Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - NFL Week 16 Reactions

Episode Date: December 26, 2023

Geoff and Gabe tell us how much the Chiefs need to panic after yet another bad loss in prime time. They then talk about the Ravens impressive Monday night win, talk about Prime's recruiting tactics, and more! Plus he gives out plays for Thursday's showdown between Cleveland and the Jets. 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, December 26. I'm Jeff Schwartz. Is Jeff Schwartz smarter than you? We are live on your favorite platform of choice. Also, thank you for listening. Please subscribe and rate and review. We'd love to get your feedback when you listen to this show. We're brought to you by PrizePix, a skill-based, real-money, daily fantasy sports game. Go to PrizePix and use code GSSY for a first deposit matchup to $100. You pick two to six players if they will go more or less in your prize picks projection. You can win up to 25 times your money on any entry.

And because of the holiday, we are taping on a Tuesday, not a Monday, so we're going to cover Thursday night football for our prize picks. At the end of the show, I will give you what I think will happen on Thursday night between the Jets and the Browns. Gabe, how was your holiday? How was your Christmas, your weekend of watching football? How are you doing, buddy? I'm doing all right.

Thanks for asking. It was a nice time all around. Family enjoyed Christmas, enjoyed some football. But I have to ask you, Jeff. Yes. You have this tradition in your family that and the whole time I've known you, this has mesmerized me for the newer listeners. Jeff buys a very large and ornate Christmas tree and enjoys it for however long. But literally on Christmas every year, his wife usually by herself

drags that thing out to the curb to be taken away. And this year, I guess she was away. So what's the status of your Christmas tree? Oh, it's on the side of the road. Um, so it's already out there. Yeah. Yeah. So yes. Okay. So my wife, um, for those who are unaware, um, we're Jewish. She's not Jewish per se, but I'm Jewish. The kids are Jewish. The kids go to Hebrew school. They're going to be bar about mitzvahed. My wife has done an amazing job of accepting Judaism. She's fantastic when it comes to Judaism. So the Christmas tree for us and for her is more about like the holiday spirit than it is celebrating Christmas. Our kids will get a gift at most on Christmas. The big gifts happen during Hanukkah and this year they are out of town so uh they're in whistler they're skiing they're actually flying back home right now

i hope to see them tonight if everything goes on time and she texted me yesterday in the morning the first thing she said to me was good morning uh take my tree down please so i took the tree down it was uh it's a 13-foot tree, Gabe. It took a long time to get the ornaments off of it and then the lights. At one point, I was pulling the light, like trying to pull the rope light through and just snapped in half. I just was so angry, full sweat. The funny part about the tree yesterday, though, was not that I took it down myself. So a friend of hers went on the trip with her left her car here her boyfriend is a police officer

and he came to pick up the car keys to take her car back home so they could have her car tonight when they get home and he rolled up with a rookie in his in his car and i was taking the tree out when he rolled up so this rookie rookie does not know me at all. There's nothing about me. Watch me pull out a 13 foot Christmas tree at 10 o'clock on Christmas morning. And I actually, I actually had to have a move because he was in the way of me pulling out the tree completely to the side of the road.

So I'm sure that rookie went back to tell his wife's significant other a great story about how he went to someone's house, dropped his partner off, and the poor soul was dragging the tree out of the house. So it's out. I cleaned the house. The house looks good. My wife gets home tonight. I hope she's happy with the way I cleaned.

It's just what she is, man. She wants cleanliness. Just having something in the house for that long really bothers her. And so, yeah, the tree is no longer here. Well, I guess my question to you then, it sounds like quite a process doing it by yourself. What lasted longer or what got bounced faster yesterday? Your tree, that process, or Brock Purdy going from MVP favoritep favorite to you know a bum what what uh took

more time because the brock purdy narrative switched pretty quick it took me two hours basically to take the tree out and do everything else and brock purdy was no longer the mvp by his third throw so i would say brock purdy is probably yeah yeah well he got dragged out uh on christmas day we'll go back to him and and for me the the point of this show is to sort of summarize all the most absurd takes i can find or just the narratives that exist out there in sports media and then have you kind of make sense of them the mvp roller coaster of the last couple of weeks has been a lot of people showing their ass excuse my language and yes totally illogical and and rushed conversation that you are going to help me sort through but first before we get to the good teams we have to talk about the worst good team or the

best bad team in the football in the nfl right now and that's your chiefs another disgusting loss i i don't even have much to say because anyone listening clearly watched what what the hell is with the chiefs man what's going on full panic button it's not funny anymore hey they can turn it around gabe we can do it um no there's no chance um by the way the defense is averaging is giving up 17.7 points per game second the nfl even six points yesterday they lost the defense is averaging is giving up 17.7 points per game second the nfl even six points yesterday they lost the problem is the offense it's just atrocious so here's what's happening can't give up 14 points you're supposed to score 28 points a game not give up 14 okay so there's many things i think are happening all at once let's start with the offensive line

pat does not trust his tackles and often i did not play well in general yesterday it was not a great showing for that offensive line um they put in the second half but pat doesn't trust his tackles and here's what's happening at the wide receiver position so they're not as talented as they need to be just physically gifted they're just not um they can't defeat man coverage and can't go deep so no one's fearful of them and they do not understand i'll put it this way they have a really bad lack of awareness if you were to rank sort of like field awareness of wide receiving cores they might be 32nd Gabe they have no feel for a zone defense yesterday Pat almost threw the interception right the one that the guy dove and it hit the ground that's because MVS just

sort of like casually jogged towards Mahomes when a guy was already right there like just no awareness that a guy was standing and Watson was open right there he just casually just walked over stopped and this guy dove and tried to intercept the ball. They just don't have awareness game. And where that manifests itself is against zone coverage, right? So against zone coverage, Mahomes likes his guys. Look, there's called routes, obviously, but he wants to throw the ball to a specific place in the zone. You have to learn what that is with Mahomes.

No one knows it besides Travis Kelsey. That's it. And no one seems to figure it out. On top of that, they don't get lined up correctly. The plays were coming in fast enough yesterday. So add all of this together and say, Mahomes, go do it. Like he has no confidence in this offense right now, Gabe. Rasheed Rice is going to be good, but obviously not good enough to sort of change the no confidence in this offense right now, Gabe. Rasheed Rice is going to be good,

but obviously not good enough to sort of change the fortunes of this offense right now. It's just a – it's everything bad about an offense all happening at once, and then Mahomes just trying to will himself into making it work. He doesn't take the easy throw because he doesn't trust anybody. If he does trust someone, they drop the you know they they drop the ball or they don't come back to the ball even the interception the the pick six um Watson has to come back to the ball you don't just like run stop and fade away from the quarterback

you you put your foot in the ground and come right back to the ball you didn't do any of that and so they're just in a bad place right now there's no fix there's no like there's no no look the defense is good enough to win a super bowl but the offense is not and there's no fix for it game it's not like they're going to magically show up against buffalo in the wild card round and be good all of a sudden tony romo yesterday kept saying like the chiefs might have to play a road a road game i'm like tony they might not win their first playoff game what are you talking about um there's no faith in them doing that right now romo by the way i don't listen to a lot of commentary

at times oh you're not getting much from romo are you as far as like what's happening during the game you're getting a lot of noises yeah i think that trick he used to pull where he'd predict the play and then the uh the gravelly voice. I think those two things have kind of worn off and now it's just, he's got to do the job. And I think he's just the same as a lot of guys who do the job. Yeah. And Travis Kelsey and Mahomes are obviously very frustrated.

You know, I see the take, you'll be able to try the Taylor Swift thing. It's not Taylor Swift, but let's talk about Travis Kelsey. Because I think it's important. He's 34, right? He entered this season with an injury. Remember, he got hurt in training camp right before the Lions game. And sort of never looked the same this year. He's just a step slower.

That's normal for being 34 years old. At some point, you'd be a step slower. I remember in the draft process, I had talked about heading into the draft the chief should target a tight end it was a very tight and heavy draft class they could afford to do that i feel like good they kind of missed their window now and so travis kelsey tad slower getting double team now because no one why would you double team anyone else on the chief's offense no one else can get open and just so this perpetual thing keeps going going and going

and they just can't score points okay so you alluded to one of the takes out there which is the curse of taylor swift so we're throwing that out you've acknowledged head on that travis kelsey separate of his girlfriend or whatever she is is not quite the player he's been historically for pat maybe he will be historically for Pat. Maybe he will be again in the playoffs, but he hasn't been most of the season. So then there's one other theory or take or idea out there that I want to bounce off you. And I don't know how I feel about it, but a lot of people I see posting jokes about Eric, the enemy sort of getting the last laugh. And you mentioned plays not being called in at the right time. Guys not really knowing where to run to give Pat what he's looking for.

That feels like you're saying coaching to me. Do they miss Eric Biennemi? That's a good question. He's not getting the last laugh. I mean, look at the commanders. He's going to get fired. So I don't know if the last laugh is that. He's going to get fired?

Well, the stats will get fired. I mean, he might keep a job as a head coach, but it's not going to be good for Washington. I think they miss Eric Bien-Ami a couple things. I don't think it's play calling. They did the stupid play calls last year too. That trick play was just the dumbest thing of all time. It's Andy Reid thing year in and year out.

It seems like they miss Eric Bien-Ami because he held players accountable. They're missing accountability. When you can't line up correctly, when the second play of the game is a bust, you're not preparing correctly. You're not being held accountable. And I think that's a huge problem for the Chiefs right now, and that's where they miss Eric Bien-Ami. They miss, in my opinion, his accountability,

his ability to get after guys, to force them to want to do the right thing. And they're missing that big time right now. Well, that sets up another point I wanted to make. Again, I'm sort of the guy who just watches the internet. You watch the all 22. It seems like there's a lot more look at Pat freaking out or look at the guys disagreeing on the sidelines or look listen to this thing we heard you know that shows that they're not on the same page it always used to be the opposite it always used to be look at these magicians who just telepathically coordinate with each other and now every little thing that they the pat every frustration he has is amplified and i wonder if all the reporting done on eric b enemy was like he's

kind of a jerk he's kind of riding people he's kind of interfering with what's working but maybe pat just needed a bad guy and pat had never lost his cool ever and now it's like five times a game yeah well look i mean it's he's losing his cool because guys are not doing what they're supposed to. Like, they can't line up correctly. Like, that would drive – eventually after 17 weeks of this, it would drive you crazy too. Yeah, maybe they're missing the bad guy, and that's Eric Bien-Ami again cussing guys out.

Look, Mahomes talking to his offensive line is very normal. That's like normal. The thing about him saying – I think you caught him saying, like, give me the freaking play. So the way the Chiefs typically have worked, and I don't know if it's the same way this year, under Eric Biennium, this is why everyone thought Eric Biennium was calling the plays.

Right, Gabe? Because he was physically calling the plays into Patrick Mahomes. Andy Reid would call the play. Eric Biennium would radio the play into the quarterback. Now I believe that's Matt Nagy's job to do. I don't know why it's taking so long. So, again, that's like striking it to Matt Nagy. Yeah, it seems very clear they need the accountability of Eric Bien-Aimé,

and they're missing that this season. The play calls to me are the same, again. It looks like Andy Reid's offense out there, right? The dumb trick plays when no one needs them. The failure to try to establish the run at any point in any game. You know, that was, we joke sometimes like that's a drew game plan like it's andy it's andy reads alter ego when he has terrible game plans we call the drew games that was definitely a drew game game plan was atrocious um but of course how do you

call plays though you don't trust any wide receivers your offensive line to protect right like i mean it's it's hard to do those things so yeah look my home showing emotion i think is actually nice it looks like he cares like he cares and you know me game i've never knocked anyone for showing emotion i've never knocked him for showing emotion my dog right now is showing a lot of emotion i dude i did six hours of radio so so far today guy didn't do guy didn't make a p for six hours as soon as i do a live podcast where the camera's on me dude's like going crazy right now just biting everything a little training device there in your hand what are we doing yeah yeah a little little buzz every now and then well

it's when it's for when he bites things he shouldn't bite you know they're a little a little land shark yeah um that's it it's not for the commands he just he's trying to eat his his leash right now well it seems like andy reed needs the same kind of device or same kind of training technique because the team's all over the place just like this dog ears aiden o'connell who i'd prefer not even know who he is but three quarters without a completion he can put a single pass it was insane bro he didn't complete a single pass. It was insane, bro. He didn't complete a single pass outside of the first quarter. They lost.

The Chiefs lost a game. I mean, there's a thousand ways to talk about this game, and none of them are good for the Chiefs. Okay, well, so let's talk about the other side of it. Although I think we saved time here. Another take out there. You got to hire Antonio Pierce. And I think for stuff you and I are not going to get into,

people have a lot of theories about why he would or wouldn't be given the job full time instead of interim. But he has won a few games that he shouldn't have won. The players do seem to care, and they surely didn't under the previous administration. Is Antonio Pierce the right fit in Oakland? And I guess, better question, who cares? Does it matter? And I guess, better question, who cares? Does it matter? Uh-oh, I lost Jeff's mic. I lost Jeff's mic. Sorry, I'm here. I'm here. Does it matter? Antonio Pierce is playing better ball?

Here's the thing about this. He's doing a great job. Absolutely great job. The problem is, is that interim coaches have transitioned to full-time head coaches have not had a successful run in the NFL. And maybe he's able to be the one who breaks that trend. I don't know. But clearly, there's been kind of a history of this not going well.

And I don't know if he's the one that's going to break this. I think he's done. He's coached really well. But how is he different than anyone else in that same situation? Well, I certainly have no idea. But, I mean, Antonio Pierce has been a known commodity in my football life for 20-plus years at this point. And he's winning games he shouldn't win with a pretty bad team.

So I'd give him the job and see what happens. Players seem to like him. Give him a real quarterback. Maybe actually makes him a playoff team next year we'll find out in the offseason i'm sure they'll screw it up i'm sure they'll hire some dumb dumb you know coordinator from some team you know some geek who used to be behind the real genius will end up with the job we'll find out let's talk about good teams uh so the ravens last night put on a show um you know sports media twitter i think probably drunk on well maybe alcohol but turkey and ham and other things too uh just started going crazy with the mvp debate and it basically went from you're nuts if you don't give it to brock purdy to you're nuts if you don't give it to Brock Purdy to you're nuts if you do give it to

Brock Purdy to it was Lamar all along and everyone is a jerk for not noticing it and I'm getting tired of the ups and downs and Dak Prescott was woven into the middle of all that forget about MVP for a second what did we learn about the Niners last night beyond the fact that Brock Purdy will make mistakes? I think we learned that not, not as don't have one way to win, but it's sort of clear that if they get behind, they're not built to come back from, you know, from a deficit in the fourth quarter.

It's not what they are. It's not who they've been. And this is not who they're going to be. And so if they get behind in games, they're in a little bit of trouble. It's not who they've been, and this is not who they're going to be. And so if they get behind in games, they're in a little bit of trouble. It's not how they're built to come back. The injuries, we've talked about this before. Like, they're not a deep team. So injuries can really cost them, right?

Trent Williams going out costs them. Rock Purdy with a stinger, obviously, if any quarterback gets hurt, it kind of costs them. They're just in a lot of trouble right now when it comes to being able to come from behind. Kyle Shannon's 0-38 now when trailing the fourth quarter by eight points or more. Now, to be fair, 7% of the time you win those games. So it's not like he needs to win two of those to be more like league average. But that's kind of a repeated pattern now, not being able to do that in those moments.

And also, too, look look last night the you know the um the tip passes i mean like those are doesn't happen every game like the penalty the turnovers really aren't always on the quarterback in the situation gabe so i don't know how much it's on purdy but again the lack of ability to kind of come back in that game i think really is is the biggest concern i have for them right now yeah i think that the number of balls that got batted around and just landed perfectly in raven's hands sort of that's the correction you know to the mean he'd been very very lucky all season long not to turn the ball over on maybe throws that could have been picked not all of these were terrible passes but four of them result in picks they lose okay so then let's talk about the Ravens and and Lamar so you know all of a

sudden mid-game the betting markets have him suddenly become the MVP favorite he's been on a real run the last several games it's hard to deny that his team looks like the most well-rounded and so he deserves a lot of credit for that but are we getting a little carried away with just like every quarter it feels like of every weekend we change our mvp leader is he really the most valuable player or is this just a very good team with a pretty good quarterback jeff you're muted again you're dodging my question i i don't like how you keep ignoring me hey how about this let's take a short break real quick i gotta get rid of this four-legged friend and then we'll come back and answer the question this guy's bothering me it's i'll be back in a second we'll we'll take our break now

and i'll be back gabe how about that that sounds great let's take a quick break we'll be right be right back are you smarter than your friends prove Prove it with Vaulted by predicting, challenging, and beating them with your sports knowledge. Vaulted, spelled V-L-T-E-D, is a place where you can store your sports predictions, participate in cash prize pools without any entry fees, and prove you are smarter than your friends by using the Vaulted challenge feature. I will have my own pool on Vaulted each week. We can answer questions to win cash prizes, and there are no entry fees required to participate.

This football season, Vaulted will be handing out money. The only way to qualify for my big game pool is to beat me in one of the regular season pools, which won't happen because, as you know, I am smarter than you. I will be using Vaulted to make and store my five favorite predictions of the week. So join Vaulted, and you can like, dislike, comment, interact with my predictions. Or if you're bold enough, you can make your own and see how smart you are in football, which won't be as smart as me. Go download Vaulted, spelled V-L-T-E-D. And remember to use the code Jeff.

That's G-E-O-F-F. So you can see my predictions and play along. Guys, I want to tell you about my favorite new daily fantasy game i have been playing this season prize picks is a skill-based real money daily fantasy sports game how does it work you pick two to six players and if they will go more or less than the prize picks projection you can win up to 25 times your money in any entry so go to to PrizePix and use code GSSY for a first deposit match up to $100. It's so easy to use. I can make my picks in less than 60 seconds. The depositing was simple and straightforward. They even just added Apple Pay so I was able to get up in minutes and start playing. At PrizePix,

you're competing against other people. It's just you versus projections available instead of battling thousands of other players, including pros and sharks. So follow along my weekly entry and see if you can do better. Remember, go to PrizePix and use code GSSY for a first deposit match up to $100. All right, Gabe. Sorry about that. The dog has done great today. We've had six hours of radio and no problems today.

No problem for six hours, hour seven seven a podcast that's like a lunatic it stopped raining at least we could go run outside he's gonna be a mess when he comes back inside i don't even care let's talk about lamar jackson okay so the reason why the mvp race fluctuates every five seconds is because those markets can change on a whim, right? Like they're not markets set in Vegas. They're typically offshore markets and they change. If me and you talk about it and we have a wager on some side or whatnot. The thing about though, is that there's not a favor.

There's not a guy where you're like, yep, that's him. You know, last year it was Jalen Hurst. So he got hurt. Then Patrick Mahomes. Next week, it could be Tua for for all we know. Or Dak Prescott. There's no one who is standing above and beyond. I will say, after watching last night, it does feel like Lamar Jackson played like the MVP.

If you're looking for an MVP in that game, it was Lamar Jackson. What if the Ravens play the Dolphins this weekend and he doesn't play well? Is Tua the MVP? Is it back to Brock Purdy? Is it Dak Prescott who might be the Lions this weekend? Like, it just, there's no great answer this year for MVP. Maybe it's McCaffrey.

Maybe it's Tyreek Hill. I don't know. But that's why every game or every quarter feels like the odds shift. Okay, but it's Tyreek Hill. So we could just save time. It's Tyreek Hill. I have a huge bet on Tyreek Hill to win the MVP. I hope he does win the MVP.

That'd be fantastic for me. I mean, he's the most important part in the most functional unit in football right now who are having success, and the team he's not on are struggling precisely because he's not there. They used to be world beaters. Now they're crap.

Like in every, in every metric, hard or soft sort of subjective skills here, he is the guy and we're only ignoring it because he plays the wrong position. But like all these quarterbacks are B plus quarterbacks who have good weeks and bad weeks. Like every one of those guys you just named would be in the second tier of quarterbacks in this league at best.

Yes. Here's the thing about the non-quarterback MVP part of this, Gabe, is that we've seen to win the MVP as a non-quarterback, as typically a running back, right? You have to do something extraordinary, right? Rush for almost the record. LaDain Thomas would have X amount of touchdowns. He broke the record.

Sean Alexander, 2,000 yards. If Tyreek Hill gets to 2,000 yards, he probably wins this. But he's got two games to do that, and the two games are against the Ravens and the Bills. He is at 1,600 yards right now. If he gets 400 yards, essentially, in the last two games, Gabe, yeah, he probably wins MVP because that means the Dolphins,

most likely, are the one seed, right? So he certainly has the ability to make this happen. But the reason why we're still talking about this is because no one has emerged. I mean, Coach of the Year. Who's Coach of the Year? To me, it was Kyle Shanahan before this game. It probably is Dan Campbell.

Dan Campbell's going to win, I think, even though I don't think he should. Stefanski's absolutely the Coach of the Year. What he's done with Joe Flacco is taking the Browns to the playoffs. Do you know they still have a chance for the one seed right now? There's three teams that have a chance for one seed. Ravens, Dolphins, Browns.

Chiefs are out of it with a loss yesterday. So it's an incredible job of keeping the Browns afloat and getting them to win. Yeah, well, so there's a time saver. It should be him. It should be Tyreek Hill. Back to Lamar, though, who I guess now is the front runner, and I got no issue with it.

Good for him. I like Lamar Jackson. Remember, the whole offseason was about where's this guy going to go? Do the Ravens value him? Why aren't more teams interested in sort of that sign and trade setup? Refresh our memories on how that was all meant to work, and the take i keep seeing is everyone's so dumb for passing on him it wasn't quite that simple right like it would have cost

you a lot to go get lamar jackson and yes he's playing really well right now but he's also had some bad stretches so let's not rewrite history right like chill for a second on the Lamar should have been somewhere else takes. It's a very easy take to have when the Falcon stink and the commander said, it's just easy to have today, right? This would, if they had lost, do we see this take out today? No, right, Gabe? No. So it's just a, it's just to get clicks, just to get a reaction.

We talked about this for months and months and months that the price of Lamar Jackson paying Lamar Jackson teams were not sure because guess what? He had finished the last two years hurt. He didn't finish the last two years. Teams were not trading all those assets for a player who had not stayed healthy. So this is not, look, this is just, it's Twitter at its finest, right? Exit its finest. Just a bunch of people looking for clicks, man. That's all it that's a time saver but let me ask you this maybe i'm just looking for clicks it's not a minor statistic at this point how good lamar jackson is against the

nfc he's pretty good against the afc he's a winner 20 and one now yeah So if he can get to the Super Bowl, seems like he's going to win it. You know? Yeah, right. What's going on? Why is he so much better against the NFC? It's not just a scheduling snafu of playing, like, weaker teams from another conference. He's playing the best teams.

Well, I think he's such a unique player that you can't prepare for him. Right? Okay. So, you know, a typical schedule that you can't prepare for him right so you know something you know a typical schedule you play you know nfc team once every four years right now you might play them because the new schedule with the crossover game you might play them more frequently right but in general you play once every four years and if you you see Lamar Jackson once every four years, hard to defend Lamar Jackson, right?

So that's part of it, Gabe. It's just hard to do that. It's hard to prepare for him. There's no one like him in the NFL. Yeah. Well, okay, so let's talk about the team that is preparing for him right now, the team we just talked about. The Dolphins and Ravens play each other this Sunday in Baltimore.

So weather could be an issue. This is looking more and more like the AFC Conference Championship preview. But I don't know how they prepare for one another. And I am not smart enough to know how these teams actually match up. They both seem pretty balanced. I'd say Miami a little heavier on the offense than the defense, but solid enough. How do you like this game?

What do you expect to see? It's a fun game, right? Yeah. I'm curious what the weather's going to be like. I want to see two outside again in elements. It does feel like being able to beat the Cowboys the way the Dolphins did, which is not your A game offensively, is a really big confidence boost for that team.

Yes. Their defense has been outstanding since Jalen Ramsey returned. So the defense is playing, in my opinion, Super Bowl caliber. You know, like, again, we talk about this all the time. If your offense is the Dolphins, you need, like, a league average defense. That's all you need, right? So they won this game against the Cowboys without playing their A game on offense. And it should give them a lot of confidence.

The Ravens are on a short week now. They fly all the way back from San Francisco, right, on a short week to play the Dolphins. And so I just – it should be a fun game. I'd lean, I guess, slightly Ravens right now the way they're playing, but that could be very reactionary off Monday Night Football. The line is three. I think I would lean Dolphins plus three at the moment,

but what a fun game, man. It's going to be a great game. Let me ask you this, really inside sort of locker room stuff. I think I heard and believe that if you have to play on a holiday, so now in the NFL you can play on Christmas, does coach usually give you your Christmas the next day so like how does the schedule work for the Ravens coming off a late night on Christmas today's Tuesday if you're listening if you're watching live how's their week structured and could that like set them back even more than a usual monday night game well they'll get tuesday off uh no matter what whether

christmas or not and then so today's their christmas and they go back but that's what i'm saying like isn't this more of like a as a former player like if this you're celebrating the big holiday christmas today isn't that like a little bit harder to recover from and be ready for practice tomorrow than just an average tuesday off like the nfl always gives no just remember too this time of year you're not practicing so much as you're just sort of walking through and mentally practicing mentally taking reps um so that that's sort of i think where they're at i i don't think it's a concern put it like that so the fact that like i and most of our audience probably feels like crap today after what we did to ourselves the last two days you're saying that's not actually a concern for an nfl player i think being beat up is a concern

for nfl player this time of year but not the idea that it's a holiday they're spending today opening at presents no i was thinking about the eating and the drinking but all right fair enough let's uh they probably they probably eat and drink i mean anyways you know what i mean yeah no i guess we're talking about a group i mean we watched tyree kill walk into a stadium with mc with McDonald's. We know how much you were able to eat in a game week in your playing days. So maybe this isn't a concern. One thing I don't think we talked enough about, I heard our buddy Colin Cowherd talking about it today,

but I didn't think I heard enough about it going in. The Cowboys line is banged up. We've all sort of criticized the Cowboys deservedly when they lose games that would prove they're good and they aren't. But like talk about their line and in general, the top teams, the health of their lines and how that's impacting things. So did you send that tweet over to our text thread about the Chiefs, about the guy that had the metric for offensive lines? Was that your text no that sounds like something i would not do so the offensive line thing is interesting so i saw a tweet from here it is right here this guy named uh mckay i'm gonna give him a shot

mckenzie rivers how about this but offensive line play ready with the chiefs losing a sixth game they clinched the under win total of 11.5. That means at pregame now, that's his company, I believe, the pregame now offensive line continuity system? I can't even say that word. Continuity? There you go. Continuity?

Yeah, sure, continuity. It's shocking to have a podcast. I mean, they fade teams that had above average offensive lines that had significant turnover in the offseason. They improved to 24-2, fading teams that lose offensive linemen since 2016. So that matters because when the Cowboys lose to Ron Smith, it's a big problem. It's been for years. Last year corrected itself a tiny bit but it was back in a big way for the dolphins game like they missed they missed him a lot the

left tackle that was in there had a lot of uh blown assignments didn't play very well they need him back in in a in a big way yeah it just seems like it's after the fact it's always the thing everyone's like well obviously how are they supposed to win without that guy but we never spend as much time pre-game just saying like this is going to be a disaster for the cowboys and tony pollard and dak prescott are not going to be able to do what they like to do because the best player on the team is out. We just never say it ahead of the game. I don't know why. I mean, I use that specifically for the Cowboys to handicap them. It matters for the Cowboys.

They've had this problem for years now. They almost overcame it, though. We took a break earlier, so let's keep rolling here. I got a quick one for you. Baker and Trevor Lawrence, they play each other. Baker wins. Here's my thought the media i guess we're part of it you certainly are yeah but the group of people out there who

talk about sports for a living seem on balance to want to see baker fail the narrative is always that like there's something wrong with baker and he's not a winner and the exact opposite is true of trevor lawrence no matter what he does next next game out next season out that guy's gonna There's something wrong with Baker and he's not a winner. And the exact opposite is true of Trevor Lawrence. No matter what he does next, next game out next season out, that guy's going to be awesome. Just you wait and see. I think we've seen enough.

Like we have this backwards. Baker will Baker Mayfield is a winner. Trevor Lawrence is not. Why are we still debating this? Hmm. Well, I don't know if my conclusion of that game was that Trevor Lawrence is a loser and Baker Mayfield's a winner.

I mean, Trevor Lawrence won a lot of people's college. I didn't say he was a loser. He's fine. He's fine. I think the takeaway is Baker Mayfield sort of improved. He's gotten better this season. I'm not sure anyone's rooting for him to fail. I just think a lot of us thought he wasn't good enough to be drafted

first overall he was rooting for him to fail now i don't think anyone cares about i mean they spent like two seasons talking about how he was the only thing holding back because the browns then we then wherever he went we criticized how he wasn't possibly want him there he wasn't very good he's much better this season tampa bay like that's there he wasn't very good he's much better this he's in tampa bay like that's that's part of it too he's played better game he's look he's the first pick overall the expectations are he's supposed to be a hall of fame type player he's clearly not okay and trevor lawrence loses a lot of games that he shouldn't lose and then we have ready excuses we always have excuses for him and it it's always, well, next year, you know,

oh, that's because the ankle. Oh, that's because new coach. Oh, that's because lack of weapons. Like, what? I got nothing against Trevor Lawrence. He seems fine. But, like, I thought he was supposed to be the MVP this year. What are we doing?

Keeps on losing games. But he hasn't played well. No debate for me on that one has not played well it's not level of expectations absolutely not all right here's one for you more takes this one's from me bit of sarcasm though bill belichick is currently winning games to cost the pats the elite qb that they could get if he did the right thing and tanked because Bill Belichick knows he's leaving because Bill Belichick is always playing 90 chess. He's one to seven moves ahead of us at all times, and he's actually winning to screw over the team.

He doesn't plan on coaching anymore, even though he should be tanking to get a good quarterback to continue coaching the team he coaches got it i do not believe that he is purposely trying to win games to screw the franchise over i think he as i say each and every week guys are trying to win games they don't try to lose and it is a funny story though that he will leave and he has now cost them a chance at drake mayor caleb williams which i know you love i'm just saying the genius bill belichick the hoodie the you know darth vader himself outmaneuvered everyone again what a what a brilliant mind he is lose a whole bunch of games to then start winning them at the end in order to screw over the team that wants to fire is it he's a genius yeah genius genius okay we talked about um stefanski and flacco you got anything else you want to say

on them uh i have a job man that's incredible like they're playing good football yeah uh are there a lot of guys who are better than the guy in front of them who just need to be playing more? Tyra Taylor, Jacoby Brissett. They're guys, Joe Flacco, obviously. They're guys like that out there. Well, Joe Flacco I think is an anomaly this year the way he's playing. But Jacoby Brissett, you know what he is. And I think Washington was hoping that they'd figure out what Sam Howell is,

and they have, and it's not very good. Yeah, it's not. When you know what you have with those guys, there's not excitement to play them, right? Because you're trying to find someone else because you know what you have in Jacoby Brissett. He's playing exactly like he should be. But Washington was hoping that Sam Howell would take that next step

and be their quarterback of the future. Yeah. What do we think the Browns do in the offseason with the quarterback position? They go back into another year hoping Deshaun Watson is a different human? Yes. And they won't be. They don't have a choice.

They don't have a choice. I have a big take theory on what they should do to clear themselves of that problem, but it's not for this podcast. Probably not for anything near a microphone. Let's shift gears a little uh to college ball uh your chance to dunk on dion coming up here if our notes are correct here he only signed six high school recruits on national signing day last week which is not enough if you want to be a national title contender like we all pretended he was he still seems to think he can build his team through the portal.

It worked once, but didn't get him a lot of wins. I know you think this is a flawed strategy. Please tell me why. So Gabe, I do this thing in sports where I look at like how successful things are done. And I say,

you know what? I want to probably do that, right? So when I look at the top of the 24-7 rankings for college, for recruiting, and I see the top of the rankings, oh, that's basketball, wrong one. Here we go, team rankings, okay? I go to all, and I see Georgia takes 28 commits alabama 25 texas 23 ohio state 21 oregon 26 oklahoma 28 florida state 22 northern 23 you get my drift right tennessee 21 michigan 27 um and then you see colorado 6 and you think to yourself huh you know the best teams build through high school ranks and

then add additions through the portal as needed um in year one yeah you should build through the portal absolutely agree but then year two man you gotta start bringing your base and here's the reason why coach prime today tweeted this out. Just when I thought Santa was on his way back to North Pole, he dipped off. Santa, please drop another D-tackle, cornerback, linebacker, one more pass rusher to the portal. He's begging for players on Twitter because you can't be assured you're going to get a transfer portal player. You have to actually go in the portal to get in.

You have to build up. You need to be able to say, look, man, actually go in the portal to get in you have to build up you need to be able to say look man we didn't we missed in the portal here's a young guy ready to play his strategy appears to me like he's going to be there for this one more season and leave with the sun because he's not recruiting in a way that makes me think he's there for the long term which is fine if that's the case but he's out here on twitter asking for players to like to to portal in the chance that he might be able to get them yeah i guess i wonder i dion has been a largely a source for good right he's been fun to talk about he seems like it seems like a pretty good guy at least this latest version of him seems like a very good guy i think he's changing a lot of kids lives um and maybe opening eyes for a lot of

people but yeah i think it's probably going to be time to start asking wait a sec what's his end goal like what's he doing here because if he's not doing anything to establish that he he wants to build a team for four five six eight ten, like most good coaches suggest they want to do. Yeah, what is the play? I don't want to call it a con, but it doesn't feel like a long play. Yeah, I don't think it is. I think the play is like, I'm there and my son leaves and I'm trying to find a new place to be. That's what I think the play is.

But his next move is the league, right? So Deion's going to go coach him in the league? Like, what are we talking about? Is it in the league or is it in the SEC? So you think they play one more year together in Colorado with a bunch of transfer portals and they get all the same attention they got last year and maybe they go seven and six or whatever the math is.

And they impress some people and they win a couple of ranked games because they have enough talent to do it. You're saying they then leverage that to go take a Tennessee job or an Ole Miss job or whatever? Florida might be open. Yes. That's what you think. And then they do one more year together with somebody else's

roster and another sexy bunch of transfer portals and yes that's where he stays like what okay i'm just i'm just curious what would qualify him to be an nfl coach right now i'm not suggesting anything does i'm just wondering like what when does he just say all right i'm here also fair that nothing qualified Cliff Kingsbury to be an NFL coach either. So it's like, you know, so that's, I mean, it's. And in his case, he wasn't even arguably the greatest football player of all time, which Deion is. Absolutely. So you think he's going to stay in Colorado?

I really have no idea. I guess I'm just wondering like when his son is no longer part of the equation is he just gonna set up shop somewhere and be a coach and accept that not every year is exciting i don't have that answer i have no idea i wish i did i have no idea okay well one of the places we all thought he might end up one day is now the epicenter of chaos in college football. Florida State, his alma mater, stealing a joke from someone else. FSU is trying to hit the transfer portal themselves right now. They are suing the ACC to get out of the conference.

I guess they believe that the conference held them back from the playoff appearance that they think they deserved. Many think they deserve. This is confusing for a lot of reasons can you please put on your lawyer hat and explain this suit to me and explain what ultimately comes out of them suing their own conference all right so they're basically arguing that the contract they signed is was under like um false pretenses or they were manipulating to sign it because it has a clause in there that in 2027 espn could just exercise like a 10-year extension of the grant of rights what this is about is f, fear of being left behind, right? Fear of missing out. It's what I felt when Oregon wasn't in the Big Ten. You have these two big conferences, SEC, the Big Ten.

Why am I not included in this? Oregon has everything they need to do. Why are they not in the Big Ten? Why are you not included in big boy football? The ACC right now feels like it's below those two conferences, especially when you go 13-0 and don't make the playoff, right? You feel like, well, if I was 13-0 in the SEC, I would have made the playoff. So they want to be part of the big boys club,

and they have to find a way legally to get out of the grant of rights to do this. So they sued. ACC sued them back. So they're in the tit-for-tat right now. ACC wants this case to be held in North Carolina. Florida wants this case to be held in north carolina florida wants this case to be held in florida state i mean for state obviously in florida that's a big dispute they're having right now what i think happens in the end gabe is there's a settlement florida state pays a penalty and they leave and they join the sec conference whoever wants to take them and that happens with miami and with north carolina the

acc is trying to like the pac-12 becomes a little more obsolete. And we move to either three power conferences with the Big 12 eating up everyone else or two major conferences and the Big 12 is just sort of surviving by themselves. Because not everyone's going to want to go to the ACC. Not everyone in the Big 10 or the SEC will want to gobble those ACC schools up. So leftover schools are probably just playing the Big 12. And you have the Big 12, you have a big Big Ten and a big SEC

is what I think might end up happening. Okay. So the legal side of this is just a step and not one we need to learn a lot about. I guess it's hard. I can imagine for people in Florida, Florida State fans specifically, it's hard to take this lesson but i mean on balance they're not as good a team as those other teams but they were excluded

because they lost their quarterback so it's actually still a better a more likely path to the championship to be the most dominant team in the ACC, at least for another few years, then to become like the 10th best team in a massive conference and have to fight and claw your way, you know, to winning a conference championship with one loss. Like, shouldn't they just accept reality here and stay where they are and have an easy road most years. That's what Clemson did. Yeah, but when you're, again, when you're feeling like you're being left behind, which they certainly feel like they are, I don't think that matters anymore. Like you want to be in the big boys club. Look, same arguments for Oregon, right?

You could have stayed out west in the Pac-12 and just sort of dominated the conference, but you don't get any respect. You don't get the same money. Like it's all of that. You go to the big boy conference, you get the respect, don't get the same money like this it's it's all of that you go to big boy conference you get the respect gabe right you're part of the club and then eventually you make more money right oregon and washington are getting full shares in like five years so that's what that's why florida state wants out i hear you i just as a more casual than you i don't actually think that's how it works for a lot of people i don't have any

respect for missouri football bro but it's not up to me they have a great year it's not up to me and you it's up to if this was about me and you the patch hold would still be the pack 12 yeah it's not up to us it's up to the tv brokers it's your friends you're you know these people you're best friends with them yeah you go their holiday parties like you you're the you know you get drinks with these guys you tell me yeah okay no you just tell me so i'll just pour some eggnog and say hey fellas what are we doing here you sometimes i've talked to people at fox that make these decisions zero times sometimes you've talked to them countless don't put this on me i got nothing to do you know what and you're a usc guy you you and silverman been plotting together get out of here

i don't know i'm not even i'm not going there just throw one guy fox i mark seems great i met him one time i don't he's just the same he's the one everyone just talks about is like the guy who did this even though it probably isn't his fault uh i have i honestly have no idea i'm not even i know i don't know all right so let's let's let's transition from one thing that makes me squirm to one thing that makes me squirm for a different reason which is jets football um you know i still in my life i have people who i don't see as often come up to me and like start a conversation with like hey man sorry about those jets and then i have to tell them like don't say sorry to me i ditched their asses years ago i hate those guys but you know i'll fall for it again coming into next season

when rogers is healthy and sala is hopefully there, it seems the ownership wants to keep him. The Jets are bad in all the bad ways. Like they're not going to get a good pick, but nobody takes them seriously. And yet they play a team just like themselves who are on the other side of that. They're like bad but good in the Browns. So how does this work? And then give me some picks for this Thursday night. Well, the Jets keep me Rogers on, on the roster.

So it's funny. The report came out on Friday that Rogers led the scout team in a spirited practice against the, and then I looked at the, I watched the fourth quarter that, that Washington commanders game. I said, Oh, where's the spirit at now? As Jacoby reset, just marched up and down the field. Like, were NFL media tripping over themselves to report on Rodgers stuff? It blows my mind.

It's insane that he's on the roster right now. He's not playing. He's taking reps away from players that actually have to prepare to play games this season. It's just not how most places would operate at all. He could still be out there and not practice like he could stand out there as an injured reserve guy doesn't have to be inside it's it is it is what it is man um i just don't have faith this organization

sort of operates in a way that that wins like next year that's it this is it one it's a one year one year for them game to make this work. And this is a year when you had the Bills aren't as good, the Bengals are hurt, the Chiefs aren't as good. What happens next year when all those teams are good again? But this is a year to do it, and Rodgers got hurt, unfortunately. Yeah. All right.

Well, so then give me a play for Thursday night because they're playing that Browns team. We already agreed, might have coached the year.acco's playing ball what are we doing it's a tad early in the week so unfortunately i know um you know we're i we we got we got but look we won last week we hit we were three for three last week remember so go to prize picks use promo code gssy hundred dollar match deposit pick two to six players and again get this closer to game time get some good numbers on some of these guys here's what we're doing right now greg zerline the kicker for the jets little beat up though but he's going to play over excuse me more than one half field goals made brown's defense defense, number one in the NFL in DVOA. Jeff can move the ball at times. We're going to have to hit a lot of field goals.

So I'm going with field goals here. And we're going to fade Amari Cooper off the best game of his career, best game of any Browns receiver ever, and we're going to go less than 55 and a half receiving yards. So Greg Zerline more than one and a half field goals made. Amari Cooper less than 55 and a half receiving yards. That's my price pick square early in the week but there's enough football yeah i like putting those two together

that situationally i could see zerline getting several tries i mean he could even miss a couple and still get you more than one and a half and cooper yeah it's funny every other year he has some record 200 plus receiving yards or 15 catches. I feel like an Amari Cooper receiving record happens every now and then, and then he disappears again for a long time. You're just sort of counting on that pattern. I am absolutely counting on that pattern. I'm counting on the Jets saying, you know what?

You're not going to beat us. And they have a good defense, and they're going to say, you know what? You're just not going to beat us today, and we're taking this away from you. Yeah, it also does seem like that's really all they have to play for is individual matchups and pride on defense. Yes. Okay, I like that play. I normally like to challenge you a little.

That one seems smart. I know. I know. I was three for three last week, though. I didn't get in three for three. There we go. I like it. All right, guys.

We'll talk to you guys on Friday. Gabe, 43 and 30 and six. 59% still. Or if you don't, excuse me, 44, 30 and six. 44, 30 and six. Another winning week for us. So come back on Friday for that. I hope you guys had a great holiday again.

Please rate, review, subscribe. We'll talk to you guys on Friday. Have a good one, everyone. Bye.