Is Texas Back? (Hour 3)

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That's right. It is the Zach Gelb show coast to coast on CBS Sports Radio. We welcome you in across all of our great local CBS Sports Radio affiliates, Sirius XM, Channel 158, assuming they are airing us tonight because you never know, I get a lot of messages from people. I listen to the show on Sirius and after an hour or two hours, it cuts off and then there is this boring announcer saying, welcome to Sirius XM Radio for play-by-play. Listen to the Guardians up against the Royals on Channel 133 or something like that. So I've reached out to Sirius.

We've had conversations before. I like the people at Sirius, but they told me it's something with bandwidth, but I don't know. In the year of 2023, you would think that they would be able to air our show in its entirety. So if that ever happens and you're a Sirius listener, you could always tune into the free Odyssey app where you could find the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio and give us a follow on Twitter where I am always reading the cesspool of tweets or on Instagram where I'm straight flexing at Zach Gelb, Z-A-C-H-G-E-L-B. But we do have to welcome in a new affiliate and we would like to thank the folks at The Horn for welcoming us into their homes or their cars or on their cell phones each and every day. They will be airing the final two hours of our show.

So that's Monday through Friday. You could hear us on The Horn in Austin, Texas from 7 to 9 p.m. Central. So we'd like to say hello to everyone at The Horn that is hearing us potentially for the first time. And let's actually talk some Texas football right now because this is not just because we are welcoming in a new audience, but I am really curious. And I've said this before, whether it was Fosse Whitaker who joined us a few weeks ago, Brian Jones who I think will join us at some point this week, or even Ricky Williams who joined us a few weeks ago. Texas football this year, there's a major question. And the major question is are they back? And I know probably the Texas football fan is sick and tired of hearing that question because most of the time it does not take much for the Texas football fan or former players like Sam Ellinger to say, we're back. And a lot of times Texas football is not back. But this is the most excited that I've been for a Texas football season in a long time. And that's for two reasons. I know the Big 12 is adding the four new teams this year in BYU, Houston, Cincinnati, and UCF.

That's not why. And next year you're gonna see Colorado join the Big 12 even though you have Texas and Oklahoma leaving. But the future of the Big 12, which has been a major storyline, where we thought once Texas and Oklahoma were leaving, the conference was gonna crumble. They did a nice job adding the four teams that I mentioned. And then you've known in the last month, right, Colorado joins and then you're seeing Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah gonna be joining the conference. So yes, Texas is leaving, but it's can they go out with a bang in their final year in the Big 12 before they embark in a very tough conference in the SEC where you take a look. You have Georgia, you have Alabama, LSU just for this year, which I think the SEC could send two college football playoffs in, teams in the college football playoff.

We've seen that before. Last year it was the Big 10 that got two teams in. You may have two Big 10 teams and two SEC teams get into the college football playoff this year. But you look at the ACC, and I do lean Florida State over Clemson. But are those champions gonna have two losses?

If so, they could be in the outside looking in. The Pac-12, I think they're all gonna beat up on one another. But you look at the Big 12, there's a lot of parity this year entering it, where you have teams that you may like, but no one that you love. And you look around, I like the job that Chris Kleiman has done at Kansas State. Oklahoma, I think there's still a lot of questions to be answered with Brett Venables, who for years was the right-hand man of Dabo Swinney, and last year was a horrible season for Brett Venables and Oklahoma. You got Texas Tech, I like Joey Maguire. Joey Maguire is a good culture football coach.

Now, I like the energy that he presents himself with. TCU, they're gonna take a step back. They had a monster year last year. No one saw that coming. You had Sonny Dykes in his first year, even he was surprised. He said that on his show when they were like 4-0 or 5-0.

He would have never thought that would have been the case. But you lose Max Duggan. You also lose Quinnen Johnston. Naturally, they're gonna take a step back.

The question is, by how much? Baylor, Dave Aranda, who is a fun person to talk to. Dave Aranda, year one, super duper successful. Actually, he's never been there for three years. Year one was a struggle. Then year two, he wins the conference.

And last year, they didn't meet the expectations. Oklahoma State, always gonna be a player with Gundy, but we'll see what happens with their quarterback position. I was surprised Spencer Sanders left. Maybe he felt like he accomplished all he could at Oklahoma State and it was time to move on, but now he's in a QB battle with Ole Miss. Now, Leipold's done a nice job at Kansas. Matt Campbell, I've been out on at Iowa State. And ever since they didn't meet the expectations, and then all of a sudden, you look at Iowa State, when they didn't win the Big 12 that year, he's like, oh, that wasn't my expectations. That was your expectations.

I thought it was weak. And then you have the newcomers and it's like, okay, what is BYU gonna be able to do? They've been strong for the last few years. UCF, Houston, Cincinnati, and then you have West Virginia in last place and Neil Brown's gonna freak out about that one. But you look at this conference, even though Texas was by far and away the pick in the preseason media poll, and you get to see the first coach's poll that comes out today, and they're the first team from the Big 12 to be on there, when you do have Texas in at 12. And after that, the next Big 12 team is TCU. Anything short of winning this conference this year, and just cause you win the conference doesn't mean you're definitely gonna go to the college football playoff.

It's a difficult game to play. It's a disappointing season for the Longhorns. And you look at the Longhorns right now. This is a major year for SARC, but also it's gonna be one of the biggest stories in college football is what does Quinn Ewers do this year?

Cuz there's a domino effect from what Quinn Ewers does on a football field. And we all remember it. Last year up against Alabama, where they were in a great spot and about to make a major statement. And then unfortunately, he got hurt. And you had that idiotic tweet by Drew Brees like, he should keep on playing.

And then he missed some time. But Quinn Ewers came back and he proved that he belonged. And we know that he was a number one quarterback and leaves Ohio State and joins Texas and all that stuff. But there's a spot for Quinn Ewers. And I thought we were all expecting there to be this classic quarterback battle between Arch Manning and Quinn Ewers. And very early on, SARC comes out and puts all the distractions away and says Quinn Ewers is our guy for this season.

But you know this and I know this. If this Texas season doesn't go according to plan, or if early on Quinn Ewers unfortunately gets hurt again, or he doesn't live up to the hype, I know that you may think there's a long leash for Quinn Ewers, but there isn't. Now, the fascinating thing that comes out of this is if Quinn Ewers does not live up to where he should be, are they really going to go with Malik Murphy over Arch Manning? Because there's one thing right now for Arch Manning to be listed third in the depth chart and Malik Murphy to be number two in the depth chart. But if Quinn Ewers, let's say, if you have a Texas football team that's winning games, but you don't have Quinn Ewers playing great, we've seen that before in college football. Whether it was at Clemson, whether it was at Alabama, where teams have won and they've won games.

Remember Oklahoma? A few years back with Spencer Rattler and Caleb Williams, we've seen teams win games and still have questions with their quarterbacks. And if there's questions after a few weeks with Quinn Ewers at quarterback, what has everyone been talking about? They've talked about Arch Manning before even committed to Texas, and there will be loud cries to see Arch Manning play. And there's one thing for Steve Sarkeesian to say right now or list the depth chart that Malik Murphy's number two. If let's say Quinn Ewers got hurt, which you know wouldn't ever want to see that, but if you got hurt and then at halftime you put in Malik Murphy, that's one thing. But then if you can't play the next week, are you really not going to play Arch Manning?

And that's a fascinating question that I have. But you look at this Texas schedule this year, Rice to open up the season. Then you get a major test in Alabama. Then after that, you play Wyoming. If they beat Alabama in that week two, people are asking if Texas is back, if they beat Alabama in week two, and this Alabama team, it's weird to say that they're vulnerable, but there's questions about Alabama heading into this year. And they just had the number one and number three pick in the draft, and they weren't able to get to an SEC championship game this past year or even a college football playoff spot. If they beat Bama, that's going to be enormous for Texas and also enormous for Quinn Ewers. But after that, you get into your Big 12 schedule and you have a lot of teams that there's question marks about.

We talked about it. What's Dave Aranda as a football coach? We've seen a good year and then two bad years. Kansas, I like what Lightbulb's doing, but that's a team you should beat. Oklahoma, it's a big prove year for Brett Venables. Houston just joining the conference. BYU just joining the conference. Kansas State, you know what's wild with Kansas State? If I asked most people who won the Big 12 last year, most people say TCU, right? Because TCU was in the college football playoff. Now, Sonny Dykes, and I said this to him when he was on the show, I hand the ball off to Max Duggan at the end and you would have won the Big 12 championship game. But I've never remembered a conference champion like Kansas State with what they did last year.

And they're probably the least talked about conference champion ever when you look at the power five. And then at the end of the year, we'll see how far TCU takes a step back. Iowa State's going to be dreadful. And then Maguire always gives you, for what he's done in a short sample size, you know that's going to be a solid football team in Texas Tech.

But no sure thing. So outside of Alabama, and Alabama's not even a sure thing this year, but they're still Alabama. Bare minimum, they're going to be the second or third best team in the SEC. And personally, I know that didn't reflect in the coaches' poll, I would have put LSU in front of Alabama entering the year. You look at that schedule, it kind of shows what the Big 12 is in Texas's and Oklahoma's final year in the Big 12.

There's a lot of question marks. And when you look at this Texas team, and when you're picked to be the Big 12 champion before the year starts in the media poll, you have to find a way to deliver. Because just for bare minimum, anything short of winning the Big 12 this year for Texas is a failure. And if they don't win the Big 12 this year, I'm not saying Starks City get fired. Because I really do believe that after this year, either Quinton Ewers plays himself into the NFL or Quinton Ewers is not going to be the starting quarterback of the Longhorns.

Probably Malik Murphy does transfer, because there's going to be a spot somewhere for him to start. And then next year, barring him somehow get on the field this year, it's the start of the Arch Manning era. And I do think at the worst case for Sark, even if this year does not meet up to where they should be, going into a new conference, also Arch Manning committed to you, is going to get him another season.

But it only gets tougher from here. And if you can't in your final year, and if you can't in your final year in the Big 12 win, well, it's only going to get tougher in the SEC. And I know why Texas is going to the SEC. You know how much more money there is to gain when in the SEC, but we've seen Texas now for a long time struggle in the Big 12. You better get the job done this year and have some positive momentum heading into the SEC, because we know those fans are always going to be there.

We know those fans are always going to be crazy. And I mean that in a good way. The future of your program with how competitive the SEC is, we don't know what you're going to do in that conference, because you haven't done a good job recently in the Big 12. Now it's put up or shut up time for this Texas football program and for Sark. And you look at that schedule this year, the Big 12, they're going to beat up on one another. But there's not a team on your schedule heading into this year. And I include Alabama in that, that you look at Texas and say, Texas can't beat them. That doesn't mean they're going to be undefeated. That doesn't mean they're going to beat them all.

But when you look at that schedule, there should be a lot of wins in that column. And if they're not, all this talk and hype, talk and hype, it's going to turn quickly and it's going to get ugly because the Texas football fan is a great football fan. And you know, if the Longhorn Faithful is not seeing a product that they like, they're going to be a lot of people.

And I don't blame them that I'd be bitching this year. Now, I will say as I sit here on the seventh day of August in the year of 2023, if I had to give you what remains of the, well, I guess it's like the last year of the Power Five because the Pac-12 is about to fade. If I had to tell you right now who I think is going to win the five Power Five conferences and their conference championship, SEC, I'll go with Georgia.

They deserve the benefit of the doubt until someone knocks them off. Big 12, I will take Texas. I will buy into the Texas hype and I usually don't.

So shame on me if I end up have an egg in my face. Pac-12, USC, their offense is incredible, but I still don't trust their defense. So I'll go with Washington.

I just hope Michael Penix can stay healthy because you saw last year what happens when he does. The Big 10, I will go with Michigan and you get McCarthy back, you get Coram back, you get Donovan Edwards back. And then in the ACC, I think it's two team race between Florida State and Clemson, I will lean Florida State over Clemson. So right now in the Power Five, I have Georgia winning the SEC, Florida State winning the ACC, Texas winning the Big 12, Pac-12 Washington, and Big 10 Michigan. Give me a team in college football that you're really curious to see how we're going to be talking about them at the end of the year.

855-212-4TBS, 855-212-4227. Texas to me is one of the more intriguing teams in college because they have everything that you could want outside of in recent years, the wins on the football field. Passionate fan base. You look at some of the talent they have at quarterback and they have a conference that's winnable this year. If we're talking about Texas at the end of the year in a bad way, Steve Sarkeesian better be looking up at the football gods and praying that Arch Manning is going to be like Peyton and is going to be like Eli. Or else a year from now, when that season gets underway and that season plays on out, we'll be talking about how Sark is on a hot seat. But go get some positive momentum here.

Add it into the SEC and go win a Big 12 championship in your final year in the Big 12. This is Zach Gelb's show on CBS Sports Radio. We will take a break and when we do come on back, we got to update you on some of the biggest stories in the world of sports with some audio. We get to the news brief and also NFL general manager, second year with the Giants, Joe Shane will join us coming up at 9 40 p.m. Eastern, 6 40 p.m. Pacific.

Soak in baseball is boring. Listen on your Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast. You'll be glad you did. Now back to the Zach Gelb show. Time for your daily news brief. We get you caught up on the rumors, reports and reconnaissance from the day in sports.

All right. News brief time on CBS Sports Radio. Let's get to Jamar Chase, who was talking to the NFL Network, and he was asked about when Joe Burrow should return.

And he had an interesting take with Joe Burrow having that cast rate. I told him to I told him that with all honesty, I don't want him there. You don't want him to play.

I want the same thing with me, Mom. Last week, 20 exactly. Exactly. You know what I'm saying? And I set out an extra game just to let my hip all the way hill up.

And, you know, you don't want to cause no other problems later on in the season. And I told him, as long as you're there after week five and on, you know, we're good, brother. What did you say to that?

I'm sorry. Did he did he respond to that? I mean, he just told me, you know, he's gonna see how he feels when the time comes. You know, he doesn't know when he'll be back, but, you know, he'll be back soon. Now, he suffered that calf strain going back on July 27, Joe Burrow. And I think we all remember the video where we saw him get carted off and everyone was panicking. And then Zach Taylor said, it looks like everything's going to be OK.

Here's the thing. I'm not saying he should definitely sit out week one. You don't need to make that decision yet. But what Jamar Chase is doing and you know how close Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase are going back to their days together else, he was saying, like, don't feel rushed to come back because we got to remember that this NFL season, it's a marathon, not a sprint. And as long as Joe Burrow is upright at the end of the year, well, the Bengals are going to have a shot. I'm not saying he should sit week one. If he's healthy, you play him. But he shouldn't step on that football field until he's 100 percent.

Let's hear more. So you had that Jamar Chase clip on the NFL Network and then he was asked more about it in media availability the next day. They were wondering, did Jamar really mean that, that he doesn't want him to play week one?

Yeah, I 100 percent mean that. Is that anything to do with where Joe is now or you just want him to play it safe? I want him to be 100 percent healthy to play. I don't want him rushing nothing. I don't want people in his ear telling him to play a certain time. I just want him to be healthy. And that's not me telling him to play this certain game.

It's just that's me saying be healthy when you're back 100 percent healthy. And you're talking about the regular season. You're not just talking about preseason. He shouldn't see the field during preseason. Would this team be okay?

Do you think if he did miss time in the regular season? I don't think nobody wants him out. He's talking about, I mean, we'd be okay as long as he's there for the end of the season. You know what I'm saying? We're worried about the bigger picture, not the small picture here. That's where we're trying to win. So as long as he comes in around the season that we need him, then we're going to be okay. Your comment was just don't rush back.

Don't come back. Yeah. You know, y'all always blow stuff out of proportion. That's why I gave y'all the answer.

I find it funny. You guys always blow stuff out of proportion. Sometimes he's right on that. Sometimes he isn't. They didn't blow anything out of proportion here.

You said what you said. But in this case, what he's basically saying is I don't want you to play week one if you're not healthy. If he's 100 percent healthy, I guarantee you this. He'll be on the field.

I think Jamar knows, though, the competitive spirit of Joe Burrow. And a lot of times in the NFL, they leave it up to the player where the player probably shouldn't play. But they're like, yeah, you're good enough. So it's up to you. It doesn't make sense if he's at 80 percent to play him come week one. But with the capture and I'm not a doctor, I won't pretend to be a doctor. That happened on July 27th. You would think you should be right in line to be ready for for week one up against the Cleveland Browns.

But we'll have to wait and see. So a lot of times in sports, I always laugh where you always have people do the whole be back bro kind of dance where you're getting ready to fight. But then you then when you're charging at someone, you wait for a teammate to engage with you and then hold your shirt and pretend as if they're preventing you from getting to someone else. Well, you had a situation go down between the Guardians and the White Sox, where Jose Ramirez is sliding into second base. And I guess he didn't like the tag that was put on him from Tim Anderson.

And I didn't have a problem with the tag when I first watched it. I did think it was an overreaction by Jose Ramirez at first. But then Anderson puts his fist up like let's be like hockey players, drop the gloves and let's go.

And sometimes if you're the guy that wants to fight, you get hit, you get hit hard, and then you get embarrassed and knocked out. And that's what happened with Tim Anderson. And the suspensions come out today. Ramirez gets three games and Anderson gets six. And at first you may say like I did.

Oh, what's the difference here? Why should Anderson get more than Ramirez when Ramirez was the one that was annoyed? It was Anderson who put his fist up first.

So starting that fight ended up getting to more games. But out of all this, it's the great play by play call from Guardians Radio with Tom Hamilton, the legend. You gotta hear his call of Tim Anderson going up against Jose Ramirez. So sometimes you get a moment like that. And since it's the craziness shock, so you don't give a great call in the moment to basically do the down goes Frazier with down goes Anderson.

That is a great call by a legendary play by play man in Tom Hamilton. Alrighty, college football has been the biggest story. We finally found this out, even when it looked like there was some reports saying the opposite would happen. Washington, Oregon off to the Big Ten starting next year. You also, and we already know, right, USC and UCLA leaving the Pac 12 to go to the Big Ten, Texas and Oklahoma leaving the Big 12 to go to the SEC. The Big 12, we've already seen new four teams coming in this year. They're also going to add next year, Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah.

Let's listen up to the president of the University of Arizona, Robert Robbins. And he talked about how the Pac 12 was close to surviving. But another president that notified him about their school's move to the Big Ten.

And that's when it ended the end of the day. You know, we were I think we were all expecting Friday morning. We were showing up together to sign and blood our grand rights over to the to the Pac 12 conference. And, you know, we were notified by I guess they must have split us up. I got called.

I won the presence and said, Look, this is tough. But we we came to an agreement with the Big Ten, you know, 10 minutes ago. And I just want to give you heads up before we get together as presidents and chancellors that will be will be taking our talents to the Big Ten. So here's the part of that. Sometimes when you divorce, you want to look like you were in the right here, because you know that there's going to be some fan bases, the remaining four teams, like who cares in the Pac 12, they're going to be annoyed at you, but you never want to look at you're the person that is why that this marriage ended.

Is anyone buying the Arizona president when he's like, Oh, yeah, we expect the next day to just show up and and there we go. We would all be, you know, together signing with Apple TV at Washington and Oregon leaving. They would have been the two dumbest schools in the history of college football if they didn't elect to join the Big Ten. Because if Colorado was able to leave the the the Pac 12 and go back to the Big 12, you don't think other schools would have been picked up by the Big 12 in the Pac 12. And eventually you did see that with Arizona, Arizona State, and also Utah.

So Arizona, they could say what they want. We all know that this was the best move for them because there was no stability in the Pac 12. And it's like this great long term stability in the Big 12. I don't know what the Big 12 is going to look like. But you had two ships that were sinking after Texas and Oklahoma announced they were leaving the Big 12 to go to the SEC starting next year. And then USC and UCLA followed saying they're going to go to the Big Ten. And the Big 12 find a way found a way to get that ship back to shore and have it sail again. The Pac 12 was like the Titanic.

And now everyone is jumping off and going to other places for safety. Let's hear one more from the Arizona president how he talked about I thought so funny analogy, how the Pac 12 Apple subscription was not economically feasible. And it was going to be like selling candy bars for a little league or for when people ask you to sell Girl Scout cookies. So parts of it were very, very compelling and exciting. And it was Apple.

And it was, you know, in our backyard. And but I think that the base price, the guaranteed price, the fact that there was no linear and that it was subscription based. None of us, you know, we were trying to think, well, it's gonna be like selling candy bars for a little league or, you know, Girl Scout cookies.

I don't know. But you get my point. You've got to convince three to 5 million people every year to sign up for $100 a year to watch on streaming only F. I think I think, you know, if you're asking Oregon and Washington, they came to the conclusion that that may not be the best deal. And when when they had opportunities for other deals, I think, again, not blaming anybody, they made the best decision that they thought was in the interest of their university.

And I will never fault anybody for doing that. So here's the thing from that. I like the analogy because I think everyone in an office setting has been there where a coworker goes, oh, buy the Girl Scout cookies or all my kids little league team is selling candy bars. And pretty much that deal with with the Pac-12. Yeah, they would get a base that they would automatically get.

But then the more subscriptions of schools got, the more money the schools would make. So that is actually a spot on analogy. The only thing that I don't understand that I know we now live in a world where everyone like is afraid that they're going to say something that is not politically correct. Is the term Girl Scout cookies now like not allowed? I'll tell you this.

But my brother in law, his niece, Olivia, every year I get an email about Girl Scout cookies and every year I buy the Girl Scout cookies. So I don't know if that's not allowed to be said, but it was weird how he said that. Let's hear the head coach at Washington State talk about how money has hurt college football and its regional rivalries.

I think it hits home. You know, I talked about rivalries yesterday. I'm going to think it's the end of the Apple Cup. You know, to think it's the end of the Civil War.

I don't even know if they can call that that anymore. But at the end of the day, you know, what's it worth? I understand business. You know, I understand change.

Everyone's got to change and we got to adapt and watch you will find its way. We have for one hundred and some years. It stinks. Don't get me wrong. When you have a lot of these rivalries going away and when teams leave conferences, you know why those rivalries do go away. It's because you play a certain amount of conference games. And then after that, you for a lot of these schools, they try to schedule cupcake games for the non-conference games to boost their win total. And I'm sure right. If Washington State was added to the changes, they wouldn't be bitching about it today.

But they were the person that was left out. Sure, it stinks. A lot of these rivalries are going away, you would think, but it's following the money and the geography part of it. When we saw the Big East breakup, when you go back to basketball, that was kind of one of those things where you understood and football drives the train and has nothing to do with how close you are to proximity.

It's about what conference can you go to to get the most TV money? Let's hear from Nick Saban, head coach at Alabama. He isn't thrilled about the realignment in college football.

Look, I did not hear what anybody's comments have been about this. Look, there's a lot of traditions that we've had for a long time in college football. And I think we're in a time of evolution for whatever reasons.

And some of those traditions are going to get sort of pushed by the wayside, I think. And it's sad. And once again, he's not wrong, but you did have the SEC and I know Alabama doesn't speak for all in the SEC. They did add Texas and Oklahoma. And finally, I thought this was the most spot on because a lot of coaches are just afraid to give you the truth. Deion Sanders, where you have Colorado leaving the Big 12, I mean, leaving the Pac-12 and going back to the Big 12, he gave an honest assessment about everything that's going on with realignment in college football and explain what the big reason is for it. Same teams are talking about us, right?

He's right. It's all about money and all the Pac-12 teams that were bitching about Colorado going back to the Big 12. It was like Dan Lanning at Oregon. He was like, what did they want? Who cares? And then Oregon goes right to the Big 10.

It's all about those schools securing the bag and getting the most money possible. All right, that's the news brief. This is that Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. We will take a break. Actually, before we do that, I got to go to Rich Ackerman about something. So I don't know if you've seen this yet, because I know you're on social media, but I wouldn't call you a big social media guy.

I think you've even told me the moment you retire, you're going to delete all social media. Yes, but I'm on it all day here. Did you see the photo of Hot Take Hickey from his bachelor, not his bachelor party, but he was at a bachelor party this week. I did not. I don't know if I follow Hickey.

Oh, wow. You see Hickey every day and you don't follow him? I haven't even thought about it until you just mentioned it. Axe like, I've been here for so many years. Gelb, you think I'm really following Hickey and seeing his ridiculous sports tanks.

I love that. So Hickey's a good looking guy, right? Usually has a beard. He shaved. I asked him if he was going to shave.

I said, the beard is a little hot out there. He shaved. Now he's been against shaving for a while because he says that he looks horrible when he does, you know, when he gets a clean shave. He partially shaved. He shaved one side of his face. Has a mustache now.

Okay. Now I'm going to go. He must look like Carlos Rodan. Let me tell you, Hickey right now, and I said this earlier, if I was walking in the desert of Arizona and I saw him with his hat on and the sunglasses and the mustache, I would be afraid for my safety.

And I would call 911 because he looks creepy. So I had this on my phone. I'm going to reveal to act right now. Your thoughts.

Oh, you're going to shave, shave it all. I love this reaction from Mac. Cause I know what act is saying on the air is like giving you the impression. Ooh, that's bad.

Ooh, really bad in his mind. He's like, what the bleep is this moron doing? And that's why you don't follow Hickey on Twitter.

It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS sports radio. And we'll see if Hickey, we will be back from a bachelor party tomorrow. We'll have the mustache. Do you think they'll have the mustache or will he shave it all off? How's the mustache? Oh, wow.

Okay. And act those Hickey. Well, even though he doesn't follow him on Twitter, so we'll see tomorrow. We're placing bets. You could hit us up at eight five five two more CBS. If you want to chime in on the Hickey stash and I will put the photo out there on the good old cesspool of Twitter at Zach Gelb, Z-A-C-H-G-E-L-B. Now back to the Zach Gelb show. All right. Zach Gelb shows CBS sports radio.

You can think around the auto parts where your car care needs guaranteed low prices and excellent customer service from the professional parts people at O'Reilly Auto Parts. You know, I'm very curious to see who the rookies are at the end of the year that we're really praising, especially on the offensive side of the ball. Like last year, Garrett Wilson with no quarterback had a wonderful season. We've seen Jamar Chase as a rookie have a monster season. I know he didn't win Rookie of the Year, Justin Jefferson, but he had a great first year. Justin Herbert, Kyler Murray, Saquon Barkley, Alvin Kamara, Dak Prescott, Todd Gurley, Odell Beckham Jr.

The list goes on and on and on in the last 10 years or so. But you go into this year and here are some rookies on the offensive side of the ball that I'm just curious what they're going to do. Like you look at Bijan Robinson. I know Tyler Algier had a really good season last year and they're going to use Bijan not only run the football, but catching the football. I don't love taking running backs early in the draft and in the first round unless that's the last link that you have and you look at it, you have such a well-built team, it can only help you.

The Falcons have a lot of holes, but that division stinks. And I do believe as long as you can get average quarterback play with guys like Kyle Pitts and Tyler Algier and Drake London and Bijan Robinson, that you could go win that division because eight and nine may win that division once again. And we know that Bijan Robinson was perceived to be one of the better players in the draft.

The only reason why he went at eight was because running backs going early. Yeah, they go on and have good careers, but how many backs in the league now do we see go second rounds and later and end up having dominant careers? Whether it's a Nick Chubb or a Derrick Henry or Alvin Kamara and the list go on and on and on we consider all day. You know, Ezekiel Elliott, he went in the first round, now he doesn't even have a team. Saquon Barkley on and off healthy, then injured. And you look at Christian McCaffrey, he's been great when he's on the field.

So you look at a lot of teams that take running backs, they go on and have good careers, but how many teams take a team second round later and with the nature of the sport running back by committee end up finding some gems? And I look at Aaron Jones or even Austin Eckler who was undrafted and is one of the better running backs in the NFL. Bryce Young, I just talked about how bad the NFC South is. I don't love the Panthers offense on paper, I love their defense. I like the Panthers offensive line, which is big for Bryce Young, but you see the rest of the offense.

Miles Sanders I think is overrated, wide receivers, you don't have a number one on the roster. But here's what I love about Bryce Young, two years ago he won the Heisman. The year after that, Bryce Young I thought was more impressive than his Heisman winning year. And I know he didn't win the SEC, I know he wasn't in the college football playoff, but Bryce Young outside of Jamir Gibbs did not have much in the offensive side of the ball at Alabama. And Bryce Young was never a reason why they lost the game. So you look at Carolina, solid coaching, not great coaching, but solid coaching. Guys that really are centered around the offensive side of the ball, it's not as if they have an abundance of talent there on the offensive side of the ball, but you have a good old line. Would it be crazy if Carolina wins eight games this year and wins that division?

No, it would be not. I don't think either of these teams are going to be playoff teams, I think they're going to be both bad, but Anthony Richardson and CJ Stroud are both going to be really fun to watch. And Stroud, he was disappointing last year, but had his best up against Georgia. And Anthony Richardson, everyone keeps on talking about that potential, I want to see what he could do in year one.

And if he could show some signs of putting it together with the Indianapolis Colts. Jamir Gibbs is going to be massive for the Lions, he needs to be. With Williams no longer there, Swift no longer there. I know they brought in another running back, but you draft the running back at 12. I thought Gibbs could have gone in the first round and never thought it would have been in the top 15.

I didn't think it would be in the top 20, if I'm being honest with you. Dalton Kincaid, I still think, and hey, James Cook's having big this year for Buffalo running the football with them losing motor Singletary. But you look at Kincaid, a lot of people don't understand that draft pick. They throw the football a ton. They put the ball in Josh Allen's hands a ton, whether he runs it or he's the one throwing it. I love Kincaid going back to Utah, and I think he could have a monster, and I mean a monster rookie season, because they need another piece in Buffalo. He has the fond digs for Josh Allen to throw the ball to, and then it's also like, okay, Gabe Davis at times has been really good. You look him and Dawson Knox lining up.

I think that's going to be a damn good connection. I'll give you two more rookies here. I thought the best receiver in the draft was Jackson Smith and Jigba.

He lands in Seattle. Now you got a ton of talent there when you look at Lockett and also DK Metcalfe, but I love JSN. And then also I like Quentin Johnson a lot from TCU, and it's just can he stay healthy? And the same thing for Jackson Smith and Jigba too, as you saw last year. But you look at Quentin Johnson, it's similar to what Seattle has. Now the Chargers have better quarterback, but in terms of you look at the Chargers, they have Keenen Allen, Mike Williams, both guys that struggled to stay on the field, and now you had Quentin Johnson into the fold. Both those wide receivers I'm very high on.

So those are some offensive rookies that I'm just wanting to see how we're going to be talking about them at the end of the year. All right, we'll take a break here on the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. When we come on back, we do this segment every Monday and Friday. If you're new to the show, it's called Five Questions, Five Answers.

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