Let's take a look at Florida's run game and defense. They will need these units to get the upset. Get seven days of IT for $1: https://www.on3.com/teams/texas-longhorns/join/ David McClellan is a fiduciary financial advisor and partner with Forum Financial. He works broadly and deeply with his clients as a financial life coach. He specializes in financial planning and has contributed numerous articles to Kiplinger on the topic of retirement tax bombs. For a free intro consult, contact him at dmcclellan@forumfinancial.com or 312-933-8823. Call Luxe Kitchen and Bath at 833-358-LUXE today or visit luxekitchenbath.com to discover where quality meets luxury and begin the process of transforming your home. Purchase The 2024 Longhorn Football Prospectus: Thinking Texas Football - 12th Annual Edition: https://sites.google.com/view/the-2023-burnt-orange-bible/home Written for the passionate, smart fan who wants more than recycled corporate media content. Find out why it's called The Burnt Orange Bible. Smashwords (compatible with any device, select epub for Apple/Kindle): https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1591653 Apple: https://books.apple.com/us/book/2024-longhorn-football-prospectus-thinking-texas-football/id6554008037 Amazon (Print): https://a.co/d/iVszuhf Be the smartest fan in the room and start Thinking Texas Football today. Listen to the Podcast: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3P0cwAUPNZrsNrTOKOfa6x Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/inside-texas-football/id1721623113 Find Us On Social Media: Twitter: https://twitter.com/InsideTexas Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InsideTexas/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/insidetexas/ https://www.on3.com/teams/texas-longhorns/
Inside Texas Football
IT Live (11/06): Florida's Run Game & Defense, CFP Rankings Released
Good morning, everybody, happy to see y'all. Tex Homer here with Ian Boyd. We are, of course, going to go into some schematic elements, try to really understand the mechanics of the teams we're going to face. And this week, we got the Florida Gators on the slate. So first, we're going to talk about their offense. Oh, that's the old one. We're going to talk about the Florida offense run game specifically, and then the big humans element of that. Then we're going to talk about the Florida defense. They're also going to be a key factor in this style that they're going to have to implement versus Texas. And then we're going to talk the new CFP rankings and their practical applications. So there's the rankings, and then there's the actual seedings. We're going to look at the actual seedings, because that's how it's going to actually be reflected in reality. So that's going to be a big difference there. All right. You ready to rock Ian? I'm ready. Let's do it. Roadster, good morning, man. Good to see you. What time did you do to the plate last night, Homer? I went to bed probably around 1230ish. I fell asleep on the couch kind of early, like 1110 or something. Yeah, I normally am in bed by like turning off the TV probably at 1130, but I've been going to bed way earlier these days. I've got to wake up with the kids every morning. Well, it's weird. The time change should actually make it feel like it's 1230, but I've actually ended up staying up later since the time change is kind of weird. I don't know what's going on there, because it should be the opposite. I should be going to bed earlier, but for whatever reason, I'm not. All right, let's talk Florida run game. So first, if anyone wasn't aware, Florida's on their third string quarterback. If you listen to Napier, Legway might even be back, not happening. So third string, Aidan Warner's there, and he's going to be limited. So really, the strategy for Gators to win this is going to be an effective run game that can chew clock, tires out, and then on the flip side, their defense has to be able to perform and kind of frustrate Quinn. So that's the model for how to make it win this, but first, let's pull up the Ian's article on the Florida run game. Maybe while you're doing that, worth noting that on Legway, the reason you would play him is just because his arm can stretch the ball down the field better than Aidan Warner's can, but he's going to have to elude pass-rushers. And there's just no way they're going to ask if Billy Napier's job is safe, which it seems like it is, there's no way you ask your phenom freshman to go out there and play on a bad hammy and try to dodge Colin Simmons. You're just begging for disaster and like a much worse injury. Yeah, I mean, hamstrings are notorious for how easily you can re-aggregate them. I have a, in my right top of my hamstring, I have a little twin from when I run. And I've been dealing with that for like six months, it seems now. And then I'll rest it, you know, and I'm like, we're good to go. And then I'll go back out and run again, same thing. So it's like, that's a really tricky injury to deal with. Soft tissue is a weird thing. I think that's actually what happened to-- you can correct me if I'm wrong or maybe somebody in the comments can if they're not all sleeping off election night. I think that's what happened to Qui Leonard. Is he had this like chronic hamstring deal? And I think the Spurs even told him like, this is like the generative. You're going to be fighting this forever. And he was like, no way, I'm not trying to hear that. And that's like part of what led to their big breakup. But they, you know, it was right, obviously, because he's never been able to stay healthy ever since then. Yeah, exactly. And load management is pretty much all you can do for a hamstring. Like you can just kind of wait a week, come back, tweak it again, wait another week, come back, tweak it again. There were all those rumors flying about Oklahoma's Nick Anderson. And I think like, oh, he's holding out for NIL or whatever. And that's why he's not playing. I think it literally was just this. He had a bad hand me. He did try to play against Texas, I think, or the week before Texas. He ran one route. He was Tennessee, right? He ran one route against Tennessee. And then it was like, and it just like worse. Yeah, it's a brutal. It's a brutal injury, man, because there's no way you're not going to tweak it again. Durnshippling, hamstring issues for years until he finally did some like super long term aggressive rehab to get over that issue. Yeah, and it was just funny. Napier even trying to suggest that he would come back. Fellas, put yourself in shark's shoes. What would your opening script be on offense? Throw at the corners. Yeah, I think you're going to want to test those corners a little bit. And if you land something, then you just immediately run foot the gators with whatever. If you're able to pick on their corners early and they're not covering it up, then they're going to have to immediately make adjustments with their coverages and how they're playing you. And then the rest of the game's really easy. Are they majority? I know you said that they play a lot of corners. Is corners their majority coverage? Yeah, Meg. Meg quarters is their preference. They play man everywhere he goes with the corners? Yeah, safety, safety. Safety post by the number two, and then dig by the number one. Yeah, that's my opening script. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Subversion of dig post. Yeah. For double post. Yeah. Quinn, if the corners are truly in there on-- because Dejan Johnson went down, that was their third string. I don't know if he'll be back. More was on crutches, like you said. And then is it Marshall, the one that went down for the season, landed on his shoulder, weird, and Kentucky or Tennessee? Presumably they would tell their safety to bracket the deepest route and then just leave their corners. Sorry, leave their backers on the dig. And then you find out if Quinn's ready to step up and-- No. And hit those or not, which I think you will. Yeah. Sarc loves his Yankee concept. Everyone does. Even in the NFL, I mean, it's so prominent. It's the most beautiful and efficient route combination there is for what you get out of it. All right, so kind of what's so on their offensive side, we don't think they're going to be able to pass successfully. Also, they lose Eugene Trae Wilson, which sucks, especially for me, because I had to write a couple minutes on him in my breakdown. So really devastating for me. I don't have to waste that. But he went down, which is also important, because he's their yak guy. So lowest average depth of target in the SEC, highest yards after catch per reception in the SEC. So that's a quarterback's best friend, because he could just throw the little screen out to him and then he can get you-- he's averaging 11 yards. He's averaging over a first down every time he gets the ball. And he's doing it on his own. That's kind of a disaster for them, because that needed to be their change up to the run game was ball control passing with Aidan Warner throwing to that guy or other short range targets. Yeah, so that's why it's brutal. So I guess as a young quarterback now, you just rely on the big body tight ends closer to the line. But man, to just be able to throw that screen and he picks up a first down, that would have been huge for them. So they're not able to do that in the passing game, right? They're going to need to fall on the running game and do some ball control stuff. And Ian's first portion of their running game is Billy Napier's big human. So can you please expand on your thesis here? When Billy Napier took over at Florida, the first thing he did was exactly the same thing as what Steve Sarkisian and Kyle Flood did at Texas, which is go find the biggest people you can recruit in time and get them on your campus and transform your offensive line into the-- we need that Kyle Flood, Vitruvian man meme. Where it's like the ideal man, but Kyle Flood's ideal man looks like a world's strongest man, like just a huge guy with, you know, not a six pack, but just mass everywhere. Some of these guys, the smaller guys you see, like Jalen Farmer and David Connor, are already off the roster. And I think those were holdovers from-- they were either very late additions, or they were holdovers from the previous staff's recruiting class. And then he got those two huge guys, Cameron Waits and Osiris Torrance, who's now in the NFL, and Jordan Herman, who also fleshed out of the roster, but they tried to add him in too. So these are just gigantic people. And if you look at their offensive line right now, Waits rotates in. They have Damian George from North Shore, who people will remember, who's enormous. Their center is big for a center. Yeah, slaughter. It's Jake Slaughter, their left guard. He's like, Jake Slaughter's thinking like Cole Hudson, probably. Their left guard is not tall, but he's 325, 330 pounds. They're just-- they are big. That's their deal. We're going to be big. We're going to cover up your guys so that you can't get penetration into the backfield. And we're just going to screen you away from the ball. Yeah. And not even purely on offense, right? Cam Jackman on the defensive line. Desmond Watson's the absurd one. He's the nose, 6'5", 449 pounds. Crazy, crazy size. Like too much size. And let's see. It works decently. They hit a guy like that at Louisiana, too. Do you remember doing previews when Texas played them with Hudson Card? Yeah. Like one of the notes was like, hey, they're playing like a lot of under front. And then the nose they're putting at the point of attack was like a 350 pound dude that maybe got in trouble somewhere and transferred in. I can't remember his name. But that's-- he loves that. He wants-- he's like-- he's just making it real simple. And the trenches were just going to be really big. Yeah. Like Texas, they rotate between 11 personnel and 12 personnel. Yep. Prostyle team. And the guy who stays on the field for them in either package is tied in Hayden Hanson. Also a really good receiving tied in. So he's like second or first in yards per reception and second or first in yards after catch per reception. Are you really clear? Yeah. He's like nine balls. Yeah. I guess they've all been very damaging. Yeah. That's basically what it is, right? They block with them, block with them, block with them, send them out, and then they get you. So like once or twice a game, he's going to make you pay. He's like-- he's like-- Texas's ideal future for Spencer Shannon is Hayden Hanson. I don't know if that'll happen or not. He's just another big guy at the point of attack, blocking. So he makes it really easy to block all their run game. The big thing with Hayden Hanson-- and obviously he has hands too. So if you don't cover him, he'll catch it. The big thing with Hayden Hanson for this game against Texas is that a lot of 11 personnel teams that have a running quarterback, when you have a running quarterback, you don't have to block somebody up front. So like you can leave a defensive end unblocked and have the quarterback read him on the option, right? Unlike 60% of your run plays or more. And the quarterback's not even going to get that many carries because they'll just make that guy stay home and then you can still hand off, right? Yeah. So then you end up with a receiving tight end because it's like, hey, we don't have to block these guys that much. So our tight end can be a 230-pound dude who's like a big slot, right? Harlow's Sporting Ham. Harlow's Sporting-- and they-- Florida does have those guys. Or like a Juan Davis or a Jetavian Sanders type guy. But Florida does not do that. They still have the huge blocking tight end. So when you take away the quarterback run and it's like, well, now we have to block somebody with our tight end. Now our tight end is going to have to block a defensive end. That's no problem. That's already built in. So they're totally OK in that respect. I don't think losing lag way in the run game, it sucks for them. But it does not cripple their run game concept in any way. No. So this is the current group, Austin Barber fourth year, and IJ Harris second slot fourth. It's-- I just did it for my breakdown, but I can't remember. It's IJ or something like that. OK. Harris, Damian George, and a right tackle, Brandon Crenshaw Dixon. So 6'6", 6'3", 6'5", 6'6", 6'7", and then Hayden Hanson, 6'6" that tied in. The tackles are-- they're tall, which is good, obviously. The tackles are not like Cameron Williams, but they're just like insane. They look like normal tackles. Yeah. But the interior is really big. That's where they are more plus sized. Yeah. So this is what's interesting. I think you talk-- you cancel out some conventional wisdom of why you want big bodies purely for like inside zone or vertical push concepts. Can you say that there's more value and size opposed to just blowing people off the ball? Yeah. The myth is people tend to think like, oh, you have a really big offensive line. Now you can really push people off the ball. Tall, heavy dudes on the offensive line are often actually not that good at pushing defensive linemen backwards, because it's a low man wins game, right? And it's just really hard for them to get low and get leverage to push people. But what they are really good at is enveloping people. They get their hands on somebody, and he can't really do anything. Even if he holds his ground decently, he's like flailing his arm, trying to make an arm tackle or something. He's not getting push, because it's equally hard to push the 350-pound dude backwards. And a lot of the really good ones are good at turning a shoulder or screening a guy. Plus, late in the game, after you've been pushing and fighting with these massive people throughout the game, at the end of the game, when those double teams come, then you do start to get movement, and people get washed out, because it's exhausting. But yeah, the guy that gets the best movement for them is probably Nije Harris, who's the shortest guy, and the smallest guy. But-- If you've even seen noses and some tackles on the defensive line get shorter, and I think an example is like from us would be Byron Murphy. If you're a super tall, 6'7" player, I mean, he's going to out-leverage you every time. He's going to be basically under your chest, and there's nothing you're going to be able to do. And so that's kind of the interesting size, too, is we have this concept of being really tall, being super advantageous. When normally what we're talking about, someone being tall is actually their length. The length of their arms is the huge beneficial part. It's not purely their height that makes them good. Yes. So I think-- The ideal lineman would be like short, but have the big wingspan, like a twin raid, like 6'4", but 6'11" wingspan, that would be-- They would look very weird, but that would be the ideal thing. 6'7" is cool, but most of the time we're saying, it's because he has good reach, because he's 6'7". Yeah, before we keep going real quick, let's hear a word from our sponsor. I'm just going to say it, guys. You probably need a fiduciary financial advisor, and I've got the guy for you. His name is David McClellan with Forum Financial. He works broadly and deeply with his clients as a financial life coach. And he should know something about coaches, and because he won several national championships as a swimmer for the University of Texas. He specializes in financial planning, and has contributed numerous articles to Kipling on the topic of retirement tax bombs. So contact David today to be your fiduciary financial planner, and schedule a one-hour consultation to assess your financial situations. The free consultation is available, so just give him a call. The number is 312-933-8823. That's 312-933-8823. His email is also in the description below. - Take 'em out, y'all. All right. So let's talk about some of their concepts here that they like to run. Let me zoom this in as much as I can. You know, kick it into mobile mode. Okay. So this is inside zone. - This is the split zone where they motion the title. - Oh, yeah. - If the teams do this all the time, A&M was trying to do this with a lineman that they stole from Penn State. Like you put an extra offensive lineman on the field and you motion him, like the title on split zone. But when you do that, it's pretty obvious. Go ahead. - All right, let's roll. - Yeah, what you see here is they're initially just holding the point of attack. And then when the running back makes his cut and the defenders try to pursue, then the big guys start leaning on him. That's basically what a standard positive Florida run looks like. And they're doing it against Georgia here, which as you recall, it looked very different when Texas was trying to get push or trying to win the point of attack on these plays against Georgia. They were getting stacked and stuffed. - Yeah, why is that? You think Florida is just a better run blocking unit than we are? Or you think Georgia just wasn't as inspired? - We hope not. I don't know. I mean, that's the Hawcom's razor, right? - Yeah. - There was one guy in particular for Texas that was getting whipped a lot though. So it's hard to know what that, like maybe one guy just wasn't dialed in or injured or something. - Yeah, I remember that same guy when we were playing OU on the OU side, they were saying that that guy also was who they would attack and teams seemed to have keyed in on that. - Yeah. - All right. So that's the split zone stuff where the tight incomes and blocks the backside end on zone. - You did a good job too. - Yeah, you did. - Usually like when Gunnar Helm executes that block, you're just like, just screen the guy and don't let him get any push. - Yeah, he'll stop his feet in like, he basically runs up to him and then stops. And that's how you get beat every time blocking. - Yeah. On outside zone, it works a lot better than inside zone 'cause you're just holding for the line creates the backside crease and inside zone, you kind of want to knock that guy back and Hayden Wilson got some knock back there. - Yeah. Lots of motion from the tight ends, let's watch this. - This one's outside zone where they motion the tight ends both to the edge and then they just clear out whoever that was that was trying to set the edge just gets taken out. - And outside zone's the most common run concept that Texas runs as well. - Yeah, they're really similar Texas and Florida. It's almost the same run game in some respects. Florida is probably a little more inside zone heavy this year than Texas. Probably attribute that to Texas having, you know, Jake Majors and Calvin Banks and Hayden Conner who are better at outside zone than inside zone. - Yeah, good lateral movers. - Yeah. - And then they add the punch with counter. So yeah, it's a similar style. But two leads there and then, oh, that's Michael. Yeah, he gets a good block on Michael Williams. I mean, sets him back enough. - Is that who's on the edge? - Yeah, 13. - Yeah, we're gonna see more of that in a minute. There's a counter run that I also gift in this article and Hayden Conner has to block. - Yeah. - This one. - Yeah. - Hayden Conner has to block Michael Williams at the point of attack on counter to set the edge so that the pulling blockers can get around him and it barely works. - Yeah. - Okay. - They've gotten better with counter too as the kind of season would go on. I would expect a lot of bear fronts. - Just to try to frustrate the zone scheme. - Yeah, I think they'll do that when Florida plays with two tight ends, which I guess they kind of, if I were Florida, I'd be tempted to play more 11 personnel. 'Cause I don't know if I want to. - Yeah, but with the lack of quarterback and Eugene Wilson out. - Yeah. - I mean, you just kind of have to sell out 'cause you can, I mean, I get why you're saying why you would do 11, but you don't have the quarterback to make the other half of 11 even make sense in the past game. - I would just go basically a ton of tight ends, try to run it down. You're probably going to lose either way. And then the big plays, hopefully you can leak out Hayden Hanson for something running to the sidelines and hopefully turns it up field. - The one complication for Texas in this game is that they're best defensive tackle. Vernon Broughton misses the first half 'cause the targeting penalty. So they're number of SEC caliber defensive tackles that they can play in this game. Like Bill Norton can play in this game for sure. Alfred Collins, Jermaine Lule, and then what? Like is Tia Savaya up for this? Can they play one of the younger guys like Dre Bledso or Michael January? Can they get a couple of decent snaps out of those guys? Who am I missing? - Sadeer. - Oh yeah, Sadeer. So Miss, maybe a Sadeer game 'cause Sark did talk him up in the picture. - Which I think is good, man. I'm glad that he's been able to get back into good graces 'cause we thought he was out of here. So I'm glad that he's back in the mix 'cause we need that type of big buy, especially next year, man, when we're losing a bunch. But yeah, I think the first half is not gonna be ideal there. The first half is just slow 'em down, man. - Yeah, they're gonna, yeah, so definitely you're gonna wanna, I think you're right, and just go big and try to ball control if you're Florida, like Mississippi State. - Mm-hmm. - Shorten that first half up real good and see if you can lean on him. Blake's asking about Alex January. When's the last time we saw him? - Dude, I have no idea. - I think that-- - I can try to pull up his snap counts real quickly. Let me see. - I can try to pull up his snap counts real quickly, let me see. - They have young guys, Blake. They have a bunch of young guys that they're gonna have to play next year, but they brought in so many older dudes in the portal that there's no way those young guys got a ton of first team, second team reps in fall camp. - Yeah, so he played 17 snaps versus Oklahoma. He didn't play weak. He didn't play versus Georgia, and then he played two snaps versus Vandy. My guess is that in the spring, they'll probably portal in another defensive tackle or two, but I think in the spring, they will send January and Mitchell and Bledso to boot camp and just zero and like, okay, you guys have to be good now. And we've seen that at Texas, like when it's a defensive tackles turn to have a chance to make money and to be the featured guy, they get developed very differently. - Yeah. - Andrew Sweatt made it enormously per senior year. - But these guys are also still young comparatively to whenever we normally see that leap, you know? - Yeah, that is a potential to hang up. Vernon Broden made it enormously. Need at least one guy to do that. - Collins has improved, Vernon has improved, but those are all like fourth, fifth year players. That's kind of the tricky part. Can they do it with a third year guy? - Yeah, when you can dangle the NFL contract in front of them in the off season, it's easier. - Yeah, but also it's like we have this weird incentive structure where it's like, you don't really have to try it to your last year, 'cause all you've seen that you can just show up at Texas, not do anything until your last year and get your millions. I wish we would have a structure that was like, you need to start being good at year three, and then year four, I guess Byron Murphy is a good example of doing the dang thing from day one, but it is funny how we're like, just hang around until year five, and then we'll get you in the league. - It may just be a reality of the types of guys that play defensive tackle at the University of Texas and the nature of being a semi-pro athlete in the city of Austin is a big guy. - Yep. - Just a lot of luxury and distractions and-- - Food trucks. - Food trucks, terrific food. Some spending money now to spend on that food, it's tough. It's like, and those guys like, Broden and Sweat, they were decent. They were like, they legitimately got better every year, but before they made those enormous leaps, but it was like the last possible year like, okay, if you want that NFL contract, it has to be this year. - Yeah. And so that's the scare. We said like a Dre Bledsoe or a January could be like, I know you want this for me, but I don't have that same urgency. - And I want a Dre Bledsoe in particular, man, he's a special athlete. Whenever, if that light comes on for him, man, that's gonna be awesome. But also I'm worried about just size, right? Alex January and Cedir Mitchell is like, for next year, I want some big bodies. Also, just for the record, we don't, I don't know that Bledsoe and January are at all held back by lack of desire. We don't know that that we're not trying to imply that that's the case. That's just, there's no intel here. - Yeah, there's no, it just seems to happen a lot with big defensive tackles. It's just like a stereotype of what often happens with big defensive tackles as well. - And you can prove it data wise. It's what defensive tackles one of the highest bus rates too, right, as opposed to recruiting stars to NFL output. So yeah, it's, you gamble a lot with those big guys, man. - Some of them are big, here's the difference. This is what you gotta figure out. So to gain that much weight for some people, it requires so much discipline. They're having to eat an absurd amount at these exact four or five times a day, like a body building, right? That's actually very disciplined. But on the flip side, you have the guy that's not disciplined at all. And he just naturally eats horrible food all the time. You have to figure out which one they are. And that's where the bus rate can be a little different. Are they just guys that are excessive anyways? Are these more of a body building mentality where they're trying actively to gain weight? Or are they just naturally very overweight guys lacking that discipline? And that's why I think there's high bus rates in that position, 'cause they can go kind of either way there. - Yeah, it happens where there are a lot of guys that are naturally powerful and explosive and also naturally 300 pounds. - Yeah. - And you ask any high school coach for basketball or football, there will always be enormous guys that they had to like beg or convince to play their sport. - Yeah. - And they're really just playing it because they can and they've been like pushed into the device too and they may or may not like love it. - It's like being seven foot. Like what is the, there's some crazy stat that like, what is it like 5% or 13% of people over a certain height play like college and an NBA basketball? And there's no way that many are interested. It's just you're seven feet tall. - Yeah. - You know? - You can kind of tell too, which ones are we? - Yeah, you can sort it out. But yeah, that's the DT is high bus rate and it makes sense with the body types why it could be high bus rate plus man, it's gonna be 350 and still put out the athletic output of like a safety is crazy, man. All right. You ready to look at the Florida defense? - Yeah, let's do it. - Let's do it. But before I trick you guys, before we do that, let's hear a word from our sponsor. - This video is brought to you by Luxe Kitchen and Bath. Luxe has been offering high-end kitchen and bathroom remodels for three generations throughout the greater Austin area with five-star review after five-star review on Google and Facebook and an A plus rating from the Better Business Bureau. You can put your faith in Luxe Kitchen and Bath's award-winning designers and skilled craft people to bring to life that dream vision of your special home. But that's not all. Luxe's All-Star team provides full remodels, large additions and even commercial build outs as well. So call Luxe Kitchen and Bath at 833-358 Luxe today or visit luxekitchenbath.com to discover where quality meets luxury and begin the process of transforming your home. Get a free quote today by calling 833-358 Luxe. That's L-U-X-E. Or by visiting luxekitchenbath.com. Link in the description. - Link in the description. All right, scouting the Florida Gator defense. All right, let's see where to start. - Okay, so your main point you start with is Carson Beck, I picked off three times and they held Georgia for 4-4-11. I never looked at that. 36% on third downs. And some of those interceptions were directly schematic. I can't remember all of them, but the one where they sim and then drop back to the middle of the field and I think Aaron Gates or whatever gets that pick. That was a schematic interception. - There's maybe, no, I think that one, I think that one is gift in here. I don't know if that's what happened in that one. - The Aaron Gates one? - Yeah, he's the nickel, right? - Yeah, Aaron Gates is the nickel. Is this him? - Yeah, that's it. - Let me see. Is this the one where he pressures and drops out? Oh no, you're right. I was thinking that was much more. - I don't know what Beck was doing on that one. - Yeah, I don't know what he was doing either. I assume that they had to have been applying pressure. - They were late, I just don't, I don't get that one. But they don't. - He's reading his eyes the whole way too, if you are. I mean, it's literally, he's just taking them to the football 'cause he's spot-dropping in his own. And he just, yeah, he's just falling back. I thought there was much more of a coaching win than that was. - That's how Aaron played much of last year, when Texas was more of a quarters team. You'd watch him sometimes and he'd be way more shallow in zone than you would think, but he was pulling angles. The other one is a schematic interception for sure, or the edge picks it off. - So give the first part, the profile of improvement, kind of what's been going on the past couple of years and then surprisingly, you know, what have they been able to do this year? - They added Ron Roberts, which I almost neglected in this article. Ron Roberts is like a older godfather figure in the like zone replacement blitz school. So like one of his big proteges was Dave Aranda. Dave Aranda came up with Roberts at some point. Ron Roberts- - He's the big creeper simulated guy. - Yeah, which I guess we can explain in a minute, 'cause that sounds weird. - Just he's a creeper. - Yeah, he's a creeper. So Ron Roberts worked with Billy Napier at Louisiana. And when Dave Aranda got the Baylor job, he brought Ron Roberts with him to come help him at Baylor. Then he had to fire him and throw him under the bus when things went awry at Baylor. And Billy Napier ended up adding him this year to help Austin Armstrong, which is his young coordinator. Florida was really struggling with defense. Like they were decent with Darth Mullen, but not great. And then like year one, they slipped with Napier. Year two, they like collapsed and they were like making changes mid-season. And you figured that they would get a lot better this year 'cause it's hard to play defense that poorly at Florida if you try. You just, your athletes are too good to be that bad at defense. And early in the year, it looked like they weren't going to somehow achieve being terrible again. - Well, everyone kind of wrote Florida off after the first couple of games and they've improved consistently since then. - They've improved, yes, considerably. They are, I heard maybe the players had begged Armstrong to be a little less exotic and just let them play a little more base defense. - That makes sense if they're playing a lot of quarters now, right? - Yeah, but they, we'll get to that in a second, but they are playing well. They hang up is that they lost their best corner a couple of weeks ago. They lost the other starting corner back potentially. I haven't seen an official deal. - Yeah, yeah. - He left the game and he didn't come back against Georgia last week. They've got the turncoat five star that was at Colorado for a year and bailed on Dion is now one of their starting corners. - Cormono was playing. - Cormono McLean. The other starting corner might be a guy that they had improved a lot by playing him at safety. Triqwezi Bridges. - Yeah. - Triqwezi. - Okay. - Yeah. - He's a former Oregon player, yeah. - He's a, he's a good player, but I think having him at safety was a huge boost to them and I think having him at corners less great. So they are significantly improved, but that may not be reflected in this game because one of their big edges was just having really good corner play in a few veterans and now they're gonna be a lot younger and a lot less, a lot less sure, a lot less of a sure thing at cornerback, which is huge because of the way they play schematically. - Yeah. And it would have been more, it seems like it would have been more frustrating if Armstrong was still trying to throw the kitchen sink at everything and confuse super bad. But if you're playing like Meg, man everywhere he goes on the corners, at least he've simplified there, it's just can they athletically keep up. I think Cormono McLean can athletically keep up. - Yeah. - And kind of figure it out. - He may have some mistakes though, 'cause I mean he's gonna be going up against Isaiah Bond now coming off of a week of rest and that could be tricky. So the nature of their scheme is perfect for creepers and symbolises because they play Meg quarters, term we keep saying. - And Meg just means you're just talking about the technique of the corner. So if you're here Meg, it just means man everywhere he goes. You'll also hear mod corners, m-o-d. That could be man only deep. I've heard it man only deep, man on demand, blah, blah, blah. It basically means that corner would take anything deep, but if he runs like a shallow drag, he'll let that go to the linebackers. So when we say Meg, mod, whatever you hear about corners, just the technique of the corner. So they're playing Meg, meaning that man everywhere he goes, even if they run shallows or drags. - They do some of those, but they usually have at least one guy and press man coverage at corner. And science, sometimes both. But inside, they play the opposite, which is they zone everything off with their linebackers, including the nickel. - And I love it. - I think both of them are replacement blitzes. So this is the one we just watched for Grant. But watch the edge on this one. - Pie burn right here. - Yeah, pie burn. - Number 44, white guy. - So the corner and top is impressed, man. Yeah. So pie burn drops into zone underneath. And then the weak inside linebacker blitzes. And then they do the same thing on the next example. Only it's the mic inside linebacker. - And Georgia did this first play of the game versus us. Work went almost, throws that pick to the boundary and he's able to get it right over. Same concept Georgia did. - So they're playing their coverage techniques at linebacker are pretty simple zone drops, pattern matching or pattern reading, I would say. And the safeties are both deep over the top. The corners are just on their own little islands. Does he stay in if the back stays in? Is it the back that releases here or is it the tight end? Let me see. Oh, it's the tight end that releases here. Nevermind. I didn't know if it was conditional on if the back goes to the flats or not, but he's here. - No, it's not. Yeah, it's like it's zone. - Yeah, it's pure zone drop. - It's pure zone drop. The same thing on the next clip. Maybe not. This is not what I thought. - Who are we looking at? What is this? Let's see. Remember which one this is. Apparently they're gonna play quarters on it. Oh. - Oh, it's like where you're talking where the safety can come down in the alley. - Yeah, the safety can run the alley because the corners are in man. That press man coverage, the safety can help that corner on anything inside. But if he sees run, he can just run the alley. - We're gonna score on these guys then. - 'Cause all you do, all you're gonna do is fake counter to the field like this, bring the safety down and then you got one-on-one matchups with a third or four-string corner on like Isaiah Bond. Let's see how bad the corner bites on the run fake. Does he go all the way up at that point? Let's see. - You mean the safety? - Yeah, the safety, sorry. He waits a little bit. So he's not like crazy firing down the alley. - He doesn't do it otherwise. He got one-on-ones all day. - Ron Roberts trick that he did at Baylor and that he's doing at Florida, is that because the quarterback looks the other direction, and the back is the other direction, the safety plays it aggressively. If he was looking at the safety when he was handing off, the safety would stay back, in case it was a RPO or play action. - Yeah. - Then you see the nickel. The nickel would potentially be a part of the run fit. But because he sees the quarterback look to the field, the nickel puts his eyes there too and he doesn't play the run as aggressively. And he knows the other side is where the run sport's gonna come from. - Yeah, he's looking at the RPO bubble screen. - So that, you probably have to play action then to really punish that? - Get him to fight, fight. Let's explain a creeper and a sim pressure. So the difference is a creeper doesn't show pressure pre-snap. So if you look at Fire 3 creeper, you see this will right here that's dropping. He's just standing where he normally is and they're gonna send pressure from the backside from this nickel. The difference with a simulated pressure is the will is mugged up and the mic is mugged up. They drop out and they still send the nickel here. So you're expecting like something upfront to catch your eyes on the play side or whatever it is, you're looking at that, but really the pressure's gonna end up coming from the opposite direction. But the difference when a creeper is they're just not showing you pre-snap, simulated pressure, the value of a simulated pressure here is that you're trying to check the offensive line into five O protection or man protection and limit their amount of double teams. So you're gonna get the protection check and then you're gonna drop out. So you're gonna get the advantages of plateauing with an offensive line and you'll get the benefits as if you were blitzing to their protection scheme as long as they're not using scan protection and then you'll drop out and get the benefits of zone. So you're gonna get best of both worlds. We've kind of figured out in football that the idea of blitzing is more effective than the actual blitz sometimes. And you're seeing a ton of these simulated pressures. I mean, there hasn't been a week we haven't seen them. They've kind of just completely taken over. - Yeah, the idea, you wanna do less with more if you can manipulate the offensive line into running a predictable protection then you can attack the weaknesses of that protection. - Well, and look here too, right? Say that, so what do you have on the line here? One, two, three, four, five, six. Okay, you have six guys on the line, okay? You only have five offensive linemen. So we automatically know that they're gonna have to do five on five there and then the back is gonna have to pick up one of the line backers here because he's gonna be coming in the A-gap or B-gap or either A-gap and that's to faster route to the quarterback. So you're gonna have the offensive line trigger onto these guys and you're gonna have the back naturally step up at the snap. Well, when you do that, these guys are gonna drop out but the back is are gonna be picked up there and you're gonna already have this end trying to deal with this F player and you can fire the nickel theoretically off the edge on the backside and you've canceled out the running back who would naturally be able to pick up that nickel for you. - So everybody, this is part of why you don't see freshmen have success at quarterback anymore. - Definitely. - Or even sophomores. - Both on split safeties and simulated pressures have like destroyed quarterbacks. - Yeah, it takes a long time to figure out how to see these things coming, how to work with your offensive line, how to anticipate, like even if you were theoretically good at moving in the pocket, you're a lot better at moving in the pocket if you know where to move because you know where your protection is gonna be and where it's being attacked. Just the understanding of all these things is very complicated and takes time. - Well, and Florida and all the other teams, you know, there's some teams that are so simulated they almost never actually send this blitz. Florida does though. 'Cause if you were smart as a quarterback and you threw tape, you realized they just keep simming these things but these guys are never firing. So if I'm feeling the heat in front of me, I really need to be aware of this backside pressure, this backside nickel, and so wherever I'm looking, I need to be aware of the opposite of where I'm looking is where the pressure's actually coming. But Florida will mug both Howard and what is it? Shamar, Shamar, whatever, the mic and will, they'll mug both of them and then they'll send them. So it's not even like, you know, they have the real blitz that backs up this simulated pressure and it actually makes it dangerous. So you don't know, are they actually sending them? Or is it this fake pressure where they're gonna drop out and send somebody from the other side? And keep in mind, Florida has the best pass rushing nickel grade in the SEC and Vandy's nickel was wreaking havoc on us. So this is another test for the offensive line. This is another test for Quinn. Let me figure that out. - Ironically, Pibern, their edge is really good at dropping. He has a pick in one of these gifts I have but he has like zero sacks this season. - Yeah, he's built more like a runstopper too. Like you watch him in like counter, he's like shoving the lead puller into the lane. So he's been pretty good on run, but he's all toughness based, it seems, not a ton of finesse. - Roberts and Aranda, Roberts and Aranda both kind of like him like that. Like that one year when Aranda won the big 12, his two top blitzers were, their edge guy was like, just like a big strong guy and good at dropping and he didn't have many sacks. But their nickel was a hot enough for good his name. He was like a freak in. - Drawing into the Texans? - Yeah. - I don't, I'm blanking on him too. - He was awesome. And then they're one of their different line records. - What? - The Petrie? - Yes, Jalen Petrie. He was, he had like seven or eight sacks as a nickel or something, he was awesome. He had, he would time it so well, he was physical. And then they had this like smaller, faster, weak side linebacker that also had a ton of sacks. This is what total Orlando was trying to do. And this is why total Orlando would do things like try to play Brecken Hager or Malcolm Roach at inside linebacker. - Yeah. - Got a Brecken Hager, man. - Obviously it did not work. Should have just let them play their natural position and not, not try to be clever like Aranda and Roberts and just do things traditionally, but. - Well, yeah, when you guys hear us talk about sim pressure, simulated pressure, this is what we mean. I guess for the fans, you can kind of understand it as like a fake blitz, but it's not entirely fake because they will send a player not aware of on a blitz. So the pressure comes, but they're ultimately, they stay sound, right? They're showing you potentially in this theory, one, two, three, four, five, six guys could come, even you could even watch the nickel. So potentially seven guys can come right there, but really it only ends up ever being four, meaning they have seven to drop back and coverage so they're not vacating any zones. So it seems aggressive, it feels aggressive. It's actually a very conservative strategy. They're not vacating any zones. They're making sure they're buttoned up. It's basically all reward, no risk, but it presents like it's this high stakes play style and it's really not. - Yep. - Cool. But yeah, that's intro to simulated pressures. As a fan, you want to learn this, not like the actual schematics, but just the idea behind it because everyone is doing it now and it's totally messing with the quarterbacks. All right, any other parts of the Florida defense you want to look at? Here's your zone replacement blitz, right? - I'm still saying the creeper, Sam. - Oh yeah, here, let me pull it out for you. Okay, this one? - Yes. So this is a really good example of how complicated this stuff gets, which is that can you run it and get it back to the beginning? - Yeah. Oof. - I burn actually gets out to the-- - He's a good dropper. - He's a good dropper. - Yeah, I thought he was just going to the flats. I didn't really see you go to the hook. - They show, they mug one line. - Well, three line lines, yeah. - They really mug one, but then they drop him and bring the other one and they drop the edge. - Yeah. - So it looks like they could be bringing five or four that are different than the four they actually bring. - Yeah. - And see, he comes and he also, he waits to see where the line commits. And then he sees like the guard, the left guard and the left tackle are both engaged. So instead of running into the unengaged center. - He's going to loop around. - He loops, he like reverses direction back outside. See, he's like, okay, do I go inside? Nope, he's about to like Eurostep basically back across. And then, oh, there's no one here to block me. Nails back, back through prayer. - And then I was in the middle of the field that gets that interception. He's coming off the edge here originally. - Yeah. - So you see why these quarterbacks are getting frustrated and confused and I heard an interview with Sark yesterday that I thought was interesting. He would, I can't remember what show he was on, but they were showing him plays and he was having to explain his offense. - And he says that they're much more full progression now because he even Sark said most of the time I can't tell these defenses. He's like, I don't know if they're in quarters. I don't know if they're in two. And so it's like when the offensive coordinator is telling you he doesn't know what's going on from shells and they're having to go to, what he means by like progression offenses means there's like one, two, three, four, five reads. And hopefully like maybe one is a man beater, two beats this, three beats this. And so if you keep going down the line, theoretically you'll automatically get to the route that does beat whatever coverage it could be. But that's what they're having to do now. I've posed to just pure middle field open or middle field close reads, right? If middle field's open, the post is there for you. If middle field's closed, you're gonna throw outside. That was kind of the basic way of playing quarterback for the longest time. And then next it became like half field reads where you just are looking at two wide receivers. This is like computers like programming. If this then that style, if he runs this, therefore this guy should be open. And now that's also been kind of broken because they're able to create these triangles of coverages. So two players don't do well anymore because they'll have a safety and nickel and a corner able to box them in. And so now we've had to go to these full field progressions meaning you're going one to two to three and then ideally check down. But that's taking a lot of work while you're having past rushers come and freak you out. So playing quarterback is just, it's not a fun time to play quarterback right now. And I think, I was thinking about this last night, I was like, what's the answer to this? And I was like, the answer is, there's no more tight ends. They're just more offensive line. So you have seven offensive linemen and you have two wide receivers and a running back. And that's all you do now and you just run the ball and get them out of these crazy, hard to decipher two high safety looks. - Also, just to get back on the soapbox again, the athletic strong armed four, five star quarterback that likes to see it before he throws it is gonna have a high bust rate again. And it's gonna be the quick thinking, maybe non-ideal physical specimen quarterback that thrives because they're breeze Baker Mayfield. Yeah, this is the diagram of that I burn sack, or sorry, interception. - Yeah, perfect. So they're potentially showing you one, two, three, four, five, six, they could come in theory. You have to account for them on the lines that much, they're too close. But well, who they're threatening, they're gonna drop out and they're gonna send the mic from the other direction. So, and then Pibern, of course, drops to the middle of the field and gets an interception, which is crazy. So it's really tough for quarterbacks right now. It's tough for offensive coordinators. I really think the answer here is when you gotta run more and you gotta get heavier. I think that's the next, I would call it an evolution, but it's actually not an evolution. It would be to return to basics, essentially. That's the pansy way, Connor. - You would just want to throw through. Are you going with the bombs theory? - Moms, or do you know what else is fun, is get into 12 personnel or 21 personnel, but then throw. - Yeah. - 'Cause these kids, they're not gonna stop doing seven on seven in flag football. - Yeah. - So you have these highly skilled big guys. You can still throw to them. - Wishbone, baby. - Time to invert some veers, get to work. All right, cool. So that's afforded defense. This is why it's kind of a frustrating defense. Now, of course, their corners are hurt. So that changes a lot of what we're talking about here, but this team of good corners, right? This is confusing for a quarterback and it's tough to execute, but fortunately for us, unfortunately for them, they're gonna have some personnel issues with these injuries. - All right, Ian, let's talk CFP. And then you have felt very strongly about these rankings whenever I brought up AP. Some of the statements have been doesn't matter, who cares, these kinds of things. But now you have to carry in because these are the-- - I don't know. - You do now because these are the official rankings. And why I cared about AP is because the CFP rankings are not that creative. They're gonna copy the AP. There's only 25 teams. And that's what they've essentially done. I think they what? They flipped Georgia and Ohio State. But as far as the AP people, this is the AP people. We're not dealing with a bunch of huge forward thinkers in these selection committees. When you hear their logic behind things, you're like, "Well, we're not in a good place." But here, so let's talk to the difference between the rankings and the seedings, right? 'Cause Texas is number five in the actual rankings, but that doesn't matter because Ohio State is behind Oregon. Therefore, Ohio State doesn't get the bid for the big 10. And so Ohio State ends up getting knocked to five in that situation, knocking Texas down to six. - Yeah. - So, and also it's frustrating for Ohio State, right? Because they're ranked number two, but it doesn't matter. They end up being a functional number five. - If I'm Ohio State looking at this, I'm not too frustrated. - Oh, dude, I know, dude. - You told me how to make it, yeah. - You're Ohio State, you're like, "Oh yeah, no problem, dude. "I'll take a G5 and a former G5 independent." - It's two G5s. I beat two G5s and then I get my rematch with Oregon who's had to beat one of Indiana or Tennessee who are both probably better and more talented than Boise or BYU. Although I haven't watched a 10 of BYU this year, so maybe they're a little better. They got one of those older, quick thinking quarterbacks we've been talking about. Those are always gonna be problems. - Yeah. - You know who else that frickin' Indiana quarterback is awesome. - I haven't watched Indiana either. Now, I don't watch those Cinderella teams until it becomes real and it seems like it's coming to be coming very real for them. So now I'm actually gonna pay attention, but I'm not gonna waste three hours for them just to upset on game six or whatever. - I asked a guy who does some scouting where they had Rourke and the NFL deal and he was like, "Oh dude, Rourke, what are you talking about?" And I was like, "Oh my gosh, how do y'all know it?" Yeah, this is gonna be like another perdy type steal for the NFL. Like believe me, this guy, they get so fixated Connor. They're like, "Well wait, he's not fast, "you can't get out of the pocket." It's like your fast guy that can get out of the pocket can't figure out this crap that teams are throwing at him. The mental eval is so much more important. - Yeah, if you get a truly special mind, that's what you have to take it, even if they're not. But the problem is these scouts and stuff, like you think about how easy it is to get fired, they can easily stand on the table for traits. They're highly, it's highly visible. And even when those traits do bust, it doesn't matter, they can say, "Well, I don't care he was six, five, and ran four, three." And he can throw it to the moon. So we've created this incentive structure where you're not rewarded on finding true value, you're just looking at the assets that everyone clearly wants, and then you can justify your job for one more year. It's... - Let me put it another way, which reinforces what you're saying. All the reasons, you would think something like Tom Brady's never gonna happen again, where the greatest quarterback of all time drops way down because of this traits thing. It would 100% happen again. - The next Tom Brady would absolutely get overlooked and fall way further than you would think. - Oh yeah, we would miss it every time. It's all about traits. And you'll hear the, also you'll hear the inverse in college, right, like we've seen it. We're like, we say it's like a big 12 quarterback, and he has good traits, but we've watched him since a freshman for four years and he's an idiot, you know? And like, you just know that Nomad, I don't care. You know, if he's this big and this good or whatever, he doesn't understand football at a core level. They'll still take him because it's easy to justify and you can point to tangible traits. But shout out to the good scouts, man, that are willing to actually do their jobs and risk being fired and giving real takes 'cause other ones, man, scouts are not paid for the first round. The first round is the, I could do first round scouting. It's whenever you're talking about like, is he a seventh round or is he undrafted? That's where you're finding value. You're finding value in the fourth round. That's the skill of scouting. I can take anyone from this chat right now and they could pick the first 32 pretty safely. - You know, I'm looking at Texas' draw now really for the first time and this sucks. - Yeah, I know it's not ideal, is it? - Eric, I've been watching Miami to write about him on the Substack America's War Game.substack.com. And Miami's offense is, Miami is basically the Washington Huskies of 2024. They have good receivers and their quarterback makes quick decisions and throws lasers into tight windows. - And he does stupid stuff sometimes where you're just like, there's no defense for that. Like, and I'm in stupid, like, you get some plays where you're just like, what the hell? How do you defend that? Real quick. - It's rough. - Based on trait logic, Joe Milton would be a superstar. Anthony Richardson also, based on trait logic, would have been a superstar. - Yep. - I agree with you with Miami. I know everyone's saying they're pretenders, but Cam Ward will make some dumb mistakes. He's dumb, he's throwing some dumb balls, but also he cancels that out by having a little bit of magic to his game too. - They're also, I was watching their Duke game and Miami was playing with a ton of tempo, like a big 12 team back in the day, 'cause they were like, look, if we increase the number of possessions in this game high enough, our offense is going to score a ton of points and you're not gonna be able to keep up. It's not just that their defense is bad, it's also that their offense, they're trying to win games with offense, which Washington did not do that at all. Washington was very careful in offense to protect their defense. I don't think Miami can win too many playoff games with their style, 'cause it just takes one team that can hold them down for a minute and score, and then Miami will get down on their own and not let them come back, 'cause they also put themselves in sketchy situations. - Yep. - It's not like they're just front running the whole time, that's a different thing. They keep getting behind. - But Miami has Conor McGregor knockout power that can fail any team in the playoffs probably. If that left counter hook catches you, you're gonna be unconscious, even if you're Georgia, whoever. So I do not want to have to play Miami in the playoffs. I think Texas could beat them. I think a lot of these teams could beat them. I don't want Texas to have to be the team that has to beat them. - It's just those are murky waters. - And also kind of, Washington also kind of had that weirdness about them last year too. They would get behind in some games, like Arizona and stuff like that. They had a kind of a, they've won a lot of one possession games. How do you feel about one possession teams? 'Cause it could be their underperforming, but also I think that also can be a positive trait. Like they know how to win those games. So it's like it can be either side that, "Hey man, I shouldn't even have been in one possession game. "I agree with you." But also teams with a lot of experience, like when it does get close and they have to prove clutchness and they proved that they can win it when they have to, that's also kind of a scary thing. But we match up well in Miami. Well, you have Kim Ward, and you have the number one passing defense in Texas. So I mean, if you're gonna match up, you're gonna match up as well as you can. - Yeah. - Specifically. - Good, good passing offense. - Beats, good passing defense. - Good passing, just everybody, just trust me this here. It's yes, Texas could beat them. You don't wanna have to mess with it. Like, "Oh, I'm gonna make you avoid." - Yeah, if you could avoid this problem altogether, you would. - Yeah, none of these other teams can throw the ball arounds like Miami. - Yeah. - Like you just don't wanna be in Texas as not been tested by a passing game like Miami's. - I was gonna say, Texas is the number one passing offense, but also we have no experience with this level of passing attack. - Yeah, just forget it, you don't want it. - Yeah. - Well, in the one possession game, like it's kind of like Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs. We're like all the analytics, like, you know, crying, crying meme with the crying under the mask and it's like, "No, momentum isn't real." And one score games are a 50-50 proposition and then just Patrick Mahomes, you know. Ring making machine go burr, right? - Right. - Like when it's because of a really good quarterback that knows how to manage these games, it is absolutely replicable. Now they can get themselves into trouble. Like James Winston in Florida State was exactly like Miami in 2014 where they won all these one score games in the ACC. They were undefeated and everyone was like, this team is not actually that good, but then they kept winning because Winston and the passing game were so impossible to handle and then they got to the playoffs and then they, and freshman Dalvin Cook fumbled twice. So James Winston fumbled and Oregon jumped on him and then Florida State fell apart, which could happen to Miami. - Yeah. - And it probably will happen to them at some level, but they could easily stack up one or two more. How did they do that wins first? - Yeah, I think fans are most questioning their lack of schedule. - Yeah, it's all valid. I'm just... - If you could avoid it, why would you choose Miami if you could play BYU? - I would rather play almost every other team. - Yeah. - I think I would rather play every single team in the top half of the bracket than Miami. - Yeah. Now Alabama match up, what do you think? - I don't like that one either that much. - Yeah. - 'Cause they have some of that same deal where... - Jalen Milroja is just gonna take off. - You know, like here, you've got him and then Milro makes a play or he throws to Ryan Williams and he like clowns somebody. - Yeah. - But Alabama, the one thing about Alabama that keeps biting them, I don't think, I don't think Alabama is gonna make it to the playoffs because they're secondary, they still have some games left, I think. - They got play in LSU. - There you go. Their secondary is too young and I just don't think they're, I don't think, like the two ways that you consistently win close games is veterans in the secondary and a veteran at quarterback. - What do you think, too, like secondary? - Yeah. - What do you think, too, like, just how the seating works, like Alabama is gonna be a favorite versus BYU in the betting markets. You think Alabama would be a favorite versus Penn State in the betting markets? - Yeah. - I just think the seating's all backwards 'cause like the whole point is, right, the whole point of you wanting a fifth or six seed is for you to be rewarded for your success and to play a team that's not as good. - And then in turn, you end up with Alabama, who's better than BYU, likely better than Indiana. I haven't watched Indiana, so I might be saying something dumb there, but likely better and then likely better than like a Penn State. They're better than Notre Dame probably. So it's like, my problem is like these seedings are all screwed up and we're not incentivizing what we're supposed to be incentivizing. What's the point of being the fifth seed if you end up having to face Alabama and Miami? - The debate that's gonna be all over the internet is not which G5 or ACC big 12 team is should be left in or out or what chances they have. The big debate is gonna be, why are we pretending that the big 10 and SEC are equals? Because they're gonna need to pretend like the big 10 and the SEC are equals and they're like, well, Alabama has two losses and Penn State has one. And Alabama is gonna be like, we would whoop Penn State on a neutral field. We would whoop Penn State in Happy Valley. This is a joke. - Yeah. - Feed me James Franklin. But they're gonna pretend like the two big conferences are mostly at parity. And so, and that's gonna result in things like this. - Yeah, this dumb seating where it's like, wow, Texas, congratulations for getting the fifth seed in the country. You are rewarded with Alabama. So it's just like, that's where it's dumb. And we need some like, we need some, man, we need to bring back some like real rankings, man. Like how they do in basketball, how they're able to really equalize for conference and schedule because it's absolutely silly. And the concept too of BYU getting a first round by as the ninth ranked team in the country. And I knew everyone was gonna be like, see, I told you guys were gonna turn on these top four conference champions, but it's true. The number nine team getting a week off is silly. It doesn't make sense. So we just, I like the playoffs. I like the structure. I like it better than a four team. I think this is, look at, I mean, look at these teams that are gonna play each other and you get home playoff games. This is a way better model. It's just, our seating is totally jacked up in my opinion. - They'll go to 14 teams and then they'll give the big 10 and SEC champions the only two buys like in the NFL playoffs. Or just, yeah. Or just top four gets a buy. - No, maybe eventually, but they're gonna wanna preserve the conference championships. - Yeah. - 'Cause of money. So they'll, plus I think winning the big 10 or SEC should have a reward, whether they have a championship game forward or not. - But I also think too, I mean, if you win the big 10 and SEC, there's no way you're not gonna be top four. So you're, it's like, I get that it's like, technically you're not automatically granted that, but practically you are always gonna be top four for winning your combo. Unless it's some weird thing where like you're nine and three and they're 12 and O and you do some weird upset, but. - The problem is not whether the big 10 and tough in it. The problem is not whether the big 10 and SEC champion get rewarded, it's that BYU and Miami get rewarded when it's like, this is the joke. - Yeah. And so yeah, that's where it just, it doesn't work. - Top four get a buy, conference champs get a home game maybe. - No. - I would have to see how that, I haven't even thought of that propagation, but I do agree with the top four get a buy regardless of your affiliation. - It's, I'm just telling you right now, SEC champion gets a buy, big 10 champion gets a buy, then you have a field of 12. And the bracket works like the NFL where the, we're only the AFC and NFC regular season champions get those buys and everybody else has to duke it out in the first round. That's what's gonna happen. - But how does it work at that point has the SEC and the big 10 absorb the other conferences? Cause AFC and the NFC are the only conferences, which is just award two, conference five, you know? - No, no, no, they can still have all these conferences, that doesn't matter. But they will expand the playoffs to 14 teams from 12. And then the only teams that get the buy will be the top two seeds. And the top two seeds will invariably be the big 10 and SEC champion. It won't even be a written end of the language that it's the big 10 and SEC champion, but it'll play out that way. - Right. - Yeah, so yeah, practically, that's how it works. Yeah, okay, yeah, I'm down. Remember 2022 K-State would have been in the top four winning the big 12 TC would have been dropped to at least fifth. - TC you may have been left out, probably not. Probably not. Yes, that would have been. - But it is, yeah, I mean, my issue is deceding here. And of course that's cause we're probably getting an Alabama Miami draw in this situation why Ohio State gets Boise State and BYU. - That's a huge disparity from five to six. - Yeah, that's like insane. Yeah, like Ohio State's the fifth seed where the, and really Ohio State's the second best team, they end up, they're getting rewarded for their drop. - Our drop, we're getting the opposite of rewarded. So it's just kind of silly. - Yeah. - Even Georgia has to play Notre Dame or Penn State, like woo. - I believe this is why Ohio State has struggled to be a really tough program under Ryan Day. Is that the big 10 routinely protects them 'cause they're their best shot at the playoff payout. - And they gotta play like one game a year. - Yeah. And I think that it just totally keeps breeding and reinforcing this like front runner protected mentality and they just can't handle it when they get punched in the mouth. - Yeah. Yeah, it would be interesting to see Ohio State in the semifinals after this cute little early run. - There, Kat, I thought that was easy for a second. I was like, should we be grounded this whole time? - No, I think I can hear her too though. So we should maybe. - Yeah, we're going long anyways, we're at like hour 15. All right, fans, thank you guys for hanging out. It was fun to talk some schemes, some ball, and then also the college football playoff, which is gonna be fun, but also annoying as we can tell. But Ian, I appreciate you. Fans, thanks for hanging out. Hook 'em, y'all. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
Let's take a look at Florida's run game and defense. They will need these units to get the upset.