October 14, 2025 • 38 mins
This week on Weekend Warriors, Anish and Tom recap the Panthers 30-27 win over the Dallas Cowboys, discuss the Panthers stellar backfield, react to James Franklin being fired from Penn State, and so much more!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Carolina Panthers officially have a first world problem.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
The big question in Pantherland what do you do with
ric o'dowdell when Chuba Hubbard comes back. Well, Dave Canallis
told us on Monday, Hey, they're gonna find a way
to get ric o'dowdell touches because what we've seen the
last two weeks, and this is in hyperbole historic. He
goes for two oh six against Miami and then kind
(00:28):
of put some headlines out there against Dallas saying, hey,
that's my old team, five years with them, they let
me go. They know what's coming. Buckle Up goes for
one eighty three on Sunday, fifty six receiving yards and
a receiving touchdown to boot. This guy was an undrafted
free agent. He was in our backyard. We saw him
at South Carolina. Yeah, hurt a lot in college. Gets
(00:51):
to the NFL, really didn't get a shot until year
five with Dallas runs for one thousand yards. Still nobody
was willing to give him more than a one year deal.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
The Panthers get.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Him Asheville kid, and then he gets a shot with
chub Hubbard having the calf injury and he just goes Ham.
There's a couple of ways I want to take this,
But first, you know Luke's you kind of sit back.
You watch those two performances in this day and age
in the NFL. I mean, he was seventeen yards away
from back to back two hundred yard games. The list
(01:25):
of guys who've done that, it's OJ Simpson twice, Moone Campbell,
Ricky Williams, and then Jaya Jai randomly is on that list.
Like that's the list.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, that's it. And think about the history of that
position in the National Football League, right, Like even just
go back to the ninety nine rams, Like, how did
Marshall Falk not do that? Right? I mean, that's unbelievable
when you think about what an accomplishment that is. And
I think the other thing that gets glossed over in
all of this fifty three carries in those two games,
(01:55):
Like how often do you see a running back get
thirty carries in one game? Very rarely rare, right.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
And I thought, what was fascinating it kind of did
a little bit of a deep dive on this yesterday
before a coaches show. So one of the plays that
the Panthers love to run is duo, and it's a
very basic downhill running play. I'll let you explain it,
but essentially, it's two offensive linemen closing in on one defender.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
It's two double teams at once. It's two on one
on one side, either two on one if they have
a nose, or two on one on the opposite guard
right on the opposite side. So you're basically doubling up
and you were just going downhill and the back's got
to find a crease.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So on the season, when the Panthers run duo five
and a half yards per carry like that's.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Wild, Well, it's funny. It's funny you say that because
there's a lot of coaches. There's a saying in coaching
with the duo play, and here it is when in doubt,
run duo, run duo.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Dallas Luke's seven and a half yards per play on
duo unbelievable and that was with three offensive linemen out.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Yeah. Are you are you guys getting healthy this week? Well?
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I think the hope is Taylor Moten comes back. We'll
find out when the first injury report comes out Wednesday.
We take the show on Tuesday. You know, Kate Mays
has been fine Frankly at center, and then people forget
that was a competition.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
In the offseason.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
It was Austin Corbett Cad Mays at center and Corbett
veteran guy leader. They kind of gave him the nod.
But May's played a lot last year. Actually had a
stretch where he was going up against like Dexter Lawrence,
Chris Jones, vitevea executive weeks. Jalen Carter was in there
and acquitted himself really well. And then Brady Christiansen again,
(03:52):
he's been a guy who's been with the team for
you know, four or five years now, swing tackle, he
can play any position on the line. He's filled in
for Robert Hunt, the best offensive lineman Pro Bowler last year,
and he's done a nice job.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
At right guard.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
So they've held the four and josh n I have
Ben played well right tackle for Taylor Molten last week.
But you mentioned health. I mean, if Chuba comes back,
good problem to have. Jalen Koker might be coming back.
This is an offense when you look under the hood,
there's actually a lot to like. They were getting explosive
(04:26):
plays against Dallas, but plays per drive numbers strong. They're
three and out percentages amongst the.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Lowest in the league.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
They actually have the most rushing yards cumulative of any
team in the NFL, and that's al Rico Dwell the
last couple of weeks. And it's just allowing them to
do more. I mean, Dave Kanal has shed it. At
one point, I think we were into the third quarter,
they were averaging ten yards per play on first down.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
That's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
That doesn't play caller. That opens up your entire playbook.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, and you're rarely behind the sticks. Well, you're technically
never behind the sticks.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
I mean they were living in second and short and
I get a Dallas bad defense. Yeah, you're living in
second in short.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
So here's the next question. Can the Panthers play all
of their games at home?
Speaker 2 (05:17):
I think that is a fair question, and I pose
that to Dave Canalis on Monday. I said, this feels
like the next step, the next building block here going
on the road. And yeah, I really like what Derek
Brown said after they beat Atlanta thirty to nothing. He
kind of treated it like, yeah, Okay, we we did it,
but we have not earned the benefit of the doubt.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Now we got to go do it again.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And almost dismissed the magnitude of the win, and then
he kind of did it again this week leading up
to a game against the oh and six Jets. He's like, yeah,
you know, everybody's feeling us. We've got a couple of wins.
And I'm paraphrasing, and he goes, we've been in the
spot where the Jets are. He goes, we still tried,
(06:02):
We're still competing. We expect them to compete. And the
message essentially was, hey, we're not at the point yet
where we can just show up and go win. I mean,
we saw it last night on Monday Night football, right Buffalo.
I know they're on the road against Atlanta, but Buffalo
was the favorite there.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Yeah, beat them, I mean just ran all over him
Byjeon went crazy. Yep, listen, if you can get it
right on the road, the fortunes change.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Oh yeah, I look at it again, and we get
to not take it one game at a time. So
they get the Jets and they go and beat the Jets,
who are in bad shape. And the Jets run the
ball well, the Panthers run defense. That's been a revelation.
I mean, Javonte Williams was the third leading rusher going
into Sunday. They held Dallas to thirty one yards on
(06:56):
the ground. Right the week before, Devon a Chan had
nineteen yards, or the Miami had nineteen yards as a team,
they shut down each that's two too, two really good
running backs. And now the Jets run the ball well.
If the Panthers play the run the way they have
the last few weeks, and you get justin fields to throw.
(07:16):
He's taking fourteen sacks in the last two games.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
You saw the numbers. Yeah from last week? Yeah? Bad?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Negative net passing yards.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
How does that happen? Well, when you get sacked nine times? Right,
But man, I mean net passing yard totally smokes.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
So there's an opportunity. Then listen, Buffalo at home, green
Bay on the road is going to be a challenge.
But if you get to four and three, and let's
say you should beat the Saints twice, Okay, it's a
minimum of six wins, and let's say that's where you're
Let's say you're at six wins going into the last
three games, and then there's a little bit of irony here,
(07:54):
which is Tampa Seattle, Tampa. My gut says, six is
like the minimum number here. But if you're at six,
I think you're gonna have something to play for over
those last three games, the iron being you're gonna have
to go through Baker, Sam Darnold Baker.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, but it's a fun story. But you want to
be in position, right, like, if that's your minimum, like
you said, six is the minimum, and you're still in position,
that's exactly where you want.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
To be, right And you may have to win all
three of those games, but again, you know you're talking
about playing meaningful games late in the season. I think
six is the minimum number. And if you beat an
OO six Jets team and you beat a bad Saints
team twice, that gets.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
You to six.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Now if you go steal another one, you go beat
San fran a banged up team on Monday night on
the road, or you beat the Rams at home, or
maybe you steal one against Buffalo, or you beat Atlanta
on the road. Right all of a sudden, the math
changes in your favor. But I think if you're at
six like that is a very I think reasonable even
low bar. If you get to six going into the
(09:00):
last three.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
You got something to play for, no doubt, no doubt.
Exciting man I mean, that was an exciting day on Sunday,
Ladies and gentlemen. The weekend, no CROs to the end zone, MLL,
it's the catch Weekend Warriors.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
A lot of good vibes in panther Land, a lot
of angst in the college football world after Sunday and
the big news and it came down right in the
middle of the Panthers Cowboys game Sunday afternoon. Penn State
moved on from James Franklin. And people have a lot
of feelings on James Franklin. Okay, and I know he
(09:44):
wasn't the most beloved head coach at Penn State, never
endeared himself to that fan base. But they did win
double digit games three years in a row leagues. They
were not just in the College Football Playoff. They won
two playoff games last year.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Yeah, I had both of them. I was on the
sideline for him.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
They were in the College Football semi final. And listen
the big game James stuff. You can't hide from that.
He had ruled against the top tier teams. That's true,
It's all there. I can't say I was shocked, but
I was a little surprised, only because when you zoom
(10:25):
out and you go, okay. Bill O'Brien took over after
the whole fiasco with Sandusky and Paterno and Bill O'Brien.
The thing he did best was he didn't have the
ship sink. He kept at James Franklin came in, kind
of held the fort for a couple of years, had
(10:46):
some double digit win seasons, and then right around COVID
there was a little bit of a dip, talk of
him being on the hot seat, and then they elevated again.
It told me, I don't know how you feel about this.
It told me like they were kind of looking for
a reason to get rid of them, because again, double
(11:08):
digit wins the last three years, in the playoffs of
the semifinals, just a year ago, and I get a preseason,
what were they number three?
Speaker 1 (11:16):
They were in the top five of the preseason? Yeah,
two or three? I think yeah, two three?
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Right, Drew Allery gets hurt. The UCLA loss unacceptable, the
Northwestern loss unacceptable, But they're right there with Oregon. I mean,
they're right there in the Oregon game. It just told
me like, I don't know if you're listening to Twitter,
if you're listening to social media, if the boosters if
the alumni are And I'm not even saying it's the
(11:41):
wrong decision, but it almost felt like they were looking
for a reason to make this move.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Right now, Well, I think you're correct, and I do
think there's some validity in that. You just cannot lose
to UCLA and Northwestern. Now, I understand UCLA has really
turned things around, but you got to look at it
from the standpoint of perspective of going into that game.
(12:08):
Going into that game, UCLA was the laughing stock, not
just to the Big Ten, but of college football. Right,
So you lose that game, then James Franklin comes out
with the tweet on Sunday, Northwestern Northwestern, Northwestern time to
go one to zero. And then you go out and
(12:29):
lose to what arguably people would say was the second
worst team fair in the Big Ten. So now you've
got the record in big games versus ranked opponents and
the numbers are staggering. Okay, and then you go out
and I really believe that in this particular set of
(12:49):
instance circumstances, they did not prepare their football team, and
that goes directly on coaching. They were in their mindset.
You lose, the heartbreak to Oregon and you in the
and nobody's staying it out loud, which you're going, all right,
we got UCLA this week, right, we got UCLA this week,
and so what do you do? You go on cruise control? Right,
(13:12):
And from a preparation standpoint, that was really really disappointing.
And I think that hit hard, like really hard from
an administration, powerbroker, financial side of things. And now we've
always been in the most bottom line business in the profession, right,
but now more so than ever before. And he had
(13:35):
some things working against him. The vast majority of the
roster was returning. I hoped for Drew Aller, and to
your point, you know they're one play away and it
was a Drew hour interception for playing for the national title. Okay.
The problem is is the Drew Holler stuff kept rearing
its ugly head and there was no progression of development
(13:59):
getting him out of it. Right, He never I mean
it was it was always something with him in the
passing game that was limiting them, and to be honest
with it, it cost everybody. And I don't want to
put all the blame on Drew Aller, but Drew Aller
has never played his best football when they needed him
to play his best football.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
I'm going to go into the vault here. A quarterback
from the early years of the James Franklin era at
Penn State who was talked about at one point in
a similar vein that Drew Aller was talked about, Christian Hackenberg. Correct,
he was talked about as a potential number one overall pick.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And Bill O'Brien did a great job with him as
a true freshman.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
And then once James Franklin got there, we saw Hackenberg decline.
He never really got better. In fact, you could say
he went south.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
I think he ended up being a mid round pick,
went to the Jets, never really had much of an
NFL career, and we haven't heard from him and I
want to say, like a decade. So I just always felt,
you know, Penn State, and you could stereotype this a
little bit, but there was always just kind of like culturally,
(15:12):
the whole blue collar put your work down, say less.
It was always that kind of program, right even on
to the color scheme, right like white and blue, just
plain like we're not trying to be flashy. And James
Franklin talked, He talked a lot. I'm not sure he
ever endeared himself to that fan base, and so you know,
(15:34):
when things went south, they turned on him. Even when
things were good, they pointed to the fact that he
couldn't win the big game. But on that note, he
has a significant buyout. We're talking like fifty million dollars
in that y. It got me thinking because for years,
you know, the power brokers, the super agents in college football,
the Jimmy Sextons of the world, the Trace Armstrong's of
(15:55):
the world, they would always say to schools and they
would kind of hold them hostage.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
Hey, if a.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Coach doesn't have four or five years on his deal
at all times, he can't recruit. So that's where you
get these huge extensions and then these huge buyouts that
come as a byproduct. That's not true anymore. You're right
of the portal and teams resetting the roster year to year,
(16:23):
whether you've got two years on your deal or three
years or four years. I don't think it matters all
that much because I don't think the high school kid,
when he commits to a program, I don't think the
high school kid sees that as more than a place
where I'm beginning my college career, not a place that
I'm looking at as a four or five year destination.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
I said that exact same thing on National Signing Day
one year ago. This coming December, this is a pit stop.
The vast majority of these kids that are signing on
this day will not be with the program they're signing
with on this day. Right. So the entire profession, coaching, player,
all of it is now almost one hundred percent transient.
(17:06):
So players are going in and out, coaches are going
in and out, and you're trying to build and establish
some form of like foundation, which is hard to do.
And you know, you talk about the buyout. The other
thing about the buyout is when you make a buyout
like that, you're also sending a message that this is
our guy. We're not going to lose him, we don't
(17:29):
want him going anywhere. Right, So you've clearly established some
level of confidence that you think he makes a significant difference.
And now you look at it financially and I actually
we're going to talk about this this week on College
Football Live. So he's owed more than forty nine million
dollars roughly eight million dollars annually per his contract. He
(17:52):
has a duty to mitigate clause in the contract which
essentially requires him to look for another job and either
coaching or broadcasting, and then Penn State would owe only
the difference between the eight million dollars annually that's owed
to him and then whatever the new annual salary is.
So let's just say he gets a coach he died
for six million dollars, then Penn State would only owe
(18:13):
two million dollars of that up to him for the
duration of the remainder of the Penn State contract. Right,
And so not only are you talking about a buyout,
but now to replace him, you're talking about a buyout
of somebody else's contract. Let's just say Kurt Signetti. Hypothetically
(18:35):
his is over fifty million. So now you've got the
contracts of James Franklin, the contracts of the entire staff,
then a buyout of another coach and their staff, and
you've got to pay him and pay his staff, and
then pay him and pay his staff. So this is
a massive, massive financial choice that they have made. And
then when you look at the landscape across college football, Okay,
(18:58):
and I know that Matt's name has come up, Okay,
obviously that's his alma mater, Kurt Signetti's name has been
brought up. What if you're a Penn State broker, if
you're a finance guy, if you're donating, if you're a booster,
you're alumni, you're on that committee. What is going to
(19:18):
be acceptable in this hire in terms of the status
of the coach that would exceed the accomplishments of James Franklin.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
And that's what I was getting at, right, James Franklin.
What was he thirteen and three last year?
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (19:35):
The year before they had ten or eleven wins? So
here you go his last three or is thirteen and three,
ten and three, eleven and two. Yeah, their final ranking
in the College Football Playoff Final poll four ten and eleven. Okay,
they won two playoff games, lost in the semifinals last year,
(19:56):
lost in the Peach Bowl in twenty twenty three, won
the Row Bowl in twenty twenty two. Prior to that,
he won a Cotton Bowl, he won a Fiesta Bowl,
he lost a Rose Bowl.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
That's a high bar, all right for a guy who
doesn't beat anybody, right, Like, that's that's a high bar,
I know. And again this isn't in defense of James
Franklin because you could, you could start to sense it.
And we you know, your dad was a coach, and
we have enough colleagues and friends we work with who've
been in the coaching profession, and Franklin had been there
for more than ten years. They all say, like, after
(20:31):
ten years at one place, the school gets tired. That's
get tired. It's the same stuff you get bored with success.
There's a shelf life, there's an expiration date, and it
comes after ten years.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
So fine, I just think.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Okay, you're gonna make this kind of financial commitment, like
the next guy now needs to do better than that.
Better than that is you're saying, Penn State needs to
go win a national championship or two.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Yeah, or and that's the maximum. At the minimum, you're saying,
he has to do everything James Franklin did and beat
Michigan and beat Ohio State right and beat ranked teams
either in a bowl game or get past the semi
final of the College Football Playoff. So he has to
do all of the other stuff plus the stuff that
(21:20):
essentially James Franklin got fired for. That's a that I mean,
who are you gonna go get that's gonna feel comfortable
with that.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
Again, you look at James Franklin's tenure, right, his first
two seasons seven and six, seven and six, eleven and three,
eleven and two, nine and four, eleven and two, twenty twenty,
the COVID year, which is crazy four and five, twenty one,
seven and six, eleven and two, ten and three, thirteen
and three. It's a lot of winning, man, it's a
lot of winning. That's a lot of winning. And so
(21:52):
that becomes now the low bar, that becomes the lowest
turtle you've got to clear. I think it becomes fascinating.
But you mentioned Kurt Signetti. I watched the entire Indiana
Oregon game, and I gotta be honest. I knew what
Indiana had, and Fernando Mendoza watched him a little bit
(22:13):
at Cal last year, great quarterback new Offensively they were good,
but to go into Austin and to physically beat Oregon
the way they did their front seven on defense, I
kind of walked away from that, going, okay, apologies.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I wasn't familiar with your game.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I didn't realize Indiana's front seven was that good and
would hold up and dominate the line.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Of scrimmage the way they did.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Maybe I'm crazy, but I walked away from that game going, yeah,
Kurt Signetti may get poached from Penn State, but he.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Might have a chance to win a national championship in football.
By the way, at Indiana, which for years, for years decades,
was one of the worst Power conference football teams out there.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Yeah, and it's been a program and a team that
would bust out a nine win season. Even Tom Allen
had I think a ten win season that year he
had Michael Pennix junior, which ironically that was the season
when they opened the year against Penn State and he
reaches across the piline I remember that, right, Yes, but
(23:19):
nobody's ever been able to do back to back. Nobody's
been able to sustain it. Nobody. Like when you looked
at Indiana, you had an appreciation and a respect for
what they did last year. But because of how we've
been conditioned to your point of the history of the program, Oh,
big drop off coming, big drop off coming. He didn't
even give them credit last year.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Like, let's be honest, right, they got into the playoff
last year, and the narrative was they played nobody on
their schedule, right, best thing they had on their resume
was that they lost to Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
That was what their resume came down to.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
And then they go into the playoff and then they
get crushed in their first round game, and everybody and
all the hindsight and the captain hindsights of the world, Hey, look,
told you so should have ever been in.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
They weren't that good. They'd earned the benefit of the
death the Illinois game earlier this year.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
You go, oh, okay, all right, okay, maybe these guys
are pretty good. But to go on the road at
Oregon and maybe one of the five or six toughest
environments in college football, and to match up with them
and that team physically, I thought Oregon was the best
team in the country.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah, coming into this past weekend, I really did. So.
That was what seventeen or eighteen straight wins they'd had
at outsin stadium that they just broke. Right, If you
look at all three phases of the game, they won
all three phases. That fifty eight yard field goal at
the end of the second quarter, that was big, man,
because now you carry momentum into the locker room on
the road, which propels you coming out of the locker room,
(24:42):
whether you start on offense or defense, it doesn't really matter,
I thought. I think the number one thing that has
been most impressive about Kurt Signetty and in this Indiana
team and what they've been able to do is when
he went into the portal for a quarterback search, he
never cares about the big name. He never cares about
(25:02):
where was the guy ranked when he came out. I
got the kid from Ohio last year, Curtis Rourke. Well,
if you started to peel back the layers, because I
actually had Ohio three times over the last five years,
and Curtis Rourke won ten games at Ohio I think
three years in a row. Right, This guy was productive.
This guy was a player. And so Signetty goes, all right, well,
(25:27):
that guy's won a lot of football games. That's what
we need here to start this thing off. Well, then
he goes into the portal and when you watched Mendoza
last year, and obviously through the ACC I got to
see him a lot, like he got the snot beat
out of him and he still played good. He was
the only reason they had a chance. He's six foot five,
two hundred and twenty five pounds, he can run. The
(25:48):
plays he made with his legs the other day were
a huge component to why Indiana won that game. So
what I appreciate is like he's gone out and identified
like who he thinks is the best core back for
what they do, regardless of any recent history of what
has that guy has been labeled as, which is not
(26:08):
easy to do because you're you're you're not succumbing to
external pressure when you do that. No, this is what
we're doing, this is what I think, and this is
how we're going about it.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
That's my favorite part about Kurt Signetti. Even when you
watch him on the sideline interviews, unapologetic, apologetically himself, there's
a conviction in his methods. There were people who thought
he was nuts and he wouldn't win because he brought
a bunch of guys from James Madison with him to Indiana.
I remember doing one of his games at James Madison
and I was looking through my notes before a show
(26:39):
and he said, we feel like we have a bunch
of power.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
Five guys on our roster.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, and a bunch of guys who could play and
start for a lot of teams. And he goes, we
trust ourselves and our staff to evaluate and go recruit,
and it's not always based on you know, the recruiting
rankings you put out. But a lot of these guys
aren't scene and they know what they're looking for. And
I think that's become such an advantage for him now
(27:06):
at a bigger school with more resources, to go into
the portal and.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Say, yeah, okay, this guy. You know, maybe he.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Didn't play a whole lot for a group of five,
but they're not using him the right way.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
We know how to use him. Let's go get him again.
I think Indiana is.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
Going to have a challenge to keep him. But there's
also a little something about Kurt Signetti where again, if
he takes the money and takes Penn State, for example.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
You don't know if that's who he is.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
You can't you can't blame him, no, But you can
also see him staying in Indiana and like say watch me,
like watch me.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
That wouldn't surprise me either, because the greatest advocate for
Kurt Signetti is Kurt Signetti. He loves himself some Kurt,
and you know what, I like it because you always
know where he stands. He's kind of like Steve Spurrier
in that regard, right, there's no there's no gray area.
He is what he is. He says what he wants
to say, but say what you want. The results are
(28:05):
the results, and they've been that way everywhere he's been.
Doesn't it make you wonder?
Speaker 2 (28:12):
You know, Penn State's got an opening, for example, and
they want obviously an established coach and it may be
a Signetti, it may be a Matt Ruhle, but a
guy like Signetti whose perception is different now than it
was five years ago.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Matt Campbell.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Matt Campbell, right, a guy who got his start at
what Division three?
Speaker 1 (28:33):
Mount Mount? Yeah, Willie Fritz.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yes, ipolled. So you have these guys who worked at
smaller schools. Willie Fritz was telling us a few weeks
ago when he had some stops at Blynn and some
of these junior colleges and D two schools. Yeah, he
has his Class C bus driver's license and he would
drive the bus sometimes eight hours.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
Yeah, his teams to games.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
How great is that these guys have painted fields and
they've done groundskeeper work.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Yep. They're innovators.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
They see the whole picture and they may not have
the flashy name. And I'm always curious why more schools
aren't trying to find that guy. You know, a Jamie Chadwell,
for example. We've had him a couple of times when
he was a coastal. He's at Liberty now. But you
and I'm marveled at just some of the innovations he
(29:33):
had offensively.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Oh, unbelievable. Unbelievable. I'll give you another one. Jeff Monkin.
Everybody's scared the death of Jeff Monkin because they think
he's gonna run the triple option. No, he's not. He's
running the triple option because that's what you have to
do at his service academy. That's not necessarily what he's
gonna do. If he's in a place with vast resources
and a completely different style of player. What he's doing
is the reason why he's a good coach, right And
(29:54):
and you know, I've got East Carolina in Tulsa this week,
and Trey Lam's a head coach at Tulsa. He and
his entire staff all came up at Mercer, Easterner, Web,
Gardner Web, all these places. They've had to do it
the hard way they and they don't know any other way. Right,
And so how is that guy not going to be
(30:17):
successful if you give him tools in the toolbox. These
guys have been doing it without any of that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Pretty cool, And I think sometimes schools get so enamored, well,
you know, this guy's a decordinator at an Alabama or
or a Georgia or one of these big time schools.
And often you know, that first head coaching job for
those guys, it's at a smaller school and now it's like, Okay,
you might have less to work with, yeah, and you've
got to do more. And we find out that's a
(30:46):
tough task versus bringing in the guy who has done
more with less his whole career and I'm giving him more.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Well, and prime example of the first thing that you
mentioned there is Tony Elliott at Virginia. He takes the
job of Virginia and he very quickly realizes, we can't
question at Virginia what we did at Clemson, right, we don't.
We don't have any of that. So he had to
figure out a different way. And it got dicey there
(31:16):
a little bit, and now here they are one bad
throw in the end zone against sense. He stayed from
being undefeated, right because it took a little time, but
he figured out that he had to, you know, skim
the cat a different way. And I just have a
lot of respect for those guys. I know you do too,
and we see him just about every week. Willie Fritz,
(31:37):
you mentioned who, like anybody listening to this podcast, go
look up how many football games Willie Fritz has won.
You would be astounded. Nobody pays attention to it.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
The guy took over a two lane program and that
was his first big time FBS head coach job. And
Tulane was a place where, let's be honest, most people
didn't think you could win, and he won it twu lane.
Not only did he win, he won a Cotton Bowl
where Tulane beat.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Caleb Williams and USC. Yeah, that was here.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Caleb Williams won the Heisman and played in the game. Yep,
and Tulane lined up and beat them. Goes to Houston.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Year two. What are the Cougars? Five and one? Five
and one? Yeah, five and one? Right.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
The guy has won everywhere he's gone. Lance Leipold was
a guy who turned around a doormat Buffalo program, and
again he had come up through the ranks smaller schools
Division three three, no scholarships Kansas, and he has breathed
new life into that Kansas program.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
His success helped them get game day to come on campus.
His success helped them get a new stadium adium.
Speaker 1 (32:47):
Yeah, I know what there's value in this, and I
think sometimes the people that are in power, they don't
think it's flashy enough. Right, Like you have to give
Georgia Tech a lot of credit when they hired Paul
Johnson because Georgia wanted to win. Well, Paul Johnson won
everywhere he coached, right, So you know, don't knock it
till you try it.
Speaker 2 (33:08):
I'll give you one last one and I covered him
doing some FCS championship games at North Dakota State.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Chris climbing yep, Okay.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
When Chris Climban was at North Dakota State, he had
built the program a certain way. He gets the job
at Kansas State, and that was an impossible position to
step into because nobody outside of Bill Snyder had won
in Manhattan, Kansas. Correct, And now you're the guy after
Bill Snyder, and the first guy after Bill Snyder, the
first time coach, Prince.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Yeah, well no it didn't.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
And they brought Bill Snyder back and k State fans
a bunch of them were up in arms like what
are we doing?
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Who is this guy?
Speaker 2 (33:48):
And you know, all Chris Climbing did was win like
four or five championships in a row.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And look at the identity though of the two programs,
like it couldn't have been a better marriage.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Could not have been a better marriage. And so you know,
he was playing old school powerful ball with a full
back and and to his credit, a good coach adapts
his way. So you know he's got a running quarterback
in Avery Williams. All right, we'll change the offense. They
add a little zone read and they sprinkle some stuff in.
But he's come in. I know this year they've they've
had some lumps, but you know the most part, it's
(34:16):
been a successful tenure at a place where it's hard
to win. And again, flashy name, no good coach.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Heck, yeah, do you know who Casey Keeler is. Casey
Keeler he was.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I think he's a Temple now, but he was at
sam Houston, Delaware.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Right, Yeah, a lot of football games one and he's
winning a temple and he's winning at Temple. There we go.
Nuff said We've covered all the good.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
Guys, covered all the good guys. Give me a wild
weekend in college football. You are back at East Carolina.
Do you like got a time share there now?
Speaker 1 (34:52):
Yeah? I'm the official television broadcast partner of East Carolina
Pirate Football and uh listen. The knowledge that you have
going into the game though, helps with prep every week.
And you know that time you get doubled up, this
time tripled up. It just it helps ease all the
other stuff we're doing aside from just preparing for a game.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Who do you have in Berkeley, California? For UNC CAL?
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Oh? Do you get JKS Friday night? Jaron Kave? I've
been practicing, Yeah, been practicing. I hear you.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
You know it's funny because that kid's a good story.
If you haven't seen him, Lefty kid, he's from Hawaii.
Fernando Mendoza, as we talked about, goes into the portal,
leaves Cal for Indiana in the offseason, and this kid
originally goes to Oregon. He had committed to Cal, flips
on Shining Day lands with Oregon. He's only there for
a few weeks and then just kind of realizes like
(35:52):
not a good fit. Goes back to Cal beats out
Devin Smith, who came in from Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
To be the step Yes, Devin Brown and uh.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
His first few games, like his first game, he's nine
for nine.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
He's slinging. No little did we know what Oregon State
was gonna be true?
Speaker 2 (36:14):
But like he kind of reminds you of a bigger,
stronger version of Tua with a better arm.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Yeah, he's got a rocket of an arm and he
can change arm angles. He's uh. Now he's he's getting
a dose of what it's like to be a freshman
the last few weeks with decision making. But he is
uber talented, Like it's not hard to see how he
beat everybody else out.
Speaker 2 (36:39):
No, And we're on at ten thirty Eastern on Friday night,
and I just kind of get the sense, given the
stories circulating around North Carolina, that feels like a rubbernecking
delay game where there's maybe a lot of people looking
out to see what's happening. I'm curious, Like Carolina has
had to buy in two of the last three weeks.
(36:59):
I know, I know, does it lead to an improved product?
They lost to both of them, by the way, Does
it lead to a better version on the field than
what we've seen when they've played big time opponents. You
had them early in the year against Charlotte. It listen,
seventy new guys, forty transfers. That's a lot to integrate.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
It is, but but remember they didn't inherit that. That's
all on them, those guys.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
They chose that. Yes, I also think it's tough. I mean,
this is part of the new age of college football.
You got an East Coast team playing essentially a ten
to thirty Eastern time on the West Coast. That it
self is a challenge. And this is not a one
off game on August thirtieth. This is middle of October
conference play exactly college football.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Yeah, welcome to the new world of conference realignment. We
will do this again next week. Halloween candy suggestions, Horror
movie suggestions for next week's show. Horror movie suggestions. We'll
save it for next week. Oh for next week. Oh,
I got I got a list list, all right,
The Carolina Panthers officially have a first world problem.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
The big question in Pantherland what do you do with
ric o'dowdell when Chuba Hubbard comes back. Well, Dave Canallis
told us on Monday, Hey, they're gonna find a way
to get ric o'dowdell touches because what we've seen the
last two weeks, and this is in hyperbole historic. He
goes for two oh six against Miami and then kind
(00:28):
of put some headlines out there against Dallas saying, hey,
that's my old team, five years with them, they let
me go. They know what's coming. Buckle Up goes for
one eighty three on Sunday, fifty six receiving yards and
a receiving touchdown to boot. This guy was an undrafted
free agent. He was in our backyard. We saw him
at South Carolina. Yeah, hurt a lot in college. Gets
(00:51):
to the NFL, really didn't get a shot until year
five with Dallas runs for one thousand yards. Still nobody
was willing to give him more than a one year deal.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
The Panthers get.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Him Asheville kid, and then he gets a shot with
chub Hubbard having the calf injury and he just goes Ham.
There's a couple of ways I want to take this,
But first, you know Luke's you kind of sit back.
You watch those two performances in this day and age
in the NFL. I mean, he was seventeen yards away
from back to back two hundred yard games. The list
(01:25):
of guys who've done that, it's OJ Simpson twice, Moone Campbell,
Ricky Williams, and then Jaya Jai randomly is on that list.
Like that's the list.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, that's it. And think about the history of that
position in the National Football League, right, Like even just
go back to the ninety nine rams, Like, how did
Marshall Falk not do that? Right? I mean, that's unbelievable
when you think about what an accomplishment that is. And
I think the other thing that gets glossed over in
all of this fifty three carries in those two games,
(01:55):
Like how often do you see a running back get
thirty carries in one game? Very rarely rare, right.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
And I thought, what was fascinating it kind of did
a little bit of a deep dive on this yesterday
before a coaches show. So one of the plays that
the Panthers love to run is duo, and it's a
very basic downhill running play. I'll let you explain it,
but essentially, it's two offensive linemen closing in on one defender.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
It's two double teams at once. It's two on one
on one side, either two on one if they have
a nose, or two on one on the opposite guard
right on the opposite side. So you're basically doubling up
and you were just going downhill and the back's got
to find a crease.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So on the season, when the Panthers run duo five
and a half yards per carry like that's.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Wild, Well, it's funny. It's funny you say that because
there's a lot of coaches. There's a saying in coaching
with the duo play, and here it is when in doubt,
run duo, run duo.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Dallas Luke's seven and a half yards per play on
duo unbelievable and that was with three offensive linemen out.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Yeah. Are you are you guys getting healthy this week? Well?
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I think the hope is Taylor Moten comes back. We'll
find out when the first injury report comes out Wednesday.
We take the show on Tuesday. You know, Kate Mays
has been fine Frankly at center, and then people forget
that was a competition.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
In the offseason.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
It was Austin Corbett Cad Mays at center and Corbett
veteran guy leader. They kind of gave him the nod.
But May's played a lot last year. Actually had a
stretch where he was going up against like Dexter Lawrence,
Chris Jones, vitevea executive weeks. Jalen Carter was in there
and acquitted himself really well. And then Brady Christiansen again,
(03:52):
he's been a guy who's been with the team for
you know, four or five years now, swing tackle, he
can play any position on the line. He's filled in
for Robert Hunt, the best offensive lineman Pro Bowler last year,
and he's done a nice job.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
At right guard.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
So they've held the four and josh n I have
Ben played well right tackle for Taylor Molten last week.
But you mentioned health. I mean, if Chuba comes back,
good problem to have. Jalen Koker might be coming back.
This is an offense when you look under the hood,
there's actually a lot to like. They were getting explosive
(04:26):
plays against Dallas, but plays per drive numbers strong. They're
three and out percentages amongst the.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Lowest in the league.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
They actually have the most rushing yards cumulative of any
team in the NFL, and that's al Rico Dwell the
last couple of weeks. And it's just allowing them to
do more. I mean, Dave Kanal has shed it. At
one point, I think we were into the third quarter,
they were averaging ten yards per play on first down.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
That's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
That doesn't play caller. That opens up your entire playbook.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, and you're rarely behind the sticks. Well, you're technically
never behind the sticks.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
I mean they were living in second and short and
I get a Dallas bad defense. Yeah, you're living in
second in short.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
So here's the next question. Can the Panthers play all
of their games at home?
Speaker 2 (05:17):
I think that is a fair question, and I pose
that to Dave Canalis on Monday. I said, this feels
like the next step, the next building block here going
on the road. And yeah, I really like what Derek
Brown said after they beat Atlanta thirty to nothing. He
kind of treated it like, yeah, Okay, we we did it,
but we have not earned the benefit of the doubt.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Now we got to go do it again.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And almost dismissed the magnitude of the win, and then
he kind of did it again this week leading up
to a game against the oh and six Jets. He's like, yeah,
you know, everybody's feeling us. We've got a couple of wins.
And I'm paraphrasing, and he goes, we've been in the
spot where the Jets are. He goes, we still tried,
(06:02):
We're still competing. We expect them to compete. And the
message essentially was, hey, we're not at the point yet
where we can just show up and go win. I mean,
we saw it last night on Monday Night football, right Buffalo.
I know they're on the road against Atlanta, but Buffalo
was the favorite there.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Yeah, beat them, I mean just ran all over him
Byjeon went crazy. Yep, listen, if you can get it
right on the road, the fortunes change.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Oh yeah, I look at it again, and we get
to not take it one game at a time. So
they get the Jets and they go and beat the Jets,
who are in bad shape. And the Jets run the
ball well, the Panthers run defense. That's been a revelation.
I mean, Javonte Williams was the third leading rusher going
into Sunday. They held Dallas to thirty one yards on
(06:56):
the ground. Right the week before, Devon a Chan had
nineteen yards, or the Miami had nineteen yards as a team,
they shut down each that's two too, two really good
running backs. And now the Jets run the ball well.
If the Panthers play the run the way they have
the last few weeks, and you get justin fields to throw.
(07:16):
He's taking fourteen sacks in the last two games.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
You saw the numbers. Yeah from last week? Yeah? Bad?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Negative net passing yards.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
How does that happen? Well, when you get sacked nine times? Right,
But man, I mean net passing yard totally smokes.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
So there's an opportunity. Then listen, Buffalo at home, green
Bay on the road is going to be a challenge.
But if you get to four and three, and let's
say you should beat the Saints twice, Okay, it's a
minimum of six wins, and let's say that's where you're
Let's say you're at six wins going into the last
three games, and then there's a little bit of irony here,
(07:54):
which is Tampa Seattle, Tampa. My gut says, six is
like the minimum number here. But if you're at six,
I think you're gonna have something to play for over
those last three games, the iron being you're gonna have
to go through Baker, Sam Darnold Baker.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, but it's a fun story. But you want to
be in position, right, like, if that's your minimum, like
you said, six is the minimum, and you're still in position,
that's exactly where you want.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
To be, right And you may have to win all
three of those games, but again, you know you're talking
about playing meaningful games late in the season. I think
six is the minimum number. And if you beat an
OO six Jets team and you beat a bad Saints
team twice, that gets.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
You to six.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Now if you go steal another one, you go beat
San fran a banged up team on Monday night on
the road, or you beat the Rams at home, or
maybe you steal one against Buffalo, or you beat Atlanta
on the road. Right all of a sudden, the math
changes in your favor. But I think if you're at
six like that is a very I think reasonable even
low bar. If you get to six going into the
(09:00):
last three.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
You got something to play for, no doubt, no doubt.
Exciting man I mean, that was an exciting day on Sunday,
Ladies and gentlemen. The weekend, no CROs to the end zone, MLL,
it's the catch Weekend Warriors.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
A lot of good vibes in panther Land, a lot
of angst in the college football world after Sunday and
the big news and it came down right in the
middle of the Panthers Cowboys game Sunday afternoon. Penn State
moved on from James Franklin. And people have a lot
of feelings on James Franklin. Okay, and I know he
(09:44):
wasn't the most beloved head coach at Penn State, never
endeared himself to that fan base. But they did win
double digit games three years in a row leagues. They
were not just in the College Football Playoff. They won
two playoff games last year.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Yeah, I had both of them. I was on the
sideline for him.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
They were in the College Football semi final. And listen
the big game James stuff. You can't hide from that.
He had ruled against the top tier teams. That's true,
It's all there. I can't say I was shocked, but
I was a little surprised, only because when you zoom
(10:25):
out and you go, okay. Bill O'Brien took over after
the whole fiasco with Sandusky and Paterno and Bill O'Brien.
The thing he did best was he didn't have the
ship sink. He kept at James Franklin came in, kind
of held the fort for a couple of years, had
(10:46):
some double digit win seasons, and then right around COVID
there was a little bit of a dip, talk of
him being on the hot seat, and then they elevated again.
It told me, I don't know how you feel about this.
It told me like they were kind of looking for
a reason to get rid of them, because again, double
(11:08):
digit wins the last three years, in the playoffs of
the semifinals, just a year ago, and I get a preseason,
what were they number three?
Speaker 1 (11:16):
They were in the top five of the preseason? Yeah,
two or three? I think yeah, two three?
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Right, Drew Allery gets hurt. The UCLA loss unacceptable, the
Northwestern loss unacceptable, But they're right there with Oregon. I mean,
they're right there in the Oregon game. It just told
me like, I don't know if you're listening to Twitter,
if you're listening to social media, if the boosters if
the alumni are And I'm not even saying it's the
(11:41):
wrong decision, but it almost felt like they were looking
for a reason to make this move.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Right now, Well, I think you're correct, and I do
think there's some validity in that. You just cannot lose
to UCLA and Northwestern. Now, I understand UCLA has really
turned things around, but you got to look at it
from the standpoint of perspective of going into that game.
(12:08):
Going into that game, UCLA was the laughing stock, not
just to the Big Ten, but of college football. Right,
So you lose that game, then James Franklin comes out
with the tweet on Sunday, Northwestern Northwestern, Northwestern time to
go one to zero. And then you go out and
(12:29):
lose to what arguably people would say was the second
worst team fair in the Big Ten. So now you've
got the record in big games versus ranked opponents and
the numbers are staggering. Okay, and then you go out
and I really believe that in this particular set of
(12:49):
instance circumstances, they did not prepare their football team, and
that goes directly on coaching. They were in their mindset.
You lose, the heartbreak to Oregon and you in the
and nobody's staying it out loud, which you're going, all right,
we got UCLA this week, right, we got UCLA this week,
and so what do you do? You go on cruise control? Right,
(13:12):
And from a preparation standpoint, that was really really disappointing.
And I think that hit hard, like really hard from
an administration, powerbroker, financial side of things. And now we've
always been in the most bottom line business in the profession, right,
but now more so than ever before. And he had
(13:35):
some things working against him. The vast majority of the
roster was returning. I hoped for Drew Aller, and to
your point, you know they're one play away and it
was a Drew hour interception for playing for the national title. Okay.
The problem is is the Drew Holler stuff kept rearing
its ugly head and there was no progression of development
(13:59):
getting him out of it. Right, He never I mean
it was it was always something with him in the
passing game that was limiting them, and to be honest
with it, it cost everybody. And I don't want to
put all the blame on Drew Aller, but Drew Aller
has never played his best football when they needed him
to play his best football.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
I'm going to go into the vault here. A quarterback
from the early years of the James Franklin era at
Penn State who was talked about at one point in
a similar vein that Drew Aller was talked about, Christian Hackenberg. Correct,
he was talked about as a potential number one overall pick.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And Bill O'Brien did a great job with him as
a true freshman.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
And then once James Franklin got there, we saw Hackenberg decline.
He never really got better. In fact, you could say
he went south.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
I think he ended up being a mid round pick,
went to the Jets, never really had much of an
NFL career, and we haven't heard from him and I
want to say, like a decade. So I just always felt,
you know, Penn State, and you could stereotype this a
little bit, but there was always just kind of like culturally,
(15:12):
the whole blue collar put your work down, say less.
It was always that kind of program, right even on
to the color scheme, right like white and blue, just
plain like we're not trying to be flashy. And James
Franklin talked, He talked a lot. I'm not sure he
ever endeared himself to that fan base, and so you know,
(15:34):
when things went south, they turned on him. Even when
things were good, they pointed to the fact that he
couldn't win the big game. But on that note, he
has a significant buyout. We're talking like fifty million dollars
in that y. It got me thinking because for years,
you know, the power brokers, the super agents in college football,
the Jimmy Sextons of the world, the Trace Armstrong's of
(15:55):
the world, they would always say to schools and they
would kind of hold them hostage.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
Hey, if a.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Coach doesn't have four or five years on his deal
at all times, he can't recruit. So that's where you
get these huge extensions and then these huge buyouts that
come as a byproduct. That's not true anymore. You're right
of the portal and teams resetting the roster year to year,
(16:23):
whether you've got two years on your deal or three
years or four years. I don't think it matters all
that much because I don't think the high school kid,
when he commits to a program, I don't think the
high school kid sees that as more than a place
where I'm beginning my college career, not a place that
I'm looking at as a four or five year destination.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
I said that exact same thing on National Signing Day
one year ago. This coming December, this is a pit stop.
The vast majority of these kids that are signing on
this day will not be with the program they're signing
with on this day. Right. So the entire profession, coaching, player,
all of it is now almost one hundred percent transient.
(17:06):
So players are going in and out, coaches are going
in and out, and you're trying to build and establish
some form of like foundation, which is hard to do.
And you know, you talk about the buyout. The other
thing about the buyout is when you make a buyout
like that, you're also sending a message that this is
our guy. We're not going to lose him, we don't
(17:29):
want him going anywhere. Right, So you've clearly established some
level of confidence that you think he makes a significant difference.
And now you look at it financially and I actually
we're going to talk about this this week on College
Football Live. So he's owed more than forty nine million
dollars roughly eight million dollars annually per his contract. He
(17:52):
has a duty to mitigate clause in the contract which
essentially requires him to look for another job and either
coaching or broadcasting, and then Penn State would owe only
the difference between the eight million dollars annually that's owed
to him and then whatever the new annual salary is.
So let's just say he gets a coach he died
for six million dollars, then Penn State would only owe
(18:13):
two million dollars of that up to him for the
duration of the remainder of the Penn State contract. Right,
And so not only are you talking about a buyout,
but now to replace him, you're talking about a buyout
of somebody else's contract. Let's just say Kurt Signetti. Hypothetically
(18:35):
his is over fifty million. So now you've got the
contracts of James Franklin, the contracts of the entire staff,
then a buyout of another coach and their staff, and
you've got to pay him and pay his staff, and
then pay him and pay his staff. So this is
a massive, massive financial choice that they have made. And
then when you look at the landscape across college football, Okay,
(18:58):
and I know that Matt's name has come up, Okay,
obviously that's his alma mater, Kurt Signetti's name has been
brought up. What if you're a Penn State broker, if
you're a finance guy, if you're donating, if you're a booster,
you're alumni, you're on that committee. What is going to
(19:18):
be acceptable in this hire in terms of the status
of the coach that would exceed the accomplishments of James Franklin.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
And that's what I was getting at, right, James Franklin.
What was he thirteen and three last year?
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (19:35):
The year before they had ten or eleven wins? So
here you go his last three or is thirteen and three,
ten and three, eleven and two. Yeah, their final ranking
in the College Football Playoff Final poll four ten and eleven. Okay,
they won two playoff games, lost in the semifinals last year,
(19:56):
lost in the Peach Bowl in twenty twenty three, won
the Row Bowl in twenty twenty two. Prior to that,
he won a Cotton Bowl, he won a Fiesta Bowl,
he lost a Rose Bowl.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
That's a high bar, all right for a guy who
doesn't beat anybody, right, Like, that's that's a high bar,
I know. And again this isn't in defense of James
Franklin because you could, you could start to sense it.
And we you know, your dad was a coach, and
we have enough colleagues and friends we work with who've
been in the coaching profession, and Franklin had been there
for more than ten years. They all say, like, after
(20:31):
ten years at one place, the school gets tired. That's
get tired. It's the same stuff you get bored with success.
There's a shelf life, there's an expiration date, and it
comes after ten years.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
So fine, I just think.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Okay, you're gonna make this kind of financial commitment, like
the next guy now needs to do better than that.
Better than that is you're saying, Penn State needs to
go win a national championship or two.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Yeah, or and that's the maximum. At the minimum, you're saying,
he has to do everything James Franklin did and beat
Michigan and beat Ohio State right and beat ranked teams
either in a bowl game or get past the semi
final of the College Football Playoff. So he has to
do all of the other stuff plus the stuff that
(21:20):
essentially James Franklin got fired for. That's a that I mean,
who are you gonna go get that's gonna feel comfortable
with that.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
Again, you look at James Franklin's tenure, right, his first
two seasons seven and six, seven and six, eleven and three,
eleven and two, nine and four, eleven and two, twenty twenty,
the COVID year, which is crazy four and five, twenty one,
seven and six, eleven and two, ten and three, thirteen
and three. It's a lot of winning, man, it's a
lot of winning. That's a lot of winning. And so
(21:52):
that becomes now the low bar, that becomes the lowest
turtle you've got to clear. I think it becomes fascinating.
But you mentioned Kurt Signetti. I watched the entire Indiana
Oregon game, and I gotta be honest. I knew what
Indiana had, and Fernando Mendoza watched him a little bit
(22:13):
at Cal last year, great quarterback new Offensively they were good,
but to go into Austin and to physically beat Oregon
the way they did their front seven on defense, I
kind of walked away from that, going, okay, apologies.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I wasn't familiar with your game.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I didn't realize Indiana's front seven was that good and
would hold up and dominate the line.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Of scrimmage the way they did.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Maybe I'm crazy, but I walked away from that game going, yeah,
Kurt Signetti may get poached from Penn State, but he.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Might have a chance to win a national championship in football.
By the way, at Indiana, which for years, for years decades,
was one of the worst Power conference football teams out there.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Yeah, and it's been a program and a team that
would bust out a nine win season. Even Tom Allen
had I think a ten win season that year he
had Michael Pennix junior, which ironically that was the season
when they opened the year against Penn State and he
reaches across the piline I remember that, right, Yes, but
(23:19):
nobody's ever been able to do back to back. Nobody's
been able to sustain it. Nobody. Like when you looked
at Indiana, you had an appreciation and a respect for
what they did last year. But because of how we've
been conditioned to your point of the history of the program, Oh,
big drop off coming, big drop off coming. He didn't
even give them credit last year.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Like, let's be honest, right, they got into the playoff
last year, and the narrative was they played nobody on
their schedule, right, best thing they had on their resume
was that they lost to Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
That was what their resume came down to.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
And then they go into the playoff and then they
get crushed in their first round game, and everybody and
all the hindsight and the captain hindsights of the world, Hey, look,
told you so should have ever been in.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
They weren't that good. They'd earned the benefit of the
death the Illinois game earlier this year.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
You go, oh, okay, all right, okay, maybe these guys
are pretty good. But to go on the road at
Oregon and maybe one of the five or six toughest
environments in college football, and to match up with them
and that team physically, I thought Oregon was the best
team in the country.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah, coming into this past weekend, I really did. So.
That was what seventeen or eighteen straight wins they'd had
at outsin stadium that they just broke. Right, If you
look at all three phases of the game, they won
all three phases. That fifty eight yard field goal at
the end of the second quarter, that was big, man,
because now you carry momentum into the locker room on
the road, which propels you coming out of the locker room,
(24:42):
whether you start on offense or defense, it doesn't really matter,
I thought. I think the number one thing that has
been most impressive about Kurt Signetty and in this Indiana
team and what they've been able to do is when
he went into the portal for a quarterback search, he
never cares about the big name. He never cares about
(25:02):
where was the guy ranked when he came out. I
got the kid from Ohio last year, Curtis Rourke. Well,
if you started to peel back the layers, because I
actually had Ohio three times over the last five years,
and Curtis Rourke won ten games at Ohio I think
three years in a row. Right, This guy was productive.
This guy was a player. And so Signetty goes, all right, well,
(25:27):
that guy's won a lot of football games. That's what
we need here to start this thing off. Well, then
he goes into the portal and when you watched Mendoza
last year, and obviously through the ACC I got to
see him a lot, like he got the snot beat
out of him and he still played good. He was
the only reason they had a chance. He's six foot five,
two hundred and twenty five pounds, he can run. The
(25:48):
plays he made with his legs the other day were
a huge component to why Indiana won that game. So
what I appreciate is like he's gone out and identified
like who he thinks is the best core back for
what they do, regardless of any recent history of what
has that guy has been labeled as, which is not
(26:08):
easy to do because you're you're you're not succumbing to
external pressure when you do that. No, this is what
we're doing, this is what I think, and this is
how we're going about it.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
That's my favorite part about Kurt Signetti. Even when you
watch him on the sideline interviews, unapologetic, apologetically himself, there's
a conviction in his methods. There were people who thought
he was nuts and he wouldn't win because he brought
a bunch of guys from James Madison with him to Indiana.
I remember doing one of his games at James Madison
and I was looking through my notes before a show
(26:39):
and he said, we feel like we have a bunch
of power.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
Five guys on our roster.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, and a bunch of guys who could play and
start for a lot of teams. And he goes, we
trust ourselves and our staff to evaluate and go recruit,
and it's not always based on you know, the recruiting
rankings you put out. But a lot of these guys
aren't scene and they know what they're looking for. And
I think that's become such an advantage for him now
(27:06):
at a bigger school with more resources, to go into
the portal and.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Say, yeah, okay, this guy. You know, maybe he.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Didn't play a whole lot for a group of five,
but they're not using him the right way.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
We know how to use him. Let's go get him again.
I think Indiana is.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
Going to have a challenge to keep him. But there's
also a little something about Kurt Signetti where again, if
he takes the money and takes Penn State, for example.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
You don't know if that's who he is.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
You can't you can't blame him, no, But you can
also see him staying in Indiana and like say watch me,
like watch me.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
That wouldn't surprise me either, because the greatest advocate for
Kurt Signetti is Kurt Signetti. He loves himself some Kurt,
and you know what, I like it because you always
know where he stands. He's kind of like Steve Spurrier
in that regard, right, there's no there's no gray area.
He is what he is. He says what he wants
to say, but say what you want. The results are
(28:05):
the results, and they've been that way everywhere he's been.
Doesn't it make you wonder?
Speaker 2 (28:12):
You know, Penn State's got an opening, for example, and
they want obviously an established coach and it may be
a Signetti, it may be a Matt Ruhle, but a
guy like Signetti whose perception is different now than it
was five years ago.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Matt Campbell.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Matt Campbell, right, a guy who got his start at
what Division three?
Speaker 1 (28:33):
Mount Mount? Yeah, Willie Fritz.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yes, ipolled. So you have these guys who worked at
smaller schools. Willie Fritz was telling us a few weeks
ago when he had some stops at Blynn and some
of these junior colleges and D two schools. Yeah, he
has his Class C bus driver's license and he would
drive the bus sometimes eight hours.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
Yeah, his teams to games.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
How great is that these guys have painted fields and
they've done groundskeeper work.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Yep. They're innovators.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
They see the whole picture and they may not have
the flashy name. And I'm always curious why more schools
aren't trying to find that guy. You know, a Jamie Chadwell,
for example. We've had him a couple of times when
he was a coastal. He's at Liberty now. But you
and I'm marveled at just some of the innovations he
(29:33):
had offensively.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Oh, unbelievable. Unbelievable. I'll give you another one. Jeff Monkin.
Everybody's scared the death of Jeff Monkin because they think
he's gonna run the triple option. No, he's not. He's
running the triple option because that's what you have to
do at his service academy. That's not necessarily what he's
gonna do. If he's in a place with vast resources
and a completely different style of player. What he's doing
is the reason why he's a good coach, right And
(29:54):
and you know, I've got East Carolina in Tulsa this week,
and Trey Lam's a head coach at Tulsa. He and
his entire staff all came up at Mercer, Easterner, Web,
Gardner Web, all these places. They've had to do it
the hard way they and they don't know any other way. Right,
And so how is that guy not going to be
(30:17):
successful if you give him tools in the toolbox. These
guys have been doing it without any of that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Pretty cool, And I think sometimes schools get so enamored, well,
you know, this guy's a decordinator at an Alabama or
or a Georgia or one of these big time schools.
And often you know, that first head coaching job for
those guys, it's at a smaller school and now it's like, Okay,
you might have less to work with, yeah, and you've
got to do more. And we find out that's a
(30:46):
tough task versus bringing in the guy who has done
more with less his whole career and I'm giving him more.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Well, and prime example of the first thing that you
mentioned there is Tony Elliott at Virginia. He takes the
job of Virginia and he very quickly realizes, we can't
question at Virginia what we did at Clemson, right, we don't.
We don't have any of that. So he had to
figure out a different way. And it got dicey there
(31:16):
a little bit, and now here they are one bad
throw in the end zone against sense. He stayed from
being undefeated, right because it took a little time, but
he figured out that he had to, you know, skim
the cat a different way. And I just have a
lot of respect for those guys. I know you do too,
and we see him just about every week. Willie Fritz,
(31:37):
you mentioned who, like anybody listening to this podcast, go
look up how many football games Willie Fritz has won.
You would be astounded. Nobody pays attention to it.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
The guy took over a two lane program and that
was his first big time FBS head coach job. And
Tulane was a place where, let's be honest, most people
didn't think you could win, and he won it twu lane.
Not only did he win, he won a Cotton Bowl
where Tulane beat.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Caleb Williams and USC. Yeah, that was here.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Caleb Williams won the Heisman and played in the game. Yep,
and Tulane lined up and beat them. Goes to Houston.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Year two. What are the Cougars? Five and one? Five
and one? Yeah, five and one? Right.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
The guy has won everywhere he's gone. Lance Leipold was
a guy who turned around a doormat Buffalo program, and
again he had come up through the ranks smaller schools
Division three three, no scholarships Kansas, and he has breathed
new life into that Kansas program.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
His success helped them get game day to come on campus.
His success helped them get a new stadium adium.
Speaker 1 (32:47):
Yeah, I know what there's value in this, and I
think sometimes the people that are in power, they don't
think it's flashy enough. Right, Like you have to give
Georgia Tech a lot of credit when they hired Paul
Johnson because Georgia wanted to win. Well, Paul Johnson won
everywhere he coached, right, So you know, don't knock it
till you try it.
Speaker 2 (33:08):
I'll give you one last one and I covered him
doing some FCS championship games at North Dakota State.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Chris climbing yep, Okay.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
When Chris Climban was at North Dakota State, he had
built the program a certain way. He gets the job
at Kansas State, and that was an impossible position to
step into because nobody outside of Bill Snyder had won
in Manhattan, Kansas. Correct, And now you're the guy after
Bill Snyder, and the first guy after Bill Snyder, the
first time coach, Prince.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Yeah, well no it didn't.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
And they brought Bill Snyder back and k State fans
a bunch of them were up in arms like what
are we doing?
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Who is this guy?
Speaker 2 (33:48):
And you know, all Chris Climbing did was win like
four or five championships in a row.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And look at the identity though of the two programs,
like it couldn't have been a better marriage.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Could not have been a better marriage. And so you know,
he was playing old school powerful ball with a full
back and and to his credit, a good coach adapts
his way. So you know he's got a running quarterback
in Avery Williams. All right, we'll change the offense. They
add a little zone read and they sprinkle some stuff in.
But he's come in. I know this year they've they've
had some lumps, but you know the most part, it's
(34:16):
been a successful tenure at a place where it's hard
to win. And again, flashy name, no good coach.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Heck, yeah, do you know who Casey Keeler is. Casey
Keeler he was.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I think he's a Temple now, but he was at
sam Houston, Delaware.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Right, Yeah, a lot of football games one and he's
winning a temple and he's winning at Temple. There we go.
Nuff said We've covered all the good.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
Guys, covered all the good guys. Give me a wild
weekend in college football. You are back at East Carolina.
Do you like got a time share there now?
Speaker 1 (34:52):
Yeah? I'm the official television broadcast partner of East Carolina
Pirate Football and uh listen. The knowledge that you have
going into the game though, helps with prep every week.
And you know that time you get doubled up, this
time tripled up. It just it helps ease all the
other stuff we're doing aside from just preparing for a game.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Who do you have in Berkeley, California? For UNC CAL?
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Oh? Do you get JKS Friday night? Jaron Kave? I've
been practicing, Yeah, been practicing. I hear you.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
You know it's funny because that kid's a good story.
If you haven't seen him, Lefty kid, he's from Hawaii.
Fernando Mendoza, as we talked about, goes into the portal,
leaves Cal for Indiana in the offseason, and this kid
originally goes to Oregon. He had committed to Cal, flips
on Shining Day lands with Oregon. He's only there for
a few weeks and then just kind of realizes like
(35:52):
not a good fit. Goes back to Cal beats out
Devin Smith, who came in from Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
To be the step Yes, Devin Brown and uh.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
His first few games, like his first game, he's nine
for nine.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
He's slinging. No little did we know what Oregon State
was gonna be true?
Speaker 2 (36:14):
But like he kind of reminds you of a bigger,
stronger version of Tua with a better arm.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Yeah, he's got a rocket of an arm and he
can change arm angles. He's uh. Now he's he's getting
a dose of what it's like to be a freshman
the last few weeks with decision making. But he is
uber talented, Like it's not hard to see how he
beat everybody else out.
Speaker 2 (36:39):
No, And we're on at ten thirty Eastern on Friday night,
and I just kind of get the sense, given the
stories circulating around North Carolina, that feels like a rubbernecking
delay game where there's maybe a lot of people looking
out to see what's happening. I'm curious, Like Carolina has
had to buy in two of the last three weeks.
(36:59):
I know, I know, does it lead to an improved product?
They lost to both of them, by the way, Does
it lead to a better version on the field than
what we've seen when they've played big time opponents. You
had them early in the year against Charlotte. It listen,
seventy new guys, forty transfers. That's a lot to integrate.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
It is, but but remember they didn't inherit that. That's
all on them, those guys.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
They chose that. Yes, I also think it's tough. I mean,
this is part of the new age of college football.
You got an East Coast team playing essentially a ten
to thirty Eastern time on the West Coast. That it
self is a challenge. And this is not a one
off game on August thirtieth. This is middle of October
conference play exactly college football.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Yeah, welcome to the new world of conference realignment. We
will do this again next week. Halloween candy suggestions, Horror
movie suggestions for next week's show. Horror movie suggestions. We'll
save it for next week. Oh for next week. Oh,
I got I got a list list, all right,
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