Speaker 1: All right, some breaking news that just dropped about five.
Speaker 2: Ten minutes ago. Tayshawn Lyons has re entered the transfer portal.
Speaker 1: Utah wide receiver Tashawn Lyons has re entered the transfer portal.
Speaker 1: If you recall, Tayshawn Lyons entered the transfer portal earlier
Speaker 1: this week and then withdrew his name after about a
Speaker 1: couple of hours in the portal. But according to twenty
Speaker 1: four to seven Sports, Tayshawn Lyons is now back in
Speaker 1: the transfer portal. Utah added a wide receiver yesterday from
Speaker 1: Utah State and Otto Tiya, So maybe that's one of
Speaker 1: the reasons Tayshawn bounced College football season, Bowl Season, CFP, Transfer.
Speaker 2: Portal and the like. With our buddy Kyle Bonagura on
Speaker 2: a Friday afternoon. Kyle, Happy Friday.
Speaker 3: How you doing, Bud, I'm gonna good sense are you?
Speaker 2: I'm well? I'm well? So how what?
Speaker 1: What did what did Christmas Day look like? In the
Speaker 1: bonne Guera Household out everything go? Did santacom everybody stay
Speaker 1: safe and have a good time?
Speaker 3: Yes, Santa made it safely down the chimney. One year
Speaker 3: old and a four year old uh all their dreams
Speaker 3: came true, So it was good Christmas.
Speaker 2: One and four.
Speaker 1: So you're you're in the thick of it, aren't you.
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that you are.
Speaker 2: You are in. That's a battleground zone every day, isn't it.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I just broke away from the battle right now because
Speaker 3: those you know, in between the holidays, everyone's off you
Speaker 3: preschool all that, so everyone's kind of running wild right now.
Speaker 3: So I got to escape to the back of the
Speaker 3: office to chat with.
Speaker 2: You right on. Well, I appreciate the time.
Speaker 1: Today, Let's just start with the silly dynamic that college
Speaker 1: football has.
Speaker 2: Free agency while the season is still going on.
Speaker 1: Like this is so dumb, uh, And there's so many
Speaker 1: dumb things right now about this great sport and this
Speaker 1: great product that we all love. But what what what
Speaker 1: are your what are your thoughts on the current situation
Speaker 1: that again essentially as free agency while the season is
Speaker 1: going on, and you know this can't last, This is untenable.
Speaker 1: This has to change, Kyle, doesn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah? I mean it definitely has to change. But you know,
Speaker 3: how did that? How did that happen? I don't know.
Speaker 3: I don't think I have like a fully fleshed out
Speaker 3: fix here, because I mean, this is really the problem
Speaker 3: that you have with teather professional sport education.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: You have semesters, you have quarters like guys portals, so
Speaker 3: they can roll in time. If it's a semester, it's different,
Speaker 3: it's a quarter. You've got the coaching changes happening during
Speaker 3: the seasons, so many moving pieces that like you can't
Speaker 3: just say, okay, do this one thing and that solves anything.
Speaker 3: Because with one fix, which is what the transfer portal was, right,
Speaker 3: it was a fix to allow these kids to have
Speaker 3: flexibility and all that that they that they should they
Speaker 3: have had. But with that fix became this madness that
Speaker 3: we're watching play out right now at the middle of
Speaker 3: the season. It's in between bowl games. It's you know,
Speaker 3: in the thick of you all, I should be on
Speaker 3: the ploffs right now, right Like in theory, it should
Speaker 3: be like the NFL where the portal opens at the
Speaker 3: end of at the end of the season, right, But
Speaker 3: for some of these teams, that means that your season's
Speaker 3: over and the last week in November, so that means
Speaker 3: you got to wait two months and then classes start.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean it's a it's a mess, and
Speaker 3: this is the result of kind of kicking the can
Speaker 3: down the road every time you were forced to do
Speaker 3: so by you know, the powers that be, you know
Speaker 3: the courts, right with all the lawsuits that have pushed
Speaker 3: for more rights. And you know, if if the NCAA
Speaker 3: would have like fully embraced where this has had a
Speaker 3: long time ago, you could have kind of be set
Speaker 3: and tried to design a system that could have taken
Speaker 3: this all intoccount. You know, nothing about the way that
Speaker 3: the organizition is ever acted makes me think that the
Speaker 3: level just blow it up. I'll just have one. It's
Speaker 3: going to be plugging holes in the sinking ship until
Speaker 3: we eventually are looking at something that's nothing like we
Speaker 3: see today.
Speaker 1: I wonder what your thoughts are on, you know, the
Speaker 1: past few weeks we're hearing, you know, the venture capitalist
Speaker 1: firms and private equity money are starting to kick the
Speaker 1: tires on purchasing portions of college football programs, and look,
Speaker 1: I don't know how that would work. I don't know
Speaker 1: the mechanisms on how to make that happen. If I did,
Speaker 1: I'd probably be a venture capitalist myself and not talking
Speaker 1: about sports for four hours every day on AM radio.
Speaker 1: There's got to be you know, involvement of course from
Speaker 1: local legislators in the state because several institutions are publicly owned,
Speaker 1: and then there are private institutions like BYU. You know,
Speaker 1: the model that we're hearing is there'll be private equity
Speaker 1: firms that are looking to purchase We'll just say Ohio
Speaker 1: State forty eight percent of Ohio State football and give
Speaker 1: them six seven hundred million dollars up front that Ohio
Speaker 1: State can then go use on nil endeavors to improve
Speaker 1: their facilities whatever they want.
Speaker 2: And then, of course the big.
Speaker 1: Payout for the vcs will come once the pro model
Speaker 1: is in place and that TV deal will shoot through
Speaker 1: the roof with the I don't know, the forty biggest
Speaker 1: brands in college football. The dynamic that we've all discussed
Speaker 1: over the past couple of years, if that comes.
Speaker 2: To be a reality, Kyle and I feel like it's
Speaker 2: going to.
Speaker 1: Is that a situation where, you know, the people that
Speaker 1: get together and spend hundreds of millions of dollars on
Speaker 1: purchasing percentages of these teams will then be able to
Speaker 1: put central leadership in place and we could have a
Speaker 1: Roger Goodell of college football and a central leadership office
Speaker 1: that can actually be forward thinking and see around corners
Speaker 1: and come up with solutions instead of reacting to problems.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I don't think you should have to
Speaker 3: go that far before you have someone who's kind of
Speaker 3: been a commissioner's share, and I think there's a clear
Speaker 3: need for that to be there already. But like, just
Speaker 3: like the structure of the sport makes all of it's
Speaker 3: all of it is so difficult to game out because
Speaker 3: of all the different variables in place, right, Because when
Speaker 3: you have these conference commissioners, like if you're the commissioner
Speaker 3: of the Big Ten or the SEC and you're in
Speaker 3: this powerful role, like you're probably out, you know, you're
Speaker 3: not trying to get that up right, So you're pushing
Speaker 3: back at every step to prevent something like that from happening.
Speaker 3: And that's kind of how we got here, right, is
Speaker 3: people trying and think on the power for you know,
Speaker 3: it's kind of human nature, I guess to a degree.
Speaker 3: But like I think like that prevents a lot of
Speaker 3: what you're talking about from happening. I think that the
Speaker 3: more you see control the outside parties, like the individuals
Speaker 3: that have to allow that to happen, Like it's not
Speaker 3: in their best interests. So I think you're gonna get
Speaker 3: all the push back there, and then you know, eventually
Speaker 3: there needs to be more tiers to this sport, right,
Speaker 3: Like FES as one hundred and thirty teams, Like it's
Speaker 3: a joke, right, there's not than thirty teams playing at
Speaker 3: the same level. So I think whether it's forty, whether
Speaker 3: it's whatever the number is, I think there probably should
Speaker 3: be three divisions within you know, within FBS. Right, there's
Speaker 3: so many different ways this could go. That's why, like
Speaker 3: I try not to like get too in the weeds
Speaker 3: with all this because it's it's just so hard to predict, right.
Speaker 3: I think it's like the idea of private acity, Like
Speaker 3: you understand that those talks are happening. There's a good
Speaker 3: chance that it does happen to some degree, but you
Speaker 3: know we're not there yet, right, and so to know
Speaker 3: exactly what it's going to look like, it's just so
Speaker 3: hard to understand. Like if this happens, then this will happen.
Speaker 3: If you push this button, then this lever drops, Right.
Speaker 3: There's just too much of that going on to have
Speaker 3: a great sense of what the sport's going to look like.
Speaker 3: When the new TV fields kind of are upper auction,
Speaker 3: so to speak.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about some actual football that has
Speaker 1: been played and will be played coming up. I wonder
Speaker 1: what your thoughts are, because I haven't spoke to you
Speaker 1: since we saw the first round of the CFP games
Speaker 1: played and duds ultimately in my opinion, and it led
Speaker 1: to wailing and nashing of teeth and angry people who
Speaker 1: cover the sport talking about, you know, no more auto bids,
Speaker 1: and look, I don't know how you could. You cannot,
Speaker 1: in my opinion at least, and obviously it's my opinion
Speaker 1: because I'm about to speak into the microphone, so I
Speaker 1: didn't really need to say that, But you cannot devalue
Speaker 1: the regular season in college football.
Speaker 2: You just can't do it, because it's what makes this
Speaker 2: sport great.
Speaker 1: That every week feels kind of like do or die
Speaker 1: for college football teams. And I do think you need
Speaker 1: to continue to find a way to value winning.
Speaker 2: Your conference as well. But I don't think like we're
Speaker 2: in the big twelve foot print.
Speaker 1: I don't think Arizona State should have had a first
Speaker 1: round by you know, and I can understand why people
Speaker 1: are upset that boyse got their first round by even
Speaker 1: though Boise had a great year and barely lost to
Speaker 1: Orgon the best team in the country.
Speaker 2: But I also can call it how it.
Speaker 1: Is, and you know, maybe these aren't one of the
Speaker 1: four best teams in college football. And ultimately, you know,
Speaker 1: should SMU have really been able to get in even
Speaker 1: though they.
Speaker 2: Played their conference championship game close? I don't know. I mean,
Speaker 2: like everything else, there are no easy fixes.
Speaker 1: But it seems like a lot of people that wanted
Speaker 1: the expanded twelve team format are now upset at this
Speaker 1: format too.
Speaker 2: So did the I guess the way, I'll ask the
Speaker 2: question long way to land the play?
Speaker 1: Did the first round CFP games change your opinion on
Speaker 1: what this sport should do to crown its national champ.
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 3: I actually think it's fine. Right, there's blots. There's gonna
Speaker 3: be blots. That's the sport. There was blots with four,
Speaker 3: there's bloods in the NFL, there's bloods in the final four,
Speaker 3: Like the national champion a few years ago was sixty
Speaker 3: five to seven, Right, So I think we just have
Speaker 3: to understand that whatever the format is going to look like,
Speaker 3: there's just going to be blotted. And yeah, there was
Speaker 3: there was, there was all of them that there were
Speaker 3: no competitive games this time, and that to this type
Speaker 3: of discussion, right, it's fair. It's kind of the natural
Speaker 3: way to go with it, like how do we make
Speaker 3: things better? But I think at the same time, like
Speaker 3: what we saw during the regular season this year, I
Speaker 3: thought was so much better because it kept everyone in
Speaker 3: the country relevant through the whole year. I mean, we
Speaker 3: have the whole country is still relevant. Right if you
Speaker 3: look at it, if you look at a map and
Speaker 3: you see where the teams are, like, those teams are
Speaker 3: a part of the conversation in college football, and that
Speaker 3: just was never the case during the four team right
Speaker 3: it was the Pac twelve was eliminated with three weeks
Speaker 3: to go, you know a few times, right, and that
Speaker 3: was just unhealthy for the sport before that, like the
Speaker 3: BCS with two like that was a joke to have
Speaker 3: just two teams played for it. Yeah, like it's those
Speaker 3: are probably the two best teams. But also you know
Speaker 3: then you know, I still want to see I still
Speaker 3: wanted to see these good matchups atin of the year,
Speaker 3: like this this round, right, if you look at it, right,
Speaker 3: Texas centers and say, all right, Arizona State one. It's conference.
Speaker 3: Let's let's do we can do against the two? You
Speaker 3: can do texts if you if you get blown out,
Speaker 3: at least we know you got blown out. And we
Speaker 3: just didn't decide it was going to be a blow
Speaker 3: up before the game took place. Right, We had a
Speaker 3: round of games on what was it like December twenty
Speaker 3: first was or is when when the games were right
Speaker 3: like most years, there's no college football that day, right,
Speaker 3: So are we saying that we'd rather just like not
Speaker 3: have these, like on paper, really good matchups. Yeah they were.
Speaker 3: They were blowouts, but like I'd rather be sitting in
Speaker 3: front of my TV on that day watching those games
Speaker 3: as opposed to like the gallery furniture, dot com bole
Speaker 3: or something else that doesn't really matter. Right, there's this
Speaker 3: This for me is has been a good format, And
Speaker 3: I don't think it's like the results of the first
Speaker 3: round in year one make me feel otherwise. And yeah,
Speaker 3: I think there's tweaking to do with seeding and buys
Speaker 3: and all that, but I think like where we're at
Speaker 3: is so much better than where we wore prefer that
Speaker 3: I'm kind of you know, I'm I'm okay looking over
Speaker 3: like these those uncompetitives men not competitve games in the
Speaker 3: first round.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I do agree with that.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm going to ask a long question, Kyle, and
Speaker 1: while I'm asking the question, I'll just ask and see
Speaker 1: if you can move around the house to get some
Speaker 1: better reception. And then I'm aware that you have to
Speaker 1: deal with two young girls as well, So let's kind
Speaker 1: of reset a little bit, see if you can get
Speaker 1: a better connection with Kyle. The next round will start
Speaker 1: on New Year's Eve. It's Penn State, Boise State, and
Speaker 1: then on Wednesday, the other three games will be played Texas,
Speaker 1: Arizona State, Ohio State, Oregon, and then Notre Dame Georgia
Speaker 1: the final game.
Speaker 2: So we'll get to those games in a moment.
Speaker 1: Kyle Bonnagura is our guest, don't forget coming up in
Speaker 1: about twenty minutes from right now. Richard Smith and Frank
Speaker 1: Layden live on site. So if you've never met the
Speaker 1: legendary Frank Layden and Smitty, they are the best people
Speaker 1: and they'd be happy to take pictures with you, shake
Speaker 1: your hands out here at Tim Dolly Southtown. Tim Dolly
Speaker 1: Nissan Southtown. So put that phone or excuse me, put
Speaker 1: that address in your phone and your GPS and follow
Speaker 1: it out here if you want to meet Frank. So
Speaker 1: we'll bring Kyle back on now. So Kyle from a
Speaker 1: local standpoint. Unfortunately, Utah of course not pull eligible, So
Speaker 1: we don't have a game to talk about with the Utes.
Speaker 2: The last time we had you on, I asked you about.
Speaker 1: Jason Beck and Devin damp here, So we won't go
Speaker 1: down that route. But the game that we do have,
Speaker 1: ironically enough, we're the home of the Utes, but we
Speaker 1: have the BYU Colorado.
Speaker 2: Game on our radio station.
Speaker 1: So it's tomorrow, it's five point thirty. Colorado's a three
Speaker 1: point five point favorite. These two teams landed in San
Speaker 1: Antonio on Tuesday, and you've done a number of pieces
Speaker 1: on Dion and Colorado, and obviously this will bring a
Speaker 1: massive amount of attention. I would imagine the rating is
Speaker 1: going to be super high. BYU is a massive brand
Speaker 1: on their own right, and then everybody watches coach Prime
Speaker 1: and Colorado is among the most watched teams in all
Speaker 1: of college football. Give me your thoughts on the Alamo
Speaker 1: Bowl tomorrow in San Antonio.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I think if you look at the like
Speaker 3: the slate of bowl games, non playoff games, it's probably
Speaker 3: the most interesting one. The fact that you have the
Speaker 3: heis and Trophy winner who's not sitting out. You have
Speaker 3: the potential number and overall pick in sure, George Sanders
Speaker 3: not sitting out. That's a pretty good starting point for
Speaker 3: you know, game that is involved in the playoff, right,
Speaker 3: And so that's that's pretty intriguing for what I understand.
Speaker 3: Buya hasn't hasn't really had many defections, although I haven't
Speaker 3: been keeping close tabs on that. But yeah, and the
Speaker 3: fact that they were, you know, in the same conference,
Speaker 3: tied for the tide for first place. It's kind of
Speaker 3: this consolation Big Twelve title game in a way, right
Speaker 3: They both team was finished seven and two in the conference,
Speaker 3: and you know, probably felt like they deserved a chance
Speaker 3: to play to get into the the playoffs. I'm excited
Speaker 3: to see this one. A few weeks ago, I went
Speaker 3: down to Provo, had a chance to sit down with
Speaker 3: with j Hill and just kind of talk about the
Speaker 3: season that he's been through, I mean, heart attack two
Speaker 3: days before the season opener and then kind of dealing
Speaker 3: with that. You kind of in recovery on a parallel
Speaker 3: path with the season. So I wrote about that. I've
Speaker 3: got a story publishing tomorrow. The BYO Pans will probably
Speaker 3: get a enjoy reading because that that story about what
Speaker 3: he's been through this year is pretty remarkable.
Speaker 1: Yeah. In fact, since we're in that space, let me
Speaker 1: follow up and without spoiling.
Speaker 2: It, because we want people to go read it.
Speaker 1: Jay is a friend of the show once upon a
Speaker 1: time up here and saw Lake obviously at Weber and
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people around here figured he
Speaker 1: would get a head coaching opportunity quickly, and that hasn't
Speaker 1: come to fruition yet. He's still very young. My guess
Speaker 1: is he's going to have a program to run on
Speaker 1: his own. Tremendous recruiter. It took a little bit for
Speaker 1: the new players to get used to his system, but
Speaker 1: year two under j Hill, that defense has.
Speaker 2: Been really good.
Speaker 1: So I would imagine that was the first opportunity you
Speaker 1: had to meet Jay and sit down with him.
Speaker 2: What were some of the main takeaways.
Speaker 1: What do you think makes makes him such an effective
Speaker 1: recruiter and defensive coordinator.
Speaker 3: Yeah, when you sit down with him, it's really just
Speaker 3: like the energy that he exudes is right off the bat, right,
Speaker 3: there is a kind of a comfort level that exists.
Speaker 3: I'm sure this is the case with almost anyone who
Speaker 3: sits down and starts talking. He's just like enjoyable to
Speaker 3: be around. He's got this kind of positive energy that
Speaker 3: you know, it really seeps into the team. I know,
Speaker 3: his his players. I talked to a few of them about,
Speaker 3: you know, just kind of the impact he's had in
Speaker 3: the program, and they rave about him in a way
Speaker 3: that you don't usually hear players talk about coaches like right,
Speaker 3: it's it's it was all also like very genuine, I guess,
Speaker 3: is what I'm saying. That they really believe in him
Speaker 3: as a coach, believe him as a person. And yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean, look, b Yu was one of the worst
Speaker 3: defenses in college football teeriears ago. This year, they were
Speaker 3: right there at the top in the Big Twelve and
Speaker 3: in every meaningful statistical category. So yeah, and that handsful,
Speaker 3: handsful Saturday with with Shador and Travis Hunter. So it's yeah,
Speaker 3: like I said before, it's it's about as good as
Speaker 3: you can hope for in a bowl game, given all
Speaker 3: the different factors that are taken away from those games.
Speaker 3: These days.
Speaker 1: All right, Kyle, before I start, you loose on a Friday,
Speaker 1: get you, get you back to the fam. I was
Speaker 1: thinking about this this morning. I feel like, from my
Speaker 1: advantage point, I feel like there have been moments watching
Speaker 1: Ohio State this year where I felt like that's the
Speaker 1: best team in the country.
Speaker 2: I feel like there are.
Speaker 1: Moments I've watched Oregon this year and feel like that's
Speaker 1: the best team in the country. I would say the
Speaker 1: same thing about Georgia. I'm not as high on Texas
Speaker 1: as most, but they're obviously really good. Of the remaining
Speaker 1: teams left, there eight teams left in the CFP, how
Speaker 1: many would you say qualify from your prism as potentially
Speaker 1: the best team left standing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so just going right down the list, you know,
Speaker 3: obviously Oregon and Ohio State both can can get there.
Speaker 3: I would remove Georgia actually, just you know, I have
Speaker 3: you're starting quarterback, you're gonna do it with the backup? Like,
Speaker 3: maybe it's possible, and I'll I'll be wrong in a
Speaker 3: couple weeks, but I just don't think that you can
Speaker 3: be confident in a team with this backup quarterback. Texas
Speaker 3: is right there, of course, and I thought notre Dame
Speaker 3: looked really good that in that playoff game too, So
Speaker 3: I think that's the that's the group I would sit with.
Speaker 3: I like, look, they're all all these are good teams,
Speaker 3: and you can like you can sing their praises, but look,
Speaker 3: Boyer State's not it's not gonna happen, Penn State, it's
Speaker 3: it's it's not gonna happen, at least I don't think so.
Speaker 3: In areas on a state again, great season, Kenny Dillingham,
Speaker 3: among the best coaching jobs in college football year. But
Speaker 3: they're just there's a there's tiers here, right, and that's
Speaker 3: not a team for me that has a chance to win.
Speaker 3: So those are the four that I think are in
Speaker 3: are have a shot, and I think that's like, that's
Speaker 3: what exciting about this field, right, Like you have four
Speaker 3: teams where you know you can be like I could
Speaker 3: probably be convinced of any of those four of of
Speaker 3: why they deserve to kind of be sitting in that
Speaker 3: in that chair at the end. So again, this is
Speaker 3: the for me, the playoff format is a good thing
Speaker 3: that we have all those teams still in the mix.
Speaker 2: Kyle, thank you, my friend.
Speaker 1: We'll let you get back to the fan happy holiday season,
Speaker 1: have a great new year, and we'll get you back
Speaker 1: on soon, all right, thanks