Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Week 1 Reactions: Chiefs Back! LA Teams In Trouble? G-Men For Real?

Episode Date: September 15, 2026

Geoff and Mitch break down the NFL season opener, including the Chiefs returning to form against the Broncos, the Rams and Chargers both starting slow and the Giants dominant performance over the Cowboys. Also, is Justin Herbert at least partially responsible for the performance of his O-line? Also, is it time to buy or sell any surprise Week 1 teams like the Cardinals, Bucs, Jags or Vikings?

It is Tuesday, September 15th. I'm Jeff Schwartz. That is Mitch Schwartz. This is a Schwartz football show. We were back after a great night for the Schwartz Brothers. A great night for all football. The Chiefs are back. A big win over the Denver Broncos.

We're here to recap all of week one, Mitch. It went well. It went well on the NFL side for us. The college side, we maybe discuss another time. Maybe the end of the show. We'll get to that. But Mitch, how are we doing, man? First week of the NFL season in the books now.

I'm doing good. It's nice we get to actually watch football and talk about football and not talk about the theoretical things that will happen coming out of camp. I know we'll touch on a couple theoretical heroes later in the show. But yeah, that's nice. I would say off the get-go, people think that I like care more about the Chief's outcomes than I probably do. Obviously, I'm rooting for my friends and I hope they play well and do good. But like if the Chief's win or the Chiefs lose, I go to bed the same. I don't know.

I'm good. So, yeah, I'm a Chiefs fan. I want them to win, but I'm not like, you guys got to win. Otherwise, my whole day is ruined the way I think that a lot of people assume that I feel. Well, for Oregon, that might be true with me a little bit. But for the Chiefs, I feel the same way as you. It's also a long season. It's a long season, right?

We played the middle of February this year. There's 18 weeks, 18 games, right? 18 weeks, 17 games. Like, there's a lot of football left this year. So we're going to talk week one overreactions, underreactions. We're going to talk some charges offense. We're going to talk Giants Cowboys. But we do have to start Mitch with it with the,

We saw last night. Kansas City takes down Denver, and I noticed a particular coach did not tweet last night. Sean Payne, is he active on social media last night? Did he skip that? No, he didn't. Okay.

All right, Mitch, what do you make of the Chiefs win last night over Denver? I mean, the win was fantastic. It was a rushing attack that I don't even think any of us thought the Chiefs would commit to. Now, it's one thing for that first drive

to come out and just kind of dominate and run, run, run. I mean, first two plays are runs, third and three, shotgun run gets two yards fourth and one go for it another run um didn't expect that and then you know as the the drive progresses they just keep running the ball and then we see the rest of the night like they're willing to get under center willing to commit to it obviously physicality up front to do that the running back is just freaking amazing um what a performance from kenneth walker i mean i would argue he might

have missed one or two reads but he more than made up for that with uh the rest of his performance and just he's got that like a little bit of levy on bell the patience though the waiting and then boom hits it and the explosiveness to get up to speed the change of direction um it's just incredible so i would say going into this game it was a big litmus test game for me for kansas city um you know offensively o line against their d line how are we going to hold up in protection or how are we going to run the ball um how we're going to open up some lanes well i think you saw that pretty good um in terms of the past game you know i'm going to be hold off on that. That was not the greatest performance, but can the receivers get open? Not necessarily. Can we push the ball down the field? Not necessarily quite yet. But then you look at defense, you know, can we stop the run? Can we get after the quarterback with, you know, our defense aligned theoretically is not as good as what we've seen from the Broncos all line. Check there. Can we hold up in coverage against a pretty good receiving group? Check there. Can we turn Boe Nix into the quarterback that Jeff Schwartz thinks he is? Triple check there. But no, it was really,

impressive. I think, again, offensively, I would say the one thing that I don't see that I'm worried about for the weeks upcoming, it's not even the past game in particular. It's the marrying of the undercentered run game with the play action that all the top offenses are doing. You know, you've got the Shanahan outside zone system that runs a lot of nakeds and runs a lot of kind of hard play action, turn your back to the defense. Now, a little bit less as his defenses are disguising more and covering up what they do. But he's still getting a lot of. He's still it like hardball run cell from the O line. And the chiefs just like don't have play actions like that. It just feels a little more passy, a little more kind of passive from the O line. And so I want to

see a better marriage. If the chiefs are going to go so, you know, gap scheme heavy the way they did, they pulled guys a ton. You're going to want to see some gap scheme play actions, which puts at least one tackle on an island. And maybe that's why you're not seeing it. But if you're going to run that many gap schemes, ideally, you're going to have some gap scheme play actions, and we just haven't seen that. So that would be the biggest offensive worry to me. Defensively, I mean, just fantastic spags firing on all cylinders, a lot more zone blitzing than I expected. So Armason Thomas dropping a coverage five or six times. I Carlotta's dropping a coverage a few times, which don't want to see, but you know, you got to do it to not have

100% tendency with who you want to drop in those looks. So yeah, a lot to be encouraging. courage about and then a lot to, you know, think that there's room for improvement and how is it going to look better the next week and against, you know, other good teams? Well, as far as the play action pass users, isn't that something they can add, right? Like the proof was they ran the football, well, now teams are going to start low in the box. I mean, doesn't feel like an easy edge to say, okay, now that we have a proof of concept, we can run the football, teams are going to key us now.

Now we can add in the play action pass. Maybe they just didn't think that was going to be part of what they had to do against Denver. Well, I do. I mean, they ran play actions. It's not like they didn't run them. I would just say, again, like stylistically, they're not the kind of run cells that we see from the other top teams. You know, you think of the speed off the ball, you know, hardball run coming at you like, Shannon style. You don't like see that in the Chiefs past game. We didn't really see any nakeds, maybe one or two. So that's one thing. That's just like an easy way to get out on the edge and see a ton of those. And then you talk about running like duo. gap schemes and kind of the RAMs style, you go with the inserts at wide receiver, you know, Rishi Rice, great job blocking, not just on that touchdown, but a couple of times he's the insert and then digging out of safety. Well, that's going to be a play action down the road where you go, you bluff and you fake

hitting the guy, you peel off, run around, get a big play over the top. So I just, I'm not seeing the offensive line come off the ball in play action and like the picture look the same way it looks for the Rams or San Fran or. Chicago or some of the other, again, top under center offenses. Now, will it happen? Is it going to be better as clearly this run game is going to force an extra defender on the box? Yeah, I like to think so.

But again, is that something that is going to need EB to bring from Chicago more than like Coach Reed running past 95W and pass solid? Like, probably. Little chunk, 67 chung, throw that in there. I mean, that would be great, actually, if they ran that play. That's just a boot to the, the afferile. It's like a staple play action. They didn't run it.

I know. I think that they might get to it. My favorite play the night, by the way, was off a torn ACL speed option on third down. Just won't QB sneak? Speed option. And I think speed option is a great play against man coverage. It's an awesome play. It works a lot.

I think more teams should run it. But Mitch, like, they won't sneak to Mahomes, but they'll run speed option with them. It's ludicrous. I think he called into that, which isn't technically coach Reed calling a speed option, but the fact is he hasn't available for him to get to. We'll get to the chargers and things that quarterback can get to later. But that is a double agap look. You think it might be man.

Great call. You know, put the defensive end in a bind. D.N. played it pretty well. Pat kind of went back and forth, tossed it. Nick Benito ran it down from the backside, how quick he is. It kind of shows, you know, what you're able to do. But, yeah, I mean, that's something that. Again, the top offense is what are they doing?

Quarterback is getting a sneak on third and fourth and one. They're extending the drive in that manner. You can only run so many eight linemen on the field, including one defense alignment and just attempt to run power and hope that you're successful. You know, that kind of has an expiration date, and it would be nice to get the QB sneak back into the mix. Last Chiefson, before we get to a little bit of some Denver discussion here,

Cleo Benson played left tackle for the first time, I believe, since high school. and I, Mitch, I'm getting increasingly frustrated with the post-game stats being released, these advanced stats with past protection numbers that are just remotely not close to what happened during the game. I give Clio Benson a lot of credit. I thought he played his butt off. I loved his effort. I actually let his pass sets, Mitch, for the most part, were pretty clean.

Like, he took a good pass set. He stayed between him, he stayed between him and the quarterback, the best he could. He was a lot better against the bigger past wrestlers than Benito, but he'll give him trouble. And then, you know, they did a good job formationally and helping him and all that stuff. But he got beat clean. He got a holding call.

He got beat clean. He got beat clean on the Kelsey, the long pass, the short pass, long run. He even touched Benito, but he went right underneath him. And they got beat later. Like, he got beat a few times,

but that's sort of expected. But we see this like zero pressures. It's not what happened, man. Again, I give him credit for the way he played. I thought given the situation, he played really well. but it wasn't clean game, Mitch. I think we do this far too often with, like, the PFF stuff.

I'm dealing with the organ right now where it's like, this guy graded at 16. I'm like, did you watch the game, man? Like, come on. Watch the game. What are we doing? Yeah, I mean, I went down. I did a little video on it. I got to upload either later today or tomorrow.

And the one pressure in 32 pass blocking snaps is about as misleading of a stat as you can throw out there. Now, he locked up 92 pretty good. Yes. 92 doesn't quite have much juice to him. Kind of ran into him most of the time. But going against a quality speed guy, it was not going to say not pretty, but it wasn't that great. Pat got the ball out as fast as he's ever gotten the ball out. He was, I think, a little antsy from getting back out there, obviously feeling on-draft-free agent, left tackle, injuries, nerves, all that stuff.

But the ball was coming out quick. So on plays that he blocked Nick Benito, Kaleel Benson, and of those plays that weren't chipped or influenced, like, he probably lost the majority of them. It's just the ball was out. If it's, again, you know this. Like for people, there are two ways to evaluate what a guy did. There's strictly, did he do his job for whatever amount of time he was asked to block? And that's the one out of 32 pressure situation that like, technically you could argue that.

I still think you'd be wrong. But did he theoretically do the job for the 2.2 seconds he was asked to? Yes. Did he do it with the right technique? I would argue more often no than yes. I think there's still some things lacking. There's did better getting off the ball, I will say, a few times he was late. A couple times he, you know this from having to flip sides.

He would drop his right foot back on contact, which is right tackle, right side muscle memory. So don't let necessarily love to see that. In terms of the punch, he was often either mistimed and or outside with the hands and given up his chest. And then I thought a lot of the time he was kind of getting his feet a little too clicky and too crossed over. So a lot of the technical stuff and that is this going to hold up if the quarterback had stayed in the pocket? Is this going to hold up on third and 12? Is it going to hold up against a different pass rusher? On a lot of those fronts, I thought the answer was no.

Now, that's, again, to your point, not to take away anything that he did. It was a great performance better than all of us expected for the situation, the circumstances. We saw tons of great finishes, run and pass. So he played a tremendous game. but the pass pro number that's being thrown around is one wrong and two, I think incredibly misleading for what he did on the field and what that says about expectations for upcoming weeks. I have no faith Josh Simmons is playing anytime soon, by the way. So he might be a left tackle for a good amount of time. So hopefully he can grow into that position.

I think Mahomes does not get enough credit for his pocket navigation. By the way, like his ability to hit his back foot and climb up in the pocket. but that also is because the chief's guards are big and strong. That's why they had big strong guards. Keep the pocket as best you can firm. He can step up into the pocket. Mitch, this was a big game for me,

not only because I had the chiefs minus two and a half, but also because if Bo Nix played well, man, I was going to be fried on social media. But guess what? He stunk. It was a great night for me. For those who missed it, I said on a show,

the question was whether or not Bo Nix is going to be better or worse this year. I said worse. I laid out a bunch of reasons why. I misspoke and one of the things I said. Sean paid tweet at me saying essentially like I didn't do any. You misspoke on the one thing that they had evidence to throw back at you. Correct. That's the problem.

Yes. So don't be a dumbass and say the right thing. Okay. You may go on television next time and you can say the right thing for me. Here's his pass chart, by the way. He didn't complete that one touchdown pass, which, by that concept was used a bunch this week. The Giants did it three times in a row against the Cowboys.

Sort of that like, you know, kind of like a 20 yard out with a, with a, with a, Yeah, a hitch in a corner. Yeah, it worked all weekend with a bunch of deploy. They had Waddle in the backfield there. And the rest of the game, he looked bad. Look, the Sean Payne thing, losing play calling, he looks furious on the sidelines. They wasn't calling plays.

And this is 100% because Boenix didn't want him calling plays anymore. That's why he's not doing it. And Mitch, it backfired mightily last night. They did not call a good game. Third and one, empty protection. What are we doing? Bono's looked uncomfortable. But I will say this.

I think Spags had a brilliant game plan. They had free runners at Bo Nix all game. They matched up the linebackers on the backs who did not block very well. Armason Thomas did well. Chris Jones. It just was a good collective chief's effort there. But Bo Nix played poorly. And all the things that we thought about Bo Nix came true all in this game.

So I thought Spaggs had a lot more zone blitzes, like I said, than I expected. I don't know if that's something with Nix's game with how much, you know, he tends to throw the ball short, which you've highlighted a few times. but just kind of spot dropping defense alignment and other guys into throwing lanes where you would want to take away that initial read or maybe the hot throw. Yeah, it's interesting with the Knicks and Payton thing. I guess I'd heard some speculation that it was Knicks that didn't want that. I think that the public maybe thought that Davis Webb was getting some, you know, hype to be hired somewhere else and Sean Payton had to keep him

and had to give him the play calling to retain the duties. if it's the quarterback that says I'm not having the head coach call plays, like you're coming off a year two. What's he going to do? Is he going to force a trade after year two? Like what's the actual recourse if the quarterback doesn't want the head coach calling plays? I don't know, but do you think Sean Payton was like, I'm giving up play calling duty?

After 30 years, I was giving it up on my own. It's been, I've talked about this more than I've heard anyone else talk about this. I don't get it at all. It's, again, you go over the last 25 years. you kind of take the McVaghan out of it, say they've only been doing it for 10 or 15 years. Sean Payton, Andy Reed, Josh McDaniels,

probably top three offensive coordinators in the NFL. Correct. It's the thing that his whole career is based on. It's his entire identity. It's the thing he's known for, the thing he gets hired for, the thing he's excellent at. I still don't understand why he gave it up.

And I think it's a massive detriment. Obviously, Davis Webb's probably going to get better as the season he goes along. Not going to blame him for the first time he's doing it, But everyone talked about, well, Denver's going to be better. They added Waddle, all the stuff. Like, they lost one of the best play callers of this century. Like, that's not a nothing burger.

It's not. And it looked disjointed. But here's the thing, Mitch, it might take time. He might be good by week eight. But their first six games are brutal. Like, you don't have eight weeks to figure this out. Jacksonville, Los Angeles Rams, Chargers, Niners, Seahawks. And you play the Chiefs again.

like it's not if you can't figure out in the first eight weeks and I agree it takes eight to ten weeks new install I've been in it many times but if you start the season one and five then you've wasted your season Mitch trying to figure out a new offense well the other thing I saw someone that kind of made it sound like they did this to like expedite the play calling so that like he could just get in his ear and I'm just thinking this is stupid because Andy Reid relays the play to the coordinator who then relays the play to the quarterback and that's worked for 25 years like I just, we don't have like a clear, solid answer on why he's not calling the plays. And be nice if someone could get that for us.

It's because Bonex didn't want it. That's why that's, that's simple answer, Mitch. And we'll get more information I imagine. Sean Paine will leak into someone at some point, especially if they start really slow this season. Someone will say it, right? I mean, Colin will say it immediately about why, why this happened. But yeah, good night for the Bohnicks people like myself who think you won't get better. this season and the Chiefs take down the Broncos. Mitch, Sunday night football, Giants,

Cowboys, resounding winning for the Giants and what they're trying to do with Harbaugh and with Dart, 28 to 20. And look, the Giants, I played great. They found weaknesses and kept exploring. They ran multiple drives where they ran the same play over and over and over again or some version of the same play. They threw the ball of the flat, I think four times in a row. They ran that little corner hitch whatever you want to call it, three times in a row, no way to stop it. So I give them credit for finding things that could not be stopped. They ran the ball decently well. Cowboys offensively just kind of look discombobulated.

I was impressed, Mitch, with the Giants, how much you buy and what they did in week one. I actually am buying it more than I expected. I kind of thought the Giants would not be very good this year. My thing is offensively, you know, Matt Nagy's offensive coordinator, Greg Roman's there, Brian Callahan's there. I have no idea what to expect. The only thing we've seen of Nagy when he left from Coach Reed was that he kind of kept up the shotgun spread offense, RPO,

the few weeks that he turned over play calling. So I think it was Bill Aiser. It was like the five weeks that Mitch Chubisky basically got under center and ran naked for 18 plays a game and his numbers were great and everyone's like, Trubisky's fixed. And it's like he did the Ty Simpson preseason game. So no, he's not fixed.

So I wasn't sure what to expect out of that. I think to me, they had an identity out of the get-go. They were under center. They were mixing up formations. They were running the ball and play action. They were still doing some shotguns, still doing some zone read. Jackson Dart can probably get down a little sooner on the few of the zone reads. I'm sure they're talking to them about that this week.

But obviously they got scat. They got some other weapons out there, not OBJ. And it just felt like that offense knew who they were. And the physicality up front, I mean, the O-Line has been pretty crapped on for a long time in New York for a lot of different reasons. But Andrew Thomas has been a top left tackle when he's been healthy. You know, Jermaine at right to tackle has been a pretty solid player. They got the rookie at right guard who had a great debut, you know, good players at center and left guard. So if they can do that and be physical, you know, run the ball, under center play action, mix in some read option, shotgun stuff with dart, his creativity, his play, his play, making.

ability. That was the biggest takeaway from the game for me. It wasn't oh, well, Dallas not going to be so bad on the one concept. I felt like the Chief's Eagles Super Bowl where you have that one motion, it works and you keep spamming it until they stop it. But like physicality up front and identity

on offense, that blew me away. So that gives me hope for the rest of the season. And then you look at the defense. I mean, we all still love that defense aligned, despite the Dexter Lawrence removal. But Abdul Carter looks like an animal and a star already. I mean, his quick twitch has changed direction, his pass rushability, showing up right

away. Obviously, Burns and Tibido still have some ability themselves. So yeah, it's hard not to like it. If they're going to do that on offense, they're going to get some leads and they're going to turn it over to that D-line. I mean, that is the recipe for success in the NFL. I was impressed with what you talked about with the formations and sort of what the Giants did, because that's not what Mad Nagy's done in the past. I feel like that was a big Greg Roman influence on that run game plan yesterday two days ago. Lots of fullback, right? Fullback usage.

Finding ways to give the defense different looks and running the same thing. And they just, they pounds away. The Cowboys had two possessions in the second half. That was it. And that's the style of football that John Harbaugh wants to win. And the Cowboys, man, I did it again.

I did it again. Your guy, Kevin Clark tweet out, something like they're out of, what do you say there? they did out of I did again shirts or something like that. I'm like, I bought one. I bought one. I bought the hype.

Like I did it. It's my fault. I shouldn't do it, but I bought the hype. And unfortunately, the Cowboys defense here is right. They're running out of Fell Ford again merch in the Cowboys team store. I bought myself a shirt there. Dude, the defense stunk, man. It looked absolutely atrocious.

Again, it's week one. I get it. But they have brand new pieces and brand new defensive coordinator. And they got bullied by the Giants yesterday. had no answers. I keep saying yesterday. No answers, Mitch, no juice, no pass rush. It looked like the same old Cowboys defense, and we were told it was going to be better. Well, yeah, and if you listen to, you know, some of these defensive guys talking about

the scheme, they make it sound like it's day one install that they're messing up. So it's not even, you know, disguise coverages or trying to play off each other or trying to be cute. Just base the defenses are messing up the rules of. That's not good. You know, we, you were high on Dallas. Again, you bought the shirts and the merch shop. We were just hoping for a middle of the pack defense.

Correct. Like, if you're 16th on defense and you're fourth on offense, like, that's a recipe for success. Defense doesn't seem like they're there. It seems like they're far away off. Defense line was supposed to be much improved. They got manhandled by the Giants, which is not, quote, unquote, supposed to happen, at least based on our expectations coming into the year. And then offensively, just not really clicking.

I mean, offensive line, I feel like we've been talking about their. O-line for a while and not being, I mean, nothing's going to replace when DAC first started playing. Like, that was a couple of Hall of Famers on the O-line. I guess three Hall of Famers you could argue with with Frederick. But you talk about the lines from the mid-2010s. Dallas has been chasing that ever since. They put a ton into the position. But you've got your best lineman, the left guard who's injured.

And then you've got the right tackle who's, I guess, regress to the point where you're talking about Broderick Jones starting over him, which I still don't understand. So that combination of if the O line is taking a little bit of a step back from expectation, and they're not improving, you've got a young left tackle who theoretically should be improving, that's not going to allow you to throw the ball down the field to get it to your playmakers, to, again, run the ball to control the game, and the defense is going to just have to be better, simple as that. Well, maybe the most disappointing results of any weekend. Well, it depends what type of fan you are for either of these teams,

but Arizona Cardinals upset Los Angeles Chargers. One of my life just went out. That's interesting. And the light might have got out on the Chargers. It's the Ghost of Justin Herbert. Yeah. So the Chargers were a disaster on offense. They chartered more than any charging.

You could charger. 30% of survivor entries are out after this. And the blame game begins, right? Is the light going out? Justin Herbert's fault? There's a play that both you and I talked about, Jason Kelsey talked about, Kurt Warner talked about,

everyone there talked about where about two months left in the game and here it is right here. Three Chargers, offensive alignment end up blocking one guy. Guess what? The Chargers offense was correct. Go to my page at Jeff Schwartz. Check out the entire six-minute video here, Mitch. But in the end, right, these are type of plays

that Justin Herbert and Year 7 has got to figure out how to do. Whatever excuse you want to make, I know you're going to throw it out there. No, Harbaugh says it's a wide receiver's fault. He didn't break out when he was supposed to. to break out. Enough of it, man. Year 7 now, the charges can't keep

having these problems, Mitch. No, and so that's why, like, last year it was a big thing with the protection and the communication up the middle. Like, if Herbert is who we think he is, and he's a top five quarterback in the NFL or has a potential to be,

like, you're setting protections. You're telling the only what to do. You're evaluating every defensive front and you're in control of that. See that from a home. See that from DAC. See that from Josh Allen. Like, all of the top quarterbacks

are doing that. So this O-line miscommunication thing, there shouldn't be miscommunication. It should be everyone's on the same page, but we guess the blitz wrong or they disguise better than we expect it. But you shouldn't be having free runners. Now, this specific play,

everyone blamed the O-line because that's the fun thing to do and it's the Chargers. I kind of half-joking, half-serious, said, no, it's actually the quarterback's fault. All the alignment are doing what they're supposed to do based on the call. And if the quarterback wants it picks up, then he needs to change the protection.

Now, in the moment, didn't really think about the fact and it's a Mike McDaniel's offense and Shanahan's scheme, and they tend to like defeating blitzes with hots. They don't want to stress too much over like being perfect in finding the right protection. It's just we're going to have hots available and we're going to throw those. So in this specific look, you know, we've broken it down enough, but essentially the five of alignment are all correct.

The guys who are rushing Herbert are on Herbert as hot throws. He is looking for his hot throw. Harbaugh is making it sound like the receiver did the wrong thing, which, you know, definitely could be the case. So who's at fault here? I would say schematically, it's partly Mike McDaniel. And I'm not going to say it's Herbert's fault, but in year seven or whatever year it is,

I want a guy who's supposed to be a top five quarterback in the NFL to have answers for anything he's seeing. And it's a, you got three receivers to the right, two receivers to the left. You've got two DBs to the right over three receivers. Someone's probably dropping over there. So does your right tackle need to block out against that defense event? Probably not.

No. So let's just start there. Let's send the line to the left. Is it necessarily going to be an overload blitz? I don't know. I don't necessarily think so. That particular blitz also might have been hard to pick up because the left guard would have had to push through a blitzer to get through.

Center would have to push through a three-tech left tackle or a three-tech defensive end to a blitzer. So like it's going to be a tricky blitz to pick up even with the right call. But the fact that Herbert doesn't have those tools at his arsenal to do that to me is the problem. Like, he should have the answer to every single thing that he's seeing, and we've seen Brady talk about that. Like, I wanted the answer to every single thing the defense could do on the field. And again, McDaniel would say that, well, the answer is that we throw hot. Like, that's not always the answer. We've seen defense's getting so good.

Arizona dropped a guy right in the hot throw. That's what they know that too. Well, I know. That's why the whole he broke the wrong direction thing doesn't really pass the smell test for me. But that's like, they're dropping from different spots that you're used to. They're dropping into coverages. They're dropping into where the hot throws are supposed to be. So you can't just rely on that.

So, again, I'm not like blaming Herbert, but I am just asking for more from a quarterback who's this advanced to mentally, we know he's a great quarterback. He's smart. He understands coverages. Like, give him the tools and allow him to change the protections to get to the right call to get him protected and to unleash, you know, him and the offense. And we're just not seeing that.

You know what, Mitch, I think I think I'm going to be out on Herbert. till otherwise. I think that was the game that kind of like, I, I, wow. Like, uh, you, so who's your,

who's your favorite Oregon and quarterback in the NFL now? Dylan Gabriel. Hillary Smith. No, I mean, out's the wrong word, but I think it is time that I start more putting all this on Herbert, right?

Because, like, think about all the guys we saw in week one who played in suboptimal conditions or didn't have the perfect office line blocking on a given play or, I mean, I know that the bill's offensive line is maybe better than the charge of offensive line. But did you watch Josh Allen this weekend? Lamar Jackson played this weekend.

Mahomes, who didn't play terribly great but made enough plays. Like, all these guys were playing really well. Maybe Mahomes shouldn't be in that category as far as playing really, really well. But, like, where's that from Herbert? But he protected the weakness. The whole line was the weakness. He protected that. Now, he had his own probably anxiety and the injury.

but like, sure. He knew that there was a weakness that he had to protect. Sorry, or Caleb Williams, who was unbelievable on Sunday and doing some like crazy ass shit

that like you're like, there's no way. And he does anyways. Or, you know, or, you know, Burroughs for yesterday.

One of, one of, Twitter's three favorite plays, duo mesh and YLeak. Why leak? Yelik, not open. And Caleb just throws like a back shoulder

dime into the corner of the end zone over a draped in coverage. of safety. Like, that was probably my favorite throw of the week. Anyway, back to Herbert. And so, like, we just see

all these guys making plays, man. And I just, I don't know, man. I feel like I just want to see that from him. I just want to see it from him. I mean, look, I'm not saying he doesn't do it, Mitch, throughout the season. But we just saw an entire weekend of quarterbacks making those plays for their team, right?

And when things are not perfect, guys get it hurt. And I know McConkey was out. I get it. I understand. I'm not. But just like they just make it anyways. They make a play. They do the extra.

The crazy thing happens. I don't know, man. I just, I want to see more from Herbert. And I don't know, it's the wrong word, but I'm just sort of tired of trying to find ways to not make this on him. I think that's the best way to put it is like for so long, it's the circumstances guys around him. Like last year, he legitimately played great. And the circumstances around him were awful. then he got to the playoffs and played terribly.

So that's what's going to stick with us. I mean, Sam from formerly PFF voted for MVP because he felt like he did such a good job despite the limitations around him. So, like, we know he can do that. But I think to your point, it's just, it's tiresome after this long to keep trying to find that reason that the chargers aren't performing better.

Now, you can say 11 and 6 or whatever it was, again, to the playoffs is good with the circumstances. But like, again, then the playoff performance is terrible. he's 0 and 3 in the playoffs probably not going to end up being the greatest quarterback of all time Mr. Harbaugh but also JJ McCarthy is not going to be the best quarterback in the NFL either so maybe we should

stop listening to him. It's just that's one of those things where like is it that like unquantifiable thing that just is missing that we just don't feel that like it from him that either film watchers or some you know EPA stuff or advanced stats

tends to find the answer for potentially this might just be like a feel versus real thing or like a figure it out versus, you know, the surroundings. You know, a lot of Chargers fans are going to argue for Stafford and Detroit. And did you ever, you know, put it all on Stafford the way people are putting on Herbert? So yeah, Stafford was pretty maligned for a while there. And they were questioning why they were making them the highest big quarterback in the NFL. So, yeah, it's getting frustrating feeling like this should be the fifth quarterback,

along with Mahomes, Allen, Burrow, Lamar. Like, Herbert should be there. I push back on this after year two where people were already putting him in the top five. And I was like, we just haven't seen anywhere near enough to put him there. And you look at all the data and like, he averages out to the 12th to 14th best quarterback

if you just kind of go by the data, which we all feel like he's better than, but it's just getting tiring saying it's O-Line. And then it's scheme. And then it's receivers. And then it's this. And then it's that. Like at some point, I mean, if the quarterback has to elevate the entire team, which is an unfair burden to put on him, but that's the standard that you're graded on.

That's a good way to put him, Mitch. And look, it is week one, right? You never finished product in week one. And I thought the offense design was atrocious. Like, what are we RPOing from Pistol for? What the fuck is that, Mitch? Like, what are we, that's not a real offense with Justin Herbert. That's a two offense.

Why are we doing RPO, Pistol, zone reads? It just looks like a BS game plan from that. It looks like a game plan. They didn't trust the quarterback. Use the quarterback that we were supposed to. We're doing pistol zone read for Justin Herbert. Like just the whole thing. Especially the pregame report that like McDaniel's pulling into plays that he's never

run before and all this stuff. It's like, okay, let's see it. Let's not see the two of plays. Same, same shit. So the charges were the most disappointing team for me in week one, Mitch, but I always like to look at week one. And look, it is what is. You're never finished product.

But I do think it's okay to over and underreact a little bit here. What is the week one result that you will say in week 18, like, oh, oh, that happened. Wow, that was odd. Is there a one that comes to mind about a result we saw this weekend? That's a good question. I mean, I feel like Green Bay is kind of always in that category. You know, I could see them still go in 12 and 5. And we think...

Their old line stinks. That's the problem, Mitch. No one, no one, I seem to acknowledge this, but their own line has gone downhill very, very fast, very quickly, and it's terrible now. Yeah, and the guys they've drafted to kind of replace haven't been living up to expectations, especially of Green Bay of yesterday.

I mean, I do feel like it's not fully right to judge them without Parsons. Like, that is a huge point of their defense. And because of the trade, because of the contract, like, that's an outsized part of their team. And the second he left the field last year, the defense basically fell off a cliff. So it's hard to, like, give them some sort of grade. But I feel like that one could definitely be up there because obviously once Kyler gets hurt and Wenz comes on, everyone feels like Green Bay's got this thing locked up.

And they just don't finish the way they should. I still feel like the Chargers game might end up being the wacky one. I don't know. I mean, I have more, like, positives that I think are going to be realistic outcomes for the rest of the season than I do like, oh, that's going to be. going to be was the last year the Patriots lose to the Raiders in week one kind of thing so okay so let's go there then what's one thing you saw in week one that surprised you like on the positive side do you think of something sustainable for the season oh i got a bunch i mean we talk about the giant's offense i think that was sustainable for the season really encouraged by that

Ravens just kicking ass across the board i mean couldn't have had a better first game offense look great, you know, what's it going to look like under Declan Doyle. Well, it's going to look pretty awesome. Yeah, it was awesome. A little more of my win another MVP. Chicago, just keeping the foot down. I mean, as again, this, this panthers defense is not bad. Like, they're already a solid defense. They added Phillips. They added a couple other guys. Like, supposed to be a pretty good unit. And 59 points is pretty impressive. I would say Cincinnati. You know, everyone kind of had Cincy and Dallas as those two teams with like great offenses, defense just get to like average. well Cincinnati defense first week against

Baker and the Bucks and historically a really good offensive line we saw some really good play from obviously Big Dexter Lawrence and some of the rest of the defense so I would say like Sinci positive Ravens positive Giants positive Chicago positive

I think those are four that I like what I saw and I think it's sustainable and I think it's not just like well it was week one and fifth I would also put Arizona in that category like we're all talking about the Chargers having dumpster fire and Herbert not doing this, but Arizona looked good. Jeremiah Love does not look like he had a high ankle sprain three weeks ago.

The offense looks good. I mean, LaFleur was one of our assistant coaches in Cleveland under the Shanahan year, so I love him and I'm really excited for that opportunity, but they look great. I mean, defense look good. I think Walter Nolan's going to kind of emerge this year being one of the top interior defense alignment that no one else has really heard of or paid attention to. So those are all, you know, five positives that I really think, you know, can keep up the rest of the season.

I will throw in their Raiders offensive line, Mitch. I know it's the Dolphins, I get it, but wow, huge improvement in that Raiders' offensive line. Like a night and day difference between we saw last year and this year, which was really impressive for me. I think the Cardinals, excuse me, the Cardinals, the Vikings' ability to come back with Carson Wentz was, I think, just a great team win for them.

They were able to really harass Jordan Love and that sort of, you know, got them going in the right direction. As far as the negative... They're like 85% blitz or something. Yeah, okay, this is... True blitz or... Okay, this is my problem, okay? We were talking about this last week.

So a blitz is considered charting-wise, right? Is that if you bring one extra guys, so you bring five guys, right? Now, you can sim pressure, bring four, and that's counted as a blitz as well. But really, is that for us, Up front, we consider a blitz if a non-known rusher comes. So if you have five pass rushes in the game, which teams do, they put five on the field.

And all five rush, to us, that's not a blitz, right? There's all five known rushers. Yes, I do expect Von Miller and a Marcus Ware to rush the passer. Yes. Oh, my God, it's a blitz. They're rushing. Because Denver used to have the underfront with those guys played Sam and D.N., essentially, and they both rush.

So that's not a. In our mind is offensive linemen. That's not a pressure, okay? A pressure is when they bring a second or third level defender or sometimes they walk a linebacker up who's not a normal pass rusher and he comes as well. That's a pressure. So Mitch, I've not watched a film yet.

I don't think they brought what we would consider a pressure 80% of the time. I'm curious to find out, but it's still a high number no matter what. And they just, again, the Packers' Offensive line did not handle it very well. things I was disappointed in a match relative to my expectation of week one with talking about the Cowboys defense like just a complete dumpster fire and then I'll tell you what

look I was low in Tennessee Titans buddy I'm even lower now what did you see that freaking camboard play? Real quick yes why does the media love Brian Davele and why do they think he's this like

genius offensive coach because he had one or two Josh Allen years but other than that has he really done much No. It was awful in New York. So, like, the most recent thing he did was terrible. So I don't really get why he's this, like, great offensive coach that's supposed to, like, mold quarterbacks and do all these things.

I mean, Chris Ballas was considered a good GM by the media, and he's made zero playoffs. So, I don't mean, it's like, whatever. The media just likes to have the guys they like, whatever. Touche. Like, the Titans, did you see the player where Cam Ward did, like, the, the plaction, the double-clash-past? So he was faking like he was going to pitch the ball on the end of round. But no one else was like running the end around fake. So no one really like you have a shit.

He just threw the ball up in the air to himself. Like but his back was to the defense. So he couldn't even see that he did it essentially. It's like you wouldn't even see the. So he faked to the running back and the guy was coming behind him. And instead of like faking the ball out in front of him, so it looked like a fake, he just threw the ball up in the air to himself. And then turned around got sacked.

Sack was the best part. It was like a... The sock was the best part. Yeah, it was like four different, like quasi-trick plays at once. Like, it looked like he flea-flickered himself. It was the best part was like turning around an immediate sack. Like, it wasn't like it was four seconds. Turn around sack.

Play over. Oh, geez, man. What did you... What did you think of the Eagles? I know you weren't high on them. I don't know if you were able to catch much of that one. Well, the old line, you know, Dickerson's out for what he... Dickerson was bad.

and he's out for, what, no? No, he was bad. He was like really bad, which is shocking. He went on injured reserve and he said he shouldn't have played.

I thought they were fine. I mean, they had 10 first downs, dude. I mean, so the two long touchdowns that anyone's that high on Washington either. One of the touchdowns,

they said was a clear-out route that hurt has never thrown ever in practice, which is the long one he threw. And then the Goddard one, like, I don't know, is he,

That can happen very often where he runs like a skinny post and stops on a dime and then run outruns for. I mean, I don't know, man. I just, I thought it was fine at 10 first downs. It's not good. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we're going to need to see it for a few more weeks. But I was just curious to know you were very anti-Eagles to start the year. I was.

I was. And if not, first, Stefan Diggs. What do you say, Mitch going penis first, dick first. Goal Post. Without going Dick first in the goalpost, the commanders might have tied the game up. Just the way he lives his life. I, like, it's such a selfish play.

For those who missed it, Stefan Dick scored, okay? And he ran toward the goalpost and then jumped on it, like jumped on it and hugged it, essentially, with his legs and his arms around it and just like right into it. The ref was like, you're stupid penalty. And it pushed back a potential two-point conversion attempt for the commanders.

So at the time, Washington had just cut the lead to nine. So this is where you want to do the two-point conversion early. So you know later in the game if you needed second possession or whatever it is. It was, they cut it to two. No, cut it to two. Then they went for two and ran the dumb shovel pass. This was the one before. So they didn't have the option of knowing whether they needed nine or seven later in the game.

Well, no, it was, the score was 17-9 at the time when the Washington scored. And things got out. Oh. It was 17-9. And then Philly scored, is that the deal? Yeah, then the Phillies scored. Oh, okay. So it played out that way. But I feel like they would have scored.

They would have gone for two. They were down, you know, two points with 10 minutes left. And then the last play of the game, look, the Chiefs have ruined this play for everyone else, the shovel pass, okay? It only works in Kansas City. And like, only a quarter of the time does it work. It worked last night.

They did weird play. Stop calling shovel pass, Mitch, to four-string tight ends on two-point conversion. I hate it so much. It takes too long. Right? Like, yeah, Aligetti missed a block, but by the time he spun back and like,

it takes too long, but I hate shovel pass on poor situations in the red zone. Okay, the other thing with a lot of shovel passes is usually that throw is live. Like, it's not just a shovel pass. You have a couple of different options on the play. You can throw that little quick fly route

that everyone's saying, Jaden should have thrown. And other people are saying, well, he's reading the defensive end. What's he reading the defensive end for? They think it's just going to be like a run play if the defensive end sucks in? I don't know, maybe,

but I would say most of Andy Reid's shovel plays. They had it like an arrow route like what it was open. I know. That should be the read. That's what Coach Reed has a lot of his plays. Read that first. You read that first. You don't get back to that.

That happens off the snap. That's the thing you get to. You don't necessarily read the defensive end. So if this was not a call in and run at shovel patch, which would be the stupidest thing, then he was reading the defensive end to either figure out if he was going to run for it, which doesn't make sense given the routes and given the fact that the guy was looking for it.

So that's the thing with the Andy Reid is he built in a ton of eye candy. Mahomes leaving the pocket. You know, Pat started to do the underhand thing because defenders, they can't really see you throwing over the top, but they can or they see you thrown over the top. They kind of lose back to the site when you underhand it, done some, you know, behind the back stuff. Like they build in creative ways to do it.

They don't just like run boilerplate shovel passes anymore. So, yeah, it's a terrible play. And hopefully we don't see it ever again. Hopefully we don't see that ever again. I'm sure we're going to see it pretty soon. All right, wrapping up the first, the second game of the season is because we have not talked since then.

And we talked about the Rams of 49ers. Preparation for that game, the Rams looked like half asleep and didn't look interesting in the game. Miles Garrett clearly was hurt, and I was under reserve. And the Rams lost a game 27 to 7. Do you believe the Rams,

and this is a theory going around, I don't believe this, but sort of like punted on that game to be ready to play the rest of the season by their travel schedule. Because I, look, I get it. I know the same specialists, all that stuff. But man, the Niners look fresh, dude.

They looked more into the game, more physical, more prepared. They were a preseason game. What do you make of that game, Mitch, in the Rams future now? Have you seen the way McVevales right now? He looks disheveled and like, if the idea was that you get back into the states

and you feel good, he's not caught up on asleep. He looks pretty bad. Now, I'm sure part of that's getting his butt kicked by Shanahan and losing his star defensive player. My takeaway was just an incredible physical performance by San Fran. I mean, they keep getting guys injured and they keep just kind of steamrolling straight ahead.

The offensive line's gotten kind of sneaky better over the years. Punea Guard's been a nice addition. Trent obviously is a monster when he can stay healthy. You know, McKibitz has turned in a pretty solid player. So their ability to, you know, stick to what they're trying to do. saw true dropback, seven-step drop from under center, which was awesome. We've seen some like three and five-stepers lately. Okay, okay.

I'm glad you mentioned this. I saw Jalen Hertz try this. They tried like an old, like, pepper pass where they full slid the line to the right and cut the defensive end. Hertz looked so uncomfortable. He tried to do a three-step drop. He was stumble over himself. I remember that plug.

I was going to text to you about that, but I forgot to. We did see some under-center placer pass that, and it's, full, like actual dropback, which is what, since early 90s? Like, what have we last seen that, Mitch? Yeah, I know. It's awesome. And this is all the stuff these guys grew up on.

Like, the true old West Coast system is all this under center stuff. So it's all things that most of these guys have familiarity with from a long, long time ago. But no, I mean, dominating performance by San Fran. I don't think the idea was to, like, punt on the first game. I think the idea was to prioritize the rest of the season while still feeling really confident about their plan for this game.

Like it was kind of an either or you either do it this way. You do it the Niners way. Now, I will say what the sleep specialists say, right, is if you get acclimated to the time zone, it takes one day per hour to, you know, unacclamize yourself, whatever terminology you want to use and to get back to West Coast time. So I think it was a 15 hour difference. It might have been a 13 hour difference, actually. But if it's within that kind of 12 to 13 hour difference, the Rams played on

Thursday and they don't play again until Monday night. So they actually have an extra day to get back. So you can argue that like maybe they should have gone and they should have just, you know, stayed there, gotten used to it. And they have an extra day to get acclimated back to West Coast timing that Sam Fran doesn't have. I don't know. You kind of have to trust the scientists. You do wonder, you hear the reports of the random sending, you know,

staffers and other people out over the last two years. They weren't going to play football. Whatever they were doing that second day to kind of do something physical and report back on what they were feeling. Obviously, you know, it seemed like it affected them. These are the kinds of things that we can speculate about. We can't really talk about with any certainty. Miles obviously did not look right. You know, he looked bigger too. I don't know if it was the jerseys or maybe lack of practice and can't imagine he's any heavier than his normal, but he just looked a little bulkier and still had actually quite a few pressures despite the

kind of lack the opposite of the Cleal Benson. Like, well, okay, another image, like they said he had no pressures. And you just put in the film, you're like, here's four of them immediately. What are we watching, dude? He beats Trent inside and then splits the guard. Like,

I just, it's, it's, that stuff is really starting to frustrate me because it feels like really disingenuous on how they're doing it. And they're framing a certain way and they go back and change the grade afterwards.

You know, Caleb Williams being graded like the 18th best quarterback of the week is such bullshit. Come on, man. Like, maybe he made the wrong read a couple times. Johnson would tell us if he was frustrated. And Ben Johnson has said nothing but good things about Caleb.

They scored 59 points in an NFL game. 59 points. We looked it up, Mitch. The last team to score that many points in the game was you, you in the Rams, 54, 51. Like, it's so 59 points, dude, it's ridiculous. I know, yes. And again, Ben Johnson is excessively honest, probably to a fault.

Like he would have said if he was not okay with, what Caleb did. But yeah, getting back to the question, Rams, a little worried about them. We'd like to see Aaron Donald come back. We'd like to see the effect he has. I would imagine Miles, by like the end of the season, we'll kind of be up to speed.

This does feel like a team that doesn't have to be the one seed to get the extra week that, like, they can get in their 10 and 7, and you kind of trust their ability to go on the road to play good games. So I'm not, like, worried about the Rams per se. I just think we need to see them get a little help, healthier. We need to see offensively, obviously, a much better performance. The O-line was a concern having to replace a right tackle. Left tackle might get suspended, not totally sure there,

but that has been a strength for them the last few years. So I want to see a little better there. And then obviously the Pook and Devante, you know, pairing and making sure that they're staying healthy and they're available to get open for Stafford. But, yeah, frustrating for the Rams. Great for the Niners. And I don't know that that's like, I think it sets. the tone and a great way for the nine-ish for the rest of the year. I don't know that that's instructive on what the Rams are going to look like. I would imagine they'll kind of internalize it. They'll feel, you know, the pain and both physical and mental from the outcome of that game

and use it for fuel to kind of better themselves for the next few weeks. I found that Eagles play, by the way, it was not a full turn. The defense ended up went inside, but Barclay did cut the outside linebacker and Hertz ran around for eight seconds and threw the ball away. It was a hilarious play. It looked like, I just texted to you. look completely awkward, like no purpose whatsoever in running this. But I guess when you're under center, you can't run the ball every time, right?

You have to do some plight of pass and move the pocket and whatnot. Any last words, Mitch? Anything else when you got out of your chest about NFL week one? No, it's just, it's football's back. I'm excited. I think, again, there's always like the squirly things that happen. I just don't think anything is that squirly. It might be the chargers.

It might be, you know, the giants and cowboys like that might be the one that we look back and say, huh, that was a weird one. But I think a lot of these teams that played well, like they played well for a reason. And it's stuff that they fixed from the offseason, whether it's a new coaching staff, whether it's a new style, new commitment to physicality.

I mean, the lions still each one out there. You saw the good and the bad of both the lions and the saints in that game that we didn't really touch on. But, yeah, man, just nice to have real football back. I know you've been on college football for a few weeks here.

But sorry about your ducks. I'm about two weeks away from not caring anymore. So we'll see how that goes. Uh, no, we got USC in two weeks. It doesn't, you know what's great? Regular season doesn't matter. So who cares? If we lose, it doesn't matter.

If we lose, it does matter. But the thing about, you know, all sports, right? Mitch is like, to Oregon loses and the fan base is like, fire the old line coach, fire Dan landing, fire the OC, change this and that. I'm like, it's two weeks, man. Like, you're not, you know. Can you, can you do a brief discussion of the whole tipping place thing? Okay, great.

So, um, people went and saw the first. film and saw Dante Moore's feet were staggered like this in a pass and square in a run. However, however, when a play action pass, his feet were also square. So, okay, like, you know, people are like, we guessed it right at the time. There's no way you guessed it right because I'm watching the same stuff you are. And by the way, the players are not watching the high sideline TV copy. They're looking at his feet in front. of them. So like, there has to be extended stagger to really tell. And the thing about it, Mitch,

is when you watch the film, Oklahoma State does nothing at all like they know the plays are coming. I even put a clip out there. There's a play where he's Dante Moore Stagger is huge. And they run a blitz and three guys are open. Look, if they knew it was a pass, they drop eight in coverage, right? Why would they blitz at all? And so do I think it matters a little bit? Maybe. I think the problem is this. This is the problem that I see, right? Is if you have a stagger stance, on first and 10, you're giving away your pass of the ball. Like, that's the problem, right? It's on first and it's a 50-50 downs where you run pass.

First and 10, second and eight, second and five. That's the problem. And if that's actually what's happening, then that is a tell that needs to be fixed. And so we'll see if they address that. But, you know, the week before, they scored 34 and 500 yards and off it's eight yards of play. Like, I don't, that it, this is the type of stuff, Mitch, you know this. It's like red meat for fans looking for.

to blame something and they have failures, right? It's like, it's a, because they can't just say the team sucks or this and that. Like, it's like, no, this is why. If they fix this, it's all going to be fixed. It's like level, not level. It's number 15 on the list of things they have to be fixed. One through 14 or more important, 15's a problem.

But yeah, the Pall action passed off, but his feet are staggered. Plaction pass. Right. And so I'll say as an NFL player and, you know, speaking for other NFL players, once you pass like 10, or 15% different than you're expecting,

you stop relying on that information. Yes. Like, if it's a nine out of ten, then like, sure, I can go off that information. Maybe I'll gamble on the one time. But once it gets to, you know, two out of ten times that the guy has the stagger and it's the wrong call,

oh, then it's just like, well, I can't trust it. And I'm not going to be there. So to your point, you're running play action more than a few times. Like, that's enough of a tendency breaker to, you know, throw them off and to say that this isn't something we can trust. And the other thing, I know you watched O-line and tently, like, you would be able to

tell if defensive ends are disregarding play action run cells. If defense alignment are hunkering down for the run because they know it's coming versus like three techs jetting up the field and playing, you know, a different technique on certain situations, which as you just pointed out, they're not. Like those are the things that you would see clear as day as if they're able to call that run versus pass. And you're just not seeing that. This is so, so the first play of the game, right? Oregon has their spread out formation two by two, no attach players. And Oklahoma has a five-man box cover two, right? And the first play, they run a run stunt.

They run a T-E-run stunt, and they squeeze the end and bring, and bring like the nickel, right? Like a cover-two run defense. That's all that is. It's not because they knew it was a run. That's how you stop a run and cover two. You have a five-man box with five offensive linemen. Like, that's what you do. So, like, people think, oh, see, they knew.

And you're also probably expecting a more inside zone style of run, which stunting guys is the way to defeat it. And Steve Spagnolo, first. freaking like run of the game sends a double corner blitz or double DB blitz. Like, did he have a run past hell? Like you blitz on rundowns to try to defeat runs. That's what you do. It's just like, it's just, you know, and, you know, because Indiana, Indiana, there's a book out on their championship run.

And part of the book said that they had tendencies on Oregon that were formation based for the most part. Like if this formation personnel, they run these three passes and they use, which again, not great, but that's what we do, right? we look at tendencies. That's legit. The Patriots, what, did they run the ball 90% of the times Matt Collins is on the field?

Like, those things are legit. Yeah. And so, but then there was something in the book that said, we noticed they run a lot of 21 personnel. Yeah, Mitch, they had three healthy wide outs at the end of the season. Like, no shit, they ran 21 personnel. That's all they had was healthy. Like, see, but people don't get that, right?

They read that. They're like, see, like, what were they supposed to do? They had no wide receivers healthy. So they ran 21 personnel because they had better, they had more running backs than. And so, like, it's stuff like that. Just like, Jesus Christ, man. But this album you lose, right?

You lose a game you shouldn't lose. And then all this stuff comes out and fan bases go crazy. Not for the Cal Bears, though. Cal Bears, one-on-one, big win in Syracuse, big ACC matchup, Mitch, for the Cal Bears. I'm going to get you in the Cal this season. Oh, yeah. I was definitely locked in and watching all of that. Kingston Lopa, three interceptions at safety.

Oregon Transfer. You're welcome for that. All right. Anything else, buddy? I guess that Nike money dried up. Tosh took it all. Who's, you have Nike? Are you Dita school?

Yeah, I think we're Nike. Oh, there you go. There you go. Did you watch Ohio State, Texas? I don't think I watched a ton of it. I think I had it on at points. I definitely did not see the comeback. I saw more of the early part of the game.

Can't tell you why. I don't remember what Saturday night what was like for me. but I watched a little bit of it. But now I'm just, you know, I'm not quite as locked in on college football. It's nice to have one in the background if you're not doing much. But now I'm not going to kind of sit down. Like I said, I used to love the 230 in Kansas City, the 230 SEC game and the 630, I think 630 ABC game.

Those were just like the two games of the week I would watch. I will say it was nice to have the Big Noon kickoff watch. What was that in Michigan this week? Yeah, that was fun. I had that one on. That was a good watch and that ended up being a nice little victory there from Michigan.

That 3-3-CBS game is now the Big Ten game. That's now a Big Ten took that slot over. So the ESPN has all the SEC matches. I think we'll be a ton of fun considering all the Lane and Old Miss stuff that we saw. If you want to, yeah, that is this weekend, right?

I think I'm running. Yeah, it is this weekend. 7.30 on 8. I think so, yeah. So make sure to check that one out. If you're into college football, we back on Friday with our gambling picks two and three last week with Will Hill filling in.

Better start than it felt like. So the NFL sucks to wager out. Don't ever wage on the NFL Mitch. Don't start. If you haven't started yet, just don't bother. There's no point. It doesn't feel good at all. All right.

Anything else, buddy? No, I don't plan on it. But again, good to see you, good to talk ball. Good luck with your picks. We'll be back on Friday, everyone. and then Mitch I'll be back on Tuesday talking ball. Take care, everyone.