They have beat the hell out of people this year.

Right.

But he is so intense, right? When you sit down with him, it's like when the first time he meets you, at least it was with me, it was, okay, everybody, basically clear the room.

And it was like it was like 60 minutes.

Right.

It was like, I mean, he'd pull up a chair right next to you and get in your face.

I mean, basically face to face.

They

But as a play caller, an organizer, a guy who's running an offense, why was it so much better with Will Stein at Oregon, and why is Kentucky so much better with Will Stein now?

now?And what's amazing with Kentucky is, like, if, if, if you showed me the numbers on paper, right? I'm, I'm, I'm looking at them right now.

I'm looking at Kentucky's numbers right now, and I, and I know what their record is.

I know what they've done, and I know where they're ranked, and I would not guess they are ranked where they're at, okay? Now, n- now quickly back to your question on Will Stein.

Uh, this, this guy got on our radar after his first year at UTSA, um, because of what he did in terms of turning it around, the progression, the efficiency on offense, uh, both in rushing and the pass game.

Uh, so even after year one at UTSA, he popped up on the radar as, as a p- as a person of interest, okay? Uh, when Dan Lanning went and got him, um, my first thought was: How did Dan find him? What was his decision process? Because Dan's a defensive guy, and for a defensive guy to go out and find an offensive guy with such upside, um, that seemingly didn't have a friend-buddy connection with him, um, I, I, I immediately was like, just what's his hiring process? It's gotta be really good.

Uh, and then Stein obviously at Oregon, uh, put up back-to-back top 20 offenses.

I said yes- they scored 15 at home against the eighth best defense in the Big Ten.

Right, yeah.

And so 2025, everybody's like, "Hey, we got his quarterback coach.

This should be good." O- okay, I can buy into that, and it was the opposite of good.

Uh, and then now we have Kendal coming in, and Kendal's numbers, he's portable.

He's done it at three different places.

He's immediate impact.

Look, your offense is top 30 in the country right now, right? So Kendal's doing his job.

Your thoughts on, uh, Florida State Louisville?

We may just parrot each other.

Yeah.

You know? A- a- and, and so, you know, you got Elko at A&M.

You got Lanning at Oregon.

And so, um, now A&M didn't go next man up on defense.

They brought in Hemphill.

And, uh, a- and look, that, that was an upgrade from Bateman.

Tell me what he is now at Northwestern.

I better get, I better get that subscription today."

Right.

Well, you know something? With, with all the work I've been doing with football, um, all the data, uh, one of the things that fans love I always get questions about is, is gambling, right? Is betting.

And so I approach numbers and data very differently, number one.

Uh, number two, without computing power, I never had the time to take everything here and put it here in my computer for people to be able to see.

So essentially, Matrix Edge AI is I'm using, and I've been... it's taken me about a year to train, uh, several AI agents on using college football and NFL data, uh, and putting it into the site.

So the nice thing is, because I was able to make it myself, it's five bucks a month.

... one of the examples.

Uh, so I don't know if he's going to, but this is not good enough.

No, it's, it's, it's not.

And I, I think... [sighs] Look, I've, I, uh, I try not to get into the emotion of college football, right? But I, but I have to keep my pulse on it, finger on it to, to get that pulse to be able to try to know what the fans are hearing.

And so with Lincoln Riley, and you know me, Chuck, I'm always trying to get a different angle than what's being presented.

It feels like, like that post-Oregon game, listening to his comments and the nonchalance, it's almost like he is daring them to fire him.

It's like he wants out without saying, "I don't need my 70 million.

I just wanna go 'cause this sucks." Because it has to suck.

even those trademarks are gone.

And I was like, I don't think this is the right call, and it really ain't the right call for you.

No, but here's the thing, though, is at least in his presser, okay, that was the only answer he could give that was defensible.

That was the only answer he could give.

You know, Lagway was hurt.

I got the banged up guys because statistically – now, for you and everybody listening, if your coach has one play card for going for two or going for it on fourth down for the season – Their analytics group is terrible.

Absolutely terrible.

Because, Chuck, when you open that up, the big word in there was situational.

Do you have any sort of just general feedback about the situation in Baton Rouge and with LSU right now? Because they do have 11 more on-field games to take care of.

Bad product.

Several times over.

Yeah, it was horrible.

Horrible.

Even year three wasn't very good.

And then suddenly, boom.

It suddenly flipped.

And I'm like, okay, is this credit Sanchez? Is it a new day in his college coaching career? Or is this a problem with Ashton Daniels and the Florida State team?

That's not a compliment

I know it's not.

It's not.

Because both of them were given the keys to a Ferrari at Oregon and Oklahoma, and the head coach that handed them the keys stuck around and managed everything for them, Bob Stoops and Mike Belote, two of the greatest head coaches in my lifetime for college football.

And as soon as they lost their Bob and, um, their Mike, you know, boom, everything falls apart.

And I realized Chip never had the staff, and he's terrible at it.

Riley never had the staff.

Um, tell me about Dabo heading into the season.

[laughs]

And he wa- he, he is the only football coach in the last 16 years in my numbers.

I have a little thing called coach effect.

We've talked about it.

Dan Mullen is the only human being with three consecutive 10 years of positive coach effect in 16 years.

The only one.

Three straight years.

Oh, wow.

Mm-hmm

...

when it comes down to football and, and the angles I take.

It can make my imagination come to life, and it can test everything.

It can test 10 years of NFL or college football in a matter of minutes.

And, and so, uh, I just felt...

Because c- the NFL is so...

Give me a review of Raheem Morris.

Mm-hmm.

The closing line is the most unbiased odds to win, and a lot of people don't realize that when they see that spread, when they see that money line, that is an odds to win that game.

And if you interconnect them Even without the teams playing, you can create this massive spider web of closing lines that all interconnects that judges strength of schedule.

But more importantly, it judges strength of record, which is how well you did against that schedule.

It's not the quality of the schedule that's important.

It is what did you do relative to that schedule? And so I back-tested closing lines, uh, uh, Vegas closing lines basically for the last five years, and I created a strength of schedule and strength of record off of those.

And so what it told me is, Sankey is right.

Yep.

It's actually strength of record, and you've explained that before, that it accounts for when fans say, "You didn't play anybody." You could be ten and two and your strength of, uh, record is a different reflection than necessarily your str- strength of schedule.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So, um, you know, I was paying attention when, when Greg and Lane were talking about strength of schedule at SEC Media Days.

Um, and they're right.

I, you know, I ran the num- in fa- in fact, I sat down.

I f- I finally...

Go ahead.

Where are we with this combination in year four, especially post NIL?

Well, you know, with, with, with Rob, uh, you know, the statement that you have with him is extraordinary.

That was the number, number three, uh, offensive face to just beat in college football last year.

Um, and so his impact has been really good, uh, where he, he's been fast.

Uh, Dana, it is...

You, you look at his composite years, you know, our, our biggest concern, um, and from a data standpoint, that's always usually my number one thing is I go to, what's the floor? Everybody's always looking at the ceiling.

Um, you know, the, the offense for his career, he's got, he has a high ceiling.

Mm.

Yeah.

Okay? But prior to that, he had eight consecutive years of underperforming the talent.

Now, not terrible years.

It was a half game or a full game or little...

It, it was little things, you know? Um, but...

A- and then every once in a while, he'd pop a bad one, but he was never good.

Washington, never.

I would agree.

If we had an average coach, we would get 5.7 wins, and with this coach we got 4.5 or whatever.

Exact- almost exactly that.

And so I, I spent, uh, you know, a good portion of a couple weeks running it.

Um, and finally it's like, okay, I got coach effect figured out.

I'm like, all right, if you don't tell me Kirk Cignetti is number one in coach effect, I did something wrong.

Kirk Cignetti, number one in coach effect.

All right, we're going somewhere.

Sometimes when you're not Charlie Strong, don't you just kind of nod and take the paycheck?

Um, tell me what's real about Hugh Freeze as a coaching candidate.

Right now I, I, I don't know.

I don't know who, exactly who he is in terms of the motivation at this point, you know, because, uh, like you said, it, it, he, he was successful everywhere he was at.

Um- Very successful, you know.

Um, and so e- even at, even at Auburn, the, the only thing that really couldn't click, uh, was the offense because it was still a, it was still a really solid defense, um, last year.

So, you know, I, I, I think if I'm an athletic director, if I'm interviewing Hu- Hugh Freeze, um, the resume's there.

Uh, I think the intangible part of it is the psychological.

It's like why he started, that program started to slide bothers me as much as the actual record.

I think he's gonna be a starter, but he's also, like, working out at every single position that they have on that offensive line.

Oh, man, the only thing I love more than healthy guys is guys that can play multiple positions, especially interior linemen.

God, that, that versatility is just great.

So here's what I'm looking for with Trey.

Not an immediate impact starter.

Guy who plays a lot, right? I mean, hi- his peer group, when you get picked in the third round, offensive line, you should be playing a lot of games.

His peer average is 15, right? E- even though there's been 43 guys picked in the third round, offensive lineman, interior offensive lineman, the average number of, of games played is 15.

Right, right.

Mm-hmm.

So that's creating more draft value.

Line in the sand for tackles.

In his peer group, the number one tackler, 118 tackles at safety, drafted in the last 13 years.

But his peer group average is 62.

So for me, once he hits about 60, 70 tackles, now he's become a- above average safety value.

Um, anything more than one interception is awesome.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

In fact, every coaching position in the NFL since 2010.

So when I look at Fernando Mendoza, I look at him through the eyeballs of what has his offensive play caller done for his career, and I look up at the matchup of every defensive coordinator he's going against.

Because there are some games where he has a higher odds of throwing for 300 yards.

There are some games on the road or at home against certain defensive coordinators, he has a better odds of throwing an interception, throwing a touchdown.

So when I'm looking at these numbers, I'm not just throwing a dart, s- you know, it is actually projecting exactly how many, you know, how many yards a guy is gonna have.

But with these, like I said, as I-- I'm just taking all the rookie numbers and, and aggregating them, uh, which is a, which is a separate thing altogether.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

In fact, every coaching position in the NFL since 2010.

So when I look at Fernando Mendoza, I look at him through the eyeballs of what has his offensive play caller done for his career, and I look up at the matchup of every defensive coordinator he's going against.

Because there's some games where he has a higher odds of throwing for 300 yards.

There are some games on the road or at home against certain defensive coordinators, he has a better odds of throwing an interception, throwing a touchdown.

So when I'm looking at these numbers, I'm not just throwing a dart, s- you know, it is actually projecting exactly how many, you know, how many yards a guy is gonna have.

But with these, like I said, as I, I'm just taking all the rookie numbers and, and aggregating them, uh, which is a, which is a separate thing altogether.

Mm-hmm, yeah.

Right.

And Rutgers, when, uh, the, the big thing that he did at Rutgers is he got the signatures.

He turned the recruiting profile at Rutgers.

So remember, that wasn't in the Big Ten.

That was the Big East, right? That, that, that's when he went from, you know, not having the recruits to being the best recruiter.

He, he was the Ohio State.

He was the Boise State.

What is Lincoln Riley in your eyes now as a guy running a program?

Uh, give me some examples of maybe who calls, the type of people who call, and the type of question they may have, 'cause they have to tell you what they, what they want, and then you can say, "Okay, let me do you one better."

Right.

What's the need? That's what we got to identify, you know.

Um, a-and so, let's see here, recent, recent phone call.

I'm trying to think of one that, uh, that I can use without being too, uh, too specific on who it might be.

Um, right now, I don't...

It, it's, it's kind of the off-season, so I don't have a really good story that I can, I can get into.

What, what happened? What was the curveball I didn't see? That's funny.

Tell me what Wazzu, I wanna say what Wazzu has, what Wazzu may be borrowing until a bigger program comes along.

Oh, let's not get too far over our skis.

The, the guy ain't coached a game yet, Chuck.

He ain't been a head coach for one minute.

But I, I think one of the connections that people don't understand with Kirby Moore and Washington State, uh, out there on the East Coast is Kirby Moore is from that area.

Now, the state of Washington, to drive from east to west, it's about an eight and a half hour drive.

It's not a small state, and the last five hours is high desert.

Ryan Beard, what do they have?

Because I always, you have to, you have to go for somewhere to get back what you lost from Brendan Sorsby, and it would be the coaching staff.

Right.

Well, the, the, in the coaching staff, I said this last year when, when Joey was putting it together.

I thought Texas Tech, everybody was talking about the upgraded money they had available to go out and buy a better roster.

Okay, they did that, but what a lot of people really overlooked was the staff overhaul, uh, with Leftwich and with, um, Scheel as the defensive coordinator.

It w- it was pro- arguably, I would argue it was the biggest OCDC upgrade in college football heading into last season.

Those guys are still there.

Uh, tell me about the staff and the coaching advantage, coaching impact, uh, from Kirby Smart, and I guess that staff last year and how you project for this year.