Sports

The new approach to college football will make it more and more like pro football. Which, in theory, provides an advantage for college football coaches with pro football experience.

Nebraska coach Matt Rhule, who spent two-plus seasons as head coach of the Carolina Panthers, believes his time in the NFL will help him when it comes to shaping a college roster in an era of players getting paid.

Via Shayni Matra of SI.com, Rhule made his case in a recent visit to Greg McElroy's podcast, Always College Football.

"I think the biggest thing you learn when you’re in the NFL is really evaluation," Rhule said. "Before, in college football, it was like, ‘Yeah, he’s a good player, let’s offer him, let’s take him.’ You get to the NFL, they’re all good players. It’s just, ‘Hey, what’s the financial value we put on this person and put on this position?’ Every year in the NFL, you go through free agency, and you see teams walking away from it with really good players because of their contract situations."

One key difference comes from the inability, under the current college system, to manipulate the available spending by carrying dollars over from one year to the next.

"The smart teams in the NFL carry money over and position themselves through the years," Rhule said. "But that discipline, I think, is something that’s really, really unique. It’s hard because you get to know the players. You want to take care of everybody."

One goal of the House settlement is to balance out the dollars. Rhule hopes that will lead to parity.

We'll believe it when we see it. With the money now flowing freely, the programs that have the most will always find a way to get it to the players, directly or indirectly.

Then there's the thing that you were probably thinking earlier and that probably goes without saying. But I'll say it anyway. Given that Rhule was 11-27 in 38 NFL games, does it make sense to put much stock in his NFL experience making a positive difference at Nebraska?

The NFL released its schedule for the 2025 season before Aaron Rodgers signed with the Steelers, but the choice for Pittsburgh's Week 1 opponent seemed to account for the likelihood that Rodgers would be joining the AFC North team.

Rodgers spent the last two seasons with the Jets and the Steelers will be visiting MetLife Stadium to play his former team in the season opener. The Jets have hired a new coach and General Manager since Rodgers took his last snap with the club, but cornerback Sauce Gardner is still on the roster and he said on The Pat McAfee Show that he's "looking forward to the challenge" of facing a player he learned a lot about the last two years.

Gardner knows that Rodgers learned a lot about him as well, so he said he's been working to come up with some new tricks ahead of the September matchup.

"He might think he knows all the tendencies that I have, but this offseason has really been me trying not to give nothing away," Gardner said. "I’ve been trying to work on literally everything because I already know I'm about to go against a wizard Week 1. I already know what time it is.”

The Jets' coaching change means that Gardner's tweaks won't be the only changes Rodgers will have to adapt to if he's going to start his Steelers tenure with a victory, but the corner's play will be a big part of the plans for the AFC East team so the matchup will be one to watch in Week 1.

Broncos safety P.J. Locke underwent back surgery shortly after the team's playoff loss to the Bills, he announced in a 14-minute YouTube video.

The first episode of the personal documentary series, "My Breakthrough," lays out that there were "no guarantees that P.J. would return to play football ever again" as one of the first NFL players to undergo spinal fusion surgery.

Locke shared a meeting with his surgeon, Dr. Chad Prusmack, on Feb. 10 after surgery. The degenerated discs in Locke's L4 and L5 vertebrae led to bone-on-bone, and Prusmack fused the spine with a “cage” and screws.

“How I felt the first week after surgery. It’s like: ‘Oh, my God. I don’t know how I’m going to get better after this,’” Locke said in the video, via Kyle Frederickson of the Denver Gazette.

Five months later, though, Locke said he's "got no pain levels."

“Even the little bit of pain I do have from certain movements, it’s nothing compared to what I was dealing with during the season,” Locke said. “I feel like it’s been a miracle. I feel like it’s a breakthrough I’ve been praying for. It came out of a blessing that I wasn’t expecting.”

Locke was named the team's Ed Block Courage Award winner in January. No one outside the locker room realized exactly what he was going through to get on the field for 15 games last season.

He played 1,000 defensive snaps in the regular season and all 76 snaps in the postseason loss.

Locke did not participate in the team's offseason program as he continued his rehab. He is expected to compete for safety snaps after the Broncos signed Talanoa Hufanga in free agency.