Speaker 1: Well, John, we may have to readjust that countdown intro music.
Speaker 1: I'm like falling asleep here.
Speaker 2: That's not what I remember from the good old stream
Speaker 2: Yard archives.
Speaker 1: Well, John and I were just joking. I said, I
Speaker 1: we don't do this ever. So I think it's been
Speaker 1: sixty five days since we podcast.
Speaker 3: So I come on stream Yard.
Speaker 1: Everything's different, but truly because I do listen to my
Speaker 1: cracking podcast, and they had started using that. Oh maybe
Speaker 1: they've gone in and tweet because I everyone uses the
Speaker 1: default just like right, I go, wow, there really were
Speaker 1: no I guess Streamyard decided all of that.
Speaker 3: Well, we are back here.
Speaker 1: Jenna's checking in, everyone saying hi, John, we are here
Speaker 1: the week of the UFL kickoff Monday.
Speaker 3: This week.
Speaker 1: We'll get to all of that. Paraffina will be stopping
Speaker 1: by soon. John's on here today, making time during his workday.
Speaker 4: Whoa, here we are week.
Speaker 3: Of week of kickoff.
Speaker 4: John.
Speaker 1: Let's just check in, say hi, how are you? And
Speaker 1: then we'll kind of set the scene here.
Speaker 2: I'm good man, I'm excited about this week. You know,
Speaker 2: it's finally here. It feels like we've been talking about
Speaker 2: it forever. I have some concerns about Friday night that
Speaker 2: we'll talk about. But I'm really looking forward to what
Speaker 2: this season holds. You know, we've talked before about if
Speaker 2: this is a make or break season.
Speaker 5: I think I was.
Speaker 4: I was on that.
Speaker 2: I was kind of on that train that this is
Speaker 2: a make a break season. But I also think it's
Speaker 2: maybe it's more of a pivotal season. And I think,
Speaker 2: and what I mean by that is, let you know,
Speaker 2: maybe if you know this season is, you know, the
Speaker 2: equal ratings and equal ticket sales and everything, then that's
Speaker 2: not necessarily a bad sign. I know they want to
Speaker 2: see growth, but you know, as as they say, we'll
Speaker 2: take it one week at a time and see what
Speaker 2: goes on here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so normally we would be generally I go live
Speaker 1: kind of the day of the game, or we'll kind
Speaker 1: of do all that stuff the Friday. This year makes
Speaker 1: it challenging MLB Opening Day, isn't that? So this is
Speaker 1: kind of that this year. John and I are doing
Speaker 1: the best we can. That's probably we have Monday this week.
Speaker 1: John and I's goal is weekly recaps following the games
Speaker 1: this week or excuse me, games this season. Maybe Tuesdays
Speaker 1: we can get Mike's ratings in there. We'll figure that out,
Speaker 1: but we're doing the.
Speaker 3: Best we can. Pat's been traveling for work.
Speaker 1: I was gone to I was at spring training, and
Speaker 1: then I was out in Minneapolis and then Toronto. Watched
Speaker 1: some fun hockey games, got to go see some other
Speaker 1: stuff and kind of participate, and that I think kind
Speaker 1: us some meet and greets with some of the podcasts
Speaker 1: we listen to, which I always think.
Speaker 3: It's exciting to kind of be on the other side
Speaker 3: of that.
Speaker 1: But anyway, so this is the best we're doing. Pala,
Speaker 1: come on here. So we're going to run down the
Speaker 1: Barlow stuff. We'll talk through all the Labor Strive stuff.
Speaker 1: We are going to preview the games. Pat was going
Speaker 1: to write an article surprising cuts and things from the UFL.
Speaker 1: We'll talk to the website here and all that, so
Speaker 1: we'll get to all the football stuff. But like and
Speaker 1: subscribe when we get to four thousand subscribers. We are
Speaker 1: giving away a couple Royal retros at custom jerseys. We've
Speaker 1: done that before. You can get a UFL one, you
Speaker 1: can get a CFL one. I've even done like a
Speaker 1: throwback XFL back for the away jerseys for the Dragons
Speaker 1: that they didn't have a chance to produce back in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, so like and subscribe, give a thumbs up
Speaker 1: on that. But I was going to tell John Is,
Speaker 1: I'm actually building a custom MLB Randy A Rose array
Speaker 1: and the Mariner jersey, and Dustin is able actually because
Speaker 1: they print everything you know to order and custom make.
Speaker 1: He was actually able to stitch me some custom numbering
Speaker 1: I need apply to another jersey. So even if like
Speaker 1: what do I need or that you get mean destined
Speaker 1: does baseball stuff on there? The season started, so anything
Speaker 1: checkout Royal Retros. John has his affiliate length. Do you
Speaker 1: want to give him that? Because I never did that?
Speaker 4: Do you want to give them that?
Speaker 2: I know you're above that, but I will say if
Speaker 2: you go to Royal Retros and you put in code
Speaker 2: JLSS at checkout, you get ten percent off your order.
Speaker 2: So thanks for the plug.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, no support John.
Speaker 1: John's going to be on here all season his channel,
Speaker 1: John Lewis Sports and then Pat with analyze and educate.
Speaker 1: We're all part of all football digests. We haven't had
Speaker 1: a stream since that. Hope everyone's enjoying that. That's been
Speaker 1: a little bit more of my speed right now. Traveling
Speaker 1: kind of being able to log in and manage the
Speaker 1: site as opposed to go in live. John, do you
Speaker 1: feel like, Okay, we're weak of kickoff here a hype level.
Speaker 3: I'm seeing a lot of March madness.
Speaker 1: I will talk through the DC Defender stuff, But how
Speaker 1: are you feeling right now? Because we haven't done a
Speaker 1: podcast in too much because they're really like there's things
Speaker 1: to talk about, But like, are John and I going
Speaker 1: to sit down for an hour to dice?
Speaker 4: You know?
Speaker 1: Obviously now the week of kickoff, I think we're here,
Speaker 1: But it's been weird that way it's been. I have
Speaker 1: felt very not knowing kind of as a fan. I
Speaker 1: haven't done this much on the media side this year.
Speaker 1: What have you made it of kind of the preseason?
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, there's you know, it's been. There's been little
Speaker 2: drips and drabs of news and that you know, tends
Speaker 2: to happen because there's just not a lot happening. You know,
Speaker 2: we get some some social media content through training camp,
Speaker 2: those kinds of things. I mean, the big news drops
Speaker 2: and we'll talk about it. You know, Reggie Barlow leaving
Speaker 2: UH DC Defenders to go to Tennessee State. Uh, there
Speaker 2: was some surprising cuts. You mentioned Pat's doing an article.
Speaker 2: I just had a video that came out yesterday kind
Speaker 2: of my one surprise for each team, And there were
Speaker 2: some surprising cuts that you know, I've just I couldn't
Speaker 2: you know, a few of them I just couldn't fathom.
Speaker 2: So I know there's always more to the story with
Speaker 2: some of these, uh, some of these cuts. But as
Speaker 2: far as I leading up to game, like, I'm excited
Speaker 2: about it, I've been watching a lot of March madness.
Speaker 2: So obviously on you know, CBS and True TV and
Speaker 2: t n T and TBS, you're not going to see
Speaker 2: any UFL content, But here and there, watching SportsCenter and
Speaker 2: some of the recap shows on ESPN, I've seen UFL ads.
Speaker 2: So I'm you know, really hoping that they kind of start,
Speaker 2: you know, rolling it out here this week because this
Speaker 2: is a big week for Fox and Disney and certainly
Speaker 2: for the league and all of us fans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just a quick note here Alex's Football buck Club.
Speaker 1: That's Rick here. Checking in websites great, Yeah, check out
Speaker 1: the website, allfootball dot Com. A little less news, a
Speaker 1: little bit more like the news happens. And then we
Speaker 1: have opinions and commentary on that. We have CFL stuff
Speaker 1: we'll be ramping up. I know Anthony is really kind
Speaker 1: of backbuilding a lot of that on his own. Tremendous
Speaker 1: sort from Anthony Miller there on that Pat's episodes go
Speaker 1: live there automatically when they go up, so this, John's
Speaker 1: and this will be on there. So but check out
Speaker 1: All Football dot Com and we're going to be doing
Speaker 1: more arena stuff. And just I kind of felt like
Speaker 1: everything had disappeared, right the UFL board had gone away
Speaker 1: and just the sports illustrated with that we were kind
Speaker 1: of being a part of, and I thought, well, we
Speaker 1: have all these writers and people that need to host,
Speaker 1: so that's kind of what it is.
Speaker 3: This is what we've built it.
Speaker 4: To so far.
Speaker 1: We have some premium articles on there as well, trying
Speaker 1: to build that membership, which has been pretty I mean,
Speaker 1: website self suspicion, so like it should be good that
Speaker 1: way in terms of pam for stuff.
Speaker 3: But anyway, it's been exciting. Check out All Football signed up.
Speaker 1: Mike's got some stuff Greg breaking down you know, UFO
Speaker 1: word books. Normally I would have plugged a lot more
Speaker 1: of that, but we we haven't had a chance to
Speaker 1: do that. Denzel's putting something in the chat here. I'm
Speaker 1: going to look at that in a minute, John, do
Speaker 1: you feel like the I guess let's start here, Let's
Speaker 1: get your immediate reactions to the DC Reggie Barlow stuff,
Speaker 1: and then we'll kind of move over from there. Came
Speaker 1: out over the weekend, right I think, you know, James
Speaker 1: had posted about it, and then I think Jake Russell
Speaker 1: had posted about it, and then DC came out they posted.
Speaker 3: I can't think it was yesterday.
Speaker 1: I've been running around that weekend thoughts to that here
Speaker 1: and then let me check out something else.
Speaker 2: Well, what I thought about it was I was very surprised.
Speaker 2: It's understandable. I don't know what his contract situation is
Speaker 2: with Tennessee State yet. I do know that Eddie George
Speaker 2: was making four hundred thousand dollars a year with another
Speaker 2: one hundred thousand dollars incentive claws at there are clauses,
Speaker 2: so what.
Speaker 4: The timing is terrible?
Speaker 2: Anthony Miller has a really good article up on All
Speaker 2: Football Digest right now about you know how this can
Speaker 2: work into the favor of some other assistant coaches that
Speaker 2: that maybe they you know, we've heard, like you know,
Speaker 2: Jared Horton and with aj Smith, like we thought they
Speaker 2: might be given a chance to be head coaches in
Speaker 2: some capacity or another. So with Shannon Harris stepping up,
Speaker 2: stepping up to be the interim head coach, I think
Speaker 2: that is you know, that's interesting and you don't want.
Speaker 3: To see Sean I've got more here, hang on.
Speaker 2: So I'm not going to say I don't want to
Speaker 2: see coach defections right now, but I have a feeling
Speaker 2: something's breaking right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Jans Larson here, Why isn't that can this stepping
Speaker 1: away from the show butes for multiple sources, two coaches
Speaker 1: now week of a week of the season. John, you
Speaker 1: have been on and involved. Candidly speaking, I haven't done
Speaker 1: this much of the media surrogate at this time, just
Speaker 1: time wise and everything else. John, you've been a part
Speaker 1: of a lot of the showboat stuff. Have you had
Speaker 1: any chance to interview a head coach or Jared Well,
Speaker 1: what do you make of this?
Speaker 3: It's pretty crazy?
Speaker 2: This I don't I don't understand. I mean, you never know,
Speaker 2: like what what situations are, what it could be, but uh, yeah,
Speaker 2: this is this is surprising. I have been in on
Speaker 2: you know, a few of the Memphis preseason availabilities. Talked
Speaker 2: with Ken wizen Hunt about you know, all kinds of
Speaker 2: different things, and he just seemed very you know, excited
Speaker 2: about trying to turn Memphis around. And he's been out
Speaker 2: in the community and you know and talked about all
Speaker 2: the community events.
Speaker 4: So I don't know what the story behind.
Speaker 2: This is, but this is this is tough because, as
Speaker 2: James points out in this tweet, he's the head coach
Speaker 2: and also the offensive coordinator. This is tough for a
Speaker 2: team that was really trying to turn things around this year.
Speaker 2: I have not gotten anything of official yet for Memphis,
Speaker 2: but I'm keeping an eye on it.
Speaker 5: Here.
Speaker 3: Let's bring Pat on. I think he is a guy
Speaker 3: out here, Pat pat clean shaven here.
Speaker 1: Let me get get let me get this here for
Speaker 1: a minute so we can see paths beautiful face on
Speaker 1: her back.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 1: You know this won't be breaking news all day. This
Speaker 1: will be a little bit more of the preview and everything.
Speaker 1: But Pat man pretty surprising here. Two coaches, We'll get
Speaker 1: your thoughts on DC. But what do you what do
Speaker 1: you make your Memphis is coming down?
Speaker 6: So literally, I just get out of a meeting just
Speaker 6: you know, gotta gotta check out the twitter.
Speaker 5: X whatever we call it, and I see this and and.
Speaker 6: I'm a venture capitalist, right, But then there's memes on
Speaker 6: the Instagram that always go late stage capitalism because of
Speaker 6: late stage capitalism.
Speaker 5: Personal opinion, don't really agree agree with that, but in
Speaker 5: this stage the meme is fitting. No bueno.
Speaker 6: I I don't know what's going on with coach Whiz.
Speaker 6: I don't you know, just like John, I'm on a
Speaker 6: couple of these Memphis show boats calls, but man, I
Speaker 6: I just form Memphis just not not great, not great.
Speaker 6: And obviously you have a little bit of a lack
Speaker 6: of transparency because you know, you got David Davis. David
Speaker 6: Davis is obviously like not in camp, gets cut and
Speaker 6: then we're all like and they're like, oh no, it's fine,
Speaker 6: he's coming back. And then you have, you know, they
Speaker 6: release Quentin Dormandy with all that stuff, and they bring
Speaker 6: in a young guy like Dresser Win, which are like
Speaker 6: that dressers in this league. But there's not a lot
Speaker 6: of transparency about that. And is it a league issue?
Speaker 6: Is it Memphis issue? I think it's kind of both. Personally, Yeah,
Speaker 6: it sounds like yeah, I'm sorry. It sounded like the
Speaker 6: day with Davis thing was an injury, some kind of
Speaker 6: injury deal. But it was really hard to figure out
Speaker 6: because when I saw the same thing, I'm like, there's no.
Speaker 4: Way they cut this guy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you're right that that was all that I
Speaker 2: thought was, you know the issue there, and you're in, Yeah,
Speaker 2: what DJP just said, they're just giving AFL vibes and
Speaker 2: that that's not a good thing.
Speaker 3: Well, and here's my question. I guess for both the
Speaker 3: it's different sides here.
Speaker 1: So the DC obviously more of a fan favorite team there,
Speaker 1: right and a little bit more of a culture didn't
Speaker 1: succeed as much last year. But DC they have an expectation, Okay,
Speaker 1: we want to have this team come in and compete
Speaker 1: and all that stuff. Memphis, on the other hand, has
Speaker 1: kind of been a dumpster fire since the expansion or
Speaker 1: relocation whatever here. Okay, we're going to bring in a
Speaker 1: new head coach oc kind of all that build this.
Speaker 1: Now you're losing that. I mean, both of these stings,
Speaker 1: both these stings from optics pat which one do you
Speaker 1: think is worse guy? Kind of from that football or
Speaker 1: optics wide And then we'll get to John oh Man.
Speaker 6: I I want to say, I want to say Memphis,
Speaker 6: because I am very blessed that I have a connection
Speaker 6: to Reggie Barlow that and not like a person like
Speaker 6: I know people who are in his circle. So it's
Speaker 6: not that I knew that Reggie was going to leave.
Speaker 6: I had an understanding that job offers have been extended
Speaker 6: to Reggie and he was looking for the right fit money.
Speaker 6: I don't know the specifics of it, but Reggie was
Speaker 6: definitely entertaining job offers with something else, like obviously love
Speaker 6: to be a coordinator at the NFL level, but you know,
Speaker 6: he's I don't want to say he's like a very
Speaker 6: sought after guy, but he's an extremely capable, like football coach,
Speaker 6: a good leader of men to where he did not
Speaker 6: have to do the DC Defenders. This was kind of
Speaker 6: like a side quest for him. From what I understand
Speaker 6: and have been told. I'm sad that he's going. I
Speaker 6: would have loved because I think they're like in the
Speaker 6: middle of springball right now. I was kind of hoping
Speaker 6: that they just kind of let him, Like, hey man,
Speaker 6: springball already started, so like just get here when you
Speaker 6: get here type thing. On the flip side as you
Speaker 6: were saying, Memphis has just not had it together for
Speaker 6: the last three years, and you're losing the offensive coordinator
Speaker 6: and the head coach of a team in transition a
Speaker 6: little bit bigger of a deal with Shannon Harris stepping
Speaker 6: up into that role for DC and keeping Kiss and Williams.
Speaker 6: There two grown men who have been football coaches and
Speaker 6: are you know, older gentlemen. All Harris has to worry
Speaker 6: about is just leading men. And while that's not an
Speaker 6: easy task, it's a lot easier to do that than
Speaker 6: worry about game plans. You can just raw raw your
Speaker 6: way and just have Kyson Williams do the scheme, and
Speaker 6: you're probably going to be in a good spot with
Speaker 6: Memphis with the lack of continuity, the lack of fans success,
Speaker 6: the lack of market identity, and now a lack of
Speaker 6: offensive scheme.
Speaker 5: I mean, is TJ Vin, are you gonna be the
Speaker 5: OC now?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 6: I don't think he's ever called plays even that gain
Speaker 6: and nothing against him. You learn when your feet are
Speaker 6: thrown to the fire. But there's a lot of concern
Speaker 6: there for a team that really hasn't had much success
Speaker 6: going back to its days as the Tampa Bay Bandits.
Speaker 3: One real quick joke here, John, and then we'll get
Speaker 3: to you on this.
Speaker 1: I just before I forget to make this joke, I
Speaker 1: Reggie Barlow updated his profile photo today. I said, I ready,
Speaker 1: that's way too soon, way too soon, Reggie.
Speaker 3: I mean, like you brother, like read the room here.
Speaker 3: But this is what I like.
Speaker 1: Obviously this is spring football, right John, And we joke
Speaker 1: about all this. But to me, and I was reading
Speaker 1: James's article kind of in the background here to see
Speaker 1: if there was any more details. It says he's stepping away,
Speaker 1: could be up to most of the season or part
Speaker 1: of the season stepping away versus the the Reggie Barlow
Speaker 1: stand down. But like this still is just horrible optics.
Speaker 1: Like even if you're right, coach Barlow, like you left
Speaker 1: the week before the season, Like I don't care that
Speaker 1: you took a better job, Like if that all you
Speaker 1: have is the low broom of men in all that way,
Speaker 1: I'm just curious, John, just come kind of from a
Speaker 1: from a personnel standpoint.
Speaker 2: Well, Pat brings up a good point at springball here,
Speaker 2: and I think you know, with the transfer portal in
Speaker 2: college sports, now you're recruiting all you're recruiting your own
Speaker 2: players all the time, and I think that if there
Speaker 2: were you know a lot of players tend to be
Speaker 2: on the fence, uh in any sport, in college sports,
Speaker 2: when their coach steps away, you know, he Eddie George
Speaker 2: might take some players with him.
Speaker 4: It happens.
Speaker 2: I mean, anyone who's watching March Madness, you're seeing some
Speaker 2: of these you know, new coaches who roll into the
Speaker 2: scene and they're having a run because they brought players
Speaker 2: from their you know, previous stop with them. Because of
Speaker 2: the transfer portal, you can just you know, you can
Speaker 2: play the next year. But so I think that's probably
Speaker 2: a big part of it is they they wanted to
Speaker 2: hire him and get him you know, in Nashville as
Speaker 2: soon as possible, because that's you know, that's what you're
Speaker 2: doing all the time. You're always recruiting your own, uh,
Speaker 2: your own players. And there, you know, now it's official
Speaker 2: with Ken Wesen Hunt. And yeah, the optics are bad.
Speaker 2: It feels like there's more to this story. So I'm
Speaker 2: not trying to throw Ken Wesden Hunt under the bus.
Speaker 2: There's some issue I think that's happening here and it's
Speaker 2: too bad. But because I really felt like this could
Speaker 2: have been a turnaround for Memphis. I thought the Showboats
Speaker 2: were poised to have like maybe the best turnaround.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 4: I know the bar was low.
Speaker 2: They only won a couple of games last year, but
Speaker 2: it felt like they were putting everything kind of in
Speaker 2: place to like, you know, like be a little better
Speaker 2: this year and they get out in the community. It's
Speaker 2: just this to me could like really just kind of
Speaker 2: wreak havoc on a already kind of struggling franchise and
Speaker 2: fan base.
Speaker 1: Pat, how do you think and then we'll transition here
Speaker 1: continuing on how do you think UFL management is in
Speaker 1: their mindset here today with both of these here in
Speaker 1: the span of seventy two hours.
Speaker 6: I think they're wishing they had a little bit of
Speaker 6: a time machine and just get it the Friday get
Speaker 6: kick off.
Speaker 5: You know good? I mean, what is it? There's some
Speaker 5: sort of.
Speaker 6: Saying, I'm I make it's you know, just kind of
Speaker 6: good football.
Speaker 5: Oh, character is you're a genius.
Speaker 6: If you're rich, you're you know, you're weird if you're poor,
Speaker 6: or something like that.
Speaker 5: If we go on the.
Speaker 6: Field and the football play is great, less.
Speaker 5: People will talk about it.
Speaker 6: I think they just they're just hoping to get the
Speaker 6: Friday kick it off, and then everyone starts like saying
Speaker 6: like you know, you know, Kumbaya and all that stuff,
Speaker 6: you know, and they do that, and they're like, hey, man, yeah,
Speaker 6: we've had some you know, hiccups along the way, but
Speaker 6: that was a pretty good game on Friday, you know,
Speaker 6: you know I and I I it just it sucks, man,
Speaker 6: Like this is this all just kind of sucks because
Speaker 6: you get a guy like Ken Wizenhunt who's at the
Speaker 6: end of his like coaching career, where now he just
Speaker 6: becomes a consultant and a analyst for a lot of
Speaker 6: bigger schools and whatnot, and you're like, oh, this guy
Speaker 6: can just kind of like, you know, coach football but
Speaker 6: really not be crazy invested. He's the guy that we
Speaker 6: might be able to keep around for two or three years.
Speaker 6: And it's unfortunate because he's not there right now. And
Speaker 6: I don't think we ever really got a question about Flip.
Speaker 6: I mean, Jeff Fisher did a one and done. You know,
Speaker 6: Kevin Sumlin the one and done, Larry Fedora won and done.
Speaker 6: I mean, you kind of want guys who are in
Speaker 6: their wade Phillips Era, who are like, I'm not really
Speaker 6: job searching, and you thought wizen Hunt was one of
Speaker 6: those guys. And it sucks because it's like, who do
Speaker 6: you who is your template to hire now? Like who
Speaker 6: is your avatar for your ideal candidate? And they don't
Speaker 6: have one because based off the last couple of years,
Speaker 6: it's been all jacked up. And you got Anthony Beck
Speaker 6: out there tweeting, you know, I also interviewed for the
Speaker 6: West Virginia General right, Like.
Speaker 2: It's interesting when you read the release here the quote
Speaker 2: from Darryl Johnson is it's a joint quote with with
Speaker 2: Russ Brandon and Daryl Johnson said, if and when Ken
Speaker 2: wes Quinn Ken wizen Hunt is ready to return to
Speaker 2: the UFL family, we will welcome him with open arms.
Speaker 2: So it sounds like there's something a little bit more
Speaker 2: behind the scenes that that's happening there with him personally.
Speaker 2: It does say for personal reasons.
Speaker 5: So the UFL family, not the Memphis show Boats family.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I don't I like your conspiracy theory there.
Speaker 2: Maybe there's something going on there, but I just, you know,
Speaker 2: I hope for for him. And there's some bio information
Speaker 2: I hope everything is okay with Ken wizen Hunt because
Speaker 2: he seems like again like you said, he's he's a
Speaker 2: guy who is uh. I thought he was going to
Speaker 2: come in there use that experience to kind of turn
Speaker 2: things around, and that that's a tough blow for UH.
Speaker 4: For for Memphis and the fans. Did they announce ye,
Speaker 4: Jim Turner, Yes, the line coach?
Speaker 5: Right?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Is that that was that from James's tweet? Or is
Speaker 3: that this is?
Speaker 2: This is in the release here it says Brandon and
Speaker 2: Johnson have named offensive line coach Jim Turner. So it's
Speaker 2: interesting that it that it was the CEO and the uh.
Speaker 1: The way I had it the way on my street.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you can see.
Speaker 3: I was like, I was like, what the heck does okay?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Jim turn So it says it. So it's interesting
Speaker 4: it wasn't the GM, it was the the league has
Speaker 4: named their head coach.
Speaker 5: There.
Speaker 1: Well, and this is gets to this and well, I
Speaker 1: want to transition to the labor strife here, Philip. I
Speaker 1: see your question. We'll talk opening weekend here in a
Speaker 1: little bit. I have it started. This is why and
Speaker 1: well to the labor strife. You know, when you have players,
Speaker 1: like we're going to sit out or whatever we leverage?
Speaker 1: Do you have two head coaches just walked out of
Speaker 1: the building the week up and and and obviously, like
Speaker 1: we said, we're presuming that Ken's situation is different, right,
Speaker 1: I think it's a little worst optics. You have Reggie
Speaker 1: Barrow and to take the job the week before. I
Speaker 1: understand why he did that. It's just all that stuff.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's why I never understand and they should.
Speaker 1: I mean, I support players getting what they want, but
Speaker 1: you don't have any leverage and that Pat, do you
Speaker 1: have updated thoughts on that as we transition?
Speaker 3: And then I do want to look we'll look matchups
Speaker 3: and talk actual teams here, I promise.
Speaker 5: Man.
Speaker 6: Literally, I get out of this meeting at like eleven
Speaker 6: fifty seven, and I think I might have said the
Speaker 6: word leverage about twenty seven thousand times. Leverage, leverage, leverage.
Speaker 6: People like guys and gals in do not understand when
Speaker 6: they are not in positions of power. And I'm going
Speaker 6: to come off like a corporate hill a little bit.
Speaker 6: When you are not in a position of power, you
Speaker 6: do not have say. And this is the thing is
Speaker 6: when they got rid of AJ McCarran. I personally feel
Speaker 6: they lost a lot of leverage because everyone knows who
Speaker 6: Aj McCarran is, and I think if he was leading
Speaker 6: the charge, a couple more people would listen because he
Speaker 6: had the financial backing and he also had the name
Speaker 6: recognition and the play on the field.
Speaker 5: This wasn't Matt McGloin going out there or Landry Gilbers.
Speaker 6: Statistically, AJ has been the best quarterback outside of Magoo's
Speaker 6: twenty twenty three, which you can technically argue in this league,
Speaker 6: and he had the brand. When you don't have let
Speaker 6: you don't have power realistically, And I think John you
Speaker 6: said this, you could get twenty four more quarterbacks and
Speaker 6: we're all still watching. There's plenty of other guys out there,
Speaker 6: and maybe would the quality of play go down a
Speaker 6: little bit? Possibly, I don't know, because the thing is
Speaker 6: if they all step out and you bring in some
Speaker 6: more more like you remove and replace the players, if
Speaker 6: they're all a little less skilled, they're all gonna look
Speaker 6: the same like as far as on the skill level,
Speaker 6: and we're still we're gonna be watching Division two, you know,
Speaker 6: Division two football, which is still some pretty good football
Speaker 6: to the average viewer, which ninety percent of people do
Speaker 6: not care. But there's so many guys who also went
Speaker 6: to big schools that are killing to get in this league,
Speaker 6: and they would do it. It's an unfortunate fact. And I
Speaker 6: wish these guys would also make one hundred and fifty
Speaker 6: grand plus and have the insurance, but they don't have leverage,
Speaker 6: and that we don't know what the p and ls are.
Speaker 3: It just it felt weird to me.
Speaker 1: And then John, I'll toss you we're and I was
Speaker 1: really the day it all came out, and I want
Speaker 1: to talk a little bit more about the optics of
Speaker 1: it before we move on. I just so many people
Speaker 1: on here, and I never even realized the fan kind
Speaker 1: of aspect of it before I got into this, Like
Speaker 1: people really love spring football and really love and obsessed
Speaker 1: and the players and we we we followed this and
Speaker 1: we follow them online and we DM them when we
Speaker 1: do all that, and it was it was crazy to
Speaker 1: me that it's the same with the CFL, where you
Speaker 1: have this connection with the fans and then I'm not
Speaker 1: a player, I'm not on the field, but as soon
Speaker 1: as they're like, well we don't feel that we you know,
Speaker 1: we need something, We're not gidding, and everyone said, we'll
Speaker 1: just shut up and play football.
Speaker 3: What do you do?
Speaker 1: Like it? Just? I think the truth lies there somewhere
Speaker 1: in the middle between, you know, the giving the players
Speaker 1: everything they want and then this thing with the fans.
Speaker 1: But it just seemed weird to It felt like a
Speaker 1: heel turned that way, like, well, now the players are
Speaker 1: the bad guys, like f the players, I want football
Speaker 1: and you go. I thought you were just like championing
Speaker 1: this guy with AI photo shops in jerseys and the offseason,
Speaker 1: and now you're saying so that to me was we
Speaker 1: I never get that because I have never been a
Speaker 1: professional athlete, you know, getting paid to do anything.
Speaker 3: So who am I to tell anyone what to do
Speaker 3: that way? John? What did you make of that? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think well, first of all, Pat, you brought up
Speaker 2: Quentin Dormandy, which leads me to we talked about like
Speaker 2: the top ten players, and I said, Lynn Bowden and
Speaker 2: Quentin Dormandy, we're gonna be in the top ten players
Speaker 2: before the end of the year, So please delete that video.
Speaker 4: That'd be great.
Speaker 2: But Pat brings up a good point about you know,
Speaker 2: we don't know what exactly what the what the profit
Speaker 2: and loss here is and what Pat and I had
Speaker 2: have conversations and read you and I have had these
Speaker 2: conversations too, is when you have a company, it's not
Speaker 2: you know, for Fox and Disney, this whole thing is
Speaker 2: a rounding era. They're they don't care about losing you know,
Speaker 2: you know, a whole ton of money.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 2: They don't want the headache of this though, if it
Speaker 2: if it came to that, if it came to some
Speaker 2: kind of player action where they walked out or something,
Speaker 2: because they could just say, you know enough, Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: it sucks, but listen, we're gonna have to move on
Speaker 2: and do something else. Especially when you have some something
Speaker 2: like Redbird Capital involved. They're not involved to lose money.
Speaker 2: They're involved, you know, you try to go for the
Speaker 2: long run here and and and try to make some money.
Speaker 2: So yeah, you talk about leverage, and that's that's just
Speaker 2: what I worry about. It's like, yes, the players need
Speaker 2: to be fairly compensated, and you know, and I don't
Speaker 2: know what else they wanted. I reached out to Quentin
Speaker 2: Dormandy trying to I just would have loved to have
Speaker 2: talked to him to say, like, please, please spell it
Speaker 2: out like what do you guys want, like in specifics,
Speaker 2: and like what is what's the league telling you? You know,
Speaker 2: we hear, we hear little, you know, some things here
Speaker 2: and there. But I would love to just one on
Speaker 2: one talk to one of these quarterbacks to just say,
Speaker 2: tell me what the conversations are, like, what do you
Speaker 2: guys want?
Speaker 4: And why is the league not given that to you?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I see a comment hear about Dormandy and the child
Speaker 1: unless you were on the field with him. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was absolved of everything back last you know, with
Speaker 1: it with the rule books and all that stuff.
Speaker 3: So I hate that.
Speaker 1: I hate that too, where you it's someone like a
Speaker 1: Pro Football Talk or whatever that the reports stuff last year,
Speaker 1: and then when that's all gets cleaned up, they never
Speaker 1: you know, no one ever sees the the correction as
Speaker 1: much as the original accusation.
Speaker 3: And then you you know, then you have this ball
Speaker 3: it that way. Pat has this helped?
Speaker 1: Obviously, the UFL has been in the in the spotlight
Speaker 1: here the last couple of weeks, I think more than
Speaker 1: it would have been.
Speaker 3: But when all you're getting.
Speaker 1: Is national coverage from Fox Office Sports and Mike Flourio
Speaker 1: talking about.
Speaker 3: How the league is going under?
Speaker 1: Is that helpful, pat, because this is I see this
Speaker 1: now being a thing. Last year we couldn't do anything
Speaker 1: because it was the late merger and all that, and
Speaker 1: I see this now, well, we had this labor strife
Speaker 1: and we had all these players streatening to walk out,
Speaker 1: and then we had like what were we supposed to do?
Speaker 1: Even though you know, players blogging out two weeks here
Speaker 1: doesn't have anything to do with the last six months.
Speaker 5: I think we'll find out on Friday.
Speaker 6: I think we'll find out based off the year long
Speaker 6: metrics of of of the viewership and everything like that.
Speaker 6: I think we'll find out in attendance and whatnot. But
Speaker 6: I think, you know what is it? All press is
Speaker 6: good press or something like that. So, I mean people
Speaker 6: are talking about it.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 6: It's like when people comment on a YouTube video that
Speaker 6: dislike it, you still watched engagement, Yeah, I mean, keep
Speaker 6: boosting that algorithm, cheach, you know. I I think I
Speaker 6: think it's I think we'll find out on Friday, And.
Speaker 5: I mean maybe battle Hawks.
Speaker 6: Stallions or battle Hawk's Renegades might have been a little
Speaker 6: bit better.
Speaker 5: Obviously we don't know what like availability is.
Speaker 6: But I mean, I mean I think I just once
Speaker 6: we get more data, I think we'll understand more about
Speaker 6: like kind of the temperature check of everything going on
Speaker 6: and how many people are going to be engaged. I
Speaker 6: don't know if it's like the echo chamber of social media,
Speaker 6: but I did see a bunch of accounts that I
Speaker 6: never followed before, like after the super Bowl that we're like, man,
Speaker 6: and the super Bowl was terrible, can't wait for the UFL.
Speaker 5: So I don't know if that was like the way
Speaker 5: it was last year.
Speaker 6: I thought the super Bowl and twenty three going into
Speaker 6: twenty four was a lot better. But I mean that's
Speaker 6: another conversation in itself personally of like how do we
Speaker 6: ride the engagement, especially from like a bad super Bowl
Speaker 6: to like football starve people while avoiding March madness, you know. Like,
Speaker 6: so it's a lot of minutia that I think we'll
Speaker 6: have data for in a couple In a couple of.
Speaker 1: Days, I'll get my shots at thoughts. If I could
Speaker 1: talk after John here, John go ahead.
Speaker 2: Uh no, I mean I agree with all that. I
Speaker 2: think that you know, we need to see some numbers
Speaker 2: here after the first week. We need to see like
Speaker 2: this is this is going to be a bit of
Speaker 2: a barometer of success for this first weekend. Although I'm
Speaker 2: almost willing to throw it out. That said, I mean,
Speaker 2: I'll talk on both sides of my mouth here. I'm
Speaker 2: almost willing to throw it out because, as you guys mentioned,
Speaker 2: and we're going against march madness.
Speaker 4: That's why I wish I know.
Speaker 2: That there are there are reasons for the way that
Speaker 2: they start these and the dates they start these. I
Speaker 2: really wish they would have waited at least a week
Speaker 2: to start to start the league. So you might be
Speaker 2: competing with the Elite eight or the Final four, but
Speaker 2: you would still like you can work your way in
Speaker 2: there with you know, the four games, so especially with
Speaker 2: a Friday night game. So that's but yeah, I think
Speaker 2: you make some really good points there. We need to
Speaker 2: see some numbers to start to just start to feel
Speaker 2: things out here.
Speaker 3: I'll be curious here.
Speaker 1: And Greg Parks has a great article up right now
Speaker 1: in All Football Digest if you want to check out
Speaker 1: kind of comparing the college football ratings on Friday with
Speaker 1: basketball and football and kind of what to expect from
Speaker 1: the UFL.
Speaker 3: I'm a little scared.
Speaker 1: I am one of the camp that the February start
Speaker 1: is the premiere time to do it.
Speaker 3: I think you get lost in a lot of this now.
Speaker 1: I think the UFL did better last season than we
Speaker 1: thought and doing this similar weekend, but you're fighting against
Speaker 1: MLB opening weekend. That's a little bit deluded now, just
Speaker 1: because they do like the Tokyo Series and all that
Speaker 1: the week before, but it's still opening for you know,
Speaker 1: ninety percent of the fan base. I just think it's
Speaker 1: hard in the March Mountains.
Speaker 3: I don't like that. Pat any other thoughts on kind of.
Speaker 1: The time of year, and then I'll pull up the
Speaker 1: schedule and we can talk kind of battle hawks for ROUGHNECKX.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I personally lean. I didn't like.
Speaker 6: I didn't dislike in theory the USFL timeline on except
Speaker 6: forty games in Birmingham isn't fun, which obviously it would
Speaker 6: be five, and then you can put those games at night.
Speaker 5: It'd be a little bit cooler.
Speaker 6: I didn't dislike it because now you kind of create
Speaker 6: your own like threshold. But in my optimal, perfect world,
Speaker 6: I do like February sixteenth or whatever the date is,
Speaker 6: to start the week after the Super Bowl. People, especially
Speaker 6: if they don't like, you know, Chiefs playing they can
Speaker 6: go into that. My biggest like argument for the for
Speaker 6: the for the earlier start was always rookie mini camps
Speaker 6: and getting those guys in the rookie mini camps because
Speaker 6: it creates content, it creates awareness to the NFL teams,
Speaker 6: and it creates guys in the signing cycle. So a
Speaker 6: lot of times this year I think we only saw
Speaker 6: two or three guys during the mid season get signed
Speaker 6: who were fresh, fresh players. If you get those guys
Speaker 6: in front of the scouts in the rookie mini camps
Speaker 6: in May and whatnot, those guys are in the rollodecks
Speaker 6: for these gms. And in twenty twenty three, I think
Speaker 6: the XFL had like almost ten guys signed who weren't
Speaker 6: in who weren't in camp, Like obviously AJ McCarron was one,
Speaker 6: but I mean he had a little bit of a resume.
Speaker 6: Drew Plitt was another guy, a couple specialists and whatnot.
Speaker 6: But these are all guys who were in rookie mini
Speaker 6: camps with teams that didn't go into training camp. But
Speaker 6: when the injuries mounted, there was some sort of data
Speaker 6: on these guys. So I will always lobby that the
Speaker 6: best pathway to advertisement is your product and the proof
Speaker 6: that your product is superior, which is these guys transitioning
Speaker 6: and making money in the NFL.
Speaker 2: That's what Michael hug Away I'm sorry read, but that's
Speaker 2: what Michael Hugues always said, who was the commissioner of
Speaker 2: the previous UFL. He always said spring football will never work,
Speaker 2: and that's why he ended up. One of the reasons
Speaker 2: that he left as commissioner because they wanted to move
Speaker 2: in the spring. A lot of people might not remember,
Speaker 2: but the other UFL that played in the mid two
Speaker 2: thousands and lasted actually for a few seasons, they played
Speaker 2: a fall schedule opposite. They didn't play against the NFL obviously,
Speaker 2: but they would play like Thursday, Friday, Saturday nights.
Speaker 4: And that's what he said.
Speaker 2: It was about getting these players in the cycle of
Speaker 2: the NFL because everybody knows that's where they want to go.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had I was going to pull up here,
Speaker 1: just the kind of the TV ratings and everything as
Speaker 1: we transition into the Friday night.
Speaker 3: I found this from Mike Mitchell back last year.
Speaker 1: On the Saturday one point one A, so that was
Speaker 1: the midday Saturday. They kickoff game on on ABC right
Speaker 1: or on excuse me on Fox, and then this year
Speaker 1: it will be on the ABC or no excuse me
Speaker 1: on Fox Friday Night. They did it back and forth
Speaker 1: with that with the championship That's where I was confused
Speaker 1: with that, and then the one point three nine hundred
Speaker 1: thousand on Sunday for that. You know, throw your estimations
Speaker 1: if you want, and they're kind of weird, thinking, John,
Speaker 1: where do you see that?
Speaker 3: Friday?
Speaker 1: I was pulling up Greg's article on you on All
Speaker 1: Football and we were talking. You know, it's kind of
Speaker 1: in the in the million range one point four in there.
Speaker 1: It's there's certainly a floor there you want to hit.
Speaker 1: In terms of the UFL, have you seen like have
Speaker 1: we I haven't been in a position to see any
Speaker 1: like UFL on Friday night commercials rolling out here? Have
Speaker 1: we seen any promotion or what are your thoughts on
Speaker 1: the Friday and then we'll talk about the game.
Speaker 2: Well, like I said, I've kind of been involved in
Speaker 2: March madness, so I haven't watched a lot of you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of Fox, so I don't know, but you know,
Speaker 2: showing what you know, Greg Parks had there, I really
Speaker 2: feel like, uh, it's I mean, and certainly they'll beat
Speaker 2: you know, there was like a Providence Saint John's basketball
Speaker 2: game there that went up against college football playoffs, which
Speaker 2: is like six hundred thousand or something like that. I
Speaker 2: just I really do think that they can match or
Speaker 2: exceed a lot of those. And this is something that
Speaker 2: we have all talked about. If Fox will really go
Speaker 2: in and it'll be interesting to you know, maybe we
Speaker 2: can see this week if they really really go in
Speaker 2: and try to promote this and make the Friday night
Speaker 2: thing a thing, make this game a thing, like they
Speaker 2: did so much promotion for SmackDown, and they did so
Speaker 2: much promotion for you know, for the Friday night college football.
Speaker 2: You know, I think that they can hit that that
Speaker 2: million number. So it'll be interesting to see that that
Speaker 2: That's the one game that I am really interested to
Speaker 2: see for a variety of reasons, one being that you know,
Speaker 2: that's the Friday night game on Fox, and that should
Speaker 2: be that should be like very possibly the largest rating
Speaker 2: that they're going to get the whole week, because it better.
Speaker 3: Be that's on that and then I'll respund their comment
Speaker 3: will go the game.
Speaker 6: I mean, yeah, I have no idea what to expect
Speaker 6: as far as as far as.
Speaker 5: Like ratings and whatnot.
Speaker 6: I'm I care, I care less about the ratings and
Speaker 6: more about the people in the stands right now. I
Speaker 6: don't know if that's the correct mentality to have. But
Speaker 6: I mean, if if they're pulling three million viewers, let's
Speaker 6: say arbitrary number, and six people are in the stands,
Speaker 6: doesn't matter.
Speaker 4: You know, like three million come back?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean like yeah, I mean like I'd like
Speaker 6: to get a one point five. I mean, I hope
Speaker 6: that you have the Saint Louis metro area is going
Speaker 6: to be a little bit engaged, you know. And I
Speaker 6: mean it is Fox and everything like that. I I've
Speaker 6: never been great at ratings and whatnot. I just I care.
Speaker 6: And once again, I'm not sure if this is the
Speaker 6: correct metric. I care more about butts in the seats
Speaker 6: versus how many people are putting it on passively.
Speaker 5: Yet you know, at a Buffalo Wild.
Speaker 1: Wings, Mike's DM and me he's driving. He goes, I
Speaker 1: wish I could call into the show right now, I said, Mike.
Speaker 1: I know Mike's running around doing aarons. It's okay, Like
Speaker 1: I just one quick thing on here. We did have
Speaker 1: a question, you know, and we talked about this all
Speaker 1: the time. Do you think the man stay not having
Speaker 1: West Coast teams have this country?
Speaker 3: Do you? I'm the same way.
Speaker 1: I mean, I was even at I was at the
Speaker 1: Mariners opening. We do like a fan fest, run the
Speaker 1: basis and everything yesterday and of course I went, but
Speaker 1: you know, and like we're talking with our baseball podcasts
Speaker 1: there because we listen and they're all like, you know,
Speaker 1: it's all I did Creator Economy and they're like, so like,
Speaker 1: what do you do again. I'm like, well, we used
Speaker 1: to have a team here, but we don't now. And
Speaker 1: then we kind of do you know, and they're like,
Speaker 1: so does anyone hear care. I'm like, well, not really,
Speaker 1: you know, It's just it's a hard thing when you
Speaker 1: don't have any team. It's just it's such a hard
Speaker 1: it's an impossibility for me to talk about with anyone.
Speaker 3: Because anyone I meet on a daily basis doesn't have a.
Speaker 1: Team that lives anywhere near them, So it's it's a
Speaker 1: really hard sell for me that way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I really thought and read I think you brought
Speaker 2: it up last year. One sign of success for this
Speaker 2: league would to have been to expand this year, even
Speaker 2: if it was two teams. I know they have kind
Speaker 2: of an expansion process in mind. Uh, but I really
Speaker 2: thought that and if they did, right, if they did it,
Speaker 2: it should involve West Coast because I think that's a
Speaker 2: good point that the poster made there was that it was,
Speaker 2: you know, just does it feel like you're shutting out
Speaker 2: half the country because they don't have a team in
Speaker 2: their region?
Speaker 4: I mean not even close.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Pat, we have peeve on both sideses. Yeah, people
Speaker 1: need to be in attendance. That's a look good for television, agreed.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean I mean yeah, we all heard that way.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we all heard the other side.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I mean it's just like it's also for like the
Speaker 6: the players, dude. Like I mean, I coached you know,
Speaker 6: an AIA football and like, you know, granted, our stadium
Speaker 6: is really awesome because it can make make it look
Speaker 6: a lot bigger than it really is. But like you know,
Speaker 6: you have some teams that have stands that are so
Speaker 6: big and it's like two thousand people there in ten thousand,
Speaker 6: ten thousand, you know person stadium. And I mean I
Speaker 6: think that's what makes DC so awesome, is that it's
Speaker 6: fifteen eighteen thousand dollars or thousand people and you get
Speaker 6: ten there and you're like, yo, sixty six percent capacity.
Speaker 6: You know, I mean what it wasn't It wasn't protective,
Speaker 6: But it was Legion Stadium that was in Birmingham that
Speaker 6: made it look really bad, right, Like, I know, it
Speaker 6: looked there was more people there, like not that they
Speaker 6: were selling out, but like it didn't look like five
Speaker 6: thousand people were there at a couple of their games
Speaker 6: at Legion. You put them in protective it made it
Speaker 6: look a lot better, Like I think I think the
Speaker 6: Liberty Bowl deals with that a lot.
Speaker 1: Uh, the DC, the Yeah, Audi Stadium, Audifield, wherever you
Speaker 1: want to call it.
Speaker 3: It's the best place to see anything. Ever. I would
Speaker 3: love to be able to Yeah, okay, cause the Mariners do.
Speaker 3: I do a.
Speaker 1: Capital swing and then we can also see something here
Speaker 1: in the spring. I don't know a couple of comments here,
Speaker 1: and I want to talk about the BattleHawks and kind
Speaker 1: of camp and all that stuff. One quick thing, ratings.
Speaker 1: It is going to be tough. It is WrestleMania season.
Speaker 1: WrestleMania is off a Fox. Obviously, the UFL has taken
Speaker 1: that over, but I will be at WrestleMania Vegas.
Speaker 3: I think about that.
Speaker 1: So I do think that that is bringing a lot
Speaker 1: of that leon here at football versus forgetting about football
Speaker 1: mainstream fans at all. It's all March madness, and they
Speaker 1: just real quick. And this isn't throwing reels and heels
Speaker 1: under the bus at all. I just this is just
Speaker 1: at its expansion. They put out a press release totally.
Speaker 1: But that's why when we do stuff like that, you
Speaker 1: always take it with a grain of salt. Because we
Speaker 1: had two head coaches walk out this week, So like, yes,
Speaker 1: the plan is to expand or kind of do all
Speaker 1: that stuff, but any of that stuff, yeah, and then
Speaker 1: chuck here.
Speaker 3: I wonder if developments will affect that. I think you need.
Speaker 3: I think all Darryl.
Speaker 1: Needs is like a hangnail or like a stub toe
Speaker 1: and be like, you know what, Like I got too
Speaker 1: much on my plate right now.
Speaker 3: We got to way to get until next year.
Speaker 1: Like, I think there really needs to be ideal situations
Speaker 1: for the UFL to kind of move forward.
Speaker 3: John, any thoughts on that or ELSEO, I'm gonna pull
Speaker 3: up the schedule.
Speaker 2: No, I would I would agree with all that and
Speaker 2: I think that again, to show success, to show that
Speaker 2: you're doing things, and to show that this is financially stable,
Speaker 2: you don't want to expand. If it's going to you know,
Speaker 2: it's going to kill you. We've seen too many spring
Speaker 2: leagues die because of that. But I would like to
Speaker 2: see two more teams next year, and I would hope
Speaker 2: that that's what we do see, assuming this league happens
Speaker 2: next year.
Speaker 3: Let me go in super quick.
Speaker 1: Philip was asking about ticket sales, and then I'm going
Speaker 1: to talk about the games. I promise here I have
Speaker 1: not done this this year because I do feel like
Speaker 1: this is somewhat of a fruitful venture to try to
Speaker 1: do this with the retails. So we're only selling Riot
Speaker 1: the lower bowl here, so so don't worry about that.
Speaker 1: Let's just see what like home field there you go,
Speaker 1: so that gives.
Speaker 3: You kind of a good view, if can you.
Speaker 1: Guys all see that right? So there is a lot
Speaker 1: of inventory available. So again, none of that above, it's
Speaker 1: just the stuff with the blue visitor side obviously less
Speaker 1: on that not looking gray. Again, I don't think Fox cares.
Speaker 1: I think they should care. I think that they care
Speaker 1: more about maintaining that that ratings on Friday night with
Speaker 1: that any quick reactions, Well.
Speaker 2: The I think the concern I was talking about earlier
Speaker 2: and maybe why there's tickets available right now. The forecast
Speaker 2: in Houston for Friday is an eighty four percent chance
Speaker 2: of thunderstorms, potential for heavy rainfall and then scattered thunderstorms
Speaker 2: that night. So to me, we talked about it before
Speaker 2: and we joked about you know, I kept saying, they're
Speaker 2: rolling the dice. They're rolling the dice. You're rolling the
Speaker 2: dice on weather, and you're also rolling the dice on
Speaker 2: a Houston Roughnecks crowd that didn't show up last year
Speaker 2: when they played at Rice Stadium. So are they going
Speaker 2: to show up, you know, this year when they're back
Speaker 2: in their their old home of TDECU, pat quick anything.
Speaker 6: I just wonder, I just want, I wonder if they how
Speaker 6: bad they messed up, if they did becoming the gamble
Speaker 6: Necks instead of the Roughnecks.
Speaker 3: Yep, alien of the family.
Speaker 5: I just I just I just wonder.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean I'd have to dig dig into, uh
Speaker 6: the metrics and everything like that, but I just you know,
Speaker 6: hindsight twenty twenty, I just wonder how much that matters.
Speaker 4: I think I don't. I think it does matter.
Speaker 2: I don't think it's it's it's even if it's just
Speaker 2: a little bit, you know, we're talking about a sport
Speaker 2: that is not you know, it's not the NFL. So
Speaker 2: even if it's a little bit, you know, for them.
Speaker 4: That's it's that's huge.
Speaker 2: And and you're right, it just I did. I'm sure
Speaker 2: there was some business decision behind it, but it seemed
Speaker 2: to me the gamblers had more of uh, I mean,
Speaker 2: historically certainly, but it just seemed to me like that
Speaker 2: was just more of a it was kind of to
Speaker 2: appease both sides.
Speaker 6: I kicked back on the historic I talked to Larson
Speaker 6: about this like two years ago. He was like, well,
Speaker 6: the gamblers have more historical I was like, name one
Speaker 6: other person other than Jim Kelly. Yeah, and and and
Speaker 6: it's it's it's nothing against you, it's nothing against anyone.
Speaker 5: It's just yeah, it's Jim Kelly, big deal.
Speaker 6: But like I mean, and it's it's it's anyone who
Speaker 6: says that it's like the gamblers had more historical prowis.
Speaker 6: It's like Mike Mitchell is seventy years old, bro, Like
Speaker 6: he remembers it.
Speaker 5: That's it.
Speaker 4: Hey, listen, I remember that. I remember them.
Speaker 5: Yeah, what do you? Yeah? Because you because that's also seventy.
Speaker 5: I thought you were twenty six.
Speaker 6: But like yeah, man, it's like and you know, going
Speaker 6: back to the alienation part, it's like, dude, they had
Speaker 6: six thousand people coming to their games or something like that.
Speaker 5: You alienate a thousand people, what is that? Like eighteen
Speaker 5: that's eighteen percent of your market?
Speaker 6: Dude, Like businesses shut down because of that.
Speaker 5: Homie.
Speaker 1: So just real quick, Leon here says, we all know
Speaker 1: football will be fine, but if a if a tree
Speaker 1: falls in the forest, this is my point, and we're
Speaker 1: gonna make John John Lewis is off a Twitter, but
Speaker 1: we're gonna to make.
Speaker 3: Him a burner just so he could get back in
Speaker 3: our group chat because I said this the other day.
Speaker 1: I said, so the Mariners just reveil and keep talking
Speaker 1: about this, but we just unveiled, Like all what did
Speaker 1: they do there? All right, they just unveiled all of
Speaker 1: their stuff. So we have like this new market. You know,
Speaker 1: we have a new Cup for the season, right like
Speaker 1: it's a new so the Cup and I go, the
Speaker 1: Mariners are the anti UFL because the Mariners cannot play
Speaker 1: baseball at all, but we can like market the baseball
Speaker 1: really well or the UFL. The football is and we've
Speaker 1: always said this, so football has never been the problem
Speaker 1: with the ufl' it's everything else around it.
Speaker 3: So like if the Mariner's.
Speaker 1: Sales staff could merge with that, that would be awesome.
Speaker 3: All right, let's go to this.
Speaker 1: John, you have been involved, and this will relate to
Speaker 1: our conversation.
Speaker 3: You're going into opening weekend?
Speaker 1: Have you felt as though you have been able to
Speaker 1: get a clear picture? And Pat, this goes for you
Speaker 1: as well of any of the teams. What's going on?
Speaker 3: John?
Speaker 1: I know you've been on the show Boats. I know,
Speaker 1: like I think some of these teams are more clear
Speaker 1: to us than not. I think Anthony Miller's done a
Speaker 1: good job with the Renegades. You can look at all
Speaker 1: of his write ups on football dot Com. Pat, have
Speaker 1: you with the battle Like you get what I'm saying here?
Speaker 1: Do we have a clear picture? I guess Pat will
Speaker 1: start with you. Any thoughts on the battle Hawks here
Speaker 1: facing Houston?
Speaker 4: What do we know?
Speaker 5: I mean? I've I know, I've talked to a couple
Speaker 5: of players.
Speaker 6: I think I've only done like one or two media calls,
Speaker 6: because you know, I have a real job and whatnot.
Speaker 6: And from what I'm understanding, it's a couple things tight
Speaker 6: to the chest. I knew some things about Isabella. I
Speaker 6: knew I know some things about some of the like
Speaker 6: the movement. As far as the offensive line, I've talked
Speaker 6: to some players regarding the offensive coordinator situation. Believe it
Speaker 6: or not, it's actually people are a little bit more
Speaker 6: a lot more excitement around Phil than normal than well,
Speaker 6: excuse me, not normal than expected. My biggest fear, and
Speaker 6: I wrote this in my article, was I didn't want
Speaker 6: it to be a Orlando Guardian situation with them bringing
Speaker 6: in Seneca and like having the QB like the QB
Speaker 6: offensive or QB coach because he actually has called plays
Speaker 6: and whatnot, be the like the woman in the red
Speaker 6: dress to where Phil has obviously been there, but like
Speaker 6: things aren't working very much relating to Robert Ford and
Speaker 6: Shane Matthews of twenty twenty three Guardians. So regardless, I'm
Speaker 6: really excited about, you know, all these weapons at Receiver.
Speaker 6: I know a lot of people will get hyped up
Speaker 6: about Isabella being released. From what I understanding, did not
Speaker 6: have the greatest of camp but the one that they
Speaker 6: release that really upsets me a little bit is Komoko Toure.
Speaker 6: And the reason why is because in twenty twenty four
Speaker 6: they bring in Peta tome Pano and a couple other
Speaker 6: pieces and Chris Garrett to up that pass rush. And
Speaker 6: guess how many more sacks they had from twenty twenty
Speaker 6: three to twenty twenty four. Yeah, zero, they stood at nineteen.
Speaker 4: Yeh.
Speaker 6: Tua comes into the UFL with twelve career NFL sacks,
Speaker 6: not the craziest number, but way more than anyone on
Speaker 6: this podcast and in these comments most like so like,
Speaker 6: my biggest question for Saint Louis is how are the
Speaker 6: tackles going to hold up? I think they did a
Speaker 6: good job of And I don't want to say this
Speaker 6: in jest of moving on from Vidal Alexander, but their
Speaker 6: tackles are a little bit older.
Speaker 5: They're both creeping up on thirty.
Speaker 6: I never have been a big fan of Jared Jones's
Speaker 6: smith's footwork.
Speaker 5: I think he's got great hands in great length.
Speaker 6: And I didn't think Jowan Bushwell Beattie was improved from
Speaker 6: twenty three to twenty four and what's that pass rush
Speaker 6: going to be. Donnie Abraham has done a great job
Speaker 6: of implementing a NASCAR package in which he's putting his
Speaker 6: edge rushers in the A gaps and they're taking and
Speaker 6: they're running what we call a heat front and whatnot,
Speaker 6: which they're the int Your rushers are a little bit wider.
Speaker 5: I love that, but I'm just.
Speaker 6: Not sure, like with how much better are we going
Speaker 6: to be in the past rush. I think the secondary
Speaker 6: will be fine. I just worry about their trenches a
Speaker 6: lot more. And I'm glad they're playing Houston because I
Speaker 6: think they.
Speaker 5: Can get away with not being air quote fine tuned.
Speaker 6: And I think I'll be a lot more excited for
Speaker 6: Week two Saint Louis than I will be Week one,
Speaker 6: because then I'll have an actual expectation for the rest
Speaker 6: of the season.
Speaker 1: John just general thoughts on you know, the return of
Speaker 1: Houston here and TJ and we've had thoughts on that,
Speaker 1: and I'm trying to look at rosters and we've been
Speaker 1: trying to track and I've made jokes too about you know,
Speaker 1: let's Fox Sports and who's on the There's not a
Speaker 1: lot of information to hear about this, which I always
Speaker 1: hope is going to change every training camp, and it's
Speaker 1: it's hard. I mean, Anthony Miller went to the Renegades practice.
Speaker 1: I think he said he was the.
Speaker 3: Only media there. You can't go, you know, cover if
Speaker 3: you want to do.
Speaker 1: I've seen some local report orders now or some naw
Speaker 1: you know, like local reporters doing that remote zoom staff.
Speaker 1: But it feels like it's been hard getting information now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean we're seeing a lot of you know,
Speaker 2: funny videos out of you know, on social media and
Speaker 2: that kind of thing. But as far as like you know,
Speaker 2: really going into you know, what personnel looks like, that
Speaker 2: kind of thing. I did have an opportunity to talk
Speaker 2: to Chris Peyton Jones and you know with the BattleHawks,
Speaker 2: and he said he felt like kind of you know,
Speaker 2: building on what Pat said there, he said he felt
Speaker 2: like they have been much more competitive in camp this
Speaker 2: year than maybe they were last year. And I mean
Speaker 2: it's showing right now. Saint Louis BattleHawks courting draft Kings
Speaker 2: are a touchdown favorite over Houston.
Speaker 4: So so somebody knows something.
Speaker 2: You know, the information is out there, we just don't know,
Speaker 2: you know, really, I would love to know more, Yes,
Speaker 2: we know Luis Perez, you know, probably look good in camp.
Speaker 2: And I you know, I've told you guys. Four of
Speaker 2: the teams have finally put me on their mailing list.
Speaker 2: The other four, I you know, and and the league itself,
Speaker 2: it's like, my it's it's a dust bend. I can't
Speaker 2: It's like I open my email and it's like tumbleweeds
Speaker 2: from some of these. So I mean, shout out to
Speaker 2: the ones who actually, do you know, send us, send
Speaker 2: us some things that we can learn about. And but yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean I don't know and that and going back
Speaker 2: to Pat's point and what Pat and I had talked
Speaker 2: about before. If you're if you're not going to promote
Speaker 2: your talent that much, these players don't have a lot
Speaker 2: of leverage to say, well, we're going to walk out
Speaker 2: because it feels like the league is saying, well, you know,
Speaker 2: we don't want you to do that, but also we're
Speaker 2: not really going to promote everyone and start telling these stories.
Speaker 4: Yet.
Speaker 2: Maybe this week changes that with with the game being
Speaker 2: on Fox and this is the first week, so maybe
Speaker 2: we'll start to see some roll out of that this week,
Speaker 2: I hope. So, I mean the funny videos and camp
Speaker 2: that's been fine, and it's good to see some social
Speaker 2: media presence. But you know, I think there's there are
Speaker 2: some of us out there, and I know we're the sickos,
Speaker 2: but we would like to know a little bit about,
Speaker 2: you know, what these teams look like.
Speaker 1: I know that they just pushed out the media I
Speaker 1: think it was the updated media portal today and we
Speaker 1: had a chance to look into any of that stuff
Speaker 1: he had that's that improved.
Speaker 2: H I looked at it earlier today. There's no there's
Speaker 2: no video on there. It's a lot you know yet
Speaker 2: that uh there's some photo well there's a there's a
Speaker 2: tab for photos. But when you earlier today, when I
Speaker 2: clicked that, it just took you to the Getty Images
Speaker 2: site and there's nothing there. So some of some of
Speaker 2: the links were still kind of four oh four's And
Speaker 2: I talked to somebody in the league earlier with one
Speaker 2: of the teams who said they're going to update the
Speaker 2: media portal so stand by, and they did today, but
Speaker 2: it's still not you know, and this is listen, I'm
Speaker 2: ninety nine percent of the people watching this don't care,
Speaker 2: but it's just it speaks to you know, what the
Speaker 2: league is right now.
Speaker 1: It does and it speaks to and we've always said
Speaker 1: this them not even necessarily knowing the audience and the
Speaker 1: people that want to and we'll see here as we
Speaker 1: approach Friday with injury reports and practice reports and who's playing.
Speaker 1: And once he starts like, that's the people you are
Speaker 1: trying to attract it and candidly, I've just given up.
Speaker 1: I've made such an effort last year, then that's I mean,
Speaker 1: and we haven't podcasted every you know, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: been what it's been in the labor stripe and all that,
Speaker 1: but I just I really used all of that energy
Speaker 1: last year, you know, the repeated email lings every week
Speaker 1: over the last couple of years, and yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: even get all the things from everybody who know what's
Speaker 1: going on. And it seems like that to me is
Speaker 1: the easy stuff. And be updating that. Let's get some
Speaker 1: can we get some simulated depth charts up so people
Speaker 1: can start doing this and how yeah, how the hell
Speaker 1: are you putt in Saint Louis Is it's just based
Speaker 1: on last year?
Speaker 3: Pat? Is that what you can make of that?
Speaker 1: Is it just well, the roughnecks were asked last year,
Speaker 1: so they're probably gonna lose that. I don't even know
Speaker 1: how these DraftKings formulate that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean I think that's part of it.
Speaker 6: I mean I knew for a fact that DraftKings guys
Speaker 6: aren't getting more info. I think they're just going off
Speaker 6: the roster and being like, yeah, they're not that good.
Speaker 6: But I was thinking about this. By the way, is
Speaker 6: with the coaching turmoil.
Speaker 5: Is like C. J. Johnson kind of like air quotes
Speaker 5: safe because.
Speaker 6: It's like it's like, you know, you you have that
Speaker 6: guy at is that guy at work who's like, I
Speaker 6: just need to be not the worst guy here. Like,
Speaker 6: but I like like that's it's kind of just like
Speaker 6: the Will Smith meme a little bit where he's just like, like,
Speaker 6: where's everyone else like uf L u f L Daily
Speaker 6: or UFL Central whatever that is.
Speaker 5: Can you make that meme? It's not me? By the way,
Speaker 5: I've been accused.
Speaker 3: I do like that. Yeah, I do, Like I don't
Speaker 3: know who.
Speaker 1: I like that we have kind of our little centael
Speaker 1: now account.
Speaker 5: I love it.
Speaker 3: That's how you.
Speaker 1: Really know that you're you're doing all that. Just a
Speaker 1: couple of comments here reels and heels. They're talking about
Speaker 1: Brahma's doing so I hanging out and I can't. I
Speaker 1: can do that here showing up the Pear. I love
Speaker 1: the Pearl in San Antonio. That's a freaking sweet spot.
Speaker 1: So that would be awesome to get together for that. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: that's good. Thoughts on the on the rest of the
Speaker 1: matchups here, I mean, we don't have super deep die
Speaker 1: but you know Arlington hosting the Bramas Bramas favorited there.
Speaker 1: Do you have any thoughts on that? John, and kind
Speaker 1: of the big Saturday I guess that would be the
Speaker 1: standalone Saturday matchup at one o'clock?
Speaker 3: Is that?
Speaker 4: Well? Uh yeah, I do like that.
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, it's four o'clock Eastern time, and you know
Speaker 2: it's on Fox on a Saturday afternoon. You know, Arlington,
Speaker 2: which is the headquarters of the UFL. You got to
Speaker 2: hope that, you know, there's a good turnout for that
Speaker 2: and the optics are there. Yeah, let's see what Brama's
Speaker 2: three point favorites right now? I mean, again, how do
Speaker 2: we know? But DraftKings says that's what it is. Yeah,
Speaker 2: this should be you know, Now, obviously Friday is the
Speaker 2: is the marquee game, but that's Saturday afternoon game at one. Now,
Speaker 2: I don't know there's I'm sure there's basketball on at
Speaker 2: that time too, or should be. I guess I haven't
Speaker 2: looked at it, even looked at the schedule yet, but
Speaker 2: you'll have your Thursday winners playing sometimes Saturday.
Speaker 4: And in the UH and then Sunday, which.
Speaker 2: Though that's noon in three o'clock, it is probably the
Speaker 2: same way I should have had my I'll have to
Speaker 2: get right now, Okay, So yeah, I mean there are
Speaker 2: opportunities here. You know, we can plain so much about uh,
Speaker 2: you know, last year and the year before with the
Speaker 2: f S ones and the ESPN twos and all that,
Speaker 2: we don't have.
Speaker 4: We don't have a lot of that.
Speaker 2: So it's awesome to see on the first week Fox, Fox, ESPN, ESPN.
Speaker 1: It's not even on, it's not even showing up on
Speaker 1: my Fubo right now, I'm trying to see one o'clock.
Speaker 1: There we go, So one o'clock it's going out, and
Speaker 1: then what's the Mark Schmand that's on tn T and
Speaker 1: all that. I'll yeah, so you're going up against yeah,
Speaker 1: directed regional finals, both those on ESPN. You Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know, they did decent last year going up the
Speaker 1: head against the Athletics at the Mariners.
Speaker 2: John so well, I get it, Like, so Friday Eastern time,
Speaker 2: So that game Friday is at eight o'clock Eastern. At
Speaker 2: seven o'clock, you've got on Friday seven eastern time, You've
Speaker 2: got yeah, you've got you know, you've got actually Ole
Speaker 2: miss Michigan State, Kentucky, Tennessee. It's in the seven o'clock hour,
Speaker 2: and then the late games in nine thirty and ten
Speaker 2: or Michigan, Auburn, Purdue Houston. So you got two number
Speaker 2: one seeds that are playing in that late window. So
Speaker 2: that's why I say, like this this should be I
Speaker 2: almost want to throw it out, but I also want
Speaker 2: to say, like, this is your first Friday night, Friday
Speaker 2: night game, so you've got to make this kind of
Speaker 2: a market marquee thing.
Speaker 3: Pat thoughts Renegades here.
Speaker 1: Anthony's had a lot of coverage at PRES and all
Speaker 1: that I saw. He had some comments this week talking
Speaker 1: about the development the important is string football, and Mike
Speaker 1: was going with people just not going out but just
Speaker 1: you know, trying to build up all of this. How
Speaker 1: do we feel about the Renegades, How do we feel
Speaker 1: about Perez. How do you feel about and it feels
Speaker 1: like we're kind of rolling this out now a third
Speaker 1: time with that, What do you make of the Reneganes?
Speaker 6: I mean, I just talking like all the matchups, believe
Speaker 6: it or not, I think I think the marquee matchup
Speaker 6: of UH Saint Louis and Houston is actually the least
Speaker 6: attractive one.
Speaker 5: So I think, Yes, I think everyone.
Speaker 6: Kind of not like and I don't say it in
Speaker 6: disrespect to the league. It's just like the BattleHawks should
Speaker 6: be Yeah, exactly, Leon. The BattleHawks should win this game.
Speaker 6: They should win by ten points or more. Yes, and
Speaker 6: they need to work out all their kings Arlington and
Speaker 6: San Antonio. Yeah, is exciting because we get to see
Speaker 6: Kellen Mond and we you know, could see if he's
Speaker 6: going to be you.
Speaker 4: Know, p J.
Speaker 5: Walker or is he going to be Aaron Murray.
Speaker 6: And I find that really awesome because my biggest complaint
Speaker 6: about quarterbacks in in pro football in general is get
Speaker 6: these guys out of Q be purgatory. Kyle Sloter, he
Speaker 6: was a guy who just practice squad, practice squad, you know,
Speaker 6: elevation never got the opportunity, did okay with the breakers,
Speaker 6: you know, was able to latch on for a couple
Speaker 6: of weeks in the NFL, got another chance with the.
Speaker 5: Renegades washed out.
Speaker 6: He's good like we had our opportunity, couldn't make the standard.
Speaker 6: Kellen Mond to me is in that mold. Also with
Speaker 6: the Louis Presning. He's launching his book I think on
Speaker 6: the twenty seventh or twenty eighth Thursday night.
Speaker 5: Zoom.
Speaker 4: I'm on it.
Speaker 5: I'm on it.
Speaker 4: He's gotten zoom that he's it's the whole event. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Oh, I haven't gotten my media invite.
Speaker 4: Oh it wasn't a media invite.
Speaker 5: I'm yeah, dude, he got it.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 4: Wow, it's a it's a it's a book event. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So you can buy the book, and I guess he's
Speaker 2: gonna talk. I would just I did sign up. The
Speaker 2: sign up was free. You're gonna have to buy book.
Speaker 3: I've met.
Speaker 1: I think we've had beers with Louis Prez's cousins both
Speaker 1: and in Choctaw, Texas life there, so I'll take that.
Speaker 1: I'm happy.
Speaker 6: I'm the biggest thing with the Renegades I'm curious about
Speaker 6: is how do they use Holton Ayler's or Luke Lennon
Speaker 6: to kind of elongate the effectiveness of Perez and shout
Speaker 6: out to Daveon Smith big money moves, just showing up
Speaker 6: when he felt like it.
Speaker 5: I love that for him.
Speaker 6: He's like, hey man, you know I got I got
Speaker 6: this consulting gig I'm doing.
Speaker 5: Probably I can't be there.
Speaker 6: Nor will I real real pumped for him to give
Speaker 6: it another go in the league. But yeah, I'm just
Speaker 6: curious to see how, you know, because Bob is like
Speaker 6: the best coach in this league and not from like
Speaker 6: the wins and loss, but like him and Wade, they're
Speaker 6: just two bros coaching ball, loving it, and I just,
Speaker 6: you know, I'm I'm curious to see, in a perfect
Speaker 6: utopia where the league lasts for ten more years, how
Speaker 6: do they integrate the next wave of these guys and
Speaker 6: whatnot to see if like they can actually build a
Speaker 6: true franchise, because I think Bob and Wade they're kind
Speaker 6: of the only ones who are thinking that far ahead
Speaker 6: because they they're gonna be all right if this thing goes,
Speaker 6: you know, could put in a year. So like, I like,
Speaker 6: I'm curious to see if they start integrating some of
Speaker 6: these younger guys and as Luis, I mean I don't
Speaker 6: personally think you launch a book with the intention of
Speaker 6: coming back another year.
Speaker 2: No, I agree, like this is this is the final
Speaker 2: chapter of the paperback. When it comes out, this will
Speaker 2: be Yeah, you know, I thought it was interesting back
Speaker 2: to the BattleHawks that they posted today, you know, are
Speaker 2: starting quarterbacks and it was starting quarterbacks. So I don't
Speaker 2: know that you can't have two starting quarterbacks. So uh
Speaker 2: it was you know, So that was I thought that
Speaker 2: was interesting that you know, everyone is starting to to
Speaker 2: show kind of their depth and who who's who's going
Speaker 2: to be playing quarterback and you had a you had
Speaker 2: a two for in the uh in the picture from
Speaker 2: Saint Louis. So yeah, it's sounds like they're going to
Speaker 2: try to be pretty creative on offense.
Speaker 6: I mean you can, you can do it against Houston.
Speaker 6: I can play quarterbacks, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: There it is Yeah, I think, uh yeah, I think
Speaker 2: the three here on the on the left of the
Speaker 2: screen could probably get in there and maybe complete a pass.
Speaker 1: Well, so here's my question here, as we like to
Speaker 1: these last two games and then there I wanted to
Speaker 1: do that. So this this Stallion's game, this might be
Speaker 1: a disaster, right because you have Birmingham coming in off
Speaker 1: the championship game here and then d C. Right, we
Speaker 1: have no coach, we have no OC. You know, we're
Speaker 1: we're kind of reeling that way. Uh the Memphis they
Speaker 1: might have been screwed kind of anyway.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm curious what you guys make of those two games
Speaker 1: where I think Birmingham probably was obviously going to be
Speaker 1: the favorite anyway, but especially now with the head coach.
Speaker 3: But Johnny Eddie thoughts on that, Yeah.
Speaker 2: I kind of wish this was switched around because if
Speaker 2: Michigan Memphis ends up just being an absolutely terrible game
Speaker 2: in a blowout, it gives you no lead in for
Speaker 2: the Birmingham and DC. Just from a TV perspective. I mean, again,
Speaker 2: the people want watching here. We're all sick, so we'll we'll,
Speaker 2: we'll watch it. It doesn't matter. But yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: I don't know, we see we see so often with
Speaker 2: a new coach steps in and you know, the players
Speaker 2: kind of end up playing for him. Uh So I
Speaker 2: don't know that. To me, Birmingham d C is a
Speaker 2: lot more maybe compelling maybe in my eyes than it
Speaker 2: is your guys eyes. But I just I really worry
Speaker 2: about that lead in because Michigan Memphis right now. I mean,
Speaker 2: you know, maybe the Memphis players step up to play
Speaker 2: for for Jim Turner. But also I don't know how
Speaker 2: much talent they had in the first place there, so
Speaker 2: it's it's hard to tell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what we're having comments here. Mike ge is
Speaker 1: chatting in this ye shots see Barlow leave.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, some of these teams might not have been great anyway,
Speaker 1: but certainly with all of this, Yeah, it'd be nice
Speaker 1: if you could have had the Memphis DC.
Speaker 3: Kind of the battle of the coach list teams. I
Speaker 3: would have liked that.
Speaker 1: That's on either of these, either of these other bats
Speaker 1: before we get out here.
Speaker 6: I think Memphis the Memphis game, it will be closer
Speaker 6: than we think. And then because there's talk about a
Speaker 6: dual QB system, and I think with those two guys
Speaker 6: getting comfortable, I do think Perkins is way better or
Speaker 6: excuse me, I say like maybe a gear or two
Speaker 6: above Ettling. I think either one of those guys obviously
Speaker 6: wins the game, but with them not being able to
Speaker 6: get into a system, whether it be are they going
Speaker 6: every series or are they going every quarter?
Speaker 5: And then whichever quarterback.
Speaker 6: That they lean towards for that second half or those
Speaker 6: second set of series and whatnot. That's when I think
Speaker 6: the kind of the continuity and whatnot getting together. That's
Speaker 6: when I could see that Memphis game looking into that
Speaker 6: thirty to thirty to fifteen, which yeah, it's only a
Speaker 6: two score difference, but it really was like Michigan kind
Speaker 6: of messing around a little bit, figuring out their kinks,
Speaker 6: and then exploding into the second half with DC with
Speaker 6: the continuity at coordinator, with Tayamu, a good offensive line,
Speaker 6: and good football players on that team. Very generic speak.
Speaker 6: I know, Shannon Harris just needs to not mess up.
Speaker 6: That's all he has to do. And like I said,
Speaker 6: it's he doesn't have to worry about the x's and
Speaker 6: o's to an extent.
Speaker 5: He just has to not mess up.
Speaker 6: He needs to lean on he needs the lean on
Speaker 6: his experience in his staff. There might be some issues
Speaker 6: because I know that they've lost their offensive line coach
Speaker 6: as well. I don't remember who they replaced it with,
Speaker 6: but you you have Fred Kais and Greg Williams.
Speaker 5: These are two smart, grown men. Use them.
Speaker 4: Well.
Speaker 2: Here's the question, though, do they have them, though, are
Speaker 2: they gonna stay on staff?
Speaker 4: I don't.
Speaker 2: I haven't seen if. Because there's some talk that Reggie
Speaker 2: Barlow was gonna take some coaches with him.
Speaker 6: Man, I so I will I will shoot I will
Speaker 6: shoot somebody at TACKS message about that because I I
Speaker 6: have had the privilege of talking to some Tennessee State people,
Speaker 6: and I will talk to my mentor about that and
Speaker 6: maybe have a breaking news thing. But I mean, yeah,
Speaker 6: I just I feel like that decision comes out tomorrow,
Speaker 6: like now, you know what I mean, Like like I
Speaker 6: have to look at what Tennessee State's doing springball wise.
Speaker 6: I was under the understanding that they started already, but
Speaker 6: you know, you just.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 6: Man, I feel like, if anything, he would have brought Shannon.
Speaker 6: Shannon's his guy, like he Shannon Harris is his guy.
Speaker 5: So it's like like.
Speaker 4: He might go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 5: He might leave after the season.
Speaker 6: Like it's not it's not a big deal to take
Speaker 6: a QB coach or OC after springball. There's going to
Speaker 6: be coaching changes throughout college football after springball because guys,
Speaker 6: just stuff happens, you know, it's a real reality of situation.
Speaker 6: I mean, guy from UCLA just went to UTPB within
Speaker 6: the week ago.
Speaker 5: You know, like there's been stuff with our staff as spring.
Speaker 6: Ball's going on, you know, and so like you know,
Speaker 6: and it's gonna continue to change. I believe a year
Speaker 6: or two ago, our offensive coordinator did spring ball with
Speaker 6: another college and then came to us.
Speaker 5: Like we lost our oc he went to another school.
Speaker 6: It happens. So granted's smaller level, but it happens all
Speaker 6: over the place. And if you go on FootballScoop dot com,
Speaker 6: job applications are out there every day and it's the
Speaker 6: greatest website out there.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was just gonna you know, what do you guys think?
Speaker 2: Was this Shannon Harris move? Maybe Reggie Barlow saying listen,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna leave try out this head coaching thing. This
Speaker 2: could be more of a of a resume builder than
Speaker 2: you coming, you know with me to Tennessee State.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's certainly not a not a bank account booster,
Speaker 1: so yes, but get your name on your resume as
Speaker 1: a head coach of a football team.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I mean helped Reggie Barlow, I mean he
Speaker 2: had been a head coach before, obviously.
Speaker 5: I don't think it helped.
Speaker 6: I think Reggie personally, I think Reggie Barlow was trying
Speaker 6: to make the jump from and I don't compare him
Speaker 6: to be enemy because there are two different human beings
Speaker 6: from a character standpoint, but I would say Barlow was
Speaker 6: trying to make the jump from college football coach to
Speaker 6: associate head coach at the NFL level, with hopes of
Speaker 6: getting to become a coordinator one day and then eventually,
Speaker 6: like Barlow, I think will be an NFL coordinator and
Speaker 6: then a NFL head coach before he leaves this Earth.
Speaker 5: I am one confidence on that. If that is what
Speaker 5: he wants to do.
Speaker 4: Seems like he's positioned for that. That's true.
Speaker 6: He is in a very good spot to where and
Speaker 6: he's got some connections to the pro level, played in
Speaker 6: the NFL. I think he has a Super Bowl ring,
Speaker 6: and he's got plenty of guys that are yeah that
Speaker 6: have Barlow.
Speaker 5: And I think Mike has told me this. Barlow has
Speaker 5: had position.
Speaker 6: Jobs to him, But I think the associate head coach
Speaker 6: position job is it not even money wise, but a
Speaker 6: status wise. That's what he needs to get the coordinator
Speaker 6: to do his time and then there. But if he
Speaker 6: crushes at Tennessee State, I mean they play in the
Speaker 6: o VC wins a couple of those. He could go
Speaker 6: to a Power four level. Power four guys have come
Speaker 6: from OVC schools.
Speaker 3: Anything else.
Speaker 1: I had a couple of comments, I'm gonna pull up
Speaker 1: here before we get out. Pat's got it out here in.
Speaker 3: A few minutes. And then I know, John, you got stuff. Well,
Speaker 3: it'll be good. This very is.
Speaker 2: This is my lunch break right now, So this is
Speaker 2: what that's good.
Speaker 1: I did think it was funny they posted this, you know,
Speaker 1: the Shannon Harris thing, and it's like just the most
Speaker 1: generic coach speaking the world, Like I want them to
Speaker 1: know we're going to be the team that plays.
Speaker 2: When I saw this, it reminded me of every college
Speaker 2: basketball media day that I covered in thirty years of television.
Speaker 2: We're gonna play up tempo this year. We're gonna do
Speaker 2: but I want the team to know.
Speaker 3: I want them to know when we step on the
Speaker 3: kind of team that we.
Speaker 4: Are one hundred percent.
Speaker 2: But I will give DC you know, it was probably
Speaker 2: good to get him, you know, instead of just pictures
Speaker 2: like get him talking and and here this is your
Speaker 2: new head coach that's gonna that's gonna be coaching this.
Speaker 4: Weekend, so I'll give him credit on that one for sure.
Speaker 3: Oh totally.
Speaker 1: I did see something about new jerseys coming out here,
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna see.
Speaker 3: If we can get that before we get out.
Speaker 1: Uh, pat Any, any thoughts on the Oh yeah, here
Speaker 1: we go.
Speaker 3: No here, let's do this here real quick. So we
Speaker 3: got under.
Speaker 1: Armor here, I'll look through here. Pat Any pouts on
Speaker 1: engineering coach speak.
Speaker 3: Let me get some decent to pull up.
Speaker 5: Oh dude, I love generic coach speak.
Speaker 6: You know what I always have to do with my
Speaker 6: kids is I always have to like, you know, it's
Speaker 6: I always gotta give some generic coach speak where it's like, yeah, man,
Speaker 6: you gotta drive your hands, keep your leverage and oh
Speaker 6: yeah man, like keep keeping this fight, you know, and
Speaker 6: low yeah. I mean my favorite thing is if you
Speaker 6: play for the name on the front, the.
Speaker 5: Name of the back will prosper.
Speaker 3: All right, here we go, so let me share this
Speaker 3: and this this website. But we got it here.
Speaker 1: I'm like, can we just like pull up the thing?
Speaker 1: So we have new under Armour stuff so you can
Speaker 1: buy like shirts ever. But they now have the jerseys
Speaker 1: on here, which I think, right fantastic because you get
Speaker 1: home on the ways of both, which we never got again.
Speaker 1: I can subscribe, get us up to four thousand subscribers.
Speaker 1: Dustin and Royal Retros will make you a custom one.
Speaker 1: I have a Dragons one from twenty twenty. That's awesome.
Speaker 1: I get complimented out all the time. But anyway, we
Speaker 1: have all these on here Birmingham. I still love the
Speaker 1: Roughnecks stuff. I think the roughnecks look really good, but
Speaker 1: you know, go check them out on there. Not a
Speaker 1: big fan of the one. It's a tough number to wear.
Speaker 1: I was really upset when Deebo Samuel decided to keep
Speaker 1: it one for the commanders. I was going to get
Speaker 1: a Devo nineteen John. I was going to get it
Speaker 1: like the Vapor Rush Nike Elite, you know, like the
Speaker 1: five hundred dollars. I was going to get that, but
Speaker 1: he didn't.
Speaker 4: He had a one.
Speaker 1: I said, well, I'm not going to do that anything else.
Speaker 1: Before we want to get out of here. Mike did
Speaker 1: have a comment that he's not seventy but he is.
Speaker 3: Where is he?
Speaker 1: I had it here. I had Mike's yeah, not seventy
Speaker 1: yet out there? Yeah, Mike with sarians and DMS in
Speaker 1: the group chat people very very shocked by that.
Speaker 3: So there you go. Anything else before we want to
Speaker 3: get out of here.
Speaker 2: John in the comments, Well, that brings up a good
Speaker 2: question though that maybe that's why in the release. I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm speculating here because it's what we do. But in
Speaker 2: the release it never said that Jim Monos the GM
Speaker 2: made this, made made this, you know, Jim Turner elevation.
Speaker 4: It was it was the league that did it.
Speaker 2: I just I just thought that was interesting and that
Speaker 2: Buell's right that under armour gear looks pretty awesome. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it looks good, and he's also right about that.
Speaker 3: Anyway, I've pad anything else real, No, I just.
Speaker 6: You know, really excited to see the Stallions, believe it
Speaker 6: or not, in the post Potter era. You know, I
Speaker 6: don't think this is like a legacy thing for Skip.
Speaker 6: I think, yeah, I'm a pretty big Skip Holtz fan,
Speaker 6: you know, just the love that his players have for
Speaker 6: him and whatnot. But I mean, I think my favorite
Speaker 6: part about the Stallions and a lot of people are like, oh,
Speaker 6: I'm sick of them winning, and I'm like, but it's
Speaker 6: really not them. It's a new group of guys and whatnot,
Speaker 6: and like I'm curious to see on the Magoo, Like
Speaker 6: how does Magoo look like in twenty twenty five? You know,
Speaker 6: like I still you know a lot of people don't
Speaker 6: realize like how many reps he's got in and whatnot,
Speaker 6: his perspective with the receiving and whatnot. So I'm just
Speaker 6: I'm really excited to see how Birmingham looks. I mean,
Speaker 6: that team is that team looks great. I mean Pother's
Speaker 6: not there anymore, but I think like eighty percent of
Speaker 6: those players are his, So I don't get mad when
Speaker 6: they repeat because it's not Pat Mahomes. I mean, they've
Speaker 6: won three different championships with three different qbs. I would
Speaker 6: even lobby a fourth because Matt Corral got them to
Speaker 6: the got them to the championship game against Michigan last year.
Speaker 5: And you know, I'm excited. I'm pumped for that game too.
Speaker 6: So I know we didn't talk about Birmingham too much,
Speaker 6: but I mean they are the standard.
Speaker 1: So we did I think our best kind of working
Speaker 1: through all this stuff. One quick thing on here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we already have the thing, Yo, Leon, who's number one?
Speaker 3: You can't do the number one?
Speaker 1: Just do just do twenty five, Like just do the
Speaker 1: year of the thing. If you can't, if you're only
Speaker 1: doing one number one looks terrible.
Speaker 3: But if you do. Look down here it's a pre order.
Speaker 1: They'll ship on April eighteenth, which is and again obviously
Speaker 1: it's not going to ship by the kickoffs this weekend,
Speaker 1: but like the season's done, I mean that's gonna be
Speaker 1: and the best, right, So like.
Speaker 3: Just just something to think about. I had.
Speaker 1: I wrote a horrendous email to WWE Shop about something
Speaker 1: because I ordered a on seeing the shirt that they canceled,
Speaker 1: and they said, so it took him, John, it took
Speaker 1: him three weeks to cancel my order. And then they go, oh,
Speaker 1: it's sold out. I go, well, everything's gone now and
Speaker 1: everything's markup and everything's bootleg. I go, okay, so what
Speaker 1: did I get from buying through the source anyway?
Speaker 3: So we have all that on there? Yeah, Boomer says,
Speaker 3: someone beat the Stallions.
Speaker 1: All right, we're gonna get out of here. So Pat's
Speaker 1: gonna go John and I gonna get out of here.
Speaker 1: You know, check out Pats Channel, I analyze and educate.
Speaker 1: All his episodes go on.
Speaker 3: All Football, Allfootball dot Com.
Speaker 1: And then John's John Willis Sports on there, John and
Speaker 1: I will look to be back every week at some
Speaker 1: point after the games. We'll talk through all that and
Speaker 1: figure out and we might have some special guests and stuff.
Speaker 3: But like, this is kind of where we're at now.
Speaker 1: If it's too like, if people got too much stuff
Speaker 1: going on, we do it when it works. If you
Speaker 1: like it, listen, please like it, subscribe. But I can't
Speaker 1: stress anymore. I spent four years trying to stress about
Speaker 1: all this stuff. So that's what we're gonna do. Pat
Speaker 1: anything from you, and then we'll go to John.
Speaker 3: We'll get up no guys.
Speaker 6: Obviously, like Reid said, my channel is to analyze and educate.
Speaker 6: I will probably be doing QB ranking videos, all that
Speaker 6: goofy stuff I've done for the last couple of years.
Speaker 6: Should have a showboats player on, might do a little
Speaker 6: fifteen minute video with them. Personal opinion to those I
Speaker 6: don't know how many people are watching this have tuned in.
Speaker 5: I usually we do pretty well with these type of things.
Speaker 6: But very grateful that we're able to continue to do
Speaker 6: this for twenty twenty five. And obviously, like this might
Speaker 6: sound a bit crass, but the more engagement, the more
Speaker 6: videos we do. If people don't like it, you know,
Speaker 6: we'll still probably do it, but just for Yeah, it's
Speaker 6: more just like hanging with the homies and type thing.
Speaker 6: But yeah, guys, you know, continue to get feedback and
Speaker 6: you know, obviously I think I think, you know, the
Speaker 6: more feedback we get and worst case he done, the
Speaker 6: CFL will continue.
Speaker 5: To do there a thing.
Speaker 6: But you know, we got a prep for when we
Speaker 6: get this real, right if the QFL is our next niche.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Pat and I We're always gonna work for the
Speaker 1: quality Football league here coming up in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3: Yeah, John, anything else from you.
Speaker 2: No, I had, Like I said earlier, shout out to
Speaker 2: Brian Stall, who's the PR director at Saint Louis, helped
Speaker 2: me get a you know, one on one with Chris
Speaker 2: Payton Jones, who has a great story.
Speaker 4: If you don't know it, I'm hoping to tell it
Speaker 4: this week.
Speaker 2: And I did not mean to put my handle on
Speaker 2: there twice, but it is at John Lewis Sports. If
Speaker 2: if I wants to check it out, and I do
Speaker 2: some I do some UFL stuff, you know, try to
Speaker 2: at least weekly and and you know I'll be on
Speaker 2: here with you read every week.
Speaker 4: We'll talk break down the games. I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 2: I'm cautiously optimistic, So I'm looking forward to this weekend
Speaker 2: and I you know.
Speaker 4: I'm pulling for this league. Man.
Speaker 2: It is so fun to watch and it's given these
Speaker 2: players so many chances. So looking forward to it.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I said, we're gonna do what we can in the
Speaker 1: in the in the way that we.
Speaker 3: Can in the time. But I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Check out Anthony's workover on allfootball dot Com and Pat's
Speaker 1: Got stuff and John's episodes. Everyone's kind of stuff and
Speaker 1: Mike and crag and should be fun. Give a thumbs up.
Speaker 3: I like everything, and we'll see you guys next time.
Speaker 3: Next