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December 26, 2025 41 mins

In Hour 3 of the show today, the guys ponder the upcoming coaching cycle in the NFL for 2026 and try to figure out who could be the newest and hottest hires for NFL teams. Plus, the guys talk about a new Michigan rumor, play a game of would you rather, and more!

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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. It's a weird year
in the NFL.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
But maybe that weird year gives us fresh perspective, fresh opportunity,
and new teams to fall in love with. Buck Rising
has already decided that the Jags are headed to the
Super Bowl from the AFC.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Could a wild team be doing the same from the NFC.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
He's Buck Rising, I'm Jason fitz were hanging in for
two pros and a cup of Joe here on Fox
Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
Buck, hear me out? All right, the NFC's wild, right, Like?

Speaker 3 (00:29):
Is he?

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Are you? Are you gonna call the NFC a three
team race? Is that where we are?

Speaker 4 (00:32):
Like?

Speaker 2 (00:32):
I'm including the Packers with the Rams and the Seahawks.
Were comfortable with the Rams and the Seahawks Packers sort
of being the the the upper tier? Or no, you're
not comfortable with that? You're giving me a look like
the Rams?

Speaker 4 (00:44):
Why would you put the Packers over the Bears?

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Oh yeah, that's up. I picked the Bears this week.
I like, I can't tell on the Bears. Where are
you on Chicago? You are you all in on the Bears?

Speaker 4 (00:56):
Yes?

Speaker 5 (00:57):
They're really good? What what would what even is the
argument against the Bears. I mean, I would argue Seattle, Chicago,
I would take San Francisco, the Rams, and I like
all four of those more than I like Green Bay
and green Bay. I mean, hell, green Bay may be
a good enough team to win the AFC if they
were in the other conference at this point in time,
for as wide open as that feels right now.

Speaker 4 (01:20):
But you know what would be your argument against the Bears.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
Well, the Bears spent much of this season winning weird games.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
They're just weird.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Like, Okay, so they have two win or they have
two games against the Packers that both came down.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
To the absolute last play. We know that that was wild, right, And.

Speaker 2 (01:36):
Obviously the Bears had the dominant win over the Eagles,
But look right before that, weird win over the Steelers,
weird win over the Vikings, weird win over the Giants,
it was an ugly game, wild win over the Bengals
that I'm not sure they really should have won, then
a loss to the Ravens before that. So that five
week period it was just all sort of I'm not
sure how they're winning these games. They had a weird
win over the Raiders, a weird win over the Commanders.

(01:57):
I mean, hey, these are a lot of bad teams
that I'm listening be. It was just a lot of
wild outcomes.

Speaker 1 (02:04):
Through all of this.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
So I just I sat back and said, it feels
like this is just one of those years where the
Bears are sort of kissed by the football gods.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
But I'm not sure how great the Bears aren't.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
Now that being said, if I'm going to give the
Packers any benefit of the doubt, I also have to
give the same benefit of the.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
Doubt to the Bear. So I'll you're right one hundred percent.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
I have to, knowing how close those two games were,
I feel like there have been question marks about the Packers.
I left the forty nine ers off and that's a
mistake too. The forty nine ers have done nothing but win,
even though they're just a shell of themselves on defense.
So maybe you're right, maybe I'm valuing the wrong teams.
Will you put the Carolina Panthers anywhere in this conversation, elitist?

Speaker 4 (02:49):
Somebody came up to me the other day.

Speaker 5 (02:51):
Maybe it was on the local show that I do
here in Nashville, but I can't remember who's a phone
call or a tweet or what was it, but it
was something like eight and eight or nine and eight
or eight and nine in the seventeen game schedule doesn't
buy you what it used to, right like, it's no
longer enough to be one of these teams that's hovering
around five hundred. If you're trying to make the NFL postseason,

(03:14):
I said, and I said, I would present to you
the NFC South, where the winner of that division is
perpetually eight and nine or nine and eight or right
now eight and seven of the Carolina Panthers. At this
point in time, I am an elitist in terms of
I like them. They are fun, they have exceeded my expectation.
But if you told me they were a five hundred

(03:34):
team that ended up winning the division, that's bad. I
would have said, well, what the hell happened to the Bucks?
And the answer is injury. And if the Bucks are
injured and the Panthers are just what's left, then that's
fine too. But that's not I will be elitist in
that fact. I will snub the Carolina Panthers here, who
are a division winner, but you know, not threatening any

(03:55):
of the other six teams that would be in the postseason.

Speaker 4 (03:58):
Right now, Although I would Carolina and.

Speaker 5 (04:00):
Philadelphia, I'd just be curious to see what that would
look like. And I know that's not how it would
how it would play out in h right now, if
the if the seating were to stand at this point
in time. But I don't know how much better the
Eagles are than the Panthers, And I think that's a
crazy thing to say.

Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, look this Panthers team.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
Bryce Young has certainly gotten better than I think a
lot of people expected. And it's funny. It's just a
reminder to everybody calmed down a little bit on.

Speaker 1 (04:29):
The immediate return.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
So Bryce Young playing much much better, for sure, But
this is a Panthers team I struggle to make sense of.
I mean, how the hell you get swept by the Saints?
That makes no sense? And then look at the team.

Speaker 4 (04:41):
Have you watched the Saints?

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Yeah, cover Tyler Shucks having a there's a little bit
where Tyler Shuck's having a moment.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
By the way, the Saints are playing a little better.

Speaker 5 (04:50):
Not if you pay attention to some of the stuff
that's being written in New Orleans. Do you know who
Jeff Duncan is. He's covered the Saints for one hundred years,
Jeff Duncan did two weeks ago after so they beat
the Panthers, wrote a definitive column Tyler Shuck is him.
He's their present, their future, and he's their franchise quarterback
moving forward. Like I'm paraphrasing a little bit here, but
I was somebody sent it to me in NFL media

(05:13):
and said, has anybody in Nashville said anything as definitive
about cam Ward as being as is being written about
Tyler Shuck in New Orleans? And I know they're five
and ten, and that's easy to turn your nose up
at at this point in time, but like New Orleans
isn't playing bad football right now.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
Now, New Orleans is just devoid of a lot of talent.
You're right, Tyler Shuck felt like a reach. A twenty
six year old rookie in the second round that's had
a bunch of surgeries, just felt like a weird It's
going to take him a minute to develop, was the conversation.
And we laughed on our draft broadcast on Yahoo at
the time, saying, well, it's going to take him a minute,
what's he going to be? He's gonna be thirty when
he's ready to play. But to your point, killing Moore's

(05:52):
brought him along quickly. They're better. The Panthers lose to
them twice. The Panthers also got shellacked by the forty
nine ers. They got shll act by the Bills, they
got sill ACKed by the Patriots. They got to beat
week one by the Jags. Those are all teams that
have turned out to be pretty good. So I don't
know what to make of the Panthers. I think that
there's a weird process this year in the NFL. There's

(06:14):
a weird sort of line in the sand. Because you
mentioned somebody saying eight to nine nine and eight isn't
what it used to be. That's all fair, that's all accurate.
That's in part because there are so many bad football
teams in the league. Look as we sit right now
with two games to remaining for basically everybody, right there's
two games for mainying. As we sit right now, Buck,

(06:36):
there are ten teams that have lost double digit games.
That number could get bigger, but almost a third of
the league right now has already lost double digit games.
If the Falcons lose one more, they will join that list.
If the Dolphins lose one more, they will join that list.
We could literally end up with over a third of

(06:56):
the league having double digit losses. This is like the
new which is weird. There's no more middle class. You're
either winning ten games or you're losing ten games. The
seven and eight's are you know now, the seven and
nines and whatever.

Speaker 1 (07:10):
I can't get to the math. The seven and tens
is where we are.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
The barely five hundred teams don't really exist anymore because
it feels like there's this huge sees suck and then
this group of teams that are feasting on that cssock,
and then we don't even know if that group of
teams feasting on the seasuck are actually that good or
if they're just beating up on bad football teams like
g It's a very weird moment.

Speaker 5 (07:31):
Yeah, but think about who are some of the teams
with double digit losses this year that we probably would
not have guessed, right, it's the Chiefs at six and ten,
It's the Bengals at five and ten. You could have
probably guessed Jets, Titans, Browns, and Vegas would have ended up,
although Vegas I maintain preseason expectations or just like what

(07:55):
Tom Brady and Pete Carroll and Chip Kelly and all
those different pieces and parts that we thought might work
better together.

Speaker 4 (08:00):
They had bought themselves some equity.

Speaker 5 (08:02):
For them to be definitively the worst team in the
league right now, I think is pretty stunning. In the NFC,
it's less surprising, right it's Saints, Commanders, Arizona and Giants.
Washington is the outlier there because they were just playing
in the NFC Championship game a year ago. But when
you take into context how Washington season's gone, you could
have said, yeah, if Jaden Daniels plays as little as

(08:24):
he has ended up playing so far this year and
get shut down dude, injury four and twelve feels about
right for a team that was getting by with some
injury lucked in twenty twenty four and getting the most
out of an aging roster that is now I think,
aged out at a variety of different positions and needs
a bit more of a hard reset than they might
have otherwise realized. I don't expect that Cincinnati and Kansas

(08:48):
City are going to be double digit lost teams for long,
right I mean, although I don't know. I mean the Bengals,
you talk about trying to figure out the Panthers. I
don't know what the hell to do with Cincinnati because
it doesn't sound like Zach going to get fired. It
doesn't sound like anybody's getting fired in Cincinnati at this
point in time. Maybe they make some changes, some tweaks
here or there, but like Al Golden, the defensive.

Speaker 4 (09:08):
Coordinator, I don't think he's going anywhere.

Speaker 5 (09:10):
I think that that's a personnel issue and that that
would require the Bengals to fire the general manager, Duke Tobin.
I don't know if they're going to be willing to
do that, because, rightly or wrongly, there are organizations who
show patients that is good. There are organizations that show
patients out of I would argue apathy is probably not
the right word, but just kind of like, yeah, it's fine,

(09:32):
it's fine, we'll get by, and the Bengals are, yeah,
it's fine, we'll figure it out. You guys will do
better next year, right, run it back, Marvin Lewis, all
these all these different type of things that you know
that that's embedded a bit in their DNA. So if
if Cincinnati ends up being one of these teams that
we're talking about as a perpetual bottom dweller with one

(09:52):
of these fire breathing dragons at quarterback.

Speaker 4 (09:54):
That would be one of the crazier stories in sports.

Speaker 2 (09:57):
Makida tool is at the home depot, built with precision,
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home depot. How pros get more done. He's buck rising
on Jason fitz Here's the crazy thing you just mentioned,
and I mentioned double digit losses. We got ten teams
with double digit losses to your point, all solid reporting,

(10:21):
and we've talked about this before. I want to stress
I think the Athletic does a really good job of
solid reporting. There are speculative people. When you do radio,
your job is to try and find crazy fun angles.
When you are a reported for the Athletic, I think
you're just doing a little bit more of a deep dive.
You're a little bit more down the straight and narrow.
The reporting from the Athletics seems to be regarding the

(10:42):
Bengals that no change is coming, so the Chiefs aren't
going to make change. The Bengals aren't going to make change.
The Jets are not going to make a head coaching change,
even though the things have already gone off the rails.
The Titans have already made their change. And then if
you go down, the Giants have already made their change.
The Commanders aren't making a change, The Saints aren't making
a change. If you go up and down the list
for the number of bad teams that there are right

(11:03):
now in the league, the Browns may or may not
make a change. Every insider I've talked to has said
that there's no change coming for the Browns. You could
be looking at a staggeringly low number of head coaching
change even though there's a staggeringly high number of bad
football teams. And I don't know the methodology for this,
because this kind of comes back to the Harbaugh conversation,

(11:25):
where is the line on continuity? The first time I
ever interviewed Adam Schefter in my entire life, when I
was just a tiny podcast nobody was listening to, I
asked Schefter. The first question I asked him was what's
the difference between a great football franchise and a terrible one?
And without hesitation, Schefty said, continuity you have to find
a way to keep stability within an organization, and that

(11:46):
stability comes from continuity. And that's always been in my
head because you look around. Smart organizations keep the right
people in place. Bad organizations hire the wrong people, so
they're constantly changing who they've hired. I don't know what
to make of it. I just think that right now,
if you look across the landscape, they're going to be
far less job openings than we presume, and there are
a ton of bad football teams. I think it speaks

(12:07):
to the fact that the bottom of the NFL has
been the bottom of the NFL for so many straight
years buck that it's just like, I don't know how
you fix it. So these teams are just going to
keep running it back, hoping that they can change something.
But there isn't immediate change. There's no savior coming around
the corner for a lot of these teams.

Speaker 5 (12:24):
Well, and that's the thing, right because in the case
of the last couple of coaching cycles, who would you
say definitively FITSI And I'll buy you some time if
you need to look this up. Like of the coaches
who were hired ahead of the twenty twenty five season
teams who got a maybe not a new an outright

(12:44):
new coach, but got a coach that was different to them.
So you're talking about the Patriots, for example, you're talking
about the Jets. You're talking about who else hired a
new head coach or a new to them head coach
in twenty kelln Mark of the Saints, Saville Right, William Collines.
So of these of these teams, who was the best

(13:08):
and most definitively sought after coaching candidate in the twenty
twenty five hiring cycle?

Speaker 1 (13:14):
Ben Johnson.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
No doubt, everybody wanted Ben Johnson. Everybody covet at Ben Johnson.
And what do you know, Ben Johnson went where he
had the best opportunity to win with the quarterback he liked,
and boom, immediate results, Ben Johnson, and he was coveted well.

Speaker 5 (13:28):
And the second most, you might argue, was Mike vrabel right,
and both of them, for different reasons, sat out a year.
Ben Johnson went back to be the coordinator of the Lions,
something you almost never see done, and they.

Speaker 4 (13:42):
Made it to that.

Speaker 5 (13:42):
They made it, had a decent postseason run, but ultimately
came up a bit short.

Speaker 4 (13:47):
And Ben Johnson said, Okay, you know, well.

Speaker 5 (13:49):
We'll take advantage of the fact that a job opening
that wasn't there the last time I was interviewing for
these things has become available and the situation is much
more suitable to me. The same could be, he said
of Mike Rabel, even though the path wasn't identical, right,
he looked around at the jobs he interviewed last time
the cycle was, but ultimately he decided to go to
Cleveland on this front office internship. For lack of a

(14:11):
better term, come out, I think a better coach for it.
Hired Josh McDaniels to work with the uber talented quarterback
that he's got Now and all of a sudden, Drake
May is an MVP candidate. And he's not an MVP
candidate because Mike Rabel's there, but Mike Brabel's presence has
created the circumstance to bring out the best version of
Drake May and other players who are.

Speaker 4 (14:31):
In that situation.

Speaker 5 (14:32):
Who is definitively the best candidate to be available or
who will be available in twenty twenty six.

Speaker 2 (14:39):
Yeah, I mean probably. I mean, if you like offense,
Clint Kubiak, if you like defense, Robert Salah and man
I like it.

Speaker 5 (14:48):
But even then, there's not that same that there's not
the Clint Kubiak has not thought of in terms of
Ben Johnson and Robert Salas. Is is poor man's Mike
Rabel at best? Right, I don't think that. I don't
think they are comparable in terms of what they bring.
Just knowing Mike very well after six years with him,
and then knowing or learning more about Salah again not firsthand,

(15:12):
so I would I don't want to, you know, I
don't want to say that he's appreciably worse, but I
don't think that he's in the same caliber really as
Mike frabile is. So we're talking about basically knockoffs of
the two guys that were the most sought after candidates
who took a year to figure out what they actually
wanted and to set themselves up for better success.

Speaker 4 (15:31):
I am. I'm curious to see.

Speaker 5 (15:34):
What this is going to look like because FITZI man
to be a first time NFL head coach, and you know,
maybe Brian Callahan was never going to be good at it,
but just watching him have to go through that while
also calling plays, which is the thing that a lot
of NFL teams.

Speaker 4 (15:48):
Want right now.

Speaker 5 (15:50):
It will burn you out fast, especially if you're going
to a place with complicated office politics. As a lot
of these bad football teams too. The Titans are a
mess as far as what the working dynamic the next
coach has been has been put into. Will will they
iron some of that stuff out? They think so with
some of the changes that they've made, but based on
their precedent, I wouldn't trust them to be able to

(16:11):
do that well. The Browns, the Raiders, the Giants, I mean,
I don't know what. I really don't know what to
make of the Cardinals or anything like that, much less
would the Cardinals even be open. But if you're an
NFL club right now, are you looking around at the
candidates that would be available to hire and be like, yeah, definitively,
that's our guy.

Speaker 4 (16:27):
Let's go get him.

Speaker 5 (16:28):
We'll go through the Rooney rule process and all the
different hurdles that we need to jump through, just as
long as we.

Speaker 4 (16:32):
Get our guy.

Speaker 5 (16:33):
I don't know if that guy is out there this year.

Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah, I think the one name people want to make
that guy would be, you know, obviously, Marcus Freeman from
Notre Dame and I continue to die on the hill
that if Marcus Freeman we're going to be an.

Speaker 1 (16:46):
NFL head coach, he already could be.

Speaker 2 (16:48):
So I think, I think what we're finding out for
everybody that says all the Giants are interested in Marcus Freeman,
the Titans are interested in Marcus Freeman, everybody's interested in
Marcus Freeman. Well, there's no collusion rules between the NA
and college football. There's no contractual rule that would stop
a college football coach from already interviewing, and he fulfills
the Rooney rules. So if Marcus Ruman were really a

(17:09):
candidate for the Giants, he could already be in the
building and there's literally nothing that would stop that. He
could already have a head start on analyzing the entire roster.
He could be sitting in the offices right now with
the interim coaches studying who's out there. So I think,
when you put that mat together, one of the big
sexy names I don't think is really a big sexy name.
It's always sexy. If you need a cold night and

(17:30):
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C store for details. Okay, coming up, it's the coach
of the day. I feel like every single week we
find out that there's a new name that's hot for

(17:53):
university and Michigan Schefty has tweeted it out. We'll tell
you who Michigan's looking at. Coming up next, but first,
bucks got to tell you about t book a quick.

Speaker 5 (18:02):
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(18:48):
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Speaker 3 (18:59):
Fox Bolts Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live. Polly Fools Go here with Tony Foodsco. Yeah.
As everybody knows, we're the hosts of the award winning
Polly and Tony Foodsco Show. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (19:18):
But instead of us telling you how great we are,
here's how Dan Patrick described us when he came on
our show.

Speaker 5 (19:23):
Quick, knowledgeable and funny, opinionated.

Speaker 4 (19:27):
What you doing interrupting our promo?

Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, you wasn't talking about you.

Speaker 3 (19:31):
You took those clips totally out of context.

Speaker 1 (19:34):
Oh yeah, Well after this promo, I'm gonna take you
out and beat you. Let me put this into context.
Shut up.

Speaker 2 (19:40):
Yeah, anyway, just listen to the Paully and Tony Fosco
Show on iHeartRadio, Apple podcasts for wherever you get your podcasts. Ye,
he's buck Rising. I'm Jason fitz bucking Fits hanging out
with you. Fox Sports radio and for two pros and
a cup of Joe. I don't want to music to stop.
This is electric.

Speaker 4 (20:02):
The only reason I want.

Speaker 5 (20:03):
To have to stop is because of how awful a
dancer you are, Like, yeah, no, terrible dancing. We're both
chair dancing right now. We're looking at each other Fitzings
in Connecticut. I'm in Nashville. But your your little shoulder
bounce thing that you're doing.

Speaker 4 (20:18):
Yeah, I need that to stop. With your thumbs up.
My god, you would be ashamed. I'm doing the same things.

Speaker 1 (20:24):
I can't even be mad.

Speaker 2 (20:25):
Here's the thing I embrace, like this whole concept of
I have impeccable rhythm, like I can subdivide a beat
all day long. You can havepeccable rhythm and not be
able to dance. I can't dance, Like I understand that
I can't dance, but I bob, well, I just just
got to get a little bob going to the background.
All I could think of was if that music came
on and you and I were I don't know, fencing,

(20:47):
would we stop fencing and dance. And by the way,
if you ever wanted to try an Olympic and Paralympic
Paralympic sport. You could just try fencing. It's fast, safe
and easy to start. Find a beginner class near you
at USA Fencing or slash try Fencing that USA Fencing
dot Org slash try Fencing. I love the idea of
like we're about to go all guard and then all

(21:08):
of a sudden we just drop it like it's hot.
That's that's what I love. We've got some what what
am I not allowed to say drop it like it's hot?

Speaker 1 (21:15):
Now? Is that you got rules for days over there?

Speaker 5 (21:18):
No, you would have said, shaked that thing like he
was just singing.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
I suppose no, no, no, it's a different song. I know,
but I just think shake that thing. It's just it
just doesn't work or shake that thing doesn't work for me.
Drop it like it's hot. That you know, for you,
drop it I can't.

Speaker 1 (21:36):
Find Let's see if this is working for you.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
We are breaking news this morning from Adam Schefter Schefty
tweeting out.

Speaker 1 (21:42):
Utah coach Kyle.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
Winningham has emerged as the focus of the University of
Michigan's coaching search. That's actually, according to Dan Wetzel and
Pete demmall, so, I got a bunch of people in
on this.

Speaker 1 (21:55):
This is like the coach of the week. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (21:57):
It just feels like every week we hear somebody else
has emerged as the focus, and then you know, before
it was Dillingham, and then all of a sudden he
was no longer the focus when he got a big,
a big race. Now it does seem it sounds more
and more like this is on the precipice of likely happening.
I don't know's it's a name, it's a name. I

(22:19):
don't know that this, you know, suddenly moves the needle
to some greatness, but it's certainly of everything.

Speaker 1 (22:24):
That was left.

Speaker 2 (22:26):
You know that this is a name that's accomplished a lot.
Kyle Whitningham's accomplished a lot for Utah. They've been a
solid football program year and a year out without nearly
the nil stuff that he'll get at Michigan.

Speaker 1 (22:36):
So it seems like a good hire. Sure I'm fine
with it.

Speaker 4 (22:40):
Sure I think that.

Speaker 5 (22:43):
I mean, the Michigan thing is complex, really complex. So
you have a circumstance and obviously the tragedy that is
the Sharon More story. You don't have the opening without
all of the things that led up to that, and
that's an all gooing investigation. It also puts the athletic
director ward manual squarely in the sites of well, what

(23:06):
have you been doing during your time on the job?
Was their proper oversight because Sharon Moore's incident apparently was
not I mean, that was an extreme, the one that
ultimately saw him arrested, but apparently there have been multiple
instances of some level of behavior that is unbecoming that
that of a coach in his situation or really anybody,

(23:28):
right and no matter what your profession is, with this
most recent incident being the extreme, the ward ward manual
is currently being investigated by not just a president of Michigan,
but the interim president at Michigan. So you're dealing with
potentially a lame duck ad hiring for a job that

(23:50):
is very, very complicated in an athletic department that has
had multiple scandals in multiple sports. You're talking about basketball,
You're talking about football, with multiple instances at this point in.

Speaker 4 (24:03):
Time, some more severe than others.

Speaker 5 (24:05):
The Sharon Moore is not the Harball thing, but still
like these are huge infractions on across basically every category
that you could have a scandal in in multiple sports
and it's all being presided over by an interim president
of the university. Kyle Whittingham was it Utah in a

(24:26):
very stable situation for twenty one years, and Michigan really
felt like they screwed this up because they were just
assuming that they would be able to get Kaitlin de Boor.

Speaker 4 (24:36):
It feels like externally, I'm not there.

Speaker 5 (24:39):
I don't have in depth reporting and just reading what
is being reported by people who are credible on the situation,
but it seems like FITZI, you brought up Kyle Whittingham, Kyle,
or excuse me, you brought up Kenny Dillingham.

Speaker 4 (24:54):
Wrong Ham. Kenny Dillingham roam.

Speaker 5 (24:58):
Was said that neither he nor his representation had any
contact or any kind of offer from Michigan because I
think Kenny Dillingham has been pretty transparent about the idea
that he would have had to listen because of the
kind of scope and the kind of.

Speaker 4 (25:15):
Resources that Michigan has.

Speaker 5 (25:17):
Now he's been very steadfast in his commitment to Arizona.
He's from there, he grew up with that university's backyard.
He's out here, you know, basically basically pandering for somebody
in the state of Arizona to write him a twenty
million dollars sex so he can be Michigan, right, But
he has not been shy about the idea that he
would have had to listen had Michigan made him a
real offer. We all just assumed that Kenny Dillingham would

(25:39):
make sense. We tried to basically manifest that he was
a candidate externally, because what else could they possibly be
doing other than to hope that Debor would fall out
of favor at Alabama. And now Debor is advancing in
Michigan's throwing their hands up and be like, all right,
we'll take the guy that just up outright left Utah
after twenty one years because we don't know what else
to do here. Kyle Whittingham is not a long term solution,

(26:02):
by the way.

Speaker 4 (26:04):
He's not. He's not super long in the tooth.

Speaker 5 (26:07):
I'll look up his exact age, but he's definitely been
doing this for a long time, and I would not
expect him to be somebody at sixty six years old
that is going to be a long term solution for
the University of Michigan.

Speaker 2 (26:18):
I mean, think about it, sixty six years old just
step down from Utah. His last game is supposed to
be the Las Vegas Ball on December thirty. First step
down at Utah. He stepped down, but maybe it clear
he wasn't done coaching. He was just done at Utah,
and Utah had already named sort of a coach in
waiting process for him. So you're right, this isn't a

(26:38):
ten year fix, Like you're not getting somebody that's going
to lead the program forever. You're getting somebody that's going
to lead the program for now and then try and
figure out how to bridge this gap. So it is okay.
I think to say with some of these hires that
it's the best case out of a bad case scenario. Right,
Like this is no no slam on Kyle Whittingham. It's
he's a good coach, and he's a respect to coach

(27:00):
and he's done good things at Utah. I don't think
when this entire process started the day that the season ended,
if we and again we didn't know that all the
sharo more stuff was going to happen after the hiring cycle,
you know, it made it difficult to get a coach late.
A fine All of these things are true, like I
understand the why. I'm just saying that if we go
back to the last day the game, the day of

(27:22):
the game, all right, Ohio State wins, and then we
could sit there and say, Okay, of all of the
people not named Sharon Moore in all of college football
that you could pick to be the next head football
coach of Michigan, how do we feel about Kyle Winningham.
If you had stacked it up that way at the
end of the season, there would have been a laundry
list of.

Speaker 1 (27:39):
Names much higher.

Speaker 2 (27:41):
So I think it's okay to admit, hey, they got
the best guy that they could get right here, But
also that wouldn't be how anybody had even wanted the situation. Like,
sometimes you can't change the cards that you're dough, but
certainly that doesn't mean that when you're dealt the cards,
you can't look around and say, man, this is going
to be a tough hand.

Speaker 1 (27:56):
To make a winner out of this.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
Feel like remembering that the only thing Michigan is going
to be judged by, or supposedly national championships and you know,
the ability to win the game. Can you turn around
and out, Coach Ryan Day, can you turn around in
this environment. Can Kyle Winningham be a better coach than
Ryan Day, than Dan Lanning, go up and down the list,
you know, does he compete at that level? If the
answer is no, then long term that's not going to

(28:20):
be good enough for Michigan.

Speaker 5 (28:21):
Well, and it's important to remember that this is not
There is information that tells us it is trending in
the direction of Michigan hiring Kyle Whittingham. Kyle Whittingham has
not been hired by Michigan. This is a circumstance where
while it is it seems like it's the most likely outcome.

(28:42):
Michigan is such a wild card as far as like
what's going on from an infrastructure standpoint, that Kyle Whittingham
could get further along in this process, discover some new
information or have some new information disclosed to him or
his representation find out something new. There could be a
curve in this that leaves Michigan without Kyle Whittingham for

(29:04):
whatever reason. Like I almost think that's more likely than
them just getting Kyle Whittingham at this point, even though
if you're him it makes a lot of sense. This
would immediately be the best opportunity that Kyle Whittingham has
ever had in his professional career. And to your point,
like the kind of Michigan or the kind of money
that Michigan has, I would put up put it up
against anybody in the country. I mean, this is Larry

(29:27):
Ellison type of money. This is this is you know,
a richest man in the world, founder of Oracle type
of money. Like this is real, real resources, truly deep
pockets at every possible or in every possible way that
you would want. Your excuse would not be your if
you did not win. It would not be for a
lack of resources that have been invested into the program.

(29:49):
I want to see how this plays out a little
more because it's just the latest information that it's trending
in this direction.

Speaker 4 (29:56):
But I don't I think it's anything but a lock.

Speaker 2 (29:59):
Is to say about modern college football that the reason
I feel like this is probably gonna happen is because
Kyle Winningham already left the Utah job. There isn't somebody
to go out and say, I will match that. Like,
it is wild to me whether Dillingham actually heard from Michigan,
because there's been so many different reports on it, and
you know, whatever we've seen so far Michigan has become

(30:21):
a bargaining chip for people to stay where they are
for more money.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
Like that that is wild.

Speaker 2 (30:26):
So like, the funny thing is that Kyle Whitningham choosing
to step away from Utah might be the very reason
that he's actually attainable by Michigan because Utah can't come
in and match.

Speaker 1 (30:37):
It, or won't come in and match it in this situation.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
It's just I can't believe that Michigan is swimming in
these waters, right because to your point, this is the
undeniable thing about modern college football. Michigan's a better job
than many jobs. It's a better platform than many platforms,
it's a better fan base than many fan base, it's
a better Saturday experience with more money, it's a better brand,

(31:00):
and it's a better all of these things. But and
there's a butt to this. If you can turn around
and make basically the same money and quality of life,
says you'd rather live in Arizona. In modern college football,
you don't need the Michigan kick, Like don't you no
longer need one of the premier gigs in college football
to be paid like a premier coach? And that is

(31:22):
a different world. For competitive nature. For when you talk
about the contract for all of these coaches, like the
fact that you don't need Michigan's money, you can keep
that money and just not have to live in ann Arbor.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
You can choose to live in Arizona.

Speaker 2 (31:35):
Like that's just a different world than existed in college
football five, seven, ten years ago.

Speaker 4 (31:42):
Oh oh, of course.

Speaker 5 (31:43):
And there's the biggest question that I have around this
is one, how much money are they going to make this?
Is it worth it alone for Kyle Whittingham just to
be the Michigan coach or is there a certain level
of Hey, we're to pay you more than you've ever
paid been paid in your professional career. We're going to

(32:04):
be more financial security than you've ever had because we
understand that we have to give you certain assurances about
what this job is or basically find a way to
make you feel better about this. Maybe he doesn't need this,
Maybe he doesn't need that level of assurance. Maybe it's
enough for him to be the coach of Michigan and
to compete in the Big Ten and to you know,
compete in some of the biggest college football games and

(32:24):
one of the biggest college football conferences and have the
opportunity to. I mean, I'm not saying that you're gonna
be up there with Ryan Day or it's crazy to
say Kurt Signetti at Indiana or anything like this.

Speaker 1 (32:37):
Signetti, Yeah, you're right, right.

Speaker 5 (32:38):
Because that's that's kind of where he's at right now.
But it's it is, it's almost it's a different version
of the Penn State thing because pennstand Penn State scret
around and still ended up with a better option than
their circumstance or their timeline.

Speaker 4 (32:52):
Probably saw that they deserved.

Speaker 5 (32:56):
Right for them to end up with the Iowa state
coach Matt Campbell, given how long it took for them
to get there and the kind of pitfalls that they
experienced where it was reported or I think the athletic
director may have even mentioned that he had the wrong
number or a different number for the representation of Matt
Campbell and so they just weren't able to get a
hold of Matt.

Speaker 4 (33:15):
Campbell or in the process.

Speaker 5 (33:16):
I don't know if that's something that actually happened or
something that you just say, or speculation on message boards
or whatever the case may be. There's been a bunch
of different things out there at this point in time.
But does Michigan have to go above and beyond to
get Kyle Whittingham to say yes? Or is this just
going to be a situation where it's the best opportunity
that a coach that's been at a place that he
can that he has had basically full control over for

(33:38):
a long long time to get the best opportunity that
he's ever going to have in his professional career. I
don't know, we'll see, but's it's certainly it's certainly a
fascinating science experiment heading into the next season.

Speaker 2 (33:50):
And it all speaks to something that you know, I
consistently say, if the only goal for success, the only
metric for success is national championships, just take a look
around and realize how few coaches in college football actually
have one, and you realize how difficult it is. Yeah,
you've got You've got Kirby and you've got Ryan Day.

Speaker 1 (34:10):
That's it.

Speaker 2 (34:10):
You've got Kirby and Ryan Day. So everybody else, Lane
Kiffin all the way down to Kyle wedding, and everybody
else is just trying to figure out how to get there.
All right, If you've ever listened to this show before,
if you've never listened to this show before. We're with
you every Saturday, by the way, which is always a
great opportunity.

Speaker 1 (34:27):
If you missed any of today's show.

Speaker 2 (34:28):
By the way, you want to catch a podcast, just
search two Pros wherever you get your pods. Right after
the show, today's pod will be posted. Be sure to
follow the podcast rate at five stars. You can even
provide a review.

Speaker 1 (34:37):
Just search two Pros wherever you get your pods.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
You'll find today's full show at a best of version
posted right after the end of the show.

Speaker 1 (34:43):
Coming up, We're gonna do what we do on every.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
One of our shows together, the single greatest game show
in the history of sports talk radio.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
Would you rather coming at.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
Your next Bucking Fits on Fox Sports Radio for two
Pros and a Cup of Joe.

Speaker 3 (34:55):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live.

Speaker 1 (35:07):
He's Buck Rising.

Speaker 2 (35:09):
I'm Jason fitz Bucket Fits hanging out with you on
Two Pros and a Cup of Joe. My favorite thing
is the face that Buck makes anytime I whisper. It's
just a life ism. You all just learn this right
out of the gates. Anything that you say, that's normal.
If you whisper it, suddenly it's weird. Like if I
look at Buck on FaceTime as we're doing the show

(35:30):
and I say, Man, I like your beard today, not weird.
If I say, hy, Buck, I like your beard today, weird.
It's just amazing like that little, one little nuance makes
everything different.

Speaker 1 (35:43):
Anything like that, But thank you all.

Speaker 5 (35:46):
My ears feel violated every time you do that, and
it's worse. It's made worse because I love this song
and Mary is killed at today with the music, and
each time you have violated the sanctity of my ear
drums with whispers of sweet sweet nothing into my ear.

Speaker 4 (36:03):
I love this song. All right.

Speaker 1 (36:05):
If you're listening to us for the first time, you should.

Speaker 2 (36:06):
Hang out with us every Saturday from six to eight
pm on Fox Sports Radio, Buck Rising, Jason Fitza and
we'll be back right here for two pros next Friday.
So we're all over the Fox Sports lineup over the
course of the next week. Hang out with us. We'll
be on a bunch as we get through all of this.
But we have you you looked at our schedule. I mean, wait,

(36:27):
we are literally all over this damn frequency. I can
either confirm nor deny. I think Mary said earlier that
she's going to cancel all of her plans just to
hang out with us every single shift because we're so
much fun and we're her favorites. I can either confirm
nor deny.

Speaker 1 (36:41):
I can kind of arrange that. I think, come on, now,
let's go.

Speaker 5 (36:45):
Look at That's as much affirmation as Mary's ever given
anybody in her entire life.

Speaker 1 (36:49):
I'm convinced that is one hundred percent.

Speaker 2 (36:52):
We had every single show with the same single greatest
game show in the history of sports talk radio.

Speaker 1 (36:57):
Buck, Are you ready for it? It is time for good.
Rather that was so bad, it's getting worse. It's not
getting better. Patrick, you got questions for us? What do
we got?

Speaker 2 (37:15):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yes, I do, all right?

Speaker 6 (37:17):
So, boys, would you rather never be able to use
the internet again or never be able to watch TV
slash movies again?

Speaker 1 (37:28):
And that's a tough one for.

Speaker 5 (37:29):
Me too, Oh, I'd probably My profession requires that I
use the internet, so I would have to change the
way that I do my job, I guess. But I
feel like I would have such a blessed, more peaceful
existence without the Internet with movies and TV. I feel

(37:50):
like that's it's not as essential for information, but you
could still get you could get by. You just maybe
a beat slower to everything else, which is fine.

Speaker 4 (37:59):
I don't mind. I'd having a slower pace of life.

Speaker 2 (38:02):
If I lose the Internet, I can be blissfully ignorant
to everybody. I kind of love that I'll take away
the Internet, even though it does take away my single
greatest life skill, which is just immediately looking up anything anything.
Like the minute somebody starts speculating in fun conversation at
any party, I'm the worst. I kill every party because
immediately I google it. I'm like, I got the answer

(38:23):
the next topic. I got the answer on this already,
So it would it would eliminate my ability to tell
everybody how wrong they are. But I prefer to never
have to deal with it again, So I take I'd rather,
I'd rather lose the Internet.

Speaker 1 (38:35):
I think, Patrick, what do you got for now?

Speaker 3 (38:36):
Hey?

Speaker 4 (38:36):
Guys?

Speaker 1 (38:37):
Guess what? Well?

Speaker 3 (38:38):
What? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (38:40):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (38:40):
We got the wheel? The wheel is spinning.

Speaker 4 (38:44):
I knew something was missing.

Speaker 6 (38:45):
The wheel has spun everybody. The next one we have up?
Would you rather have a rewind button or a pause
button for your life.

Speaker 1 (38:56):
Oh, a pause button.

Speaker 2 (38:57):
I need a pause but I don't like I'm not
a person that looks back very often, and I don't
spend a lot of time looking forward. I need the
ability to press pause where everybody else stops, and I
could just yell for no reason, like when somebody's just
such an idiot that you just like you want you know.

Speaker 1 (39:13):
I'm at this spot in my life where.

Speaker 2 (39:14):
I'm taking the Keanu Reeves approach, Like if somebody wants
to tell me one plus one is three, I can't
change their mind anymore. But especially in the modern climate
we live in, I just want to be able to
press pause and then scream at the top of my
lungs at how stupid somebody is, but not get in
trouble for it by unpausing it afterwards.

Speaker 4 (39:32):
Yeah, I don't have regret necessarily.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
You'd have to have a soul to have regret. Oh
that was no, there's the line. We found the line.

Speaker 5 (39:56):
I'm disappointed, But I just I find the usefulness of
a pause button. Like beyond that and maybe you know,
pausing everybody else around you to punch somebody in the
face to further express your frustrations, like I feel like
the limitations of the pause button do not outweigh how

(40:16):
many more things you could accomplish with rewind, So I
probably go rewind.

Speaker 1 (40:20):
Okay, okay, okay, spin it, spin it marry.

Speaker 4 (40:31):
All right?

Speaker 6 (40:32):
Next up, next one up here, guys, would you rather
always smell like cheese or always have the taste of
burnt toast in your mouth?

Speaker 4 (40:43):
Oh? What kind of cheese? Uh?

Speaker 1 (40:45):
You know what that is? Up to your interpretation. Any
cheese you want.

Speaker 5 (40:49):
Yeah, I probably burnt toast in my mouth.

Speaker 4 (40:53):
I don't.

Speaker 5 (40:53):
I don't hate burnt like the taste of burnt things.

Speaker 4 (40:58):
I'm okay with that, Like I can.

Speaker 5 (41:00):
I can survive that more than I would be able
to survive the constant smell of cheese, even though cheese
is delightful.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
I'm stunned by your answer on this, buck because it
implies that you care what anybody else thinks, right, Like,
if you smell like cheese, don't I think inconveniencing everybody else.
I think this all comes down to the fact that
you're afraid if you smell like cheese, you'll never get
to do the hibitti dibbity again. And like Let's be honest,
there's somebody out there that be into it, so like
you're fine on that. I'd rather smell like cheese than
I burnt toasts smell like I don't care if y'all

(41:28):
think I smell bad, that's all's problem. We will be
back tomorrow hanging out with you from six to eight pm.
If you enjoyed this, I hope you did. Merry Christmas, everybody.
Thanks for listening to Bucking Fits
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Brady Quinn

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