Each year, LearnedLeague commissioner Thorsten A. Integrity puts out a call for submissions of proposals for One Day Specials. These are 12-question trivia quizzes run during the off-season between traditional LL seasons. I have been very fortunate to have been selected to smith 11 of these over the past 11 years, including an entire series of quizzes on the Power Five conferences, 1DSes on U.S. World’s Fairs, Detroit, the state of Michigan, Michigan Football, and Ford Motor Company, and last year’s foray into music with The Killers. (I also wrote a whole MiniLeague on College Football, but that was many, many years ago, and I am glad the League has moved to collaboration on MiniLeague construction. The MCU one I spearheaded went much better.)
So in 2022, when I was submitting my proposals on a whim, I included a proposal on the internet’s only College Football Podcast as one of my offerings. I must admit that I was moderately stunned that this topic was selected. I also got a full year to craft this quiz, as this is literally one of the final 1DSes offered during the 2023 calendar year.
But you came for the recipe, so below, please find the 12 questions (and three alternate questions that I ultimately did not use.) from the Shutdown Fullcast 1DS. Answers will follow at the end.
The Questions
1. At the 2018 Outback Bowl, co-host Ryan Nanni's campaign to appear as the costumed mascot version of what signature Outback item was successful, having garnered 10,000 retweets in support of the idea. His in-game debut coincided with a run of 23 unanswered points by South Carolina to win the game, thus earning America a free edition of the item he was promoting.
2. When introducing Podcast Business, Spencer frequently breaks into an a capella version of what jazz standard (albeit with a Fullcast twist on the words)? Its connection to college football is that it is a favorite of the marching bands in Death Valley, be it in Baton Rouge after touchdowns or as "the song that shakes the Southland" over at Clemson.
3. On a December 2021 episode, during a debate on whether Chuck E. Cheese has rights as a U.S. citizen, the gang uncovered which character from Showbiz Pizza's past, a celebratory arachnid that spoke only in garbles? The character was named for the Kansas City shopping center that was the home of the original Showbiz location (which shared its name with the capital of the Roman province of Syria.)
4. A "beloved non-sponsor of the show," the hosts have a professed affinity for what caffeinated soft drink brand created by Barney and Ally Hartman? On an August 2023 episode, Holly provided an extensive list of technically not OSHA-approved alternate uses for over 20 of its varieties, including Spark, Maui Burst, and Sweet Lightning.
5. On the "Your College Team as Biblical Story or Character" episode, Jason's journey through the Old Testament led to comparing which Power 5 conference school to the Book of Leviticus? This comparison was based on the criteria that included "very long lists of elaborate rules on how to smoke meat...not have hippie haircuts...and wear matching uniforms..." To his credit, Spencer correctly guessed it immediately, shouting out "Hullabaloo" and "Caneck, Caneck" as the criteria were being read.
6. While the show now regularly introduces four hosts and "Michael Serber on the ones and twos," an additional presence is frequently invited to comment on topics, especially ones related to Washington State, only to be inaudible to listeners, allegedly due to "the Haint." Who is this former SB Nation colleague of the crew who, while known to be forklift certified, is not a licensed barber?
7. With Georgia's ascent to the top of the college football world in 2021 and 2022, the hosts decided to pay fealty to their new Dawg overlords' conveyance of choice by asking each other the status of their SUV, specifically, this model that is the Chevrolet counterpart of the GMC Yukon.
8. In a 2022 summer episode, the Fullcast was joined by which hardcore Colorado Buffaloes football fan (and CU alum), who is better known in the podcasting world for long-form "seasons" of his main show, such as "Blueprint for Armageddon," "Supernova in the East," and "Death Throes of the Republic?"
9. The "Thanksgiving Disasters" episode provided a great deal of show lore, including the idea of Buzz Aldrin stranding Neil Armstrong on the moon. However, earlier in the episode, what culinary innovation, born out of necessity due to a failure to thaw the meat being brought to a Friendsgiving and thus arriving six hours late to the gathering, led to the creation of show merch with the seal of a fictional university with this name with the motto "Sues non Verba?"
10. One of Spencer's strangest on-show talents, beyond his oddly passable Scottish accent and espousing his roulette "philosophy," is that, on command, he will sing in the "voice" of a computerized dog, taken from the preset sound effects bank of the SK-5 sampling keyboard released in 1987 by what electronics company, which was also known in the 1980s for its series of G Shock watches?
11. With humble beginnings as part of Vox Media's SB Nation network, then moving to Learfield IMG as a distributor after a hiatus, what avian-named content network, founded by John Skipper and Dan LeBatard, is the current overseer of the Shutdown Fullcast?
12. Running for over a decade and counting, the annual EDSBS Charity Bowl benefitting New American Pathways now lives on as a part of the Fullcast. While the donors for Michigan, aka The Money Cannon, have won every edition of the Charity Bowl, in 2023, people with what first name, a top ten most common boys' name from 1974 to 2008 in the U.S., would have finished third overall if tallied on their own, and represented 4.5% of all donors?
Bonus Questions (these were the alternates that were written but ultimately not used.)
B1. The hierarchy of needs (according to the hosts) of what musical artist, who has an RIAA-record nine diamond albums, is shown in the following image, discussed during the 2019 40 for 40 series on the bowl games. The recipe was originally featured in Home Cooking, the 2010 cookbook of the artist's wife, a popular musician in her own right.
B2. During "Tennessee Group Text Hell," Ryan decided to make the ALL CAPS messages of what then Vols' interim coach by doing his impression of said coach, as translated into Italian? That interim coach spent a year on the Carolina Panthers' staff before returning to the Mountain West school, where he had won Coach of the Year in 2010 and would do so again in 2021.
B3. While obscure pop culture references are part and parcel of the Fullcast, one of the deepest cuts is Holly's not infrequent mentions of what 1991 Disney film starring Gabrielle Anwar as a Depression-era woman who makes a career as a rider of [checks notes] diving horses?
The Answers:
Bloomin' Onion
Tiger Rag
Antioch(, the Birthday Spider)
Mountain Dew
Texas A&M University
(Brian) Floyd
Tahoe
Dan Carlin
Night Ham
Casio
Meadowlark Media
Matt(hew)
B1. Garth Brooks
B2. Brady Hoke
B3. Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken
I hope you enjoyed playing along; if you did not, please send all complaints to @38godfrey on Twitter.
CDB