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A more relevant late November in college football than in decades!

(TL/DR)

And it’s all a direct result of the 12-team playoff keeping 6-7 SEC teams hopeful late November. It’s also a direct result of NIL and the portal “diluting” quality depth on formerly dominant teams like UGA, bammer, and Texas.

Why? Because NIL warchests get deployed to steal 2nd and 3rd string quality players. And Bama and UGA can’t pay enough NIL to retain the depth athletes because what they’re BUYING is PLAYING TIME.

As the great Lou Holtz said, in November, you’re either trying to WIN something, or RUIN something (an archrival’s dreams).

So here we are, and I will 100% take this new football model over our archrivals being allowed to have a $2 million higher salary cap every year and whip our a$$ 8 of 10 seasons. AU can recruit and damn sure has no excuse not to coach at a high level to make the playoff maybe 3 of any 5 years.

Check the Nov 23 and 30 games and how RELEVANT SEC football still is. I think I’d rather have only 2 losses and NOT play in the SEC title game if I’m Bama, Ole Miss or aTm. Texas may need the game to become an automatic bid with its weak schedule strength.

UGA is done with its conference games, and can’t be worse than 6-2, coming off an impressive win over Tenn as well as the road Texas win to offset the bad Ole Miss loss. But the Yellow Jackets could “wreck” the Dawgs’ playoff hopes barring an SEC championship game win.

Nov 23

aTm has to play in J-H - at NIGHT. The 1-loss Aggies can ill afford a “bad loss” to Auburn with the Nov 30 home game v Texas up next. Can Auburn ride its rabid home crowd to make it a 4-quarter game? We won’t have to wait long to find out. My take is AU will compete well, on the strength of our stout defense, and leaning heavy on the ground game to set up timely play action to a WR corps that is arriving in Cam, KLS, Simmons, and Rivaldo. Hard to call it a looking ahead (to Texas) game for the Aggies, but that’s a slight X factor as poor as AU has been.

Bama goes TO Norman, Oklahoma, with the Sooners having had an open date to get well and put a plan in. Can Venables deliver a defensive gem? Doubtful, but a treacherous year for SEC teams when they go on the road. The thin margin of winning makes home field quadruply valuable.

Texas hosts Kentucky. Should be a blowout. Should. Texas has a horrific strength of schedule and needs a blowout W.

Hot 2-loss Ole Miss has to go TO Gainesville, and I like the surging Gators to shock Hotty Toddy. Stunning that Billy Napier has survived. Coming off the open date hearing how they’re the best team in the SEC, can Lane Kiffin deliver a performance that helps Ole Miss transcend the weight of their mediocre program DNA, with a gimme Egg Bowl to follow?

Vandy goes TO LSU and no one cares, which is why I like the Fighting Diego’s in this game. Brian Kelly is a fraud for now, and an EXPENSIVE one at that, leaving LSU in buyout purgatory.

Nov 30 - what a HUGE weekend for any 1 or 2-loss SEC contenders.

Iron Bowl brings the pressure of being a a MUST WIN for first year coach Kalen DeBoer (unless they lose to Oklahoma) in his first ever Iron Bowl. AU will make it a game if we can run the ball, and avoid costly giveaways, which we’ve been doing for 5 games. Likely a 2:30 kick with aTm v Texas the prime night game.

Texas AT aTm. Like the Horns a little, but this will be a very emotional game and tough environment for Texas. Loser leaves town for playoff?

Tenn AT Vandy !! Huge game for the VOLS

Friday, Nov 29th, 2:30 pm Black Friday - Egg Bowl. Miss State AT Ole Mrs !!! Must win for OM.

South Carolina AT Clemson.

Georgia Tech AT Georgia - dangerous game for the Dawgs. A loss would knock them out, unless they then win the SEC Championship game.

FOOTBALL TIGER TALK REVIEW: Texas A&M Week '24

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It's once again time for TIGER TALK on the radio waves throughout the Southeastern United States!

LIST OF AFFILIATES AND LINKS

PREDICTION: None tonight. (Andy is out becuase there's a late basketball game tonight.)

**********

(They're at Baumhauer's tonight.)

NOT ANDY wants to talk about the ULM win. "Is there a way we can go back and have that be Game One?" GUFFAWS ALL AROUND (He said it was the most complete game they've played since he's been at Auburn.) "It was a really good effort. Complete game. Great crowd."

NOT ANDY asks about to know if Freeze knew they'd be that sharp. "I had a feeling after the two weeks we had. I just felt like we could be our base self and go tempo and get people involved. In this game, you felt like we were the better team roster-wise."

NOT ANDY asks about Cam Coleman's big day. "I know two of the catches were run plays, a response to what the defense was giving them. Malcolm got involved also. Dre went for 100 yards also."

NOT ANDY says that's the first time since 1994 that Auburn had a 100-yard rusher and two 100-yard receivers in the same game. "A stat like that says that you were having a good day, for sure. It felt that way from the get-go. They believed in the tempo and what we were doing."

***COMMERCIAL BREAK***

NOT ANDY wants to talk about Payton's game. "It should have been 26 of 32 for sure and maybe more. The guy threw five touchdowns and completed a lot of balls for us and didn't turn the ball over. He played really, really well. It'd be nice to have a repeat of that on Saturday. That would be real nice."

TERRY is in the house. He wants to know about how Auburn doesn't lose people in the portal. "We've got to get the '25 class signed on Dec. 4. Our current players ... we started having conversations during the dead period (the prior week) with all of what we'd consider to be our Tier 1 or Tier 2 guys. It's very uncomfortable for me. I want to coach them. I want to build a real, genuine relationship that's not based on money being a motivating factor even though I'm happy that they get it. We've already begin trying our best to be proactive. We think revenue sharing is coming in July, which will be a good thing. Prior to that ... this run through December and January could get really, really, really wild. You have no idea what truth is. It's an ever-moving goalpost. Inflation for recruiting in the portal has tripled for sure. I don't blame the kids. Whoever allowed the start of this didn't think it through very well."

NOT ANDY wants to asks about how the schedule affects portal recruiting. (The early NSD occurs before the portal opens.) "You don't think through all this stuff until it happens. You're kinda at a disadvantage by having an away game as the last game of the season. If you have a home game, you can bring in the visits again right before. Fifty percent of our league will have targets that we want, (players) that are committed to us, they'll have them on their campus. Every other year, we'll kind of be at a disadvantage. Now that you don't have visits in December, January will be a mad, mad rush."

***COMMERCIAL BREAK***

NOT ANDY wants to talk about Ian Vachon. "I think Towns (McGough) is going to be outstanding. You don't get leg strength like Towns has very often. A freshman DB or a freshman O-lineman makes a mistake and it kinda go unnoticed. A freshman kicker makes a mistake and the whole world knows it. It's kinda in a funk right now. Ian was really solid. That was good to see."

KYLE is in the house. He wants to know if Auburn is going to run the ball a lot Saturday. "We've got to figure out how we want to run the football on them. Hopefully it's successful."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about tailbacks. "Jarquez has been the bell cow. To see him get 1,000 yards is gratifying. You talk about the future and all of that ... Damari and Jeremiah Cobb are two outstanding players. Those are two guys we have prioritized and need them to hang around here. Hopefully they follow in Jarquez's footsteps."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about the defense. "We've gotten better and better and better as we've gone on. We're stopping the run. We're containing the quarterbacks decently, which will be tested Saturday night. Credit to DJ and the defensive staff. They continue to grind. DeMarcus Riddick has been a spark ... with the way he runs. Keldric Faulk and his leadership has been invaluable, also."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about those young guys gaining confidence. "I think I see that in them at practice. It ticks them off when they give up explosive plays. Saturday night will be one of the better tests we've had."

FLETCHER is in the house. He's young. He wants to know Freeze's favorite color. "Can I go with two favorite colors? Orange and blue." GUFFAWS ALL AROUND

***COMMERCIAL BREAK***

NOT ANDY asks about how Texas A&M's defensive front will be a challenge. "Stay out of 3rd-and-Long. We really need to stay in 3rd-and-Manageable where they don't know if it's run or pass."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about how Auburn did well on converting third downs against ULM. "We worked very hard on that during the open week. Payton did a nice job in those situations of getting them to the open people and getting those conversions."

NOT ANDY wants to know if misdirection will help Saturday. "It's more about keeping them unsure. You want to stay out of negative plays."

NOT ANDY wants to ask about A&M's offense. "I just think they're a complete team. They've lost a starter, but I don't know that their stats have gone down much."

NOT ANDY wants to ask about this being Senior Night. "I wish it wasn't on an SEC game. I wish we'd have done it last Saturday. They don't ask me those things. It's hard to truly honor (them) ... at the same time, you know what's getting ready to happen. You're kinda scattered. All the hoopla right before kickoff is a bit much, truthfully, with everything that's going on. It's just a lot."

***COMMERCIAL BREAK***

GREG is in the house. He wants to ask about freshmen playing at Auburn this season helping recruiting. "It's something we've used for sure with this '25 class. This is our vision of building it — with high-school kids. We think that's the most sustainable model. We need you to come help up and return glory to Auburn. The level to which we're recruiting outweigh the classes from before our arrival. We're going to play the best kids. We've certainly used it a lot. I think the '25 kids believe that."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about Walker White playing against ULM. "It's invaluable, the experience. I wanted to throw it some more with him because his arm is live. We were up and we want to have some class. I might should have put him in a little bit earlier."

NOT ANDY wants to talk about formulating game plans from week to week. "We'd love for it to be that easy (like it was against ULM). Our roster was better than Monroe's roster. That's what should happen when your roster's better. We still had to make plays. You still had to do things the right way. They're not going to line up and play 10 yards off your receivers, Texas A&M. They're going to get up in your grille and it'll be press coverage and they'll be in your backfield pretty quick if you're not careful."

NOT ANDY asks about keys defending a mobile quarterback. "Rush lanes. You've got to have rush integrity. If dual-threat guys are able to go north and south right now, that's a problem."

NOT ANDY asks about how the season is almost over. Isn't that crazy? "It's going to be a long off-season waiting for another opportunity to give our fans a full season ... where they're more excited than not. Until then, let's get ready for thse last two and make some noise."

Freeze ends with an affable "War Eagle."

BE GOOD. BE YOU.

--30--

Need some Vegas help

Wife and I are on a flight to Vegas for a big concert weekend.
Seeing The Eagles @ The Sphere on Friday
Seeing Billy Joel/Sting @ Allegiant Stadium on Saturday
We aren’t gamblers and we don’t drink so Vegas isn’t a place we frequent. As you can imagine, we have broken the budget on tickets so I’m looking for reasonable dinner/lunch/breakfast options
We also want to grab a dessert one night?

All recs would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Since we probably aren’t going bowling this year…

Is it possible to schedule a post season exhibition game against Florida State and meet at a local high school stadium say in the Enterprise or Dothan areas? In keeping with the same quality of the football being played this season the game could be live streamed on the NFHS app. Would also be great if American Standard or Toto could in part sponsor the game.
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