The Solid Verbal College Football

College football is almost here, so we brought ESPN's Bill Connelly back on the show to help us separate the teams worth believing in from the ones carrying more risk than the preseason conversation might suggest. We start with Bill's annual look at the most important players in the sport and work through the quarterbacks, transfers and returning stars who could swing the 2026 season in either direction.
From there, the conversation turns to some of the biggest contenders in the country. How good does Keelon Russell need to be for Alabama to get back into the national championship picture? Are we overlooking the questions surrounding Texas despite all of its star power? Which quarterback situations are the most terrifying, how much should we trust Penn State, and which teams look very different once Bill compares what the numbers say with what he actually believes? We also bounce through the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC, talk potential chaos games, the wildest weekend on the 2026 schedule and the conference race that deserves more attention than it is getting.
Plus, Bill gives us teams that could be much more fun than expected, a few Week 0 and Week 1 games worth circling, and one program college football fans should consider adopting for the season.
After Bill leaves, we somehow end up revisiting Ty's old wedding betting pool, complete with ceremony over-unders, music props and some extremely specific long-shot wagers.
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In this college football podcast episode, we react to the first AP Top 25 of the 2026 season and our first preseason poll as official AP voters. We run through the top of the rankings, compare the national poll with our own ballot and talk about what it feels like to put actual votes behind all the opinions we’ve spent the offseason developing. Which teams already look a little too high or too low, and how much should anyone really trust a preseason poll before the games begin?
Then it’s time for some Zagriculture. We take a bank of familiar college football narratives and draft the ones we’re most willing to push back against. Is Notre Dame really just a product of its schedule? Is Dabo Swinney actually cooked at Clemson? Can USC finally build a respectable defense under Lincoln Riley? What should we expect from Oregon when the biggest games arrive in January, and how much faith should anyone have in Lane Kiffin eventually delivering a championship at LSU? Along the way, we also wander into Ole Miss, Iowa and several other preseason assumptions that may look very different a few months from now.
Plus, Ty gets talked into an alarmingly specific Iowa offensive prediction, Dan dabbles with weird phrasing, and we continue preparing for Week 0. Sign up to support the show at Verballers.com.
Support the show!: https://www.patreon.com/solidverbal
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In this college football podcast episode, we take one final deep breath after our marathon run of 2026 conference previews and turn the show over to the Verballerhood for our August Q&A. With the season finally within reach, we dig into the teams we find most interesting, the best dark horse candidates around the country, and one of the questions that could define the expanded College Football Playoff era: What would a convincing 9-3 playoff resume actually look like?
We also zoom out on the changing power structure of college football. Was Lane Kiffin right to bet that a job like LSU still offers advantages that programs further down the traditional hierarchy simply cannot match? Has the transfer portal, money and increased player movement truly leveled the field, or have the old powers merely lost some of their margin for error? Plus, we compare a handful of the biggest coaching moves from the offseason, wonder what issue could become college football’s next great existential fight, and ask whether all that player movement could eventually take some heat out of the sport’s biggest rivalries.
And because it’s a Q&A, things inevitably get weird. We debate the ideal school for a punter, investigate sports conspiracies, build a college football soundtrack out of movie scores, evaluate SEC stadium bucket lists and learn that Dan has apparently developed a neighborhood reputation as an illicit dealer of highly coveted pizza cheese.
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In this college football podcast episode, we close out our three-part 2026 SEC preview with LSU, Arkansas, Texas A&M, Missouri, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Alabama and Auburn. The biggest mystery may be LSU, where Lane Kiffin has assembled a loaded transfer class around Sam Leavitt but still has to make a huge collection of new pieces work together immediately. How quickly can the offense come together, and is Blake Baker’s defense good enough to give the Tigers a real College Football Playoff ceiling while everything else settles in?
We also dig into Alabama’s attempt to build a more complete offense around a young quarterback, with plenty of excitement around Keelon Russell and plenty of questions about whether the offensive line can finally create a reliable running game. Texas A&M brings back Marcel Reed and a strong collection of skill talent, but a rebuilt line and a brutal closing stretch create more hesitation than expected. We also wonder whether Missouri’s recent consistency is a reason to believe, or if new QB Austin Simmons, Ahmad Hardy’s recovery, a rebuilt defense and a difficult schedule are enough to make the Tigers one of the SEC’s biggest regression candidates?
Elsewhere, we reconsider Ole Miss after taking a deeper look at a roster led by Trinidad Chambliss and Kewan Lacy, wonder how much fun Kamario Taylor can make Mississippi State, and size up Alex Golesh’s first Auburn team with Byron Brown running a familiar offense. Plus: offensive line anxiety, Mizzou hopium, Pete Golding interview bias, and one last round of preseason roster-induced delirium as we finally finish the conference previews.
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Support the show!: https://www.patreon.com/solidverbal
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In this college football podcast episode, we continue our three-part 2026 SEC preview with deep dives on Georgia, Vanderbilt, Texas, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Tennessee and Florida. Georgia enters the season with perhaps the cleanest case of any contender in the conference, while Texas has all the talent to make a run at the SEC title but also enough lingering questions, plus a brutal schedule, to make us hesitate. How much separates the league’s best teams, and which concerns are worth taking seriously?
We also dig into the growing Oklahoma hype and whether even marginal offensive improvement could make the Sooners significantly more dangerous, the latest attempt to build a functional offense around LaNorris Sellers at South Carolina, and a new era at Kentucky with Will Stein taking over for Mark Stoops. Vanderbilt begins life after Diego Pavia, while Tennessee forces us to reconsider whether we’ve been overlooking a roster that may be much closer to contention than we initially thought.
And then there’s Florida. Ty goes all in on Jon Sumrall, a loaded Gators defense and a roster he believes is capable of making real noise in the SEC. Plus: Gunner Stockton’s continued toughness, buff John Mateer, Forrest Gump back in the SEC, Dan's Tennessee marriage, Simone Biles playing linebacker, and Jon Sumrall’s potential for postgame hijinks.
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Support the show!: https://www.patreon.com/solidverbal
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.