Notre Dame Podcasters In Hot Water For Calling Miami Players 'Unintelligent Thugs '

A group of Notre Dame podcasters have found themselves in hot water ahead of this weekend’s big game. On Sunday night, sixth-ranked Notre Dame travels down to Miami to play the tenth-ranked Miami at Hard Rock Stadium.

This week, What Tho The Pods: A Notre Dame Football Podcast talked about the game, and things got a bit unhinged when one of the podcasters called Miami players “unintelligent thugs” while everyone around him agreed with him.

“The biggest advantage that Notre Dame has is that Miami is a bunch of unintelligent thugs, that just play instinctually and not wisely, and the best thing about Miami, for their purposes, is that they are a bunch of unintelligent thugs, who just play instinctively.”

These Notre Dame Podcasters are out here talking crazy😳🤯 pic.twitter.com/u0jVa2ThIU

— Grant Speaks (@GrantSpeaks1) August 29, 2025

Social media immediately called out the podcasters for being “racist” for the way they were talking about Miami players.

Outright racism from Notre Dame podcast. Perhaps they thought nobody would hear it given their lack of subscribers.

The masks are off. And given how they look physically, the masks should probably stay on. https://t.co/Zy74lyFXzo

— CanesInSight (@CanesInSight) August 29, 2025

One of the podcasters, Ryan Downey, says he is shocked that people believe the comments made on the podcast are “racist” and issued an apology to anyone “offended.”

“Not sure if you saw…I was shocked and surprised to see people thinking this had any sort of racist undertones. It did not. Sorry if I offended anyone. I only meant players out there picing fights, only hitting hard, taking dumb penalties. Truly sorry. ”

Eventually Downey made his account private as the backlash continued to grow.