(upbeat music) All right, let's go to part two of today's show and we're gonna talk about Gabriel Rubio's injury and kind of what comes next for Notre Dame. So to begin, obviously Gabriel didn't practice at the end of yesterday's practice. We didn't really know why. We're not allowed to comment on injuries until we're given a word on it, but we did get word today. They announced to the media right before practice started and then obviously they put the tweet out. That Gabriel injured his foot yesterday and what Notre Dame said was, I'm gonna read this, they said that he broke his second metatarsal and had a surgery performed by Dr. Thomas Bemondurfer and they said that they did not give us a specific timeline. So that's why I put indefinite on the story. They said that they do anticipate having him back at some point time in the 2024 season. So I don't know when that'll be, I don't know if that'll be September, October, November. It's, they did say they expect him back. Obviously this is disappointing for the team and especially for Gabriel from all of you that read my Intel report. He came back this summer after missing the spring, being out of school, really locked in, really working hard and really just wanted to just be a part of what they're trying to build here. They were gonna count on him a lot this season and now you don't have them and at least for a period of time and that's disappointing for him and for Notre Dame because let's be honest. Look, he was not as good overall as Howard Cross or Riley Mills last year. That's why he didn't start. But when it comes to just at times he was arguably their most stout run defender. Now he didn't make as many plays but it just far as like being a big physical presence, eating up blocks, getting a push. I thought Gabriel did some nice things last year and Notre Dame was not as good in my opinion and when it comes to rush defense, now they were so good rushing the quarterback but when it comes to stopping the run, I didn't think they were as good when Gabriel didn't play. And I just think they were a better defense last year when Gabriel played and now you're not gonna have him for a period of time. You're definitely not gonna have him for the matchup against Texas A&M, right? 'Cause if, you know, broke his foot out and definitely some point in time it usually doesn't sound good that he's gonna be back for the first game. So that's gonna be an issue for Notre Dame for sure. People in the chat saying Tom Bemondurfer, it was a Penn High School and Notre Dame offensive lineman, that's awesome. I know Dr. Radigan also is a former Notre Dame player. So I think it's pretty cool to see former Notre Dame players having that kind of success off the field. So love to hear that. So, but let's, you know, back to the topic, it's a blow for Notre Dame. I'm not gonna sit here and try to say it's not a blow. I'm gonna say some things about, hey, I think they're gonna be, this guy's gonna do this and that guy's gonna do that. But as I've always said, it's better to have this guy, that guy, and the guy that either left the program or isn't injured. So they're a better defensive lineman, Gabriel Rubio is healthy. There's no question about that. And they're gonna not have him healthy for a period of time. But let me give you a couple, in my opinion, silver linings. And then I'm gonna get into specifics of the players mentioned. If they can handle the time period where he's out, if they can handle that and other guys step up and not in a way where Riley and Howard have to now play the same amount of snaps he did last year. But if other guys can step into the rotation and perform the job that's needed, then I think this could end up being a little bit of a blessing because Gabriel's a bigger kid, three or 10 pounds, big guy, you've got a 16 game season coming up. If he can get back somehow in the second half of the season, then you're gonna have a fresh set of legs and some beef on the defensive line. So that's some spin, but it's also true that if you can get by without him in the meantime, being able to plug him back into the lineup in the second half of the year, hopefully if that's when he comes back again, that's conjecture on my part, it's gonna be good for them because he'll be fresh and he won't have the same wear and tear in his body that maybe they had early in the season. So the other one is obviously get some other younger guys opportunity reps and practice and helps them develop a little bit faster. So those are the two sort of like silver lining type of situations for Notre Dame. The concern, however, is that whenever you lose a guy, it always hurts your depth from the standpoint of now you can't afford to lose another guy. And you've got, you had really going in the season, five guys that you were comfortable being part of the rotation because of what they have done. - Right, you have Howard Cross, Riley Mills, Gabriel Rubio, Jason Onyank, Diamond Hynish. Those five guys until report showed and then also of course last season, those five guys were gonna play and you had some depth, well, now you're down to four, which means with five, you can handle an injury. Okay, so Gabriel's out, they should be okay. You know, with the two guys that we talked about plus some other young guys that I'll get into. But now you're in a situation when you lose a guy this early, it's gonna press your depth. It's gonna definitely press your depth a little bit and now other guys are gonna have to step up. And just because it creates opportunities for certain players doesn't mean that they always take advantage of it. So with Gabriel out, you've lost your biggest defensive tackle that at least of the veterans, you're losing arguably your best run defender and a guy that brings a great motor, to be honest with you. I mean, as he's gotten older, his motor's really been good. And so in that regard, it's a loss. It's definitely a loss and they're gonna have to figure out a way to overcome it 'cause as a coach, you go into the season thinking, this is my plan. I got this guy available, I got that guy available. I'm gonna go in the season, this is my plan. Well, then first day, boom, first day you lose a guy for experience of time and you kinda gotta reorganize everything. And so what is it gonna look like if that happens? The plan, of course, is you wanna be able to do that without having to then add reps back to Riley Mills and Howard Cross, that's the goal. In the day, if nobody steps up to take over those reps or snaps, then you just give 'em to Howard and Riley. That's just what you do. It's like, you'd love to play depth. And what I mean, what you do, I'm talking about against A&M, Louisville, Florida State, teams like that. You can play anybody against Northern Illinois and Miami, Ohio and you should be good. But I'm talking like the big games. Who's gonna be that guy against A&M? Okay, well, we're just gonna have to play 15, 20 more snaps of Howard or Riley in some combination until somebody else kinda steps up improves it. So obviously that's one goal or one thing you could do. Hopefully that's not the case. Hopefully what you want to have happen, your ultimate goal, if you're Al Washington and you're Al Golden, is you want multiple players to kind of step up and say, hey, no, no, we'll take Gabriel's reps and we'll give him, we'll give you the production that you're gonna get from him. We'll give you the level of impact play that you would've got from him. And so here's basically some candidates. Obviously Jason Onye is a rotation guy already. Right now, going into the season, Jason was part of that number two D line behind Riley Mills and Howard Cross. He's a guy that's played both nose and three technique, the last couple seasons this past year. Obviously he was listed at times as the nose. Later in the year, we saw him playing more three. This year in fall camp or in the spring ball, he was playing a lot of three. Gabriel was expected to play more of the nose when he came back in the fall, which he did early. But Jason Onye is a guy that could play both. In a certain situation, if there's a potential to where, let's say, if you're talking about say 65 snaps between the two positions, right? So 65 it knows and 65 a three technique. There's a world in which Howard played 40 and Riley played 40. And so then it knows you've got 25 more snaps. So let's say that Gabriel was going to give you 15 snaps at nose and Donovan was going to give you 10. And then Jason was going to give you 20 snaps at the three technique and Donovan and Gabriel, maybe as a rotation would give you 15. Well, now there's a situation where you've got, let's say 20 snaps or so from Gabriel that you've got to find a way. Let's say 25 snaps from Gabriel that you've got to figure out a way to replace. Well, some of those can be Jason Onye. You know, so if Jason Onye's able, now the younger's belt is a, hey, listen, I'm going to play some at nose. I'm going to play some at three techniques. So I'm not just Riley Mills is number two. I can be the number two behind Howard Cross as well. And so that's obviously an option. It's also the possibility that Donovan Hynish could be that guy and take something. Hey, look, I'm the number two nose now. You give me all those reps. So I'll take the five to 10 I was going to give and I'll take the 15 to 20 that Gabriel is going to give at those two positions. And so he could certainly do that as well or it could be a combination of the two of them where simply Donovan slides in and he takes, let's say half, you know, I mean, but I'm just kind of giving you an example of just the snap totals, but let's say Donovan takes five to 10, 15 of those and Jason takes 10 of those. And what that means is instead of Donovan playing 10 snaps and maybe now he plays 20 or instead of Jason playing 15 to 20 snaps, now maybe he plays 30 between the two positions. And so certainly an opportunity for those two guys to get more opportunities. And if they play well, then you should be good. And we've saw those two guys last year perform well. I mean, when you look at Notre Dame last year and how well I thought that they played at times last season on the D line against the run, I think those two guys stepped up and helped this football team out last season, you know, 'cause you had Gabriel against Ohio State, you had him, but you didn't have him, you know, in certain other games. I thought D line played really well in central Michigan. He didn't play a ton there. The other guys had to step up and perform. Donovan at times last year had to step up and perform and be the guy, but, you know, as we've talked about before, a lot of those guys didn't play a ton of snaps last year. And when you look at the defensive interior, you had 610 snaps for Howard Cross, 535 for Riley Mills. Your next highest snaps on the inside was Jason Onyade, 155. Gabriel Ruby only played 135 snaps last year, 136 snaps last year, according to Football Focus. Daven only played 100 snaps last year. You needed those guys to take over more snaps anyway. Now you need them to not only take over more snaps in themselves, but you need them to take over more snaps from Riley and what I say to themselves, like from Riley and Howard, but now you need them to take more snaps away from themselves as well. And that's from Gabriel. And that's gonna be a big part of what they're trying to do. There's some other players that obviously are gonna get a chance. Now here's the question with some of these guys. With some of these D line that we're about to talk about, are they guys that feel that void against Northern Illinois and Miami, Ohio, Navy, maybe Virginia? Are they guys can also help fill the void against Texas A&M and Louisville and Fort State? That's gonna be a question. 'Cause you should still be able to limit the reps for the starters against Northern Illinois and Miami, Ohio without Gabriel Ruby. That shouldn't be an issue. The question is, do they now gotta play 50, 60 snaps against Texas A&M? That's really what we have to figure out when we have to see what their aim is gonna do. 'Cause if you look at Howard Cross last year, played 58 snaps against NC State, 64 against Ohio State, 57 against Duke, 60 against Louisville, 55 against USC, 65 against Clemson. That's way too many snaps. Way too many snaps for a defensive tackle. As I've pointed out before, Michigan starters, none of them played over 500 snaps. And I think only one of them, I'm gonna pull it up again, I think only one of them, according to Pro Football Focus, even played over four, actually none of them. None of them played over 450. The most snaps they had from an interior defensive tackle last year was Mesa Graham at 442. Howard Cross at 610, Riley Mills had 535. Riley Mills, same thing, 49 snaps against NC State, 50 against Ohio State, 52 against Duke, 52 against Louisville, 50 against USC, 62 against Clemson. Those are a lot of snaps. You need their snaps to go down, but you can't do that if other guys don't make plays when they're in there. So your hope was is that Gabriel and Donovan and Jason could go in there and take on some of those reps. Well, now Gabriel's reps have to be figured out too. And so as I'm trying to explain, you have to find a way to be good enough with your twos to where you don't have to play 62 snaps with your starters against A&M and 55 to 62 snaps against Louisville and Florida State. And that's why these guys got to step up. And the more that can step up, the better it's going to be. So who are some of the players behind Jason Onye and Donovan Hynish? And that's what we're gonna kind of look at next. First guy that kind of is on my mind when you just think about just beef, right? Just pure beef, there's two guys that really, not one, two guys really that to me I'm looking for, as far as it's that nose. Yesterday at practice, when Gabriel went down, a guy that stepped in and got a lot of reps is Armel Mucum, red shirt, fresh Armel Mucum. Now Armel has missed a lot of time in his first year, Notre Dame. He missed a lot of time in the fall with a shoulder injury and he missed the entire spring with a shoulder injury. So he's a little bit behind from a development standpoint, that's a problem. He doesn't have a lot of experience and he's gained at least 40 pounds since he's been here. Now here's the good news. My wife and I were eating dinner at Salsas the other day. The Salsas over between Grape and Maine. There's a Salsa out by our house out in Granger, but we were doing some shopping over there. So we went and ate Salsas over there. And Inwalks Jr. Chilamaka and Ben Minick and Armel Mucum. So I got a chance in Devin Houston. So I got a chance to see Armel and he is big, I mean, just a big, big kid. And but it looked good. It didn't look like he had got fat. He just has really filled out his frame and he's like really big arms, really big chest. He's put a lot of good weight on. Now what I don't know if it's from a stamina standpoint, he can handle that much weight or how, or I should say how well he can handle that much weight. But I don't know the answer to that right now yet. But he is, he does provide beef. He's a legitimate 300 plus pounds now. Armel is like legitimate, like good 300 plus pounds. Loved his upside coming out. He was my number two upside guy on defense in that class in 2023 athletic kid. Shows a good first step still from what I've seen from him. This is an opportunity for Armel to step in because Armel is more of a true nose. I don't know that Devin Houston is that right now. Sean Savolano is a true nose. So these are the guys that are kind of battling to just directly take Gabriel's reps and from the standpoint of can they have be that big bodied eat up space type of guy that can be that run defender. That's asking a lot of Armel. Cause he has, like I said, he hasn't played a lot of football. So he's gonna, if he's gonna be that guy, he's gonna have to grow up in a hurry. Now the good news for him, not for Gabriel, but the good news for him, is that this creates more rep opportunities for him. And so he's, we're gonna see if he can kind of take it on. Now a guy that we saw in the spring get a lot of reps partly because Armel and Gabriel were both out in the spring. Gabriel wasn't in school when Armel was out with the shoulder injury. So in walks, Sean Savolano, who was like 340 pounds, he slimmed down a little bit. Didn't get a chance to see a lot of him yesterday or today. So I don't know how he's doing so far in fall camp. I can't see everybody. But he's another guy that now gets an opportunity to say, hey, I can be that guy, I can be that run stuffer. I can give you, you know, 10, 15 snaps a game in that role. So now instead of, you know, let's say you've got 25 snaps to take over a nose, let's say Dottum was gonna give you 15, you know, or Gabriel was gonna give you 20 of those and you had another five by Donovan. Well, now Dottum can maybe take 10 of them. So he's now got 15 of those 25 backup snaps at nose and maybe, you know, maybe Donovan or Armel could take those 10 or Savolano can take those 10. Or maybe, you know, they take five each or 10 each. And then now you can maybe play Donovan also a little bit of three technique as part of that. So now Rubio is your number. I mean, oh, yeah, is your number two, three technique. And now Donovan can maybe get a little work at the three technique and, you know, maybe, you know, so those are potential options as far as like those guys, if they can take over some of those legit nose reps, especially on early downs, then I think that helps alleviate some of this problem. But that's asking two guys that have never played a meaningful snap of college football to step up and play. And I don't even know, I'm gonna have to look this up. I don't even know if I think Armel played a game last year. Just give me a second. I'm looking at the snap count for pro football focus. He played six snaps last year. I believe that was against Wake Forest. Yes, it was against Wake Forest. He played six snaps. So this is a kid that's only got six snaps of football and there's belt who only played eight or nine games as a senior to private school in Virginia. So he's got a long way to go, but there's talent there. He's big, he's athletic for his size. And so now it's up to Coach Washington to kind of coach him up and get him ready to play. Couple other guys to keep an eye on. I don't know where Brendan Vernon is at overall. I did see Brendan make a couple nice wins yesterday and one-on-ones and team. Perhaps Brendan Vernon can now maybe take on some of those three technique reps. I still think Brendan's vest position is probably big end, but maybe this is a chance for him to take some of those reps. I think this is an opportunity also for Devin Houston to take some of those reps. But again, here's the issue. So like, I love Brendan Vernon's potential. I love Devin Houston's potential. Devin had a really nice play yesterday during a team period where he went in and made a play. And he's got some energy, he's got some ability. He's over 290 now, so he's got some size he brings at a table, not as much as Armel and Savilano and Gabriel, but he's starting to fill out and get to that 290 plus range. And he's a guy that I liked coming out of high school. So maybe he can take on some of those three technique reps. Maybe those two guys can take some of those, Donna can take some of those. And now maybe you can use own yay, a little bit more at the nose if you need to have him there. So, you know, that's something that you can look at as potentially with those two guys, maybe you have Brendan play more of three technique, although I still, like I said, I'd like to see him play three play outside more. Cole Mullins maybe could take some of those reps. I think it's probably a year too early, but I know the Notre Dame staff loves Cole Mullins. I just don't know if he's physically ready to play there yet, but this kind of gets us in a guy that I thought could have maybe stepped in in a situation like this was Quentin Autry who transferred in from Columbia. He's a guy that I thought, you know, look, you could get five, 10 snaps out of this guy against, you know, kind of not quite as much as what Chris Smith gave a couple of years ago 'cause Quentin Autry wasn't as big. The problem is Quentin Autry's injured right now and he's not in practice. So that's another blow that you could have potentially had 'cause he brings more of that experience. The issue that Notre Dame has is outside of like, own yay and in high-nish, all these other guys that we're talking about are all young. Devin Hewson's a red shirt freshman. Armou Mukam's a red shirt freshman. Sean Savilano's a true freshman. Brandon Vernon's a red shirt freshman. Cole Mullins is a true freshman. There's this big gap between the vets and then the young guys on this roster because of some of the recruiting misses in other years. So that's a, I'll be honest, a little bit of a concern for me is that lack of, here's that veteran presence to just kind of throw out there now. You tie-nish, own yay, and then big drop off an experience for Notre Dame. And that's something that I find to be a little bit concerning as we kind of dive into what comes next. So I don't know what the answer's gonna be. I don't know who's gonna step up. I don't know how it's gonna shake out. I don't think anybody does right now because this was an injury they weren't prepared for. Now they gotta figure that out. So we're gonna see kind of who steps up here over the next few weeks. That's gonna be one of the more intriguing camp stories for me now is who does anyone step up inside now that Gabriel Rubio's out? Without you having to say, okay, Riley Howard, sorry, man. You guys are gonna have to play 60, 50 plus reps a game now. Again, sorry, sucks for you. Hopefully you can make it through 16 game schedule. Ideally, you just don't wanna do that. You don't, if anything, you wanna take reps away from them from what they did last year because of the potential for an extended season. You really need those guys to step up. Now, the good news is I am excited about what Oni and Heinesh have done this offseason. Jason Oni had a great spring. So I think those two guys alone can take some of those reps, but can they handle all of them that were gone? And then who kind of comes in and maybe can be that next in line guy to give some beef because I could see us in air where Oni and Heinesh simply just take over the reps that Rubio would have given. Just from pure reps, that's fine. Those were good players, but do they give you the unique skill set that Gabriel brought to the table? I mean, Jason Oni is very disruptive, but can he be a guy that you just go in there and say, hey, go be beefy, go kick that center's butt for 20 snaps against this team? That's not really Jason's game. That's not Donovan's game. Their game is different. Does anyone give that specific role? And that's why I talked first about Armel and Savilano because they have the potential to be that. They have the potential to be that, hey, 300 plus pound guy go in there and for 10 snaps a game, 15 snaps a game, just give that center heck. Just battle his butt, make him hate life for the 10 snaps you're in the game. Hopefully somebody can step up and give you that type of role and a goal line type of situation, a short yard is type of situation or just early down first and second down, fight like heck with that center and that guard and make those guys stay on you. If they're double teaming you, make them stay on you. Don't let them get off that double team and let those line backers run in feast. That ultimately is what you hope one of those young guys can do. So that's my take on that. We did have some super chats before we get out of here and I want to bring those up before we hit the road. We got a with with your chest with a super chat. Appreciate you very much. Francis fans overreacting about five periods of practice is still way better than fans overreacting to recruiting. That is a great, great point. I know there's a lot of questions in the chat and people watching about Doosnite not commenting about Doosnite on the show. There's no point we're talking about fall camp but I do have some intel pieces on the board about Doosnite so you can kind of get my thoughts on what's going on there and if you want to know my opinion of what's going on Doosnite, just ask. I'll tell you on the board, on the premium board but I'm just, I'm keeping that off of this channel for now 'cause right now I just want to focus on fall camp. I'm over talking about fall camp. I'm over talking about recruiting right now. I'm over talking about Doosnite and what's going on there and just gonna let it play out from the show standpoint and I'll talk about things later. But if you want to know where I thought, the thoughts are the latest message board, boards@arshbreakdown.com is the place to be to that but yeah, I'm with you on this man. I'd much rather us have some dramatic overreactions to a day or two of practice than recruiting. I would always rather talk about the team than recruiting. I know some, I know there's a lot of people that would much rather talk about recruiting. I'm not, I care more about what's here, not what might be here. So that's certainly a true thing there. Charlie Weiss' last belt loop would have super checked. Thank you, Charlie, show in love. Appreciate you man. And I did get your DM about your little incident with that person the other day. That's hilarious man. Just not surprising at all though. Not surprising at all. So Iden Benami, thank you for your shoot chat. Iden, the thing I'm most excited about from yesterday was the communication you mentioned. To me, that's a huge great sign and a great intangible for winners. I agree with you. I absolutely agree with you on that one, buddy. So man, I appreciate you all very much today guys. I know a little bit shorter show today, but just wanted to get the practice support out and talk about what's going on with Gabriel. We'll be back next week with getting into, 'cause there's a lot of things we were gonna cover this summer regarding the team that we didn't get to intentionally because once we saw what our availability was going to be and there's not a lot and it's all condensed and for the most part, short period of time, not complaining, not saying it's good or bad, I'm just commenting. We had to alter our schedule and get down to, okay, we're gonna have a lot more open periods in between, you know, this, I mean, we're gonna, three of our six full practices we're seeing are in the first three days. So, you know, after tomorrow, we're gonna have three or four availabilities and they've still got 20 plus practices left. So, a lot of stuff we decided to shift into in August to when we could kind of talk about it leading into the season. So, excited about that and working on, you know, what we're gonna do in season this year since I don't have Ryan anymore. And if you guys haven't checked it out, go check out Ryan's Twitter page, Rise and Draft. He's putting content out from what he's doing at A&Z Sports, excited about what he's doing. He and I were talking to Dave about Notre Dame and some different things. So, check out what he's doing. But obviously, we're gonna have to alter a little bit kind of our plan. I'm excited about some of the things that we're gonna do. Just got a commitment from somebody that's gonna come on on our Thursday show when we do predictions and we're gonna talk some national stuff. And so, I'm gonna have a national college football writer that's gonna join us on Thursdays to preview some of the games of the big games of the weekends. I'm excited about that. I'm gonna announce hopefully later today a two new hires of writers, team writers for Notre Dame that I'm hoping to get on the show from time to time. One of them, who I'm excited, I almost said his name, one of them excited about who's gonna do some shows with me. And he's a guy that's gonna cover the team. So, I'm very excited about that as well. So, we'll hope to announce those here very soon. Still looking for some recruiting writers. I've got a bunch of resumes. I still gotta go through. I wanted to do him a couple weeks ago. It's been so, so slim with everything else, but I'm hoping to get on that here for the next week and finish putting that recruiting team together. Hope to have Nick on the show here at some point time soon. Nick Kramers obviously already right for us, but we just kind of gonna get through this fall camp here. So, August is gonna be slimed. I'm excited about all the things we got coming on in August. It's gonna be a lot of fun and no-be-feeder. That is not who is coming on the show. That's very well played, my friend. But that will not be our national writer. We only have people that we take seriously on the show, but that's not who it is. So, I'm excited about what we got going on. So, anyway, that's it for today's show everybody. I'll be nation sports talk tonight at six, five o'clock. Vince, now I'll be back tomorrow, one o'clock. We'll kind of wrap up practice. We'll dive into our mail bag. So, get ready for those questions that you have. And then next week we'll get back on track with like BISO holds and our big 12 preview and things like that and Notre Dame opponent previews and Notre Dame team and all that kind of stuff. So, we're very excited to do all that. So, thanks for being with me today, folks. Appreciate you all so much. Have an awesome rest of your day. And we'll talk to you guys again on the Irish Breakdown podcast. 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