Full Ride - Championship Monday Show Report

Today's show was a lively one as Miami/Indiana get ready to make history.

Full Ride Show Report — Championship Monday Edition

Today’s Full Ride was a lively one. Championship game days always bring a little extra juice. Although…I have a weird feeling Indiana is going to dominate tonight. (I hope I’m wrong, because I’d love an actual game rather than three hours of background noise.)

Rick is in Miami because of course he is. For whatever reason, over the last couple years I’ve haven’t been with him at the title game, so I’ve had to live vicariously through him and the other TV/media creatures roaming South Florida. When we logged on before the show, I immediately demanded a full briefing on his weekend.

If you’ve followed us for a while, you know championship weekend normally comes with plenty of downtime, rest for normal humans, city exploration for people like me, and tee times + steak dinners for Rick Neuheisel, country club liaison to the stars. His trips usually involve 18 holes, white tablecloths, and some aperitif with a French name.

But this year? I was stunned to learn my guy has barely seen the light of day. At the ripe age of 64, Neuheisel has plunged headfirst back into coaching as the new head man of the UFL’s Dallas Renegades. Outside radio hits and playoff chatter, he’s been locked away in a hotel room like a Stanford grad student in finals week — Zooms, film, emails, roster decisions, and long calls with his son Jack about assembling a staff.

I think half of him is wondering “Why did I sign up for this?” and the other half is quietly giddy to be drawing up power concepts again. But on the rare occasions he escaped the hotel for food, he said the only thing he saw on the streets or in the lobby was a stampede of Indiana fans.

Not shocking. Even though Miami is playing at home, these Indiana people travel like it’s a religious pilgrimage. I saw it myself at the Rose Bowl — I swear 95% of the stadium was wearing crimson. They’re starving for success, and they will milk every drop out of this miracle run that started when Curt Cignetti rolled into town two years ago.

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Commercial Break Theater

Now for the important stuff: the commercial breaks. Let me tell you — they might be more entertaining than the actual show.

Most of today’s breaks featured Rick yelling at me for my habits. Neuheisel is a country club stiff and I am a simple man who enjoys carbonated energy drinks in the morning. (Shoutout to Aulani Peach)

Unfortunately, those things make me burp like Al Bundy on a Friday night. Rick hates it so much that I now deliberately burp directly into my microphone during breaks. Without fail, he melts down:

“That has to stop!”
“You are so wrong!”

Every time I get a rise out of him, it feels like a win. Allie cackles while Rick contemplates his life choices.

Mix in me crying about the Bears losing (which still hurts), plus a brief detour into how insane the Darian Mensah transfer saga is becoming (Miami vs Duke, lawyers vs vibes), and you’ve got yourself a very productive 3.5-minute intermission

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