August 26, 2019 • 50 mins
Doug discusses Andrew Luck retiring and his "controversial" tweet that said Luck was a typical millennial for retiring at 29. He also talks to NFL Insider Jason La Canfora to find out what everyone around the league thinks about Luck's sudden retirement.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of the Doug Gottlieb
Show podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weekday
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(00:22):
the Doug Gotli Show on Fox Sports Radio. Boom, What Up, America,
Doug Gottlieb Show, Fox Sports Radio, coming to you from
the beautiful sunny city of Los Angeles, California. I hope
you had a spectacular weekend. We have a full slate
of college football games, which means it is game week.
(00:44):
Football season is here, and we are your home for
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experience into play at Farmers dot com. Um, we are well,
(01:06):
what shall we talk about? Huh? I mean, I'd love
to talk about the fact that I tried to take
my daughter fishing and the fishing pole last exactly three
casts before I mistakenly broken because it was caught in
a rock. Or the fact that I tried tried to
stay off my phone, like you know, it's last weekend
without full weekend of football. I tried to stay off
(01:29):
my phone the best that I possibly could. But we're
gonna talk about Andrew Luck. We will talk about my
tweet about Andrew Luck. We will talk about the responses
to my tweet about Andrew Luck throughout the next three hours.
I'll also give you the phone number eight seven seven
six three six nine eight seven seven six three six nine.
(01:52):
That's eight seven seven ninety nine on Fox. All right,
I'm watching Saturday afternoon in South in California. It could
not have been a better August day, you know, in
beach cities in Southern California usually is just in the
mid to upper seventies. It was the eighties. We just
got back from the beach. I pop on to watch
(02:14):
Miami versus Florida. And as good as that rivalry sounds,
the game was equally putrid. It was a terribly played,
although very close football game. So poorly played Miami had
eight penalties during the first half and had the lead
at halftime eight and then of course the Andrew Luck
(02:35):
news broke. Andrew Luck was gonna retire. Now there's a
there's a there's so many different angles to this story
which are really really interesting, way more interesting honestly than
my tweet about Andrew Luck. But nonetheless, we'll get to
that in a second. So it breaks while their third
preseason game, which Andrew Luck obviously is not dressed, is
(02:56):
going on. During the fourth quarter, he leave eaves the
football field to booze. First. Here's Andrew Luck on why
he decides to walk away. I haven't been able to
live the life I want to live taking the joy
out of this game. And after two thousand sixteen, where
I played in pain and was unable to regularly practice,
(03:18):
I made a vow to myself that I would not
go down that path again. I find myself in a
similar situation, and the only way forward for me is
to remove myself from football. In this cycle that I've
been in, he said, he's in a cycle of play,
get hurt, rehab through play through pain, right, rinse, repeat,
(03:41):
rinse repeat. Now it should be pointed out that at
least what we're told. What we're told is first it
was a calf, then it was an ankle. No, it
was a high ankle sprain. Maybe there's something to a
bone there, right, like we've been told so many different things.
And then of course the immediate reaction I think was
(04:02):
from people going off on Colts fans who booed him
as he walked off the football field. Not every one
of them, but enough of him did for it to resonate.
Here's Andrew Luck on the Bill on the booing. I'd
be lying if I didn't say I heard the reaction.
Yeah it hurt. I'll be honest, trap it hurt. Yeah,
Mike Chap will us answering the question. Now, To be fair,
(04:27):
if you're a Colts fan, you're there in the fourth
quarter of the third preseason game, you are pot committed
to the Colts, right like you can't give you can
give away preseason tickets, but if you give away preseason tickets,
generally those people don't stay to the fourth quarter of
a preseason game, right Like, Like you got free tickets,
you got free parking, You're not gonna stay the fourth
(04:47):
quarter Like came, I saw the team, blah blah blah,
blah blah. There are guys that won't be on the team.
I'm probably out though I'm not a bower. I'm not
a bower, and frankly, I'm not really a cheer. I
don't have anyone team that I love so much that
I boo or I cheer. I'm just not I do
at least understand the fans. Imagine you're sitting there and
(05:11):
you've been told all offseason it's a calf, he'll be fine,
it's an ankle, he'll be fine, it's a bone, he'll
be fine. He's working through it. And then during the
game you see that he's going to retire, and you
realize that now you spent your good, harder and Midwestern
money on a team that is no longer nor will
(05:31):
they ever be. Quarterback by Andrew Luck. What would your
immediate reaction be? What would it be? So yeah, I'm sure, yeah,
I'm sure it heard, I'm sure it hurt, and I
wouldn't boo. But people who boo did boo. It's not
(05:55):
the end of the world. And by the way, neither
is my tweet. Here's my tweet, which has made over
five million impressions. Retiring because rehabbing as too hard as
the most millennial thing ever hashtag Andrew Luck. Now, first
of all, I under I understand that on Twitter, sarcasm, snarcasm,
(06:19):
tongue in cheek comments don't always translate. I do think
by now, I've been doing this long enough that there
are plenty of people, my friends, especially in the business
and listeners and viewers or whatever, that understand I'm a smartass.
I always have been, I always will be. And if
I can't find something funny with the things in life,
(06:39):
then you know what strike me down? Because I like
to make fun of things in life. I'm actually an
Andrew Luck fan. A year ago, I was on First
Things First with Nick Wright and he questioned, why do
people think Andrew Luck so good? And I was like, wow,
because he won thirty three games with a terrible team
his first three years in national football. He had a
(07:01):
bad GM, he had a terrible coach, and yet he
found a way. Bruce arians is actually the better coach
because Chuck Bogantoo got sick, but then they had to
give the job back to Chuck Bogano. These are all
things that I've said. These are all things on the record.
And while it was snarcasm and sarcasm and tongue in cheek.
The fact is that I think we can also admit
this is kind of part of whether it's the millennial
(07:23):
generation or the new generation in sports. No, he's not
a typical millennial. He does not have a perfectly coft beard,
nor does he go tight on the sides. He doesn't
roll up his pants. Guy, he's not a hipster. But
there are characteristics of millennials that people are latching onto.
(07:46):
And me making fun of those characteristics of millennials, which
are real, legit things, is I think what brought a
lot of this backlash. Let me just say this, and
I'm gonna say this one time. I understand, and if
you don't like me, or like my tweet, or you
think that I'm characterizing somebody is something they're not that,
(08:07):
that's fine. But I'm only going to point out that
to people like Tory Smith, who I don't have a
bone to pick with. To others in the media or
in sports, if you want to go to me stealing
credit cards twenty three years ago, you're gonna have to
deal with the fact that those questions have been asked,
(08:28):
that has been answered we've all moved on. And if
you think that I can stop or should stop commenting
on sports because you don't like my opinion because of
something I did as a freshman in college nearly a
quarter century ago, I think you're gonna have to look
in your own past and think, all right, what's the
worst thing you've done the last twenty five years? Do
(08:52):
you want that brought up every time you get into
a sports discussion. Look, dude, if you haven't gagured it out,
Millennials are wired differently. They just are. And those of
us who are now creeping up on middle age, we
think a lot of it is funny, some of it's interesting,
some of it has a great perspective, but it's definitely different.
(09:13):
Andrew looks a different dude. He's twenty nine years old
and his body hurts and he doesn't want to rehab anymore.
We're in the same field, right. This is the same
sport that gave us Brett freaking far didn't he Brett
Farve's dad died. He played Bret Brett Farve. You want
(09:34):
to know why it went bad with the New York Jets.
He had a torn bicep. He played Brett Farve played
in the worst weather, behind some bad offensive lines. At times,
didn't have skill position, guys wrong him. Sometimes he did,
and he played every day, and that has been shaping.
That is a football mentality. Ronnie Lott cut off his
finger to play in a game. Did happen? Right? I
(09:56):
didn't say that that the new generation doesn't think that's
really stupid and that they're not right for thinking it.
But there is a new way of thinking and looking
at football and looking at the business of sports. Some
of it is smart and profound and some of it
is not. And look, Andrew Luck runs the benefit of
(10:16):
the fact that he does have a ton of money,
and he comes from a good environment. He has an
awesome family, he went to Stanford, and he's got other
things in life. So this is kind of the perfect
scenario for him to walk away. Calvin Johnson the same,
Calvin Johnson, smart dude, ton of money, already achieved great success,
and he was like not doing it anymore. Body hurts.
(10:38):
Don't feel like it. Even when we create an era
in sports where you cannot touch the quarterback, remember think
about this. Andrew Luck plays for a team which has
been remade with the sole purpose of him not getting
hurt anymore. Right, that was how Ryan Grigson most screwed
it up was they didn't protect him. So Chris Ballard
(11:03):
comes in, He's like, what's our best asset? How do
we protect our best asset? And he went about doing it,
and he's done a great job. And then you're in
a support where now you can't even touch the quarterback
below the knee, can't touch him above the neck, can't
touch him releases the ball, can't touch him definitely, can't
pick him up and throw him down, can't land on him,
can't sneeze on him, can't fart near him, can't do
anything to him. Why Because they're important and we don't
(11:26):
want to see what's happening with Andrew Luck. That's why
Brady can still play. That's why Breeze can still play.
That's why Ben Roethlisberger can still play. That's why Philip
Rivers can still play. Look, the new generation they want
(11:47):
to have fun. The old generation used to say the
fun was in winning. Now the new generation just with
that fun every day. Do you do remember when the
Eagles won the championship? Right, remember when the Eagles won
the Super Bowl two years ago, remember that, and Lane Johnson,
(12:07):
their star left tackle, said they don't have any fun
over there. And the older response the Patriots hap was
to go win another super Bowl, which is the real fun.
That's the older school mentality of the fun is not
in the process. The fun is in the ultimate result.
And whether it's a millennial idea, a new age idea,
(12:31):
and Andrew Luck idea. But he said not fun anymore.
I used to I used to have fun playing. Now
I don't have fun playing, right, That's what he said.
It's not fun, taking away the joy of football. So
I guess I don't understand why dudes are so mad.
(12:55):
I'm not questioning whether or not it's body hurts. I
don't really know what's wrong with him because we've been
lied to so many times, which, by the way, that's
why Colts fans are pissed. I don't even think they're pissed.
I mean they're they're probably a little tick that he's
walking away. But it's more Wait, this is the second year,
in the second time in three years that we were
told Andrew Luck is gonna play, and now he's not
(13:16):
gonna play. And I don't spend money on season tickets.
Do you know why? This is why? Because you spend
money to see one guy play and now that guy's like,
can't do it. Body hurts. Sorry. And the percentage of
(13:36):
guys that are more educated that play football, the percentage
of guys that understand, hey, I'm gonna get my money
and I'm gonna get out. We talked about this with
Antonio Brown, like Antonio Brown probably don't want to play
after this contract. Levyan Bell had enough money where he's like,
I'm gonna sit for a year. I'm good. I made
more money than I ever could have fathomed. These guys
(13:57):
are smarter, they do and and on some level, I
think they do fear the potential to have brain injuries.
I think they fear the potential to be almost disfigured.
Like some of these like Brian Baldinger is with his
finger that points out or simply walk in in pain.
It doesn't mean that's what Andrew Lucky is going to
suffer from. Because this does feel like there's just something wrong.
(14:21):
Maybe he thinks he saw what happened to Kevin Durant
tearing his achilles tendon when it felt like a calf,
it felt like an ankle and then all of a
sudden he thinks that could be me, and I just
don't have the heart to do it. I get it.
But if you think this has been the mentality of
football players for the hundred years of football, you're simply
(14:44):
not paying attention. In surfing, they say Eddie would go.
There's a famous Hawaiian surfer who would go the biggest
and most treacherous way. It's of course he died surfing
big ways people do not meant. And that's like the marathon, right.
A marathon was a century who ran from Marathon Greece
(15:06):
to Athens to warn that an attack was coming. People
forget to mention that the century died upon delivering the
news that they were being attacked. But the surfer mentality
has always been that he would go. The marathon runners
mentality was you just find a way to fish, and
(15:28):
the football players mentality was play through pain. You figure
it out, You put on your bonnet, snap up your chin,
snap and you got it out. And the reward is
in winning and pushing through pain. Those dudes are wired differently.
(15:51):
You don't think football players are wired differently. It's amazing, right,
the things they will put their body through and Andrew's
lucks like no, may, I'm out. And while I understand it,
if you don't think that's a departure from where we've
always been, and if you're seriously bothered by what I
(16:11):
thought was a kind of sarcastic, snarky, tongue in cheek
comment about such a such a sea change, And maybe
it's not even in what he's done, because we've seen
that a little bit limited before. Right, Barry Sanders did it,
Calvin Johnson did it. Now he's done it. But from
the quarterback position, which we do everything possible to make
those guys happy, to make those guys say, that's a
(16:32):
in his prime. That's a big thing. But if you're
seriously bothered by me pointing out the new generation in
athlete that has something else going in the search for joy,
These are all new ideas. It's the generation me go
(16:58):
up and look at what all that they things that
define millennials are They wanted record groups, but they do
want confirmation and affirmation of their success. They're willing to move.
Anyone who hires a millennial will say, you know what,
it's amazing. They're really smart. They're kind of worldly they
come in sword and would think they know everything, but
(17:18):
they'll get after and work hard than they want to
raise like two weeks later. That sounds like any football players,
you know, I want to raise as soon as they
see any sort of success, even though their contracts as otherwise.
I mean, all these kids in college transferring, You don't
think that's the search for success and the willingness to
go elsewhere. Nobody wants to sit. Why nobody wants to
(17:40):
red shirt, Nobody wants to back anybody up, because that's
not fun. The fun is in actually playing and winning
and producing. And then ultimately they want to get paid.
Want to get pay in college. Then once they get
paid in college, I want to get paid in high school.
It's a now now now, now, now, now now. And
some of this has always existed, but now it's become
not just more, isn't, But in the world of social media,
(18:05):
it's become okay, it's become championed. You go, Andrew Luck,
you go explore the world, you go find yourself. You
don't need football. And that's a departure from what our
values always were about football players being special. Boxers are
wired different, right, Boxers are always carried out. Champion is
(18:29):
never is never carried on top of the shoulders out
of the ring. They're always carried out of the ring.
I mean, honestly, Floyd Mayweather is like the only he's
like a diabolical genius because he keeps finding fights that
he can win. But eventually, like Muhammad Ali, they all
get carried out. And that's always been football players, will
(18:52):
you go until your shot? Peyton Manning? Yeah, you want
a super Bowl, but he couldn't throw a football anymore.
And the new generation maybe they're maybe they don't care
as much about the ultimate success. Maybe they just get
that it's a short term profession. Get a lot of
money and get out. But if you tell me that
(19:12):
I'm a jerk or an idiot or my past twenty
three years ago is your reason for hating me and
my tweet, kind of think you're missing the point. Be
sure to catch live editions of The Doug Dot Leap
Show weekdays in noon eastern three pm Pacific on Fox
Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. Jason Lack
canfora joints us NFL Insider for CBS Sports and Jason,
(19:37):
where were you when you found out? Andrew Luck was retiring.
I was monitoring preseason action, uh, fighting to stay awake
to me honest with you, Um, when things kind of
started breaking out, and uh, I was shocked, you know,
(19:58):
Like when I first heard of it, I just I
figured it was, um, might not be true, you know,
And it wasn't one of those where the knee jerk
reaction was um oh damn, um I should have known
or whatever. It was like, Man, I wonder, is that definitely?
You know that really? Yeah? You know what I mean.
(20:19):
Everybody had to make some phone calls immediately here and
try to get to the bottom of this, right, Everyone
I know looked and we're like, wait, that's a that's
a fake account. That's gotta be a fake Adam Schefter account.
And then all of a sudden, you look, and you look,
you look, and then it appears on screen and like,
oh my gosh, this this is in fact real. Um okay,
so what do you make of and I did I
(20:39):
read your tweet yesterday? What do you make of his
not just decision, but the logic behind his decision to
walk away? I get it, I mean I get it
on on every level. Um, he's earned more than I
think most of us could ever fathom, I mean a
hundred million on the field, and lord knows how much
(21:02):
off the field with national endorsements, etcetera. He has. He's
just starting a family, you know, he recently got married,
wants to have kids, and hasn't felt sort of at
ease or pain free or honestly normal now for four years.
And you feel like you're you're constantly being sort of
(21:24):
prodded and probed and tested and try this, try that,
and and as soon as you sort of kind of
fixed one thing right now, it's it's a whole another
treadmill for something else. And the beating that he takes
is real. I mean it we forget about it from
week to week and we go on and watch the
next game, but you know, they're they're living with that,
(21:47):
and it's an accumulation of things, and he has other
interests and he has the world at his sort of feet.
And once I sort of digested it, slept on it,
talked to a few people as like, you know what
I I I think it took more bravery to do
(22:07):
what he did then to you know what I mean,
pocket another twenty million of Ursay's money and and kind
of try to chuck and jive and wing his way
through something that in his heart he felt like wasn't
right for me anymore, wasn't right from my family anymore. Um,
but you know, let me, let me just try to
(22:28):
you know, skirt my way through these next four months
and then I got a whole another offseason to figure
it out. I think for him to have done it
almost on the team schedule, like if if it's going
to happen to like it's not ideal, shouil happening off season,
the other dude took every snap anyway, like the other
dude got all the work because this guy couldn't work.
So it's now two weeks before the season starts, and
(22:51):
and it'll be well in their rear view window by
the time they play a game that counts. And I
think he's a cerebral guy who you know, he he
gets to risk and how real it is and not
just what this means for this week and this month
and this year, but what this might mean for me
(23:12):
five years down the line. I feel like that, uh,
that that kind of is a little bit the point
of my tweet, which is like, look, part of it
is just being starcastic. Right, But part of it is
like this is kind of the new generation of guy
where they might actually think too much. Like the reality is,
(23:35):
I'm sure his body hurts, um, but he's also now
in a system with a team that's solely designed to
protect him. Right, That's what they've drafted. That's what they've done,
which is smart they should have done a long time ago.
But Gregson just wasn't good enough. You're a league now
who is doing everything in their power to keep quarterbacks
upright and in the position of playing quarterback for a
long time. And I think because guys are more educated,
(23:58):
maybe even to educated on what they're post football future
would be like. And the money is so big, and
a guy like Andrew Luck already comes from a good background,
is married, Like I kind of think this is part
of the next generation where guys will walk away much easier.
I mean, it certainly could be. I I don't I
don't know you can be too educated or too smart
(24:21):
for your own good, because it's completely his decision, you
know what I mean. Like it's it's a personal choice.
If if you don't want to be on the radio
anymore tomorrow, you know what I mean? And you wake
up and you're like, this just isn't in my soul.
I I don't want to do it anymore. I just
you know, it's it's too much of a grind or
(24:42):
I want to flex different muscles. Like you know, you'd
you'd work your way, you'd work your way out of
your contract and a way you would go. Um, I
get it. People are paying money to see this in YadA, YadA, YadA.
But his covenant at the end of the day is
with himself and with his family. Teams are you know what,
Like teams and doctors and owners and gms and coaches
(25:05):
are generally making decisions for right over the history of time,
they've been the ones who've made the decision for athletes,
either they or the market when there's no contracts out
there have said you're done. It doesn't have to be
that way. We're conditioned to expect it to be that
way because that's sort of how it always was. So,
I mean, maybe there has been a bit of an awakening,
and we certainly know more now about the mind and
(25:27):
and how it reacts to this sport and ct E
and everything else. And like, I mean, the guys had
a lacerated kidney. Right, he's had he's had long issues.
He's had a serious soldier issue. And yeah, he was
in that system this year and he had a great season,
and then he spent five months not able to do anything,
you know again, and then he thinks he's gonna be
(25:48):
able to I was there to day he didn't. He
stopped practicing. I never in a million years thought that's
the last time I would ever see Andrew Luck, you know,
out on a football field doing an interview after a practice.
I didn't think there was any way he was going
to retire, but he certainly was someone who was getting
a little bit confused and bewildered about why he can't
get his body to do what he wants it to
(26:09):
do and what it's always done. There's there's something that
sort of just kept betraying him, calf, ankle, shoulder, whatever.
But but to retire because of the calf, ankles, calf ankle,
whatever thing, considering the other injuries he suffered, is kind
of bizarre. Now, No, because I don't think I don't
(26:30):
think you can say he retired because of the calf.
I think you the way he framed it was, it's
for four years, I've I have not been anything close
to healthy, and I haven't felt like myself. And there's
been constantly some ailment or another that has led me
on another cycle of more pills, more rehab, more recovery,
(26:53):
you know, away from my teammates, on my own for
another stretch of period, trying to get my body right.
And it's really not even playing football right, It's it's
it's all of the sort of um assortment of ailments
and the constant pain. I just think after a while,
and especially somebody like him who can see beyond the
(27:15):
scope of himself, beyond the sport, It's like, man, it's
coming into week one. I'm already only with one good leg.
Whether they protect me or not, I'm going to get
the crap kicked out of me because that's inherent in
what I do. I'm already from chasing from behind again
because I'm not going to get healthier as the season
goes on, right, I'm only going to get more beat up.
(27:35):
And like, when am I gonna just feel normal again?
And and I think it really is more about that.
Whether it was a calf or an elbow, or you
know what I mean, a pinky finger, it's just the
succession of constantly having something that's not right. That's that
I have to devote my mind, body and soult to
to get right in order to play this sport. I
(27:58):
just think he needed a respite on all levels. I mean,
I think he made that much clear. The question is
is that forever? Is it a year? Is it two years?
And I don't even know that he can do the
mental calculus on that himself yet. Um, But it was
clear he had he had to get off for his
own I think, mental clarity and maybe to some degree
(28:18):
sanity and to be able to enjoy his life again.
He had to get off this roller coaster. How long?
I don't know. Yeah, listen that that that that is
kind of the big question. If he doesn't play football again,
is he a Hall of Famer? I don't think so.
I don't I don't think so. Um. I mean he
because of all the time he missed. I mean, when
(28:39):
you start looking at just sort of the gross stats, yeah,
you can always look at it through that window of
most X in the first five years and most why
in the first six years. But I think also the
position he plays, I mean, guys are playing into their forties.
You know, I just don't know how, even five years
from now, you're gonna be able to make that case.
(29:00):
It's not Kurt Warner. Kurt Warner was a historically significant
playoff quarterback. Kurt Warner willed teams that no one thought
had a chance in numerous games, two things that no
one saw coming, and he did it a couple of times.
And he was doing crazy stuff in Arizona too. You know,
it wasn't even just St. Louis. So I think that's
that's different. You know, it's it's it's not you know,
(29:23):
t d where Okay, short, short span of time, but
like he was a singular factor in those Broncos teams
winning back to back Super Bowl that Andrew Luck made
into one championship game, and I'm not sitting here. Wins,
you know, is everything. But I just don't think there's
enough of a body of work to be able to
especially at that position, and with what passing numbers are
(29:45):
going to become moving forward, because the league, as you said,
is doing everything it can to protect quarterbacks and to
let people throw the football. I just I don't know
that that argument you're gonna be able to make that
argument how much does football, specifically AMC South football change
without Andrew Luckett. I still think the Culture the best
team in that division. I would have been inclined to
(30:06):
think they win it by you know, three games or
something like that. If if there was you know, the
specter of a healthy Andrew luck for most of the season. Um,
I don't know that they run away with anything, but
I still think. I think Jacoby Brissett is going to
be a highly functioning quarterback. I think Frank Raich is uniquely,
through his playing experience and his coaching experience, the guy
(30:30):
to navigate this situation. It's been a vastly improved roster
over the last eighteen months. I think they've added speed
and twitchiness. They'll they'll maintain a balance. They have a
solid enough offensive line, the defense has made strides, And
I just mean, to me, Houston is a mess. I
think Tennessee has kind of been floating by on these
(30:52):
these sort of flukish nine and seven seasons. I think
the Chickens are coming home to roost there um. Jacksonville
to me, would be the team that would wished them
the most, and Jacksonville defense might be able to carry
them to the division title. Um, But I I still
lean to the Colts that that's gonna be gonna be fascinating.
A couple of things real quick in that division. Mariota
(31:15):
gonna start or is Tanny Hill gonna beat him out?
I mean, I would think Mariota starts, but I would
expect something of a quick hook if he If he
can't show um what they drafted him to be early
in the season, and I think they make the switch
and they never go back. It feels kind of knee
jerky as well. But man, Pittsburgh looks good. Am I
(31:36):
wrong to think there's a different level of focus with
this team? No? I think I left that camp. I
came into that campus skeptic on the whole edition by
subtraction thing, and I left Latrobe like, you know what,
they do know how to draft receivers. And this Washington
kid looks really good and like Moncreef isn't going to
be super special, but he'll move the chains for them
(31:58):
and bends in the best if I've seen for a while.
And it just looked like there has been sort of
a falling out there and everybody kind of exhaling, and
the winds have coming from a different direction now and
there's not those same expectations. Um. I still questions about
their defense, but the offensive line is damn good. They
ran the ball almost the same with Connor as they
(32:19):
did with Bell. He doesn't catch as many balls and
all that. But no, I think Pittsburgh is gonna have
a very strong bounce back season. Yeah, it definitely, It
definitely definitely feels that way. Um. Last thing, Lamar Miller
gets hurt. There was some talk of Houston maybe trading
(32:39):
for a running back, specifically, we're reaching out for Melvin Gordon.
Uh Any thoughts that this kind of reinvigorates that now
with their need for starting running back. I mean, how
much are your future you're gonna mortgage at that position?
You know, Like if and if you were really give
a three for Duke Johnson, I mean, if I'm the Chargers,
I'm like, well, I mean that was a third. I
mean I think Duke Johnson has been an underutilized asset.
(33:00):
But let's be real, Um, I just I don't know.
I know, you guys cut you know, unfortunately, this is
an ugly week in the NFL. There's gonna be so
many running backs on the street, and with what people
have been able to do with that position. I don't
think you can keep doing that. But the problem is
they also don't have a GM. And you know how
coaches are. Coaches care about today, they don't care about
next year's draft. So I guess nothing's impossible there because
(33:23):
they've been doing some baddy stuff to me for quite
some time. Um, but I think the walls are closing
in there. Likelihood Zeke shows up this week this week,
I think they get something done by this time next week,
by early next week. Jason law Camphora, CBS NFL in
Center j l C. Thanks so much, man, My pleasure, buddy,
have a go pleasures absolutely much. Be sure to catch
(33:45):
live editions. So the Doug Got Leaps Show week days
at noon eastern three pm Pacific. Joe Clad joins us.
He's a former quarterback. Of course, he's a lead college
footbin aalist on Fox Sports, getting ready for our own
college football kickoff this upcoming weekend. Joel, what do you
think about Andrew Luck not just retiring, but saying like, hey,
I actually thought about retiring two thousand sixteen. Yeah, I mean,
(34:07):
I listen, I get it. I think that this was
an admission that he just he couldn't do it anymore,
because there's there's a level, um there's a level of
of of mental commitment and fortitude that you have to
have in order to play at the level that he
plays that and there's also a level of physical commitment
(34:29):
and fortitude that you have to have in order to
play at that level. And I don't think any of
those were matching that bar, that expectation bar, and and
for him, he wasn't just going to go out there
and trot out and roll his helmet out there for
the paycheck. So what I when I first saw it,
I thought it was actually something that was, I mean
(34:51):
incredibly selfless, you know. I mean, how many guys roll
out there and they just were like, well, i'll be
injured this year and I'll try to you know, I'll
try to him for one more deal. And it's and
it's literally all about the money. And we lament that,
and as fans constantly, I wish it wasn't all about
the money for this guy. I wish it wasn't all
about the money for this guy. And this clearly was
(35:13):
a case in which it was not all about the
money for Andrew. Look, I think it was about the
expectation that he has about where he has to be
mentally as far as his commitment level to the sport
and to his teammates, and where he has to be
physically just able to move and able to go out
there and play from a fortitude standpoint, and he wasn't
at that. The guy cannot play football anymore. I mean,
(35:37):
look at what has happened to his body. So I
certainly come down on the other side of the quarant
coin from what you did. And and I know that
you're gonna stand strong because I know you, and you're
gonna retain that opinion. I do think your opinion it
was totally wrong, though, Yeah, I mean, like, look, I
if if it was does he have a torn a
killers tendon? Like why were they telling that he was close?
(36:01):
But why were they leading us to believe that it
was a calf and then an ankle and it was
a tedious injury? Like it doesn't feel like he was
that far from playing. And forgive me if I'm wrong,
but I kind of thought, like the football player mentality
has always been to fight through these things to get
out there for your team to play until you couldn't
(36:21):
play anymore. Yeah, I mean, listen, I think that that's
I still think that that's the case. And I would
argue that that's probably still the case for Andrew. I
think that it's it's a case in which he's not
gonna do it or and while they're saying like, hey,
he can get back to the field, in his mind
(36:43):
is like, I'm not going to go out there as
ascent of myself just to collect a paycheck. Um. He
was going to do it only if he could do
it the right way. Um. And then I also listen,
trying to get back to the field and having any
(37:03):
quality of life for the rest of your life are
two different discussions. You know that, you know that, deep
down in your heart, you know that, And and at
some point there's there is a reflection, and and that
person looking back in the mirror looks at you and
says like, this is it. This is it. You're you're
(37:26):
not going to pay the ultimate price physically. Now ultimate
most people think of that in terms of like life
and death. But you're not gonna pay You're not going
to pay close to the ultimate price physically in order
to play a few more years of football and and
I I think you could see the anguish on his
(37:47):
face for having to make that decision and having that
conversation with himself and with his loved ones. This was
not a guy that was just shrugging his shoulders and
being like, well, you know, been a good ride, see you.
I'm a millennial. I think you got it totally wrong.
I think you got it totally wrong. This guy was
incredibly conflicted, conflicted, and the anguish on his face was
(38:09):
apparent and it was real. And quite frankly, the fans
that booed, I thought that was a total disgrace and
I felt like they showed an insane amount of selfishness
and jealousy. That booing was born out of those two
emotions period, a selfishness of like that this guy owes
them something. He doesn't know them anything. He's basically paid
(38:30):
the price physically to where he cannot play the sport
that he loves any longer. So that's I mean, that's
the way that I view it. And I know I'm
not going to convince you. I was just gonna that's
those are my thoughts. No, listen, listen to Okay, here
I will give you the counter on the Colts fans.
I'm not a booer. Okay, I never booed. I just
I don't go to a game to boo people. But
(38:52):
it's the fourth quarter of the third preseason game. Those
are hardcore fans. Those are the people that paid thousands
of dollars to have season tickets, and then you know
they had to pay to get those preseason tickets that
they didn't want. And I don't think the booing is
is solely to Andrew Luck. It was the idea that
this is the second time in three years that they've
been told Andrew Luck is gonna play, and for the
(39:14):
second time in three years, he's not going to play,
and now he's never going to play, and they just
ponied up all that money and had to go to
that game. I think that's where I think that's where
the anger comes from. Okay, listen, even if I said understandable, understandable,
even if I said that, does it really change those
people's lives? No? But in the like look in the
(39:37):
moment you're hold no, no, no, but no no. Does
it change Andrew's life if he cannot walk or play
with his kids later in his life, Well, obviously it
does obviously it does. So I don't care if if
Joe Smith in the third deck thinks that true Luck
(40:00):
owes him because he pointed up a couple of hundred dollars,
like to me, that guy's priorities are all out of whack.
There's life is going to be better because the culture
a better team. Give me a bright again, like, look,
you're speaking to me as a rational person, but a
fan is short for a fanatic that doesn't necessarily need
to be rational. And we're also talking about, like what
(40:22):
is the percentage of their budget that they spend on
their colds And like, again, you may not think their
life is better, but they certainly do. Perception becomes reality.
Also pushed back on you on this, like, look, I
don't doubt that the whole I think, the whole quality
of life thing, I think a lot of that is
the fear that is born from uh, from some of
this als stuff from from the you know, supposed war
(40:44):
on football. And I'm not sure if that's the reality
for Andrew Luck because look, like we said he thought
about walking away in two thousands sixteen because of the shoulder,
So you can tell me that it's this litany of
other injuries. But he he this was how he out
a long time ago. He knew he had other things
in his life. He had fallen out of love with
(41:05):
the process of being great in football a long time ago.
And my my relate, my relating it to millennials is
this is how millennials role. It's not all bad. The
people look at millennials is a bad word. It's not.
It's an It identifies a group of people, and those
people have shown themselves to have things outside of their
current job. If they don't like their current job, they'll
switch jobs. They don't like where they live, they'll move.
(41:27):
That's not what previous generations did. And and yeah, sometimes
when things get really hard and aren't fun, they don't
want to do them anymore, whereasous previous generations would. But
you're you're you're making an argument that he is running
from something hard. That's the basis of your argument. That's
the bottom line of the entire thing that you just
(41:48):
explained right there, is that he is avoiding something hard,
running from something hard. What if that's not the case,
I would argue it's not the case. Okay, so is
he is? He is? He hurt much worse than we thought,
it's like it's a high ankle spraining calf injury, Like
what is right? Like? Is there is there? What is?
I don't understand the debilitating, arduous path of rehab from
(42:11):
this injury. I think the lacerated kidney and the combination
of that, and who knows about the head injuries and
and who knows about the shoulder and how many throws
he has in it? He he and the doctor and
maybe his wife are the only one that know exactly
how band add together? He is what about all the
stuff that we don't know about the arthritic you know,
(42:32):
right hip, whatever it is. And to to suggest that
it's like, oh, this is all fear based means that
he would have no picture or he would have no
community of players around him that have been through this
for their entire career, you know, and which is which
is again an assumption that I would deem his false.
So I think that that's a false assumption on your part,
(42:54):
that that he doesn't understand acutely and astute lee might
be a better word, what he's paying for, you like
the price he's paying um with his body. Jill Clatten
joining his league College fooball analysts for Fox Sports. All right,
let's let's get to college football. That was not a
well played game that was really taken away from because
(43:18):
you know of Lux's announcement, But Florida did somehow survive Miami.
Are there any big picture takeaways from Florida surviving a
Miami team that was terribly penalized and yet still had
a chance to win it late um, I it was
really hard to do to derive specific takeaways for each
(43:39):
team because of the sloppy nature of the game, right,
I think you're probably in the same boat on that.
It was. It was really tough. Now I came away
from that even with Florida winning, maybe having a more
positive image of what Miami could do in a very
weak conference in the a c C and potentially play
for the conference title against Colinson later in the year.
Whereas Florida, if they continued to play anywhere near that
(44:01):
sloppy in a particular from the quarterback position, I don't
think that they even sniffed the Eastern title in the SEC.
You know, George is a much better team than that
earliest I would expect. So those are a quick team
takeaways that I was at. Jared Williams. I was very
impressed with a couple of mistakes it's going to happen
with your first start in college football. But overall, I
was very impressed with Jared Williams, a true freshman for Miami.
(44:23):
Now a couple of takeaways just on the overarching first
game out there, we you know, because of and I
guess this relates in some way to our discussion that
we just had. Because the fear based rhetoric has dominated
football the sport for the last few years, we've changed
(44:43):
completely the way that we have gone about preparing to
actually play the sport. So we no longer practice tackling,
We no longer practice in pads. There are no two days,
so conditioning I think has taken a back seat, in
particular in the lead up in fall camp and so
and now what you see, at least in the last
few years, from my estimation Doug, is teams that are
(45:04):
not physically ready to play football, that have to roll
out there and play sixty minutes of football. I actually
think it's more dangerous for them now in the first
week of the year than it used to be five
or six years ago, when there was two days and
they would practice tackling and they would practice some paths
we do. We do not see quality tackling whatsoever. We
(45:24):
see so many, I would say, more injuries, we see
tired mistakes, a lot more mental mistakes because of the
fatigue that's going on. So that was my takeaway just
from a global standpoint is I think that we need
to bring back a more rigorous fall camp where we
need to allow these coaches to teach the art of
tackling and do it safely. And then I also think
(45:47):
that I would change the sport a little bit if
I was the commissioner, and I would allow for a
scrimmage um and you go out there and you find
another team that wants to scrimmage and you can knock
some of that rust off against another opponent, because I
will tell you, as a quart of in college football,
one of the hardest things to do is not play
the sport for months and months and months and months
and months, and then all of a sudden, you've got
(46:07):
to roll out there against an opponent and it's live
and accounts and we're ready to go, and it's the
first time you've seen another defense in nine months. That's
that's really hard to do. Yeah, No, I mean I
I think it's that's why I'm we're we're unfortunately, we're
going to make a condemnation or a celebration of the
Pac twelve based on how Organ does this weekend. And
(46:29):
here's a team that hasn't played together again with exception
of their spring game and a fall scrimmage in months
and months and months, right like that's and we're gonna
saying that Auburn starting a true freshman quarterback bow Nicks,
who's going to be a stud, but we're gonna make
a determination of their level of aptitude based upon how
they do against Organ, who has a veteran quarterback, when
Nick has never seen live bullets in a college football game. Yeah,
(46:50):
I think it's unfair both ways. I don't think we
should condemn either conference. I will say this though, I'll
be right there joining that prey and and that um
chorus of people analyzing it, because the bottom line is this,
Oregon and Utah are widely considered the two best teams
in the Pac twelve conference this year. Auburn at best
(47:10):
is fifth or sixth, probably more like seventh in the SEC,
at least in the preseason. But the true freshman quarterback
Gus Melson coming back in to call the offensive plays.
You know, if Oregon loses, I think it's gonna be
kind of a good night situation for the Pac twelve.
No one's gonna care. Nobody's gonna care what the Pac
twelve does the rest of the year if Oregon cannot
(47:33):
be Auburn on Saturday in Arlington. Do you think Texas
is back? Oh gosh, I do UM back is I
don't know where they're back to. I think they're back
to competing for championships. I think that Sam Ellinger is
a guy that could potentially have a Heisman esque season.
Um and and last year they were one of the
only teams that you could say, lined up against one
(47:56):
of the big boys in Georgia and physically took it
to them. You know, Georgia had come in on a streak.
You know, before the SEC championship game, Georgia had run
for over three hundred yards per game in the last
five games of the regular season. Then they ran for
a close to hundred eighty against Alabama, and then they
ran for seventy two against Texas. Texas meanwhile, while ran
(48:16):
for a hundred and seventy eight yards the most anybody
ran for against Georgia. So Texas was physically up to
the task of going up to an sec big boy
and playing toe to toe with him, which Oklahoma has
not been able to do over the last couple of years.
And we've seen that in both in my final games
with Georgia a couple of years ago, in Alabama last year.
So from that standpoint, yeah, I think Texas is is
(48:38):
in a position where they've got as good a chance
as any to to line up against some of the
premier teams in the country and actually physically go to
to to Yeah. Um, you mentioned Utah. You play b
y U Holy War first game of the season. Um,
I don't know any thoughts that the old rivalry thing
with b y U ends up derailing what's people believe
(49:00):
it could be a dream year. Um, that's that's the
that's the negative part for a team like Utah that
has high expectations and have to open with a game
in which you would say, at the end of the year,
let's throw the records out right. I mean, at the
end of the year, we wouldn't be talking about, you know,
how good these teams are. We would just be talking
(49:20):
about the rivalry aspect. Then you throw into the fact
that they're both going to be rusty because of the
conversation we just had. Then he's thrown into the fact
that it can be one call here, they're one turnover here,
they're um yeah. It's not a position I'd love to
be in if I was Utah, But for them, they
get to rely on what I consider the best defense
in the Pac twelve Conference. Great upfront, their front seven
(49:43):
Doug is really good led by a guy named Lucky Photo,
and Bradley and I excellent players. And if I was
going to go and play a real meaningful game, even
a rivalry game, early in the season, my hope would
be that I was defensive lead and not offensive lead,
because an offense takes time to get the timing and
the execution of the details in order to go play
(50:04):
their best football, whereas defense is still about effort and physicality,
and those can show up to a greater degree earlier
in the season than the timing and the specificity of
the details of offense. Alright, great stuff. Joe clatt by
the way, Fox Sports one Tulsa, Michigan State starts Friday,
afternoon out here at seven o'clock East Coast time, and
of course followed up by myl Modo Oaklahoma State going
(50:26):
against the Oregon State up in Corvallis. It's Fox Sports
one College Football getting kicked off course Joe clatt Our,
lead college football analyst, love agreeing to disagree with you.
Great catching up and thanks for being our guest. Absolutely man,
I'll talk to you next week. Joel clatt Yes, Joe
clad joining us in the Doug Galag Shows
Thanks for listening to the best of the Doug Gottlieb
Show podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weekday
from three to six pm Eastern Time that's twelve to
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(00:22):
the Doug Gotli Show on Fox Sports Radio. Boom, What Up, America,
Doug Gottlieb Show, Fox Sports Radio, coming to you from
the beautiful sunny city of Los Angeles, California. I hope
you had a spectacular weekend. We have a full slate
of college football games, which means it is game week.
(00:44):
Football season is here, and we are your home for
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experience into play at Farmers dot com. Um, we are well,
(01:06):
what shall we talk about? Huh? I mean, I'd love
to talk about the fact that I tried to take
my daughter fishing and the fishing pole last exactly three
casts before I mistakenly broken because it was caught in
a rock. Or the fact that I tried tried to
stay off my phone, like you know, it's last weekend
without full weekend of football. I tried to stay off
(01:29):
my phone the best that I possibly could. But we're
gonna talk about Andrew Luck. We will talk about my
tweet about Andrew Luck. We will talk about the responses
to my tweet about Andrew Luck throughout the next three hours.
I'll also give you the phone number eight seven seven
six three six nine eight seven seven six three six nine.
(01:52):
That's eight seven seven ninety nine on Fox. All right,
I'm watching Saturday afternoon in South in California. It could
not have been a better August day, you know, in
beach cities in Southern California usually is just in the
mid to upper seventies. It was the eighties. We just
got back from the beach. I pop on to watch
(02:14):
Miami versus Florida. And as good as that rivalry sounds,
the game was equally putrid. It was a terribly played,
although very close football game. So poorly played Miami had
eight penalties during the first half and had the lead
at halftime eight and then of course the Andrew Luck
(02:35):
news broke. Andrew Luck was gonna retire. Now there's a
there's a there's so many different angles to this story
which are really really interesting, way more interesting honestly than
my tweet about Andrew Luck. But nonetheless, we'll get to
that in a second. So it breaks while their third
preseason game, which Andrew Luck obviously is not dressed, is
(02:56):
going on. During the fourth quarter, he leave eaves the
football field to booze. First. Here's Andrew Luck on why
he decides to walk away. I haven't been able to
live the life I want to live taking the joy
out of this game. And after two thousand sixteen, where
I played in pain and was unable to regularly practice,
(03:18):
I made a vow to myself that I would not
go down that path again. I find myself in a
similar situation, and the only way forward for me is
to remove myself from football. In this cycle that I've
been in, he said, he's in a cycle of play,
get hurt, rehab through play through pain, right, rinse, repeat,
(03:41):
rinse repeat. Now it should be pointed out that at
least what we're told. What we're told is first it
was a calf, then it was an ankle. No, it
was a high ankle sprain. Maybe there's something to a
bone there, right, like we've been told so many different things.
And then of course the immediate reaction I think was
(04:02):
from people going off on Colts fans who booed him
as he walked off the football field. Not every one
of them, but enough of him did for it to resonate.
Here's Andrew Luck on the Bill on the booing. I'd
be lying if I didn't say I heard the reaction.
Yeah it hurt. I'll be honest, trap it hurt. Yeah,
Mike Chap will us answering the question. Now, To be fair,
(04:27):
if you're a Colts fan, you're there in the fourth
quarter of the third preseason game, you are pot committed
to the Colts, right like you can't give you can
give away preseason tickets, but if you give away preseason tickets,
generally those people don't stay to the fourth quarter of
a preseason game, right Like, Like you got free tickets,
you got free parking, You're not gonna stay the fourth
(04:47):
quarter Like came, I saw the team, blah blah blah,
blah blah. There are guys that won't be on the team.
I'm probably out though I'm not a bower. I'm not
a bower, and frankly, I'm not really a cheer. I
don't have anyone team that I love so much that
I boo or I cheer. I'm just not I do
at least understand the fans. Imagine you're sitting there and
(05:11):
you've been told all offseason it's a calf, he'll be fine,
it's an ankle, he'll be fine, it's a bone, he'll
be fine. He's working through it. And then during the
game you see that he's going to retire, and you
realize that now you spent your good, harder and Midwestern
money on a team that is no longer nor will
(05:31):
they ever be. Quarterback by Andrew Luck. What would your
immediate reaction be? What would it be? So yeah, I'm sure, yeah,
I'm sure it heard, I'm sure it hurt, and I
wouldn't boo. But people who boo did boo. It's not
(05:55):
the end of the world. And by the way, neither
is my tweet. Here's my tweet, which has made over
five million impressions. Retiring because rehabbing as too hard as
the most millennial thing ever hashtag Andrew Luck. Now, first
of all, I under I understand that on Twitter, sarcasm, snarcasm,
(06:19):
tongue in cheek comments don't always translate. I do think
by now, I've been doing this long enough that there
are plenty of people, my friends, especially in the business
and listeners and viewers or whatever, that understand I'm a smartass.
I always have been, I always will be. And if
I can't find something funny with the things in life,
(06:39):
then you know what strike me down? Because I like
to make fun of things in life. I'm actually an
Andrew Luck fan. A year ago, I was on First
Things First with Nick Wright and he questioned, why do
people think Andrew Luck so good? And I was like, wow,
because he won thirty three games with a terrible team
his first three years in national football. He had a
(07:01):
bad GM, he had a terrible coach, and yet he
found a way. Bruce arians is actually the better coach
because Chuck Bogantoo got sick, but then they had to
give the job back to Chuck Bogano. These are all
things that I've said. These are all things on the record.
And while it was snarcasm and sarcasm and tongue in cheek.
The fact is that I think we can also admit
this is kind of part of whether it's the millennial
(07:23):
generation or the new generation in sports. No, he's not
a typical millennial. He does not have a perfectly coft beard,
nor does he go tight on the sides. He doesn't
roll up his pants. Guy, he's not a hipster. But
there are characteristics of millennials that people are latching onto.
(07:46):
And me making fun of those characteristics of millennials, which
are real, legit things, is I think what brought a
lot of this backlash. Let me just say this, and
I'm gonna say this one time. I understand, and if
you don't like me, or like my tweet, or you
think that I'm characterizing somebody is something they're not that,
(08:07):
that's fine. But I'm only going to point out that
to people like Tory Smith, who I don't have a
bone to pick with. To others in the media or
in sports, if you want to go to me stealing
credit cards twenty three years ago, you're gonna have to
deal with the fact that those questions have been asked,
(08:28):
that has been answered we've all moved on. And if
you think that I can stop or should stop commenting
on sports because you don't like my opinion because of
something I did as a freshman in college nearly a
quarter century ago, I think you're gonna have to look
in your own past and think, all right, what's the
worst thing you've done the last twenty five years? Do
(08:52):
you want that brought up every time you get into
a sports discussion. Look, dude, if you haven't gagured it out,
Millennials are wired differently. They just are. And those of
us who are now creeping up on middle age, we
think a lot of it is funny, some of it's interesting,
some of it has a great perspective, but it's definitely different.
(09:13):
Andrew looks a different dude. He's twenty nine years old
and his body hurts and he doesn't want to rehab anymore.
We're in the same field, right. This is the same
sport that gave us Brett freaking far didn't he Brett
Farve's dad died. He played Bret Brett Farve. You want
(09:34):
to know why it went bad with the New York Jets.
He had a torn bicep. He played Brett Farve played
in the worst weather, behind some bad offensive lines. At times,
didn't have skill position, guys wrong him. Sometimes he did,
and he played every day, and that has been shaping.
That is a football mentality. Ronnie Lott cut off his
finger to play in a game. Did happen? Right? I
(09:56):
didn't say that that the new generation doesn't think that's
really stupid and that they're not right for thinking it.
But there is a new way of thinking and looking
at football and looking at the business of sports. Some
of it is smart and profound and some of it
is not. And look, Andrew Luck runs the benefit of
(10:16):
the fact that he does have a ton of money,
and he comes from a good environment. He has an
awesome family, he went to Stanford, and he's got other
things in life. So this is kind of the perfect
scenario for him to walk away. Calvin Johnson the same,
Calvin Johnson, smart dude, ton of money, already achieved great success,
and he was like not doing it anymore. Body hurts.
(10:38):
Don't feel like it. Even when we create an era
in sports where you cannot touch the quarterback, remember think
about this. Andrew Luck plays for a team which has
been remade with the sole purpose of him not getting
hurt anymore. Right, that was how Ryan Grigson most screwed
it up was they didn't protect him. So Chris Ballard
(11:03):
comes in, He's like, what's our best asset? How do
we protect our best asset? And he went about doing it,
and he's done a great job. And then you're in
a support where now you can't even touch the quarterback
below the knee, can't touch him above the neck, can't
touch him releases the ball, can't touch him definitely, can't
pick him up and throw him down, can't land on him,
can't sneeze on him, can't fart near him, can't do
anything to him. Why Because they're important and we don't
(11:26):
want to see what's happening with Andrew Luck. That's why
Brady can still play. That's why Breeze can still play.
That's why Ben Roethlisberger can still play. That's why Philip
Rivers can still play. Look, the new generation they want
(11:47):
to have fun. The old generation used to say the
fun was in winning. Now the new generation just with
that fun every day. Do you do remember when the
Eagles won the championship? Right, remember when the Eagles won
the Super Bowl two years ago, remember that, and Lane Johnson,
(12:07):
their star left tackle, said they don't have any fun
over there. And the older response the Patriots hap was
to go win another super Bowl, which is the real fun.
That's the older school mentality of the fun is not
in the process. The fun is in the ultimate result.
And whether it's a millennial idea, a new age idea,
(12:31):
and Andrew Luck idea. But he said not fun anymore.
I used to I used to have fun playing. Now
I don't have fun playing, right, That's what he said.
It's not fun, taking away the joy of football. So
I guess I don't understand why dudes are so mad.
(12:55):
I'm not questioning whether or not it's body hurts. I
don't really know what's wrong with him because we've been
lied to so many times, which, by the way, that's
why Colts fans are pissed. I don't even think they're pissed.
I mean they're they're probably a little tick that he's
walking away. But it's more Wait, this is the second year,
in the second time in three years that we were
told Andrew Luck is gonna play, and now he's not
(13:16):
gonna play. And I don't spend money on season tickets.
Do you know why? This is why? Because you spend
money to see one guy play and now that guy's like,
can't do it. Body hurts. Sorry. And the percentage of
(13:36):
guys that are more educated that play football, the percentage
of guys that understand, hey, I'm gonna get my money
and I'm gonna get out. We talked about this with
Antonio Brown, like Antonio Brown probably don't want to play
after this contract. Levyan Bell had enough money where he's like,
I'm gonna sit for a year. I'm good. I made
more money than I ever could have fathomed. These guys
(13:57):
are smarter, they do and and on some level, I
think they do fear the potential to have brain injuries.
I think they fear the potential to be almost disfigured.
Like some of these like Brian Baldinger is with his
finger that points out or simply walk in in pain.
It doesn't mean that's what Andrew Lucky is going to
suffer from. Because this does feel like there's just something wrong.
(14:21):
Maybe he thinks he saw what happened to Kevin Durant
tearing his achilles tendon when it felt like a calf,
it felt like an ankle and then all of a
sudden he thinks that could be me, and I just
don't have the heart to do it. I get it.
But if you think this has been the mentality of
football players for the hundred years of football, you're simply
(14:44):
not paying attention. In surfing, they say Eddie would go.
There's a famous Hawaiian surfer who would go the biggest
and most treacherous way. It's of course he died surfing
big ways people do not meant. And that's like the marathon, right.
A marathon was a century who ran from Marathon Greece
(15:06):
to Athens to warn that an attack was coming. People
forget to mention that the century died upon delivering the
news that they were being attacked. But the surfer mentality
has always been that he would go. The marathon runners
mentality was you just find a way to fish, and
(15:28):
the football players mentality was play through pain. You figure
it out, You put on your bonnet, snap up your chin,
snap and you got it out. And the reward is
in winning and pushing through pain. Those dudes are wired differently.
(15:51):
You don't think football players are wired differently. It's amazing, right,
the things they will put their body through and Andrew's
lucks like no, may, I'm out. And while I understand it,
if you don't think that's a departure from where we've
always been, and if you're seriously bothered by what I
(16:11):
thought was a kind of sarcastic, snarky, tongue in cheek
comment about such a such a sea change, And maybe
it's not even in what he's done, because we've seen
that a little bit limited before. Right, Barry Sanders did it,
Calvin Johnson did it. Now he's done it. But from
the quarterback position, which we do everything possible to make
those guys happy, to make those guys say, that's a
(16:32):
in his prime. That's a big thing. But if you're
seriously bothered by me pointing out the new generation in
athlete that has something else going in the search for joy,
These are all new ideas. It's the generation me go
(16:58):
up and look at what all that they things that
define millennials are They wanted record groups, but they do
want confirmation and affirmation of their success. They're willing to move.
Anyone who hires a millennial will say, you know what,
it's amazing. They're really smart. They're kind of worldly they
come in sword and would think they know everything, but
(17:18):
they'll get after and work hard than they want to
raise like two weeks later. That sounds like any football players,
you know, I want to raise as soon as they
see any sort of success, even though their contracts as otherwise.
I mean, all these kids in college transferring, You don't
think that's the search for success and the willingness to
go elsewhere. Nobody wants to sit. Why nobody wants to
(17:40):
red shirt, Nobody wants to back anybody up, because that's
not fun. The fun is in actually playing and winning
and producing. And then ultimately they want to get paid.
Want to get pay in college. Then once they get
paid in college, I want to get paid in high school.
It's a now now now, now, now, now now. And
some of this has always existed, but now it's become
not just more, isn't, But in the world of social media,
(18:05):
it's become okay, it's become championed. You go, Andrew Luck,
you go explore the world, you go find yourself. You
don't need football. And that's a departure from what our
values always were about football players being special. Boxers are
wired different, right, Boxers are always carried out. Champion is
(18:29):
never is never carried on top of the shoulders out
of the ring. They're always carried out of the ring.
I mean, honestly, Floyd Mayweather is like the only he's
like a diabolical genius because he keeps finding fights that
he can win. But eventually, like Muhammad Ali, they all
get carried out. And that's always been football players, will
(18:52):
you go until your shot? Peyton Manning? Yeah, you want
a super Bowl, but he couldn't throw a football anymore.
And the new generation maybe they're maybe they don't care
as much about the ultimate success. Maybe they just get
that it's a short term profession. Get a lot of
money and get out. But if you tell me that
(19:12):
I'm a jerk or an idiot or my past twenty
three years ago is your reason for hating me and
my tweet, kind of think you're missing the point. Be
sure to catch live editions of The Doug Dot Leap
Show weekdays in noon eastern three pm Pacific on Fox
Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. Jason Lack
canfora joints us NFL Insider for CBS Sports and Jason,
(19:37):
where were you when you found out? Andrew Luck was retiring.
I was monitoring preseason action, uh, fighting to stay awake
to me honest with you, Um, when things kind of
started breaking out, and uh, I was shocked, you know,
(19:58):
Like when I first heard of it, I just I
figured it was, um, might not be true, you know,
And it wasn't one of those where the knee jerk
reaction was um oh damn, um I should have known
or whatever. It was like, Man, I wonder, is that definitely?
You know that really? Yeah? You know what I mean.
(20:19):
Everybody had to make some phone calls immediately here and
try to get to the bottom of this, right, Everyone
I know looked and we're like, wait, that's a that's
a fake account. That's gotta be a fake Adam Schefter account.
And then all of a sudden, you look, and you look,
you look, and then it appears on screen and like,
oh my gosh, this this is in fact real. Um okay,
so what do you make of and I did I
(20:39):
read your tweet yesterday? What do you make of his
not just decision, but the logic behind his decision to
walk away? I get it, I mean I get it
on on every level. Um, he's earned more than I
think most of us could ever fathom, I mean a
hundred million on the field, and lord knows how much
(21:02):
off the field with national endorsements, etcetera. He has. He's
just starting a family, you know, he recently got married,
wants to have kids, and hasn't felt sort of at
ease or pain free or honestly normal now for four years.
And you feel like you're you're constantly being sort of
(21:24):
prodded and probed and tested and try this, try that,
and and as soon as you sort of kind of
fixed one thing right now, it's it's a whole another
treadmill for something else. And the beating that he takes
is real. I mean it we forget about it from
week to week and we go on and watch the
next game, but you know, they're they're living with that,
(21:47):
and it's an accumulation of things, and he has other
interests and he has the world at his sort of feet.
And once I sort of digested it, slept on it,
talked to a few people as like, you know what
I I I think it took more bravery to do
(22:07):
what he did then to you know what I mean,
pocket another twenty million of Ursay's money and and kind
of try to chuck and jive and wing his way
through something that in his heart he felt like wasn't
right for me anymore, wasn't right from my family anymore. Um,
but you know, let me, let me just try to
(22:28):
you know, skirt my way through these next four months
and then I got a whole another offseason to figure
it out. I think for him to have done it
almost on the team schedule, like if if it's going
to happen to like it's not ideal, shouil happening off season,
the other dude took every snap anyway, like the other
dude got all the work because this guy couldn't work.
So it's now two weeks before the season starts, and
(22:51):
and it'll be well in their rear view window by
the time they play a game that counts. And I
think he's a cerebral guy who you know, he he
gets to risk and how real it is and not
just what this means for this week and this month
and this year, but what this might mean for me
(23:12):
five years down the line. I feel like that, uh,
that that kind of is a little bit the point
of my tweet, which is like, look, part of it
is just being starcastic. Right, But part of it is
like this is kind of the new generation of guy
where they might actually think too much. Like the reality is,
(23:35):
I'm sure his body hurts, um, but he's also now
in a system with a team that's solely designed to
protect him. Right, That's what they've drafted. That's what they've done,
which is smart they should have done a long time ago.
But Gregson just wasn't good enough. You're a league now
who is doing everything in their power to keep quarterbacks
upright and in the position of playing quarterback for a
long time. And I think because guys are more educated,
(23:58):
maybe even to educated on what they're post football future
would be like. And the money is so big, and
a guy like Andrew Luck already comes from a good background,
is married, Like I kind of think this is part
of the next generation where guys will walk away much easier.
I mean, it certainly could be. I I don't I
don't know you can be too educated or too smart
(24:21):
for your own good, because it's completely his decision, you
know what I mean. Like it's it's a personal choice.
If if you don't want to be on the radio
anymore tomorrow, you know what I mean? And you wake
up and you're like, this just isn't in my soul.
I I don't want to do it anymore. I just
you know, it's it's too much of a grind or
(24:42):
I want to flex different muscles. Like you know, you'd
you'd work your way, you'd work your way out of
your contract and a way you would go. Um, I
get it. People are paying money to see this in YadA, YadA, YadA.
But his covenant at the end of the day is
with himself and with his family. Teams are you know what,
Like teams and doctors and owners and gms and coaches
(25:05):
are generally making decisions for right over the history of time,
they've been the ones who've made the decision for athletes,
either they or the market when there's no contracts out
there have said you're done. It doesn't have to be
that way. We're conditioned to expect it to be that
way because that's sort of how it always was. So,
I mean, maybe there has been a bit of an awakening,
and we certainly know more now about the mind and
(25:27):
and how it reacts to this sport and ct E
and everything else. And like, I mean, the guys had
a lacerated kidney. Right, he's had he's had long issues.
He's had a serious soldier issue. And yeah, he was
in that system this year and he had a great season,
and then he spent five months not able to do anything,
you know again, and then he thinks he's gonna be
(25:48):
able to I was there to day he didn't. He
stopped practicing. I never in a million years thought that's
the last time I would ever see Andrew Luck, you know,
out on a football field doing an interview after a practice.
I didn't think there was any way he was going
to retire, but he certainly was someone who was getting
a little bit confused and bewildered about why he can't
get his body to do what he wants it to
(26:09):
do and what it's always done. There's there's something that
sort of just kept betraying him, calf, ankle, shoulder, whatever.
But but to retire because of the calf, ankles, calf ankle,
whatever thing, considering the other injuries he suffered, is kind
of bizarre. Now, No, because I don't think I don't
(26:30):
think you can say he retired because of the calf.
I think you the way he framed it was, it's
for four years, I've I have not been anything close
to healthy, and I haven't felt like myself. And there's
been constantly some ailment or another that has led me
on another cycle of more pills, more rehab, more recovery,
(26:53):
you know, away from my teammates, on my own for
another stretch of period, trying to get my body right.
And it's really not even playing football right, It's it's
it's all of the sort of um assortment of ailments
and the constant pain. I just think after a while,
and especially somebody like him who can see beyond the
(27:15):
scope of himself, beyond the sport, It's like, man, it's
coming into week one. I'm already only with one good leg.
Whether they protect me or not, I'm going to get
the crap kicked out of me because that's inherent in
what I do. I'm already from chasing from behind again
because I'm not going to get healthier as the season
goes on, right, I'm only going to get more beat up.
(27:35):
And like, when am I gonna just feel normal again?
And and I think it really is more about that.
Whether it was a calf or an elbow, or you
know what I mean, a pinky finger, it's just the
succession of constantly having something that's not right. That's that
I have to devote my mind, body and soult to
to get right in order to play this sport. I
(27:58):
just think he needed a respite on all levels. I mean,
I think he made that much clear. The question is
is that forever? Is it a year? Is it two years?
And I don't even know that he can do the
mental calculus on that himself yet. Um, But it was
clear he had he had to get off for his
own I think, mental clarity and maybe to some degree
(28:18):
sanity and to be able to enjoy his life again.
He had to get off this roller coaster. How long?
I don't know. Yeah, listen that that that that is
kind of the big question. If he doesn't play football again,
is he a Hall of Famer? I don't think so.
I don't I don't think so. Um. I mean he
because of all the time he missed. I mean, when
(28:39):
you start looking at just sort of the gross stats, yeah,
you can always look at it through that window of
most X in the first five years and most why
in the first six years. But I think also the
position he plays, I mean, guys are playing into their forties.
You know, I just don't know how, even five years
from now, you're gonna be able to make that case.
(29:00):
It's not Kurt Warner. Kurt Warner was a historically significant
playoff quarterback. Kurt Warner willed teams that no one thought
had a chance in numerous games, two things that no
one saw coming, and he did it a couple of times.
And he was doing crazy stuff in Arizona too. You know,
it wasn't even just St. Louis. So I think that's
that's different. You know, it's it's it's not you know,
(29:23):
t d where Okay, short, short span of time, but
like he was a singular factor in those Broncos teams
winning back to back Super Bowl that Andrew Luck made
into one championship game, and I'm not sitting here. Wins,
you know, is everything. But I just don't think there's
enough of a body of work to be able to
especially at that position, and with what passing numbers are
(29:45):
going to become moving forward, because the league, as you said,
is doing everything it can to protect quarterbacks and to
let people throw the football. I just I don't know
that that argument you're gonna be able to make that
argument how much does football, specifically AMC South football change
without Andrew Luckett. I still think the Culture the best
team in that division. I would have been inclined to
(30:06):
think they win it by you know, three games or
something like that. If if there was you know, the
specter of a healthy Andrew luck for most of the season. Um,
I don't know that they run away with anything, but
I still think. I think Jacoby Brissett is going to
be a highly functioning quarterback. I think Frank Raich is uniquely,
through his playing experience and his coaching experience, the guy
(30:30):
to navigate this situation. It's been a vastly improved roster
over the last eighteen months. I think they've added speed
and twitchiness. They'll they'll maintain a balance. They have a
solid enough offensive line, the defense has made strides, And
I just mean, to me, Houston is a mess. I
think Tennessee has kind of been floating by on these
(30:52):
these sort of flukish nine and seven seasons. I think
the Chickens are coming home to roost there um. Jacksonville
to me, would be the team that would wished them
the most, and Jacksonville defense might be able to carry
them to the division title. Um, But I I still
lean to the Colts that that's gonna be gonna be fascinating.
A couple of things real quick in that division. Mariota
(31:15):
gonna start or is Tanny Hill gonna beat him out?
I mean, I would think Mariota starts, but I would
expect something of a quick hook if he If he
can't show um what they drafted him to be early
in the season, and I think they make the switch
and they never go back. It feels kind of knee
jerky as well. But man, Pittsburgh looks good. Am I
(31:36):
wrong to think there's a different level of focus with
this team? No? I think I left that camp. I
came into that campus skeptic on the whole edition by
subtraction thing, and I left Latrobe like, you know what,
they do know how to draft receivers. And this Washington
kid looks really good and like Moncreef isn't going to
be super special, but he'll move the chains for them
(31:58):
and bends in the best if I've seen for a while.
And it just looked like there has been sort of
a falling out there and everybody kind of exhaling, and
the winds have coming from a different direction now and
there's not those same expectations. Um. I still questions about
their defense, but the offensive line is damn good. They
ran the ball almost the same with Connor as they
(32:19):
did with Bell. He doesn't catch as many balls and
all that. But no, I think Pittsburgh is gonna have
a very strong bounce back season. Yeah, it definitely, It
definitely definitely feels that way. Um. Last thing, Lamar Miller
gets hurt. There was some talk of Houston maybe trading
(32:39):
for a running back, specifically, we're reaching out for Melvin Gordon.
Uh Any thoughts that this kind of reinvigorates that now
with their need for starting running back. I mean, how
much are your future you're gonna mortgage at that position?
You know, Like if and if you were really give
a three for Duke Johnson, I mean, if I'm the Chargers,
I'm like, well, I mean that was a third. I
mean I think Duke Johnson has been an underutilized asset.
(33:00):
But let's be real, Um, I just I don't know.
I know, you guys cut you know, unfortunately, this is
an ugly week in the NFL. There's gonna be so
many running backs on the street, and with what people
have been able to do with that position. I don't
think you can keep doing that. But the problem is
they also don't have a GM. And you know how
coaches are. Coaches care about today, they don't care about
next year's draft. So I guess nothing's impossible there because
(33:23):
they've been doing some baddy stuff to me for quite
some time. Um, but I think the walls are closing
in there. Likelihood Zeke shows up this week this week,
I think they get something done by this time next week,
by early next week. Jason law Camphora, CBS NFL in
Center j l C. Thanks so much, man, My pleasure, buddy,
have a go pleasures absolutely much. Be sure to catch
(33:45):
live editions. So the Doug Got Leaps Show week days
at noon eastern three pm Pacific. Joe Clad joins us.
He's a former quarterback. Of course, he's a lead college
footbin aalist on Fox Sports, getting ready for our own
college football kickoff this upcoming weekend. Joel, what do you
think about Andrew Luck not just retiring, but saying like, hey,
I actually thought about retiring two thousand sixteen. Yeah, I mean,
(34:07):
I listen, I get it. I think that this was
an admission that he just he couldn't do it anymore,
because there's there's a level, um there's a level of
of of mental commitment and fortitude that you have to
have in order to play at the level that he
plays that and there's also a level of physical commitment
(34:29):
and fortitude that you have to have in order to
play at that level. And I don't think any of
those were matching that bar, that expectation bar, and and
for him, he wasn't just going to go out there
and trot out and roll his helmet out there for
the paycheck. So what I when I first saw it,
I thought it was actually something that was, I mean
(34:51):
incredibly selfless, you know. I mean, how many guys roll
out there and they just were like, well, i'll be
injured this year and I'll try to you know, I'll
try to him for one more deal. And it's and
it's literally all about the money. And we lament that,
and as fans constantly, I wish it wasn't all about
the money for this guy. I wish it wasn't all
about the money for this guy. And this clearly was
(35:13):
a case in which it was not all about the
money for Andrew. Look, I think it was about the
expectation that he has about where he has to be
mentally as far as his commitment level to the sport
and to his teammates, and where he has to be
physically just able to move and able to go out
there and play from a fortitude standpoint, and he wasn't
at that. The guy cannot play football anymore. I mean,
(35:37):
look at what has happened to his body. So I
certainly come down on the other side of the quarant
coin from what you did. And and I know that
you're gonna stand strong because I know you, and you're
gonna retain that opinion. I do think your opinion it
was totally wrong, though, Yeah, I mean, like, look, I
if if it was does he have a torn a
killers tendon? Like why were they telling that he was close?
(36:01):
But why were they leading us to believe that it
was a calf and then an ankle and it was
a tedious injury? Like it doesn't feel like he was
that far from playing. And forgive me if I'm wrong,
but I kind of thought, like the football player mentality
has always been to fight through these things to get
out there for your team to play until you couldn't
(36:21):
play anymore. Yeah, I mean, listen, I think that that's
I still think that that's the case. And I would
argue that that's probably still the case for Andrew. I
think that it's it's a case in which he's not
gonna do it or and while they're saying like, hey,
he can get back to the field, in his mind
(36:43):
is like, I'm not going to go out there as
ascent of myself just to collect a paycheck. Um. He
was going to do it only if he could do
it the right way. Um. And then I also listen,
trying to get back to the field and having any
(37:03):
quality of life for the rest of your life are
two different discussions. You know that, you know that, deep
down in your heart, you know that, And and at
some point there's there is a reflection, and and that
person looking back in the mirror looks at you and
says like, this is it. This is it. You're you're
(37:26):
not going to pay the ultimate price physically. Now ultimate
most people think of that in terms of like life
and death. But you're not gonna pay You're not going
to pay close to the ultimate price physically in order
to play a few more years of football and and
I I think you could see the anguish on his
(37:47):
face for having to make that decision and having that
conversation with himself and with his loved ones. This was
not a guy that was just shrugging his shoulders and
being like, well, you know, been a good ride, see you.
I'm a millennial. I think you got it totally wrong.
I think you got it totally wrong. This guy was
incredibly conflicted, conflicted, and the anguish on his face was
(38:09):
apparent and it was real. And quite frankly, the fans
that booed, I thought that was a total disgrace and
I felt like they showed an insane amount of selfishness
and jealousy. That booing was born out of those two
emotions period, a selfishness of like that this guy owes
them something. He doesn't know them anything. He's basically paid
(38:30):
the price physically to where he cannot play the sport
that he loves any longer. So that's I mean, that's
the way that I view it. And I know I'm
not going to convince you. I was just gonna that's
those are my thoughts. No, listen, listen to Okay, here
I will give you the counter on the Colts fans.
I'm not a booer. Okay, I never booed. I just
I don't go to a game to boo people. But
(38:52):
it's the fourth quarter of the third preseason game. Those
are hardcore fans. Those are the people that paid thousands
of dollars to have season tickets, and then you know
they had to pay to get those preseason tickets that
they didn't want. And I don't think the booing is
is solely to Andrew Luck. It was the idea that
this is the second time in three years that they've
been told Andrew Luck is gonna play, and for the
(39:14):
second time in three years, he's not going to play,
and now he's never going to play, and they just
ponied up all that money and had to go to
that game. I think that's where I think that's where
the anger comes from. Okay, listen, even if I said understandable, understandable,
even if I said that, does it really change those
people's lives? No? But in the like look in the
(39:37):
moment you're hold no, no, no, but no no. Does
it change Andrew's life if he cannot walk or play
with his kids later in his life, Well, obviously it
does obviously it does. So I don't care if if
Joe Smith in the third deck thinks that true Luck
(40:00):
owes him because he pointed up a couple of hundred dollars,
like to me, that guy's priorities are all out of whack.
There's life is going to be better because the culture
a better team. Give me a bright again, like, look,
you're speaking to me as a rational person, but a
fan is short for a fanatic that doesn't necessarily need
to be rational. And we're also talking about, like what
(40:22):
is the percentage of their budget that they spend on
their colds And like, again, you may not think their
life is better, but they certainly do. Perception becomes reality.
Also pushed back on you on this, like, look, I
don't doubt that the whole I think, the whole quality
of life thing, I think a lot of that is
the fear that is born from uh, from some of
this als stuff from from the you know, supposed war
(40:44):
on football. And I'm not sure if that's the reality
for Andrew Luck because look, like we said he thought
about walking away in two thousands sixteen because of the shoulder,
So you can tell me that it's this litany of
other injuries. But he he this was how he out
a long time ago. He knew he had other things
in his life. He had fallen out of love with
(41:05):
the process of being great in football a long time ago.
And my my relate, my relating it to millennials is
this is how millennials role. It's not all bad. The
people look at millennials is a bad word. It's not.
It's an It identifies a group of people, and those
people have shown themselves to have things outside of their
current job. If they don't like their current job, they'll
switch jobs. They don't like where they live, they'll move.
(41:27):
That's not what previous generations did. And and yeah, sometimes
when things get really hard and aren't fun, they don't
want to do them anymore, whereasous previous generations would. But
you're you're you're making an argument that he is running
from something hard. That's the basis of your argument. That's
the bottom line of the entire thing that you just
(41:48):
explained right there, is that he is avoiding something hard,
running from something hard. What if that's not the case,
I would argue it's not the case. Okay, so is
he is? He is? He hurt much worse than we thought,
it's like it's a high ankle spraining calf injury, Like
what is right? Like? Is there is there? What is?
I don't understand the debilitating, arduous path of rehab from
(42:11):
this injury. I think the lacerated kidney and the combination
of that, and who knows about the head injuries and
and who knows about the shoulder and how many throws
he has in it? He he and the doctor and
maybe his wife are the only one that know exactly
how band add together? He is what about all the
stuff that we don't know about the arthritic you know,
(42:32):
right hip, whatever it is. And to to suggest that
it's like, oh, this is all fear based means that
he would have no picture or he would have no
community of players around him that have been through this
for their entire career, you know, and which is which
is again an assumption that I would deem his false.
So I think that that's a false assumption on your part,
(42:54):
that that he doesn't understand acutely and astute lee might
be a better word, what he's paying for, you like
the price he's paying um with his body. Jill Clatten
joining his league College fooball analysts for Fox Sports. All right,
let's let's get to college football. That was not a
well played game that was really taken away from because
(43:18):
you know of Lux's announcement, But Florida did somehow survive Miami.
Are there any big picture takeaways from Florida surviving a
Miami team that was terribly penalized and yet still had
a chance to win it late um, I it was
really hard to do to derive specific takeaways for each
(43:39):
team because of the sloppy nature of the game, right,
I think you're probably in the same boat on that.
It was. It was really tough. Now I came away
from that even with Florida winning, maybe having a more
positive image of what Miami could do in a very
weak conference in the a c C and potentially play
for the conference title against Colinson later in the year.
Whereas Florida, if they continued to play anywhere near that
(44:01):
sloppy in a particular from the quarterback position, I don't
think that they even sniffed the Eastern title in the SEC.
You know, George is a much better team than that
earliest I would expect. So those are a quick team
takeaways that I was at. Jared Williams. I was very
impressed with a couple of mistakes it's going to happen
with your first start in college football. But overall, I
was very impressed with Jared Williams, a true freshman for Miami.
(44:23):
Now a couple of takeaways just on the overarching first
game out there, we you know, because of and I
guess this relates in some way to our discussion that
we just had. Because the fear based rhetoric has dominated
football the sport for the last few years, we've changed
(44:43):
completely the way that we have gone about preparing to
actually play the sport. So we no longer practice tackling,
We no longer practice in pads. There are no two days,
so conditioning I think has taken a back seat, in
particular in the lead up in fall camp and so
and now what you see, at least in the last
few years, from my estimation Doug, is teams that are
(45:04):
not physically ready to play football, that have to roll
out there and play sixty minutes of football. I actually
think it's more dangerous for them now in the first
week of the year than it used to be five
or six years ago, when there was two days and
they would practice tackling and they would practice some paths
we do. We do not see quality tackling whatsoever. We
(45:24):
see so many, I would say, more injuries, we see
tired mistakes, a lot more mental mistakes because of the
fatigue that's going on. So that was my takeaway just
from a global standpoint is I think that we need
to bring back a more rigorous fall camp where we
need to allow these coaches to teach the art of
tackling and do it safely. And then I also think
(45:47):
that I would change the sport a little bit if
I was the commissioner, and I would allow for a
scrimmage um and you go out there and you find
another team that wants to scrimmage and you can knock
some of that rust off against another opponent, because I
will tell you, as a quart of in college football,
one of the hardest things to do is not play
the sport for months and months and months and months
and months, and then all of a sudden, you've got
(46:07):
to roll out there against an opponent and it's live
and accounts and we're ready to go, and it's the
first time you've seen another defense in nine months. That's
that's really hard to do. Yeah, No, I mean I
I think it's that's why I'm we're we're unfortunately, we're
going to make a condemnation or a celebration of the
Pac twelve based on how Organ does this weekend. And
(46:29):
here's a team that hasn't played together again with exception
of their spring game and a fall scrimmage in months
and months and months, right like that's and we're gonna
saying that Auburn starting a true freshman quarterback bow Nicks,
who's going to be a stud, but we're gonna make
a determination of their level of aptitude based upon how
they do against Organ, who has a veteran quarterback, when
Nick has never seen live bullets in a college football game. Yeah,
(46:50):
I think it's unfair both ways. I don't think we
should condemn either conference. I will say this though, I'll
be right there joining that prey and and that um
chorus of people analyzing it, because the bottom line is this,
Oregon and Utah are widely considered the two best teams
in the Pac twelve conference this year. Auburn at best
(47:10):
is fifth or sixth, probably more like seventh in the SEC,
at least in the preseason. But the true freshman quarterback
Gus Melson coming back in to call the offensive plays.
You know, if Oregon loses, I think it's gonna be
kind of a good night situation for the Pac twelve.
No one's gonna care. Nobody's gonna care what the Pac
twelve does the rest of the year if Oregon cannot
(47:33):
be Auburn on Saturday in Arlington. Do you think Texas
is back? Oh gosh, I do UM back is I
don't know where they're back to. I think they're back
to competing for championships. I think that Sam Ellinger is
a guy that could potentially have a Heisman esque season.
Um and and last year they were one of the
only teams that you could say, lined up against one
(47:56):
of the big boys in Georgia and physically took it
to them. You know, Georgia had come in on a streak.
You know, before the SEC championship game, Georgia had run
for over three hundred yards per game in the last
five games of the regular season. Then they ran for
a close to hundred eighty against Alabama, and then they
ran for seventy two against Texas. Texas meanwhile, while ran
(48:16):
for a hundred and seventy eight yards the most anybody
ran for against Georgia. So Texas was physically up to
the task of going up to an sec big boy
and playing toe to toe with him, which Oklahoma has
not been able to do over the last couple of years.
And we've seen that in both in my final games
with Georgia a couple of years ago, in Alabama last year.
So from that standpoint, yeah, I think Texas is is
(48:38):
in a position where they've got as good a chance
as any to to line up against some of the
premier teams in the country and actually physically go to
to to Yeah. Um, you mentioned Utah. You play b
y U Holy War first game of the season. Um,
I don't know any thoughts that the old rivalry thing
with b y U ends up derailing what's people believe
(49:00):
it could be a dream year. Um, that's that's the
that's the negative part for a team like Utah that
has high expectations and have to open with a game
in which you would say, at the end of the year,
let's throw the records out right. I mean, at the
end of the year, we wouldn't be talking about, you know,
how good these teams are. We would just be talking
(49:20):
about the rivalry aspect. Then you throw into the fact
that they're both going to be rusty because of the
conversation we just had. Then he's thrown into the fact
that it can be one call here, they're one turnover here,
they're um yeah. It's not a position I'd love to
be in if I was Utah, But for them, they
get to rely on what I consider the best defense
in the Pac twelve Conference. Great upfront, their front seven
(49:43):
Doug is really good led by a guy named Lucky Photo,
and Bradley and I excellent players. And if I was
going to go and play a real meaningful game, even
a rivalry game, early in the season, my hope would
be that I was defensive lead and not offensive lead,
because an offense takes time to get the timing and
the execution of the details in order to go play
(50:04):
their best football, whereas defense is still about effort and physicality,
and those can show up to a greater degree earlier
in the season than the timing and the specificity of
the details of offense. Alright, great stuff. Joe clatt by
the way, Fox Sports one Tulsa, Michigan State starts Friday,
afternoon out here at seven o'clock East Coast time, and
of course followed up by myl Modo Oaklahoma State going
(50:26):
against the Oregon State up in Corvallis. It's Fox Sports
one College Football getting kicked off course Joe clatt Our,
lead college football analyst, love agreeing to disagree with you.
Great catching up and thanks for being our guest. Absolutely man,
I'll talk to you next week. Joel clatt Yes, Joe
clad joining us in the Doug Galag Shows
Host
Doug Gottlieb
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