Totally Cool Jimbo, Green Jersey Superstitions, Awesome Drones & More!

Happy Thursday! Did you know that March 23rd is the 322nd most common birthday? So, not that common at all. According to USA Today, the most popular birth date is September 9th, which represents Week 2 of the 2023 college football season. And there are some BANGERS. Texas vs. Alabama, Texas A&M vs. Miami, and Iowa vs. Iowa State, just to name a few. See, it all comes back to college football.

Just a reminder... to pay special homage to the teams that went one-and-done in this year's NCAA tournament, I rejiggered our referral bonuses. For a limited time, JUST ONE REFERRAL will get you in the door of our Virtual VerbaCon event this summer. Scroll down for more info.

Onwards!

Here's my very unofficial ranking of the 5½ college football things that got the juices flowing over the last week:

1) Jimbo is totally fine with not calling plays this season 😉

Everyone can relax, Jimbo Fisher is at peace with turning over the offense to Bobby Petrino. Uh huh, yup, definitely cool with it. Phew.

"We'll go through that as we go"? Jimbo's tone is reminiscent of how you'd respond to jury duty, a karaoke party with co-workers or a fall wedding invitation. The aggressive ambivalence oozing from this answer means that this fall could feature an interesting dynamic with Petrino in College Station.

As detailed in Sam Khan Jr.'s fantastic write-up for The Athletic, Jimbo speaks glowingly about Petrino. They've "known each other for a long time" and "have great respect for each other." But also "game planning, calling plays and coaching quarterbacks is what Fisher loves." It's not hard to see a potential conflict between two coaching alphas.

Ultimately, as Sam points out, none of this will matter if the Aggies hum on offense this fall. But there is some real boom-or-bust potential here that we can't ignore.

2) Come and get your QB battles!

Spring football is right around the corner, and our pal Chip Patterson at CBS Sports did a great job summarizing some of the big quarterback battles that are sure to make news. For obvious reasons, the Quinn Ewers-Arch Manning competition will be front and center, but there are handful of more interesting contests among the nation's top teams at Georgia, Alabama and Ohio State. For my money, the competition at Ole Miss between Jaxson Dart, Walker Howard and Spencer Sanders might be the most fascinating race in the country.

Quarterback derbies have long captured the imagination, but the transfer portal has added an extra layer of complexity. It'd be wise to familiarize yourself with some of these names, because at least some of them will head elsewhere if they lose out.

3) About those Brian Ferentz performance objectives...

We interrupt our Iowa sabbatical to bring you this tidbit from a presumably gruff Kirk Ferentz who just wants the kids and their new fangled offenses to stay off his damn lawn.

My dream is that this season sets up like the scene in Ocean's 11 when Andy Garcia has to choose between his money and Julia Roberts -- it's either the old offense or Brian! I'd feel bad for the Ferentz family, but that'd be tremendous content.

4) Mythbusters: Green Jersey Edition

Every so often, perhaps to juice merch sales or make itself feel dangerous, Notre Dame decides to fully steer into its Irish-ness and dust off its alternate green jerseys. Last week, the Irish announced that they'll be going green again this September 23rd when Ohio State comes to down. As a lifelong Notre Dame fan, these uniforms are my biggest, my irrational fear.

Is it justified? Well, Tyler Horka did God's work last fall and chronicled the results in every green(ish) jersey game dating back to 1983. The good news is that the Irish are 10-6 over the last 39 years when wearing some form of green in their jersey. At present, they're actually on a five game winning streak, albeit against lackluster competition. However, my phobia stems from the results during my formative years as a fan, between 1994-2011, when Notre Dame was just 2-6 in bigger games against USC and more formidable versions of Colorado and Georgia Tech in major bowl match-ups.

This year's matchup with Ohio State will be the first time the Irish have worn the green in a big, meaningful game in over a decade. Why tempt fate? The smart money is on Ohio State minus the points.

5) USC Pro Day 🤝 Boat Goals

I had to include this item because of the picture above. USC's Pro Day was just a bit waterlogged after a rain storm moved through Southern California earlier this week. Eventually, they were able to find a spot dry enough to run the 40-yard dash; however, stars like Jordan Addison didn't want any part of it. That said, Addison did run routes as part of his workout for pro scouts. Likewise, defensive lineman Tuli Tuipulotu looked good in position drills. Both Addison and Tuipulotu could go in the first round of next month's NFL Draft.

Speaking of the Draft, most of the draftniks are predicting that four quarterbacks will be selected in the top ten. After the Panthers traded up to the No. 1 slot, a consensus seems to have formed that C.J. Stroud will be the guy.

Others Receiving Votes:

• Look, I don't know where you stand on drone delivery technology, but this is pretty dope:

• If you spend any time on the internet, you know that the big tech companies are currently engaged Battlebots: Chatbot Edition. A new challenger has entered the ring in the form of Google's Bard. I think Bard is a weird name for this, but they didn't ask my opinion:

• Do you know how tennis balls are made?

THE VERBALLERHOOD

WHAT'S GOOD IN THE VERBALLERHOOD?

This week, we kicked off our Year One Debrief series, starting with Lincoln Riley and Billy Napier. We were fortunate to lean on the wisdom of Ryan Abraham of USCFootball.com and David Waters of the Gators Breakdown Podcast for more information. We'll continue working our way through some of the most notable first year coaches in an effort to grade out how each did at their new stops.

Listen to the podcast by clicking here or check out our individual episodes below. You can also view full episode videos and smaller clips on our YouTube channel.

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Thanks for reading. Until next week, stay solid!-Ty Hildenbrandt