New Orleans Saints great Drew Brees is very high on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish and the program Marcus Freeman has built in South Bend.
Brees — a Purdue Boilermakers alum — admits that he “hated” Notre Dame during his collegiate career. Brees started three times against the Fighting Irish and went 1-2 during his collegiate career with Notre Dame considered one of Purdue’s biggest rivals at the time.
However, he recognizes the values and culture of the program that has been built by coach Freeman. The Fighting Irish will have the opportunity to win their first National Championship since 1988 when they match up against the heavily-favored Ohio State Buckeyes on Monday.
”There’s just something about Notre Dame and I think it’s one of the great stories in all of college football and especially in this era of NIL and transfer portal,” says Brees of Notre Dame in a one-on-one interview on behalf of his partnership with Dos Equis. “I think Notre Dame has become one of the standards. Something that I think we should all look at and still recognize like what’s the most important thing in college football and that’s building a team and an identity and creating a standard and just living by that standard.”
While Brees makes sure to give credit to the Buckeyes, he says they’ve built the roster the way college programs generally build them these days — through money, which is the standard way in the NIL and transfer portal era.
“Let’s just be perfectly honest — it’s how much money can we gather and then go out and buy players,” says Brees of the current college football landscape. “I mean, it’s the NFL, it’s free agency, right? It’s what Ohio State did last year. They can recruit, they can build from within, but man, they went out and made a bunch of acquisitions too so that they could win a National Championship. They were pissed that Michigan won it last year.”
Brees Wants Players To Feel Allegiance Toward Their College
Brees is a fan of the old school way of building college programs — which is building from within. He says that Freeman’s Fighting Irish have built a program based upon culture.
”That program is based on going out and recruiting the right type of guys,” says Brees. “Guys that recognize the value of being at Notre Dame, it’s about playing for a storied program, an organization and you represent that every day. It’s about getting a great education, it’s about being a great student-athlete and representing yourself in the university well at all times, and it’s about then plugging into that network after college.”
The current college football landscape is much like the Wild Wild West with very little rules or restrictions. Brees isn’t the first prominent figure to bring this to light, with former Alabama Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban attributing a big reason for his retirement due to the current landscape of the NIL and transfer portal era in college football.
It’s obviously a rather new landscape with NIL only recently being legalized in 2021. Furthermore, players who transfer schools no longer have to sit out a year. That was the case prior to the 2021 season.
”I just think we need to put these kids in a position. where they’re making decisions on universities based on all of those things and not who can write me the biggest check,” says Brees. “You see guys bounce around three and four times. At the end of the day, I think the best thing for a lot of guys is to stick it out, to handle adversity and to handle tough times. To face disappointment, to learn how to cope, to learn how to push through, strive through, because you end up being a lot better, a lot stronger on the back end of that.”
Brees stresses the desire to see some “guardrails” put into place during the NIL and transfer portal era.
“That’s truly what develops a lot of those character traits that are going to serve you really, really well later on,” says Brees. “I think we’re hopefully moving to a point where we put some guardrails around this NIL and transfer portal, because I think it’s definitely gotten out of control.”
Drew Brees Speaks on Dos Equis’ ‘Go for Dos’ Campaign Leading Into National Championship Game
Brees is speaking on behalf of Dos Equis’ “Go for Dos” campaign. The campaign is simple — if a two-point conversion is attempted by either the Fighting Irish or the Buckeyes in the National Championship Game, fans will get 100K free beers. The premise is perfect considering the beer’s name is synonymous with the two-point conversion attempt. Fans can claim their free beer — if there’s a two-point conversion attempt — on Dos Equis’ official website.
“This year in college football, they went for two more than any time in history — 449 attempts they chose to go for dos,” says Brees. “As a result of that, Dos Equis gave away a ton of free beer to college football fans throughout the season, which was awesome. Leading into this National Championship Game, if either team goes for two at any point in this game, it’ll unlock a 100,000 free beers for college football fans everywhere.”
