ESPN's Josh Pate Talks Michigan Controversy, LSU Drama, Texas/Ohio State & More I Rich Eisen Show

Rich had seen Josh Pate's cell phone video from Saturday night, shot from well below the chin, as he tried to put the end of the Michigan game into words. Even Pate stumbled. Rich related completely. When he got home and his wife asked what happened in the Michigan game, his answer was, "I don't know."

And Rich, who has been doing this for 30 years and is about to start his 24th season with NFL Network, admitted he had no idea the game clock, the broadcast clock and the replay clock were all separate.

Pate had not calmed down. "I'm very upset about it, as upset as an outsider could be," he said. He has heard from plenty of Michigan fans, and he understands the machinations of the Big Ten's explanation that came two hours later. His anger was more basic than any single call.

"If you have a secret way of doing anything that is integral to deciding the outcome of a game, and we don't know about it, that's a problem," Pate said.

He pointed out that the Big Ten itself insisted on transparency during the Sorsby case, when it told Texas Tech that the league would consider a scheduling boycott if the school didn't act. "You've got to have transparency to have integrity on the outcomes of games," Pate said. "And they were right."

To be clear, he is not alleging anything. "I'm not one who's claiming a fix was in," he said. "What I am claiming is a lot of people will think that." The fix is to "fully peel the curtain back," the way the ACC already does with its review process. Otherwise people are left to wonder whether the league would have gone to the same lengths if Western Michigan needed a tenth of a second. "And the answer is, we can't know, because you're not transparent enough."

Rich asked whether releasing video of the actual review wasn't transparent enough. Pate's answer: "Not waiting two hours to do it. Do it in the live broadcast just like the ACC does."

Then he grabbed a bottle and pretended it was a tin foil hat. If you already doubt the league, a video two hours later won't help. "Anybody can edit anything in two hours." Pate said he believes the Big Ten released the exact feed it used, but "there doesn't have to be any smoke." He also noted the Big Ten already televises reviews on its Friday games. "So just do it league-wide."

Rich, the Michigan alum, had his own complaint about the cheating talk. "As if the extra play Michigan got was a tush push from the half yard line," he said. "The kid had to throw it 60 yards flat-footed."

That brought them to the real issue in Ann Arbor. Does Michigan have a quarterback problem?

"I do," Pate said. "And I think it's a bigger problem now than it would have been five years ago, cuz five years ago you wouldn't have had an eight-figure price tag attached to a quarterback."

Pate is going to the Oklahoma game this weekend, and part of him is arguing the other side. "You've watched this sport long enough. You know that week one lies to you all the time." Ultra-talented rosters with their backs against the wall go into wounded animal mode, and Michigan just got an unexpected stay of execution. "You know they can get off the deck week two."

The other part of him has seen the matchup. The athletes Western Michigan put on the field pale in comparison to Oklahoma's. "This may be the best defense in the country coming into town this week." He expected Michigan's ground game to carry Bryce Underwood, and the rushing output stunned him. "I don't know what the move is if he struggles mightily again this week."

Pate then turned the question back to Rich, who admitted he is nervous. He has met Underwood twice and found him supremely confident, a kid who has lived in the spotlight since he was 16 or 17. Rich also remembers Drew Henson being Mr. Michigan and struggling, before Tom Brady turned out to be very helpful for Michigan. He is rooting for Underwood to come out against Oklahoma and wing it. But he knows Kyle Whittingham may eventually have to go with another quarterback despite the price tag.

Nobody has a playbook for that, in Pate's view. "This is one of the firsts of a coaching staff inheriting a very, very highly paid asset at quarterback that the entire future hope in the next three or so years was built around," he said. "I'm not going to say it's a dead product. I'm not going to say that yet."

Baton Rouge was next. Pate had just come back from debuting there with the Bussin' guys, and Rich wanted to know about Lane Kiffin's weekend: College GameDay, the halftime comments about pro players, and the leaked halftime speech that peeled the paint off the walls.

Pate said LSU fans are excited "in a way that I haven't seen since the 2019 season, and maybe even more so," with an added us-against-our-own-league mentality. And there was news. The SEC had just scheduled a meeting for Thursday to vote to kick LSU out of the league.

He was in the building all day Friday, around Kiffin and his staff, and heard pregame language every bit as forceful as that leaked audio, if not more so. He doesn't know how leaked or authentic the audio was. What he does know is that LSU expected everything that happened. "They never expected a competitive game, and they didn't get a competitive game." Kiffin, the offense and Sam Leavitt will get the credit, but Pate singled out defensive coordinator Blake Baker, who nearly left to be a head coach and is "one of the best in America."

The SEC's position, Pate explained, is that it doesn't matter whether LSU rostered those players. The line has already been crossed. He read from the league's filing, which "expressed great concern that LSU President Ross and Athletic Director Ausberry have no meaningful control over Kiffin or the football program at LSU." For those unfamiliar with how LSU operates, Pate said, that is the SEC alleging the governor is running the program through a recently installed president and AD as proxies.

Still, he can't picture it happening. "I cannot imagine an SEC without LSU in it." His read is that this is a threat to ground LSU for a year so that six months feels like relief, a reassertion of who is really in charge.

Rich closed by looking ahead to Ohio State at Texas. Pate sees two potentially elite defenses, with Arch Manning and Julian Sayin on all the promotional artwork, and a game that could easily look like last year's defensive battle in Columbus.

"I think Ohio State would really love to win this game. I think Texas needs to win this game," Pate said. Texas has been out-physicaled by Georgia a couple of times, and Ohio State can do the same thing. Texas believes it has upped its physicality and can go toe to toe with anyone for four quarters, in its home building. "If they're wrong about that, it's going to be a pretty scathing indictment." Clemson believed a lot of things about itself too, he noted, and found out it was wrong.

His pick, such as it was: "I slightly lean Texas. Very slightly lean Texas." He is also looking forward to the chess match, with Steve Sarkisian bringing in Will Muschamp as defensive coordinator against a Ryan Day staff he rates as highly as any head coach and coordinator trio in the country.

Pate on Campus heads to Ann Arbor on Friday, 2 p.m. Eastern on ESPN.