(upbeat music) - Hey, what's going on? - This is the Sardion South podcast. I am Sean Cara. You are Will Ogburn. - Well, we're in person. - This is great. I was just thinking to myself, you know, you don't have to do with my typical stuff I do, but see, I just bang my knee into this, shaking the microphone. I have a whole new round of ticks from where I'm person. So this is great. - Love it. As long as we don't get table smashing like this, if you do that from here. - I'd need like a Thor's hammer to hit it from here. - That'd be impressive. - And no reason to do that. The vibes are high in this talking season. We are through day one of SCC media days. We had Ole Miss here. We had South Carolina. We had Vandy and we had LSU. Well, I'm just going to say it. I'm still not used to, people are sick of saving. I'm not used to saving being in this role. Wherein' he is a media member who can make SEC Championship picks. And he also backed it up by, he picked Texas and Georgia and then said, but this is also why it's too early to make these predictions and said that Alabama, the questions he has in the secondary are why he can't pick Alabama to go to an SEC Championship. That is so bizarre to hear that from saving here. I'm talking that candidly about just the big picture overall. And I know there's a lot to get to today. We're gonna talk about all the SEC takeaways. We got Derek, our guide, Derek Peterson, that's gonna be joining us in a little bit. And we will make sure that we put a bow on day one. We're gonna talk some Oklahoma, Texas stuff with him as well. But I'm just so not used to seeing this well. And I can't, I don't know if I'm ready for saving in this role yet. - Yeah, I think the thing about him is it's like, I think when I see him not coaching, it's gonna be the big thing, right? 'Cause I think we're used to seeing him on air, seeing him in a half black commercial. They're seeing him with a blue suit. Like we're talking about that on the desk. But it's different when you can kind of cut loose because he's not talking about himself or his rivals or like given the, you know, bulletin more material slash rat poison. Like what it used to be is, and it's probably still a little bit like this and it'll probably be like this for this season where it's like, "Oh, Nick Saban said X about Georgia." And like that in itself is a story. - Everything is relevant. - Yeah. - But I think next year is probably we're gonna get to where like every quote he has isn't gonna be, 'cause now Nick Saban just came out and was like, "You know, I really like the job "the clerk we used to do and that would be a story." - Right. - Yes. And the fact that Nick Saban forgot his credential at media days in his hotel room and had to be told, "No, you need to go back upstairs "and get your credential to be granted." Like that just shows you how weird this is, that he is here and he is in this role in the media. Fine Mom talked about how strange it is that Saban's gonna be here and how, you know, Saban's like, "Oh, you made my life miserable "for 17 years." And my mom's like upset that he's sharing a desk with him in this role and that part was just really, really strange. But I thought big picture takeaways from today. Sanky had a couple of noteworthy things about the future of the SEC, one of which being, there is still not a tiebreaker. Well, we don't have a tiebreaker for the SEC Championship. He has not listened to that episode yet. And I'm very annoyed that he won't just, he said, "Oh, there's a plan in place. "They've had a call, it's a principal thing." Whatever, the eight principles are gonna be factored into it. All I had to say was Connor, I saw exactly what you wrote. I floated this to the ADs, we're on board, but instead we sit here in mid-July without a tiebreaker for the SEC Championship. Yeah, I think Sanky, like, I don't know, maybe I'm getting a little bit too like editorial here, but I feel like we're just kind of like, generally in like a leadership vacuum, like it's kind of uncool for people to just come out and make a decision. It's very behind closed doors, click and dagger. And I feel like the way that he carried himself was actually really indicative of what is, become more or less bizarre of college football. In Sanky, he's really, you know, he's the incumbent, you know, Big Ten commissioners, newer. And, you know, I think he was able to speak on lots of different things, while still kind of keeping the veil up, keeping professionalism. I think that he was able to definitively say some things about, you know, okay, you know, we want to be cautious of gambling based on what the NBA is done, which I thought was kind of a shot, but it's a good one to take and say, hey, you know, we want to keep that at bay, kind of talk about some of the things that are going on across the sports landscape and say, hey, like, I'm just, you know, this is all an evolving situation. We're all in this together. You can trust me, but I don't have all the answers. We're just going to get through it a day at a time. And his line about the 16, the 16, the 16. How many times did he have to say that? So he got asked like four different times about expansions. Like, I think he's pretty much said all I can say. Like 16 is our today and 16 is our tomorrow. And you don't have to answer the question. Well, what if the ACC, all of a sudden gets, you know, this grant of rights just thrown out because they now are able to see this contract via SPAN. He doesn't have to answer that question. So I don't even get why people ask that. Those are dumb questions, in my opinion. What is sinking into say? Oh, yeah, you know, we actually looked at Wake Forest. We're really considering Virginia in North Carolina. We've looked at all these different possibilities. No, no, no, that was never going to be the message today. The SEC doesn't have to go to 18. Just because the big 10 is that 18 does not mean the SEC has to, I actually, I was right there with him. By the time, by like the fourth different time, he answered that question during an hour of speaking to us. He's kind of like, I don't know how many other ways I can say this. Yeah, like 16 is our presence, 16 is our future. And then I think it was Andrea Edelson, who does great work for ESPN, was like, do you mean that literally? Like, it is literally today and tomorrow. It's like, yes, see, as far as I'm concerned, it's not making any of those additions without massive seismic shifts in the ACC. And that's OK. I think we had enough new for today. We had enough new. Yeah, I can't remember the last time someone was saying kind of a party line like that, and we were agreeing with them. Because you felt out, it's like this guy can't, to your point, say this specific team called. And after he kind of made it clear, they're like, I've said enough, because his comment about the ACC was, we've gotten some calls, which is fair. He kind of was like, hey, we've received those calls. It's not like we're just sitting here or whatever, but it's my responsibility to make a decision. And one thing that he really did hit on, which I'm sure he has before, this is my first time seeing it live, is that the regional footprint of the SEC. And I think that's not something that's lost. As we've seen every conference, we've seen Pac-12 schools join the ACC, we've seen the SMU join the ACC, we've seen out West schools join the Big 10. And him just being like, no, this is actually, I can say that southeast means something. And yeah, OK, we were already at Mizzou in HEXA and M. What is Oklahoma going to do? The Texas and Oklahoma news from that broke three years ago at SEC Media Days, Brent Zuernam and just great work for the Houston Chronicle broke that story. And there was no sign whatsoever that that was in the works. That came out of nowhere, to the point where we were so baffled by the way that this developed, that I remember when Jim Pofisher was available, nobody was asking about it yet because everybody's kind of looking around and going, is this real? And then I think it was Mike Bianchi who finally asked 20 minutes in a question about Texas and Oklahoma reportedly joining the SEC. And it's just a reminder that these things are not for the consuming public. They're just not. If this is going to happen, we're going to have a much different perspective than asking Greg Sanki and then finding out that he actually looked into these teams. So I didn't really think that was that noteworthy in terms of the overall scope of the sport or anything like that. We had helmet technology discussed. We had the use of iPads. That's going to be a thing. Brand name iPads. Now, watch out. These are not tablets. These are not surfaces. We got the best of the best here in the SEC. What is better to be chucked in a Microsoft surface or an iPad? Well, probably a Microsoft surface. It's got the badges on it. Who will be the first coach to just shatter an iPad? Oh, man. That's a good question. That's actually a great question. I have to look at the schedules to see that one, honestly. I'm going to say it's-- you know what, the Unaut Kirby is the one who could do something like that. And it'll be 35 to 7. George is up big. A second-stringer ran the wrong route. He just shatters it. That will be the first iPad shattered in the history of the SEC football. Listen, don't sleep on Blake Baker week one, all right? That's a good one, man. That's a good one. Feel like, wow, because I know those DVDs, Blake Baker, SDU 2, F for this camp. But I know what they're capable of on the field sometimes. Stay dry and tripped again. Oh, my god. Speaking of LSU, Brian Kelly discussed the role of Harold Perkins and talks about how-- and I asked BK, if you could have done anything differently with Harold Perkins, what would have been last year. And you can kind of go up in a variety-- I thought for a while-- about how I wanted to ask that so that he wouldn't just say, oh, you know, he was a development and work in progress. Because Kelly is actually the type of coach that would give you something that he probably shouldn't say in that setting. And then sure enough, that's exactly what he's like. Well, we would have tied him down and made sure that he ate more. Yeah, I was telling to most youth fans, I guess, how in the hallway, Brian and anger, I'm just the only person I've ever seen moved to Louisiana and struggled to gain weight. Facts. So you can't just be like, well, we wouldn't have yet enough. That's all in your string and conditioning program. I lost so much weight when I left Louisiana. Like, if you're telling me that Harold Perkins was only a second team all-conference guy, and he still had a good season, but five and a half sax for a guy that rushes a passer, we've talked about it. It's just unacceptable. Twice as many pass coverage snaps as he had rushing the passer. And you understood going in, this is going to be different. This is going to be a work in progress. To look back on that entire year and the amount of time in which that heat-seeking missile was invisible, and to think that was just chalked up to not being able to gain enough weight, I didn't really like that answer. And then Brian said it. Brian typically just goes, how come you didn't try him at safety last year? And just a whole new wave of rage hit me as I went. We were playing this guy at Slot Corner. And all he had to do would be a better Andre Sam. And it would have been more useful to us. Well, and it should be too. So he makes a comment about he struggled to gain weight, and that's been a priority. He's up over 225 pounds. He's playing around 217 last year. And the thinking now is that he is put on the weight, and that he is taking a more dedicated approach to film. That's what he said. And I bet there are LSU fans listening to that going, oh, wait, you're watching more film? Are you going to be thinking even more while you're out in the field? Because we don't want the Harold Perkins who's on his heels. And it's like, oh, I'm reacting to this. I'm processing this. We want the guy that was out there in 2022. That was just sea ball, get ball. And that is, I think, a real legitimate question for Blake Bakers. How do you make sure that you find that line with him? Because that is not maximizing the abilities of a guy who is, by the way, still 19 years old, is representing this team at ICC Media Days, not because he's the most diplomatic or anything like that. Everybody talks about how smart he is, how important he is to have that presence in that locker room, which I totally get. Harold Perkins is not at ICC Media Days because he's the best spoken one. Brian Kelly even talked about that. So you're putting him in this spot. You threw a ton on his plate. But we still, I think, we're allowed to have those questions. Even though I don't think it's this important pre-snap. But post-snap, man, if they don't get this right, it's going to hang over Brian Kelly for a while. It will be the thing that we talk about. Yeah, I mean, I'll say this too. I think that watching tape or watching film is such a base level expectation. And I think that gets said to throw people off the scent. I will give an opinion here. And here's my opinion. I don't think that Harold Perkins has spent much more time watching tape in this offseason. I think there was more to watch. I think there was a-- That's a good point. There was people there who could show him what was going on and saying, no, this is what's going on here. You need to be here. You were here what's going on. Versus just like recess, free play hour, whatever. It's like, you could watch tape with Matt House as long as you wanted and you were not going to get better. Exactly. Exactly. So it's all these things are going to have to come together. If he's going to be the player, that ultimately, we thought he was going to be. At this time last year, this guy is the best defensive player in all of college football. And there are NFL people that are already talking about him. I know my guy Trevor Sycamore was bringing up how, man, even if he's an edge guy, he's still really, really light for that. Those guys in the NFL are 230 pounds. He still has a ways to go even to get to that. And I think it's interesting to hear him talk because he wants to do everything. He talked about how fun it was to get a carry in the bowl game. He's like, I'm just a ball player. I'll play quarterback, receiver, defense, like whatever. And so you have to manage this guy who wants to help the team and wants to do all those things. He talks about how he wants to be playing in that inside linebacker role. He feels like that's where he's best. If you just line him up off the edge, you can run away from him. It's a little bit easier to game plan around that. That's his words, not mine. And so you have to figure out still, OK, are we doing everything in our power to make sure that the defense has to account for him? Because that other way too many times, your defense didn't have to account for him. And it was almost like they played right into the offense's hand of taking him away. He's one of the most intriguing players in all college football coming into this year. And I thought it was pretty telling, hearing him talk about it. Rice and Gravy and Oxtail are his favorite foods to be able to put on weight. I think I've ever had Oxtail before. Oxtail is good. Yeah, it's like a Jamaican-sized Caribbean type of type of vibes, depending on who makes it. It's pretty spicy. So interesting, because it's-- I'm not going to say it's necessarily a similar occasion food, but there are a lot of similarities between kind of those port cities. Anyway, yeah, I think it's kind of like football, especially in college, is a little bit like life, right? I mean, how many guys get recruited on this promise of, you're going to be a running back. You're going to be-- oh, you can play some special teams. And then as your team counts on you more, start to be more of a leader, right? Like, great example, even you know, Alan Camara with the Saints, right? Like, he's not returning punks anymore. He's got stuff to do. And same deal there, which is like, you know, OK, you're one. Just go out there and have fun, man. Just don't transfer, honestly. This is your one. Let's figure it out. We have some holes, whatever. Year two, OK, we're going to try it over here again. Year two is lost, whatever. Year three, it's like, dude, there's your pre-deaf season. Like, you need to show that you can be an NFL player that does one or two things. Like, OK, you can play. Like, you can be a runstuffer, or you can do a little bit of coverage. But you really, like, other than, you know, maybe like a tie-man Matthew or like a Dion Sanders, everybody has to grow up eventually, right? And I think what we're seeing here is that the stuff that's fun for him may not be the stuff that makes him money at the next level. And Pastor Usher might be one of those things, honestly. It's so hard to do everything at an elite level. Yeah. And most guys have flaws. It's just you don't see them. And you're not as dependent on them because of your deficiencies. And that's, I think, the issue. And it could still be an issue with Harold Perkins, even as someone who has faith in Blake Baker. I think that's legitimate. OK, you spent time around a couple of quarterbacks today. Jared Nesmar, Jackson Dart, The Swagger, The It Factor. Who did you get that vibe from more so? Oh, man, that's actually a great question because they're very different people, right? Like, no smire is kind of like, maybe I'm reading too much. And I'm being a coach's kid, but he does seem very like-- it's like everything is like an outline to him. It's like, you guys can have a question. It's like, OK, well, I'm going to address this part, then this part, then this part. He's like, purchased things, kind of like a little bit more coach speak, a little bit more analytical. Jackson Dart strikes me as that guy that is just chill. And he doesn't want you to know what he's thinking. Like, if I asked you, OK, Connor, what's your favorite type of car? Nesmar would be like, OK, I like a Mustang because he's got this many horsepower. And Jackson Dart would just be like, like, Sonoma goes fast, baby. But in the back of his head, he knows why he loves that car. He knows the same, or maybe even a little bit more than Nesmar is, or what they've shown in the field, at least. And that's the crazy thing, is that it's almost like Dart's whole thing was to make you feel like he was this guy who was chill and was kind of like a cali cool guy. But in reality, you can see that we all spend. You can see when he was talking about build leadership in the pickleball league, even, and talking about a little stuff like that. And again, that can be kind of silly stuff. But you can see both Jackson Dart and Lane Kiffin grow up together. Yeah, they're so, I think, alike in a lot of ways. And I thought Macarral and Lane Kiffin were very like-- I thought their overall demeanor, the way that they approached the game, was perfect for that stage of Lane's career, as opposed to having maybe early career Jackson-- we've got horns in the background. We're in a major city. They're cars, not trained. That's true. I don't know what that was. We're in a major city, folks, it happens. But yeah, the mindset that Dart has is definitely earned. And I'm now having these conversations during talking season of, am I high enough on him? Now, I drafted-- you drafted him in our quarterback draft. I had him just as high on my big board, I think, as you did. I think I had him at five, I want to say. And sometimes, you can listen to someone speak, and you can be a little bit more inspired by them. And I get why Jackson Dart has that impression in that old missed locker room seeing him interact. Doesn't mean he's going to be Georgia. Doesn't mean that he's going to lead Ole Miss to a college football playoff win or anything like that. But if there's ever a guy to kind of do it, it is this. And the more you talk to this Ole Miss team, the more you realize this is the type of way that you would hope that they would correct things. I don't really know what more we could have asked from Lane this offseason than to do things the way that he did. Unless you're going to tell me, like, oh, Lane just-- I mean, he even brought Zacharnetta as an analyst. If you told me Zacharnetta was Ole Miss's offensive coordinator, I'd be like, yeah, whale of a hire. They crushed that. He did everything you could have hoped for. So he's checked all of these boxes. And if it comes up short, it's going to hurt that much more. It will sting, man. Ole Miss fans, they know that how precious this opportunity is, and if they blow it, and this isn't eight and four seasons, that would be blowing it. That would be. It's just going to hurt so many more ways than I think they've experienced at any point in the Lane Kiffin era. Yeah, it feels like that was a concise effort from all the players and from Lane Kiffin as well. I mean, I feel like we saw-- and it's always tough with someone. And all of our thoughts, our prayers, and our hearts grow up to Lane Kiffin, who's just recently dealt with the passing of his father, Monty, great defensive line. But I'll talk about dark first, actually. So talking to Dart and everything, it's like, OK, you come in here. I mean, you remember, you were one. We were talking about Lane Kiffin, like a histrionics on the sideline watching Dart play. Didn't trust him. Didn't trust him at all. And then last year, he takes this big step up. And then you start to think, OK, well, OK, you've got 11 wins. You got better, way better from year one or year two, in terms of what you were able to do and how much freedom you had. Well, how do you do this? And the next-- like, what is your expectation? What do you want to do next? And it was like any type of a thought like that, it was quickly brushed off, because they don't want to lean into that hype train. And I'll say the same thing about Lane. And like I said, it's always hard to judge someone in such a tragic time. But he was very careful to not be Mr. Funny, Mr. Quote, Mr. Typical Lane in that we expect. It was like both Jackson Dart and Lane Kiffin, we'd so seen go through the wars, go through the histrionics, go through all these, you know, grab your popcorn, get your clippers like that type of stuff. It was like, no, we're not going to give you that today. And it's going to be on purpose, because we don't want to be the joke, we don't want to be the happy party team. We want to be like, yeah, we talk about Ole Miss as a tailgate school, but we want Ole Miss to be the football coming and beat your mud school, you know? I think so many more people will be talking about Trey Harris after this year. If Ole Miss has that type of a season, I asked him if he thinks that this group of past catchers is the best in all of college football, and his very biased opinion. He said, yes, like I absolutely do. We still have to go out there and show it. But I can make that argument. I can make that argument. And I think you see the confidence that he has talking about working out with Jackson Dart in California and doing those things and the depth that they have. And I was talking to Brad Crawford about this. This is going to sound weird, but it's going to be true because if they're built, the way that we think they're built, this is very likely going to happen. There will be days in which Juice Wells is the fourth option. And you'll look up at the stat line and go, Juice Wells had one catch, and did he play in this game? Did he get hurt? If you have depth, like Ole Miss does, you should be able to do these things. But I don't know that Ole Miss fans are necessarily looking at that going, hmm, that's the thing that's going to get us over the hump. And that maybe has dialed down some of the hype about these Ole Miss skill players and stuff because so much of it is going to come down to who they are in the trenches. So we talk about everybody in the SEC, it's what we do. Texas and Oklahoma know that all too well. Very early on being in the SEC. But yeah, Ole Miss did feel like a team that was trying to just dial the hype down on it, and I have no problem with that. Any other takeaways from day one of SEC media days, which I don't really feel like we got some massive headline or anything like that, which is probably the way that a lot of these coaches draw it up. Yeah, it was bold to start with Brian Kelly. He didn't do anything that great into the podium. He did write a bull the cowboy hat on, regrettably. Yes, he did. I think you should just lean into that. Kind of same deal. I mean, in terms of the order of guys, right, Brian, Kelly, Beamer, Lane, you think those are kind of your three heavy hitters for a quote, maybe in the whole conference, right? And all of them were pretty dialed back. I think that Beamer was pretty like-- I think Beamer is aware of the situation that he's in, which is that he also doesn't really want to be a novelty. Beamer looked directly into my eyes when he said, yes, some of us were picking us as the dark horse in the SEC last year. And I was like, I feel seen right now. No, he didn't, actually. But I thought Beamer definitely came across as someone who's like, I realize nobody believes in us whatsoever. And that is a difficult place to be, I think, for South Carolina after the progress that they had. But he's well aware that they're going to be, as he said, picked to finish 13, 14, 15, 16, whatever, in the SEC. They're going to be in that bottom group. And this is the time that he has to thrive. It's as simple as that. Can he have a year in which it all of a sudden, like it's all that post 2022 momentum back? He feels that he can. He feels that they're going to be better on defense. He feels that they're going to be better in the ways that they had to be young on the offensive line and work through that. What time will tell? And I think he kind of knows that. It would have been nice to be able to see Lenora Sellers here. Would have been nice to be able to see Rocket Sanders here. But I realize a new quarterback running back that's a transfer. He's injured as well, not so much. But yeah, Beamer, I'm just going to guess there was a little bit of a different mindset juice coming off of a five and seven season. Yeah, and I think, too, I think there's something really key that you hit on there, which is that I think previously he has done a little bit, right? Not all of, because I think he's pretty aware, but he has done a little bit of the foxhole mentality of, nobody believes in you. You've got to improve him on. This time felt a little bit more like, that's kind of on us. Like, we almost let you down last year. And now it's on us to bring it back versus, like, you guys don't know, like, and he talked about, you know, the youth, especially on the offensive line and how that shows room for improvement. So I think, yeah, now that I'm kind of looking at the lineup today, which should have been kind of a juicy lineup, and what it became was, guys kind of maybe realizing some mistakes they had made, even as recently as last year, all three of these coaches are completely different people, I think, starting last year. One year in the SEC, it'll do that to you. Yeah, that's the way that it works. All right, let's get-- All right, Clark Lee was there. All right, Clark Lee was there. He was also there, don't be creative. Did Clark Lee say anything of actual no other than having to answer a question about 1920s match-ups against Texas? No, I would say probably not. No, I learned that he, a polyside degree from Vandy. I knew he went to Vandy. That's a pretty worldview, big picture stuff. I'm sad he didn't name the presidential administration in the '20s when they were being in Texas. But outside of that, I think he just kind of had a rough-- or he had a tough assignment today, and I think he didn't find and didn't say anything wrong. Not all of us can just rattle off presidential errors. No, it's a very difficult thing to be able to do. But yes, day one in the books, we have more takeaways from Derek. Derek, first time at SEC Media Day, so let's kick it to that interview with him. All right, Derek, biggest takeaway from day one in Dallas, we had Ole Miss, we had South Carolina, we had Vandy, we had LSU in action today. What was the thing that, throughout all of this craziness of SEC Media Day's, the spectacle is that kind of stood with you throughout this first Monday? Yeah, Ole Miss sticks with me. You know, I think Harold Perkins was probably the biggest storyline from the teams that went today, just because of Brian Kelly joking to you that he wished you would have strapped him down and made him eat more. Standard vote from Brian Kelly, if you just got it. And everybody wants to know, OK, how is the LSU defense going to look under Baker? And LSU doesn't seem to have any interest in telling us. And everybody wants to know what Perkins is going to be doing. So I think he was a big draw just looking at him. But I was curious to see how Lane Kiffin and his players would approach the messaging today, because there were a number of different directions that they could go. Everybody expects them to be a very good team. I expect them to be a very good team. A lot of us expect them to contend for a playoff spot. And sort of be in a position that the program just hasn't really been in. And for a roster like what Kiffin has, where so much of it has been built through the portal, you're sort of like patch working your culture and hoping that the pieces that you add aren't going to change anything about that culture. And to get something that is going to be conducive to a title run is probably pretty finicky. Probably it's a pretty fine needle to thread. But I kind of get the sense that Lane has maybe done it. The messaging today was just all about work. We don't care what you're saying. We don't care where you put us. Somebody asked Jared Ivy. It is Jared, right? Jared Ivy. Yeah, former George sex transfer. First year, don't know what I'm trying not to kill. I'm trying not to get killed. Someone asked him, what's going to look different? What do you remember about the Georgia game? I think it was your question. I asked that, yeah. What's going to look different? And he made the comment that there were things that night that they could build on. But then he also said that no one's going to outwork us this year. And something Trey Harris said that he's already been out to Los Angeles multiple times to work out with Jackson Dart. And then Kiffin, just sort of being like, we have to prove it. And there are so many things that we still have to do. I just liked that messaging. And I liked that messaging for the coach of him being like, hey, even on the plane ride out here, I'm talking to the guys about like, this means nothing. What they're about to tell you means nothing. We have to work. We have to earn it. We have to prove it. And I just like that messaging. And I felt a little bit more confidence and sort of expecting Ole Miss to be what I expect it to be. Isn't it interesting that this is the first time Lane is going to have a team. This highly ranks since 2012 USC. I was talking to Michael Katz about this, about how you almost get the sense that Lane knows that. And it's this mental hurdle for him to be able to get over. Because the way that 2012 USC played out was so horrific as Michael Katz brought up. He's like, yeah, you start off number one in the country. And then you end the season in El Paso. Like, that's just not the way that you draw it up. And if Ole Miss does anything short of that, we've talked about this throughout the offseason, it will be seen as a disappointment. I always wonder if a coach is going to come into this setting at media days and you're going to know, you're going to get this sense of, oh, they're really confident they love their team. The example I always gave is 2021 Kirby Smart. That was the first time I really saw Kirby come out of his shell and speak freely and not be afraid to make jokes. He brought up how Cuevo was instructing them about NIL. Don't be thirsty. It was the advice from Cuevo. And you're like, who is this guy in front? And I look back and think, Kirby Smart knew he had a really good team. I think Lane is taking a different approach. You almost get the sense, and at least I did. Maybe you can correct me here. Does Lane sound a little bit like Sabin when he is trying to be serious about stuff? He has these Sabinisms that'll come out and he is downplaying. And he's not doing the, I'm going to build my team up. He's not doing the Get Your Popcorn Ready or all that. But I got that sense from him that he was very much trying to downplay this in the way that his obviously former boss did better than anybody in the history of the sport. Well, and still did today by not saying, on one day, by not having Alabama and his title picks. Same as the network. I think that was a little pointed, not-- I think there was a lot of truth to it. But I also think there's a little bit of supplemental messaging there. But yeah, I would agree with you on that front. But I could see Lane doing the same thing. When you're telling your team, we still have so much work to do. You're sending them a message. And so many coaches will use availabilities and press conferences and just meetings with the media to send in their team a message. And I'm saying, hey, we still have to work. We still have to do this. We still have to prove this. I would agree with you. I think Lane was using today as an opportunity to continue speaking to his team and continue setting the tone for what fall camp is going to be for them and setting the tone for where the head space needs to be heading into the start of this. If you had taken a drink every time you heard Rap Poison or the mention of Texas or Oklahoma, how are they going to fit in the SEC? I think Texas and Oklahoma mentions would have gotten you drunker. I definitely think that. What was the pre-Texas and Oklahoma conversation? Because it felt like-- I mean, some of these questions that were coming in, I'm not going to name names of who said this. But the question of Clark Lee about Vandy having a winning record against Texas. And they're like eight, three all time. Oh, they haven't played since the 1920s, by the way. Clark Lee's like, what? What are we doing here? But there were a lot of questions about Texas and Oklahoma. Did it feel like they were getting the proper due, the proper respect, or was this more of like, we're still kind of looking at this with an eyebrow raised? Let me preface this. I went to school with Oklahoma. I grew up going to Nebraska, Texas games. I grew up in a Nebraska household. So I have been born and brought up through a lot of like-- Texas hatred. You have a horns down tattoo on your neck. That's not true. I have one tattoo, and it's not that. I try to be as objective as I can with Texas in this context, in the professional context. But it was funny to me today to listen to some of the like. Hey, talk about how good Texas is. Hey, talk about Texas being able to come into this conference and be successful right away. Hey, talk about what you like about Texas. And then listening to some of the Oklahoma people that I know from when I lived their approach, the same sort of angle as what can Oklahoma expect? Hey, what's a night game in Death Valley like? It was just very funny to me. And someone had made the comment and it got saving off on a tangent about Texas running the Big 12. And it was a question to Greg Sankey. And it was, how do you expect Texas to fit in? And Sankey was like, well, they're going to fit in. This is the SEC. And I think the Texas ran the Big 12 comment, which may be taking a little bit. I don't know if that was literally. Yeah, I don't know that that's what anybody was trying to say. Not in the sense of them winning a bunch of championships because we know Oklahoma did that. Not in the sense of them being super competitive and winning a ton in the Big 12 because we know of late, minus last season, they didn't do a ton of that. But Texas was very influential in the Big 12 offices. And Texas was all about wanting the Texas way. It's what drove Nebraska out of the conference. It's what drove Colorado and A&M and Missouri away from the conference. Was this fear of Texas running things in the Big 12. Yeah. And that's just sort of been the Texas mindset. And now that Texas has made a college football playoff, I think Texas is a very storied program. I think Texas has a right to puff its chest a little bit. They should have a very good team this year. I think they can challenge for not just an SEC title, but a spot in the college football play off in a spot in the national championship. I think they have that kind of a team. But it was just kind of interesting listening to the two different approaches very different, knowing what I know about the school. But I will say Oklahoma's not in a place where they're going to contend for an SEC title right away. And they're going to contend for a national championship. They're just not in that place. So Oklahoma having a more like, hey, what should OU fans expect? Hey, what's the game to atmosphere going to look like? That approach makes more sense to me. And I wrote about this before the thing. I was like, I want to see if there's going to be some modesty, some grace, or a little bit of confidence from some of these newcomers as they come in. Will Sark have a cowboy hat on? Please. It's all we asked for. We didn't ask for one. I mean, we saw Ole Miss players in cowboy hat. They all cowboy hats. Brian Kelly had a cowboy hat on, and he was riding the bull. Riding the bull, wearing a cowboy hat, went in Dallas. This is just what you do, apparently. Yeah, I think that was-- I mean, it's interesting that Saban said, you know, Texas is going to come in here and run the SEC. And I think he's saying that from a diplomatic perspective. And Saban has, perhaps, firsthand experience of knowing what that is like with those important people at Texas and saying, like, hey, you're not going to necessarily do this, this, and this. The rumored, you know, Saban is going to go to Texas thing. But I think that at the same time, like Saban has Texas in his SEC championship. And he has Georgia in his SEC championship. And it does feel very different to be predicting stuff like that, and they actually have to factor this in. And it's going to feel a little bit more real when Texas and Oklahoma are here in the middle of the week. They, of course, haven't spoken yet or done anything of that nature. But I was waiting for the take of Texas going to go 7 and 5. They don't know what they're important. I didn't see any of that. I think there's a lot of respect for Texas. And I think that's OK. I'm not crazy about the anti-Texas takes. Because I think if you did that, you would be like me letting my haterade come through. It would just not be objective. It'd be you hating on Texas because it's fun to hate on Texas. It would be you letting your fat tattoo-- Your neck tattoo would be showing. You'd be trying to get me in trouble. It's on the back. You can't see it. Yeah, this is not a five-loss team. And as much as I don't want to go there, even if Quinn Ewers isn't OK, I think we all think they have a pretty good backup quarterback. I've heard of them. They can come in and do some things and maybe steady a ship if a ship gets a little rocky. This is going to be a really good football team. Now, one thing that I'm really curious to ask about is how they plan to replace the two big guys in the middle of defensive line. That's a big issue. And we heard multiple coaches today talk about how one of the differentiators between the SEC and other leagues is the size and the length, particularly at the line of scrimmage. When you've got two players, like a sweat and a Murphy that Texas had, they're just hard players to replace in general. Probably if you're Texas, you would have liked to have those guys for this year. They would have made a difference. But even having to replace them like Texas is done well in recruiting under SARC. SARC has an identity and a clearly established culture. And who was it today that said that he was one of the toughest coordinators to game plans? Clark Lee was talking about that. When Clark Lee was at Notre Dame. And he talks about how when Alabama faced Notre Dame in-- it was weird because it wasn't the Cotton Bowl. It was like the Rose Bowl. It was the Rose Bowl. But they played it in Texas. Yeah, yeah, yeah, because it was COVID. And he said it was one of the most unique offenses I've ever had to prepare for. And that's a testament to SARC. Like that is what he's going to bring to the table. And that's why the floor feels very high. It feels very high when you've recruited this well. And we've actually seen the proof of concept. So yeah, I mean, I think Texas at home are going to dominate conversation all week. It was interesting hearing Greg Sankey say that they had talked about having SEC many of these in 2018. And they didn't do it, it just didn't necessarily work. They ended up having an Atlanta there. But I see many of these in Oklahoma City. Nobody's brought that up, yeah. Underrated Oklahoma City. I got Chris Blanksman telling me. You'd have it at the Devon Tower? Is that where you would do it? Sure, that sounds like a place where you can see nothing but flat outside behind you. Yeah, they would take us to a Thunder game. Not a Thunder game because they probably wouldn't be playing basketball in the middle of July. That's not how that works. But you can see the Thunder practice facility. Let's see the practice. Let's see the whole inverted dog food facility. Oh, yeah, OK. Sure, I'm on board. But the globalization of it, like Sankey-- yeah, trust me, if you can't go down the street and find six different fast food places that you would want to go to in any major US city, like what are you really doing? Well, Sankey talks about how the regionalization of the SEC, wanting to branch out, wanting to have Texas in Oklahoma, feel like they are ingrained in the SEC. They're going to fit in perfectly. It'll be interesting to see how they fit in this year. I am so interested in that. I know we have talked so, so much about it. But if we're fast forwarding four months from now, let's get your official prediction on the record. It's talking season now. What's the overall vibe of Texas in Oklahoma? Post year one in the SEC? Is it zero being like Jim getting through a snowball fight with Dwight? And the very famous image of him in the office just looking disheveled. He's got blood all over his face. That's like a zero. Aura 10 is like Stanley on Pretzel Day. Vibe being within the program, vibe of the fan base, people outside. Fan base. Let's go fan base. Pretzel, Stanley on Pretzel Day. It's an elite feeling. It's a one in 365. They're just in two different spots. So I think both are going to be a solid five to seven, six to eight in that range. I think both are going to be happy. I don't think OU is going to be bad, but I don't think OU is going to be awesome. And I don't think Texas is going to be bad. Bold. Pre-season national champion favorite. Texas confirmed not bad. I don't-- they've just been preparing for this for so long. I think so much of this season is going to feel like a celebration to a lot of these fan bases. Now, maybe Brent Venables feels differently after the season. Maybe he's a lot closer to Jim looking to shovel at the desk with blood on his face. But even then, I think that OU's in pretty good shape on the defensive line in the front seven. And Bill Biedenbauer's got a reputation as an offensive line coach as anyone. We have motorcycles going outside the Airbnb, right? We've got a lot of people who like to rev their engines outside. Nothing says that you are a man more than revving your engine, just random times. So I think they're going to be pretty-- I think they'll be pretty pleased. Texas has a pretty decent schedule. I don't know if you've seen. Yeah, part about it. Oklahoma has a fun schedule. That's one way to put it. Well, I say fun because I was talking to my father-in-law who loves to attend OU games. He lives in the area. He can't wait for OU Alabama. He can't wait for Alabama fans to be on campus. He can't wait for that atmosphere. And there's a level of this where it's not to just like stoke the egos of SEC fan bases, but this is just not what OU has been used to. It's just not what Texas has been used to. There are programs that just don't take it as seriously or haven't taken it as seriously. It doesn't mean more. It doesn't mean more. And it's just the big leagues. And I think that there's a lot of people within both of the fan bases that are super excited about having that weekly atmosphere. Every single Saturday, it's going to be a fun Saturday. Now, it might not end fun, but it's going to be an adventure and an experience and a memorable experience. So I think I said this, you had me on a podcast previously, and I said, I think, oh, you can win eight or nine games. I think they could also win seven games and label it a good season, or six games and label it a good season. They won't label it a good season if they win six games. They won't. Some might look at some of the games that they win and say, didn't expect that. If they go six and six, that will not be labeled a good season. You know? OK. OK. Yeah, OK. If it ends, it'll pass off. Well, it's not starting at number one. And so we don't have that big a guess this time, true. OK, yeah, OK. I've got OU fans yelling at me. They're not going to go six and six. I don't think they're going to go six and six. But I think there's an element of this where there's just going to be a little bit of a celebration this season. So I don't think anybody's going to be like just absolutely hating life, sitting at their desk, disassociating. We should go back to the big 12, like that's not going to happen. No Nebraska syndrome. Now, they tell you they don't even have Nebraska syndrome. I think they're very different. I think they're very different. Both you and I can can speak to that very much, very different mindsets of public, like reasons for expansion or realignment, all that stuff, and at extremely different places in their fandom. So we don't even have to go down that road. Here's the thing that I'm most interested to find from-- and I might not get this answered over the next two days, but I'm going to try. How difficult do they expect it to be to prepare for the season? Because I talked to people who prepared for a conference switch previously. And it was a coaching staff that was not super thrilled about the conference switch happening. And in preparation for the new season, it was a lot of like we have 11 non-conference games. We have 12 non-conference games, like this is absurd. And the amount of time that we have to invest to get ready for the season is just on a completely different level from anything that we've experienced before. There is something to be said for that. No tendencies whatsoever. Like, yeah, so I faced-- they faced Bama last year. But at the same time, it's like, all right, well, you still have a new coaching staff to prepare for. You have no tape or confidence to pull from. Is that a challenge, or is it different now, because of maybe the transfer portal, because of how teams can change year to year? Texas obviously has the Alabama game that they can pull from, but Oklahoma has nothing. What's that like? I would like to get that answered. I don't know if I'm going to get that answered. But that, to me, is the most interesting thing, heading into this for those two. Derek, great stuff. Were you out on the tweets these days? Doctor, is it-- it's something peaty. It's just Dr. Peaty. Dr. No, I don't really tweet. It was a couple like fever tweets during Copa America. But like-- so don't follow Jerkontwater. It's basically what he's saying. Every time I get on Twitter, I get sad. Yeah. Makes me sad. That's fair. That's fair. All right, thanks, man. Appreciate it. Well, I'm going to go with one of my guys. I'm going to go with Hester, go Jacob Hester. Did he convert another fourth down for a touchdown by running full-back dive? No, he did not. Actually, was he running out of the full-back dive? He was an eye formation, of course, whether he was a full-back or a tailback or a velvet. Hester did nine and a half hours of radio today. Oh my gosh. For those who have ever done anything for nine and a half hours, picture this. Just picture what it's like to be on, do have to be worried about your mistakes for that long of a time. I think doing three hours of radio per day is crazy. I think it is such an unbelievably difficult thing to do. I think there are so many people that cannot do it for a half hour and wouldn't be able to muster the energy and all that stuff. He's out of here. I was selling three different shows. Also, his daughter Harlow, 30 minutes after he left to come to SEC Media Days, started walking for the first time. She is already running. Low-man wins. I think she's going to be a future LSU star. I mean, hey, if she could play DB, we would dig her right now. There are some teams in the SEC and eating the offensive line. I'm just saying, just throwing it out there. But I wanted to shout out Hester just because he's the man. Got to catch up with him a little bit today as well. I just think that he needs to get the recognition for being a guy that works so unbelievably hard. And I see former athletes all the time that are-- how should I say this politely? Take advantage of their name a little bit. In a half hour spot, 45 minute spot. You're going to co-host a show here, do this there. That dude works his freaking tail off. And yeah, I love Hester. So he's my lovely week. See, I'll tell you why. It's because he was humbled like coming up at the same time as Devin Hester. So he was my favorite player. Jacob Hester coming up. I would explain this to people in Alabama. I'd be like, man, my guy Hester. And they'd be like, you know, bears, Devin Hester. I'm like, I don't know who that is. Yeah, I just think they're related. And then I was very sadly disappointed. Just a little bit different. Yeah, I'm right there with you. It's super cool to watch. We joke sometimes about this kind of like growing up and some of the younger coaches and stuff like that. And I'm just like one of the guys I've talked to who is-- like I said, made me love the SEC football. I'll talk about the fourth down. You can forward it and all that. So it's cool to watch these guys in kind of that next phase of their career, some of the guys that have been around forever, we've done away today. So I'll just kind of segue into that. I don't want to talk about any of the players, the coaches who have been with you one day. So I'll just say like the SEC media apparatus is just cumulatively my lab in the last of the week. There's been a lot of people that have been able to see this week that I saw, gosh, nine, 10 years ago, or that have just known me as the guy who lapsed really loud or is a square box. And so many people were so nice to me today without-- again, I'm not a writer. I don't put in the hard hours like you do. I'm not the guy asking the good question. But I think it's been really cool to grow up across SEC country between Louisiana and Alabama and Florida and Georgia and to meet people along the way. And we see each other. And it's like, oh, man, so the interview you guys had the other day, or I saw this project, I guess, D.S. is working on, or I saw you post in the other day. Plenty of people like Gordy is a guy that we've mutually followed each other, lots of friends, but you got to meet him today. Same thing with Dunaway. I don't think I personally like shook hands with Dunaway, but grew up listening to him. So yeah, it really is. That is what people talk about in the South, or what's kind of a down home environment. Being my kind of like day job, being flown around the country, these big media markets, it just feels-- hate to say it just means more to do the cliche thing, but it does feel like a family, man. It feels different to us. It does. And it is truly special. There's a reason why I look forward to this week so much. And it's fun to be able to be like, oh, yeah, I didn't realize you hadn't met Chris Gordy. You hadn't met Dunaway before. Oh, yeah, Hester, probably the last time that you and him were interacting was what we did at a live show in 2019. And it is fun to be able to do that, because they're not all like this. Derek was kind of talking about that as well. There is a different vibe. And there is a reason why I love coming here every single week. We get to do in-person pods. And it's an absolute blast. So we have another show that we're going to record on Wednesday. So that will kind of put a bow on all things, probably Texas and Oklahoma as well. How are they going to do in the SEC? You just handed a fake mic to me when you had a real mic. I love that. Yes. And I mess up my own levels today. That's playing yourself. Exactly. Exactly. So I got a drink, because you just-- you asked me that question, right? Yeah, so, gosh, I've had to answer that question so many times. I'm not even going to answer it. I'll do you one better. But yeah, the Texas and Oklahoma conversations we will continue to have later in the week, we have a very, very special guest coming up on our pod later in the week, at least one, maybe two, with TBD, a certain former Georgia star that's scheduled to be able to join us. So be on the lookout for that. Well, this has been real. We need to get some food right now, because I am absolutely starving. And then, yeah. So let's go do that. If you have not, lose five star review. That is on iTunes, wherever you listen to podcast, please do that. Follow us on Twitter. @cjogara@cosohard at the SES pod. @setdownsouth. And yeah, thanks, guys. Have a seat. [MUSIC PLAYING] (upbeat music)
The guys are in person in Dallas for SEC Media Days. What stood out? What did Greg Sankey say that was noteworthy? How weird was it that Nick Saban was there as a media member? And what did Brian Kelly say about Harold Perkins? The guys discuss all of that and more (0:30). SDS' Derek Peterson joined the show to talk about the surprising subdued nature of Lane Kiffin, as well as the Texas and Oklahoma presence ahead of their arrival (25:00). The guys close with Lad of the Week (51:00).
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