Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Chiefs Bills Recap, the Eagles are Legit, and the NFL's Upset Special

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

Geoff is back with Gabe to talk through the Chiefs loss to the Bills in the rematch of last season's AFC Divisional matchup. Both these teams have been at the top of the league all season, but this week Geoff is ready to put a third team up there with them: the Eagles. Plus, the Jets pulled off a surprising win over the Packers. Will that be enough to pull Gabe back in?This week on Moving the Line, Geoff breaks down the playoff implications of Utah's victory over USC, and Gabe wonders if Tennessee's win over Bama paves the way for four SEC teams to make the playoff. Also, we check in on Beth from Buffalo!As always, be sure to follow and rate the pod if you enjoyed, and leave a comment or tweet @geoffschwartz to let the boys know what you think. Did you donate money to buy TU a new goalpost? Explain yourself! No judgement, we just want to know.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

it's Tuesday October 18th I'm Jeff Schwartz alongside Gabe Goodwin this is Jeff Schwartz to smart on you powered by the varsity podcast network Gabe is fired up he's been waiting to talk down about the Chiefs for a long time now covering up of course his USC Trojans losing don't do that to Utah and he just he just didn't text me after the game I was very disappointed in Gabe so much to talk about the National Football League. Is anyone good? I don't know. We'll talk about it today.

And some college football talk as well. Please, if you like the show, give us a rating, give us a review. We absolutely love to hear all the feedback. Gabe, how was your sports weekend? One of your teams is really good, the one you swore off. Stop evading the topic, Jeff. The Chiefs lost to the Bills. People like you have been promising me that wouldn't happen,

and now you surely have a bunch of excuses. Talk about that. Don't talk about my Trojans. Wait, wait, what? I promised they would win? I thought, I didn't know I promised that. You just assured me over and over again that the Chiefs were the better team, that the Bills got approved in the postseason.

Yada, yada, yada. I picked the Bills to win the Super Bowl this season. So a couple things about this game. The Bills were the better team, and they won the game. I mean, that's not, I don't think that's anything of a surprise here. The Bills, this kind of goes to show you, I think kind of like how you slowly build up a roster to get ready to win a Superbowl, right? They obviously have, you know, got Josh Allen, but they did everything to make sure that

he improved. Again, that improvement is unbelievable and they continue to improve, right? Like last season, guys, there were 32nd in variance on offense, which means basically they were the least consistent team week to week on offense. If you remember last year, they'd have one week they'd score 39, then go to Jacksonville and score six. The entire season was up and down like that.

This year, not a problem. Right in the middle of the pack, invariant. So they're much more consistent on offense. They've done this, by the way, without having to use josh allen's legs as much which they did at the end of the chiefs game which i really liked um i think josh allen this season just is a little more refined uh refined not making the errors right um you know he did throw that ball away in the first drive which kind of silly mistake of his but the chiefs pressured him no withering no bad throws just continued to make plays.

He was very impressive. And then the Von Miller addition, kind of going to like the roster building game, that stood out as a big difference in this game, where Von Miller was able to dominate the game and the Chiefs had no one to rush the passer like him. And if you're looking at like one thing in this game that you would say is the biggest difference between these teams, if they meet again in January,

it's the pass rush, right? The Bills were able to get home with three or four guys, most often Von Miller, keep a lot more guys in coverage, where the Chiefs had to bring pressure. And it left a lot of one-on-one matchups with young defensive backs.

And, you know, the Chiefs and Bills both have injuries in the defensive backfield that'll be, I would imagine, by January in an upcoming rematch. They'll be in Buffalo now. We'll change by then, but still. So I thought it was a good football game, man. Like, it's why the NFL is the best, because you have a week six game that felt like a playoff game.

Like, I mean, look, even in college football, Tennessee-Alabama was an awesome game, right? 52-49, USC, Utah, great football game. Was it 43-42? It was a good game. Come on, game. But like this game just hit differently. Like it just, it felt different, right?

Two of the best quarterbacks in the NFL, two really good franchises. And so the Bills were better. They were favored by three. They won the game. And they're a good football team, man they're good okay well actually i will compare it to the usc game because there were a lot of similarities like cam rising's nothing like josh allen in terms of overall talent but similar sort of ability to just take over and use his body to will a team to victory, but left a minute or so on the clock for the better team with the better quarterback

who couldn't get it done. There were actually similarities there. So I guess I'm wondering, are we sure for all the people out there giving the take that this solidifies the as the better team in the AFC? Are we of that and how much does that home field advantage really make a difference it should make a Chiefs fan like you nervous um well it certainly should I mean the Chiefs have not played a road playoff game under Pat Mahomes uh which is just kind of wild and you know they have and they've also not been the one seat they've been the ones only two of the four years they've had they've hosted games at home as the two seed twice. The glaring issue

that I see with the Chiefs right now, I mentioned the pass rush, and that can get better. They have young players. Maybe that gets better. Again, defensively, they add Willie Gayback. They'll add Trent McDuffie in the secondary. They'll be fine, I think, on defense. Offensively, a couple things. One

is their tackles are giving up a bunch of pressures they just are wiley if wiley you're right tackles your worst guy in your offense line you're still doing pretty well like he's a good football player for what he is uh reminds me a lot of myself like just kind of like battle out there you're gonna lose some you're gonna win some but you know you're you're just you're doing what you can to get by and he's good again if he's your worst lineman you're doing fine as an offensive line Orlando Brown's giving up too many pressures got to play better but I think we're seeing in some of these games the bits and pieces of where Tyreek Hill mattered right um and it does not mean the Chiefs offense is not good Chiefs offense is fine they can score points um but

you know Pat doesn't trust a wide receiver yet he just doesn't he doesn't trust someone when he's scrambling and to make that that special play that used to always be Tyreek Hill getting open I think we're seeing a little bit more use of Sky Moore which is good for this offense I feel like that could be the connection that is that Tyreek Hill-esque type of guy. You're not going to replace Tyreek Hill. But we're not seeing those as many

second window off-platform plays as we have in the past because he doesn't really have MVS is good, drops a couple passes. Juju's getting kind of in the swing of things. he doesn't he doesn't trust someone quite yet outside of travis kelsey gabe and i think it shows in games like this so you mentioned sky more and the little tiny it seems to me being the dummy on

this show that like a step in the wrong direction timing being off by half a second these are the kinds of things that make a big difference to an andy reed offense and to pat specifically so i don't want to blame sky more but maybe we should like what happened on the the game ending pick because i feel like it was a i was i was the defense made a great play that's all it is he just jumped it made a great yeah but i mean it was a it was pat should have seen that but the defense i mean just jumped it and made a great play. Yeah, but I mean, it was, Pat should have seen that. But the defense, I mean, the guy dove and made a great play. He picked it off with athleticism. Yeah, they forced Mahomes out of the pocket on kind of the rush.

Miller probably had a two-way go. He went inside. Unfortunately, and this is something that's very technical for the offensive line, like Trey Smith, the right tackle, Wiley, was in good position. He was fine. And then Trey, like, hit Von Miller, like, in the side and back, kind of forced him closer into Pat. Pat rolls out.

They have the spy come downhill on Pat. And he threw the ball. It was a bad throw. It was a bad decision. I think it was cover two that Conor was kind of squalling right there on that crossing route. And, look, the interception on the first drive was the first yeah first drive wasn't great either i mean mvs hasn't shown the ability to

to catch those 50 50 balls um you know again josh allen made that bad error on the first drive too so they kind of had both bad errors on their on their opening drives and obviously pat at the end that's a difference right like i didn't feel as confident as a Chiefs fan they would go score a touchdown as I would if they had Tyreek Hill. I think, like, that's where you see it, right? And again, the offense is number one right now in expected points added.

They're number three in DVO. They're fine. They're going to be fine. And they are fine. But remember, I told you guys, it would take six to eight weeks to start feeling kind of like where the offense're going to be fine. And they are fine. But remember, I told you guys, it would take six to eight weeks to start feeling kind of like where the offense is going to be at. And I think that when they get off schedule, it gets good teams.

Not against the Raiders, the Bills, right? It gets good football teams. That they just don't have that guy that can really change change the play because you know change the play at wide receiver like they had tyreek you know this shows up very subtly sometimes in games like this yeah the real winner of this game vegas i mean my god i know you spend a whole episode and half your life talking about betting and you love looking at chiefs games but man i was like i get to have the chiefs as a home dog it's like i saw it as two and a half or three and a half i was like that seems like easy money and then sure enough i mean 24 20 like i don't know how the

hell they do it dude i i mean we'll talk about this with Matt. Gambling on the NFL, man, is like, it's so... Like, we had a winning week. We went 3-2, and you're just like, holy shit, man. It is exhausting. It's brutal. Our two losses happened in the final minute of both games. Yeah. Both teams were worth, in the number, the Chiefs and the Saints for the entire game

until the final... Well, the Saints was two minutes and the Chiefs one minute we still went three and two yeah man it is um and and of course the books won because every single soul bet the over in that game which I could have I could have told everyone do not do that I'm under hitting that one dude I thought it was a good game like again I think you're it's pretty obvious where the top teams in each conferences are after this week. And then the Chiefs and Bills very clearly are the top of the AFC conference. Yeah, I don't think we'll spend as much time on the Ravens as we could today.

And they definitely took a step backwards. Let me ask you this. You can be honest here. You're saying you're taking the Bills to win the Super Bowl, but are you doing some sort of jinx thing no no i thought that this was their year i said the beginning of the season that um the chiefs are not as good as last season i don't think okay and they they will be there it might be next year they're gonna they're fine again they're they're gonna be in the game again i imagine on the road to buffalo i don't know four to six point underdogs i guess somewhere around there based off of this game this past weekend depending on the teams kind of finish up

and i thought this is buffalo's year again they went and got von miller i thought was great josh allen continues to play well the one concern i had was the new office corner ken dorsey that seems to not be a problem and i think they're the best team in the NFL. I picked them to win the Super Bowl. I mean, no one in the NFC right now feels like a great option. I mean, we'll talk about the Eagles in a second. I'll explain kind of why they're not a great option yet. But yeah, Buffalo is the best team in the NFL.

It's no surprise, I think, where they're at right now. And even if they lost that game, I don't think I would change my opinion on them. These are two teams they're going to meet in the NCAA championship game. It's a matter of getting there as healthy as possible and getting there. If you're Kansas City,

try to find a pass rush and just trying to find that connection between Mahomes and a wide receiver that he feels comfortable ending situations, moving outside the pocket, things like that. that connection between Mahomes and a wide receiver that he feels comfortable ending situations, moving outside the pocket, things like that. Is there any chance in a game like that that either team is holding something back, not wanting to show their full hand for the season?

No, and I thought, again, the Bills for years have killed the Chiefs with running Josh Allen on sweeps. And they hadn't done it. I don't know if the Bills have called one, like, all season. And they brought out that final drive, man, after the two-minute warning. It was when he hurtled the Chiefs defender. Like, they brought it out. You know, the Chiefs just ran back the same game plan they always do against Josh Allen. They pressured the shit out of him from his it out. You know, the Chiefs just ran back the same game plan they always do against Josh Allen.

They pressured the shit out of him. From his throwing hand. It worked in the first half. Didn't work in the second half as much. I mean, these teams are pretty even. I mean, look, you see the mistakes, right? You see a missed field goal by Kansas City. You see, you know, the pitch that Josh Allen had.

The early interception Mahomes had. Penalties here and there that kind of kill teams or don't kill teams. In these type of games, man, it's the little errors that really stand out. I'm just very pleased it wasn't the refs to blame. We'll get into that anger later. We don't blame the refs on this podcast game. Okay, well, we're going to have to. The team you brought up, NFC's best team right now is the Eagles.

They beat the Cowboys who had been hot. You know, I think a lot of us are kind of like still not sure we want to go all in on the Eagles. But you tell me, like, if either the Chiefs or the Bills make it to a Super Bowl and that's who they get, is there any chance they aren't a huge favorite? The Eagles or the eagle or the or the afc team the afc champ um look and this eagles team really keep it up i guess that's what i want here's the thing about the eagles um if they just had to play the first half of every game they'd be the best team in all of football history like right like they yeah they have been so good in the first half of games this season. In the first week, they're up 38-21 in the fourth quarter of that Lions game.

They scored 24 first-half points. They won 38-35. They scored zero second-half points in two straight weeks. Wins against Minnesota, win against Washington. The next week against Jacksonville, they scored nine points in the second half against Jacksonville. And then against Dallas,

against Arizona, they scored six points in the second half. And against Dallas, they scored seven. Excuse me, six, because they missed the two-point. They got to find a way to play better offense in the second half of games. And the idea that I have, I asked some people that have watched Eagles more than I do about this

because I have an idea of what it is, and they kind of confirmed it, is this staff does a really good job, this staff being the Eagles staff, of game planning based off the film. Right? They come out, that first 15 plays, their second quarter point differential is like plus 100.

They're so good early in games. And when teams adjust to them, they don't make the adjustment back. And that is why they can't really do much, in my opinion. They don't make that adjustment. And then they realize, too, teams realize, like, the Eagles aren't really throwing the ball downfield very often. And, you know, the run game, you kind of, they scored twice against Dallas

where they kind of leaked out the wide receiver, right? Kind of like on one of those, on a bootleg type of thing. Like, those don't work after you run them a couple of times. Like, you know what I mean? Like, they ran them. They worked. They don't really work the fourth and fifth and sixth time you do them. And so, I think that's what it is.

It's the adjustment part. And I'm not saying they can do it, but they just haven't shown so far the ability to play well offensively in the second half of games well let's drill into that a tiny bit further in case there's something smart you can teach us here so uh good on hank for finding this stat good on the nfl research team so they've scored 112 points in the second quarter of their six games that's like a record by a million but they basically don't score in the second quarter of their six games. That's like a record by a million. But they basically don't score in any other quarter. They're averaging

three scores in every other quarter. 112 points. We're not averaging. They've totaled three scores in every other quarter. What is it about the second quarter? Is there something that happens? I mean, my guess is it's kind of like you know the accumulation of everything i just

mentioned where kind of the opposite everything i mentioned right like they're they're just they're they're game planning up and they're able to make the one adjustment off the first look they showed right got it and then it's like and that happens obviously after the first drive okay here's how they're playing us let's make the one adjustment make the one adjustment and then do we make the next one right like dude is our base offense going to work in the second half and that's i think what they're doing in in the second quarter of games is they're just they're just blitzing teams man like they show what they do in the first quarter they show the next playoff of that especially with some of those rpo and the run looks and stuff like that you know the offensive line typically the run game takes a little bit

of time to get into a rhythm by the second quarter you feel a little bit better about it you're ripping off those bigger runs screen passes work a little bit better once it's kind of the defensive line gets in a little bit of a lather tries to rush the passer a little bit that that makes sense about when you watch them play why that would be happening in the second quarter. Now, defensively, I don't know why they don't allow points second quarter. Just like the Bengals have not allowed or have allowed one touchdown so far in the second half all season. Some teams, I can't explain it. I don't know why.

Yeah. Let's talk Jalen Hurts specifically then because you know remember we came into this season I was not one of these people but a lot of people were like well this is the year like they want to get rid of him and so this is the year that they'll show that he isn't the guy so they can go get their guy well I don't know why that was anyone's opinion but he's obviously outperformed anyone who thought that he's moving towards that top tier of quarterbacks in the league. Probably not all the way there. Like, why are he and the coaches there

and the other playmakers there such a good match? And is this who he is? Or is there some sort of reversion coming? So this is an example of an offensive mind, Nick Sirianni, just tailoring the offense to what he does best, to what Hurts does best.

For so long in the NFL, they tried to make the quarterback fit the offense, not the offense fit the quarterback. And they were just seeing a perfectly tailored offense for what Jalen Hurts can do. Look, to me, we're at this point now where very clearly Jalen Hurts can win a lot of regular season games there's no doubt about it to me now the next step is the playoff wins right it's how do you play in the playoffs you'll be the one seed most likely how do you do you get

a super bowl you gotta win one game one home game to host the ns championship game like are we getting there like that to me game that the next step now on his progression. I know people always say, well, the playoffs is a small sample size. Well, sure is. Not a lot of teams make the playoffs, and there's not a lot of playoff games. But that's why you got to be buttoned up. You don't have a lot of opportunities to play in playoff games. So to me, we're at that point now where the Eagles

are going to lose once or twice most likely. We're not going to defeat it. And then how does Hertz play as a one seed hosting? Could be Green Bay. Could be, Vikings are 5-1 right now. The Packers might be a wildcard team on the road to play the Eagles. I don't know. The NFC right now is, there is, I tweeted this last night, people got

offended by this. I said, there are three teams right now I trust in the playoffs. I put the Eagles up there, then they're playing good football. Again, the Hurts thing we'll see. The Bills and the Chiefs. That's it. There's 29 other teams in the NFL. I don't trust a single one of them.

They're all like 3-3. The NFC is like Carolina stinks, and then everyone's 3-3 except the Cowboys, Vikings, and Eagles. Everyone's in the middle of the season, and I don't trust any of them. And it's going to make for really fun playoffs if you can get a lot of teams in there

that maybe were good aren't as good anymore but get better later in the season it's gonna be a wild playoffs game yeah well you left out the giants and your teams that are not average they look above average right now but the nfc sucks so who knows steelers up our eagles upcoming schedule which starts with the steelers looks very very easy so we'll we. I think we're going to have to keep talking about them. The Cooper Rush era, we were saying we don't know when it'll end if he keeps winning. So now he loses a division game and Dak looks ready.

We saw last night. It's not. It's over. That's the point I've made, and I think we saw last night. He's good when everything around him is fine. But when the defense is not as good, running game doesn't work as well, not as good that's fine it's a backup it's okay did four and one is a backup gotta love it yeah i don't think i can remember a time where one or two good off seasons started to pay themselves off as quickly as it seems like things are going for let's say it my

jets i'm back jeff uh the jets look great or the packers suck i'm not sure which it is but the jets won again sauce is everybody's favorite player in the league right now they're somehow managing to taunt teams in their own stadiums and kind of get away with it and seem lovable um i don't believe in their quarterback yet but their coach is doing something right there obviously their front office has done something right in the draft. I'm not willing to ask, are the Jets for real? Because I know they're not, but are the Jets dangerous?

You don't believe in a quarterback that was 10 for 18 for 110 yards? I'm not... I want to be back. After the draft, I was like, maybe I'm back. I think the Jets do some of the things well that you need to be a good team, right? They rush the passer.

They can stop the other team's passing attack. And their offensive line, when all healthy, I think can be really good. Yeah. Zach Wilson, obviously, we need that jump, obviously, to see if he's that, you know, can be the guy that gets you, that you win because of him, not in spite of him sometimes. But they blocked a punt.

Like, they played a good game. The Packers, I think, royally stink right now. Anyone, you follow the Packers, like, they're just, they look dead, man. Like, they didn't show not a lot of effort in that second half. I feel very glad that we have a Brees Hall Offensive Rookie of the Year ticket on our preview show this season, guys. That looks

very good right now. 116 yards on the ground in that game. The Jets are feisty, man. Robert Sala said he was keeping receipts. He's keeping them. The Jets are, what, three and four and two, right? Are they four and two or three and three? Four and two.

Four and two. Giants are five and one. Yankees play tonight, I believe, against the Guardians or maybe tomorrow. They might go to the ALCS. It's a good time to be a New York sports fan right now. Syracuse football undefeated. Six and oh, you're right. Yeah, six and oh.

Buffalo right now, five and one. Oh, what a time to be in. And then there's obviously. The the season well then you have the mets so yeah who stop who okay are you are you one of those baseball fans upset about the postseason schedule what do you mean upset about it so a lot of baseball fans are pissed because all the good teams lost and they blame the schedule where the buys i think the teams with the buys have not played as well right like the dodgers braves yankees and the format of the five game format allows in theory allows the the worst team to win that's why a seven game series is more preferred because over seven games, typically the better team is going to win. No, that doesn't bother me. That actually gives me

a nice segue back to the Jets and Sauce Gardner for a second. So he pointed out something that I think a lot of us forgot or never knew, which is that when you're playing in London, you have the option. You can pick one of your opponents or take a bye week coming off that tough travel week and the packers but going into the season said yeah we'll take the jets we'll treat that like our bye week we'll save the bye week for some other time sauce gardner kept track of that they won that type of motivation does work for people doesn't it it it's a great story when you win i don't know how much it mattered on Sunday. It's a fun story when you win.

He's really good. No surprise. I mean, you know, again, they drafted well. Yeah. It's again,

it's a fun story when you win. I just don't know how much that actually mattered to the game. You played on some pretty bad teams though. Yes. One, one really bad team didn't you got one bad team didn't you like kind of try to motivate yourselves by thinking that other team was mocking you or not taking you seriously no we were so bad you were so bad you

didn't even get into that headspace no there were i i have i don't know a story before so i felt every game i ever played in my life, we had a chance to win. Every game, right? Of course, you know, you prepare, you think you're ready for that, except one. In 2010, playing the Steelers on Thursday Night Football. We are 2-11 and they are, I don't know, 9-3,

or whatever they are, right? The Steelers are good in 2010. And we were joking in our hotel room as the offensive line the night before, we were going to get our asses kicked tomorrow. We lost 27-3. I mean, our goal that game, the Steelers were only allowing 66 yards rushing a game.

A game! 66 yards rushing, right? This is like the Casey Hampton, the Brett Kiesel, James Harrison, Paul Amalo, Ferrier, Ryan Clark, Ike. It's the Steelers' defense, right? Yeah. And our goal was to rush for more than 66 yards, and we did. We had like 74 yards rushing. We were pumped.

We had the most embarrassing. We lost 27-3, and the three points was only because like big ben fumbled the fourth quarter on his 20 yard line we just like went three and i feel cold so the game is so bad okay espn.com has no box score for the game it's not it's not on their website wow yeah that's a strange bit of trivia it's just because i like jimmy clausen had like 85 yards passing it was just it maybe jimmy knows someone got that struck from the record it was it's either it's either that or it's on on pro football uh reference it's not on the here 2010 right here yeah uh yeah it's not on here there's no box score but you you you click the link and you get like a scoring summary and team stats no

team stats available no box score available just not not in there great well congrats on having a game that just disappeared we were 2 and 1212 during that game, and they were 10-4. Yeah, sounds like a bye week. So Aaron Rodgers and the Packers, that was a weird week for them. We already started the maybe Aaron's going to retire bullshit. We always thought we would at least get to the offseason before the same old cycle started. Here we are, week six, it's started.

Are they done? Are they cooked? Or should we just write them off and then find them to win 10 of the next 12 and be a playoff team well the problem is is like i don't trust the vikings either so i'll just roll the packers till i have to declare them dead but they don't it's it's like to me it's a little bit of effort thing like they just don't look like it's not as good why like obviously the chiefs have been able to weather the loss of their wide receiver better than the packers have the packers like didn't do anything the chiefs went and got mvs and juju and sky more the packers drafted watson who can't even play for them yeah well it seems like their quarterback has kind of hijacked them speaking of which

jeff my favorite part of the show i'm uh i'm just gonna read a tweet word for word because i don't know if anyone could have said it better than this here goes this is from uh harrison p kent tom brady skipped training camp takes every wed off, stayed out late this past Friday in New York City to party, and flew to Pittsburgh without his teammates before today's game. Yet he has the audacity to chastise his offensive line on national television. What a loser. Those are his words, but hard for me to edit any of them. Perfect take. Why did Robert Kraft have a wedding during football season?

I've heard the story. You can tell me if you believe this. Allegedly, it's because he wanted Elton John to perform at his wedding, and that was the only night Elton John was free. Do I buy that? No. Not a problem I had for my wedding, Gabe. I wasn't waiting on Elton John to perform.

No. The thing about Brady this season, I'm not worried about him yelling at the offensive line, whatever, is for a guy that has spent his career, at least what we know of his career, meticulously preparing for each week, the fact that he's not practicing on Wednesdays, which is not, which is not,

which I should say it's normal. Like older guys don't practice. It's okay. But for a guy, again, that meticulously plans out his week, that has spent every moment what it seems like preparing for games, for him to miss Wednesday and then go to a party on Friday night, like those are things he has never done in his career. I don't understand if it's another guy that does that.

There are plenty of guys that go on a Friday night game, but that's not been Tom Brady's routine, at least not that we know of. And so now you're drastically switching up your routine when you're 45 after having 23 successful seasons. That's a problem. It's not great. And you might finally be getting your final laughs in at Tom Brady here.

I don't know. I don't trust the Bucs right now. They played their four last games, right? 12 points against the Bucs, blown out by the Chiefs, the Packers, blown out by the Chiefs. Falcons win by six, up 21-0. That Grady Jarrett roughing the passer. Bailed out.

Bailed out for that. And now just the Steelers stink. They are bad. They're not a good football team. They might not win another game for 10 more weeks. And Tampa Bay was never in that game, really. I mean, they had to score a late touchdown to even make that even sort of a game. I really think, too, that Tom is missing

Gronk in the red zone. They have a huge problem in the red zone. They have no one to throw the ball to in the red zone. Okay, but so you were an offensive lineman, and maybe you didn't get to play with a legend like Tom Brady, but you played with some pretty successful quarterbacks in your day. Guys who at least command respect.

But you've also been a person who tells me like this isn't college. Don't come at me with that rah-rah shit. I'm a professional. So are you. Let's come here and do our job. If some guy, even if it's Tom Brady, starts MFing you in front of cameras and he's not playing well and he's not working as hard as you are you gotta run out of patience for that maybe it's not this week but there was a tantrum a couple weeks ago there's the special rules that have been made for him

you know like don't you think some of those guys who aren't his loyalists they aren't gronk will just say this guy well it depends on on you know how often he's he's cussing his offensive line like i understand once you know every now and then um also it depends on winning and losing right when you're winning you tolerate it when you're losing you hate it so if they continue to lose it's gonna be a problem if they win no one will care you just strike it up to to a little competitive you know he's a competitor well okay i i just think the human side like i think in the past the guys who played around tom brady would take a bullet for him and and i guess we have to

give him credit for that i don't think that's going to be the case for these guys if it if this is the way that he behaves. The guys that want a Super Bowl with him would probably still take a bullet for him. Not that many of those guys left there. Fair. You're right. Not as many. All right. One other team in the NFC. So we talked about the Eagles, the Packers, the Bucks now. Here's one other that I find to be an interesting team that we thought might be a challenger to the top AFC teams are the Niners, but then they just, they seem like they struggle

every other week. And then we unearth this great stat, credit Josh Dubow over at the AP. 49ers are 0-26 under Kyle Shanahan when trailing by more than four points after three quarters. Okay, I'm not going to get into the rest of that stat. Just let that sink in. He can't win when he's down more than a field goal in the fourth. That's weird, man. Yeah, because he mostly has,

because he has Jimmy Garoppolo as his quarterback. That's why they try to move off of him. He also, and I did not watch much of that game yesterday, but following Niner's fans' tweet, it seemed like he just knows there's an urgency. They had this 12-minute drive in the fourth quarter down two scores. They ended up with no points.

They're just an offense that's not built for that, man. They're not built to come from behind. It's not what they do. They have to ball control, run the ball, play action, pass. They get the Chiefs this weekend. If the Chiefs can't stop the run, that formula might work. But it's not going to work. If the Chiefs score 21 to 24,

28 points, that's the issue, man. That's why I try to move off Jimmy Garoppolo. But they chose a quarterback, Trey Lance, that obviously has young and hasn't played a lot, but doesn't seem like he's the guy. Are the Giants any different then, since their quarterback is not the guy?

Dude, the Giants are fascinating, dude. So they are the pull of stat up here. The Giants overcame a 10-point fourth quarter deficit to defeat Baltimore, as we know. They have overcome second-half deficits of 10-plus points in three wins this season. The fourth team in alpha history to do so in the first six games um to their this is an example of coaching again man like they just

they battle their asses off right the entire game their offense is just designed around let's not let daniel jones throw the ball very much we have no wide receivers, and our interior offensive line isn't very good. It's an incredible job they're doing. Baltimore has issues, though, man. Baltimore is not finishing games well. I don't know what it is about them, but they're just – they're not – so there's a thing here.

How about this? Three lost NFL teams, total seconds trailing in all games lost, okay? The Buccaneers have trailed for 9,000 seconds. I don't know why they did seconds, not minutes. That feels like really – Yeah, that's a lot of math. A useless amount of time to just say that. Okay, so let's see.

You know I have an actual calculator. I have an actual on my desk. 150 minutes if I'm good at math there, right? That sounds right. The Ravens have only trailed for three whole minutes the entire season and have three losses. Two minutes, 120 seconds, two minutes, whole season. Like, they're there.

They're just not finishing games. It's very odd when you have a rushing attack like the Ravens not being able to close out games. Yeah, they sort of feel a little bit like the Falcons of a few years ago, where they're like, God, they're inventing ways to lose games at this point. Like, how does this keep happening? They are, man. So now the Giants go to Jacksonvilleville we'll see what happens man i'm kind of curious yeah all right uh let's take a quick break we'll move the line uh we'll cover a few more topics including some college ball that's next jeff we're. Let's move the line a little over under game. Not real bets, but they sound kind of real.

Over under 20% of talking heads who think Bailey Zappi should start over Mac Jones for the rest of the season. 20% feels low to me. Oh, way over. And how many of those are going to also say that he's next Tom Brady? That's a frustration. That's going to be so freaking annoying. Gabe, will you give up your Jets fan as Zappi turns he's next Tom Brady. That's going to be so freaking annoying. Gabe,

will you give up your Jets fan as Zapichert into the next Tom Brady? Would I give it up again? Yeah, would you just be over it? I just can't do this again. They broke my heart again. Yeah, but I'm glad you asked me that as a Jets fan who can't do this again. So let me ask

a simple question, Jeff. Is Bill Belichick a genius for drafting guys like tom brady and bailey zappy in the late rounds is he uh uh no um no but um but i mean look again like you know where i'm going with this if you like exactly that much you would drop him in the first round yeah or play him. I don't know. Make him not your third starter. But I think you have to give Belichick credit for winning with the quarterbacks he's had. Like, come on.

They're playing good football, the Patriots are. You can give him credit. You're the smart one on the show. I don't have to give him credit. All right. Well, I think the Patriots are doing a lot with, excuse me, winning a lot and playing good with maybe not a lot with, excuse me, winning a lot and playing good with maybe not a lot of talents.

Yeah. Okay. So what you're saying, though, is you don't need to be a great quarterback to start winning a lot of games with the Patriots. And eventually, when you've been in the league long enough, you can turn loose. Tom won six Super Bowls in New England, buddy.

Well, the first few years, he was not the reason why. Okay. Then they turned him loose. He won three of them where he was the reason why. Does that make you feel better? Yeah, it took him like 20 years to get those, but okay. How many, did Jets have many Super Bowls? You know what?

You know who's got a son playing at Marshall right now? Yeah. Chad Pennington. I believe his name is Cole Pennington. Okay. That's our future. Cole Pennington, the Jets' future. Cole Pennington.

Uh-huh. Is he any good? Cole Pennington on line one. I don't even know if he's good, but draft him. Okay. That's the guy. That's the guy we need. Get back to our roots.

The best quarterback we've had in, I don't know, since Boomer. Okay, this one pains me to bring up, but here goes. Over under 30% chance Colin Cowherd, our buddy, can fix Pac-12 refereeing. This comes from a message board. People are asking Colin to use his powerful influence and his friends at USC

and around the Pac-12 to solve this problem. I guess the theory is that because the Pac-12 knows they're losing USC, the refs are out to get them. And I would love to get on board for this, but I don't even know if I can go there. Yeah, it's absolutely not true. Guys, you allowed 43 points to Utah.

Like, come on, come on, come on. Yeah, I thought the roughing the passer, the first one was I think both are probably bad but there were missed calls it's blaming the refs for losses is just lazy fandom it's just lazy

it's easy to say it rarely actually ends up making that big of a difference in the whole there's a lot of football to be playing that game right I mean USC at 42 points this is the thing we've said about USC right gave their defense it's like a it's a lot of football that'll be playing that game, right? I mean, USC at 42 points. This is the thing we've said about USC, right? Gave their defense. It's like a, it's a big 12 team.

It's what he had at Oklahoma. Good on offense, terrible on defense. I mean, you let Dalton Kincaid, who's a good tight end, don't get me wrong. One tight end have 16 catches for 200 yards. It was like third and four. Where's the ball going? Oh, Kincaid wide open again. Third and four. Where's the ball going? Oh, KK wide open again.

Third and seven. Where's the ball going? Oh, guess what? KK's open again. Oh, it's third and 12. Where's it going? Oh, that tight end again. Who's open every single play.

Come on. When the officials bring your defense. USC also this season's had trouble in second half on offense. They've started games really fast. And they have kind of like settled down as the games have gone on. I don't know why that is. It reminds me a little bit of the Eagles. Like you come out, you kind of have your –

I thought USC's early game plan, they were showing plays they hadn't shown all season, right? Like kind of just – and then you just don't have those plays available anymore, and teams just kind of sit back and say, don't have those plays available anymore and teams just kind of sit back and say all right well we're not gonna get beat deep now and but dude Caleb Williams he is good he is he like I'm not even sure he's a great like thrower of the ball per se like he's a good thrower but the other stuff he does is like his ability to escape extend plays I I think he's really good at the line of scrimmage.

He knows where pressure's coming from. Every time you hear him talk, I interviewed Pat to a media day, really well put together, very mature. Again, I'm not sure he's the – you look at him and think, I don't think he's got a terribly big arm, right? It's good, but Duke can play football, man. He is a good football player. He is, and I want to back up a little bit.

So no, I think blaming the refs when so many of the late flags were more to do with the noise in the stadium or just frankly the Trojans not being ready for the moment, which I think we have to look at coach for. I do, though, think that the national coverage has overlooked the fact that addison and gentry were out by the end of that game so you know the guy who's done the most for you on defense and your best weapon on offense yeah but when you have mario williams washington rice you have the eight other wide receivers i can't even name right now plenty of good players like i feel like a little bit less sorry for you than i would for for another team that lost a Bryce, you have the eight other wide receivers I can't even name right now. Plenty of good players. I feel like a little bit less sorry for you than I would for another team that lost a wide receiver.

I'm not saying feel sorry. I'm just saying that is part of the equation. Gentry, for those who don't pay attention to you, Gentry is a 6'6 linebacker, okay? I don't know what he does in the NFL. I've talked about this on my show. He can't play linebacker 6'6 in the NFL. I've talked about this on my show.

He can't play linebacker at 6'6 in the NFL. He's not going to be able to move laterally probably. Does he play pass rusher? He's not going to play middle linebacker in the NFL at 6'6. He's so fascinating, dude. He is a long linebacker. Why couldn't he play? Okay, so here's interesting. And again, I need to watch with the comment I want to.

Is when you have guys that are that tall, they often don't have the lateral quickness of shorter guys. Does that make sense? Longer limb guys, right? Okay. So if you're guarding tight ends like Travis Kelsey and running backs at the backfield, you're going to have trouble doing that at that size. You also allow 6'6".

Every offensive lineman is getting under you, buddy. Like, you're tall. I think those things are to consider when it comes to that. How many guys in the NFL play linebackers? Brian Urlacher was 6'5", but he was 240. Gentry's like 2'10 he's tiny he's like really thin yeah I'm very curious about his NFL he's good he's really good um but I don't feel bad when you lose one linebacker and one wide receiver and then replace Jordan Addison with like another five-star kid you down the sidelines I'm not asking to feel bad I just I'm saying it was a factor in the game credit to Utah

we were tweeting about whether or not they would go for it at their own stadium most conventional wisdom would say you kick the extra point you go to OT you lean on your home and home field advantage they knew it's now or never. They went for two. The quarterback ran it in there. I hate to admit it, but that was balls, and it worked. And they really did deserve that. I think you have to do that in that spot because with your quarterback being a dual threat guy like that, he just – someone was open.

I don't know. I didn't even look. He's just like, boom. I have two yards. I think it's three yards in college football. Just scamper it in and make in make it happen dude i don't know if you saw the video i put out i didn't put out i retweeted it was loud like it was deafening enough oh incredibly loud it was incredibly loud so but usc still has a shot for the playoff like they have the only game they're going to struggle in the rest of the year is ucla and then if they beat ucla they're in the pac-12 title game most likely and then you you'll play ucla oregon or utah but the two or three options and then

12 and one got a chance to get in yeah i was glad you were reassuring me of this 12 and one pac-12 champ with a win over it's usc take the pac-'s USC. Take the Pac-12 champ out of that. It's... 12-1 Oregon, 12-1 USC. They're viewed a little bit differently. As much as my... I don't want to say about my ducks, like, that's the way it is.

They're USC. So you think UCLA beats USC, then UCLA wins the Pac-12? Well, so basically what would have to happen is, like, Oregon... The best way for USC to get in, honestly, is for, like... is for like, is for, is to have like,

you want to play, in my opinion, you want to play Utah or Oregon in the title game. You need Oregon. So you really, but Oregon's got to basically beat UCLA. They have to beat UCLA or Utah. They play them, you know, they play them at home.

Be one of those two teams to probably play USC in the Pac-12 title game. But UCLA is good. I'll tell you this. It's nice that conference has some juice game. Like we have some juice again. We got some good players, good play, national attention. We got a ranked game this weekend. 9 versus 10 in Eugene.

Game day is going there. So I'm excited for this weekend's game. All right. I'm going to skip around here then. Over under two and a half SEC teams that make the college football playoff. There's a scenario where it could be all four. No, no, no. Because Georgia and Alabama have to –

Tennessee has to play – Are they in the same division? I've got to look this up. They're not all three going to be in because only two of those can play in the SEC championship game. So you're not... Right, but if the wrong teams miss... So if Bama now misses the championship game...

Yeah, they're not going to get in without missing the title game. Clemson blows it in the ACC. Okay, so Tennessee still has to play Georgia. They still have Georgia. They still have Kentucky. Let's say Tennessee loses to Georgia. Georgia plays Bama and loses.

Bama's in and probably Georgia's in. They beat Tennessee. Because they beat Tennessee. Because they beat Tennessee. Yeah. And then Ohio State or Michigan. And Ole Miss? Ole Miss is out there. I'm not worried about Ole Miss.

They're not going to keep it. Okay. Ole Miss still has to play. They still have to play. LSU's playing better. A&M, Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi State. That's a pretty tough five-game stretch to finish. Okay, but then for us to avoid more than two SEC teams going in,

which I know sounds so stupid to even talk about. It seems nearly impossible, dude. You need an undefeated Big Ten champ. You can't have Ohio State getting dinged by Michigan. Well, you're only going to have – The Big Ten East is where all those teams are at, right? It's Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State. Yep.

Whoever wins that, basically whoever wins the big game between Michigan and Ohio State will go play Illinois. Like, they're going to smoke Illinois. Like, whoever it is. Like, Illinois, Purdue, whoever. You got to hope. And then you have that one team in, two SEC teams, and have right now probably undefeated Clemson.

Until Syracuse comes along. That's this weekend, right? Yeah, it's this weekend. Clemson-Syracuse, yeah. There you go. We talked about Tennessee. People probably saw the video of, in the final drive, one of their players projectile vomited in the direction of Alabama

and then gave a head nod like, that's right. So over under 0.5 times, Jeff has puked on a football field and used it as an intimidation. Never, never, never had that. That was just all Gatorade too, like all liquid. Like he had long eaten seven hours before that. Just pure, he's just so tired. Like you drink too much much you throw up like that

can't drink that much during the game how by the way tennessee very excited you guys won this game very cool scene afterwards the the goal post in the river supposedly who knows where they're at but shame on you guys for trying to raise money for a freaking goalpost yeah like come on and i look today game they raised like 75 000 people are giving money to a college athletic program that makes millions of dollars a year to buy goalposts they already have a pair of neil and stadium waiting to put up for this weekend what are we doing fans of tennessee they don't need your money save your money for when you have to pay for the new Titan Stadium in Nashville. My guess is the way things work now, they'll probably take the old goalposts, chop them up into little pieces. NFT them.

Yeah, NFT them, sell them somehow. So if they NFT them, they take a picture on their phone and upload that picture to like the blockchain. And then like you own that picture that came from my phone that I took? Yeah, that's perfect. You just described it just right. Is that what it is? How many NFTs? Hank probably has a lot of NFTs.

He's probably got a whole, he's probably got a Texas, Oklahoma, Red River rivalry NFT from two weeks ago. I think Hank has made an NFT out of every reference to himself on this show and then I think Mr. Groberg got it all. Hank is correct in the chat that Nick does have a ton of NFTs. Oh, Nick.

Yeah. Oh, boy. Let's not mess with Nick. It's better to mess with Hank. Oh, much better. Yes. I'm sorry. The NFT thing, do not understand. I mean, I get it. I just explained it. I don't get the allure of owning something that everyone else can look at. I don't get it.

It doesn't make sense to me. Me neither. All right, Jeff. This one also doesn't make sense to me. So over under 10% chance Beth from Buffalo is still following you. Oh, let me check. So yeah, Beth, this fine lady named Beth. She was nice enough.

Big Bills fan. Did not like that I tweeted out the Chiefs kicked the field goal to end the first half. Again. It happened again. Butker, by the way, nailed that kick. And Beth was like, I'm unfollowing you. And then I looked and she hadn't unfollowed me yet. I was like,

Beth, come on, man. Why didn't you unfollow me? So Beth from Buffalo, let's see if she still following me. She tweeted, oh, just, oh yeah, sorry Jeff,

totally impulsive tweet, still didn't like what you had to say though. Oh, she backed off? She's still following me. Beth, follow through. Come on Beth,

you won. Stick it to him. Someone tweeted, you may want to consider whether you're taking sports Twitter too seriously. Beth, be like your quarterback. Just, just ram it down Jeff's throat. Beth, be like your quarterback.

Just ram it down Jeff's throat. Come on. Take it from him. That is, as Chris Collinsworth said, what did he say last night? I don't even want to get into it. Landon Dickerson? Can we say it?

It's a kid's podcast, right? There's Landon Dickerson coming down your throat. There's this whole social media thing now where just like now to say dirty stuff. It's not even dirty, obviously, in the context of when they're saying it. And people just make TikToks out of it. It's incredibly funny. So, yeah, he was excited for, for, for, uh,

Linda Dickerson there. Um, did you see Josh Allen hand that ball to the kid to take a picture? Very, very, it was awesome video. But then the dad of the kid is like, sorry, my kid's Jersey. Sorry, my kid's Jersey. I'm like, buddy, he just gave your kid a ball and grabbed your phone and took a picture with you guys all together. Stop being greedy.

Stop being greedy. Sorry, stupid fans. Look at you, siding up with Josh Allen. I'm starting to think your loyalties are in question. Stop being greedy. Well, yeah, it was a great sports weekend for me. I won a lot of wagers and the Dodgers lost.

So that was also very exciting for your boy. Jets won tonight. Broncos, Chargers, God bless. I'm not staying away from that game. I'm telling you right now. I'm just not. This ain't going to happen. It's going to be so gross.

What is the storyline tomorrow morning from this game? What do you think? Guaranteed Austin Eckler on another heater. And then the talk will be, wait, we are actually pretty good here. The Broncos, I think, are buried after this. I think it's, holy crap, maybe the Chargers are good. We've had a lot of national games to look at them. Austin's playing well.

Keenan's coming back. Justin's an MVP contender. And the defense is real. That's what I think the storyline is on Tuesday. All right, well, Chargers, you have to beat the Jets at some point to claim a place in your heart all right everybody nobody cares about this this inner show bs about me being a former jets fan just just according to the show today you're now also a jets fan again all right guys

how about the varsity podcast network thank you everyone for listening uh we back with our gambling show we won last week so so we're short of 500. We're in the same place we always are. We wouldn't know one money, okay? It's the worst place to be in. Hopefully, we're better this week. We're better than we were last year, I'll tell you that.

So please remember to subscribe. Talk to you guys on Thursday. Take care.