EP #15: Navigating the Complexities of College Football Recruitment with Brandon Huffman
In this conversation, Chris Hall interviews Brandon Huffman, the National Recruiting Editor for 247 Sports, discussing his journey in football recruiting, the evolution of media in sports, and the impact of NIL and the transfer portal on college football. Huffman shares insights on the importance of camps and showcases for athletes, advice for navigating the recruiting landscape, and the significance of the Avery Strong Showcase, which honors his late daughter. The discussion emphasizes the need for athletes to control what they can and focus on their development to succeed in recruiting.
To listen to more episodes, hop over to https://reddingfinancialadvisors.com/podcast/
To find out more about Brandon Huffman, visit https://x.com/BrandonHuffman?t=3lzFds43r1qn1fCYpNvBfA&s=09
Transcription:
Chris Hall (00:02.164)
Hi, this is Chris Hall and welcome to Healthy Wealth. It is football season and so we are honored to have a really cool guest with us, Brandon Huffman, who is the National Recruitment Editor for 247 Sports. So if your kid is trying to get recruited, you probably heard his name. He’s pretty much all over Twitter and Instagram and we’re going to talk some football today. So Brandon, thank you so much for being on the show.
Brandon Huffman (00:26.7)
Yeah, thanks for having me on, Chris.
Chris Hall (00:28.736)
Absolutely. So how do you become a national recruiting editor for a place like 24 7 Sports? Like how does that look?
Brandon Huffman (00:39.174)
It was really I say this all the time. It was timing. It was I got into the industry in 2003 in the recruiting side of things. I when I graduated college, graduated with my degree in communication and my journalism emphasis at the time, as a specific did not have a journalism degree, had a communication degree. And so I majored in that with my focus being journalism. And this new thing of the internet was starting to crank out a lot of sports
content. And I was writing for a website called College Football Digest covering the old Pac 10. That’s how long ago it was. It still the Pac 10. And eventually that turned into another opportunity with another website, fanstop.com where I was their NCAA sports editor. And I did that for about three years. And then in just the most fortuitous timing ever, I was at
UCLA, I’ve still lived in Southern California time at UCLA and there was a press conference where you still is introducing Ben Howland as their basketball coach. And the guy who ran the UCLA site on the old scout.com network said that he and his partner at the USC site were looking for somebody to cover recruiting who knew football who knew recruiting who knew the West Coast landscape. And that’s how I got my start in 2003 just covering UCLA and USC recruiting.
to give other context of how long ago it was. Carl Durrell was in his first year as a head coach at UCLA and a guy named Pete Carroll was about six months away, seven months away from winning his first national championship at USC. So I got into it as people were still trying to believe is the internet really gonna be where we get our news to now, know, 23, 24, gosh, almost 23 years doing this. I’m in my 23rd recruiting class.
And now I’m here at the National Recruiting Editor of 247 Sports, been with them for about eight and a half years. I was with scott.com for 13, 14 years before that. I can’t even do the math anymore, it’s been so long. 14 years, 14 years there, eight and a half years at 247. I was part of CBS Sports and now I’m covering recruiting from coast to coast, up into Alaska, out into Hawaii, and even some international stuff.
Chris Hall (02:48.659)
Okay, so so like you had mentioned you went to Azusa Pacific and that’s actually where I went to school as well and that’s kind of how we connected a long time ago. So you played for Azusa, correct?
Brandon Huffman (03:01.153)
No, so I actually went there to play and my freshman year was a redshirt season and it was then that I realized that, you know what, there’s a ceiling on my future on the football field. Why not go into working in athletics and working in football? So I spent the next four years working for Gary Pine, who’s now the athletic director to specific. This is back when AP was at NAI school and I worked as the assistant SID after I graduated, worked for the school paper but worked in the athletic department was the…
public address announcer for some football games, soccer, for basketball, for all that, and realized that I wanted to be on the writing side, on the content side, but spent a lot of time around football, around the football program. The year after I graduated, AP won the NAI National Championship. My roommate, my senior year, was the backup tailback on that team, but I played some significant minutes. The guy who was the NAI Player of the Year is now a high school coach in Southern California, so it’s been kind of fun.
A lot of the guys that I went to APU with, I’ve covered their sons over the last decade or so. And it’s been pretty funny to see how many players in that era that were there, in the early to mid 90s that now have offspring that are being recruited. And it’s kind of funny that little humble APU has produced a lot of people in the football industry, the head coach of Boise State, head coach for the Carolina Panthers, both APU football alums.
Chris Hall (04:24.479)
That’s cool. I didn’t know that about Carolina. That’s really neat. Yeah.
Brandon Huffman (04:27.009)
Yeah, Dave Canales, former receiver at APU.
Chris Hall (04:31.517)
I’ll be darned. then you, so you were, you were actually doing that job when I was at APU, cause I was like 92 to 94. So that’s cool. I love that. That’s really cool. and then you, you know, my son is a long snapper. He’s currently a rising senior on this to be his last year. He’s, know, trying to get recruited and he’s doing all those things. And, you also were a long snapper in high school as well. Is that right?
Brandon Huffman (04:36.833)
Yeah. Yep.
Brandon Huffman (04:55.029)
I was, was a very average long snapper and a very average, you know, especially on the punts. know, was no, Chris Rubio is a year older than me. I know Chris, know Jonathan Himelbach. I know a lot of these guys that are snapping coaches, but none of those guys existed in the early to mid 90s.
Chris Hall (05:12.026)
Oh, I so I have a story about that. So I’m at Azusa. I’m playing middle linebacker and We had is it it Barnett that the right name Doug Barnett who played who played in the NFL as a long snapper and He was teaching one of the office of line guys. I remember the guy’s name his name is Jake He was teaching when the office of lineman to snap
Brandon Huffman (05:22.605)
Yeah, done by now.
Chris Hall (05:35.456)
And this guy couldn’t care less about snapping, but the guy knew he’s like, dude, if I can get you to snap at your size, you’re going to the league. And, uh, and it never worked out, but in my back of my mind, I’m like, Hey, teach me to snap. And you know, here we are, you know, 30 years later and my son’s snapping. So it’s kind of weird how that all kind of plays around. So yeah, I know Gary Pine, great guy. So really enjoyed having him. Um, so, so scout.com let’s talk a little bit about that. So did they get absorbed by somebody else?
Brandon Huffman (05:42.177)
Yeah.
Brandon Huffman (05:48.021)
Absolutely.
Brandon Huffman (05:55.671)
Yeah.
Brandon Huffman (06:04.48)
Yeah, so it’s kind of a funny long convoluted history, but the original rivals.com was started in like 1997 by a guy named Jim Heckman, who was a University of Washington alum, and he started rivals. It was the first internet website to be focused solely on recruiting. And like a lot of websites over the late 90s and into early 2000, the dot com bubble burst. And so the original rivals went kaput. guy named Shannon Terry bought it in
took Rivals to the next level, eventually sold it to Yahoo. And at the same time, Jim Hekman came back and started a new brand and it was originally called the Insiders, which eventually became Scout.com. And we did that for two years, independent as a startup. And then in 2005, Fox Sports bought Scout.com. Interestingly enough, this is always a fun fact.
On the same day that Fox Sports bought Scout.com for 55 million, they invested in another website for $550 million called MySpace. And the irony in all of that is in 2013, when Scout was sold by Fox back to the original founder, MySpace did no longer existed. And so Scout.com for a 10th of the price of MySpace lasted longer and outlasted MySpace.
So that’s always kind of a funny story, but for eight years we were owned by Fox Sports. you know, I was a part of Fox Sports when they launched Fox Sports One, which was supposed to be the TV station that was going to compete against the ESPN. didn’t Fox Sports West at the time, Fox Sports Prime Ticket were televised in lot of high school sporting events in Southern California at the time. You know, Fox Sports really made an emphasis into sports.
But then they sold Scout because of its values, the only profitable digital property that Fox Sports had. So they sold it back to Jim Heckman in 2013 and he took it kind of back to startup stage with the hopes of launching into this media men’s interest type of website. Well, that failed miserably because of just enough leadership and went bankrupt in 2016. And then in February of 2017,
Brandon Huffman (08:20.884)
CBS Sports, which had owned 24 seven sports for about two years at that point, bought Scout out of bankruptcy. Shannon Terry, had started the original rival or who had taken rivals after it had blown up, sold it to Yahoo, I think 2007, started 24 seven sports in 2010 and sold to CBS. CBS bought Scout and merged 24 seven and Scout together. And that’s where we’re at now. Shannon ended up leaving in 2020.
retired, started on three in 2021, and then just re bought rivals back about two months ago, and merged on three and rivals. But you know, the majority of the recruiting team is still at 24 seven sports. But yeah, there’s a few of us there that were part of scout.com, even before Fox Sports bought it. And we’re part of the original scout.com recruiting team. So it’s been fascinating to be on that side of it where you have major corporate support from Fox Sports to your back to being a sports to being a startup.
to you’re now owned by the most powerful media conglomerate in the United States with CBS and Paramount to then watching what happens when Paramount’s being sued and CBS is being sued to then just last week, Paramount and Skydance merging and now we’re back to being owned by David Ellison who is the son of Larry Ellison of Oracle. So it’s been a, I came for the recruiting and apparently I stayed for all the business transactions.
Chris Hall (09:44.412)
Well, it sounds, mean, like it feels like in a space like this, you would feel like you would have consolidation, right? But it actually kind of feels like there’s not really consolidation as much as there’s like, okay, we’re going to go over here and then we’re to try this. then, you know, it’s like, it still feels like they’re still trying to fill it out and how that works.
Brandon Huffman (10:02.442)
Yeah, there’s been times where there’s been four networks at one time. You had ESPN, had Scout, you had Rivals, had, technically you five, you ESPN, Scout, Rivals, 24-7, and…
yeah, I can’t count. You had four ESPN Scout rivals in 24 seven. Then you had ESPN rivals in 24 seven. Then you had ESPN rivals 24 seven on three to now we have ESPN 24 seven and rivals on three is merged together. So there’s been times where there’s been four networks and there was down to three then it was back to four. Now it’s down to three. I feel like we are in a stage now where there’s going to be never more than three. And it wouldn’t surprise me if at some point it only is
24 seven owned by Scout and rivals on three, are part of, know, they’re kind of with Yahoo still. And then ESPN still does recruiting rankings and they do a great job. All the under armor camps, excuse me, all the under armor camps across the country, the under armor all American game are part of ESPN. But in terms of true blue recruiting websites, there really is just 24 seven and rivals on three. So there’s been consolidation, there’s been expansion, but there, you know,
It was kind of back to being consoled. This is why I should need a breakfast part.
Chris Hall (11:24.189)
No worries. No worries. We’ve all been there. Do your break.
I can go in and edit out all the props, no problem.
Brandon Huffman (11:33.814)
Sorry, random granola bar remnant. There’s really gonna only be two true blue recruiting sites, because ESPN obviously, their stakes are in television. They’ve obviously got their podcast network, their radio network, the digital properties that they have. But yeah, it’s been fascinating too, because it’s kind of where we are with media. You have…
Chris Hall (11:39.583)
Thank
Brandon Huffman (12:01.109)
a little bit more consolidation in media. I remember back when we were growing up, had ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox. Then you had the cable channels. Well, now you’ve got Paramount Pictures, which also owns Nickelodeon and BET and CBS and Showtime. Then you’ve got NBC and you’ve got them with Comcast and Pico. So you’re seeing more consolidation because it’s easier to streamline it. And now that everybody wants to get in on the streaming game. So, I’m kind of a closet sports business nerd.
I listen to probably six sports business podcasts a week. Four or five of them are like daily, you know, daily podcasts, the daily buzz in the sports business world. And it’s been fascinating because here I am on the content production side of it, the media side of it. But I’m because I’ve been a part of major mergers and sellings and acquisitions on the sports business side by the sports business networks. I can’t help but be drawn to that because I’m always trying to see, you know,
If I’m listening to this podcast, it’s talking about the English Premier League. I know that there’s still a way that that’s going to impact me because Premier League and, you know, go lazos a part of the CBS Sports Network. So it’s amazing how they’re all intertwined. You wouldn’t think that soccer being played in England has any impact on recruiting coverage in the United States. But because there’s been so much consolidation at the higher levels, it’s trickling down to impact us. So, yeah, I think you’re going to see probably more consolidation in the
coming years rather than you are expansion and then those consolidated sites are really going to be the authorities and the really kind of the champions of that particular space.
Chris Hall (13:39.56)
Yeah. Now you are a busy man and I watch you, you know, from afar on Instagram and Twitter quite a bit and you are always moving. And so what is, what is that kind of like a daily, what does a, what does a day in the life of Brandon Huffman look like? You know, in season, off season, is there a time when you take breaks? How does that work?
Brandon Huffman (14:00.744)
Yeah. Believe it or not, August is usually my quietest month. And that’s because all camps are done at that point. High school season is getting underway. Practice is getting started. College season is getting underway. It’s getting started. People always think, oh, you’re really busy during the football season. I’m not as busy as I am from January and really from December until June is the craziest seven months. know, all, I think last year I spent in 2024, I spent 138 nights in a hotel.
This year I’m at like 97 and we still got the season. I was 110,000 miles in the air without ever leaving the country. I spent more time in a rental car than I probably did my own truck. It’s a lot of travel because…
you know, when you’re a national guy, you got to get out to national events. So it’s not just events in California and Oregon or Washington, Nevada, Arizona, Idaho, Hawaii. I’ll go to events in Florida. I’ll go to events in Texas. I’ll go to events in the Midwest. I’ll go to events in the Northeast. So, you know, my typical schedule is it varies during the season. You know, it’s Hey, Fridays through Mondays are the busiest time for me because I’m on Thursdays. Really? I make games on Thursday night. I games on Friday nights, Saturday. I’m usually watching college football and
one afternoon high school game I’ll be at, but then I’m also tracking all the recruits that went to the various games around the country. How was the visit? And then Sunday, it’s a lot of trip recaps. Monday through Thursday, it’s a little bit more slower. know, scouting reports from the weekend games, but it’s a lot of, you know, catching up with guys that went on the road. We get to November, December, you start getting towards signing day. And then for mid December, well now with the signing day being the first Wednesday in December,
The rest of December is tracking the portal. It’s tracking those guys that I covered in high school that are now going into the transfer portal. They’re transferring up, they’re transferring down, they’re transferring sideways. So you’re doing that all the way until, you know, when the bowl games start and then you get about a week where it’s a dead period and then because of Christmas and then New Year’s, then right after that, guys are taking visits that are in the portal before the semester starts or the quarter starts. At the same time, I’m in San Antonio for the All American Bowl. I’ve been there I think 19,
Brandon Huffman (16:11.691)
All American Bulls, I’ve covered in San Antonio. I get home last year, it was crazy. I I covered the Peach Bowl. I left for the Peach Bowl on a Monday, covered the Peach Bowl on a Wednesday, flew home on Friday, got home on Friday night, flew out Sunday to San Antonio, was there in San Antonio until Thursday, got on the last flight out of San Antonio, got home on Friday, then went to Hawaii for 10 days for the Polynesian Bulls. So was home at a total of three days the first three weeks of January, covering college football playoffs.
the All-American Bowl and the Polynesian Bowl. You get four or five days at home and then it was every weekend except for the weekend my daughter got married. I was on the road in Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Idaho for seven on seven tournaments at camp. there’s so many events that are going on from the new year until the end of June when the dead period starts that I think I counted four weekends at home the entire first six months of 2025.
And two of those weekends I still had events that I covered. The other two weekends were the weekend of my daughter’s wedding and then the last weekend in June where the dead period had hit. No, that’s not even true because I was in Florida that weekend. So yes, I had one weekend where I was at home where there was, and Father’s Day weekend. All the camps that I covered were the following week. So the weekend of my daughter’s wedding and Father’s Day weekend were the only two weekends that I was home with no events in the first six months of the year.
Chris Hall (17:40.692)
Wow, that’s a lot of work. must, I mean, obviously you must really love what you do, because that’s a lot of travel. I mean, you must really enjoy like kind of, I guess probably the best part is maybe is finding these, these talented kids, know, is, know, taking a kid who has no stars and giving them a four star or three star and getting them on the board.
Brandon Huffman (17:45.557)
I did.
Brandon Huffman (17:55.327)
Yeah. Yes.
Brandon Huffman (18:01.45)
Yeah, and I try to get everywhere. I I will live by the time this year is done. I would have been in every state in the western part of the United States, with the exception of, you know, Alaska, I went to Alaska for a camp in 2023. No, sorry, 2024, 2021 and 2020 went to Alaska. That’s the only state I don’t have on the calendar to go see, or I want to have seen a game by the end of this year or camp, but I’ll have been in every western state.
multiple states across the country and I don’t just go to, you know, the big city. I drove to Fruitland, Idaho. I don’t know that many people know where Fruitland, Idaho is. It’s right on the Idaho and Oregon. Yeah, but it’s home to a former first round NFL draft pick in Jordan Gross, who’s an All-American at Utah, was the first round draft pick at the Carolina Panthers, a pro bowler. He’s now a head coach and he’s alma mater and they’re home to another elite off of the tackle, the number one tackle out west.
Chris Hall (18:39.635)
I’m going to take a break.
Brandon Huffman (18:56.362)
We’re in the Northwest in 2025 or 2026 Kelvin Obot who’s actually headed to Utah himself. But it’s right on the Oregon and Idaho border and it’s a small farming community. I’ll drive up there I’ve been to know to small towns in Idaho I’ve been to you know outposts in Northern California and Central California flyover country type places and you you go find it now. The one great thing about this job is there’s so many major events that I it’s easier for me.
to go to a major event where 150 guys come to you rather than go to 150 places. Because there’s just not enough time in day, there’s not enough manpower, there’s not enough to turn to the investment of going to all these small towns. But if all these small town guys have a chance to get seen at a camp, I’m watching. But I will still go watch games in obscure outposts and try to find that talent.
Chris Hall (19:44.222)
Yeah. And then so like with the camps and stuff, you know, like we did a few of those, you know, where you go to the college camps and then we did a couple showcase type things too. But like with those ones, like I think the hardest thing for kids to know, parents too, is like which ones they’re supposed to go to. You know, because I mean, you know, we get starting when my son is a freshman now, like said, now he’s a senior. Like we would get emails all the time, like, Hey, there’s a camp, there’s a camp. mean, they would be obscure colleges like, you Laverne.
down in Southern California or, you know, places like that where they’d say, we’re going to camp and the and they all sound like they’re going to be these amazing showcases. But then, you know, obviously some, you know, like, especially for like these Northern California kids where I’m at, these guys are not really getting recruited. So they’ve got, you know, they can only go to three or four of these camps. They can’t go to like, you know, 20 camps. So how do, how do kids pick like, well, how did they
Brandon Huffman (20:35.53)
Sure.
Chris Hall (20:39.748)
Like how do they differentiate between what’s going to be a good camp, what’s going to be, you know, a camp where they’re just trying to get money.
Brandon Huffman (20:40.062)
Yeah.
Brandon Huffman (20:45.098)
Here’s where I would say the only camps we should be paying for are the college camps that there are going to be college coaches at. And those are not the camps that they’re saying, hey, we have a bunch of division three and division two schools. It’s all due respect to small college football. I was a small college football recruit myself, but those are more for the camp people that are running it. And those are not being ran in June. The only camps that should be paying for the ones from, know, in my opinion, even if they say college coaches are going to be there.
the June 1st to the end of June where there’s going to be FBS, FCS, Division II, Division III, NAI schools that are going to be added. The rest is if you’re invited to an Under Armour camp, if you’re invited to an Elite 11 regional, those are good to go to because those are free camps and you’re going to have the best of the best. You’re to have media coverage. You’re going to have verified testing, verified measurements. But I think a lot of kids want to tweet that they are going to all these camps, but I’m a big John Wooden guy. Don’t mistake activity with achievement.
A lot of these guys are getting invitations because they opened their DM and there’s the invitation. You don’t have to go to everyone. And do your homework. mean, that’s really what it comes down to is a lot of parents don’t do their homework. They see their kid gets invited, they think it’s a big deal. Hey, you’ve been selected to this All-American camp, you should come. And then mom and dad wanna run to Facebook and Twitter, say, Johnny got invited, but it’s All-American camp. And it’s like, yeah, it’s in America and all the players there are probably from America, but that’s the closest thing to an All-American camp that it is.
and it’s about doing some basic homework. if you’re gonna invest, I’m the kind of guy that if I’m gonna buy a car, if I’m gonna buy a phone, if I’m gonna buy a sandwich, I’m gonna go read the reviews and make sure that there’s good track record before I put any kind of money down.
Chris Hall (22:23.273)
Yeah, we had, had got, so I know that you’re really involved with the Polynesian Bowl, which is awesome. You know, I mean, it’s a showcase of parts, but it’s invitation only. but we had gotten invited to something like really similar and it looked like it was similar. It was like, Hey, this is like an all-star game. We’ve selected you, blah, blah, blah. I mean, you have to pay for yourself to get there, but you know, once you’re there, we take care of everything. I was like, that’s pretty cool. And I can’t remember the exact name of it, but all I know is like, what I did was I went to the last year’s roster.
And I started texting kids, DMing them through Twitter and saying, hey, you were in this game last year. What do you think? And they were all like, no, it’s all division three coaches. It’s all from the same team. And there was no media. There was no exposure. But they go, but it was fun. And I was like, yeah, not going to spend valuable time.
Brandon Huffman (23:05.797)
I know what game you’re talking about. Yep.
Yeah, you’re sharing a bed and yeah, there’s four of you in a hotel room. There’s two beds, you’re sharing a bed. mean, we all see it, but like, you know, and again, I mean, it’s cool to have those opportunities to play, but like the best of the best that people are gonna go cover are where it’s the free game that’s promoted and sponsored by the Under Armour All-American game or the Polynesian bowl or the All-American bowl. You know, that’s where the best of the best is.
Chris Hall (23:38.182)
as a kid, like let’s just take a kid from like where I live in Redding, California who let’s say let’s say if he was at Folsom High School in Sacramento, you know, he’d probably already have six offers, you know what mean? He’s just he’s a good kid, he’s a good student, he’s doing well, but he’s up in Redding so he’s not getting exposure, he’s not really helping, you know, there’s like our school is actually pretty good, our coach is really good, he tries to like this year we’re playing Reno, we’re playing Del Oro down a sack, we’re playing San Marin down in Marin County.
So he’s trying to get our kids out in front of people because we know that those teams are getting recruited. So outside of that, that’s pretty rare for this area. Most of these kids just play around the area with other area teams. How is a kid like, let’s say he’s a sophomore right now and he’s just really good. Like what should be his game plan to get on like a Brandon Huffman’s board? How does a guy like to get on your board?
Brandon Huffman (24:32.021)
Yeah, so here’s the, I’m gonna answer that question in kind of two parts. One thing that I think people struggle with in a lot of ways is getting outside their own bubble. And this is a shot at you Chris, this is just for regionally based because I hit this all the time, you my kid is just as good if he was down in Sacramento or Los Angeles or San Diego, he’d have a ton of offers. If your kid is as good as you think,
where he would be getting a ton of offers in Sacramento, San Diego, or Las Vegas, or Los Angeles, he would already have them because now he’s got the opportunity to big fish in a small pond. And I see this all the time, oh, if this kid who’s in Idaho played in Los Angeles, he’d be a five star. Well, it’s like, dude, he’s a five star in Idaho. If he was in Los Angeles, there’s five guys just like him, more likely that he’s not gonna get recruited to that extent. So now these coaches are very intentionally going to small town USA, Idaho and finding him and saying they want him.
But if he’s in LA, they’re also gonna go to this school and that school and that school and this school and this school and they’re gonna find four or five guys that are just as comparable. So you’re better off being an elite player in that small town. The number one player in Idaho this year comes from Fruit League, which nobody’s ever heard of. The number one player in California, yeah, he is from Folso. But, know, the North Cal kids get sucked up. Well, why is the number one player in California from Northern California? know, there’s coaches. Here’s the crazy thing that I think.
It’s the acceptance that maybe my kid is not as good as I think he is. I don’t want to think that my genetics and DNA has hurt my kids chances of playing at the next level. So I’m going to blame coaches for being lazy. I’ve been around college football for 23 years. Here’s a crazy thing that people don’t understand. College football coaches want to win football games. They want to win lots of football games. They want to win national championships. They want to have an opportunity to win a national championship and go to the Super Bowl. You know how you do that? Is by getting the best players.
So you’re not going to just say, well, I only want this player because he’s at this school. They’re going to go find the best player in the country. Michigan’s in the news today on Friday for the NCAA sanctions that came down as part of their cheating. But what people forget is that part of the reason that Michigan won a national championship is that Jim Harwood did a really good job of turning over every nook and cranny to find good players. All right, yeah. His star defense alignment played at Servite High School in the best league in the country.
Brandon Huffman (26:49.021)
but his starting tight end played in something called Kimberly, Idaho. All right. Wouldn’t be a first round draft pick at the Michigan Wolverines. Kimberly Idaho is like two and a half hours from Boise. All right. Off the beaten path. It’s not easy to get to Boise. So it’s called coaches will do their due diligence if the player is worth it. And so that’s the hard part is like, well, if he was down at this school, he’d have a bunch of offers. That’s not entirely true. Cause there might be eight to 10 other guys that are just as good, if not better at that school. That’s why coaching you’re going to that school because those good players are all there. So.
I think that the first thing is to not play the geographic victim card. That’s the one thing that I think hurts people is they’d rather play the geographic victim card rather than getting out. How do I get to these camps? Go to those camps, dominate, be good. But you also got to have all the identifiable traits that make you worth recruiting. It’s a speed, skill, strength and size game. The faster you are, the stronger you are, the bigger you are and the more skilled you are, you are going to be recruited.
Just because you’re big, fast, strong and skilled in a smaller region doesn’t mean you’re big, fast, strong and skilled against better competition. Okay? And if you’re against that competition, that’s not as strong as the bigger schools, you better dominate that competition, not just be good. Okay? But then you also have to have the identifiable traits. You’ve got to have the size, the length, the speed, the quickness. And I’ll say, oh, you know, he was the fastest kid in this league. What did he run? Oh, at 11.3. That’s not fast. 11.3 is slow.
Yeah, might have won you the league hundred meter championships, but that’s not going to get you recruited unless you’re 275 pounds. Okay. Oh, well, you know, he was an all league tackle. Cool. How big is the audio 62 to 30? That’s not an NFL tackle. That’s not a college tackle. That’s a middle linebacker. That’s a fullback. That’s a tight end. You’re smaller than a lot of the tight ends. You know, so it’s mistaking all league for domestic activity with achievement again, you know, just because you’re all league doesn’t mean you’re going to play. And here’s what I’ll go back to.
My first year on this job, I drove down to USC and met with Pete Carroll. And he gave me some great advice and said, don’t be a stats guy. I’m like, what does that mean? Well, don’t just look at a kid’s box score if you got all league and assume that he’s a good player. That means he helped his team win on Friday. That doesn’t mean he can help me win on Saturday. That doesn’t mean he could help a team win on Sundays. It means he helped his team win football on Friday. Everywhere in the country, there’s gonna be a quarterback in Redding, there’s gonna be a quarterback in Bradenton, a quarterback in Dallas, a quarterback in Chicago that’s gonna throw a touchdown pass. Does that mean that kid’s a Division I football player because he threw a touchdown pass?
Brandon Huffman (29:13.096)
Quarterbacks are supposed to throw for a lot of yards. Running backs are supposed to rush for a lot of yards. Receivers are supposed to catch a lot of touchdown passes. Offensive linemen are supposed to get a lot of pancakes. Defensive linemen are supposed to get sacks. Linebackers are supposed to get tackles for losses. VBs are supposed to get picks. That’s happening in thousands of high school games all over the country. But does that make those guys elite prospects? No. We’re trying to find the guys that are doing all that, but then have all the physical traits to help us win on Saturday and then on Sunday.
Okay, if you go look at the NFL draft every year, there’s guys that are elite college football players, but they’ve hit a ceiling. College is as good as it’s going to get. And it’s always sobering in a sense to look at the night that the NFL draft ends. And you see a lot of guys that are really good college players that didn’t get drafted. Well, what did they do? I they were productive in college for three or four years. You know, they’re playing at the Clemsons, the Alabamas, the Georgians. Why are they not getting drafted?
because the traits don’t happen. So even the guys in the bigger schools don’t necessarily have the translatable traits. So I say that to come back to, if you’re a small town kid, how do you get on the radar by having those identifiable traits that separate you from not just the players in your own backyard, but from everybody else in your region. Because if you’re good enough, the whole phrase, if they’re good enough, you’re gonna get found. It’s never been more true than it is in 2025. Because with a video camera on your phone,
social media, you can get yourself scouted. And then you go to those events and you go into those events and you dominate. There was a kid who I met when he was in eighth grade and when I was at one of the camps in Alaska. And as an eighth grade, he was gonna be at this camp where he’s going to Cal Poly and he’s at Anchorage. So it was hard for him to get recruited. College coaches aren’t going to Anchorage if they don’t have to.
But he, so he went to every possible camp you could possibly go to in California, was MVP at a number of them, and then he got a couple of FCS scholarships. Now he’s going to Cal Poly, getting a great education. The weather is going to be a shock for him going from Anchorage to San Luis Obispo, but now he’s playing a visual in football. So he went to them, and that’s the thing. You can’t sit back and say, you know, if they’re good enough, they’ll find you. That doesn’t mean they’re gonna come to you to find you. If you’re good enough, you gotta go to those events, and then they’re gonna find you when they’re looking through all the verified traits and testing markers.
Brandon Huffman (31:27.11)
and then they’ll watch the film and see if the film matches the athletic traits. And then if you have both, then your entire future may change.
Chris Hall (31:33.888)
Yeah, I love that. That’s such a great answer. I really appreciate that. Not only for me, but like, you know, because I live in a Northern California small town, you know, we do have a lot of what we just talked about kind of like in the background, but you’re right. I mean, it’s never been, we’ve never had better access, you know, like my son, he probably has, you know, 15, 20 special teams coordinators, probably assistants.
In his DMs on Twitter that he’s can regularly talk to he’s got another half a dozen guys. Maybe ten guys He’s got their cell phone. He can actually text them and talk to him and stuff And so I think it’s never really been easier like you said But they ought to have the transmutable skills and I really like the analogy that you move He’s like I think people can only think in that first person like where I’m at right now, but I was the East East West game East coordinator for like six years and you know, we’re talking about
some of the best of the best for college football. It’s a college football all-star game. And I mean, you walk in and I’m not a small guy. I’m six foot, I’m 235, 245. And you know, when I walk in and I look like a miniature version of a human being when I’m standing next to these people. And then you watch them and they do great things and they’re performing on the field. And then sure enough, like, you know, half of those guys are gonna get picked up as an undrafted free agent. They’re not even gonna get drafted.
And then, know, there’s, then out of those half of those guys, know, half of them, you know, probably don’t even get make the starting roster. So, and these are the best of the best, like you’re talking about. I mean, you know, I think that, you you’ve got three or four college all-star games and this is probably like ranked number two out of all of them. So, so that’s a, I mean, it’s a really good point. Like, you know, your skills can be good. They can be excellent.
But that doesn’t mean they make it to the next level. And I think that’s really cool. I think I really love your explanation. think thank you for sharing that. That was really cool. So let’s talk a little bit about NIL and Transfer Portal and all these kinds of things. I don’t want to sound like a victim or anything like that, but I actually do think these 2026 kids probably have it harder than anybody else because of the disarray.
Chris Hall (33:45.031)
of what’s happening in college football with NIL and how many people they can have on roster and how many people can have scholarships in NIL and all that stuff. So can you kind of go into that, what you think about how that’s operating like in today’s world?
Brandon Huffman (33:57.144)
I have had a job for 23 years where I cover college football and the top athletes and I’ve been able to monetize their abilities and write about them. So I have been a big champion of like these kids deserve to get paid. know, schools have made millions of dollars, coaches have made millions of dollars. I’ve made hundreds of dollars, not millions with my career in covering it. So I’m all about these kids getting what’s owed to them and what they deserve.
Here’s the thing, and I see this every single year. The transfer portal is killing recruiting. No, it’s not. There’s still supply, there’s still demand, right? Okay, so unless a school drops football and 100 roster spots just went away, those football players have to come from somewhere, right? So those players that are being recruited out of the portal, whether they’re at a…
FCS school going to an FBS school, if they’re at another FBS school is going sideways, if they’re in a D2 school jumping to FCS or FBS, that school that loses them has to replace and replenish that player as well, right? So what it’s doing is it’s not killing recruiting, it’s recalibrating recruiting. And what I mean by that is there’s still 85 guys that are allowed on a roster on scholarship. Some schools can now have 105, it’s up to the conference. The NCAA is allowing for 105 scholarships on FBS programs.
A couple of conferences said we’re staying at 85, but 105 roster spots total. Okay, so yeah, there have been a few spots that have lost most of their walk-ons. But what it is is the days of back when signing day was on the first Wednesday in February, you would see a guy that might be committed to Fresno State. And on the night before signing day USC and UCLA might say, you know what, we’ll take this kid as our 25th player in our class. We’ll develop him. We’re not gonna see him on the field for three years. We’re gonna redshirt him. We’re gonna stash him.
He’s not gonna transfer without having to sit out of here. We can develop this guy and then in year four, when he’s now no longer a 17 year old boy, he’s a 21 year old man, he’s bigger, faster, stronger, where he’s gonna go dominate. Those days are done. Now schools, they have their recruiting classes essentially done at the end of June to fourth of July weekend. So there are now schools that will not sign another 2026. They won’t even recruit or talk to another 2026 player. They’re only worried about keeping those guys that they have.
Brandon Huffman (36:16.231)
Okay, and NIL factors into that. They may outbid another school for the end for another top kid who might be getting cold feet, there’s a coaching change, whatever. But the days of the FBS school is making a late flyer on a kid, those are done. What that has done is that has allowed FCS programs to get better players than they ever did before. It used to be that, you’re only an FCS player. That’s like, no, that’s actually a good thing. Because you go to the FCS level and dominate for two years and now you can go from the FCS to the FBS.
In April, there was a young man who signed with an FCS school out of high school. High school quarterback in the state of Texas, wasn’t heavily recruited, the school ran the wingtees, so he went to a school called Incarnate Word. What are you supposed to do at Incarnate Word? Ended up transferred to Washington State, left Washington State, went to Miami, was the number one pick in the NFL draft. There’s still players like that that…
recruiting didn’t go great out of high school. So instead of him crying and saying the portal’s killing recruiting, he went to an FCS school, dominated and worked his way up and now he’s the number one pick and he’s the starting quarterback for the Tennessee Titans. Yes, is that an extreme outlier? Probably. But the point being is that you’re never seeing more FCS players get drafted than that. Now they’re not getting drafted out of FCS schools. Most of those guys have left the FCS program to go to the FPS level. But what it’s doing is it’s recalibrating. So instead of dreaming of
that big power four offer from the in-state school you grew up reading for, you’ll know by May if that’s going to happen. You might know much sooner than that if that’s going to happen. Now you need to start looking at the group of five schools, the FCS schools, even the D2s and the D3s. There’s still spots to play. It just may recalibrate the level of which you think you’re going to play and the level of which your skill set will allow you to play. So I think the 2026s are in an era now where
Yes, no, it’s a lot more difficult to get recruited by the big schools. It’s not difficult to be recruited. Okay, if you have the skill set, there is a, if you have the skill set and the academics, there is a place for you. It just may be different than where you dreamed to play. The reality is Chris, neither of us ever dreamed to play in the Azusa Pacific. You know, we probably dreamed of playing at the Roswell and the Coliseum growing up in Southern California. You may have dreamed of playing at, know, Berkeley or Stanford being from Northern California. You probably had where you wanted to play.
Brandon Huffman (38:31.984)
But if the dream is to keep playing college football and then potentially after that, you’ll go where you can get on the field. And too many kids logo chasing, that’s where you run into the issue of it’s hard for us to get recruited. No, it’s like you were chasing the wrong schools rather than the schools that were chasing you.
Chris Hall (38:48.991)
Right? I like that. Yeah. When it comes to the 2026 case, the one thing I don’t know, I don’t have clarification on, but it seemed like they were going to move from 135 rosters down to 105 rosters. Did that happen?
Brandon Huffman (39:01.766)
Yeah, it went from 120 down to 105. So you went from, let’s see, I’m gonna do the math right here. 130 times 15. So there’s, technically there’s 1,950 players that were already on rosters that were essentially phased out. So it’s not even the recruiting that was impacted, it was the retention. But then those players, a lot of them were walk-ons and they were telling you to go to a lower level or go somewhere where you can play.
but there’s still spots available. yeah, what gets buried in that is when everybody’s gnashing their teeth and saying, well, 105 spots, now schools are, a lot of schools in the specific conferences are allowing 105 players to be on scholarship rather than 85 on scholarship and 35 walk-ins, all 105 could be on scholarship. So there’s give and take, but only one dominates the clicks and the headlines.
Chris Hall (39:55.146)
Well, I, you know, like one of the things I think about with the NIL is like, you know, you got kids like, like Arch Manning, you know, great player, but hasn’t really started many games. You know, he’s been behind Quinn Uris the whole time and he’s got more NIL than Brock Purdy got in his first contract and he’s not even playing, you know what I mean? For the most part. And then you’ve got other kids who are literally on the roster who are starting, who are still walk-ons. Like at some point, doesn’t it make sense that like, if you’re at least starting, you should have a scholarship.
Brandon Huffman (40:24.486)
Yeah, and I think you’re seeing more and more schools shifting to that model. And part of the reason why you’re seeing the school saying, hey, you know what, even though we can have 105 guys on scholarship, we only want 85 to be on scholarship is because revenue sharing is a lot easier to distribute to 85 players than it is 105 players. So those other 20 players, if you’re not getting revenue sharing, you might be on scholarship, but you’re still essentially a walk on because you’re not getting the piece of the pie. You’re your academics paid for, your room and board paid for, you know.
closing gear and food, training table. But I think nowadays, if you’re a starter, you now have leverage because from the revenue sharing standpoint, now you just turn around and say, I’m gonna transfer to another school. There was a kid that was at UCLA last year who was a walk-on, was a backup, started a couple of games after injuries, ended up parlaying that into a full ride to Stanford where he’s gonna get revenue sharing. And he was a walk-on at UCLA, but played in a couple of games, got on the field.
started and now he gets to go to, you know, that everyone public or private FPS program in terms of academics in, you know, college football. So you’re seeing less and less walk-ons not getting a piece of the pie. You’re, and we’re also, we were in this four years of kind of the wild west. The wild west isn’t going away. That’s not going to change. But now with revenue sharing, there’s less creativity coming from NIL collectives and more, it’s just coming from the top. This is now being shared with the media rights fields.
Chris Hall (41:28.692)
Yeah.
Brandon Huffman (41:48.442)
with these conferences and with those programs in those conference, there’s becoming the distribution of the wealth like it is in the NFL. Your quarterback’s gonna make 50 million, your long snapper’s gonna make the league middle.
Chris Hall (41:59.104)
That’s true, right. Which for the NFL is not too shabby. Yeah, $600,000 a year is pretty good minimum wage. what do you got? now Augusta is pretty quiet for you for the most part. By the way, thank you so much for the great answers on these questions. Like these are things that like literally rattle around in my head all the time. And to hear your clarification on it from somebody who’s like in the mix every day. It’s very helpful. So I hope the listeners enjoy that as well.
Brandon Huffman (42:02.79)
not at all.
100 percent.
Chris Hall (42:29.055)
But so you’ve got a couple more weeks and then season is starting pretty much. I mean, I know that some schools are actually playing ball games this week. So at this point, is this when you start visiting the schools and watching the games themselves or?
Brandon Huffman (42:42.662)
Normally it would. I’m in a kind of a weird state of life right now. It’s not a weird state, it’s an exciting state, but if you’re hearing an echo, normally I have a bunch of pictures on my wall. I usually have jerseys on my wall, but my house is being sold and at the end of August, my family and I are moving to Arizona.
and we will basically spend the opening weekend of college football driving from Washington to Arizona, which sucks because there’s some great games starting in the morning and U-Hauls don’t have satellite radio. So I will be listening to the Ohio State Texas game and I’ll be listening to the Alabama Florida State game, which is a bummer, but I’ll be there in time to watch the Monday night football game between North Carolina and T.C. So I got that going for me. But in a normal year,
Chris Hall (43:13.286)
my God.
Chris Hall (43:31.058)
Miami versus Notre Dame is on a Sunday night. You should be able to guess that too.
Brandon Huffman (43:32.262)
My neighbor submitted it on a Sunday night. So I should be pulling into Arizona just in time to watch that at the hotel. Then we move into our house on Labor Day, but there’s only one game. I’ll get to, you to do some and I might, you know, sneak a peek at my TV or at my app, my phone while at a rest stop, not while I’m driving. But normally I’d be, yeah, exactly. I’m always about conscientiousness on the road. Normally though, I’d be, you know, living in Washington. They start high school practice next week.
Chris Hall (43:50.335)
Sure, of course. Of course. That’s not saying.
Brandon Huffman (44:00.038)
By this point, I’m starting to get out, where am I gonna go to practice? What games am I gonna go do? Last year before the end of September, I had already been to four different states for high school football games, County, Washington, where I lived, and went out and spent a weekend in Idaho, watched four games out in Idaho, went down to Oregon, saw three games in Oregon. It was great, they staggered like a 12 o’clock, four o’clock, and seven o’clock start, so I could knock out three, get into some Jamboree. So yeah, it’s typically.
Chris Hall (44:23.453)
Nice.
Brandon Huffman (44:27.513)
From mid August, when practice starts, I’m at a game every weekend until state championships in California are done. Hawaii started their season last weekend, Utah starts their season this weekend. My colleague, Blair Angulo, he was in Salt Lake City today and yesterday he was at a game last night, he’s going to games tonight. California starts on the 22nd, Oregon starts some games on the 29th, Washington starts on the 5th, Arizona starts at the end of August.
And so yeah, from this point on, now it’s tracking who’s going, it really ramps up when the college season starts because my busiest part of the fall is tracking who’s visiting what schools for those games. Who’s been invited by the school that they’re recruiting pretty heavily. know, UCLA, it’s not the official visits because those are now really heavily done in the spring. It’s the unofficial game visits, which are big for the underclassmen. like UCLA hosts Utah and their season opener, I think it’s the last kickoff.
Chris Hall (45:07.977)
Right. The official visits.
Chris Hall (45:13.725)
game visits.
Brandon Huffman (45:22.645)
of Saturday night on the opening day. So UCLA is expecting a big list of recruits. Oregon State plays Cal that week and Oregon State’s hoping for some visitors. Washington, I think, has like UC Davis, Cal. So some schools, Arizona State plays Northern Arizona. So those schools can now have, it’s been dead since June 26th, or no, June 23rd is when the dead period started. So players have not been on college campuses in almost two months.
So that opening weekend of college football is the first weekend that recruits are allowed to go back to college campuses for visits, unofficial games, all that. So that’s when things really start ramping up because you have games Thursday, Friday, and then Saturday, you’re tracking who’s at what games across the country.
Chris Hall (46:03.409)
Okay, that sounds pretty busy. So now why the move from the Pacific Northwest down to Arizona?
Brandon Huffman (46:11.109)
Yeah, there’s this cool thing in the sky called the sun and I don’t get to see it very much living in Seattle. you know, born and raised Southern California, my wife’s family’s from Washington. She lived up here when she was in high school. So we moved up here when our oldest was born and we spent a little bit over 20 years here. But I have a mobile job. on the road a ton. I’m all over the country. And, you my kids are getting older. My oldest graduated from the University of Washington last summer. My son is a sophomore at Arizona State.
We have our youngest at home is an eighth grader. She was excited about the opportunity to move and it was more, we wanted to get back to California, but we wanted it to be affordable. And with our son moving to Arizona, we wanted a place where like, hey, where’s our kids that they move across the country? Where do they come visit? Well, they probably come visit Arizona in the winter and come for Christmas and the grandkids can go in the pool. So as a change of scenery, a stage in life where we’re like, hey, where do old people go when they’re retiring? They go to Arizona. I’m not retiring, but I’m getting old. Yeah.
Chris Hall (47:06.783)
No burden it. There you go. I love it. That’s great. I’ve always told my kids like, know, cause we live in a nice place here too. Reading’s nice. It gets real hot in the summer other than that. It’s a pretty great place to live. Um, but I told my kids, I’m like, if you move, I’m going to go where you go. So just, you know, got to choose something that I would like. Cause I want to be where they’re at.
Brandon Huffman (47:09.592)
Snoop! Yeah!
Brandon Huffman (47:24.421)
It really made it, it was crystallized. When my son, you know, who was born and raised in Washington, went to ASU, came home at Christmas and he came home and he was like, oh, I’m excited to wear all my winter clothes. This is gonna be fun. Gets home on a Friday. On Saturday, he goes down to the baseball field to go play. All his college buddies are home from Christmas. They go down and play in a driving range. He comes home, he goes and lays by the fireplace and said, I hate this place. I’m never moving back here. Why did I ever leave Arizona? And that was the.
kind of the indication of my wife and I like, hey, we got one who’s getting married, she may move to the Midwest. We’ve got a son who doesn’t wanna move back to Washington. And then he spent the entire Christmas vacation convincing his baby sister, hey, you get to wear shorts all the time, you get a pool in the backyard, you should move. So she was all in at that point and we thought she’d be the toughest one to crack because of how social butterfly she is. But once she was there, we’re like, all right, let’s do it.
Chris Hall (48:03.839)
He’s recruiting her!
Chris Hall (48:10.623)
you
Chris Hall (48:14.607)
I love it. That’s great. That’s really cool. He recruited her. He knew who the linchpin was.
Brandon Huffman (48:17.669)
He works in the recruiting and personnel department at ASU, so he’s no idiot. He knew exactly how to win.
Chris Hall (48:23.971)
right on. Cool. I love that. That’s awesome. Hey, so this last summer, my son and I had the opportunity to come up to Tacoma, University of Puget Sound, and go to the Avery Strong Showcase, which is your showcase. I was wondering if you would take a few minutes to tell us how that came about and what’s that all about, because I know it’s important to you.
Brandon Huffman (48:43.653)
Yeah, I’d be glad to. So the Avery Showcases began in 2016. The first one was held in Southern California in I believe June of 2016. There was an eighth grader who was getting ready to start his freshman year in high school who was at that camp and got his first offer. After that camp, that guy would go on to lead modern day to a national championship, would go on to win the Heisman Trophy and be the number one pick of the Carolina Panthers, Bryce Young. The camp started
because four months before that, daughter, my wife and I’s daughter Avery passed away from an operable brain tumor that she was diagnosed with in June of 2015. And she was six years old, just finished kindergarten, had been your rambunctious typical kindergartner and started having some issues with her eye. And we thought she might need glasses. Turned out she had a incurable and operable brain tumor on the back of her brain stem.
and she valiantly fought for seven and a half months before when she was diagnosed, the prognosis immediately was you’ve got best case scenario of nine to 12 months with her. This is not treatable, this is not curable, and the mortality rate is 100%. So we were told make a lifetime of memories in the next nine to 12 months. We got seven. And after she passed away, my wife and I said, listen, there was nothing that.
could be done to stop this. Modern medicine wasn’t up to where it was at, but we wanna keep her name alive. We wanna keep her legacy going. So three months after she passed away, we established the Avery Huffman DIPG Foundation in her name, in her honor, but 100 % committed to finding a cure for the brain cancer that she was diagnosed with. we have in just under a decade, we’ve raised over a million dollars. My wife and I do it as a passion project. We don’t take a salary, we don’t take a stipend, we take nothing.
Spend money out of our own pocket to do it, to share her story. And we support Stanford Children’s Hospital and the Seattle Children’s Hospital lab with two of the most prominent researchers and doctors in the world that are treating this particular brain cancer. And a big part of what we do is the event space. And I don’t ever run the event. It is my event in the sense that it’s the name, but I just show up. I show up and I tell every story.
Brandon Huffman (51:03.436)
University of Puget Sound hosted, but we’ve had so many schools and organizations that have been inspired by Avery’s story that they asked, can we put her name on this? Can you come and share about Avery? And I’m like, saying her name, keeping her legacy alive has been our motivation. The fact that we could raise some funds for research is better, but the bigger thing is I gotta talk about my daughter. And while she may no longer be with us here, her story is not going anywhere.
We started the Avery-Shonk Showcases in 2016. There’s a whole seven on seven tour, the Bravie Northwest tour that’s expanded all over the West Coast. And then the Avery-Shonk College Showcases returned in 2023 at UPS. The first year we did it, I said, hey, we should be excited if we get 200 kids. We have 500 kids. This year we had 800 kids. We’ve had, two years ago, the first year we did it, we were the only college camp in the United States that had a coach from Michigan and…
University of Washington at the same camp. But why was that significant? Because six months later, those two teams played in the national championship game. Haley Naboor was our featured speaker our first year. Jake Dicker, he’s now the head coach at Wake Forest. Both spoke this year. had San Diego State’s head coach, Idaho’s head coach, Washington’s head coach, Washington State’s head coach come. Last year we had Dan Lanning from Oregon there. We’ve had numerous coaches. We’ve had over 40 schools that have been a part of it.
staffs from all over, players getting offers at those camps. And it’s been an awesome opportunity. We’ve had, I think, seven players that ultimately became five stars that have been at any of the previous three camps. Multiple Polynesian Bowl, Under Armour, and Navy All-American Bowl selections have come that have been a part of those camps. So it’s been awesome to see, you know, and every one of those. The camp is done about a five minute drive from the hospital, which we sat and we’re told that our daughter is going to succumb to this brain cancer.
And so instead of letting her legacy die when she passed away, we’re keeping that legacy going. And it’s been big on the football space this last week and my brother each year hosts a wood bat baseball tournament in Southern California in her honor as well. So it’s not just football, though. 95 % of the heavy lifting is involved in the football space.
Chris Hall (53:10.845)
Yeah, yeah. my gosh, I love it so much. And what a great testimony to Avery. I know she was super brave during the whole thing and it’s just it was it was really cool to be part of it. Like so we were looking at our camp schedule, trying to figure out what we wanted to do for my son. And when I saw that we could get to your camp, I said, look, we got to go. We got to go to this camp. And, you know, we went to it for the right reasons, which I believe, you know, was to support you and further the cause.
But then was pleasantly surprised by what you had already mentioned, was there was my gosh, there was a gobs of college coaches there. And again, my son’s special teams. So if you go to a big camp where there’s like 20 colleges there, there’s a real off chance that you might see an actual special teams coach at one of those like they’ll say, hey, these guys are all coming you get there. There’s almost never a special teams coach there. They had you guys had at least 1215 guys there that were just special teams guys.
Brandon Huffman (53:47.054)
Yeah.
Chris Hall (54:08.063)
And it was, I remember Idaho was there, San Diego state brought their whole staff. It was really.
Brandon Huffman (54:08.439)
And another fun fact, the whole staff, you had the special teams coach for the number one seed and the number three seed in the college football playoffs were both at the camp and Joe Lorig from University of Oregon and Stacy Collins from Boise State too. it wasn’t just small college coaches. You had two of the top three teams in the country, schools that had two of the four Heisman Trophy finalists and they had their special teams coach at that camp, which I think…
It says a lot about the camp and the talent level that is at each of those camps that you’ve got, you know, two high profile coaches and they could have gone at any college camp across the country. There are major camps going on in Texas that same weekend and they chose to come to that. And both of them said, hey, we would love to be a part of this. We want to be here to support you and support your foundation. You know, the Avery Showcase is exactly the kind of event we want to support. So I could tell you as a dad that that means more to me than anything is that.
they wanna come support and share Avery’s legacy too.
Chris Hall (55:07.219)
Right. Well, I think you just do so much for this community, know, from kids to parents to coaches, recruiters, like all the specialized coaches that are out there doing their thing. I mean, you just do so much for the community. think it’s a great way for them to like, you know, sort of also thank you for all that you do. And I know I’m appreciative of you. I know that I’ve been lucky to be able to like actually text you and say, hey, what do you think about this? It’s been pretty cool to have access to you.
Is there anything else that you’d like to talk about? want to be respectful of your time. I told you I’d take about an hour. We’re sitting right about 56 minutes, so
Brandon Huffman (55:44.484)
Yeah, no, I would just say like, you know, guys, it’s, it’s the biggest thing is, is you got the opportunity to spend 10 to 14, 15, 16 Lord willing weeks playing the game that you love so much. Make the most of those games. Stop worrying about, stop, you know, watching somebody else’s plate. Don’t look at their meal. Look at your meal. Worry about what you’re eating and how you can make that enough to make you full. And I think that that’s one thing is, you know, don’t.
Now more than ever, don’t play the victim. Play how can I be the hero? And what can I do to change my life and change my family’s life? And you control that, all right? The college coach doesn’t control that. The media doesn’t control that. The player that you think you’re better than across the field, he doesn’t control it. You control that. Control what you can’t control. Worry about what you have to worry about. And I think you do that. It’s gonna be the most pleasant experience of your senior year, your junior year, your sophomore year, freshman year, whatever year you’re in.
Chris Hall (56:40.735)
Yeah, that brings up one more thing that I wanted to ask you and I had it in my notes here, which is what is Juco playing these days? I mean, with the Diego thing, you know, some coaches we talked to, they’re like, Juco doesn’t count. Some coaches we talked to, they’re like, we have no idea. Some coaches we talked to are like, we think Juco counts.
Brandon Huffman (56:56.291)
And that’s the misconception that it doesn’t count. No, it does count still. There has not been an NCAA ruling that if you go to a juke of those years don’t count. What it was, it was a blanket waiver given for players that played during that time that they could get here, but not every player was given that waiver. There was a couple of other players that, you
were impacted, thought, gonna have a sixth year. And then the NCAA said, no, you’re out of eligibility. Those Juco years counted, the calendar, the clock started, so the years count. So Juco football is still an awesome opportunity. know that, know, Coach Snelling over at Butte College in Chico does a fantastic job. You know, there’s a lot of really good juniors. I would say probably the two schools that do the best in California getting their players recruited are City College of San Francisco and College of San Mateo. And both
really successful JUCO programs, but also getting players recruited. So JUCO is absolutely an option, but don’t just assume if you’re going to a JUCO, it’s not counting against your clock. The NCAA has not ruled that JUCO football does not count towards eligibility. What it did is it gave Diego Pavia a waiver until the NCAA makes their ruling, but not everybody even got that waiver. So JUCO football is still an awesome opportunity to get film. If you’re not getting recruited, you’re not ready to go to a small school yet, you want to bet on yourself, JUCO football is fantastic.
and it’s gonna be good high level football.
Chris Hall (58:19.455)
Okay, good. is that at this point we do believe it counts towards your eligibility. So, okay. That’s a great clarification. Thank you for that. So, okay. Well, Brandon, thank you so much for your time. I loved having you on the show. If you ever want to come back and talk about anything, you’re always welcome. I know that for me, I’m trying to, you know, with my podcast, I’m trying to talk about obviously accumulating wealth. And to me, you know,
Brandon Huffman (58:24.195)
Yep, 100 % it does.
Brandon Huffman (58:37.367)
glad to.
Chris Hall (58:46.589)
You can’t be wealthy if you also don’t have health, right? And so sports plays a big part in people’s like existence as far as like being healthy when they’re young and translates really well into being an adult, you know, and being active and stuff like that. So I’m really a big fan of football. obviously changed my life. I came from a pretty poor upbringing and you know, I’ve done pretty well for myself and I definitely.
I definitely hand my tip my hat to football for that. That was a huge thing. I was actually supposed to go. I was a junior college. I was supposed to go to Western Missouri. And like last minute, the defensive coordinator made a couple phone calls and I ended up going to Azusa, which I had never heard of before. But it was kind of like, do I want to play football in Missouri or do I want to play football in Southern California? And it was pretty easy choice. So, but I think that’s kind of where like it again, like some of these kids I think are still on that same fence, you know, like.
Brandon Huffman (59:28.419)
Sure.
Brandon Huffman (59:35.064)
Yeah.
Chris Hall (59:40.724)
Like do they want to play FCS? You know, they want to try to find a division two school or do they want to go to JuCo route? You know what I mean? So I think, you know, I think the best thing you can do, like for me, I always said, I just want to go to school for free wherever I go is fine. does division two schools obviously give scholarships? Do division three schools give scholarships?
Brandon Huffman (01:00:00.407)
They don’t give scholarships for athletic, no athletic aid, but it’s academic based. So if you are a good football player and you have good academics, they’re gonna find academic aid for you. But they don’t give athletic aid at the Division III level. NAIA, they do. FCS, FBS, D2 all do. D2, they’re smaller scholarship numbers than FBS and FCS. There’s a lot of partial scholarships. Like we’ll give you 6,000 or we’ll give you 12,000. We’ll cover your books. even the FCS level, have 20.
one less scholarships to give than FBS. But Division III is the one school that doesn’t give athletic aid, but they find a way to give you a lot of academic aid to offset a lot of the costs.
Chris Hall (01:00:41.119)
Good and this does kind of same way with NAIA
Brandon Huffman (01:00:43.873)
Yeah, NAI gives a little bit more on that because they are permitted to give athletic aids. So they give a little bit more on the athletic side, but then also can couple that with academic aid.
Chris Hall (01:00:52.861)
Yeah, so when I went to Azusa, they gave me academic grant, athletic grant, and basically I ended up paying for my books. That’s what I ended up paying for. So, yeah. So, okay. So that’s kind of still same then too, NAI is still the same way there. Okay, all right. Any advice for any kids out there listening and maybe a sophomore in high school?
Brandon Huffman (01:01:13.805)
control what you can’t control. The best way to do that is have fantastic tape. All the traits help too, but if your film’s not good, it doesn’t matter how big, long, fast you are, they’re not gonna be interested if the film sucks. So you can control that on Friday nights, but then you also control that on Monday through Thursday in practice in the classroom, in the weight room, then you control it on Saturday and Sunday with good decision making so that you don’t offset everything that you work for by being stupid. So control what you can’t control and focus on being good on the field and then.
everything else should fall into place after that.
Chris Hall (01:01:45.151)
Great advice, great advice. Thank you, Brandon. Appreciate your time. You have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the move.
Brandon Huffman (01:01:47.555)
You bet.
Thank you, I will. I don’t know if I’ll enjoy the move, but I’ll enjoy the destination.
Chris Hall (01:01:55.423)
Sounds good. Alright, thank you again.
All right.