Man Card

This is The Drive with Josh Graham Podcast. We are killing it online. Tune into The Drive weekday afternoons 3 to 7 on WSJS.

So glad to have you. On this Monday Drive, you are listening to WSJS News Talk Sports for the Triad, where our guests today are App State graduates. One, the head coach of the Mountaineer, Sean Clark. A conversation that, if you missed, already up on our YouTube channel. If you searched The Drive with Josh Graham, make sure to subscribe there. The other is our state's Pro Football Hall of Fame voter from Panthers.com, it's Darren Gantt who will be here at 535. And let's actually talk about those Carolina Panthers.

There's no way around it. Bryce Young's preseason debut didn't go to plan. It was mediocre.

This really shouldn't be seen as much of a controversial take, at least not this far. The Panthers lost to the Jets 27-0 after all. However, it's not Bryce Young's fault that Saturday did not go well. That was out of his control because, mostly, he faced too much pressure.

At least, most obviously, that's why things didn't go right. He was hit three times, including a sack on his last snap. That led to an offensive line meeting after the game.

When W.D. and I went into the locker room, we didn't see any of the offensive linemen. We later learned it was because James Campin and the guys got together to talk about that.

How they performed or how that type of effort wasn't going to be acceptable. And it's too soon to overreact to the offensive line. When you consider they were really good last year with many of the same guys who were back, yes, the sack came on the right side where Austin Corbett would have been if he's not hurt.

And they have rotating answers that they're trying to figure out for replacing him early on in the season. But give some credit to the Jets, too. It might have been more about the Jets than it was the Panthers O-line.

All the advanced analytics folks believe that the Jets might have the best defense in the NFL and they have one of the best fronts and some of the most depth that we see among defensive lines and defensive fronts. So Bryce faced too much pressure, which led to a lot of the drives stalling that we saw Bryce, those three drives. The other thing, again, isn't his fault, but it's something you have to bring up. It's the first time I ever saw Bryce Young play in person, and the size thing is real. It really stands out in person. It took some time to get adjusted to, well into the first series. I'm still looking at him stand next to people on the sideline rather than paying attention to when the defense is out there because I wanted to see just how he compares standing next to Brian Burns and Ikki Iquanu when the Panthers were introduced and ran out onto the field. The offense is as a unit, first person you can identify as Bryce, given how short he is.

That's again, not his fault. But when you talk about first impressions, I think about Cam Newton a dozen years ago when he faced the Giants in the first preseason game. A big part of the positive first impression was, wow, the size does translate. Wow. He is the size of linebackers.

This guy's going to be a problem. This was the opposite of that. But then again, he took the hits and took them in stride.

They still look scary. A lot of that because of how small Bryce is. If Bryce looked like Cam Newton, I don't think anybody is all that concerned about his well-being on that first row where the quarterback got drilled. Bryce got hit pretty good there. What's funny is W.D., Will Dalton, the executive producer of the show, he was filming video for whatever reason in the press box, even though the game was being televised.

Bryce's first row, the one where he took that big hit. And what you might not know is in the press box, it's soundproof and it's pretty quiet. Here's what it sounds like when a touchdown is scored. Here's what it sounds like when there's a big interception. Silence and a bunch of keyboard clacking. But when Bryce took that big hit there, this is how it sounded courtesy of W.D. 's Instagram video. Just a clear, that is not something we created. This was not. It sounds like what you might find. Generic gasp sound.

Like if you wanted to create it in a computer. But no, this is from video in the press box when Bryce took that hit. And a big part of the reason why is he looks very small, but he takes the hit like he took hits in Alabama. So when I asked him about it after the game, I thought this was a great answer where he said, hey, I haven't been hit since the Sugar Bowl. It's just a good reminder of how football is supposed to feel. I think as a quarterback, you know, you go like, you know, you go months and months without actually getting hit. And this isn't something that's new this year, but kind of every year, kind of the first time you get hit is like a cool, like, all right, cool, like, you know, it hasn't happened. But like, all right, I remember what it feels like, like we're back playing football. So, you know, yeah, it's definitely like, you know, the first time I've been hit since college. So, you know, you don't get the same, you know, tackling drills or full physicality that other positions get. So I think universally, you kind of every first hit you're like, all right, cool.

Like now we're back into the season mode. You've got to be built different to play football, man. Like you either like contact or you don't. And if you don't like contact, you don't play football. These people, Bryce Young saying, yeah, cool. Got hit.

Cool. That's how football feels. To spin it positively, as bad as it seemed for the Carolina Panthers, Bryce didn't make any mistakes.

Yeah, you would have liked to see more from Bryce, but it could have been a whole lot worse. Look at what all the other rookie quarterbacks did over the weekend. Look at the terrible pick that Anthony Richardson threw off his back foot. Look at CJ Stroud, his interception on one drive against the Patriots. Will Levis even threw a pick at the end of that Bears game. Bryce Young protected the ball.

He didn't try to force something. He didn't throw it to the Jets, despite all the pressure that was in his face. None of those picks, or pardon me, none of those hits he took, including the sack, or him holding onto the ball too long. Ball got out, went to the right places. He completed a few of them. He didn't make a big mistake. And when you're talking about a rookie against a good defense facing a lot of pressure, the fact there wasn't a big negative is a pretty significant positive.

His mediocre debut wasn't really his fault. On Twitter at WSJS radio, if you want in on the show, that's where we're streaming video in addition to YouTube and Twitch, however, and wherever you are listening or watching, we appreciate that. Well, Dalton, the executive producer of this show, WD and I going to a movie tonight after the show, going to the theater, either going to go see Barbie for the first time or Oppenheimer a second time in IMAX. You're leaning Oppenheimer a second time, yes? Yeah, I really enjoyed it. I did. I'd like to see it again. What do you think we should do?

Let me know in the comments below. Meanwhile, a week after holding up the Sam Snead Cup in Greensboro, Lucas Glover won the first PGA Tour playoff event in Memphis yesterday. And yes, it's huge for him personally.

And we had him on the show last week. It's easy to root for a guy, 43 years old, the oldest player to win on tour last week and this past week in two and a half years since Phil Mickelson won at the PGA Championship. But this was also a huge win for Greensboro.

And here's why. He used Sedgefield as a springboard. The popular belief the last few years that we heard for why many of the top golfers decide to take the Wyndham Championship off before the playoff is, oh, this is how you best prepare yourself for postseason competition, by resting, by taking that week off. Without playing such Sedgefield, Lucas Glover does not win yesterday. Now, there's the obvious reason that he needed to play well in Greensboro just to qualify for this tournament.

But the fact that he played really well in Greensboro directly led to him being hot and leading pretty much the entire way in Memphis. And here's the thing. It wasn't just Lucas Glover. Get this. Six guys that finished tied for sixth or better played the Wyndham Championship the week before.

I'll say that again. Six guys who were tied for sixth or better played the Wyndham Championship. Guys like Sung Jae-in and Russell Henley, a few to name. Players who played well and were in contention on Sunday. Meanwhile, the top two players in the world in golf right now, Scottie Scheffler and Jon Rahm, who did not play Greensboro, were non-factors this week. Didn't really hear much from them. And the reason why, they weren't really in contention. Tied for 31st for Scheffler, 37th place finish for Jon Rahm.

They are easily the two best players in the world right now. They took the week off. The guys who played the previous week, they did pretty well. So, hopefully this is something that Mark Brazel and Bobby Powell and Bobby Long and company can remind players of next year when they're looking to put together their schedules. Oh yeah, let's just take the week before the playoff off if we can. Let's just take that week off.

I don't know if that's best for you. If you're really trying to make a run to make a Ryder Cup or you really, you know, you want to start the playoffs right, maybe view that last regular season weekend in Greensboro as something that can be a springboard for you. Because speaking of the Ryder Cup, Lucas Clever might have just played his way onto the team.

Here he was when asked about it after his round and after his championship yesterday. Would you pick you? Right now, yes.

Playing pretty good golf and I think I'd be pretty good in the team room and be a good partner. So yeah, absolutely I would. It would require, unless he wins this next week or any of the next two weeks, him to be a captain's selection.

Maybe you ride the hot hand and give him a shot. That would just continue how amazing of a story this has been. And again, none of that happens if not for Greensboro.

They already had a great field this year and really the last few years with the playoff positioning and especially with the playoff cut changing from 125 to top 70. 15 of the top 20 or 15 of the top 50 players in the world golf ranking played Greensboro this year and it would have been 16 if Tom Kim was healthy enough to go. He was supposed to be there. A late scratch.

Who knows? Maybe that number gets even better when you consider what Lucas Glover did this past weekend. We certainly hope so. Will Dalton's team as we bring in the head mountaineer. Luke Combs is friends with and also going to be rooting for as many of us are as well. Sean Clark, the head App State mountaineer joining us at WSJS. And if the Orioles weren't leading the American League and winning crazy series like they did this weekend, I'd be wearing App State gear right now. But that doesn't mean this studio isn't well represented for App State stuff. For those who are watching on our video stream, Sean Clark, he delivered on his promise in studio.

He was going to give us some App State hardware in here. So we start this conversation with the thank you, Coach Clark. It looks pretty good in our new studio. I appreciate you having me on. It's always fun to be on your show. And you look a lot better with the Orioles shirt.

You have the overhauls. The last time I was in the studio. So no, it's a good time. We're having a lot of fun in the mountain right now. Football season's here. I think we're 19 days away and there's a lot of excitement in the air right now. And that's what I'm excited for. I mean, this is the time of year you live for.

And where can we get started? Bruce Gardner Webb here pretty soon. Let's get into your football team. In your first few years as head coach, it really felt like at this point in camp, we all had a good feel for what the identity of your team was going to be.

And a lot of that had to do with continuity. Then again, we're not at practice every day. We're not seeing what you see on a day to day basis. How good of a read do you have on what this team is in terms of its identity?

Or is that something that you discover later on? I think we have a pretty good feel of who we are. I guess the first time and since 2015, we're coming with a new quarterback that hasn't been in the program very long. And we go back to Taylor Lamb and Zach Thomas and Chase Bryce. Now you're breaking in either Ryan Berger or Joey Aguilar to be our starting quarterback.

And that's where it all starts. And we're going to be as good as our quarterbacks play. But you watch your team through practice and we're practicing through practice 10 right now. And I like who we are. I like who we're becoming. We're a very close group. Our kids love playing football.

And that's one thing here. This this this fall camp, we've never had to get our players about practicing and practicing hard. They're practicing with a purpose. This year is a reset year for us. It's not a rebuild.

I reload. We're resetting to get back to the standards of absolute football. And our kids know what's at stake. Our coaches know what's at stake.

And we have a big purpose right now. That's put our program back on postseason play and play for championships. What traits are separators to you, major separators when trying to figure out who your quarterback is going to be? Well, we talked about we have the three quarterbacks with Mason McHugh also, but we brought him in and talked to him. The person with the starting job is a person who can control or run our offense. They're the coach on the field, but really the quarterback who leaves our field, leaves our team down the field, scores touchdowns and doesn't turn the football over.

And that's really simple to say right now. But, you know, their quarterbacks tough and you're the hero, you're the goat. But the main the main theme is, you know, don't turn the football over for touchdowns and give us a chance.

Best chance to be successful. App State coach Sean Clark with us here on WSJS. As we've discussed many times in the past, the Sunbelt, it's been active in realignment and its approach has been valuing regionality, valuing valuing local rivalries such as the one that App State's had with Marshall and adding James Madison is a good regional fit as well. That seems to be the exact opposite of what we've seen the last few weeks with the way that the Pac-12 has been rated.

How has that news hit you? Well, I really haven't had much time to pay attention to it, but, you know, I think the Sunbelt is what college football is all about. I think if you look from a regional standpoint and regional rivalry, you know, I speak for our program, we will sell it every single home game this year.

We've already announced four and two more will be announced later on this this week or the following week. But any time you can travel to see your kid play college football week in and week out, it was a five really is a five hour window from boons or to our opponents who are going to play. And so I think Commissioner Gill really hit on the head and I'm very proud of Doug Gillen. Doug Gillen had a lot to do with the realignment of Sunbelt. And I think right now we're as a conference as a whole. That's what college football is about. And we all know it's about the bottom dollar and making money. But as far as filling stands, regional rivalries, you know, like-minded institutions, the Sunbelts at the very top.

But that news does touch everybody, at least in a certain way. And the way I think about it with App State is there's a misconception about the new playoff format that's going to begin next year. Some have interpreted the automatic qualifiers as being all the power five leagues, as they were called. They get automatic bids and then the best group of five conference champion will get an automatic bid.

That's not how it's written. The way that it's written is the six highest ranked conference champs get automatic bids. So it looks like as good as the Sunbelts been, regardless of what happens to the remaining schools in the Pac-12, you guys are going to be one of the five best conferences in college football, which means in all likelihood, the winner of your conference year to year is probably going to be represented in this new 12-team college football playoff format. The guys you're recruiting right now hope to be part of that playoff. Is that something you use already, this new playoff format, access to the playoff as a selling point for being at Appalachian State?

Without question. I think when you come to put win championships and now the new playoff format, you have a chance to compete for national championship if you're the very best in your league. I like the new playoff format because it does give you a chance.

Now you have to go out and you have to have some big wins. You have to win your conference and be relevant in the very end of the season, but it gives you the opportunity. If you go back to 2019, we would be right in the mix for it as we speak. In 2021, we're tending to it in the season. We're not a conference champs. We're ranked close to the very end there. It puts you in you're relevant now when you're talking the big picture of things. We talk about recruiting. Our players and our coaches know about it. Sean Clark with us here on WSJS. I feel like I already know the answer to this.

W.D. and I, we're going to go see Oppenheimer tonight for the second time. Did you get roped into either seeing Oppenheimer or Barbie in the last month?

No. My daughter wants to watch Barbie, but I have not. I let my wife handle that.

Thank goodness we're right in the fall camp. I was out of that equation. I didn't ask how it was, but I knew they went to watch it. Yeah. See, you remember it was you and your first wife, or not first wife, your only wife. It was your first date, right? You guys went to a movie, yes? Is that right? That's right.

That's right. I went to a dinner and went to a movie. I can't recall what the first movie was, but I know where our first dinner was.

As you can tell, former Office of Lyman, you know exactly where you eat at all times. That was a sales pitch, a nice dinner, a movie, and we went on our way. Well, then let me ask you this, since you haven't seen the movies that we're talking about here. When you're in the movie theater, what do you come equipped with? Ideal circumstance, what are you snacking on? What do you have on you? What are you drinking if you're at a movie theater?

Well, you know, I'm kind of a cheapskate in some ways. M&M's, they're $13 in the movie theater, so I might slide by the Dollar General store and pick up a pack of M&M's in my pocket. But other than that, you have to get the popcorn, extra butter, and of course, a large Coke there, in my opinion. W.D., you want to tell them? We've already got the candy.

We've already worked this out. He's already got the candy. The Sour Patch Kids for me. What do you get in the nerd ropes? These nerd clusters on clutch. It's like the nerds on a dummy cluster. It's changed the game, Coach.

With game plan. I'm a candy person. It's changed the game. I know all about the nerd ropes.

My wife has her favorite candy, so I know all about the nerd ropes. We've learned plenty today about Sean Clark. Okay, Coach, best of luck for Gardner Webb. You know how big App State is around here, so the time's always appreciated.

And best of luck against Gardner Webb, as you said, 19 days from now. Thanks for the time. I appreciate you guys having me on. Again, thanks for putting me on your program. And again, hello to all of App Nation throughout the Triad area.

So thank you again. You're on The Drive with Josh Graff. We'll circle back to the Carolina Panthers when Darin Gant joins us 15 minutes from now.

Pro Football Hall of Fame voter from panthers.com, but we've got to get to some rankings. Talking season's about over. Not this Saturday, but next Saturday. You have college football games. Week zero. Notre Dame facing Navy, for example, in Ireland. We've got high school football this week.

It's pretty much here, you guys. And the AP preseason top 25 is now out. And you want to know how useless the preseason poll is? Last year, 15 of the 25 teams that were ranked in the preseason were not ranked at the end of the year. And you had many teams that ended up not even going to a bowl game.

This is one of our best skills. Identifying the team and not taking the easy way out of just picking somebody who's 23rd, 24 for 25th. That isn't going to be any good. The team that everybody thinks is great, but isn't going to be any good. Last year, Texas A&M was that team. And they didn't go to a bowl game last year. Other than Clemson, the ACC gives us our best candidates for disappointing teams in 2023. Teams that are going to be underwhelming, giving where they're at in the rankings. Florida State's the top 10 team this year. They are ranked eighth. They're a spot ahead of Clemson, which nobody can explain to me how that happens. What is the argument for Florida State over Clemson?

FSU, yeah, they return guys, but so does Clemson. They have Cade Klubnick back. There's an upgrade over D.J. Uwe on the other way. They've added Garrett Riley as an OC, so that's going to be better.

It's certainly not going to be worse. They got Will Shipley back. They have dudes that defense is great. Am I wrong or did FSU lose three conference games last year? Clemson won the ACC. They haven't lost the Florida State since Jamis Winston was playing quarterback for them. And they're going to be ranked a spot ahead of the Tigers when they have to go to Death Valley this year. Please, FSU is this year's A&M, the team that's way over the hype, that hasn't done anything in forever, that is not going to meet that mark. And it starts with the fact that they're playing a team that legitimately can win a national title this year in LSU. LSU is a legit national title contender, and I don't think that first game in Jacksonville is going to go well for the Knolls.

The next team I look at is North Carolina. They check in at number 21. Now, let me be fair here. There is a clear drop-off point when it comes to the rankings. Somebody has to be ranked.

That's what you have to remember. Before you get mad at people for where they put a team ranked in the top 25, oh, my team should be in. Okay, well, do the rest. Do your own top 25, and you tell me who's good after you get past 15. You do that. So this is what happens at the media.

I'll take you behind the curtain a little bit. We tend to be lazy sometimes, us in the media. I don't know if you've noticed this, but the degree of analysis that some people might have in putting together their preseason rankings, well, which quarterbacks are back? Who am I hearing that's talked about a lot, and who's their coach? Do I like their coach? Do I trust their coach?

It's that simple. If you check those boxes, you've been talked about, you got the quarterback, you got a head coach that I know, and well, that's enough for you to be ranked in the top 25. North Carolina checks all those boxes. They're talked about. Drake May, top five pick. Mack Brown, we like him. That's how North Carolina gets ranked 10th in the country in the preseason poll two years ago, and now here they are at number 21. That schedule is just a gauntlet. It's brutal, those first six games, and then the last three. This looks like a seven and five football team as a result of that. There's so much change, and then you talk about that schedule, North Carolina bound to disappoint, and we'll include Notre Dame in the ACC for these purposes, because that's another team that I look at and think, you're 13th based on what? Last year, they didn't finish in the top 25. They had bad losses last year. Are we sure Marcus Freeman's a great coach yet? Are we sure of that?

Sure, they added Sam Hartman, but here's what we know here in Winston-Salem that maybe the nation does not know about Sam. He has one Achilles heel that's pretty obvious. When he plays on pretty big stages, he doesn't really play well. Like his worst games are on the biggest stages Wake has. Like when Wake's ranked in the top 10 last year, what happens? They go to Louisville and he throws a million picks on consecutive possessions. Wisconsin, bowl game a few years ago. Last game of the year, Wake four is trying to have a winning record.

It goes poorly. The biggest game he ever played in, the ACC championship game, he has a ton of picks. And now he's going to play Ohio State and USC with Caleb Williams and play for one of the biggest brands in the sport. And I'm supposed to believe, oh yeah, he's going to be ready for all of that. And he's going to thrive in that setting?

I don't know. I'm not saying he can't. I'm just saying I doubt it given that schedule and what we know about Sam and what we've seen. And the same thing with Marcus Freeman, who the jury isn't out on. So Notre Dame at 13, North Carolina at 21, Florida State at eight. Those are the three teams we have circled this year set to be underwhelming.

And who knows, might even be in a Texas A&M type spiral where they don't even play for a bowl game all together. Darren Gantt going to be here in just a bit. Can we really quickly get to this James Harden sound today?

He's out in China where they're having a basketball event of sorts. And then he airs out his dirty laundry with the guy who runs the Sixers Basketball Operations, Daryl Morey. Over the weekend, they said they stopped having trade talks with teams. They haven't gotten an offer that they wanted for James Harden, and James Harden's not happy with Daryl Morey. Daryl Morey is a liar, and I will never be a part of an organization that he's a part of.

Let me say that again. Daryl Morey is a liar, and I will never be a part of an organization that he's a part of. So pick sides.

Who you on? You on the player empowerment side? You on James Harden's side, or you on Daryl Morey's? I'm never going to play for another Daryl Morey team again. He's a liar.

Let's call them names. I'm on Daryl Morey's side. I don't know the entire story, but I know there's no star that's been worse for the NBA the last dozen years than James Harden's been. That dude has now demanded trades for three different teams, forcing his way out of the net situation, forcing his way out of Houston the first time, and now here he is with the Sixers?

Yeah. Other people have followed his lead, and that's bad for basketball, and if he doesn't get his way, he throws a tantrum. He either gets super fat and out of shape with the Rockets forcing a trade, forcing their hand, or now visibly and vocally throwing a tantrum. I'd love if one of the kids were like, who's Daryl Morey? Like, what?

That's what you're going to say to these kids? And also it's a reminder, Daryl Morey traded James Harden from Houston. He's already caved to his demands once after bending over backwards to surround him with talent, whether it be Russell Westbrook or Chris Paul and all these things that they tried to do to make that team good and leading to him winning an MVP, but that wasn't enough, and when he forced himself out, it probably was the beginning of the end of Daryl Morey losing his job in Houston. He did that to do right by James Harden, and now here we are again. You don't give me what I want. I'm going to trade you, and apparently the story goes he wanted to be traded back to Houston, but he didn't get an offer that he liked.

Daryl Morey. So he didn't trade him there, and now you're a liar because you said you were going to trade me, and I'm going to put you out on blast. So you can make the argument from a basketball standpoint, his style of play, all the iso ball and trying to force free throws. It's a cancer on the way that the game's played. That summed up with the way he handles himself off the court. There's no star that's been worse for the league than James Harden has. It's either him or Kyrie. You can take your pick on that. James Harden or Kyrie Irving. Who's been worse for the NBA over the last dozen years for basketball? Among stars. Those two. So I don't know the full story.

None of us do, but I'm willing to side with Daryl Morey a lot more than I'm willing to side with James Harden, given their track records. What should we take away from the offensive line struggles the Carolina Panthers had on Saturday? What is Frank Reich saying about this at practice today?

Darren Gantt will give us those answers when he joins us next. There are plenty of highlights from the weekend that we just haven't had time to talk about today with the Panthers preseason opener and Lucas Glover winning back to back weeks. Like, for example, the Basketball Hall of Fame speeches were this weekend. You talk about huge names that were inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. Dirk Nowitzki, Greg Popovich, who was up there with Tim Duncan and Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili. They were all up on stage with him and Pop had jokes talking about how one of the greatest joys in life, one of the greatest joys he has as a coach, is figuring out ways to get Tim Duncan to simply nod an approval at something that he says as a coach. He said that Tony Parker, the ways that he pushed him early on as a player, he would be arrested for today if he tried those things.

Oh boy, how basketball's evolved over the last 20 years. But the speech that stood out the most from Saturday was Dwyane Wade, who I didn't realize was a junior. He had the same name. He has the same name as his dad and he asked his dad to stand up and he had a lot of really heartfelt things to say. And he invited his dad on stage with him and they got inducted into the Hall of Fame together. That's the way that Dwyane Wade wanted it. So that was a highlight.

Another highlight was going to the Panthers game on Saturday and getting to see some old faces and catch up with some new ones, get to know some of the guys. We had a chance to tell JC Horn about the drop that he's made famous here in the Triad. Every single time something betting or gambling is referenced, we have the JC Horn drop that we play on this show. At first, I don't think he understood what we were talking about.

I don't either. I mentioned that, hey, on a mic, I said hot mic, that you told Brian Burns to send me that cash out, fam. And it was involving ping pong.

They said they haven't brought the ping pong tables back out yet. So JC is very excited about doing that when that time comes. Shy Tuttle apparently is tight with Robert Walsh. The moment I bring Robert's name up. Really? He's like, Robbie?

I didn't catch that part. When you get in Robert Walsh's midst, you never forget the guy and he's very lovable. We've come to learn he's doing very well down there in Nashville as the former producer of this show.

I wouldn't call a highlight the actual football itself. And here to talk about that with us is our friend Darren Gant from Panthers.com because one App State graduate isn't enough for today. We need to have multiple App State guys on. Sean Clark was with us earlier. Darren, I think you're the most noteworthy of the App State grads we've had today. What do you think? Oh, I don't know about that. Sean Clark's doing some amazing things for the university. We are grateful for all his contributions as a player and a coach and so many more.

I mean, when you're talking about a school with the illustrious academic history of Appalachian State University, surely I cannot be at the top of said list. Okay. You're going to enjoy this. I think you're really going to like this exclusive sound that we've obtained.

Oh, I like a good exclusive. Yes. So Will Dalton is a weirdo in that he is filming some like taking video of some of the plays that are happening. Bryce's first snap. Yeah.

Bryce's first snap. Even though it's on like they have television cameras and they have things of that nature. You're in the press box. Your phone isn't getting is it capturing that the way that it would on television where we're not in a soundproof when you're on TV.

But it does serve this purpose here. You won't because it's radio be able to see the video. You don't really need to because we're in a soundproof press box. You don't hear the crowd. What you instead hear when Bryce Young gets hit on his first completion is this.

An audible gasp that sounds like it's straight from a Hollywood like sound mixing room. That's what it sounded like, Darren. When Bryce took that hit, you guys were sitting down there near the TV guys on the wrong end of the box. Right.

You're not near us. Yeah. Yeah. That's really something that I feel like we're treating him in a way that he doesn't necessarily deserve. It's almost like he's a young puppy and we're just it's so adorable and we're all proud of him and want him to do so well. But if we think he's in danger, we we get nervous.

I don't know. No, I think Bryce, a big boy, you know, this just in the S.E.C., he got tackled every now and then. So he has been tackled before, even by large people, even by people who are in the NFL now. So I yeah, I think it's probably a little overdone, but that's just kind of the way we have talked about Bryce all off season.

You know, I think, you know, I was joking with somebody else. I did another radio spot and they said, what surprised you the most about Bryce Young? And I said, how much he's grown. He's a mountain of a man now. He's six foot five and two hundred and seventy five pounds, as far as you know.

So no, you're absolutely right. Like it's it's the frame. It's at every stage of this.

It's when he starts day one of camp. It's like, whoa, they traded up to the number one pick and gave up first round picks and they intend to play the guy. It's amazing.

Yeah, it's nutty. Who knew? And that's the thing.

And part of the reason I think Bryce just has is I think bemused is probably the best word for it. When people ask about height, he was a short quarterback in high school. He was a short quarterback in junior high. He was a short quarterback at Alabama. He has been a short quarterback literally all his life. I did enjoy it. The combine when he said I've been this size my whole life.

And my first thought was your poor mother. Darren Gant with us from Panthers dot com getting to the offensive line, which has been talked about a lot today. What have you learned about the offensive line meeting that happened after the game?

Who called for it? Oh, I mean, that was James Campin, man. That was y'all get in here for a minute.

He let Frank get done with him. And it was like, you know, when your parents give you one of these, you know, I remember when I was a small child out in in church, if I wasn't behaving, my dad would say, do you need to go outside? And the first time I thought, I'm getting out of church. It seems like a pretty good idea. And then I realized it was not a good idea.

So I said, no, I do not want to go. But it was a little bit like that. But anyway, it wasn't what they expected. It wasn't what they planned.

I mean, honestly, I think the culprits, it's easy. A lot of people have locked in on a lot of people have locked in on the right guard where they're still rotating guys through and trying to, you know, figure out who the starter is going to be. But he wasn't great the other night.

I mean, if you just watch him, it was not his best evening. And they kind of look to me like a bunch of guys who felt they're going to roll it out, play a series, get on out of there, put the bucket hat on and call it a night. But they didn't realize the Jets were bringing it. And Frank Craig mentioned that today. I mean, he said we played with such intensity in the joint practices earlier in the week that I kind of expected that to continue.

And it didn't really happen. So I think that was a little bit jarring for Frank to see it go that way. But listen, I mean, much in the way you don't want to overreact to Bryce Young being five foot 10.

Still, you don't want to overreact. I mean, this is still a group with Taylor Moten, who's basically played every snap for the last six years. Iki Iquanu was top five pick a year ago for a reason. You know, a really good group and Bradley Bozeman coming back and keeping everybody together. Now, are they going to miss Austin Corbett for the first, I don't know, amount of weeks? We're not sure about that part yet.

They will. But at the same time, still a pretty good group. And I don't expect it to be that same kind of free for all every time they walk out there. How many guys are in play to start at right guard? I would say right now the realistic list is probably four. I mean, when's the last time you remember four guys being up for a starting job on the offensive line with three or four weeks until the season? Part of the problem is two of them haven't practiced in the last week or so. I mean, Chandler Zavala has barely done anything since started training camp.

Nash Jensen, who I have taken to calling the young white Buffalo in homage to Andrew Norwell, the great white Buffalo, because he has very Norwellian tendencies about him, that young man. Those two were in the mix, but they didn't play the other night. And I think they've got a chance to get back in. And I think realistically, Cade Mays and Justin McRae are going to be on this team in some fashion. I mean, Cade can basically play all five positions if you need him to. That's got a lot of value, and I still think he could end up being the guy. McRae's gonna be on this team. I mean, James Campin's dragged him around. This is the fourth city he's had him. So I feel reasonably confident that Justin's got a role here just because he knows how to do all the stuff and and can be the kind of mentor other people need. And once you throw Zavala, I mean, if he can get himself well and get on the field, he's got an opportunity in a game this week if he plays to make a name for himself. I mean, I think on draft weekend they kind of envisioned him competing for this job.

He just hadn't been well enough to on a regular basis lately. What's the bet for ECU App State in a few weeks or about a month? I don't know. I've got a mason jar full of something from the high country that I would be able to put on the line.

If you have an appropriately equivalent honorarium, you would like to wager in gentlemen's fashion here. I will buy you some barbecue in your we could pick a place in Charlotte or I can get you some Lexington barbecue where we're at out this way. There's also some eastern type places around here. Prissy Polly's comes to mind in Kernersville or oh, shoot, I messed that up in where's that at, W.D.?

Kernersville. That's right. Yeah. You're not going to drive to Greenville and give me some parkers and bring it back or anything like that. Parkers is great.

That's the best spot. I've been telling Zokie this, who now is the voice of the Panthers for ECU Pirate Football also does stuff. Yeah.

Yeah. He I told him Sam Jones barbecue. That's the spot. But I don't know if that'll hold well going from Raleigh to Charlotte.

I don't know if that'll hold well. So I'll just pick we'll pick a barbecue place of your choosing if ECU loses or and I would rather light a candle than curse your darkness. If you can't get actual Greenville barbecue, a photograph of you in the little white hat from Parker's Barbecue.

I think that might satisfy the terms and conditions of this one. Yeah. Are they still wearing the little paper hats at Parker's?

They still do wear the paper hats. That's a good submission or or I have to do a radio show after consuming the contents of whatever's in that Mason jar. All right. Fair enough.

I feel like everybody wins in this bed. Darren, I'll see you in a few weeks. It was good to see you over the weekend. It's like, you know, it's like being off for the summer. Like I didn't sign your yearbook or anything like that, but it was good to see you. Yeah. Stay cool. Let's get the show going.

It's The Drive with Josh Graham. For those who are watching on YouTube, Twitter or Twitch, you could see I've got my Baltimore Orioles gear on today and contrary to popular belief, I'm not the type of person that shoehorns my favorite teams into conversation for the sake of doing so. I'm a Carolina Hurricanes fan, for example, but we're not going to spend a heck of a lot of time talking about the Canes unless they give us good reason to.

And in the last few years they have. The show is the longest running daily sports talk show in the history of the triad. The first three years that we were on air, really the first four, we didn't talk about the Orioles all that much because the Orioles didn't give us much reason to actually bring them up. So it's not one of those things where I'm going to talk about my favorite teams and that's what's going to make up the content.

It's just that they keep giving me reasons to bring them up on the show. And over the weekend, looking specifically yesterday, Greensboro's finest Cedric Mullins had the best inning that I've ever seen a player have. This is the greatest inning you might see a player have.

It's a high leverage situation. That's the terminology baseball people like to use when you talk about close games, games that feel like they have playoff atmosphere. It was sold out. It was Felix Hernandez's bobblehead night. They retired his number the night before or something like that. They honored him.

So a big crowd in Seattle who's pretty good this year. And the Orioles needed a great defensive play in the ninth. And they got it from Felix or from Cedric Mullins, who again, is from Greensboro, who made a catch at the wall. Here's how it sounded on Masson So they needed that defensive play to keep the game alive. And then in the next half inning, Cedric Mullins stepped to the plate and did this and Mullins drives this one into right field.

That's a fair, you know, that is deep. That is Cedric Mullins. Rob's a home run. Cedric Mullins hits a home run and the Orioles are back in front.

You kidding me? Cedric had, this is probably the greatest two half innings I've ever seen a player have. He brings a home run back, hits one foul and then comes back and hits a two run homer to get to where it was a two run lead. Have yourself a bomb in the ninth and top of the tenth. That won the game for Baltimore. About as good as you're going to get. Robbing a home run in center field. And then in the tenth inning, hitting a two run bomb.

That's pretty darn good. And he's from Greensboro. Also, by the way, welcome back, Kevin Brown, which gets to the other point.

They just keep giving me reasons to bring them up. There are big time national story. There's the local angle of Cedric Mullins. But OK, you also have the broadcasting fiasco or to use the WD word debacle from last week. And he gets back into the booth.

And how how are these games? Yeah, you have that yesterday. But the Orioles faced a starting pitcher who threw a nine inning complete game shutout. Or it would have been if the Orioles also didn't shut out the Mariners to went to extras in the Orioles, one one to nothing. So they faced a guy who threw nine shutout innings and still won the game. And then they won yesterday like that. They have a three game lead in the American League. So yeah, they've given us reasons to continue talking about them.

You're wanting to jump in, it looks like. Oh, I was just going to say there's no worse feeling than throwing a nine inning complete game and still losing. There's it doesn't get worse than that.

Doesn't get better, though, winning that game when you have a nine inning shutout. That's what I watched after we got back from Panthers Jets on Saturday, which speaking of which. Saturday was evidence that preseason football is just a giant waste of time. It's a giant waste of time. Other than W.D., nobody wanted to be there.

Nobody wanted to be there. Four p.m. kick. The players are like 93 degrees on turf. This is what we're doing. Everybody's just crossing their fingers and praying that no one gets hurt. I can't tell you how many people I walked up to in the three hours we were there before the game whose comment was, let's just hope this game ends without a weather delay or just make sure we get in and out of here. Let's just get this thing over with.

Nobody wanted to be there. It was bad football after the first quarter. My primary focus was what I was going to eat next. I gained like three pounds.

Not a joke. Based on what I ate in the press box. Had like two helpings of a buffet before the game. They had an ice cream machine that they turned on hot dogs at halftime. And then I thought I was going to leave that point after the game with that being all I ate. And then they said, hey, would you like some Bojangles Chicken Supremes? We've got that on buffet, too. Yeah, I think I will.

And I did. Yeah, that that was the highlight for me. The preseason opener for the Panthers. The food eating incredibly unhealthy and then seeing Ian Eagle beaming at W.D. at how many movies that he's watched this week.

He's watching Dodgeball. I am going to put this to the audience, though. So I already got the candy that I will be sneaking into the movie tonight that we're going to. We haven't fully decided, even though I kind of felt like I knew where W.D.

was leaning when we were chatting with Sean Clark. Oppenheimer or Barbie. We'd seen Oppenheimer before. This is a second time in IMAX. Barbie neither of us had seen yet.

The argument for Barbie is that we haven't seen it. Yeah. And it's a shorter movie.

And Dua Lipa is in it. Continue. It's an hour and like 54 minutes. So if that starts at seven forty five, hypothetically, we'd be out by 10 o'clock. We're going to go see Oppenheimer hypothetically at eight o'clock, which means we won't be leaving until like eleven thirty at night.

That's something you weigh. Also. So if you look at it that way, then you might see why you favor Barbie.

Barbie might be the choice. But the argument for Oppenheimer is it was so good. Well, yeah, it was good. And there's it's Nolan movie. So there's a lot of things to go back to.

But also. When it leaves IMAX, when you rewatch it, it's not going to be the same experience that you get like when you write when you watch Barbie at your home or whatever. I don't think you're losing a lot from the theater experience to your home. That would be the big argument for Oppie rewatching again. You know, I thought about that. I was like, OK, so whenever Oppenheimer comes out or streams, wherever it goes, like I wonder how much different it's going to seem.

It's going to be a good movie, but it's just not going to have that massive element that it does in IMAX. Sure. And but again, I'm still conflicted on it. So the argument's been laid out both ways.

3 3 6 7 7 7 1 600. Let us know what we should do in this circumstance before we get to Graham's grades. But getting back to preseason football real quickly, coaches aren't even trying. So why should we care? If coaches don't care, why should we care?

Like they don't run their stuff. Salah bench 20 starters. I mean, listen to Frank Wright spell out his preseason philosophy. I just know what our philosophy has been, what my philosophy has been in preseason. And when you're a new coaching staff, I just don't want to show too much. Some teams don't know the things we're going to do. And there's some of it.

I'm willing to take a look. I'm willing to take it on the chin a little bit in preseason to hide some things that we're going to do in the regular season. I'm willing to just lose games 27 to nothing in preseason.

Why? Because I don't want to show teams what we're doing. So we're just going to run a bunch of plays that are deceptive and just root for effort and pray that people don't get hurt. That doesn't seem like a good reason to have preseason game. So have more controlled joint practices. Coaches will like that more. Every team should get two, one in the robe, one at home, and maybe you can figure out a way to televise it. And networks can bid for that type of coverage. Bid on those joint practices, those broadcasts, and you can try to mitigate what you'd lose in terms of revenue for having those preseason games. Not having those preseason games.

There's some way you can figure it out. Let's go to Mike in Winston-Salem. Mike, you heard the arguments for Barbie, which neither of us had seen.

You've heard the argument for watching Oppenheimer again since it's an IMAX and you won't get that when it leaves theaters. What should we do tonight? Well, if you go see Barbie over there, I'm going to have to take your man card away from you. Really? That's what we're doing? Yeah, really. Come on, it's Barbie.

Yeah, I heard it's pretty good. What? Okay. There you go.

There's Mike in Winston-Salem. Apparently I'd lose my man card. So factor that into the calculus too. I'm not of the belief of that. See, I'm a big fan of watching rom-coms. I love rom-coms and I love Ryan Gosling.

I hear Ryan Gosling is really funny in this movie. So I don't know. Does that factor into your calculus at all that you might have your man card revoked? Do we still have man cards in 2023? If we do, you might get it revoked. Does that weigh on you at all? Not in the slightest. Oh, sorry, Mike.