What Will Notre Dame Do With Sullivan Absher And Styles Prescod At Right Guard

0:00football is back and this is believed your home for NFL and college football news and analysis all season long. Now let's start the show. Weak day sports meet with Amherst breakdown.com continues Sean Steyers. Vince D'Aario is here. Talk some Notre Dame football. How's it going there Vinny D? It's going fantastic there. Sean Steyers, how about you? You're my my traveling buddy for the weekend. I was going to say I'm still recovering from the revenue 30 or so hours that we spent together a couple days ago. I mean recovering and more working with the players. I'm going to be a little bit more more focused on the game. I'm going to be a little bit more focused on the game. I'm going to be a little bit more focused on the game. I mean recovering in more ways than one. Luckily we were riding in style.

1:00That's true. That's true. 30 hours of me is a lot. I get that. You know, someone say the same about me. So I'll leave it. I guess. I tell you what, that was obviously the outcome was fantastic. You know, with Notre Dame winning the way that they did because we watch a full game, not just the first half. So that was a good outcome. But then also the pomp and circumstance surrounding it. I mean, going to Lambo and everything that that man and just being out there and I don't know. It was a great weekend overall. I will say that. It was a good time. I told Jesse the, our Jason Garrett story. Yes, that was fantastic. Everybody. I will say this. You know, because I said, you know, I was talking about how, you know, I told you it's like I didn't, I would have gone up and after the whole thing, he waved at me. I waved back. I was like, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I don't know what, like I didn't, I didn't, Aguil Lee. Up to the corner on the yellow sheet,

2:01we were going at a lot of Magnet with the backside covering up and they saw Jack Bertram shrimpunp English D自己. You know, you've seen, одну Sasque's some of those tiny Conservative artists who ran that movie was very popular recently as Per Malcolm. As a viewer, the boy une supports uko 87. The best anytime. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. Okay. the TV crew up to the entrance there to Lambo and he heard you say it and so he's just got this look on his face. It's like, who is this guy? Who are these people? The look was the, I just smell the fart look is what it was and you can tell that he was trying to figure out why I know this guy. Is he really my guy? Why you were his buddy? Like that was the whole thing and it's like, man, you don't think that people recognize you because you were the Cowboys head coach for a long time. It was fantastic. And the best part was, you know, it's always a running joke that I don't have an inside

3:04voice. And so whatever I say, everybody's here. It does boom. Like Vince, and Vince does not even try to, you know, like very rarely. Not anymore. It was a pseudo whisper during the press conference. You know, is he's giving me his running commentary about things going on in the post-game press conference while my recording devices are sitting right in front of him. I thought about that after the fact, by the way. Yeah. I was wondering if that got caught on there. It was just, there's your body. Yeah. I look, look, look, it looks like it's running. And then so he's looking at us funny, like he's trying to figure it out. And then he zooms past us. But then they park and it takes him a minute to get off the golf cart. So we catch up. We walk. We walk him in. And then he sees us again. The look on, he's just like, he's going to get this cock-eyed look on his face. He's like, I'm just smiling. And then he smiles again and waves again. And it's like, he has no idea. And it was glorious. It was so great. And I was, I told, I think I told you and I told Jesse yesterday, like I would have just,

4:06you know, because I had this same hat. It's, you know, like, it's kind of an incognito. Cowboys had it just as he is. He wouldn't football on top, but it's Dallas Cow. And like, I would have fun up, but it's like, after, hey, I'm a Cowboys fan. Like, where do you go next? Because it's not that I have, you know, I really don't have a ton of ill will. I always thought Jason Garrett did the best he could, living in the, you know, Jerry's world and, you know, being the head coach under Jerry. Obviously things sunk at the end. He was definitely improvement and improvement from Wade Phillips who he took over from, you know, in the middle of a season, you know, when he became, I guess, that time interim head coach and then became head coach. I always thought he did a good enough job that, you know, they were in the playoffs. They obviously, like everybody else before him and after him never did anything. Good point. He is high watermark in the last. Where'd he go after him? Like Cowboys, fat. You know, it's like, you were, you were a coach, you know, like, it's just, it's what it is. So I know we just kind of kept walking, you know, and kept it as awkward as possible.

5:11They said, oh, it's great. I enjoyed it. I very much enjoyed that interaction. But, but no, overall, the whole day was just so much fun and it was a long day. When you look back on it, Sean, that was a very, very, very long day. But I don't want to complain because people would trade places. A lot of people would cut our brain to be there. That's right. 100%. So it was a good weekend. Got to saw my, see my kid do his thing on Saturday and then got to see Notre Dame on Sunday. And then we had a nice drive back on Monday. So good weekend. I tell you what, looking back at some of the photos from that game, you can sure see those uniform numbers much more clearly in a photo than what we can see. It was, I was explaining it to somebody the other day and I must have been yesterday, obviously. But like, when we first got up there, the sun was still out, right? And I get out my binoculars and I'm looking down and there was about five or six Wisconsin players just sitting on the bench, you know, on the opposite side.

6:17And they were guys that were injured, they weren't going to play. So they just had the Jersey tops on. And I'm get out my binoculars. I'm looking at those guys sitting and the sun is reflecting off of the numbers. And A, you couldn't read the numbers in any way, shape or form at that point because of the glare. And what it reminded me of is like on TV and in the movies when you see like surveillance video, but the robber or whatever put something on their face to make it look like it's real bright. So you can't see their face. That's what it looked like. It would like totally skewed any kind of remarkable thing about the person. You could not tell anything about the players. And the Notre Dame's one were just as bad when the sun went down, obviously. Then you had the lights, you know, from the stadium just as bad. Yeah, you couldn't, you couldn't see anything. And then you taught me a long time ago when you were doing, when you do play by play for basketball or football, you look for defining characteristics like some were an arm sleeve or a leg thing or, yeah,

7:19everybody knows the name though. All of it was Navy blue for Notre Dame and all of it was red for Wisconsin. There were no defining features on anybody. It was awful. Yeah, it was my wife actually told me she thought that the uniforms look good on TV, but you know, based on some of the comments in the chat, not everybody feels the same. So I they looked good up close because like when we went down in the field and they were like doing the Lambo leap after the Alma mater, like they look really cool up close. Like I like that. Chromy look, but when it's monochrome like that, you just can't. It's rough. It's rough goodness. Okay, game itself. I know you, you know, you did upon further review with Driscoll the other day and I'm trying to think I don't think you've done anything besides that so far. No off yesterday. So yeah. So sitting here a few days later, what's your biggest question coming out of that game? You know, my biggest question is, are they going to make the right decision at right guard?

8:24You know, moving forward. I think that they will. I don't see how they can't. I don't know how you can watch the video or the film and be like, no, let's just do what we did last time. Like I don't see how that's a possibility. I just don't. And I want to, you know, we're going to talk a little bit more about that position moving forward. So I don't want to jump into it right now. But like my biggest question right there is a, are they going to make the right decision at right guard? And then I guess there's some still some question marks. Around in the wide receiver position. But I don't think it's the same questions that a lot of fans have about the wide receiver position because of the manner in which Wisconsin took certain things away. Certain guys weren't going to get the football. Yeah. It's just just, yeah, it's just the way it went, right? And it was one game sample. Right. It was, you know, they played a lot of zone. They played a lot of too deep and you're not just going to take, you know, take shots down the field throwing into that. That's why they're playing too deep.

9:25You know, like they're trying to make you literally, you know, take, take what the defense gives you. And that's what C.J. Clark did. And again, I know that kind of unsettles a lot of people because they, you know, the, oh, we got C.J. Car and, you know, we've heard all these great things about these receivers. Well, you still can't just come out trying to drop bombs. That's when you throw three in exceptions in a game when you're 100%. Thanks. They were trying to take advantage of the fact that C.J. does like to throw deep. He likes to take chances. You know, things like that. He didn't do that. And it showed incredible maturity on his part, by the way, as a second year starter to not try to take shots when they weren't there, to not try to squeeze the ball into smaller windows that, that didn't exist and things of that nature. Jordan Fazon was single covered most of the game. That's why he was open. They took away the slot. It wasn't just a great house. Like, what does that tell you about how they, they thought to play? You're going to, you're going to single cover Notre Dame's leading receiver. Is it because, well, he doesn't look that physically gifted and these other guys, the two slot guys,

10:29Graham and, and Fazon, like they look like they've got the better tools. It's a great question. I was surprised by that. I, I don't disagree with you, but the defense that they were playing took away the slot and it took away deep shots. And, you know, C.J. Car said in the post game, you and I were sitting right there. He's like, we knew that our running backs and our tight ends were going to be open most of the game. Like, we knew that was going to happen and so we took advantage of it and they did and they had room to run afterwards. But they really only took advantage of the running back aspects in the second half after they were picked. Right. You know, a couple touch down and part of that was because they were able to get the run game going. I mean, that, that those two things do go hand in hand. Um, and so they were able to get the run game going and, and, and the run game wasn't a whole lot different in the second half than it was in the first half. It's just they actually executed it. Like, offensive lineman weren't running their feet. They weren't doing things that they should be doing. The relationship on the right side was iffy at best. Um, and then they made that one change and it's like, Oh, wait.

11:32These are the five guys that have been working together since January. Maybe that would have been the way to go from the start and all of a sudden now they're all working together and making things happen. Right. Okay, I'll save the receiver. Talk. Let's, let's get into the offensive line. The right guard thing here. Did you get to hear any of Freeman's press conference? Yes, good. I could not because I couldn't find it when you guys were looking for it early. And then I didn't watch it later last night. So apparently it was down for a while. Like, I don't know what I heard was there was an audio issue or something. So it was offline for a little bit, but they did put it back up. So I was able to get, you know, a little bit cleaner audio off of that feed. So we talked about this yesterday, the styles press God Sullivan ab sure they are still listed as press God or absurde. They are on the depth chart. Did you see that? Yes. Yes. And so the question is he talked to his press conference yesterday, Mark, as Freeman did about if he wants to keep them splitting time or if he wants one of them to job,

12:34grab the job permanently and here is the response to that. Well, we'll see what the future holds. You know, I thought both of them played extremely well, both played good a lot and have things to improve on as well as many people on our team and coaches and everybody else. But, you know, I think the plan going in, we weren't verbally talking about this to obviously the media or anybody else, but was, hey, how do we kind of get 30 reps for each guy? Right. And right now that's probably what we thought was best. We thought those guys playing 30 reps were what's best for the offense instead of saying one guy go for 60 reps. And we're intentional about that. And this week will present something different. We'll see exactly what our plan is going into Saturday. We have some initial thoughts. But again, it will be based on, you know, their defense and some schematic of things they do and in what's best for our offense.

13:37Be curious to see what those thoughts turn out to be. I mean, I think pretty much everyone watching the game, whether you're media, fans at home, wherever, like, Sullivan, Absher played better. And, you know, like we went through, you know, the pro foot of the PFF grades yesterday, like Absher grade, they played almost the same amount of reps. Press God got two more reps, I think it was compared to Absher. And Absher's grades were like 20 to 30 points higher in everything. The overall grade, the run blocking grade, the past blocking grade, Absher was better at it. Like he just looked like the guy who's used to playing right guard. So I guess if they think that they need to split him again against rice this week, okay, but it feels to me like the way they played, Absher needs to be the guy who's starting. And if they get a lead, that's when you give press God snaps after that. What do you think? That was one of the worst answers I've ever heard. Mark is freaking it gives.

14:38That's what I think about that. Look, I get coach speak and I get you don't want to, you know, put your game plan out there and things of that nature. But a complete novice can watch the game that we all watched on Sunday night and realize that 75 should start not 71 period. I mean, look, and again, I get why he said what he said. I just don't like it because it's so obvious. And I asked him the question about it and the question was, would you like one of these two guys to, you know, grab hold of the job or do you know, unsplitting reps going forward? It wasn't which one are you going to start this week? It was, you know, it's pretty, right? And he wasn't going to say it. And you heard the response to it, you know, because like that response is one thing. But he, you know, like do you want one of these guys to actually do it? And I mean, like to hear him answer that. It sounds like they might just be splitting the reps, you know, for a little bit longer. At least this week anyway, it's like, I don't know if Sullivan Absor tried to like break into Marcus Freeman's house or,

15:47you know, called his mom a name or something. And like I don't know what they have against Sullivan Absor because they've been rolling five or six different guys into right guard trying to steal this job away from Sullivan Absor. And he's the last man standing. He keeps just fighting off these guys over and over and over and over. And I don't know what this man has to do to get the starting job out right. I just don't understand it. Obviously I'm joking about the other stuff, but I just don't understand why they're, they keep pushing this. Because look, this has nothing to do with styles. Prescott. He looked like a tackle trying to play guard. Right. And that was the problem. You can't, he was, he was like, he was reaching trying to find his blocks, whereas Absor was actually moving the way you expect to guard to right. It's you're asking Prescott to do things that he hasn't done before. He can be great as a tackle and, you know, like it sounds like if just based on everything, the way things were trending, if anything had happened to either Lambert or Black,

16:49Prescott would have been the next guy in at tackle. And he may look, you know, really great at tackle. I don't know, but right now it's obvious that Absor is the better guard between the two. And like it's really not even close based on what we saw. Oh, and the game was not like the game was, was, you know, out of reach when they put Absor in. And all of a sudden, he's playing back up. So he's, he's playing Wisconsin's number ones. The whole game and there were, there were much like there was the running game got better. It felt like to me, you know, like we can talk about it. Nia's Williams and blame him for the first half and everything else. But like there were actually running lanes for a new run through in the second half. And Absor was in there. Look, I can tell you this right now again, a complete novice can sit down and watch the TV copy of the game. Watch the run game in the first half and then watch the run game in the second half. And we talk all the time about moving the line of scrimmage, right? Offensively you want to move it forward defensively. You want to stalemate it or move it backwards. It was a stalemate at best in the first half just was in the second half.

17:52They were consistently moving the line of scrimage to three, four yards down the field. And the running backs wouldn't even touch anybody until they had already gained three yards. And then there was a whole to run through. Yeah, it was just, it was a completely different scenario in the second half than it was in the first half. And you ask yourself, okay, what was different between the first and second half? Solve an Absor was in the game in the second half. That's what was different. They weren't calling magic plays, you know, Mike Dembrok didn't eat his magic beans and all of a sudden was calling a better game. Like it was the fact that they were executing. They were running their feet. They were doing things that the in the first half they weren't doing. The relationship on the right side was so much better in the second half than it was in the first half. Sometimes it can be just that simple. And I just think that it is. And again, this is nothing to do with styles. He's a tackle. He's a tackle. And he's the first tackle in the game is something happens. That's his role for this year.

18:53And that's okay. Solve an Absor right now is your best right guard. He needs the one starting. I completely agree with that. And, you know, like again, if you want to get both of these guys reps, it feels like just watching. It needs to be the situation that you just said. Absure starts. Then if you get a big enough lead, he gets his reps because he just needs a lot more development. And you know, like the follow up question to that was, was there some missing ingredient that you were trying to get during training camp when they were auditioning all these other guys, including Prescott. And really the response was consistency. You know, like that was the word that came up a couple times in the answer. Like it sounded like they were looking for more consistency. So if nothing else, maybe again, just based on what we saw in an actual game, maybe this just means that it pushed Absure to work harder and made him a little bit hungrier.

19:54I mean, he definitely made the most of his opportunity up there in the opener and pretty much everyone, you know, again, viewing from the outside saw a guy who, you know, one guy performed better than the other. And so I'll be really curious to see if they actually make that switch this week. I will be to and, you know, somebody in the chat mentioned, you know, some guys just aren't great at practice, but when the lights are on, they perform. And maybe that's the case with, case with Sullivan, Absure, I'd love to tell you what kind of a practice player he is, but we didn't get to watch a lot of practice. So I don't know. We definitely didn't get to see any live line play. Right. What I do know is what I saw on Sunday night. And I saw one guy was better than the other guy when the game was going on. That's what I saw. And so I think that's what the coaches are seeing on film as well. And here's the other thing like I don't, if I'm Joe Rudolf or Marcus Freeman or Mike Denbrocker, any variation of the three, I get that you gave a shot to Styles Press God

20:55to be the right guard. Okay. That's awesome. I would not be pushing it and pushing it and pushing it at this point. Because then he's going to forget how to play right tackle or left tackle. And his, his value to the team right now is the first tackle in the game if something happens. That's his value to the team. And if he's so focused on battling for this right guard spot that he starts to change his technique because it's different technique when you're on the inside, then what happens if he has to go in at tackle? You know what I mean? Like, yeah, stay focused on one spot, man. You don't have to be a jack of all trades in a master of none. I agree. I agree with that. Well, let's flip over to the other side real quick. Do it. We'll stick with the offensive line. I'll save the wide receiver talk for rapid fire. We'll get into that a little bit in rapid fire because I do want to talk about that today. Anthony Naptho, after two years as the left tackle, made his first career start at left guard in Marcus Freeman had had some, well, I'll just let you hear it.

22:00He is a dude. He is a grown man that he reminds me and hears what he reminds me of. His mentality and approach to practice reminds me of Joe. Like Joe, you just look at him every day and he was ready to practice. He knew what practice time was. There's some guys. The majority guys, right? Normal guy. Okay, I got a pride. We got to go. We got to talk to yourself and you got to make yourself go. That's what normal people do. Then you get your guys like Joe, and Naptho, that love it, that know how important it is. Man, he is a heck of a football player. Tough, physical. I mean, he is. Man, I love it now. I mean, he obviously loves him some Anthony Nap. And look, like this is kind of the opposite of what we're talking about. We're Prescott's going from his natural position to guard where Naptho was playing out of position essentially.

23:00The first year, especially out of necessity. And what did we say for two years? He would be a better guard. And just one game in, that is pretty obvious who the best guard on the field was Sunday night. Like Naptho, you know, and what's fun about going back and watching some of those eclipse and stuff like him is like this guy was just like looking for guys to hit. Like if there was nobody in front of him, Anthony Nap was still going to find somebody and stick his nose in there. To me, the funniest part of the whole thing is like this guy looks like the fresh face, you know, like a freshman in high school basically, but he might be the next guy on the field. Yeah, that's right. Marcus Freeman sounds like he wished he had older daughters that he could like marry off to Anthony Nap. Like that's what that sounded like to me. He's ready to adopt Anthony Nap into his family. And you know, in retrospect, it makes a lot of sense as to why they threw him to the wolves

24:06as a true freshman at left tackle because if he comes to practice like that, yeah, you see those traits, you see the hard work, you see, you know, all of those things are like, well, let's give him a shot, you know, like that kind of a deal. And so I mean, it makes sense now looking back. When that first happened, we were all looking at each other like what is going on? Like why is this happening? It makes more sense now, right? Because as coaches, you want guys that you can trust everybody trusts Anthony Nap. You know what I mean? Like everybody trusts that he's going to do his job. He's going to do it at a high level and wants to hurt someone in a good way. And so then obviously that's what makes him a nasty guard as well, meaning that in the most positive way. I mean, he's got a lot of quint Nelson type traits in him. That was a like quint Nelson. That was the name that came to mind for me, you know, obviously he Freeman didn't coach Nelson. So he didn't he didn't make that comparison, but he made the comparison to Joel, because he coached Joel, you know, can you imagine even a Joel and Anthony nap left side?

25:09Like that would be a lot of fun to watch, right? No kidding. No, I think I think I do think black can get to that point at some point. He looked like a rookie a little bit on Sunday, right? I mean, he made some rookie mistakes and things like that. But the kids got a lot of natural talent. He'll just get better as the year goes on. Yep. Absolutely. Sloppy Joe says that he would listen to podcasts of opposing teams last year. And when they would do their film reviews, they would constantly ask why Notre Dame is playing nap at left tackle because he was clearly an interior lineman. And it's exactly how it went. He got he did get markedly better from year one to year two at left tackle. I mean, he was a he was a serviceable left tackle at this level of football. He was now he's all American caliber guard. Like that's the difference to me. Yeah. Yep. And he's got a guy who I wouldn't say will blank is all American caliber right now, but he also just took his first career snaps. Right.

26:09And he's definitely got potential within a year to to be in that all American 100%. He's got all American attributes, right? Like he's got he's got that he's got that ceiling. And again, we probably won't see it this year, but I mean, it would be great if Anthony Napstase for four years. I have no idea what his plans are after junior year, obviously. I'll be curious to see, you know, because guards obviously are not the commodity. Right. Of a tackle, but he has obviously shown positional flexibility. I would think the NFL is still going to view him as a guard. But you know, like if he just, if it's obvious, I think at the end of this year, I would think that there's a hard time for him coming back. Although with NIL, you know, like it's kind of a magic, a magical lister like you just, you never know how far that's going to go with some of these guys. Seeing will black and Anthony nap together for two years, I think could be that could be an elite situation. Right. Because even this year by the end of this year.

27:11He's the only guy out of eligibility. I believe that's accurate. Yeah. I believe that's actually potentially plug in Joe Otting next year and you bring you that's if that would were to come back and you bring everybody back, you know, besides him. And if you're a brand new starting quarterback, if CJ Carr happens to leave for the league after this year and you've got that starting lineup in front of you, you don't have to be good. That's a pretty good situation and not to mention the fact every single one of you running back. That's eligibility remaining is exactly. All right. We will get into some of that wide receiver conversation in rapid fire. Excuse me, a little hiccup there in our number two of the show with Vince D'Aario, Sean Steyr's rapid fire is next on weekday sports beat with our breakdown.

29:56If you liked the show, please take a moment to rate, review and subscribe. It really does help the show to grow. Thank you for listening.