Dumping Them Out – Maybe We Let Football Players Punch Each Other

John Rich10/11/2026 6:00 PM

Welcome back to another College Football/Boob GIF episode of Dumping Them Out. Not that there has ever been, or ever will be, an episode that is anything other than __/Boob GIF-themed. That is the entire point of this blog.

On Friday night, when Iowa embarrassed the shit out of Washington – what the hell happened to Washington, by the way? Ever since they made the National Championship, they've been a joke. I suppose that's why their quarterback tried to leave them high and dry in the 11th hour. Not that he's been much help.

Anyways, everybody was praising Iowa's quarterback for this "snap count of the year"

It's a funny video and all, but I know we've seen that before. That real "snap count of the year century" will be when an offense lines up in a fourth-and-short situation, the QB gives a hard count, and with about 5 seconds left on the play clock, he gives an emphatic "FUCKING JUMP MOTHERFUCKERS!!!" – but then they actually snap the football. That's a big brain move right there. Nobody expects the offense to snap the football when the quarterback starts doing bits.

Speaking of 4th-and-short, what a horrendous breakdown on defense by Nebraska yesterday. Idk what the hell they were thinking. Indiana couldn't run the ball past the line of scrimmage vs a 4-man front and zero blitzers. To sell out for the run and leave their two best players completely unmanned… absurd.

Boy did Indiana get away with one yesterday. I love my Hoosiers, but they aren't even close to the team they were last year. I think the offense will be fine. Yesterday was a bit of a weird game, as they were playing in near 40-mph winds. But the defense has taken such a massive step back. They desperately miss D'Angelo Ponds shutting down half the field. They couldn't beat Nebraska's athletes to the edge. I swear, last season, Indiana's defense barely missed a tackle. This year, they're consistently getting beat in the open field, and it takes half the defense to bring down a powerful runner. Idk how the hell they're going to handle Jeremiah Smith next weekend with no true shutdown corner to rely on.

Thank god for Nick Marsh.

Is Lane Kiffin is really going to fuck around and not make the playoff with a $50M roster? They still have to play Alabama, Texas, and Tennessee. Maybe they can sneak in with 3 losses. You know the committee will put at least one three-loss SEC team in like they did with Alabama last year. But losing to Kentucky is tough, Lane.

Rico was telling me he thought LSU should have gone for two after scoring first in OT, because LSU should have known Kentucky would go for two if they scored. But idk. If you know Kentucky is going for two, kicking the extra point just gives LSU two chances to win. If you don't stop them from scoring a TD, you can stop them on the conversion. In hindsight though… maybe LSU should have.

My hot take of the weekend is that the refs shouldn't call a penalty on this play.

They're obviously going to call it. If you're Kalen DeBoer, you gotta lay into that kid. Maybe even bench his ass for a week. But what if we just let football players punch each other? Not in the midst of a play that matters, but in a situation like that where a couple players away from the play are slapping each other back and forth… I mean, they're wearing fucking helmets. Nobody is going to get hurt, other than maybe the puncher if he breaks his hand on the helmet. In general, I always wanna see refs let way more stuff go if it doesn't affect the play.

Conversely… they really should have thrown a flag for this one. My goodness.

My goodness. I'm not sure I've ever seen the broadcast throw up the flag graphic when there's no flag on the field at all. The ESPN flag button guy couldn't envision a world where a flag wasn't thrown. He probably thought he was going color blind and suddenly couldn't see yellow.

My less hot take of the weekend (because it's a take that pretty much everyone has now) – Arch Manning just isn't that good. He never has been. Not for more than maybe a few games in a row. Even when they beat Ohio State, when you watch Arch Manning play, there's always this underlying lack of confidence. I don't think I've ever watched him and thought he looked comfortable. Maybe we should have put more stock into his dad being the wrong Manning brother.

Until he stops being incredible, I will continue to mention Oregon State's true freshman wide receiver Jesse Legree in every college football blog I write. He won't win any awards over Jeremiah Smith. I genuinely think he would need to best him by 10 TD's and 500 yards for voters to even consider it. But still… he's so damn good.

One more dumb thought from yesterday – If a couple MAC schools took the place of teams in a top 10 matchup (say, Georgia-Alabama last night), what percentage of people notice? Take player names out of it. Obviously, people would know if Gunner Stockton and Keelon Russell weren't playing quarterback. I'm just curious how many people (me included) could easily tell the difference between "good" and "bad" football. I'd like to think I could, but if the teams are evenly matched, it might be harder than we think.