Game On Rewind: Dalton Wasserman of PFF joins the show! 2024-12-11

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
We'll help break us down. Here is our good friend,
Dalton Washerman PFF dot com. There's a lot going on
as well. It's not just Belichick, of course. He splashes
this news into us on the cusp of the college
football playoffs beginning next week. Dalton, crazy times, how you doing? Man?

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Fantastic too, the crazy time. Certainly, college football is never
a quiet sport, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 (00:21):
No, never quiet. Belichick has certainly been less quiet over
the last year making the media rounds, and I think
we all sort of agreed at some point the Etch
would come back. You know, coaching is his life. He's
obviously branching out and dating, and he's got you know,
a lot going on on these television and radio programs,
but those really, I can tell you, and you know this,

(00:42):
it doesn't take a lot of work to do what
he does right now. It's fun. He's having a good time.
Did you think he'd be back this soon? And did
you think he'd be college?

Speaker 2 (00:50):
I thought he would be back this soon, but I thought, honestly,
you know, there's been a lot of rumors throughout the
whole year about the NFB East, right, about the Giant's
job or maybe the Cowboys shob Or at one point
was about the Eagles job, you know next year on
he looks safe there, but it sounded like that was
going to be the destination. But now it's shocking that
he's going to college after, you know, never doing it before.
And obviously he had a when you have a four

(01:11):
hundred page you know what, somebody called an organizational bible
ready to go. He was prepared to take this job.
You know, he had an idea about you know what,
if I took over a college program, this is how
I would run it. And you know, Belichick's as detailed
as any coach that's ever lived. So certainly North Carolina
likes that plan enough. And that if that includes Steve Belichick,
who's done a nice job as a defensive coordinator at

(01:32):
Washington under Jed fish fit Yere, you know what, if
they're cool with it, then I think we have to
be cool with it. And it is shocking that he's
that he's coaching college. But I think the fact that
he also, you know, somebody brought this up to me,
the fact that he gets full control right because he
was looking in the NFL, I think to be you know,
head coach and GM again like he was with New England.
I don't know if that's going to fly in the
NFL anymore. It certainly flies in college.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
I wonder if they can schedule one of those old
exhibition matches between college and the pros where North Carolin
could take on the Falcons next year and just exact
some revenge on or Arthur Blank. I should say to
Arthur Smith, let's see Arthur. Arthur Smith's doing quite fine.
Arthur Blank, of course did not hire Belichick. That was
his one sort of door back into the NFL last year.

(02:14):
So it's interesting that he is in college. How do
you think it goes early on? I mean, he talked
about this on McAfee Daldon. He's viewing this like the NFL.
It is a business. They're going to conduct it as such.
It's an interesting spin on it. Is it easier said
than done.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
It's always easier said than done. But I'll tell you what,
I think there are some parallels here, and it's not
as flashy and out there, but I think there's a
lot of parallels here to Colorado and what Dian Sanders
has done and when standards has shown as the example
of listen, I can build a team through the portal,
I can build a brand here really quick. The way
college football is structured now, this isn't about I mean, yes,
it's about high school recruiting, but not like it used

(02:53):
to be. Most of those guys are transfer and anyway,
it's about going out every off season, rebuilding your roster,
finding that foundational And then I'm curious too, how Belichick's
gonna fill out you know, his coaching staff with other
guys he may have connections with. Right is it could
be Jedfish with Steve Belichick. Is it Joe Judge? Who's
that old miss right now? Is it Josh McDaniels coming
back as his offensive coordinator. I'm fascinated by that end

(03:14):
of it. But I absolutely I think it's more possible
to quickly turn a program around now with the Transford
Portal and NIO on the way it works than it
ever was before, when it used to take to rebuild
a program, what four or five years waiting on one
high school class to get great.

Speaker 1 (03:28):
Yeah, and I like, I've already looked at the future
schedules here in conference. I mean, this is the first
thing I went to when Belichick was pretty much rumored
to be almost closing in today on this. And one
thing I found interesting is, you know, Bill O'Brien being
at Boston College. They already played this year. They don't
play again for like three more years, So maybe that's
part of it too. I doubt it, but that's just
one little wrinkle. Maybe O'Brien hopefully he keeps doing well

(03:50):
up there at BC, but if not, he's got a
soft landing spot with his guy Bill in the conference here.
I'm fascinated by the staffing too. I'm with you. I mean,
where do they go for that? How do they reconcile
to all that? And we'll see how it works. But
it's interesting because there were so many NFL teams that
were sort of rumored to be, you know, maybe interested
in Bill, and if there was reciprocal interest, do you

(04:11):
do you get the sense there was that interest out
there in Belichick in the NFL market. Obviously, it's still
early in the process, it's still hunting season in a
lot of ways. But was Dallas ever in consideration, or
was it mutually thought of that maybe that would work,
maybe Chicago or was it just that the well was
dry again?

Speaker 2 (04:29):
I think the problem is is he he must have
gauged NFL interests as this season has gone on and
feel like, maybe, you know what, maybe the college route
is the way for me to go. But I do
think there would have been again interest in Belichick as
a coach, But I don't think there was interest in
Belichick as the combo coach and GM. And I think
that's the thing is that I think that was a

(04:50):
deal breaker with the Falcons last year is that he
wanted to be GM and coach and have all the
organizational power and that wasn't the case. So the Falcons,
you know, they pivoted to Terry Fonteaen where he Morris
and that feels like.

Speaker 1 (05:01):
Hey, I could have paid Kirk Cousins one hundred and
eighty million dollars guaranteed and drafted Michael Pennix. I could
have done all that, right.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
I mean, you know, so, I mean, and look, everybody
makes their decisions and the way things go, everything hindsight
twenty twenty is always right. But I don't know that
the Falcons would have been necessarily better with Belichick or not.
But I think there is a belief that giving one
person the power of the entire NFL organization isn't necessarily
the best way to go about it. That's what I
really think it was, is that he wanted that GM power.

(05:29):
He wanted that power to control the entire thing. And
in a college program, that's how it is. The head
coach controls the entire thing. They are president, they are president, CEO,
head coach, GM, everything you can think of. So I
think part of that might have appealed to him that
if he has his hands on everything, it can work.

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Well, let's get back to the game itself. And it
was a great weekend of football, obviously for a lot
of folks down here in the upstate Clemson. What a
wild ride it's been by Clemson standards, obviously. You know,
this is a program for a while that was just
locked and loaded and ready for a four team playoff,
and it took a lot of miracles to come together
in the middle of them getting embarrassed by South Carolina

(06:06):
at home for them to even have a chance. And
I just told myself, if they just get back to Charlotte,
anything can happen. They start fast in that game, but boy, SMU,
they're impressive, and they just play so fast, and they
play so pois within that speed. What a dynamic game
back and forth. Let's just keep your action to just
first of all, on the game. Both teams with some
star studded performances, especially this young quarterback for SMU who's outstanding.

Speaker 2 (06:31):
Absolutely, two terrific football teams that played a great game,
and obviously SMU really beat themselves a lot in the
first quarter. And you know, when you spot a team
like Clemson the league, especially with their defense and the
way they can force turnovers, it's a real problem. But
two teams deserving of the playoff bids that they have. Obviously,
Clemson won the play they won the ACC and they
get the automatic bid and they get their shot against Texas.
And I'm fully on board with the decision to have

(06:53):
SMU in the playoff in that eleven spot as well. No,
Jennings has been really good all year and as far
as SMU goes, they had kind of a controversy beginning.
It was it gonna be Preston Stone who got hurt
late last year and missed the end of the season,
or was going to be the younger Jennings and RT.
Lashley rolled with Jennings, and man, that decision is paid
off and It's something my question earlier in the year.
But more power to them for having the guts to
go to Jennings, the younger player and succeeding with them.

(07:16):
And I think both teams, I think definitely have a
shot to win these games. I think I think they're
going to be counted out on the road against Penn
State and Texas, who are thought to be more talented teams. Obviously,
but look, Texas has some issues when it comes to,
you know, inconsistency from quinn Ewers and Penn State. There
have been times where they've played tight games with teams
that we thought were lesser of the USC game the

(07:37):
Minnesota games. Though it's not like you're talking about two
impervious teams here. I think they're both really talented. SMU's
got a lot of speed in a really good pass rush.
Clemson listen at still Dabo Sweeney. It's still Dabbo, and
it's still you know, they got a talented defense that
they've been tweaking some things with, and their offenses come
alive you know, at certain points this year when they've
needed it. I think both teams do have a reasonable

(07:59):
shot to win the first game, you know, I'm.

Speaker 1 (08:01):
Glad you said that because the path for Clemson, at
least on the surface, looks okay. Is Texas defense is
so damn good and it's going to maybe be one
of those sixteen to thirteen finals between a couple of
programs that value defense and might not do a lot
offensively from what we saw against Georgia for Texas, and
obviously Clemson's going to be up against it. But the
path there was following this game for the winner as

(08:22):
Arizona State, I wouldn't sleep on them. They've had a
dynamic year with Kenny Dillingham. It seems to me like,
and again you're the expert here, Dalton watsonman is not
really a team maybe other than Oregon. I'm looking at
and saying, man, they can't really be beat, and they
can still be beat. It's kind of wide open if
you're talking about it from the perspective of widening the
net and making it more of an NFL style tournament.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
Absolutely, that's why this playoff is going to be incredible.
I'm all in favor of it, and it's why I
hate the idea that you know some you know, there's
some teams and some programs and conferences that just go, well,
we're better because we're better proven on the field, then
let's go get in all team playoff. I don't You're
absolutely right. There's no one here that's invincible, even Oregon,
and I was at the game against Penn State this
past week. They have their flaws. I think, are they

(09:08):
the most well rounded team in the country for the moment, Sure,
and they may win the whole thing, but they are
not unbeatable. Nobody's unbeatable everybody. I could look at every
team in this playoff and go they have this issue specifically,
and I think when you talk about some of these
underdogs winning, Looksten, We're gonna see four games, and I'm
seeing right now, right around seven to ten point spreads
in favor of all the home teams in these games.

(09:29):
These are going to be tight games with an extra
week to prepare, with an extra week to get healthy,
a lot of really good football team, some great matchups.
I'm telling you between Tennessee Ohio State's gonna be a
great game. Notre Dame in Indiana's going to be spectacular.
I think, SMU, you can't sleep on them. And I'm
telling you right now, Clemson the X factor in that
game is going to be Queen Ears. Absolutely if Quiney

(09:50):
Rus plays fine, he doesn't turn the ball over. Yes,
Texas is more talented, but I'm on very shaky ground
with Queeny wars and the way that it's real hot
and cold and if he's old comes and absolutely has
a shot. So I think they're gonna be a bunch
of great football games played among these last twelve teams.

Speaker 1 (10:05):
I think on that note, they've been chasing Jinnings and
Leonora Sellers around for eight straight quarters. I'm not saying
yours is a treat at all. He can be a
very dynamic player, but I think they can be more
traditional with their rush and TJ. Parker has been wrecking
things left and right. It should be a great physical game.
Dalton Wasson and has you covered a PFF for all
the college playoff doings and of course the Bill Belichick

(10:27):
News follow PFF for much more on that. Hey, as
always try to get some sleep. We know it's a
busy time, man.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
Oh yeah, no, always busy, but you know what that
just comes with this time of year, no issue with it.
And then we just get then we jump right dive
head right first into the draft. So oh good, that's
all good.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
Hey, Doug, real quick. I was on the PFF draft
simulator last night because my son was arguing with me
about Will Johnson or Mason Graham for the Panthers were
already trade. These are the names you need to know
our mock draft seasons around the corner, and I saw
Will Johnson committing and so I went ahead and nabbed him.
But I did make a trade for Garrett Wilson. You
might want to tweak the You don't want to tweak

(11:03):
the trade parameters because I fleeced the Jets.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
We'll see it. Listen. Apparently it wouldn't be the first time.
And trust me, I'll tell you what you had Garrett
Wilson into. How the Panthers are playing offense right now,
It's not that's the worst idea I've ever heard.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
It's the big Sam Darnold, Joe Douglas payback. That's what
it was. Dalton will see.

Speaker 2 (11:21):
But yeah, take it easy yet, there he goes

Speaker 1 (11:25):
Dalton Watson in PFF dot Com