4 Hard Downs: Pool Day, What's Up At Bama & Being A Hyper Specific Person

A cool pool coozie, being a control freak, Alabama gets it this week &

Y’all, I am gonna get to the Thanksgiving Initiative because we took a big step this week. However…

We had our first “Family Pool Day” this Saturday.

Cooler. Beach Bag. Wine. Beer. Floatie. Meeting People. A ton of sun.

Shout out to Miller Yoho, the man who hooked me up with the Frost Buddy for Duke’s Mayo. Also, shout out to my buddy Laura who said, people might just think you’re slugging down Duke’s Mayo at the pool.

Swam my first laps in years and let me tell you, I am tired from that for sure.

But, you know what I’m not to tired to do…SPOT THE BALL

1st Down: Being A Hyper Specific Parent

My kid spent the night with my mother this week.

I woke up at 7:15 & started putting together everything for her to go see her grandma. (Correction, I was up Friday night making a big ass list of everything she needed so that I could cross it off in the morning as I added things to it). I went for a quick walk, got back and put together the beach bag, the cooler and finished most of the non-perishable packing for the kid to go stay at my mom’s house.

Then we went to the pool and I got back and finished packing.

Took her to my mom’s, a woman who has not only raised 1 very successful son & then also me. Plus spent 30 years in education handling children. I proceeded to explain every piece of things that were brought over from blankets, to sound machine, how much in snacks she can have, when she can have Body Armor and bedtime plus pick-up time for Sunday.

My mom. My dad. My wife. All are like, “why are you like this.”

I think it is a combination of playing college football and my own control issues.

In CFB, and anyone who has played knows, if your locker isn’t perfect you run. If you forget a thing, you run. If you miss a thing, you run. If you mess up a thing, you run.

Forgetting isn’t an option.

Add that to my natural issues, mixed with working from home and being able to control things for so long this is my parental equivalent of just: I Do Not Want To Run.

That’s it. I don’t want to run. The best type of preparedness is being over prepared and that’s what I’m aiming for in general. I don’t want to get a phone call with questions, I want to answer every question before it gets asked.

Overkill? Sure.

Effective? Yes.

2nd Down: Thanksgiving Initiative Is Back With Ramp Butter

Shout out to TheGurglingCod on twitter, who has become a real life friend, JBF, for the ramps he sent me from his haul.

I turned them into a ramp compound butter.

Ramp City, Ramp Ramp City Bitch

Stuffed the cold butter under the skin of a turkey to roast. I am normally a turkey fryer or smoker but how can I get good at smoking turkey if I never do it? That’s sort of the point of the whole “Thanksgiving Initiative” that practice makes perfect.

Tied Up & Ready For Action, Foil Makes Clean Up Easier

400° for an hour.

325° for 3 more hours, depending on the size of your bird, but mostly time is a flat circle and the goal is to get the thighs to 155-160 and the breast to 140-145.

But you’re not done. Uncover and then cook to crisp skin to get them to 165 and 150, respectively. Pull and cover with foil and let them temp out to 175 and 165; dark to light meat. Let it temp out and then rest and you’ve got a juicy bird.

Crisp Skin Ready For Pickin

The ramp butter is great dripping from inside the turkey. The flavor is pervasive.

Breast & Thigh, Ramp Butter All Over

Then I turned that into a very good “mock Thanksgiving” dinner of roasted turkey, creamed corn and green beans.

Goat cheese in the creamed corn with ramp butter and ramp butter with the green beans and you’re in business.

God I had green beans

The point here is not, “Hey use ramp butter on your turkey,” rather it is make turkey more than one day a year. You can’t get good at a thing if you don’t practice. My guy Hunter Mandel at Overtime asked why I was roasting a turkey when, in my real Thanksgiving, I would never roast, I always fry and smoke. The answer is I want to get reps and understand the bird and know what works and what doesn’t so that I can be better in every facet.

That’s the point. Be better in every facet.

3rd Down: Preview Of “Baby Gronk” Convo & Overtraining

So if you haven’t seen it here is basically the quickest catch up:

Baby Gronk is this kid

Jim Nagy is the Senior Bowl Director and he said this

Stetson Bennett entered into the convo here

So, you’re caught up.

We are going to spend a good amount of time on this on Inside Football because there are so many levels to this shit.

I was a super motivated, focused kid. I knew I wanted to go to UNC, my parents were teachers and knew exactly what I needed to do to get there, so I did it. I hated getting told what to do, so in my home life, and in sports, I figured out how to get things done so no one would talk to or correct me.

My dad bought me an Air Attack 2 with Nitro because he knew I wanted that for my bag.

But my folks never made me go out and practice, if I wasn’t into it then they weren’t into it either, there was no “you have to” of it all. Only, “you get to pick how good you want to be and when you need us we are there.”

He also didn’t make me specialize in a thing. The only reason I became a football player exclusively, and let baseball go, was because I had a bad shoulder injury and the two options were pain management or surgery. Surgery would mean my football season was over in October. Pain management got me to be able to play in the playoffs the first time my high school went in like a decade.

Tuesday, Inside Football on Stadium, we’re going to get into this at 1 eastern. I have strong feelings as a player, strong feelings as someone works in the space and sees kids who hate it but their parents make them, strong feelings from seeing athletes burn out and strong feelings from diversification and strong feelings as a parent.

We will see what happens.

4th Down: Bama Blues

I have no idea what is going to happen at Alabama.

I also am not as optimistic about Alabama as other people because new OC Tommy Rees can have a great relationship with Tyler Buchner; but Buchner wasn’t on the “he is really him” radar. 6:8 TD to INT ratio. Which leads us to, what are the other guys doing wrong.

And I know they are all working hard, you don’t play at Alabama very long and not work hard.

But, the biggest thing for me is this:

What does the RB room look like this year? Between lack of experience and injury issues, who is Nick Saban going to truly count on?

Add in this:

What are we going to get out of the WR room.

I know they brought in Malik Benson, the JUCO wide out. They also got CJ Dippre from Maryland from the portal. Neither of them feel like Jameson Williams, the Ohio State transfer. So, for Bama, a team that will likely be ranked in the Top 5, They have a lot to prove this year, which could be good for Saban.

But…

If you don’t have a QB you love and the two pieces who make the QB look better, who aren’t OL, are just ok, how are you dangerous?

I am very invested in what Alabama is going to do this year. I am curious to see the running back room, the QB position and how they replace 3 safeties who were very good. This is going to be a wild one for CFB with no real, entering the season, elite complete team, even on paper.

Cheers!!