Will Texas be a SERIOUS national championship contender in 2026? Why isn't Jeremiah Smith the Heisman Trophy favorite? Who is to blame for USC & Notre Dame not playing?

On today's Andy and Ari on 3 presented by BetMGM. It is a Dear Andy, Dear Ari show. Your questions answered. Ari's nemesis from the Feinbaum show asks a question about Ari's continued hype of Texas in the SEC. Will Ari stand up for the Longhorns or will he back down? Also, whose fault is it that USC is not playing Notre Dame? The blame has been passed around, but one listener believes that the blame lies squarely with the Trojans. We will discuss. Also, if Jeremiah Smith is the best player in college football, why isn't he the Heisman favorite? We'll discuss that as well. Your questions answered today on Annie and Ariane 3, presented by BetMGM. this show is presented by bet mgm and there's no better place to be during march matchups than las vegas this year college basketball fans can win a vip trip to the court of legends event featuring the cavender twins simply play sports bets and your position on the leaderboard will determine if you win one of the 25 grand prize packages just sign into your bet mgm account opt into the promotion and start placing sports bets of at least ten dollars to climb the leaderboard Make this March one to remember. Join the Court of Legends leaderboard and make it legendary. If you haven't signed up for BetMGM yet, don't forget to use code CFB. That's CFB as in college football to claim your new player offer worth up to $1,500 off your first wager with BetMGM. So come see us on the Court of Legends and make it legendary with BetMGM. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only. U.S. promotional offers are not available in New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER in the U.S. Call 877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY 467369 in New York. Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP in Arizona. Call 1-800-327-5050 in Massachusetts. Call 1-800-BETS-OFF in Iowa or 1-800-981-0023 in Puerto Rico. First bet offer for new customers only, subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in seven days in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Don't forget, if you haven't signed up for BetMGM yet, use the bonus code CFB and get your $1,500 first bet offer today. Welcome to Andy and Ari on 3 presented by BetMGM and Ari Wasserman. We got questions from the people, including one person who I expected to be yelling at you on my television yesterday, but that didn't happen mostly because your Paul Pender, I think, did not go as I had planned. I was expecting Brad and Macon to be screaming at you over your choice of T-shirt. Your Big Ten trifecta T-shirt came in the mail. You bought it specifically to wear on Feinbaum. Producer River, can you show us a shot of Ari on Feinbaum? Ari, unless the logos are on the shoulders, that's not going to work. All-time bag fumble. All-time bag. And I need to get into my bathroom and shave. I'm looking like a caveman. I need to be shaving every three days. I don't know why it takes me every other week. Yeah, I'm kind of upset about that. I thought that it would at least be visible during transitions or at some point in the show, and it wasn't. And that was like a $48 T-shirt when you consider tax and shipping. And I'm never going to get worn or wear that in public because I don't want people to throw fruit at me. So, you know, like it's it was not the way I planned it. But, you know, the good thing that I feel really solid about Andy is, is that I converted one of the angry SEC years from the fine bomb show into a listener of our show, a listener into our show so much so that he asks a question. And I'm very he loves our show. Brad Macon loves our show. Brad and Macon, regular Feinbaum caller, big Georgia fan, nemesis of Ari Wasserman, calls Ari the little tenor. Which is hilarious when you get to his question, how ironic that turns out to be. Well, in this particular case, yeah, he's not even asking about the little ten. He's asking about straight-up SEC at this point. So we'll start with Brad and Macon's question. Andy, why does Ari come up with the worst analysis? He just asked me the questions. It's not even dear Ari. It's dear Andy. Why does Ari come up with the worst analysis? Picking Texas to win it all. How'd they do against Georgia the last two years? Adopt the Penn and Teller model. Andy, your Penn, and Ari, your Teller, so shut up and sit your ass down. I've never seen that show, Andy. Have you been to it? Because it's in Vegas, and I've always wanted to be it. I have not. I would love to. I don't really get the reference. Is Teller like the funny sidekick or something? Teller's silent. oh didn't know that pen is very talkative pen gillette very talkative yeah you could just do your show from two years ago and i'll just sit over here and not say anything that'll be good do i still get paid that would be funny it would just but we leave the the camera on you we just leave the box up yeah i'd be like aj hawk yeah hey hey hey hey hey aj hawk's a friend of the show i like aj hawk i just think it's funny that he always gets made fun of for not talking i think it's I as someone who has been lucky enough to to live well basically where where his wife wants him to live uh for most most of his days uh I appreciate that AJ has managed to have a spot on one of the biggest shows in the universe and he didn't even have to move yeah it's amazing yeah he's great uh and he was a better linebacker I don't think people remember how good of a linebacker that guy was so freaking good all right enough little 10 talk enough little 10 what i do i just try with every fiber of my being to rip any sec topic and turn it into a big 10 brad's head's about to explode you're like why ask a georgia and texas question and he's talking about an ohio state linebacker all right let's talk about the texas of it all we talked about this with chris low on yesterday's show interesting that brad brings up georgia which texas does not play this season in the regular season. Now, maybe they will meet in the SEC championship game or sometime in the playoff. But I find it interesting thinking about this because as good as Texas has been, Georgia has been their kryptonite since they entered the SEC. They're 0-3 against Georgia. The regular season meeting in both years, the SEC championship game in 2024. And two of those meetings, the SEC championship game was a tight game, But two of those meetings were kind of beat downs. But here's the thing, Brad in Macon, Ari can pick Texas to win the national title all he wants this year because they don't play Georgia. If you think Georgia is the team that's going to get them, you're going to have to meet them somewhere that you have to earn your way to. Yeah, I don't understand. I understand that he's a Georgia fan. and Georgia obviously has been one of the premier programs of the last five plus years. But I don't understand why the question is framed through the lens of Georgia anyway. That has nothing to do with anything. Because he's a Georgia fan. I know. But from my perspective, it's like, how did they do against Georgia the last two years? I don't know. Not very good. But both teams ended up in the same place. Not the national title game. So I don't know why. This ended up further in the playoffs than Georgia did. two years ago in 24 didn't make the playoff but georgia did yeah but georgia lost in the quarterfinals both years so like i don't know though there's no nexus between those two things but i i think that the ironic part about this and like this is why we always butt heads um is that andy his number one thing when he yells at me when i make appearances on the fine bomb show saying the big 10 is really good now is that the sec has all this talent it possesses all this talent why are you even talking about other conferences the talent is all in the south and he's like really into that like 2017 talking point so then why are you confused why i would pick one of the more talented teams because you didn't pick your team it's like why does he keep picking texas i don't know brad they have a lot of good players on their team like i mean it's not that complex so you know yes they have not fared well against georgia the past few years um they were a touchdown away or a possession away or a freaking inch away from tying the game against Ohio State in the semis a few years ago and Ohio State near the goal line so you know we don't want to relive the the toss play call there but like it is not that insane of a pick and like I honestly how do we haven't made our picks going into next year but Andy I think Texas is as attractive as a pick of anybody in college football to win the championship next year it's a very attractive pick throw the schedule up there again producer river please again i mentioned they don't have georgia we have to study these schedules this year because the big 10 has shuffled things up in its schedule the sec is going to nine games so the sec schedules all look radically different than what we've seen before and we kind of need to familiarize ourselves with this like we with texas we knew they had Ohio State early in the season, so they're playing them week two. We just learned all of this a few months ago. We knew, obviously, they would be playing Oklahoma when they are because they always do. We knew they'd be playing Texas A&M at the end of the season, and that game would be in College Station. Everything else was a mystery. Look, I don't know what the Florida team that goes to Austin in October after the Oklahoma game, I don't know what that's going to look like. Ole Miss? I'm kind of excited about the Ole Miss at Texas game because Because Trinidad Shambliss and Keewan Lacy against this Texas defense, that feels like a very fun game. Yeah. I think that my view for Texas this year, Andy, is that Texas should just be what I thought Texas was going to be last year. And you know what? We might show up in August and see them play against Ohio State. They could lay an egg, and they might not be very good at all. But I am 100% buying back into the hype that Arch Manning is going to be very good. that's something that Chris Lowe you know shares an opinion with and you know was on the show talking about on Thursday I think that Cam Coleman is the best non-Jeremiah Smith receiver in college football and hasn't been appreciated enough yet for circumstances that were out of his control I think that their running backs are much better I don't think it's possible for their offensive line to be as slow of a start or as bad as they were for the first half it's gonna be better and I think that part of it the offensive line being better that's that's the biggest piece of it I I mean, it's all adding up again to, you know, a very good team. And, like, obviously predicting college football in 2026 and beyond is much more difficult than it was six, seven years ago. In fact, I think that the entire national media was kind of on board with two teams being very good last year in Clemson and Penn State. Both of them stunk. And there was that running bit, I think On3 actually did it, where they took everybody's preseason national champion and the national media and, like, tweeted out a graphic. and like all of us but like one person were wrong and then ultimately all of us were wrong because nobody picked indiana so like you know i don't know what it's going to be but i have until somebody helps me read through the tea leaves and explain to me a new way of trying to pick who's going to be good outside of who has the best players and you know maybe there's a new formula to it who do you think has the best chemistry which coach is the hottest who like but like if i am i supposed to know that Indiana is going to win the national championship last February? I mean, maybe I should have. Yeah, that's what you get paid for, dude. You didn't know that? No, I get paid to chronicle the past, not predict the future. So what I find interesting about this Texas thing is they went 9-3 last year, didn't make the playoff, and now it feels like we've been sunk back into the, oh, you guys always overrate Texas. And I feel like Steve Sarkeesian's earned the benefit of the doubt at this point. And if we go back to last season, they did lay an egg against Florida. That's true. But by the end of the season, they were really good. And I'm not going to just say, oh, they are 2010s era Texas again that always underachieve. They don't always underachieve. They produce NFL players now, which is something they weren't doing back then. They going to keep being good I mean think where we are right now Where are we right now Texas goes 9 loses to Ohio State in the opener by a touchdown misses the playoffs and they a disaster Like, that's the disaster? That was a season that Texas would have died for five years ago. So, you know, I kind of have a bucket of teams that I think are going to break through and eventually win a national championship in the next five to ten years at some point, and maybe as soon as this year. Oregon's in that bucket. Texas is in that bucket. It kind of feels like LSU is now in that bucket, even though they're not a team that's starving for championships. They won one in 19. I think that these two programs, specifically Oregon and Texas, have done a very good job of knocking on the door. It's a concept we talk about on the show all the time. And if you actually were – and we did this last summer. We'll do it again. It's a long, long offseason. But drafting or listing the 25 best players in college football going into next year. Like, does Texas have four or five of them? Like, it's just not that hard to draw a line from point A to point B. It might not turn out that way. But, like, if you think someone's crazy for picking the team with awesome players, then you're not analyzing the score the same way that I am. An example, Clark Brooks, the stat cat who did his impact players list last year. That was where I realized I'd messed up on Indiana. Because I believe they had five or six in the top 100. they were right there with Texas and Georgia and the other ones. And it was eye-opening. And I think I'll be curious to see how many Texas has on that list going into this year. And Clark usually does that spring practice into spring practice. So we'll have him on when he does it. And they have an ovaries in their stadium, so it's really hard to get in on that. That's an ovaries. Look at that. What do you see there? It's a longhorn. It looks like ovaries to me. Maybe ovaries look like a longhorn. I don't know. Hook them. See, you almost had Texas fans back on your side, and you have to do that. You cannot just make people happy. You don't think that looks like ovaries? Look at me in the eyes right now and tell me that isn't ovaries. I didn't say it didn't. I'm just saying you don't know how to make people happy. You get them back, coming back toward you. Maybe that Ari Wasserman, my white ass, is not so bad. and then you say something like that. Never mind. Brad's right about one thing. Well, he's not right about anything, but he's on to something here, which is, like, I've been pretty complimentary and consistently positive in the views of Texas. And if you go back and, like, read some of the columns that I wrote about Texas pre-Steve Sarkeesian, like, during the Tom Herman era and stuff, like, Texas was, like, in my opinion, like, one of the biggest underachievers and most frustrating programs to track. And I view that as a theme of the opposite. I think Texas fans would agree with you on that. You know, if you want to get mad at me about the ovaries thing, that's fine. But, like, I've got a lot of respect for what Steve Sarkeesian has built there, and I am anticipating they'll be very good, not just this year, but into the future. All right, Wasser on my white ass. You got to let the ovary thing go. You just got to. I haven't talked about it for, like, a minute. I won't bring it up again. You've brought it up, like, six times in a minute. Next question? Okay. Next question comes from Wade. I'm sorry. The next question comes from Chris. Chris says, if we all know that Jeremiah Smith is the best player in football and may have been the last two years as well, how is he not the Heisman favorite? Isn't it for the best player in football? It is for the most outstanding player in the United States. Best and most outstanding are not always the same thing, but you're the best who always votes for best player. No. Well, I vote for the player that I would pick on my college football team if I were starting it from scratch this year, using only the stats from this year. That would have been Fernando Mendoza. Did you see the discourse coming out of the NFL Combine this week about how Ty Simpson had a better illustration of tape for the first eight weeks of the season than Fernando Mendoza and that Ty Simpson could be an underappreciated draft prospect? I think it's all clear that Fernando's going 1-1. But I do think it's just kind of interesting when we get into NFL draft season, how we start to like manipulate the season and what happened and try to. It's not manipulating anything. Ty Simpson was awesome for a period of the season. And then he was banged up and not awesome at the end. Yeah. All that's to say is, you know, it's an annual conversation and we will continue to revisit it. But it is a quarterback award and you have to put up absolutely insane numbers to break the club. So, yeah. And that's the problem. So Jeremiah Smith, I've got my BetMGM app up right now. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Jeremiah Smith is number eight in terms of the odds. Jeremiah Smith is plus 1,400. Ari, very interesting though. Who is the favorite as we record this in late February? I know the answer to this, and I haven't even looked at the list unless it's changed. When I popped the list open, I was like, oh. I was surprised, but then it's kind of the Alonzo morning gif where after a second or so, oh, but I get it. I get it. Did you ever do your list of top quarterbacks? Did you ever get around to doing that? I didn't. I keep putting it off. I keep putting it off. No, I want to do more research. I'm going to do the prediction for the starting quarterback for every Power Conference team and Notre Dame. And then I will, after that, compile my list of the top 10. Well, I didn't put the number one quarterback on the Heisman list in my top five, and I heard about it. Is it still C.J. Carr? I think you're probably wrong on that. But again, we've talked about it. There's a lot more returning production this year, so you can make arguments for more people. But CJ Carr, Notre Dame quarterback, CJ Carr is the current Heisman favorite at BetMGM, plus 700, followed by Arch Manning and Trinidad Shambliss at plus 800. Dante Moore at plus 1100. Julian Sayon, plus 1200. Josh Hoover, who's transferring from TCU to Indiana, he's at plus 1200. So there will not be a missing out on the Indiana transfer. People are hip to that now. But CJ Carr is a good choice here. Makes sense here. Because he's going to be playing behind a really good offensive line. He's a year older. He was really efficient last year. I have no problem with this choice right here. The Jeremiah Smith thing, I get the spirit of the question. And Jeremiah Smith still might go number one. In the 2027 NFL draft, even with potentially a bunch of quarterbacks because he's that special. But like you said, as a receiver, you have to put up insane numbers. And Devontae Smith wanted in 2020. He did put up those kinds of numbers. If you watched Devontae Smith play it all in 2020, you got it. He was the most dominant player in college football. It was not close. and one of the single best receiving seasons. I don't know statistically where it stacks up, but visually it's like one of the best, most dominant performances I've ever seen from an individual. So, you know, I, the, with Jeremiah Smith, like last year they had Carnell Tate on the team who, by the way, I don't know if you've been paying attention to the combine, but like wide receiver one, it's like being mocked to the Browns at like seven or something. Like it's, you know, so there was a lot of, of, production value being split between a lot of very good players on that team. So even though I believe him to be the most dominant player in college football and have for the past two seasons, it isn't necessarily manifesting in the numbers. And there are a lot of people who vote for that trophy who do not watch the games and, you know, kind of look at the stats and, you know, that's kind of how it shapes it. And like, honestly, as much as you, you know, I resent my Heisman Trophy viewing strategy of telling the story of the year. But like you couldn't have you like who won the trophy last year, even if they might have been both true, the best overall player in the country. But like his story was phenomenally interesting. So like here, but here's here's the thing. And this is the difference between the NFL draft and the Heisman. And also how I do mine. Like I said, I do it. If I were starting a college football team from scratch, using only the stats from this season and the production from this season and obviously watching the games this season. Yeah. Who would I pick? If I had to do it now where I don't get any production numbers, I have no evidence to pick from. If they just said, Andy, you're drafting a college football team from scratch right now, who you got number one, it's Jeremiah Smith. Yeah. I'll need to see more in the season, but if I am doing it without the benefit of any performances this season, and it's just who you got, I'm taking Jeremiah Smith. I mean, I actually think that Jeremiah Smith might be a sneaky good play, too, because the other thing that worked against Ohio State last year, Andy, was they didn't play any interesting high-leverage games during the regular season, and there was never any opportunity for him to have a big moment on a stage that everybody was locked in on. So, like, next year with their schedule, they play Texas on the road, Texas, I think, ultimately is going to be a much better team. Frankly, I don't know how they're underdogs right now. If I were looking at the look-ahead line, I would take Texas right now with points at home. But he has opportunity throughout his schedule with USC and Indiana and Oregon all in a row. Michigan, obviously, is there. Illinois and Iowa are going to be – I mean, they've got a pretty tough schedule next year. So I think that if he produces a 1,000-yard season and has 17 touchdowns or something, he has a chance to win it, especially if they're playing close games that mean something in October and November. Yeah. This is fascinating. I'm going down the list of the Heisman odds. Darian Mintz is not on the board right now. There's a lock next to his name. We'll see. That probably changes soon. I wonder why that's the case. He's been at Miami now for a few months. Austin Mack is plus 5,000. At this point last year, Mike Simpson was. He might not win the Alabama job. Keelan Russell is also up for the Alabama job. He's at plus 8,000. Keelan Russell would be a really good bet right now, I think. You know who else is plus 8,000? Who? Our guy, JKS. Jern Kjabe, Sangapolini from Cal. I think, I mean, your team has to be good. And I know that Cal might be pretty good next year, but you got to be like the Indiana story. Here we go. Here we go. Dylan Raiola plus 15,000 backing up Dante Moore at Oregon. Take it and then convince Dante to go to the NFL. Like, I don't know. Like, he's not, he's leaving now. Yeah. But, but yeah, as far as Jeremiah Smith goes, if you're asking me right now to use the same Heisman procedure, but I don't have the whole season in front of, you know, the whole season's worth of performances in front of me. I'm going to guess that Jeremiah Smith was the best player because if you play the season 100 times, there's probably 50 of them where he's the best player. Yeah. And, you know, with the quarterback, more so than even last year, like who do you take number one at your quarterback spot? Like if you were going to make that pick, like quarterbacks a little bit more murky. Even if you go look from the list, when you get around to yours, go look at other people's lists. Everybody has a different number one. Well, the thing is, if you're going down this Heisman list, I mentioned Josh Hoover, Jane Maiavas, plus 1,400 USC, Marcel Reeds, plus 2,200 at Texas A&M, John Mateer, plus 2,500 at Oklahoma, Brennan Sorsby at Texas Tech, plus 2,500, Byron Brown at Auburn, plus 2,500, Bryce Underwood at Michigan, plus 3,500. So like DeMond Williams, who we talked to Jed Fish at length about, plus 4,500. Like, DeMond Williams could put up massive numbers on a team that may win 10 games. Like, that's kind of the profile of people who go to New York. I mean, the last two years, the Heisman winners have been major long shots at this time. So, if you go look. Yeah Diego Pavia wasn high on anybody list right now Yeah You know I think And obviously Mendoza was nowhere on anybody list I still have the big Manning thing hanging over my shoulder It's like, if he's good, he's Manning. If he's good, he's Manning. Like, that's still talking to me in my ear. You know, I was in Vail last year. Maybe it was the altitude, but I guaranteed he would go. I'm kind of guaranteeing again that he's going to go. So, you know, I mean, we're going to make a whole show. You're guaranteeing with your body. With my body. You've got to run five miles. You'll survive. Yeah, I'll be okay. But, I mean, this is a whole show at some point in the offseason. Who are the ten best long shots to take? I love it. I love it. I love it. We'll have that show. Yeah. Do we count Jeremiah as a long shot where he is? Probably not. I'm talking like 20,000 plus. Yeah, okay. Well, again, I'm taking Jeremiah if I don't have any information from this season. If I just say, who do you think is going to be the best player this season? I'm taking Jeremiah right now. So he would be my preseason favorite. But again, do you think he would have been a bigger favorite to win the award if he would have gone to South Florida? Just like a thought exercise. Do you think that going to a small school and following your coach and then making them awesome is a more compelling storyline than being another good player? By the way, Ohio State's going to have four players taken in the first round. He put up bigger numbers there because there wouldn't be anybody really to take away from the numbers. and who could cover them at that level. Yeah, right. And Ohio State is going to have other receivers that are going to get thrown to. Obviously, Jeremiah Smith will get the attention of some of the best defenses in college football because as you pointed out, Ohio State's regular season schedule is significantly tougher this year than it was last year. It's just harder to stand out on a team that has, like Andy, I don't know if you're, you know this, they might have five of the first top 15 players taken in the NFL draft this year. Yes, right. Right. And it's obviously not that level every season, but there are multiple first-round picks on the Buckeyes almost all seasons. There are multiple top 100 picks on the Buckeyes every season. So that's what you're doing. And probably multiple top 100 picks on the offense every season. So that's the part that there's a little bit of competition. 15 picks isn't even the quarterback. And that's the other thing. It happened to him last year, too. if Jeremiah Smith is a Heisman finalist, so will Julian Sagan. And then they split both. And that's what happened with Devontae Smith. Mack Jones was a finalist as well. Kyle Trask was a finalist that year. I think Kyle Pitts probably should have been. And obviously, Pitts' success and Trask's success were combined. Mack Jones and Devontae Smith's success. So Sagan and Smith, yeah, they're handcuffed. Tough break for Kyle Pitts, too. I was living that Kansas City Chiefs dream for him, and it's not going to pan out. Yeah, franchise tag. That's right. All right, next question from Wade. Can we finally settle who is to blame for USC and Notre Dame not playing anymore? It's USC. Their proposal was to play in Week 0, which neither team was eligible to play due to NCAA rules. USC's only offer for an eligible game was Mexico City in Week 0. A joke. So here's the thing, Wade, and I'm not sure if that's your real name because Wade Garrett is the Sam Elliott character in Roadhouse, in which case I appreciate that too. But how we frame this will determine who we decide. I think if we are going by the spirit of things, I think Wade is right. I think USC gave Notre Dame a very difficult set of circumstances to play in. which so here's the deal with week zero which by the way this may change the there's a proposal to change this that the ncaa is is probably going to pass where next year week zero is going to become week one but right now if you want to play week zero you have to play against hawaii that gives you the opportunity to play in week zero if you want to or you have to play an international game hence Mexico City. The only way USC and Notre Dame could have played without a waiver, because remember, Florida and Miami got a waiver a few years to get to play in Orlando on Week Zero. But the only way to do it without a waiver, which this would have been a pretty late date for a waiver, is to play internationally. So the Mexico City thing would have made sense for that. So yes, USC gave Notre Dame an extremely narrow set of circumstances to continue that game. And by the way, the reason Wade is asking this question is USC did finalize its schedule. They will be playing San Jose State in week zero. San Jose State plays away. So what did Marcus Freeman say? He said anytime, anywhere. And that's the part I was going to get to. Oh, OK. Week zero is a time. Mexico City is a place. So if you said anytime, anywhere, and you said no to Mexico City in week zero, then you're not willing to play them anytime, anywhere. ExoCity would be kind of fun. I heard that they have great food there. High altitude. Oh, I didn't know that. Very high altitude. So it's kind of like, I believe they're higher up than Denver. I think there might have been an ancient aliens episode about some of the rock formations that are in there and where they came from. But it's another ancient astronaut theorists believe. I mean, like, I guess, like, if USC made it harder, like Notre Dame still could have figured it out if it was, like, important enough to them. Well, that's the thing. Anytime, anywhere. But I tend to agree with what I think. I think that is being very. It's. You are taking that anytime, anywhere to its extreme. They are. As you said, I will do it only in this place, only at this time. And they probably put that out there knowing that Notre Dame wouldn't want to. So it's kind of like that's – I'm not saying that Notre Dame is all to blame here. But I feel like in the power struggle of which team is weaker or more afraid, it's like we're so – Look, USC doesn't want to play Notre Dame because USC has a very tough Big Ten schedule. and a part of it also was not wanting to play Notre Dame where Notre Dame falls on the schedule traditionally. So this was a game at USC this year, which would have been the last weekend of the regular season is traditionally where that fell. And given SC's Big Ten schedule, I don't think they wanted it at the back end of that gauntlet. But the question I have for you, Andy, and I don't know the answer to this, what was Notre Dame's biggest reason for not wanting to play that game because of what happened last year? Notre Dame wanted to play the game. No, but not wanting to play in week zero in Mexico City. Like, what's the number one drawback to that? Because I think that Notre Dame should have learned from last year that they need to play as many of these types of games as possible. Well, they definitely need this game. Yeah. I mean, if they don't play USC last year, they're not even in the conversation for the playoff probably. They just missed it. And they wouldn't remember if the playoff rules that are in effect for 26 had been in effect last year, Notre Dame would have made it. I'm going to read off Notre Dame's schedule. Here it is if you're watching. Wisconsin, Rice, Michigan State, Purdue, North Carolina, Stanford, BYU, Navy, Miami, BC, SMU, Syracuse. and I can already see it from a mile away. BYU is going to be a 10-win team again next year, and they're going to be using that as their quality wins and the debates, and they're not going to have the games that they need, so you better not. Now, if they beat Miami and they beat BYU, I think they're going to be okay. You can't lose twice next year, or you're at risk. I don't know about that, because I – all right, flash Notre Dame's schedule up again there, Producer River. This is one that looks somewhat easy on paper, I think, but there's a possibility that it gets more difficult. Wisconsin could be quite a bit better. I don't know if they're going to be, but they could be. First year under Pat Fitzgerald for Michigan State, we'll see about that. Bill Belichick's defense got better. We'll see what they do on offense. We know BYU and Miami are going to be good. We know SMU is going to be good. I don't have a lot of faith in Boston College. And if Steve Angelli stays healthy for Syracuse, they could be pretty good did you just strain a muscle in your back trying to make that schedule hard i didn't say it was hard okay i just don't think it's as easy as it looks yeah i'm not saying it's like the easiest it would be a lot better if usc was on it think about how i feel like a year removed from not getting in because you didn't have enough quality wins it's kind of a tricky thing to say no to that regardless of how insane the circumstances are i i i still place more blame on USC for the end of this. And I understand, but this is the same thing we've said to the Texas fans, the same things we said to the Alabama fans, same things we said to the Nebraska fans, same things we said to Texas Tech head coach Joey McGuire himself, to the Indiana fans. Don't. What's out of these games? Stop it. Stop. Go play them. I hate both of them right now for it. And also, this isn't just a tough game. It's a game that's meaningful to the fabric of the sport. Yeah. It's not just like any tough non-con game. This is a game that we... But what USC can say is we have this tough conference schedule, and USC is probably correct in that the Big Ten draw this year, now if they got Ohio State's Big Ten draw last year, this would not be a good schedule at all, but they did get a hard Big Ten draw, so they can say, hey, look, we got Oregon. We got Washington. We are going to Penn State and Indiana. We have Ohio State coming to us. We are challenged. And if we are 10-2 at the end of that, we're in. And they're probably right. And they're right. Yep. But that sucks. And I hope it winds up in a situation where somebody, like Texas, which is playing Ohio State, or Ohio State, which is playing Texas, like I hope whoever wins that game, if they get in the situation where they are on the fringe, that they get in over a team that ducked a game like this. Just to pay a lesson to the people who ducked it and also to put an end to this asinine talking point that hard games don't matter. I just can't continue to live in a world where that's an accepted level. The committee has to continue to reinforce that, and a lot of people believe the committee never does that. We've given them examples of when the committee did it, including last year when Miami got in because they beat Notre Dame. A decade plus of data, but it's fine. Yeah. But yes, I hope the teams that duck these games get punished. I do. And I don't want to hear about it. It's both their faults. If we're assigning percentage of blame, I'd say 75% USC, 25% Notre Dame. All right, good luck. May the force be with you. Anytime, anyplace. Mexico City's a place. Week zero's a time. So you do have to share some of it. You might need that game. You might need it. I don't know if – I mean, it would be terrible if the same thing happened to Notre Dame again. But you need those games. Or you need one of these teams that's on the list here to be extraordinary when we're not expecting it. Like, for all we know, Wisconsin's 10-2 next year. I don't know. But it's – looking at it right now, it doesn't look like there's – Or they just go 12-0. I mean, Rice, Michigan State, Purdue, North Carolina. Stanford. I mean, come on. Well, like North Carolina and Stanford is not their choice. No, I know. It's not going to be very persuasive next year is all I'm saying. Yeah, I know. And this is Notre Dame's problem is they're lucky that the ACC gave them Miami when they did. And they gave them SMU when they did because at least Notre Dame is going to have challenging games in that part of the season. yeah or if you do lose they didn't at all if you do lose next year lose to a bad team and beat the good ones they didn't have that last year they beat all the bad teams right right they lost in northern illinois and beat everybody else and they got in the playoff so and then they made it to the national championship game but yeah if we're assigning blame i'm gonna sign 75 blame to usc and 25 to notre dame i think that's perfectly fair and i'm sure everybody everybody will internalize that bases will disagree completely but yeah next question comes from our friend lori could we move the army Navy game to veterans day November 11th Most of the time statistically would fall on a day No major college football is happening. Keeping the eyes of the public solely on that game puts in the regular season, keeps it in the cold and draws more attention to the Patriots. Isn't it all? If November 11th is on a Saturday or Sunday, which doesn't happen again until 2028, there'd be an opportunity for the schools who always play on Saturdays to do Thursday and Friday games or schedule their byway by weeks. then the other obvious but absolutely absurd dates would be memorial day or armed forces day the week before in hawaii this satisfies none of the above criteria except usa but would be very fun to have a football game in the middle of the off season and the troops deserve a trip to hawaii i agree with that uh laurie there's there's no way that the networks are giving up a full slate of college football in in early november it's it's not going to happen but laurie laurie And several other viewers slash listeners chimed in with the Veterans Day suggestion. So I appreciate the imagination and I appreciate the ideas and keep them coming. Because we talked about this situation. Our friend Seth Emerson from The Athletic talked to Jeff Munkin, the Army coach, who said they might be willing to play the game on Thanksgiving weekend. Michael Kelly, the athletic director at Navy, said absolutely not. Not interested. I don't understand why they can't play at the week of Veterans Day on Monday night and lead it into the Monday night football game. Because of, ooh, that's actually a great idea. That's actually a great idea. Is that not like an exclusive enough window because people are working on a weekday? Like, I don't know, but like. Yeah, probably because people were in. Remember, lots of VIPs go to this game. So having it on a Saturday allows them to get there. Mm-hmm. but that's not the worst idea. Yeah. You could do it. Yeah. Veterans day at five o'clock in the afternoon, Eastern time. Cause they always have it on the East coast. And then it leads into Monday night football. That's a good, it's not, it's not a bad idea. Like we're going to know we are in the no bad ideas phase of college football. We're like at the mind meld area. Like this is a podcast. We're talking to through, which is people being people, you know? I don't know. There's so many other, like, things that come into play from a logistics standpoint that it makes it hard if you don't have a floating date, like, or if it's a floating date, like Veterans Day, where it can land on any day of the week. One problem you have there is they're on CBS, so it's not actually a lead into Monday Night Football, which appears on ESPN and ABC. So I don't know that that works either. if CBS had a property, I don't even know what CBS has on the United States anymore. You just put it in that window because you know more people will watch it. Right. I don't know. I don't work at NBC, so I don't know how that works. But there's got to be a solution here for them to play it in the regular season at some point and still having an exclusive viewing window. Yeah, I think smart people will find a way. Like if we use our imaginations, smart people can find a way. I can call my mom on a cell phone and talk to her like face to face. We can figure it out. Exactly. Exactly. All right. Next question. Final question comes from Jacob. Does Brandon Walker get a free Ari Wasserman, my white ass T-shirt? Brandon, send us your size. you absolutely get a free one. You came up. Anybody who gives us this much, we got to give Lori something too because Lori's given us a lot. Yeah, anybody who's helping us with show material I think gets a t-shirt. People in my life have been saying my white ass to me a lot lately. It's kind of catching on. If you see Ari in public, I want you to yell as loud as you can. Ari Wasserman, my white ass. ass yeah it was was on my white ass so like yes but also defeated at the same time the tone was perfect perfect comedic comedic tone from him yes so next time you say because i i've seen it in action myself you know when ari and i are out and about we're at games sometimes we're just randomly eating at a restaurant you know the the folks will come say hi so by all means when you see Ari, it is hello, Ari Wasserman, my white ass. Ari Wasserman, my white ass. Beautiful. Yeah, no, Brandon's more famous than me, so I mean, I guess he's helping me out a little bit. Well, and he deserves a free t-shirt. Yeah. So we gotta get t-shirts made. We gotta get t-shirts on the press. There's a lot of ideas here, not a lot of action, and it's kind of bothering me. Yeah, Ari Wasserman, my white ass, just be good. Just be good. Tamper better. Tamper better is a great one. Which, you know, this week was a point of conversation that we might have to hit on the show at some point next week. Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, it's interesting because I don't always want to make this show about the rules because I feel like people tune out when it's about the rules. This one, though. The suggestion that they could suspend a coach for six games and then dock a team 20% of its football budget if they take a transfer this spring when there's no transfer portal. That's a fun one. Never going to happen, by the way. It is a suggestion. It has to go through various levels and layers of NCAA committees to be passed. If it did get passed, it would be sued into oblivion immediately. But I'm here for the fun part. I'm here for the rules thing. I think people don't care about rules, but I think in this specific instance they do. I think people care if their coach is going to miss a game. Yeah. I just think tampering in general is a hot button. That wasn't the, this is, this is the transfer thing and the tampering thing. Yes. That's also another one where they said they're going to, they're going to, this is the director of enforcement for the NCAA said, Oh, we're going to have strict tampering penalties. Didn't say what they are. And then said, we're going to have the ball state president in panel of task force to come up with with an even better you know policy and and penalty structure like okay great let's let's have a task force that can then make a committee and then a subcommittee sounds good this is why they never ever get anything done yeah but i mean i do think that if there is a coach who gets caught or anybody on a staff who gets caught reaching out to a player that's not in the portal during a time which they're not supposed to be reaching out to them that there's they should be penalized for that. Well, here's the thing, Ari. There's a little bit of mutually asserted destruction here. If you penalize one coach for doing that, because, listen, I'm telling you, a lot of them are really dumb about it and don't cover their tracks really well. Yeah. I can tell you right now there are four coaches you will not get. There are four head coaches you won't get. Dabo Sweeney, because he's really new at this transfer portal stuff. Brian Newberry from Navy. Jeff Munkin from Army, Troy Calhoun from Air Force. If you just said, we know. Because they can't take transfers. Wild Wild West has been an era of college football that we've been living in. If they say, as of August 29th, 2026, if you get caught campering after that date, or we submit, somebody submits a paper trail or a text message or a DM or any other way that you get caught or anybody on your staff gets caught, will deduct money from your revenue share or suspend your coach or do something. I don't know what the actual thing is. I think – Okay, here, let's – Try to police it. Let's say Pete Golding gets nailed for whatever Dabo sent in because Dabo called out Pete Golding by name, the Ole Miss coach. Let's say Pete Golding gets nailed. If I'm Pete Golding and I get in trouble, the first thing I'm going to say is, so what are you doing to Lane Kiffin who was raiding my roster the entire time? But that works if you don't start at the date. You have a date that starts as of this date. So we're still in the amnesty period? Yeah, well, you can't go re-litigate every case of tampering from behind. You have to start a date of this enforcement committee is going to start really cracking down on this as of this date. So then if Lane gets there, I think most coaches would ignore it. But then maybe they get somebody. Maybe they get in trouble. Yeah. So if I'm Pete Golding, instead of reacting to your players being tampered with by tampering with others, the next time your coach a coach tampers with your players you turn them in that coach gets in trouble then i don't know maybe it starts to i mean i know i'm just again this is friday my hair hasn't been done like we're just spitballing here i don't know just imagining jeff munkin the army coach sitting back going take anybody you want boys i don't care i mean there's no can't even take a transfer no honor amongst thieves and everybody's a thief right now but if you create a law that people start getting in trouble for, maybe it gets back to a more sane system where you can't do that. Like, I don't know, maybe I'm full of crap and it just can't. But, you know, if you say we're starting at this date, here's what gets you in trouble. If you do it and we catch you, we will penalize you or fine you or restrict your finances. And then people ignore it and then start getting in trouble and they're able to enforce those rules. You'll see an improvement in it well maybe maybe you've given them the magic bullet maybe you've given them the idea because we're so tired of hearing about coaches complain about it like even jed fish said on the show the other day tampering if that's even a thing anymore it's like if you make it a thing it'll be a thing well right as our friend max olsen at espn likes to say they like to reserve the right to tamper. It's true. But you make another good point, though. It is the coaches themselves complaining about it for the most part. Yeah, because it's cool. Maybe they stop complaining about it publicly and then we're relieved of that. Either way. I actually think the more likely scenario is not they stop tampering because they're scared. It's they stop whining about it. And then we win either way. So it's hard. Ari Wasserman, little tenor solving the world's problems. Take that, Brad, for making Ari Wasserman, my white ass. I don't – you're the man with this, Andy. I don't know to – like if you start stopping people from tampering, if there are other legal issues that will get moved over. I think it's a little easier dealing with coaches because coaches do sign in their contracts almost all of them. everyone I've ever seen, the coach agrees to follow the NCAA rules. But where it gets murky is if you nail a coach for tampering and getting a player out of the window, what happens to the player? Do they still get him? Like that's the – Well, they can't stop the players from moving outside the window. So if I were a coach and I could tamper and get Jeremiah Love on my team, I would gladly take a two-game suspension for that. Like I don't know – You'd take a six-game suspension though, probably, yes. I mean, yeah. Didn't part about won a national title being suspended for six games, right? Yeah. And it was at different points of the year, too. It wasn't all at once. Could you pick? Like, Michigan tried to pick their own suspension game. He would have been glad to be suspended for the first half of that season. Because remember how Michigan's schedule went that year? Yeah. Real games didn't come until the end, and he missed those. And coaches can't pick what game it is. Like when Michigan tried to self-impose, it's Sharon Moore penalty. Yeah. They successfully did that, by the way. They did. I believe he was supposed to miss the season opener this coming season. He's going to. He's going to, yeah. What a week! By the way, you have sent a lot of juicy games in for 2026. You have done your homework, and I appreciate that. Monday, the juiciest games of 2026. We'll count them down. we'll talk to you Monday