Hey, hey, where you been, but got talk is about to begin, hey, hey, hey, come on in.

Welcome back to your Friday, what I talk from Cleveland.com, Doug Lamarice and Stephen means and we are digging in Stephen on what Mark Pantone had to say when we had interviews last Wednesday.

We have worked our way through the entire defensive staff.

If you guys missed any of those, you can go back to the last three podcasts. We did defensive linebackers and secondary.

Nathan is off today, so Stephen, we've been saving Pantone for this.

And there's a lot of strategy stuff that we're going to talk about here and a lot of strategy that is changing or at least tweaking being adjusted because of NIL.

And in listening to what Mark Pantone had to say, I thought one of the big things, Stephen, and we have talked about this on Buckeye Talk.

It feels like they think what happened with this 2023 recruiting class was a one time thing, not because the rules are going to change immediately, but because they are going to adjust.

And the idea of wasted time came up with Mark Pantone and the energy they put into some of these national kids who in the end, at least from Ohio State's viewpoint or the way they talk about it wound up making their decisions a lot on NIL.

And that's just not where Ohio State is competing for recruits at that level right now.

The frustration, the time not well spent, it feels like maybe a one time blip.

And Mark Pantone, he talked a lot about the idea and I've talked about Mark with this before. I'm sure you've talked about it with Mark before.

Like he keeps saying things like there's a lot of smart people in college football. We just need to figure this out.

Like one of the things is like, are there? Are there other people at least not at the top, not at the organization, not at the structural level, not at the NCAA level.

But Mark Pantone speaks as if this continues to be a situation that is not at its final resolution with NIL and how it is administered and how it specifically applies to recruiting.

So they're still in the waves, but at least I think they've grabbed a life preserver at this point, Steven, they don't feel like they're drowning anymore.

And so at the very least it seems like next year when we talk to Mark Pantone and Ryan Day and December and February, they will be less frustrated.

Do you believe that will actually wind up being the case?

I think so, at least less frustrated for the reasons they were frustrated this siding day.

Because if you put together a bad class and obviously you're frustrated, I think that whether it was intentional or not 2023, talk them some lessons on how to conduct themselves in this new world going forward until the NCAA gets its head out as well.

Or as you like to say, it's scrambled.

Yeah, so I mean it is, it is an idea here and Nathan's off today, but before he went on a little break here, he did put up a story on Thursday morning about Ohio State and NIL and Ohio State believes it is moving toward more of a plan with name, image and likeness for Ohio State.

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