Hour 2: Guest Host Bobby Bones’ Top 5 NFL Villains, plus The Athletic’s CFB Insider Stewart Mandel

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1:48This is The Rich Eisen Show. This is the Rich Eisen Show. With guest host, Bobby Bones. Rich Eisen, he's calling me, that's cool. From the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. Earlier on the show, NFL Network insider, Ian Rapoport. Coming up, college football insider for The Athletic, Stuart Mandel. Actor and musician, Nick Jonas. and now sitting in for rich it's bobby bones hey everybody i'm bobby let's welcome in all my friends here today that are making me look halfway decent uh the great chris brockman chris hey bobby great to see you man and tj jefferson how are you my friend i'm great man how you doing i'm okay uh tj just told me to say my name more oh well just bobby bones i've been bones that is right for everybody that's on the phone I want to talk to you do not hang out please I just want to say that we will come to you in a second I promise you or my name's not Bobby Bones Bobby Bones thank you we're going to bring on college football editor in chief for the athletic and co-host of the audible Stuart Mandel and college football is back this is my favorite when he posts an article I am on it I'm a subscriber.

3:10I get the little thing on my phone that goes, your$6.99 has now been charged. And part of that reason, Stuart, is because of you. Thank you for coming on. Thank you for having me. I can probably get you a better deal than that. Yes, all right. 10 % off, though, that's$60. Friends of the program. Okay, let's talk first of all about the Big Ten and the SEC taking a stand as far as pro players in college. Where does this end up shaking out? Yeah, it's an interesting window into what the college football might look like going forward. If the NCAA can't enforce any of its rules, even one that seems so common sense is this, judge after judge after court after court, striking them down, maybe we see conferences take it into their own hands.

3:52Without getting too into the weeds on legal things, there is a wide opinion that a conference can make more stringent rules. Because it's not like, okay, if these guys that were going to play for LSU can't play in the SEC, they do have other options, right? Which is a lot different than the NCAA saying you can't play anywhere. So do we think this is all going back to court again for the hundredth time? Well, it's hard to keep track of all the different court cases out there. But I think the thing that football has going forward if they want to keep these NFL players off the field is the season's about to start.

4:30And in fact, the teams that are playing this weekend have to lock in their rosters by Friday. LSU's playing next weekend so they'd have to lock in theirs by next Friday and as long as there's motions and appeals and all like it might just the clock might just run out because it is the SEC and the Big Ten that we're seeing right now really draw a line in the sand is there a chance that a Mac school or a Sunbelt school could go hey all you pro guys you can go play with us yeah possibly right now that injunction in Louisiana that allowed those guys to be eligible is still in effect. And those guys could, as of now, play college football, just can't play it right now in the SEC Big Ten.

5:14And actually, the Big 12 put in a similar rule. In fact, the Big 12 extends to all sports, not just football or basketball. So you had the Big Ten go first, and there's a specific to the NFL. And then the SEC said NFL, NBA, WNBA, and the Big 12 said, we'll top that and say, any sport. You can't come back if you've signed a contract. So what if you have, and we can Chris winky this, what if you've played baseball and you want to come and play football? That I believe is still an NCAA rule that you're allowed to do that. So I don't think there's any reason why the conferences would, would be against that.

5:50Um, you know, I think of Russell Wilson back in the day played like three years of minor league baseball while also playing college football. and I don't think that's changed. So the concern is a football player who went to the NFL, went through camp, played in preseason games, and by the way has had access, that means, for all these months to best of the best coaching and training, coming back and playing against 18-year-olds. My theory earlier was we need absolute chaos for there to be real change. We flirted with change. None has actually happened. We've got close to litigation. we saw Saban testifying but it's like let all the pros play let everybody go crazy and then we will finally actually get what we want as change because it's going to get so bad poke a hole in my theory please I mean first of all we've already had right like pure case we had at one point this summer a guy was going to play for Texas Tech after being caught gambling on his own team so I you know if the case to Congress is help we're screwed right I think we're there The challenge that the conferences and the NCAA have had is that these bills keep getting close to the getting up for vote.

7:04And then because politics is politics, somebody will get in the way and say, well, I'm not voting for this unless you take care of my state or do this pet thing. And that's why I've always thought it's very unrealistic to think Congress is going to save you. I think at some point they're going to have to acknowledge that, hey, we have to negotiate these things with the players. right. We have to have some form of collective bargaining, but colleges have been avoiding that. Like the plague to this point, hoping Congress will just step in and say, no, you have the right to make your own rules and you don't have to do that.

7:38Another wild theory that I'd love to share with you for you to poke a hole in is that I say it's not so much NIO money anymore or facilities or even coaches to actually win. You need a great local judge to allow you to win. Your thoughts? Yeah, I think there's some truth to that. We have seen that in isolation. I mean, Trinidad Chambliss could win the Heisman at Ole Miss. He could be the best quarterback in the country this year. And he wasn't supposed to be eligible. He found a judge that was very sympathetic in Mississippi to this medical issue he had in Division II four years ago. And so some of these things are involving kind of peripheral guys.

8:20That's involving one of the best players in the country. So, yes, I think, I mean, I joke that, you know, the next frontier is going to be you don't like a call in the game. You know, you think the refs had it out for you. Take that to court. I was reading your latest article where you were talking about the Big Ten and the SEC, basically saying if the NCAA can't control eligibility, we'll just do it ourselves. But do you think this at all leans to what has often been speculated? We'll do it ourselves means we'll just go and start our own super conference type situation. Yeah, there's certainly that that notion out there.

8:51I mean, the SEC has really been the one talking the most publicly about trying to just do self-governance. I think that a lot of people think that's kind of unrealistic. But they have insisted to this point, no talk of a breakaway. I think some of that's going to be played out on the field. You know, the reality is, and people don't want to necessarily hear this, that the SEC and Big Ten schools are playing in a different tier financially, competitively so far in the college football playoff. than most of the ACC and Big 12. Miami obviously showed they can break through that. And so if that continues, and the playoff might get bigger, probably will get bigger, and just continues to be dominated by these two conferences, at some point do they say, yeah, we don't really need the other conferences.

9:39We can just have our own national championship. What is your expectation for Bill Belichick this season? Oof, not good. Not good. I mean, it's been a nonstop soap opera there, obviously. His son, the defensive coordinator, is on medical leave right now. The GM, Mike Lombardi, is being investigated. They took an interesting approach to roster building, which was in this age of teams getting older and bringing in very experienced portal guys. They went young. And so they're going to trot out there on Saturday with the second least experienced roster in the country, which doesn't seem ideal. and they're also playing a tougher schedule than last year.

10:20They went 4-8 against a relatively manageable ACC schedule. They're going to have to play Miami and Notre Dame this year and a couple other pretty notable teams. I don't see it being better than 4-8, but I'm always happy to be proven wrong. There are a couple things I think about that set new precedents. The first time a guy ran a four-minute mile after forever, then everybody ran one. Now when Adrian Peterson tears his ACL and comes back basically a day later, and everyone now felt like they could get healthier and go quicker. Indiana, Signetti comes in, is really great year one, wins a national title year two.

10:58And now I think everybody's comparing whomever they're hiring to. Is this the next Signetti? Do you think this is now going to be the culture of hiring new coaches and that's the comparison? I think he's a unicorn. I mean, we may be looking at one of the all-time great coaches, and there aren't a lot of those floating out there. I do think what they showed, though, is the wisdom of hiring guys who have won consistently at stop after stop. And it doesn't matter that that was D3, D2, whatever it may be. UCLA just made a very similar hire in Bob Chesney, who actually followed Kurt Signetti at James Madison and took them to the playoff.

11:35But he, before that, had won at D3 and D2 and FCS. And for me personally, that's more impressive or more indicative of a guy's ability to lead a program at the highest level than hot defensive coordinator X or guy who became a group of five coach, had a couple good years, and is already moving up to a power conference school. Indiana's ranked sixth in the first AP poll of this year. At sixth, is that something Cignetti can look at and go, look at the disrespect? Probably. I mean, he's as I learned doing a big story on him this spring, like that's his thing. He will find any sort of snub to go out there and try to kick the team's ass.

12:19And yeah, I mean, look, sixth is a lot better than Indiana has ever been in the preseason before. But he has a right to say we were we finished the season number one and perfect. And they're saying, yeah, we we don't we can't do that again. They're behind two teams in the Big Ten in Ohio State and Oregon that they beat last year. Oregon twice so yeah I would think he'll use that as motivation we have Stuart Mandel on with us talking college football I just like to throw a team at you and you tell me their ceiling and then even a terrible floor like what's the lowest that could happen with a team like Ohio State I'm assuming the ceiling for them is gonna be national championship yes and they have won double digit games every year since 2012 but if ever they were going to go nine and three it might be this year when they're playing at Texas, at USC, at Indiana, Oregon at home.

13:13It's a tougher schedule than Ohio State usually plays. So can't see it being worse than that. And probably they will continue the streak of 10, 11, 12 win seasons. But if you're asking like worst case scenario, yeah, nine and three, which by the way, might still get them in the playoff. I do want to go to Oregon next because I think Dan Lettingen's got the reputation of, man, just hasn't won the big one. But man, his big ones are always like in the final four or Ohio State. Like they've been the really, really big ones. Oregon, are they set up to win it this year? Yeah, I think that's an unfair reputation.

13:44I think it's because, you know, the last two playoffs, they got blown out by Ohio State and then by Indiana. But they've won a lot of big games there. I think they're set up to possibly win the national championship. Finally, my concern with them isn't the talent. They definitely have it. it's losing both coordinators from last season in Tosh Lupoi, who's now at Cal, and Will Stein, who's now at Kentucky. Can Dan Lanning plug in the next guys and just keep doing what they've been doing is the big question there. The only other team I want to ask about is Notre Dame because they are stacked. They have a great roster.

14:22However, they're playing eight high school teams. So how many games can they lose in order to not make the playoff? Well, I think that depends on who they beat. And also, by the way, rule change this year in the playoff, if they finish in the top 12, they're in. And so that means they would have been in last year, even when they got snubbed. One other team, and I only want you to say something bad about them. Because I hate them so much. So tell me, I don't want the best case. I want the worst thing you could possibly say about Texas. Like, tell me something that's going to be really bad about the Longhorns.

14:55okay well there's already been some bad signs they're all american left tackle hurt his knee he'll be back at some point but he'll be out probably for that ohio state game um their linebacker who wasn't necessarily going to start but has definitely played a lot uh got kicked off the team and then there's rumblings rumblings the arch hasn't looked great in the preseason so it's not i would say you know it's hard to get real information out of preseason camps now but they're one of the only teams that i've heard kind of everybody else is like we've got the best team ever we're bigger stronger faster than ever and that's the only one where i've heard some like whisperings that hey we might have some problems and i guess the final final question is of all the colors of all these teams why is burnt orange the worst and make you also want to vomit all right i guess i don't know the background here your school is arkansas and it was the first picture they showed on this they showed arch manning throwing through arkansas yeah yeah it's stupid well i don't i don't predict many good things for arkansas this year i didn't ask hey stewart i didn't ask hey now one part of me said please comment in arkansas their worst case scenario is a lot lower than texas yeah um all right well not to really you know probably never get invited on here again i like burnt orange i think i think texas and ucla have the best uniforms in college football oh you do who do you think has the best helmet it oh uh gosh i mean it's got to be either uh notre dame or michigan and uh i don't know exactly how to break that tie i mean i gotta go with michigan too i think and i'm not a michigan fan at all but i don't think we can count like history because notre dame is only cool because newt rockney i mean notre dame is only cool because he's been around for 100 years right or am i crazy or is that i think for me it's that the way the gold just like shines so if you've ever been at a Notre Dame game, it's like you're being blinded by the sun from 300 feet up in the air.

16:50I think I'm going to go with you. I'm going to go with Michigan. You know, those are probably, I mean, if nothing else, those are probably the most recognizable helmets. Like, we could go to Japan and be like, do you know whose helmet this? Oh, yeah, it's Michigan. Who do you think, Chris? I'm going to pull another one out. I'm inclined to say Notre Dame. Also, there's nothing to it. It's gold. That's the idea. I'm thinking your favorite ice cream vanilla. By the way, I don't mind Penn State. So you just like history. Yeah. Penn State's is definitely unique. Alabama's is unique with just a little number.

17:25But yeah, I think Michigan. TJ? I'm a Penn State guy. I also love Pitt's uniforms. What is happening? Yeah, Pitt's good colors. So much bias. One final thing here. Are we going to see any sort of rules on NIL anytime soon and what we can spend, how we can spend it, like more clarity on who's spending what? Absolutely not. But there was supposed to be rules, right? The house settlement was supposed to be the big solution. Everybody gets the same amount of revenue share. Everything else has to go through a clearinghouse. And all that did was set a new floor. you know now now the starting point is 20 million you know two years ago Ohio State's 20 million dollar roster was was the big talk and now like if they had 20 million they would they would be in real rough shape um the top end rosters are closer to 50 million at this point so um short of some miracle inner congress intervention I would think you're going to have at least another year of those costs going up uh you guys follow him SL Mandel also read his articles I'm a massive fan Stuart thank you so much for being on And I hope you have a great day Yeah thanks for having me I also don't mind Florida State, USC Those are just iconic Also though I got to say My Oregon Ducks Okay I feel like iconic shouldn't count Those uniforms are amazing Because a reputation is affecting what you think is It also just looks cool Only because it's iconic Really?

18:57Yeah but it got to be iconic Like with no bias whatsoever, I'm going to pick Arkansas Razorbacks as the best uniform. No bias whatsoever? That sounds extremely biased to me. It's completely biased. I like the Qs. All orange. Sick. When the Qs is in the house. You know what? Pumpkin heads, baby. That is cool. And different. That orange is so different. Yeah. I just, I don't know how I would say this. I just named something after myself at the University of Arkansas. Yeah, you did. Wait, what do you mean? Yeah, I did. No, I'm like pumping you up. Like, yeah, you did. Oh, yeah, I did. Yeah. so my brother-in-law is the head softball coach at Tulsa right and so I bought the outfield because you can just buy anything and put your name on it now so to help him in recruiting and building facilities he just just took the job I bought left field and put my name on the left field wall right and it's called the boneyard if they hit a home run of course it is and then I donate to the local the children's hospital in Tulsa right every home run that's hit and that's cool and so my school Arkansas hits him and goes hey you're spending money with them uh what's up and so I don't like our athletic director at Arkansas I think he's garbage can, however I don't know the coach yet, he's brand new we've texted a couple times, but I'm always going to be a Razorback fan, no doubt, it's in my blood I got a tattoo, and so breaking news, the Bobby Bones x-ray room in the football stadium, that's right wow, alright so when they go in to get their bones checked see, do you see it now?

20:18it makes sense, they were like, give us some money what do you want to name? Rick Dalton, Jeff right there do it i don't know you never saw once upon a time in hollywood lenardo caprio oh the point oh yeah pointing i didn't know his name i know that i know yeah rick dalton you called a jiff interesting gif jiff me no you're right that's how you're supposed to say it i get told i'm wrong all the time there it is yeah yeah that i'm familiar with like that meme i did not know that was his name do you like that movie love that movie you know movie i watched it was so good and I hate horror movies.

20:52Obsession? No, I gave it a no rating. I don't do any horror, so I haven't even seen it. I just know it's like a cult thing. I don't do horror either and I watched it and I could respect it because it was written wonderfully, but when I reviewed it because I'll review movies, I gave it a no. It wasn't for me. But it was excellent if you're into horror movies. Have you seen The Menu? The Menu? Yeah, where they go to this restaurant on this island and this super famous chef. oh man it knocked the old socks off and only had one on and it was amazing i don't know what review it gets i hate horror movies but i watched the menu it was excellent a plus five stars rave fines oh rave fines is the chef and taylor joy john legazamo i watched the one with a lot of good peeps in this movie the demie morwen where she's uh you guys seen that one where she goes back and right has to like inject herself to be prettier whoa no that won a bunch of awards no yeah she got um nominated the substance she got nominated the substance that one was crazy that was all that's my movie i i watched like one movie a year why oh you got a lot going on he's too busy he has so many jobs he has a new baby yeah baby that's why i left rich's best dad ever up.

22:09Yeah. Because today I will be holding that title as best dad ever. You know what we have coming up next hour? Who's that? Nick Jonas. Yes. Oh, hey. Big fan. I'm a sucker for you. No, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys don't know that one, do you? I do. Yeah. Oh, you do? At the Waffle House, baby. Alright, good deal. Alright, I'm Bobby Bones. We're gonna get to these calls. I promise. That's next. We love callers. Back in a second.

22:39Rich Eisen here. We talk a lot about battles in sports. Teams battling through adversity. Athletes fighting for every yard. The toughest warriors I've ever seen, though, aren't on the field. Their kids fighting cancer. Their families standing beside them. Doctors, nurses, caregivers. That's why I'm proud to support Hyundai Hope on Wheels. For over 28 years, they've helped fund pediatric cancer research, raising more than$303 million and supporting over 40 ,000 children. Learn more and donate at HyundaiUSA.com backslash Hope on Wheels. Rich Eisen here with some advice. If high interest credit card debt is grinding you down, it might be time to call an audible with a SoFi personal loan.

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24:36Get started by posting a free job at linkedin.com slash Eisen. I'm Bobby Bones. Glad everybody's here. I do want to go over and talk to Dennis in South Carolina. We were talking about teams that people expect to be bad that might be better than what people expect. Dennis, what do you have?

24:56Oh, Dennis. Jay, you want to put Dennis on the horn here? Dennis decided his first day back in a while. There he is. Hey, Dennis, start over. All right. Hey there. What's up, Dennis? Hey, sir, what do you got? Tell me your team. It's Bobby, Dennis. Tell me your team you think will be better. I think Miami's going to be better. Please tell me why. The reason why, you know, they won seven games last year with the three Musketeers at quarterback. Okay. I think, and the over-under this year, I believe, is four and a half. And I think they got a better offensive line. I think they're going to be probably a top-eight rushing attack, providing they don't have to come from behind, you know, 30 friggin' points every game.

25:45but you know a chain when they interviewed him a couple of months ago he says he's he's sick and tired of hearing people that they're rebuilding for this year so you know i'm going to give them a shot and i'm going to tell you they'll probably be in first place after the first week and i'll tell you yeah because i think i think buffalo is going to lose at houston and I think New England is going to lose at Seattle and not to mention that the Super Bowl loser doesn't even make the playoffs the following year. I hope for the NFL's sake the Dolphins are good. I would like to see the Dolphins be good.

26:28I don't have any feeling at all about the Dolphins. I think to me the Dolphins always seem like a team regardless of when they've been pretty good to terrible. If they play anything below 60 degrees, it just doesn't make sense to them. It's like they're on a whole new planet. But I hope for your sake that they're better. I don't hate the Dolphins. They just intentionally tore it down. Tua and Tyreek and Jalen Waddle, obviously all gone. Mike McDaniels gone. Malik Willis is the quarterback. Yeah, I understand Waddle and stuff. Waddle had one 100-yard game last year on the team. He got 666 yards for the whole season, and everybody's saying, oh, my God, we lost such a fabulous player.

27:08I can't believe it. And Tyreek Hill, he was a non-issue last year anyway. So I think people better watch out, because if they've got a good running game and keep the ball away, I think they have a chance. Well, Dennis, I appreciate the call. Thank you so much. I was looking at Pro Football Focus, and where do you think they rank Miami's receivers? I don't know. Pick a number. 32. If you guess last, you are correct. And they just have roster holes everywhere. Offensive line. secondary pass rush obviously receiver they want to lose right am i crazy to think they want to lose um you know it's a it's a rebuild you know that i don't think they're expecting you know the moon this season uh it's also one of the competitive play hard one of the top five hardest schedules in the nfl yeah on top of that so i i like that hey i like i like old dennis there from south Carolina.

28:05It's going to be tough for Miami for sure. I just like pointing out the false narrative that the Super Bowl loser never makes the playoffs the following year because the last time the Patriots lost the Super Bowl in the 2017 season. TJ, what did they do in the 2018 season? Hopefully not won. Won the Super Bowl. So that's one though. That's one. But it's this specific team doing it. Yeah, I hear you. You know what I mean? It's going to be rough for you guys though this year. I will take all bets. but the bet isn't that you're going to be bad or even have a bad record i got people telling me they're going to go eight and nine like in what world are the patriots under 500 that means drake may's injured like it goes catastrophically bad the only reason i would say such a thing not eight and nine but i could see nine and eight as a floor you know this like last year they had the greatest schedule ever because they were so bad the year before the problem with going to the Super Bowl is, you now have to play the hardest schedule.

29:02And so now their schedule, we're starting with Seattle. We got Buffalo. The Bears are going to be good. Our Bears. Green Bay is good. Detroit. The Chargers. Buffalo. Minnesota. Okay. I don't know. Kansas City. I just feel like 9-10 games, you should be happy. Do you feel like you should be happy with 9-10 games winning? If we win 10 games, if the Patriots win 10 games, I will not be happy. really yeah okay 14 to 3 last year it made the super bowl a lot of things fell just right just just right perfect uh the guy also performed they also played well they also yeah they overachieved with less lesser than uh position groups across the board and all of those have improved agree and you do have a threat a wide receiver now like a real one a real one and that's exciting And a real number two.

29:57Yeah, it's exciting. Biggest villains in the NFL going into this season. Here's my list at number... Oh, we have a production. Slow down. One, two, three, four, five. Bobby Bones! Top five. Let's go. You bring production value, Bobby. Let's go. Don't rush it. Don't rush, baby. You guys got a real picture of me and my shirt off. How'd you get that? That was an actual picture of me shirtless. We talked to your wife. Wow, look how ripped I am. Yeah, look at that. Jacked, bro. At number five. I have Nick Sirianni. Oh, interesting. Now, you may ask, I just think he loves being a heel. That's straight up.

30:32It's nothing that he's even done recently. Like, Sirianni is one of those guys who is perfect at the... He is the Ric Flair of the NFL. Woo! Embraces it, loves it. He is who he is. I'm a Sirianni as a heel, and I like him because of that. Nick Sirianni at number five. Sirianni Truther. At number... You ever met Sirianni? Yeah, we had him at the Combine this year Was he? Bro's bro Yeah, he was there with Big Dom My new best friend Oh, right That's right I don't like those people, Bobby I'm going to be honest I wasn't listening much to that conversation Because I was thoroughly enthralled talking to Big Dom for a half hour And I was thoroughly aggravated watching Brockman talk to Big Dom You were Because you're a Cowboys fan?