1.6.22 - Emory Hunt Interview with JR

No one's more locked into the NFL than First and Pod. Why is it not within the realm of possibility that Geno Smith was a victim of a horrible organization, bad offensive coaching, and then went and played behind three high-level talents and only got spot starts and did okay by the way? Well because it's just it doesn't really happen that often anymore.

Subscribe to First and Pod on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. When you need to know what's happening it's it's it's it's time to get hit. In the Huddle. This sham with Steve Keim out there in the desert, I mean it's like no accountability. Never my fault. It's never his fault. Stuff just happens.

Losses just fall from the sky. It's not Cliff's fault. It's not Kyler's fault. It's not my fault.

It's not the owner's fault. We just have really bad luck. Just hang in there and keep throwing money at us and we'll figure it out. Shut up.

Listen to In the Huddle available on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast. Let's talk to someone who I think understands well I know he does. It's my main man Emery Hunt from CBS and CBS Sports HQ. Emery how are you man?

I'm doing fine there man. Appreciate you bringing me out. No doubt about it.

Help me out here uh Emery. You're an educated man in many ways and many things. What I just said did it did it make a little sense? It made full sense right? Right. If you're speaking literal about something you're talking about a perceived fact like yes it is hot outside because it is 105 degrees outside right and if you say man it's just hot out it's hot out here you could it all depends on the context because it really could be 79 degrees but it may feel hot because of the humidity or whatever you may be talking about the humidity you know what I'm saying or it may be hot because it's 79 degrees in the summer you just program to think like okay it's the summertime I'm just hot it's hot outside you know so there's a difference you know first to your example and this it is rich coming from someone like me who understands this part when you talk about home in a way and I used to joke with people they used to say this when we were when I was playing college ball like man oh you know they're playing at home they could win like bro we lost all our games it didn't matter if we was playing at home on the road if you can't catch at home you won't be able to catch on the road you know nobody at our games anyway so it don't really matter but what the to the caller's point the one element I would say matters when you play at home is the comfort part because your schedule is not thrown off however the flip side of that is because you're playing on the road you're kind of forced to lock in because your schedule is thrown off so I could see both sides but yeah if you're talking like sometimes we take things literally when we should take it figuratively and sometimes we take things figuratively when we should take them literally yeah we had a caller he called about the uh the baltimore ravens and he's like oh the the playoff situation isn't fair and away to the ravens and I'm like yeah okay you're right but let's also call a spade a spade the ravens look like ass right now so I mean some sometimes we gotta step into reality and the reality is whether you are playing at home or you're playing away when the whistle blows you can only control what takes place in between those lines exactly and that's actually one of the things that that will take place of this monday night as as you're a college football and football expert we know stepping away from the nfl for a minute that we have the college football national championship speaking of a neutral site we're going to see tcu taking on the georgia bulldogs and nobody expected tcu to even be here they haven't won a championship since the 30s they weren't even ranked to start the year their starting quarterback wasn't even starting the season and then you got the georgia bulldogs who are looking to go back to back and these were some wild games last weekend for both of these teams to to move forward are you expecting similar in this game big scores high scores or should we expect some of the offense to get kind of narrowed down I think all things can be true we probably won't see the the crazy back and forth that we saw from michigan tcu but we could see almost a second quarter that we saw from georgia and ohio state but it all depends because what worked for tcu in that game against michigan is that they got the confidence because the biggest question many people had and i had myself was whether or not that 335 stack will be able to hold up against that 13 personnel three tight ends double tight ends sets that michigan throws out there and run the football and if you're judging based off the first play of the game you're like well this is going to happen all throughout the game they're going to be able to run downhill against this defense because they're not built up front or within the front seven to stop the downward pressure they'll see from this run game but tcu adjusted they were able to you know make the adjustments up front to where you're throwing a lot of slants and quick at the offensive line which clogged them up they couldn't get to the second level and allow those linebacks to roam free and make plays georgia theoretically can do the same thing michigan can do up front they got guys that are big beefy guys up front the question will be whether or not tcu offensively can make plays uh perhaps banged up in the backfield but can they make plays absent of georgia turn the ball over one thing we don't see is georgia make mistakes we saw michigan make two crucial mistakes in that game and if they don't make those two mistakes they win the ball game so that's going to be the biggest key where can tcu find offense or five points outside of their own offense emory hunt of cbs and cbs sports hq is joining us from what it sounds like uh like many people you're favoring georgia to go out there and beat tcu am i wrong no you're you're absolutely right i think georgia can go out there and win the game most people tend to over or underestimate what stephan bennett brings to the table i've been on the show before saying he should have been you know in new york city last year i'm glad he got the free trip this season and georgia i think got the and here and this is funny how things come full circle you know where georgia fell a victim to last weekend is an example of home in a way mattering is because had they played that game in athens they probably wouldn't have seen the passing game from ohio state that they saw now you put ohio state that wants to spread the field and run routes indoors in perfect conditions you're going to be in trouble they don't have to worry about that with tcu they're not built the same way so i do think they take care of benson with you know you mentioned emory hunt is here with us of cbs sports hq you mentioned stetson bennett i feel like he is uh this is an exaggeration i'm i'm speaking figuratively uh many ways tonight emory he feels like an 80 year old quarterback out there uh on a college team he's trying to go back to back what realistically will he be doing at this time next year is he going to be on a practice squad what is he going to be doing next year it's a fascinating question jr and i have a great philosophical answer and a big picture approach if i'm stetson bennett if i'm mag duggan if i'm jt daniels who just signed with rights for whatever reason if i'm dj uyangole instead of going oregon state i'm going directly to the xfl or usfl i'm playing crowball against pro level talent i'm gonna let the nfl re-evaluate me from there because we all know this stetson bennett will get poked and private at the combine he'll finally realize that he is 5 11 he's 186 he doesn't look the part matched up against the other anthony richardson's or the you know the uh cj straws and those guys even though he played toe to toe against those guys and played really well and we know the same thing about max duggins and all these other people so why not go play against pro level talent make money and then take your chance from that level to you know to the nfl it's better than jt daniels going play 25 year old football at rice like what how is he going to get better there and you know you talk about this and bennett he's playing that 25 year old ball against georgia well of course you better look good at 25 years old against 18 19 year olds so why not go challenge yourself against pro guys pro coaches and see how good you are and then maybe make your chance to jump into the nfl from that level so emory you believe and we actually got the release of the xfl schedule this week i'll be watching it in passing and i'm sure like most people i'll see the highlights etc we'll start to hear some names and you know we'll get a couple of guys who will make their way into the league you believe that the xfl will be an additional feeder for quote-unquote uh tweeners guys like stetson bennett you think that's a realistic possibility for the league if they want to sustain themselves they should be and i've said this before the xfl and usfl should be going after two separate types of people the xfl i think has the advantage because they play in february and they run through april early april so right before the nfl draft why not go after the young college players or the players in the transfer portal and therefore those guys use those 10 games to elevate their stock and then still have a chance to get drafted out of the nfl we saw this with uh i forgot the kid's name his last name was robinson in the xfl of 2020 where he was with the saint louis battle hawks balled out and trained and got drafted from the by the panthers to the nfl and the usfl should go after those guys that have been in the nfl for quite some time that are languishing on rosters i.e your jared stidham your nathan peterman those guys that have played maybe two three years but won't see anything above you know a qb3 or wire receiver six go play there play those 10 games and try to jump back into a training camp after you put out good take you saw what that has done for kavante turpin he turned the 10 game stint with the new jersey general into an all-pro season and a significant part of the dallas cowboys return game that's the type of talent you go after xfl go after the younger talent while the us will go after the young to mid-year talent the 24 25 26 year old talent okay wow emory hunt this is why you're the football expert here you're giving me another reason to watch the xfl i'm thinking about stetson bennett and then sure you're thinking about what the best case scenario would be for him uh if he and you know maybe his stock doesn't change all that much even if he wins another championship but the possibility that you presented i think would certainly uh garner him more attention than going into a training camp and just languishing and then sitting on a bench and maybe just being a glorified uh you know clipboard carrier for the next several years let me ask you this this final question uh how does tcu win we you you mentioned max dug in and i know they're running back yandere miller's busted up a little bit quentin johnson is big time how does tcu walk away with a victory in los angeles they gotta muck the game up they gotta bring georgia down to their level and and by that i mean do what you did against michigan you forced michigan to break tendencies they got michigan out their game on their first drop michigan drove down the field in the one big run then they got cute inside the red zone wanted to do the philly special and then you get down inside the red zone again which should have been a touchdown but then you try to run hand the ball off to a guy that hadn't touched it no more than nine times in the season and he fumbles the football so if you get georgia out of what they want to do the best way to do that is and it sounds easy but you got to stop the run you got to make this a setton bennett versus max dug in game the reason why i say you got to make it a session bennett game it's not because that's bennett can't wing it around the yard it's because georgia really doesn't have those dynamic dogs out on the perimeter like they normally have they're all tight in base their tight ends are legit elite however if you force them to make plays on the perimeter outside of the tight ends you got a chance and i think that's how tcu can win if they can stop the run force georgia go to their receivers instead of their tight ends it gives themselves a punching chain a puncher's chain against the georgia bulldogs yeah i'm i'm with you emery i think uh the bulldogs they're gonna go they're gonna go back to back and uh stetson bennett is gonna have a good old time when he gets back to uh to athens and at that point we can evaluate his next stop emery hunt has been joining us from cbs and cbs sports hq football game plan where can people follow you your commentary watch you on television all the great things that you're doing emery well follow me on twitter at a full game plan lock in on cbs sports hq you'll see me there tomorrow as well and keep it locked there football game plan youtube.com football game plan i'm on my all-star game circuit now so i'm at the college boudin showcase here in fort worth texas covering these college prospects performing in front of these nfl cfl xfl usfl scouts and you'll see all the video content practice highlights interviews on the youtube channel youtube.com football game plan so you'll see that this week the next week i'll be at the hula bowl and on so on and so forth so that's where you can follow me and get uh get soaked in with this content this draft content it's draft season at jr absolutely we're going to be tapping in with you you're a football expert you know everything from the the high school level the pro level just everything college and man you have coached you have you have done it all emery i appreciate you man thank you so much man appreciate you having me on no doubt about it it's the jr sport brief show here with you on cbs sports radio when you need to know what's happening it's it's it's time to get hit in the huddle you're fraudulent you're not in the business of winning football games you're in the business of trying to prove your own asinine decisions correct we can talk about the ursay thing do i think the saturday thing is the biggest joke in the history of the nfl i do but at least he was going to say this ain't working for me i don't care that i just gave him extensions listen to in the huddle available on the aussie app or wherever you get your podcast when you need to know what's happening it's it's it's it's time to get hit in the huddle this sham with steve kime out there in the desert i mean it's like no accountability never my fault it's never his fault stuff just happens losses just fall from the sky it's not cliff's fault it's not collard's fault it's not my fault it's not the owner's fault we just have really bad luck just hang in there and keep throwing money at us and we'll figure it out shut up listen to in the huddle available on the aussie app or wherever you get your podcast no one's more locked into the nfl than first and pod why is it not within the realm of possibility that geno smith was a victim of a horrible organization bad offensive coaching and then went and played behind three high level talents and only got spot starts and did okay by the way well because it's just it doesn't really happen that often anymore subscribe to first and pod on the odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast