Green Light with Chris Long - NFL Week 5 Recap & Superlatives. Mike Tannenbaum Former Jets GM, on Bill O'Brien & Dan Quinn. Mt Devil Heads.

Episode Date: October 12, 2020

(1:25) - Open and Mount Devil Heads. (12:57) - Sunday NFL Recap. (23:53) - NFL Questions. (35:25) - Former Jets GM Mike Tannenbaum on NFL Firings of Bill O'Brien and Dan Quinn, Trevor Lawrence Draft Destination, and Almost Drafting Chris Long. (1:05:50) - NFL Week 5 Superlatives. Sign up for your DraftKings account at https://www.draftkings.com/sportsbook and use promo code : Greenlight Green Light with Chris Long: Subscribe and enjoy weekly content including podcasts, documentaries, live chats, celebrity interviews and more including hot news items, trending discussions from the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, NCAA are just a small part of what we will be sharing with you. http://bit.ly/chalknetwork Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy Monday, everybody. I'm your host, Chris Long. This is my co-host, Making Gunner. Hello. He's wearing sunglasses, whatever that means. We'll see. We're very lucky today to be joined by Mike Tannenbaum, former GM of the Jets,

a guy you see on ESPN a lot these days, giving us kind of nuanced front office, kind of breakdown type stuff. He can fill in a lot of the gaps for us right now with everything going on in pro football. It's nice to have a guy like that on the show. So he'll be on in a bit. Also, we're going to go through the worst Sunday slate of football

that I can remember in recent memory. Had a bad day at the office, so to speak, gambling. We'll talk about that. We'll talk about AJ Green. We'll talk about Aaron Donald maybe breaking the sack record. Jalen Ramsey's hit. Can the Niners make the playoffs? And then we've got awards that we want to hand out as usual on Monday.

So stick around. Be a lot of fun today. First off, I want to do a PSA and a shout out before the shouts out to my buddy Andrew Dewey who has counseled me to not set my laptop on the old family jewels for the duration of my podcasting career. He noticed that.

And I'm also that calls into question whether or not any of the listeners actually give a fuck about my health. You've been watching me put this, radioactive five-year-old. By the way, Macbooks are supposed to last like, what, four or five years? I'm on like year six. Yeah, a 2013 model here.

Wow, I got a 15, and I'm in the market for a new one. But either way, you shouldn't put the MacBook over your stones. That's interesting. I happen to know Andrew Dewey, and I didn't get that. Because you said it more like on your knees, like way down there on your knees. and for me a lot of times sitting in bed etc laptop is right you know there so shout out to

Andrew Dewey for counseling me on getting a platform to sit my laptop on and that's what I have today and I'm also wondering why nobody mentioned anything that listened to this podcast besides do drop shout out to Dewey um hey hey Thursday night Thursday night's been rough Yeah we can't get Neither of us can get a win On our Thursday night time machine

The tally is 3 to 0 me And if these games Keep getting moved around You might be heading for a Waffle House sooner than later I think I am going to the Waffle House Once again my lovely wife Meg Had me run an Aaron

And the mattress store was right In the same shopping complex As the Waffle House here In Greater Charlottesville Virginia and that's where I'm going probably the old the old Aaron to the mattress store hey can you go run run pick me up a mattress a mattress it was great uh the people were very helpful at the mattress store also an interesting dynamic of selling mattresses is you're always selling a product to somebody who's laying down right you got to test it out yeah but it's just a weird dynamic you're

standing over somebody who's making themselves at home and in your establishment right also where are you on the cleanliness of those mattresses in the era of COVID? Like, do you really want to lay down on a mattress in mattress warehouse or mattress firm right now? Test it out? Do not. No. Yeah, no. I didn't think about that, but I'm good.

It's been a couple weeks. So, yeah, Thursday night time machine. If you haven't checked it out, it is a really cool segment we do on Thursday nights. It's the only one in existence of its type. It's gotta be, right? Where we predict the scores, acknowledge that it's real time, pregame Thursday at the time of recording, and then transition by a time machine type noise.

A sounder. Sounder is what they call it in the biz. Then we break down the game after, or I break down the game after usually at one or two in the morning. So I work very hard on this segment. You're sleeping, which I understand you have another job. it's got to be the only segment of this type, maybe in the universe. I'm quite certain it is. If you were to tell me that another show would write, quote,

we start with a time travel prediction and recap of Thursday night football, end quote, I would be shocked. I would be shocked. I would be shocked. I don't think it exists anywhere. No. No. Uh-uh. Speaking of segments, I had a little idea. Oh yeah, which, you got. Mount Rushmore. Let me give you a little history lesson. What's Mount Rushmore? It's a colossal sculpture carved into the granite face of, get this, Mount Rushmore. No way. In the Black Hills in Keystone, South Dakota. Sculptor Goetz and Borglum created the sculpture's design and oversaw the project's execution from 1927 to 1941. That had to be hard. With the help of

his son Lincoln. He had the help of his son, Lincoln. Yeah, just one guy. The sculpture features the 60 foot heads of presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. The four presidents were chosen to represent the nation's birth, growth, development, and preservation, respectively. Preservation, that's a key one these days. At any rate, there are four heads. And I was thinking, we like ranking things. Yeah, I love it. Who doesn't? Like every podcast likes ranking things, right? Maybe we put a spin on it. Instead of Mount Rushmore, we call it Mount Gushmore, because we we're going to gush over our four favorite subjects in any given realm. Oh, that's an interesting spin.

Yeah. I like that. I love it. Okay, here's the problem. There's just one big problem. And I like your idea. It rhymes. It's a way to rank things.

I think it's tremendous. But I have two buddies that have a segment. I just realized call Mount Rushmore. They have a podcast. They have a segment called Mount Rushmore. And I wouldn't want to take something from my friends. I just wouldn't want to do that. You know, I wouldn't want to lift their segment.

Right. It would be bad form. Whether it was unintentional or intentional, and I were to lift their segment and just do another Mount Rushmore, it would just be a bad look, wouldn't it? That's fair, yeah. Yeah, pardon my intellectual property. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

We'd probably be told to maybe cease and desist. Okay, fair enough. I do have, I do have an idea of speaking to Mount Rushmore's. Did you know that there's a Mount Rushmore in the Czech Republic? or they call it the Czech Mount Rushmore. In Czechoslovakia, I don't know which one it is. Yeah, I think it's Czech Republic these days. Are you referring to the devilheads?

Devilheads. Devilheads, yeah, they can be accessed in the northern part of the Czech Republic where an expanse of dense forestland gives way to the village of Zelizi. With their hollowed out eyes, the ghoulish-looking twin-figured reliefs carved into the side of the cliff are the stuff of childhood nightmares, reaching 30 feet in height, the two menacing faces are the creation of Czech sculptor Vaklav Levy, who carved them on site from 1841 to 1846. So devil heads. I think that's a great idea. I'm seeing something else saying devil's heads. You know what? Let's do devil's heads. I think it's a great idea. How many heads are there?

Two. Two heads. I think that's the perfect way to rank things. Right. One is just your favorite. Yeah, because you can't just use one thing to rank. Like if we did like Statue of Liberty, be fucking stupid, right? It'd just be one thing. It'd be a goat argument. Yeah. Those are boring. Two is perfect.

Four is too much. Also, who was the guy you said did Mount Rushmore? Gootson Borglum. I wouldn't want to do that as a segment because it says here that Gootson Borglam, he did Stone Mountain and worked with the KKK. So that's kind of a problematic segment there. Canceled, Goetzen. Yeah, he's canceled.

I'm thinking maybe. Mount Rushmore as a monument is canceled. I don't know about it as a podcast segment. I think the devil's heads is the new. It's just bad to do the KK. You know, like it's just bad to work with the KKK. Devil's heads, full steam ahead. Devil's heads, there's nothing problematic about that, is there?

Nah, what would you like to rank? Well, the Lakers won the big one last night, didn't they? Lake Show, congrats. I love the Lakers. They call me Laker Chris in some circles. I saw zero minutes, zero seconds of that ballgum, didn't watch the ceremony. I saw a tweet or two afterwards. Let's do top two Lakers on the current roster.

Oh, I like that a lot. Yeah, that's a good way to kick off devil's heads. We each get two. Yeah, we'll do a snake draft. Okay. Do you want to go first? Laker Chris? I'd love to go first.

Why don't we go one of the best Lakers of all time? Dwight Howard. Damn. Redemption story. He made a run in 2012. came back to finish the job with the franchise that he's most synonymous with. Good pick. Yeah, I'm going to go Dwight Howard for, you know,

the first ever entry into the Devil's Head segment. Okay. With the second overall pick in the Devil's Head's draft of current L.A. Lakers, I will take Rajan Ronde. Some people call him Rajan. I call him Rojohn. Some people call him a leader, you know, because he taught LeBron about leadership last week,

according to Rajan. 34 years old, the linchpin of this roster. Last one of ring in 2008 with the Celtics was LeBron's mentor, Chris, physically, emotionally, spiritually, went for 194 and 4. I really fucked up that first pick. I would have loved,

I would covet Rondo had I thought about it. The series winner, I should say. Snake draft, so I'm still up. My second devil's head of two devil's heads. I'm gonna go another two-time NBA champion, J.R. Smith,

aka J.R. Swish. Shirt off last night. Too sexy for shirts. Shirt off on the court. A stunning performance for a D&P coach's decision. Showing that he's just as valuable on the sideline as on the court.

All right, well, let's round out the first installment of Devil's Head with this was a guy I'm so thankful you didn't take I'm actually shocked you didn't Danny Green gotta be not just one of the best Lakers

on the roster right now but of all time he's got three different championships on three different teams say the best for last Danny Green good pick those guys are gonna look good on our graphic of the devil's heads monument

which we will put out on social media the check mountain grushmore To recap your devil's heads are Dwight Howard and Danny Green. I went Rajan Rondo and J.R. Swish. Now, the great thing about devil's heads is who made the devil's heads? Vaclav Levi.

Did he work with the clan? Not clear at this time. But probably not. Unlikely. I think we're in, we are in the clear with this segment. I think it's going to be a tremendous segment.

I can't wait to do it like all the time. How could you not like this segment? It's also original. It's an evergreen segment. It's evergreen. We can do it on this show. And then on Thursday of course, we have our other unique segment, the Thursday Night Time Machine.

Thursday Night Time Machine, only of its type. Only segment once more in the universe that we know of. Now there are other there are other galaxies out there. Maybe in some Earth-like planet, some other podcast is doing a Time Machine segment transition by a time machine noise, starting with a real time prediction segment into a post-game breakdown on the Thursday show that comes out on Friday.

Like maybe somewhere else in a galaxy far, far away, but not this galaxy. Laker Chris, let's get to some segments. Let's talk about this ugly slate. Hopefully it's the worst of the season. First off, really gloomy Sunday. It rained like biblical yesterday, as they say. in central Virginia and along the eastern seaboard.

It's still gloomy out there. You've got COVID bearing down on the country and the NFL subsequently. You get robbed of a Josh Allen experience because of it. We're Slate so far this year, and I haven't looked ahead, but hopefully we don't see this type of Sunday again. You had one meeting between teams with winning records. The best game of the week was Thursday,

and the best game of the day was during the NBA Finals. For the NFL, the entire NFC East is awful. So not good from a market standpoint, Eastern Seaboard standpoint. Two coaches got fired this week. And the moment that we thought would all save the slate and maybe did save the slate because Alex Smith's redemption story was so touching,

just felt like it didn't maximize the potential of inspiration because one, it was a game that nobody was watching. We didn't have any time to get ready for it. I mean, it happened in a flash. And if you were watching another game, it wasn't like they turned the game to FedEx Field for a live look. He deserved a raucous ovation,

and I felt robbed not to see it happen that way. I know it doesn't matter to him if there are fans in the stands or not, but he deserved 70,000 people on their feet. Maybe it would be just the same without a pandemic at FedEx Field, but here we are. And as much as I loved seeing his family, and it was touching to me, I just watched them kind of sitting there nervously

in a torrential downpour in an empty stadium, and it was just this surreal moment. And you couldn't even enjoy the success story for more than a couple of hours, because before you could soak it in, you had one of football's best good guys suffering a similar type injury on the field. Now, what happens after this is all based on

how the recovery is executed, and God forbid, anything like that happens to Dak Prescott, but they're two very serious injuries. And for Alex Smith, he completed the redemption story arc yesterday. And maybe in his mind, it's not done. And maybe he's way more serious about playing quarterback in the NFL than we were ever about him going forward in 2020 and beyond.

You couldn't soak it in before DAC was laying on the field as one of these guys who's universally loved and he's got a gruesome injury of his own and we saw it. Like we saw it. I saw it on accident. It was disgusting. And that moment reminded me that football is just not that big a deal.

I mean, as if the pandemic doesn't drive at home when you see guys from around the league tweeting, you know, praying for DAC, thinking about Dak. You've got Jason Garrett coming over there, puts his arm around Mike McCarthy, and they're both struggling to kind of take this thing in. You hate seeing a player get hurt like that, and all injuries really do do hold weight in a locker room. But we naturally, when it's the quarterback and a great guy to boot and a guy who's playing on the tag. I mean, like, it was just an awful moment and so many ways and Dax been through so much in his life

and it crushed me to see it and it drove home that football is not that important as only something like that could. And in the end, all that having been said, you had four one score games to show for that Sunday. And there was one game that nobody was watching. One game was New York, Dallas, which is a shit show right now.

and obviously you had the DAC injury, he had one one score game that was during the NBA finals. And then the one score game that actually was relatively exciting and thrilling, it ends with a Mahomes loss. And even if you're happy for the Raiders, you just hate seeing Mahomes lose. I just, people turn on Mahomes to see him go off

and win the game. So it was a bad Sunday, bad Sunday. And it ended even worse for me. Do tell. Viking Seahawk. I was in chase mode. I was like behind the sticks running around like a chicken with my head cut off, like scrambling to get a bet in,

which is never a good thing on Minnesota and the Seahawks. And I loaded up and I'm not saying that lightly. Which side? I was on the Seahawks and the over. Seahawks Money Line. Seahawks points. Points. Yeah, dude.

As the game developed, is one of these mind fuck type games where you're like, do I have a chance? I probably don't in the first half. I have to focus my energy on pulling for the Seahawks to cover. The Vikings have a lead, so you can't root for scoring. Then there's that explosion in the third quarter, and I'm thinking, okay, I got a chance at both here. 21, 13.

I'm back, and then eventually it's 26, 21. Now, mind you, the over is 55. So I'm looking at that in Hawks minus 7 and 26 plus 21 is 47. So it's painstakingly close, but you're doing the math, and I'm thinking maybe with the Vikings milking the clock in four-minute mode,

which felt like they were in four-minute mode the whole fucking game, it's the theme here, keeping Patrick Mahomes off the field with a great running back in Josh Jacobs. And Josh Jacobs. And then Minnesota, when I thought Dalvin Cook went out with a groin, I thought this game would change completely, but they kept pounding the rock.

I'm thinking maybe they kick a field goal, make it 29, 21, and the Hawks score, and I have the over either. Or maybe they kick a field goal in that fourth and one situation. And Hawks go down and score and go for two and overtime and you're in everything. Exactly. And then I'm in everything. And that's what you get greedy as somebody with money. on the table there. And they go timeout, and I'm like, don't fucking do it, Mike Zimmer,

because what I can't have is a first down. First down crushes me and kills the Seahawks. It's at this moment that I realize that not only do I have the Seahawks, but I also have the Seahawks over nine and a half wins, so I'm like, and that's a big bet. And I'm thinking to myself, like, golly, Mike Zimmer,

please no. Mike Zimmer goes for it. We can talk about the decision in another time, gives Russ the ball back. And then Russ is magic in the rain. Just magic. I could not believe that this guy orchestrated this drive in that amount of time with the way the water was dropping out of the fucking sky in Seattle,

as it does. You get a scramble. He skips it to David Moore. It's apparent the ball is wet. He misses David Moore on a crosser. Skip that one too. Yep. Fourth and ten, you get a prayer to Metcalf.

Just a prayer. and Dansler couldn't track it. They're inside Vikings territory with 1.15 to go. Then they're like spin out, rollout to lock it. It's so unorthodox the way he moves in the pocket. Under a minute one time out at the 20 and you're thinking like, oh shit, they're going to go and score here. And I haven't done the math yet.

Keep that in mind. I'm thinking I'm just pulling for the Seahawks to get another win towards that nine and a half total. I'm not thinking about the possibility that they could score and go for two. and push at 55 and save my night from being a total disaster. I'm just pulling for the Seahawks. At what point does it dawn on you that 53 plus 2 equals 55? When they're literally taking the snap

to convert the two point conversion. So bad, dude. I'm like, oh my God, they got, oh my God, they're going for two. Oh my God, they got it. Oh my God, he dropped the fucking ball. Like, it was the worst roller coaster ride of emotions but as a gambler, but what's really important

is the Seahawks just find ways to win. They really do. Minnesota had them in a dead-to-right situation. I mean, really looked like they were in control of the ball game the whole time. Terrible matchup for the Seahawks.

In fact, I think they lost last year at home against the Vikings as well. I think it was on the wrong side there as well. But Decaf Metcalf with the win, I swear, make a statue of Pete Carroll, it's gonna be hunched over, drenched in a navy blue poncho chewing gum. Like when they put a statue outside CenturyLink,

that's exactly what it's gonna be. And it needs to be like a fountain. There needs to be a fountain that's just water rushing down over his gray hair continuously. That's the lasting impression I have of Pete Carroll. Decaf, Metcalf for the win. It's a huge, huge ballgame. for them. It looks like they're going to be in control of the NFC West, judging by what's going on,

but you want the cushion because Arizona could get better and better. And you're going to be competing with the Green Bay Packers of the world. For the loan buy. Here was the worst part. Even when the Vikings got the ball back, I'm thinking they could kick a field goal. Like, this isn't over for your boy. You didn't maybe see this. I did. you saw this. Yes. Kirk Cousins gets sacked. We don't know it at the time.

It looks like an incomplete pass, but players are trained to pick the ball up just in case. They don't blow the play dead, which is good. That's what we need to do more of, right? The ball could have easily been picked up for a touchdown. Went right through dude's hands. I actually would have covered. It went from like, oh, fuck, you're dead, to oh, God, you could push.

Oh, you could win the bet. I hate gambling. Dude. worst game of Sunday was saved for last for me personally and they couldn't pick that wet son of a bitch up and it wasn't incomplete pass that the officials decided to rule fumble so they could get out of there so basically like in every way I feel like I got Buffalo Wild Wings

like Buffalo Wild Wings wants me to lose money have you considered giving up gambling no I haven't let's get to the let's get to the games Alrighty, questions from week five. What is next for A.J. Green. I don't know what's next for him. I don't know what his trade value is. It seems like, and this is the craziest part,

that ISO of him on the sideline, his lips were read very clearly. He's talking to some assistant coach, and he's saying, if you're not going to use me, trade me, essentially. Now, luckily, nobody was watching that game, really, at that point. again in a slate of terrible games. But he'd been on the sideline for much of the second half,

essentially benched. I'm not really sure what was going on there. Coming in, the big question mark was Joe Burroughs made everybody better. Why hasn't AJ Green had that uptick of success? And, you know, before the year, you were thinking to yourself, this is an automatic. This is going to be good for Joe. It's going to be good for AJ.

it hasn't worked out that well. It also has to be terrifying to say something like that and not know you're going viral or saying something like that until you get to your locker and you check your phone. Absolutely terrifying. Not if you don't know. I think he knows by now.

Well, now he knows. Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. It has to be terrifying the feeling of doom when you realize you have 800 notifications and 700 text messages like, dude, they got you on camera. camera. I think there's going to be a lot of turnover in CINC. Dunlap's going to be on next year. He's already been kind of demoted. He had a great run, but he's owed, you know, 13 mil. And if they

don't cut him, they save 11. A.J. Green's not going to be there next year. You got people wondering what's going on with Gino, Atkins, there. Those are some of the core players from the Andy Dalton era. And it looks like this, this big change that came with the quarterback and the coach. is eventually gonna get them too. As it does, I have no idea what value AJ would get in the market though right now. How's about none? He's 32 years old.

Yeah, yeah, it's tough. It's tough and I hate that for him because he's been such a great player, but played in such a shitty place. I feel for him. Did you see the interception performance by him? No. He was overthrown in, I believe, the second quarter.

And I mean, maybe you quit on the route, It was way over his head. The worst part then was instead of tackling Marcus Peters, he's running alongside him as if he's going to make a block. Like zero interest in trying to make a play. What he realized in that moment was it's scary to get tackled, but going to make plays in the open field against the tide of 10 guys running to blow Marcus Peters up

is actually like there's collisions there too. Being a tackler is also a scary prospect for offensive players. Fourth overall pick in the 2011 draft, A.J. Green. Cam Newton was one, Von Miller, two. Marcel Darius at the time, three. Now Marcel Darius, I believe. Yeah, wasn't that the legendary 2011 draft? Patrick Peterson next. Julio Jones. Alden Smith at seven. J.J. Watt at 11, Robert Quinn at 14. Unbelievable.

Mike Pouncey's in there, Tyron Smith, a lot of big names. Wow. Cam Jordan at 24. What a draft. Yeah. Good, good draft. Speaking of a dude you played with. Yeah. A.D.

Does he break the sack record? This is one I got to looking at. I think the chances are good. I had Cowboy Reed pull some stats. All right. You're looking at his schedule. He's got how many five right now? Or seven?

Seven right now in week five. He's got seven in week five. I was told you had Cowboy Reed pull some stats. Yeah, but this was a stat I didn't have him pull because I was supposed to know this. Seven sacks. in five weeks, which doesn't surprise me. But with Aaron, there's always a chance at like a four-sac game. Seven and a half right now.

Seven and a half. Okay, so literally the record is 22 and a half, I believe. So he's got 11 weeks to get 15 to tie it. If my math checks out, you know how I am with math. He's got a good chance to get four of the next two games. That's the way I look at it. Got to get four the next two games. And you're really in the driver's seat here.

he's got San Francisco next and Chicago right after San Francisco is a bottom five team in Sacks Aloud and he's had a four sack game against them before and I'm not even saying he has to get four next week but if he does if he gets three next week he's really really tracking that way

you remember a year or two ago he was ahead and then cooled off I feel like this year he's going to be bearing down right on it again San Francisco Chicago you can get a four piece in those two games he'll be 11 and a half at the halfway point, essentially, ahead of the halfway point. And this is good news for him.

The Niners are terrible. He's got 11 and a half on his career versus the Niners in 11 games. He gets them twice more, including one of the next two weeks. Chicago just lost the guard. That will put him again at 11, seven weeks into the season, 11 and a half. You get Seattle twice more. Their bottom 10 in sacks allowed. Russell is like a sack machine, very sackable guy.

Aaron would agree. I mean, Aaron could put his own. His highlight tape against Seattle is better than most Pro Bowl players' career highlights. Like 12 for 12, 12, 12 games against the Hawks, 12 sacks, Russell, again, great player, but you love playing against him because he's going to extend plays.

And sometimes you don't see things so well, he'll run right into you. He's got the Jets left as well. That's a hat trick, unless my guy Joe Douglas comes down on the field and throws a chicken wing in there. the dry spells could come against the Pats and the Cardinals. Pats don't give up a lot of sacks.

Neither do the Cardinals. The Cardinals obviously have a quarterback who's real athletic and that's a different speed than a Russell Wilson for sure. Both tough targets. And then Tom Brady's going to get the ball out as well. So there's three games I worry about him. If he can register in all three of those games and get hot the next two weeks,

I think he's got it. I really do. Yeah. 80s teammate Jalen Ramsey was he in the wrong and you're talking about the hit that's right absolutely not he was not in the wrong I tweeted something about it I didn't realize it spoke to so many people I think there is a double standard when the league litigates this stuff listen I understand it's a bang bang play I don't expect the the officials to see

this especially not expecting Kyle Allen would lower his head first I have no problem with the flag people make mistakes but if Jalen Ramsey gets fine for this and if he takes any kind of heat beyond what he did from a bunch of people who don't know what the fuck they're talking about yesterday you'll cover the fine. I'm not going to cover the fine. You know what Jalen Ramsey, if you get fine for this,

I got 500. Nice. Greenlight Studios has 500 of this fine. Put me in for 20. $520, Jalen Ramsey. If you get fine for that bullshit, Jalen Ramsey has lowered his level and turn to the side to get his head out of it for some five, seven yards now because he's a great athlete.

And Kyle Allen, last second, like spastically just lowers his head. It didn't make any sense. I mean, it looked malicious to me. That's what we would say if it was a defender. But it's fucked up. I hope Kyle Allen's okay. It's football. It's a really physical game. I know he didn't mean to lower his head. But come on, guys. Also, Jalen Ramsey is a suplex guy. Like Jalen Ramsey is a big hitter,

but he's always going for that beautiful form tackle. He saw it on Golden Tate last week, right? Sweep the leg and just power bomb somebody. He's that athletic. So he's not like some dirty headhunter. Also, I would ask, is he so spectacular that it's just gotten boring as a football player? Like, we should be pulling up tape on him like Aaron Donald.

we should be pulling up tape on him like we do other players around a league. I just feel like sometimes we are numb to how good he is. And he wasn't wrong yesterday. He's got to be one of the most athletic guys in the league pound for pound. Do the reigning NFC champ,

San Francisco 49ers at 2 and 3 make the playoffs? They do not. We said it last week. They lose the game to Miami. They're not going to the playoffs. Also on our Greenland gambling show, I gave out as one of the three legs

of our Joint bank account. Yeah, joint bank account, which we almost hit. Our guy, J.B. Smooth, tricked it off with the Jets pick. I gave out Dolphins Money Line. So this was not a surprise to me. What was a surprise that they got beat that bad at home by a team led by an NFL journeyman, the best NFL journeyman of all time in Ryan Fitzpatrick.

I mean, they put up a 40 spot on that defense last year that we said was like, oh, for a while, we were like, oh, it's like the Ravens. I mean, that's where people were going with it. The NFC West could still have three teams in the playoffs. Somebody is going to slide in that spot. You know, the NFC east is down. The NFC North is kind of top heavy. And the NFC South has questions of his own.

This could solidify seeing the Arizona Cardinals playing playoff football with Kyler Murray. And by the way, Jimmy got benched yesterday. Quietest benching in football history. What say you? Yeah, well, you do it at half time. That helps. Yeah.

And Chanahan says he clearly wasn't himself on that ankle, and they were going to have to throw a lot. So he wanted to protect him. Which is plausible. Bethard. Very plausible. You also was underperforming. Yeah, but it is plausible, too.

I mean, I don't think Jimmy's a long-term answer. I don't know that a lot of people have thought that. I, again, thought last year was such a perfect storm. And Jimmy did what he was asked to do. but he's not going to be able he's not the type of players going to elevate a bad team and right now they've really cratered

they're seeing the Rams the Pats the Seahawks the Packers the Saints the Rams and the Bills in their next seven L's just a ball pit of L's Can they win any of those games I'll probably get one just just by virtue of showing up one day

or somebody having a down day then they finish out the year with Washington Dallas Arizona and Seattle I don't see I see three four wins tops Yep. That happens. Yeah. There's a Super Bowl hangover. Week 5 of football is in the books and now it's time to review the tape and get ready for week six.

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only at Draft King's Sportsbook. Must be 21 or older in New Jersey, Indiana or Pennsylvania only bonus comprise the first deposit bonus and first bet match, each up to $500 deposit bonus required 25 times play-through. Restrictions apply see draftkings.com slash sportsbook for details. Gambling problem call 1-800 gambler or in Indiana, 1,8009 with it. So Mike Tannenbaum is about to join us. And again, this is a guy that I sat with at Vavachi of all places in Charlottesville. on a Jets draft visit in 2008.

It was almost a jet. I had Vivachi not two nights ago. Yeah, nice place. Chicken Parm. Chicken Parm is always good. That sounds good. I might have that tonight. Yeah.

Go full circle, have Tanenbaum on the pod. Instead of eating with him, I get to think about what might have been. Could I have been a big Apple superstar? He was born on Valentine's Day. Mike Tanenbaum was. Yeah. Nice.

You could have a nice little date night with a chicken parm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And also his charity is on the Greenlight Monday hotline. The guest gets $500 donated to the charity of their choice. Last week, Cam, Jordan did a New Orleans hurricane relief thing through the United Way. It's great. Greenlight's happy to help out there. We're going to help out with Mike Tannenbaum's scholarship fund that he set up at UMass.

So it's for people trying to get into the business of sports, creating a lot of opportunities that way. So shout out to Mike Tannenbaum doing good and Cam Jordan last week doing good as well. And we're happy to help. So let's get him on the hotline without further ado. So here's Mike. And we were just reminiscing offline about, gosh, many years ago,

I was almost a jet. I was almost a jet. And that would have been fun, man. I would have had fun up there, I think. Yeah, Chris, that was when I had more hair and less weight, and you would have made me look smarter. You know, not that Vernon Goldson, we had all the best of intentions, but, man, we fell in love with you.

You would have been perfect for us. Unfortunately, that one did not work out, but I'll tell you what, and I told you this before, I told you to your dad, like, you know, your family's name is synonymous with great playing and really true royalty of football, but way more than that, Like your folks are Hall fame parents and to raise the type of children that you guys have turned out the people, the parenting that you do now. It's really, it's inspiring. And you were raised the right way.

And you have so much to be proud of. Thanks, my brother. It's funny to be like removed from it and be looking at you on a Zoom call. It's just, it's just time moves fast. And now we're doing the media stuff. So I love watching you on TV. and I figured yesterday when all this was going down, this was before the DAC injury,

which was horrific, and we'll get to in a second, it just hit me, I go, I want to get Mike on. He'd be my number one guest. This is like the perfect Mike Tannenbaum day. I mean, it's like we have a couple firings, unfortunately. You've got a contract consideration with DAC,

and, you know, there's multiple franchises bearing down on maybe a number one pick in a situation with quarterbacks. So let's start with DAC. This is as bad a situation as I can remember on the tag. Maybe I'm wrong. Did you ever make a decision where you had to play hardball with a player and it backfired for the player? Not that you've ever been in Jerry's shoes because this is bad, bad. But have you ever been in a situation like this?

Yeah, I have. And I'll tell you, I wouldn't say it's hardball because I think the way I would describe it, Chris, is when you have the pros of one of these jobs, you're really the point guard of information. And what I mean by that is you want to make sure that players feel like they're being taken care of fairly. And again, you're going to have a lot of disagreements. And I certainly did. But we did have a couple of players that bet on themselves and got hurt and never made the

money back. And I actually blamed their agents a couple of times, but I felt like their agents were just overreaching. And I think in this situation, Chris, what you need to do is, if I'm Jerry Jones, I'm in that hospital like right now and saying, hey, look, we are going to stand shoulder to shoulder and get this figured out. We'll figure out the contract for next year. Maybe we'll split the difference or I'll handle that with your aid. Don't worry about that, Dac, but you're going to be a cowboy for a long time. Let's get you healthy. Let's just pull the economics off

the table. So everything should be singular focus about getting you healthy and getting ready for the future. And because he's under the franchise tag, he can't even sign until the end of the year anyway. So, but if I'm Dallas, I'm immediately relieving him of that burden. Right, right. How does this affect the Marjor? if it doesn't happen. I would still, and I'm, I got to get all the information from the medical people I trust, but from, I take it, this is an injury he can come back from and be 100%. He'd have to have a really good market. I mean, even coming off the injury, yeah? I would think so, Chris. Again, every injury is a little bit differently, and we're going to

await word on it. But assuming he comes back now, as you know, Chris, there's another mechanism here called PUP, which is, hey, let's just put you down for the first six weeks. weeks, give you even more time to rehab. So there's a lot to play out over the next 12 months. But when you look at supplying the man, I mean, there's just so many teams like, you know, you could talk about the Jets, you could talk about Denver, you could talk about maybe even LA, San Francisco, Detroit maybe, where there's a number of teams I'll be looking for corebacks, Jacksonville. And Dak Prescott is somebody that up until yesterday has been incredibly durable, 42 wins as a starter. He's high character. He's won play games. He's checked every box.

I've said for the last few years, it's beyond me that they didn't sign him first. He should have been signed first, second and third, and then you figure out everybody else. I agree. And I wonder where his head's at. It's so hard for him, I'm sure, to even digest the entire timeline and what might lie ahead. But if he does end up on the market, I had Mike Golick on over the summer, and he made a bold prediction that Cam might not be in New England next year. for various reasons.

And he thought maybe he might end up down in Dallas. Now this is pretty wild to speculate at this point. But do you think Cam is in New England next year, period? I do. And here's why I think it's been a really good fit. And just think like with an offseason program, Chris, like they could really build on and make that offense even more difficult to defend when you get into the.

And Chris, you know as a defense player like RPO's, I mean, they are really hard to defend when the quarterback can be plays with feet. Now, what I would say is it's probably going to have to be at the right price. And maybe there's that sort of like mid-tier market now, which is in the upper 20s or low 30s. But if I'm doing it, I'm resigning Cam and maybe I'm drafting another one. Hoyer's not the answer. Stidham, the grade is incomplete. But I'm certainly trying to keep Cam.

Because when Cam's out there, they have a real chance to win. Yeah, it surprised me over the first month of the season. I had heard some talk out of there that maybe he didn't look as good throwing the ball down the field. Like maybe the arm was a consideration. And this was from like sources in the building. And then you saw in that Seattle game, it was like there was this epiphany that, hey, I know that they say that the real season starts in October and you might want to hold that, you know, that strength in developing that aspect of your offense's game. But they had to play catch up. And that's what New England doesn't want to do this year.

He looked really good throwing the ball down the field. I've been surprised at how healthy he looks. I think he could go another four or five years. And it could be there. You're right. At the right price. I could see him being the perfect. It's funny because you know Bill.

Nobody would have guessed this would be a Bill marriage, but that's how Bill is. Like this is, Bill respects people you would never guess that he would respect. Bill covets players that you would never guess that he would covet. So I think this is going to be an interesting situation come February and March. Cam Newton, by all counts, loves football. And I'll tell you something that was really interesting to me that was subtle, but I think there's some interesting comparisons here. If you heard Ron Rivera talk about two weeks ago, he said, you know, I'll live with

Dwayne Haskins in the growing pains the way I live with Cam New in the growing pains because I think people saw Cam Newton have tremendous football character and showed up early and was a guy that was there were bumps in the road but kept getting better. And when Haskins got benched and was the third string, not second string, with that said, like, I'm a big believer, Chris. And communication isn't what's said. It's what's heard. And when I heard Ron Rivera say was this guy's not cutting it off the field because two weeks ago we talked about, hey, Cam Newton bumps in the road but getting better.

Now all of a sudden, Dwayne Haskins bumps in the road third string. Yeah, it felt like there's something in the building that we're not privy to seeing that's going on. And it might not be like there was a big blow up or, you know, this, that, and the third. It's just one of those things that when you're not their guy, and I've been in that situation I talked about in the pod last week, I got Ben's to begin. in my second year, Spags came in, and I was a slow starter, but, you know, I wasn't Spags' guy, and I don't blame him looking back. Now, eventually I was inserted back in the lineup pretty quickly, but it's one of those things that when your head coach gets fired, and by the way, Gruden wasn't even, you know, a Haskins guy, this is the owner's pick, you're kind of floating,

and so you have to be perfect. You really do, and it sounds like from a preparation standpoint, he was far from perfect. Now, do you think there is a value there in the trade market? and that that's what they're doing by letting that last Baltimore performance, which was relatively good compared to what he's shown in the past. Do you think that there's an opportunity for him to have some value in the market with that being the last game? Yeah, I think so from a standpoint that, you know, someone's going to say, hey, a lot of upside, successful in Ohio State, let's take a flyer on him. You know, Josh Rosen was trained from Arizona, Miami for a second round pick.

And people have certainly brought that up too, like with Sam Darnal. I think there is some value for those players, maybe not what it wants, was or should be, but yeah, there is some value there for sure. Yeah. Back to Dallas for one second before we get into the firings this past week. Do you think we can accurately evaluate Mike McCarthy at this point? I don't think so. I think in fairness, you know, it were what five games through a season where there was

no offseason program, no OTAs, no preseason games or scrimmages. So I think it's a work in progress. I would say I'm disappointed by the lack of effort on defense. everybody else. I think that's been pretty well documented, but you just can't let another team run for 300 yards. Like, that's not acceptable in water. That tape hurt me physically. I mean, as a former player, I'm like, I know exactly. Unfortunately, I know how that feels. I just feel like they're, from a scheme standpoint, the personnel doesn't fit the scheme, in my opinion, when I watch that D-line. Are you an attacking front? Are you a reed front? I don't know what it is. And the effort's a problem, too.

I think they miss Vanderex as well. But even going forward, forward, Mike McCarthy without DAC is hard to evaluate. Yeah, but you know what? Like there are no excuses and, you know, there's a lot of other weapons. And hey, if you want to be a great coach, then, you know, win with what you have. And they did that yesterday to McCarthy's credit. And now they're sitting in first place. And I got to tell you this, given Philadelphia's injuries, Chris,

and Andy Dalton leg Dallas Cowboy team very well made. Still be the favorite in the NFC East this year. I think until Philly and I love those guys, but until they're healthier and they show us more. and Carson plays better. I can't say with certainty that this is like, you know, okay, hey, it's yours. Andy Dalton's still a very experienced quarterback who's had moments and got Cincinnati to playoffs a bunch. He looked pretty comfortable sliding in there yesterday, so I think they could make a little

run here, especially because the NFC East is cratered. Okay, we had the big news being Dan Quinn, who's a friend of yours, I know, and I like Dan a lot, and all his players love him. That's so apparent. But with the one in six start, with the one and seven start, the comeback, that's. sort of thing. It was probably time. We also have Bill O'Brien recently. Most important task each place, if you're the GM, and which job would you rather have? Yeah, those are great questions. Yeah, Dan's a dear friend, and I think he deserved a better situation in terms of some of the

secondary shortcomings. It was really hard for anyone to be successful there, you know, in the end, given what they were dealing with. But, you know, I would say this, like in Atlanta, it really starts with how do I maximize, you know, these incredible weapons I have because when you look at the cap, if the cap goes down, Chris, you're still going to have Julio and Ridley. That's going to be, you're going to have to outscore player teams because your best players are on that side of the ball. So to rebuild that defense, it's going to come through the draft. So I would go with an offensive coach that could be explosive. Now, ironically, I like Dirkcutter a lot. He's their offensive coordinator. We'll see what happens.

And then Houston, I say similar from this standpoint, like Deshaun Watson's their future, I think they made some really bad decisions, you know, just in terms of when you move on from D'Andre Hopkins, if you make that decision, you know, go maximize that value and get multiple first round picks the way Minnesota did with Stefan Diggs. They inherited an average player and David Johnson and a bad contract. So I think that's a longer-term rebuild. I do like Watson, obviously, in terms of he's a guy that can make all the throw. make plays with his feet.

I think short-term Atlanta is a little bit more appealing to me. I think with Houston, you're going to be a lot of patience. Yeah, you are going to have to be patient because you could walk in and your first draft is you're not going to have a pick until the third round, right? And, you know, Bill kind of burnt draft capital. And then in Atlanta, one positive is, even if you don't love Matt Ryan long term,

he is longer in the twos and all that, he's immovable for like a year, right? I mean, after this year, you might be able to get out of that situation. I guess that begs the question, does Matt finish his career as a Falcon? Or is that just impossible to speculate with whoever's coming in? Yeah, I've been around too much, Chris. I had Jay Cutler in Miami and Brett Farb at the Jets.

And nowadays it just doesn't seem like that happens. You know, we're seeing, obviously, you know, Tom Brady and Tampa Bay. So at some point I can see that I'm trying to draft his replacement now. Unlike Houston, Atlanta does have their first round pick. Maybe that comes into the conversation. I think there's going to be a couple of guys, Trey Lance from North Dakota State, Justin Fields.

So once you even get past Trevor Lawrence, there'll still be a number of first round picks. So is anybody besides Joe Burroughs safe down in that bottom tier as far as Trevor Lawrence is concerned? Because I bet all those quarterbacks are having nightmares of that blonde mane of his running down the field. Like I just figure in today's day and age

where no quarterback safe, you've got to be thinking about it. Yeah. And that's such a fair point. And I think we saw that going back to Josh Rosen, you know, top 10 pick, Cliff Kingsbury comes in, they draft Kyle Murray. And now you look at even Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, Daniel Jones. All three of those quarterbacks were inherited by new coaches. So if they don't play well, and right now I would tell you, I think Cleveland's winning despite Baker Mayfield not because of it.

I think all those quarterbacks could be in play Chris at some point. Absolutely. I mean, Cleveland's going to probably play themselves out of that thing because that team's so talented. but you're right. And Baker can flash really good with the arm, but they got to move him out of the pocket and use play action so much. You look at his numbers inside the pocket. We talked about this last week. Even with the Dallas game taking an account, they're so pedestrian, just dropping back and throwing the ball. So nobody's safe, indeed. What's the Rich McKay situation in Atlanta like? I mean, is that a consideration for a GM? Yeah, you know, Rich has had, you know, obviously a long career there.

He does a lot with the competition committee. My sense of it, and I don't know Chris says they would probably bring in a GM and a head coach. You know, obviously Rich is a lot closer to the end of his career at the beginning. So I would think they're looking for, you know, multiple positions of leadership. Houston, my guy, Jack Easterby, who was the chaplain in New England. I used to eat breakfast with him. I mean, I forgot where he was. And then I read an article last week that he's going to be in on the decision making on these next hires.

And what's his title exactly in Houston? Yeah, I'm not even sure what it is right now. But yeah, he has a big seat at the table. There's no doubt about that. And it's really remarkable that he somehow got to Houston with Coach O'Brien. And now he's like the last guy standing. Is there any consideration? I'm sure people I've floated last week.

It's one of those things that the story might sound cooler than it is in. practice. Dabo, friends with Jack. I know that from getting to know Jack he used to be in his roots in South Carolina. And then the Deshaun piece of it. I know Eric Bianami is the hot name right now and I might not hire Dabo because I'm afraid of college coaches, quite frankly. But do you think Dabo looks hard at this if he gets a phone call? I think at some point, if I'm him and I could either go with Dishon or Trevor Lerner Lawrence, I got strongly considered, because at some point you're going to say there's nothing else I could do at Clemson. I've maxed it out. He's done a historically great job there.

I mean, when you think about the ACC now, it used to be UVA, UVA, U.N.C. Florida State. Now it's Clemson and draw a line. And he really has done a remarkable job. So if I'm him, I go out on top. And if I can get one of those two quarterbacks, I got strongly consider it. So who do you like in the head coach hunt in these two spots? So a couple of names that come to mind. You look at Tampa Bay.

I actually like guys on both sides of the ball there. Todd Bowles, you look at the job. He did the Jets. Every day that looks better and better, given the track record since he's left, right? Yeah. And Byron Left, which is a younger coach that I know you've played against Chris and a lot of leadership, a lot of intangibles. And I think if Tampa Bay has this run that, I think a lot of people believe they will.

I think those are two names that will be at the top of the list. You mentioned Eric Biont, me, Josh McDaniels, obviously. be in the mix for obvious reasons. So those are to be of some of the names that comes by. You wonder, though, if they're scared straight and they're like, we'll just take one break for a second from New England guys. We just had Bill, but Josh isn't exactly. I don't think of Josh, and you know this from knowing all those guys.

Like, Josh isn't a cookie cutter New England guy. Like, he's really kind of gone down his own path, in my opinion. So I don't think you're getting like the overkill on the cultural infusion if he comes down there. Yeah, I think he's his own guy And I think he'll bring Hopefully he'll bring a lot of learnings For what he had You know, in Denver

You know, he spent a year with Spags And in St. Louis And I think he is his own guy How hard is that for New England guys To like forge their own path Because, you know, It's been a mixed bag And it does seem like sometimes

It's you overly contrive The I want to be Bill thing Like how do you walk that line? I think, Chris, you know as a foreign player. To me, it comes back to really a couple very fundamental principles, authenticity and leadership. You have to be able to lead men and they have to believe in you, not like your resume, not what you did here or there. Like, are you giving them a plan each week to be successful? And I work with, you know, Coach Van Genie early in his career and Eric was like

a little bit of an under the radar guy. But players gravitated to him because they felt like he gave him the answers to the test. You know, Rex was more of this extroverted, bombastic guy that really gave the team confidence. So there's more than one. one way to get there. But at the end of day, it has to be about can they lead men and can each week, can he put together a plan that gives them a reasonable chance to be successful? Yeah, can you be influenced by your, you know, the coaches you coached under before without being them, be yourself. But, Keogh, because a room full of grown men, you can't fool them. You have to be you. I mean, that's the, they try to get away with it on a regular basis, but coaches have to be themselves.

Does this speed up the process for other teams? You know, like you've got now two vacancies where behind the scenes, I don't know what's going on, but you're definitely the wheels are turning. If you're the Jets, if you're the Lions, if you're any other number of teams, it seems like there's a lot of bad teams this year. Are you like, man, we've got to make our moves quicker now? I think there is a little bit of an arms race when you start thinking like, well, we're going to be, you know, is this spot going to open or is this spot going to open?

So there is a little bit of that angst, involved. And, you know, I saw people say, Chris, in the preseason, like, oh, you know, coach owners like this team's going to be safe. That team's going to be safe because of the pandemic. And, you know, we're just seeing like the great NFL machinery just keeps chugging along. And it's going to chew up people and spit them out. And, you know, we're racing too.

And I hate speculating about other people's jobs. But, you know, in our likelihood, we'll see at least a couple more before the end of the season. And we could be looking at, you know, 25% of the league turning over by the end of the year. Yeah, it's wild. And what is the kind of frenzy going on behind closed doors right now? I mean, like, I know there are rules. I texted Billy Devaney the other day to try to get an idea of this, but he was like speaking French to me. You've been in these situations. What's happening right now in these buildings that they're allowed to do? So I've been in a few of them. We had an interim coach who with Dan Campbell replacing Joe Filbin a number of years ago. And basically what we get. It is, we told Coach Campbell, hey, you're going to have a real chance at this job, but we're going to start a search so you could do it, you know, that way with an interim coach

or if it's a coach that you may have to make a change. Like one of the things you have to do as a front office person, Chris, is your video guy can leave the next day. Your defense event, you get hurt. Your head coach may not be there next year for a lot of reasons. So you have to constantly be thinking about what are the challenge is three months from now, six months from now and preparing. And when it comes to the coach, you're having very intimate. in confidential conversations with your owner, which is basically, hey, we don't want to make a

change. We hope we don't have to. But if we do, here's what I'm thinking about now, and you wanted to stay ahead of that story. Who's, I mean, I know you don't like to speculate, but let's say you're in a situation like the Kirk Cousins situation. And I know Mike's, there's maybe a little heat on Mike. How would you, like that's got to be a first time head coach, right, in a situation like that. If you have a quarterback situation like Kirk cousins, unless you're in love with him. And I like Kirk, but I don't love Kirk. And I think that's the problem. Who takes a job like that? A first timer, right? It's got to be. Yeah. You know, what's interesting about that situation, the cover's out there, you know, they're very young in the secondary. I think they're going to keep

getting better. I like Gladney. I thought they had a good drought. I like Jefferson, you know, on the other side of the ball. Oh, yeah. So the challenge you have, is you're going into a division. Look, I was with the Jets and the Dolphins for a while, Chris, which is it's going to be a long time until we're better than Green Bay. That's just the reality of it. Aaron Rogers isn't going anywhere.

So I think I agree, you probably want to go with a younger guy there that could grow with a nucleus. How did Bill O'Brien have the time in the day to do both those things? I think too often we digested as, oh, he wasn't good at both, and that was his downfall.

because he was just fine as a coach, in my opinion. He's a pretty good coach. The GM stuff is, in my opinion, what got him fired. Okay, so how do you have physically, logistically, the time in the day to do both? Like, what is he, how does he pull that off? How did Bill Parcells pull it off? Yeah, I was fortunate I was around Bill to see it. And basically, there was a couple of people like Scott Pioli, myself.

Like, our job was to go in there. Like, here's what you need to know. And you're making the decision. we're going to tee it up for you. And I agree. I think Bill O'Brien, the GM, got Bill O'Brien, the head coach fire because he had a solid record as a head coach, Chris, but some of those moves were catastrophically bad or trading for Laramie Tunsell and not giving him an extension and just giving him massive leverage. Like, I'm not going to be a play caller, but I've worked really hard at my craft and hopefully gotten better over the years by just refining my, like,

you were a better defense alignment. You're eighth and ninth year in the league because you experienced and he got better at it. For him to do both jobs, unless you really have great people around you that can distill a lot of information where you're just making the decision, it's really hard. And I don't think at the end day,

like his performance as a GM got him fired, so I don't think he had the time to do it right. Well, he can always say the GM fucked it up. It's like you could always say it's somebody else's fault when you're doing both. I got one more question before I let you go again. Thanks for the time. new ownership per se in Detroit

I know our guys up there my guy Maddie P's up there he's on the hot seat and all that what does it mean because you went through it in 2000 and you weren't the GM yet but you were in New York right when Woody came on what's that like when there's a changing of the guard in the building

and does this change things for Matt yeah that's a great question Chris absolutely. And what's really important is communication, like again, I go back to something very fundamental, which is when you communicate, you have to understand how the other person receives information. So if you have a new owner, and by the way, I would have bet the house that Maddie P would be a good head coach, because I think he really checks every box. He has to work really hard at that. And that's a big part of his job. He has to understand that with the new owner,

how does she like to consume her information? Does she want to text once a day? Does she want an email? Does she want to Zoom? Does she want to Zoom on a Monday and a Friday? What's the cadence? And we're in a multi-billion dollar industry. But at the end of day, Chris, it's 32 family offices and each office is dealt with differently. And how the Hess family and the Johnson family or Steve Ross, my career, communicated was immensely different. And that's part of your responsibility is to understand that. You know, Chris, you may be a texter, I may be a texter, but your owner may not text. So you've got to figure out what they want. You know, it may be a face-to-face meaning.

You know, I've had an owner that wanted to have lunch more than one day a week. I've had certain owners that want to me call it certain times of the day. And there's no right or wrong answer, but you have to understand, you know, the game that you're being, you know, put into in terms of like every game, the rules are a little bit different. And you can't say, like, well, this is what's good for me because one of your jobs as a head coach or GM is, you are serving the owner and how they want to be served is really important. Absolutely. It's got to, I mean,

it's more of a difference than people know, I'm sure. I mean, you know, owner to owner. That's right. Thanks so much for the time. I hear the film noise firing up.

So you go, go, hey, I know that. I know that noise. Hey, Mike's on this film. You got that.

I missed that. I got an Xbox controller that works my, my little setup, but I miss the real thing. The XOs, are you on the Xos? are you on? Yeah, yeah, I got a little bit of both. I do the game pass with the, you know, all 22 and so use my thumbs, but hey, you know, we got to stay on top of things, right?

Yeah, you're the man. And the people can tell when they watch you on the tube. You're one of the best that it's giving us real information about what's going on behind the scenes. So, Mike, really appreciate the time. It's great to see you again. Yeah, Chris, you too. And please say, some of my best to your folks. And again, a great congratulations on your career. And, you know, I have a lot of respect for you and your family. Thanks, brother. I really appreciate. Appreciate you. Have a great day. Okay, Chris. Take care.

Hey, guys, quick, quick announcement here. Listen, we've been doing this annual foundation event, which has been awesome. Shout out to King Family Vineyards here in Charlottesville, which is a beautiful, perfect place run by great people, the King Family, aptly named King Family Vineyards. This year, we got to take it virtual for obvious reasons. We're hosting the Chris Long Foundation's Wheels, Wine, and Wonder event virtually. on Saturday, October 17th at 11 a.m. And my guy right here, Macon is co-hosting.

Looking forward to it. That's what friends are for. Honored. Honored. I'm honored to have you with me. Saturday, October 17th, 11 a.m. Great thing about doing this event virtually is open to anybody. Wherever you can join us,

we'll have special celebrity guests like Sacramento King's Shooting Guard and National Champion, Kyle Guy, my former teammate James Laronitis. viewing of a short, powerful documentary about the clean water crisis and chances to win Water Boys merchandise during live games.

We're also holding an auction the week leading up to the event. Don't miss your chance to bid on autographs sports memorabilia, overnight getaways, and a chance to visit the Greenlight Podcast Studio. Yeah. That's a big deal. That is a big deal.

Maybe you could bring a mop with you. Oh, the floors are dirty. All proceeds go towards domestic and international clean water, projects. Our thanks to our title sponsor for the event WorldServe International WorldServe has been our implementing partner for international water projects since Waterboys began in 2015. To check out our online auction, go to waterboys.org slash auctions and go to waterboys.org slash events for more information on the event and to purchase tickets. Also, Aaron Donald's

going to do a personal video for one of the auction items. So you could have Aaron Donald delivering you a personalized message that you don't have to pay for like cameo. It just goes to a good cause. Hey, a lot of bad in the world. This is awesome. What you do is awesome. What the foundation does is awesome. And this is a nice way for everybody to participate, have a hand and doing a lot of good. Well, appreciate y'all. And I appreciate my co-host again, Saturday, October 17. 11 a.m. Check us out. Let's go to Superlative, shall we? We shall. Best, worst plane ride. What's say you? Best plane ride for me is the Carolina Panthers. I think there's no better feeling than thinking you might have something. It's even better than having something. Thinking you might

have something. It's exciting. And there's no better flight than a short flight. That's probably 35, 40 minutes. Atlanta to Charlotte, North Carolina. That's not even enough time for the, for the beverage cart. You can't even get some peanuts, which is a beautiful feeling. I hate the beverage cart. It's like, we get it. Okay, like, ma'am, I get it. Like, you're rolling the beverage. Maybe somebody wants some Canada dry. Could you not bang my leg with the cart? Like, they will bang your leg maliciously with that motherfucker. Yeah, a lot of tomato juice. I'm six foot four, okay? My knee might, six three and a half. My knee might be,

but this is really a leg thickness issue. You might not relate. I'm not being funny. Like my legs are in the aisle. Yeah, I usually have some part of a foot out there. Yeah. Because I am six four.

Also, don't give me shit when I asked for my third tiny bag of pretzels. I'm hungry. Okay, I can't, I just ate lunch at Hudson News. I just want to be oblivious

to the fact that we still have 90 minutes plus left. in this flight. Don't show me the beverage cart. We just came from the airport. What if I got a pee? Yeah. Yeah. So that's... Panthers beat the Falcons. Panthers get the Falcons coach fired and there's three and two. You got something there as far as it's better to think you might have something to have something. Because once you have something, it's like, what do you do with it? Then their expectations. When you think you have something, it's like, yeah, we might fucking have something here.

This could be all right. Yeah. And I do think they have something. But I don't know. if they're like a team that's gonna buy for a playoff spot. Play loose. You never know. We talk about that new wild card spot that might be opening up due to the San Francisco upheaval. Maybe they're thinking, hmm, hmm, hmm. I'll go raiders. There was a there was a monkey on cars back when it came to beating the chiefs.

I think Mahomes just owned them. Going in the game, we talked about Josh Jacobs, seven yards of pop last year, ride Josh Jacobs, play keepaway, but they slugged it out with them. Like they really did, and there were times where Josh Jacobs came into play in four minute mode. It's like the guy falls forward for three yards.

He's the worst guy you wanna face in four minute mode. The Raiders aired it out, Ruggs was back, Trent Brown was back, those are big deals. And it shows you what that vertical threat can do to a guy who's come to be synonymous with checking the ball down serially. Ruggs had a 46-yard catch in the first that led to points and then the 72-yard touchdown in the third

that illustrates what cars been missing. Half-time adjustments were big for Las Vegas. They held the chiefs to eight points after the half. Like, I mean, they damn near hit the over in the first half, they might have. And then it just grubesmen grind it to a halt. So the game ended when Gruden opted to go for it on fourth and one,

up eight with two minutes left after Mahomes got eight with four minutes to go. And it was the right call. Again, short flight to Vegas akin to, you know, what you've talked about with the Panthers. And it's the biggest party these guys can hit. Because when you go back to Vegas, it's tantalizingly close, but there's this thing called a pandemic,

I would hope that's keeping you off the streets. worst plane ride can I do can I do the heat here oh that's intriguing is it intriguing Orlando to Miami and you stayed as long as possible

in the bubble and you didn't come on didn't come on with hardware it's so bad because when you talk about I remember Rob Nickavits saying this I've always remembered it when we were sitting there getting ready for the Super Bowl

and doing it's like there's no worse feeling than losing a Super Bowl and you might as well not be there you might as well go Owen 16. And I had done that sort of thing before. I'm glad I never got to feel the second one. Now basketball is less physical than football, but that was a grind that they just went through. All their series were tough ones. They were competitive and Jimmy Buckets played a lot of minutes.

He should have been a shout out. I mean, that guy is just an absolute hero for his performance this postseason. He's a Tyler Hero. Yeah. Call him Tyler Hero. He was a Duncan Robinson, Tyler Hero. And you like the role players there. They're fun. It's a really fun team.

Even without the Dragon, they went toe to toe with those cats for a while. But you got to wonder, like, what happens when they say you can go now? Like, what do you have to do? Like, what's that entail? Were these guys bags packed? I'm not saying they didn't think they were going to win, but you might as well have your bag packed just in case you can get the fuck out of there quick.

I know you're thinking NBA players, where are they going? They go into Vegas? Well, there's nowhere to party. Like, this is the worst part. You've been in Disney World behind that red and white diagonal striped gate that comes down on your car at the toll booth. They've been behind that imaginary boundary for what feels like six years now, just to lose in the finals and not get swept. play six be competitive only to have the damn break last night also if you're booking a PJ private jet that happens ahead of time so you can't even book a PJ and be like hey I got to

have it ready for game six just in case we lose because that says you're thinking about losing luckily for them saving grace maybe they're just party busing down to Orlando I wonder if they even slept in the bubble last night my worst plane ride the Minnesota Vikings you're wet you get the showers yeah go back outside get more wet yeah your suits wet your bags are wet it's late you uh you lost mm-hmm shouldn't have lost no and um you're going back to uh I don't know Minneapolis we've had some good times there I love Minneapolis yeah Natty but little a little on the chillier side and but point being should have won the football game now you're one and four and you're wet and

it's late yeah and you probably still feel wet you know we're recording midday on monday like you still feel wet yeah at this point i mean it just doesn't that Seattle cold chill doesn't quite get off you for 24 hours even if you've dried off and then when you get to the bus it's the worst the bus driver always says here i'll take that bag and just assaults that motherfucker might drop it in a puddle outside Century Link. He's going to throw it in there. You got a laptop in there. You hear it clunk. It's always the worst after a loss. You say I can be like Larry David. That might be an instance where I am. It is the bag. Oh, hey, I got that for you. And then I say actually, would you mind if I placed it under the bus? And then the bus driver takes a fence and it's a whole big thing. And

then he's looking out for it on the way once you arrive. He's going to try to. He wants to show you that he can handle the bag. And handle it. Yeah. Don't let him handle the bag. So what's it like being a ghost? Ghost are dead. I'm very much alive. Hollow Man Award this week. I hate to do it, but Brian Allen, first game since October of 2018, or actually, I don't know what month it is. I have that written down. I'm not sure I can say that with certainty. He is a DB for the San Francisco 49ers who keep coming up for all the wrong reasons of Fitsy's first 168 yards, 124 were on Brian Allen. He gave 47, 28, horse collar, an eight-yard catch, a 19-yard catch, a PI for a first, and, oh, that set up a

first and goal, and a 22-yard touchdown pass. The NFL is hard, man. Like, Brian Alley didn't ask for this shit. He did not ask for this shit, and he replaced, he was replaced by a Keller-Witherspoon, who wasn't even supposed to get time. He'd missed two games with a hamstring, and they were just like, hey, sorry about your hamstring, but we got to stop the bleeding here. Get out there. Yeah, Brian Allen, Hollow Man.

AJ Green could be Hollow Man too, though, for asking to be traded on national television. Who's the winner of your St. Louis Rams Memorial Award this week? It's going to be Todd Gurley. Aptly. Todd Gurley, originally a member of the St. Louis Rams. He goes 14 for 121, one touchdown, four catches for 29,

75 touchdowns before his 27th birthday That puts him in elite company Jim Brown Emmett Smith LT and Randy Moss Okay those guys are all Hall of Famers The knees look pretty good right now But like what a strange career for my guy I mean it's just You think about comps it's really hard

It looks like he's going to get a second act Which I'm so excited about for him And we'll see what happens with the coach But I was thinking about comparisons Terrell Davis Sean Alexander second mention in the pod they burnt hot and they were gone. Okay?

I think Todd has a second act. Maybe more priest Holmes. Levion Bell could be like a junior Todd Gurley, except he hasn't found his second act yet. Todd Gurley, what a ride it's been. And I hope it just continues and continues. The guy is one of my favorites. And I know everybody that's played for him is excited for him,

seeing him tear it up even on a bad football team down there in Atlanta a little bit. and that obscurity piece is what makes it the St. Louis Rams Memorial Award. Yeah, for sure. I mean, he's good in these spots. Speaking of winless teams with dudes balling out, Darius Slayton gets my nod, best receiver you've never heard of. It goes for 129 yesterday on eight catches,

13th in the league in receiving yards, fifth round pick out of War Eagle, Auburn Tigers in 2019. Nice player. Very good player. Nice player. but uh nobody's watching sucks sucks for him he might be like the new

Alan Robinson one day I bet yeah maybe so where people are like guys awesome guys awesome nobody's ever been throwing him good balls nothing against Danny Dimes I mean a little bit against Danny Dimes Danny Dimes throws some good balls he just doesn't take care of the football which is part of throwing the good ball

at times the it I test I don't know if the guys got it that's coming from a Giants fan a lot of a lot of and I mean this in the worst way because I love this guy

a lot of Eli in that facial in the face yes yeah yeah you're looking Eli right in the face when you look at Tanny Dimes yep yeah and there's no O.C.

Strayhand, tuck Fred Robbins they're not walking through the door anytime soon no Tiki Sequin though get him back next year

healthy somebody's gonna enjoy him I don't know if it's gonna be Danny you want to do fly on the wall? Yeah, I think it should just be you because yours is brilliant. Yeah, I think being in the scheduling meetings for the NFL has got to be, I would love to know what's going on in those meetings right now. You can't push this thing anymore.

They don't have a plan as it is. I think that's one of the biggest things that I could read to frustration in Devin's quote was like, listen, we haven't heard like what are we doing? Like what are we doing? And if the NFL is players, if the NFL hasn't delivered a contingency plan to you to keep in mind or like, hey, prep for this,

we might do this. That means one of two things. They don't have a plan, which is a problem. And they haven't let players in, which is a problem. If you're thinking at some point the NFL is going to bubble, that would be something they should tell players, right?

They haven't done that because I talked to a bunch of NFL players. I would have heard about it. Doesn't seem like they've told anybody. They don't have a plan as it, as is and the next incident could really yield some more extreme measures. I really do believe that. We've had two outbreaks to this point, really. Last week, you know, we saw eight games moved involving eight teams, mostly because one team can't keep it to fuck together. And I think the scariest part, if you look at it about monitoring this New England situation and their facility is shut

for two more days. They haven't had a positive today, which is good news. But as we know, that doesn't necessarily mean much. Evidently, the Titans just had a coach test positive who had been quarantining for 12 days and tested positive again. So, like, the Pats aren't in the clear yet, and when you look at these two outbreaks, I think the most interesting part

is the dichotomy between the two franchises and how we would guess they would handle these insoling. which makes the Patriots outbreak, not just the second outbreak and compounding the whole scheduling thing, but also a barometer for where we go from here and what the rest of the season looks like, because there's only gonna be more cases. I hate to be a pessimist.

The Titans are essentially the dick-off guy in the back of the classroom that's not taking notes and talking during class and, you know, just the problem kit. You know, they had their chance, they totally fucked it up. They left their contact tracers behind. They organized the Montgomery Bell Academy workout, which who knows what that did to, you know, spreading the virus.

Their incubation period has been so stretched out. It feels like forever since they played football. They obviously are more the class clowns. They're the guys that you're like, well, it's no surprise. If you handle it this way, it's going to go this way. Okay, we know that. But what about the valedictorians?

like the group that we knew coming in the season for a number of reasons. Foxborough is safer than a big city. There's nothing there. You've got Bill Belichick. You've got that leadership. You've got the fear of God in you as a player. You've had a roster that seems really intelligent and conscious.

They've opted out a number of guys have. They're not going to have an outbreak. And if they do, you could probably look to that anecdote and extrapolate what's going to happen the rest of the year because nobody's going to handle it better than the Patriots. Now, Cam Newton fucked it up by going to the Braintree Mall, which was a bad move. And players have to own this too. But it's not just players.

The Titans had a coach start it, and we're still dealing with staff members and coaches. But if the Patriots can't get this thing under control, and even if it's no fault of their own, and this thing lags out for them, the league's going to look at this and say, and I think we should look at this and say, this is a major red flag. It's not just the compounding of the scheduling. It's also the best and the brightest can't contain this thing. And that would be really, really bad. So I'm wondering in meetings what the contingency plans are and looking at this Patriots real-time experiment unfold before our eyes,

what it's going to mean coming out of it. Also, it's interesting that we're learning so much about COVID in real time through the NFL as a society because we've heard so much conflicting and developing information. Of course, it's a novel virus, which is part of the reason you exercise extra caution no matter what. like we're seeing Gilmore and Mahomes hug at midfield and you're saying surely they're going to transmit COVID to each other

well maybe that's not the case viral load and such well you know what's going to happen in a locker room when one guy gets it we are acquiring like data right now in a really unofficial way and that's interesting the Gilmore Mahomes hug has to be the most looked at COVID situation outside of the Rose Garden on national TV like you're seeing it, you know one of those guys has COVID. And Mahomes so far so good. So you're learning about

this stuff as it goes, not just in the football setting, but also in real life. For sure. Does a droplet exit Gilmore's mouth and hit Mahomes in the temple as opposed to the corner of the mouth? I'm thinking the saving grace might be that Gilmore just played a hell of a ballgame and he's tired and he's dehydrated, not a lot of moisture in the mouth. So maybe, yeah, less viral load. Well, speaking of,

I'm willing this week, okay, let me ask you this, is there a world in which this season has just stopped? I don't think they'll pause. I don't think they'll ever stop the season. Unless the country is in peril. Like, unless society at large is,

and country is in peril. So ironically, we're playing through that. If we unlock the next level of just chaos in America, Maybe they'll have to stop, but I think they're hell bent on getting this thing done. I think we could see a pause. I think we could see a bubble for the playoffs.

I don't know what we're calling this, but I'm going to cancel the post-game handshake in the spirit of the last couple minutes of your hot tape. We could just, Tom Brady, that's what he was doing, I guess. Safety first. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a nice, that's a nice crutch for Tom to lean on. we just and I get it I get the other side of that argument we've just been running into each other for for three hours exactly but hey getting rid of the handshake the postgame handshake is by definition minimizing exposure even if it's a fraction of a percent of what you've just experienced I would like to cancel also in the same vein the thong that lane kiffin was wearing on his face the the decaf metcalf thong I mean If you're going to wear a thong on your face, we're big fans of decaf, Metcalf, but come on,

that was like, what were we doing there, Lane? Right. And wearing it is generous. It was usually around his neck. It was draped around that neck. Yeah. Also, by the way, Nick Sabin, everybody steals signals in college. I think, like, big schools hire people to steal signals.

Lane said it wasn't possible because they want to go so fast. They want to go so fast. Come to the sip. Right. Come to the sip. I love this dude down there. He's so Ashley Schaefer. If they were both to stay there a decade,

are you betting on Mike Leach or Lane Kiffin? I'm betting on Lane Kiffin. Oh, I would say Mike Leach. No, Mike Leach said, I'm not buying it anymore. I'm just not buying it. You're staying there for 10 years. Oh, you're saying staying longer. Yeah, I'm not, no, no.

I'm saying if they both had to stay there for a decade. Oh yeah, I'm betting on Lane. Okay. I'm on the lane train now. Also cancel the franchise tag. I mean, goes out saying after what we saw yesterday. What happened out there, Dadda? What happened?

out there, dad-da. What do you got? Well, for me, it's the Mike Zimmer call to end the game. I don't hate it, ultimately. My offensive coordinator, Jason Garrett, says, if your drive-ins in a kick of any sort, it's a good drive. Oh, yeah. Whether that be a punt.

Yeah. Or a field goal or a P-A-T. Yeah, you kick the field goal. You cannot lose in regulation. It seems like Russ is going to go down there and score no matter what. So, sure. Go for it. in the game. It didn't happen. We all know what the result was. But what, what is your son asking me? What happened out there? Uncle Macon. Yeah. Mike Zimmer made a fine call and it didn't pay off,

Whalen. Yeah, it was the right call, I think. Not for me gambling was. Right. But it was the right call. I'm going to go golf spike. So funny because I've, it reminded me of when I let one get away. sailed a first pitch in St. Louis. I don't think I ever told you this story, but I was a rookie in St. Louis. A lot of hope there at that time for the franchise for me. Trot me out to throw out the first pitch

at Cardinal Stadium. They call that baseball heaven. I wouldn't dare desecrate it. Is that not Bush Stadium? No, I think it's Cardinal Stadium. Or is it Bush Stadium? I don't know. I don't watch a lot of baseball.

It's a stadium. It's a stadium. Beautiful Skyline. got the arch in the background, but I would not dare desecrate that place by mailing it in on a first pitch. I'm in the bullpen with the catcher warming up. And I used to pitch a little bit back in the day.

You know, it wasn't my strong suit, but I'm asking the catcher, I forget who it was. I forget the guy's name, but I'm saying, how do I do this? Like, what do I do? And he's saying, you hadn't practiced at all leading up to that.

No, not until I got, I don't have a fucking bullpen at my apartment, you know? Well, you have like outdoor space and... I also have like a season to worry about and that sort of thing and the pressures that go with being an old CBA number two pick. It's just like there's a lot going on. I'm guessing it wasn't Yaddy who was catching. It wasn't Yaddy, I would have remembered.

It was a bullpen catcher. Jason Leroux, Mark Johnson. I don't know. It was one of those guys. But the guy told me whatever you do, man, don't skip the ball. Okay? he said just don't skip it yeah we have people all the time skip it in dirt shit week i said do you care if i go out of a wind up he said that'd be awesome go right ahead so the guy's gassing me up i get

out there i'm winding up and i let it get away from me a little bit i'm trying to clock 78 in that range which is which is high for a first pitch but you know me and i also don't i get nervous in front of people so i'm nervous anyways but i'm like i'm gonna go big i sail the ball, it goes over the guy's head. He can't even jump up and get it. It almost hits a fucking World War II veteran in the head, in the dome.

This man's got to be 80-something years old in 2008. Misses him by two feet. They're about to honor him in five seconds. He could have been killed, okay? I almost killed the guy. Hits the backstop, which is brick, rolls all the way to first base. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, so I've let him get away from me before. In the football world, there was a Danny Amadola spike in St. Louis that you could YouTube where I think he hit a stadium worker, an incapacitated said stadium worker with an errand spike. Just follow through. You know, the football was wet yesterday.

I didn't have that excuse at Cardinal Stadium. Jared Goff, that's what happened. Also, playing really good football right now. So we're not making fun of you. Go Rams. Go Rams. Game ball for you. Alex Smith. Alex Smith, it's a layup this week, right?

High draft pick, written off as a bus. He turned into a really good quarterback in the league, really good quarterback in the league. And it all began in 2012 for him. I was there. I was on the field. Me and my mates were chasing Alex Smith out of the pocket at the old candlestick park.

And we pressured Alex. Alex Smith into a scramble situation where he's trying to pick up a couple yards and Jolon Dunbar tattoos him and he goes down. And then the guy with the cornrows comes in who runs really fast and lit up the league for the better part of three, four years. And we all know who that is and he could stand to get a job right now. But that was the end of Alex in San Francisco, just like that. And he ends up with the chiefs and he did a fine job there, but he became the unlucky

dude that came before Patrick Mahomes. But also still the guy good enough to play, to be the guy during Mahomes' first year. Yeah, no doubt about it. And probably had a lot to do with Patrick. Patrick Mahomes is going to be fine with or without Alex Smith, but I'm sure if you ask Pat Mahomes, and I'm sure somebody has,

and we'd have a quote had I been more prepared, but Pat Mahomes is probably pretty appreciative of having a guy like that in the building. And that's not just like a cookie cutter vet who doesn't play, It's a guy who's showing you how to do it on the field too. He's not a Pat Mahomes, but he can show you how to be a pro. But he becomes unlucky again with him. And he even had the Washington football team in first place a couple years ago

before this whole thing went down. So this guy at every turn has been unlucky, in my opinion. Then came the injury. We all know the story. Infections, 17 surgeries. You heard he could lose his leg. I mean, that's crazy. I mean, Jacob Rainey, who played at UVA,

our buddy, hopefully a friend of the program, Woodbury Forest, had the femoral artery thing and lost his leg playing football, quarterback. I mean, this stuff happens. It's very rare, but it happens. And that was petrifying as a football player to think that that could happen on the field.

You could be at risk of losing your leg. And then a comeback that we all kind of rode off as a like 30 for 30 fodder, right? Like, that's all it is. It's like, it's about the journey. It's not when he gets there, he's just going to sign with the team, take his victory lap and say,

hey, I overcame 17 surgeries, you know, all these infections. This is just the formality. I'm closing the loop. That's what I thought it would be. Now, we talked to Matt Matava over the summer. He said he could play still. Matt Matava is my old team doctor.

He came on the pod. And that's the first time I had really heard from somebody I trusted that, oh no, this guy, he's structurally good. Like, he could go play, and I cringe hearing that. Because it was a week after we saw that video of him ambling out.

out of his house. Like it was just painful to watch objectively. And I'm thinking, don't do it, don't do it. But when somebody wants to check a box, like Alex Smith wanted to check that box, nothing's gonna stop him. And I was just so inspiring. You see him in practice in camp.

You're saying, oh, maybe he's gonna take some team reps. Then Haskins gets demoted. And how crazy is it, like that the loop on his recovery and his journey kind of closes with another quarterback scrambling outside the pocket and getting hit in the dome. And just like that, we said it earlier. There was no like runway, there was no buildup. The perfect storm of things happened to give Alex a chance at his redemption. And it's just crazy that's how the ride started eight years ago. That's how it begins again for him in his second chapter, wherever that takes him as a player just yesterday. And immediately, through the

ball three times. They weren't afraid to use him. Scramble, stepped up. Even past his first big test, they said, you know, yesterday it was Aaron Donald was a 300-pound Jan Sport backpack. That's about, like if you had to write up a script for let's find out if Alex Smith is good, that, that's the one. Like, that's, there's no bigger test. And seeing his family was was a silver lining like that, you know, on a bad day of football. I mean, you couldn't help but be touched by, like knowing what they're going through and seeing all the hard work that they had a front row seat

on the last couple years. Because when players get injured, it's not just the day you get hurt, it's not just the day you come back. Your family, like, and I haven't had a bunch of surgeries. I had a few, but like your wife helps you to the toilet. You're puking in the OR. The pain meds stop in the middle of the night

and you just start crying because like, it's just so bad depending on the injury or the anguish mentally that you're going through. For us, Alex Smith was a background story for two, three years. To his family, that's like every day. And they've been supportive of him doing this crazy fucking thing because they knew it meant something to them.

And I think his kids should be very proud having seen his dad complete this admittedly insane comeback. But a comeback nonetheless, and I think for him, it's more than just checking the box and closing the loop. He actually wants to play in the league.

And so jokes on us. Hats off to him. Gameball, Alex Smith. Our greatest glory is not never falling, Chris, but in getting up every time we fall, Emerson, paraphrase. And Alex Smith has lived that. Very impressive. I love an Emerson name drop at the end of the pod.

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. Maybe we'll do Devil's, what is that called? again. Devil's heads. Devil's heads of Emerson quotes. Of Emerson quotes next week. Nice. Or Friday.

All right. See you all Friday. Take care of yourselves.