You're listening to the Back Home Network presented by Home
Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cask and
Claudio joining you. It is Sunday the 19th of May and
for the first time in I think over a month, we've got both
founding members of Crimson Cast on the podcast at the same time.
Scott Caulfield joining me here in the late morning.
How are you doing, Sir? It's it's been a hot minute.
I it's been a while and then I made you wait another hour then
I'm. I'm running late this morning so
it's on me. But no, it's it's been a while.
Good. Good.
Talk to you again, man. Yeah, absolutely.
No, it's fine. It's, I had some grading to do
and I had to walk a dog this morning.
So it's it's fine. You know, we, I, I I've learned
to do things in the mornings when Scott's unavailable for
podcasting. It's great, but.
I'm normally up early. Today was a little bit rough,
but it's good. Hear it from my wife.
Hear it from you. It's awesome.
No. No, no, I I I praise you as, you
know, as as a person who can't sleep anymore and really could
barely sleep even when I was a bit younger.
I always am envious of people who can shut out the outside
world for a little bit and get some extra shut eye.
So congratulations, that's. Helped a lot, yeah.
Yeah, absolutely. It always does.
But anyway, we're going to talk some IU stuff.
We've got obviously both football and basketball to talk
about, so we'll touch on some topics there.
We've also got the Indy 500, which many of you are interested
in. So latter half of the podcast
will tackle that. And before we get to all that,
just a reminder, we're part of the back home network.
If you missed any of the content on the back home network, you
should go check it out immediately, including your
other podcast. Scott Right up Meridian, which
is big day today for the Pacers. For those who are listening on
like when we drop this which will I think about noon on
Sunday Pacers play at 3:30 and you've been having a bunch of
different people on Tony Adrania from the back home network's
been on but Dustin Doe Pirac's been on several other people.
Really great resource for Pacers related talk so go check that
out. Subscribe.
You can go to the YouTube channel for the back home
network and and see the episodes as well as hear them.
Also of course, the Exes and Joes show they've been doing a
lot of offseason breakdowns of various items related to college
basketball and IU in particular. And of course our friends over
at Assembly Call and doing the work.
All of that available and presented by home field apparel.
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folks at home field. Go ahead, Scott.
Well, I was going to say I needed home field apparel last
night. So you you, you, you enjoy kind
of, you know ribbing me on what we're doing up here in
Westfield. So we we, we gave a donation to
the Westfield Library Group and so they had a they're building a
new library And so last night was AVIP donors event to kind of
see the new library which was awesome at a great time.
But the dress attire was yeah. So it's a it's an event.
So I'm thinking, all right it's got to be dressy.
But the the dress attire was they're doing a race theme kind
of thing. And it's like black and white
racing fun. And like I don't know, like I
need, I need home field apparel. Like I need a black and white
shirt. Like I was like, I need
something because I don't, I didn't know how to do this.
Like I could do because racing is like if you've been to the
500, you could be wearing like a Star Spangled Banner thong and
like there's a lot racing covers, a lot of stuff.
Wait, have you done that? Before I have not, but I have
seen it and I know that you have as well if you've been to the
the 500, but so anyway I was like I just.
I'm not, be honest. When I go to the 500 with most
of the people there, I'm just happy they're wearing anything.
Yes, yes. Anyway go on I just I I was it
was so the event was awesome. I had a great time, won a
charity auction for the first time, but really, yes I did.
Did you get I I well, hopefully I won a couple rounds of golf
that I bid on. But the other one that I know
that we won because we left fours done we had a friend text
us was one of those. It's like a police thing where
you get like a police blanket, a Lego set, but then the kids get
to drive to school in like a police Hummer van.
Interesting. Like a SWAT thing.
So that'll that'll be fun. Anyway, the point was you're
getting me off track. Jeez.
The point was that I needed home field apparel to help me dress
'cause I didn't know what to wear.
I ended up going with like, I have an IndyCar work shirt and
it it worked out pretty well and people liked it.
But it's like, you know, for your next event, if you're
struggling with what to wear, go with home Field Apparel.
Should have had your trucker hat.
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Great idea all the way around. Yes, the Trucker Hat Indy 500
apparel out the wazoo. They just released that
collection. Some Arrow McLaren stuff and of
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So anyway, go to homefieldapparel.com, check them
out on social media as well. Also just a reminder, we are on
sub stack. We've talked about that join the
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We've we haven't done AVIP video in a little bit which makes the
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But Scott's going to have AVIP video, I think right after this
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You think of people just people don't want to see you, they just
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Back Home Network YouTube channel that's been hopping here
lately. So anyway Scott, let's dive into
our first topic of the day. Let's start with IU basketball
on the men's side. We haven't talked since the
roster filled out but the roster has filled out.
We you know Miles Rice, Kane and Carlisle.
Luke Goody. You know you've you've had this
Landon Hatton obviously recently.
So you've had the stocking of the roster.
We talked a lot at the beginning of the cycle about some concerns
that we had which were reasonable given last year about
whether or not this was going to be possible.
It is possible and IU has certainly done as well I think
as anybody in the country at leveraging the portal to get the
players that on paper at least it looks like they need in order
to have a much higher level of success for this upcoming year.
So you had an interesting thought which kind of dovetails
with this because we've talked a little bit in pieces and and our
friends at Assembly Call have talked about this as well about
what Indiana has done this offseason.
And I said on my last podcast, I think it was the last one, that
what we're seeing is a coaching staff that has kind of checked
all the boxes that you would want them to check in the
offseason. And yet what's interesting is
there's this clear split in the the the at least the online
population of IU basketball, maybe in the offline population
too. I'm not 100% sure about the
disposition of the coaching staff and Mike Woodson in
particular. So you posed a question on text
which I'll let you read and then kind of dive into that I think
is is an interesting one to talk about right now since we've, you
know we've got a pretty good sense now of what the roster is
going to look like. Yeah.
I mean I was thinking this last couple of you know weeks as as
you said IU and coach Wood Woodson has done a fantastic job
in the in the offseason and and so on one hand my thought was
all right well you know let me let me phrase this correctly as
I I think that you know most times you go into a season where
the the coach is kind of either one of two things either on the
hot seat or is very you know safe in their job.
And the way this offseason went, I think Woodson is actually, you
could make a very valid argument for either one.
And I thought it'd be an interesting way to discuss
because I was like almost like just give you the other side.
It's like a debate like just you take one, I'll take the other
because I I can really, you know, I'll I'll stop and then we
can if we want to take it one and the other.
But I I think you can make a very valid argument that Woodson
is really on the hot seat coming to this year or he's totally
safe with what he's done and based on some other external
factors. And I just thought it was
interesting because it doesn't seem like a lot of people are in
that spot. You kind of have this divergent
of things are going great or things are not going great.
You kind of have a, you can make an argument for honestly both
sides of of that. Yeah, it's.
There, there's really there's two different streams of thought
I think here that you can really zero in on and it's kind of like
a Rorschach Rorschach test in terms of what you want to
perceive is where IU basketball is AT and therefore where Mike
Woodson is at as the head coach. So you can look at it from the
perspective of your here's a coach that made two tournaments
in the first three years, and there were injuries and other
items that led to this past year not being very good.
And yet they finished strong. They go out and get arguably the
best transfer class in the entire portal and they look
reloaded and ready to reassume the mantle and reassume the
trajectory that they had before last year's kind of off approach
to things. And a lot of the, the the
criticism of Woodson and the criticism of the team last year
was way over the top because, you know, between the injuries
and between maybe some pieces that through no real coat far to
the coaches didn't fit well together.
It was an off year. But you've seen many teams and
many programs have off years where they'll miss the
tournament entirely and including teams like Villanova
and North Carolina. And you know, teams like that.
And now you come into this season with IU already projected
in the top 25. I've seen a couple of
projections with them, even like close to the top 15, like the
the future looks rosy for IU basketball and you not only got
good players in the portal, but a few of them are guys who could
be here for more than just one season.
They're guys that could come in and really lay a foundation for
the next round of things. And so thinking that Woodson
would be in any kind of danger would be silly.
That essentially, I think, is the argument to be made on that
side of things. I I would, yes, and I would
agree with all of that. I also think that you almost had
kind of a, you know, war games style feel of how things would
go and that things got real. So what I mean by that is things
got really rough at the end of last season.
So yeah, And Ali Sheedy showed up.
And no, I'm sorry, go. Ahead.
Yeah, as soon as that. A computer redoing the IU
Northwestern game over and over and over again.
The computer's like this. The game is new.
Should not be played. Should not be played.
Mike Watson. That's actually that's actually
how the Big 10 tournament works every year.
The only solution, the the only, the only solution is not to
play. Yes, it's it's.
It's so much about you, the big. 10 tournaments It's like I run
all the scenarios we had a year with COVID and.
Let's try the new option. Maybe this will work.
Yeah, I mean, if COVID didn't get us a title, not gonna
happen, right? We laugh because we care and we
can't and we can't win the tournament.
It chases. It chases the herd away.
That's all it does. So, so yes.
And you know last year, oh, the the war shack.
So you had the the test where you had a obviously a very bad
end of the year. You had, you know IU getting
booed. You had suddenly this this feel
for all right we might need to change coaches And not only did
it not happen, you had the administration and the people
who matter kind of come out quietly and say or you know,
quietly, unquietly be like no, he is our coach.
He will be our coach. So he has a vote of confidence
after an off year and then he reloads this offseason.
But this is an offseason as you you know as we all know it's not
like this is just all good vibes and recruiting.
This is based on money. I mean a lot of these are nil
deals that cost some money and you know, so he has the the
support of enough high level donors to get money to get
problem. You know, I'll just say the best
recruiting or the best transfer class and some of the best
recruits and one of the best offseasons that wasn't paid for
by, you know, varsity club donations that was paid for by
private donors who want to give money.
And those people need to feel like that this is a a wise
investment and that everything is right.
And obviously all those things happened because there was a ton
of money thrown around this offseason.
And so I just, I look at that as the other piece of the argument
that you know at a university level some of the most important
people are the trustees, the high level people in the the
athletic administration and the high level donors.
And to a man, all three of those gave their vote of confidence to
Woodson's. That's where I was thinking this
offseason. You know, this he he he has all
of the confidence of all of those people.
So he's probably very safe in his job based on everything else
that you also said as well. So I guess I'll give the other
side of the equation I mean. I can then I can start with the
other side and then go from there.
And it is kind of a funny, you know, flip.
I'll use some of the same arguments against Woodson.
This is where I was thinking is that, you know, you now had a
lot of people who wrote really big checks.
And if this team is not able to finish at a, you know, top 20
type level, I would assume that a lot of those people are like,
all right, well, this is really bad ROI in my investment.
Like I just paid a lot of money to see a basketball team
underperform again two years in a row.
That's not going to be awesome. Everything that I mentioned
within the fan base, not that the, you know, not that you know
podcast and fan base totally matter, but they do it.
If you're getting booed again in assembly hall at home, that's
going to have some repercussions.
And then just the fact that you know this is, you know what one
thing that I'm personally being a little tentative about just
kind of waiting to temper my expert expectations is I
continue to go back that we were not bad in last year's offseason
both Portal and re resigning players.
We it seems to be this For those who are very positive, it seems
to be this feel of like, man, we killed her this we have so many
good players. How can we not be good?
It's like well, we did pretty good last year.
Like yes, it doesn't look as good now in retrospect because
we saw Peyton. We saw Peyton Sparks play when
we first signed him. I remember listening to other
shows being like, you know how well at least he's going to get
at least 10 to 15 minutes a game.
He's really going to provide that.
As an Indian, it's like all the things look like the most
positive aspects of where they could be.
Now that we see them, it's like, Oh yeah, those are not great,
maybe the best portal sightings. Well, we're in that same spot
here. Not everyone's going to pan out.
But I would also say that, you know, if if Woodson is, if this
team is not able to meet some level of those expectations, you
are going to wonder. It's like, all right, you know,
what kind of team is going to be successful under this regime?
Because the only example at that point, assuming we have a bad
year this year, would be a team of Archie Miller's players.
Honestly, I mean, you would have back-to-back years of really
killing it in the offseason and not a lot to show for it.
So I think that would be the flip side in my mind on that
piece. I think there's actually even
more layers, you know, because that you you're very right that
a lot of, you know the a lot of what we're seeing, if there's a
vision that's being sold and that is what brings players in.
Like we've talked a lot about how it's not just nil money that
brings players in, it's also how do I fit, does this seem have a
chance of success? But that doesn't mean the nil
money isn't important. And I think ultimately, you
know, the checks that have been cut so far to build this roster,
there is going to be that kind of donor class expectation.
Like, all right, well, we're, we're trying to make this
happen. You cannot afford a season that
looks like last year. And really I don't even know if
you could afford a season that looks like the first year.
You know, 'cause keep in mind like Indiana was was borderline
for a good part of that season. They had to win their way into
the NCAA tournament in the Big 10 tournament, which we know how
reliable that is as as an approach.
So I do think you're looking at a circumstance where there's
going to be an expectation all by itself that there needs to be
a higher level of sustained success.
You cannot afford to go out and look like crap against all of
your good non conference opponents.
You can't go like finish 8th in Atlantis or something like that.
But I also think that the, you know, the the other layer to
this is most of the complaints about Woodson and the program
have not been coming at least publicly from donors or from
even from media. They've been coming from the
rank and file fans. They've been coming.
I mean there were I was at a couple of those games where
there were booze in Assembly hall.
Like that was just frustration coming from people who are not
giving money to nil in any great numbers.
That was fans who have had this reservoir of frustration
continue to get water behind it and and those levels keep
building higher and higher because of the lack of any kind
of sustained success. And so that's what's going to
make this upcoming year very interesting in that I think
there's AI talked about this a little bit on the last show.
There's a real amount of skepticism and I think a loss of
trust on the part of many people towards Woodson.
And the, you know we've had people in our comments talking
about how people can't let go of last year that's that is true.
And I mean it last year is last year.
I'm not expect you wouldn't expect people to let go of
something when they have had nothing to replace it in the
matrix yet. But it's not just last year.
To me that's a knock on effect from the entire Archie Miller
era. The, you know the the aspects of
the first two years of Woodson that were less than ideal in
terms of of varying outcomes because there were those.
I mean, as much as that 2023 season was special in a lot of
ways, there were also a lot of moments where we were looking
around saying what on earth is going on, why, why isn't this
team more consistent or better? So I say all of that with the
idea that some of this is not just Woodson, it's a general
frustration with the program. And so that leads to this idea
of, I think Woodson's disposition is really based upon
what are people's expectations, what what are the expectations
of this team as it comes into this new year.
And I've yet to really see those elucidated.
You know, when it when a team is ranked somewhere between 15th
and 25th, realistically you're talking about a team that's
going to be a four or five seed in the NCAA tournament in
contention for a Big Ten title, but maybe not a team that
ultimately wins a Big Ten title a season.
Frankly, Scott, that looks a lot like the 20/22/23 season does.
Is that enough? Is that enough knowing that you
know you're you're only going to have Omar Balo for a year.
You're only going to have. I think I think Luke Goody is I
think he's one year you know you're going to not going to
have Trey Galloway anymore you might not have Malik Renew.
Like the the page will certainly look like it turns quite a bit
next year regardless of what happens in this upcoming season.
So that's where I I to some degree.
I think a lot of the overarching questions about Woodson's job
and disposition were quelled by what's happened over the last
six weeks. That could all come back very
quickly though if Indiana doesn't hit the ground running
in this upcoming season. And that trying to remove our
opinions out of the equation and just focus on how fans are going
to react. That's really what this entire
exercise is about. It's a really interesting
thought exercise because I really don't know how people are
going to react if Indiana is anything other than, you know,
playing at a top 20 level to start off the season.
One something we mentioned last year that's also there is that
you know we're when we start the season we're going to be like 18
months removed from our last really signature key win against
a top blue blood program that's also doing well.
I know it's a lot of caveat there cuz then we we leave
Michigan State at the end of the year last year but Michigan
State was not where you would consider them to normally be.
And so I I agree with you, I'm very curious to see how people
react if you know if we go through the the we'll probably
win a game or two in Atlantis I would assume.
But if if we go through the non conference similarly to what we
did last year and just kind of not get any of the scalps that
we're expecting, how are people going to react to that?
You know that you're mentioning the expectations for the season.
I think what's also interesting is as where we're at is you know
if we have a season similar to 23 where we're good, we get a
protected seed, but we don't get to the second weekend, I I do
wonder what that's going to be like too.
And you mentioned some of those donors.
I I think a lot of these high level of not one not one of the
high, high level donors but I I think that you know they they
kind of check in periodically. I don't I don't think they're
watching games like like you and I are and really dissect and
it's kind of a little bit more checking in.
How's IU doing. But I I think if you know we
have a really good if we have a season like 20-3 and then we get
a protected seed but we're not in the second weekend.
I do wonder if some of those are going to look up and like hey,
where where are we? Like I was expecting to be here
and I think this is what also you know, the residual build up,
you can look at every specific year and you know under
Woodson's tenure in 2223 and 24, it's like all right, none of
those years were really a second weekend type year in the micro.
But in the macro it's like, all right, we're in year four and at
some point you need to breakthrough the second weekend
of the the tournament And it is a bit of a crapshoot and it
does, you know, sometimes it involves luck and you can have a
really good season and just meet the wrong team, but you can't
keep doing that. At some point you then have to
have a not so good season where you meet the right team and you
breakthrough into the second weekend.
You know, it's wild how we used to talk about Final Fours and
titles and now it's like, can we just get a second weekend?
But that's what I love. But I I do wonder how you know
how this season is viewed if we don't have that that year end
success. And I think that's something
that is going to be interesting because I think some fans are
going to reserve judgment until we get to May.
And it's got you know, Woodson's kind of, you know, future and
his legacy is going to be determined by a couple of games.
And it's unfortunate, but it's but it's not because this is the
career these guys are into. It's like I knew Bruce Pearl,
you know, took some heat after, you know, he had like they had a
great season. Auburn had an awesome season in
whole. They lost one game in March and
fans are not happy. What happens if we have a season
like that, like that? I think that's a real concern is
if you have an Auburn type season and then it's like all
right now what what do we do with that at the end of this?
Coming year? Well, yeah.
So a couple of things. First of all, donors at the
level you're talking about generally have a different
motivation structure than the average fan.
And I think a lot of the support from donors and from people in
the higher ups of of IUI mean a lot of it is because Woodson is
a native son. He's a, you know, he's a an alum
of the program. You know, I think there's a
real, I think there's patience with Woodson where there might
not be with other coaches in similar situations.
And I think for IU it's interesting because ultimately
the the question has to be asked like where it it's not
impossible to have high levels of success.
And the question is at what point do you say the foundation
needs to have been laid where there's consistency.
That was really ultimately the problem with the Archie Miller
era. It was really the problem with
the Tom Crean era and it was the problem at the end of the Bob
Knight era where it's like you just aren't being consistent
enough. 1920 wins, 21 wins, whatever is, is fine in in one
season, not consecutively, not consistently.
And this is where you know, I just, I've always rejected this
idea that well, you just can't do that in Indiana anymore.
And you just mentioned like well, Bruce Pearl is doing it at
Auburn where you probably shouldn't be able to do it at
all. It really does come down to is
the alchemy there where a coach can do what they need to do in
terms of recruiting, in terms of coaching, in terms of setting
things up and ultimately the results say everything about
that. I mean, I I believe as we look
at Woodson's tenure and we think about it from the standpoint of
where is he within the confines of the fans.
What I'm really fascinated by is the sea change in approach that
seems to have occurred since the end of February with now you've
got your multiple visits out to to high school recruits.
You've got all of these other things that people were, were
being critical about and it's suddenly they're happening and I
don't think that's accidental. Like I don't.
I don't think that that's just one of those things where it's
like what we were planning on doing that anyway, there's there
has appeared to be a real delineation from the before that
period and then after that period in how the coaching staff
and Woodson are approaching these things.
And I do think that that stuff matters.
And you know, you the lot of the criticisms and complaints about
Woodson have been kind of twofold.
One of them has been the refrain we've heard quite a bit from,
you know, people that follow recruiting or journalists who
follow college basketball, that Woodson is not as active as as
fellow coaches, at least in the high school recruiting scene.
Clearly does very well in the portal clearly does very well
kind of swooping in and grabbing players who are disassociated
like Bryson Tucker or Malik Renew.
But the the other aspect is the criticism around the style of
play, the criticism around the offense.
The my, I guess, you know, the the few criticisms we've seen
about the defense this year, this upcoming year, you know, I
think this team could be very good offensively.
I'm not sure how good they're going to be defensively because
it's just really hard to bring people together.
But all of this is all, you know, it's all happening with
the backdrop of a college basketball scene that's changing
so dramatically, so quickly that the old methodologies of who
you're recruiting and who you're bringing in and how you're
approaching things. I was trying to get into this on
the last podcast where I was talking about, you know, the
extra scholarship. But it's like, well, do you
really want to go and fill that with somebody who's not going to
play when you'd rather have that player probably going somewhere
and playing for a whole season and getting extra development
and then being able to come in with a little more experience?
There's not really a need to have a 13th player on the
roster. That in and of itself is a huge
change philosophically from how a lot of programs would have
thought about things 5-10 years ago.
So it's it's it is really hard to judge Mike Woodson on a, you
know, a rubric that we've used for college basketball judgement
in the past. A lot of it is very dependent on
the current factors and then is ultimately dependent on things
we can't predict, which is how do all of these players that
they've gone out and gotten come together and and and get put
together. So to go back to the central
thesis or the question that you were asking about.
And can I add one more thing about how things are changing?
You know, at some point there, you know this is not going to
age well, but at some point there will be a team that
crushes it in the transfer portal that then crushes it in
the season. But at least with the small
results, you know when you look at, and it's one point that
there's a lot of different ranking services and This is why
I'm not a huge fan of getting too much into, you know, either
Portal or recruiting stuff. If you go to 2024 seven sports
and you look at last year's team rankings for the transfer
portal, Number one was Arkansas. Number two was Indiana, #3 was
St. John's.
Number four was West Virginia, #5 was Kentucky, Kansas.
Alabama. Washington, MI, UCLA, one of
those teams made the Final Four and a a good handful of those
didn't make it to the second weekend or didn't even make it
to the tournament at all. So you know this And again they
they're this is not. Things are changing very quickly
in college athletics. So there will be a year when
someone is the top of the transfer portal and then makes
the Final four and then suddenly everyone's going to think that's
the new model. Maybe this is that year for
Indiana, but this the idea of we're going to do a full scale
reboot through the Portal every offseason.
At least thus far it hasn't shown that it can work again.
I'm prefacing it. I think at some point it will
work. But that's that's the real
question that's at hand too, is, is this the right model right
now? And that's it's funny that's,
that's kind of been the thing under Woodson is, as you were
talking about it, you know, people get this murmuring about,
you know, he's not showing up to recruiting.
He's not doing it the way it's been done.
Then he kills it in recruiting. It's like, all right, that's
awesome. And then we're also, you know,
concerned about the, the style of play.
And my thing is, like, you know, then just then when, like at
some point, like results can cover up a lot of that, you
know, no one's going to give him concerns about the way he's
handling recruiting for the next five or six months, 'cause like,
yo, man, you just crushed it in the offseason.
And he did. Yeah, well and going back to
your central thesis, like Woodson appears to be both mega
safe in his job but also on shaky ground.
I think among the people for whom it matters he's on pretty
solid foundation and and you know that's going to be I think
interesting to watch though because ultimately we keep
coming back to this core issue. However good you feel about a
coach and I think it's been touched on an axis and Joe's a
bunch. However good you feel about a
coach, there is a honeymoon period that stops at some point.
And a lot of what they talk about on that show is in terms
of recruiting, in terms of the the caliber of recruits that
you're able to pull in. But it's also about the fans and
it's about that relationship with the people who were paying
money for tickets. And yes, the donors are are more
important in the micro, but ultimately the macro, the
atmosphere around the program is the key thing and that was
really what was so concerning about February of 2024 with this
basketball team. And so much of this I think is
predicated moving forward on can Indiana avoid that kind of a
scenario where they've got a bunch of people looking around
and saying why on earth is this happening.
And and I guess the one thing I'll notice like Woodson has now
had, you know, two out of his three years, Indiana's had at
least A5 game or or or they lost four out of five or excuse me 5
out of 6 in February this year. They lost five in a row in
February in 2022. And it's like, yes, in both
cases they recovered a little bit at the end in 2022, they
recovered enough to get to the NCAA tournament in the playing
game. But that is that a trend or is
that just statistical noise that we've seen the first two
seasons? I think this is where it makes
it hard to determine what the actual atmosphere is around the
program because there's a lot of people and you you see them in
the comments, you see them responding on social media and
you take some of that with a grain of salt.
But these are real people and in many cases from what I talk to
people who are not online, they they match some of those
attitudes. These are people who just look
at this and say this isn't working.
It is going to take, as you said, wins against teams that
are better than what we've seen Indiana beating in order to get
that out of the mindset of those people, regardless of how much
success there is in the portal or how much their success there
is on the recruiting trail. The other thing that's at play
here, and I'm, I love the honeymoon period, it's so true.
You're seeing with IU football. I think that's why there's
excitement in back in IU. Football is just sometimes a
regime change just provides that just kind of provides, you know,
it's a it's a divorce, you're moving on.
But I would also argue, I think there's a reverse honeymoon
period on the back end of careers that unfortunately Mike
Woodson is going to be facing here is you know it, it does
feel like when fan bases kind of see the end of the light so to
speak of you know you're seeing it now with Michigan State.
They've had a great, fantastic run and Izo has been the premier
coach of the Big 10 for 20 plus years.
I have a couple friends who are Michigan State fans, but they're
they're like they're in their little sphere of the world.
They're talking about, all right, when do we get, when do
we get rid of Izo? Like he's losing his touch.
Like he like they because they wouldn't do that in 20, you
know, 2011, because it's like you're right in the middle of
his career. And you know what's absurd?
Izo is going to be gone in the next three to four years or yes,
sometimes not not breaking news, but like he his career is going
to end soon. They know that.
And now kind of comes like the reverse honeymoon.
All right, we got to do we start to get antsy and this is
something that is just going to be dealing with Woodson and that
if he's 66 years old, he's not going to coach until he's 80.
All the stuff that you're mentioning which your your stuff
on the business side is awesome. I love all of it.
But the other thing that you're seeing is all the older coaches
are getting out like this is not a older coach game.
And so I do think that is also going to be at play is that a
lot of IU fans are just look, you know, going to look at it
every year is like all right. At some year Woodson's going to
be on a this is my last two or three-year plan.
Even if even if he wins three titles.
I'm not, I'm not trying to say push him out.
He just no coach over 65 seems to enjoy the landscape of
college basketball. You're right.
However, the one thing is that Woodson is not your traditional
old or college basketball coach. You're right.
I mean that's like. Everything has a.
Everything has a has a left and a right.
Yeah. It's weird, no.
But it's interesting because the things that Woodson clearly
doesn't love to do, which is go out on the recruiting trail and
recruit high school students, you can make an argument that's
becoming just less and less important.
And this idea that you know you're going to get your high
profile five star freshman who decommits from somewhere or
maybe you grab them in the early period and they stay, yes,
you're going to plug those people in.
But a lot of it now is, as I've mentioned, very similar to how
European football works, where you get players that start at
lower levels, they demonstrate how good they can be.
The ones that are going to stick around in college sports, you
can grab those guys as sophomores or juniors.
It takes a lot of the lack of certainty about who they are and
what they can be out of the equation.
And Woodson, as we've mentioned since he got hired, if he has an
advantage in this environment is if if it keeps going that way
that is, do you want to have a guy who can evaluate talent and
say right now we see what this person can do and how they would
fit in and now we don't have to think are like are they going to
be a bust? And we saw that, let's say, you
know it's like CJ Gunn just transferred out, Kayla Banks
just transferred out. Those guys were not developing
at a level that was commensurate with playing in the Big 10.
So you wasted kind of two years of development on both of them.
You're you're not necessarily doing that with the guys that
you're bringing in in the transfer portal, the last thing.
Sorry. It also seems, it also seems
that, you know, traditional coaches are used to having a lot
of control and they want to control this process.
And it does feel like with the portal, it's very similar to the
NBA where you're dealing with intermediaries and it kind of
just becomes money's not the only thing, but money's a much
more important thing. And you're kind of, you know,
Woodson is probably used to dealing with intermediaries and
just, you know, it's all about this number.
And I'll deal with your people, and maybe I'm not even involved.
Maybe my people deal with your people kind of thing.
The one last thing I'll say, and I think this is probably going
to be the big acid test of this year for a lot of people.
I mean, I I think if value just wins a lot, it won't be as big
of a deal. But if IU is still kind of in
this borderline where they're in the kind of 19 to 24 win range,
does Woodson change his offensive approach to match more
modern basketball and have it not look so stodgy, you know,
not have an offense that was as inefficient as it was last year?
That's going to be an interesting question because I
think a lot of people are just of the mindset that IU is not
going to modernize their offense, that they're just going
to be locked into playing this. And I think there's a lot of
justifiable reasons why people feel that way because they felt
like they got sold well. They they felt they got sold a
bill of goods in the offseason last year where it's like, well,
we're only running that stuff because of Trace Jackson Davis.
And it's like, well, actually you weren't, but maybe it was.
Well, we're only running that stuff because we don't have
creators that guard and and that destroys everything and and
maybe they've got that this year.
But it's also interesting with the way the roster is
constructed. Even if you're playing both bigs
at the same time, it doesn't look like you're going to be
able to do that for 35 minutes a game because you don't have
enough depth there. It does look like they may go to
a smaller, more versatile, more athletic line up.
I think a lot of people are tuned into that.
If that changes, I think a lot of the concerns around Woodson
among fans start to dissipate because I think fans are willing
to accept losses as long as they don't pile up and as long as IU
doesn't look dreadful in the losses, and that will be a
really fascinating thing to keep it.
The Pacers are kind of an interesting example of this
where you know, if the same Pacers team with the same record
and the same outcomes was scoring 93 points a game as
opposed to whatever they're scoring like 108 or 115.
I think there's a far different perception of the team, of the
of the franchise, of Rick Carlisle.
You know, having an offense that is is exciting to watch and can
go on these big spurts covers up a lot of the defensive
deficiencies that lead to losses.
You know, I'm really curious with IU to see how that plays
out and whether that ends up being a factor in how people
perceive Woodson moving forward. No, I mean that's that's a
really interesting comp because that is one thing that I love
about this Pacers team is I feel like on any given night they can
beat anybody if they're playing well.
I don't know if they can win the NBA play series.
I don't know if they can beat A7 game series against the Celtics.
Even if they play 4, I'm not sure they can put together 4
great games. But, you know, it's been a while
since I felt that way with an IU team where it's like, hey, man,
if we're clicking, we can beat anybody in the country.
And that's with college basketball.
Like the tournament's different. If you're just clicking for a
couple weeks, you can do that. You're playing different
opponents and and things. You know it.
It's obviously different than the NBA, but I I agree with you.
But at some point it just comes down to to wins and losses, you
know, and and I I it does feel like to me that, you know,
Woodson is starting to, in my mind, narrow his options.
And the one option is going to be there needs to be some March
success 'cause I feel like if we have a really good season with a
lot of wins. And then we are not able to make
the second round of the tournament.
I think that's a goal. Second weekend.
Alright, second week, second weekend, second.
Yeah, that'd be a problem. But I think, you know we've been
to the second round a couple Times Now.
Like I think second weekend is tough and as you know you've
you've mentioned this couple months ago and it stuck in my
head. But it is true that you know
this, this is where it's a little bit unfair with college
basketball because it all comes down to you know, a couple
games. But it also is like this is the
job you signed up for and that's the those are the the
requirements that are up there. But you can have a really good
season. You can be a protected 3 seed
and not make the second weekend and it's you know it that This
is why it's tough to put all of your marbles in.
We have to have success in March.
But I think that that is unfortunately what's going to
start happening with IU because there hasn't been that success
in March for so long that at some point you're going to have
to do it. But unfortunately you can have
really good teams that don't mean again, Auburn is a great
example. That was a great year.
That was a well constructed team, that was a well coached
team. They lost the wrong game at the
wrong time. The question is, was that a
successful season or not? You know they had a final four a
couple years ago that helps temper some of that.
We don't have any of that. So that that to me would be the
biggest fear is you have a season like Auburn coming up in
front of us and like how how does that?
Solve or resolve any of these issues and it probably doesn't.
I I think success in March is going to probably be that's
going to answer the the the most important answer to this
question Maybe though the one thing I'll say is I I do think a
really good regular season would solve a lot of people's concerns
about you know to me like like you know a Big Ten title or or
even just finishing in the top two again of the Big 10 would go
just as far unless IU goes and gets blown out in the tournament
afterwards like that you know so but there's a big.
Ten title, I'm with you. I think a Big Ten title serves a
lot. You know that that that 2016
team that holds a lot of Big 10 title is something, you know, a
Big 10 tournament title, which I know is fanciful.
That's something too. Well, and it's interesting
because if you look at the, the way too early rankings as far as
the Big 10 is concerned, I mean we've talked about this already,
the Big 10's going to be a bit down.
I mean, I'm I I am, I would love to smoke whatever the national
media are smoking regarding Purdue.
It's illegal in Indiana. Whatever.
It's illegal. It's legal in every other state,
wherever they're buying this stuff.
I mean, my God. I I mean, I've, I've seen
multiple people now come out and say, well, Purdue's got the best
backcourt in the country and I was like, on what planet are we
talking about Purdue having the best backcourt in the country?
Seriously, I, Graydon Smith and Fletcher Lawyer without Zach
Edie to draw defenses away is the best backcourt in the
country. I I wish you the best of luck
with that if that's what you're putting your money on.
But anyway, like if you look at the ESPN way too early rankings
put together by Jeff Borzello 6 days ago, Purdue's ranked 13th
in the country, Indiana's ranked 16th in the country.
And if you look around the rest of the Big 10 and this is where
it gets weird, do you know who the next team to consider is in
the national rankings? I've.
Not looked, I'm going to guess. I would assume Illinois.
No, This is why it's weird. And this I want to guess again.
Like just, I mean, just nationally, maybe like Michigan,
even though it makes absolutely no sense.
But. No, no.
It's weird for a different reason.
It's UCLA. Oh, I.
Forgot, forgot they're in the Big 10 happened.
That's the thing that happened, happening.
This year, you're right. I feel so.
Weird what's going on? I know, but that's like the next
like the next regular big Ted team is Ohio State, who was
dreadful last season and who's getting this ranking largely
because John Deebler had like, or Jake Deebler.
John John Deebler is Jake Tiebler finished eight and three
at the end of the season, so you got a bit of a dead cat bounce
there with Chris Holtman getting fired.
But that doesn't mean that they're going to be good.
It would be. If somebody's doing one of these
prognostications just threw in like DePaul, just to see like
like just to see if it took somebody like, oh shit, I didn't
realize DePaul wasn't the Big 10.
Yeah, I know. Well, And then like the next
ranked team is Maryland, who was dreadful this last season and it
was yet to really show much of anything under Kevin Willard.
But my point being we talk about Big 10 titles and I could, I
could maybe hear it in the back of some people says, well, IU is
not going to compete for a Big Ten title.
It's like that Big 10 is no, like there's no clear winners,
there's no clear leaders. IU from a talent perspective has
every piece of the puzzle. And to some degree, I'd like to
thank the national media for continuing to decide that Purdue
is the top team in the conference despite losing Zac
Edie and other pieces. Because that actually I think
will take a lot of pressure off of IU where they won't come in
as the the favorite in the conference.
Maybe they'll come in second or third, But that, you know, in a
season where there's not a clear favorite and where Indiana's
taking all these steps to make their roster better.
In the back of a lot of IU people's minds, I could see
they're saying, yeah, we we should compete for a Big Ten
title. And I think that would go such a
long way towards quelling whatever related or remaining
unrest there is in terms of Mike Woodson and and the way that
this program is is headed. So anyway.
I completely agree with that and I I think that's you know Big 10
hardware really matters and that is especially for a fan base
like like Indiana that you know we're competing with Purdue for
Big 10 titles And it it does that that regional piece, even
though it's UCLA, you know matters.
I I think you know that's something that could cover up
for a bad March, even if it's just man, it's a bad match up in
the second round or you know, however that happens.
You know if you had the Auburn season but you all don't did I
don't did Auburn win the SEC? But like if if you have the
Auburn season but you win the big 10s, you have a great
season, you win the big. Auburn.
Auburn did win the SEC outright. No, I'm no, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. Tennessee wanted outright.
Auburn was in a four way tie for second.
I think that's like that to me is the the worst case scenario.
You have a really good season, but you don't win the Big 10,
you don't win the Big 10 title. You have a you know horror
result in March that's going to be really tough to square that
circle. But I do think if you get a Big
Ten title while it's going to suck if you lose in March.
I think that that that's enough like all right man that you you
did something and you've done something here that you know for
your coaches haven't done before like Archie Miller.
So I I think that would be that be important and I I kind of
agree with you I'm I'm trying really hard personally.
You know, I've taken some some crap on Twitter for for you
know, being too negative or not being positive enough with them.
Like I'm trying really hard to just I don't want to get in a
yo-yo effect where I'm just like super high, super low.
Like oh or you know, I was pretty unhappy at the end of
last year and I'm trying to get back to neutral where it's like
I'm not super happy, super low. Like let's just have some
results show me. But you know that would be a Big
Ten title would be awesome. I think just winning, you know,
going through that process. Would be good too.
Let's jump over talk IU football real quick.
Obviously it's been a fascinating last few weeks for
them as we saw some exodus of players and I think that was
always to some degree to be expected given the lack of
certainty about how guys were going to adapt.
But we've also seen IU go back out, grab some additional
players who look really good. We're seeing them rated
relatively highly in terms of overall roster talent.
You know still some questions certainly on the lines but
they've they've made a lot of strides and we enter kind of a a
quiet period to some degree for IU football.
There's going to be some players that will still come into the
portal, they'll be still or come in from the portal.
I think we're done with players leaving in the portal because
that deadline has passed a couple of weeks ago.
But I think you know at this stage I'm I'm really curious
about IU football and expectations since we've been
talking about expectations this whole podcast.
This is 1 where I almost feel like the opposite is the case
where I feel like there's so much positivity about what Kurt
Cignetti and his staff have done up to this point.
I do. I, I, I, I look at a lot of the
the roster compositions of the various teams and who Indiana's
got to play. And while the the schedule is
certainly favorable, I do think it's worth just reminding people
that there is a long way to go with this IU roster.
And much as we've talked about the problems that IU basketball
might have about bringing a bunch of new feet faces
together, getting a good system in place where everybody knows
their role. IU football with the amount of
turnover they've had is in maybe an even more complicated state
because of how many pieces have to work comp in a complimentary
manner for good football to take place.
And so you look at like UCLA, who a lot of people are very
much disregarded. You know, their, their defensive
roster's actually very good and they're they're not going to be
a pushover, especially having to travel on the road.
You know, Washington on paper looks like they lost a lot, yet
they brought a lot in. And a lot of those players are
players that Jed Fish, their new head coach, had at Arizona.
You know, Northwestern. I mean, they're that's a team.
That is, they always seem to find a way to surprise.
They're either better than you think they're going to be or
worse than you think they're going to be, and I'm a little
worried that they're going to be better than people think.
I say all that not to try to pour cold water on the IU
football front, 'cause I think there's a lot of really exciting
moves being made. But I could see a scenario where
they're not winning eight or nine games certainly and and I
think that a lot of people, I don't know what the expectations
are, it's just been all positive.
I am curious to see what the reactions will be if it's not
all positive since it's the first year of Cignetti and his
staff at IU. So I'm going to reach out to our
or not reach out. I'm going to call out our
friends over at bite side Bison Taylor's done a great job over
there. Had a sub stack where he went
back and forth with Ben Witterstein with the
Wittenstein. I was never going to say it
right with the the the pre preseason analysis, but what I
thought was interesting is you know where Indiana on the Vegas
books is at 5 1/2 wins this season and when you look at the
other teams, Indiana's playing in the Big 10, four of those
teams are either at or below that.
Now now obviously people can be above the expectations, below
the expectations, but we have the the same win total as UCLAA,
higher win, sorry, same win total as Northwestern, a low
higher win total than Michigan State who's 4 1/2 and Purdue is
also at 4 1/2. So if you assume that you know
we're at that level or we're better than those teams that's
four Big Ten wins right there with three non conference that's
A7 win season which to me is awesome.
I I think this is where you know expectations this is you know
back to the ex's and jo's guys. You know this is you have the
honeymoon phase and so even not meeting expectations in your
first year is not awful because you can still sell yourself on.
We're building the the foundations that's why this is a
good place to be. But I also think that IU
football just has a different expectation set then, you know
IU basketball and that if we get to five wins and it looks like
we were really close to get to six or seven, I think people
will be there. I just, I look at it similarly
to you with the basketball that I'm not sure given our schedule
how tough it is going to be for us to win four or five games in
the Big 10 just based on the teams that we're playing and
where they're all projected to be.
I'm also drinking a lot of the Kool-aid and really enjoying
what I'm seeing. But yeah, it's going to be
interesting. I also just think if if Indiana
falls a little bit flat, I don't think there's going to be the
same kind of reaction. But you know, all of that is
going to change. If they come out and they're not
able to go 2 and O going into UCLA, like if you can't beat FIU
or Western Illinois, you know what we'll get.
As Yogi Berra would say, it gets late real quick here.
You know that those that is where I think there would be
some alarm bells like, oh, this is, well, you really won the
offseason, but you're not able to win games on the field.
But if they come out, you know, even if they're two and one
after that UCLA game, things are fine.
But it kind of depends on what that one loss looks like.
If it's the FIU or Western Illinois, it's not good or they
just get completely boat race by UCLAA team that's not projected
to be awesome. That's also going to be
concerning. Culture change is hard, which I
guess is kind of why I wanted to bring it up.
And you know there's. That's very fairpoint.
I'll use so I I'm a for those who follow the Premier League.
I'm a Tottenham supporter and it's been interesting watching
the first year of of Antipostokoglu as the Tottenham
manager they did. You know they they lose the best
scorer in Premier League history before the season starts and
they still figure out a way to finish fifth.
They're going to I think they're going to finish fifth here and
and that's a great accomplishments.
First European football they've had in a couple of years first
year that they finished with the same manager they started with
and yet though they ended the season very poorly.
You know I think they dropped they they got three points out
of their last five games which is real bad.
The thing is that you know you you if you see the press
conferences that have been held and and you read through the
comments, a lot of it is post to Cogloo saying the culture is not
there like there is. There is still a lot of problems
with the mentality and the thought process that the players
and the and the club have and that is leading to a lot of the
problems in key pressure moments for IU.
You know this, this is going to be the big question mark.
Like as much as the culture looked like it had changed under
Tom Allen and as much as in the the 19 or the 20 season and the
21 season, it was like, oh, actually it's the 19th season
and the 20 season. It was like, wow, this team is
different. This is not the same IU of old
21/22/23. The veneer comes away and it's
like, oh, we still have a beat up car, yeah.
Exactly. And so that to me is a really
fascinating thing with IU football which is like you can
bring these extra players in. And this is where I think even
if you've got questions and Taylor's done a good job on bite
sized bison of of trying to parse you know how well
statistically will and basically a non power five player
translate to the power Five level.
I have to stop using the term Power 5 because it's really just
power two. But coming from James Madison up
to this level or coming from a Max school up to this level,
there's a statistical element. How does that translate?
But the other aspect of it is if you can import winning culture
and if you can import that idea that the thought process is as
important as the actual physical manifestation on the field, that
really does make a big difference.
And that I think is going to be the big question mark, not just
for IU football, but for IU basketball to some degree as
well. Like so much of this and this is
I guess where it's an A, a, a, a thing that hasn't been talked
about as much with Woodson, but I think after last year deserves
some commentary and and really will help to determine how
people think about things moving forward.
It's like it felt like the culture took a step backwards in
2324. Does it come back to where it
looked like it was in 2223 with IU football?
Nobody's around essentially still from the last really good
culture team that IU had, can Signetti instill that in his
team because that as we know from watching teams like Iowa,
Wisconsin, you know teams that are underpowered from a talent
perspective, a lot of their wins.
Northwestern is probably the best example of this come from
mentality and and come from being able to to do the little
things. So that to me is where I'm the
most interested in how all this plays out.
And I'm looking forward, frankly, to those first couple
of games because as you said, if you're close in those games, I
mean what look, if you think about IE football last year,
when did we know for sure that there was a real problem?
You know, it, it wasn't the huge losses that Indiana, you know,
would suffer. It was Akron.
It was the Akron game, 100%, that Akron game.
Like you, we thought we looked at that Louisville game and we
said to ourselves, oh, maybe this team has got some juice in
it because, you know, they. They they the second-half is
what we're going to get the rest of the year.
And then you get that Akron game and they got to go to multiple
overtimes to defeat Akron at home, and that was a terrible
Akron team. And immediately they come out of
that. They lose 4417 to Maryland, they
lose 52 to 7 to Michigan, they lose 3114 at home to Rutgers and
were really never in the game. They lose at Penn State, yeah,
but the Penn State game was better.
But it like they they were clearly in a swoon at that point
and and I think you know by the time they go into the Penn State
game they were like one but two and five or something like that.
So we will know I think pretty early then the question is, is
that sustainable over a 12 game regular season.
So yeah it should be fun. It's interesting, but that's
that's the stuff that we can't tell from looking at the
transfers in and out and looking even at the schemes that have
been run. What I'm excited about is on the
last pod that you did, you were talking about that I didn't know
the the venue change. I knew that Northwestern had
turned down their stadium. I didn't know the venue change
stuff. It's funny, you're just like
you're normally, you know, relatively even keel and you
have, you have very measured, you know takes on the pods.
It was just funny when you're like like moving the game in
Northwestern and I'm pissed and now I'm excited for your post
game for that. Because if we end up losing that
game based on like wild wind or something crazy.
I just, I'm going to normally you kind of let me go bananas
and just rant like I I'm just going to I'm putting a pin in it
now put a note like put a thing in my calendar.
Like if we lose that game because of something crazy based
in the field like I'm just going to let Galen cook.
Like I'll do the open. I'll do the home field apparel
and then I'll just get a quick that's a coffee again cup of
coffee and let you cook. It'll be a hell of a way to
close out September, I'll tell you that much.
Yeah, Tune TuneIn on that one, folks.
Make sure your your sub stack subscription is ready to roll.
There'll probably be AVIP episode about that one too.
Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Anyway, before we wrap up, let's
talk some Indy 500. We are.
We're recording this at 11:40. Well, we've we've been recording
for an hour at this point, so if you're still with us, thank you.
But Indy 500 qualifying this wacky format that they went to
several years ago where that we've locked in positions 13
through 30 as real? Quick, I did a I'm sorry, I'm
interrupting. It's it's on brand.
I did a premium post about this on the sub stack, but I'm
curious, your thoughts, getting up to this point real quick,
IndyCar talk. What are your thoughts on the
the Penske pass thing and, you know, having to actually change?
It's been an odd season, so I'm just curious, you're recapping
again if you go to the premium sub stack.
I have some videos on my thoughts on IndyCar up to this
point. It's not that we're trying to
put it all behind a paywall, We're just trying to not subject
people with more IndyCar talk 'cause it's wild.
What are your thoughts on what's happened so far this season with
that? Well, I mean, look, I'm at, I
am. I'm glad IndyCar actually took
the steps to say something was done wrong here.
We're going to go back and investigate.
I think that's important. The problem is ultimately
twofold. A Penske's got such good cars
and and there's such a well run organization then ultimately the
punishments that were metered out aren't really going to be
punishments that are going to hurt them the same way they
would hurt like Errol McLaren or or Andretti or you know well
Andretti does a good job of hurting itself most of the time.
But like, so people I think are expecting Penske to get like
penalized in a way that's going to harm their performance.
It's like that's not going to happen because their performance
isn't really dependent on the things that they're getting
penalized for to any huge degree, so.
You know, it's it's important that the series demonstrate that
nobody's above the law. And I thought all the Penske
explanations were kind of dumb. But I also think it's important
to remember that cheating happens in auto racing all the
damn time. It happens in F1, it happens in
IndyCar, it happens in NASCAR. Probably 5 to 10% of it actually
ever gets caught. And I so I I have a hard time
being that upset about the actual scandal itself, given
that it's in the big scheme of things, probably a relatively
minor thing, all things considered.
But it's like it's a it's a cloud.
For a series that didn't need clouds, that is not a reason to
not do the punishment. It's just it's almost like it's
such a weird thing to try to describe what happened that it
almost loses its impact. Does that make sense?
It does. You know my my feeling on it is
it it highlights what is so wrong with this series is that
you know we we talk on these races especially the road and
St. courses. All they talk about is push to
pass and top the different tire compounds and and I would be
hard pressed to remember 4 races where either of those things
really affected the race. You know it it maybe it does on
the margins, but we talk about tire compounds ad nauseam in
these races. And then I went to the indie
Grand Prix with my family. It was awesome for 12 seconds
when the race started, it was awesome for the one restart.
The rest of the time Pelosi is running away with it and it's
like you need some kind of competition to bring these teams
together. And I just it to me it it
highlights, you know, it's like you said it's a dark cloud over
a sport but it's like we're going nuts over this, this push
to pass when it never effects anything.
I've never seen a race, you know, it's like, oh, he's got,
he's got more push to pass, but there's no, there's nowhere to
pass in Barber. So that's all you know, it's
like it's these advantages they talk about on the broadcast.
They're trying to sell the excitement and then nothing ever
happens. And so to me, like to the
series, like you guys are kind of wrapped around your own axle
here, like make this stuff better or more important or just
get rid of it because the push to pass like people were
cheating, but it still didn't matter.
Like, I don't think Newgarden won that he was going to win the
race anyway. It's like you still, he still
couldn't pass the people. He couldn't pass on the places
you couldn't pass. I don't know.
I just, I think it highlights. They have all of these little
gimmicks, but none of them are working.
It's like if you're going to go down the gimmick route, do the
NASCAR thing and just do a competition yellow every 20
laps. I mean just have real gimmicks
that actually bring the field together or just be the the the
natural racing series. But I don't know, I I took away.
It's like, like you said, it's really tough to explain to
somebody what this is like. Oh, this is big enough that they
got penalized a winner of a race.
Then you'd be like, Oh well then this, this push to pass must be
the most important thing in every race.
Like, no, actually, it really never effects anything.
Well, I mean, yeah, I get what you're saying.
Yeah. Ultimately, it's just it's one
of those things, and this is where I think rules violations
in all sports are problematic to try to explain.
It's kind of like I think about the NBA with this, like the
number of things that I haven't been aware of as far as like the
minutiae of the NBA rulebook. There was this thing happened in
the in the Mavs Thunder game last night, which you missed
because you were, you know, bidding on on on prizes.
But you know, there's a call at the end of the game that ends up
ending the series. And, you know, I'm still trying
to put together exactly what the hell happened.
We've seen this in the Pacers series with Yeah, it's like, oh,
that's not reviewable. It's like why?
I didn't know that. Yeah.
Or oh, that's not a foul, even though it's clearly a foul.
There's just all these things where I feel like, yeah, the
there needs to be a reckoning across the board sometimes
about, OK, what is actually important, what is not.
Because these rule books tend to not get cleaned out and and
organized properly. And most of them are written for
scenarios where you're not using replay because they precede
replay and yet now we've got replay.
But they're not really using replay in the way that could be
used to make things easier. They're just taking complicated
things and making them either seem stupid or incomprehensible,
neither of which is really a good outcome.
It also feels like aliens just dropped basketball, you know,
sports on. It's like, well, this has to be,
you know, this is Bible. It's like, no, like this.
In the end, this is entertainment.
Like, I want to be enjoying what I'm watching and yes, I'd like,
you know, fair competition. But I also, once we go to the
monitor for the 15th time, like this is no longer.
I'd rather have just missed calls than 30 seconds to the
monitor every two minutes. Or if you know that's, I agree.
Like the more you can get rid of the monitor, the better I think
you're the better solution you have at that point, not so much.
Not the monitor itself like you need to be.
You need to be looking at calls and making sure they're right.
What you don't need is the performative theater of the
official then going and talking into a microphone where they're
on camera. That got that really hurts.
And now going back to the IndyCar thing, I think the
problem there. The weirdest camera.
And just side note, the weirdest camera angle in the NBA.
It's like great visuals the whole time and then suddenly
it's like he's on my webcam talking into monitors.
Bananas anyway. IndyCar and it was the IndyCar
thing I was going to say was essentially it's it's not a
great look when rules breaking happens and you're not sure what
the heck's going on that it's almost the opposite there, where
it's like the broadcasters generally don't do a great job
of describing why something happened the way that it
happened. And in a very technical sport,
which has a lot of technical rules, I think that there could
be some better things done there.
Anyway, I'm done. I'm done on that topic.
But anyway, qualifying will happen to see or it happened
yesterday on Saturday and then by the time some of you listen
to this, we'll already have the full field set.
We'll have the the, the fast twelve thing.
It's it's been kind of a of a a not terribly exciting month of
May so far. Unfortunately some of that is
weather we haven't had the the track time for a lot of the
teams. It is weird, like you're seeing
a lot of engine issues on both sides of the equation.
Honda's had issues, Chevy's had issues.
Which is always funny to me because then the the the driver,
not exactly an engine issue, but like you know, Graham Rahal came
out and I get it. He's like, man, the guys in the
the the guys in the garage been working on this, you know, for
nine months. They've been putting their work
in. You always hear that and it's
like have that like have you been working for this for a
year? And I know it's way more
technical than I'm giving credit for, but it's like you've been
working for a year. Why can't you get 4 laps out of
your engine? There's just a lot of little,
and again, these are very complicated machines and you
know, you can watch F1, you see a similar kind of thing.
But the problem for indie though, is that this is the
month that everything has to align.
You need a good show. You know, you had the, you had
the Indie Grand Prix, which happened, you know, basically
two weeks ago or a week ago, and that was a really dull race.
Again, I've, I can't remember. Like, I don't remember anything
about those races other than bad stuff that's happened.
Like, I don't remember the winners, but I remember Cliff
ran into each other. And.
Or Hinchcliffe getting hit in the helmet, you know, I mean you
like stuff like that is that is seems to be the most and it's a
shame because that is what the fastest Rd. circuit that they
have on the series, I think or something along those lines.
And normally it's just kind of like, well here's an event to
start. And so I like that idea, but
it's blended into a pretty nondescript period here.
And qualifying yesterday, I mean I watched almost the entire 8
hours or wherever whatever it was and there just wasn't a lot
of drama there. It's in.
And you know, this has been the case for years where everybody
wants to go with the very beginning because the track is
still cool and then some stuff happens during the middle of the
day, but the track is too hot in most cases to really go out and
good get good attempts. Then everything jams up at the
end and you know the the, the used to be that everything was
decided on the first day that mattered and then you'd backfill
the field on the second day and there was a whole second weekend
of qualifying, which is when the bumping would happen.
That wasn't a great system either.
I just don't know that what they've got right now is a
particularly good system because you really have to be pretty
hardcore to want to sit there and watch 8 hours of qualifying
when the whoever finishes in the top 12 really doesn't matter.
It's really only who finishes 11th, 12th, 13th.
No one's that worried about the bottom of the field because no
one cares about the fact that the 30th driver gets in and the
31st driver doesn't. Even with some big names there
like Marcus Erickson has not qualified yet.
Graham Rahal is not qualified yet.
The chances of both of them getting in are still pretty
good. Maybe.
Maybe Graham Rahal not, I don't know.
But is Graham Rahal's not almost not a big enough name at this
point to even get that fired up about it.
The Fast 12 kind of looks like a FAI accompli.
Like are is anybody really going to be able to challenge any of
these Penske cars for the front row?
It doesn't look like it, you know, maybe Rossi.
But Rossi, I I I'll be surprised If Rossi's on the front row.
I'd be happy to eat my words. But given the problems with the
rest of the team has had, the only really interesting story
was the Kyle Larson thing. And even that was just kind of
like what we know he's going to qualify the car and he's
probably going to be in the fast 12.
It just felt like a long day of not a lot, and that for a series
that really needs to maximize what little time in the sun it
gets, that feels like a concern. I agree.
I mean it's it's the the last 30.
We were texting about this. The last 30 minutes of the
Saturday is always good. But it's like this is the
problem with filling the field is you have to fill basically 20
spots that are not exciting. You know, it's either you're in
the fast 12 or you're in the bottom 4.
Everything in the middle is kind of just once you're in those
middle numbers. Yeah, you're in, like you're in.
You're not going to be fast. You're not going to be slow.
You're in, you're in. And it, you know, it takes 2
hours to do that. It's not super fun.
The thing that's frustrated me with the qualifying process, I
do kind of. I'm OK with the system they have
now. It makes for a really
interesting Sunday and it just sucks.
And now it's like going up against the Pacers game.
So no one very few people are you know Pacers fans are going
to watch. They've you know by by bringing
in the Indy Rd. course. The idea was that's kind of how
you open the month of May, but in doing so, you know that lock
them into four days of practice because then they have to.
You know, Mother's Day is the day after Monday.
They got to flip the course back to the Oval.
So you don't have practice on Monday and now you just have
practice Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to bring the
boost up, you know, and weather seems to always come into place.
The weather's always taking off 2 days and everybody's like,
wow, we don't have any practice time.
It's like well. It's May.
It's May in Indiana. Like we've done this a bunch.
Like for how old's the state? 200 years old, I mean.
Had to go to thermal to fill a weekend like you have a ton of
time. Move that IndyCar, the the road
course, race back a week or two, doesn't have to be in May, end
of April and then bring us back two weeks of qualify, 2 weeks of
practice, maybe two weekends of qualifying.
Like sell this is your event, sell your big event.
I mean, as somebody who's a fan, I love having practice on, just
on my TV, just kind of listening to it, watching it.
I only get three days, you know, three or four days of that now
and normally 2 because it rains out like I I think they've done
themselves a massive disservice. And I think you end up seeing a
lot of teams struggling to figure things out and it ends up
being just a a Penske shootout almost.
It's always a Penske Ganassi shootout every year because
those are the teams that, you know, pardon my French, have
their shit together. And other teams, you don't give
them enough qualifying, they're going to have a bunch of issues
and trouble getting it in the field.
So anyway, that that being said today will be interesting.
I agree with you. I think it's, you know, normally
the fast 12, anyone in that top four is going to be on the front
row. You very rarely in this in this
set up that we've had for the last couple years, somebody in
position 6 or below in that fast 12 ever jump up to the front
row. You know I like Santino
Ferrucci. I think he's a driver that has
done well in the race. But I mean he's his team is AJ
Foy. So that that's always going to
be a hindrance. I just, I think you're going to
see that. As for the the drivers don't
make it. I think the Ericsson thing is
interested. It's a guy who's finished first
and second his last two, five hundreds to now be on the
bubble. You know this is what IndyCar
should be selling. This should this is your like
this is a guy who you know theoretically is on track to
have one of the best careers at Indy just based on his first
couple of races who's not even in the field right now.
That's that's the the focus. I think a lot of people are
looking at Graham Rahal. The idea like he hasn't made it
two years in a row. Maybe that's more on him.
Oh my gosh, fast jumping in on me.
That's the sign that. That's the sign we've gone too
long. And he's right.
He's. Way more interested in paper
than Indy 500. Wow that that was seeing Scott
get freaked out. Watch it on YouTube.
Scott almost having a heart attack with his.
I hope, I hope the viewers got as much joy out of that as I
did. That was tremendous all.
Right. Thanks, man.
All right, that's he gets the talking gene from me.
That's tremendous. Being interrupted by my own son.
It's it's karma. But anyway, so I I think that I
I am interested for all of this, but I it does, as always, feel
like IndyCar has good things to work with and finds a way to
kind of do the worst with them. I all I'll say is, I mean, I'm,
I was trying to talk of this on the last podcast and we'll wrap
up here. I'm just not sure who to get
excited about this year. Yeah, I'm really not.
And I know who the drivers are. I know who, who, what teams they
belong to. I'm just not sure who to get
excited about at this point. And so I.
Think it's a problem with the series that drivers just you
know none of them are It's not it's never been to me AUS or
foreign thing like I Tony Kahn is one of my favorite drivers of
all time. I think Elio is very fun to
watch. You know my wife loves
Tekumasado. I think he's a fun driver.
None of them are American. I can tell this is just a a
batch of drivers that are all kind of vanilla and boring and
and a lot of them are you know VVQIS as I'm programming my my
scanner. It's all a lot of, you know V
Quist, you know Rosenquist, a lot of VQISTS, a lot of kind of
you know, Scandinavian drivers who just are not super
interesting in the crop that's coming in.
They just need some personality. Like Newgarden is screaming to
be the face of the series and it's like just be interesting
man, like stop taking the Scott Dixon playbook.
And to me I think that is part of the problem of Graham Rahal
is actually kind of a interesting engaging guy.
He's just not good enough to to be up there.
I I think that's a problem is the series needs needs
personalities and this is this is what you get with single
player sports. You know, tennis has dealt with
this where it's not so much in a you know, people love Federer
and Nadal. You you need guys who are who,
who grasp your imagination and sometimes they're not there.
And I think that's what's running with IndyCar right now
is a lot of the younger drivers that are coming up like the
Paddle Awards, Alex Pelosi, who were good, are just not super
interesting. I don't I mean I I I know you
and I have talked about this a bunch and I understand where
you're coming from. I just think the races aren't
that interesting at this point. That's that's 100%.
I I honestly could give or take the personalities.
I I fell in love with IndyCar because I really enjoyed the
racing and it just it isn't there to me at the same level
that it needs to be. And and that is like Indy's the
one race where it's normally pretty good.
Although it's like it's also just kind of a crap shoot at
this point. Indy is It's a luck thing more
than anything. Else so you get a lot of Indy's
gotten worse too. It's turned into like everyone
goes the first lap and then everybody's immediately in.
All right, let's let's prepare for the last 20 laps.
It's like that's again, back to the rules.
Like, that's great guys, but like.
I'm sitting here in the sun for three hours like I'd like to not
just Fast forward to two hours from now.
Some of that is because the cars are just that much better.
I mean, like the number of the thing about the every qualifier
on Saturday did at least 231 miles an hour and didn't look
like they were pushing it. And that's great for safety and
it's great because you've got this high level speed, but
everybody's within essentially 2 1/2 miles an hour of each other
or three miles an hour of each other.
So there's this, like there, there was this whole like thing.
There's this, like, why is Hakuma Sato's car working and
Graham Ray Hall's isn't? And you know they're both on the
same team. And then you look at the numbers
and it's like Takuma Sato's car went like 2 miles an hour faster
which which on four lap average of the.
It's just it's it's it's milliseconds.
You know it's tenths of a second like that's it's really not that
much of a difference. So you're, and to some degree I
think you get to a point in auto racing where the differences
become so minuscule that it does take away from the competitive
aspects. Because, as we know, like the
big the big misconception about Indy is that IndyCar, like in
the Indy 500, is a race to determine who the fastest car
is. That is technically true, but
Indy was always about What Car could go 500 miles under those
conditions. It's essentially an endurance
race that happens to have really, really fast cars.
Well, and you and I love to watch the old races.
And if you go back and watch races from the 70s, eighties,
even the 90s, you know, every 25 laps it's like, oh, it blew an
engine, like, oh, it blew a gasket.
Like, you know, it's, it's, it's one of my favorite things of all
time is watching AJ Foy come in. This is like, you know, 84, like
back when people had and fire suits, those guys in jeans and
overalls just coming out and like banging on the couch.
But it's like, no, you're right. I mean, you used to have seven
or eight cars that would just not finish the rate.
Not based on wrecks, just based on our car.
Couldn't make it. Yeah, so I it may be an
unfixable issue, which whatever, but it it's unfortunate because
it does feel like with some of the ex, the exodus of certain
drivers and just the way that the series is gone, it's just it
doesn't feel like that passionate of the month.
There's people who disagree with that right now and that's fine.
I'm just saying it, it feels to some degree like there needs to
be a reset in some way, shape or form, either in the format or in
something. So we'll see what happens.
But I agree, because I was thinking about it too.
You have a field with you. You have a lot of a lot of
former winners you have you know some really good young drivers
like Pullo and paddle Award who haven't won yet and and normally
you know that the years that the the field hasn't been as
exciting as you don't have a lot of former you have a lot of
winners here. So you have a lot of people who
people know and they know their racing styles and they've won
and engaging fashions and so it's it is interesting but I'm
feeling the same thing just kind of like oh wow, it's coming up
like and I'm just not as excited that that said I'll be going and
and excited for the race because it's the race is always more
than just the race it's it is a spectacle and a way to spend a
great Sunday in May. On that note, we'll go ahead and
wrap up as we've kept you for 80 minutes.
That's probably enough time we will be back.
Scott's going to have AVIP video popping up a little bit later in
the day. So if you're on the Crimson Cast
sub stack on the VIP side, keep an eye out for that.
We'll have some podcasts coming up later this week.
We'll probably do like a full or at least some kind of actual
preview of the race we can talk through.
We'll do it. We'll do it later on this week
and then we'll see what else goes on.
I'll have some more college sports business stuff popping up
later this week as well. So keep an eye out for that.
And just a reminder, be sure to visit homefieldapparel.com, our
presenting sponsor. Be sure to check out the other
podcast on the back home network, and be sure to have a
good Memorial Day weekend. If we don't talk with you before
then, although I promise it won't be us, it'll be you.
So anyway, for Scott, I'm Galen. This is Crimson Cast.
We'll catch you folks on the flip side.
Thanks for joining us once again.
Bring back the Bison song, everybody.