Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Mahomes vs. Brady, Rush vs. Prescott, and the Ravens vs. Themselves

Episode Date: October 4, 2022

Geoff and Gabe are back and happy as ever celebrating the Chiefs win over Brady and the Bucs on Sunday night. Plus, Gabe wonders if the Cowboys should stick with Cooper Rush even when Dak gets healthy, and Geoff shares what he learned from watching the Bills comeback to beat the Ravens.This week on Moving the Line, Geoff tells you how he'd play everything from Tua's concussion protocol to Manny Pacquiao's semi-pro basketball league. Tune in for all that and more, and be sure to leave a rating or comment if you enjoyed.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 4th I'm Jeff Schwartz alongside Gabe Goodwin this Jeff Schwartz is smarting you powered by the varsity podcast network and Gabe the best team in the national football league put a beat down on your favorite quarterback last night the other best team in the NFL had a huge win in Philadelphia so much to get through through four weeks of the NFL season we'll do it all here some quarterback controversy happening in dallas and we'll talk to some college football along the way if you like this show please give us a rating it's very helpful reviews are great as well you can go to my twitter at jeff schwartz go to itunes go to gabe's twitter whatever you want to leave a comment just let us know if you like the show gabe buddy how you doing you had a good weekend because your chargers won yes Yes. Your Jets won. Yes. Your Trojans won.

Yeah. Your baseball team, not so much. Hey, come on, man. We were just getting warmed up nice. And by Elton John. Elton John trolling my Mets. What is with Elton John being a Braves fan and calling out a Braves sweep at a concert? Where did that come from? Really?

Yeah. Yeah, that's on the internet right now. Wow. Wow. Who knew? I didn't know he was a Braves fan. Big Bravos from? Yeah. Yeah, that's on the internet right now. Wow. Wow. Who knew? I didn't know he was a Braves fan. Big Bravos fan. Yeah.

Yeah. But yeah, otherwise, football-wise, great weekend in the Goodwin household. The Rams are Monday night, so my son, a Cooper Cup fan, could get a happy time. My fantasy team sucks, but nobody cares about my fantasy team or anyone else's, Jeff. So let's talk about the big game from Sunday night. Yeah, let's do it because I was right as usual, but continue. Oh, okay. Well, you were right as usual. So the chiefs put a smack down on Tom Brady. Uh, and listen, I obviously people who listen to the show know that I am very biased towards Tom

Brady against Tom Brady. Yeah, exactly. I think it's appropriate though, to talk about him in a critical light, given this game, because all we've been told lately is that, you know, Tom Brady is still the goat and now he's also got this great defense and boy, look out, the chiefs aren't going to be able to do it. They'd been a favorite in something like 38 straight games with Pat.

They weren't the favorite and Pat absolutely destroyed them, just destroyed them. And I think I have to ask like. Well, first of all, for you and all your friends who were always sure the Chiefs were what we thought they were, how come Tom Brady, when things don't go right, just turns into the like guy who demands that he throw on every down and doesn't use the run game? Like how come he just abandons all football common sense whenever things go wrong? Why can't he trust anyone? Well, they didn't run the ball terribly well last night, no matter what they tried to do. They only tried six times, I believe.

So they didn't try very hard. I think that when you're in a game against Kansas City and the Chiefs offense is looking like it is, you have no choice but to score as many points as possible, as quickly as possible, and that's via the pass. Plus, look, if you're attacking the Chiefs defense, I would go after some of their corners, not all their corners. And they did that, right? They went after the young kid Watson who had the interception

against the Chargers. But again, he's seventh round draft pick, and Mike Evans is going to be a future Hall of Famer. They went after him many times last night, but he is, Gabe. Mike Evans is going to be a future hall of famer they went after him many times last night but he is game mike evans is going to end up hall of famer yeah so i'm yeah go look this up mike evans will end up if the if he just has his normal career every single year he will end up either second or third all-time in receiving yards and he'll end up in like the top five in touchdowns we're just giving giving him longevity. We're just like, oh, if he stays on this pace. Frank Gore is a Hall of Famer, right?

And he's just longevity. I mean, you're just assuming that Mike Evans will stay on this pace for another 10 years. I think he will. But nonetheless, very good football player. All right. I got nothing against Mike Evans. That's fine. Okay.

So you had to keep up with Kansas City. And I think they thought they would do that via passing. What's Tom Brady's record when they score 31 points or 35 points in his career? Like 125 and five? Like they don't lose many games when they score. My takeaway from this game, Gabe, was holy heck. When Kansas City wants to try, they're pretty freaking good. How about we try each week?

Why do we have to do a Colts game? Why do we have to do this to the chiefs fans to yourselves like you cost yourself a loss that was not needed because you bullshitting against the colts when we know you have this in you the entire time and i thought this game solidified they don't need tyreek out now they still miss him like there are parts of the offense where you're just not getting those explosive down-the-field plays, but that doesn't mean the offense can't function. There's plenty of guys open. There's plenty of guys in rhythm for Pat to throw

the ball to. They ran the ball well. I don't know who 25 was on Kansas City last night. I haven't seen that guy since they drafted him. Claude Edwards-Hilaire had his best game, minus that really bad drop, but he had his best game in a long time running the football. The offensive line played great.

I thought Pat Mahomes got the ball out quickly and on time. Obviously, look, the off-platform plays, the street ball plays, right, that great play obviously we saw when he kind of just, you know, juked everyone, spun, threw up. Those are great and all. But I'm more excited about the plays that happen in rhythm. Hits his back foot, finds a guy, throws it open. The wrinkles were great, man.

It looked like Kansas City cared. They had wrinkles in their game plan that they don't normally do. They had that, obviously, the touchdown sneak to kind of fool Tampa Bay there, but also stuff with motions and shifts and stuff, breaking tendencies. They came to play, and defensively, they're good too. Tampa Bay just scored, obviously, a little bit more than I think Kansas City wanted it to. But my takeaway from that is that Kansas City is still good.

I think Tampa will be fine in the long run. Their defense just got torched. All right. So you mentioned the lack of Tyreek. That was the off season worry. Maybe not for you, but for a lot of us who don't follow the team as closely. So according to Shield Compadia, EPA per drive, KC is first through four games.

Points per drive, first. Offensive points per game, second. Success rate, third. And Pat himself is first among starting quarterbacks in EPA per pass play. I don't actually know what the hell most of those stats mean, but I bet you do. He can do it with whoever's playing the X, the Y, the Z, et cetera, right? Yes, he can do it all. All right.

So then let's go to the other guy. Yeah. I'm going to go back to him. Okay. Here's my impression. It's time to start admitting that the run up the score, be the best fantasy quarterback alive. Tom Brady is actually not a winner.

He's likable to many. He puts up great stats. He's doubling and tripling down on his Hall of Fame status with all those numbers. But it's actually just the rely on your defense and coaching staff, not to mention some cheating and luck guy that got him to be the GOAT. So when he's just bombing it all night long, throwing for 300 plus yards, three touchdowns, but doesn't trust anyone else on the team. He's not, not great. What was wrong with him last night though?

No, but that nothing is wrong with him except they lose. That's my point. They lost because they allowed 41 points. Okay. But so then. But that's not, that's not Tom Brady's fault. It's not his fault that the defense isn't very good, but can we just agree that... The defense was good,

and I think it's still going to end up being good. The Chiefs just torched him last night. But his GOAT status is based on the important wins, not the stats. So good for him on the stats. The stats were great Sunday night. The win comes from actually managing the game in a way that the whole team can beat a better team.

And that doesn't happen as often. Win comes from actually managing the game in a way that the whole team can beat a better team. And that doesn't happen as often. So, wow, he's 125-5 when they score 31-plus. Like, what defense can't hold you under 30? I guess I'm just saying he's not a world beater by himself. He has to be part of it. But no one – this is the problem, man, is that no one thinks Tom Brady has ever done it by himself. on, man, is that no one thinks Tom Brady has ever done it by himself. People that hate Tom Brady, like yourself, have always thought that because you try to use that to say he's not a good football player.

But I've never, and I like Tom Brady, I've never once said Tom Brady does it by himself. He needs the coach. He needs the defense. You need all these things to win. We saw Kansas City two years ago, right, in the playoffs. You need an offensive line, right? You need things to happen for you to win. We saw Kansas City two years ago in the playoffs. You need an offensive line. You need things to happen for you to win these games. People that hate Tom Brady have made this argument that he can't do it by himself.

I've never argued that. I've always said he needs – everyone does. You need all these things to happen to win a Super Bowl. You need injury luck. You might need luck in a game. You might need turnover luck. Things that you need to happen in a game to win, Tom has never done it by himself.

The people that hate him like you just keep saying things like that. Okay. Well, I guess it does help me that the stats show that he's three of the only five times in NFL history that a team has run the ball six times or less were him. He just abandons the run and just decides it's up to him when things aren't going. I don't think, but there's a couple of things about that. One is that obviously he's

not calling the plays, even though I think he has an outsized influence on what happens, right? Do we think that he's not just doing what he wants and Todd Bowles is just kind of keeping quiet sometimes? No, I think him and Lefkowitz work together on the game plan. But here's the thing that is really hard when you're playing a good offense like the Chiefs is that you get out of your game plan quickly because they're scoring so fast. This happens a lot in many NFL games, college games, where you have to have a lot of fortitude to stick with your game plan when you're losing early in a game.

And it's really hard to do that. You start having panic. You start thinking you need to keep up. And we've seen a couple of times, like the Rams are really good at this, where they'll be losing and they stick with their game plan. And all of a sudden, it's like, oh, okay, we're back in the game. I think Buffalo does this well. I think it's on Saturday, Sunday, excuse me, no panic from them, down 20-3, come back.

And I think Tampa Bay in this game, panic. They also have not run the ball terribly well. I saw an article today on The Ringer, kind of interesting. For so many years, we were told that the run game doesn't matter at all, Right. And then there's article out today, like, oh, you know what, maybe it's, it's good if like teams can run the ball a little bit. It's like, well, yeah, you think like, so it was, it's funny to see like that admission of like, yeah, it might be nice to be good at that. I didn't read the article yet, but the headline was the conceptual balance. Teams like Denver, Tampa Bay, Cincinnati have the star QBs to feel good offense, but the inability to run is making things harder while Detroit, Seattle, and Philly are scoring

for fun. I mean, it's just funny. For years, I fought this battle game, and now we're coming back to it again. It's not about establishing the run. It's about that balance, right? And how things play out of each other right because if you're not running the football as much as we don't want to admit that because the numbers say this and again i agree with the numbers on on most for the most part is that you know play action path is not affected by your ability to run the football but we're seeing in certain instances it is like tampa bay's play

action pass not as good because they can't run due anymore as well as they have in the past. And so defenses don't bite. Again, guys, linebackers, which is affected most by play action pass, they read run to pass, okay? So they will always read run first. It's what they do. It's what their coach. When they get coached to read pass, pass then run then this won't be a problem

but if you can consistently show you can run the football or the threat of running the football they will react to that run first and again i'm not advocating to run the ball every single play like the falcons did this weekend but there has to be some of that in the offense and um we're seeing some teams struggle with that that have quote-unquote good offenses just need a little bit more balance. Alright, so you're not losing faith in Brady and the Bucs. And get guys healthy again and get an offensive line back a little bit. I mean, their offensive line

is not going to be going to come back at all. They're going to have a problem probably. Alright. Our buddy Nick Wright put a fun idea out there. I think he's pretty serious about this. He's the biggest Chiefs fan I know. He said, what about Cam Newton for short yardage situations?

Obviously, they have the quarterback. They're not looking to have Cam Newton do anything but short and goal line. But take that idea seriously for a second. Do you like it? Well, I'm not. One thing I like about Nick is not taking that seriously okay is that he obviously in his you know jobs which you work with him and he works on fox sports obviously you know very professional like fandom not involved just giving you his taste how he feels

it except for kansas city where his full fandom is on display at all times, which I love. He's a fan of the Chiefs. And this is a message board fandom comment from him. You're not. I don't know. I liked it. Of course you did. You probably want Tebow to come back and have that role for the Chiefs. It would be amazing. Oh, I said that.

I said that out loud. I'm sorry. That's a great idea. I'm going to bring that to Nick and see if he likes that idea better. It's a fandom. You cannot. First of all, I think they were fine last night in short yardage. They need to just get under center and run the football. Like in the four minute, which is the end of the game when they're winning,

they run the ball really well. But for some reason, the goal line, they just do this shotgun nonsense. Like get under center, run the football, and you don't need Cam Newton for that. And here's the practice. But they're afraid of Pat getting hurt, right? Doesn't he have a history of it not going so well when he tries to go over the top? Well, they've only tried. I mean, it hasn't happened since he dislocated. They don't have it in their playbook. They're

afraid of Pat getting hurt that way. That's why they have the tight ends do it. But here's the thing, though. In a practical sense, Gabe, you cannot use up a roster spot for a player that might play in a game a quarterback. Like, he's either your backup quarterback or he's on your team so if you want to bring in cam noon to be your backup quarterback and have him ready for these spots great if not you cannot use up a roster spot on game day for a third string quarterback who may or may not play if you're

inside the two yard line what about if you're using up two or three roster spots for guys who kick the ball as the Chiefs currently are? You typically use two. Yeah, how many they got right now? Two. But they have two kickers and a punter? No, they have one kicker. They can't seem to figure out

the kicker position. That's what I'm saying. They have one kicker. One kicker. And one punter. And no, they should not trade for Taysom Mill. Okay, it sounds like

what you're saying is bring Tebow back, have him do goal line and kicking and then problem solved. Trade for, sounds like what you're saying is bring Tebow back, have him do goal line and kicking, and then problem solved. Or like Hanger said in the chat, trade for Taysom Hill. Even better. Love this idea. By the way, all of this is moot.

Geno Smith is the best quarterback in the league, according to PFF. We know that their stats never lie, so we're going with that. How about this, though? Seattle fans spent years blaming Pete Carroll, and so did I. I'm part of this. Yeah.

For the offensive issues in Seattle. And now they get rid of Russell Wilson, and he's struggling mightily in Denver. And Geno Smith, of all people, is the most efficient quarterback in the NFL, leading the number one offensive offense in the NFC. Absolutely not. I don't know how long this lasts. They play a Lions team that's allowing 35 points a game right now. But wow.

I mean, I have to feel like they're pretty happy. Look, if you're a Seattle fan, I'd love to know this. If you're listening, please just, again, at Jeff Schwartz, tweet me this. It's fun to watch Gino Smith play. I watched that game yesterday. A lot of fun. A lot of points. But don't you really want to lose?

Like, don't you want to have the top pick in the draft or do you want to win six games with Gino and have it be a fun year but then you look at like the draft you're like uh I they're Denver's pick too though right yeah that I mean they've got picks and I guess if Denver stinks enough too you might have you might be fine they're worth the hilarious if Denver stunk so bad after they got Russ in the deal. That would be amazing. All right. You're giving me a segue, though, which is a team that you can't quite tell if they should be rooting for their bad quarterback to win or not. It's the Cowboys.

We made it this far. We haven't talked about them yet. Here they go. So Cooper Rush won his third game as a starter this season. Going back to last year, that's his fourth win and four starts. Okay. Of all the undrafted quarterbacks ever, only Kurt Warner started with a better record. He was 6-0.

Jeff, some very big takemakers and very big Cowboys fans are out there saying there's a controversy going on in Dallas that maybe Cooper Rush, a guy most of us had never heard of until last year, maybe he's better for the team than Dak Prescott. And some of these people, including my buddy Skip Bayless, they seem to really believe this, that Cooper Rush gives them a better chance to win. When Dak is healthy in a few weeks, we think what what are they going to do now that I got to keep you honest here they're three and one they won three in a row the next two games look very tough Rams and Eagles but what are they supposed to do with the Dak situation you're just laughing at this uh I mean that's gonna play because they paid him to play um that's different than what

they should do. Yeah. Well, okay. The offenses, though, are just very different with either guy playing, right? So, you know, the Cooper Rush offense is kind of – what's the right word to use? It's just more protected. Like, it's just – they're keeping tight ends in.

They're a very controlled passing game. And it's really only going to work if your defense continues to play this well. If your defense has a game, let's say they're playing the Chiefs, okay? The Chiefs have a game like they did against Tampa. Cooper Rush is not the quarterback to win you that game. Dak Prescott would be. That's the difference, right? And so I think that's the delineation of where if you're a Cowboys fan, it's working well now in this

offense as designed for Cooper Rush, but Dak allows you the opportunity to have a more explosive offense if the other parts of your team aren't as good in a given week. Now, Jerry Jones loves this more than anything else because he loves the discussion and the attention he's getting for all of this. But I think he knows in the back of his mind, in his heart, this is the right answer. Dak Prescott is the guy. And I think, you know, you obviously keep Cooper Rush,

but like there could be a situation where a team gets desperate and needs a quarterback, and they trade for Cooper Rush. I don't know if that's going to happen, but Dak Prescott's your guy. You have to play him when he gets healthy. All right. Well, thank you for being clear about that, but let me push back a little bit. Is it possible that the Cowboys offense for all these years that Dak has been there, just with almost anybody in there with some reps in practice, was going to look like a better than average quarterback? Dak never looked to me like much more than that.

You know, he was a borderline top 10 guy. Now Cooper Rush, I don't know what he looks like, but he's certainly winning. guy. Now Cooper Rush, I don't know what he looks like, but he's certainly winning. Is it just that this offense with the other players around it is always going to be pretty good? You plug in one of the hundred guys on earth capable of being an NFL quarterback and they look pretty good and you get a little lucky and you win. No, because I feel like we have plenty of situations around the NFL when backup quarterback comes in and doesn't play as well, even with the weapons that are given to them. I understand.

I'm just saying. I think he's doing a good job. I'm saying is this actually an indictment of Dak Prescott that imagine if he were good, how much better this team really would be? Because now a guy who couldn't even barely play college football looks like he's a pretty good starter we don't know because that's only played one game this year like we don't really know if Dak is back healthy from last season and playing better from last year because we just don't know Gabe he hasn't played he's played one game and in that game he didn't even have Michael Gallup right like give him everyone back gallup is back obviously i had a

touchdown and let me see him play for a couple weeks and i'll give you your answer but dac is better than cooper rush and it allows your offense to do more when dac's in the game yeah i'm just wondering if he's that much better like if anyone could be better we we if you get if you let him run this offense he's's going to be great in this offense. But if you put Cooper Rush in the offense, in the Dax, one-for-one trade, it's not going to be as good for Cooper Rush to play in that offense. Okay.

Let me ask you this question. You said Jerry's loving this. I assume you just mean the attention. He likes all the shows. Yeah, Colin and all our buddies are talking about it. Oh, yes. Loves it. Yes.

All right. So let's say I agree with you there. He can't be loving the fact, though, that for the second, maybe arguably third time in a row, the guy who makes a little less money at the key position is clearly out playing the guy who makes a ton of money i'm thinking about zeke and tony pollard to an extent cd lamb and marie cooper obviously cooper rush and dak prescott it's not looking like the greatest businessman um he can't love that you you just got that opinion now that he's not the best business guy for the, to be back

great business guy, team manager, team builder. Not quite sure. Right. You, I, I go back to like Dak's injury when he hurt his leg was two years ago. Now, remember he was playing, he was playing on the franchise tag that year. If he had just been himself, i don't know do they pay him a big deal like i just felt like the cowboys weren't gonna do it and then when he got hurt they felt bad i kind of felt stuck and then paid him i'm just i if you remember i was on that

bandwagon for a long time game they were never gonna pay him yeah because they just didn't they didn't if they would have if they liked him, they would have paid him already. Right. And they just didn't. And I wondered openly at the time, like, do they really like him? Like the media says they do. And I wonder if he had not gotten hurt,

if they would have paid him, but now they're stuck because they have paid him. And unless someone's going to trade for Dak Prescott in the off season, then he's your guy. And maybe someone does trade for him. And there's plenty of teams that I think would love to have an upgraded quarterback for a salary that's not that bad for now as we continue to go

with contract extensions, right? His deal gets cheaper and cheaper and cheaper as the cap goes up as well. Who would love to trade for Dak Prescott? I mean, are you telling me like Bill Belichick wouldn't trade for Dak Prescott in the offseason uh the the Saints right like any of these teams that I think they're they can win next season they would love to do that again I don't think it's gonna ever get to that I think Dak's the guy he should be the guy and you just know you have a good backup quarterback yeah okay. Okay. Here's another question for you.

And I'm not really sure. I don't know if I believe what I'm about to say, but here goes. So Mike McCarthy long ago thought of as a good quarter or a good coach wins a ton of games, including a Super Bowl. And eventually a quarterback with an obvious ego, superstar capability, essentially runs him out of town. He can't manage the ego at quarterback. Now, he has a similar problem. The quarterback's bigger than life in Dallas.

He can't win with him. He looks like a mess with Dak. And then he gets some no-name, and he wins three games by, you know, coaching his way to victory. Is it possible that Mike McCarthy's's a good football coach he's just bad at managing talent oh good question oh but is that part of being a good coach though yeah it is but like being if i'm thinking about my world as a producer like some people are great show producers they're not good executives they're not they're not good at managing teams they don't know what budgets work they're not thinking about like the big picture they're just they put together a great show and the talent are i like working with them it's hard to do both yeah um it's it's

possible but but i but i do think though that that part of part of of your job is managing the talent so um so you're saying like good x and o's guy just bad at managing talent that's what i'm wondering yeah like let's say in baseball joe tory is kind of the opposite right yeah i i um i mean it's definitely i think it's fair to say that even though i think his offense did get stale in green bay for a while mostly because aaron rogers was just so good um he kind of like could just do what he wanted to and there needs to be a reboot there but i i can buy that for right now i mean obviously he's doing doing really well uh with with cooper rush even though technically kellen

moore's the ost okay well i mean that's the guy he manages i i don't know it's more of a thought exercise let's keep an eye on it because i feel like we were ready to fire mike mccarthy after week one probably i'm not i'm not saying he shouldn't get fired if they go on another losing streak. But it just occurred to me that, like, I don't know, maybe he's just deficient in very small ways, like dealing with a superstar quarterback. Speaking of superstar quarterbacks, this game, I feel like probably got undercovered because of a couple of the other things we just talked about. covered because of a couple of the other things we just talked about. I feel like the Bills-Ravens game was really a very likely NFC championship matchup. Obviously, the Chiefs could be one of those two teams. And that game was unreal. So the Ravens are up three scores and then just gack the whole game away. And Josh Allen finally wins a close game and a comeback. He hadn't really done that before. So we kind of learned something about each team.

The Ravens kind of don't have what it takes to hold on against a good team and the bills can come back and win a close game if they have to. What, which lesson do you think is more important from this game? Oh, the bills had to win a close game in a long time, right? We talked about this. It was like seven in a row they had lost under three points or under seven points. And, you know, we talked about this. You know, they won every game the last year and a half by more than 15 points.

They're down 23 on the road in the wet and wild conditions of Baltimore, and they just grinded away, man. They made a lot of plays. Again, they didn't abandon their game plan, Gabe. They just went about it slowly. And Baltimore did not score in the second half. They were up 23, did not score again. And this solidifies Buffalo and Kansas City, the top of the AFC.

As far as Baltimore, man, I'm disappointed. They're up 38-21 at home against Miami and lost that game. Also, I had a wager on Baltimore that day, and then I wagered on yesterday of 23 at home and lost by not scoring the second half. It's becoming a problem, Gabe, becoming an issue. And the reasons are, you know, roster injuries, not as great, you know, don't really have that kind of explosive wide receiver to really

catch a short pass and take it really far and kind of break a defense up and make a big explosive play when you need one. Very reliant on Lamar to do all of that. Mark Andrews is great at tight end, but he's not that type of player. You don't just throw to him seven yards and then let him run 30 yards. It's not really the player

he is. Buffalo has those guys, right? Like they have a dynamic quarterback that you can spread everything out and there's that fear that he'll beat you with his arm and his legs. So I'm worried about – I like Baltimore a lot this season, but their – the inability to finish these games – and they're supposed to be a running team, like a team that's able to control a line of scrimmage

and pound you to submission at the end of games they have not done that probably again their offensive lines really beat up and they've had to replace a lot of players it's hard to go from you know marshall yanda ronnie stanley orlando brown to not have any of those guys right now brown's on kansas city yanda retired and stanley's not back yet. So a lot of concerns, I think, for Baltimore. But again, it made me feel Buffalo. I'm not moving off my Buffalo to win the AFC pick quite yet. I was texting with a buddy today, and he's like, the AFC's going to come down to the weather in Buffalo

on January 30th. And I was like, yeah, probably. Like, it's probably what it would come down to. But I'm for it. Mahomes has yet to play a road playoff game, by the way, in his career. Wouldn't that be something? First road playoff? Yeah, he's only played home games, buddy. Or Super Bowls. What? Yeah.

Never played a road playoff game in four years. That's insane. Only home game in Super Bowls. That's crazier to me than the stat I heard today about him having been a favorite in 38 straight games until Sunday. Yeah, because they've hosted four straight after-champion games. And he's always been the one or two seed.

Yeah, wow. Okay, well, so all the frustration that you're pointing out with the Ravens blowing these two big leads and against game teams that are supposedly competitors for the afc and just just looking awful in the fourth quarter uh that's probably what was on marcus peters's mind when he started yapping at his coach yeah we don't know for sure but it seems marcus peters who was seen yelling back at harbaugh on the sideline was probably pissed that they went for it instead of kicking a field goal late in the game. He probably, because he's a defensive player and has pride, thought, go get the lead and we'll hold the lead. We're not going to let these guys score. But then also there was some confusion on whether or not they should let the Bills

score or how they should handle the final minute and a half of the game. What do you think is going on there? Make us a little smarter because you know these situations. Well, I think they try to let them score and Buffalo wouldn't score. Yeah, so this is always an interesting discussion, right? Harbaugh gave a very good answer about why he did not go for it. And then Buffalo then proceeded to march down the field right away. So three points wouldn't matter, right?

They could get in the end zone, score, win the game. And Baltimore was touched down there, obviously. That would have been a tie game, not a game winning field goal at the end. But, you know, I feel like Baltimore has gone this spot a couple of years in a row now. Or like they've lost games they should have won with some of these decisions at the end of the game, right, Gabe? And we've seen this with Brandon Staley in Los Angeles.

And, of course, there are situations, I think, you know, vice versa, right, where the aggressiveness of John Harbaugh has worked and the aggressiveness of Brandon Staley has worked. But I got to go look at this. I don't have a ton of research. But I feel like, you know, in the end, the coaches that seem to have to defend themselves less like win the super bowl i don't know like it's it's a and maybe there's no actual

reason for that right because obviously when you lose you defend yourself the ravens want to score a touchdown and help the bells out of the end zone we would have praised john harbaugh, right? So I'm not sure there's an actual grand answer to this, but it does feel like, in the end, more coaches that are not playing in the playoffs, the Super Bowls, are the ones defending decisions to go for it or not. Again, when you convert, no one cares. You don't have to answer questions.

So maybe I'm just remembering the times that Harbaugh had to talk about this and Brandt Stanton had to talk about this and not Andy Reid and Bruce Arians, right? And Sean McVay. And Sean McVay is like weirdly aggressive and not aggressive at times. But I don't know, man. I do wonder, though, that if this happens a few more times this season

where they go for it and do not convert. Remember, in the Dolphins game, too, they had a fourth and one to one yard line. I'm for going for that. I said, totally fine. And it was early in the game, and they fumbled the ball, and the Dolphins went down and scored a touchdown. And Mark Andrews in the locker room said, yeah, I trust my coach. Like, go for it.

And all the players are going to want to do that. But if you end up losing a lot of close games this year because of that players will start getting upset even though again they want to go for it but the losses man i've said this before like losing nfl is is tough buddy everyone in the building is just so sad all week. Like it trickles down, man. Even like the non-football side people, right? Like even like the accountants and the secretaries and the resource, like they're just,

everyone in the building is just like miserable all week. So it sucks to lose and your emotions come out. And I think for the players, same thing happens. But how come players can't do a better job of recognizing like what the quote-unquote right thing to do is right they have a job perform as high a level as they can on the side of the ball where you know where they play coach's job is to make those decisions and balance it all out so like the offense is always going to say let us go for it on fourth down the defense is always going to say we can stop them.

They all know this about themselves. Isn't it coach's job to be like, I hear you, but like, I got this. Why don't they just shut up sometimes? You mean the player shut up? Yeah, like, obviously, like, I guess I guess the issue, the reason we're talking about this today is because conventional wisdom in the NFL has been the opposite of what Harbaugh did. Now it seems you've got to score. You can't give the ball back to almost any quarterback in the league anymore.

It's too easy to move the ball down the field. So you've got to get six. Three isn't enough. That seems to be what people are starting to believe. But defenses don't think that way. I guess I wonder why players can't just get behind their coach, especially a guy like Harbaugh who's been an unbelievable coach for a decade. For the most part, like, Mark Andrews has, and I give you, everyone will do that.

But again, like, the losing, it's, in my opinion, it's more a product of the actual wins and losses result and like the process result, right? Like I'm pissed we lost. I'm going to take it out on my coach's decision to go for it. If we won, I praise my coach for going for it, which is kind of my point about like, it just feels like more often than not, the teams that are winning are not defending themselves probably because they win those games. Like, but you know, you you you get my point right like we see more coaches than not up there

at the podium defending themselves for bad decisions and that costs their team in situations but again if if you win if harbaugh had won he's not defending himself that clip doesn't go viral right so i'm buying look i've been very clear about this. If you're going to be aggressive, then be aggressive all the time. If that's who you're going to be, then be that coach. Because then the rest of your team understands it and you play that way. You understand that my coach is going for it no matter what. I love it. Just be yourself and Harbaugh is himself.

If you're Brandon Staley, be that guy. Except this year he seems to not be that guy. So I don't know who he is anymore but Harbaugh's been that guy he's been aggressive, I'm fine with it he would have hit the field goal I think the win percentage was 2% different go for it, take a field goal

so in favor of going for it by the way but again eventually if you lose enough of these the players will get tired of it. Yeah, well, that's a nice segue to our moving the line segment. One of the topics in there will be that the Jets, who routinely make the wrong choice and get questioned for it, actually beat in some late and close situations the team that always gets it right and the coach who's very very hard to second guess in mike tomlin so we'll get into the steelers and their

future the jets we don't need to talk about them and also i want to come back to two with some more serious stuff because that story isn't over yet so we'll take a quick break we'll come right back we'll move the line all right jeff we're back uh we'll start with more of a serious one then we'll get to some fun stuff so um and i don't know if my over under is quite right here but over under two and a half weeks until we see tua on the field again um and you can catch us up in talking about this with everything that's gone on in the last few days so tua is uh out this week he's already been announced out this week. Smart decision. So here's the part that people are missing here is not been talked about.

Maybe I don't listen to a lot of people talk about this. Go back now two games ago, right? He gets what appears to be a concussion. We talked about this at the time. I think it was a concussion. He shakes his head, gets up, wobbles. It's held up, comes out of the game and they evaluate him for a head injury

he passes the concussion test which players can do while they're concussed we've talked about this before other players have said since this point you pass the test while concussed at that point they have to determine whether or not that wobbling was because of a head injury or his back spasming, essentially, right?

Right. But because he passed the test, they can reasonably say that was because of his back, even though I think we all think that's bullshit. Right. And when they say that, that wobbling, part of the procedure, as it was, it's going to change. The wobbling, if determined to be orthopedic, does not constitute a no-go, which is the way they phrase any sort of – we saw Cameron Brate last night. That's a no-go too. Shouldn't come back in the game for a play. So because of that distinction, he got to go back in. Now, I would argue, even if he passed the concussion test,

very clearly concussed on the field, and that's what an independent neurologist is supposed to be there for. Now, I did not know that, Gabe, that the independent neurologist does not have the final say. I thought it was always him or her. It's actually the head trainer, the head doctor. I did not know not know that that might change along the way but that was very scary i actually i am my radio host makes fun of me because i'm very emotionless like i just love my family kids but comes a football man like whatever just like even keel no up and down but i was really upset the two-a-thing man because um he should have

been out there i feel like the dolphins like you know the saying um don't piss on my back and tell me it's raining like yeah they were pissing on our backs back injury and then i saw the report it's not jeff darlington's fault at all because they told him this that's one thing too guys like these reporters are getting told stuff by teams like they're not making this stuff up you can't get mad then for reporting it but he reported that like to his back injury is is worse because they have the torque with his body that he throws with like what the fuck is that every quarterback throws with torque with their body like what are we just nonsense we're feeding out here that's a back injury like come on man it's not it yeah it not, he had it in his head in the back, had the fencing pose.

Like, it's terrible. So to me, the only recourse was to fire the independent neurologist, even though it may or may not have been his or her fault. Though my guess is that any wobbling at all, not playing the rest of the game. And also important distinction too. And I do not think in the moment the Dolphins made this decision to claim it was a back injury. But if he goes into concussion protocol on Sunday,

he's not playing on Thursday. Most of the protocols are done team to team most often. They're five days. So you get cleared by Friday. They play Thursday. Again, I do not think they thought themselves, well, let's call it back injury because he can play Thursday.

It might've been like, let's call it back injury so he can just play today, right? And again, passing the concussion test allows them to make that determination. If he would have failed the test, they would have been like, sure. The wobbling was because of that.

It wouldn't have played anyways. Of course. So that's where I think people have not talked about those specifics in the way that I just did. So hopefully you learned something today. All right. Well then let me just to button all of this. So Schefter reported that the NFL PA and NFL will soon be expected to agree

to new protocols in which anytime any player demonstrates any instability, he's not allowed to return to the game. The rule could go into effect as early as week five. So I'm making you repeat yourself a little bit, but like that's pretty aggressive. I mean, that's quite a response to what we saw. That's basically saying common sense will, will overrule, you know, a surprising result from a test yeah it's what should be because because the thing about concussions that i think we're learning as we continue to go to grow is that they affect everyone differently to say that you can have one set of rules basically if you pass a test and that's it that's's the only thing that matters. But it's not really, right? Because again, I've had teammates

play concussed, unfortunately, and play fine. I had a teammate one time, we were down, I got hurt this game, so I wasn't playing. Another guy wasn't, we only had five guys left,

and he was concussed. And he had to play through it, unfortunately. He played. He did it. Yeah. I've had players on teams play entire games not realize they're concussed coming monday with a headache i've had players coming wednesday and thursday with headaches from sunday they like had to have them till wednesday everyone's different and that's why i think you have to make the most stringent of protocols, stick to it, and err on the side of player health,

especially with head injuries, especially for a league that preaches that. I thought what Rodney Harrison said yesterday was really good. If you have not seen that yet, I know Hank was texting us about the fans cheering in the background. The fans aren't listening. They don't hear what he said. They're just being told to cheer because that's their – make noise behind the camera, everybody.

Listen to what he said. Very important. I luckily do not suffer from any of these issues, Gabe, at least not yet. I feel healthy, feel good, good spirits. All those things are great for me. I'm very fortunate in that sense. But listen to what he had to say. This is why it's important, guys.

So I hope that the NFL airs on the side of caution. Again, the NFL has to protect their players and it's a players league right like compared to let's say college football where if a player says justin herbert i'm playing then he's gonna play but you have to sometimes protect us from ourselves which getting a jj watt the cardinals should have said you're not playing with your heart being shocked back into rhythm on Thursday. What are we doing? Yeah.

Yeah, that happened. So, I mean, JJ, I'm reluctant to even mock him at all. Normally, his social media game is very mockable. In this case, I guess he heard that news was going to get out about this, so he preempted it and tweeted himself. Well, my guess is that, like, I think glazer was the one who broke it is that like glazer probably sent a message like yo is this true yeah so he so he goes live with it he said i had my heart shocked back in rhythm on thursday and i'm playing today that's it so most of us are like wait what like you have such a severe heart issue that you have to shock it back into rhythm and you're going

to play. Maybe some doctor could come in here and tell us why this is very common or normal or not scary, but it certainly sounds scary. Yeah. And it begs the question, why isn't there someone saying, hold on, dude, no, not this week, which brings us to another point. Ryan Clark covers the NFL. Obviously had a nice career in the NFL. He told a story, I've heard him tell it before, about how Coach Tomlin basically said, look, I care too much about you. You're not going to go play in Denver because of a blood issue that he has. I'm worried about you in that altitude. I don't want to see anything bad happen to you, even if we could use you out there. That's the summary. Yeah, because again, players want to play. bad happen to you even if we could use you out there that's the summary yeah because again players want to play we we live in perpetual fear of being replaced and the first

time you sit out of a game you know if jj watts sits out and some guy comes in and plays really well as much as he's not going to be replaced that that thought's in your head i might be replaced like that's why i mean it's, it's why guys play, man. It's so hard, dude. It's so hard to sit out when you're deemed healthy by a health professional. If they told JJ Watt he was healthy, Tuatango Voa, they told he was healthy. They're going to play.

And I get Michael Daniel, the Dolphins head coach said, yeah, they cleared him. Of course, I'm going to play him. Yeah, I get it. Yeah, you're going to play him. You rely on them to tell you injuries. They rely on you to coach the team. Yeah, I get why you'd play him. So either the player, someone

I thought it was the independent neurologist, quite honestly. He's supposed to be in charge of that process when it comes to the head injury stuff. But yeah, man, it's I was surprised he played. I'm glad he's fine. Sounds he's fine he played he played in charlotte here no issues um and uh yeah good for him so that's jj how long do you think until tua is on the field again i know that's not really the point

but i'm curious if you think we'll get back out there this season uh i don't know i probably i mean i would imagine i would imagine even if he does pass all the tests they're going to keep him out longer because of the of the talk around this yeah um they have a very capable backup teddy covers man teddy bridgewater covers it's we're talking about this on on wednesday he covers a lot of football games um do not count him out. They play the Jets. They don't have a bye for a while. Jets, Vikings, Steelers, Lions, Bears, Browns. That's an easy schedule.

Pretty easy schedule. That's a winning schedule. Yeah, I mean, you could win all five of those games with Teddy Bridgewater. Yeah, Teddy isn't the reason you're going to lose those games. That's an easy schedule. The first bye is they play the browns i get a buy i mean if they could make it all the way jets vikings steelers lions bears browns maybe you haven't met play for the bears game i don't know but i would imagine that they hold them out longer than than maybe usual because of of the double concussion

issue here yeah all. All right. Let's shift gears. Hopefully some easier stuff to discuss. Over under eight and a half wins for the Steelers this season, which would mean the difference between Mike Tomlin continuing his streak of at least 500 seasons or not. It's not looking good right now. So the Steelers brought Kenny Pickett in. Yeah.

He threw 13 passes and none of them hit the ground. now so the Steelers can he pick it in yeah he completed he threw 13 passes and none of them hit the ground he completed 10 to his team and three to the other team it's one way of putting it yeah we took the Steelers over seven and a half I think I didn't like it I don't think so

they're 0-7 now when Watt doesn't play in his career yeah there's different he's one of those guys that were the rare guys I don't think so. They're 0-7 now when Watt doesn't play in his career. Yeah. There's a difference. He's one of those guys that, with a rare guy that's not a quarterback, that makes that much of a difference to winning and losing on a football field. So is this just one of those years?

We talk about this all the time in pre-off season, about what should a team do? They got the rookie. Do they turn it over to him or not? I'm sure they were hopeful that Mitch Trubisky had something in him. It doesn't look like he does so they'll go to pick it they'll probably just stay with pick it by the end of the year do you think they'll know they got their guy or not uh yeah uh maybe the offensive line no harris and harris up and down i think after i think what you want to see is that each kind of quarter, right, like each month he gets a little bit better.

That's it. He's going to have his bad games. He's going to have his good games. But at the end of the season, you feel like, okay, we can really – he's our guy, yeah. All right. I think I'm proposing that we, with respect to their history and with no real mean negativity here,

I think we move the Steelers into that category with the Colts. Just we don't need to talk about them anymore. For now, we do not, correct. The Colts should be 0-3-1. The Chiefs just didn't like, just like showed up a little bit to that game. Two more nominees for the, I think we're done talking talking about them even though one of them won the game the broncos and the raiders that was just a stink fest yeah okay do i even have to ask this question i think the raiders would have i think the raiders would have lost that game we would get serious josh mcdaniel should be fired

discussion yeah yeah oh yeah of course how about how about this gabe thursday night football do you know who's playing thursday night don't look it up i'm not i'm not looking at it who is it broncos colts oh god we wagered on last thursday night we will not be wagering on broncos that's it you know i don't have the phrase for it but there should start being a term where that when the Thursday night game is that much of a stinker, that's just like your Netflix catch up night. You know, because I'm sure you're like me. You got to really manage like your when are you going to watch the stuff you want to watch? What are the shows you watch with your wife?

What are the, you know, the nights you have to yourself watching football? If Thursday night is Broncos Colts, man, that's a good. So I'm watching the new gommer thing on netflix i don't know if you're watching that at all um bits and pieces it's a little bit dark sometimes my wife so my wife just decided she was home from work this week she was sick one day work from another day she decided to start watching handmaid's tale without me oh and she's so into it she's watching it like she's in season three by herself first show she's ever just binged without me i've no

so like we're in like separate rooms every night now i'm just like watching football in the living room and she's just watching handmaid's tale all night so i have you watched it yet i've watched the first two or three every time i walk in someone's getting killed it's not great it's probably not a great show to have your wife. I don't know what's better, her watching that by herself or Dahmer by herself. I'm watching Dahmer. She's watching. She wouldn't watch Dahmer with me,

but normally we watch shows together. She liked it so much, she just continues to watch it. She watches it on her phone while she's doing laundry around the house. Just some random things just watching The as Dale. Okay. Yeah.

I don't know if you need to watch it, but that's a bad, that show can get you pretty upset. Um, all right. Over under 50% of Brits think Kirk cousins is good at American football. Is that because he only does it every time he won there? Who knows? He's like a London... He's the opposite on Monday night

from what he is in London. Nice win. How about this weekend? First time in London history, game history, both teams have a winning record. Giants, Packers. Alright, you're welcome London, finally. Yeah, the Giants. Yeah, the You're welcome. London. Finally. Yeah.

The giants. Yeah. The three in one giants. I, I have wagered so much money the last two weeks as a number has gotten cheaper for giants. No playoffs. Like my entire bank account is on giants.

No playoffs right now. Cause you know, the number was like minus 600 to start the season. Now it's minus two 50 minus 200. Their wind holes. I think it's going to be nine and a half this week when it comes out, I will hammer their wind total under like it is wild, dude.

Yeah. I, it's funny. I'm trying to think, cause I've traveled in and out of England a few times during COVID. And I don't remember if they had any, um, mandates on vaccines. I wonder if that's going to be a story at all.

I haven't heard anything about that. Just not. How about this though? How about a bad trip to London? So unfortunately, one of the Vikings young players got a tib-fib. He did a compound fracture of his leg in the stadium.

And he's got to stay there. Because you need surgery immediately. I think they said they did surgery today. he did a compound fracture of his leg in the, in the stadium. And he's got to stay there. Like, cause you can't, you need surgery like immediately. I think they said they did surgery today or yesterday to repair for like a more major surgery. He has to stay in London and do his rehab at least till he can fly probably weeks till he can fly.

Yeah. Yeah. Can you imagine living in London for a whole month at some point oh that would be terrible during the middle of your work during the middle of your busiest part of your work year can you imagine something like that i've been to london one you married that's your fraud that's your problem um i went i've been to london once i just was like it's just not appealing to me sorry what i like paris way paris way better okay i mean i like london yeah. It throws you off a little bit when you just randomly live in London for a month. Good luck to him

getting healthy. You live on the farm side or you live in London? No, no. Cut it out with this farm stuff. I lived in London the last time I was there. The last time you went, you lived in a farmhouse. That's like three trips ago. I was like in the middle of COVID when you couldn't be around anyone.

Now, I live in London when I'm there. You like like tea. Like you drink like tea with the, with the locals. No, but you like the beer though. Probably. Here's pretty good.

Yeah. Fish and chips. Good. Yeah. It's the only place I eat it is there. It's not great. Um, Jeff over under one and a half more weeks till you'll admit the Trojans are

good. No, never. So when they beat Utah in two weeks, you'll admit the Trojans are good. No, never. So when they beat Utah in two weeks, you're not going to admit it? Oh, they're not beating Utah, sorry. Okay. But if they do, I'll come on the show and be like, yes, they're good, but they're not good. Buddy, the Cougars come into town this weekend.

Just watch out for the Cougars this weekend. All right, I'm not going there. USC has not covered the last two games now. It's going downhill. You don't need to cover. You just need to win, buddy. Oregon seems to be covering a lot of their games. Oh, yeah. They covered that game a couple weeks ago when it took them a

miracle to come back and win. They covered that one. Wazoo scored the last part of the game to cover. Otherwise, Oregon was covering that game. Last thing. This is in the rundown, and I saw this on the internet, and I thought,

this can't be real. This has to be old or some sort of setup. Manny Pacquiao allegedly banked in a three-pointer to tie a game in some, like, basketball game he created.

So how many points would you average in a Filipino semi-pro basketball league that featured manny pacquiao running the point over under 19 and a half points a game i'm watching this right now i would average 55 points 55 point you don't think there's anyone who could guard you buddy this is bad it's bad it's really bad like are they letting him yes letting him shoot are they letting him

shoot manny pacquiao is like uh yeah like they treat him like you Manny Pacquiao is like Yeah They treat him like You know the old fable about the king with the no clothes And everyone's afraid to tell him the truth This is how I feel This is how Kim Jong is like 12 under in a golf tournament

Same idea They have one guy who's maybe 6 feet tall And he looks like he's Yao Ming. He looks like he's the biggest human, Manute Bull. He looks like the biggest human of all time. He doesn't keep naming giant humans. Mark Eaton, just like giant humans that you watch him play, you're like, oh, my God, they're the most giant humans of all time.

Wow. Yeah, I'd get more. I even hank would average 20 points i still that pic by the way the picture of you hank i think was page right from the uh hank is i i thought hank was like five five ish yeah he's he's probably he's pretty well together well together put well together he's not he's he Yeah, no, he's a normal size. A little bit thicker than I thought he would be a little sturdier. He'd be a tougher. You know, if we had to put two guys up against each other in our little shared universe,

guarding each other in a game of basketball, we're putting him and Nick Weiner up against each other. A little stockier than you think from a zoom image. A little thick. I was I was a little bit. I was like, oh, OK. hank and uh mr groberg we're not saying athletic looking we're saying a little a little sturdier a little sturdier than i thought i thought you would be yeah uh i want to read you a quote as we say goodbye here i'm glad that we finally got to make fun of hank at some point in the show it had been too long um how confident is tyree kill that'll be able to produce with

teddy bridgewater at quarterback this is uh from marcel louis jacques uh tweeting about it he said to marcel he looked me dead in the eye and he said quote i'll put up numbers with you that's how that's how confident tyree is, that it won't make a difference. So, you know, he's got a lot of confidence these days. We'll see if the Dolphins are good with him. We'll see if the Cowboys have a quarterback controversy. We'll see if Tom Brady can come back and actually trust his teammates and run the ball a little bit. We got a lot to learn in the next few weeks, Jeff, but you made me smarter this week. Thank you, buddy. Football season is often roaring. And look, we were 2-2-1.

The Ravens are killing us. So we're on the winning side still. We were 2-2-1 this week. We were 10-9-1 overall. So we're moving our way along this board. We'll be back on Thursday with our wagering show. Please rate, review, subscribe. Powered by the Varsity Podcast Network.

We'll talk to you guys in a few days. Take care.