Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: W vua FM, tuscaloosa.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Welcome in, ladies and gentlemen, to the low tide here on 90.7 Capstone. Nicholas Persley joined as always by Adam Hambright and usually Joe Schats, but he's running a little bit late tonight. It Adam, do you know what today is?
[00:00:30] Speaker A: All I really know is today's Sunday.
[00:00:32] Speaker B: Well, today is Sunday, okay. But it also is the 20th ever episode of the Low T milestone.
[00:00:40] Speaker A: Yeah, this is a big deal. This is a big deal right here.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: So later on in the show, fan favorite segment coming back, beef of the week later in the show.
[00:00:51] Speaker A: It's hard to choose just one true.
[00:00:54] Speaker B: So you're not going to want to miss that. So stick around.
With this being the 20th episode, I just want to start by thanking everybody who listens, whether that's to us as a podcast on Spotify or on voices, ua.edu or live every Sunday on 90.7 or the live three, six, five or tune in apps. So we just want to thank everybody for that.
So we'll get started today.
Some almost sad news, honestly. Eli Gold is out as the Alabama play by play commentator. Crimson Tide Sports Network has apparently opted not to renew Eli Gold's contract, which will be up in June.
The crazy part is that apparently this was not Eli's choice. Obviously Eli has had some health scares here in the past couple years. He was only calling the home games this past season with Chris Stewart taking the duties on the away games. But this is going to be a big change.
[00:02:05] Speaker A: Yeah, this is the first time they'll have somebody else permanently in the role of play by play broadcaster. I believe it's 36 years now, but yeah, this was not Eli Gold's choice exactly.
I know two years ago that season with health issues he had to sit out. Then last season he called home games and the Iron ball Chris Stewart filled in for him. And now what I heard was that they offered to still let him call the a day game and then be in a limited role this upcoming season. No telling what exactly that would be. He would obviously not be a color commentator. Probably end up being either somebody for like a pregame, post game, maybe halftime analyst. But it's obviously something that Eli Gold did not want to do. He still wants to be play by play, so he turned down that offer is what I was told. And now he will be the official play by play broadcaster for the national cats of the Arena Football League. Chris Stewart now steps in full time for football and for basketball, as well as other sports that he'll fill in for which is good for Chris Stewart. He's obviously well suited for the role. He's going to do a great job. But it is a sad day with somebody who is synonymous with Alabama football not being in the role as official play by play broadcast for football for the first time in about 36 years.
[00:03:39] Speaker B: Yeah, so we mentioned the Crimson Tide Sports Network releasing a statement. I'll go ahead and read that. As we noted in yesterday's release, Eli Gold has been a legendary broadcaster in a career spanning 52 years. In 2023, we worked out a plan to have Eli call the home games plus Auburn with Chris Stewart handling away games. We are incredibly appreciative of the positive things Eli has contributed to the Crimson Tide Sports Network and the University of Alabama during his time with us, which is why our desire was for him to remain part of the game day broadcast and allow us to celebrate his UA broadcast career. But at this point, the interests of UA and Crimson Tide Sports Network are best served by Chris Stewart handling play by play for all games. After a series of conversations over a period of time, Eli was presented with an opportunity to continue his contributions to the Crimson Tide Sports network broadcast team in the coming years in a more limited role, including the lead broadcast role for this year's a day game. Unfortunately, he declined the opportunity. We will always appreciate Eli and wish him nothing but the best in his next endeavors. We are incredibly excited about the future of Crimson Tide Sports network and what Crimson and what Chris Stewart will bring to the broadcast in his new role.
So Joe has joined us a little bit late, but just in time, honestly. So, Joe, what's your take on Eli Gold being out as the play by play commentator on the Crimson Tide Sports network?
[00:05:09] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, I don't know how in depth you guys went over the last two, three minutes, but, yeah, I don't know. It's a really weird situation now. I mean, it kind of started and it seemed like, oh, at least when the announcement was made, my immediate reaction was it some health related thing or he just wanted to step away? And then it kind of comes out that it's more of like a university kind of head. Someone above the pay grade made that decision, and now it just kind of seems like everyone, it seems like all sides are kind of in some sort of mess of some sorts. It seems like the university kind of treated him, I agree, they treated him wrong and kind of the way that this whole thing seemed to unfold, and then now it seems like Eli Wol wasn't. He was kind of offered a job when it didn't really sound like he was before and then he turned it down. So now it's just kind of like both sides have made some pretty bad errors, although I'd say the university probably made a bigger one because it's like old, for Pete's sakes.
But yeah, no, I just feel bad. And then kind of the last thing you guys were talking at the inter about Chris Stewart. I mean, he's like a phenomenal play by play guy. He did really good for the road games and now I kind of feel bad for him because he's stepping into a role like this. This is kind of his introduction to being the voice of Alabama football, which is such a huge job down here. So, yeah, it seems like all three sides of it are a little messy, but mean, I guess. Just to kind of sum it up, I'm disappointed it's Eli Gold's gone, but it'll be nice to listen to Chris Stewart.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: Yeah, I think Chris Stewart was great this past season, calling the way games, so I'm excited to see him get that opportunity and step into that role. But it is unfortunate how everything went down. So Eli Gold spoke to AL.com and said, well, the university has chosen not to bring me back. This is not with a capital no t, not at all health related. I'm very healthy. Everything is wonderful. I am as healthy as a horse. You love to hear that.
He's not retiring. He straight up came out and said, he's not retiring. The university just decided to go in a different direction, which is what can happen sometimes. But it is kind of a shame. You would have liked to have seen him get a proper send off and it doesn't look like that's going to happen.
[00:07:48] Speaker A: Yeah, it kind of seemed like what they tried to do was the university and the Grimmside sports Network, which Learfield is kind of like the owner of. It looks like they were like in conjunction and kind of made the decision to go in a new direction, but they still wanted to have some kind of send off. That's kind of what it seems like they were offering with him being able to call the a day and then not being play by play, but they wanted him a part of the broadcast. Almost sounds like they wanted it to be kind of like a Farrell tour, kind of bring him in for like pregame post game stuff. And then Eli wasn't having it because he still thinks he can do the job and he was still able to do the job last year. I understand the health issues. Eli Gold says he's healthy. I would have still liked to see an official send off, let him sign off on his own terms. But I also understand it from the university and curbside sports network point of view.
Still think it could have been handled a little bit better? I think it's going to be good. I wish Eli would have actually gotten a better job. Maybe he just wants to call the national Cats arena football. I kind of wish he would have gotten a little bit higher profile job. I don't know what would exactly be available. Like, I don't know how many play by play openings there would have been, but I would have liked to send a better send off. And then obviously I wish he could have got a better job for the later stages of his career.
[00:09:20] Speaker B: Yeah. So in other Alabama football news, there was a lot of official announcements, a lot of things finally made official that we had known for a long time, probably the most recent one Courtney Morgan officially announced as the GM. We've talked about this before about know, kind of new age college football front offices are going to start to look more like NFL front offices. I mean, just a few years ago, not very many teams had a GM, and now with Kalen Dubois coming from Washington to Alabama, he's bringing along his GM, Courtney Morgan.
We've talked about this before. What do you think the impact of a guy like Courtney Morgan can be on a program like.
[00:10:08] Speaker C: Mean? I think it could be pretty important. I mean, this is, like you mentioned, a very different time for college football because now you have a GM and I'm waiting for the president of football operations to become an official position.
But I think it could have a lot of impact, especially with how much stuff needs to be done in college football now. I mean, you look at not only the calendar in terms of recruiting and high school recruiting, but you're now looking at, especially with Alabama this season, transfers, who's going to leave, who's going to stay, convincing guys to go to stay here or kind of convincing guys to come to Alabama. It's a lot for just a singular guy to do, especially one who already then has to coach a football game that Saturday for months on end and especially down here win those games on.
You're, I think for a guy like Morgan, who by all accounts sounds like he did terrific jobs at Washington and I believe Michigan and kind of helped those two programs get their roster kind of completed.
I think, for getting him here, that's a very good job by Dubois. And I'm interested to see, though, just kind of what he does because Alabama's football has never had a GM, so I'm interested to see just what the.
[00:11:31] Speaker B: Role in know, it's interesting to me because do you ever think Alabama football would have had a GM under Nick Haven? No, but he basically was. He's like, you know, Belichick. Exactly. That was the comparison I was about to make. But it's just wild to me how this direction that we're going in with college football.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: So the official press release has that Morgan will be tasked with managing the Crimson tides roster while overseeing and directing the daily operations of both the personnel and recruiting departments. He will help organize the head coach's film evaluations and prospect communication while also organizing transfer portal evaluations. Morgan is also tasked with supervising internal brand management for so, you know, part of this we've kind of seen lately, some people have speculated as to why some coaches have either left head coaching positions to be assistants and other coaches go into the NFL is because they just want to focus on the football. And by Courtney Morgan being hired as a general manager, it kind of opens up all the other coaches, Kaylin Duboer and the rest of the staff, to focus on the coaching. And obviously they will still have to do recruiting and stuff, but at least while it's in season, it looks like Courtney Morgan will kind of take the brunt of that work to allow them to focus on actual game planning and getting ready for the opponents to where you're not having your head coach worried about a hundred different. I mean, Kaylin Deborah is still going to be worried about it, but he's going to be able to focus more on the game planning, making sure the team is in the right spot. And then that last part, internal brand management, kind of makes it seem like any of the players that are doing dumb stuff out in town, he's going to be the kind of the one in charge of being like, hey, don't do that. You're an Alabama football player now, so just kind of helps the coaching staff actually focus on what they actually want to do, which is coach football.
[00:13:23] Speaker B: Can the subtitle of his position be like Alabama standard?
What's the word? Like coordinator? Alabama defender?
Enforcer. That's the word I was looking for.
There's also some more official announcements. Obviously, Kane Womick. Sorry, Kane womick. Trying to get rid use of that pronunciation. It's in use.
[00:13:45] Speaker C: I think it's okay.
[00:13:46] Speaker B: Announced as the defensive coordinator, he's also going to coach the inside linebackers. And then obviously Nick Sheerden and Jamarcus Shepard named co offensive coordinators Sheridan will be running the offense, calling the plays. Jamarcus Shepard obviously coaching the receivers just like he did at Washington that we've talked about so much. Out of those three guys, who are you most excited to see have an impact on the Crimson Tide this upcoming season?
[00:14:15] Speaker C: I'll start. I'm pretty interested in seeing how Sheridan does in that OC role. I mean this is a position that's been at least to start the season scrutinized the past three, four very, I think it's very much gets the brunt of the finger pointing if the offense does well, whether or not it's on the OC or you know, I'm interested to see kind of what he does. It sounds like he or not sounds like he has worked with Michael Pennix at Indiana before and has been with are. This is kind of a position in that quarterback that he's really comfortable in and I'm interested to see kind of what he can get out of Miller because that was kind of what we were saying with grub before he took the Seattle job was, oh, this guy was the OC for Pennix and Michael Pennix was a Heisman finalist and Washington was in the title game with this great offense and I think that just kind of gets passed on to Sheridan who is a little less well known than Grubb, sure, but has worked with kind of these an elite level quarterback before and was his quarterback coach at Indiana. So with I think him coming in, it should be just interesting to see what the role of Milro and some of these offensive players that are coming in new what kind of that side of the field looks like.
[00:15:38] Speaker A: Yeah, and it would be very easy for me to say the same thing with Sheridan working the offense and then Shepard with know the receivers. They've kind of like stepped down the last couple mean they've still been good but they haven't been to that level that we had been used to seeing. Know Devontae Smith and Jerry Judy and everybody before, but for me it's coach womick. And the biggest improvement on last year's team to me was that defense. We had seen how they had been previously under Pete Golding and then Kevin Steele came in and I know Nick Saban said that he had a much more hands on approach to practice and everything, at least with the defensive backs, but you kind of saw how the defense kind of got closer to what they had been earlier in Nick Saban's career at Alabama to where it was a defense that people were kind know scared to know that could actually shut down teams and not the team that would just hope to get one stop to where you'd win a game. That was a then, you know, Kevin Steele had announced his retirement before Nick Saban did. So now you had Nick Saban and Kevin Steele retired, who were the leaders. You had defensive backs coach go to Georgia, you kept a couple of coaches on staff and then you get coach woman coming from South Alabama to now be the defensive coordinator and he's already, you've seen it plastered on social media. The swarm defense is four two five that he's implementing. And I wish I could have actually sat down with these players, but last week at a basketball game they had, some of the players were giving autographs, a couple of them, Deontay Lawson and Malachi Moore. I tried to stay a little bit longer to kind of talk to them and see how they were feeling about coach Womick. And they're excited. They're having fun with practice and right now the offseason conditioning and they seem excited for what he's going to bring to the table, scheme and game plan wise on the defense. So I'm just excited to see if they are able to continue what Steele and Saban had kind of brought back last season.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: Yeah. So for me, I guess I'll take the last one. Jamarcus Shepard is, I think, going to have an incredible impact here at Alabama. You talked about how Alabama has for years had these top tier receivers and in the past couple of years Alabama has not had a real true number one guy step know every once in a know we thought it was going to be bond there for a little bit and now he's at Texas. He might have got a Lambo.
Things have changed, let's just say that.
But JaMarcus Shepard arguably had the best wide receiver core in the nation last year. Two players had over 1000 yard seasons.
He had a first team All American.
I believe he might have had two first team All Americans receivers.
Just a fantastic offense there in Washington. So it's going to be really interesting. I think the thing that I'm more excited to see is the fact that he didn't just build one guy, right. He didn't have one star receiver, right. He had multiple guys who he turned into NFL level talent who were not NFL level talent before this past season. So it's going to be interesting to see, and you would hope if you're an Alabama fan that that passing game would be electrified this next season by the addition of, sorry, by the conditioning of a stronger wide receiver. Core. So that's going to do it for us.
We will be right back. We've got a fantastic rest of the show planned for you. Do not miss it. We'll be right back here on 90.7 of WVUaFM 90.7, a division of student media at the University of Alabama. Support us by leaving a review rating or following us on X at WVUA FM. Sports welcome back into the low tide here on 90.7, the capstone. Nicholas Joe Adam talking some Alabama basketball here on the 20th ever episode of the Low Tide. Pretty exciting.
What was not exciting was Alabama's performance against Kentucky last night. They obviously traveled to Kentucky and just got demolished. 117 to 95 is the final score.
Joe, you want to break this one down for us?
[00:20:50] Speaker C: Yeah, sure.
Sorry, I sounded real enthusiastic.
It's an interesting game because if I think had you not watched the game at all and I told you that Alabama scored 95 points, shot 57% from the field, had made 21 of their 27 free throws, you would have been like, oh, sweet. They had, I believe, the Crimson tied at 220 point scorers in this game. And you're like, oh, awesome. How much did they win by? And you're like, oh, they lost by nearly 30.
It would have been bad and you would have been shocked. And the reason is because Kentucky shot 60% from the field, 54% from three. They had five guys, excuse me, in double figures, and really, they had Justin Edwards for them.
He was ten for ten. He did miss a shot all game by the second half. I think I might have even tweeted this out with about like 15 minutes left, alabama just, like, stopped really playing Kentucky. Absolutely.
Maybe you could say a wake up call for that Alabama defense. I mean, to get 117 dropped on you is absurd.
They lit up 58 in first half, 59 in the second. So it was just, I mean, I think everyone who, going into that game, everyone figured it was going to be a shootout and figured it was going to be high scoring, but you can't let up 117 at all. And I believe NATO's post game was saying, like, yeah, with some things, I just don't know what to do.
That end of the court is so poor defensively for Alabama. When you play an offense like Kentucky's, you're going to get exposed like that.
[00:22:50] Speaker A: Yeah. And I kind of talked to somebody else off the air after that LSU game in Baton Rouge, and I was like, I never thought I would see a day where Alabama basketball would give up over 90 points and still win by about 20. And then I watched this game this week. And it's like, I never thought I would see an Alabama team score 95 and lose by that much.
And then they were a little shorthand to go into the game. You had Latrell Ricel Jr. Who he had gotten hurt before the Florida game, which we would have liked to talk about, but with how bad that Kentucky game is, they kind of took a backseat. But he had suffered head injury before that Florida game, missed the Florida game, missed the Kentucky game. Hopefully he'll be back this week for that game at Oxford. And then Mohammed Wagi, who was suspended by the SEC, had an elbow. He gave an elbow to the head of a Florida player that Nate Oates had even said they would have suspended him after reviewing the tape.
Know, one guy that had been put into the starting role, Wagy had been getting really good minutes lately. And I know Nate Oates said that it wouldn't have made a difference and it might have not made a difference in the final score, but he also, in that press conference, said that Latrell Wrightsol was one of the more shorthanded guards of not turning the ball over. And then you look and points off turnovers from Kentucky was 29. So it's like if you had had somebody in there, I'm not saying it would have changed the outcome of the game, but if you had somebody in there that was better at maintaining possession of the ball, not turning it over, it could have kept it closer. Obviously, we've talked all season about how the defense has kind of been, what the weak point of this team has been, and they need to figure it out. But also now they're still tied for first in the SEC with Tennessee. Tennessee has a tiebreaker now. They have the game against Ole Miss this week and then Tennessee on this upcoming weekend where college game day will be. Hopefully, you know, a good crowd comes out for that first time college game day had an Alabama basketball game or Alabama home basketball game. So hopefully Alabama is able to defeat Tennessee, kind of get back. They still got a chance to win the SEC and then obviously you got the SEC tournament. They're still holding strong at the three line for the SEC or NCAA tournament.
So the season's not over, even though you never want to see your team give up the second most points in program history. But once you get injuries and people back from suspension, as long as they don't continue to make plays like that, you still got a lot to play for this year and still championships to be won.
[00:25:46] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a tough look. Did you know that this was Kentucky's first quad one win of the entire season.
That's wild.
Obviously, 117 points is preposterous. We were just talking about Loyola Maramount last week.
They certainly would have been proud of this game.
[00:26:06] Speaker A: It started off so it was close. I remember at one point it was 26 25, I believe. And then all of a sudden I look up and it's like, oh, we're down by six. Oh, we're down by ten.
[00:26:15] Speaker B: And going into halftime. Alabama has had several comebacks this year. You're not freaking out per se. And they looked pretty good coming out of the half. They looked like they were playing with some fire, hit a lot of shots. And then Kentucky just goes on this run which gets capped off by three point shooter. One of Kentucky's players shoots it, goes in fouled, and that's the dagger for.
[00:26:41] Speaker A: And there's one thing I want to bring up, and I'm not saying that we're champion, we're not their Super bowl or anything, but have you all noticed, I believe it's last two times Alabama's went into Lexington. Kentucky plays like their best game of the season.
So this year, obviously scoring 117. And then I believe it was the last time we were in Lexington. I could be wrong, but Keon Ellis went off in the first half. Alabama had like a 20 point lead in the first ten minutes of the game. And then before halftime, Kentucky had the lead back and then they almost scored 100 points again. But anyway, they get up for Alabama when Alabama comes in the lake.
[00:27:17] Speaker C: Well, everyone wants Bama, I guess.
[00:27:19] Speaker B: Well, everybody's wanted Bama for so long in football, but now is that changing for basketball as well?
Sign of changing times.
So what does Nato have to do? What can he do? I mean, I know he talked about it a little bit, but something has got to change here. You would think that 117 points being scored on you would be a wake up call, which honestly could not come at a better time. You've got Tennessee coming to town and that looks like it could potentially be almost an SEC title game.
What can NatO do to, if not, he's certainly not going to fix it, but maybe take some of the pressure off the offense.
[00:28:09] Speaker C: Yeah, I don't know. It's hard to say because you can't switch your defense. If you can't run a man to man defense, you're not going to be able to run his own.
That's harder, I should say. And I do wonder if maybe quite like this was, this is just like, maybe it's the optimist to me, but maybe this is what they needed. Maybe you needed to see 117 put on you because if you go into this game, they led up 93 to Florida, but that was overtime game 75 to a and M 92 to LSU, but they won by 17.
They hadn't really suffered a humiliating loss since that one at Auburn when they lost by 18, but even then let up 99 and scored 81. So you're just thinking maybe it'll click eventually?
I think with a game like this, especially with it being on the road where Alabama has struggled this season, maybe now they'll finally realize it and look at defense in a different way. But to be honest, I don't think it's as simple as just saying, oh, we fixed this, we're going to be fine on defense because there really isn't one.
This maybe sounds horrible. There's not one thing that they do poorly on defense. They just play defense poorly.
It's pretty hard. And that becomes really bad when you also turn the ball over like they did yesterday, which also plays a little bit into the defense. But yeah, to be honest, I'm kind of just as perplexed as you, Nick. I don't know, Adam, if you got anything.
[00:29:53] Speaker A: Well, I mean, we way better. So with Kentucky specifically, right. They shot 63% from the field, 54% from beyond the arc, and it's probably Kentucky's best shooting performance of the season if that game gets played again tomorrow. I don't think Kentucky plays as well as they did in that game, but we've kind of seen this for several years now with Alabama and a couple times this season where they'll go on a little winning streak and then they'll have that one game where they'll get blown out. Oklahoma last year and then they had a long winning streak, then they'd lose again, then they'd have another long winning streak. And this season you had, after those three big games, a little bit of a winning streak. They get blown out at Tennessee, winning streak, blown out at Auburn, winning streak now blown out at Kentucky. Hopefully we see a winning streak coming out of it. With four games left in the regular season. You have Ole Miss, you have Tennessee, you have a game at Florida and then Arkansas to end the season before you go to the SEC tournament. So hopefully this kind of gets the team back to practicing and playing how they were when they started the streak. But like you were saying, too, seeing them give up 90 plus points to LSU and to Florida and they're like, oh, well, we're winning. Maybe we don't have to try as hard on defense because it's going to carry us. And then you run into Kentucky, who has one of the best performances, and then they had 44 points in the paint, 44 points from their bench. And I don't think, just like you, Joe, I don't think there's anything to fix this season. You just got to try harder, be a little bit more, give a little bit more effort on defense, box out rebounds, keep those second chance points off the board. Hopefully you make a little run here and then next year we'll see if it is having to go with smaller lineups because next year we do have one of the best centers in high school that is committed. So once you have somebody that can match teams with the size, you don't have an excuse for that anymore. So for this season, really just got to give more effort. Next season we'll see if they can actually fundamentally change the I thought, I.
[00:32:17] Speaker C: Just wanted to chime this in here before we ended basketball talk. It was a really good quote from Nate Oates post game where he said, we told our guys that we've had question marks about our defense all year. Those question marks are completely erased and everyone knows we can't really guard at this.
Know he goes on. There's a couple mean this was like a tirade more than was a press conference by NATO.
Any kind of decent defense was played in the last eight minutes when I thought the game was already over.
There's not a lot of positives. That's two quotes from him.
There's not a whole lot to say about that game other than just abomination on defense. But the good thing, and people talked about is that it's only one loss, still tied for first in the SEC, still pretty much control your own destiny with Tennessee coming to Tuscaloosa a week from, I guess yesterday now. So you got to take care of Ole Miss on Wednesday on the road, which is going to be tough because maybe the Rebels can sense a little blood in the water with this team.
But if you take care of Ole Miss on Wednesday and you can get up and beat Tennessee at home, which wouldn't honestly surprise me if Alabama can turn it around and win two games and get a firm hold on that SEC regular season title.
But if you can do that, and it's going to have to come from.
[00:33:44] Speaker A: Playing defense, if you want to win the regular season SEC championship, you need to at least go three and one in these last four.
[00:33:53] Speaker C: And, you know, to be honest, for how good Alabama is, or at least how talented they know you should expect. You know, you got Ole miss, Tennessee, Florida and Arkansas to end out the year. Ole Miss and Arkansas are unranked and Arkansas has kind of been falling out for the whole season at this point.
So you just really got to make sure you can win these games against.
If you can get one of the.
[00:34:21] Speaker B: You know, one thing quickly.
I wonder if this type of know, because Nate Oates is still a very young coach. He's only been in Alabama for a few years.
I wonder if this type of season changes maybe a little bit of his mentality when it comes to building a team. Right in today's age of college basketball, your top prospects are only going to be there for a little bit. You have a guy like Brandon Miller come in, you're not going to have him for long.
A lot of these teams have to be built through the transfer portal. You're not going to see as many, maybe some bench pieces, guys who will stay for four years, but it's pretty rare nowadays.
I wonder if a season like this where, frankly, it seems like either he's got players who just don't want to play defense or just aren't, particularly don't have the right skill set.
[00:35:24] Speaker A: Well, you kind of saw it this year already a little bit. So last season you obviously had the Noah Clowney, you had Brandon Miller come in and then you had Mark Sears that you got on the transfer portal. But for the most part, it was guys that had already been here. And then those recruits you brought in, he had already changed it a little bit. He had brought in more transfer players than what he had with all the people that they lost. Brought in Grant Nelson, brought in Aaron Estrada, kept bringing in more. He wanted more experienced guys because if you notice once. So Alabama lost to San Diego State in the Sweet 16. San Diego State was a very upper classman heavy team. And then I think it was like seven of the eight elite eight teams were all like super heavy, like grad students, senior students. And so he brought in a lot of more transfers than what he was used to. I think maybe similar to what you were saying is maybe he'll look at who exactly he's bringing in. Because a thing that a lot of people say was they expected to have Bettyako, right, a guy that could be there to guard the rim. And then Bettako was gone, and he hadn't recruited through the portal or any recruits coming in to replace him. So I wonder if he won't make that same mistake again and actually constantly recruit somebody that could step in to be that rim protector role. Like a seven foot guy. Rim protector. But that's still not going to really help on the perimeter if you don't have guys that are actively trying to defend throughout the game. But I think you'll see a little bit of that and maybe some taller interior eyes.
[00:37:02] Speaker B: Yeah, it'll be interesting to see over the next couple of years, hopefully for many, many years to come with NATO.
[00:37:10] Speaker C: Here and maybe in a new arena, maybe.
[00:37:13] Speaker B: Well, we can. Who knows? Will it ever be built? Only time will tell.
[00:37:18] Speaker A: Maybe they'll build it next to the.
[00:37:19] Speaker B: Northport beach park, next to the $800,000 condos.
Could go crazy out in the middle of the fake lagoon. Could that go crazy? Like a moat. A moat. A remnant.
[00:37:37] Speaker C: I know if people move to one side of the stadium, you start sinking.
[00:37:42] Speaker B: We might have just found a way to get the stadium built here on the low tide. When we come back, do not miss it. Beef of the week is back after probably some baseball and softball talk, but beef of the week will come back on this 20th episode of the low tide. Do not miss it. We'll be right back here on 90.7 the Capstone. Nicholas, Joe, Adam, closing things out with you here on the 20th episode of the low Tide.
[00:38:37] Speaker C: Beef of the week is through the balloons party.
[00:38:40] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, the cookie cake is outside.
None for everybody else, only for us.
But beef of the week is back after we do some baseball and softball talk because baseball is on fire.
[00:38:57] Speaker A: Yeah, baseball continues their hot start to the season. We had talked after they had started off three and now they're up to eight. And so over the week they had beat Middle Tennessee. Then they had run ruled four games in a row. So they run ruled Alabama State and then Valparaiso over the weekend. Series all three games and bats of state hot. TJ McCantz has just been amazing this year.
He's batting like over 400 and now I think he's up to six home runs. Now. I don't know the specific numbers and the home runs off top of my head, but bats have stayed hot. The real thing has been we now have a new question mark with the pitching rotation. So last week, Saturday, what looked like was going to be one of our weekend starters. Riley quick pitched the Saturday game, pitched three innings, didn't give up a run, got taken out, learned on Tuesday before the middle Tennessee State game that he would have Tommy John surgery. So he is now done for the season. So second year in a row that Alabama has lost a weekend starter.
I think last year might have been before the first game. This year it's right after the first series has started. So they have had to kind of redo how they're going to do their weekends.
So they moved Adam Mazda up to Saturday. So he started yesterday. And then today Greg Ferron got the start. He won, went three innings, allowed one run, two hits, five strikeouts, and then became a bullpen game. The three more relievers came in. Austin, Moore, Spraylon, Myers, Pierce, George added another five strikeouts to the game. So pitching staff still looks to be okay, but it will be interesting to see once Alabama gets into a little bit tougher competition consistently.
Pretty soon they're going to have Tennessee as their first SEC series.
This weekend they go out to Texas. They have games against Indiana, Arizona and Dallas Baptist. Three very good baseball teams. So we'll see a first little test. And then once they actually get the SEC play, how will the arms hold up? Because I don't think the bats are going to go anywhere soon.
[00:41:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Exciting to see on the softball side. Softball continues to dominate 15 and four. And this weekend in the green and gold classic in Birmingham today, they beat UAB 15 to nothing in five innings. That's season high.
Topping their 13 run performance over Longwood from earlier this season.
They just continue to dominate. Alabama softball last season had trouble scoring. It does not appear that that is going to be the case this season. One would hope.
[00:41:49] Speaker C: Well, if you can end a game in five and six innings routinely, then you're doing something right on offense, too.
[00:41:55] Speaker A: Good.
[00:42:01] Speaker B: Drumroll.
Beef of the week is back. Finally, red on the audiobook.
[00:42:09] Speaker A: You're welcome.
[00:42:10] Speaker B: Yeah. Apologies to anybody who had the volume turned up.
Beef of the week is back. It's been so long. When was the last time we did beef of the week?
[00:42:18] Speaker A: I do beef of the week every day, but that's just beef for the day.
[00:42:21] Speaker B: All time hater.
So who wants to start? Who's got a juicy beef?
[00:42:29] Speaker C: I'll let you one if you two take that.
[00:42:31] Speaker A: All.
[00:42:36] Speaker B: Right.
[00:42:37] Speaker A: Now it's focused on one guy, but it's a bunch of people. It's a bunch of casual sports fans, specifically on the campus. But we know we've talked about before, people walking around with other teams stuff on. And this isn't like that. It's just Alabama has a bunch of students from around the country, and that means a bunch of them have their allegiances to professional teams, one being, say, the Patriots. So when we're standing in line for an Alabama basketball game, you're a student at Alabama, you're in the student line to get into an Alabama basketball game, do you think you need to talk about your team and say, oh, that guy that was a Heisman finalist at the University of Alabama who's currently a quarterback in the NFL is a bum? Is that how you should word it while you're a student at the school that he went to? Probably not. And I'm singling this guy. I don't know his name, but he's the top of my mind. But we have many people like this who will just say, just work on your wording. Right. Like, if you wanted to be like Mac Jones, he just hasn't really lived up to what he did in college. And I could then point out he's had three different offense coordinators in three seasons. He's had a defensive guy be his offensive coordinator. But when you come out and just say, he's a can't, we can't go anywhere from automatically. I'm automatically assuming that you don't really know what you're talking about because you can't actually say what's wrong with the situation because the situation isn't really Mac Jones now. Mac Jones now might have lost his confidence. He might not turn into a Pro bowl quarterback again. He was a Pro bowl quarterback his first year in the.
Then, you know, now he's had two more offensive coordinators. One guy shouldn't have been. But now you're trying to tell me, oh, they just need to take, you know, with that third pick. That's all they need. Just take another quarterback. That's not going to help you. You need offensive line, you need receivers for him to throw to. That's why I'm like, if you have the third pick right now, maybe try to get a quarterback in free agency. But if you've got the third pick and Marvin Harrison Jr. Is there and you don't take him, that's something that New England hasn't done. They haven't had, like, a real receiving threat since Gronkowski, and he was a tight, mean, we could say Edelman, but he's not the game breaking receiver that you need. So how about, especially when you're from that area and you're now a student at a school that that quarterback is from, don't just be like, oh, yeah, he's a bum.
Let's not do.
[00:45:12] Speaker B: The passion comes.
[00:45:14] Speaker C: Yeah, for real.
All right, I'll go. Because, Nick, I know yours and yours is kind of a way cooler one to end my, my beef of the week, and I'll preface it with this. I love the sport of baseball. I always have. I love professional baseball. I think they have really exciting players, and I think college baseball has really exciting games. My beef of the week, though, is these spring training overreactions, as if they're not playing like legit high schoolers.
Some of these guys in spring training are 18 years old, 19 years old.
They're facing 35 year old veterans of major league baseball. That guy should win.
And I just say this because every time, I follow a lot of baseball accounts on social media, staying the news and everything, and every time one semi decent prospect makes a play, it could be a routine ground ball to third and the guy threw it to first clean. I'm seeing how Barry Bonds is reincarnated in this kid, or like, hank Aaron is going to be the next this guy. And for five years, and then five years down the road, I'm never going to hear about him, just in general. And then to kind of tag along with this, any spring training that does have a talented players, rosters kind of go head to head.
I watched the Orioles yesterday. Corbin Burns was on the mound, the big trade acquisition for them, and he go pitches like one inning, and all of a sudden, before I know it, he's out of the game. And I'm like, really? No point. See you. Now. I'm watching a dude I've never heard pitch. So I think the spring training overreactions, I must say, especially in a sport like baseball, because you're not supposed to. It's a game of failure, as they say. You're not really supposed to hit the ball statistically. So anytime someone does, it's as if we're watching Babe Ruth come back to life, and I'm like, this guy is a 28 year old in AAA.
[00:47:18] Speaker A: That's not where I thought you were going to go with this.
[00:47:20] Speaker C: Sorry, go ahead.
[00:47:21] Speaker A: Where did you think. No, I thought you were going to talk about the uniform fanatics jersey disaster. Hey, they're trying to tap into a new demographic of viewership with their see through pants.
[00:47:36] Speaker C: Truly, to be honest, I completely forgot about those.
[00:47:40] Speaker A: But yeah, he's so upset about the overreactions.
So upset with the overreactions. Forgot about the awful jerseys.
[00:47:49] Speaker B: I think that the fanatics, like pants could pass, like the clear bag policy at Denny. Like straight up, like you could bring them as a bag.
[00:47:57] Speaker C: A TSA would see everything as you board a plane.
[00:48:01] Speaker B: Oh, man. Okay, so my beef of the week is sports video game companies, two k ea, refusing to release meaningful information about their games until, like, a month before the game comes out. Okay, so everybody's been talking college football. 25. Finally we're getting another college football game.
Apparently all it took was $600 and a copy of the game to every athlete, every scholarship athlete in the country, which is that really? I mean, I think it's going to come down to one heck of a deal for EA. Let's just say that. And who doesn't want to be in the game?
Obviously you saw Malki Moore was one of the first.
[00:48:51] Speaker A: People get $600 and a copy of the game.
[00:48:54] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm telling you, the copy of the game does more lifting than people think.
[00:48:59] Speaker C: I agree.
[00:49:00] Speaker B: I just put that out there.
[00:49:01] Speaker C: Getting that game for free. Yeah.
[00:49:04] Speaker B: Okay. So we still don't have any gameplay footage. Okay. We've seen literally a teaser trailer.
The hype has been building for a decade.
[00:49:17] Speaker C: Decade.
[00:49:17] Speaker B: A decade. They finally announced like in 2021, three years ago now that the game was going to come back to begin with.
[00:49:25] Speaker A: I think they delayed it for a year.
[00:49:27] Speaker B: Well, they did. Which I'm fine with. Right. Like delay it, get it right. Because your legacy is on the line, ea. If this game comes out and it stinks, I mean, there might be riots.
You truly will not see. We were joking about this. There might be a national labor shortage the day that the game comes out. Because all of a sudden men everywhere are just not going to be out in public. Everybody's going to be at home and doordash.
[00:49:54] Speaker C: Hey, ladies like football?
[00:49:56] Speaker B: Hey. True. Yeah, everybody. The world will cease. It'll be like Covid too.
We still don't have any gameplay footage. Now we have seen little bits and pieces of, like we saw big Owl, which you love to see. Right? Saw some stadium, some stadium work. And teams have been submitting all kinds of pictures of the stadium. Fight songs, mascots, uniforms. They've been submitting all this stuff for.
[00:50:27] Speaker A: They also did like stadium songs too.
[00:50:30] Speaker B: Right. And they've said that the game is really supposed to focus a lot around the tradition of college football. All the things that make it special.
But at some point we have to see some gameplay. A lot of people are worried that this is going to be a Madden clone, which if you play Madden, you know, is like a dumpster fire. You do not want this to turn into another madden. And at some point we need to see some gameplay. And you would like to see it sooner than literally a month before the game comes out. Just personal pet peeve. Two k does this too with NBA.
[00:51:05] Speaker A: Two k. What I will say to kind of alleviate some of the fears which I know you've heard it just as much as I have. It is a different team than the Madden team. I know it's still ea but it's a different team working on the game. So probably not exactly like Madden. And I think the biggest news that we've actually heard came from Chris Fowler when he went live and was basically gave this whole speech about how he's been recording stuff for two years and for every single team. Like he's been doing customized broadcast for situations and for specific teams to where it's not your just generic touchdown and I don't know.
[00:51:48] Speaker B: He's already confirmed that there are lines in the game for a 75 yard field goal and the one point safety. So who can be the first to hear the one point safety?
[00:52:00] Speaker A: Don't cheat. Let it happen naturally. Naturally.
[00:52:02] Speaker B: Getting that one point, man it's going to be tough. Speaking of. Okay, one thing.
Mini beef of the week inside this.
[00:52:12] Speaker C: Like a patty of the week.
[00:52:14] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:15] Speaker C: Not quite the whole beef.
[00:52:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
I was going to try and elaborate there but I just could not think.
[00:52:25] Speaker C: Happy meal.
[00:52:26] Speaker B: Yeah. No free ads.
[00:52:28] Speaker C: That's true. Sorry.
[00:52:30] Speaker B: So we heard about all the talent, the broadcast talent that's going to be on the game. Not a single sideline reporter announced. Are you serious?
What are we doing? Where is Holly Rowe? Straight up.
[00:52:48] Speaker C: Especially with how kind of important a lot of them are.
Who was the lady? I forgot her name now and see but Jenny Taft I believe that was her name.
There's a lot that have been doing this for a while that should be in there.
[00:53:04] Speaker B: Yeah. Come on.
[00:53:05] Speaker A: I was hoping for the reenactment of Maria Taylor and.
[00:53:10] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. No coaches in the game unfortunately. This I think. I do not think Nick Haven made the cut in time to be on college game day in the actual game. We're going to have to wait till next year unfortunately.
[00:53:26] Speaker C: Franchise like this. Let's wait and see.
[00:53:28] Speaker A: Could we get like a little DLC later to put them in? I don't know. Probably not. But next year cover for the new game will probably just be college game day with him on there.
[00:53:43] Speaker B: Well this is ea so they'd probably charge you about $20 to get the Nick Saban DLC which I'm sure many people would. That's what it'll many people would pay for. I think that's happening.
[00:53:53] Speaker A: If there is any edition that has Nick Saban on the COVID I'm buying the physical copy and I'm never opening it. Like I'm literally just going to have it.
[00:54:00] Speaker B: So what's like your cut off price wise? You would expect that the game is going to be $80 because that's the new trend for next generation games. For them to be 79, 99.
You know, they're going to come out with some goat edition, something like that. Some Heisman edition, something like that. What is your cut off? What is the absolute most that you would spend on this game? Which for some people they would say like $20,000. That's how important this game is to them.
Okay. I'm dead serious. You think I'm joking?
[00:54:34] Speaker C: No, I'm not questioning that. I'm questioning the people that you're talking 100%.
[00:54:39] Speaker B: But what's the cut off for the goat edition?
[00:54:43] Speaker A: Okay, for me, if they came out goat edition, Nick Saban cover, I'm buying the physical copy. I'll probably put my cut off at like $200.
[00:54:53] Speaker C: Yeah, I was going to say something very similar. I was going to say like 100 and 5200, something like that. It would also depend also just like on how, to be honest, how cool the COVID is too.
[00:55:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So here's the thing. I bought the God of War Ragnarok collectors edition that came with like a hammer and everything. I'm just talking about I will spend $200 just for this cover.
[00:55:18] Speaker B: Just in the wrapper, just to put Heisman edition. You get a mini Heisman trophy that comes with it.
[00:55:24] Speaker C: Oh my gosh.
[00:55:25] Speaker B: I mean, let me cook.
[00:55:26] Speaker C: That would be great.
[00:55:27] Speaker B: Ea, sign me up. I want to be in the game.
Can we get student report?
[00:55:33] Speaker C: I know Jalen Miller said he's in the game. Can I be in the game?
[00:55:36] Speaker B: Can I just declare that I'm in the game?
[00:55:38] Speaker A: Can we get it? I think I've been on the.
[00:55:40] Speaker C: If you're in the dynasty mode, if you kind of have gone idle for a little bit, you can get the low tide in the background.
[00:55:46] Speaker A: How many times do you have to be shown on the jubbotron before you get put in the game? I'm asking for a friend.
[00:55:51] Speaker C: That's true. How many times until you're like an iconic fan?
[00:55:55] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I mean, this has been beef of the week. We got to keep it around every time it comes. I think it's come back like twice now, but every time it's just an absolute boring.
[00:56:07] Speaker C: We've been on 20 shows total. It's like a good portion of our shows have had it and then come back from it.
[00:56:14] Speaker B: It's like Roman Reigns. Like Roman Reigns returns the week. Returns every single week.
[00:56:20] Speaker C: Like Brock Nillisner, there for a while where it was like, well, he's kind of a UFC fighter, but. Oh, here he is.
[00:56:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
So that's going to do it for us on the low tide, this 20th episode. Hopefully there will be many, many more episodes of low tide, many more additions.
[00:56:36] Speaker A: People will show up on time.
[00:56:37] Speaker C: Yeah. Sorry, guys.
[00:56:39] Speaker B: Tough look on the 20th episode. It wasn't that late. It was like two minutes.
[00:56:44] Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, we were talking about you like gold.
[00:56:46] Speaker B: The hustle was crazy, but that's going to do it for us here. Make sure to join us again next week, same time, 07:00 p.m. We'll see you next time here on 90.7. Thank you for listening.
