College Football Hall of Fame linebacker Brian Bosworth took the time to reflect on the College Football Playoff so far and the upcoming championship game.
We are about to something really special going on in Atlanta on Monday night. The 2018 College Football Playoff National Championship game will be played at the brand-new Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta between two SEC powers in the No. 3 Georgia Bulldogs and the No. 4 Alabama Crimson Tide. Many are deeming it The Southern Super Bowl.
While his alma mater’s team came up a tad short in double overtime to Georgia in the Rose Bowl, College Football Hall of Fame linebacker from the Oklahoma Sooners Brian Bosworth took a few minutes of his time to talk about the College Football Playoff ahead of Monday night’s championship bout.
The Boz was in Atlanta on Sunday at Playoff Fan Central on behalf of Panini America. The Boz was excited to talk about the work he is doing with Panini and of course, some college football topics of note.
FanSided: Brian, what can you tell me about the work you’re doing with Panini America and the Panini Blitz app?
Brian Bosworth: Actually, I’m here in Atlanta signing some cards. We’re just finishing up this next version of these really cool cards that they have come out with. I love how the trading card industry has taken it to a different level. With Panini being the exclusive partner of college football and the national championship, it is really cool. Even Oklahoma will not be represented in it, we were close we didn’t quite get to the final match, they brought me in to help bring awareness to the new cool stuff they’ve got.
We’ve got an autograph booth to help even more expose the cards, so the fans can come up and get Panini licensed products and start to see some of the stuff that is coming out. They’re going to introduce cards of the college and pro years that I was there. It’s kind of a cool little deal they’ve got there and they’re taking it to another level. I think they just started a digital format where they can go on the NFL Blitz trading card app, download stuff and people can trade cards online almost like cryptocurrency, kind of like Bitcoin. It’s a different world.
FS: That sounds fantastic. If we can move on the national title game for a bit, as a two-time winner of the Butkus Award yourself, what are your impressions of Georgia’s Roquan Smith heading into the national title game? Does he remind you of yourself back during your playing days at Oklahoma?
BB: He’s certainly very physical at the point of attack. He runs downfield. I got a chance to watch him obviously last week against our squad. Even though their defense seemed didn’t seem to be at their normal level in the first half, they made the adjustments in the second half. You know Roquan ended up at the end of the game making some key defensive stops, especially in overtime where he helped set up the blocked field goal to eventually go on to win the game.
I’ve always been a firm believer that if you’ve got a leader on defense that you can get the other guys on defense to rally around him. With his physical play, he’s always around the ball. When he makes the hits, he seems to finish the hits with convincing tackles, instead off bouncing off the edge and not wrapping up. He’s certainly deserving of the award and the recognition that he’s getting.
I look forward to seeing how he matches up against Alabama because they are certainly loaded on the offense side of the ball. They’ve got some key players back on offense and defense. So it should be a pretty physical game. In the first half, it could be one of those low-scoring games until somebody breaks it open. But I definitely do see some hard hitting action that’s going to happen on Monday night.
FS: As I was looking at the game, I noticed a ton of really great front-seven players. Outside of Smith for Georgia, is there anybody you really like on either side?
BB: To be honest with you, I am an Oklahoma football fan. I watch Oklahoma and I know Oklahoma’s players. I don’t watch the SEC until it matters to us and the Big 12 and we’re matched up against them.
Over the course of the last few years, you know obviously Alabama and Clemson have been the stalwarts, and mostly Alabama, because of their unique nature of losing players on both sides of the ball to the draft and being able to come back with an even stronger squad the following year.
Now that Kirby Smart is over at Georgia, he’s taken that defensive philosophy and mentality and I think they are where they think they are: keep the main thing the main thing. And I think the main thing is defense and being physical. So I think that team has adopted Kirby’s mentality and his attitude. You can certainly see it in the short time that he’s been there and the type of philosophy Georgia football is going to take in the next few cycles.
FS: Yeah, he’s done a really good job. As I was watching the Rose Bowl last week, one player that I found really fun to watch was Oklahoma’s Ogbonnia Okoronkwo. I know he won Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year. What can you tell about him as he gets ready for the NFL?
BB: Well, he’s Co-Defensive Player of the Year in the Big 12 with Texas’ Malik Jefferson. I’ve watch Malik and Oko the last couple of years. I watched Malik coming out of high school and thought he was a great player coming out of high school. He would have been an outstanding asset had Oklahoma gotten him. Well, I guess he wanted to go to Texas. More so, I would have certainly loved to have had Malik and Oko on the field at the same time wearing the same jerseys.
FS: Another player you share the same alma mater as 2017 Heisman Trophy winner Baker Mayfield. What do you think his legacy at Oklahoma will be? How do you see him faring in the NFL as a starting quarterback prospect?
BB: Well, I certainly think that Baker is the jet fuel to the engine for Oklahoma. He’s been there for the last three years and the way that he came in, I think that his story is remarkable. A Lake Travis kid who grew up being an Oklahoma fan. He didn’t fit at Texas Tech and didn’t jive with [head coach] Kliff Kingsbury. He decided to take a chance and walk on at Oklahoma and he earned the spot beat out Trevor [Knight].
You can just see the passion that filtered and the maturation that he went through from his first year starting all the way through his final year, his last year, where he won the Heisman Trophy. He was in the Heisman Trophy conversation the entire time he was there. But it was his leadership and style of play he was asked and displayed on the field that really carried Oklahoma over these past three years to a level they really haven’t seen in recent years.
Just because of his energy. He had so much of that inside of him. He’d run with a different style and it was remarkable that he’d get the crowd and the players to go to another level. So he’s going to be remembered forever as one of the all-time great Sooners. Obviously, his stats speak for themselves. What he displayed on the field, he just left his heart and soul on the football field each and every game.
And that’s what it really means to be a part of the Sooner Family. With the tradition, you look at the history of the great players that have played in the past, under the great coaches, they’ve all kind of adopted that attitude of “I’m leaving it all on the field every single Saturday, every single snap.”
FS: One last question for you, Brian. With the national title, what do you think is the deciding factor for who ends up winning the game. Do you see any key element that could signify who wins?
BB: Well, I definitely think they are both so evenly matched, both of their front-sevens on both sides of the ball are evenly matched. I think you’ll see a very controlled game. Jake Fromm has now gone through the firing squad here, at least with the big game last week at the Rose Bowl. He has certainly shown that he has the ability to stand in the pocket, move in the pocket, get out of the pocket and make plays on the run. And they have the same thing on the Alabama side of the ball, too.
At the end of the day, I just think that when you line them all up on both sides of the ball, Alabama has a little more talent and a little more physicality. They’ve had a month to get their players back healthy. I know they are missing one on their offensive line and it might hurt them, but I’m pretty sure that they’ve got some depth on the offensive line. The next guy will step up and step in to do what the previous guy has done.
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I like Alabama just simply because they’ve been there. They know what that feeling is going to be like, especially in the four-quarter game. If it comes down to the last play, though it didn’t work out last year against Clemson on the very last play of the game with the pick play, but you know what, that’s championship football. Alabama has been a champion four or five times over the last five of six years, so I think that kind of experience gives them an edge heading into this type of a game. And I kind of like Alabama to win it in a really, close tight one