In the South, especially in the footprint of the Southeastern Conference, this time of year has been reflective of crossing a metaphorical bridge.
As in, the bridge from football season to signing day season to spring football practice season.
Signing day now carries more weight in December, and the NCAA Transfer Portal spreads out roster addition and subtraction more across the entire calendar, but that bridge, well, it's fully crossed as nearly every Power 5 football program in the nation is already undergoing or this week opens spring camp.
Nick Saban's strong message Monday at the outset of Alabama's camp, which features new offensive coordinator Tommy Rees and defensive coordinator Kevin Steele, as well as a quarterback derby, is on Saban's unyielding operation of his program with the indefinite suspension of Tony Mitchell following Mitchell's arrest last week in Florida.
Could Saban's comments about "no such thing as wrong place, wrong time" have possibly been misconstrued as some suggest? Scott Roussel, Zach Barnett and John Brice debate the point.
The crew also dive into the bizarre Iowa offseason, which saw coordinator Brian Ferentz receive an absolutely head-scratching set of changes to his contract while the school also settled a discrimination lawsuit -- with head coach Kirk Ferentz making a rather obtuse statement at that time.
LSU and Notre Dame have new special teams coordinators, and while John Jancek for the Tigers and Marty Biagi for the Fighting Irish are at remarkably different career spots, both moves make a lot of sense. The Tigers must hope Jancek greatly enhances their woeful teams play from a year ago while the Irish need the well-regarded Biagi to maintain the 2022 level of Brian Mason's Notre Dame units that helped win multiple games.
Mason, FootballScoop's 2022 Special Teams Coordinator of the Year, accepted a job with the NFL's Indianapolis Colts as the franchise's special teams coordinator.
Georgia and Kirby Smart are welcoming back Mike Bobo atop the Bulldogs' offense, and perhaps no dynamic anywhere in college football is going to be more intriguing than the Jimbo Fisher-Bobby Petrino unholy union at Texas A&M.
All these items and more as FootballScoop gets its spring podcast-motor running:
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