MASSIVE? Auburn's Game Against Baylor Changes EVERYTHING, Can RELOAD on Talent QUICKLY

0:00So I think I've changed my stance on this Auburn Baylor thing. You are locked on Auburn, your daily podcast on the Auburn Tigers. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Yes, welcome on into Locked On Auburn, your daily Auburn Tigers podcast on your Hosek Blackorby. Thank you so much for making Locked On Auburn Norfurs list. And every single day Lindsey Crosby of the barn Auburn hanging out with us, as well as a many million other places. We'll talk to a little Auburn baseball chatter. You guys have been asking for it. That'll come towards the end of today's show. Who gets more yardage? Keishan singleton at Auburn this year or Cam Coleman last year. I think that's interesting. But I want to start Lindsey with something that was a big topic several months ago and it's kind

1:01of simmered down, but I think now that the portal's done, you're going to start hearing more numbers come out. And I mean, just talking to folks like it sounds like it sounds like Auburn's going to get close to seven, maybe a little bit more million dollars for NIL. That's not necessarily all football. That could go to other sports that's been documented. But you know, the magic number for Auburn was, you know, $28 to $30 million. And you got to think that's going to be kind of normal for the SEC for an SEC roster. Like if all those numbers are true, an Auburn can get a fourth pretty much a quarter of the payroll from giving up one home game. From Auburn's perspective, I don't know how John Cohn was supposed to turn that down. If you look at the cost to build a competitive roster in college football nowadays, decisions like this I think are going to become more common. You know, if you like a lot of G5 rosters are like

2:07three, four million bucks and your average power for team is spending what 15 million or so. But if you look at the top tier teams last year in spending, what was it? Texas Tech spent $28 million on their football team last year. I think that's low, by the way. Yeah, that's the public projection. They went to the college football playoff they lost to Oregon. Reportedly, ESPN had them at $7 million just on the defensive line. Right. One of the best in the country makes sense. Texas this year is projected. I think it was on three said they're thinking about $40 million is what the cost for Texas's 2026 squad is going to end up coming in to be. And if you think about the fact that $20.5 million is revenue sharing from the school, everything else you got to find other places to get it. And this is, like you said, it's very hard to turn down this amount of money for one home game and not a conference game.

3:09The game that would have been the hottest part of the year that probably would have been scheduled midday, you can now play it, get paid $7.5 million to do it. I'm not saying I would always want to sacrifice a home game. But if you do sacrifice a home game, there's worse games to sacrifice than the very first game of the year, middle of the day, hottest part of the season. Yeah, what does get interesting is when you think about the future schedule for Auburn, like I think everybody's excited about the Auburn Notre Dame series. You know, does it open the door to do something like that? And look, I originally thought about like the local businesses that are impacted by this. And obviously that stinks. It does. But I'm not entirely positive, like that's Auburn's job to do that. Could they have rolled it out differently? I think everybody agrees that they should have. And I'm just guessing, like if Cohen and Auburn could have done this differently,

4:10they probably would have rolled it out different than he did. I'm just guessing. I'm just guessing on that front. But the aspect of like what is the role of John Cohen? And the role of John Cohen is to put his coaches in a situation, the one championships. And I guess this decision, I'm trying to remember the timeline, but I guess this decision was made like, yeah, I was made before Alex Goulish was Auburn's head coach. But regardless, it's about putting the football program in a situation to be competitive from an NIL point of view. And I think this does do that. I'm curious, I can't wait to see that when we get closer to it. Like what all, because it has to be an exchange of goods and services, they can't just show up and play in the game. So just one, I think it's Aflac is like the main one. Yeah, Aflac. So I'm curious to see if they pop up in like social media posts or they have to go to these events or like what exactly they have to

5:15do to get that money. But I am curious to see what that looks like. Moving forward, the aspect of it being Baylor is intriguing. You obviously went two Waco in one last year. And that was really when we were at our peak, we're like, are we about to turn this around? We didn't exactly. Playoffs didn't come in. They were not. Yeah, but I do wonder, I do wonder like how much of a home field you are giving up with this. I mean, Auburn's going to have the vast majority of the tickets. They are still, it is still technically a quote unquote home game. But you're planning to get to DJ lagway. That's not a saw your Robertson. I actually think saw your Robertson's better. Auburn, there's no way Auburn would have known that at that point when they've decided this, but I am curious to see like how much footing you give up in this game now because of that. We saw the last couple of seasons, even when this roster or this team has not been weakened and weak out with the win lost record that we want. They're incredibly competitive inside

6:16Jordan here. So I do think there is an argument from a football perspective. You run the risk of taking a short term loss for long term gain in the money that you're getting back. I do think, you know, a quarterback his first game with the school and everything. It's probably a competitive advantage to play the game at Auburn. But at the same time, it's a lot easier to travel to Atlanta from Auburn than it is to travel there from Waco. Somebody who has gone to Waco many times, my wife has family there. It's not an easy trip. You're not flying into Waco. You're flying and you're driving for a couple hours and it's not fun. So I'm sure a ton of their fans will do it. Chip and Joanna might just be all over this game and Atlanta on the TV. But Auburn's still going to have a bit of home good advantage here. It's just not going to be nearly to the level that it would have been at home. Yeah. And I don't love that it's like that goal is just first games away from Jordan here. But I don't know if that really matters. That was certainly like gut reaction.

7:20But if that game funds a fourth of your roster, paycheck games are here for everybody now. I mean, this has been the way it's worked at smaller schools for decades is they've gotten paid money to go on the road in week one and usually take a loss. You're getting paid big money to go to a neutral site and you probably are favored to win the game. So in one respect, NIL is kind of equalized the field for a lot of people because SEC schools weren't doing paycheck games before 2026. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I understand the fan that doesn't want to go into that game. I totally get it. Yeah. And yeah, you do have three more home games in a row after Baylor, including two conference games, Florida and Vanderbilt. But it does still, I mean, it does still suck for the fan or for the city and the businesses downtown who have not had a lot of business over the summer and they're waiting

8:22for football season to get here to push that out another week. I do agree that does suck. That is not ideal for them. Yeah. Especially a year when Georgia and Alabama are on the road. Stuff. Right. A stuff. No question about it. That's super, super tough. And you know, Auburn's doing more. It seems like with the concert stuff they're bringing in. And then, you know, I think eight is going to be a larger deal this year than in previous years, especially with a new coach. Does that counteract a game day weekend? No, it does not. But hopefully it does help. We'll see. Hey, we'll see. Baseball is going to be it's going to be like that when when Auburn hosts a super regional again this year. We'll get to it in third in the third segment. I hope you're right. That'd be awesome. That'd be awesome. All right. Uh, who has more yards? Cam Coleman last year at Auburn or Keeshawn Singleton this year at Auburn. That's next right here unlocked on Auburn. Today's show brought to you by our friends at Fandall. Fandall is America's

9:24number one sports book. It's the last chance to wager and get on the action on football this football season. Lindsay. So last one, your patriots are not the favorite. Nope. They're not. They're four and a half point dogs. I actually just pulled up Fandall to see if there's any new Auburn numbers. The timing of this is impeccable. Auburn, a seven and a half point favorite against Baylor to open the season. The timing of that is insane. So go ahead and get in on the action there at Fandall and you can bet five dollars and get $200 in bonus bets if you win. Make it count because after the Super Bowl the season is over. Less call for football on Fandall. An official sports book partner of Super Bowl 60 visit Fandall.com today to get started. Today's show also brought to you by our friends and alumni hall. We love alumni hall. Can you imagine getting any Auburn gear other than with our friends at alumni hall? Lindsay Crosby. I would never do it. I have a great little baseball swinging obi hat with a little orange

10:26rope. Navy hat or a group. It's clean. It came from alumni hall. Yeah. I mean, I've got so much stuff from alumni hall hats, shirts, quarter zips. Whatever it is, go check them out. They've got three great physical locations selling Auburn gear and Auburn, Opalika and Huntsville. And of course, you can also go online at alumni hall dot com. Were you about to ask? Were you about to ask that question? Yes. Like, what if I can't make it to one of the physical locations near Auburn, Opalika or Huntsville? Lindsay, look, that's a great question. You can go to alumni hall.com. It's that easy. Thank you to alumni hall for partnering with Lockdown Auburn. Thank you so much for making Lockdown Auburn your first listen every single day. What I encourage you to join the every day or club locked on Auburn dot supercast dot com to sign up for the every day or club. You get access to an ad free audio feed as well as an invite to a members only discord, which is super, super cool. We'd love to have you there. So diving into, okay, who has more yardage came coming last year at Auburn,

11:30which was 708 yards or Keeshawn singleton coming in this upcoming season. Can Auburn get more production from their wide receiver one this season? For context, Keeshawn singleton last year had 877 yards average 17 and a half yards per carry. I think he'll have more receptions this year. I do think that average will go down because he'll be playing against SEC corners. But a system that he knows a quarterback that he knows ahead coach and law fits of coordinator that he knows. We've talked about how much his benefits Byron Brown. But guys like singleton, guys like Jeremiah Cogor coming over from USF. It benefits them too. Yeah, this is an immediate plug-and-play for Auburn. And provided they handled the change in opposing talent, which is not a guarantee, but provided that they do that, you can absolutely see how he can do more. I do want

12:34to my first thought when we present, we discussed this topic was, but Cam Coleman went on that absurd run late, right? The last four games, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Mercer, Alabama, and it was that big 10 catch game against Vandy. If you take those four games, he had 268 total yards in those four games. Yeah, 143 against Vanderbilt, but just barely over 100 in the other three. So 268, if he did that for every four games stretch of the season, he's barely over 800 yards. So, Cam, Coleman was pacing to barely beat, like to not even beat what Keeshawn singleton did last year. That's the big thing because I was wondering about like, you're counting Kentucky in that. Oh, you know what? I am counting Kentucky in that. Let me fix that and redo it without. No, so if you did a, yeah, what if you did the last three games, and then you multiply it at times four, what would it get? That would be about 936. So you would have beaten, he was on

13:37a table there. After the firing, good, good call there. Yeah, not counting Kentucky, just Vandy Mercer, Alabama. He was on pace. Yeah, Kentucky. He was probably emotionally fired at that point, but was not actually fired. That's right. That's right. I just, yeah, yeah. And he would have been on pace to score eight touchdowns. Had he, because he scored two touchdowns in that three game stretch. And I'll point out Keeshawn singleton had eight touchdowns on his own last year. That's right. So, so like the, the best answer here would have been Cam Coleman in 2026 would have beaten all of these numbers, but he chose to leave. So I still think singleton provided he gets enough volume should be able to beat Cam Coleman's numbers from last year and maybe even beat his own numbers from last year as well, depending on the volume he can get. Yeah, I mean, they spread the ball out in these goalish systems, but we have seen, you know, with what they did at Tennessee

14:38when there's a clear number one, what that looks like. We've talked about this a ton, this true sophomore class, and you take your biggest step from your freshman year to your sophomore year. And coger being a freshman last year, going 38 catches for 597 yards as he take a big step there. And I think that's where this gets a little interesting is if coger takes more of the market share of yardage and targets from Byron Brown, does it eat into singleton at all, which I think would be a problem that every Auburn fan would be fine with, you know, if singleton doesn't get 900 yards or whatever, but you have multiple guys that get over six or seven hundred is like, yeah, okay, that's arguably better for the offense because as a defense, you can't game plan for anybody. So I do wonder, I do wonder what that dynamic will look like because developmentally, and I feel more comfortable saying this because he's playing for the same position coach,

15:42coordinator, head coach, and student condition and coach in this transfer. I think developmentally taking that step as typically when you see the biggest jump. Yeah. And, you know, he had those 50 catches. I think another interesting aspect of this conversation, you mentioned how they spread the ball around so much, does he get more targets than the 70 he had last year? Because I do feel like the one place where Auburn, I'm not going to say has an advantage, but where you could see this whole idea of ours falling apart is Auburn having enough other pieces on offense to eat into that more so than USF did. Because you do how you just have, I mean, you have multiple really talented backs. You've got, you know, you did retain some of your own receivers and things like that. Do you have the USF PFF page up? Is that what you're looking at? Yes. The Medea Rubin. What year is he on there? Oh, let me, let me find that Medea Rubin.

16:46So Keeshawn Singleton led USF for receiving last year. Then it was coger. Then it was Rubin and then his other Auburn Tigers, Chaz Nimrod and Christian Neptune. So just curious, what what happened with Rubin there right in the middle of it? Why did he potentially not come over? Well, I had it up until you asked. Yeah. So sorry. That's super important. But Rubin had, Rubin was third with 495 and then Nimrod was right behind him with 466 and there's a bit of a drop off the Neptune with 335 and then a big drop off to tight end with Wyatt Sullivan at 176. So which I think will be, I mean, is that an Eccles type role or is it or is that a Jake Johnson type role? So, Rubin's in here as draft eligible. I do believe he returned to USF for his final season under Brian Harlan. He was a transfer from Stanford. He only played four games in, I think it was

17:52in 24 at Stanford. So he was able to red shirt. I think it was only four games. Either way, point is, he is back at USF for one final season. He came back with Brian Harlan. Yeah, he played in the in the bowl game. So that makes sense. Yeah. I wonder if, I wonder if Golis didn't want him. Like is that, is that what that happened? I mean, that he was newer to the system. He only had one season. Yeah. With you as, and he joined in the summer, he didn't like, he joined after the spring semester of 2025. So it may have been something where Golis is like, hey, it's not maybe worth, you know, he's not able to teach the Auburn guys as much as a single tin wood as a Nimrod wood, some of these other guys who were there longer, right? Right. But I will say, yes. He did at Stanford win the Community Outreach Award for the team in 24. So he's a good dude. Nothing against. I love that. He gets him here. Yeah. Love that. Good for him. That's right. Yeah.

18:53It's great. So you're, so we're in agreement that Keishan single tin will get more yards this year for Auburn than Cam Coleman did last year. I think we are provided the usual coffee acts of injury and things like that. That's obviously what stands out here. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's nothing against Cam Coleman. I think it's more of a testament to the scheme that we believe in that this there's actually going to be an offense back at Auburn, which is very, very exciting. Auburn baseball is getting closer and closer, which is very, very exciting. Let's take a little bit of a dive into that next right here, unlocked on Auburn. Today's show brought to you by our friends at Mazda. This is Mazda's moving the game forward for those who show there's more to score than what's on the screen. We'll mention Keishan Hall again, even though Auburn lost on the road to Tennessee. Keishan Hall was able to score in the second half at another 20 point performance.

19:56For him, these performances remind us what it really takes to raise the bar. It's that extra work off the court dialing in every detail given that extra fire, the grit, the never quit. We put the same passion in every model Mazda does. Highlights make for real, but what it takes to get there makes accounts. There's more to a Mazda because there's more to you. Thank you so much for making lock on Auburn. You're first listen every single day. I want to get to the baseball schedule in a second, because obviously the SEC is low and I kind of want to get your thoughts on the non-conference because I mean, sometimes if you're like just casually in the baseball and you look at some of these teams, like you just never know how good some of these teams are at baseball. So before we get into that though, what's the main thing butch and this baseball program wants to have answered slash what are they working on going into the season? What's the biggest question right now? From talking to butch a week and a half ago, one of the big things is they've got to figure out who's going to play where and like that's obvious, right? But it's the way

21:02that they're doing it butch has given them like specific targets and goals and this is an essence, you are dictating your own playing time, right? You are through what you do during these some of these you know, these scrimmage games and things like that. You are dictating how much time you will get and it's not just it's not just like the pitching staff who's going to be your big three and I've got some more thoughts on them in a minute. It's everything down to like who's going to play shortstop, right? Like they don't have a definite for sure knowledge of this is our guy and that's the thing Auburn's really had that for a long time. You kind of known like Brody Moore is your guy, Ryan Bliss was your guy, Colt Foster was your guy and you don't have that this year. There's options, all of them are good. It could be something like Eric Guevara kicking from third to short like there's a lot of different options and movable pieces and they've got more guys than spots to play them and yeah, something I say a lot is like depth will always work itself out. It's a good problem

22:03to have now but from talking to butch like this is probably the biggest question floating around his head is like where do I play these guys and how much runway do I have to give them if they struggle before I have to replace them because of the schedule. And then did I see butch talking about like some keystones that they're working on. One of the big things he's harping on and I really like how he's doing this is the pitchers need to throw 64 percent strikes like you have to be able to throw your pitches for strikes throw them in the zone versus giving out free passes. So they are shooting for 64 percent and that's kind of normal Lindsey for context. That's a little bit higher than college average but your better performers are typically floating around 60 to 65 percent for context. Some of your drafted guys are much higher than that. Karen Fluke

23:04at Coastal Carolina came in last year for the super regional. He threw his fastball 75 percent strikes Andy was throwing in the high 90s so like there's always room to get better but 64 percent overall is a pretty healthy target and I feel good about they are confident enough in the actual pitches right the pitch movements and everything where they feel like if we're in the zone a little too much they're still going to miss bats if they do put it in the play our defense is going to be able to make these plays they're not avoiding contact they're wanting to attack hitters that's kind of the big takeaway I had from this is we're not giving out free bases and we're attacking you and we're making you earn every base you get that was kind of the takeaway I had from that but he's also the lead-off man needs to be on every single inning and I think that's probably one of the big reasons you're going to end up seeing Chris Rembert leading off from a pure like lineup building perspective you want a guy like that to hit third or something like that to drive and runs

24:09but butch is focusing so hard on the lead-off man needs to be on every inning that let's start the game with Chris Rembert leading off and getting on to set the tone for the whole game and then the big thing it's doesn't feel like it's as big of a deal to us but to butch it's a big deal communicating on defense and it's not just like hey good play you'll get up next time but it's being technical with it like hey I'm moving two steps to the left for this batter you have more ground to cover things like that because there's so many new pieces on this roster right they don't all of this stuff isn't automatic already like it has been when you had you know Ryan Bliss in the infield for three years right Sony new pieces where you have to discuss this stuff and you have to make sure you're on the same page so he wants them to verbalize it and talk it out okay so let's go through this schedule starts Friday the 13th which seems like bad luck but that's okay

25:11they open up things against Youngstown state which is not a state I think we can all agree on that yep we are Cincinnati so I mean are either of these teams kind of like sneaky in the baseball world when you so Youngstown state if I remember correctly Youngstown state was a postseason team last year I'm trying to remember like when you look at most of this non-conference schedule is like these are all most of these are postseason teams Youngstown state I want to say was maybe a three seed anyway oh wow okay but yeah Youngstown state was in as you go through and I'm just thinking about they've got the event in Arlington they play Kansas state Florida state and Louisville postseason teams right and then when you come back home Nebraska that's a power conference opponent they had an RPI think of like maybe 50 last year so really tough opponent there

26:14I mean then Winthrop before SEC play yeah it's and then even in SEC play some of your midweeks Georgia Tech for a midweek it's a home and home of Georgia Tech yeah if I remember right from talking to butch and from looking at this I was talking to Mark Athens from D1 baseball this is a top five schedule in the entire country it's just one of the hardest schedules in baseball but all five of them are going to be in the SEC right I believe yes yeah you got it all in the SEC but this is still one of the hardest and so like just the fact that if you just are good not great you're just good it's going to be like last year where you end up hosting a regional and being a national seed for a super because you're challenging yourself there's virtually no giveaway games here right like Jacksonville states again me Alabama states a given even Jacksonville state I think is underrated I mean they're going to put out their best guy though typically or

27:17there's a chance they could use their best guy and Auburn's using you know a freshman midweek arm at that point like you just never know with mid weeks and baseball exactly Jack state I want to say knocked off Auburn a couple years ago and I feel like they get us every now then yeah guys weren't happy about it but like but like other than the Youngstown state one all of these are really good for our PI like all of these series are just their tough opponents and Auburn is challenging themselves with all of these and it's going to pay off if they can just hold serve and I think they have the offense to do that my only real question and shout out to Butch I always love and Butch tells me what great questions I ask um he I asked him about the schedule being so difficult and having to figure out all of these starters and he said that's the biggest thing he's worried about right now is just like how much runway can you give a new starter if he struggles in this tough schedule when you have fix or seven other guys who could be weekend guys that's

28:21the biggest thing for me to watch for I didn't even think about it can't really yeah that's the biggest thing to think about is just you got to find your guys early because you can't afford to take three or four weeks yeah mid season to figure out who should be your guys yeah if you miss our announce Mitt Lindsay and I or planning to go live after pretty much every game this year there's going to be some scheduling and all that but that's the goal we'll see we'll see how close we can nail that over the course of the year but I mean Auburn fans can't get enough or if you don't watch the games and you want to kind of a quick recap that'll be an option as well because I think a lot of people care but it's a lot of games a lot of games so we want to offer that to you as well kind of a day-by-day type thing so Lindsay how can people check out everything you've got going on I'm on social media at Crosby Baseball the Auburn Baseball content obviously here at barrenalburn.com you know in a brace content brave today in the brave today podcast please like

29:22the video please subscribe we'll see you next time this has been locked on Auburn