Matt Baker

SURVEY TIME ✍️

College football fans, with just a couple of weeks to go until the start of the season, how are you feeling about your team?

Our annual Hope-O-Meter is back, and we want to hear from you below.

http://dlvr.it/TMKwRs

The only logical explanation for Michigan 13, Ohio State 10

A Miami Northwestern reunion with Bucs LB Lavonte David

Can't believe that happened again!

College Football Playoff 2025 sleepers: 11 unranked dark-horse teams to watch Four teams started last season unranked in the coaches poll and made the College Football Playoff. Who could pull off the same this fall?

Who are some CFP sleepers who aren't in the preseason coaches poll? I made the case for a Big Ten team:
www.nytimes.com/athletic/653...

What we learned from Netflix's SEC football documentary, 'Any Given Saturday'

The Netflix SEC football documentary, ‘Any Given Saturday’, is available today, chronicling the 2024 season.

While many of the big brands didn’t participate, it still has compelling and revealing moments, especially from Florida and Vanderbilt:

www.nytimes.com/athletic/653...

Texas opens at No. 1 in Coaches Poll: Who's over- and underrated entering 2025?

Breaking down the Coaches Poll Top 25. Last year only 12 teams in the preseason top 25 made the final poll.
Who's underrated? Who's underrated?
www.nytimes.com/athletic/653...

College football Freaks List 2025: Ohio State’s Jeremiah Smith tops a list of 101 The 2025 Freaks List is here. College football is close!

A 6-7, 366-pound left tackle who vertical jumped as high or more than five of the wideouts who were at this year’s combine?!? A 6-3, 338-pound DT who clocked almost 21 MPH? A 6-4 1/2, 208-pound WR who broad-jumped 11-9? Meet the 2025 Freaks List: www.nytimes.com/athletic/652...

I assume the current flag is just a giant glass of its famous tap water

Shout out to the NYT Mini

See, other sports *can* have a playoff committee.
A very interesting read...

How often do college football players actually transfer?

How often do CFB players actually transfer now?

I looked at the top 50 prospects at every position from the Class of 2021 and tallied how many times each transferred.

Then we told some of their stories.
www.nytimes.com/athletic/652...

ACC Preseason Player of the Year voting:
1. Cade Klubnik, QB, Clemson (146)
2. Haynes King, QB, Georgia Tech (9)
3. Kevin Jennings, QB, SMU (5)
T4. Carson Beck, QB, Miami (4)
T4. Kyron Drones, QB, Virginia Tech (4)

It's beautiful

Hope you're sitting down for this: Clemson is the favorite to win the ACC, according to the preseason media poll. Tigers got 167 first-place votes. Miami was next with 7.
SMU and GT with two apiece. Virginia Tech got one, and Florida State got 4.

Lagway has made a lot of quick progress, Napier says. Something they're monitoring. Doesn't sound as if Billy is too concerned with Lagway's health, FWIW...

Billy Napier says QB DJ Lagway will be limited as the Gators start preseason camp. He's day to day, as are we all

What we learned at Big Ten media days: SEC barbs, Penn State hype and more

What we learned from Big Ten media days:

What we learned from Big Ten media days:

The feud with the SEC brings out the rhetoric from Big Ten coaches.

Penn State the clear favorite on paper.

The league’s best depth ever?

Remember Champions Week?

www.nytimes.com/athletic/652...

Buying/selling a home took years of my life...for a move across town. Never say never (I guess?), but a LOT would have to change for me to consider moving again. Starting with a large enough bank account to pay people to do it all and not worry about how long a house is on the market

Deion Sanders was dealing with an aggressive cancerous tumor on his bladder this summer that was removed. His medical team says the cancer is now gone.

Sanders says he has lost 25 pounds this summer dealing with the cancer and complications from surgeries.

H/T @davidubben.bsky.social

How the Big Ten rallied around a CFP plan no one else is sold on

Why have Big Ten football coaches rallied around a CFP plan the rest of college football doesn’t like?

“They’re in sync with the plan because they helped create it.”

An inside at the numbers and rationale behind its CFP proposal.

www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

How UCLA landed Nico Iamaleava — and is banking its rebrand on college football’s lightning rod UCLA is ready to compete in the Big Ten, and it invested heavily in Nico Iamaleava to do so.

How UCLA landed Nico Iamaleava — and is banking its rebrand on college football’s lightning rod
www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

Finishing a marathon isn’t as entertaining as the stories I’ve seen going around with this, but yeah, that

What I learned from ACC media days: Clemson’s back, Belichick’s funny, FSU’s confident The conference features fascinating transfer quarterbacks, and other things we learned after three days of reporting in Charlotte.

Got home around 1 am yesterday after three very productive days in Charlotte. Here’s what I learned from the ACC’s football media days: www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

UTSA coach denies QB receiving Memphis’ playbook information impacted game "It got blown out of context in my opinion," UTSA coach Jeff Traylor said on Friday of the situation.

This Memphis-UTSA leaked playbook story is pretty wild.

Also, I suspect, something that happens a bit in this portal era as players move around while having access to things.

www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

Fanfare follows Bill Belichick at ACC media days, but UNC's coach handles it his way

Conference media days are an only-in-college-sports event. So what was it like at Bill Belichick's first one? @davidubben.bsky.social followed the most interesting coach in the country closely (but not tooooo closely).
www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

Here's a first: I saw a dog get stopped by airport security. The dog appeared, by all accounts, to be a very good boy or girl, but its service dog vest had some metal, I guess.

Bill Belichick fits right in at ACC media day — and even cracks a few jokes

Bill Belichick drew three laughs in a five-minute span today at the ACC Kickoff.
No, really.
www.nytimes.com/athletic/651...

I have seen Belichick smile a few times and chuckle once, if you're wondering

The second question to Belichick is about ... fullbacks