It's time for The Mailbag, presented by Whitney McNutt of Tommy Morgan Inc. Realtors, where I answer your questions from RebelGrove.com and Twitter.
I asked for questions. You delivered. So here we go...
From MarvMerchants: This requires a little effort, but it is worth it in my opinion. Kendall Toole’s 30 minute hip hop ride..... after completing the ride, is that the coldest shower you’ve ever taken?
I became a Kendall Toole fan on her first ride. I wonder why.
I sometimes take her classes as a warm-up ride. It's certainly not fodder for a cool-down ride.
From nas5108: Heading into another week of COVID quarantine how is everyone in the McCready house holding up? Anybody going crazy yet like me?
My girls were on an edition of The Beer Garden, presented by Oxford Krystal, Friday. They talked about their experiences with this from their perspective. I thought it was interesting. We're all holding up pretty well. I'm the only one who I think experiences some mood swings from it. Carson gets frustrated that there's no one to play ball with other than me but he seems to be doing pretty well. Laura is back at work this week and they're busy as hell processing loans and whatnot, so I'm not sure it's all that different for her.
No one is going crazy. Antsy? Yes. Crazy? No, thankfully, everyone here seems to be ok.
From nas5108: With all the talk I have heard recently of an expanded college football playoff how soon do you believe it will be expanded to 8 or more teams?
I think it happens no later than 2025, and right now, I'd bet on 16 teams, not eight.
From nas5108: What are a few places on your bucket list that you would like to travel to in the future?
At this point, anywhere.
Frankly, I can't think of anything better than a beach, a book, a cooler of beer and a baseball game to listen to. My God, that sounds glorious -- and a million years away.
From MBARebel: The Aaron McLaughln QB that we were hot after at one point. He was committed to someone, but opened up recently and is now a lean to NC State. Did his stock drop? If not, it seems we should be able to compete with NC State for a top notch QB so do you think we are trying hard, but not making ground? Or, this staff has others they like better? thx
I haven't heard his name much. I don't think he's high on Ole Miss' list.
From REBNUT: Let's do a where are they now interview with former players ? I think it would be fun !
I don't know. That's not really in my wheelhouse. I like doing stuff like what we did with Jared Duke and we'll likely do a few of those type things over the next few months, but, yeah, that's about it.
From nas5108: How well do you expect AK to do at UAB? NCAA tourney team once every 3 years?
He's put together a very good staff and appears to be recruiting well right now. He's energized. He learned a lot during his two years away from the bench. I anticipate he will do well.
From Colonel3491: What month is the next big sporting event played in a sold out stadium/arena?
Great question. I wish I knew.
I'll guess... November?
From dpittsms: What is the best way to listen to y'all's podcasts/shows? Spotify, YouTube, Apple?
Apple podcasts is likely best but we're on SoundCloud, Podbean, etc. You can watch the stream on YouTube. Thanks for listening.
From Loblolly7: Which team would have had a better shot to win a national championship in their respective years: the 2010 MSU team, but Cam Newton is their QB instead of Auburn’s, or the 2014 Ole Miss team but 2015 Chad Kelly is the QB instead of Bo Wallace. Which team would have won in a head to head?
Wow, great question. Both teams would have been dramatically improved. Both would win two more games easily. That 2014 Ole Miss team with Kelly at quarterback would have been amazing. I'll go with it, but if 2010 Mississippi State had Newton, wow, it would've been a real contender.
From DeuceMccluster22: Recently on GPITS, you said Terminator 2 was a terrible movie. Huh?
Not my jam. To each his or her own.
From Marty McReb: Yo Neal! I'm a new member of the board but a day one listener/fan of the pod! Decided to finally pull the trigger and sign up. Have you guys ever thought about, and you probably have, putting together a week's worth of interviews of former Rebel football players/coaches? This would be the perfect time to do it! Here's my dream list (in order by day of the week): Evan Engram, Brandon Bolden, Patrick Willis, Eli Manning, and the grand finale...Nutt. Also, do you think twins ever realize one of them was unplanned? Thanks.
Yeah, but it's hard to get those kinds of guys on. We try. I suspect we'll keep trying.
I've never thought about that with twins. At one point, a doctor thought we were having twins. I was super excited about it. I suspect most parents are.
From OrangeBeachReb: Will you have David Morris back on? We need to drill down on this JRP controversy Also, other suggestions to have on pod/HRG: Swag, Marshall, AK, Geoff Caulkins, Rex Chapman, Reginald Buckner, Rob Evans, Eli, Max Howell, Deuce and Joe Harvell.
I love David. He's a super guy.
We've had Chad Kelly on. I've reached out to Marshall in the past. We've had AK, Geoff and Deuce on, I believe. I can't imagine Buckner doing a podcast. We'll reach out to some of the others.
From Hannitized: IF you owned an NFL team would you consider drafting ONLY SEC players?Would love to hear you and Jerry Jones going head to head because he LOVED a player from Washington State and you were pushing a stud from LSU!!! LOL!!!!
I wouldn't limit myself to 14 programs, but that wouldn't be an awful strategy. Kids are NFL-ready after playing in the SEC.
I'll try. I've watched more movies lately, but sitting down for 2-plus hours is hard to accomplish. I've been just as busy as before.
Just give me some Cubs baseball. I miss it. I'd also like to watch a Thunder playoff game, but mostly, I just miss the Cubs.
From pcrebel: If you need to get @drmikecmd 's help with the answer, that would be fine by me.My wife is getting more and more frustrated with staying at home. I know she is not alone across the country. So I am posing her question here:Tuesday morning the news said that many areas haven't peaked yet such as TN and MS and our peak is 10-15 days away. Yet we have been Sheltering In Place (SIP) to flatten the curve since March 17th. What has been the point of sheltering in place if it hasn't peaked for almost 30 days and we have almost destroyed our economy? Isn't it just going to start spreading again when we slowly start to open things up? We're being told our peak is 10-15 days away but we have been supposedly flattening the curve by SIP for the last 30 days.
I'm with your wife. I'm frustrated. I was for SIP and still am, but I sense a shifting of the goalposts and I'm bothered by it. The point, I thought, was to prevent the overwhelming of hospitals at the peak. OK, we did it. It's time to re-open (slowly) and start getting back to work.
From OxfordRebels5: I'm missing baseball bad too. If you had a vote for the HoF, would you vote Clemens, McGwire and Bonds? Any others from the "steroid era" you would consider?I would. If Selig is in, then they should be too.
I'd vote for Clemens and Bonds, but I'd want their plaques to acknowledge steroid use. I don't think McGwire is a Hall of Fame player without steroids. If he's in the Hall, Sammy Sosa should be too, and steroids made him who he was, in my opinion.
From Ignatius9: If football starts in January, do you think there would be a large exodus of players leaving school to get ready for the NFL combine?
That's a great question but it's impossible to answer in a vacuum. Did the NFL start on time? Did the NFL move the draft? If so, then yes, elite players would leave early and get ready. Otherwise, I doubt it.
From coachnuke: Which do you think coaches would prefer, opening the football season say 3-4 weeks later in September and games of the back end with players not in "peak condition" or train in Dec and Jan. and play Feb-May with players in "peak condition"
The correct answer is either. They know they have to get a season in. My guess is most would opt for the fall, even knowing their players were not in peak condition.
From TX via TN Rebel: I've heard on more than one occasion that Jim Nantz is a real jackass prima donna behind the scenes. Have you run across any of these wildly famous sports jackasses in your travels?
I've never met Nantz. I met Bill Raftery a couple of times and he was an ass. Most of the famous media types I've met seemed OK. A lot of the former players-turned-broadcasters are pretty conceited, but whatever. I'm not particularly social in the press box, either, so it doesn't matter to me.
From rogertheshrubber: I'm still a relative newcomer to the site and don't know much of the history....you do a good job of being "non-partial," especially in regards to Ole Miss but when you speak of other SEC schools, there seems to be an edge when it comes to MSU. For some reason, you don't seem enamored of them. Care to elaborate why? (Cue the "You need ANOTHER reason why?" comments).
Sure. It's my experience that people like the guy I've linked below are representative of their fanbase. Their fans, at least the ones on Twitter, are downright obnoxious -- and that comes from someone who worked in Alabama for 12 years.
