Phantom Island

Arkansas State Head Coach Butch Jones sat down with Steven Godfrey before the start of this football season to discuss the realities of building and sustaining a program in the world of the transfer portal and NIL. How do you build culture when your roster turns over so frequently? Have coaches shifted their perspective on what it means to lose your best players to the portal? And when does a team find its identity in this new system?
This is a preview of the full episode, which is available to paid subscribers – go to phantomisland.show to sign up today. Phantom Island is presented by Homefield and produced by Michael Surber.

Steven Godfrey has football opinions about the LSU-Ole Miss showdown in Week 3, but what he really wants to talk about with Ryan Nanni on this episode is the cultural history of this rivalry, how Lane Kiffin distracts from it, and whether this game will lead to the kind of anger and chaos lots of people think might come to pass in Oxford.
This is a preview of the full episode, which is available to paid subscribers – go to phantomisland.show to sign up today. Phantom Island is presented by Homefield and produced by Michael Surber.

Freelance writer Sydney Bauer joins Ryan Nanni to review the WNBA's summer tumult over transgender athletes, what those stories revealed about the media's ability to provide necessary context and nuance to a complex topic, why the discussion always seems to focus on hypotheticals and not real people, and how one profile sprawled into almost every other topic in the WNBA. Phantom Island is presented by Homefield and produced by Michael Surber.

Steven Godfrey and Ryan Nanni discuss the extensive opportunity Ted Cruz was given this weekend on College GameDay to rally support for the Protect College Sports Act. What does that moment say about GameDay as an entertainment vehicle, ESPN as a political force, and the absence of a cohesive group representing athletes at the college level?
This is a preview of the full episode, which is available to paid subscribers – go to phantomisland.show to sign up today. Phantom Island is presented by Homefield and produced by Michael Surber.

Steven Godfrey is joined by Parker Fleming to break down the far from transparent world of player valuation in college football. How do teams analyze a player's worth in a sport with so many teams and options? What's the best way to prioritize development versus immediate returns? Does the job of determining value better fall to coaches or general managers? And what makes this exercise so different from its counterpart in the NFL?
This is a preview of the full episode, which is available to paid subscribers – go to phantomisland.show to sign up today. Phantom Island is presented by Homefield and produced by Michael Surber.