Speaker 1: Potential Hall of Famer guy Eric Weddle's gonna stop vibe.
Speaker 1: But on a Wednesday, starting things out, Josh for Long
Speaker 1: covers the utes board, KSL Josh, Happy Wednesday.
Speaker 2: Man, how are we doing?
Speaker 3: I'm doing well? How about yourself?
Speaker 2: Since I'm good, man, I'm good.
Speaker 1: So since we're gonna have you at on your reaction
Speaker 1: to the College Football Hall of Fame news.
Speaker 2: I think that dropped about a week ago or so.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, well no, I was actually I think.
Speaker 2: Monday Monday gotcha. So what do you think?
Speaker 3: I mean, I think this is a no brainer.
Speaker 4: Quite honestly, I'm I'm part of that committee that helps
Speaker 4: select some of these guys, and he was a no
Speaker 4: brainer to me as I was looking at some of
Speaker 4: these these individuals who are the greats of college football
Speaker 4: and then there's, you know, no question that the Alex Smith,
Speaker 4: the Eric Weddles are the greats of U tough football.
Speaker 4: I was I was not in the state during the
Speaker 4: time that Eric Wettle played, so I don't I wasn't
Speaker 4: familiar with his college game, but just watching kind of
Speaker 4: the ambassador that D is to the program as well
Speaker 4: as kind of what he did in the NFL like,
Speaker 4: this is a guy that truly cares about football being
Speaker 4: played the right way, play the physical, but also more
Speaker 4: just trying to help people grow. So I think there's
Speaker 4: there's no better person to be kind of a candidate
Speaker 4: for that. Knowing kind of who he is on and
Speaker 4: off the field, that really kind of specifies like the
Speaker 4: types of people that the Hall of Fame wants to
Speaker 4: represent and bring forward. So I think it's a great
Speaker 4: opportunity for him.
Speaker 2: I didn't know that you were part of that that committee.
Speaker 2: That's really cool.
Speaker 1: Illuminate us on the process, like how did these things
Speaker 1: kind of work and ultimately how did it end with
Speaker 1: Eric Weddle on the ballot.
Speaker 4: So it's I'm only a part of it. So what
Speaker 4: happens is is they have different regions and you have
Speaker 4: to select a certain number of players from each region
Speaker 4: that get brought up to the larger committee, which I'm
Speaker 4: not a part of, but you basically rank the number
Speaker 4: of players that you think should be presented to that
Speaker 4: larger committee from your region. This is dating back to
Speaker 4: guys you know, well before I was even born, But
Speaker 4: it's it's looking at a bunch of these guys that
Speaker 4: you know have had great careers. They look at their
Speaker 4: on the field, you know how they did, you know,
Speaker 4: what they did at the NFL, if that's what they
Speaker 4: were able to do, as well as.
Speaker 3: Kind of what they do now nowadays.
Speaker 4: And kind of like the service that they provide and
Speaker 4: other stuff like that.
Speaker 3: So it's kind of cool to kind of put.
Speaker 4: These names that you've seen forever and compare them to
Speaker 4: one another. I mean, for example, like Eric the Enemy.
Speaker 4: You know, obviously a great coach out there, he's involved
Speaker 4: in that kind of situations and being presented as somebody.
Speaker 4: So you get a wide range of college football players
Speaker 4: and trying to see, you know, if it's their time
Speaker 4: to be in the Hall of Fame.
Speaker 3: And you know, some of them are on this list
Speaker 3: for quite a while. Others are on.
Speaker 4: Their for a shorter time, and I think Eric's going
Speaker 4: to be on their first shorter time quite honestly.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, good for our guy. It'd be fun
Speaker 1: to catch up with him today. All right, let's do
Speaker 1: some off season college football storyline. Since you and I
Speaker 1: last spoke, certain things have kind of come down the
Speaker 1: straight seeding. So we'll start with what's in front of us,
Speaker 1: and then we'll get to the expanded sixteen team CFP,
Speaker 1: but that's not until next year. The straight seating seemed
Speaker 1: to be one of those things there was such common
Speaker 1: sense that I have no clue why they didn't do
Speaker 1: it to begin with. So now we do have straight
Speaker 1: seating coming up for the twelve team expanded CFP coming
Speaker 1: up just simply this year. Do you agree with this
Speaker 1: endeavor and do you think it's probably something they should
Speaker 1: have done right out the gates?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I honestly don't know why they wanted to do
Speaker 4: it the other way. I mean, I get it from
Speaker 4: the standpoint they're trying to do whatever they can to
Speaker 4: eliminate the selection committee really having full control over it.
Speaker 4: But I think you look at a lot of people
Speaker 4: seeing Boise State and Arizona State being a three and
Speaker 4: four seed and not being that highly ranked compared to
Speaker 4: some of the other peers, what it could do to Oregon,
Speaker 4: that kind of stuff. I mean, I think there's just
Speaker 4: a lot of unintended consequences as part of it, and
Speaker 4: just an you know, a straight seating seems to be
Speaker 4: the easiest. This is the thing that everybody's familiar with,
Speaker 4: whether you're playing, you know, Little League baseball, all the
Speaker 4: way up to you know, football, whatever it may be.
Speaker 4: That's how tournaments are, you know, one play sixteen or
Speaker 4: whatever it may be, and you're used to that. So
Speaker 4: I think this seemed like the easiest way. But college
Speaker 4: football obviously have to try to overcomplicate things and make
Speaker 4: things a little bit more complex and entertaining.
Speaker 3: So we'll see. I think this will be a better system.
Speaker 1: So now we move over to what's on the table
Speaker 1: for twenty twenty six, which is an expanded sixteen team CFP.
Speaker 2: And it depends on who you talk to.
Speaker 1: I think, well, most people out this way with the
Speaker 1: big twelve foot print, we'll say the eleven plus five
Speaker 1: or whatever model is the way to go. I also
Speaker 1: think it's probably difficult to deny that the SEC and
Speaker 1: the Big ten, you know, Josh, in any negotiation, it's
Speaker 1: pretty simple, whoever has the leverage is going to come
Speaker 1: out on top. And I think it would be a
Speaker 1: fool's errand to pretend the SEC and the Big ten
Speaker 1: don't have some leverage. I don't know how much, but
Speaker 1: probably enough to push this for AQ each conference thing through.
Speaker 1: Of course, Ryan Day comes out with his comments today
Speaker 1: when the dust settles two part question what do you
Speaker 1: think the sixteen team model will look like?
Speaker 2: And what do you want it Josh to look like?
Speaker 4: Ooh, those are two really interesting questions.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: I've gone back and forth on this five plus eleven
Speaker 4: versus the four four two two one plan. I can
Speaker 4: see benefits and consequences of each. Honestly, though, like, I
Speaker 4: think there's some undercurrent of all of this right where
Speaker 4: I think it's it's more political play where you have
Speaker 4: the ACC and the Big twelve saying hey, we want
Speaker 4: to earn it on the field, which kind of is
Speaker 4: a nod to the big or the Big ten, and
Speaker 4: the SEC kind of saying hey, look we're going to
Speaker 4: give you that, and we may take less because of it,
Speaker 4: but we don't want to give you all the power,
Speaker 4: you know, getting four automatic bids. But then on the
Speaker 4: other hand, like you're giving up two straight guarantees that
Speaker 4: you're going to get plus a potential maybe third if
Speaker 4: you managed to get in that high. You know, I
Speaker 4: think this is a really tricky situation. I think it's
Speaker 4: probably going to land somewhere closer to the five versus
Speaker 4: eleven guarantee, the top five conferences a spot and then
Speaker 4: straight seed from there. I just, you know, I don't know,
Speaker 4: this is hard. I feel like we're over complicating it
Speaker 4: for something that doesn't need to be that way.
Speaker 3: If you want to.
Speaker 4: Say it's sixteen teams, just the best sixteen teams are
Speaker 4: in there. If you're really that worried about a selection
Speaker 4: committee that you've put together, you know, that's that's.
Speaker 3: The bigger problem.
Speaker 4: But the reality is they all complain about the selection
Speaker 4: committee when these are former coaches and these are former administrators.
Speaker 4: These are people that understand this at a high level.
Speaker 4: This isn't just like you and I going out there
Speaker 4: and trying to select the sixteen best teams. These are
Speaker 4: people with well intentioned, you know, reasons behind all this stuff.
Speaker 4: And we're doing everything we can to kind of avoid
Speaker 4: the selection committee, and we're going to try to give
Speaker 4: certain conferences a number. Just the sixteen best teams need
Speaker 4: to go in there. Like, to me, that would be
Speaker 4: the best approach. I think that's what it is. You
Speaker 4: see disparity between one versus sixteen. Can a sixteen seed,
Speaker 4: you know, make a run or upset? Sure, you know,
Speaker 4: any given days something can happen, But I think it
Speaker 4: gets really tricky trying to maneuver and finagle certain things
Speaker 4: to try to get a certain number of teams in there.
Speaker 4: And I just don't love that approach, even if it
Speaker 4: is a guarantee just straight seated go from there.
Speaker 1: So it's been a really wild news cycle over the
Speaker 1: past couple of months.
Speaker 2: As we all were awaiting the House v.
Speaker 1: NCUBA Settlement to simply provide guidelines and guard rails and
Speaker 1: just we kind of all thought that would be across
Speaker 1: the line, and there have been a tremendous amount of
Speaker 1: things that have stopped the progress, a lot of red tape,
Speaker 1: roster number restrictions, and then what nobody saw coming.
Speaker 2: I certainly didn't. I don't think anybody.
Speaker 1: The Ross Dellingers of the world didn't seem to see
Speaker 1: this coming. Are a couple of states, including Tennessee and others,
Speaker 1: actually passing legislation telling their member institutions that reside in
Speaker 1: their state, like, hey, just so you know, you don't
Speaker 1: have to adhere to what the NCUBA House Settlement Act
Speaker 1: actually tells you to do with NIL funds and distributions.
Speaker 2: So good news, if.
Speaker 1: You're in our state, you do not have to adhere
Speaker 1: to the guidelines that you will receive from this settlement,
Speaker 1: and then the P four conferences draft contracts and disseminate
Speaker 1: those contracts to all their member institutions, saying, hey, regardless
Speaker 1: of what your state law says, if you want to
Speaker 1: be in one of our conferences, you do have to
Speaker 1: adhere to what the House VNCAA settlement says about nil
Speaker 1: distributions and such. And you know, Josh, at this point,
Speaker 1: I just wonder if it's time for all of us
Speaker 1: that love this sport, cover this sport and consume this
Speaker 1: sport just to say, like, this is the new normal,
Speaker 1: and it's just going to be a scenario where every
Speaker 1: off season essentially the only people that are enjoying it
Speaker 1: are the attorneys because they're going to make the money.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if we're still high speed ahead
Speaker 1: to this pro football model, hybrid AFS, the NFC two
Speaker 1: conference college football reality anymore. I just think we're kind
Speaker 1: of in this space, and we'll be in the space
Speaker 1: where quite some time where it's just kind of continued
Speaker 1: chaos and lawsuits and filings and state legislation, and I
Speaker 1: don't really see an endgame. I've just kind of accepted
Speaker 1: that from the standpoint of people that do the job
Speaker 1: that you and I do. We're just in for these
Speaker 1: lawsuits to be filed and then ultimately, you know, you
Speaker 1: have these lawyers over here deciding they want to look
Speaker 1: at this, and then they're going to push back on that,
Speaker 1: and I just think we're kind of in for reshuffling
Speaker 1: deck chairs and the Titanic in college football for the
Speaker 1: foreseeable future. I don't know that I really see an
Speaker 1: endgame anymore based off the chaos we've seen this offseason.
Speaker 3: No, I completely agree with that.
Speaker 4: I mean, I think that's the frustration about a sport
Speaker 4: that everybody loves because it seemed more pure, right It
Speaker 4: seemed like you had your agencies based on you know,
Speaker 4: whether it be your family has always been you know
Speaker 4: this this fan or you went.
Speaker 3: To that school.
Speaker 4: There was a lot of pride that went into that
Speaker 4: more than just a professional team, right Like, there's different
Speaker 4: types of pride for that, And now that's really chipping
Speaker 4: away at the core of what college sports is. And
Speaker 4: I think that's you know, you're getting more of the
Speaker 4: hardcore fans, the ones that are paying attention to it
Speaker 4: every single day. They are the ones getting riled up,
Speaker 4: especially because they're the ones that understand the nuances. They're
Speaker 4: the ones that don't tune in suddenly in August and wonder, Okay,
Speaker 4: what's happening. Who's on the roster. These are the people
Speaker 4: that are looking every single day. These are the ones
Speaker 4: that are paying attention. These are the ones generally probably
Speaker 4: maybe the boosters, the ones that are putting in the money.
Speaker 4: When you start disenfranchising that group, I think you lose
Speaker 4: the effect of what college sports can be, especially in
Speaker 4: college football. We all understand that it did shift it away,
Speaker 4: especially from an amateur model. It was always a mass
Speaker 4: amateur model. There was always a lot of different things
Speaker 4: that the NCAA screwed up. But now we're sitting in
Speaker 4: a quasi professional realm where there's no you know, no
Speaker 4: straight understanding of how it's supposed to be. There's no
Speaker 4: collective bargaining agreement. There's, like you said, state laws that
Speaker 4: are trumping the NCAA, which really doesn't have any legal
Speaker 4: power anyway. And it's just this big cluster that doesn't
Speaker 4: really make sense for anything. And I think that, you know,
Speaker 4: I don't know what the endgame here is, right like,
Speaker 4: unless there's some sort of binding contracts, which will still
Speaker 4: get challenged in court. But unless there's some sort of
Speaker 4: binding contracts or certain things that kind of pull everyone together,
Speaker 4: this is going to continue to be the cycle every
Speaker 4: single year. And it's frustrating because most people, they just
Speaker 4: want to tune into the games. They want to show
Speaker 4: up on a Saturday, kind of relax from all the
Speaker 4: stresses of the regular work week and just enjoy their team.
Speaker 4: And now it's becoming much more professionalized, much more complicated,
Speaker 4: and it just doesn't feel like the sport that we
Speaker 4: used to know.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's still fun, don't get me wrong.
Speaker 4: Ratings are still high, everybody's still excited to watch it,
Speaker 4: and come August September, you know, we're all going to
Speaker 4: forget what's happening in the summer. But there's still that
Speaker 4: in the background that frustrates people, that makes them not
Speaker 4: want to, you know, donate to the programs or or
Speaker 4: invest in in the same way, because one, you don't
Speaker 4: know if the players are going to be there, you
Speaker 4: don't know what it's going to look like. Your team
Speaker 4: may be relegated suddenly, and you have no clue, and
Speaker 4: so it's just kind of this complicated system and nobody
Speaker 4: really has any standing to be able to make it work.
Speaker 1: One follow up here, because you're plugged into this stuff
Speaker 1: in a way that I probably am not, because we've
Speaker 1: been pretty basketball and hockey centric with the Stanley Cup
Speaker 1: and NBA Finals draft coming up. But in twenty seven days,
Speaker 1: D one athletic departments are scheduled to begin paying out
Speaker 1: more than one billion dollars to athletes. And as of now,
Speaker 1: without housing the NCUBA being settled, there are no rules.
Speaker 1: There's no enforcement because the nc double A has been told,
Speaker 1: oh hey, by the way, you.
Speaker 2: Can't enforce anything.
Speaker 1: So there's conference by conference enforcement and very little regulation.
Speaker 1: And we're all waiting for this settlement to take place,
Speaker 1: and they have twenty seven days before the more than
Speaker 1: one billion dollars is set to be distributed to these
Speaker 1: young people that play sports at schools. Are you hearing
Speaker 1: anything about a finished line in sight? I can't believe
Speaker 1: it's June fourth and we're still talking about this thing
Speaker 1: not being done.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, everything has to be settled by July fifth.
Speaker 4: If there is a settlement. Obviously, Claudia Wilkins could extend
Speaker 4: it beyond that, but July first was the date that
Speaker 4: everybody has given that everything has to be in July
Speaker 4: first is the date that schools have to say, hey,
Speaker 4: are you in the settlement or not? And if you
Speaker 4: opt out, you don't have to pay athletes. There's a
Speaker 4: lot of other rules, but you're.
Speaker 3: Not tied to it.
Speaker 4: But most of these schools, especially at the powerfol level,
Speaker 4: have prepared for the last year plus to opt in.
Speaker 3: They're ready.
Speaker 4: Most of them at the very least are throwing one
Speaker 4: year's worth of cash into this program to see how
Speaker 4: it works, to try to make sure that they can
Speaker 4: pay players, remain competitive in this landscape that nobody really understands,
Speaker 4: and then kind of go from And so I think
Speaker 4: whether the settlement passes or not, I really think most
Speaker 4: schools are probably going to be moving forward that way
Speaker 4: because to that point, the NCAA has nothing to do
Speaker 4: with it, right, Like, they can't say no because what
Speaker 4: are you gonna how are you going to stop them?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 4: And at the end of the day, the NCAA is
Speaker 4: there to do the bidding of the NCAA pre or
Speaker 4: the college presidents and kind of put it all together.
Speaker 4: But when there's no framework and nothing there, it's going
Speaker 4: to be chaos, So I don't know that there's going
Speaker 4: to be a ton of change. I think the real
Speaker 4: problem though, comes with roster limits and scholarships, because there's
Speaker 4: always been this this other end where Okay, you can
Speaker 4: offer walk ons and you can still have your scholarships. Well,
Speaker 4: now everybody essentially is a scholarship player proportionally, and you
Speaker 4: have to be able to have a certain roster limit,
Speaker 4: you have to have certain things. That's not going to
Speaker 4: be equal if this settlement doesn't pass. So there's so
Speaker 4: much to go into this, and obviously I don't want
Speaker 4: to get into the weeds of it, but I think
Speaker 4: there's going to be mass chaos. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: I don't think it's gonna be me. As I'm saying this,
Speaker 4: it reminds me of like if you remember, like when
Speaker 4: Y two K was coming and everybody's like and your
Speaker 4: milk is going to explode and everything, Like, I feel
Speaker 4: like we're kind of getting to that level where no,
Speaker 4: it'll be fine, you know.
Speaker 3: We'll figure it out.
Speaker 4: But I think it's kind of getting to that mass hysteria,
Speaker 4: to a certain settle, like we don't know what's going
Speaker 4: to happen, and so you kind of start going down
Speaker 4: to the worst case scenario situation.
Speaker 1: All right, Josh, let's move off of it and talk
Speaker 1: about some storyline surrounding Utah football, And of course the
Speaker 1: storyline that everybody loves every year is the schedule release
Speaker 1: when we actually get kick times. Let's start with the opener.
Speaker 1: It's at UCLA. It's nine pm Mountain Time on Fox.
Speaker 1: I'll look, I'm single, I'm chilling, you know, like I've
Speaker 1: got one sad. He's twenty four, he lives in New York,
Speaker 1: so it doesn't really affect somebody like me. But I
Speaker 1: can't imagine very many people out there with kids, or
Speaker 1: deadlines or actual lives in a way that I don't
Speaker 1: are thrilled about a nine pm kickoff for the opener.
Speaker 1: Let's start there. Your thoughts, you'd tell you sala nine pm.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's.
Speaker 4: Not ideal, especially for a game that a lot of
Speaker 4: people thought could have at least a little bit more
Speaker 4: national relevance just with Nikuayamilavia. But I think, look that
Speaker 4: first day of college football, people are so excited to
Speaker 4: have it back that I think you're still going to
Speaker 4: get a lot of people tune into this game. It's
Speaker 4: going to be on network TV, and so it's going
Speaker 4: to be something that people can find readily. You know,
Speaker 4: maybe you've heard about this Tennessee quarterback that went to
Speaker 4: UCLA and you want to check it out. So you know,
Speaker 4: I still think you're going to get the die hards.
Speaker 4: The hard part here is I mean, like even here
Speaker 4: in Utah, that's a nine o'clock game, right, I mean,
Speaker 4: that's really hard for a lot of people to stay
Speaker 4: up for. You know, some of these people are going
Speaker 4: to church in the morning. Some of these people, you know,
Speaker 4: have different things on Sunday that they do. That becomes
Speaker 4: a really difficult thing. And so it's not the best.
Speaker 4: But at the end of the day, it's college football
Speaker 4: and we're going to watch it whenever it is. I mean,
Speaker 4: if the game was at two AM, I guarantee you
Speaker 4: people would tune in and watch it. So I you know,
Speaker 4: I don't get too caught up on it. I do
Speaker 4: like earlier games, and I think for a team like Utah,
Speaker 4: they want to be more on the national spotlight, but
Speaker 4: the last two years haven't afford to them that And
Speaker 4: so I think you get the break where you are
Speaker 4: on Fox. You get that National Line. But you're not
Speaker 4: going to get it in the exact prime time that
Speaker 4: you were thinking of, so it still works. It's still
Speaker 4: something that people are going to be excited for most
Speaker 4: you know, a lot of fans are going to go
Speaker 4: out to the Rose Bowl and check this game out
Speaker 4: and have fun, so it'll still be a good time.
Speaker 2: I'm opener cal Poly four o'clock. That feels like a
Speaker 2: really really.
Speaker 1: Solid time then at Wyoming six o'clock, CBS Sports Network.
Speaker 1: But I'll ask you about the final game of the
Speaker 1: regular season at least and will you be spending Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: in Kansas as it's the day after Thanksgiving and it
Speaker 1: is a ten to a m kick, which is aggressively early.
Speaker 2: Your thoughts on that, Yeah, the ten AM one.
Speaker 4: That one I'm more frustrated with because nobody likes that game.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's nice in the sense that it's early
Speaker 4: and it's it's one of those things that people can
Speaker 4: wake up after Thanksgiving and enjoy.
Speaker 3: But you know, covering games like that, it's tough. Last year,
Speaker 3: I had to travel.
Speaker 4: On Thanksgiving, miss you know, spending time with my family
Speaker 4: to go out to UCF to be able to have
Speaker 4: the Black Friday game and that was a little later
Speaker 4: in the night. But you know you have to take
Speaker 4: them the flights you're given this one, you know, this
Speaker 4: one's tough. I mean, you know, I'm gonna be once
Speaker 4: again on a plane on Thanksgiving ready for a ten
Speaker 4: am game. For me, I don't love it just because
Speaker 4: of the travel, But I'm not going to have anybody
Speaker 4: worry about me.
Speaker 3: That's not my issue. I just think ten.
Speaker 4: Am games are just a real testing right, Like I
Speaker 4: think you don't want to have that at the end
Speaker 4: of the day. If this is on ABC, I think
Speaker 4: fans will be happy. If not, it's on ESPN, which
Speaker 4: is still good. But I think you know, if you
Speaker 4: can get that ABC Utah is doing well, suddenly that
Speaker 4: becomes a great showing for your program and maybe you're
Speaker 4: in a position.
Speaker 3: To be able to be in a big twelve championship.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 4: We'll see how this team goes, but there's there's the
Speaker 4: ten where it could be good. You're gonna have a
Speaker 4: lot of eyeballs on you. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: that's usually the rivalry weekend and a lot of other
Speaker 4: teams are going to be paying attention to that week
Speaker 4: more than Utah Kansas.
Speaker 1: Tell our listeners, Josh, you guys have been covering this
Speaker 1: and I obviously read the stuff you write about, you know,
Speaker 1: anything pertaining to the you it's the twenty twenty six
Speaker 1: visits in the twenty twenty six recruiting class. Obviously that's
Speaker 1: not top of mine right now. We have a season
Speaker 1: prior to. But how that's kind of the main you know,
Speaker 1: you know, point of emphasis for this program currently in
Speaker 1: this coaching staff currently. Any insight on how these visits
Speaker 1: went and any names you want to throw out there
Speaker 1: commits that our listeners should know about.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so Utah has two commits right now, Preston Pitts
Speaker 4: and Lagary Mitchell. Two two good guys that I think
Speaker 4: are more of the underrated guys that Utah tried to
Speaker 4: go for and hope that they can be stars. But
Speaker 4: you know, starting last weekend there's a you know, a
Speaker 4: large group I think it was twelve players that came
Speaker 4: in for an official visit. This begins a one month
Speaker 4: period where there's going to be something like forty five
Speaker 4: or more athletes coming through Utah on official visits where
Speaker 4: they whine and dynam really try to show how it
Speaker 4: is one of the perspective, you know, recruits. He showed
Speaker 4: video of the Utah offensive line really working through plays
Speaker 4: with him so that they could kind of get a
Speaker 4: vibe with it. So this is this is really Utah
Speaker 4: trying to showcase themselves to all of these kids that
Speaker 4: have a lot of talent, that have a lot of buyers,
Speaker 4: that are going to be visiting a lot of other places.
Speaker 4: The biggest name there, at least locally, is Celesimoa. This
Speaker 4: is an athlete who can play both sides of the ball.
Speaker 4: I mean, he is probably the closest that we've seen
Speaker 4: in a while to probably like a Travis Hunter style
Speaker 4: where he can play wide receiver, he can be on
Speaker 4: the other sides of the dB. Really talented kid, number
Speaker 4: one kid in the state of Utah, and so there's
Speaker 4: a lot of emphasis to try to get him to Utah.
Speaker 4: The other kid that I'll mention is Kelvin Obot. This
Speaker 4: is the number one recruit out of Idaho. You know,
Speaker 4: with Spencer Fano and Caleb Lomu potentially moving on to
Speaker 4: the NFL this next year as potential first round picks,
Speaker 4: this becomes a great opportunity to get a new offensive tackled,
Speaker 4: and Utah has shown that they're willing to put freshmen
Speaker 4: in there, just like they did with Spencer Fanos.
Speaker 3: So that's that's the.
Speaker 4: Big selling point for for those And if you can
Speaker 4: get those two guys alone, I think that really improves
Speaker 4: your chances on what this recruiting class can be. So
Speaker 4: this next month is going to be really busy for Utah.
Speaker 4: There's gonna be a lot of kids coming in and
Speaker 4: out of the state of Utah to try to kind
Speaker 4: of see what they're all about. And you're gonna start
Speaker 4: seeing a lot more commits here coming soon.
Speaker 1: Since you and I last spoke, Bill Conley released his
Speaker 1: post Spring sp Plus for ESPN dot Com and I
Speaker 1: like Bill and this model seems to make a lot
Speaker 1: of sense to me. And of course a post Spring
Speaker 1: sp plus ranking certainly will not tell the entire story
Speaker 1: what we could see come fall, and we still have
Speaker 1: a number of months until we actually see these teams play.
Speaker 1: But when you look at the post Spring sp plus ranking,
Speaker 1: the highest rated Big twelve team is Case State at eighteen,
Speaker 1: and then it goes like this, Arizona State is twenty
Speaker 1: two byu Exeated Texas Texas twenty six, BYU is twenty seven,
Speaker 1: and we'll see what the rets last stuffed, you know,
Speaker 1: as far as how that plays out, then it is
Speaker 1: TCU twenty nine in Utah thirty one, and Utah's right
Speaker 1: ahead of Iowa State, who's at thirty two. So that
Speaker 1: puts Utah at five in the Big twelve. On Bill
Speaker 1: Conley's sp plus Vegas over under a seven point five
Speaker 1: and that also puts Utah about five six seven. It
Speaker 1: seems like most everything I read for Big twelve predictions
Speaker 1: and previews has Utah kind of middle of the pack
Speaker 1: as opposed at the top of the pack this year.
Speaker 2: Does that drive with your understanding?
Speaker 3: Yeah, no for sure.
Speaker 4: And I think you know, Bill Conley does a great
Speaker 4: job of being able to put those things together. He
Speaker 4: fine tunes his data to really make sure that it
Speaker 4: fits with the current you know, ages of the transit
Speaker 4: portal stuff like that. But I think that's that's really
Speaker 4: where Utah is going to fit, right. I think based
Speaker 4: on their potential on paper, they have what it takes
Speaker 4: to kind of be in the mix, right, and I
Speaker 4: think you're going to see them, you know, at least
Speaker 4: be competitive and people think that they can be competitive.
Speaker 4: But the real question is just canad all come together
Speaker 4: with so many players coming over from the transfer portal
Speaker 4: on the offensive side, especially, you know, it takes.
Speaker 3: Time to jail.
Speaker 4: I mean, I think there's there's you know, positions that
Speaker 4: help Utah in the sense that the offensive line.
Speaker 3: Works together, they've played together, that one's going to be connected.
Speaker 4: And then you've got a quarterback that has seemingly done
Speaker 4: really well at Jason Beck's offense. I think those things
Speaker 4: can work well, but it's still unsure how that will
Speaker 4: go against, you know, teams in the Big twelve.
Speaker 3: So I think it's a good spot for Utah.
Speaker 4: You know, you're not going to get this preseason polled
Speaker 4: where you're a top twenty five team, but you're lurking,
Speaker 4: we'll say. And so I think whether you're you know,
Speaker 4: the second tier, third tier type team and the Big twelve,
Speaker 4: I think that's good for Utah and I think they
Speaker 4: can do some damage if they live up to the
Speaker 4: potential that they.
Speaker 3: Have for themselves.
Speaker 1: I hate to make the rets last off a football story,
Speaker 1: I really do. But this is a sports talk radio show,
Speaker 1: and so I will ask you while we're all kind
Speaker 1: of a waiting word about how this is going to
Speaker 1: play out.
Speaker 2: Brian Santiago made his first comments.
Speaker 1: I think to you, guys is where I saw that
Speaker 1: since taking over as a d and he said, what
Speaker 1: you would expect, They're going to let the process play out.
Speaker 1: He has confidence it will work out. Blah blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. If if the Rets laugh stuff comes to
Speaker 1: the point where they just have decided they've got to
Speaker 1: move on from him, what does that make BYU's football
Speaker 1: season look like?
Speaker 2: And do they have good depth in that room?
Speaker 4: Yeah, that one that was the real tricky question there
Speaker 4: because coming into spring camp they had three quarterbacks including
Speaker 4: rets last and you have experienced the Ka Hills, did
Speaker 4: you know it was up at Utah State had obviously
Speaker 4: started for them and had some success, but they're you know,
Speaker 4: it would be a definite drop off from that. They
Speaker 4: did get some in the transfer portal and stuff that way,
Speaker 4: but I think that becomes probably the biggest worry for
Speaker 4: this team, where they're predicted that seven and a half
Speaker 4: wins as well, and obviously coming off the season that
Speaker 4: they had, there's a lot of expectations for this team
Speaker 4: to be good. But if you don't get a good
Speaker 4: quarterback that knows the system and it has that chemistry, you know,
Speaker 4: especially if there is this off the field drama with
Speaker 4: you know, I don't know if players are frustrated with this,
Speaker 4: you know what their feelings are. It has a real
Speaker 4: chance to distract, even if you have a good quarterback
Speaker 4: in place, to distract from kind of what you built
Speaker 4: last year, right, And I think coming into lot from
Speaker 4: last year, this is a team.
Speaker 3: That was overlooked.
Speaker 4: They kind of believed in themselves, They rallied around themselves
Speaker 4: and really just kind of insulated themselves from the world.
Speaker 4: And when it started to work, things jibed.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 4: Now, you've got this huge off sson hurdle that you
Speaker 4: have to manage, and whether you have reds left back
Speaker 4: or not, that becomes a real distraction to just what
Speaker 4: you're trying.
Speaker 3: To do as a team. Right.
Speaker 4: Obviously, the things that are being alleged are way more
Speaker 4: serious than.
Speaker 3: What football is.
Speaker 4: But at the same time time, when we're just speaking
Speaker 4: about the football, that becomes a very massive distraction, as
Speaker 4: it should, right, I mean, I think if there's something
Speaker 4: serious that happens like that, it should be a distraction.
Speaker 4: But I think that's unfortunate to these guys that have
Speaker 4: put in their hard work and effort to be able
Speaker 4: to get there, to suddenly have something that didn't even
Speaker 4: impact them now distract them from kind of the success
Speaker 4: that they were hoping to build.
Speaker 1: All right, Josh, before I set you loose, Look, I
Speaker 1: don't know if the narrative, a narrative of Alex is
Speaker 1: going to hire Andre Miller was just something that we
Speaker 1: created out of thin air, or maybe it was people
Speaker 1: pining for Utah basketball the past and believing that one
Speaker 1: two punch would be really dynamic. And I maintain, as
Speaker 1: somebody who was there in the nineties that Andre has
Speaker 1: a level of cachet for my generation that is hard
Speaker 1: to find. But it looks like it's not going to
Speaker 1: be anything that we'll see, at least not anytime soon.
Speaker 2: Do you have any insight here?
Speaker 1: Do you know whether or not it was ever really discussed,
Speaker 1: or it was ever really close And maybe is there
Speaker 1: a chance that could happen at some point even though
Speaker 1: it doesn't look like it's gonna happen now.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there was definitely some real conversations about that. I mean,
Speaker 4: there was mutual interest between Alex and Andrea to be
Speaker 4: able to bring him on staff. I think with what
Speaker 4: Alex was trying to build for his first year and
Speaker 4: just kind of the output that he was expecting, I
Speaker 4: just don't know that there was a you know, the
Speaker 4: right fit right. Obviously, andre is a great ambassador of
Speaker 4: the program, he was going to be a great salesman
Speaker 4: for the you. He was going to bring a lot
Speaker 4: of excitement. Those weren't the questions. I think it was
Speaker 4: more just with what Alex was trying to do this year,
Speaker 4: what kind of commitment level it would take, And I
Speaker 4: just don't think they were able to agree on that.
Speaker 4: So you know, whether that whether he's able to circle
Speaker 4: back to that in a future time, you know, remains
Speaker 4: to be seen. I think, you know, there's definitely not
Speaker 4: a door closed there, but I think there you know,
Speaker 4: Alex is trying to do the best that he can
Speaker 4: to bring his model and not necessarily bring back.
Speaker 3: The Vick and Jarris era.
Speaker 4: He's still going to play homage to it, try to
Speaker 4: bring in that kind of era and kind of.
Speaker 3: Get people excited. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 3: this is the Alex.
Speaker 4: Smith or Alex Jenson or excuse me, and you know
Speaker 4: he's got to do what he can to be able
Speaker 4: to be the guy and not live off the cotails
Speaker 4: of somebody else.
Speaker 2: All right, Josh, good to catch up. Man.
Speaker 1: Appreciate the time as always, have a great week and
Speaker 1: we'll chat soon.
Speaker 4: That great appreciate it, sense.
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