2026-04-23 SEC Vibe Check with Cole Cubelic (raw)

Welcome to The Solid Verbal. The Solid Verbal. Come after me! I'm a man! I'm 40! I've heard so many players say, "Well, I want to be happy." You want to be happy for a day? Eat a steak. It's that whoop, whoop. And now, Dan and Ty.

Dan Rubenstein, it is time to do a little bit of a vibe check today, is it not?

Yeah, buddy. Yes, it absolutely is. We're doing SEC vibe checking with the SEC Network's Cole Cubelic. Obviously, you can also hear him on the radio with Greg McElroy, WJOX. Morning show there. And I think he does a great job. His economy of like words per second, words per minute. He doesn't say "um" like I just did. He just goes. He goes.

Oh, yeah. And so he is connected to fan bases and has callers on his radio show. So his connective tissue to the heartbeat of the conference, which of course is the heartbeat of any conference, the heartbeat of any college football conversation, it's the craziest and weirdest fans, and I say that lovingly. He's got that. He's got that connection. So very excited to speak with Cole. Just check, not an SEC preview, just checking in to see how people are feeling. In what, late April?

Absolutely. And his podcast is called The Cube Show.

Oh, yeah. He did an episode, I want to say about two weeks ago. Go back and listen to it if you haven't. Where he brought on Gene Chizik and Austin Armstrong, titled "The State of Defense in College Football." And it was a fascinating listen.

Was it good? That sounds like it is good.

It was like an hour and a half. And not to give too much of the game away, but it talked a lot about how defensive philosophy has shifted away from just trying to play sound defense that bends but doesn't break to now the advantages of basically putting together a high havoc defense, turnovers, tackle for loss, things like that. I got a lot out of it. Cole obviously has played the game at a really high level, played for Auburn. We'll talk about that here in just a minute or so. But I got a lot out of that. And it's great to have guys like Cole on this show who can speak to it knowledgeably as somebody who has played the game and, in his case, cares a lot about the trenches. Which, as you know, it all starts up front, right?

Always starts up front. Point of attack? Is that what we're talking about?

We can talk about point of attack. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So go and check out The Cube Show.

Yeah.

Specifically, that episode, if nothing more, we are pleased to have Cole back on this show. It was about a year ago that we last had him on the show. So we'll talk through SEC vibe check. Hit a follow, hit subscribe. If you are new here, if you have yet to do so, we'd love to have you with us here in the Verballerhood. Of course, if you want to support directly what Dan and I do, go to Verballers.com. V-E-R-B-A-L-L-E-R-S.com. I just got a note in the email actually that I had to renew it so that we didn't lose Verballers.com.

Yes. Very important, Ty. Keep our URLs. Keep our domains, Ty. That's you're the domain lord. That's what have we bought any fun domains lately? I know we have at one point we had smelltyshair.doctor.

I did, I did renew smelltyshair. You could say I'm the master of our domain.

Yeah, you are the master of our web domains. Nobody disputes this. Let's bring on Cole. Let's talk through SEC vibes. Let's regroup at the end and talk through what we learned.

And with that, obviously, it's our pleasure to welcome in our old friend Cole Cubelic from SEC Network. Obviously, you can hear him all over the fine state of Alabama with Greg McElroy, who may not believe in technological advancements of the mid-twentieth century. Who's to say? You know, life continues and maybe we change minds over the course of time. But, Cole, how are you doing?

I'm great. I'm staying out of that conversation. I don't want that blowback. I don't need it.

I okay. Somebody made Awful Announcing's day really easy that day.

Dude, I was at the San Diego Zoo and I started getting texts about your radio show and beliefs about space exploration. I was like, what a world we live in where I can look at pandas and get updates on Cole having conversations about technology in the 1960s.

I think it's never have I mimicked Hansel and Gretel more than on the radio that day. In my brain, I'm saying, okay, I gave him the out and I said, if you want to go down this path, I'll just continue dropping the breadcrumbs.

Exactly. Here we go. I will lead you right down it. And you just do what you got to do.

Thank you. In the beautiful state of Alabama, the space-forward state of Alabama, no less.

Anyway, we're here to talk SEC football. We're here to talk SEC vibes. This is not an SEC season preview because that would be ridiculous, as this is springtime and there are still battles all over the place. And as you eloquently mentioned before we started, nobody knows anything. And that's great. This is the fun part of the conversational portion of the calendar. Here's my first question because I don't know, this seems worthwhile in April. What are the vibes like, I guess, either inside the SEC offices or among SEC fans or maybe inside SEC programs as it relates to a national championship drought? Is it a real conversation? Is it overblown?

Yeah, it's definitely not a real conversation because this is the SEC. We live in fantasy land most of the time here. You know, the conference is always going to be bigger, stronger, batter. No one's ever going to be better. Every team should win every game. There are never real reasons as to why that person's team should lose a game or not win a national championship. So I actually don't think that that part of the conversation and maybe it could be fans just completely putting the blinders on, ignoring that intentionally, not wanting to talk about it.

I think some of it is just the dose of reality of where we are in today's collegiate athletics and that things are just so different. And we've talked about it on our show plenty of times. I've talked about it on my podcast, retraining our brains to where we are today, whether that is a nine-win season. People want to talk about Alabama's season, Georgia's season last year, some of the letdowns. It's like compare them to teams that did advance in the playoffs more than they did. The records are actually not that different opposite Indiana, whose was immaculate and unbelievable.

But there's just so many aspects of roster retainment, depth on rosters, what a great, good, positive season is for a lot of these fan bases. What realistically should be expected from an accomplishment standpoint? You talk about Alabama, they won a playoff game on the road, which, under normal circumstances, is incredible. 98% of college fans would sign up for that every single year and never ask a question. Yet, Kalen DeBoer is somehow viewed as on some sort of hot seat by some people. It's wild to imagine.

So, I do think that there's a little bit of, hey, we're just not going to talk about that or pay attention to it because we think we can do it again this year. Because we were the best, we were the baddest for so long that we still think that easily we're going to be able to obtain that again.

What is the mood in Tuscaloosa, right? That like you have the unrealistic expectations of every single fan base. But not necessarily inside, but is the mood, hey, we know the back half of the season wasn't incredible last year, but it's a new year with new players and transfers and freshmen coming in. Do you get a sense that everything is washed clean? Or do you get a sense that people are more on edge than you'd think they'd be considering playoff win?

You guys know this like I do. "Fan" is short for "fanatic," and we have tiers of fan bases, and it is the completely ridiculous. And this one is more difficult because we in our lifetimes, some people too in their lifetimes, have seen a head coach at that place do things that no one else will ever do. And so the comparative game is always going to be played. It's unfortunate. It should not be real. It should not happen because of the other things we talked about in college football. You're not going to be able to do those things anymore. They are not obtainable. Nick Saban statistics are not obtainable in today's college athletics. They're just not. Neither are maybe even Urban Meyer's at Florida or a laundry list of other Tom Osborn's at Nebraska are not going to be replicated. Bobby Bowden at Florida State is not doable again. It just isn't.

So I think just the understanding, the coming to Jesus with that is not going to happen for a lot of people, specifically Alabama fans. They're going to hold on to that expectation of national championship or bust every year. It's great that you want that, but you have to sprinkle in a small dose of reality every now and then as just to you don't have 19 out of 22 players that are just flat better than every other team you're going to play. It's not real anymore. It just isn't. So that makes it difficult to understand that.

I do think there is a portion of the fan base that gets all of that and understands we're not the biggest, baddest, strongest every week. Also, that have-you-defeated-when-we-take-the-field mindset is not very real anymore either. And whether that is the logo, the tradition, the university, or how bad they beat the two teams the two prior weeks. Those things don't exist anymore. There's too many players from too many other teams that have seen it, done it, been there on other spots, or talked about it, or played against it. They can share it with other people that it just doesn't exist to that extent anymore. But there's also a large portion of that fan base that expect to at least compete for or win national championships.

I also think, too, this isn't just Alabama, but one thing that hurts these expectations, if you will, is some of the sub-goals have been deteriorated to the point where they don't assist in this anymore. When I played college football, we wanted to win our division and then win the SEC. Everything else was happenstance after that. I would have loved to have won a national title, but I played in two SEC championship games. Those are probably the two biggest games I played in because the ultimate goal is getting that SEC championship ring. It was also a very different time as to how the Big Ten, how the SEC, then some, the Big East, the ACC, then were all viewed. Pac-10, Pac-12 was viewed at that time. It was all very different, the landscape of college football.

So, a national championship was a lot of times not even seen as a possibility or a reality until Spurrier started doing things at Florida. Then Tennessee came along and did it, and that started a whole new cycle of things that were going to potentially take place. So I think an SEC championship, don't have divisions anymore, but winning the SEC, where is that even with fans this day? I don't see I think it's awesome that Kirby still loves it and that Kirby puts an emphasis on it. And he played when I played. So we have that similar sort of emphasis on what it was.

I haven't heard a lot of Georgia fans tooting the horn to winning the SEC this offseason. I haven't seen that. I haven't seen a lot of brag tweets about how we won the SEC. I damn sure haven't seen it from the ACC because you had a team that didn't even play in it, go play for a national championship. So I don't some of the sub-goals be it ten-win season, going to a bowl game, going to a New Year's Six bowl game, which is not even real anymore because most of those are playoff games. The other goals that we have, like you take a team like Illinois. They had a historic season in terms of their program last year, yet are outside of Champaign not a lot of people will ever discuss that that way because they just are not allowed to view that as being hyper-successful. Bret and his crew, and the fans of that team that have not witnessed a lot of nine-win seasons, should absolutely view that that way. As "man, we're so proud. That's amazing. Celebrate it. You should. I want you to." But we've been desensitized to so many of these other goals or sub-goals in college football.

And honestly, what's really sad is it's not even making the playoffs anymore. Like now it's you have to advance some, or else we just don't even care. Like, I don't A&M fans aren't super excited about that season and how it went. Disappointing as far as not advancing, I get it, but you were in the playoffs. That should be celebrated for eternity because it's a very difficult thing to do. And I think that also plays into some of these expectations and maybe how out of whack they are at certain places.

I want to flip it real quick, just because I think everything you said is correct. I assume you've seen the movie The Sandlot.

There's a scene where Smalls is sick.

Overrated.

Overrated. Interesting.

Sorry, I'm not a fan of it, but I have seen it.

There is a scene where Smalls, the small kid with the glasses, gets sick of the lotioning and the oiling and the oiling and the lotioning of the lifeguard Wendy Peppercorn. You'd have to have a cold heart to not find at least the beginning of that part of the movie and the beginning of that scene funny. Who would be the antsiest fan base that you're like, "I get it? I get why you're so antsy. You're seeing the same thing over and over again without like clear improvement." And obviously, we have new coaches, and maybe that's why, obviously, that's why things were changed. But I guess of the returning coaches and returning situations, like whose antsiness, you're like, "yeah, I get that."

If it wasn't returning coaches, I would have said Arkansas.

Yeah.

But and the main reason for that would be is, and I don't think it's their fault. I think it's the observers of college football, the SEC and the Arkansas program's fault because when NIL became a real thing, we all just started handing them championships because the Waltons were going to step up, Tyson Chicken was going to step up, all these Fortune 500 companies were just going to start doling out these giant checks. Arkansas is about to steal the game. They're about to take it from everybody. And that's not fair because first and foremost, the Waltons don't owe the Arkansas Athletic Department anything. And they already probably do more than they technically should. The return on that investment is probably not what is never going to be something that a business person only would deem worthwhile. Now, if you love Arkansas athletics, then absolutely have at it, go for it, if that's your thing.

As far as the returning teams, the returners in the league, we have so many new coaches that's kind of difficult.

Missouri? Tennessee?

I was going to say Missouri, but you also, that's one that I look at and say, it had been a minute since you had been there, and the things that have happened have actually been really good. And you still haven't had that many players on that level to say, "well, we should be where Georgia is, or we should be where Texas is." Like, I think Drink has still overachieved, even with softer schedules that he has benefited from greatly, and some late-season mishaps of games that they had chances to win. I would still say that you should probably look at that as better than what it probably would have been with a lot of other people in that situation.

South Carolina?

South Carolina, you've got to remember who you are. And you and this is the thing that I hate most about college football. I think it has been maybe put in italics now more than ever, is we forget greatness faster than anyone else in any other sport at any other time. And part of that is because of the turnover. It used to be we had these guys for maybe four or five years, then we had some for three. Now we're lucky to have them for two, sometimes one. So, yeah, we turn the page is now turned for us often, a lot. So, I get it. But also, like, you were knocking on the door of the playoff two years ago, and now you're going to talk about running this guy?

It's very fair to say you have a generational player on defense, a generational player on offense. You need to make something happen with that. Totally fair. I get it. I think Kendal Briles was a great hire. I think LaNorris Sellers has a chance to take a big step. I think if their offensive line is healthy, which unfortunately two are not going to be in the spring, they have a chance to overcome a lot with solidifying that specific position. Clayton White does not get the credit he deserves as a defensive coordinator.

So I think you look at what see, this is the part of where I look at other things. I think Shane has done more with less through the portal than anybody else. Yeah, Joshua Simon from Western Kentucky at tight end. No one talked about that kid. I thought he was maybe the MVP of the team two years ago. Rocket Sanders was done. He was done. He was banged up. He couldn't stay healthy. He goes out there and has a great year. Remember, Spencer Rattler was like a mental problem. Like he was, he had the ego too big to deal with, and like he'll never succeed anywhere. He can't, he got run out of there by Caleb Williams. Well, he had a pretty good run at South Carolina.

I heard South Carolina Beth fans boo Xavier Legette in game, and then comes back and has, and I'm not saying that's not a portal guy, but a developmental guy. Look what Juice Wells did when he left South Carolina.

Yeah.

Not what he did when he was there. Not a lot. So there are things he's doing that he deserves more credit for. And we just become so trigger happy on getting these coaches out. And I still say, even though he was just fired, like Mitch Barnhart, Mark Stoops should sort of be the blueprint. Year two, year three, I can't remember which one it was. They all wanted him gone. They all wanted him out of there. And they gave him one more time, and he righted the ship, and he gave them seasons on like only Bear Bryant had ever delivered at that place.

So I think there's a couple that fit that category. I think Mississippi State is there right now because they've had some good talent and they have done some more with some guys that people probably didn't expect. But there is a massive hurdle, that six-, seven-win plateau, that hasn't been crossed many times in the last decade. That I think they're probably sitting there going, "all right, we want our turn now." Tennessee's got a little taste of it. They went to the playoffs. So, like, y'all need to chill out too, because we forget where this thing was four or five years ago. Like, on the you were the doormat almost at the end when Vanderbilt kind of took a little step. Tennessee was arguably at the bottom of the league for a couple of years. So you have to remember where you have been recently, also, in my opinion.

By the way, I'm getting a lot of like vice principal vibes from Cole. Like, the school's been acting up, and Cole has to sit everybody down in the gymnasium. Be like, "listen up, all of you. Let's just take a beat and slow down. Everything is fine." And I got to say, I'm a huge fan of Vice Principal Cubelic.

I love it. Okay. Yeah.

That's a new segment for your radio show.

Kind of on that same note, Dan, Cole, you did do a little bit of a vice principal thing with Auburn because a lot of portal departures. New coach coming in. I'd imagine a fan base that has mixed vibes on a number of different fronts. I think if I am characterizing your position accurately, with regards to Auburn, the place where you played. Yes, you don't want to see guys walk out the door. Also, a bit overblown. Also, this obsession that people have with the portal should not be taken with more than a grain of salt, given that there is a new regime coming in. Were you surprised by the hire? How do you feel about what you have seen thus far from Auburn this spring?

I love what I've seen from Marlborough this spring. I am an Alex Golesh fan, have been since I got to know him when he was the OC at Tennessee. We had a handful of their games. And immediately I thought to myself, this dude gets it. He understands it. He's going to be, he's going to go places. The reason it was a little bit of a surprise is because I don't think that he was on top or near the top of the leaderboard for the majority of that search. And I do think some things sort of fell apart late. And there was a portion of him falling into Auburn's lap, but that doesn't mean it's not a good hire. Things can happen, but things can happen circumstantially that still end up being a positive and are good for all of those involved. And I think this is one of them, which, by the way, I got algorithmed into the USF fans yesterday with this whole like "we're the same as Auburn as far as winning the national title." Let's go back to what we said a few minutes ago. Like, some people would need to just have a little bit of recall of who you are and where you are and what you are, because that's just not real. And I'm not sure how people can convince themselves that it is.

I love the hire. I think he is a football guy, football guy first. There's a handful of guys in college football right now. This is a little bit of a sidebar, a detour here, that people see what the offense is and they think that they immediately go with the crowd that has been or was at one point in time soft. That is also classified with that offense. Jeff Lebby is one of these guys. Josh Heupel is one of these guys. Alex Golesh is one of these guys. Everyone sees the receivers four inches from each sideline. And they see the vertical shots and they just think, "oh, well, he just wants to throw it around the yard." Like, no, Jeff Lebby emphasizes the trenches every single day. And his kids practice hard and he wants to win at the line. He's a line of scrimmage guy. He's a lineman by trade. So it's in his blood. It's in his DNA. Alex Golesh is the same way.

You're going to see the offense. You're going to think, "oh, you know, this is like Gus Malzahn 2.0 or whatever. Like, this is just another Hugh Freeze tricky offense trying to, you know, smoke him." It's not what he is at all. Just because it is designed in a little bit of a different way doesn't mean it's that.

As far as the portal guys go, I just had it was a moment that I was caught on microphone that maybe, I don't know, maybe I don't really care, should or should not have been in my personal life, in my public life. In my viewings of Auburn football from a fan and coverage perspective, I just grew sick of people thinking that Auburn could not take a single solitary step forward. And I'll be honest with you guys, some of it was from the administration as well. That there could literally be not a single step forward without Cam Coleman and Deuce Knight. And it infuriated me. And I don't know another way to say it because I am an offensive lineman by trade. I believe in you have to work together and you have to build from within. And there's never a single guy that goes out and wins you games.

Like we won the West with Rudi Johnson, Heath Evans, Ben Leard, Ronnie Brown, Alex Lincoln, Rob Pate. Like Rudi was awesome in the NFL. God rest his soul. And we don't do that without him, but I don't think he does that without us. Like, I don't think you plug him in any other SEC team and they automatically go win the division. Like, Alabama didn't win the division with Rudi that year, they didn't. So I just believe that you have to build a team.

And it was part of the mindset that had crept into a lot of Auburn fans of, "oh, we have to have this guy. Oh, we have to have that guy." No, you don't. You need a team. Like you need a foundation, and the foundation of what you're going to be on offense and defense has to be built to where it can be sustainable. Not, let's lob it to this guy and still lose at Vanderbilt, but he makes one-handed catches and wears pink ski masks. Congratulations. Like, I want to win games. I don't want receptions. I don't want yards. I don't want highlights. I want the school that I love the most to compete for titles, and that is not having a fast quarterback and a receiver that can Moss people every now and then. There is a foundation that must be built and set in order for that to happen, specifically for that to consistently be attempted to happen at all, which is so hard in today's college football.

So that's kind of what it was for me is just like get off of this train of "no one can win without these two." And it's nothing against them. Cam Coleman's probably gonna have a big year. I actually think Ryan Wingo is gonna have a bigger year because of Cam Coleman. But he's a really good football player. Deuce Knight has an abundance of talent. And McElroy shut me down when I asked the question on air: "What games did Auburn win because of these two guys?" And he immediately bursts out "Mercer." And you know what? He was right. Deuce Knight went crazy against Mercer. Congratulations. That's not the win that I'm looking for on a consistent basis. I'd rather get a couple more against LSU, Bama, and Georgia and Tennessee. And the other SEC schools and the non-conference schools that you're going to play that hopefully can get you to the playoffs.

So it wasn't really having it didn't have a lot to do with those two individuals. I think they can both be great. It's just that you could have put any two names in there that were on an Auburn uniform, in an Auburn uniform last year, and I would have said the exact same thing. I don't care where they go. Let's do what we can do to help the next guy build the things that need to be in place to go compete for championships, something Auburn hasn't done in a very long time. You can make the argument that Auburn is in the midst of the worst five-year stretch in the history of its football program. It's wild, but when you put the numbers out there, it's real. So, there's not a guy or two guys that are going to call them out of that. There's just not.

And I also want guys that act right, that play right, that do all the things. That's why I throw their names out there, like Courtney Taylor or Germie Bernard at Alabama, Parker Brailsford at Alabama. Like, those are the guys. Like, give me a Hines Ward or an Anquan Boldin. I'll build my damn program on those kinds of guys. But they're out there trying to block people. They're trying to help their team win. Like when I hear a coach say, "I didn't need to make my guy a captain because he already does all those things," that's the guy that maybe I'll make the foundation of my program.

Cole, I want to ask you about Texas. You mentioned Cam Coleman, Ryan Wingo. You've been consistently pretty high on Texas. Throughout the coverage, at least that I have heard recently, I know you like this team a lot. If we are sort of framing this around vibes, I'm curious what your antenna is picking up with respect to Texas and the Texas fan base, because we heard a lot of the same stuff last year. Like, "oh, this could be the year." And so far, what I've been picking up in some of my studying this offseason is "no, no, no, this is the year now." So, where's the fan base at? I like Texas too, but I'm just curious to get your perspective since I know you're high on this team. What is it that you're detecting from people that you talk to around this version of Texas versus last year's version of Texas?

This is I think it's only going to get worse, unfortunately, for Sark and his staff. The hype is it's definitely not unwarranted at all because there are proven sports cars on that football team right now.

Oh my God, yeah.

Absolutely. You look at Colin Simmons and what he's done. You mentioned Wingo. Obviously, you bring in Cam Coleman. I think Arch Manning is absolutely one of those. I don't think Arch Manning gets enough credit for the development across the course of the year that we saw with him. I mean, he was throwing wormburgers early in the year. Like, everything was rushed. Everything was overdone, overproduced, overthrown. And I don't mean over the receiver. Just like it was like, ah, it was too much early. And I talk often about quarterbacks finding their calm. And until a quarterback truly finds his calm, I don't think he can be great. And he started to find that later in the year. And that's why he was a lot better.

And we know Sark's tutelage with quarterbacks is always going to be great. It just is. His offense is going to find mismatches. The two tackles, Goosby and those guys, are going to have to be more consistent than they were a year ago. The inability to run the football was not great. The one scary part about their team is, I forget who the non-con team they played, it was like Illinois State or Utah Tech, somebody they played earlier in the year. It was the best individual tackling performance I saw all season. I could not believe watching the film. And Roman Harper, I told him this when we did our show on Monday night, he was like, "get out of here, you're dumb." I'm like, go watch it and just watch their defense and tell me there were more one-on-one tackles made in that game against a team in which one-on-one tackles should not have been made, than I have ever seen.

And Roman went back and watched it, and he called me on like Wednesday and he goes, "Dude, you were right." He goes, "This is embarrassing." Like throws in the flat with five yards of space, one-on-one tackle. You know, stretch zone with plenty of room to operate, defensive end comes off one-on-one tackle. And you're like, "Texas guys are supposed to break those tackles and take it for 80 or at least eight." And it wasn't happening.

So I do think that some of the changes that Sark made that people look at the roster and say, "what in the world?" I think he wanted to try and get a little bit more big time with his playmakers. Not that the guys he had, like, I think Quintrevion Wisner was really good. I think he's going to help Florida State. But there's a couple of guys that left that you say, "why would you well, he was working. Like, what's happening?" You know, you got another starting running back at one point in time that's going to be at Kentucky next year. But they may have gotten a little more juice of a couple of positions, which I think can help the way his offense operates.

They just have to get more rugged at the end of the day. Because I think the last two times we've seen Georgia line up against Texas, I think Georgia said, "we're about to find out how rugged you are." And there are probably terms that I would use in a different manner for that. And Georgia has proven that they weren't where they needed to be from that perspective. Because I don't think Georgia just went out there and like truly out-game-planned them in a lot of ways. It's like, "we're going to use blunt force trauma. We're going to see if you can manage it." And they didn't manage it very well. So that part has to continue to get different. I do think it's improved.

And here's my biggest question with Texas right now. Who are your hard hat guys? Who are your utility workers? Like, who are your glue guys in the facility? Like, because I've been in there and heard Sark talk about Jake Majors, Gunnar Helm, Jolly Baron, Michael Taaffe, these sort of program guys, if you will, that have helped Anthony Hill Jr. last year. Who will do anything you ask him to do? They could have said, "Hey, man, you need to do cartwheels on this play if we're going to get a stop." And he'd be doing 20 cartwheels to the sideline. Like that guy would do whatever you ask him to do.

I don't, I'm not saying they don't have them. I'm telling you, I don't know who those guys are for Texas right now. And if they find those guys and they find a pretty good number of them that can hold it together, help. And I do think Arch Manning is one of those guys, by the way, and probably doesn't get credit for that. I think Arch raises the level of the people around him, and people will probably never credit him for that. I think those kids love playing with him and for him, and they will never get credit for that because his name is Manning, and people just expect him to do these inhuman things. But what you're not going to notice is those other dudes play their tails off because they like him and they want to help him be better too.

So they just need more than him. Like it can't just be him. So, if they find those guys and they get a little bit more of an edge, and I think that's one of the main reasons that Will was brought in, is to bring a little bit more of an edge, they can absolutely compete for a national title. But those would be my two biggest concerns for Texas now, which let's parenthesize this. A lot of teams would like to have that as their only concerns right now. So don't get mad about that. It's just that that's the reality.

Final question, this is the biggest story of the SEC offseason. I can't believe we've gone this far without asking. But if you are locked in and focused on who are those dudes, who are those glued dudes, who are the guys that are going to be leading your culture, LSU has a bunch of new dudes on the coaching staff and on the roster. And Lane has tried to manage expectations, even despite how aggressive they were in building this roster. Yes. Can a team in year one with this much new are you a believer in the connective tissue? Look, we're coming off of an Indiana national championship. So, what I'm saying is not a crazy question. My question is, do you believe in the Baton Rouge glue in this moment?

I don't know. And I told you guys before we started this interview. Just remember, no one knows anything about anybody. Nothing. No one knows anything about you. Nothing. You know about Lane Kiffin? Definitively, we know nothing right now.

I like that.

Here's what I do like about that situation. Lane can make it easy. And I'll ask you guys this question. I asked it on my show the other day. We were talking about this because I said the same thing with Josh Heupel. Who was the last quarterback that failed under Lane Kiffin?

Well, Austin Simmons to start last year, but that was injury stuff.

Injuries, yeah. You'd have to go back to early FAU. I even forget the kid's name, but there was a year at FAU, his first year. The quarterback numbers were not good. Since then, and then you throw in the coordinator years, it's been pretty good almost every other year. He's going to make it work. Now, when you go from eight wins to 11 or 12 wins, is when the other stuff works.

Here's what I love: Blake Baker, Whit Weeks, Trey'Dez Green. You do have some glue guys back that one can be matchup problems, and two can potentially take over games. And three are going to make the guys around them better. Like the attempting to trade as green gets is going to allow Harlem Berry to get more yards on the ground. Now, am I a believer in the offensive line? Not really. But I love Jordan Seaton, and I think he's one of the most talented offensive linemen in America. Maybe most talented at any level of football. That doesn't make him one of the best tackles in football. When you watch that young man move with his size and the agility that he has, it is impossible not to be wowed.

So there are guys there that one have made plays there, have made plays other places coming in, and you have a coaching staff that was either there or I hate to say easy, I probably shouldn't say that that knows how to simplify things and put people in position to have a high rate of success. That's probably how I should describe it with Lane Kiffin. And he's done it everywhere he's been. And Sam Leavitt is super talented.

Now, what I'll be worried about is your quarterback ain't healthy right now. And the injury that he has had, worked on more than once, at times has been reoccurring. That would be one of my bigger question marks of this year: is not Sam Leavitt healthy now, can he stay healthy? Because that's an injury that we've seen pop up again for other guys.

So it can absolutely work, and they should expect it to work because the money that you're putting up and the reputation that's on the guy that you're bringing in, there's proof that those things, when you put them together, have been able to find success. Now, here's the part of it that I've Lane is almost perfect for today's college football. Because we always viewed this as this laissez-faire, nonchalant, who-gives-a-rip attitude, when in reality, what I think it's kind of become is we give you this therefore, we expect that. You can do it, and we will help you be really good at it, or you can leave, and we don't care.

And his attitude is offsetting to some people because it looks like he doesn't care about things or he doesn't want things or he doesn't know things. But there's a little bit of that I don't give a rip that I think kind of wakes some guys up as to, "oh, they'll just put the next guy in." And by the way, the next guys have been pretty good too. Like when Austin Simmons came in against Georgia, he was pretty good. You know, nobody was talking about Dae'Quan Wright at tight end last year. And it's like all of a sudden, Dae'Quan Wright's one of their better football players. Like, they find some other guys that have also been pretty good. So, I think there's this you can do this for us. And oh, by the way, you're making this doing it. And look what all these other guys have done catching, blocking, running the football, throwing the football. Our way works. So get on board. We'll help you make it work. Or we're going to put the next guy in.

Let's leave it there. Cole Cubelic, check out all of his fine work. We appreciate your time today. I know you got to run. Let's do this again sometime soon. Okay? Cookies in the mail, yes or no?

Not yet.

I'll get you some cookies. You send me your address offline. I'll look up how to make sure they don't end up there a crumbly mess. This is not to be messed with. I showed my wife the photograph and she said, "That's a follow-up. Make sure you get those."

I will secure the cookie. Your time is worth butter and brown sugar and not chocolate chips. Cut up chocolate bars.

I would have been happy with the chips, but you know, I'll take the bars. The bars give you, they give you the river of chocolate in the middle. Come on.

Okay, we'll do that. Nothing but the best.

Yeah, that's acceptable. We'll allow that.

Awesome, cool. Thank you so much, all right. Take care.

Thanks, guys.

All right, again, Cole Cubelic, check him out on the radio. Check out The Cube Show, his podcast, Dan. What did you learn from that? What did we get out of that as two guys who are pretty far removed from SEC country?

Yeah, I appreciated it. I had that sort of follow-up question about LSU with what he was talking about with glue guys at Texas and how when there is so much movement in the sport, not knowing who those people are in the way that you would have 10 years ago, 12 years ago, like, okay, this outside linebacker was a rotation guy for a couple of years, is now coming into his own. And you hear a lot about that with like NBA veterans, like Al Horford, right? He shows the young guys what it's like to be a pro, how to prepare and everything like that, and what it's like playing for whatever team. And that we're losing those guys or the continuity of those guys more and more makes it so much more difficult. Forget that they, you know, that everybody's transferring all the time, but you want that base layer of "this is what it's like to play at Michigan State. This is what it's like to play at Texas" in his example. "This is what it's like to play at Kentucky," whatever it is.

So I thought of that. I thought that sort of point that he was in that road that he was going down was super interesting. Because a lot of the times that's the deciding factor in winning close games, right? That there's a confidence on the sidelines. It's like we have done this collectively before and we can do it again. Whereas now you're just like, sure, Texas has I think it was Rasheem Biles, the Pitt linebacker, I think by all accounts, has been very, very strong in spring camp for the Longhorns. But hasn't been there with these guys. And we both root for schools that are going to be depending on portal guys this year. And you hope for the best. And so hoping for the best for all the schools that he mentioned, but that is an interesting way of looking at questions with teams, or just like, who are the guys that are going to set the pace in off-season workouts and fall camp? And, you know, keep everybody on the same page when things don't look great going into week seven, that kind of thing.

Yeah, I mean, one thing that did not come up that I think will come up, especially around the whole conversation of vibes, which are very subjective. The SEC now has a nine-game conference schedule. And we joke on this show often about the gauntlet of the SEC schedule, which I don't think is necessarily a joke. I mean, we make a joke of it, but it is a gauntlet.

Well, you just, when you hear the word so many times, you can't help but to enjoy it.

I would put a pin in the whole nine-game conference slate conversation as well, because first year of this every team playing nine conference games instead of eight. Arkansas has a brutal schedule. Oklahoma, on top of their nine-game conference slate, they open well, I shouldn't say they open, but they're on the road early on, yeah. Early on in week two at Michigan.

We've got like I think a conversation that is going to really take hold probably later this year once we start talking playoffs, not just about the nine-game slate, but then, "oh, and they also played so-and-so." Look like in Arkansas's case, look how hard it was for them to try and go through that. The conversation about SEC and gauntlets, that stuff is not going to go away anytime soon. It didn't come up now, being so it is mid to late April. But I would expect if we're going to have a realistic vibes conversation, even as soon as July when we start doing previews, it's going to be hard to ignore the fact that the schedules have changed.

Yeah, and look, we have other conferences, other major conferences that play nine conference games. We have each of these conferences being deeper than they ever were before, right? With the Big 12 adding what they have. Both in the West Coast schools and the expansion from a few years ago now, the ACC, not just adding a quality SMU team, which has been right there or been in the ACC Championship early on. But even if Cal and Stanford aren't great, you're still adding that new wrinkle of traveling cross country if you're one of those teams on the Eastern Seaboard.

And adding that ninth game does more to prevent, you know, a team like Mizzou or Texas A&M last season where it works out, where you're just getting the bottom of the conference by and large until the final week or whatever. So it's a gauntlet, but it, in all seriousness, it's a gauntlet in the right ear, but it also does a good amount to prevent terribly uneven schedules as the conferences are now so huge. So hopefully, it does enough in terms of giving us more data that we have a list of standings that feels more accurate.

Yeah, I mean, I also think, again, just relative to vibes, the conversation will be a lot about quarterback. This time of year. And there is a conference-wide quarterback shuffle that I'm not going to go into with any great detail now. This is not a preview. That's going to be a talking point. Clearly, the portal spend is already a talking point, if only at LSU.

What interests me actually is that we've got a lot of turnover at defensive coordinator. By my count, about nine of 16 teams that have some kind of meaningful defensive shift. You've got big changes at places like Tennessee, right? Tennessee hired Jim Knowles. Texas brought back Will Muschamp. Ole Miss hired Marcus Woodson. Arkansas with Ron Roberts. Kentucky with Jay Bateman, which is a pretty big move. Florida with Brad White from Kentucky, Mississippi State bringing back Zach Arnett.

Yeah.

That's in addition to some other internal promotions. The defensive coordinator turnover is the kind of thing that I think is going to shape September in a way that I'm not sure how many antennas are talking about that, at least in the types of things that I've been reading about the SEC. A lot has talked about quarterback and returning production and schedules and portals. But truly, the turnover on that side of the ball, on the coaching side, is going to be really interesting to follow as we get a little bit closer.

Yeah, it's interesting. There are enough known entities at quarterback in the conference on a high level, right? When you look at Trinidad Chambliss and LaNorris Sellers, Gunner Stockton, Arch Manning, or the best of Arch Manning.

Right.

That you're like, okay, I have a good concept of what their offense could be if everything kind of works out and they're able to weather whatever injuries they have to weather.

The point about the defensive coordinators, paired with just portaling in general, paired with however many new coaches we have now, in Jon Sumrall and Ryan Silverfield, and Alex Golesh, and Lane Kiffin to LSU. And Will Stein at Kentucky. I just think there are going to be teams, whether it's new coaches or new coordinators or new quarterbacks, whatever. I think this could be a particularly pronounced year in which teams look like something on September 23rd and look completely different on November 9th.

1,000%. That's exactly what I was speaking to. Yes, that there is something to be said about, like, okay, I know this is what they look like now after the non-conference portion of their schedule. I know what this team. You know, and I haven't even mentioned the new starting quarterbacks that are going to be in this conference. That you can't trust your September eyes this year in the way that maybe especially with fewer conference games, you could in previous seasons.

And I know obviously, we like to hammer the point where like between weeks one and weeks two, that's where so much change happens. I think we have to look at September as sort of a training wheel month for so much of this conference right now that you just you can't the conclusions that you jump to can't be too severe.

Yeah. Easy to say, this is college football. All of us are prone to making extremely severe conclusion jumping because the data points are pretty limited still. But yeah, I expect like a lot of October problem solving or lack thereof, but a lot of dramatic shifts in this conference in October.

I mean, you've got Gunner Stockton at Georgia, Arch Manning at Texas, Marcel Reed at Texas A&M, John Mateer at Oklahoma, LaNorris Sellers at South Carolina. Kamario Taylor at Mississippi State. I think that situation is pretty settled. New full-time starter.

New full-time starter. Yeah.

And Tennessee will have a new quarterback. Trinidad Chambliss.

Those are the ones that I've got jotted down as I think being fairly settled as to who we know is going to be out there. And at least we've seen them with their teams. But there is like a pretty big pack of others around college football and certainly within the SEC, like nine other SEC teams, that I'm not going to say it's unsettled as to who the starter is going to be, but these are situations where we haven't necessarily seen this guy at this place. And that makes it interesting, if nothing more.

Yeah. And, you know, we have a concept for like what the best of Sam Leavitt is, but as Cole mentioned, like, there's a ton up in the air with the foot injury. Foot injury, new supporting cast, new place, like the you just can't take it to the bank that these are all going to work.

Yes.

This is, to me, a very long-winded way of saying we're going to see some snakes in the SEC toilet this season. There's going to be a week where we're like, "oh, Kentucky figured it out." Oh, we haven't even mentioned a 10-win Vanderbilt team from last year, who's obviously starting over at a number of key places, but like won games for in a number of different ways.

And I just, there's going to be like a, I got, I always, was it 2011, the week that Oregon lost to USC. I want to say Oklahoma State lost to Iowa State. There was like that one weird week. There's going to be a there's almost assuredly going to be a week where we're like, what is happening in the SEC? That Kentucky just beat blank and Mississippi State just beat blank and Florida just beat blank and it completely threw off, you know, the track we thought we were on.

Yeah. Can't wait.

Yeah. I mean, the combination of schedules with quarterback turnover, with defensive coordinator turnover, I think it makes for an absolutely fascinating conference. That is never not the case with the SEC. But in particular, I think this year is going to be really interesting to chart as we move forward.

I did jot down, I know this isn't a preview.

Please.

But if you just want a Ty vibe check on the SEC, I have not put together all of the preview content yet. That won't happen for at least another month, month and a half or so. But right now the way that I have labeled my teams in the SEC. My viable playoff teams right now is a pretty big list because I haven't paired it down yet. So this is a preview to the preview.

Preview to the preview. Vibe check.

My playoff viable teams in the SEC, and this is part of why I think it's so interesting.

Yeah.

Georgia, Ole Miss, Texas A&M, LSU, Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma. What is that? Seven teams?

Seven teams out of eight. Seven's like half the conference that I think is playoff viable.

Okay. And then beyond that, if I go down a rung, I've got Tennessee, Missouri, and South Carolina in some tier. Whatever that is.

Wow, you have a big Vanderbilt falloff in terms of viability. Okay.

Yeah. And then underneath that, like, I guess my tier three, I'm not even labeling these yet.

Right. Okay.

I don't even know what under playoff viable consists of at this point, but just the way that I kind of have been power rating them in the early going here, underneath that class, I've got Auburn, Vandy, and Florida. Florida is probably too low. But right now, just where I'm at.

Okay, vibes.

Teams that I think will or could make a bowl: Mississippi State and Kentucky. And then at the bottom, I've got Arkansas. I have no idea what to make Arkansas right now. That's just how I would stack them up. This is going to change like seven times before we do previews. But I'm having a real hard time sort of distinguishing at the very top because I can make a case for all of those teams, which I think is what makes the conference so interesting.

The important thing that we will leave you with is that we must recognize that the SEC has fully shifted its momentum to men's college tennis.

And baseball.

And baseball. Well, baseball's been there for a while. I know college tennis has been there. You know, there's been a lot of strong SEC teams, I think, highlighted by Georgia. What was the tennis thing that you told me? Seven of the top 13 teams in the nation, five of the top 10, and 12 of the top 30 come from the SEC. That's not nothing. If we just went on the air. And by the way, the tennis national championships, the NCAA tournament, the end of it at least, is at the Georgia tennis facility.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. It's a cool thing. If we came on the air, if we hit record.

Yeah.

And without any kind of introduction, just talk tennis.

Like college tennis?

SEC specific tennis? Just did a full hour on SEC tennis with no warning.

Yeah. What kind of feedback will we get to that? We're not softening the ground. Like we're not we're not warning anybody.

Right. It's a full-on bait and switch.

Yeah. So we would have the ability to prepare to talk about SEC tennis. But nobody else would.

I think there would be confusion, and then we would have three new fans for life.

Diehards. Our downloads, or I should say the people who downloaded and completed the episode would consist of 16 SEC tennis coaches, and that would be it.

That's exactly right. And you.

And you.

Right. I yeah, that would be difficult, but a lot of respect to the dominance in the SEC on the on the tennis courts, and I expect more dominance come late May.

Why don't we leave it there, folks? Thank you again to our guest of honor, Cole Cubelic. Always a pleasure to have him on. We will definitely need to do it again at some point before the season gets rolling. It'd be great to get his feedback. Thus far, we have now done two vibe check episodes. We did John Kurtz. Go back and listen to the episode we did where we talked about the Big Twelve. That was just John and I.

John and me, what is the proper what am I supposed to say there? Do the sentence one more time.

The SEC or the Big 12 vibe check that we did was John Kurtz and I or John Kurtz and me.

Me. Yeah. It was just John Kurtz and me. So you the the object of that sentence is the the vibe check episode featured John Kurtz and me. Okay.

It was John and me on that one, and this one obviously was the three.

Nope. It was John and I on that one.

I screwed up already?

Yeah.

All right.

It was the two of us.

Yeah.

You were the object, so it's me. The subject was the episode.

You're a pain in the ass.

All right. I know. I'm sorry. It was the two of us on that episode. It was the three of us on this one. We've got two big power conferences yet to go. We will work those in. We'll weave them into the offseason content however we can here over the next days and weeks that are ahead before we get into previews season, which for those newcomers, starts up around July. Please hit follow, please hit subscribe so that you do not miss any of our episodes. Verballers.com is where you can go if you want to support the team. For that, go over there, Dan, for our guest of honor, Cole. My name is Ty. We'll catch you all next week. Enjoy your weekend. In the meantime, you know the drill. Stay solid. Peace.