ITG 138 - Where is the Love?
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00:00 [MUSIC]
00:05 In the gun episode 138 of your new favorite WVU football podcast and
00:10 we have got some feelings, some emotions about the AP final top 25 poll
00:15 that came out on Tuesday for the college football season that neglected,
00:21 that left out the world champion West Virginia Mountaineers.
00:24 We'll get into that.
00:25 And obviously we have to give some thoughts on the college football playoff,
00:28 the national championship game that played out on Monday night with Michigan.
00:32 The Wolverines taking down the Huskies in Houston.
00:35 We'll get into all of that and more on this edition of ITG.
00:38 I'm Wesley Uler.
00:38 As you already know, I've got the best teammates in the business.
00:41 It's just me and Jed, the signal caller on this one.
00:45 Owen a little tied up, Skyler a little tied up.
00:47 So just Jed and I for, I guess an abbreviated version of ITG.
00:52 This will be a little shorter than our typical episode,
00:54 just a topic or two to touch on here as we come to midweek.
00:58 And as always, the one thing that remains the same, this episode of ITG brought to
01:02 you in part by our friends at BetOnline where the game starts.
01:06 Jed, the game ended last night.
01:08 Like I said, we are gonna give some final thoughts as the college football season is
01:11 now officially in the books,
01:13 capped with Michigan winning the national championship over Washington.
01:16 We'll get to that on the other side of the break though, because with that,
01:18 obviously, with the college football season ending, comes, is released,
01:24 anticipated the AP top 25 poll for the end of the season.
01:30 The final poll of the 2023 into 2024 college football season.
01:36 And hey, at the top, it's kind of what you would expect.
01:39 Michigan won, Washington two, Texas three, Georgia four, Alabama five,
01:44 Oregon and Florida State actually tying for the sixth spot.
01:49 Missouri, Ole Miss, Ohio State, that rounds out your top ten.
01:52 You got newcomer Arizona right there, right and on down the list.
01:56 Oklahoma finished 15th, Oklahoma State finished 16th,
02:01 Kansas State at 18, and that, and Kansas at 23 as well too.
02:08 The full poll obviously is out on social media out wherever you can see me.
02:11 You can just go to Google and put an AP top 25 poll.
02:14 I don't think I need to roll through every single spot here and
02:16 bore you to death.
02:17 But the news that relates to us, Jed, that is pertinent to ITG here,
02:22 is that despite a nine and four season,
02:24 the West Virginia Mountaineers not in the AP top 25 poll.
02:28 They would have actually finished 27th because you can see,
02:31 the next few teams, others receiving votes.
02:34 The Mountaineers would have finished 27th.
02:37 And I think rightfully so, there was some anger, some frustration about this,
02:41 that WVU did not finish the season ranked in the top 25.
02:45 I've got a pretty damning stat on that as well too, but
02:48 I've rambled here for a couple minutes to get us started.
02:50 So how you doing, Signal Caller?
02:52 And just give me your initial reaction to whenever you found out the Mountaineers
02:57 were not ranked in the final top 25 AP poll of the season earlier today.
03:01 >> I was hopeful, but I wasn't optimistic.
03:04 As we discussed before, in looking at the top 25,
03:09 as it stood before our bowl game, there were eight teams
03:13 outside the top 25 receiving votes.
03:16 We were not one of those eight teams.
03:19 So we recognized that it would take a lot of breaks and a very heavy lift
03:24 to jump all the way from not getting votes into the actual top 25.
03:30 And what that means, Wes, is that doesn't necessarily mean, okay,
03:32 there's the top 25 plus the eight getting votes, there's 33 teams.
03:36 That doesn't mean you're 34th.
03:39 That just means you're no higher than 34.
03:40 You don't know where you might be because you're not getting votes.
03:43 So we knew it would be a stiff challenge, but you hoped things would break our way.
03:49 There'd be some goodwill with what we put together down the stretch,
03:53 a good bowl performance, really a decisive win.
03:57 A three touchdown win, which we didn't play our best football.
04:01 You can say what you want about who North Carolina had playing and not playing.
04:04 It was on the road, in their state, and we didn't play our best football and
04:08 won going away.
04:09 So I think that's why at the end of the day,
04:13 we did receive the votes that we received.
04:15 Now, it would take a lot to leapfrog eight teams getting votes and
04:22 all the other teams that were gonna fall out.
04:24 We did not do that.
04:26 Technically, we landed, as you referenced, 27th.
04:31 Oregon State was ahead of us at 26th, if you wanna count it as those getting votes.
04:36 And I kinda looked at it.
04:37 This is what I sent to you guys in the group thread.
04:41 I was fascinated, Chuck and Ciara, from a vote count standpoint.
04:46 Where did we land in terms of how many voters put us at 19,
04:51 how many voters put us at 20, and on down the line?
04:55 Here's the way it broke.
04:56 The highest vote we received was 19th, and
04:59 that was a voter in the state of Alabama.
05:01 So I would, again, without knowing otherwise, trying to connect the dots,
05:07 probably somebody familiar with Neil Brown's work at Troy,
05:10 recognizes it pays maybe a little more attention than others might, and says,
05:14 yes, they're worthy of a top 20 vote.
05:16 So that voter put us at 19.
05:18 Two voters had us at 20, including Chuck Landon.
05:22 So 21, five voters had us 21, three voters had us 22,
05:29 six had us at 23, six had us at 24, and four had us at 25.
05:35 The big number, 38 had us unranked.
05:39 Now, those that I find most disappointing, out of the 38,
05:45 this is wildly unofficial, this is just me counting on the fly.
05:47 I'm sure I'm off on some of these numbers, so I'm ballparking.
05:50 But I have been commiserating with John Antonik throughout the course of the day
05:56 since the news broke about the poll.
05:58 And we're looking at, all right, who are the guilty culprits?
06:01 Who on the Big 12 beat could have easily put us higher or put us in the top 25?
06:07 The UCF beat writer didn't have us ranked.
06:09 The Cincinnati beat writer didn't have us ranked.
06:12 Now, the one that disappoints me, I've known Don Williams,
06:16 the Texas Tech beat writer for a long time, and I have a lot of respect for Don Williams.
06:20 Don Williams does his due diligence.
06:22 He does his homework.
06:23 I mean, there's many times Don's reached out to me.
06:26 Hey, I'm doing research.
06:27 I want to put my whole conference team together.
06:28 I want to make sure I'm getting this right.
06:30 So it's not like he's just mailing it in.
06:33 So I'm sure Don had some reasons for not putting us in the top 25,
06:37 but it wasn't for lack of knowledge.
06:39 But so here we go.
06:40 I mean, you can make the argument that even though we did land right there at 25
06:46 in the coaches poll, so we landed right there at the cutoff in the final coaches poll,
06:52 we landed at number 25.
06:53 But here in the Associated Press poll, we did not land in the final top 25.
06:58 We landed at 27.
07:00 And maybe that gives you an axe to grind in the offseason more so than anything.
07:05 Maybe that's our new 14, right, Jed?
07:07 That's our new 14th is 27th.
07:10 Enjoy it where you can, and Mike Joseph will, I'm sure,
07:12 make the most of it in offseason conditioning.
07:14 Because by the time we step on the field again, we're going to be ranked.
07:20 I think so.
07:23 But I'm not as--
07:24 Jed, I'm not as--
07:26 If you would have asked me last week, is WVU going to be ranked to start 2024,
07:31 I would have said, hell yeah.
07:32 You're asking me now.
07:33 I don't know.
07:33 Because it's pretty clear a lot of these guys don't watch the games.
07:37 They just don't.
07:38 They look at the preseason rank--
07:40 right.
07:41 And to be fair, think of your buddy who covers Texas Tech, right?
07:45 He spends his entire Saturday covering Texas Tech, being at the game,
07:48 then he's got to write about it.
07:50 He might watch one or two other games that entire Saturday.
07:54 Those guys aren't watching all these single games.
07:57 And--
07:57 It's impossible to do that.
07:58 But the same guy that I'm talking about that didn't have us ranked
08:02 understands what we have coming back.
08:05 And he'll be looking at it that way.
08:06 Sure, he might.
08:07 But the equivalent from the ACC might not.
08:11 The equivalent-- the guy who covers Rutgers might not.
08:13 The guy who covers Clemson might-- so again, I think you're right.
08:16 I'll say this, Wes.
08:17 I think we're preseason top 25.
08:19 I do.
08:19 I'm just less convinced of that than I was a couple hours ago.
08:23 More so than anything, do you know why I think we are?
08:25 We return our quarterback.
08:28 And those who do mail it in, the one thing they tend to check--
08:31 That's true.
08:31 That's a good point.
08:32 Quarterback.
08:33 --is your quarterback returning.
08:34 I mean, that is enough to put you over the hump.
08:37 If you're a fringe top 25 team, you will get more votes
08:41 with your quarterback returning than you otherwise would have.
08:44 And it's not even close.
08:46 Couple that with the fact--
08:47 Yeah, go ahead.
08:48 --we open with who?
08:50 Penn State.
08:51 Thank you.
08:51 You don't think that the power brokers in TV
08:55 want that to be a pretty tasty looking matchup between two
08:59 ranked teams?
09:00 It should be.
09:00 They shouldn't want it to be.
09:01 Along with the reasons.
09:02 It should be two ranked teams.
09:04 I mean--
09:04 This doesn't change my mind at all.
09:07 Again, I would have been pleasantly surprised
09:09 knowing all the things we would have
09:11 had to overcome to be ranked in this final poll.
09:14 But I'm not surprised.
09:15 I would have been pleasantly surprised
09:17 had we overcome all those things and been ranked.
09:20 I would be just as surprised if we're--
09:21 even though ESPN in their way too early poll
09:23 didn't have us in the preseason top 25,
09:26 I'll be just as surprised if we're not a preseason top 25
09:29 team next year.
09:31 So I like your take.
09:32 It's reasonable.
09:33 It's rational.
09:34 It's well thought out.
09:36 It's probably keeping your emotions in check.
09:39 Let me spin the block to the other side for you
09:42 here, Jed, if I can.
09:43 Before I do that, another thank you
09:45 to our guy JR and Toothman Ford.
09:47 We all know cars cost less than graft.
09:49 And I know if JR and the good people at Toothman
09:51 had an AP vote, all right, the Mountaineers
09:53 would be ranked in the top 25.
09:55 When I saw the news this morning,
09:59 I texted you guys right away.
10:00 It was like the first thing that I saw,
10:02 because the poll released overnight last night, which
10:04 again, tells you how much they really put into all of this
10:07 when the poll comes out hours after the final game.
10:09 I mean, come on.
10:11 But I saw it that like I was convinced I
10:13 would have almost bet my life.
10:15 I would have been 95% sure that the Mountaineers were
10:18 going to be ranked somewhere between 22 and 25
10:21 in the final poll.
10:22 It didn't happen.
10:24 I was angry this morning.
10:25 I was texting you and Owen and Skylar.
10:28 And I'm still angry now.
10:29 I'm not as cool, calm, and collected
10:32 as you are, because you do present
10:34 an accurate, a rational case.
10:36 But I think there's another side to this, another side
10:39 to this as well, too.
10:42 Like I referenced, these preseason polls
10:44 matter so much in college football.
10:46 And I told you I kind of had a take on this
10:51 earlier in the show.
10:52 When you combine a lot of the teams that
10:55 finished in the tail end of this top 25 poll,
10:59 started very high or at least much more significantly ranked
11:02 than we were to begin this season,
11:04 and when you also combine kind of where
11:06 we've been since 2018--
11:08 we haven't been nationally relevant in the college
11:10 football conversation since 2018, right?
11:13 That hurts you in these type of things.
11:15 It just does.
11:16 It shouldn't.
11:18 But it does, because again, when you
11:19 have the chunk of people that phone this in like they do,
11:23 they think, ah, West Virginia.
11:24 I mean, those guys haven't been good since Dana Holgerson
11:27 and Bill Greer.
11:28 Compare them to Tennessee.
11:29 Compare them to Clemson.
11:30 Compare them to Kansas State.
11:32 WVU hasn't been nearly on their level,
11:34 so they must not be as good right now.
11:37 There were five teams in college football, Jed,
11:40 that went 9 and 4 and won a bowl game this season, right?
11:44 Tennessee finished ranked 17th.
11:46 Kansas State finished ranked 18th.
11:48 Clemson finished ranked 20th.
11:50 Kansas finished ranked 23rd.
11:52 And your world champion West Virginia
11:54 Mountaineers, who were not ranked.
11:56 For the record, those preseason teams--
11:59 and shout out to Chris Anderson of 24/7 Sports.
12:01 He laid this out nicely on Twitter on X.
12:04 Those teams that I just mentioned,
12:06 you want to know what the big difference was between WVU
12:08 and those teams?
12:09 Tennessee started the preseason ranked 12th.
12:11 Kansas State 16th.
12:12 Clemson 9th.
12:13 And Kansas was finished a pick in the middle of the Big 12
12:16 with the preseason offensive player of the year,
12:19 as opposed to WVU, who then--
12:20 Name the teams again, Wes.
12:22 Tennessee, Kansas State, Clemson, and Kansas.
12:25 You know what three of those teams have in common?
12:28 What's that?
12:28 They started the season in the top 16?
12:31 This was my concern.
12:33 And they have voters in the AP top 25?
12:35 This was my concern going into our bowl game.
12:38 There were eight teams receiving votes.
12:41 We weren't one of them.
12:42 Correct.
12:43 And listen, again, that's the rational part--
12:45 Clemson, Kansas State, and Kansas.
12:47 That's the rational part from your side.
12:49 For instance, Wes, for instance, Kansas
12:52 was one of eight teams receiving votes,
12:54 and they were only receiving eight.
12:56 The difference between on that receiving votes list and not,
13:00 they finished 23rd.
13:02 Kansas, Kansas State, and Clemson
13:05 were unranked but receiving votes.
13:07 I'm telling you, going into that final poll,
13:10 that's the first thing I look at.
13:12 All right, who are the teams we have to jockey past?
13:14 No, that's what I looked at.
13:16 That's why there's rhyme and reason to what you're saying.
13:22 Yeah, no, again, that's why you are digging into what happened
13:25 and explaining it in a very accurate way
13:28 while I'm trying to explain why it's a bunch of BS, right?
13:31 You're right, though.
13:33 Because once you start, the poll position
13:35 at the beginning of the year, which
13:36 is why I think it's going to be critical that we are ranked
13:38 in the top 25.
13:39 Correct, maybe we'll be on the other side of this next year.
13:41 It's going to dictate so many things, so many things.
13:46 For instance, let's say Penn State's 10th.
13:49 I'm just tossing out arbitrary numbers.
13:51 I don't know if they will be, won't be.
13:52 I haven't looked at that closely yet.
13:54 Let's say Penn State's preseason number 10
13:56 when they come to Morgantown.
13:57 Let's say West Virginia is unranked when Penn State comes
14:02 to Morgantown.
14:03 Now let's say West Virginia takes them to the end
14:07 and loses on a field goal.
14:09 We're going to be an afterthought.
14:12 I mean, we might get a couple votes here and there,
14:14 but we're not going to crack the top 25 all of a sudden.
14:17 Whereas, if you're 16th preseason--
14:20 Absolutely.
14:21 --you're not going to change too much
14:23 by losing a game against the 10th ranked team--
14:25 Absolutely.
14:26 --because of your starting position.
14:27 And also, that's the point of reflection in week 8, week 9,
14:32 week 10.
14:33 People remember who started the season ranked.
14:36 And for right or wrong, that seat
14:38 has been planted in the mind of all these voters
14:40 throughout the course and duration of the entire season.
14:43 So you are exactly right.
14:44 That matters.
14:45 And all those teams you just talked about did.
14:49 So we're talking past each other.
14:51 We're not disagreeing.
14:52 No, yeah, yeah, yeah.
14:53 Starting the season ranked matters,
14:55 but getting votes even when you're not ranked going
14:57 into that final poll puts you ahead of all that gluttony
15:01 of teams that are--
15:02 who knows if--
15:02 No doubt.
15:03 No doubt.
15:03 --are we 34th or are we 54th?
15:05 We don't know.
15:06 And that's the frustrating part of it is so much of it
15:09 is the politics behind this machine.
15:11 And I'm not naive enough to think
15:13 that when we went from Rasheed Marshall to Pat White
15:16 to Geno Smith to Skyler and Wilgur--
15:19 we were probably on the beneficial side
15:21 of this a couple of times as well, too.
15:22 So don't get me wrong.
15:24 But Jed, final one for you here, because a lot of times
15:27 it bothers me when people complain,
15:29 but they don't give the solution or the answer.
15:32 So 24 power five teams in college football
15:36 won nine or more games this year.
15:38 24.
15:39 23 of them are ranked.
15:42 The one who isn't are West Virginia University
15:45 Mountaineers.
15:45 Now, this Jed, though, I don't want to be the guy who--
15:51 it always bothers me when people say,
15:53 oh, Derek Jeter got snubbed for the All-Star game.
15:57 Well, don't tell me that Derek Jeter got snubbed.
15:59 Tell me who he should have been in there for then.
16:01 Don't tell me this person got robbed of being an All--
16:04 don't tell me Jalen Ramsey got robbed of being an All-Pro.
16:07 Tell me that he should have had Stephon Gilmore's spot.
16:11 Don't tell me this person--
16:13 if you're going to tell me someone got snubbed
16:15 or someone got robbed, fine, but tell me who you're replacing.
16:18 My big beef here is with three teams--
16:21 SMU, Iowa, and Liberty, OK?
16:25 For separate reasons, and I'll run through these very quickly.
16:28 But SMU, they lost to TCU.
16:30 They lost to Boston College.
16:32 They lost to Oklahoma.
16:35 Their best win is Tulane, who doesn't play in the power five
16:38 either.
16:39 Iowa-- you and I were laughing about this.
16:41 Iowa, their last two games were a 35 to nothing loss
16:44 and a 26 to nothing loss.
16:47 In Iowa's last four games, Jed, they've
16:49 scored 28 points in their last four games.
16:52 That's an average of a touchdown per game.
16:55 And Liberty played no power five schools the entire year
17:00 until they got to their bowl game against Oregon, who
17:02 had nothing to play for.
17:04 And Liberty should have been much more ready to go
17:06 for that one, and they lost by 39 points.
17:09 SMU, Iowa, and Liberty really bothered me.
17:12 Really bothered me.
17:13 Who did Liberty's best win was against?
17:15 I can tell you right now.
17:16 Rich Rod and Jack State.
17:17 Jacksonville State, thank you.
17:19 Yep, sure was.
17:21 Again, I mean, who's Iowa's best win?
17:24 Iowa State, Purdue, Rutgers?
17:28 Yeah, as you go through it, and you start getting granular.
17:31 Well, WVU didn't have any good wins.
17:33 WVU didn't beat this, and this, and this.
17:35 OK, WVU beat TCU, who SMU lost to.
17:38 SMU lost to Boston bleeping college.
17:41 SMU didn't beat a power five team the entire year.
17:44 Liberty didn't play a power five team the entire year
17:46 until they lost to one by 39 points.
17:49 And I think a lot of this should--
17:51 like, listen, Iowa deserve to be ranked
17:53 throughout the regular season.
17:54 When they were 6-2, 7-2, 8-2, 9-2, they should be ranked.
17:58 Absolutely.
17:59 But when you lose 26 to nothing and 35 to nothing
18:02 in your last two games, I'm sorry,
18:04 you don't get the benefit of the doubt for me of,
18:06 oh, well, they played in the big 10, so they were OK.
18:10 Those are the ones that really bother me.
18:11 That's what I keep coming back to,
18:13 and I like the way you approach that.
18:15 Don't complain unless you bring the solution,
18:17 or at least admit you don't have the solution.
18:19 Don't tell me somebody got snubbed for the Pro Bowl.
18:21 Tell me who you're taking out to put in--
18:23 Like, I could go through Marquee Lee
18:24 and why he shouldn't have won the Bolitnikov,
18:26 and then I can tell you why Stedman should have.
18:28 I can tell you, in 2011, in our final year in the Big East,
18:33 I can complain that Isaiah Peed was the Big East
18:35 offensive player of the year.
18:37 And then I can tell you he ran for 12
18:38 hundred yards and 12 touchdowns.
18:40 And then I can say, I'm complaining
18:41 because Gino Smith threw for 4,300 yards,
18:44 and you were upset West Virginia was leaving,
18:47 so you gave it to a guy who was staying in Isaiah Peed.
18:50 So I like the way you're-- which, by the way,
18:52 isn't that reason enough, all these years later,
18:54 for the Cincinnati Beat Rider to at least vote
18:56 for us in the top 25?
18:58 Jed, it's hilarious that--
18:59 The Texas Tech guy didn't vote for us.
19:01 The K-State guy didn't vote for us.
19:03 The Cincinnati, the Syracuse, and the Rutgers
19:06 to stab it to us as well, too.
19:07 Yeah, it's just ridiculous.
19:09 Was it Cyclone Larry West?
19:10 I texted you guys.
19:11 Who was it that exposed the biggest of all Big 12 haters?
19:15 I sent it to the group chat.
19:16 Who was that post?
19:17 Yes.
19:17 Was it Cyclone Larry?
19:19 Of course it was.
19:19 I believe so.
19:20 Yeah, a guy who covers the Boise State Broncos.
19:25 It was 1012 Podcast.
19:26 We have found the new enemy of the Big 12.
19:28 And this is @1012Network.
19:31 Ron Counts is his name.
19:32 He covers the Boise State Broncos.
19:34 Yes, he ranked Oklahoma and Texas,
19:37 and that's it in the Big 12.
19:38 He ranked Liberty 15th, Jed.
19:41 The team who didn't play an F's--
19:43 Power Five opponent the entire season, he ranked them 15th.
19:49 Well, he's the Boise beat writer, but--
19:50 I realize I shouldn't get as upset about these things,
19:54 but we haven't been ranked since December of 2018,
19:58 as I famously bitched about after the Houston Hail Mary,
20:02 because all we had to do was knock down a Hail Mary,
20:04 and we'd be ranked for the first time since December of--
20:06 and here we are once again.
20:07 But this is now the longest stretch
20:09 that WVU football has gone without being
20:11 ranked in the AP Top 25 in six decades.
20:15 So while it might really not matter
20:17 in the grand scheme of things, it just pisses me off,
20:20 because I was ready to wake up today ranked
20:22 and finally get that monkey off of our back
20:24 and put that final cherry on top of the whipped cream,
20:28 on top of the fudge, on top of the vanilla and chocolate
20:32 and delicious ice cream that was this season that not many of us
20:36 saw coming.
20:36 You were more optimistic than I was.
20:38 I did not expect--
20:38 Oh, I was.
20:39 I would have bet the mortgage that we were going to be ranked.
20:41 I thought, man, there are so many teams that are going
20:43 to have to move in front of us.
20:44 I just didn't expect it.
20:45 I would have been pleasantly surprised.
20:47 But one more point.
20:50 You can't tell me that when you're putting together
20:53 a preseason Top 25-- look, we're definitely
20:55 taking the long way around.
20:57 There are those that will start when they put together
21:01 their preseason Top 25, hmm, what should I do here?
21:04 Well, let me look at the final Top 25 of last year
21:07 and start eliminating teams.
21:09 And when you're not on there to even be eliminated,
21:11 you're taking the long way around.
21:13 So it's going to be more difficult to climb
21:16 into that preseason Top 25.
21:18 But as a person, I often say I like to live in hope.
21:21 As a person who likes to live in hope, I just have to believe.
21:25 And this hasn't--
21:26 I haven't wavered in the last couple of weeks based on this.
21:28 Nothing surprised me about seeing this.
21:31 I do believe we will be--
21:33 I would even say I think we're going to be a Top 20 team.
21:36 A preseason Top 20 team.
21:37 I think about there, yeah.
21:40 I mean, somewhere in there for a host of reasons.
21:42 I would say in the 17 to 22 range would be my guess.
21:46 That's probably fair.
21:47 There's that cluster that's difficult to distinguish
21:49 between one and the other.
21:51 I think what you alluded to, some things
21:54 help us, that we're there in the tail end,
21:56 that we have the quarterback returning,
21:57 that people are going to see we got 95% of our rushing offense
22:01 back or whatever the crazy number is.
22:03 Including Jaheim.
22:04 Jaheim's explosive and a headline grabber.
22:06 Those are the types of players that get voters' attention.
22:10 Oh, that's right, that exciting freshman last year.
22:13 The reason I think it might be more 21, 22
22:15 is because, just again, some of the lazy mail-it-in types who
22:18 just, oh, well, WVU hasn't been ranked since 2018.
22:21 Can they really be that good?
22:22 I'm going to put them at 26 to start the season.
22:26 You know what I mean?
22:26 I do think we'll have some of those people.
22:29 But--
22:29 Yeah, I agree.
22:31 I knew we were going to find our way in,
22:33 but we're taking the long way because we
22:34 don't land in this final top 25.
22:36 But again--
22:37 Fresh red meat.
22:38 I didn't figure we would.
22:39 Fresh blood in the water for Neil Brown and company,
22:42 at least, heading into the offseason.
22:43 I mean, there's so many ifs here.
22:45 There's so many ifs.
22:47 If you knock down the Hail Mary, who
22:50 knows what might have played out.
22:52 You'd be in the top 20 right now.
22:55 Let's say when we jumped on Baylor early,
22:57 we kept that momentum going and we won by three touchdowns
23:00 at Baylor.
23:00 Maybe that's a little day.
23:02 Who knows?
23:02 I mean, it's--
23:03 Sure.
23:03 Sure.
23:03 Who knows?
23:05 But we're never going to know.
23:06 So we're left to look at this.
23:10 But Penn State's coming to town.
23:12 Penn State will certainly be ranked, at least,
23:13 in the top 15 without even looking.
23:15 I don't know how high.
23:17 But the power brokers are going to want a compelling matchup
23:20 on August 31 in Morgantown.
23:23 And I'd say they're going to get it.
23:25 But it's just-- it's difficult to sit here in early January
23:30 and accurately forecast what's going
23:34 to happen late in the summer after hearing an off-season
23:38 of buzz about--
23:39 that's the answer.
23:41 What's going to get buzzed this off-season?
23:43 How much buzz is Garrett going to get?
23:44 How much buzz is Jaheim going to get as PFF's
23:47 top freshman of the year?
23:49 So there's-- who knows?
23:51 After seven months of buzz, that can change a lot.
23:54 Yeah.
23:55 Because the one thing superficial voters hear is buzz.
23:58 I mean, I was trying to make the argument in the pregame
24:01 show in Carolina.
24:04 I mean, and Tony-- and Tony and Dwight and I,
24:06 we were all talking about this.
24:08 We're like, all right, well, if we beat these guys decisively,
24:12 does it matter?
24:13 Because it's not necessarily Carolina.
24:15 Are they going to see it as, hey, Carolina.
24:17 They beat Carolina by three touchdowns.
24:18 Or they beat a wounded Carolina with not as many kids.
24:22 And I tried to say this.
24:23 And I was like, look, most voters
24:25 are going to recognize, because he's potentially a top two
24:27 pick, Drake Mays not playing in his bowl game.
24:30 Caleb Williams is not playing.
24:32 Now, outside of that, forget it.
24:33 They're not going to know much of anything.
24:35 They were trying to make the point to me.
24:36 They say, you're giving them too much credit.
24:37 They don't know Drake Mays.
24:38 I'm like, I'm saying that's all they know.
24:40 Look, most voters pretty much know that and nothing else.
24:44 The top two players in the draft aren't playing in a bowl game.
24:47 I'm not saying they can name a second player
24:49 on the North Carolina roster.
24:50 I'm not making them a genius.
24:52 And they were saying, well, not everybody's an expert like you.
24:54 I'm like, no, no, no, no.
24:55 Don't say that I'm calling these people experts.
24:58 I'm just saying that they at least
24:59 know potentially the top two players in the draft
25:02 and probably nothing else.
25:04 And I still feel that way.
25:06 But when you walk out of that environment
25:08 with a three touchdown victory, both the voters who knew
25:12 and the voters who didn't are going to scoreboard glance
25:15 and say, well, OK.
25:16 And I think that's why we got some of the votes
25:18 that we got.
25:20 I mean, some of these people will put the work in.
25:22 Some of these people will put part of the work in.
25:25 Some of these people, quite frankly,
25:26 just won't put nearly enough work in.
25:28 And that's what leaves us where we are.
25:31 But we're going to know this and scrutinize it to a much greater
25:33 degree than they do.
25:35 But as a fringe top 25 team, when you land at 27
25:39 on the outside looking in, you're fringe.
25:42 When you have your quarterback returning,
25:45 those are the types of teams that that puts you
25:47 over the top in a world full of people who don't often
25:50 put enough work in.
25:52 Wow, that kid who did this and did that last-- oh, he's back.
25:55 Oh, OK.
25:56 Well, fair enough.
25:57 That's good enough to put him at 21 instead of 26
26:00 or whatever it might be.
26:01 But it gives us something to talk about the morning
26:04 after the national championship or the mornings
26:07 after the national championship that's
26:10 pretty compelling or interesting.
26:11 But once again, we did land in the coaches' poll.
26:16 Yep, 25th.
26:16 At 25.
26:17 And I always like to say this.
26:19 I've mentioned this to Owen before.
26:21 We have been ranked number one in one of those two major polls
26:27 once.
26:28 You know when that was, Wes?
26:31 In our history, once.
26:33 In either the AP or the coaches.
26:35 Oh, in either or?
26:36 OK.
26:37 Yes.
26:38 Never the AP.
26:40 It was the coaches.
26:41 One time, we were actually ranked--
26:44 what's that?
26:45 93?
26:45 Nope.
26:46 No.
26:47 I bought the newspaper USA Today when
26:49 it had us ranked number one.
26:51 I have it in my file somewhere.
26:53 After we beat UConn in 2007.
26:55 We were number one in the coaches' poll.
26:59 Yep.
27:00 How about that?
27:02 And now we're talking coaches' poll.
27:04 So we didn't crack that.
27:05 As you would say, one of the most complete games
27:07 the Mountaineers ever played before one of the worst games
27:09 the Mountaineers ever played.
27:10 Exactly.
27:11 Exactly.
27:13 Well, I tell you what.
27:15 Speaking of good games and bad games,
27:17 last night's college football playoff,
27:19 it looked early like it was going to be a bad game.
27:21 Like it could be another repeat of last year.
27:24 Washington was able to hang on, get back in there,
27:26 make it a game.
27:27 Michigan ends up winning maybe a little more comfortably
27:29 than any of us neutral folks would
27:33 have liked that were just hoping for a classic game.
27:35 But we do have a national championship.
27:37 It is the Michigan Wolverines.
27:38 Or we do have a national champion, I should say.
27:40 It is the Michigan Wolverines.
27:42 We'll discuss when we return to wrap this thing up.
27:44 Wesley Euler, Jed Drenning, you are in the gun.
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28:15 For more West Virginia Mountaineer football content,
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29:59 Back in the gun here.
30:00 It is episode 138 of your new favorite WVU football podcast.
30:05 Gave some thoughts, some emotions, some reactions.
30:08 I'll calm down eventually.
30:10 All right?
30:11 Jed, when the new NCAA football game comes out in July,
30:14 we better have a number next to our name on there.
30:16 All right?
30:17 That'll calm me down.
30:18 That'll bring me back to life here and back to reality here.
30:22 But obviously, that's something that we'll discuss and keep
30:24 an eye on as we roll forward.
30:26 We didn't get that--
30:27 I was just going to say there was that tease
30:30 that there was going to be some big bombshell commercial release
30:33 date of EA Sports and the return of the NCAA football game,
30:38 video game, and nothing.
30:40 Jed, just blue balls last night.
30:41 Just need to roll.
30:42 Monday night, nothing.
30:43 You're right.
30:44 That's worse.
30:44 That's worse than the Michigan cheating scandal.
30:46 I mean, what are we talking about?
30:48 It is.
30:48 Yes.
30:50 Michigan takes down the Huskies.
30:52 34 to 13 was the final.
30:55 It looked like a blowout early, ended comfortably for Michigan,
30:59 but was a pretty close game there in the interim.
31:02 If you didn't watch it, you might think, oh, Michigan
31:05 won that comfortably.
31:06 And in the end, they kind of did.
31:07 And at the beginning, they built themselves a nice lead.
31:10 But that was a one-score game for a large majority of that.
31:14 Jed, for me, there's obviously a lot--
31:17 you and I don't want to sit here for an hour and break down
31:19 every detail of that game.
31:20 But what it really came down to me was just, one,
31:24 I mean, Michigan's ability to run the football almost at will.
31:28 And two, just their success at knocking Michael Penix off
31:33 of his game a little bit.
31:34 I mean, they got after him.
31:35 He was a little banged up.
31:36 His ankle got tweaked.
31:37 His ribs got tweaked.
31:39 Penix just wasn't the same superhero
31:41 that we had seen him be throughout the season.
31:43 Those were kind of the Michigan run game.
31:46 And their ability to limit Penix were
31:47 kind of the things that stuck out to me on Monday night.
31:51 Well, some people are going to look at this, Wes,
31:54 and it will forever be tainted because of what
31:56 played out with Michigan.
31:58 A coach was suspended not once but twice.
32:01 It was a highly irregular run to a championship.
32:05 I mean, to say it's unprecedented
32:07 is an understatement.
32:08 We've never seen anything remotely close to that.
32:11 So there are those who will forever
32:13 put an asterisk next to that and say, look, probably not.
32:17 And then there are those who are going to say, look,
32:19 they caught him in a scandal.
32:20 Obviously, after they caught him,
32:21 they were no longer doing it.
32:22 And while they were no longer doing it,
32:24 they tumbled Ohio State.
32:25 They beat Alabama.
32:26 They beat a good Washington team.
32:28 Good enough.
32:29 They're champions for me.
32:30 So there's going to be both sides of that.
32:33 And that's not the discussion that I want to have.
32:35 That's neither here nor there.
32:37 What I found interesting was the game started in such a way.
32:43 Washington wins the toss, and they defer.
32:45 I thought that was a good choice.
32:47 Maybe if you can steal a stop and get something going
32:49 offensively, then you know you--
32:51 I always like to know you're banking on having it
32:53 after the half against a team like that.
32:55 But instead, Michigan-- and it wasn't Blake Corn,
32:58 it was Donovan Edwards, their number two back.
33:00 They were just pushing Washington
33:02 around on those first couple of possessions.
33:05 And normally, when you get to a certain point in the game--
33:09 I don't know if it's 12 minutes deep, 15 minutes deep,
33:12 17 or 18 minutes deep, like two, three minutes
33:14 in the second quarter--
33:15 when a team is running the ball on you at will,
33:19 it feels sometimes almost impossible to stem
33:22 the tide of that and change it.
33:24 And redirect it.
33:25 You almost feel like, oh boy, this
33:28 is going to be Georgia TCU all over again.
33:30 That's what this is going to be.
33:31 It's like when you're a little kid, and that first time
33:34 that you get rocked by a wave in the ocean,
33:36 and you're just underneath the tide,
33:39 just rolling around and spinning and don't
33:41 know how to get your bearings.
33:42 That's what it feels like when a team's running
33:44 the ball on you like that.
33:45 It did.
33:47 And then at 14 to 3, here comes the stalemate.
33:53 Washington, Doug Deak played better defense,
33:56 more physical defense at the point of attack
33:58 than I thought they would.
33:59 And that's strange to say for a team that gave up
34:01 303 yards on the ground.
34:03 But I do think they rallied.
34:05 And they responded.
34:06 And they bounced back.
34:07 And the next thing they know--
34:08 Kalen DeBoer is a winner.
34:11 He is a winner.
34:11 There's a reason he won at 67 to 3 at Sioux Falls.
34:15 There's a reason he was 12 and 6 at Fresno.
34:17 There's a reason he'd only lost one game in two years
34:20 as the head coach at Washington.
34:21 He knows what he's doing.
34:22 He puts a great staff together.
34:23 He's the winner.
34:24 So the fact that they were able to hang around and keep
34:29 that as a one possession game as they're driving
34:31 in the final two minutes, all I could think
34:34 was Michigan feels like they've dominated this game.
34:38 And it's about to be a one score game at the half
34:41 with Washington getting the ball to start the second half.
34:44 If you're Michigan, you can't feel good about that.
34:46 And then they kind of squandered what
34:49 seemed like an opportunity to maybe get in field goal range
34:51 because I think they, in the final minute or 40 seconds
34:54 of the half, because they mismanaged their timeouts
34:56 and they had none left.
34:57 So you're kind of thinking, well, they could
34:59 have used one of those there.
35:00 And once again, I'm going to give Kalen DeBoer some love.
35:03 Washington came out in the second half.
35:05 And despite that pick on the first play by Michael Penix,
35:08 who Michael Penix was out of rhythm, no doubt about it.
35:12 I mean, against Texas last week, he
35:15 was hotter than Texas chili, as Rick Neuhaus and I say.
35:18 He looked unstoppable.
35:20 And for as accurate as he was against Texas,
35:24 he certainly wasn't against Michigan.
35:26 Now, part of that's credit to Michigan.
35:28 Lost in the shuffle, I think, in preparation for this game.
35:32 A lot of people forget Washington,
35:34 as they had this offensive buzzsaw with Penix
35:37 and those three receivers and Dylan Johnson running
35:40 through the course of the season, just exploding on everybody
35:42 offensively.
35:43 They had a game the third week in October
35:46 against Arizona State.
35:47 An ugly 15 to 7 rock fight.
35:51 You remember that?
35:52 They couldn't get in the end zone.
35:54 So something told me going into this game
35:56 that certainly Michigan's staff is
35:58 going to tear that Arizona State tape apart.
36:01 And I'm sure there are some parallels to what Arizona State
36:04 was doing with inferior personnel compared
36:07 to what Michigan was doing with superior personnel.
36:10 And they had their moments.
36:11 Now, they only had one sack, but they were doing things
36:14 to impact Michael Penix.
36:16 And what I mean by that is there were times--
36:19 to me, they had him seeing ghosts.
36:20 Because there were times they weren't even
36:22 on the play between the lines impacting the throw,
36:25 but he was impacted.
36:27 Even when he was untouched by a defender
36:29 and there was no defender within three steps of him,
36:31 he was impacted, or it seemed like he was impacted.
36:34 Now, part of that might be Michigan so successfully
36:37 reduced Washington's offense down to one dimension.
36:40 I mean, Dylan Johnson, 11 carries, 33 yards.
36:43 They weren't even sure if he was going to play yet
36:46 after that late injury against Texas.
36:48 I don't know if he was at full strength,
36:49 but their running game certainly wasn't.
36:51 They couldn't get anything developed on the ground.
36:54 And so what teams that are so dominant defensively
36:57 like Michigan has been sometimes often try to do,
37:01 they try to reduce you down to being
37:02 a one-dimensional offense and then set out
37:04 to attack that dimension.
37:05 That's what it felt like.
37:06 Washington couldn't run the ball, at least enough to matter.
37:11 And so they just started throwing different looks at him
37:14 in the past game.
37:15 Sometimes it was to confuse him and get an extra hat on him
37:18 and pressure him.
37:19 Sometimes it was to drop an extra fender in coverage.
37:21 And he was just out of sorts.
37:23 He was missing guys.
37:24 But I was impressed with Penix's pick to start the second half.
37:30 I thought Michigan was going to cave West.
37:32 I thought that's it.
37:33 They're going to go up 24 to 10.
37:34 But instead, their defense bows up.
37:36 It's a 20 to 10 game.
37:38 They bow up again for multiple possessions.
37:40 They allow it to become a 20 to 13 game.
37:43 Michigan was-- excuse me, Washington, to me,
37:46 was without question the more excited team
37:49 in the second half.
37:50 Credit to Kalen DeBoer.
37:52 Now that being said, ultimately, in what
37:55 felt like a staring match, you just
37:57 got the sense that Jim Harbaugh was sitting there thinking,
37:59 you're going to blink first.
38:01 You're going to blink first.
38:02 Yeah.
38:02 You're going to blink.
38:02 I'm just going to keep leaning on you and leaning on you
38:05 and leaning on you.
38:06 And I'm not going to ask too awful much out of JJ McCarthy.
38:09 JJ McCarthy was a modest 10 for 18.
38:12 Now he made a critical play with his legs.
38:14 Less than 20 pass attempts.
38:16 I mean, that third and 10, when they were pinned deep in a 7
38:19 point game in the second half, Wes, he scrambled loose.
38:22 To me, that was--
38:23 22 yards or something like that he ran for.
38:24 Yes, to me, that was the single biggest play of the football
38:27 game.
38:27 Might have been.
38:27 The single biggest play of the game.
38:28 I think that and the interception
38:30 that Pennix threw very early, because he just
38:32 looked off from there.
38:33 I think those are the two biggest plays.
38:35 I mean, I'm sitting there thinking,
38:37 Washington's fired up.
38:38 Their sideline is alive.
38:40 And now you're stuffing Blake Korman that run game,
38:42 and you got JJ McCarthy in a bad spot behind the sticks
38:45 on third and 10.
38:46 You're about to get the ball back at midfield,
38:48 down 7 with an incredibly fired up sideline
38:51 and a shocked Michigan sideline.
38:53 But instead, JJ McCarthy, sneaky athletic,
38:56 makes that play wiggles free.
38:58 20 plus yards.
39:00 They get something moving.
39:01 They get out of the hole.
39:02 But at the end of the day, Washington certainly
39:04 blinked first, probably even second, third.
39:07 And it's easy to say, look, defensively, Michigan's
39:11 a stat pattern.
39:11 Who do they play all year?
39:13 No wonder they're ranked so high nationally
39:15 in all these key categories when you're playing offenses
39:17 like the Iowa offense we just talked about.
39:19 Are you really challenged?
39:20 Come on.
39:21 I mean, look at some of these Big 10 offenses
39:23 that you're going to face.
39:24 Really?
39:24 So that's why I kind of wondered.
39:27 Ohio State was a different challenge.
39:28 Ohio State was about bracketing, getting creative enough
39:31 to shut down Marvin Harrison.
39:33 Washington typically presents a different anthem.
39:36 They have three bona fide receivers
39:38 that are three bona fide weapons.
39:40 And when Dylan Johnson's at full strength,
39:42 that's certainly enough to keep you honest behind an offensive
39:45 line that won the Joe Moore Award.
39:47 So I got to say, this is for--
39:50 I threw some shade at Michigan defensively this year
39:52 for facing those weak offenses.
39:54 But against a premier offense in Washington
39:57 on the biggest of stages, I do think that the Michigan
40:00 defense swelled up.
40:01 And I was impressed by what they did
40:04 by limiting those--
40:06 Washington didn't make the most of their opportunities.
40:09 But you also have to give credit to the defenses on the field
40:12 when you're failing to capitalize
40:13 on those opportunities.
40:14 Because something's different in that game
40:16 than any other game that you've played
40:18 throughout the course of the season.
40:20 And what I noticed was once Washington--
40:21 I'll close with this, Wes--
40:23 once they got to the postseason, for all
40:24 the dynamic, explosive things they were doing,
40:26 they struggled on third down against both Texas and Michigan.
40:30 And of course, that mattered too,
40:31 those transition downs in those more critical games
40:34 tend to matter a little more.
40:36 And it didn't catch up to them against Texas.
40:38 It nearly did, as Texas was trying to mount that comeback.
40:41 But it did catch up to them against Michigan.
40:43 But once again, until the end of time,
40:47 Michigan will forever be regarded as, yeah, but.
40:50 Yeah, but.
40:51 Yeah, but.
40:52 I mean, this is the national championship
40:55 that people always look at somewhat as cons.
40:57 They'll look at it with an eyebrow raise.
41:00 And you kind of remember how that played out.
41:02 Now, we don't know what this means for Jim Harbaugh.
41:04 I mean, he kind of hinted--
41:06 I don't know if you heard this, Wes.
41:07 He was talking about spring ball the other day.
41:09 Because a lot of people think he's going to bail at whatever
41:12 favor boy in a field job comes his way.
41:14 Yeah.
41:15 But he's talking the other day.
41:17 And maybe that's just him playing whatever version
41:19 of crazy chess he likes to play.
41:20 Because you talk about a dude-- we talk about Kalen DeBoer.
41:24 That cat, Jim Harbaugh, say what you like about him,
41:27 he has won everywhere he has been at a high level.
41:33 But maybe in part with Michigan, the turnaround
41:35 was for strange reasons, shadowy reasons.
41:39 But like I said, once it was exposed,
41:42 once it was out in the open, we talked about it
41:44 with the Patriots and Deflategate and Spygate
41:46 and all that kind of stuff.
41:47 Look, to me, the reason that will always
41:49 be nothing more than a footnote with the Patriots
41:52 is their most success came after, after those things
41:57 were exposed.
41:58 They went to 10 Super Bowls, Jed.
42:00 I mean, 10 with Tom Brady and won six of them.
42:04 Or nine with Tom Brady and won six of them.
42:06 Yes, in other words, when Spygate, Deflategate,
42:08 and all that came out, their winning percentage after that
42:11 was--
42:12 I'm not a Patriots fan, trust me.
42:14 But their winning percentage after that
42:17 was better than before that.
42:18 It's like if Michigan runs it back
42:22 and wins the national championship next year,
42:23 like, OK, well, maybe that loses--
42:25 Or the next four or five.
42:25 That's what you and I talked about how many months ago.
42:28 If they go on this crazy historic run
42:30 without doing that, that's one thing.
42:32 But right now, they're not there.
42:34 The only one they had to hang their hat on
42:35 since the late '90s is the one that
42:38 looks a little suspicious in a lot of people's eyes.
42:41 No doubt.
42:42 But hey, I'll say this.
42:44 You can give me all the suspicion you want
42:46 if we can win an Addy, all right?
42:47 I don't care.
42:48 Just give it to me, baby.
42:50 My t-shirts, my banners, my memorabilia are going to last.
42:52 Conor Stallion's out of work.
42:54 Are going to last forever.
42:55 Conor Stallion's probably trying to bang
42:56 on the door of the NRG Stadium in Houston last night.
42:59 Let me in!
43:00 Let me in!
43:01 How funny is it?
43:02 People were posting on Twitter, Wes.
43:03 I'm sure you saw this.
43:05 That of all the venues, of all the cities for Michigan,
43:07 this Michigan team to win its national championship,
43:11 it was in the town of the 2017 world champion Houston Astros.
43:15 Oh, gosh.
43:16 There we go.
43:17 Oh, that's the joke.
43:18 That's the one to wrap this thing up on.
43:20 Couple thank yous before we shut this down.
43:23 Thank you to our new friends at Johnston Equipment.
43:25 Make sure you're checking out their new location
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43:29 And of course, a big thank you to Rick, Lewis, and Fortis
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43:47 And there we go.
43:47 Just had a brain fart right in the middle of the time.
43:50 That was my--
43:52 Big thank you to Johnston Equipment and to Fortis
43:55 as well, too, for presenting this episode of ITG.
43:58 Well, Jed, this was fun.
43:59 I'm glad that was good--
44:01 nice and cathartic for me to get some of that top 25
44:04 anger off my chest.
44:06 And yeah, a national championship game.
44:08 I think that we were all pleasantly surprised that it
44:10 ended up being much more entertaining than it
44:12 looked like it was going to be there for the first 15,
44:15 20, 30 minutes or so.
44:17 That'll do it for this edition of ITG.
44:19 But we'll be back in just a couple days
44:21 with a little bit of a portal recap episode, if you will.
44:25 Some of the Mountaineers that we knew had entered the portal
44:28 have now landed at new homes.
44:30 We've had some guys that have joined the Mountaineers
44:32 from the portal.
44:33 So we'll discuss all of that in just a few days
44:35 with Big O and with Skylar.
44:38 But Jed and I wanted to make sure that we hopped on here
44:40 and gave you some national championship and some top 25
44:43 reaction while it was still hot in the kitchen.
44:46 So that'll do it for us on this edition of ITG.
44:49 Before we go, the one thing we ask of you, as always,
44:50 is to be an ear and tell an ear about your new favorite WVU
44:54 football podcast.
44:55 And shout out, if you're watching on YouTube here,
44:58 to my buddy Jed Drenning, who sent me a couple of Duke's Mayo
45:01 Bowl goodies.
45:02 But chief most amongst them, this beautiful jar
45:05 of Duke's Bowl, Duke's mayonnaise
45:08 with the Tar Heel logo on the one side, the Flying Dub V.
45:12 Two of the most iconic logos in all of college sports
45:16 on my favorite condiment jar right here.
45:19 I'll leave you with this.
45:20 The show, the post-game show, ended
45:22 at the stadium in Charlotte.
45:24 Lights are down.
45:26 Chrissy and [AUDIO OUT] waiting on me because [AUDIO OUT]
45:29 Coach Wallace.
45:31 So I'm making my way back there, and I spot--
45:33 I already had an extra one from the radio pre-game show
45:36 for you.
45:36 But I spot a case.
45:38 And I asked them-- there were a bunch of staff workers,
45:40 like stadium staffers.
45:41 Can I grab some of these?
45:43 And I said, hey, can I grab one of these?
45:45 Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
45:46 Tear it up and grab one.
45:47 Or can I grab two?
45:49 Yeah, I guess you can have two.
45:52 Look, it's in a case.
45:53 Can I just pick the case up?
45:54 No, you can't have a case.
45:56 I tried.
45:57 I'm like, what are you going to do?
45:58 I told Chrissy as we're walking out.
45:59 I'm like, there's no way they're going to do it.
46:01 They're going to sell it on eBay.
46:02 I was going to say, you'd have been putting those things
46:04 on eBay.
46:05 That's exactly what I was going to say.
46:06 That's what they were doing.
46:07 Anyway, I'll leave you with that.
46:09 Oh, I love it.
46:10 I love it.
46:11 Well, take care, everybody.
46:12 We'll talk to you here in the next couple of days.
46:14 Thanks for listening, as always.
46:15 You've been in the gun.
46:17 [BLANK_AUDIO]