw a random one in there like, I don't know. Hawaii or San Jose state or something like that. Just to throw
SPEAKER_00:it. That's the golden ticket right there. Like going to Hawaii was always a mainstay. Whenever I would say that, I feel like also, I'm pretty sure I brought this up to my dad one time when I was growing up and he's like, I'd go to Bama five times. Sick, dude. Sick.
SPEAKER_01:Well, I'd be in the chat. So
SPEAKER_00:we're just singing your, uh, your good graces, dude. Um, that's not a saying, you know what I mean? Anyway, I wouldn't have Hawaii in there for sure. I would say probably either Penn state or something like on the East coast, like UNC, I feel like it'd be kind of awesome. I wouldn't mind that. Um, man, like I feel like USC would be a lot of fun. Texas would definitely be out there. And unless you were something like
SPEAKER_01:that, Arizona state,
SPEAKER_00:that campus sucks, but the, uh, Everything on the campus is pretty awesome. And the surrounding
SPEAKER_01:town is awesome, too. Scottsdale is one of my favorite places to go. But we are not talking about those schools, Chris. We are talking about specifically some schools that have been very hot on the recruiting trail recently. You're going to be shocked to know that a few schools in the South have really been cleaning up on the recruiting trail recently.
SPEAKER_00:But, like, I know we joke around a lot about how good, like, year in, year out, Bama, Georgia, Texas now, like they do in recruiting. What Georgia just did, though, in the month of June was insane. I didn't realize until this specific year that June was like the new, like the entire month of signing day. It's insane. And that's like, even I think Shane Beamer at Carolina, he's had 30 total commitments in during his first four years were all from the month of June. I think he had, like, eight to ten last year. But what Georgia did, picking up 14 players in a span of, I don't know, roughly, like, three to four weeks, and, like, every single one of them, it's, like, one fucking four-star, five-star, blue-chip, like, top 100 defensive lineman, one after another after another after another. I mean, they... Kirby flexed his muscle, like... More so, I feel like, in the last month than I've seen them do in the last several years. Some of the guys, they went out and got whoever they wanted, and it feels like some of the guys they got were almost just out of spite, so somebody else wouldn't get them.
SPEAKER_01:The one that made me laugh the most, I happened to look at my feed on Twitter, and I see a tweet from Steve Wiltfong, who's known to be one of the better recruiting analysts. He's with OM3. He comes out earlier this week, and he's like, I'm putting in a crystal ball for PJ Dean, elite D lineman to go to South Carolina. And then like 30 minutes later, Hayes Fawcett also with on, on three comes out and just puts a graphic up. PJ Dean commits to Georgia.
SPEAKER_00:So to be fair, he was not far off from that. I talked to people cause this was a commitment that happened yesterday. It was like a four star top 100 kid. His brother played at Georgia and I talked to somebody that was close to the Georgia side of it. And he, I asked him what he thought about an hour beforehand, and he responded like two hours after the commitment. He was like, I forgot to respond, but if I would have, I would have 1,000% told you he was going to South Carolina. Everyone thought he was going to South Carolina. And in 30 minutes, which is funny you used that specific number, 30 minutes before his announcement, Schumann got on the phone with another assistant coach and apparently changed his mind. I think he always wanted to go there, but he felt like they had kind of– recruited over him with so many elite players that run in. And he made some comments like, do you guys even have room for me? Which is some pussy ass shit, first off. Do you guys even have room for me? There
SPEAKER_01:he is. That doesn't seem like PJ Dean. That doesn't look like
SPEAKER_00:a D lineman. Either way, he's kind of a tweener in size as an edge rusher. But yeah, that was a big pickup for him. And then Like everyone else, like Bama, Notre Dame, Georgia were the ones that kind of stole the show, I feel like, in June. Bama might have a really big one tomorrow as well. They just got a three-star receiver like 30 minutes before we came on here.
SPEAKER_02:And
SPEAKER_00:I'm praying that it's not because they are not going to get the five-star number one receiver in the country tomorrow. The kid from, where's he at? I don't know.
SPEAKER_01:Is that the Sedarian Morgan kid?
SPEAKER_00:Yes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. He's from Alabama, isn't he?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and he's crystal ball to go to Bama, but we'll see. Also, I'll be honest, man. I love when anytime your team is getting a shit ton of recruits and you're top three to five in the country, it's a good feeling. I feel like especially if you're somebody like us that grew up watching, recruiting, and paying a lot of attention to it because it's just like, I don't know, that's normal. That feels like normal, that kind of excitement. But now... Every time I see that they get a five star, I'm like, God, I hope they're not paying this kid way too much money just for him to transfer out a year or two later.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, there are some schools that are trying to negate players doing that more frequently by putting that in their contract, but they are coming under fire for that. We'll get to
SPEAKER_00:that here in a minute. Who is it, Tyler?
SPEAKER_01:That's my alma mater. They're in the news again for something negative. Seems like that's... pretty constant that's been like
SPEAKER_00:three straight years
SPEAKER_01:yeah it's always um but uh i did see a graphic and now i'm not gonna remember where it's from but um it was showing like uh kind of like a bar chart of how nio money by month has been spent and like june or like collectively like everybody in college football just completely skyrocketed because everyone knew july 1st was when you had to start going by the new rules so they're just just throwing money at kids and as much as they can before that rule goes into effect. So, pretty interesting. Okay, so this NIL deal, which has been talked about a lot on social media. There's this Darren Heitner, I think his name is. He's like this NIL agent, which to me... Okay, like, good for you. You're an NIL agent. He came in and was like, this was like the worst thing I've ever seen. I can't believe this would hold up, but... Essentially, four states making headlines right now for signing players to fairly aggressive revenue sharing contracts under this new revenue sharing deal with the house settlement. And there are provisions in the contract. Now, some of this stuff I think is a little shady, and I'm sure that eventually these things will be negotiated out. But basically, one of them is limiting... the player's ability to renegotiate or cancel an NIL contract, um, which on the surface probably wouldn't hold up in the court of law because I would think that you could always renegotiate a contract at some point. But, um, I mean, it's happened before state, I'm sure it's happened to a ton of schools. I mean, you like, I think even think of Georgia, like bear Alexander, um, you know, basically it's just like, well, I'm just going to sit out. Um, and, um, we've given you all this money and you're just, we're just gonna have to pay you and then you're going to transfer. So they're putting in all these clauses. Like, so, um, we can, as a school, we can extend your contract out without you being able to negotiate more money for us year to year. If your play suffers from injury, illness, lack of
SPEAKER_00:play, development, because you're at Florida state.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Can't develop players at all. Um, even if you get injured during like playing football, the, the, it's considered a breach of contract, uh, to try to renegotiate, um, or cancel out the contract that you had, um, finding the players. If they lose team, team issued equipment, um, that must be an issue. These players losing. Yeah. Finding them for basically not following the rules. Um, and then a clause potentially limiting players rights to legal counsel during future negotiations. Um, so, um, A lot of people coming out, agents, rival GMs of these. I can't believe we speak in these terms at this point about cultural, but the players, agents, the GMs of other teams coming out, blasting this. Florida State's come out after that went public and defended it, saying, we're just trying to set clear expectations on when we sign you to a contract and we're promising you money. We want you to have some liability on your side, too. It just can't
SPEAKER_00:be this. Hold on. Let's break that down from what they really mean. Let's read between the lines. What they're really saying here is, hey, guys, things are not fucking great here right now. Okay? So cut us some slack. We've had a five-star recruit, like you said, be committed for anywhere between several months to two years, and then for three or four straight years, leave on signing day. Please just don't fucking screw us after we give you a shit ton of NIL money because we don't have that much.
SPEAKER_01:Right. So I think there's probably a happy medium between what they have in these current contracts. And they did come out and say, you know, individual situations will vary. So if you're a better player, you probably won't have some of these contract stipulations, just like any other contract that exists. You know, if you bring more to the table, maybe less hoops that you have to jump through.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, the big thing here is the injury thing. The optics of that are really bad. Also, I will tell you this. Heitner being so vocal about it, I'm pretty sure that's the guy that represented Jaheim Otis, and he was the one that kind of started the process of... He was one of the first main guys that was like, I'm going to quit mid-season, make sure I don't use up more than four games of eligibility so I can have an extra year. And then you find out, too, like... That wasn't just because they wanted to make sure they could play another year. It's because that's another year of making money and being able to be shopped around a little bit. I think it's the same guy. He's also a UF grad. So I don't think he would be super objective. Yeah, for sure. But I will also say that the injury thing is shitty just from a surface level standpoint because... I mean, obviously this is like the most violent game in the world. And besides love Island. And if you are trying to figure out how to like, make sure you're still covered, like having all that in writing, that just feels super weird. Also players losing team equipment, which means they're just stealing it. Yeah. Which is fine. Like they're just stealing Nike shit, which like I, I, I did as well. Like when I told my, my coach in college that I quit, I left the office and, He called me when I was in the parking lot, and he's like, did you take that Nike dry fit? I was like, yeah, it fits me really well. I'm not going to give it back. He's like, you can turn around and bring that back right now. So I totally get that part. But it also screams there's a lack of fucking organization happening at Florida State.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Well, not to be surprised when you go 2 and 10, that there were some issues going on behind the scenes with the culture. Yeah. You know, even though today... the house settlement goes into place and ideally in a perfect world, you'd think that things may be a little less crazy when it comes to all this NIL shit. I think it's just going to be just as bad going forward. Um, because this is what college football is all about paying people under the table, shady deals, McDonald's bags.
SPEAKER_00:I miss that. I wish it would just go back to give them$20.5 million, but make them launder it or, or like pay people in the shadiest way as possible. I want to get back to some sort of familiarity with recruiting and cheating. And if it's all going to be legal, at least make it fun again. I want to see Eric Dorsett getting a fucking gold Trans Am on the day before signing day and then not giving it back. I want to go back to that. Also, what are we talking about next?
SPEAKER_01:Well, two things I want to talk about when we're talking about recruiting. There's a couple of schools that are... What's up?
SPEAKER_00:Auburn.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, I did want to talk about Auburn and also Colorado, two schools that I think surprisingly have not been doing as well on the recruiting trail. Maybe Colorado is a little bit more explainable. I didn't really notice this because I don't follow Dion on social media, but apparently he posted that he has some undisclosed health issue that he's been dealing with. He's lost a bunch of weight. He's been absent from those. Yeah, well, that definitely happened. He's been absent from coaching duties since April. Um, he's missed spring camp, a bunch of off season events. Um, and supposedly his first, like next appearance will be a big 12 media days next week. Um, but certainly, I mean, it hasn't hurt ticket sales cause there's still, I mean, they're doing great there and he's been awesome for that, but I think they had like one total commit until like last week. They've picked up a couple since then. That's
SPEAKER_00:exactly how it was last year, man. They were in the hundreds last year because their entire mentality was they were just going to go to the portal. This is going to be so interesting to see what he does this year. I don't mean just from coaching and wins and losses. I mean how he handles himself. They got Juju Lewis as a quarterback. I think they also got a transfer in. There's The cadence alter that there.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I think he's supposed to be the starter this year.
SPEAKER_00:So they still have like a, like a talent on the roster, especially that position, but his sons are both gone. Like Travis Hunter's gone, which is his, his main son. I feel like if he, if he could like that wish to come true. But here's the thing too. They like, I heard someone say this the other day that like one of the reasons why they thought that his son or sugar dropped so far in the draft is because like, Coaches felt like if he got in, didn't play well, and then the team wasn't playing well, which most of those teams, drafting a quarterback, obviously had a lot of issues, that one of the first people to go would be the head coach. So immediately, when you have this type of dynamic, a lot of people around that league felt like Deion would use that as trying to... kind of get his foot in the door to be the head coach of whatever team that was. And I don't know how much truth is involved in that at all, but I, I, I don't think it would be surprising like in the, like at all from Dion, like what we've seen the past couple of years, watching him try to be interested in this, like now it is a real job. Like he has to show up every day. Like they, like there are nine conference games. He's got to go play in the big 12 and he doesn't have his family. He doesn't have the sideshow and he doesn't have like, like the constant media attention that, from that? How does he respond to that?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think kind of what Parley P just said in the chat, which is a great name. I don't know. I think people have always kind of assumed that he was not going to be in it in the long haul for Colorado. Now, what does that mean in terms of how are they going to be on the field this year? Because they lost not only just those two players, Shador. I mean, Shiloh was... A decent player, but I don't think he's one of the main...
SPEAKER_00:No, he was terrible. He was fucking terrible.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. But Shador and Travis Hunter, now you got to completely... This is the first time that Deion's ever coached a game without his son being the QB, I think. Because he was his high school coach, then he was his coach at Jackson State, then he was his coach at Colorado. So now he brings in a totally new roster, essentially. Also,
SPEAKER_00:he's going to have to figure out how to develop that relationship with someone that's not his son. Like, every single day in practice, like, the guy leading your team, like, you have to figure out a way to make sure that you are handling that, like, since we have a much different relationship, like, no matter what. I don't think it's going to be bad. I honestly, I always say this. I think college football is better when Colorado teams out west like that are good. Like, maybe it's just a nostalgia thing for me. I want there to be, like, more inclusivity across the map in the United States so it's not always just the southeast. But there's not a big part of me that expects him to go into the season and be really, really good with what they lost, for one. And I just think he's going to be disinterested.
SPEAKER_01:That's my thing as well. And that's kind of what I was trying to get to is that, yeah, he might not be in for the long haul, but maybe it's because once the two studs are gone, it's actually one of the more intriguing storylines to me this year is what is Colorado going to be without Shador and Travis Hunter? Is Deion going to continue the success? Is he going to keep building the program? Or do they take a big step back? And if they do, the rest of college football, because everyone's pounding on the door like, Florida State, so dumb for not hiring Deion. Look what they're missing out on. Well, I'm interested to see what they've missed out on. Because if they're not having the success, Deion's you know, future pro prospects or coaching in the SEC, like those may go away. So I'm really interested to see what that looks like.
SPEAKER_00:I hope he goes to Florida state and I hope you guys go three and nine. And then he leaves after one year and then just Willie Taggart's the whole program right back into oblivion. I don't really wish that.
SPEAKER_01:Three and nine, Chris would actually be an improvement on last year's.
SPEAKER_00:Maybe six brother, maybe six. All right. Yeah. I'll tell you the team that I thought he probably should have got at least a look at because of how good I thought he would be able to recruit. Before he came to the FBS level, I just, like a lot of people, assumed that he was going to be unbelievable at recruiting because he's so charismatic. Everyone loves him. He's going to walk into everyone's home, and they're going to instantly just fall in love with his charm, want to go play for him. He's such a character and a larger-than-life personality from, like, decades right of like since his uh like days in the in the nfl and ford estate but that has not happened at all
SPEAKER_01:i gotta stop you there uh he doesn't do recruiting visits i don't know if you remember that last year he's just said no you know they can come to me
SPEAKER_00:because they want to see his house he didn't want to see their house
SPEAKER_01:right
SPEAKER_00:that's a bold statement to make um Anyway, but I thought that Auburn should have taken a look at him because when they were getting rid of Parson and the main reason they were getting rid of Parson is because they didn't like his muscular definition and they felt like his glutes, especially with how much they kind of developed throughout the season, it was a pretty obvious sign that he was not taken seriously and he was way more focused on getting some gains. Also, he didn't recruit at all or care about
SPEAKER_01:all. He was also interested, allegedly, in off the field. That was not real
SPEAKER_00:at all.
UNKNOWN:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But if you fired Brian Harsin because he was so bad at recruiting, and Hugh has done a great job at recruiting, especially over the last year and a half in the last two transfer portal cycles, high school recruiting, they had a top 10 class. They had a top three or top five transfer portal class. They have put a shit ton of resources into this turnaround, and I mean strictly financially. This is going to be the best Auburn roster they've had probably since 2019 at least. It'll be the best offensive line they've had in 15 years. They are, I think, a top two or three receiver room in the country. Arnold should be better. The defense is always pretty good. But Hugh, like, just cannot fucking figure out how to get out of zone away. Because you've given this, like, incredible second chance to come back into the SEC after the way you left. It could not be a more perfect fit for somebody that loves to tell people how much they love the Lord. That with Auburn, that's a beautiful matrimony. The fact that he has come in and started off pretty well, but you're 11-14. You're 11-14 in two seasons. You're also 1-8. What do you call it? 1-8 against ranked teams so far at Auburn. You have one lone... Signature win. And it was like four overtimes against A&M. And right now you are 89th in the country in recruiting.
SPEAKER_01:For those that are only on the audio of this pod, we're showing a commitment graphic of Denarius Gray, wide receiver, flipping from Auburn to Kentucky today, which is just pretty much the end. Well, I think tomorrow could possibly be the end of a long line of disappointments for Auburn on the recruiting trail. Yeah. I don't... I thought this was like... I know he's always been considered a good offensive mind, but I thought his calling card was recruiting.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Remember before NIL, when he was kind of a pioneer for NIL? And amongst other things. And then he went to... The thing with Hugh, too, that is... he kind of falls in line in my opinion into this category where it's like, man, I tell you what, if you beat Alabama from like 2010 to 2022, what that did for your fucking career, if you were just an average at best coach was insane. We saw the Jimbo Fisher who got a contract renewal and extension after he already had the most ridiculous contract in the history of college football. Um, Then, I mean, Freeze beats Bama two years in a row, which had never happened in the history of that program in Ole Miss. Leaves because he has to. Coach Boom.
SPEAKER_01:Coach Boom.
SPEAKER_00:Coach Boom.
SPEAKER_01:Gus Malzahn.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah. I thought that was Muschamp. But either way, he fucking leaves and goes to Liberty. And then all because Malik Willis has this incredible year against the worst competition in for like 12 straight games, puts up unreal numbers, goes to the NFL draft, gets, you know, was like supposed to be a steal of the draft, a huge prospect. And all of a sudden we're talking about Hugh Freeze again as like this quarterback whisper. And then Auburn looks at him and is like, hey, that guy, obviously great, great with quarterbacks. That Malik Willis, he actually signed with us out of high school and Gus couldn't figure it out. And now, you know, he goes to play with Hugh at Liberty and he becomes an NFL draft pick. Also, he beat Bama twice and is an offensive guru by his own admission. He said he was a quarterback guru in the fucking press conference. And then you've watched what's happened on the field. I don't know if he knows that his seat is hot because he's playing a shit ton of golf. I'm not sure if you've seen this, but this is like the new flight tracker. So people have been very frustrated. Auburn fans have been very frustrated with the lack of recruiting success this offseason. Somebody got in, I guess, on the Alabama GIN. Was it G-H-I-N?
SPEAKER_01:I was going to make a joke. What were people tracking his GIN app? That's really
SPEAKER_00:happening. Yeah, and then tweeting about it saying he has played golf 20 times in the last month and a half, this many times over the last week. And it's like, dude, at some point, some of these coaches need some fucking downtime. But again, optically speaking, that could not... Here, Eddie, pull up the Hugh Freeze GIN thing because it is... hysterical that somebody found it. It was a big story in AL.com. They're going to be fine. They will figure out a way to recruit. They always do. If he doesn't win, man... The scary thing for him is in Auburn, this is the best team they're going to have in the last probably 10 years. The month of September they got at Baylor, at Oklahoma, at A&M. They could be a good football team and still be 2-3 at the end of September. Then... Then what do you do? Do you just rehire Harsin?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, maybe they go after Kiffin again. Dude. You're kind of at a desperation point at that point because it's been now Malzahn fizzled out. Then you bring in Harsin who
SPEAKER_00:never really got off the grid. Malzahn fizzled out after you gave him$50 million.
SPEAKER_01:Right, right. Then you've got Harsin comes in, never even got off the ground enough to fizzle out. And then you got all the, you know, look, we're willing to look past the past transgressions of Hugh Freeze. He's a good Christian man, and he's changed his ways, and he's a phenomenal recruiter. QB guru, obviously, with the likes of Bo Wallace, you know, bring up the greats of the game. And, yeah, he beat Bama. And now if this fizzles out, where do you even go?
SPEAKER_00:I mean, whoever the equestrian coach is, probably just give them a shot.
SPEAKER_01:Are
SPEAKER_00:they pretty sick at equestrian? They're like an equestrian juggernaut.
SPEAKER_01:Dude, hell yeah. We should be covering that this fall.
SPEAKER_00:Horses freak me out.
SPEAKER_01:Ryan Horson, am I right?
SPEAKER_00:That should not be as funny as it is. No, they... Honestly, I feel like at some point, you just go back to what they did in the 30s, where college football coaches were basically just working their jobs the same way a restaurant staff would when they were down a person on a Friday night. It's like, hey, by the way, Suge, you have to actually cover basketball, too. A lot of them coached multiple sports. I think Suge Jordan is the only... He's top five all-time in Auburn for wins in football and men's basketball. So maybe just give Bruce Pearl a shot.
SPEAKER_01:It's not bad. I believe we're looking at the Ginn app of one Hugh Freeze here. It's a little hard to read. I don't know, Booz, if you can zoom in a little bit. What are we looking at there on the left? Those are the scores? He's regularly in the 80s. A couple 70s in there. I mean, that's... He's
SPEAKER_00:not even breaking 80?
SPEAKER_01:No. Well, he has a few times. I'm looking at the dates here. Looks like all of these are within a month of each other. So, yeah, he is playing quite a bit of golf. Hey, look, this is the system that has been set up. We talked about this last week. At what point are the ADs going to step in and be like, hey, guys, maybe we don't give these guys guaranteed contracts where, for example, they could go 2-10. And if we want to fire him, we're going to have to pay him$60 million to never coach for us again.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, the whole thing has gotten so far out of hand, man. It is, it's ridiculous. And like, and it has been for a while, but I know Auburn, I think there's a, there's a stat somewhere about how much they're still paying off in like buyout money even now. And thank God for Texas A&M because it's like, you know, they're, they're finally in the shadows of that. But I mean, yeah, like you didn't like they, they had to buy out. I think like their first, but they bought out Tuberville for 5 million. Then they had to give a buyout to Chizik two years after he won an Addy. Then they had to give, they gave Harsin a, I'm sorry, they gave Malzahn a seven year,$49 million contract. Then had to give him a buyout of like 33 or 36 million. Harsin was 18 million. Now you have, I don't, I don't think Hugh Freeze could have been negotiating with a lot of leverage when he took this job because this is, this was kind of like them, doing him more of a favor, I think, than the other way around. But yeah, it'll be interesting. I don't know how long the leash is. Let's get into the deep dive, dude.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. You want to talk about your head coaching ranks? Is that what you're talking about with the deep dive?
SPEAKER_00:We can. Let's see here. Also, yeah, tell us in the chat if you agree, disagree. There hasn't been a ton of pushback, which is shocking, because any time the Internet's involved, there usually is. There was an article that came out today on CBS Sports, and it was a deep dive into every Power 4 head coach's record against top 25 teams. And it was top 25 teams at the time they played. And also, if there was any game that was, like, wiped away because of, like, you know, violations or sanctions or whatever, they still counted those wins in favor of the coach because they obviously were well on the field. So do you want to take a guess? I think there's 64 total power four teams or programs in the country, maybe 68. If you add Notre Dame, do you have any idea how many total head coaches of that entire nearly 70, what do you call it, 70 total coaches is? How many have a winning record against top 25 teams? Over 500.
SPEAKER_01:Seven.
SPEAKER_00:I hate you. This is not fun when you do this. Nine.
SPEAKER_01:That was close.
SPEAKER_00:That's really close. I mean, I was kind of shocked by that. No conference had more than three. The Big 12 had zero. I think they had one. The guy from Kansas State was at 500. The ACC had three.
SPEAKER_01:It's probably
SPEAKER_00:just that
SPEAKER_01:one.
SPEAKER_00:So Brent Key is 6-6, Fran Brown is 3-1, and then Dabo is 40-27. So you technically have three there. The Big Ten, Ryan Day, 24-9 for a 7-27 win percentage. Dan Lanning, 10-6. Lincoln Riley, 18-15. And then everyone else is under 500, including Matt Rule, 2-22. Did not know that. Brett Bielema, 23-45. Greg Sciano. I knew you were going to throw
SPEAKER_01:Bielman in there.
SPEAKER_00:You got to. Dude, he's such a dick, though. Sciano, 4-32. Mike Loxley, 2-28. Anyway. I
SPEAKER_01:mean, I know he's at Rutgers, but, damn, 4-32. Yeah, they were, like, number two in the country when he was there.
SPEAKER_00:And this is all-time, by the way. These are their records all-time. And then you get to RCC. I'm
SPEAKER_01:talking about all-time. All-time great guy, Ray Rice, on that Rutgers team.
UNKNOWN:Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00:The SEC has three. Do you want to take a guess at who they are?
SPEAKER_01:Kirby. My guess would be DeBoer because he did really good at Washington. He
SPEAKER_00:did really well at Alabama last year, too, against ranked
SPEAKER_01:teams. I would say the fan base was not collectively very happy with the first year. Oh, they live in Alabama. Yeah, I get it. They're judging on a curve coming off the goat.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And then the next one, I don't think it's Sark. I'll go Kiffin.
SPEAKER_00:No, Kiffin is 11-24 against ranked teams. He's 8-9 at Ole Miss. But Josh Heupel, 12-12, is right at 500. He's 11-10 since he's been at Tennessee. But yeah, only three that were at 500 or better. Only two that were over 500. Kalen DeBoer... Had the best win percentage of any coach in the country for this matchup. But here's the thing that I thought was interesting as well. Because you start looking at some of these losses and like Kirby. Kirby has 19 total losses since he's been at Georgia. Only four of them have been to unranked teams, right? And you look at like, I think they had six total losses from like 2018 to 2023. And they were either, I think like four of the six were to either 2019 LSU or or Nick Saban at Alabama. So he's been phenomenal. DeBoer, I had him on the coaching rankings that I had. People did not think he should have been that high at three. I thought he should have been at two because he's 2-0 against Sark, 3-0 against Lanning, 1-0 against Kirby, 1-0 against Brian Kelly. Everyone that's in the top half and the top part of the top tier, I guess, of SEC coaches and college football coaches, I mean, he's had a winning record against– they went 10-1 against ranked teams his final two years at Washington. The issue is this. In 13 career losses, 10 were to unranked teams.
SPEAKER_01:All right. Gives me good hope for the opener this year because I know we're not going to be ranked. You made an interesting comment there, Chris. You said, I thought Kalen DeBoer should have been two over Sark. Didn't you make this list?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but I don't like getting yelled at. on the internet and people get so mad. Did you see the graphic I made about the top 10 biggest SEC former students?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely electric in the comments section.
SPEAKER_00:Two straight days. Two straight days of Jimmy Buffett didn't graduate from Auburn. I know he didn't.
SPEAKER_01:Former students or alumni, right?
SPEAKER_00:Right, it actually said it on the graphic. Yeah, it said it
SPEAKER_01:pretty clear there at the top, just like this one does, SEC head coach ranks. That would be like me being like, Chris, I don't see Dabo on here, and I don't understand you.
SPEAKER_00:That'll happen. That'll happen for sure because it happens all the time. But, yeah, there's only so much yelling over dumb shit that I can handle. But I tell you what, the thing that is going to be my new biggest frustration is on all these– There's a link attached to the article where I spend way too much time diving into the numbers so I can justify and validate the reasoning that I have going into this. And no one seems to ever click on that, which is part of the problem. Is there anybody on this list you think that's way too high? I think Stoops could be further down. I think he's gotten a free pass for years.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I agree. I mean... I'm interested to see how this year goes for Brian Kelly. Because they've got a really good squad this year. You've got one of the top three to five QBs. I'd say definitely top three QBs coming back. Starting to recruit a little bit better on the trail. But I would say that his first couple years have been fairly disappointing at LSU.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, he had a Heisman Trophy winner. He beat Bama in year one. Got to the SEC Championship game. Two 10-win seasons. I think he... As a head coach, he's had 12 10-win seasons in his last 18 years. And I think before this year, it was like eight straight. And, you know, like, this should be the most talented roster and team that they've had under him. Like, they are loaded. But, I mean, I guess. I think people are probably a little bit frustrated, mainly because, like, dude, you can't start off every year 0-1. They've lost five straight openers. They lost two in already all. last year to USC, who ended up not being a good team. Now this year, they got to go to Clemson. So I would agree with you on that. I also feel like, I mean, dude, he's been a head coach for like 35 years. He has 292 career victories. So like, I feel like he's over.
SPEAKER_01:To be honest, I mean, if you're looking like in that view, which is over the course of their career, like Hypo really hasn't done much yet. I mean, they've been good, but And then Kiffin, he's been there, but, like, I don't think he's really elevated Ole Miss past, you know, where I think some people, like, the hype that they get. Like, I think he's had a few disappointing moments. So, to your point, I think if you're looking at the whole grand scheme of things, Kelly should be ahead of them. So, I may retract my statement there.
SPEAKER_00:I think Kiffin over Heupel is, like, a pretty common ranking. And I was looking... Yeah, I was looking at the numbers on this and trying to figure out how to justify that because Kiffin's had three 10-plus-win seasons the last four years. They had back-to-back 10-win seasons for the first time in, I think, 65 years. They beat Georgia. He finally got off the schneid with some of those range posts. Dude, also, I think, too, a lot of those parts of the seasons where they were 10-2 or 11-2, most of those uh like i feel like half of those losses or maybe more were to save it or kirby so it wasn't like he was losing like teams he had a bad uh bad record against like ranked opponents until this year but the thing is like you you feel like he put it all together this year because you beat georgia and how did you also capitalize on that you lost to kentucky four and eight kentucky at home as a top five team for the first time since 1977 lost to who was the other one um late in the year obviously to florida and then you blew a a seven point lead in death valley with three minutes to go like he had like i thought bama didn't take advantage of like the the shot that they had that he had a red carpet like everything was served to him on a fucking silver platter to finish up the year make the playoff and it would have been great i feel like they would have done really well on the playoff the way they were built I cannot understand how that
SPEAKER_01:happened. So when I'm taking a look at this list, I'm seeing four to five names that should be a little bit nervous about if they have a bad year, they could be shown the door. One of them being, I don't know that Mark Stoops would be shown the door, but to your point, a man gets a pass a lot. Every year it's like, they won seven games, but I mean, it is Kentucky. And it's like, okay, well, are you ever going to progress past that? Or is that just kind of like... That's where you get your bonus. We know that. Billy Napier. Yes, people are expecting more from him this year, but if you don't perform, you're backing up the last few seasons, which have also been underwhelming. I'd take a look at him. Obviously, we've talked about Hugh Freeze. Sam Pittman has not been on a roll at Arkansas. Brent Venables at OU. This is the year for Brent Venables to prove that he can be the guy. I don't think... If they go 6-6 this year, I don't know what we're doing here. And then the last two, whatever. Clark Lee, he's had a great year last year. I don't think his job's going anywhere. And then Jeff Levy just started there. Yeah,
SPEAKER_00:I think the big thing, too, is you look at Stoops. Stoops is 3-32 at Kentucky against SEC teams that finish with a winning record.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I feel like every year... we go into the Kentucky Georgia game and everyone's like, Oh, Kentucky might have a little something for Georgia. And then it's just a blowout.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Well, I mean like last year, it's pretty close, but they, like, again, they had the win last year against Ole Miss, but like that win last year against Ole Miss, that should have like been the catalyst for something. And they ended up going four and eight. They lost, I think every game against FBS opponents, the rest of the season. So, yeah, I mean, I don't know. Like, like, There's a lot of different ways and angles to look at it. I think the biggest takeaway I had was after six, there's not a ton of... You look at the quarterback rankings and where each of those players could project this year. Even outside the top five, there's a lot of room for high ceiling, really high level players and breakout years all up and down the league. From a coach's standpoint, after the top six, it's kind of like, okay, I mean... I'll talk up Eli Drinkowitz for what he's done the last two seasons and Beamer, but I don't know really grand scheme of things. Beamer is, by the way, I will point this out, 6-0 in the month of November against ranked teams in the last three seasons.
SPEAKER_01:It seems like South Carolina is on the rise. You've got a lot of hype around Sellers. They're recruiting better than they typically have been. I think it's time for him to take the next step. Didn't you're so much better at remembering like specifics of games and seasons than I am, but didn't like Missouri was on a decent role last year and they just lost an embarrassing game. I feel like in my memory, but I can't remember exactly the specifics.
SPEAKER_00:Wait, for which one?
SPEAKER_01:Drinkwits at Missouri.
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah. It was a top 10 team.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. And just completely shit the bed. Like I think, you know, Missouri, who's Missouri's QB this year?
SPEAKER_00:Uh, it is Bo.
UNKNOWN:Uh,
SPEAKER_00:I'm saying that incorrectly. He's a transfer from Penn State. He's pretty good. They also had a five-star from last year, and they got that Sam Horn kid that was Travis Hunter's quarterback at Collins Hill. He's like 98 off the mound, but he's one of the backups as well.
SPEAKER_01:A couple media members chiming in here in the chat. Michael Bratton says, Brian Kelly over Josh Heupel is Vern Dumquist.
SPEAKER_00:He ruined it twice. Why would
SPEAKER_01:he do that? He did. He fucked it up the first time, so he had to get it back in there. And then Lockdown SEC says Kentucky before Seuss is basically Tulsa. They throw parades for going to bowls. But how long, though? He's been there for, what, 10?
SPEAKER_00:2013? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because he was RDC until 2012. And then, yes, correct. So he's been there for 12 years. How long do we just celebrate getting to a bowl?
SPEAKER_00:I mean, what's the big win? Like, he's not wrong. Like, Kentucky was always a bottom dweller in the league before he got there. But now they're, like, a fourth place in the division dweller for, like, before they split the divisions. Like, I mean, and here's the thing, too. I hate that we're bringing this up since they just got a four-star receiver over Auburn because that's shocking to me. Why are you going to go play in this offense? But I don't see it getting better. Like, how is Kentucky going to compete against Like, dude, the weird public breakup they had with their former... Michael Bratton, correct me here if I'm wrong. Who's the Vince Mara or Vince Morrow, the former OC or O-line coach or whatever that left in the middle of the night via text and went to Louisville? Like, it's the least stable program in the SEC, including Vanderbilt, including Mississippi State.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. An interesting year for a lot of coaches on this list. Yeah. I think we just go kind of rapid fire on the last bit of this stuff we have on our agenda here. I don't know if you saw, but we'll talk Jeremiah Smith real quick. Jeremiah Smith, obviously, he is the number one player on NCAA football game coming out next week. He came out in an interview with The Athletic this week with Manny Navarro of The Athletic and basically vowed to never lose to Michigan again, which... Granted, he's only going to be there for probably this year and next year, so the next two years. But his quote is, quote, I'm not a sore loser, but I hate losing. And losing to that team up north was pretty crazy. In the end, I think it really helped us play the way we did in the playoffs, but I didn't want to go to Ohio State and lose to that team up north. I just hate them. Just something about them. For the next two years, I promise you, I will not lose to them. I can't lose to them in the next two years.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know if he is aware of this, but they've lost to him like four years in a row.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and also, to start the sentence, I'm not a sore loser, but I hate losing, and I'm going to bitch about losing for the next 30 seconds. Yeah, that's a tough one. Seems like you're a little bit of a sore loser.
SPEAKER_00:Listen, Bama lost that team. They were not a good football team. They had some really good players defensively, but I don't know how you come into that game, especially after the last three years in a row where you've lost to them. and let that happen at home last game of the season um also can we just fucking say it and like stop pretending that like it's a great rivalry it's a great tradition it's it's two blue bloods all that kind of shit great it is so corny everything they do in the stupid rivalry the game that team up north do you see dude did you see on campus they put an x over every single m on campus. Urban Meyer, it says Urban Meyer on his office door. Who fucking cares?
SPEAKER_01:We don't recognize the letter M around here in Columbus. So stupid.
SPEAKER_00:What do you want to close with? Because we got to go.
SPEAKER_01:Quickly, Pac-12 out of Texas State. I'm sure you're excited to see them join the juggernaut of Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State, Utah State, Oregon State, Washington State, Texas State and Gonzaga.
SPEAKER_00:Raw stress for Les. They are little giants. That's the whole thing. Anybody can join. It is a planet fitness mentality. There's no judgment at all. No matter what your credit score is, come on down to the Pac-12 sales-a-thon. Anybody can get into a ride today. Also, Texas State is the least sexy edition of all time. I wish they would have actually put together a fun... league
SPEAKER_01:yeah the bobcats you're not you're not fired up about the bobcats from um buford texas i don't know where it's over beaufort
SPEAKER_00:it's probably something stupid like that
SPEAKER_01:uh lastly chris do you still play video games
SPEAKER_00:you haven't played video games in years
SPEAKER_01:well the new game is out next week and uh ea has like slowly been dropping their top players in the game um Real quick, we'll show you top 10 offensive players. Jeremiah Smith leading the way, 98 overall. Your boy, Ryan Williams, number two at 95. 18 years old, by the way. Did you know that? He was just 17 last year. Jeremiah Love. I know one of your favorite players, obviously. Spencer Fano, the right tackle from Utah. Right tackle? Up there with Caden Proctor. Jordan Tyson at Arizona State. The right guard for Texas A&M. What are we doing here? Eli Stowers. Okay, there's an SEC name that you know. 93. And Francis Malagoa from Miami. Nicholas Singleton. And then, I don't want to make you sad, Chris, but Caleb Downs. The number one overall defensive player on the board here. A lot of Big Ten, a lot of SEC. Very few anything else as things have been trending recently, but... I have pre-ordered the game, Chris. I will be playing it on Monday because I pre-ordered it. So I know you're really jealous since you're so into video games.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, I would love to play the game. But also, I know myself pretty well that this would be something I would devote way too many hours to. I will say this in terms of it's only been out for... They came back a year ago. Everyone's super excited about it as they should be. But this year, I don't know if you saw the team rankings and I guess whatever... The score would be the rank overall. Who was number one? Bama was number one, but there was nobody over a 90. They were like, everyone was 89 and below. So, compared to last year, where it's like Georgia, Ohio State, they were all like 96, 97, I think, overall as a team. Between that, making sure everyone is not good in the video game that isn't reality, and then putting out a top 10 list of fucking utility interior offensive linemen, that is... Pleated, khaki, sexy. That is terrible.
SPEAKER_01:That is midsummer content that you won't get anywhere else but EA Sports. EA Sports. It's in the game. Chris, you are moving from Atlanta soon, so we're going to be getting together soon in person, I hope. I will be traveling next week, so if we're going to record a pod, it's going to have to be early in the week, Monday or Tuesday. This has been awesome. We're going to get the angry fans line back up and running for the season. So get excited for that. Anything else you want to drop? We appreciate Booza, our producer extraordinaire in the background, showing all the links. He's like our Jamie from Joe Rogan. We just say Booza.
SPEAKER_00:I love you both. I got to go to my other pod. All right. My less important pod.
SPEAKER_01:Less important. Everybody like and subscribe. We'll see you next week.
UNKNOWN:Thank you.
