College football analyst Bruce Feldman joined the CanesInSight show, discussing the current state of college football, offensive lineman Jackson Cantwell, and the Miami Hurricanes squad.
Check out everything he had to say on the show:
On the current state of college football: I think we're going to find out a lot more on Thursday with this court ruling. But it's a mess. It has been exhausting to kind of, for a lot of fans, I think, to just see, because there's a bunch of different things that are going on here. You have a handful of players who are in NFL camps who got waived, and now they're trying to get back into college football. Then you have some other players who weren't in the NFL, who just the rule could kind of benefit them, and they were like, ‘Hey, I want to get paid one last time, or have one more run with my old college team.’ So I think those things, and it's confusing, to be honest. It's confusing for us. We're talking to people inside this case, these cases, as well as with some lawyers. But I think it's going to be a mess, like until we get to the point where the only realistic solution to go forward, I think, is going to be collective bargaining. And some people who are the most plugged in as it relates to the sport, these are people who are in that GM role, and they know exactly what's going on and what the landscape is. Politicians, I just feel like, they're swinging at a piñata. They're really in the dark on this, and it gets a lot of posturing. I don't think that's a realistic way forward. I think probably you see what it is with pro sports and collective bargaining. I think that's probably a more realistic, viable solution. I think you saw that in some of the political posturing that went on this off-season. It's a lot of folks who are not the one. It was like the old model, and I think it's fine for the coaches to make millions and tens of millions of dollars. A lot of people in power are very uncomfortable when the players are benefiting a lot. And so I think it threw their world upside down. And look, I'm not saying everything that came with it is a great thing. You have players playing for four different schools in four different years, and because they're not strict employment contracts like we might have, they're kind of operating around the rules a little bit, or a lot in some cases. So I think it's a really complicated dynamic that they're trying to kind of get around and sort out, and that's why it's become this big mess with no real guardrails.
On the changes he’s seeing on the field and how coaches around college football are adapting to the evolution of the game: Well, I think it's still very cyclical, right? You had for, I don't know, a generation, this proliferation of, like, the Texas Air Raid offenses that were, the Mike Leach systems, where a lot of people adapted. And obviously, you know, look, UM has Shannon Dawson running the show, and Shannon Dawson is a disciple of that style of football, and it popped up everywhere in seven-on-seven. Obviously there's elite programs, in South Florida that have put together a lot of those, some of those kids in that style of football. But I think what we watched last year was when Miami really leaned into what Mario Cristobal is in his DNA and just being physical and running right through people, I think that was when that was kind of the counterpunch, right? When 20 years ago the counterpunch was spread everything out and do some of the things, whether it's the zone read that Rich Rodriguez really invented 30 years ago, or some of the things that we're talking about with the passing game. I feel like Miami is well positioned because, what does he want to do? He wants to— he's an old O-line guy and loves physicality, and he's got a 230-pound hammer in Mark Fletcher, where I think we saw that flourish in the playoff offseason, right? And Indiana, people are following what Indiana did. He's not trying— yeah, he had a Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback, but he's not trying to throw for 5,000 yards. He took Josh Hoover and he was going to change the way Josh Hoover played, because at TCU, they were maybe not playing complementary football and protecting him as well. And I think so you'll see more people kind of lean into what Signetti did, what they saw that made it to the national title game.
On how coaches are adapting to the modern college football landscape: Look at the core. Mario is obsessed with recruiting, and Cignetti is a big— you know, he was a recruiting coordinator back in the day. Remember, I think a lot of Miami fans will remember the name Chuck Amato, who was a longtime Bobby Bowden guy at Florida State when they were rolling, and then he became the head coach at NC State and had some success up there. And, he brought Cignetti in to really help his recruiting operation, and obviously Cignetti then went to work for Nick Saban, where he was very involved in all the evaluation. I think you have guys who trust their evaluation and are all about that, and I think that's a big piece of it, because if you don't find the right players for the right system, you're going to be digging out of a hole. That's basically what happened when Florida State fell apart, right? They went from 13-0 to 2-10 real fast because they whiffed on a lot of the evaluations, right? And I think, yes, it helps that Miami has way more alignment now than they did in the last 20 years, and I think Mario's timing was fortunate, and I think they made a big pitch for him to leave Eugene, Oregon, to come back home. But if you see how things have aligned, I mean, I was out there at spring football, you know, whatever it was, five months ago, and I was blown away by the upgrades in facility and the commitment, but also the talent level, right? Now they still have to replace a lot of experience on the O-line and two elite edge rushers and some guys on the back end who made a lot of plays and were good leaders, right? But I still think from a talent level, it's really impressive what they have collected and put together, and I feel like now that adds to the culture of the competition. In the old days the competition was a green tree, and now it's indoors at a really nice facility that rivals pretty much any place else because the commitment is there.
On Jackson Cantwell’s potential at Miami: First of all, you start with the genetics, right? His dad was an Olympic medalist as a shot putter. His mom was a two-time NCAA champion. And the numbers he was putting up, right, when he was like 15 years old, his bench press was 500 pounds. That's remarkable. It's remarkable for anybody to bench, period, much less when you're 15, you're not even old enough to drive. He vertical jumped, I think, 31 inches at a combine. And then, when the Miami coaches told me just what his output of force was, it's a number that, like, a lot of average people are not going to have context for because you're not seeing anybody do it at, like, the local Gold's Gym or whatever, right? It's not a bench press or a squat or a power clean. It's something very different in terms of measuring in watts. But if you use the context of it's already a lot higher than what Mauigoa was, and he was an incredibly powerful big man, and this guy, who's been at UM for, like, whatever, seven months, has already surpassed that. That's insane. That's why he's top five, and Maui Noah was in the teens somewhere last year. So it's going to be fun to watch how Cantwell blossoms there, right? Because he was playing at relatively small school, you know, Missouri high school football, just throwing people around like they were, you know, sacks of laundry. Now he's going up against, at practice every day, really high-level guys. And I think that's the part where you'll see the development. Obviously, he has a great O-line coach, and that culture is there, and we see it, whether it's Penei Sewell or we see the guys that Mario's developed pretty much everywhere along the way, to see what this guy blossoms into. He wasn't just a five-star guy that everybody wanted with great genetics. I think you see the potential for him to be, you know, let's see what he does this year before we start talking about him three years from now as a top-10 pick. But it definitely wouldn't be surprising if he was went even higher than Mauigoa if he just kind of grinds his way and keeps into the plan.
Check out everything he had to say on the show:
On the current state of college football: I think we're going to find out a lot more on Thursday with this court ruling. But it's a mess. It has been exhausting to kind of, for a lot of fans, I think, to just see, because there's a bunch of different things that are going on here. You have a handful of players who are in NFL camps who got waived, and now they're trying to get back into college football. Then you have some other players who weren't in the NFL, who just the rule could kind of benefit them, and they were like, ‘Hey, I want to get paid one last time, or have one more run with my old college team.’ So I think those things, and it's confusing, to be honest. It's confusing for us. We're talking to people inside this case, these cases, as well as with some lawyers. But I think it's going to be a mess, like until we get to the point where the only realistic solution to go forward, I think, is going to be collective bargaining. And some people who are the most plugged in as it relates to the sport, these are people who are in that GM role, and they know exactly what's going on and what the landscape is. Politicians, I just feel like, they're swinging at a piñata. They're really in the dark on this, and it gets a lot of posturing. I don't think that's a realistic way forward. I think probably you see what it is with pro sports and collective bargaining. I think that's probably a more realistic, viable solution. I think you saw that in some of the political posturing that went on this off-season. It's a lot of folks who are not the one. It was like the old model, and I think it's fine for the coaches to make millions and tens of millions of dollars. A lot of people in power are very uncomfortable when the players are benefiting a lot. And so I think it threw their world upside down. And look, I'm not saying everything that came with it is a great thing. You have players playing for four different schools in four different years, and because they're not strict employment contracts like we might have, they're kind of operating around the rules a little bit, or a lot in some cases. So I think it's a really complicated dynamic that they're trying to kind of get around and sort out, and that's why it's become this big mess with no real guardrails.
On the changes he’s seeing on the field and how coaches around college football are adapting to the evolution of the game: Well, I think it's still very cyclical, right? You had for, I don't know, a generation, this proliferation of, like, the Texas Air Raid offenses that were, the Mike Leach systems, where a lot of people adapted. And obviously, you know, look, UM has Shannon Dawson running the show, and Shannon Dawson is a disciple of that style of football, and it popped up everywhere in seven-on-seven. Obviously there's elite programs, in South Florida that have put together a lot of those, some of those kids in that style of football. But I think what we watched last year was when Miami really leaned into what Mario Cristobal is in his DNA and just being physical and running right through people, I think that was when that was kind of the counterpunch, right? When 20 years ago the counterpunch was spread everything out and do some of the things, whether it's the zone read that Rich Rodriguez really invented 30 years ago, or some of the things that we're talking about with the passing game. I feel like Miami is well positioned because, what does he want to do? He wants to— he's an old O-line guy and loves physicality, and he's got a 230-pound hammer in Mark Fletcher, where I think we saw that flourish in the playoff offseason, right? And Indiana, people are following what Indiana did. He's not trying— yeah, he had a Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback, but he's not trying to throw for 5,000 yards. He took Josh Hoover and he was going to change the way Josh Hoover played, because at TCU, they were maybe not playing complementary football and protecting him as well. And I think so you'll see more people kind of lean into what Signetti did, what they saw that made it to the national title game.
On how coaches are adapting to the modern college football landscape: Look at the core. Mario is obsessed with recruiting, and Cignetti is a big— you know, he was a recruiting coordinator back in the day. Remember, I think a lot of Miami fans will remember the name Chuck Amato, who was a longtime Bobby Bowden guy at Florida State when they were rolling, and then he became the head coach at NC State and had some success up there. And, he brought Cignetti in to really help his recruiting operation, and obviously Cignetti then went to work for Nick Saban, where he was very involved in all the evaluation. I think you have guys who trust their evaluation and are all about that, and I think that's a big piece of it, because if you don't find the right players for the right system, you're going to be digging out of a hole. That's basically what happened when Florida State fell apart, right? They went from 13-0 to 2-10 real fast because they whiffed on a lot of the evaluations, right? And I think, yes, it helps that Miami has way more alignment now than they did in the last 20 years, and I think Mario's timing was fortunate, and I think they made a big pitch for him to leave Eugene, Oregon, to come back home. But if you see how things have aligned, I mean, I was out there at spring football, you know, whatever it was, five months ago, and I was blown away by the upgrades in facility and the commitment, but also the talent level, right? Now they still have to replace a lot of experience on the O-line and two elite edge rushers and some guys on the back end who made a lot of plays and were good leaders, right? But I still think from a talent level, it's really impressive what they have collected and put together, and I feel like now that adds to the culture of the competition. In the old days the competition was a green tree, and now it's indoors at a really nice facility that rivals pretty much any place else because the commitment is there.
On Jackson Cantwell’s potential at Miami: First of all, you start with the genetics, right? His dad was an Olympic medalist as a shot putter. His mom was a two-time NCAA champion. And the numbers he was putting up, right, when he was like 15 years old, his bench press was 500 pounds. That's remarkable. It's remarkable for anybody to bench, period, much less when you're 15, you're not even old enough to drive. He vertical jumped, I think, 31 inches at a combine. And then, when the Miami coaches told me just what his output of force was, it's a number that, like, a lot of average people are not going to have context for because you're not seeing anybody do it at, like, the local Gold's Gym or whatever, right? It's not a bench press or a squat or a power clean. It's something very different in terms of measuring in watts. But if you use the context of it's already a lot higher than what Mauigoa was, and he was an incredibly powerful big man, and this guy, who's been at UM for, like, whatever, seven months, has already surpassed that. That's insane. That's why he's top five, and Maui Noah was in the teens somewhere last year. So it's going to be fun to watch how Cantwell blossoms there, right? Because he was playing at relatively small school, you know, Missouri high school football, just throwing people around like they were, you know, sacks of laundry. Now he's going up against, at practice every day, really high-level guys. And I think that's the part where you'll see the development. Obviously, he has a great O-line coach, and that culture is there, and we see it, whether it's Penei Sewell or we see the guys that Mario's developed pretty much everywhere along the way, to see what this guy blossoms into. He wasn't just a five-star guy that everybody wanted with great genetics. I think you see the potential for him to be, you know, let's see what he does this year before we start talking about him three years from now as a top-10 pick. But it definitely wouldn't be surprising if he was went even higher than Mauigoa if he just kind of grinds his way and keeps into the plan.
