Dolphins Will Lock Up Tua To A Long-Term Deal (Hour 1)

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For all terms and limitations, visit FelixCatInsurance.com slash terms. I'm Kate Abdo, the host of Kicking It, a new weekly show from the CBS Sports Galasso Network, where Clint Dempsey, Charlie Davies, Mo Adoo and I connect with the biggest personalities from global soccer and beyond to learn about their journeys and what makes them tick. This is the place for football fans to hear unfiltered conversations with the game's most familiar faces.

So what are you waiting for? Follow and listen to Kicking It on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. Live from the play show, yet not overly ostentatious, studios of CBS Sports Radio here in beautiful New York City, sitting on top of the 10th floor of 345 Hudson Street. Welcome on in to a Thursday edition of the Zach Gelb show across all of our great local CBS Sports Radio affiliates, Sirius XM, Channel 158, the free Odyssey app, and of course, streaming on YouTube. 855-212-4CBS is numbered to jump on in. 855-212-4227. You could always get at it. You can contact me on Instagram, where I'm straight flexing, or via the good old cesspool of Twitter, at Zach Gelb.

That's Z-A-C-H-G-E-L-B. Got Moist Mike, Stuart Kovacs, rocking a roll with me all the way up until 6 p.m. Eastern, 3 p.m. Pacific. Joining us at an hour from now at the top of the hour, Danny Connell, and then at 5 p.m. Eastern, 2 p.m. Pacific, a man that will be coaching in the college football playoff up against Texas, the head coach of the Pac-12 champion, Washington Huskies, Kaelyn DeBoer will stop by.

But I got to start the show with Tuatunga Vailoa. So we've seen a lot of people start to move on from Dak Prescott. But when Dak Prescott makes $40-something million a year, I don't think anyone expects Dak Prescott to be this elite great quarterback. And really, for Dak, the big win was this year when there was a three- or four-week stretch where a lot of people were starting to say, oh, maybe Dak's going to be the MVP. Oh, this is going to be Dak Prescott's year. And then you get humbled and you get a reminder of who Dak Prescott is last weekend up against Texas. And then you get the big win against the Buffalo Bills where when it's starting to trend that he's on the verge of having a great season and he's on the verge of being a top five quarterback and an elite quarterback in this league and someone that you think, oh, you could go win a Super Bowl with, it crashes and it burns in a bad way and it happens very quickly.

With what you saw up against Buffalo where the team only put up 10 points and they look like they didn't even belong up against a team that's had their own problems in their own right in the Buffalo Bills. So there are quarterbacks now that get paid more than they should, but let me be clear when I say that, I'm not telling you that they don't deserve the money because you get what someone is willing to pay you. Whether you think that person is worth the money or not is a different conversation, but the biggest dilemma and the biggest problem right now with the quarterback position is we pay the good or very good quarterbacks elite money. And when you get paid elite money, fans should have elite expectations and there are going to be more and more quarterbacks that are good or above average and that are deserving of a big pay raise and a big contract where after you pay it, you're going to look back in a few years and go, hmm, was it really worth it? But you could only go with what the market is and it seems as if every quarterback that gets a deal, it resets the market. Like look at Kyler Murray. Kyler Murray has potential to be a star in this league, but right now Kyler Murray is just a good quarterback and someone that was coming off an injury, but he had really, I thought no leverage. And then the organization at the time extended Cliff Kingsbury, extended Steve Keim, and then if you were going to extend the guy that drafted and the guy that coached Kyler Murray, how wouldn't you give Kyler Murray a new deal? So Kyler Murray, even though he probably, when you look at the way that he plays, isn't a 40 something million dollar quarterback, he got that big time money.

And once one domino falls for just a good player, all the other good players are going to say, well, I'm going to talk myself into that and I'm going to get that deal. And if you don't want to pay me and you want to go down this franchise tag road of two years, alright, I'm going to get a crazy salary for two seasons and then somebody else will want my services. Because that's the biggest problem when it comes to paying these quarterbacks, you may know giving someone 40, 42 million dollars a year that they're probably never going to live up to those expectations.

But what are you going to do? And I know that it didn't come down to necessarily only money with the Patriots, but like I know that's the extreme with Tom Brady leaving New England. It's not easy to find that replacement. Drew Brees, retiring, moving on from the Saints, it's not easy to find that replacement. And that's the extreme, like those are two of the greatest quarterbacks to ever lace them up. And look how conflicting of emotions there are when we talk about good quarterbacks, because I don't think anyone believes Dak Prescott's winning a Super Bowl in Dallas. I don't think anyone believes Tuatunga Vailoa is winning a Super Bowl with the Miami Dolphins. No one believes that Justin Herbert, who's a really damn good quarterback, is winning a Super Bowl with the Los Angeles Chargers.

Like Kyler Murray, is anyone making a prediction he's going to go on to win a Super Bowl with the Cardinals? And three of those four quarterbacks that I just mentioned already got the lucrative extensions. Like guys, of course, like Mahomes and Burrow and Josh Allen, they're worth every penny that you pay them.

And there's a reason why those guys got taken care of with really without a hiccup. But for everybody else, it's a tough discussion and it's a tough decision. Now, I think Jalen Hurts is worth the money, but Jalen Hurts was smart. He cashed in this past offseason coming off an MVP-quality season where he outplayed even though he lost Patrick Mahomes in a Super Bowl. And now there's legitimately people, and it's the stupid flavor of the week that we do in terms of football, that coming off that performance up against the Seahawks where he had the two interceptions, now people are asking the question, after all offseason, Jalen Hurts is a stud. When they were 10-1, oh, Jalen Hurts is a stud, to now is Jalen Hurts worth the money that they gave him? And it's a never-ending merry-go-round, a rollercoaster ride of emotions where until you deliver that team the Lombardi Trophy, or until you consistently show for three, four, five years that you're a top five quarterback, it is the most scrutinized and the most difficult conversation to have is should you pay the quarterback? And then is the quarterback worth the money? And like I look at Tua, Tua would be an absolute fool when after this year, one year left on his contract, it's the fifth-year option to not cash in this offseason. Because I would challenge the Dolphins, you don't want to pay me? I'll remember it.

You know, I'll keep receipts and the price is only going to go up from here. And that's the other part, too. If you think you have the guy, you almost have to rush to pay him because the price only goes up astronomically each and every year. Because once one of these good quarterbacks gets great money, it opens up the pool to people to sit at and go take a swim in and say, okay, they're worth that money as well. And for Tua, now he's healthy. You know, for the most part, he's been healthy this season, like knock on wood, I hope he remains healthy the rest of the season. And he's playing good football. He's not playing elite football.

He's not a quarterback that I think wins a Super Bowl this year. But look how long it's taken Miami to find the guy that they like. Just like, not even love, since Dan Marino left them. It's been forever. Like, look at the bills. Look how long it took them for someone to love once Jim Kelly called it quits. Like, we're talking from the 90s, right, to now the year of 2023, the late 90s to 2023.

It takes a long time. So I'm not saying that you have to be head over heels in love with the quarterback. But if you like that quarterback, you know what life is like when you don't have a quarterback that you even like.

And we could go through the names and we could do an entire show of people that have quarterbacked the Miami Dolphins through the last 20 years. So Tua is going to cash in this offseason. But let me make it clear, when Tua cashes in, I'm not expecting the Dolphins to win a Super Bowl with him. I'm not expecting him to be a top five quarterback in the league. I'm not expecting him to be an elite quarterback, but he's going to get paid like one.

And he would absolutely be foolish with his agent and his team to not get a deal done this offseason. Because guess what? You have a concussion next year.

It starts this debate once again. Can you trust Tua Tungavailoa? Right now, the Dolphins can trust Tua Tungavailoa. Right now, he has a coach in Mike McDaniel that loves coaching and supporting Tua Tungavailoa. And remember, the last coach that was there, Brian Flores, couldn't stand him.

The GM, though, Chris Greer, he loves him. So if you have a GM and a head coach that loves the quarterback, and the quarterback's going to go to them this offseason and say, I want to get paid like a top quarterback in the league, they're not going to say no. And they're going to give him, what, a four or five year deal, pay him, what, 45, 40 something million dollars a year, whatever the going rate is, if not north of that. And it's going to be a contract where people are going to say it's not worth it. But what are you going to do? Where else are you going to go?

And like Miami is an attractive destination. But the last two, three offseasons, we've had a ton of quarterback movement. So I don't expect there to be a name that becomes available via trade that you go, okay, that's an upgrade from Tua. And you're too good to get a quarterback in the draft.

And then that's a big time gamble from what you already have knowing you have a good quarterback. So, yes, Tua's going to get a big time extension this offseason. But I think we need to readjust our expectations in the, not just Tua, but the entire market, and have that conversation of, yes, there are guys that get these ridiculous big time contracts, and I'll never expect them to win a Super Bowl with their current team. And I look at the Dolphins, the Dolphins are a good team.

And sometimes the good teams end up winning the Super Bowl. But I don't think the Dolphins, when I look at them, are a team that are anything more than you win the AFC East here and there, and you win a playoff game or two. I don't trust the Dolphins to get to a Super Bowl with Tua Tunga Vailoa. And we don't know how many more years Tyree Kilz go to play. And Tyree Kilz is essential to what Tua does. And fair or not, the lasting image so far that I have, and that's why this game against the Cowboys is enormous this weekend, to try to change that conversation, but the lasting image I have of Tua in what's been a positive year, an enjoyable year watching Tua, is that game in Germany and the back-to-back plays up against Kansas City.

The severe underthrow, and then fumbling the snap. Fair or not, when I think of Tua this year, those are the first three things out of my mouth. He's healthy, he's having a good season, but that ending against Kansas City in Germany was very alarming. By the way, Tua did speak to the media, and I'm laughing here, because he tries to say that he doesn't care what the doubters and what the haters say, and I don't consider myself a Tua hater. I know some people may listen to the last 12, 10 minutes of the show and go, oh, Zach, you're being really critical on Tua. No, I'm just saying he's good. I'm not saying he's great, and heck, I picked the Dolphins when the AFCs before the season started. So there is some belief that I have in Tua, but I don't have the 100% I'm all in on Tua Tungavailoa as my starting quarterback.

But Tua was not happy with people that had been doubting on him, and he rips his haters. I keep saying everyone wants to make this about me, about Tyreek. Please, keep pushing it to Tyreek.

Make it about Tyreek. I understand that my platform and who I am in this league as a quarterback makes me, if you want, polarizing whether I'm the best, whether I'm the worst. I could care less.

I don't listen to it. This is my bearer of bad news and Nolan. I hate to say that, but that's my bearer of bad news if anyone has something bad to say about me. But at the end of the day, I really don't care.

But if she does share it with me, I keep receipts. We all have a way of how we do things, but all the narratives about it, I am, yeah, sure. I am only good with Tyreek, and you're right. That is the only time I am at my best. You're right. I'm only good when Jalen's in. I could care less about it. Like, sure, if Jalen and those guys are not, I'm only as good as Raheem Mostert allows me to be. That's what the narrative needs to be.

And we're able to win games, and we're able to go where we want to go as a team. I am the worst football player, if that's what you want. I don't care. I really don't.

So whatever it is, whatever you need on your show, take clips out of what I just said. Do what you need to do. I'm just here to do my job, and my job is to help our guys win. That will be perceived one or two ways. The Miami Dolphin fan, the Tua fan, will say, Yeah, our quarterback's basically telling all these dopes to bleep off. And if that's the way you want to view it, I think that's your blind loyalty and blind trust to Tua. But I think most people hear that audio, and they have concerns now about Tua. Like, I think Tua's a really good quarterback. I don't think Tua's elite. I don't think Tua is a great top-five quarterback in this league. I don't think you win a Super Bowl with Tua Tunga Vailoa. But after going off for over a minute and telling us multiple times, you don't listen to people that doubt you, but then you keep receipts so you aren't listening to what people say about you that are criticizing you, and you clearly displayed in that minute audio that you are sensitive to people saying, Well, he's nothing without Tyreek, or he's nothing without Jaylen Waddle.

He's only as good as far as Raheem Mostert takes them. Like, there's one thing in not caring who gets the praise, but then there's another thing when you verbalize that and go on this rant for over a minute that it clearly does affect you, and it clearly does get to you in some capacity. And when I hear Tua respond to that, if you truly didn't care, do what Tom Brady, do what Bill Belichick had done for over 20 years. Give the media nothing at the podium. Give the fans nothing at the podium. And even though that audio clip was awesome and it was fun to listen to, it just screams to me as someone that is getting affected by the outside noise and that even though it may not show up on the field necessarily, it is in his head, and he's spending too much time thinking about it, that you're addressing this at a press conference. I know questions are asked, I get that, and you're responding to the questions, but there is still a way to respond to the question and give the media and give the fans nothing. And quite frankly, I thought that was a bad look for Tua, and it just gives people more ammunition to kind of doubt him because maybe there's some confidence issues with Tua on his own when he hears this perception about him, and if he truly didn't care, he just wouldn't even address it.

Like, when people say things about me or about other people and you disagree with it, yeah, you may fire back here or there, you know, have a witty response, but when you go on over a minute and dissect every part of the argument, clearly you've spent too much time thinking about it. You know, I'm okay with using some negative fuel as motivation, some fuel to your fire, but to verbalize that and go through each individual aspect of it, it seems like those conversations as of late regarding Tua are impacting him in some capacity. And this isn't the week to do the victory tour. Your team a week ago choked with the 14-point lead with three minutes remaining, and just because you bounce back without Tyreek against the lousy Jets, now you're going to go take a victory lap? Like, the Dolphins really haven't defeated a good team this year, and they'll have two opportunities to do that in the next three opportunities in the next three weeks with their three opponents on the schedule. But now, and I've been someone saying, win the AFCs. Like, that was my goal before the start of the year for the Dolphins.

I thought they would do that. But if you don't get to the second round of the playoffs after that whole rant, I actually think you look back at the Dolphins and you're like, you still have some questions left on them for the rest of the way and moving forward. It is Zach Gelb's show on CBS Sports Radio. How do you view Tua Tunga-Vilow as a quarterback?

The way I view him is he's a good quarterback, but not someone that can be trusted as a great quarterback. 8-5-5, 2-1-2 for CBS, 8-5-5, 2-1-2, 42-27. Danny Connell will join us at the top of the hour. Kaitlyn DeBoer, who's getting ready for a college football playoff game against Texas, the head coach of the Washington Huskies, will join us at 5 p.m. Eastern, 2 p.m. Pacific.

But when we come on back, Deion Sanders, a little Coach Prime talk, reacting to where his recruits did rank nationally and has the luster of Colorado football and Coach Prime have fallen off. And are as unique as you and me. They call it whisker to tail protection. Even fur balls?

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Get it? Meow. Insurance is underwritten by Independence American Insurance Company and produced by Independence Pet Group. Pre-existing conditions are not covered.

For all terms and limitations, visit FelixCatInsurance.com slash terms. I'm Kate Abdo, the host of Kicking It, a new weekly show from the CBS Sports Galasso Network, where Clint Dempsey, Charlie Davies, Mo Ado and I connect with the biggest personalities from global soccer and beyond to learn about their journeys and what makes them tick. This is the place for football fans to hear unfiltered conversations with the game's most familiar faces. So what are you waiting for?

Follow and listen to Kicking It on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. I am a fan. Full disclosure, I'm rooting for Coach Prime. I want to see Coach Prime do well. When he was at Jackson State, when people said he's not deserving of getting a big-time job or the next step up, I was like, why?

Like, why not? There's so many programs that have no sizzle, no juice, and they hire guys and they bring nothing to the program and they're there for three years and then they fail. So for Coach Prime, at least you know you're going to get unprecedented attention and you are going to put your program in the spotlight even if it doesn't correlate to wins on the field. And I would rather be talked about and be bad than not be talked about and be bad.

You know, that's just me. Sometimes there's publicity where people could say, oh, there's bad publicity. I don't know if I necessarily agree about that, where there's something as bad publicity. I think when you're trying to build up a football program, all publicity is good publicity.

But I will point out with Colorado, where the hype got through the first three, four weeks, it just totally blew the roof off of any fair expectations. Like I remember filling in on this show in the summer before they were like, oh, we're going to make it Zach's show. And I had a conversation with Samter when I was filling in. And Samter was on an island, that he usually is on an island.

He'll have some zany takes. And Samter's very passionate and he backs up his takes. But Samter had a take of it would be a disappointment if Colorado wasn't a seven or eight win program. And I was like, pump the brakes. Because I went through their schedule and I looked at their roster and I examined their roster.

My biggest problem was I didn't think they were built well enough in the trenches. And you even saw it in a victory up against TCU. You had a bunch of changes, but when the national championship game, even though Colorado beat TCU, you looked at them and you were like, hmm, they're not built great up front. But you have the star power of Chador Sanders, who is now coming back to Colorado.

And I ultimately believe he'll be a first round pick in the NFL. And you had one of the more incredible talents in the sport in Travis Hunter, who if it wasn't for an injury, and I know he ended up coming back and Colorado still couldn't win games, but it did stop the momentum of what Colorado was doing. And even though you could directly probably correlate it to the teams just getting tougher that they were playing, not having Travis Hunter for a stretch was enormous because he makes up a big portion of that team because not only did you have to replace his production on the offensive side of the ball, probably more importantly you had to replace his production on the defensive side of the ball. So Colorado winning early against TCU and then following it up with the victory against Nebraska. And then even though they beat Colorado State, it wasn't by big time fashion.

You had to come on back, the overtime, all that stuff. It got to a level where expectations were changed and expectations were altered, where I think most people were in my camp of four or five wins would have been a really successful season. And then it was like, uh-oh, four or five wins when you start the year off 3-0 would not have been good enough. And they didn't make a bowl game. They had that terrible choke to Stanford as well. And they were a bad football team down the stretch.

And you saw their weaknesses exposed up front. So Colorado, in this last recruiting class, I was going to be fascinated to see where the numbers were going to be. And at first you hear all these offensive linemen that they acquired. Like there was a stretch last week where it was like five or six offensive linemen committed to Colorado.

And it was like, wow, you know, good for Coach Prime. You get a lot of these guys to transfer over to your school, take advantage of the transfer portal, some coming right out of high school and all that, and you get what is going to look like a total remake of your offensive line. And everyone knew that was going to happen, that Deion was going to hit the transfer portal, was going to hit the recruiting trail hard to go get offensive linemen. Because remember when he got the job, he walked right into the team of the guys that were on the team the year before and they won one game.

And he goes, I'm bringing my own luggage. And if you're not someone that is committed to this program and if you don't show me something, you'll be out and we'll show you the door and we'll make you quit and we'll make you leave. So this idea that Deion wasn't going to bring new players in this offseason and wasn't going to try to totally revamp an offensive line that got his son hurt and also was a big reason why they didn't do more than what they were expected to once they got off to that 3-0 start, it would be asinine.

Like it would be, the definition of insanity is to repeat the same thing over and over again and expect anything to change. Like so you needed to make some changes and also operate in the current landscape of the sport. But what we were sold a week ago, and maybe what we were sold in Colorado early into the season, it's now changed as we saw earlier into the season towards the end of the season. And just what we were told in the recruiting world a week ago up until the other day when it was early national signing day. Because Colorado ranked 99th in recruiting.

With how much we talked about Colorado for the first two months of the college football season and how many guys ended up flipping or how many guys ended up not going there, that's disappointing to be ranked 99th in recruiting. And Matthew Bedford, who was supposed to be a big coupe for them in the transfer portal, he elected to go to Colorado, say he was going to Colorado, and then he flipped to Oregon. And right now, another big guy named for them as well, Jordan Seaton, it was looking like he was a lock, I think he was on Fox just like two weeks ago.

I believe that was the kid that we were talking about where he was on Fox just two weeks ago with Skip Bayless and Michael Irvin and whoever's on the new show now, you can't keep up with some of this stuff. And to be honest, I don't really watch the show anyway, but I just saw the clip and he put on a Colorado hat and he said he's going to Colorado. And now he did not commit to Colorado officially. And there's rumors that he's gonna be going somewhere else. There's some rumors that he may be joining Dylan Riola with the Nebraska Cornhuskers. So Colorado will be better up front next year. You can't get worse. But the total turnaround that we thought was gonna be coming from a week or two ago doesn't seem like they're gonna get all those guys that they thought they were going to get.

So I'll ask this simple question. Has the luster of Coach Prime fallen off? Has it worn off? Like we'll still talk about Colorado next year. Coach Prime is always going to bring buzz, attention, and news. But is this gonna be translated into wins? And even though they got four wins on the season and going into the interview and told me they got that, I would say, yeah, that's a successful season because that's what I expected. But them getting off to a 3-0 start, it's almost as if it hurt them because after that, they were never able to find that magic and get three more wins on the season. Because once you start off 3-0 and you're not even in October yet, you should be able to get to a bowl game.

But they weren't able to. And before the year, I had no expectation of them going to a bowl game. But now in year number two, I'm not gonna sit here and be ridiculous and say with them going to the Big 12 that they need to be in the college football playoff even though it's expanding to 12 teams. Like that's an insane argument.

Anyone expecting that is crazy. But if they don't get a bowl game next year, to a bowl game, then I do believe that we're gonna look at what Coach Prime is doing at Colorado. Sure, they made a ton of money. Sure, they got a lot of fans in the seats. Sure, he's brought more attention to that program that they've ever had in the last 20 years.

But what is it turning out to be? And next year, I can't say without a doubt, even though they bring back Chidor, they bring back Shiloh, they bring back Travis Hunter, who are three enormous players in the sport. Until I see what that offensive and defensive line looks like, I can't sit here and tell you I fully expect them to go to a bowl game. But if they don't go to a bowl game, what progress are you making?

You know, there's ways to make progress financially, but on the field, I eventually need to see the results in terms of wins and losses. And they open up the season against North Dakota State. I think some people say, oh, that's a cupcake.

They're not a cupcake. Then they're in Lincoln up against Nebraska, a team they beat last year. But look at the way that we talked about Nebraska after they lost to Colorado to where we talked about them now with the job Matt Ruhle has done on the recruiting trail. Then you're at Colorado State, you're at Arizona, had a good season this year, you play Utah, you play Baylor, you play Oklahoma State, you play Kansas State, Cincinnati, at Kansas, at Texas, and then at UCF, and we don't have the dates of those schedules, of those opponents, other than the first three, but that's the schedule. And without knowing what the offensive line looks like and how the offensive line's gonna play and how they're gonna get after the quarterback, I can't just say, yeah, they're gonna get to six wins. Because even when they were leading games last year, they were not able to close them out. They had that enormous lead against Stanford.

It was like 28, 29, nothing at one point. And they couldn't find a way to get it done. So Colorado took a big step last year. It didn't end the way that they wanted to, but now next year, I think we could have that conversation, you know, was this past year a success or was it a failure? And I do lean more successful.

But it is disappointing. It does leave a sour taste in your mouth when you start 3-0 and you can't find a way to go to a bowl game. And I kind of relate it to Billy Napier, his first year at Florida. That first game with Anthony Richardson as a quarterback, they played Utah.

And I remember saying this to Hickey. I said, it's probably better if they have a close game and they lose. And this is with Florida, right, that has tradition and all that. But you win that game, people are going to call you the savior. And they won that game and then the rest of the season was pretty disappointing. The rest of Billy Napier's tenure so far has been disappointing. So yes, sometimes it's weird because you don't want to punt on wins.

But sometimes when you win early, it takes the expectations to a level that turn out to just get too far away that you can't end up meeting. 855-212-4CBS, 855-212-4227. Let's go to Joe in Houston. Next up on CBS Sports Radio. Joe, what's happening? Hi, man.

Thank you for taking my call. I'm listening to you, brother. You're talking about Deion. Let me tell you, man. Deion, for what he came into, man, Deion, you got to give him a lot of credit, man.

When did I not give him credit? I'm a Deion fan. I know. I mean, I'm just saying. But for one, I mean, you were insinuating, you were like, I mean, you know, can they win more? I mean, four wins, I mean, from what they came from, I mean, that's an improvement. But when you start out 3-0, it does leave a bitter taste in your mouth. Right.

It does. And then another thing, too, with Deion and that situation right there, a lot of the time when I'm looking at the game, I'm just like, whoa, wow. I wouldn't have had all those distractions around my program. I know it was kind of trendy.

They were trending and all that stuff like that. But me, I don't think I would. That's what Deion brings. Like, Deion makes it an event. Deion makes it an attraction, because that's the way that he knows how to do it, and it's worked out very well for him as a player and then also as a coach so far. You can't bring Deion in as your coach and then get annoyed at the hoopla and the excitement that comes with it. I'm not saying I was annoyed, but, I mean, it was just like me.

I would have kind of toned it down a little bit. Now, going into the Big 12, I think they will win. I'm looking at probably about seven or eight games maybe, and once he starts getting those recruits in there, man, I think he's going to turn that program around.

He's already brought a huge financial impact to the program, so with that being said, I mean, it's just he can only go up from here. If they get seven or eight wins next year, Joe, I think people would be doing cartwheels in the streets. Like, I can't do a cartwheel.

I can't do a backflip. But you end up doing seven or eight wins next year, maybe we'll try to do cartwheels or something like that, and then I'll probably have to go to the hospital because I'll break my neck. Seven wins would be remarkable next year. First year in the Big 12, I know they put in a very tough Pac-12 this year. The Pac-12's better than the Big 12. But seven or eight wins going to the Big 12, and to take that jump from four to seven or four to eight, still not knowing what this offensive line would be, that would be remarkable, and I would love to see it, but I just don't expect it.

You know, I think if they just get to six next year, that would be a really damn good achievement. Zach Gelb here with you on CBS Sports Radio. We'll come on back with a Zach Gelb Show PSA on a Thursday.

But first up with the latest CBS Sports Radio update, here is El Capitan Marco Belletti. This portion of the show is brought to you by NHTSA. Whether you get pulled over or get into a crash, drinking and driving will change your whole world. Drive sober or get pulled over.

Paid for by NHTSA. We'll get to a Zach Gelb Show PSA momentarily. But first, let me take Adrian and Marilyn, 855-212-4CBS, 855-212-4227. Yo, Adrian, what's happening, my man? Yo, Zach, what's going on, buddy? Nothing much. Doing great. Hey, this is my thought on Deion.

Yeah, go ahead. Here's my thought on Deion. You know, all that bringing the stars to the game and all that stuff is fine and dandy, but that doesn't win games. Like I told the producer here, you got to recruit and develop linemen. You can't go to the portal and get those guys because those guys take three or four years to get going. You can go to the portal and get wide receivers, running backs, quarterbacks, defensive backs, but to be in the trenches and stuff and win the game in the trenches, you got to go recruit them, and then you got to develop them, which I don't think Deion can do that. Well, I don't know if he can't do it because you've seen players, you know, from Jackson State that had a lot of success under the tutelage of one Coach Prime, but I would agree with the point that Adrian made. And my preference would be the natural recruiting and getting guys in from high school and developing them in your program, but now in an era of the transfer portal where you get that one free transfer, if someone doesn't want to go along with your process and they don't think they're on the field as soon as they should be and they get some tough coaching that's going to propel them to eventually become a good player in a year or two from now and they don't like it, they can just get up and leave. So it is tough, but in an ideal way, I would still recruit naturally first and then use the transfer portal as an added benefit or as a bonus, where, yeah, you need to go get a speedy wide receiver you can. You know, some years you have a really good team and you just need a quarterback. Go get a quarterback in the transfer portal. So the transfer portal is good, but I think it should be used for a lot of coaches and added luxury, and still, you're going to get most of your players and have most of your success with the players that you're bringing in and developing.

But if you're a coach that's just using a school as a stepping stone and you only need like minimal success to go get the next job, then yeah, maybe the transfer portal is more beneficial. All right, it is a Thursday. Let's get to a Zach Gelb Show PSA. Warning. Warning. Warning. Warning. Warning. It's a Thursday. What do you have to say?

It's the weekly Zach Gelb Show PSA. Who's with me? Let's go! Come on! Hey! All righty. My PSA is about asking etiquette.

So it's very simple. Like, we get a nice promotion around here. I get a nice promotion.

I hear from people that some of them, I don't even know who they are, and they're like, oh, congratulations, Zach. So happy for you. You deserve this promotion. I'm like, oh, great. Thank you. Appreciate you reaching out. And then right away, there's a few people that go, hey, by the way, if you're hiring, I'm definitely interested, or, oh, I would love to join the show in some capacity.

Like, the announcement isn't even 24 hours old yet. Can we just calm down a little bit? And then, you know, this time of the year, I like to take care of the people that, you know, help us out here at CBS Sports Radio, whether it's behind the scenes in the digital world, whether it's the people that clean the office here. You know, I'm taking our guys out tonight. We're having a nice show dinner.

It's gonna be fun. But then there's some people that I don't even know work in this office, and all of a sudden, they, like, come up and they're like, happy holidays. Happy holidays. And you get that vibe that they're just kind of saying happy holidays to you to kind of hope that you end up giving them some holiday tip when you never encounter them. So I think there is an asking etiquette, and my PSA would be, if you're reaching out to someone to congratulate someone, or you want a Christmas tip or something, just be genuine about it, and you have to put some work in in order to get what you want.

When I haven't talked to you in six years, and then you're begging me for a job or something like that, you know, like, what the heck are we doing? I don't even know who you are. So that's my etiquette. It could sound a little bit douchey. But that's my PSA. I think there's some asking etiquette, and you need to know how to just play the game. All righty, Santa.

What do you got? Now, that makes sense. There's a lot of people around here. Listen, you know, it's not about what you know. It's about who you know, and I think a lot of people try to network.

They just don't know how to. Yeah, it's a big problem. Six years going by is a little bit too long of a time before you can ask somebody something. Like, if I don't have your number saved, and you just say, hey, what's up, and you expect me to know your... I'm like, who is this? I have to use that lame excuse of, oh, I got a new phone. Like, who is this when I haven't got a new phone in three years? I'm like, what are we doing here?

It's just wild. And even when you get a new phone, your numbers transfer over, so that doesn't even work anymore. By the way, I need a new phone. So I have this case on my phone. I didn't realize the back. I took it off yesterday. Totally cracked the back of my phone. Look at, like, Stu and Santa's face.

Their jaw just dropped. I didn't even know that was a thing. I took my phone case off yesterday for some reason, and I looked at the back, and I was like, oh, my goodness gracious, the entire back of my phone is cracked.

Yeah, but you know what? As long as it doesn't impact performance, you might as well just stick with it. You got a case on it. You're not even going to notice it.

You're not going to see it. It's not going to impact you in any way. But now it annoys me mentally. All right, what's your PSA? So my PSA has to do with just rude people when it comes to parking, right? When somebody's in a spot, and you pull up, and you're like, all right, well, this guy's about to get out of a spot, whether you're in a parking lot or on the street, and they see you pull up, and they know that you're waiting for their spot, and they take their damn sweet-ass time to get out. It's like, listen, I understand you got stuff to do, but buckle that seat belt, turn the ignition, and get the hell out so I can park the car. There's nothing more annoying than sitting there just waiting while someone's dilly-daddling, like, checking their phone and calling somebody. I'm one of those people. Oh, it drives me crazy. And then sometimes you see the person who, like, they see you. They can tell you're getting impatient. Yeah. So they take longer intentionally because they want to piss you off. Drives me crazy. Get out of the spot. So I'm not that person, but I still, like, whenever I'm driving, and someone is, like, right up next to my car, I still do my routine as I would do, make sure my music is ready to go, connect it to Bluetooth, you know, check my mirrors and all that. I'm not rushing just because you're rushing, and you're making me feel uncomfortable. You should. You should.

Well, we'll agree to disagree on that. Stu, what do you got? My PSA is department stores. I guess this is sort of a me problem because I waited till last night to go to the mall to do a little last-minute Christmas shopping at night after the show. So Stu forgot to get his girlfriend a gift.

No, I was with her. These are a few other bits and bobs. But we are at a department store. It's getting close to when it's closing around 10 o'clock, and there is a line of people, about 15 people deep, and there's only one singular register open, and the whole department sort of has three floors.

I just like, how is that possible? We're paying so much for all this stuff we buy. Hire more people to work.

It's a great PSA. I was in my grocery store last night with the schedule change. Like, usually I would go during the day, but now I go after work. There was a line of 15 people at the grocery store. They have four registers.

Only one person was working. And I'm not someone, when I go to the grocery store, I don't take a shopping cart. I don't take one of those bins.

I just think I could hold everything. So I'm standing there with my blueberries, my strawberries, my protein powder. I have the chicken sausage, the couscous, the eggs.

That's on you, man. What grocery store are you at that doesn't have, like, a self-checkout lane or a mobile checkout lane? Yeah, well, people don't like my grocery store choice. I go to Grastidi's. People, like, they go, how do you not go to Whole Foods? How do you not go to Trader Joe's?

Because that's, like, I guess an old person grocery store. Grastidi's works well for me. I wasn't happy with the lack of customer service. By the way, real quick, a great last-second gift, if you have no time left.

Next day or same day, CVS photo printing. You get a bunch of really cool personalized stuff in 24 hours notice. Danny Kanell joins us next at Kelp Show, CBS Sports Radio. I'm Kate Abdo, the host of Kickin' It, a new weekly show from the CBS Sports Galasso Network, where Clint Dempsey, Charlie Davies, Mo Adoo and I connect with the biggest personalities from global soccer and beyond to learn about their journeys and what makes them tick. This is the place for football fans to hear unfiltered conversations with the game's most familiar faces. So what you waiting for? Follow and listen to Kickin' It on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts.