Speaker 1: It's time to celebrate the fringest team sport known to man.
We're modern day gladiators, collide for all the glory on
the Gridi. Let's talk some college football on Cougar Sports
with Ben Cridle.
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point three ESPN the Fan.
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We were behind the glass at each time for a
little college football on Cougar Sports. Signs some BYU, some
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Speaker 2: Let's get out to the hotline. Welcome in.
Speaker 3: Ari Tempkin, co host Big twelve Radio on the tune
in app.
Speaker 2: What's up? Ari? Are you there? Brother? I got you? Yeah?
Speaker 4: You there?
Speaker 2: H I got you now, loud and clear.
Speaker 3: Appreciate you joining me, all right, give us an update, man,
what's new with the Tempkin family.
Speaker 4: Appreciate you asking man. We actually happen to spend some
time during the New Year and Christmas around Delray Beach, Florida,
which worked out perfectly for the Orange Bowl. Nice so
got to go to the Orange Bowl, which was a
lot of fun right up until the game kicked off
and then yeah, no, it's I mean, I'm as same
with Ron, your producer on we were your producer. I'm
a Bears fan, grew up in Chicago, so super excited
about the Bears getting back in the playoffs. I'm ready
to be hurt again, Ben, I'm ready to be hurt again.
Speaker 2: I love it. Man.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you've had to You've had to stay silent for
too long.
Speaker 2: For so long.
Speaker 3: I mean, how how loud were you during like the
Jay Cutler era, Like there were some good times, right, yeah,
I mean how long have you been silent then?
Speaker 2: I mean it's been a minute.
Speaker 4: Historically, you know, the Bears have just they've been a franchise.
It's both of some of the best defensive players in
the in the history of the NFL, you know, and
and our friend Jim McMahon not was standing here. I mean,
Mike Singletary, Dick Bud Case, Brian or Locker, you know.
I mean, there's just an a you know, Ron Rivera,
just an insane amount of great defensive players. This year,
Caleb Williams was like twenty forty yard shy of setting
a record for the Bear Well, He's said a record
for a single season passing for the Bears this year,
but the Bears still have not had a four thousand
yard passer. Some franchises have had three or four four
thousand yard passers. The Bears have never had one. And
Caleb almost did it this year. So, I mean, offensively,
this is a I mean the Bears. This is the
best context I can give you on this, Ben. The
Bears finished top five in total offense this year for
the first time since nineteen seventy seven. Crazy Ben Johnson
was right higher. That's all I know.
Speaker 3: Shout out to Ben Johnson, and I know you and
Ronald you guys can celebrate once again and not be
so silent about your Chicago Bear. Speaking of Bears, BYU
got Bear Bachmeyer back in the fold, our favorite bear
here in Provo. I don't think there was any question
that he was coming back, but the fact that the
true freshman All American is coming back to b YU
to lead the Cougars into twenty twenty six, that's big
time right to be able to retain your quarterback this
day and age, after a tremendous season to start.
Speaker 4: Off well, and especially considering that you know, I mean,
he was a late addition to the roster he's in
Stanford and comes to BYU, and I mean it's huge,
you know. And I've been asked Ben already by a few,
you know, different people, like who's the favorites for next
year in the Big Twelve? And I mean, I think
you've got to start with the teams that finished towards
the top of the Big Twelve at the end of
last year, and and you know BYU obviously a part
of that. So I think with what BYU brings back
the biggest question, and it's you know, I mean, it's
it's crazy to think that the decision making by Mark
Harltan and Utah has led to some friendly fire here
from losing j Hill. That's going to be a huge loss.
And you know, I mean I love Kelly Papinga and
hopefully he's able to pick up right where Jay Hill
left off, but that obviously remains to be seen and
we'll see how how good this defense can be. But
I'm excited for BYU next year. You know, I've been
shouting from the rooftops something you and I have talked
a ton about, which is, you know, the the Southeastern Conference,
which you know is way more of a paper tiger
now than it used to be, had five bids the
College Football Playoff this year. They won three games. Two
of them came against itself when Alabama knocked off Oklahoma
and All missed then knocked off Alabama, and then the
other win was All miss beating Too Lane. So they
in last three years the SEC has had has gone
three and seven in the college football playoffs. Now that
everybody can pay players, the SEC no longer has their
own strategic advantage. And you know, I say all this
to say that the Big Twelve every year gets judged
on one football game. One. They play thousands of games
a year, the entire conference, and they're judged on one
football game. And meanwhile, the SEC somehow has you know,
continues to assert itself as a dominant dog in college football,
continues to prove that it shouldn't be. So, you know,
regardless of what Texas Tech did this year in terms
of you know, the Orange Bowl, Like, to me, this
only enhanced the notion that the Big Twelve should get
more bids. Aren't we sick and tired of watching the
same SEC teams lose and lay an egg every single
year in the college football playoffs? I mean, this is
not the Alabama that we used to know. This is
not the Georgia that we used to know. These are
not top dogs anymore. They look average and that's because
they are, and like I would have loved to see.
I know we talked about this leading up to it,
but like BYU should have gotten a bid now in retrospect,
because we've seen these same the same song advance every
year from the SEC. It's a joke that they continue
to get a pass.
Speaker 3: Do you remember the conversation we had at Big twelve
media days about the Big ten and specifically the SEC
and what they were doing with their scheduling, what they
were trying to do with their brand equity that they've
been built over the last thirtiies. You recall that combo
all that we had somewhat yeah, look this is the thing, Okay,
what they just want to play each other, right, this
is the thesis.
Speaker 2: That's all they want to do.
Speaker 3: Like that way they protect themselves because why over the
last twenty five years they've been the best conference.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: Nick Saban retires for a reason because he sees.
Speaker 2: The writing on the wall.
Speaker 3: The bagmen that built the SEC no longer make an
impact because everybody can have bagmen now and they just
want you to trust them, be like, hey, we have
a gauntlet, you know in the SEC. Because we've done
all this thing the last twenty five years, that brand
equity is no longer is powerful because everybody knows the reality.
They got the best clay, that the best talent because
they're paying players and doing what and Ordern said is,
you know, having the bagmen come through the back door.
Speaker 2: Now they can have him come through the front door.
Speaker 3: But they not as many are coming through the front
door in the SEC anymore.
Speaker 4: You're exactly right now that you bring it up. I
do remember a conversation about you, right, like the Big
ten and the SEC are trying to stack the deck.
And if I'm the Big Ten, I'm on the verge
of winning a third consecutive national championship. It would be
the third consecutive different team to win a national championship.
I don't need to partner with the SEC as much
as the SEC needs to partner with me. And like,
I think, you know, the last couple of years, you
could chalk it up to whatever excuses you wanted. This year,
it's so glaring, like it's beyond belief. The fact that
Bama would lay an egg like that and lose thirty
eight to three, and that after they knocked off Oklahoma
in their first Dround game. I mean, how about Miami
finishing third or fourth in the Atlantic Coast Conference and
going on the road against an A and M team
that was eleven and oh and holding A and M
to just three points. They're not just good and elites
because they say they are anymore. And I think, Ben,
to your point, like this year proves more than without
a shadow of a doubt, five teams is far too
many for one conference that believes it to be as
as alpha as it used to be, and it's certainly
more beta now than it's been in a long time.
Speaker 3: Ari Tempkin Big Twelve Insider here on ESPN the Fan
talking from college football. Where has your bandwidth been allocated
over the last week in regards to college football the
topics he'd been broaching.
Speaker 4: I mean the transfer portal, right, I mean, it's it's
so hot in terms of the movement. I mean, Texas
Tech is continuing to you know, bring in top level talent.
They've you know, they've gone fishing now within the Big Twelve.
They've landed Brendan Soresby, wh's, you know, one of the
highest paid players in college football. Next season, they added
Austin Romaine. It looks like they're on the the precipice
of adding the freshman stud pass rusher from Oklahoma State,
Wendel Gregory, who in his first career game had three
and a half sacks in a half, albeit against the
inferior opponent. But still, so, I mean, and it's not
just that. I mean they're just loading up, you know,
in watching the Orange Bowl then, I mean they were
so dom minute on defense, but they just could not
do anything on offense. And when they lose David Bailey,
when they lose Ramelo Height, when they lose some of
the guys that made that defense to elite, you know,
it's one thing to improve on offense, but they also
then have to improve improve on defense too, because they're
not getting those guys back that made them so elite
on defense. Jacob Rodriguez has gone, Romelo Height has gone,
David Bailey is gone, and so I think they needed
to re up on defense to make sure that they
don't take a step back on defense while keeping their
eyes on the prize because their offense was not good enough,
and they did. They are going to bring back their
three running backs. Quinton Joyner was the biggest name last
offseason when when they added him, and he missed the
entire season. So he, along with Dickey and Jacoby Williams
be back if they can, you know, aside from matting Soorsby,
and look, there's legitimate questions about Thoresby too and how
last couple of years have gone in terms of the
finish for Cincinnati. But if they can add that that
Auburn receiver who's a legit NFL wide receiver, they look
like they could be even better next year than they
were last year. So you know, look, I do think
a rising to I lists all boats of the Big Twelve.
You know, it's one thing for the Big Twelve to
lose talent to other conferences. So I think, you know,
even if k State fans or you know, Oklahoma State
fans or Cincinnati fans are upset the Tech is poaching
their players, I mean, I feel as a member of
the Big Twelve conference, I'd rather lose them internally than
lose them to the SEC or the Big Ten. And
it's good to see Tech spending on the level of
those teams, because remember, as much as we talk about
how much Tech spent Oregon, they who beat Tech spent
outspent them. I mean, it's funny how that wasn't even
brought up as part of the conversation. All anybody want
to talk about was how much Tech spent. So yeah,
I mean, the focus right now I think is full
on off season for the Big Twelve in terms of
the transfer portal, and then you know, as a huge
piece to that, just how horrible the schedule is. They
need to change the off season calendar. And I think
like there's two parts to this. There's the off season calendar,
which which again obviously needs to change, and then there's
the question of whether or not they need to change
the regular season calendar. And I don't think those two
need to necessarily go together. I think if they have
to this offseason change the calendar, we cannot have the
early signing period anymore. I think we go back to
the February signing period and that being the only one,
and the transfer portal opening up on January second is unbelievable.
That needs to also be follow the NFL's offseason calendar.
You go, February should be you're not your signing period,
then shortly after that the portal should open. Maybe that
changes what Springs Football looks like. Maybe it's more of
an OTA's I know, college football has to change the
name of things that it steals from the NFL, so
it probab with some different name, but it's basically what
it would be. And then you can look at all, right,
what are we doing in the regular season. Do we
move the season up a week? You know, Joey maguire
and Dan Lanning talked about, you know that they think
that this thing should be done by the start of
the new year, as opposed to playing playoff games here,
you know, the second week of the new year and
then into the following week for the championship. So I
don't think I think the two parts to this, like
you could change the off season. You must change the
off season because it's ridiculous what's going on right now
concurrently with the playoffs. And then I think you can
take a long, hard look at what changes might happen
to the regular season in terms of everybody starting a
week earlier or not, you know, whenever you gonna have
rivalry games, or you can have a conference championship games.
Will there be an expansion of the playoffs, Like, we
can't be prisoners of waiting for the regular season calendar
to change without changing the offseason calendar, because the offseason
calendar needs to be changed immediately.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I just wanted to build off this playoff discussion.
The Big Twelve has gotten one team in the last
two years of the twelve team playoff. The first year,
you could make an argument that it was understandable the
Big Twelve only gets one team in. But this year
you have Texas Tech and then a twelve or an
eleven and two BYU regular season, one lost team. What's
it gonna take for the Big twelve to get two
teams in? Or is this gonna to be in every
every year occurrence where we just see one team year
in year out.
Speaker 4: It's a great question. I mean, I think the number
one thing is continue to build consistency at the top.
And so two years ago, you know, when you see
an Arizona State team go and win the Big Twelve
kind of coming from nowhere, you know that does a
disservice to the narrative at large, which says that the
Big Twelve is kind of a mid mid tier league
and anybody can win it because it's a League of Parody.
So I think this year fixed that because now we
saw league become a lot more top heavy. There were
more dominant teams, and I expect those teams to stay
to a degree in dominance, specifically Texas Tech. I do
expect do Yu to be really good again next year,
but like Texas Tech is going to be at the
top of the conference again. And that's the litmus test.
Like when regardless of how good Texas or oh you
were on a year to year basis in the Big Twelve,
when they were in the Big Twelve, that was always
a litmus test. You could always say, oh, well they
were good because they beat that this team that's Tech
now and could potentially be BYU as well. Moving forward,
there needs to be more consistency at the top. And like, look,
perception is reality as unfair as it is, and perception
takes time to change, and the perception of the Big
twelve are now has not caught up with reality. The
League of Parody is the SEC's that's the mid league
right now, with just beating up in each other and
then showing up to the playoffs and laying an egg.
So the Big twelve is more top heavy than it's
been and I think it needs to continue to stay
that way, and certainly looks like Tech will once again
be a behemoth based on what they're doing in the portal.
And you know, and then like BYU, if you're stringing
together really good recruiting classes, like that's also a huge
key here.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 4: One of the things, guys, that I think is such
an important subplot to the final four here the semi
final games, is there's two teams right now that are
playing in the Final four, Indiana and ole Miss. They're
not blue chip ratio teams. So quick refresher teams that
have won national championships in the modern era have have
basically always had every single champion has had fifty percent
of their roster before five star recruits over a four
year period, every single champion. So there's two teams left
that are blue chip ratio teams and two they're not,
and they're both playing each other. You know, you've got
Oregon playing Indiana one, the blue ship ratio team on's
not in Ole Miss playing Miami. One's one is and
one's not. Right, So if Miami plays Oregon, right, it
sort of goes back to that blue ship ratio thing.
But if Indiana goes and wins the national championship, I
think this says a lot about where the future trajectory
of the Big twelve is because there's been this history
that says Big twelve team can't win a national championship
because of these None of these teams are blue ship
ratio teams. And even if Tech or BYU or Colorado,
who kind of was on a trajectory to be there,
it takes three or four more years of doing what
they're doing in order to get there. So if Indiana
or Ole miss goes to winnes A National Championship, I
think it shows that in this era of the Transfer portal,
you can build a championship caliber team through the portal,
which I think would be huge, huge piece for the
Big Twelve.
Speaker 3: Ari Tempkin Big Twelve Insider here on your Utah ESPN
Radio Network, want to ask you about what you've heard
about this hold him on Williams situation.
Speaker 2: His agent has dropped him.
Speaker 3: He's hired lawyer to try to get out of his
nil deal that he signed just a day before he.
Speaker 2: Entered the portal.
Speaker 3: How do you think this this plays out legally? I
know there's been efforts to maybe hold young men accountable
that have signed an IL deals and have maybe rescinded
on that, trying to get out of the deal, but
they signed it. You know, certain teams are trying to,
you know, try trying to hold them accountable in some way,
shape or for him.
Speaker 2: How do you think this thing plays out?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, you know, as I think we all
can agree, like when you're living in a society, there's
certain rules you probably a bye bye, and you know, contracts,
you know, should probably be a little bit more you know,
set in stone than how they're being treated in college
sports right now. You know, Williams is one example, and
it's an obvious, glaring example, but there's plenty other examples
of this. I don't I'm not going to say that
rob Wright signed a deal with Baylor, but according to Baylor,
rob Wright had agreed in principle to a deal and
then turned around and went to BYU. So this happens
all the time, and it's it sucks, right, I mean
it even if it benefits you, it sucks. And I
think the Williams thing is just such a glaring, Like
it's almost as if he signed a deal, realized his
market value was higher than it was, and then rescinded
the deal. And I mean, you're totally right. Then I'm
holding people accountable. I mean, this is kind of how
things work, right, Like if you sign a bad deal,
that's sort of how negotiations work. Sorry, but that's just
how these things go. At the end of the day, though,
the reality is we need collective bargaining. That's the only
way to fix this. And I don't know how this
will go into court of law. The problem is in
a court of law, these things drag out. And meanwhile,
Williams can just, you know, like other players have before him,
you know, enroll in a different school and hey, I'm
a student, I can play football. Can I come play
in your football team? Yes? So, like there's there's major
ways around the transfer portal and you know, easy loopholes
right now to jump through in order to that, guys
are going to get their way, Like he's gonna leave,
He's not going to stay at Washington because the system
is set up for him to take advantage of loopholes
that will allow him to leave and potentially go to
LSU or wherever else he wants to go. So you know,
the only fix to this is collective bargaining. You know,
the reality is collective bargaining is not good for the
student athletes because I mean they can leave at any
time and not and not a buye bind an these contracts,
they're constantly free agents, so every year they go back
into free agency. So and it's not it wouldn't be
an easy and dev either collective bargaining. I mean, there's
so many athletes, how do you get them to organize.
It's a mess, There's no doubt about it. But you know,
and I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like within
contract law, the only viable opp here is for two
sides to come to the table and then it goes
back to leadership. There's just no leadership here, Like there's
nobody in charge. And all anybody could say is that
that nobody's in charge. And so you know, there's there's
nobody to complain to, there's nobody lobby to. So at
some point, like we need somebody to be a commissioner,
We need a collective bargaining agreement between you know, the
the administration and the student athletes, and I mean, there's
really no way around it. It's the only six you know,
Congress isn't going to save this. It's been years now
and they haven't even gotten a bill past committee hearings.
I mean, they're they're not even close on a bill.
So and even if they did, who knows that that
would even hold up and get signed into law. And
we're five years in without a build geting out of committee.
So we've got to get collective bargain. It's the only
fix to this to really rein it in. And then
you get deals that are you know, not going to
go be held up in court like this, and you
have a little bit more uniformity, and it it's it's horrible,
it's awful. I get why say and are upset about it.
I get why everybody's upset about it. It's it should
it's not how the world functions, and it shouldn't be
how college football functions.
Speaker 3: I will say this though, and I agree there's a
there's a lot of things I can say that that
that are broken about the current system. But the free market,
capitalistic college football landscape that we're operating in has allowed
Ole Miss, who has been a middling SEC team for
a long time.
Speaker 2: In Indiana, who has.
Speaker 3: Never seen double digit victories in its like in its
one hundred year career.
Speaker 2: You know, like lifespan there.
Speaker 3: Indiana may be your national champion this year, Ole miss
maybe your national champion. Oregon doesn't have a national championship.
They could win it. I don't think they have it.
I don't think they have a national championship. Miami won
one in the in the nineties. They've been irrelevant to
last twenties, That's what I'm saying, Like Miami really hasn't
been overly relevant since the late eighties and early nineties,
you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So like we are seeing in a leveling of the
playing field. That's actually a good thing, I think.
Speaker 3: Uh, But to your point, it's like, Okay, well, how
long do we want this leveling of the playing field
to play out? Like I want more data points of
free market capitalism college football wise, and then maybe we
allow the pendulum because the I'm willing to let this
play out for the next five years and then bring
the pendulum back. I'd like to see the pendulum keep
swinging this way, just to just to see what happens
from a evening of the playing field standpoint.
Speaker 4: And look, I'm one hundred percent with you on the
like evening in the playing field and the fact that
what we've had right now at transpired had allowed for
the playing field even I mean, I made the joke
earlier and it's one hundred percent truthful. The sec is
not as good as it was because they everybody else
is paying players now, and there's a lot of truth
to that. But I also don't think if you you know,
have viable contracts and there's collective bargaining, that that necessarily
would be the end of that you know, equity across
the board, you know. And I think what's maybe most
interesting about this this dynamic is is like, Okay, Indiana
had the twenty fifth ranked transfer portal class in twenty
twenty five. In twenty twenty four they had these thirtieth
ranked transfer portal class. Right, So it is obviously an
extremely inexact science in terms of the players you're going
after in the portal I mean twenty four to seven
sports on three sports. The companies that are creating these rankings,
they have the science of the high school rankings down
way better than they do the transfer portal and like
we're as media and analysts and fans, you know, glue
to these transfer commitments and then we look and we're like,
where are they ranked? And it seems more inconsequential in
terms of the ranking than anything. Like Indiana has put
together a behemoth by for the most part, adding age.
You know, their average age is twenty three. The Bears
are going to play the Green Bay Packers on Saturday night.
The average age the Green Bay Packers is twenty five.
So Inana, regardless of how the players are viewed from
a star standpoint, are performed like they've found a formula
that works. And I think that is what to me
is the most intriguing aspect of this is, you know,
the science within the science where it's not just about well,
everybody've viewsed this guy as being the best player. This
guy's got the best measurables. Like, there's other aspects that
other teams are strategizing to look for. Joey McGuire wants
guys at play, so some, you know, some in the
portal are going to look for guys that are you know,
former five stars or four stars that maybe didn't get
on the field as much at Obama or at Georgia
or a LSU. But McGuire's approaches. I don't want guys
that haven't seen the field. I want guys that have produced,
have been on the field. So everybody's got their own approach,
their own strategy. There's there's no one size fits all.
I think it's clear and that part, to me is
what's so intriguing about it.
Speaker 3: Ari, best way to support you what you do, how
you do it. For all of our listeners today, she.
Speaker 4: Had that very much, Bud. Yeah, I mean you can
follow me on social media, but I also started a
YouTube channel where I'm talking about Big twelve in college sports.
So just search my name Ari Tempting or ARI Sports
on YouTube and subscribe and like the channel there, and
then of course check out Big twelve today from seven
to ten am, or I guess that would be eight
to eleven am your time on tune in and on YouTube.
Speaker 3: Love it man, great stuff is always Ari Tempican ladies
and gentlemen. We'll catch up a again soon.
Speaker 4: You're the best. Bend Take care brother, be well.
Speaker 2: Yes, sir.
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go to break.
Speaker 2: But what was it?
Speaker 5: What was your question going to be? I'll text them
I was gonna bring up the idea. You've heard the
the phrase we need to rein in NIL the last
few years. I have a theory that's coming from the
SEC teams, mainly the Bamas and the Georgia's of them,
who just want to be able to go above a
salary cap that they propose under the table. Again, I
don't I haven't really heard that they want regulation. They
want regulation so that they can circumvent it.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 5: Like I hear a lot of people say NIL is
ruining college football, but I've yet to hear somebody actually
convince me how it is doing that, because I still
go to games on Saturdays, and I still see the
same amazing sport that I grew up in love for
the most part. Obviously, there are things that have changed
about it, but the product is still amazing. I'm yet
to be convinced what the real problem is. If your
quarterback leaves, which I don't know BYU had go get
a new one, like you can do that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 6: I don't see the problem with it, to be honest.
Speaker 3: Those that think it's ruined they are those who are
either on they were winning in the former system and
they want to continue to take advantage of the system
through their traditional bag man liquid cash means because they're
going to circumvent the rules because they're going to do
anything to win, or they're the people that thought that
they were living under a rock they're ostriching and didn't
know that everyone was cheating.
Speaker 2: Yep, they just didn't know. And they're like, well, it's
going to ruin the sport. These kids, well, these kids.
Speaker 5: I just think they underestimated. I think they all thought
that they could establish more dominance with the money, because
that's what they've been doing. I think they underestimated what
happens when you let fans impact the sport. Yeah, and
I do think you're gonna see market correction because I
think there's going to be in the next few years.
I think there's gonna be a lot of teams where
boosters are tired of paying millions and millions every year
and like they're not getting paid back, not they're doing
it out of them.
Speaker 6: I think you're going to see a correction if you.
Speaker 3: Get billionaires involved that can actually pay their players.
Speaker 2: It's nice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I don't know how many billionaires there
are in Tuscaloosa, not many.
Speaker 2: Not many.
Speaker 3: But then you had a lot of fans that were
willing to give a little bit of you know, do
little side deals to little side hustles.
Speaker 2: Come on down to the come on down to the
car dealership.
Speaker 3: We'll get you a little something some you know, and
enough money, you know, gets in those hands. I remember
hearing back in twenty seventeen when we were with BA was.
Speaker 2: Going out to LSU.
Speaker 3: I was having a discussion with the recruiting guy and
he's and I was like, Hey, what's the market rate
in the SEC for like a d N. He's like
probably ninety thousand to one hundred and twenty thousand annually.
Can you imagine this day and age having a four star,
five star d ND and you're only paying them ninety
one hundred and twenty thousand.
Speaker 2: That's what they were paying them when they were cheating.
Speaker 3: Now LSU's paying a lot more than that now, but
you got to realize that was what their cap was
less than a decade ago.
Speaker 2: What they were willing the SEC was willing to pay
at that time.
Speaker 3: And those donors, right, that's what they were used to.
That's what they're paying Now they're willing to pay a
little bit more than that, But eventually those donors will
get a little bit of donor fatigue because it's not
necessarily all tax deductible anymore.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna I'm going to say this, I'm gonna make that.
Speaker 5: I'll be very declarative. NIL has not ruined college sports.
It's fixed college sports. I believe that wholeheartedly. I think
Indiana fans will agree to Ole Miss fans. I think
most fans outside of Tuscaloosa would agree with that.
Speaker 3: Signetti is unique in the sense that I mean, I
think it's coaching culture and I mean his roster was
ranked like seventy second for their recruiting rank.
Speaker 5: Texas Tech the Oregon should agree to because Oregon was
not relevant for most of college football. It's only recently,
mostly the twenty first century, that they've been relevant at all.
Speaker 2: Sure, I think there's a lot of a lot of
truth to that.
Speaker 3: Like I said, you look at the Final Four right now.
Miami has been irrelevant for you know, thirty years. Oregon,
you know, only in the last decade has it really
become relevant in college football with Phil Knight started allocating
a ton of money to it, and and then obviously
Indiana has never won any football games. And you know,
you're just looking at oh Miss. They've always been at
bottom of the wrong middling SEC school because remember they
tried to cheat with Hugh Freeze and they got caught
and they got reprimanded, castigated from the power brokers they
were trying to they were starting to win and they're
doing what everybody else was doing and they got their
hands slapped.
Speaker 5: Just look at the playoffs over the last few years.
Any given Saturday is more is alive now more than ever.
You had Arizona State in the playoff last year. Arizona
State has been horrible Texas to most of my life.
This year, it's crazy so I think you're right. I
think it's fixing college football. Most people just say it's
not sustainable.
Speaker 2: We'll see how sustainable it is. Let the pendulum swing.
Speaker 5: It's like, what do you mean it's not sustainable? The
market will correct itself. We're still gonna have college football. Yeah,
I don't see the I'm yet to be convinced what
the real issue with NIL is.
Speaker 2: We'll go to break, please don't go anywhere.
Speaker 3: Coming up next, do we want to get into this
cougar byte Ronald the three Man Weaver, Yes we do.
Speaker 2: Okay, we're gonna get into a little cougar byte. Not
all as well. Out in Kentucky.
Speaker 3: Lexington is in an outrage right now for regarding their
basketball team. They've spent twenty two million on their roster
and their ROI is not what they.
Speaker 2: They're not happy with their ROI.
Speaker 3: That coming up next, This is Cougar Sports one of
three nine ninet eight point three ESPN