Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - BONUS EPISODE: NFL Kickoff Live: Vikings/Eagles | Bengals, Bills, Chiefs rebound | Jets' Aaron Rodgers replacement

Episode Date: September 16, 2023

Reaction to the Thursday Night Football game between the Minnesota Vikings and the Philadelphia Eagles. Who is the class of the NFC East between the Eagles and Dallas Cowboys? Will the Cincinnati Bengals rebound after their week one loss to the Cleveland Browns? What about the Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs both looking for their first win. Is the play for the New York Jets to stick with Zach Wilson the best plan to replace Aaron Rodgers?Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Jase Medical Save more than $360 by getting these lifesaving antibiotics with Jase Medical plus an additional $20 off by using code LOCKEDON at checkout on jasemedical.com. BetterHelp This podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. If you’re thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. Visit BetterHelp.com/Lockedon today to get 10% off your first month. PrizePicks Go to PrizePicks.com/lockedonnfl and use code lockedonnfl for a first deposit match up to $100! Gametime Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNFL for $20 off your first purchase. Last minute tickets. Lowest Price. Guaranteed. eBay Motors For parts that fit, head to eBay Motors and look for the green check. Stay in the game with eBay Guaranteed Fit. eBay Motors dot com. Let’s ride. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. LinkedIn LinkedIn Jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/LOCKEDONNFL. Terms and conditions apply. FanDuel Make Every Moment More. Right now, NEW customers can bet FIVE DOLLARS and get TWO HUNDRED in BONUS BETS – GUARANTEED. Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to NFL kickoff live. It'll be the best two hours of football talk every single Friday where we'll talk to you about the NFL. We'll go around and talk about every single team, every game, and get local insight that you can't get anywhere but right here at Locked On. I'm your host, Tanitra Batiste. Alongside me is Jarvis Davis and Kyle Krabs, and we are going to jump right into Thursday night football, where the Eagles looked like they would run away with it until they almost didn't. As they say, wins don't come easy in the National Football League and they don't come easy for the Philadelphia Eagles. I'm Gino Camilleri from Locked On Eagles.

The Philadelphia Eagles squeak out one against the Minnesota Vikings 34 to 28. Really, the score doesn't tell the whole story. The Philadelphia Eagles dominated in the trenches, especially midway through the second quarter and then on after that. DeAndre Swift puts together a career-high rushing performance. The Eagles' offensive line put together an outstanding 2022-esque performance. When the pass game couldn't get going, they relied on the run. That opened up the pass. Devontae Smith has a killer long touchdown. Hats off to the defensive front. They knew coming into this game that the secondary

was banged up, caused multiple turnovers on Kirk Cousins, got to him early and often, and the Eagles squeaked out the win 11 days before they had to a game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers I'm Gino Camilleri Locked On Eagles. What's up everybody it's Luke Brown from Locked On Vikings and I know that the Vikings lost 34 to 28 to the Eagles another loss at the link and I know that it is super super frustrating with four turnovers and giving up over 200 on the ground same exact exact game as last year, or as last week, right? But there is something about it that encourages me. Something about the way that they threw the ball, about Jordan Addison, about Brian Asamoah getting more involved,

what we saw from Ivan Pace, that makes me feel like all is not lost. And maybe that's just because the Eagles are a pretty good team, and they've got a lot of ways to beat you, and I thought the Vikings had an answer to most of those ways, unfortunately not all of them. But, you know, hey, hold on to the football, and we're having a different conversation.

And you don't get that one back, right? You don't get to say we're actually one and one. But there's at least something encouraging moving forward. So, I don't know. We'll talk about it more on Locked On Vikings, but maybe I can call it a moral victory. Well, guys, I guess you can call it a moral victory of some sort, but I sort of heard a lot of coulda, woulda, shouldas in there at the end of the day on the Minnesota Vikings.

But honestly, Casey, you might be a little bit more worried about where the Eagles landed last night. Yeah. So I think what is interesting about Philadelphia is reigning NFC champions. They play at New England and then they come home and they have the home opener against Minnesota and they kind of won ugly in both games. And I think there's credit that's due for winning ugly, working through kind of this transitional period. I think about Philadelphia and I'm not worried, but I am looking at just kind of how disjointed things feel when your defensive coordinator gets the head coaching job in Arizona and your offensive coordinator gets the head coaching job in Indianapolis. There's obviously this transition that takes place.

And I feel like Philadelphia is working their way through that. Now, the light bulb came on about halfway through the second quarter and said, oh, hey, wait a minute. Brian Flores is putting six guys on the line of scrimmage and three of them are linebackers. Maybe we should run the football. And that's how you end up running the ball for 259 yards. But I think just for Philadelphia, obviously,

with the expectations of Jalen Hurts, with Devontae Smith and A.J. Brown, and Philadelphia coming out, they have 154 and 171 passing yards in their first two games. So with the investment that was made in Jalen Hurts, you're just waiting to see the first cohesive game that takes place. place. And I feel like until that happens, I'll just kind of be having an eye on the trending of that offense to see, look, are you going to just embrace this run first identity all the way out? Or is it going to click? And when does it click? And how does it click? And what does it take for that to happen? Yeah. And I think I felt the same with looking at their secondary. There were times when, and like you mentioned, there were moments where Jalen Hurts connects with Devontae Smith and you think game over until the Vikings come back with an answer and have a deep ball run back for a touchdown or a pass for a touchdown as well. And then you're thinking, whoa, what's going on with this Eagle

secondary? But drivers, what did you see last night? I mean, did you see some things that despite the fact that the Eagles are now 2-0, you have some concerns about if there will be some lingering issues as we move further into the season? I mean, let's not get it twisted. Like the identity of the Philadelphia Eagles is their defensive and offensive line, right? And then when things get awry or things start to look a little weird and it's like, oh, Jalen Hurst on the interception. a little weird and it's like oh Jalen Hurst on the interception oh okay oh how about we just lean on our offensive line to lean on those linebackers that they had standing up in the line of scrimmage and in those defensive linemen down there as well because I think Kyle makes a great point like when you you have a team that makes it to to the NFC championship and to the

Super Bowl ultimately make it to the Super Bowl those are some of the things that you look at right you look at those teams up front. And Philadelphia Eagles has the best offensive line in the entirety of the NFL. So, yeah, of course, it's okay for them to lean on that. Because at the end of the day, like, yeah, I know Jalen Hurst got all the money. He got the bag and everything. I get it. I understand that.

But when times get tough, tough you're gonna lean on what got you there and what got the philadelphia eagles to that super bowl last year was their offensive and defensive line so to be able to lean on the offensive line like you did it was really cool to see deandre swift to say oh oh this is the guy that the detroit lions drafted right this is who they wanted like we're able to give him the ball 20 times and he's only had that happen one time before when he was with the detroit lions so for him to be able to have a coming out party so to speak last i mean last night i think it was just a really cool thing to see because at the end of the day like the foundation of the of this team is the big boys

and i think that for us to be for it to come out like the way it did last night, obviously Nick Sarayani, I'm sure like, okay, well, I will prefer my quarterback not throw a pick, you know, throw an interception, turn the ball over or put the ball in the hands in danger. But like, hey, I know where I can go to. And hey, I know that I can count on DeAndre Swift going forward. Indeed. And good to see a DeAndre Swift, a healthy DeAndre Swift out there for the Eagles. Now, speaking of health, unfortunately,

not a good place to be for Aaron Rodgers as far as his health goes. Of course, he gets injured on his very first drive of his very first official regular season with the Jets. We now know that Rodgers is done for the season with that Achilles injury, but do we think that he might be done for his career? I mean, Jarvis, do you look at this and see this as a situation where that might have been, unfortunately, the last time we will see Aaron Rogers on the football field? I don't know. Just Aaron Rogers kind of hit or miss.

I'm not quite sure because we think about, you know, going into the darkness and trying to figure it out. Like, oh, yeah, let me go into the darkness and figure out whether or not I want to play or not oh let me pick my team and where i want to get traded to it just seemed like now you know going hard knocks like oh yeah hard knocks he was great on hard knocks but you know ed rogers is a smart dude he understands that all the cameras going to be around so he he's the type of guy who cares i feel like he really cares on what people think about him. So I think that he, he went the extra step to be able to do that. So I think right now where I think he owes it to New York,

you know, to, to, to come back. Right. Because like, Hey, you got everybody on board.

You got the whole building up there in New York. Hey, saying, Hey, you know, jet life stadium and all this stuff. Like all of those people are counting on you to take this team to a Super Bowl. So I feel like given what he's going to be asked of and they say, hey, come through on your word.

You said you want to add another Super Bowl trophy to that case. You should come back. But I don't I'm not sure. I'm not sure whether or not he comes back or not, because like I said, Aaron Rodgers likes attention and he's going to try to get it any way he possibly can. Aaron Rodgers likes attention and he's going to try to get it any way he possibly can. And Kyle, do you think that and this is just, you know, a little bit of a petty party there. But as many of us heard about what went on in Wisconsin, there was a bar that actually had some money on what might happen with Aaron Rodgers in those jets. Right. And so that's to me, you're right. Aaron Rodgers kind of acts like he's nonchalant, but really and truly he pays attention. So I don't know, Kyle, you think he might have some extra motivation to kind of come back and show everybody in Wisconsin that, hey, I can be successful outside of Green Bay?

Yeah, I certainly think the longer it goes and the longer the speculation there is that says, oh, Aaron's done 40 years old, Achilles won't happen. I feel like that's just going to push him further towards making sure that he does come back. I do wonder if we will see the version of Aaron Rodgers that was the two-time consecutive MVP at the end there with LeFleur before the 2022 season, just because it is such a grueling rehab process, and he is at the tail end of his career physically, and your body's going to take a little longer to recover. So I think he will be back, and that's purely speculative on my part. I think the bigger question for me is when he does come back, what does it look like?

And I think that's the hard part for New York with the position that they're now in with what they invested to get him and how they've constructed the rest of the roster. And this transition with Zach Wilson right now is going to be really important because if they're going to continue to maximize this window, not just for this year, but next year as well, when Aaron is potentially back, you got to know what you have at quarterback and what you don't. And I don't know how you know what you have with Aaron until he's out on the field. Yeah. And honestly, I don't know how you know what you have with Aaron until he's out on the field. Yeah. And honestly, I don't know how you know what you have with Zach Wilson until this season actually commences. And we kind of see him maybe midway through the season to see if some of what he's seen

from Aaron Rodgers, whether that's work ethic, mindset, or all of the above, actually rubs off on him to make him viable as QB1. And then, Kyle, that's a conundrum that I think we'd all be interested in seeing. And I know personally, I would love to see Aaron Rodgers come back just because I'm the kind of person who likes to see you go out on your own terms and to see someone like him, who's given so much to the game and who's given all of us a lot of great games and just historical memories over the years. I hate to see him kind of go down and I don't know a pile like like we saw him go down just this past Monday but yeah it just kind of begs the question of where do

the Jets go from here what's next for them well you're even hearing the speculation of calling veteran quarterbacks and then they're saying it's Zach Wilson's team what happens if Zach Wilson's last year Zach Wilson for three straight weeks is it still Zach Wilson's team. What happens if Zach Wilson's last year, Zach Wilson for three straight weeks, is it still Zach Wilson's team? Are you calling somebody else? And if you do call somebody else, you got a bridge. What do you do with your draft capital? You don't have a two because it's going to green Bay already. Like it's this really kind of, I don't envy the journey that it's going to take for them to try to thread the needle, to get out the other end of this and feel like they've maximized the opportunity that they've laid out for them, which is tough because Joe Douglas had that killer draft in 2022 with Sauce Gardner and Garrett Wilson and the rest of that group. And I know there's enthusiasm about this year's group as well. But prior to that,

there were some tough swings and misses amidst some of the disjointedness of the Jets organization that, you know, when they invest what they did and went out and got Alan Lazard and Randall Cobb and Aaron Rodgers. And it was like, okay, like it's really tailored for this. But now that the rug's been pulled out from underneath of that, it kind of creates this weird limbo with the roster as a whole that it's just an unfortunate set of circumstances for anybody who likes good football because the AFC East was going to be like prime time theater all season long with the caliber of the teams that that division has. And we'll see what the Jets have to say about it from here. But it's obviously lost some of its its gusto. And Kyle, when you think about names like Philip Rivers and Matt

Ryan's name names being dangled around like oh yeah maybe they should call Philip Rivers like whoa this way isn't he teaching like um high school high school football he's coaching high school football right now so when you start getting to the point where those type of names being drawn out like that's not a good look because like you said when you have put all your eggs in the basket with Aaron Rodgers like like things like this can happen this is the nfl four plays in the man pops his achilles so these are some of the things that you know as a general manager you have to be account for so like and i'm really interested like i thought you make an interesting point like as far as with zach wilson Zach Wilson, like, like that was the miss,

you know, to be honest with you. And now you're saying, okay, Hey, we're going to bring in Aaron Rogers, a multiple MVP award winner, you know, Hall of Fame guaranteed type quarterback to come in and replace you. And then, Oh, he gets hurt now. Like, how do you come back to him? Like, I know he's going to ahead yeah go get him go get him zach this is your team like no that's not real life he's a human being so i think that it's gonna be really hard for zach to really just win that locker room so to speak because so many guys

came out you know whether it be from a source standpoint or just it was just the overall feeling like the defense felt like they couldn't win games with him so now it's saying like now you're asking him to come back and say oh yeah man come win some games for us like no it doesn't work like that man jd to your point it was like march and april building up to the draft and all of zach wilson's teammates are hopping on social media at every aaron rogers rumor and they're like let's go baby let's go baby yeah like you got it you're the man yeah it's tough tough situation and obviously the leadership of that organization with Robert Sala I like Robert Sala as a head coach I think he will do everything he can within reason to have it

click into place but it's they're gonna have to change the style of football that they want to play. I think they're going to have to be ground and pound in defense and not lighten up the scoreboard with Rodgers anymore. I think it's going to be a little bit more methodical ball control. And can you trust Zach Wilson and not make the mistakes that cost you in those kinds of games? That's the big question. And you have Robert Salah. I think the grease hall is fully healthy. Yeah. And you have Robert Salah with the experience that he had with san francisco 49ers where they had their own qb controversy so sometimes you pull from that experience to help you to deal with a situation like this and we will see zach wilson will have an opportunity

to show improve against the dallas cowboys in week two so here we go but first jarvis is here to tell you about our partners at Game Time. Jarvis Davis here for Game Time. How about this, guys? Have you ever been in this situation? Hey, come on, let me talk to y'all. Have y'all ever been in a situation where you need some tickets? You know, you're really pressed and you're like, because, you know, all those third party,

you know, people coming in and running up the prices on the tickets. Guess what? Game Time has got you covered because buying tickets to your favorite events shouldn't be stressful it should not be stressful for you to go enjoy your team enjoy the New York Jets the Zach Wilson led New York just yeah go ahead and do that because game time is the fast and easy way to buy tickets for all the sports music comedy and theater near you they always have killer last-minute deals and you can stop stressing over the tickets and start getting hype for all the fun that you're gonna have so here's what I want you to do guys make sure you check out game

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It is what it is, or it was what it was. But the Eagles have even started week two with a dub, albeit one where they had to escape to get a win with the Vikings at Jarvis. You've got to say, with what the East was able to do, it was a good look for them. But what do you make of the NFC East after week one? The Giants look awful. Like are right here you gotta go right in on the boss no i mean we're gonna get a test coming up for just seconds but like here here's why i say because you know we had all the controversy coming to the season with Saquon Barkley.

Do you pay him or you not pay him? Guys have meetings and flown out to Wyoming to have a meeting and talk about why running backs need to get paid. All that stuff. Just a lot of drama. Right. With running backs and for them to kind of work it out to kind of sort of maybe get them some more money, I guess. Maybe, you know, a million dollars. I don't know. But, you know, I think it's and then we got what Brian Dayball did last year, right, you know, as their head coach, he was the play caller for the Buffalo Bills, he came over, brought some excitement to the city, and then you go out there and lay an egg like you did, I just think that

that is something that you're going to have to really dig into because you can't afford to be playing against your division rival in the Dallas Cowboys. Like you did, like that was a bad showing. And I think that we are, there was a lot of discussion coming into the season as to who was going to be at the bottom NFC East. Yes.

The loser of that game against the Cowboys probably might be it. Okay. So now Kyle, I'm going to go and swing it, the pendulum in the other direction. Cause you make a good point Jarvis, where I don't know that we necessarily said the Giants would be that fourth team of the four, right? But there's always been conjecture about whether or not the Cowboys would be the first team, despite the fact that the Eagles went to the Super Bowl last year. But anyway, but as bad as the Giants looked and as bad as they might maybe be, we don't know yet. This is week one. Swing the pendulum the other way, Kyle. Are the Cowboys as good as they looked in week one? Week one is never, the highs are never as high and the lows are never as low. Absolutely.

Credit to Dallas. They scored a touchdown on offense. They scored a touchdown on defense. They scored a touchdown on special teams in week one against the Giants. You look at the statistical breakdown of the game. Dallas won 40-0 with 265 yards of offense. Grand scheme of things, Dallas comes out of this game. You love the fact that you want 40 to nothing point differentials. I think like the 11th tiebreaker down the road. So it's cool, but y'all got stuff to work with too. And I think that's totally fine. And I think the

thing with the giants is the giants. I think they were who we thought they were, where you were concerned about the offensive line and young players, rookie center, second-year right tackle. They didn't look good up front. Daniel Jones got sacked seven times. And on this very show last week, we talked about the Giants being further behind in their rebuild process in year two with this regime than what Philadelphia and Dallas, who have been established and have been competitive for several years,

you are head-to-head going to be behind those teams. You need games to break a certain way for you to win the football game. Giving up a touchdown in all three phases, that ain't it. So, recorrect, recalibrate. And then for Dallas' perspective, it's going to be a good defensive test for them against the Jets. The discussion with this game is going to be Aaron Rodgers and Zach Wilson and how are the Jets going to move the ball. But I'm going to be looking at Dallas too. And I'm going to be really interested in seeing what that offense looks like. Brandon Cooks hasn't practiced thus far this week as of

the Thursday injury report. And he was supposed to be a really big addition and catalyst to the offense. And he was very quiet against the Giants too. So I'm interested in seeing how Dallas attacks the Jets, how much success they have. I know they're a little banged up on the offensive line. The Jets have a really deep and explosive defensive line for rushing the passer. They're going to have answers to question. And I think just the way the game script unfolded last week for Giants and Cowboys, it's so hard to take anything definitive out of it because it was just such this unorthodox way to score a bunch of points. So I think Dallas is great. I think both them and Philadelphia are probably going to be

12-plus win teams this year in the NFC. But I don't take too much out of week one other than Dan Quinn was back in his back. I think that is fair. I think that is very fair. We're talking about Dan Quinn in this light, right? Like, this is just, he's come such a long way ever since he got, you know, laced with a whole bunch of talent on the defensive side of the football.

And I think that, you know, when you have a team that's built like that and you their expectations for the offense are to hey we need you to get on the same level as their defense versus when a lot of times a lot of teams build their their teams or whether you know they want the offense to be at a at a high level and the defense just to be able to make turnovers to kind of complement that right so I think that right now the Dallas Cowboys, yeah, like they're not going to beat everybody 40 to 0, but like Michael Parsons, he ain't going nowhere.

As long as he stays healthy, that dude is going to be a terror on the defensive side of the football. So that's defensive MVP of the league type play that we're seeing. So I think that, you know, you can kind of bank on that defense, you know, carrying that team until Dak Prescott, you know, and they get this bad boy figure out because like, you gotta think that, Hey, you know, if you trade for a former first round pick and trade Lance, like,

you gotta think that, you know, I'm just, I'm just, I'm just saying, Kyle, like, I love that. I love that, but you don't just trade for him for no reason, right? Like, you just trade for a guy like Trey Lance for no reason? It's just like, hey, yeah, we throw in your little fourth-round pick, you know, let's go see what's going on. Nah, Jared Jones is always up to something, man. Like, you gotta think he's, you know,

he's still got a little bit of sense left in him, doesn't he? I think Dallas has a really interesting stretch of games. We talked about they play the Jets defense this week. They're at Arizona, but then the next three games for them, they're home against New England. They're at San Francisco, who has given them fits in the postseason the last couple years. That's Sunday night football and then they're at Los Angeles Chargers before they're by. So I would say by the middle of October, that's a team, Dallas, that I'm going to have a lot more confidence in you are who we thought we were, or for better or for worse.

Yeah. And it sounds like we are kind of buying and selling on both sides, right? We're kind of buying and selling a little bit with the Giants're kind of buying and selling a little bit with the Giants, but also buying and selling a little bit with the Cowboys. But here's where we want to sell. Sell me why on these Chicago Bears. We know what we saw in the Bears in week one. We're heading into week two. They're a two and a half point underdog against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Here's Lauren Cox of Locked On Bears. He's going to sell us why the Bears will cover the spread. The Chicago Bears will cover the spread against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers because they know what the Buccaneers are going to do to try and stop them. And there's a lot of pressure on this Bears team to bounce back after a very disappointing week one. We all know that Todd Bowles is going to blitz Justin Fields. We've seen the Buccaneers do it in previous matchups with the Bears,

and we saw them do it a bunch in week one. It's the way to try and get in Justin Fields' head. There's no mystery here. So then they can know what to do to try and counteract that. They can get rid of the ball more quickly. They can try and roll the pocket away from the blitz. They can leave extra players in to pass protect. They can help get this offense back on track knowing what the defense is going to try and do to get after them

on the other side of the ball they know they want to go deep with mike evans they know chris godwin is going to work underneath over the middle try and use his route running ability to their advantage and it becomes an easier time to try and stop them forcing the beach with some of their lesser weapons on offense and the plan is there for the bears to put together at the very least a game plan to cover the spread if not try and get in the victory column this week there's certainly a lot of pressure on this team to play better after disappointment across the board last week it felt like they came out not exactly unprepared but just not executing at a high level a lot lot of self-inflicted wounds, mistakes where they felt like they beat themselves just as much as the Packers beat them.

That can be a little bit easier to clean up than just going out there and feel like, ah, we're no good. Well, no, it's a little bit more complicated than that. They can be better than what they showed last week in week one. And the Buccaneers are certainly an opportunity for this team to try and get their season on track. It doesn't mean they're going to fix everything and look like some kind of offensive juggernaut and big time playoff contender. But they've got a great opportunity to cover the spread against a Buccaneers team that may be a little overconfident after beating the Vikings in week one.

Oh, two and a half point underdogs are the Bears to the butts. Do they cover the spread? Lauren's trying to sell me beachfront property in Wyoming. I'll tell you what, I'm passing big time on the Bears. He almost had me believing. Very disjointed offensive effort for Chicago in week one. And then I look at the matchup with Tampa Bay. It's in Tampa Bay.

It's going to be 80% humidity and probably 90, 92 degrees outside. So there's the culture shock of playing down there in the Bay Area that already works against you, never mind how disjointed and how poorly the offense executed. And I think it extended well beyond just Justin Fields. I know quarterback conversations, everybody wants to center the conversation there, but the offensive line execution, some of the skill player performances,

the coaching and the scheme, it was just very chaotic performance. And you're worried you had all offseason to prep a game plan for week one, and that's what it looked like. And then you look over at Tampa on the other side, and I think that, yes, I think Lauren's right, they will be a pressure team, and they will come after Chicago. I just don't know how effective, because Tampa Bay's got these athletic linebackers in Devin White and Levante David. They can run. You think about trying to counteract Justin Fields and where he's most dynamic is getting outside the pocket.

And as a quarterback run game threat. I like their ability to counteract that. And then Tampa Bay's biggest weakness offensively is their offensive line. And I look at Chicago and the personnel that they have up front. They got two rookie defensive tackles who weren't first round picks. They've got a couple of guys who have been career rotational guys. They signed Yannick Ngakwe at the midnight hour before the season, and he's comfortably their best pass rusher. I just don't think Chicago has the juice up front to really threaten Tampa at home with where Tampa is weakest.

Yeah. And, I mean, at the end of the day, I don't trust the guys that you named. I don't trust Luke Getze. I don't trust Matt Ibrafluz. Like, when you think about, it what, took them seven games to figure out like, oh, Justin Fields can run the football, oh, he's very athletic, oh, he can get it, he can break off

some 40, 50 yard runs, you know if we scheme it up correctly, right, and I think that just being able to to kind of bring in this new regime and Ryan Poles at general manager and hey, talking about,

hey, we're going to win the North. We're going to take it back and never give it back and all this blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I just really, it's just hard for me to kind of like trust like an officer coordinator who can look at Justin Fields

and try to force feed him a scheme that clearly doesn't work. When you're talking about quick screens and like that is so predictable sometimes when you get into a weekly a weekend a week out basis because like you can put stuff on on tape Kyle you know this you put stuff on tape teams are going to watch film they're going to understand what formations you coming in and like and more than likely they're going to diagnose what play you're probably going to run you know before the ball is even snapped and then you put your quarterback in a bad situation on top of that compounding that by having a porous offensive line like you were

darned all right you know coming out of uh the tackle coming out of tennessee you know he didn't have that great of a game so just the you knew that you needed to protect this dude you knew whether or not he was going to be a quarterback or not. Like, you can say, hey, we're going to, you know, surround Justin Fields. We're going to protect Justin Fields by bringing in this guy. We know he can play. We're going to bring in, what, Nate Davis? That hasn't worked out, you know, so far.

Horrendous. Exactly. So, it's like, and this was a free agency addition. You actually went out and spent money on bringing this guy in, even when the Tennessee Titans coach didn't want this dude on their team anymore. So it's just a lot of bad decisions being made, a lot of preparation mistakes that are being made. So for that reason, Lauren, I'm sorry, man.

I know there's a squad and everything, but I am not buying them covering this 2.5-point spread. Well, I think a lot of people are maybe buying the Detroit Lions a little bit more after they pulled off the upset of the Super Bowl champion Chiefs in Week 1. Now heading into Week 2, they're 4.5-point favorites over the Seahawks. So here's Corbin Smith of Locked On Seahawks to tell us why the Seahawks won't disappoint and they will cover the spread. This is Corbin Smith for the Locked On Seahawks to tell us why the Seahawks won't disappoint and they will cover the spread. This is Corbin Smith for the Locked On Seahawks podcast.

Considering how poorly the Seahawks played in the second half of their season opening loss to the Rams, 12 total yards of offense, couldn't get off the field on defense. They are the big underdogs going into week two against the Lions, five-and-a-half-point underdogs in this game. But the Seahawks, even without both of their starting tackles, most likely in this game, still have DK Metcalf, Jackson Smith, and Jigba, and Tyler Lockett on the outside. They still have Ken Walker running back. And I expect a bounce-back week from Geno Smith,

with a full week to game plan for the injuries on the offensive line. I like Seattle's chance to be able to move the football well, particularly on the ground, to stay in this football game. And defensively, a lot of the mistakes they had last week were based on communication. They've had the entire week to try to clean up those areas. I think the addition of Devin Witherspoon making his NFL debut is going to help the secondary as well, keeping this game within striking distance, potentially even giving the Seahawks a chance to steal the road win to move to one and one in the season.

All right, guys. So the Lions, like I said, they did something that not a lot of us really saw coming, although we do know that KC wasn't quite KC without Travis Kelsey and Chris Jones. But ultimately speaking, the Detroit Lions are four and a half point favorites over the Seahawks. Seahawks won't disappoint and they'll cover the spread. True or false? That was such a pregnant pause. Oh, my goodness. Like this is back to back.

So first Lauren tried to sell me, you know, a bag, a magic pair of beans at the end of the rainbow. Now, you know, Corbin is trying to do the same thing. Nah,

man, this is something that, you know, like, like Gino Smith last year, like that was probably one of the better stories of, of the season in the 2022 NFL season. Right.

But I think like a lot of times yeah can he play pretty solid yeah I think Geno Smith can play some football but is he gonna play to that same level they did last year nah I don't think so I think that was an aberration like those things happen in NFL because I think the stars aligned in his way and I think that you know when you're going up against, you know, a team like this, it's just real. You have to be really careful when you're talking about, hey, hey, this is going to try to do the same thing we did last year. We're going to try to make sure we, you know,

get the ball to Tyler Lockett and DK Metcalf and the likes of those guys and Jackson Smith and Jibba as well. Like, oh, yeah, we're going to sling it all around the yard. Like the Seahawks, they have a foundation. Like they were a really good football team when the foundation of their team was running the football. And when they tried to go away from that, Russell Wilson got exposed a little bit. And I think that with Geno Smith,

you need to make sure that you continue to run the football, establish the run, and go back to some, get back to the basics. And I think that you can potentially probably may do it, but I don't think they cover this week at all. JD's talking my language here, getting back to running the football for Seattle. And the more I sit here and think about this, I think I will take Corbin up on this one. I think I'll take this one. And we say week one, the highs are never as high and the lows are never as low, right? Fair. We have pretty fair expectations for the I'll take this one. And we said week one, the highs are never as high and the lows are never as low. Fair. We have pretty fair expectations

for the Seattle Seahawks. Yes, you're going to miss having Abe Lucas who went on IR and Charles Cross doesn't sound like he's going to be able to go. But I look across at the other side in Detroit and what they have and you can throw extra attention at one

guy in the front. And it's Aiden Hutchinson's the one you're worried about. Now, beyond that, if you pound the rock and you've got all these running backs that you've invested into, you have all these big bodies up front, I think you can get hat on hat with Ali McNeil. I think you can get hat on hat with John Kaminsky, who is a good player, but he's not really a big time needle mover. I think you can get hat on hat with Benito Jones. And I think you, you can lean on those guys inside and play physical. And then you look at what they have throughout the rest of the defense and it's young players, rookie like Brian branch with the pick six and the win over the chiefs. Jack Campbell was all over the place, but it's still a rookie draft pick that's playing this year. And I just don't know.

Detroit still feels like they're another year away of investments from really having a complete roster. I can see if Seattle has success gaining plus ground in the vertical run game on the line of scrimmage. I think they can grind this out and make this a really compelling game. So I'll jump in with Corbin on this one. I'll buy. I just, if all ben johnson has

to do kyle get jameel gives the ball give him the rock you're not wrong but they didn't last yeah i know that's what i'm saying like y'all drafted this dude in the first round for a reason give him the ball so yeah i think that you know those i can see those things happening but like i think ben johnson probably looked at the tape like, ah, maybe I should get his dude ball because every time he touched it, you understand why they drafted him in the first round. Yeah, he was much more electric than Montgomery was. There's no question. Yeah, absolutely. And we had a chance to see him up front here in Atlanta with him playing for Georgia Tech and, of course, going on to play for Alabama. Yeah, Jameer gives something special indeed. Now, we talking about you know sort of highs highs lows lows and also kind of contenders pretenders and I feel like the Cleveland Browns and the Pittsburgh Steelers

kind of both fall in that space because Cleveland I don't think was as amazing as they looked against the Bengals but Steelers don't didn't look as deplorable I don't think there's a deplorable as they looked against the 49ers or at least the Steelers didn't look as deplorable. I don't think there's a deplorable as they looked against the 49ers, or at least the Steelers fan certainly hopes they are not. Anywho, Monday Night Football will tell us the true tale because it features the Browns heading to Pittsburgh to take on their division rivals. And so Chris Carter of Locked On Steelers is going to join us right now to sell us on why the Steelers will cover the two and a half point spread. I'm Chris Carter of the Locked On Steelers podcast, and I'm here to tell you why the

Steelers can cover the two and a half point spread that is given to the Cleveland Browns right now. This is the first time the Browns have been favored in Pittsburgh in my lifetime. It's been that long. The Steelers haven't lost to the Browns in a regular season game at home since 1992. The Browns haven't been 2-0 since 1993. And the Steelers haven't lost a Monday Night Football game in 20 years. There's a lot of things to go against them intangible-wise.

But on the field, there's also some reasons. The Steelers' run defense played poorly against the Niners due to the adjustments they had to make in the middle of the game. Cam Hayward got hurt. Larry Agadilbe came into the game hurt, but one thing that they felt very confident about was the emergence of DeMarvin Leal and Keanu Benton. Leal was a third-round pick in the 2022 draft, Benton a rookie from the 2023 draft, but both were able to change the line of scrimmage against the Niners, the offensive line, a little bit too late in the game for it to make a difference as the Niners built a very early lead, but it helped the Steelers establish a better tone against the run later in the game after it was kind of out of hand. The question will be, can they do that against the Browns and Nick Chubb? The other

factor here, of course, is TJ Watt. He opened the season with three sacks against the San Francisco 49ers, and now he's facing a Browns that they gave up seven sacks to the Steelers last year in the season in the regular season finale and so now he faces a rookie fourth round pick DeJuan Jones who's making his first start which gives him an opportunity to yet yet again be a huge playmaker those differences on defense will be will be in play but you also have to consider can will the Steelers offense look as poorly as they did against the Niners? The Bengals looked terrible against the Browns last week. The Browns' defense deserves a lot of credit,

and Mike Tomlin gave them a lot of credit this week. But if you look at the Steelers' offense, the improvements that they've made, there's a lot of chances that they'll be able to strike some better tones this week, as last week, most of their mistakes were on their own end. Kenny Pickett acknowledges as much, and they're looking forward to setting a new tone this week I think the Steelers do the Steelers offense able if they're able to hit on just a few points I think the Steelers ability to change the line of scrimmage and get after the quarterback are the key factors why they'll cover the two and a half points and Chris is right that is going to be a key factor

being able to get after the quarterback indeed yeah they definitely are going to want to do that however that has been made more difficult this week because Cam Hayward is on IR so the question to you guys is this thinking about that and already having someone like Deshaun Watson being challenging to bring down in the first place now you're without Cam. Will the Steelers be able to cover the two and a half point spread? I think the Deontay Johnson injury hurts too. Yes, yes.

That's a big one. Obviously, Pickens has got everybody excited and jazzed up on social media because we're making Randy Moss one-handed catches in practice, all training camp and in the preseason games. He's got phenomenal ball skills, but Johnson as a separator type, I think, is a different body type, different skill set for that passing game. That Cleveland defense, once they address their interior defensive line with Shelby Harris and Dalvin Tomlinson this offseason, they've got a really, really well-rounded defensive depth chart. So I think between losing Cam Hayward, you look at that loss and you say, okay, well, Cleveland lost Jack Conklin. Maybe those two cancel each other out to some degree.

The Deontay Johnson loss hurts, but the one that hurts the most is the Browns are wearing these snow ice white unis uh for monday night football if you have zero percent chance that football team's losing wearing those things man i'll tell you yeah talking about so icy like yeah like a fan is gonna keep my commentary quiet about that yeah listen i'm actually happy kyle because if you want to come in there kind of with your angel kind of, I don't know, I don't know, like fairy godmother out. Do that. Do that. Because, you know, I want whatever. Look, whatever advantage the Steelers can get, like you said, in all honesty, whatever advantage they can get, they absolutely will take it as the Steelers. Because, yeah, Cam Hayward is the obvious kind of the headline, if you will, of the loss. But yeah, what Deontay Johnson was able to show,

especially last season, just making sure that the Steelers weren't one dimensional and that Kenny Pickett actually had more than one guy to throw to and one threat, if you will, with receiving court. Yeah, that's a big loss for the Steelers. one threat if you will with receiving court yeah that that's um that's a big loss for the Steelers yeah and and I here's what I'm waiting on too I want to see uh this can I can we see pre you know scandal Deshaun Watson like I'm waiting for this dude to show up like I really want to see what Deshaun Watson is going to be able to bring to the table because like the Cleveland Browns defense is nasty yeah like they have talent up and down that bad boy. And when you think about, you know, those guys, you know,

Miles Garrett and, you know, that number one overall pick and like, hey, you're not supposed to pick defense on the line like that. No, this dude is a game changer. He has been well worth that pick. And I think that he's the catalyst for that defense. So I'm interested to see on the offensive side of football what Cleveland is going to be able to bring to the table because, you know, you got guys like Deshaun Watson

who he still needs to prove himself. So I'm sitting here looking at my watch saying, okay, all right, Deshaun, we need to see that guy. And I think Monday Night Football is the perfect place to try to get it going. He got 230 million fully guaranteed reasons to be the player that he was before and if he does not sniff that level of play and we have not seen it yet and he you understand it was in adverse or on a unideal weather to play in in

week one with their matchup that they they had against the Bengals. But if he doesn't start to sniff that stratosphere, that's going to be a really difficult thing for the Browns to circumvent and to ironically maximize their window because they have addressed the other questions that they have. And I even think the skill group outside of what they have with Nick Chubb, with Amari Cooper, and then trading for Elijah Moore, he's I think leading by a couple of yards. The team in receiving after the first week, very small sample size,

but they're apparently very high on him. Donovan Peoples-Jones is a really solid kind of complimentary receiver. David Njoku, like, they have a lot of pieces in place. And really, all you do is you got to just give above average quarterback play and unfortunately Jarvis like you said we we have not seen that yet for Deshaun Watson since he has returned from the suspension and you know who's going to take the take the gonna have to fall on the floor for that one Kevin Stefanski he is I don't be shocked if we don't we never see Deshaun Watson at least give you that for like at least nine or ten games or so to be able to get get some wins you know and potentially compete

better divisions like Kevin Stefanski is gonna be that guy to say oh well it's all his fault even though the ownership's signed off on you know I'm trading for you know Deshaun Watson yeah well you know Stefanski and Watson may be able to hide behind Nick Chubbs, at least for one more week, because we know what Christian McCaffrey and the 49ers running game was able to do to the Steelers last week. So we'll see if Watson gets to show improved this week. Jarvis Davis here for Prize Picks. It is the most fun thing you need to check out because guess why? Because I've been winning up to 25 times my money this football season you just select two or more players pick more or less on the projected stats

and place your entry is super easy you gotta worry about anybody getting all your information or anything like that and guess what prospects even have a little cool little thing called apple pay i know all you young people have heard of that yes you can get your money as soon as that bet clears. You can jump right there in your little Apple Pay and you can go to the grocery store and buy all your little groceries and everything. All y'all little Apple folks. Yeah, yeah. I'm talking to y'all. Yeah. So go to prizepick.com slash locked on NFL and you can take advantage of all the offers they have right there. So here's what it is all right you can use the code locked on nfl for a first deposit match up to 100 and plus they also offer weekly promotions that can lead to big payoffs like taco tuesday we going up each tuesday prize picks discounts select player projections up to

25 to pry even more value so there's another reason to go to prizepick.com slash locked on NFL. prizepicks.com slash locked on NFL for a first deposit match up to $100. PrizePicks is daily fantasy sports made easy. Welcome back to where you'll get the best football talk every single Friday. We'll take you around the league.

We'll talk about every single team, every game, and get any breaking news, which we'll get to in a moment, right here at Locked On. So anytime we have that news, we bring it here to you. I bring it to you as your host, Taditra Batiste, and these guys, Jarvis Davis and Kyle Krause, will bring you all the tea as well, including looking at some of these rooks

who definitely, definitely impressed in week one. But which rookies, guys, which rooks did you guys rock with in week one? And which one do you want to see rock out in week two? I'll go with Zay Jones from Baltimore. Obviously, that's a big schematic change for them in transitioning from Greg Roman to this new offense and the offense against Houston it did it blow up no it wasn't 466 like the Dolphins dropped on the Chargers in week one but nevertheless Zay Jones was kind of the one amidst Rashad Bateman and him looking to live up to his first round pedigree and Odell Beckham coming back from his long saga away from the league. It was Zay Jones who I thought was the one who had the most juice out of that wide receiver core. He didn't

necessarily lead in yardage. I know that was Puka Nakua, the BYU wide receiver with the Rams who the Rams kind of sprung on the Seahawks. But I thought Zay Jones for kind of the guys that we were really eager to see and have first round pedigrees and are really going to move the needle. That was one for me that kind of jumped out as seeing, I only expect his role to get bigger and bigger as the season presses on. Yeah, I think like we mentioned earlier, my guy is, it has to be Jameer Gibbs, like get the man to football. Because when you think about what the Detroit Lions identity is, like they wanted to run the football.

Dan Campbell wants to be aggressive. He wants his offensive lineman going forward, being a former tight end in the NFL himself. So when you have a guy as dynamic as Jameer Gibbs, you have to give him the rock. You have to feed him the football because David Montgomery isn't Jameer Gibbs. You have to give him the rock. You have to feed him the football because David Montgomery isn't Jameer Gibbs. Like, day one, we've seen that. You know, and just going through that process because you drafted him in the first round. So I think that, you know, I think we're going to see Jameer Gibbs

get a little bit more pushed to get that rock. Nah, and to be honest with you, it doesn't even matter if he starts. Like, just get him the football get him in the game and watch you get eight nine yards a touch yeah go ahead go ahead teenager no i was just gonna kind of chime in with you guys and i was thinking do i want to give the obvious one right in my backyard as far as the rook that i thought balled out in week one i could go be john. John Robinson. But you know what? I'm going to go up top with a guy that we really kind of want. And we love B. John down here, by the way. But we really kind of still had our eye on the guy who was in our back backyard, Jalen Carter. When I say back backyard, meaning Athens. And now he's up

top. And what we now call, Kyle, we call Philly, North Athens. And Jalen Carter is one of the biggest reasons because he had, look, six QB pressures, a sack, 32 of 38 snaps out there. He was just balling as a pass rusher. And, I mean, he did the kinds of things that you want to see him do. Obviously, he was arguably the most talented player, pass rusher, if not player overall in the draft. And Philly just lucked out and got him. But yeah, he definitely, to me, showed his worth. And one of the guys that maybe I want to see a little bit more out of, we kind of saw it, and I am going to go back to our backyard. We kind of saw it in the first half of the week one game, Panthers versus Falcons, where Bryce Young was able to show you why he was that

number one pick overall in the draft, but then kind of came back down to earth because the Falcons and Ryan Nielsen kind of figured out how to slow him down. However, you can score on the Saints. The Titans didn't necessarily do a lot of it, but that's probably because they just can't score, period. But I see that Carolina will probably probably reset and i expect bryce bryce young to have a decent bounce back with you well tanitra you're giving bijan some love that's the guy can we can we miss me with tyler algier getting 60 of the carries in front of bijan robinson i'm sorry kyle don't bring it kyle Kyle, you're touching the court. Like, I don't know if you see.

Let's take half those carries for Tyler, and let's just give him to Bijan, and we can prosper, and we can all be happy and enjoy the greatness of Bijan Robinson. Tyler's a great player, but Tyler's also the incumbent when you chose to draft Bijanbs. Give the rock to Bijan, please. I'm begging you, Atlanta. Mr. Krabs, let me tell you something, man. I went back. I know you're a big-time film guy, so I like to dab and dab myself. So going back and watching the film, man, Bijan Robinson, as great as he is,

but you know what the number one concern for running backs coming into a league is a rookie You know what about the same? It's past protection. He was With a tile edge here, he was probably one of the better running backs I've seen as a rookie coming in last year from a protection standpoint. And I think that we saw as the games went along, we saw like, okay, you understand why they took him, why they drafted him. So I think that you can't erase Tyler Algier. Let's just get that straight. You're not going to erase Tyler Algier, but I get it.

But here's the thing. Here's what's going to work out for the Falcons, and I think it's going to work out for them very well. Having those guys in the game at the same time, I feel like that is going to open that offense up tremendously, and you're going to get a really good look at why the Falcons draft the B. John Robinson, but you can't – don't start this stuff. You can't take my guy Tyler. you can't, don't, don't, don't start this stuff. You can't, you can't take my guy Tyler.

You can't take him away, man. That dude, the good doggone running back is the old school guy. You know, I try to stick to my old school guns from time to time because you know, everybody want to do all the new fancy stuff, but yeah, I really feel like Tyler is a deserves to be in this, in a game at the same time with, with, with Mr. Walk on Water, as I affectionately refer to him as. And that he is. Bajon is absolutely amazing. But yeah, he's one of those rookies who showed you, while yes, he may not have been the blocking guru that Jarvis wanted him to be, I have to say with Kyle, he showed the flashes that we wanted to see both in the run game and

in the receiving game and the versatility that not just the Falcons wanted to see, but really the league was amazed and astonished at what he was able to do overall. Now, week one saw losses from NFL teams that had high expectations. You look at the Chargers, Chiefs, Giants, and Bills. What does week two look like for some of these teams? Can they bounce back? We'll see. Let's go game to game. We'll see. Let's go game to game. If the Chargers want to pick up their first win of the season against the Titans, they need a big bounce back game from their defense. This is Daniel Wade here from Locked On Chargers,

and the Chargers allowed 36 points in week one that spoiled their own 34-point effort, and it's not going to fly against a much less dynamic Tennessee Titans offense in week two. Last week, the one thing the defense could probably say, hey, look, we improved a little bit, was their run defense. They only allowed three and a half yards per carry, which is so much better than the 5.4 they allowed in 2022. But last week, they also weren't going up against Derrick Henry. Derrick Henry is going to present a totally different kind of animal for this Chargers defense to try to contain. And the tackling last week wasn't great. I don't think that the Chargers were going to put up 34 points again offensively.

It's up to the defense this week under defensive head coach Brandon Staley to show that last week was a one-off. But for the full game breakdown, make sure to check out the Locked On Chargers podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. The Kansas City Chiefs are going to bounce back against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday afternoon because of Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes. I'm Chris Clark, host of the Locked On Chiefs podcast, and this Chiefs team is primed to head to 1-1 on the season.

There are so many things that went wrong against the Detroit Lions, all the drops, that's a big problem. But the thing that sticks out to me the most, and one of the things that I know Andy Reed and Patrick Mahomes are going to get right going into week two, is all the spacing in the offense. Reed and Patrick Mahomes are going to get right going into week two is all the spacing in the offense. One of the reasons that Andy Reed is so good offensively at calling and making play calls and getting everybody open at different times is because of the play calling and the design of the place. When you look at how they played against the Detroit Lions, you had guys that were not in

the right spacing, not running the right routes, not running the routes at the right depth. They will get that all taken care of and ready for week two. The New York Giants will bounce back in week two because, quite honestly, the team isn't that bad as it showed against the Cowboys. Not when you consider that half of Dallas's 40 points were a result of Giants miscues, right? But seriously, a key for the Giants is going to be that offensive line, which allowed seven sacks, nine if you count the two that were nullified due to a penalty, and 12 hits against quarterback Daniel Jones. The Cardinals defense is no slouch, having sacked Washington quarterback Sam Howell six times in their week one opener. But so as the Giants offensive line tries to expedite its gelling process, don't be surprised if they do a little bit more max protecting and quicker

passes to help keep quarterback Daniel Jones upright as the Giants look to go one in one this season. The Buffalo Bills will bounce back in week two because that's what they've proven able to do time and time again. I'm Joe Marino, host of the Locked on Bills podcast. The Buffalo Bills lost a goofy game in week one to the New York Jets on the road in Monday Night Football. Josh Allen turned it over four times,

which opened the door for the Bills to blow a 10-point halftime lead over the New York Jets. But the Bills are a much better football team than they showed in week one, and a homeowner in week two against the Las Vegas Raiders is the perfect situation for the Bills to get their season on track. The Bills, they're the far more talented team than the Raiders, but they also have an impressive history of bouncing back after a loss. Since 2020, the Bills are 9-3 coming off of a loss, which is the second highest win percentage of any team in the NFL. They also boast the largest average margin of victory at 10.9 points per game on average coming after a loss. Folks, Sunday's home opener against the Raiders can't come soon enough, and I expect the Bills to bounce back and get this

season fully on track. Well, you know, the NFL is full of elite talent that we'll talk about in just a minute. But first, Jarvis is here to tell you guys all about our partners. Hey, Jarvis Davis here for BetterHelp. Guess what, guys? You know, Sneet, you're talking about being better. Like, I'm all about being better as well. Like, if you've just been dealing with some situation where you're saying, you know what, man, like at night, sometimes I just I can't. My mind just continues to just run and run and run and run.

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month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash locked on, and you're going to get 10% off your first month. I want to know first from you, Casey, who is your one player to watch? Well, you know, I got to hold it down with the team up here on the wall, and I'm talking Tyreek Hill. Okay. I like it. 250 receiving yards against the Chargers, and he has openly stated throughout the course of the offseason he is

on a mission for 2,000 yards this season. We are off to a good start because we're on pace to hit it in about the third quarter of the tenth game of the season after week one. And the New England Patriots are hosting Miami. The hurricane, tropical storm, whatever it's going to be, it's going to be up out of the area in Foxborough.

It's Sunday night football. It's primetime. Big-time players make big-time plays in big-time moments with big-time audiences on national television. So I'm thinking Tyreek Hill. And then the news came out yesterday that John Jones, Jonathan Jones, one of the corners for New England, did not participate in practice.

And then he was not spotted at practice on Friday. So I don't know what that means for his injury availability just yet. But Jack Jones is already on injured reserve with a hamstring issue for New England. So you're talking about you might be down your top two corners with Miami coming to town and Tyreek hitting 215. I'm going to be keeping my eye on this race for 2K because Tyreek ain't messing around and he might just get it. You know what? I put my money on him as well. I don't think that's a bad bet at all. Now, Jarvis, who do you have your eye on going into week two?

Are you going to stay in your backyard just like our guy Kyle? No, I'm going to travel up to the NY. No, not the Giants. I'm going to leave y'all alone for now. I'm going to go to the New York Jets and Zach Wilson. This dude has to be thinking in his car right now just like just riding around you know probably you know probably still in practice at the moment but once he gets in the car I'm sure I'm totally sure that he is thinking about his future right now because how

he plays in these next couple of games is going to determine whether or not we hear Joe Douglas start picking up that phone and saying hey uh hey big head you know to philip rivers you know how you doing you know you want to have a conversation hey you want to how you feeling you want an ice bath we can fly a private jet to new york you know matt hey matt you want to take a break from this lame announcer making jokes 28-3 jokes and come out here and try to play some football yeah I think that's what's going to happen if Zach Wilson doesn't play well this week because he obviously they have to give him an opportunity because hey he's there he's on the roster but I really feel like I'm gonna keep my eye on him because he's

he's the guy that I feel like has a lot of pressure, even though we're only in the second week of the season. Well, you know, the guy that I'm going to watch because somebody should have some love and respect and appreciation for B. Olsen and the boss, meh. So I am going to say my guy to watch is Saquon Barkley. Now, he didn't do bad as far as his average. He did average about 4.3 yards per carry last week, but it was 12 carries, 51 yards. That's not really a Saquon Barkley-like game, right?

So I'm going to be looking for him to have a bounce back. Like you said, Jarvis, this is an opportunity where he was one of those guys going back and forth saying the running back room got something to say. Okay, well, running back room say something. And Saquon, you should be the voice that we hear the loudest if the Giants have an opportunity to bounce back from laying an egg last week. That's just kind of how that goes if you want to be one of those guys. Now, the Cincinnati Bengals and Joe Burrow started the season shockingly flat.

Not a shock for me, and I was happy about it. The Baltimore Ravens got a win in week one. Wasn't happy about that. But they did not come out of that game healthy, which that is a bit disappointing. So you got to wonder, how does this one play out well? Kevin Oestreicher from Locked on Ravens joins James Rapian and Jack Liskow from Locked on Bengals, and they're going to break down how they see this one playing out. playing out. We've seen Joe Burrow throughout his career. His first game against Baltimore got pummeled and then he figured it out, solved the puzzle. And that second game felt different

and he was able to do that. Well, now it's a new defensive coordinator and you had three opportunities last year. Didn't really get to, to, to get it done that way. Obviously, they won the two that mattered the most. But can he solve that? Excuse me. I think that that's a huge question. But you mentioned offensive line play, and that's the key here. Outside of Burrow solving the riddle, it's can you protect him? Because if you're going to be able to protect Joe Burrow

and he's going up against the banged-up secondary, well, good luck. That's much different than Denzel Ward and those corners he faced last week in Cleveland with Miles Garrett bearing down on you and Zedaria Smith. And so it could feel much, much different. I agree with you, Kevin. Getting off to a quick start against a team in the Bengals that I think the pressure is on them this week,

that's key for the Ravens. Flipping it, though, the Bengals, I think the pressure is on them this week. That's key for the Ravens. Flipping it, though, the Bengals, and they get something going on offense early just to build a little confidence. Not that they're not confident, but just going down and starting the game with points and not having to settle for a three and out or having to punt on your first drive. I think that would go a long way,

especially considering the possessions that they get or don't get against the Ravens. That's something Zach Taylor and Joe Burrow talked about. You don't get many possessions against the Ravens. They like to run the ball, run the clock. And so if you're limited possessions wise, you got to make the most of them when you have the ball. And the Ravens using tons more 11 personnel this year,

like 30% more than they did last year. So like the offensive transformation for the Ravens using tons more 11 personnel this year, like 30% more than they did last year. So like the offensive transformation for the Ravens, very interested to see how that's different this week. But if you're the Bengals in this game, you look at where the Ravens are hurt and you have to take advantage of that. No Ronnie Stanley, no Tyler Linderbaum, very likely no Marlon Humphrey, no Marcus Williams. There's some good players still playing on these

teams, on the Ravens, obviously, with those guys out. I have a lot of respect for Roquan Smith, for Javion Clowney. I've talked up Justin Matabike. I've talked up Travis Jones in the past, but those guys are going to have to play really well for the Ravens to overcome what they're missing in the back end of their secondary and what they're missing on the offensive line. Mark Jackson and those receivers and Mark Andrews are going to have to play really well to overcome the pieces that I think they're missing on the offensive line and in the running game. So I think that the Bengals need to take advantage of those opportunities where they have them. And a big piece is look like a competent offensive line. You talked about confidence,

James, and building confidence. If there's one unit that needs to do that this week against, again, I respect the players on the Ravens defensive line. I just don't think they're as good as what the Browns offer there. This is a week that the Bengals need to look better in the offensive line to start going in the right direction. With all that said, Kevin, you're talking about a tight game here. How do you think this plays out in Cincinnati? What's your score prediction? I think you've got a desperate Bengals team here now. What do you think? Yeah, I think going down 0-2 would be a disaster for the Bengals. It's a classic get-right spot. I actually had the Ravens winning this game before the season started, but you can't ignore the injuries that Baltimore has. It'd be great if the Ravens won it. I think they can, but I'm going to give this one

to the Bengals after everything that we've seen over the past couple of weeks. Maybe things don't go right for Cincinnati, but I'm going to say the final score, and I always overshoot it, but these are two talented offenses. I'm going to say 31 to 27 Bengals, but even that to me feels high. That's a lot of points. Yeah, it's a lot of points, and the McDonald riddle would be solved if that's the case. By the way, I'm a fan of points and big plays, so sign me up for your result, Kevin. I'm taking the Bengals as well. I asked Joe Burrow multiple times on Wednesday what it would mean in different ways,

and he said how important it was to get to 1-1 versus 0-2 like they were last year. I think they find a way at home to get it done. The Bengals 27, Ravens 20. And guys, I'm going to go back to something that both Jake and Kevin alluded to in terms of how this game plays out. You've got a team in the Bengals looking to bounce back, but then you've got a team in the Ravens banged up. Kyle, how do you think, especially with some of the news that we just received about the Bengals, how do you think this game is going to play out with some of the things that our analyst just mentioned? to play out with some of the things that our analyst just mentioned. Yeah, I think it has the potential to be a really compelling game. Yeah.

But then you look at the injury report and Marcus Williams with the peck. Yeah. Ronnie Stanley's out. And Tyler Linderbaum, their stud first-round pick from last year, is out. Yeah. And Marlon Humphrey's out again. And it's just – and it feels like Baltimore always has this stretch on an annual basis. And for it to come this early is just, it's brutal for them. I think it takes a lot of the wind out of the sails of Baltimore's chances to win the football game going to Cincinnati.

And Cincinnati facing down the prospect of going 0-2 to start the season. And that's like 12% of teams historically that start 0-2 bounce back and make the playoffs. So 9 out of 10 teams not making it is the prospect of the odds for Cincinnati that you're looking at. And you can see how they bounced back last year. And they were a team that was a part of that 12% last year. Cincinnati was. But Cleveland is better cincinnati is who they are they've made some they've had some losses in the secondary and free agency at the safety position with von bell and jesse bates leaving and they have a good matchup against baltimore this week i would say baltimore is

probably better if they're healthy. Pittsburgh, another year older, more mature. They reinvest in the offensive line. They have their own respective injuries. Every team is going to have it. And at the end of the day, the win-loss record is not going to care. It's a highly competitive division. So you leverage 0-2, 12% with a divisional game against a team that's banged up. And it makes this such a pivotal moment for Cincinnati. And they're that team that's kind of been there with the deep playoff runs lately. So I think that'll really help them, too. I think they get this done. And I certainly think that the the injuries play their part here for Baltimore.

Yeah. And to add to that, I don't see Joe Burrow having the type of game that he did last week. Like we talked about how operating extremes right that was the extreme like nobody saw what happened to that cincinnati bangles offense they didn't no one saw that coming so to to i feel like it's going to level off somewhere like a lot more than what they did last week it's offensively so it and to be honest with you on the way i see this even being a game is the fact that lamar jackson has Jackson has an MVP type season that I predicted that he would have this year so it but it's just it's hard when you have your guys like you like you mentioned Tyler Linderbaum and Stanley and those guys you know those are starters for you

up front and those guys are pretty doggone good football players so when you lose those guys like that they just been cannibalized with all of these injuries so early on and like this is something that we're not we're pretty much used to baltimore saying i don't know what somebody ain't living right up in baltimore for them to be hit with injuries like that so we might have to look look at um do a little deep dive into that for mikhail because you know it's it's it's very interesting to see them dealing with these injuries like injuries like this, this early on. Yeah. Yeah. And again, I think that it's one of those kind of interesting situations, because when you look at that game on the schedule, you think that's going to be a seriously competitive game,

even early on in the season, because these are two teams that are highly competitive. And, you know, like you said, Kyle, with the Bengals, you've definitely seen them make deep runs of late. And Jarvis, like you said, with the Ravens, they just always have a squad that's healthy. And Coach Harbaugh always has those guys ready. But I do agree as well that Joe Cool is not going to let this happen two weeks in a row. He's got way too many weapons. And there's a decent secondary for the Ravens.

But I definitely think that the Bengals are going to be able to get around that. I don't think that's going to be as big of an issue, especially with like you all said, so many other issues that they're dealing with on the injury front with the Ravens. It's NFL kickoff live. We appreciate you guys rocking with us. Come back next week and we'll give you all the news in and around the NFL. I'm Tanitra Batiste, that's Jarvis Davis and Kyle Krabs. Have a great weekend. See you next time.