Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Bills Break Chiefs Jayden Daniels Injury And Seahawks Supremacy

Episode Date: January 11, 2026

Join former NFL lineman Geoff Schwartz and Gabe Goodwin as they break down a chaotic Week 9 in the NFL and the major college football headlines shaking up the playoff picture. From the Bills’ huge win over the Chiefs and Sam Darnold’s shocking dominance to the brutal Jayden Daniels injury and looming MetLife turf controversy, this episode is packed with hot takes, stats, and expert insights. Plus: Why are the Cowboys tradig away draft picks for reinforcements? Who’s really the best team in the SEC? And can the Bengals survive their defensive nightmare? Tune in now and stay ahead of the game. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome in to Jeff Schwartz to Smarty. The Jeffers-Marnie, presented by Draftings. Draftings, The Crown is yours. Today is Tuesday, November 4th. I'm Jeff Schwartz alongside, Gabe. Goodwin and Gabe, we have a lot to get to this week with the National Football League. Just past the halfway point. College football player frames get released tonight.

We won't have the answer, but we'll sort of know, I think, what were our favorite teams they'll be at. We're with the landscape of college football. Indiana. Who would be number one in the nation? Indiana Hoosiers. Who would have thought two years ago, Gabe? They'd be number one in college football. entering the playoff picture this year, but we got NFL to talk about.

And another week in the NFL, we're like, I don't know, it was the NFL. Oh, okay. I'm sorry, I'm not going to let you off the hook that quick. You know, people who listen to this show think of you as a chiefs guy because you're a chiefs guy. You love Andy. You love the team. You talk about them every week.

They lost their fifth straight Super Bowl to the bills. They did, yeah. You need to face the music here, Jeff. You must be worried. You must be very scared. The problem, first of all, give the bills credit. They play really well, let's do that first. I always do.

It's just you who doesn't give them credit. I picked them to be the Super Bowl this season. Your reverse chinks, I forgot. I forgot about your reverse jinks thing. I have an exact in both directions. The Eagles beating Bill's and Bill's beating Eagles and Super Bowl. I bet before the season. I don't know.

We'll see what happens. Nonetheless, Buffalo played great. And one thing they did in this game, they took advantage of the chief weaknesses. I thought they did a really good job game playing offensively. They ran the ball well, which we thought they could do that. But they stuck with it the first time in 27 games, a rusher has gone over 100 yards to Kansas City. But they also just took advantage of the chief's lack of pass rush. And Josh had a lot of time to sit back there and find those tight ends.

The chiefs don't cover very well. So they did a great job offensively. And then look, the thing that's frustrating about Kansas City offensively at times is I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what, like, there's not a coherent plan it felt like. Even Kurt Warner, who look, and some of the older quarterbacks are more critical, the Chiefs' offense. Troy Eichman's always been this way with Mahomes because it's not often on structure.

And Mahomes has a lot of those things off structure with Travis and, like, a lot of the older guys that played in structure get a little frustrated with watching Chief's office. But even Kurt Warner put out tweets saying, like, I don't know what they do. Like, what are they doing? And it felt that way in offense. They just didn't have a great plan. Like the bills are out the defensive tackles. They didn't run the ball between the tackles.

I can't explain why not. I have no idea why they didn't try it all. First game, the home just thrown under 50% his entire career. I didn't like the plan. I don't know what it was. But in the end, Buffalo played a lot better. And so the Chiefs are five and four now. The Broncos get the Raiders on Thursday.

If they win, the Chiefs will be, what, two and a half back, I believe? and they play each other off the buy. If the cheese do not win off the buy against the Broncos, that's probably it for the division. Like that's how important that game becomes in a few weeks because the way, look, look, Denver has not been pretty. They've won by four, two, one, beat the show of the Cowboys, and won by three this weekend after Ced St.

Trout got hurt. But they're winning. They're seven and two. So this is a big game for Kansas. city coming up in two weeks. Yeah, okay, but let's not look too far ahead yet. Worst passing completion percentage game of Pat's career. Meanwhile, Josh Allen is like setting records, looks unbeatable.

I get that this is a regular season thing in the Chiefs for the last four seasons, just like kind of didn't care because they knew they were better, but they don't know they're better right now. So what, like, how do you not get more prepared? I actually thought, well, I actually thought, so the reason why we picked this game, and we are on a really hot streak of pick, if you try to lose as much as we've lost the last two weeks, you couldn't. It's impossible to lose as much. Like, if you tried, I'm going to pick 10 games to lose in a row. You couldn't do it. You couldn't do it. We have. So that's where we are. Not me, though. No, that's you, buddy. I'm abstaining. I'm just saying. You're saying we. Don't include me in your bad picks. I did cover, Nebraska did cover for me. So thankfully we have one wager I gave out that did cover.

Nonetheless, I thought the Chiefs were better. I thought, and the reason why I thought that is we had seen them play for so many weeks. We thought they were getting to a point where they had done a good job of masking some of their deficiencies, specifically rushing the passer. And offensively, they were at a place that haven't been in years. And Buffalo's won this game for so many years because they've been better. And this year, I thought at this point, the way the boat teams were playing at the moment, the Chiefs were better.

And they clearly are not. They're clearly not better. And so, you know, people joke about, well, they're saving their best stuff for the playoffs. The Chiefs do you have to get there. You know, Buffalo is on track to have the one seed, most likely. I don't think New England will maintain this pace. And the Chiefs are going to have to go maybe on the road if they don't win the division and win a road game and then win another road game and play.

It feels like a really tough task. But they can always do it. But waiting until the end. end of the season to play better. I don't love that philosophy. This is an important game for them. And I thought just schematically in the way they play, they fell flat in their faces. And that's not good, no matter how you want to spin it about what they do in the postseason. But this game does matter. And it was a tiebreaker for the AFC number one seed. They lost it obviously. And I don't like the way they played, whether or not it matters in the postseason. I don't really care.

They should have played better. Yeah. And January is an important month for promoting things. So if you, you know, if you're out of the playoffs, it's much harder to promote your podcasts and your girlfriend's albums and all that stuff. You know, you need those extra piece of inventory, as they say in the business. My, uh, my daughter is very much into the new album. When we're in the car, she's asking me to play a lot of the songs. The, I will say, though, the Elizabeth Taylor Backstreet Boys mashed up they did, the little, they put the songs together, gave very catchy on the internet. Someone like put them, like put Backstreet Boys and Elizabeth Taylor together to form one song.

It's a banger, as the kids would say. I'm fine with not knowing what the hell you're talking about, because I'm going to shift gears. Hank knows. Hank behind the thing, he knows. He's in that age where he understands I'm talking about. He might, he might, but Hank is pretty distraught right now because, you know,

remember he had a clear Super Bowl favorite after one season of watching a guy built like me play quarterback pretty well. He was convinced he was going to win the next 10 Super Bowls with the commanders. They added pieces. They were obviously going back to the NFC championship game. They clearly had made the best choice as a quarterback in history. And then he's been injured the entire season.

And now I'm not making a joke here. Now he's like a really ugly gruesome left elbow dislocation. Like, season's over. Yeah. I don't know what Jaden Daniels future looks like. I want to talk Seahawks in a sec, but like what do you make of the commanders and Jaden Daniels in the way they've treated him? So it's so bad for Hank.

right now that he got on the show talking about watching college basketball last time to scout number one picks for the for the wizards. So that's where that's where he's at right now. He's been thinking about that for a few years in a row now. Yeah. Yeah. So we're scouting the kid of BYU is a kid of Duke. I think the Boozer kids at Duke. I think Boozer's are so. I think I think I think Hank went to France a year or two ago just to scout number one picks he was hoping he could get a lot of guys coming out of France these days and Hank's got a beat on him. him and who's the who's the NBA guy the

win horse him and win horse over there with with with wembe's kind of like smoky French gyms Wemby's too obvious he's on SAR and less like Reese Reesho Cher and all these guys okay so the committee's down 387 and day jails left in the game and injures

an elbow right and I went to bed I woke up I saw that I didn't watch injury but I I've seen this guy before. And then I saw the backlash that Dan Quinn got. That's their head coach of the commanders. And Dan Quinn then spoke yesterday and said, hey, I shouldn't left him in the game. And I want to defend him a little bit here because of a couple of things.

One is that just a few weeks ago, we saw the Broncos score 33 points a fourth quarter and win a football game. Now, is that something everyone's going to do? No. Were you going to win down 387? Probably not. But I understand why coaches play the entire game out. Again, is it foolish? Yeah, I agree.

They weren't winning that game. Why keep Daniels in there? You weren't going to score 33 points in fourth quarter. You weren't going to make it close. I all, I buy those arguments. But I think just like from a psychological standpoint, and it obviously backfired on him. But you played so poorly, right?

They didn't play well. I think you want to feel good heading in the next week. And they did score touch on that drive. It was made of 38 to 14, I believe was that drive. And let's say you get one more drive and you score again. Now it's 38, 21. One, you get your ass kicked absolutely, but you feel offensively, like there's some positive things to look at on the film

instead of just watching film, watching, you know, you get your ass beat the entire game. So I understand the mindset of trying to finish strong. And like, just for confidence, right? Now, it backfuckers, he hurt his elbow. But the thing is, game, these injuries are freakish, right? Like, you can't just not play your players because you think everyone's going to hurt. It doesn't happen like that very often in the NFL.

This sucks. It's going to ruin their season. Their season's done. derails their year. But I think I understand where Dan Quinn was coming from keeping him in the game. And I don't think the backlash, he's gone. He really deserves for those reasons I just mentioned. Yeah, I don't think you can have it both ways, guys.

You can't be convinced that this quarterback is, no, not injury prone and also angry at your coach for playing him in a game. Like, pick a side. Okay, okay, the injury prone thing, though, quickly. So I remember I was doing Pacto Radio in 2019 when he got to Arizona State. It was 2019. He was 175 pounds listed, maybe 160. I mean the first time I saw him, I was like, this is ridiculous. I don't even ask Herm Edwards on the radio about it. Like, how do you, how do you protect him? He goes, well, we try to tell him not to run. I mean,

all this, the coach stuff, right? And then he never got hurt, Gabe. Think you hurt ASU? Think you're hurt LSU. He was never hurt. Go to the NFL. Now, year one, he had a thing, a rib thing for a couple of weeks, but still, I think he played through it. He's not been an injured quarterback. So I think it's unfair to say that, like, everyone saw this coming. Sure, you can say it happened and he's slight frame, but he was not hurt in college. Like, the injury tag thing, I don't understand because he wasn't injured until this season. Right, because he was not playing against guys who could catch him and wrestle him to the ground like they've been doing all season long.

I mean, the guys in the SEC can run at least, the Pac-12, I get it. He's not facing, you got the pack as well, but I'm not just doing, I'm not just doing a bit here. I'm being serious. I'm going to reference a guy who does plenty of great bits, Colin Coward. Colin used to say, you know, I like my quarterbacks to have a little pudding. And you know what he meant, right? Like, I like a little pudding. Like, he liked Tom Brady because Tom Brady was not built like, you know, a bodybuilder nor a sprinter.

He had a little extra pad on it. Matt Stafford, good example. Philip Rivers. Like, the most. durable quarterbacks of a generation all had like a physically like imposing body with some pad on them. And Jaden Daniels does not have any pad on them. And I'm sorry like I'm not a freaking doctor, but like if you're getting smashed to the ground with no extra weight on your body, it's it's going to lead to problems. It's not all freakish. Yeah, I turn my hat backwards for

Colin by the way. Thank you. Yes. Now your take will be more. taken seriously. No, you look, you're right about that. But to claim, like, not just you, but people are claiming, like, they knew this is going to happen to Daniels. You didn't, because it had it happened yet. Like, it sounds good to say that, but we had not seen him get hurt this much. And that's also a freak injury.

Like, I don't know if extra padding or extra pudding would have made a difference other than he can't get thrown that way, right? Like, that would be the issue. I was like, Justin Herbert's probably not getting thrown in the manner that he was getting thrown. By the way, Colin Coward's a backwards take is. actually correct and people should give him more credit for his take on quarterbacks.

No question. Wear your hat forward in press conference. It's like it feels like a professional thing to do. Yeah. So now I'm going to flip to the other quarterback. We can come back to Jane Daniels when we hear a little bit more about what his recovery time will look like. He won't play this season.

Yeah. And Hank's saying what is putting supposed to do for a dislocated elbow? I agree, but it's Jeff's point. You can't get ragdolled if you weigh 230 pounds. I think that's what it is. Like, you're not going to get... I don't watch the whole clip because I didn't want to see his elbow go sideways.

I've seen enough of those in my life, but he got like forcefully thrown down. All the time. You're just not doing that if you're a bigger guy. Yeah. No, that's fair. Okay. And so here's a guy who I...

Look, I don't think much of. And I'm probably like insanely biased here. But this jersey gives me some credibility. I have never believed in Sam Darnold. Truly, even when he was... winning miracle games at USC. I was like, I don't think so, dude.

The guy was a turnover machine. He was just, he was Brett Fav, you know, minus some of the throwing ability. And, and then obviously he stunk with the Jets. And then I,

I turned on Sunday night football. I'm like, what the, again with this guy? Every week? He was 17 to 17 to start the game. I think he had four touchdowns in the first half.

He eventually turned it over like, you know, it wasn't a perfect game in the end. But they blew that game out early and I just can't take him seriously, but I think I'm wrong now. I think it's on me that I can't take Sam Darnold and the Seahawks seriously or are you kind of with me on this? At some point we probably have to. That's a real delay in your response. Here's the thing, Gabe, is here's where this is coming from. So we saw him play with the Jets, right? It didn't go very

well. And then the end of the last season, we saw this Sam Donald last year through 15 weeks or 16 weeks. Yeah, 16 weeks. Wasn't that what we saw last Sunday night? I mean, that was crazy. We saw version of that last season. Okay. And then we saw week 18 and the playoffs.

Yeah. And the two worst games of his season were the two games that mattered the most. I think a lot of us are at the point where it's like, yeah, he did this last year. Show it to us in games that matter, right, Gabe? Because I think now the baseline is probably this. He's a good quarterback in the regular season. Show it to me now in. in the games they matter the most.

They're doing a really good job. They're a heavy personnel team that passes the football. They can't run the football to save their life. I do wonder if teams start figuring this out and start playing them a little bit differently. They throw a bunch of tight ends. They're in heavy personnel a lot of times. Those tight ends did really well the other night.

Like their game plan, their office design is really nice. It's a good job. And so I'm curious if teams adjust off that. But their schedule is easy. I mean, that's what you get when you don't win the division last season. They're very, very live to have the one seed in the NFC. If they, okay, if we assume their schedule,

excuse me, their play continues the way it does, okay? Mm-hmm. It's Cardinals. They got Titans on the schedule. Got the Falcons. Panthers a little bit better, Niners. I mean, it's a little, it's a schedule that you set yourself up for, you know, you win a 50-50 game against the Rams,

and you win the, you beat the Niners, and you're right in line to have the one seed. So it's real, Gabe. I think a lot of us just struggle with the idea that's real, because of Sam Donald because of what we saw the end of last season. Okay, well then should we

maybe, if we think there's a possibility this is real, I'm going to propose an idea here. Should we put a little bit on a coach there for coach the year? Because if he comes out on top of that division, I think we're going to take him seriously.

There's probably no value in that, even though I have a... The value discussion is interesting. He's the guy, he's the former head singer of the Doobie Brothers, right? The coach there? Is that who that is? impressive.

No? No, I'm sorry. I'm going to look here. I thought it was Michael McDonald. I thought that was the same guy. I think it's Mike McDonald. I think it's just Mike McDonald's. Probably Michael in real way, in actual.

Okay. I was led to believe that this was a former yacht rock singer who was now coaching the Seattle Seahawks. If I'm mistaken, I'm sorry. Would you ask me for the coach of the year? Here we go. Let's see here. Yeah, I'd like to know if there's value in that.

While you do that, I'm going to check on Michael McDonald's these kids. It's still five to one. It's actually not bad. You like it? I thought it'd be lower. Shane Steichen is the favor than Vrable. The question is that like the Patriots though are going to finish with the Patriots schedule is easier than Seattle's schedule.

You still get Aaron Glenn though at 300 to 1. You're curious. I wasn't curious, but thank you. Thank you for constantly bringing the Jets up even though I am not a Jets fan. Okay, well, and confirming, though, that the Michael McDonald is alive and well and not coaching the Seattle Seahawks. So I think we're done talking about the Seahawks. I will ask you a little bit about the Niners and the Rams when we get to some faster moving topics. Do you have a feel for the other top teams in the NFC, since we're talking about division winners?

Yeah. You got a little bit more tape to watch. I think Philly's up there, obviously. And then the question is like, what is Detroit, right? Right? I mean, that was a surprising loss. All they were looking, not looking ahead, but thinking the Vikings with McCarthy, they were nearly double-digit favorites. Like, we're going to be able to ride this thing and just play the way we play.

And we're now, they get a commanders team that doesn't have their quarterback, and they play the Eagles. So I'm curious, you know, we'll see in a couple weeks when they go to Philly, how they look, because that is something that, concerning based off the way they played this past weekend, Tampa Bay is going to be good. the one Fugazi team is the Packers. We've talked about them all season long.

I don't buy them at all. I think it's a little awkward take. I gave it yesterday in a different podcast, but there's just like with Jordan Love, I don't think teams fear Jordan Love. I don't think defense just think like he's the guy we have to fear. And because of that, the Packers, you just sort of take your cue off,

your offensive line, in my opinion, and your quarterback, right? Like, that's how the team takes their cue. And when your quarterback's not feared, I just don't see Love sometimes. Like, I know, and I know Packerts have pushed back. He was fine in the game. I mean, okay, fine. Is that good enough for the Packers?

Fine against a, they were 13-point favorites against Carolina. Like, it wasn't a game that fine should have been good enough, right? I just don't think teams fear, Jordan Love. And I think you want to be on, if you're a contender, You want your quarterback to be feared a little bit. I don't think teams feel that way about love in this Packers' offense. I'm going to build upon that and say, I think he's a better quarterback than Sam Darnold,

but I sure fear Sam Darnold more. Like, Sam Darnold could go win me a game. Yeah, I'm not sure Jordan Love is going to just be like, I got this. Get out of the way and go make up a couple scores. I think that's a fair way to put it, yeah. Okay. Wow, look at us agreeing, Jeff.

Well, we're going to get to these two teams that we're wearing and a couple more NFL teams. I want to save the time for college this week. So let's take that break. And then let's do quick hitters in the NFL and then do college. All right, we're back, Gabe. We'll do football here, some quick hitters. We'll get to college football in a second.

But Toronto Blue Jays, you had a chance. You had a chance to make me happy. You had a chance to make the country happy. You blew it. You blew it, Gabe. They blew the game. They blew the series. They win two games at home for,

for all the glory. We've watched a lot of sports being you. We've watched game sevens. I don't know. And of course, someone will come in, please comment if you have one, like a more excruciating way to lose that game than that. Miguel Rojas had 57 home runs in 12 seasons.

You had hit it a month, and you just, and the slider hangs up their home run. You make no bad pitches again for two innings and you hang a breaking ball. Will Smith. home run. You slide, I think if you slide head first,

in the ninth inning, you're probably safe. You slide feet first, and you're out. And, okay, here, this is a replay review thing, okay, for all sports, okay? Reply review should be used, and the original purpose, intent of it, was to fix egregious errors, okay? It wasn't to over-officiate games.

So, like, there was a college basketball game, setting a semifinal game a few years ago, maybe a championship game, a guy had the ball in his hand, a defender hit out of his hand, and as the ball was leaving his hand, it, like, tipped his pinky finger as on the way out. And they ruled the ball was off the offensive player.

That's not what we play reviews for. The ball's off the defensive guy. For 150 years of basketball, it's all the defensive guy. It's not where we play a review for. The end of that game, game, Will Smith's foot, I think, got back on the base. But the ball beat him home. He is out.

I don't want replay to ruin a play like that. Like, Roast made a great play. He's out. The ball beat him there. Like, if Smith's foot is off, the base is not, a home play's not elevated. Obviously, the other three bases are. He's still out, Gabe.

Like, I don't think replay review should be used for now. If he beats the throw, great. We can replay review that. Awesome. He didn't beat the throw. He's out. So I'm glad the World Series is on end on the umpire being like after review. He's safe.

Like, can you imagine the World Series ending like that? Like, that's the end of the end of the show. the World Series. Game 7, an umpire, his camera zoomed down on him, he turns on his mic and gives a safe signal and the Blue does win the World Series. No, that would have been brutal. And I think we all knew in the middle of it that there was just no chance that was going to happen. I would slightly disagree with your framing here living in Los Angeles, as excruciating as it obviously was up in Toronto or for any other place that was rooting against the Dodgers. That was also the most exciting seven-game series I have ever witnessed. I didn't go into it as a Dodger fan.

I'm not even going to say I came out of it at Dodger fan, but I was clearly rooting for the Dodgers with everyone around me and my kids. And I've never been through that much in any sports series. It was incredible. I mean, I went through that with the Giants in 14 when Bumgarner pitched the five innings in relief. And then he gets to the bottom ninth inning, allows a triple because a guy, you know, guy with two outs as they misplay a ball in the outfield, and then he gets Perez to pop out and they win the game. So I've been there before. But the Blue Jays, like, Dodgers had 203 for the series.

Like, they had so many chances to win this series and win this and win a World Series and just didn't do it. They just didn't do it. And last baseball thing on this. So I keep seeing people, the Dodgers had this salary guy and this salary guy and this guy. I despise the dog. Good for them. Good for them.

This is the system that baseball agreed to. If they agree to a system where you can pay the players as much as you want, you have a penalty. Yeah, the doctor are making money hand over a fist. They don't need, they'll play a penalty for the world championship. Of course they will. And if they're going to allow them to defer money, and Otani says, great, I don't need the money.

Great, let's add three of my buddies from Japan on the team to make us better. Good for the Dodgers. That's the system that's, I wish my giants would do that. We have a billionaire owner. you can afford to probably defer payments. Do it as well. So I'm fine with the Dodgers doing this, Gabe. Is it good for baseball?

Who cares? It's the system baseball is allowed. If they want to change it, there's upcoming CBA negotiations. Change the system then. Yeah. Also, the owners of the Dodgers are investing their money in the growth of the entire sport. As we all noticed, this game seven rated higher than game seven in the NBA finals by a lot. by like 10 million viewers.

Yeah, it was a good series. And that is largely because of international stars who were paid to come here, paid a lot of money to come here and play when they were already succeeding somewhere else. Like, that's good for the whole league. You know, like, there is something to the rising tide effect. I get it.

I, look, I was bothered by the way that the Yankees tried to buy their way to World Series in the early 2000s. I thought it took some of the fun out of the game. Maybe if this continues for another couple of seasons, I'll see it that way. But they're reinvesting the money, and this is going to get us back to football. I wonder if certain franchises in professional sports just are not afforded the opportunity to rebuild. The Giants, the Dodgers and baseball, the Yankees, they don't get to rebuild. The cowboys don't get to rebuild, even though so many seasons of the last 30 years were probably the one they should have said,

we got to fold up and rebuild here. Why are they buying? Why are they buying players right now? They suck and they're going nowhere. What are they doing? I don't know. And I don't think Jerry knows. And I think that they just do things on the whim of their owner.

They just traded for Logan Wilson. Yeah. Who was benched in Cincinnati. They just lost last night to Arizona. I don't, I don't, I wish I'd answer for you. It feels like an owner that's just living in the here and now and he does things, he needs a fix. Like, he just needs a fix. Like, he just has to, he just has to buy things.

My wife is like, I'm bored going to home goods. So you don't need a fix. You don't have to go buy anything right now. You don't, you don't need anything. What do you do? Why are you going somewhere to buy stuff? Like, you're just bored. Like, Jerry Jones is bored and he's buying assets that have no,

value and this has there's no reason for them to have Logan Wilson they need to suck and restart their friend and they just won't do it. I don't know if they're prisoners of their own success, you know, like they don't feel like they can ever acknowledge to their band base, which is global. This isn't it. We just we got a we got to trim a little here. But man, it is it is a weird thing to watch them add pieces. Good note from.

from Hank here, a tweet. The Cardinals have played 14 games on Monday night football. They've lost 10 of them. They have won four of them, obviously. All four wins against the Cowboys. Wow. Yeah. What a stat.

That's from someone named Babe Laufenberg. Who's probably fake, and I probably just read a fake stat. No, I think he covers the Cardinals. Okay, it's got a great name. Let's stay on the, we mentioned the trade. So they go get someone from the Bengals. God knows why. here might be why.

The Bengals are an absolute disaster. They're starting running back, who's not great, is basically saying, like, we scored what the hell is with the defense, make a stop and win the game, which, by the way, they did the week before. Jamar Chase also chiming in. I'm a stay in my lane.

I don't want no defensive player to come and chew me out for a while, or for what the F I'm doing, as in I'm not going to do what Chase Brown did and call my defense out for losing a game. Can these guys get on the same page? Do any of them want to be there? Was it just losing Burrow was all it took to show this whole team was a mess?

Like what the hell? So I didn't listen to Chase Brown because I just whatever. I don't care. Maybe I put it, but I did see that that quote that was out there might not be accurate of the way what he actually said in the whole totality. But nonetheless, this Bengals team is historically bad on defense. Like out of the last 12th,

25 years they rank as some of the worst defense that we've ever seen in the NFL. There's a picture of Loveland who catches the ball there at the end for the Bears, there's like three guys that have looked like they've tackled them, and they just don't. They just don't tackle me, score a touchdown. Here's another DVOA stat. The Bengals have the second worst defense through nine games by DVA since 1978. You know, look, it's a team game obviously, right?

Like there's frustration and I think week after week after week, it probably gets to a point where it just boils over a little bit too much. And I think it's okay to have this emotion game because it feels very natural. And when you score 42 points, you should win a game. I was on a team the 2015 Giants that had one of the worst defense NFL history. We lost a game 52-49.

We scored 49 points on offense and you lost. And like, there's just no more you can do. I think it's natural to just let some of that out. Just be like F this. Like this is the, you know, just screw this, right, Gabe? Like, I, I will allow them in the moment to be emotional.

Obviously come Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday, they're going to be back with the team, I can obviously like, but I think it's fair for them to have those feelings after the game. You think it's fair. I mean, a good team probably responds

the way you are, which is just like, all right, man, he's just blown off steam, we're good. I don't care. We know we're fine. They're terrible. And so I think everyone can be like, well, hold on, aren't you the guy who averages like two yards of carry? Haven't you had some turnovers and like? No, I, right. The finger pointing could happen, and that's obviously like not good.

But again, like, I think it's fine in that moment when Jamar Chaz is walking off the field in his uniform to say in that moment like, F this shit, come on defense, let's get together. Just like, I think it's okay for a defense. After the third week in a row, your offense gives you a touchdown to walk off the field and say, come on offense, like pick this shit up. I think those are both fair things to say. The question is, does that bleed over into your preparation on Monday?

and Tuesday and Wednesday. And look, the defensive guys know. They're not, they're not, they know how they're going to be looked at in the locker room. Look at after the game. I think once you come to Monday, good teams say,

that happened, let's get better now. We don't know, I don't know if they're on a buyer who they play this week, but that's something to look forward to to see, like, if that is the case. But I will say, though,

does Joe Flacco playing as well as he is, make you feel different about Joe Burrow. I've been asking you that for weeks. Yes. The sack rate is way down. I saw a tweet, like the sack rate is like 4%. And Burroughs above 10 every season. Yeah.

Look, I don't think that Joe Flacco is better than Joe Burrow, but I think that Joe Flacco not being that much worse than Joe Burrow is kind of an interesting point. Hey, man, Jamar Chase is down there somewhere, just throw it to him, right? I mean, I can't tell if you're being sarcastic right now, but yeah, like on some level, just throw it over there. That guy will get it. I'm not being sarcastic. That's what's the heck of what's happening.

I mean, he got, he had a lot of receivers the last few years. And, I mean, the line's never been great. But if you can just zing it to a couple of pro bowlers, it should work out. All right. I think that was probably more Bengals talk than the world was looking for. So let's stay in the division, though. The Steelers win. Now I'm confused because the Ravens, who I thought were dead, get Lamar back.

He looks like Lamar. The division winner could be a nine or ten win, you know, team. What do we pick in here? What do we want to? Because we're about halfway. Like, should we put a little money on something? Who's going to win this stupid thing? So right now, according to draft kings,

Ravens are minus 140, threeers are plus 130. Yeah. So here's. Ravens are a favorite even though they're a losing team currently. Against the team that never has a losing season just for the right. Yeah. So Pittsburgh's won two games this year where they forced five or more turnovers. It just feels wholly unsustainable, man.

The voodoo was out in full force on Sunday. It just was at, like tip balls, fumble. They forced six turnovers. They scored five against New England. New England fumbled. Remember, New England fumbled interception twice in the end zone. Like, they showed at 35 points in that game. So I think it's still, the Ravens are just better.

I think the Ravens are better and they make less mistakes. And they have less of these voodoo games, like less games where it's like we need six turnovers to win or five turnovers to win. That's not sustainable. Yeah. No, not at all. I don't want to talk about the team in Indianapolis. They lost. Fine.

Maybe Daniel Jones isn't great. Duh. Maybe Fonex isn't great. We'll come back to that one day. they keep winning, scoring less than 20. I got a provocative question for you. Yeah. Should Kyler Murray switch positions to extend his career?

We're not going to get aggregated for this. So, but he... Give me your honest feeling. No. No, he shouldn't, but he's not going to be Arizona Cardinals' Court. I'm one year late on this. I said last season, last offseason, was it this off season?

Man, no, last off season. I think, and I thought Collar Murray was not going to be the Cardinals quarterback to end to 2024. season. I was a year or two early. He's not going to be the quarterback to end this season. So everybody says doing fine. It's playing well. He's getting the ball where out, where it has to go. Is he his dynamic as of Colorado Murray? No. But there is a lot of value just throwing the ball where it's supposed to go on every given play. And the offense looks super confident right now with 50% of the line. So I think Murray is done. I think they'll find a way to ship out of there.

and maybe a contender will look for a quarterback like him or he'll be a backup. I don't know, but he's not going to be quarterback for Arizona next season. I think someone should get tricky and turn him into some kind of a trick play player. Why? I don't think so.

I mean, does anyone doubt his ability to run with the ball? Yeah, but there's more to it than just that. And see the field. We know that. He's a competitive guy. Someone will trade for him to be their quarterback. Probably the Jets. I'm not taking the bait on that.

We're not going to talk about the Jets. We can talk about the field that they play on, and then we can get out of here on the Niners. So more injuries on the MetLife turf. I've reached sort of the tipping point here. I used to ignore the complaints about MetLife turf. I used to think this was just an easy narrative, a set of coincidences.

I'm starting to think maybe really actually there is something going on. I don't get it, Jeff. You've played on that field. Like, what can you tell me about this turf and why it keeps injuring people, allegedly? So we text, right? Me, you, me, you, Hank and Matt, we have a text thread. And then every now and then Gabe's like, hey, man, I've got to call you for a second, okay? And most of the time, it's like a business thing.

It's like, this is happening. This is happening. But normally it's not calling for anything. Yesterday Gabe texts me, hey, man, can you chat? I was like, oh, maybe something happened with a podcast. Maybe we're, things are moving and grooving. No, no, no. He just wanted to call about MetLife turf

yesterday for like 15 minutes. I thought more about this game. Okay, I don't have a great answer for you. The one thing that I need to research on this is like there's only two teams in the NFL that share, right? SoFi and MetLife, or they share teams, right? I'm correct on that. Yeah, there's places like Pittsburgh

that share the college team and the NFL team. But I don't think there's only two teams, right? stadiums that share. And I don't know if the Giants have different turf because they have to remove it every time they play. So like they take it off for, they put a brand new turf for the Jets and a brand new turf for the Giants. I think in Los Angeles, where they actually just scrub the painting off and then repaint for whatever team is playing. I think that's correct. I have to double check. So maybe someone do with that where the turf is not as good because they're having to take it off and on so much. I don't know. I'm speculating. But when you play, this is going to like a not the best answer in the world but when you you go on the turf or you go on grass and you

start walking around before the game you play enough where there's a certain feel to the the turf and I think players go there and just it must feel different to them and that's look they had an ACL injury yesterday by the Niners one of their pass rushers that just had injuries maybe just unlucky but this turf has got a lot of I just gave my big time. toe in this turf. I'm not sure what I just came to my toe on grass. I might have done on different turf as well, but it was just my toe popped in the ground and just like popped out.

And unlike Jason Kelsey, I won't show my foot to the entire world displaying a foot injury. And I, it wouldn't have happened on grass. Does it happen on a different turf? I don't know. Maybe the turf in indoor fields is different than outdoor fields. I don't have all the answers, but we can start researching some of this if you would like. I just think it's starting to be a thing that doesn't just become the easy take. You know, the point of this show is for you to, like, split apart lazy takes.

And I'm susceptible to lazy takes because I don't know how the hell football actually works. But even I was like, I don't know, guys, I think you're just complaining about the turf because there've been some high profile injury. Seems like that we're going to play the World Cup there. Like, I think people know how to build a field in New York City. But the World Cup, don't they bring any grass for that? my point is just it's not like somebody's like cut in corners

at one of the most famous places to play sports in the world I think that they have the capability of having good turf. This is not Philly in the 80s you know, and they're trying to save 10 bucks. So I didn't buy it,

except now I'm buying it because it just keeps on happening to their players, to visiting players, it's constant. Yeah, it sounds like this is a case for like an off season

of Pablo finds out This feels like a, like, uh, it doesn't rise to the level of like, you know, getting secret recordings of Jordan, Jordan Hudson and Bill Belichick. But, um, and, uh, my, my wife actually, I made this comment before. My wife is not like an online person, Gabe. And so she's at home good. She doesn't have time to look at the internet. And she's also, I don't know how she does her life.

That's unimportant. Um, but she brings me stuff like weeks later. Like, for example, this weekend, she goes, hey, do you see this video that of like, why is Joe, why is Bill Batchel's girlfriend talking to the coaches like this? I'm like, this is a month old. Like, why are he going over this? Down the street from where you live, bud.

This is all anyone in your neighborhood would talk about. And like, and it's just like, I've made this comment before. Like, she watched the nightly news. Like she watched it last night. The kids were at swim. She put on the nightly news at 6.30 with David Muir. Like, that's her news consumption of the day.

Whatever is on nightly news from 630 to 7. is her thing. She watches political debates because she has not heard from the candidates, the entire election cycle until the actual debate. It blows my mind

how she operates this way, but she doesn't have, she's Instagram, that's it, no TikTok, no Facebook, no Twitter. Her IG is just like

funny dog videos and furniture and decor and home decoror stuff. So it's funny. She brings me this stuff like a month after it happens.

It's very funny. Well, you know, she'd be a great person to talk to about this next topic that we'll hit after the break,

which is who's actually the best team in the SEC. I think the problem is we've watched them play seven, eight weeks. Maybe someone with fresh eyes could tell me because I really truly cannot figure out who's actually the best team in that conference. They're all pretty good. Maybe she could just spot it this week and go, yeah, it's Alabama. Oh, no, it's Georgia, clearly.

Or you could tell me because that's the point of the show. I will give you answers after the break. I'll give you answers after the break. I have them. All right. We'll do it next. Okay, we're back from break. Yeah.

My wife's not going to be here to bring up SEC teams. I will do it for you. Okay. The best team in the SEC is Alabama. They're the best team in my opinion. Obviously, A&M is ranked higher than them. A&M plays Missouri this weekend, who doesn't have their quarterback, and then they play Texas in week, whatever, 15, whatever the 14,

whatever the last game of season is. There's a chance, by the way, Gabe, that Texas at 9 and 3 makes the playoff. Yeah. Just let you know that. It's a very, people get ready for it. It's a very, it's a possibility that it's very likely to happen. Texas would have to, I think, 9 and 3 would have to lose to Georgia coming up. Excuse me, beat Georgia.

They'd go right in the top 10 if they beat Georgia. And then you can lose to A&M in the final week of the season by three points. It's still being a playoff team in my opinion. But I don't think Texas is even like in the top four of these teams. So it's Alabama, A&M. I put Georgia. Georgia is unique because they're not the same team they've been over the years.

But Kirby Smart has said, and it's true, it's hard to kill us, and they've had multiple comeback, you know, come from behind victories, they've had multiple opportunities to lose games, and they win, they win them. Also, quick tangent, it's not a bad beat

if you haven't been covering for 59 minutes and 30 seconds, and then you have a chance to cover the game and you don't. So, for example, Georgia was favored by seven. They were not winning by seven the entire game. Florida, in fact, was winning most of the game. Now is 24 to 20.

The ball is at the four-yard line. It's third and one. Not Stetson Bennett. Gunner Stockton runs a zone read. He pulls the ball. He runs. He takes a knee at the two-yard line instead of running into the end zone. Game is over, okay?

They weren't within the number. The entire game. That's not a bad. beat if you were on Georgia, you were the wrong side. The entire game, I guess they were up 7-0 to start the game. So you're the wrong side game for most of the game. That's not a bad beat. We have to do a better job of talking about what bad beats are.

That's not one of them. Continue with what you're going to say. No, no. I'm actually really happy with that idea. I also thought a bad beat was when you have it covered and then some crazy thing happens to spoil it for you. It would have been a bad beat if you were on Florida, like the other way around. That would have been the bad beat.

But people were saying it was a bad beat if you had Georgia. No, it wasn't. Correct. If you had Florida, it was a bad beat. So it's beside the point. So those are the top five. Oklahoma had a big win against Tennessee, but I just don't buy the offense fully.

Tennessee's defense has been really bad this season. So, again, Alabama, A&M, Georgia, Ole Miss, Texas, those are probably, there's probably five SEC playoff teams. Like Vandy, Oklahoma can get in. because the rest of the country right now, you have Indiana, Ohio State, right? Oregon's got a tough schedule coming up, got to win this weekend to Iowa,

and they'll beat USC, but Washington will be tough on the road. And even at 10 and 2, maybe they get in as well. USC can be in, Washington can be in. I don't know. ACC is going to have one now, probably after the Carnies we saw this past weekend. The Big 12 is going to have one. The SEC is probably getting five teams in.

Wow. Okay. Don't you think, though, that there's a little exhaustion with them and in a coin toss between the fringe Big Ten team and the fringe SEC team, they're just going to go Big Ten?

Which favors teams like our two teams? Well, so this is a thing. I'm curious how the college football voters tonight give us the rankings game because this matters a lot to discussion.

So for example, Oregon's playing Iowa this weekend. Iowa is 7 and 2. They've lost by 5 to Indiana and 3 to Indiana State. And they're not ranked, Indiana State, Iowa State. So excuse me, they're not ranked. Tennessee, meanwhile, has lost three games,

Georgia, Alabama, and Oklahoma. They've been no ranked teams, and yet they're ranked ahead of Iowa. That narrative matters, right? because let's say Oregon wins this weekend. That's not a ranked win, Gabe. Right. It counts a ranked win.

Even though I think everyone in the country believes they should be a ranked team. Now, the CFP playoff rankings might change that. But a lot of the narrative is based off of that. And all these SEs teams are ranked and they all get ranked wins. And the resume looks a lot better when you have ranked wins. You don't get that if you're a big 10 team because they're not ranking your teams over the three lots of SEC team. Yeah, I tried to explain this theory to my seven and a half. old son. Big sports fan. We've talked about him here. This is a little beyond his depth.

Like, no, no, no, we're rooting for Notre Dame this week because it makes our, you know, like, and he was like, what? We hate Notre Dame. Like, we do. That's right. But, you know, it's complex the way that you have to root for this stuff. Are you going Friday night, by the way? It's a late. We'll be skipping. We'll be skipping. We'll be skipping the local time. The journalism bowl. That's not for us. We've got a full day of sports on Saturday. A long drive to make it 5 o'clock on 5 p.m. on Friday, too. Yeah, some Clippers tickets. We got some folks here at Blue Duck Media who'll be at the Northwestern game.

Some Northwestern fans who work in our industry who want to go to that game. We'll get them hooked up. I was going to ask you about BYU, Texas Tech. Probably the biggest game of the weekend, but whatever. You'll make a pick on that maybe on Thursday. Texas Tech is a 10-point favorite. That's what to tell you about this game this weekend. Yeah.

I think any team in Utah is scary. I'm scarred by Utah team. I'd watch out for BYU. Let's end on embarrassing you a little bit. So congratulations. You have been called out for a freezing cold take. If we can pull that up, please on screens. It's up there.

It's on the screen. Yeah, everyone sees it. Okay, great. So I don't care that they pulled me up on this, whatever, but they didn't tag me in it. Like, at least, like, give me the followers. Like, people can come to my page and see things I've said that have been correct. I would they didn't tag me in it like that feels a little rude doesn't it Gabe you're gonna put if you're gonna

give me a cold take at least tack my my my Twitter handle on there yeah say it to my face a guy that that we don't follow and and but it he said this before he goes like every time it's true every time that like you say I don't like this person or I don't like this take and you put out the universe let's say 10 people read it like two or three or three or three are going to be like, ah, kind of like this guy's take, and they're going to follow that person. Like, it's not, it's not like a, just tag me in the picture, tag me in the post. I was wrong about Miami.

And my third part about being wrong about stuff is, of course, we give opinions all the time. I'm on shows Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, Sunday, you're going to have wrong opinions. As people will come at you and be like, you're an expert. How can you get that wrong? I go, I don't know. I have to give opinions and stuff like you get stuff wrong all the time.

The hit rate for our industry is like 2%. I don't know. Like, what do you expect to happen? It doesn't. You have opinions all the time. At the time, Miami looked at the best in the country. They were four and no. They beat Florida.

South, they'd be one of these games. They beat Notre Dame. Like, they looked great. And I was wrong. And people get, they get so passionate about telling you that you were wrong.

Gabe, it's so funny to me. Well, you know what, Jeff? I like to give you shit. But right now I'm going to get your back here. Hey, all you people coming at Jeff, afraid to tag him. This guy's right sometimes.

He was right about one of the most consequential moves of the off season. Hank, cue it. Give me the Rico Dowdowdell tweet. Who was on that first? Our boy, Jeff Schwartz. Jeff Schwartz told you, this is going to come back and be a great signing. Where's Jeff Schwartz's love for that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Where's my hot takes exposed? Whatever, man. We get stuff right or wrong. It's part of our industry. And I just find the response to things that are wrong, like, very funny. Well, get a few picks right for me this weekend, please. It's been hard to bet on the NFL this year.

Get them right. Jeez. It's like impossible bit of the NFL. I'm debating Northwestern plus 14 a half Friday night, though. Stop, dude. Stop doing this. It's more because. And you didn't say with the points, you said straight up, Nebraska.

You didn't say you were. On the show, I took them, I took them. It was a best bet on bare bets plus six and a half. Oh, sorry. You're making a show every other day of the week. How am I supposed to see them all? When I talk to you, you told me they were going to win straight up. And Northwestern Post 14.5 might make the card this weekend game.

Look and Riley complaining about the schedule right after they went against Nebraska. Premier River, buddy. All right. We're done. We back on Thursday. Can't do any worse. See how it goes. Talk to you guys on Thursday.

Take care, everybody.