‘Nightcaps’ is a daily column that catches you up on the biggest sports, news and culture stories you may have missed while pretending to do work at your desk. It runs Monday-Friday on OutKick.com.
Third full week of October is here, boys and girls. Time to lock in. Everything is out in front of us.
We’re in the absolute sweet spot of football season, both college and NFL. Was that the greatest Saturday slate of all time? It may have been.
Hockey is here. The NBA starts this week for those who care. The World Series is right around the corner.
The WNBA is still, somehow, doing WNBA things and disrespecting our great national anthem.
The weather has finally started to turn here in Florida. It ain’t much, but when your highs are only 80 and not 90 on a consistent basis, it feels like winter. I only have to change shirts twice a day now!
What a blessing. How lucky are we?
Let’s roll.
Welcome to a Monday Nightcaps — the one where Olivia Dunne and an NFL WAG stole the show at last night’s Victoria’s Secret fashion show, which is apparently still going on. Who knew?!
I didn’t, but I do now.
What else? I’ve got Aaron Rodgers absolutely blasting the turf in Tampa after yesterday’s OT thriller, I’m still in awe of how bad the refs were in Saturday’s FSU-Miami game, and I’ve got some random reader mail to clean out as we start a new week.
It’s overflowing right now! Been too long since we heard from you guys. That’s on me. We’ll fix it here in a bit.
Grab you some chicken and waffles as we celebrate National Chicken & Waffles Day, and settle in for a Monday ‘Cap!
Normally I’m against popular trends, but I can’t knock chicken and waffles. Great pairing. I’ve got nothing bad to say about either.
Cracker Barrel, if I recall, had a solid chicken and waffle special at one point. No clue if they still do, but from what I remember, it was good.
Side note: Anyone been to a Cracker Barrel lately? I know it’s been a rough year for them, but I’d be curious to see if things improved over the summer after they canned that terrible CEO.
Let me know!
OK, let’s go ahead and start class — and the week — with another elite pairing: Sports and Victoria’s Secret fashion shows. The two have gone together beautifully for years, and — despite VS going woke for a stretch during the horrible Biden years — it appears that bond is stronger than ever.
Just last night, while the Cowboys were peeing all over themselves at Lambeau, the models were out and about at the annual show in LA.
Olivia Dunne was on the “Pink Carpet,” along with Kristin Juszczyk — the wife of 49ers fullback, Kyle Juszczyk.
Unsurprisingly, both had dominant showings:
Good to see a couple OutKick Hall of Famers dominating out in LA! Well done, Kristin and Livvy. While Dunne is officially in her offseason with Paul Skenes and the Pirates in vacation mode, Kristin has game tonight in San Fran.
49ers-Redskins … who ya got? Normally, I’d say San Francisco by a billion, but after the weekend we just experienced with upsets, I’m staying away from this one.
Seriously, I can’t remember a weekend with more upsets between college and the NFL. Obviously, Saturday was insane. I was stunned Georgia lost. Stunned. I thought Kirby Smart was upset-proof.
And how about the Colts choking yesterday against the TITANS of all teams? That one cut me especially deep, because I had the Colts in Hard Rock’s $2 million survivor pool. I couldn’t believe what I was watching.
Unfathomable.
The biggest near-upset of the weekend took place in Coral Gables Saturday night, where Miami — now the No. 1 team in the country — nearly lost to FSU.
Frankly, they should have.
This holding call was maybe the softest “holding” call I’ve ever seen in my life:
It was just so bad. I said it at the time, and I’ll say it again today: FSU was robbed. If that’s a hold, they might as well just go ahead and call it on every single play.
These refs just can’t help themselves, can they? They HAVE to make themselves part of the story. They’re addicted to it.
Of course, it got worse a play later:
This one isn’t quite as clear to me, but I still think it’s pretty bad. I thought it was a pick at first. But after seeing all the replays, I’m not so sure it shouldn’t have been simultaneous possession. I give the refs a bit of a pass for this one, but still …
Getting robbed on back-to-back Hail Marys is nasty work. I’ve never seen that before. Nice work!
Another weekend of terrible refereeing in the books. Par for the course this season.
Speaking of … let’s rapid-fire this Monday class into a big Monday night and start with some reader mail.
From Jim D:
More great content by the officials this weekend!
1. FSU vs. Miami … both of the last second plays in double OT … officials just wanted to get to their cars alive … 2 terrible calls back to back against FSU.
2 BYU/ ND … how many times is clock management going to be an issue with 12+ grown men watching a replay? And frankly – the stripes have to explain in black and white (no pun intended) why we have PI … it’s never called consistently. But it makes it great to manipulate the betting markets.
3 IU/OSU … call Klatt on this one, roughing the passer and targeting! Oh my! Klatt got it right on the broadcast … then the expert official from California joined the broadcast to tell us all the officials were correct with the pass interference and not targeting. Of course, because we have to protect the IU winning streak – makes for good tv drama.
Thanks, Jim! I assume the Notre Dame frustration stems from the last five minutes of that game Saturday night, which were …
Well, they were just bad:
What do we think? PI or let them ’em play? I’m always an advocate of letting them play, but that precedent has to be set in the first quarter. If refs are calling PI left and right all game long, then that should probably be a PI, too.
As for the game clock … I can’t defend that one. There should’ve been a second left. Hat’s off to BYU’s scoreboard operator on that one. He/she gets the game ball!
OK, that’s it for today. Good start to the week, everyone. Solid way to kick off this third week of October.
Let’s end class with Aaron Rodgers absolutely torching the playing conditions in Tampa yesterday after stunning the Bucs in overtime.
Tell us how you really feel, Aaron!