Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - How to Motivate Tom Brady, The Chiefs Are Back, and The Patriots Will Always be Good

Episode Date: November 16, 2021

Geoff and Gabe give their takes on Week 9 of NFL action, starting with all the quarterbacks with chips on their shoulders who came to play this week. Cam, Dak, Rodgers, and Mahomes all got it done, will Brady have the same success next week? The Chiefs scored a huge win over the Raiders, so Geoff gets to dunk all over everyone who said they were dead. All of a sudden they could be the favorite to come out of the AFC, but Mac Jones and the Patriots are throwing their hat into the ring too.This week on Moving the Line, Geoff predicts when we’ll see the Kingsbury Kollapse™ happen this season, and Gabe wonders how much Cam will be involved in his matchup vs Ron Rivera next week. Plus, Geoff is fed up with the media treating Russ like a hero for toughing out a finger injury, and Gabe asks how long he can go without acknowledging the AFC South.Remember to rate and comment on iTunes if you want to hop on the call next week to hear Geoff and Gabe discuss parenting before the record. 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 november 16th i'm jeff schwartz alongside gabe gill and this jeff schwartz is smart you are powered by the varsity podcast network what's what's the title for the show tired and wired tired and punchy punchy but no one cares that we're tired but nonetheless the chiefs are back on track a lot of quarterbacks bounce back in week 10 of the nfl we have a lot to get to welcome into into our Tuesday NFL show. Gabe, no one cares that any of us can't sleep and we have lives, but man, this might be an interesting episode.

Well, you know, listen, our producer on this show is a young man with a lot of life ahead of him. And I would say, Jeff, I'm going to take a chance here. He might have to edit this out. Listening to me and you talk about our lives particularly our lives as fathers is better birth control than anything you can buy at a cvs all right young men if you are are contemplating whether it's worth you know being extra careful

out there just hear me and jeff talk about what we live through with our children every weekend and i promise you you will not take those chances any longer to me at jeff schwartz if you want to be part of the first seven minutes of our of our non-taped episode uh before it puts i mean gabe's crushing a bagel as we're getting going i'm i it's the only time i've got by myself it's the seven seconds we do uh before um before uh the show but nonetheless we are here we had a great week of NFL action I actually won some wagers this week in the NFL which is uh which I will take so all right Gabe where do you want to start let's start with some quarterbacks I feel like I want to start with some guys who are just as punchy as we are and and this is a phenomenon that I bring up a lot on this show

and and I always say it because it's like an easy fan take but I'm starting to think there's something to this Jeff big name quarterbacks really thrive on the whole chip on a shoulder thing, and we saw a lot of evidence of it this weekend. Cam, obvious chip on the shoulder, worked great for him in his comeback. Aaron Rodgers, chip on a shoulder guy, boom, takes a W in his comeback. Dak, Mahomes, both criticized for not playing that well recently. Boom, exploding the best versions of themselves as their teams come back with big wins. And now Bruce Arians is trying to put a chip on his own quarterback shoulder, criticizing

him for two picks. One of which wasn't even his fault. Even I can admit it. Chip on a shoulder thing is real, Jeff. It matters. Yeah. Does it matter for all things? Like don't, aren't you motivated by people telling you you can't do something?

I mean, I know I am. I know I i was right i actually have a list on my phone my agent told me to make this list when i was i don't know i forget what point in my career my nfl career of like tell make a list of everyone that told you you can't do it can't play in the nfl and i did and we people use the motivation of you can't do it i'm going to show you and and what happens is because of our culture now, social media, when you have one bad week, Dak Prescott comes off one bad week, one bad week so far this year of otherwise MVP-esque season, and he hears all week, oh, Dak doesn't have it. The first seven games was a fluke, blah, blah, blah, blah.

He comes down and says, hey, you know what? Screw you guys. I'm going to show you guys. Aaron Rodgers, obviously, right, blah, blah. He comes down and says, hey, you know what? Screw you guys. I'm going to show you guys. Aaron Rodgers, obviously, right? Comes back from COVID, on the COVID list. And for 12 days, he heard, screw you, Aaron Rodgers. Screw you. Screw your takes.

I hate you now. I've had people tell me that they're not watching Aaron Rodgers anymore, which is a little extreme. I'm still watching Aaron Rodgers. But they don't respect him anymore. They don't him anymore you know he hears that too guys all these players that claim to non-social media are full of crap they all they all get this stuff teams by the way oh i oh head coach i'm on i'm not on snap face i'm not on i'm not on face face you Twitter or whatever Belichick says. Now that it's called meta, it's going to be hard to make those jokes.

That's not happening. And they all see this stuff, right, guys? They all see people ragging on them. They can feel the pressure coming down on them. And when you have good players like Dak and Aaron and Pat, they're going to play better in those. Oh, it's Pat. Cam Newton for Carolina.

Did not have many reps in the game. Scored in the first run he had, which was from the two-yard line, and then the very next series, passed from the two-yard line for a touchdown. Think about what he's been through, right? He leaves Carolina after he thought he was going to stay. Goes to New England, had a good start to last season, then kind of tumbled off, entered training camp as a starter. Now, I mean, it feels like very clearly that Mac entered training camp as a starter now i mean it feels like very

clearly that mac jones may have been a starter anyways but he misses that time because of co of the um of the covid post cam was not covid positive but he you know he went away from the team and had to miss those three or four days and mac came in and played well and they cut cam and then he came vaccinated eventually now he's back in carolina where he were and boom like the motivation of that of you know what screw you new england screw you nfl i'm back i can still play i'm gonna make plays happen and so players use that motivation i know i have in my life really when the nfl started i've never had in the media tell me i mean i mean you can't do it i don't know i've had people not hire me it's a little different than like outright like not wanting you know the nfls are more ruthless than that. Even college. I mean, I had coaches tell me I never played in the NFL.

All those things. So you use that motivation. And remember, we are way too reactionary week to week. That's why I think people enjoy following me on social media because, or listening to this podcast, I'm not that way. I don't make these every week, like I'm on a roller coaster, right? It takes weeks, months sometimes for me to change an opinion on a team

because each week is different. And you know that typically outliers are not the normal, right? You know, teams are going to have outliers. Players will have outlier games or months or weeks, but typically what you see most of the time is what you get. And when you, Dak Prescott and Pat Mahomes

for the last month and Aaron Rodgers get crapped on, they're going to come back with a little more motivation to prove everyone wrong. Well, okay. And so it's human nature. But I think it's unique to a certain kind of quarterback who have to generate some sort of passion from within. Because all of these guys are high performers. And when things are clicking, it just works. And they don't need to be pissed off to win but it seems like they all find this extra gear and so i want to drill into cam for a second because he did like you said he did

not have a ton of snaps there was no real reason he had to have a huge impact on a huge game by the way i mean they're alive because of that game and actually the cards are in trouble we'll talk about them both in over under but i guess what i'm curious about is like do other people buy it because i saw this video that everyone's sharing of like cam's circled up in the huddle uh on the sidelines and everyone's listening to him and he's coaching them up and he's immediately the leader again and that's a very convenient thing for fans to point out but is that real i mean you've actually been in huddles with the guy do people buy him immediately well you buy it you buy the veteran experience of course you do right i mean this is he's played 10 years of football he was the mvp is that is interesting it's ironic that his first start again or first time on the

field with the panthers again was at the at the place he had his first start which was in arizona in 2011 of course if a player of 10 years who has had the stature that he has had comes to the silence as, hey, guys, this is what we're doing wrong, especially when things aren't going well, of course you listen to him. Your ears perk up. Your ears perk up. And you listen to a guy that has that. I remember Eli Manning, I've said this before, I played with Eli after he won his two Super Bowls,

so it's a little bit different than playing with Eli either before or after that time. But Eli did not talk very much. But when he did talk to us, I mean, he wasn't shy, but he didn't like team speech very often. But when he did, and I'm not sure Cam does it as a team speech guy either, I have no idea. But when Eli spoke, and I didn't know Eli from scratch. Never talked to him before.

Never met him before. When I got to New York, again, I mean, he welcomed me, but he didn't give a lot of speeches. He didn't talk to the team during training camp, none of that stuff. But the first time he got up and spoke to us about something, I forget what it was, you're like, oh, okay. Like, it matters more when Eli says it. Because he's been there.

He's done it. And Cam has been there and done it. And for that team, there's a lot of young players on the team. Sam Donald's not their guy. He tried to be their guy. He's done it. And Cam has been there and done it. And for that team, there's a lot of young players on the team. Sam Donald's not their guy. He tried to be their guy. He's not PJ Walker. You take the personality of your quarterback, right? That's typically what teams are.

And in that moment, we also have the video too, Cam's leading. He's a leader. I think he gets a bad rap because he dresses stylish. Is it stylish? I don't know. I could never dress like that. But, you know, he dresses a stylish way. He has press conferences that might not be normal he uses that weird uh font whatever but no one has ever questioned him as a leader right no one's ever questioned that in carolina

and we saw that that on the first game back the team gravitated toward him because there was a void on that team there was no there was no there's no veteran vocal leader on that team yeah well the charisma part has never been in question and the and i think he was criticized for it being too much or it being you know look at me but they do look at him like i don't know that's one of those times i mean both things i've offered in this segment are pretty dumb fan guy takes but you're telling me as a person who's literally been in the huddle with this dude that it's real that people actually respond to that so then let me ask you this bruce arians is trying a trick that worked for him last year and i think it's a risky one to go back to this year he's

publicly calling out tom brady and saying you know we lost because tom didn't play well his picks were on him they weren't on the receivers that's debatable he's basically just going back and hoping this works and it fires up his quarterback and not lose his quarterback. Do you think it will work? I don't know. Will it put a chip on his own quarterback? It seems to have always worked.

It seems that this is what always works, right? Always being able to find ways to motivate Tom by calling him out, by saying he's done, by saying he's washed. Those are all ways that have worked in the past. I don't know why it would be any different now. I mean, Tom was salty, dude. He barely did a post-game press conference. And this salty Tom is what we've come to expect, obviously,

after bad performances. But, yeah, I don't know why it wouldn't work this year. That's the thing. This is a proven over-20-year career that when you doubt tom brady especially like in the playoffs last year you just shouldn't because it's you're gonna end up costing you know not costing anything you know not costing your team because typically we're fans doing that but you're gonna lose that you're gonna lose those moments because tom brady thrives up being criticized yeah but by his own coach at a time when he wasn't even actually to blame.

But last year, the same thing happened and Tom wasn't to blame for some of the stuff too and it worked. Now, Tom might just be immune from it and maybe the team needs to hear that. Like maybe Bruce Arians, it makes sense to tell the team it was Tom's fault. I don't know.

Maybe he understands he can take the blunt of this and just be like, okay, fine. It's my fault, everyone. It might not be, obviously, but there's an understanding between him and Bruce that I'll take the fall for it. It just works better for our team if I do that. Maybe that's the way they motivate themselves.

Okay. That's an interesting mind game that you're playing with Tom Brady. Also, by the way, you brought it up like what a baby just do do the post game what's your problem i i am uh i'm a tom brady defender especially on this show because there's no one who hates tom brady more than than gabe over here um but yeah he should have done a longer press conference i don't like i don't like when players do that when they lose. Like, I know it sucks you lost, but when things are good, you do the press conferences.

When things are bad, you gotta do it also. Yeah, that's just part of the gig. And like, sorry, you know, it is just a game and you lost the game. Like, you just have to answer the stupid questions. You don't have to love it.

You don't have to give long answers. You don't have to be a ball of fun, but just stand there and answer the questions. I mean, that's just what it takes. I don't understand why it's like, well, I don't like losing. Like, well, yeah, no crap, dude. Who

does? Like, how about the guys who lose almost all the time who still show up and have to take those dumb questions? Like, it's part of the gig. Yeah, like your Jets, they keep showing up every week. They show up and answer the questions. Robert Sala's not ducking the media. God bless the guy. I mean, you know, that is part of, like, part answer the questions. Robert Sala's not ducking the media. God bless the guy.

I mean, you know, that's part of the job. I just wish that Tom Brady realized that sometimes. Well, listen, one of the things the Chiefs didn't have to worry about was getting bad questions fired at them in postgame. This was probably the most joyous any Chiefs fan, you especially, has been all year. You and Nick Wright are just sounding off on your Chiefs. You know, a lot of people were out on them them now they're saying they're all the way back they they're atop the afc west pat had five touchdowns everybody's eaten it's great right like no problems remaining chiefs are the favorite again jeff say it well look gabe i can either take the three-plus years of excellent offense

that we've seen from the Chiefs or the one month they struggled. What should I believe is going to happen? The month they struggled or the great offense they had for three-plus years? I'll go with the great offense for three-plus years. And a night, by the way, when there was plenty more to be had. There were plenty of plays to be made that weren't made. We had a little bit of fumble luck go our way. You know, we had a terrible turnover on special teams.

But, you know, we kept turnovers to a minimum. Offensive line protected their butts off for Pat Mahomes. And, look, the Raiders, it's interesting. I talked about this. I was on with Mina Kimes last week on her podcast, and we talked specifically about what the Raiders are going to do on defense. And we said, so this cover two thing has been happening, right? So everyone's playing cover two against Kansas City, two deep safeties.

But you have to be good at cover two to run cover two. You have to practice it and do it a lot. The Raiders do almost none of it. And so the idea was, are they going to run cover two, which is giving the Chiefs problems, or run their defense, which is one high, and then just hope your technique wins? And none of it worked.

They did a little cover two, didn't work, and they did some single high, and they got blown up. So teams are going to come back. They played Dallas this weekend. They're going to run cover two, I would imagine. But Dan Quinn also, the DC for the Cowboys, is also a Pete Carroll guy, right? So maybe the one high is in his system as well. It's hard to just come out and run too high

when you don't practice. There's different techniques for corners, and for safeties, and for linebackers, and for the pass rush as well. It's all different. And the Chiefs looked efficient. Pat Mahomes found second options all the time, right? He'd look downfield, boom, running back.

He was just very, the screen game was back, but the offense line, they run the ball really well. That looked like the Chiefs' offense. Why is it they got Travis Kelsey and Hill involved? It just looked like it should. And I would like to believe that this is moving forward what they're going to be. Defensively, by the way, too. Much better on defense.

They've been playing much better on defense. It's helpful that Deshaun Jackson went the wrong way for some reason and fumbled, but the defense is better. The offense is doing their part. Now, they have Dallas coming up. Tough game to play. That arrowhead, hopefully that helps them a little bit. But guess what?

The rest of the AFC, you had your chance to bury them. You had your chance. And now they're first place in the AFC West, the fourth seed right now. They lose a tiebreaker to Tennessee and Buffalo and Baltimore. I get that. But nonetheless, guys, they're back. And you had a chance to bury them. The year they won the Super Bowl, they were 6-4

after 10 games. They're 6-4 right now. And no one in the AFC has claimed the top spot. Look, I know Tennessee won again. Buffalo, they smashed the Jets. But every week on offense, it's like, ah, dude, no. Baltimore lost to Miami.

So many injuries on Baltimore. Is it Pittsburgh who tied the Lions? No. Is it Cleveland? No. Chargers? No. Colts?

No. Like, who? Kansas City's right there. They're right where they want to be. So six and four after 10 games, some ups and downs. First place in the AFC West as we sit right now. I know you feel good about saying all that. And there is a team who it might be, and it pains me to talk about it.

That'll be our next topic. You left one off the AFC list, the six and four team that's red hot right now. I hate it. Oh, I did. Yeah did yeah well they're not two world contenders but they're they're uh I get to slam duck on people for Kansas City today and

because I told you guys just just guys it's gonna and I said last week do you remember Gabe I said last week that throw from Pat Mahomes to end the game against the Packers you said this changed everything so did Nick Wright he said the same thing too. And he's been very, I said, guys, it sometimes takes, you know, if you're a hitter and you're an 0 for four game slump,

maybe just hit a single, like a good contact single, right? To last, you know, your team's down eight to one. It's in the seventh inning. And you just hit a good single, like a boom, right, right at the middle and sparks you. And it's a little more stress situation for pat he's a 15 hour throw on the run like boom he hits it game's over you feel great about yourself and the rhythm of the chief's offense looked different right like there was there was a rhythm to it there was a flow to it there was some boom boom boom boom oh here boom. Couch is open. So it just felt like the Chiefs offense.

So guys, they're back. I'm sorry to tell you. Okay. Well, you're talking so much about rhythm and it's something felt like back to normal. And I mean, it reminded you of the good times. I'm going to throw something at you that's out there in Chiefs Twitter. I think one of our friends and listeners, Tyler Grant, put this on my radar and I'm going to bring it to you. And I don't think you're going to like this, but there is a theory out there

that coach Reed had sort of handed the reins over offensively to Eric Biennemi because obviously he's, he's earned the right to run that offense. But also because we're kind of all mystified why coach Biennemi hasn't gotten a head coaching job anywhere and that that was one of the criticisms as well. He's not actually technically in charge of the offense. That's the kind of thing we heard. So they turned over the offense and things didn't go so well and that maybe this week was the week that Andy sort of quietly took it back.

That's a summary of a take that is out there. I don't know if it's right or wrong care to respond yeah it's wrong um but i will say it's been pretty interesting right so the last couple years when the chief's offense was doing really well remember how many times during game that the camera showed eric biennemi calling plays in and everyone's oh my eb great job calling plays and this year when the chief's offense struggle guess who got the blame But EB, great job calling plays. And this year when the Chiefs offense struggled,

guess who got the blame? Andy Reid did. Because Andy Reid's in charge of the offense. That's why. And nothing against Eric Bien-Ami. I've said it for many years. Should be a head coach. Someone should hire him.

Be the head coach. But when things are going well, people praise Eric Bien-Ami. When things are going poorly, they bash Andy Reid. That kind of tells you, I think, who runs the offense. It's Andy Reid. Andy Reid does a collaborative effort tells you I think who runs the offense. It's Andy Reid. Andy Reid does a collaborative effort. It's not just him. He says, okay, you have you know, you're scripting the red zone this week

or you have third down, whatever it is. Offensive line coach, you do the run game. Everyone has their, it's a collaborative effort. He's not just calling plays himself. He'll ask people hey, what should we run here? But the idea that Eric Bien- the enemy called the offense this year and therefore it was bad and how avery took it over is is bs it's always andy reed's offense he didn't give it up why would he give it up there's no point in giving it up so that's not at all what has happened here and that

would have been reported by the way 100 there were people in the nfl who wanted to get that out if that was true and it's certainly not true okay well thank you for clearing that up uh i didn't know what was right or wrong about that but i know it's circulating um all right so i asked you at the beginning are the chiefs the favorites let me end by just saying are they the favorite in the afc right now i'd bet on them but they have a tough playoff road, though. They have to go to Buffalo and go to Tennessee. I still think Buffalo is that team because Buffalo defensively is doing some really good things. You know where else they might have to go in January?

If things keep up, I hate saying it, they might have to go to New England. I don't think they're necessarily going to win the division, but man, they could be the top wildcard team the way they're playing. So Mac Jones didn't have to break anyone's ankles this week, didn't have to cheat.

He still has 15 grand in his pocket that he should have been fined for last week. And he managed to throw for 100-something yards, and that was enough to get dubbed, you know, the next coming of Tom Brady as he won, I think, five straight now. Five straight? It's crazy the run they're on. I think it's four. Four straight, five of six,'s crazy the run they're on. I think it's four. Four straight, five of six, whatever. They're six and four and they look really good.

Their defense is good. They're beating good teams. They just basically ended the Browns and maybe Baker forever. It's happening, isn't it? This is real. For the last three weeks, I've been like, it's not real, right? And you're not sure. But now it kind of feels real. The Pats are good? Like, this is real. For the last three weeks, I've been like, it's not real, right? And you're not sure. But now it kind of feels real.

The Pats are good. Yep, it's real. They're good. So it's an interesting thing that happened last year. I mean, it's very typical social media to have this discussion. So I know football people actually said this out loud because it's not true. So last year, Tom Brady went to Super Bowl. And the classic response is, see? See? It was

Tom Brady and not Bill Belichick. That guy can't coach at all. He lost his edge with Tom Brady gone. And you're like, eh, guy's been a good coach for 40 years, just forgot how to coach. No. They were 7-9 last year with a bad roster. They improved the roster. Now, if you want

to give Belichick grief, it's for his roster management, which has been poor one no and everyone no one says otherwise it's been poor he can still coach and guess what he has a team now on defense that's what what he wants to be there are multiple right they do different things which they always do a lot more zone coverage this year not as much man coverage just to have Stephon Gilmore and so they changed our getting a little bit offensively same as the Tom Brady method. Run the football. Good physical offensive line.

They dominated that game. Smart, efficient passes. You're not asking Matt Jones to do too much. Just like the later years of Tom Brady, you didn't ask him to do too much. Of course, if the Patriots are in a shootout, right, they need to win a game 35-32. Is that what they do best? No.

Can they do it it we'll find out but when your offense is on schedule this is what it can look like mac joe just making better throws each week it's improving each week does he have the upside of trevor lawrence no but i think if you're the jets would you rather take mac jones right now than zach wilson well yeah i mean i said that all along like Like, you did. And I was with you on the Zach Wilson thing. So, he's just, they're playing a fish and brain football. They appear to enjoy

playing with each other. Jacoby Myers has played a bazillion years in the NFL. Never had a passing touchdown, or receiving touchdown, I should say. Finally got one at the end of the game. The whole team ran the field to go celebrate with them. Like, they look like a team that actually enjoys playing with each other that's very important as well so there's some swagger in new england and um it's

uh they're playing they're just playing good football man yeah they are and so we just talked about coach biannimi in kansas city and what credit he does or doesn't deserve or what blame he does or doesn't deserve here's one of the things that drives me crazy about the patriots and nfl media at large and this is not a knock on the guy who tweeted this because i think he does or doesn't deserve. Here's one of the things that drives me crazy about the Patriots and NFL media at large. And this is not a knock on the guy who tweeted this because I think he does a good job, but he just sort of been doing this a long time and goes for these narratives. Edward or Josh McDaniels can coach and develop a quarterback. That was the tweet. And then he shows, you know, Mac Jones's numbers so far. Like, is that really the take that, you know, that coach McDaniels is the one figuring all this out? Like what, isn't that just sort of a lazy thing

to say? We, Josh McDaniels proved already that he's at best, at best, like a Belichick sort of errand boy kind of coach. He's, he's just doing what he's told. He went and had a chance to run his own team, didn't go anywhere, and he came right back home to dad. Like, why are we still talking about Josh McDaniels like he's a genius? He deserves credit for Mac Jones, but what other quarterback has he developed?

He didn't develop Tom Brady. That was like Charlie Weiss, whoever was the OC way back when Tom Brady was there. Like, this is no. He deserves praise for this. I mean, you cannot deny that he has done a good job with Mac Jones so far. But to claim he's this overall quarterback whisperer seems silly. But he's a first-round pick who went to Alabama.

Like, he didn't come in needing a whole lot of molding, you know? And they don't even ask him to do anything. He dinks and dunks the whole damn game. How many yards did he have? None. Matt Jones had 198, I think. Oh, cool. All right, great.

The Patriots' point differential is plus what? 100 the last four games, too. They're doing it all. I mean, it's impressive. I guess I'm just... Belichick is probably like yeah go ahead josh go take the next opening and see how that goes for you again buddy like you keep telling yourself you're developing my quarterbacks let's see who believes that it just it's a silly thing that

keeps coming up and i think he must have some good agents or pr people it's always out there every time they have a little bit of success on offense, it's Josh McDaniel's time. I don't get it. Here's the thing, too, about this game, the media game. I want to talk about Russell Wilson in a few minutes because the way that we had talked about Russell Wilson this week was embarrassing.

It wasn't we. It was two people, mostly. The media members do favors for people that they like for agents and for and that this is how the sausage is made um and it might just be ed warder this boys with joshua daniels and send out a tweet like it could be that simple that's the way it is though but you know you know this yeah and i'm not trying to single out ed lots of people have said stuff like that and you know like you just said, there's some truth to it.

I just, I don't know. I just get salty. Every time the Patriots have any success at all, and I have to watch that in my timeline, I get pissy. I'm sorry. Well, can we take a quick break and come back, and then I got a few of your triggers. I got one name in particular, man.

Let's do it. Hank has a new term that he coined that I like. He's got a trademark on it in the rundown. Get ready, guys. Kingsbury Collapse coming up next. I love it. All right, welcome back. We're moving the line,

and we are starting with the Kingsbury Collapse, trademarked by Hank. Is that imminent? Will the cards finish over under 11. Is that imminent? Will the Cards finish over under 11.5 wins now? Jeff, they have eight of them. What do you think? We're going to have to do this

now because it's very important to bring this up because it's actually rather shocking, his record in the second half of the season. His first year at Texas Tech, he lost his last five games of the regular season, then won the bowl game. All right?

So that's 2013 now. First year there. Second season there, he lost, well, he won the first two games and then proceeded to lose eight of his last 10. I mean, that's kind of maybe just bad. He's just bad that year. Okay. 2015, guys, he started out five and2 and then lost four of his last six.

Not ideal. In 2016, he just was bad that year. He was 5-7. I mean, how does he get hired in the NFL? But he started out 3-1 and then lost, what, six of his last eight. So great start and great finish there. The following season, he's 6- seven and he started out four and one and then lost what my math would tell me there he lost six of his last eight there again like are we

are we setting a trend here guys last year at texas tech he starts out five and two loses five straight to end the season we know at arizona he started i believe his first year three six and one and then finished at six and ten something like that that, or six, nine and one, or he started three, no, he started three, three and one and finished at six, nine and one. Then last year he started, what was it? He started three and six and finished something like eight and eight. He just, he's finished slow every year. He loses every single season.

Why is this year any different? Why is it any different? This is why no one is buying Arizona. This is why no one's buying it.zona this is why no one's buying okay the injuries are piling up now and it keeps losing all right fair enough and and you've explained this to me that he is a second half collapser many times and i always buy it i'm here for this bit can we maybe admit that not having kyler murray has something to do with it he actually stole a win with colt mccoy like not having

kyler murray is the problem more than it's you know cliff kingsbury and his collapse yeah well yeah kyler being hurt obviously has not been good and that's been a problem of his now for a couple years he has just been he has just been hurt um at uh and every time he gets hurt the team obviously no surprise uh suffers yeah well all right i mean i don't have any more responses on the cardinals i wanted to have a longer conversation about the cardinals but i'm thinking about it i'm like i don't have any ret's here i can't talk about this team because i don't actually believe they're worth talking about yeah exactly no one believes it yeah all right fair enough um let's talk about another team that may or may not be worth talking about but we touched exactly. No one believes it. Yeah. All right. Fair enough. Let's talk about another team that may or may not be worth talking about,

but we touched on them earlier and I want to come back to them for a very specific question. Cam plays this weekend against, by the way, his old coach, Ron Rivera, over under 70% of the Panthers quarterback snaps. He got very few of them in week one, but here he comes.

That's a great question. 70% feels high. I mean, walker played well this past weekend i think that pj walker did not play as well then this would surely be that but the question is how fast can he come up with the game plan right how fast can he come up with with the office i don't think they're going to run they're going to run one one that new england like pack it in run the ball offense i mean joe brady's not going to want to run that they They're going to want to put Cam in a regular offense. And whether or not he's up to speed, I would say no. I would say that's a lot for – look, guys, this isn't someone you signed

before training camp. It's the middle of the season, right? To catch up on a new offense and new terminology is very tough. They're not changing the terminology for him either, right? Sometimes they talk about you go to a new team and they change the terminology for you to make it easier for you. They're not changing the terminology for him either, right? Sometimes they talk about, you know, you go to a new team and they change the terminology for you to make it easier for you. They're not doing that. There's a famous story of Brett Favre.

Where did he go? Where someone on the team translated the calls into West Coast offense calls for him because he didn't know. I think it was the Jets, right? I think it was the Jets. I think the first bit they were like, don't worry about it. We'll take care of that for you. Yeah, so they had a guy on the staff who took like if the call was xyz he translated into abc and gave it to far like

that's how far just didn't want to learn new offense that's not going to happen in the middle of the season and so how quickly you can't pick up on this offense i would say for this week you know kind of a revenge game with ron vera which is still it's not a revenge game i would say less than 70% snaps. Less than 70%. Okay. But all the goal line stuff and all the key spots. That's all going to be there. Third down goal line.

All there. Yeah. Okay. All right. Talking about another mobile quarterback who may or may not have it anymore. This one is sure to trigger you. Ian Rappaport said that Russell Wilson rehabbed for 19 to 20 hours a day in order to come back from his finger injury. Odds this is even within a few hours of possible.

I'm going to say over under 1% chance this is real. I think Russell Wilson is a nice guy. Right? He seems like a nice guy. But God damn it, guys. Like, why do we talk about him like this? What the, what are we doing? It's a finger injury.

We talked about, we talked about like Alex Smith and like not even close to his terms. He almost lost his leg. It's a freaking finger injury. What is he doing all day? 19 hours of rehab. Why do we buy this shit?

Why are we reporting this crap? It's just crap. He's not doing 19 hours of rehab. Why do we buy this shit? Why are we reporting this crap? It's just crap. He's not doing 19 hours of rehab. It's impossible. Like when he does squats, is he rehabbing his finger? In the meeting room, what's he doing in the meeting room to rehab his finger? I would love to know what you do in the meeting room. Oh, he's just moving his finger up and down.

Got a little ice pack on there. And they always say too that rest and recovery sleep is good for rehab maybe not for fingers because the finger is not a big deal like come on guys we've got to stop the story i even tweeted out today it was like 8 a.m i was like guys russ is seven hours into rehab we need to pick our days up and people are taking it seriously like how dare you knock his work ethic i'm just i'm looking for the e60 brother like either the east the e60 and russell wilson's finger rehab like why don't come on guys like can we at least like the hero worship of some of these guys is unbelievable to me it's a finger injury a mallet finger i had a mouth yeah you see my fingers right here i had

a mallet finger i don't even remember what finger it's on because that's how little it it mattered like i had the same injury he had i didn't get a pin in it because i just complained on the offensive line i just played with it but like it's just it's just so much it's so obnoxious and this needs to stop why are we doing this uh okay i yes full cosign and see previous comment about Sometimes it seems like the media just say like, all right, got it, and copy and paste it and put in a tweet. But think about it. Sometimes I'm like, oh, really? Like 19 hours a day.

And then you go out and get shut out. Congratulations on your rehab for 19 hours a day. What was more surprising? Was it running this story or Pete Carroll throwing what appeared to be a foot phone on the floor instead of his challenge flag? I didn't actually see that. Yeah, he tried to find his challenge flag and he just threw what looked like a foot

burner. A burner phone. Interesting. Yeah. Or it was like a mouse. I don't know what it was. It was an electronic device that maybe it was like a meter or something. I don't know what it was.

It was odd. It was very, very odd. But as Hank notes, he might win Comeback Player of the Year, Russell Wilson, because of that finger injury. Oh, yeah, from that injury. Yeah.

Well, you know, another Hank point here, a lot of mic time for Hank, but I think it's the first thing I thought as well. Maybe, since you're talking about rest and recovery, maybe Russell is including like an eight-hour night of sleep into his 19 hours that would still only be 11 hours of of rehab time which I you know feel like is a lot but whatever so now you

get 8 plus 11 that's a that's a 19 I can actually believe is possible why would you include sleep yeah the rest and recover man that's such that's like the way when you do your taxes and you say that like you know you have some magazine subscriptions and you take it as a deduction oh i do all that yeah of course i take that stuff but i actually but i actually use the athletic for my work all right see so that's a real real deduction so maybe he's just putting eight hours sleep into the rehab time. Maybe that's how he's doing it. Something you and I cannot do.

Eight hours sleep would be the best night's sleep I've had in months. I promise you right now, we're recording this on Monday. I end my radio show tonight at 9 p.m. Eastern, my Pac-12 show. I will be asleep by 9.35. I'm not watching a second of the Monday Night Football game. I don't even know who's playing. I do not care. Niners, Rams, I do not care. I'm a Niners Rams.

I think it is. I'm going to, which is going to be stupid because I got to talk about Odell at some point, possibly. You might have to, you might have to wake yourself up to comment on Odell, but we'll definitely be talking about him next week. We can promise you that because whatever the hell happens, I bet nothing happens.

It's just recordings before the game. I bet nothing happens with Odell like nothing whatsoever yeah i don't think they're gonna do much with him week one and i think they're gonna be careful with him he's got that bum shoulder right they're gonna want to be very careful because now they they really need him he seemed like a luxury when they when the trade was sort of getting an hour the signing rather was getting announced by the end of that last week they had to have him because woods is gone now. So I don't think they're going to be in a rush.

I think they're going to try to sneak through this week without using them much and then factor them into the offense more and more over the next few weeks. All right. Let me, let me ask you this. How many more weeks until I am willing to admit that the Titans are kind of good over under four and a half weeks.

Take the under. The show will never be that. We'll never do that. So it's okay. So we're just, we're gin. We're basically. February 14th is the soonest we'll admit they're good. Yeah, basically.

We're basically, the AFC South is dead to us, right? We don't talk about the C team up there in Indianapolis. We don't talk about them. The Titans just like, you know, like they're just, it just an odd team. Yeah, it's a crap. Ryan Tannehill's playing good football, though. Their pass was better this year, and Ryan Tannehill's playing good with all the injuries he's had around him.

But who outside of Tennessee thinks they're winning the Super Bowl this year? I don't know, but they got Houston twice. They got Miami and Jacksonville. They got Pittsburgh. We'll talk about them in a second because they don't look great. They got the Niners who might have given up by the time they get them. There's a very good chance the team we don't want

to talk about has 12, 13 wins. They have the tiebreaker of the Chiefs. They're going to be the one seed. The tiebreaker of the Chiefs and Bills. Let's see who else is still healthy by then. They will have had all their pieces in place for weeks.

Like they had their big injury. Some all the other good teams are probably still waiting for their big injury. That's just the way life works. So I don't know, man. That's fair. Could be could be a weird one. All right. Well, I mentioned the Steelers who somehow what a disaster.

And man, you know, I normally love the Red Zone channel. But guys, why are we spending so much time on lion stealers i feel like i watched the whole damn lion stealers game that was one of the worst football games i've ever seen in my life and now we get a tie so jeff you played on a pretty horrible team in carolina at one point you're qualified to answer this question what what are the odds the lions would rather have gone oh and 17 than 016 and one oh man poor alliance i thought they jared goff by the way has yet to win a game some games they battle their asses off other games they just suck um i think you would rather go on 17 because of the tie like you have to talk about

the tie afterwards you're like oh we tied the pit the steelers god that game was it game was glorious i watched like the last quarter and a half god glory just a glorious contest i mean the football god delivered us i mean the fumbling the missed kicks the bad quarterback play oh it was hard it was destined for it was destined for horrible. It was destined for a tie. It was destined for a tie. It was a horrible thing. And then after the game, I think Najee Harris basically was like, what, you can tie?

Every year after every tie, there's one player they find who says, I didn't know we could tie. Well, he gave it to him, rookie. I want to bring up, so I tweeted that out and people said, oh, well, how does he not know that? Well, I'll tell you this, guys. A lot of players actually aren't football fans. They don't watch football. Like, they're just good at football.

They don't watch football. They don't watch football outside of the building. They don't pay attention to, like, other things happening in the sport. They don't watch college football. Some of them are just good at football. Maybe Najeeh is one of those guys. He doesn't watch football. He goes home and has a life outside.

Not me. I come home from a game and immediately put on more football. I love football. But some guys just don't watch it. And maybe he just hadn't watched enough NFL football. He plays at Alabama. There's no pro team in Alabama. Maybe he just didn't watch a lot of NFL football.

Yeah. Also, I mean, he probably didn't. And obviously, college can't end in a tie either. And he probably didn't realize that you could ever play a game that you didn't win by four touchdowns because of his time at Alabama. Oh, that's an Alabama joke? He didn't even know. Oh, I'm sorry.

We're not allowed to make Alabama being good jokes? No, I'm saying I thought we spent that time on New Mexico State yesterday. Oh, well, we did. We did get a little Alabama time in yesterday. Boy, these days are running together, Jeff. I can't keep track of my Sundays and my Mondays anymore, my Tuesdays. It's all a mess.

Let me tell you one guy who's having a hard time with his days. This one I really want to know your thoughts. All right, so the guy who we said we would not name, the quarterback. We're still not going to name him. We're not going to name him. The quarterback in Indianapolis made it known through the media that he would not be attending

his wife's delivery of their second child on Sunday during the Jags game that he was playing. He would not go to that. And even if the delivery came next Sunday, he would also not go to that. He was skipping the delivery of his child. He had to focus on football. And hey, I get it.

But I want to know the odds that you would survive if you suggested that to your wife when you were a football player. Oh, I'd be dead. She would not let that happen, would she? Well, we had our both our kids before, like purposely. So, I mean, we didn't like plan that out nine months before that. But we had Alex, we induced my son a week before training camp in 2014.

And then Emmy was like 12 days before training camp. I think she wasn't, was she induced? 12 or 14 days before training camp in 2016. So, yeah, she wanted to have the kid before went to training which i told her like i said babe i would gladly come home for three days for for birth she's

like no no no you you you just can't do it i go no i can i promise you but she didn't want to she didn't want to like have me to fly home and so yeah we we um i i wouldn't want to miss it but i guess like how many kids is this for Wednesday? Excuse me, for the quarterback in blue in Indianapolis? I believe this is his second. And so we're joking around a little here. I don't know if the baby was born yet. How many babies is it like?

I don't need to be there for that. What age? How many babies do you think? Well, we've already established that our wives do not listen to this show. So can I answer this question honestly? Yeah, go ahead. I had the third. I was going to say third.

Third's about enough. But you had two at one time though. Right. By you, I mean your wife. Yes. I think the second one, you still better be there. I don't know how you're supposed to not be there. I feel like with a third birth, it's like if you're there if you're there you're there i think it's debatable by then

assuming everyone's healthy every gotta be i gotta assume everyone's healthy here and i'm assuming that with the guy we're talking about um it's i up after three i feel like you know you don't even have to be at an nfl game you could be playing madden or something you'd be like yeah i'm sorry if you guys are listening to this, this late in the show, you obviously love our show. Tweet me or leave a comment on iTunes about how many births you're, you think your wife would allow you to, at what point would your wife allow you to not be at the birth?

I feel like, yeah, I feel like, I feel like three and up is like, you're safe to not, not have to be present. The first one, you gotta be there.

Gotta be there. Not only gotta be there, gotta be there, gotta be ready for days in advance and be through every part of it isn't it so it's so funny man my buddies had their second kid like a week ago and i'm talking to him and it's just it reminds me the second kid you're just like what else the first one everything's prepared like in the second one you're like whatever we'll just we have a bag at home somewhere we'll just bring supplies with us at some point yeah there's just no there's like nothing no worries no concerns you're just like you're like oh i've done this before i don't have to do this again um oh man kid kid humor well we've

we've really full circled this show because this show began uh talking about how we we could really by the end people who were uh being uncareful in bed would be like oh man i can't risk having kids i gotta be more careful and here we are ending our show talking about the birth of children so you know it's a complete circle for the young men who might choose to press play on this podcast and if you just if you just um yeah if you if you don't want to have kids or you're on the fence just we will offer you if you want to tweet me at jeff schwartz and you want to come on our show for the first seven minutes every monday afternoon if we record the show you're welcome to come on we will talk to you

about our kid problems not even problems we're like it's they're bougie problems our slack of sleep whatever you want to talk about we will we will be your birth control on this show if you would like um and also get called old because i'm 35 and our producer is 17 and he yelled he called me older he called me his parents age call me his parents age yeah yeah he did he called you his parents age but but but while telling a story about how he tried to get his dad to help him with a nintendo switch game like what the hell's how why would his dad ever know the answer to that the whole thing was very confusing yes it didn't it made no sense and

he's just trying to fit in game he's young he's just trying to make he's just trying to fit in well listen when you're young these days anything you think put it in the comment section you know and you'll be famous as a result so he's just just just tick tock it just tick tock just say it in the form of some dumb dance every other person in your whole freaking life also did what is that about tick tock can someone tell me is there a reason no one has any original idea why does everyone do the same dance to the same song over and over again it's it's also most of them most people don't even dance very well either it's just like i don't know i did a tick tock once my wife had me do one of those dances i did it it's on video somewhere i don't know um i liked your tiktoks

i thought that was going to start breaking out of a stance and into a block i thought that could pick on a pickup i i never it never did i am a very uh very many rungs below attractive enough to be a tiktok star um yeah some of the videos are just cringy, but I like the food. I watch the food videos on there. There's this guy I follow who has a farm. I love his farm videos. The dancing videos, I mean, whatever. That's not why I'm there.

But all right, enough blabbering about TikTok. We are Power of the Varsity Podcast Network. You can find us there on iTunes, on Spotify. Please leave a review. Rating would be great as well. They really help our show. At Jeff Schwartz as well, if you want to leave a comment.

We'll be back on Thursday. We had a winning week. By the way, Pac-12 record, 26-9. I think our NFL record now is 21-29. We had 4-1 this week. We needed that in the worst way. So we're digging ourselves out of a hole in the NFL. We'll be back on Thursday.

Have a great couple of days.