The Drive with Jack
* Jim Keyton Jr., Lansing Eastern 3-Sport Standout & Arizona State Baseball/Football Player
(upbeat music) - Jack, I believe you're my good friend, Matt Sloatt, grab a Volcomist, lots of excitement at the two dealerships. What's new with Chevy and Nissan? - Well, Jack, great question. At Nissan, everybody seems to be talking about interest rates. We're offering 0% financing on new vehicles, and we have the all new completely redesigned 2025 kicks on the lot and ready for delivery. It is fantastic. At Chevy, same thing. People are talking about interest rates. Guess what? We have 0% financing on new, and as low as 1.99 used. You gotta come check it out. - Great time to get a car and great place to do it. Grab a vote. We're gonna stay right here, Rob. And welcome in Jim Keaton Jr. He is a proud Lansing Eastern. Three sport, Letterman actually would've been like five or six if they had had enough opportunities for him to play all those sports. And then, of course, football and baseball Letterman at Arizona State, probably taught Barry Bonds how to hit a home run. And then, played in a national football league, back here. He's done very important things in the community. Jimmy, you had to be really proud of your sun devils. Didn't turn out exactly the way you wanted, but talking to you after the game, and you weren't talking like a fan. You weren't talking like an analyst, and you said Arizona State just didn't have quite enough to finish the job. - Yeah, Jack. Happy new year, two years. And everybody in mid-Michigan. And then, a lot of my was is we just didn't do enough to get the job done. And we had our opportunities. You know, I believe that it was a targeting call, but by the rule, I don't really like the rule in general, 'cause I like to hit. And, but, you know, we had opportunities and we didn't take advantage of them. But I am super proud, and uber proud, of course, doing him and the boys. - Yeah. - Because they, I think we gained a lot of fans yesterday, and I think our boy Scataboo gained some fans and maybe some, some Benjamin's too. - Yeah, absolutely. We'll get to Cam Scataboo in just a minute. But when you talk about that targeting call, near the end of the fourth quarter, you're right. There's no guarantee that if that call had been made, that Arizona State would have won, we saw their inability to convert field goals earlier in the game, and no guarantee that they would have made one then. But if that wasn't targeting, I'd like someone to explain to me exactly what targeting is, and I have yet to hear anyone, an official, explain why that wasn't targeting. - Yeah, Jack, we had that conversation on our alumni page, and it was, it was, the reality is officials make mistakes too, right? But when you have the opportunity to watch the video replay, to determine the mistake, those are hard to swallow. And the thing that we talked about more than anything else is the opportunity, 'cause we don't know what would have happened, 'cause we could have got the targeting call and gone down and missed the field goal anyway. - Right. - And-- - Could have grown up in six. - You don't know, that's right. - Right, we know the argued results, we're just gonna talk about the play. And, but it's when plays like that occur, and officials really are not held accountable in any way. - Yeah. - That's what's frustrating, because the senior offensive lineman that's been there the fifth year, who's the second teamer, he's never gonna have another chance to strap 'em up and get ready for another game. Or never have another opportunity to win a national championship. And those are the unattending consequences to me that matter, 'cause the guys that can play, they're gonna, you know, they're gonna end up doing a play on Sunday and they're gonna have the next year that they might be able to play. But those guys that are there for their last go round, that don't get that opportunity to be successful, or have another day, or another week with their team, you know. Those are things that you can't, you can't run that back. You know, that's over, it's done at that point. - Yeah. - And not to negate, you know, Texas is a good team, and they're very explosive. I think that the team with the most talent did win the game, but the team that deserved the win the game, did not win the game. It's kinda how I look at it. - Right, I would agree with that. 100%. And the only thing I would wanna add about the targeting, Jim, is when the call like that occurs, the whole purpose of replay, in my mind, is not to re-officiate the game. It's to correct egregious errors. And to me, that no call was an egregious error, it was a miss of a call. So when they had a chance to go back and look at it, either the impression I think a lot of people are gonna have is, well, they're covering up, and they don't wanna admit they made a mistake initially, or, well, let's see, who was the beneficiary of it? It's Texas. We know what money means. We know that all teams are not created equal, and if a call's gonna go one way or the other, if that had been an Arizona state player, would the call have been any different? I don't know. - It's one of those things, Zach, where if you don't think that people are influenced by something other than what's going on, it might be fine. - You're naive. - And we all have preconceived prejudices, preconceived notions, and preconceived ideas about what should or shouldn't be. And that's just human nature. But like you say, the biggest issue is that when you have an opportunity to look at it, and when I think was Bill LeMons was the ESPN official, in first, he never even flits. Yeah, I think that they're gonna have to, don't be surprised that this is returned. This looks like classic targeting. He didn't just say targeting. He said like, classic targeting, and helmet hit helmet, he launched, knocked our kid out. I mean, I don't know how else it can be interpreted, but again, I don't wanna take away from the great game that was played like Steezy did when he got asked after the game, how they do it. He decided to flip it that Texas has been resilient instead of, hey, you know, them guys on the other side of field, they pretty much dominated us most of the day to day. We had a few big blades that helped us win the game, but you know, he does come from that school in California with SC. So I'm just gonna leave it at the back and, you know, but bottom line is very proud of ASU, very proud of the way they represented, very proud of our fans. We showed up in significant numbers at the stadium. And it was wonderful to see all the feedback that we're getting. I think we're gonna have a few more NIL dollars to work with down there now. And certainly the excitement is back in the valley, and we're real happy about that. - Well, you've got a terrific young quarterback, I think, and an amazing young coach to build around, but I wanna talk for a minute about Camp Skataboo. And I was thinking the other day, Jim, it was Arizona State and Iowa State in the big 12 championship game, right? - Correct. - If Iowa State had somehow managed to win that game, and Arizona State had been playing in a non-college football playoff game, do you think Skataboo would have opted out? I just can't imagine him not taking the chance to play football, even if it's outside today. And how much money did he make for himself? How much of a name recognition did he create for himself with an incredible performance? - Well, I think, first of all, I think the answer to your question is simply, no, he would play. And I think it goes back to a conversation. I don't know, I'm not sure if very many people saw this or knew about this, but there was ESPN did a piece on him and Coach Dillingham, and Coach Dillingham talked about last year at the end of the season what he needed to do to be able to play on Sunday. And at a very candid conversation with him about he needed to lose weight, he needed to be more of a guy that was the leader for the team, and then he became the heartbeat of our team. Now, Sam Levent was a close second, don't get me wrong. And the quarterback typically leads your team in most situations. But camp's got to be became the heartbeat of our team when he took over in the spring and spring workouts and was first guy there, last guy to leave and encouraged another guy to continue to get better. And so I think as a leader, he's really improved his heart, you know, before he was a leader by example, and this year he became a leader by his voice and by his mantra and his chant and his belief in his players that were around him. And you know, I say the mark of a great players to be able to make those players around you better. And he certainly did that this year. And as far as the the Benjamin that he made, I think that not that he wasn't on NFL scouts board before, but you know, he's he's still a unique back. So he's still got to go to the right place. And I can tell you this, he's not going to take those same hits in the NFL that he takes in college. That's just not going to happen. It's just a difference. So he's got to learn to change his game up a little bit, but he's still going to be who he is. And he reminds me a lot of a guy that that we had, there's no say when I played there, but a much smaller and that's Gerald Riggs because Riggs was the guy that when he was square to the line of scrimmage, there wasn't a whole lot of people that wanted to jump in front of him and bring him down. And but he's a he's a great young man. He's a great leader. Had the opportunity to meet him at when I was there for a alumni reunion and just all about being a great son devil and great teammate. So I'm looking forward to just to stay healthy and to represent well and when he plays on Sunday for the sundial. Jim, Cam Scadaboo was a zero star recruit, zero, and started out at Sacramento State and then was able to transfer. But he reminds me a little bit stylistically of Rob's favorite player, Mike Allstadt. And I was thinking that not that these teams have already played too many games because both of them had a first round buy. But if they wanted to have one other game and say set it up for charity, some sort of player's fund for their families or find some cause, it would be-- I know a lot of people would pay big money to watch Boise State play Arizona State and see Ashton Gente and Cam Scadaboo go at it. Yeah, that would be a showcase event for sure. Mike, it's funny because you say that and I look at both teams and it's like the biggest thing that you worry about is the defenses on the other side and how they're going to handle them. Because you know what you're going to get from the guys, but what we get from the defensive side that's going to turn the tide. But that would be why you can handle their business. That could have been saying, here are the big 12 this year. Yeah, yeah. Hey, last thing for you, Jim, we got the game going now. Georgia and Notre Dame kicking off here. Who's going to meet for the National Championship? We know that it's Ohio State and Texas. But Notre Dame is going to go against Georgia for the right to play Penn State. And what do you make of this? Who are going to be the last two standing? Yeah, I'm just going to go out on the limb. And I'm going to say that Dame Franklin will figure out a way to win a big game. I'm not sure maybe he'll not coach and win the game. That might be the option. But it's Ohio State and Penn State for the National Championship and Ohio State wins another National Championship. So all the people in Ohio that have written Ryan Day off, Ryan Day can go have a cigar and raise his NIL contract up a little bit for himself. Because the country, I believe, is the Buckeye. And like Griffin and all the people who have been sounding the horn for the SEC all season, can sit there and just sulk when they see OSU and PSU go at it. Yeah, they can just get their lighters out and light our cigars. Jim, thanks so much. You know what? We should get together and watch one of these playoff games. Let's do that. Let's do that next week. To everyone who wants a meal made just for you, let our team member, Arish, share what makes Culver special. We know the best meals are the ones shared with the people you love, like our cook to order butter burgers and our real Wisconsin cheese curds and our creamy, fresh, frozen custard. I put the same care into your meal that I would for my own family. Order ahead on the app or Culver's.com for a meal made the Wisconsin way. From Wisconsin with love, welcome to Delicious. Hey, Spartan fans. When you want the largest and best selection of Spartan gear, alumni haul is your ultimate shopping destination. Come get your officially licensed gear. Nike, champion, Columbia, Yeti, new era hats, tailgating gear, and more. MSU students, faculty and military receive 10% off in-store every day. And you can earn cash back with their haul pass rewards. Alumni haul, located at Eastwood Town Center near the Apple Store, or shop anytime at alumnihaul.com. For the ultimate Spartan shopping experience, it's alumni haul. Jack Evelyn here with my good friend Matt Sloane is a graph of ochemists. Lots of excitement at the two dealerships. What's new with Chevy and Nissan? Well, Jack, great question. Nissan, everybody seems to be talking about interest rates. We're offering 0% financing on new vehicles, and we have the all-new, completely redesigned 2025 kicks on the lot and ready for delivery. It is fantastic. At Chevy, same thing. People are talking about interest rates. Guess what? We have 0% financing on new, and as low as 1.99 used. You gotta come check it out. Great time to get a car and a great place to do it. Graph of ochemists. Time for a career change. Looking to make a difference? Dean Transportation is looking for compassionate people to join our dedicated team of school bus professionals. 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Meduar Jewelers in Lansing, Ochemists, Jackson, and Portage want to help you preserve your memories and offer you options on creating new ones. Come in today for the cleaning and inspection of your jewelry. We continue to work hard every day to earn your confidence and trust. Meduar Jewelers Hey Spartan fans, when you want the largest and best selection of Spartan gear, Alumni Hall is your ultimate shopping destination. Come get your officially licensed gear. Nike, Champion, Columbia, Yeti, new era hats, tailgating gear, and more. MSU students, faculty and military receive 10% off in-store every day. And you can earn cash back with their Hall Pass rewards. Alumni Hall, located in Eastwood Town Center near the Apple Store. Or shop anytime at AlumniHall.com. For the ultimate Spartan shopping experience, it's Alumni Hall. I'm Nighal.
Jim gives us his thoughts on the Arizona State football loss to Texas, the impact of Cameron Skattabo & more