Look out, Alabama, Georgia and the rest of the SEC. Texas is now a problem

Welcome to the new SEC, where "It Just Means More" meets "Everything's Bigger in Texas." The Longhorns have become the first SEC school to reach No. 1 in the nation in four of the five major sports - football, women's basketball, baseball and softball - in the same academic year, and they did it in their first year in the league. Scott Griffin of CBS-42 in Birmingham joins Kevin Scarbinsky to break down the UT surge and Alabama's fading dominance in the NFL Draft.

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_01 (00:01):
Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 (00:42):
Hey, everyone.
Welcome into Scarbo Knows withKevin Skarbinski.
That's me.
I'm Kevin.
College football season now isofficially over now that we have
gotten through the NFL draft.
Well, it's officially over.
It's never spiritually over.
Not here in the Deep South wherewe talk football 24-7, 365.

(01:05):
That's just what we do.
That's just what we love.
And a lot is going on.
No games being played on thefield, but lots of games and
shenanigans happening off thefield.
We're going to talk about theSEC where it just means more
meets everything's bigger inTexas.
And look out, Alabama.

(01:26):
Look out, Georgia.
Here come the Longhorns with anincredible roster.
Financially speaking, we'regoing to talk about the payroll.
that the Longhorns will fieldthis coming season in 2025 after
winning the SEC regular seasonlast year.
And we're going to talk aboutwhat happened in the NFL draft,

(01:49):
a major shift in power there.
And we're going to show you somedetails.
We're going to show you somenumbers.
We're going to show you somereceipts to let you know how
Alabama is no longer thedominant SEC football program on
signing day on game day, or ondraft day where they ruled for

(02:09):
so, so long.
And to help us sort it all out,break it all down, figure it all
out, longtime SEC footballobserver, longtime media member
in the Birmingham market,personal friend from CBS 42 in
Birmingham, let's say hello toScott Griffin.
Kevin Nader.

(02:31):
Is that what they call you now?
Kevin Nader.
That's a new one.
What is this?
A Saturday Night Live skit?
The Kevin Meister?
The Kevin Nader?
What am I doing?
Making copies?
That's an old Saturday NightLive skit.
How are you doing, Scotty?
I'm doing good.
How are you?
I'm good.
I'm good.
I know you are a draft maven.
Yes.
I know you are someone who, foryears and years, has studied the

(02:54):
NFL draft.
tried to understand what itmeans.
What does it mean for thecollege programs, the college
players making that transition?
Why do the NFL teams get itwrong so often on quarterbacks?
We're going to talk a lot aboutthat.
First of all, let me just askyour initial impression, and

(03:15):
obviously we're focusing on theSEC, on Alabama, Auburn, et
cetera.
Just your initial impression onwhat you witnessed for those
three days during the NFL draft.

UNKNOWN (03:25):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (03:26):
Boy, I saw a lot of, I guess, surprising picks, maybe
picks that the expectations wereof someone else going.
We saw Detroit move up, actuallytrade a couple of third
rounders, third round this yearand next year to grab an

(03:46):
Arkansas receiver that hadreally not done a lot, but he
was 6'4", and I'm trying toremember his name, 6'4", 210
pounds that ran a 4-4-40.
And they just, you know, nobodyexpected that.
Everybody had this guy as afifth and sixth rounder.
So I saw a lot of surprises onthat.
Obviously, normally, I thinkquarterbacks are kind of

(04:10):
overstated in the draft and somany of them go early.
This draft, we had, what, two inthe first round, three in the
first three rounds, I think, orsomething.
So we obviously know the ShadorSanders story.
So quarterback kind of took abackseat a little bit.
And then defensive linemen, andthere were certain hot topics

(04:33):
there.
It seemed like defensive linewas the hot topic this year.
Everybody wants linemen,offensive linemen, defensive
linemen, because for all of thehigh-powered offenses that we
see, both on the college leveland at the NFL level, you still
have to have the horses up frontif you want to win
championships.
Let's talk about quarterback,and not about– the quarterback

(04:54):
that everybody else in the freeworld has been talking about,
and who's gotten more publicityand discussion and set off more
debate than any fifth round pickin the history of college NFL.
Far more than Brady.
Far more than Brady, who wasselected 55 picks later.
Shadur was 144.

(05:16):
Brady was 199.
He didn't get this kind offirestorm following his
selection.
I'm more interested, and I thinkour listeners would be more
interested, our viewers, onJalen Milrow going in the third
round.
He was picked number 92 going tothe Seattle Seahawks.
And that breaks a streak.

(05:37):
And this is really incredible,Scott.
From Jalen Hurts through BryceYoung, Alabama had either a
second-round pick or afirst-round pick at quarterback
from 2016 through 2022.
That's an extraordinary run.
In fact, the last quarterbackwho went lower in the draft,

(05:57):
last Alabama quarterback thatwent lower in the draft in Jalen
Milrow, didn't get drafted.
It was Jay Coker after the 2015National Championship season.
He was an undrafted free agent.
Is this one of those thingswhere Seattle's going to be
proven really smart down theroad?
Is Jalen another potential LamarJackson potential?

(06:18):
Or are they drafting him onpotential that he will improve
as a pastor, as a decisionmaker?
Yeah, I think it's a greatgamble.
I don't think he's ready by anystretch, but obviously his
running ability is, that'snatural anyway.
You're not teaching a guy how torun, as you know, you're just
running.
I would argue, even with JalenHurts, because I think Milrow's

(06:40):
more dangerous than Jalen Hurtsbecause of the speed and the
size.
I would argue...
Maybe behind Lamar and JadenDaniels, who's a very underrated
runner, that if he were to play,let's say you thrust him in as a
starting quarterback, he wouldbe the third most dangerous
running quarterback right now inthe National Football League.

(07:04):
Okay, kudos to Josh Allen.
Maybe fourth.
I just had one come in my head.
Josh Allen's not going 70,though.
But you don't want him running alot, right?
No row.
He's not going 70 yards when hetucks it and takes off.
Right, right.
But he's got a differentdynamic.
He can get the tough yards.
So, yes, you know, you hope youcan fix the accuracy problems,

(07:26):
which I just think is footwork.
I think he throws off his backfoot a lot and he's off balance.
And I don't think he's– sharpenough to where he's worked on
it, where it's just automaticfor him.
We saw Jalen Hurts, if youremember, when he was in
college, he was not accurate,Kevin.
He was a runner and he threw,but then as soon as he got

(07:47):
benched, and I saw it inpractice, and Dan Enos was the
quarterback coach at the time,who's a footwork freak.
I used to watch him do drillswith Tua and Jalen and all the
others, and they spent 30minutes just on footwork, not
even throwing the ball.
Just chopping, doing feet stuff.
And your accuracy comes fromyour footwork.
You know that.
So Jalen got better.

(08:11):
And then he went to Oklahoma andhad a great year.
And he's been really good in theNFL.
So if Milrow can get that kindof coaching and take to it, and
I think he will, then you'retalking about a huge upside.
I think Dan Orlovsky said itbest from ESPN.
He may have the most upside ofany quarterback out there.

(08:32):
There are other quarterbacksbetter, but he may have the most
to offer if he figures it out.
Obviously, his running abilityis unique.
Scott, we hear so muchmisinformation and
disinformation, some of itintentional, some of it not,
surrounding the NFL draftbefore, during, and after.

(08:53):
One of the stories that has comeout since, and I'm really
curious to hear if you thinkthere's any validity to it, was
this notion, and I wish I couldremember who put this out there,
and I think it was an anonymoussource, as a lot of this
information does come fromanonymous sources, that the
skill players at Alabamaallegedly, collectively, were

(09:19):
all going to enter the transferportal if Jalen Milrow had
decided to come back for anotheryear of college and play that
year at Alabama.
Do you buy that at all?
I don't buy all, for sure.
I hope some guys are pickingthat beyond, and I hope guys
would be smarter to figure outhe's probably going pros.
He's our teammate.

(09:39):
I'm sure they talk.
Now, we forget, though, I thinksix did.
Did they not?
They did lose some.
But the core guys, the RyanWilliams, the German.
No, those guys did.
They had a lot of talent leaveafter this year, even with
Milrow left.
Not knowing at the time, but youcould figure he's probably going

(10:01):
to the NFL draft.
I don't think there was muchdebate about that.
It wasn't hard to figure.
But no, I don't think the entirewide receiver room would be
leaving.
But they did lose a lot.
But that tells you that itprobably isn't true because they
lost a lot to what we just said.
They knew Milrow was probablygoing pro or at least

(10:21):
entertaining it very seriouslyanyway.
So...
I didn't put as much in there.
You could see frustration,Kevin.
You saw it with Ryan Williams incertain games.
The body language of a ballsailed 10 feet over his head.
You're wide open.

(10:42):
Then having to recut.
Then he throws it and it's noteven close.
Obviously, there's frustration.
Another quarterback that got alot of conversation was not
named Shadur Sanders, was QuinnEwers from Texas.
He takes him to the playoff twoyears in a row.
He doesn't get drafted until theseventh round.

(11:05):
And now you're hearing criticismof Quinn Ewers.
What was he thinking?
He could have come back.
Well, it was pretty much decidedif he came back, he was going to
have to transfer because ArchManning has waited his turn
forever.
He's the heir apparent.
He's the guy that they'relooking to be the starter at
Texas this coming season.

(11:26):
So, Quinn Ewers, though, howmany different schools would
have paid him, what,$2 million,$3 million,$4 million?
Somebody put out a graphic with$8 million.
That wasn't enough.
Well, so many of these numbersare just ridiculous.
That's a life of four years,maybe.
But somebody probably would havepaid him two or more.
Yeah, sure.

(11:48):
And you had to love...
The backdrop.
Apparently, they have a familyhunting lodge or something, and
there were a lot of dead animalson the wall behind him.
But he said, in effect, hewanted to be known as the
quarterback of Texas, eventhough he transferred from Ohio

(12:08):
State, even though he's a TexasState guy.
He's from there in high school.
Went to Ohio State.
Didn't work out.
Went to Texas.
Had a very nice career.
Got him in the playoffs twice.
Did he make a mistake, or shouldwe– We who complain about how
much money these college playersare making.
Here's a guy that didn't go forthe money.

(12:29):
He's going to make less money asif he even makes an NFL roster.
Yeah.
He may end up in the UFL.
Who knows?
But he decided I don't want toplay at another school.
I want Texas to be the lastschool that I sued up for in
college.
Shouldn't we be applauding that?
Absolutely.
Uh, The Chad Baker Mazaras ofthe world that are 47 years old

(12:54):
that want to stay in college tomake a million dollars.
I get that because they're notdoing anything at the next
level.
But to your point, Ewers has achance.
And look, he made money in thepast.
He's probably still got a lot ofit.
We so worry about it.
It's so overstated because lookat the money you could possibly
make.

(13:15):
And I think a lot of rookiescome out, especially in
basketball, as you know, go tothe draft early because they see
that immediate, oh, 15 million,which is life-changing money for
me and you.
But at the end of the day, ifyou and I could get 10 or 15,
but we had that possibility of,hey, Kevin, if you really

(13:37):
improve your skill and do well,and it looks like you're on
track with it because you'revery talented, you'd probably
get 100 million on the seconddeal.
then that's how you're going tomake your decision because I
know you will have to do it.
That's how I'm going to make mydecision.
And that's what Ewers did.
He sees the long-term, thefuture money.
I want to get out and start mycareer.

(13:57):
I'm tired of college.
It's time to go career.
But so many guys don't do thatbecause they get family
pressures or whatever.
Oh, this guy's going to pay youa million or whatever.
But after this year, it's gone.
Not to mention, and obviously,there is an outbreak.
Like Travis did, and we just sawJordan Travis had to retire from

(14:20):
the NFL because of a horribleknee injury.
That's so rare, but it still canhappen.
You get that because you cameback for a million and a half or
two million, and now you'vecanceled that future earnings
you could possibly make.

UNKNOWN (14:35):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (14:36):
I agree with you.
I think you're looking atlong-term plans here.
There is an epidemic ofnearsightedness among young
people in athletics and beyond.
Let's be honest.
Not just young people.
Everybody sees the immediatepayoff or payday.
But let's also look at it likethis.

(14:57):
And look, we have seen it inthis state.
If you...
play football at the Universityof Texas and you have some
success, as Quinn Ewerscertainly did, he will be taken
care of.
Whether he plays professionalfootball or not, how popular is
he going to be for the rest ofhis life?

(15:18):
Because he was the startingquarterback at Texas when they
actually are back.
You remember the nonsense, we'reback, when they beat Georgia in
the Sugar Bowl and not so fast.
They clearly weren't, and TomHerman wasn't the guy as head
coach, but they are back now,and Quinn Ewers was a big part
of that.

(15:39):
He's set for life in that state.
Like a lot of football playersin this state, from Alabama,
from Auburn, you don't even haveto be a star.
Just be an insurance guy.
Ask David Smith.
SEC official, S.
Stan White.
Former Alabama quarterback,former Auburn quarterback, yeah.
S.
Tyler Watts.
Yes.

(15:59):
Are you doing okay?
Yeah, they're doing okay.
They're known.
They established themselves inthis state, and because people
love football and they lovetheir school, they are
remembered fondly for a longtime.
And there's value in that.
It's the most understated dealever.
And it's got to be that way inevery state, as you know.

(16:21):
I mean, if you're at theUniversity of Oklahoma, you can
sell insurance and be great orbe a whatever salesman.
And they're going to do businesswith you.
And to your point, you don'thave to be the star.
You can just say, man, I playedat Maryland or I played at
Florida State.
That's an advantage in businessimmediately, whatever you do.

(16:42):
But it's understated because ofthat immediate grab, that
nearsightedness you talked aboutthat we worry about.
And let's be honest, if you'repulling a T.J.
Finley and transferring everynine months and you've had six
schools on your resume, that'snot going to be the case.
You have no roots.
You can't go to Auburn or LSU orwhatever state is indigenous to

(17:06):
that.
No, because that's the guy thatleft.
So that probably worked againstyou, actually.

UNKNOWN (17:12):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (17:12):
Very understated.
Very understated.
But again, they're not thinkingabout the future.
Just like on the short-termmoney.
Everybody should be thinkingabout Texas.
Listen to this.
I asked the SEC.
I reached out.
I wrote a column that you canread in the Birmingham News.

(17:33):
You can see a snippet of it onAL.com.
You have to subscribe.
It's now a subscriptionpublication.
Not AL.com, but...
Is it on your website?
It's not on my website yet.
I will tease a snippet of it onthere.
Okay.
That Texas has done somethingthat I don't believe has ever
been done in the SEC.

(17:53):
And listen to this.
In football, obviously, for twoweeks, they were number one in
the country in the AP poll.
Yep.
Made it to the semifinals, gotfarther than anybody in the SEC,
had the best regular seasonrecord, lost it in Georgia, of
course, in the SEC championshipgame.
But they got to number one.
Women's basketball.
They got to number one for acouple of weeks.

(18:15):
They got to the Final Four andlost to South Carolina, but they
were one of the best teams inthe SEC.
Baseball right now, number onein the country.
They are 19-2 in the SEC.
Only two other teams since theSEC went to a 30-game conference
schedule in 1996.
That's a long sample size, largesample size.

(18:37):
Only two other teams had gottento 19-2.
They're number one right now.
And their softball team wasnumber one a few weeks ago.
They've dropped back to numberfive.
They just got swept by Oklahoma.
That's four of the five, I wouldsay the five major sports.
Those four plus men'sbasketball.
In NCAA, yes, I agree.
In one academic year, Texas hashad four of those sports get to

(19:02):
number one in the country.
I don't think that's everhappened in the history of the
SEC based on my research.
I asked folks at the SEC officeand they said, Man, that's going
to take some research.
We don't know that off the topof our heads.
I would say it's never happenedeven in minor sports, like
Alabama being number one ingymnastics and football.
I would bet any sport you wouldnot admit.

(19:23):
Four of your teams to be numberone in the country in the same
academic year.
And I chuckle, and I referencethis in my column today.
You remember last SEC mediadays, first year Texas and
Oklahoma were coming into theleague, football media days last
July.
And Nick Saban saying, everybodysays Texas has always run

(19:45):
whatever league they were in.
The Southwest Conference, theBig 12.
They ain't going to run the SEC.
There's arrogant people at everySEC school.
That ain't happening here.
Yeah.
Not so fast, my friend.
I think Texas is a problem.
for the rest of the sec in termsof winning championships because

(20:07):
if they've done something intheir first year in the league
that no one's ever done in theleague which has been around
since 1933 that's a scarythought is it not it is what
they're capable of no absolutelyand the only blip might be men's
basketball is not in there so ifcraig beard had stayed there It

(20:28):
might have been Chris Beard.
Chris Beard, yeah.
I mean, yeah, Chris Beard.
Sorry, Big Beard Sanford.
Chris Beard, if he had stayedthere, we really could be
talking about some differentthings.
So, yeah, nobody expected that.
I mean, that knew of anything.
And let's look at Oklahoma, howunderstated they are.

(20:50):
Their basketball was prettygood.
Their football wasn't.
But if their football was,they've got softball, which is–
Nuts.
They've won four straightnational championships.
Yeah, I mean, so both of thosehave come in and done very, very
well in most sports.
Some of the sports they'vestruggled in.
But Texas, to your point, hascertainly come in and not had an

(21:10):
issue yet.
Of course, again, when you havean Arch Manning and Sarkisian,
and it wasn't long ago wherethey were not also Rams, but
kind of middling around twoyears maybe.
But they certainly have come tofast track here, especially in
football, to be fantastic.
Under Sarkeesian, who's justrevitalized himself, just like

(21:33):
Lane Kiffin has done.
They've suddenly becometop-notch coaches after they
graduated from the Saban School.
They're taking advantage oftheir natural advantages in a
way, as you said, they hadn'tfor a long time.
the way Florida had never had,certainly in football until
Steve Spurrier got there.
That's right.
And then Urban Meyer did it aswell.

(21:54):
And so you get the right guy andyou have the advantages that a
state school like Texas has orFlorida has.
Let's look at, you know I lovenumbers and stats and especially
as a way to reinforce a point ortry to discern patterns and
trends.
Let's look at the performance,and we're going to go back to

(22:16):
football exclusively here, Let'slook at the performance of SEC
schools in the NFL draftvis-a-vis their record on the
field over the same period.
Brendan, can we pull that up,that graphic that has every SEC
school, what they've done in thelast?

(22:39):
Well, let's talk about this onefirst, and we've got two
graphics to look at.
This is a pretty powerfulindication, Scott Griffin, that
the teams with the best talentare the teams that win the
national championship.
Six straight years, the teamthat won the national

(22:59):
championship, the next springhad the most picks in the NFL
draft.
That's a pretty powerfulindication of the importance of
talent.
No, no, it's no deviation.
That's six straight.
No, yeah.
And that one year, Georgia in2023, as it's noted on the

(23:21):
graphic date, Alabama also had10 picks that year.
Yeah.
And the last team that didn'thave the most picks after
winning the nationalchampionship was Clemson 2018.
Of course, they did.
They had six the next year, butthey also had the number one
overall pick the following yearin their quarterback, Trevor
Lawrence, who hasn't been in theNFL when he was in college.

(23:44):
But this tells you how importantit is.
And that's you see the comment.
Nick Saban made that offhandedcomment during the NFL draft
coverage on ESPN.
That's why Ohio State won.
They had the best players.
Simplistic sounding, but it'strue.
Exactly.
The interesting thing isMichigan because normally they

(24:06):
don't have the draft picks, butto your point, the graphic
pointing out, when they didsurprise people somewhat and
broke into that Georgia,Alabama, Ohio State threesome
and wrecked it a little bit,they still had the most draft
picks.
That's surprising.
They always have a number ofdraft picks because they've

(24:27):
recruited well and they'rehorrible and he's got the NFL
connection.
But to have the most right therewith Georgia, Ohio State, and
Alabama still in the mix, that'ssaying something.
So that is a very tellinggraphic for sure.
It also indicates the importanceof experienced talent because
that means they had more thantwo handfuls of guys who, were

(24:52):
draft eligible they were eitherjuniors or seniors right that
played an important role indriving them to a national
championship now let's look atthe other graphic that we've got
i wonder how many transfers onthat one that would be yeah
that's a good question yeah ididn't i didn't break it down
that far i gotta do morehomework for next time on that

(25:12):
now let's look at this uh scottthis really is intriguing to me
total this is nfl draft pickstotal from 21 to 25, including
the last draft from a week ago,and then compare that with how
those teams have done theiroverall record, not conference
record, because I wanted toinclude Texas and Oklahoma, and

(25:34):
obviously they've just playedone year in the SEC.
So you can see, you get a prettygood indication, Georgia-Alabama
right at the top.
Most draft picks, best overallrecords.
Then you start to see somedifferences, teams that I...
In my opinion, they eitheroverperform their talent or
underperform their talent.

(25:55):
You know, look at, for example,Missouri in 13th place in draft
picks over the last five years,but they're in eighth place in
record among SEC schools.
That tells me Eli Drinkwitz isgetting the most out of his guys
and they're overperforming theirtalent.
Whereas LSU third in draftpicks, but only seventh in

(26:17):
record.
Maybe they're underperformingtheir talent.
I think most people would agreewith my last statement for sure.
It always seems like they'regoing to live up to it, and then
it kind of crumbles theresomehow at the end.
Certainly, there's no argumentwith Georgia-Alabama.
Texas-Oklahoma has a littlegaudier records because they

(26:40):
were better in a weaker league,and we only have one year here
to win.
you know, look at that in abetter league.
And we saw what Oklahoma did,obviously.
Good point.
And saw what Texas did.
So Florida, it's kind ofinteresting.
They're kind of down too, right?
With the draft picks, they'reup.
So they're getting talent, butthey've just had so many issues.

(27:03):
They're barely above 500 for thelast four years.
Although they finished the yearstrong and got Napier another
year last year.
So that is interesting.
South Carolina is a little highfor their, record as well.
So to your point, yeah, I thinkEli Drinkwood is really good.
And yeah, and where's Tennessee?

(27:26):
Tennessee and Tennessee's kindof outperformed their draft
picks a little bit.
Yeah, they have not performed aswell in putting people in the
NFL.
Right, right.
I think they're better, butthat's going to be interesting
to see how this develops.
But certainly the first two haveno issues.
And LSU is kind of glaring tothe negative side for sure.

(27:48):
We know that that state puts outcrazy talent, as you know,
especially per capita.
And then they're borderingTexas.
So they're going to get someTexas guys as well.
They really have no excuse tonot be in the top three or four.
What about Auburn?
What about Auburn, Scott?
I mean, look, you know, they didnot have, they didn't have a

(28:10):
first round draft pick for thefifth straight year.
Only Vanderbilt among SECschools didn't have a first
three rounder.
They didn't have a pick in thefirst three rounds for the
second straight year.
And that hadn't happened toAuburn since 1982 and 1983.
That's part of the wreckage leftbehind from the Harsin era, but

(28:34):
also the end of the Gus Malzahnera.
We can't exempt him.
Both of them were not goodrecruiters.
They didn't like it, as youknow.
They just didn't like it.
Didn't put the effort in.
Didn't put the emphasis on it.
Exactly right.
Didn't put the effort in.
That Kirby Smart does.
That Nick Saban did.
That's right.
And you see that.
But Auburn, look at thedifference.
They're tied for 11th in overalldraft picks in the last five

(28:57):
drafts.
But they're 14th in the leaguein overall record.

SPEAKER_01 (29:03):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (29:04):
With a losing overall record.
There's only four schools onthat list that have a losing
overall record in the last fiveyears.
And Auburn is one of them.
And only Mississippi State andVanderbilt have been worse.
Is this the make it or break ityear for you, Freeze?
Not necessarily whether he'sgoing to get fired.
Maybe he will.

(29:24):
Maybe he won't.
But if you're going to have anyconfidence in him improving that
program and becoming competitiveagain, forget about winning
championships.
How about getting in the tophalf of the league?
It's got to be this year, right?
You've got to see signs thisyear.
Yes, but we're wondering abouthis whole career, are we not?
Because when he was sterling inhis performance, we have that

(29:47):
asterisk of all the stuff thathappened at Ole Miss, right?
When it was kind of illegal.
So now, yeah, he did well atLiberty, but Liberty is not
Auburn.
And he took a Division I player,Malik Willis, to even get
Liberty to the levels that thatthey are.
And he's recruited well atAuburn.

(30:09):
I think the talent is better.
I think the wide receiver talentis better.
His first year, there was zerowide receiver talent, as you
know.
I think now they're better atwide receiver.
He's not recruiting a lot ofgreat running backs, but he's
getting better linemen anddefensive guys.
So it should be better.
But last year was a verynegative thing.

(30:30):
We've talked about it before onCBS 42.
You start with five home games,even with a young team, which is
all he talked about, you betterbe four and one at worst.
Three and two on your horribleday.
And that was abysmal whathappened.

(30:51):
He just lost it.
And I don't know.
Yes, to your point, to yourquestion, This is the make or
break here.
He's got another quarterback in.
They spent a lot of money on,what, two and a half is what
they say for Jackson Arnold,who's supposed to be great and
was a five-star and all thesethings.
And now you've got widereceivers.

(31:12):
You don't have Jarquez Hunteranymore, but I don't think he
cares about running the ballanyway because we were screaming
last year to get Hunter the ballon several occasions.
Yes.
He does fall in love with thepassing game.
To his own detriment too often,I think.
He could have handed– 27 of allagainst Oklahoma, but he threw a
slant with four linebackersdropping.

(31:32):
You remember that?
At the goal line.
Short yardage at the goal line.
Yeah.
Yes.
This is his make or break year.
Jackson Arnold really has tocome through.
I think he's better than PeytonThorne, but we'll see.
He's certainly got more weapons.
So there'd be no more excuses.
No more young.
He'll use the young when heloses, but okay.

(31:54):
You can't be young for three andfour years.
Yeah.
Yeah, good point there.
Well, hey, let's, and there'sone, I want to get to this too
before we get out of here.
Alabama, I think, is in a bit ofa danger zone.
And here's some more, I didn'tput these on a graphic, but if
you go back eight years, Scott,and that was after Kirby Smart's

(32:17):
first full year at Georgia,first full year recruiting,
Alabama and Georgia over thelast eight NFL drafts have the
exact same number of picks.
They've each had 75 playersdrafted.

SPEAKER_01 (32:28):
Okay.

SPEAKER_00 (32:29):
And how smart are the Eagles?
Because they either draftedAlabama guy or a Georgia guy, it
seems, every other pick.
And there's a reason why they'rethe Super Bowl champions,
because they recognize wheretalent's coming from in college.
But, okay, Alabama-Georgia tiedover the last eight years.
If you go back four years,though, Georgia's had 46 players
drafted.
Alabama's had 34.

(32:51):
That's plus 12 advantage forGeorgia.
And over the last three years...
Both Georgia and Texas have hadmore draft picks than Alabama.
So Alabama is trending in thewrong direction.
They're not Auburn in thisconversation, but they're not
what they used to be.
And how hard is it going to befor them to become the dominant

(33:13):
program in terms of signing,developing elite talent, and
turning it out into the NFL theway Saban did with Kirby doing
his thing, in Athens with Sarkdoing his thing in Austin?
Well, what was the big questionmark we had about Kalen DeBoer
and his staff?

(33:35):
Recruiting.
Recruiting.
He's never recruited here.
He was famous almost forrecruiting three stars and some
four stars and really developingthem well in Washington.
Well, developing wasn't thequestion, but you can't win in
the SEC.
You just had the graphic upthere a few minutes ago.
Nick Saban.
Why did Ohio State win?
They had the best players.

(33:56):
You can be a great developer,but you can't get three and four
stars like Harsin tried to doand Malzahn tried to do and win
big in this league.
You might win, but eight andnine wins is not going to cut.
You're not going to save yourjob eight or nine wins.
You better be 10 or 11 and throwin a championship in the ring
every three, four years atminimum to keep your job at

(34:20):
Alabama.
These are things you know.
So Yes, they've got to getbetter recruiting.
It seems like, because I knowyou follow it somewhat too, it
seems like, just keeping up withit, that they're doing that.
But we'll see.
They did get Keelan Russell, afive-star quarterback.
But these days, is he going toplay at Alabama?

(34:41):
We don't know that.
He'll be gone in a year.
So this is a critical year forthem too, kind of like Auburn
from the standpoint of, Does TySimpson take that step forward?
He's a former five-star coach'sson.
He should take that step forwardand be a high draft pick.
Will Ryan Williams continue?
Will Bernard be a draft pick?

(35:02):
Maybe some of these other guysthey have.
Will the linemen, Jayden Robertsand Thornby, some of these guys
develop into NFL players.
Is Parker Brailsford good enoughto be in the NFL?
This is a key year for theirdevelopment and their talent to
get better to try to Do that.
But let's be honest, to yourpoint, Georgia and Texas aren't
going backwards.

(35:23):
So at this point, you're goingto hope to be close to where
they are.
You're not going to get 12 andthey're going to get five.
That's not going to happen.
All right, let's close it outwith this.
What they really need is TySimpson to be Mac Jones 2.0.
Absolutely.
And he runs better than MacJones.
I think he's a very underratedplayer.
You run better than Mack.

(35:44):
That's true.
But yes, he definitely needs tobe...
That's a low bar, Scott.
I've got a sneaky feeling he'sgoing to have a big year for me.
I really do.
I think the floor iscomfortable.
There's a lot of speculationthat he let Milrow and Booker
and some of those guys kind ofrun the program.
Maybe he wasn't comfortable withMilrow taking him out a lot.

(36:06):
Now, even though Simpson's nothis guy...
I think he buys into it.
So this is a key year to look atthat to your point.
All right.
The last point, Texas,supposedly a roster, according
to Kirk Bowles, longtimecolumnist, 35 to$40 million

(36:28):
payroll for this year's roster.
And I did some math, Scott.
If they institute roster limits,and they put a 105 roster limit
on football this year, you couldpay, for that amount of money,
you could pay every singleplayer on a 105-man roster
$380,952 to play this season forTexas.

(36:52):
They're not going to do it thatway, of course.
Bottom line, last question.
Can Auburn and Alabama...
compete?
Can anyone in the SEC competefinancially with Texas in this
crazy new world of collegefootball?
I'm not sure because you'd haveto find enough great players

(37:15):
that want to come to your schoolto play for Alabama, play for
Auburn.
Always been my dream.
All those stories we used tohear that were great.
Is that relevant these days?
I don't think it's veryrelevant.
And do they have the long-termgoals of of, yeah, I want to go
to Alabama and play becausethat's where I want to play, but
also they're going to develop meinto an NFL guy.

(37:35):
I think people say that, but Idon't think they truly mean it
because they'll leave.
If somebody offers$100,000 more,they're gone.
They'll do a Ryan and Griffin,go somewhere.
You were getting developed forthe NBA at Alabama, and you left
for a little more money inKansas.
How'd that work out?
You got your stats cut.
Not well.
Yeah, and now you're looking atcoming back to Alabama.

(37:56):
I think there's still thatshort-term...
decision-making process thatwill get there.
But Alabama and the Auburns,there's no way.
I think Alabama is trouble now.
I'll tell you this.
You may not know this.
I don't think we've talked aboutthis.
This is kind of a little nuggetthat I found shocking.

(38:17):
After the Alabama spring game,the media could not do
interviews with DeBorah players.
Did you know that?
I did hear that, yes.
And for fans listening in, theydidn't do that.
They still interviewed them, butit was behind an NIL paywall.

(38:38):
Ah, for Alabama, theircollective.
So is that the future?
I thought, wow, Alabama didthat.
That means it's going to be thisway for everybody.
And who's to say that won'thappen in games in the future,
Kevin?
You and I can't go into thelocker room and get interviews.
We can the next day on Monday.
They'll make them available.
But right after the game?
No.
If you pay us 100 a month,you'll get...

(39:00):
So they're doing that becausethey've got to catch up to the
Texases of the world.
So it's going to be interesting.
And we all know what Texas A&Mbasketball just did with Bucky
McMillan.
So Texas is the land of somecash right now.
Yes, it's the land of milk andhoney.
We'll see if they can become theland of national championships

(39:22):
again.
It's been a while since VinceYoung's days.
Scott...
Thank you so much for breakingthis down.
How much NIL money do I get forsitting in on the show?
The N and NIL for you is none.
That's what I deserve, actually.
I don't have a problem withthat.
No, no.

(39:42):
You're the best.
Thank you so much.
This has been fun.
If you want to know what'shappening in the NFL draft, the
SEC, don't listen to Mel Kiper.
Listen to Scott Griffin.
Here's my endorsement, Scott.
Thank you, man.
Have a great day.
You too.
All right.
We're going to get out of here.
I'm Kevin Skarbinski.
Thank you so much for checkingout Scarbo Knows.

(40:03):
Thank you to executive producerBrendan Martin.
He's the best in the business.
We have a lot of fun talkingabout SEC football and
basketball.
We'll do it again next week.
Hope everyone has a great day.
Take care.