NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - 2023 Week 1 Recap

Episode Date: September 11, 2023

In a room full of heroes - Dan Hanzus, Gregg Rosenthal, and Marc Sessler are back with the first flagship episode of the 2023 season. The heroes start with four big hitters out of the gate in the 49ers visiting the Steelers (02:47), followed by a the Eagles beating the Patriots (11:17), a back and forth affair between the Dolphins and Chargers (18:50), and a let down between the Bengals and Browns (29:14). After the break, the heroes welcome in a new era between the Packers and Bears (37:16), followed by statement wins by the Raiders versus Broncos (43:49) and Rams against the Seahawks (49:53). The heroes then run through the Jaguars narrowly escaping against the Colts (57:40), the Ravens taking care of business against the Texans (01:04:38), the Buccaneers beating the Vikings (01:08:58), the Saints beating the Titans (01:17:20), the Falcons beating the Panthers (01:23:17), the Commanders beating the Cardinals (01:30:16), and wrap up the episode discussing a Sunday night dismantling between the Cowboys and Giants (01:35:11).  Note: Time codes approximate. NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Greg Rosenthal, Mark Sessler, week one of the 2023 NFL season is here. And now, Mark, we talk about it. That's what we do. You know, this is what we do here. If we've been doing this, because I, you know, I will put my math skills to work. If we've been doing this for 11 years. Yes. And there are, it floated between 17 and 18 weeks.

We've done 714 flagship Sunday night shows. That checks out to me. I just double-check the math for you. We're good. The numbers are correct. Do you mean like we're good like we don't have to do this anymore? I know. No one needs to check that total.

That total is so incorrect, but I don't blame you. We're all feeling a little crazy. It was a nice little witching hour there with the late games. I just mainline some coffee right before the show, as if I wasn't going to be loud and annoying enough. Once we get completely, you know, over at all, who's the first of us to go full Jack Collinsworth and force the sun into the studio? Oh, well, Greg. Greg has already crafted like a pro football robot.

My son will force himself. You guys know so little about my relationship with my son to think. Yeah, we haven't been over your house in 12 years. Let's start there. There's walls. Like physical walls, you know. That I could do anything like I'm over, Markshouse. Give me a break.

You're welcome any time. A big slate of week one action, a little bit of a funky week. But you know what? Yeah, we've been doing this for over a decade. Week one is funky. And I think the one thing to take away, I saw Kyle Brandt tweeted this, and I've always felt the same thing. There are teams that we're going to talk about today that played awesome.

And there'll be nowhere to be seen when relevant football is played in January. Teams that look like dog poop today that will get it together. And players on both sides of that corner. Players, this is not a time to panic. It's not a time to suffer. celebrate an incoming Super Bowl. But you know what? Part of the fun is reading too much in week one.

And we're about to do that in some case. When your team gets a bomb dropped on it in week one, there's no way that doesn't feel terrible. You can be as philosophical and stoic about it as need be. But it's a terrible feeling. I mean, that L counts the same as it does in week 17 if you lose a big time division matchup. I mean, it sticks there.

A lot of football, I guess, is the point. And Mark, to that point, after a lot of excitement around the Pittsburgh Steelers, it was time for real football to be played. So let's start with a game that was played in Pittsburgh against a titan of the NFC. They did pick up the first down, stretch run coming left to McCaffrey,

stays playside Brits and tackle 45, block from Ayuk down the sideline 30, cuts back inside 20, still in bounds down the sideline. Diving for the end zone. Touchdown! C-M-C! And the dynamite explodes on his first run in the third quarter.

Greg Papa, good to hear you again, buddy, and Tim Ryan with a call, KNBR. Healthy version of the 49ers offense, it just feels unfair. Christian McCaffrey took any drama out of Pittsburgh with a 65-yard touchdown run to kick off the second half. The Niners cruise to a 30-7 win. over a baffled-looking Steelers team. Boys, this was a compelling blowout because of what it said about both teams in week one. Let's start with the Niners who look like the best team in football,

quite frankly, at least this week in a dominating two-way effort. I am shocked by this. I mean, it's a big loss for the play your guys in the preseason brigade. Because who played the most and looked the best in the preseason? and the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Kansas City Chiefs didn't really help. I mean, there's so much to point to because I'm looking at their drive chart and the Steelers who looked as crisp and clean on offense as anyone because they had starters in there. But it's like you're searching for something to take away from in August,

and I guess maybe none of it matters at all. They don't have a single drive in their first five marches that crosses five yards. This was your game, Dan. Like, what happened to the Steelers? They just could not get it going. I mean, it started with a three and out. Their next possession, Kenny Pickett threw into coverage, which he did a lot in this game. A receiver slipped led to an interception.

And then, you know, it just started turned into a snowball effect. And before you knew it, they were down three scores. And even when they were able to get a late touchdown at the end of the first half, it was the only time they showed any life on offense. It took them until, I believe it was 1.15 to play in the second quarter. before they even had a first down. And to their credit, they got that first down and went down the field about 90 yards and got on the board.

And it made you think maybe, just maybe, they might make it a game. It was within striking distance at that point. But that pitch to McCaffrey makes one cut. He's gone, Brandon Ayyuk with a brilliant block on that run. Iyuk. There's the other thing about this Niners offense. If Brandon Ayuk is going to become a super-stop, start this year? I mean, forget it. Turn out the lights because he looked unbelievable. Patrick

Peterson got cooked up on the first touchdown. The second touchdown, it was again, Iuked on a beautiful purdy throw, right on the money with Patrick Peterson tight in coverage, but it didn't matter. Like I said, his blocking was on point. So he just played an elite game. I would imagine there's not going to be a PFF grade higher wide receiver than what Brandon Iyo gets in this game. So the defense turned it up on Pickett who just, you know, and it is true. He looked good in the preseason and you heard all the positive talk about him taking the next step. He kind of played like butt in this game. And it was, it's part of the concern for the Steelers, but he's not the only reason they lost.

They just kind of no showdown offense. There were a couple things you were thinking that the Steelers might be that they weren't at this time last year was an improved offensive line. They gave up five sacks. That tells me also the Niners like Steve Wilkes is like your 18th defense. as a coordinator in his many years, and the defense absolutely baffled Pittsburgh's offense. It's like they couldn't run the ball. I'm just for a lot of it confirms for me what we hoped and thought about the Niners. I mean, a lot of it is a carryover, except Ayuk looks like he's leveled up, which I'll never

forget, Omar Ruiz coming into our, in our newsroom in the middle of the summer, having been to camp and saying, we know he's good, but he's a completely different player. But we were like, question mark, who is Brock Purdy? It was last year Omaraj? Was it real? and just like kind of scanning the first half plus of this, it was the version from last year. Well, I've mentioned on the preview show

how they've started slow over the last few years. And like this team just feels much more ready to go as long as they keep their health. I mean, you don't even have Nick Bosa playing like all the snaps and making all the impact that he's going to make in the future. Nine QB hits, five sacks, eight tackles for loss, four passes defense. I mean, when you're getting Drake Jackson,

who his second year player was quiet last year, had a bunch of a couple sacks in this game and you're getting Cleland Furl, the old Raiders bust who's now like making plays like they just have so many points. And it was a disaster of a day for Pittsburgh. You had, in addition to the lopsided score, Cam Hayward leaves the game with a

groin injury. He didn't return. Deonté Johnson left the third quarter after hurting his hamstring on a 26-yard gain. He was gone after that. And you just, you get, it was kind of a worse case scenario. In fact, the only person that showed up for the Pittsburgh Steelers was T.J. Watt, who was

a monster. He had three sacks and two-force fumbles. Fumbles recovered one of them, but that was it. It was just, it was as one-sided as a game as you can imagine, and I think the final score tells you that. The one other thing that I think was a takeaway from this game,

Brock Purdy, his consistency, like, you could put it in the bank. We talked before we started, Mark, because you have them in your fantasy team. Devastated my opponent to right. Oh, congratulations. He might, not be a guy that's going to win fantasy leagues. But if you need two touchdowns and 220 yards passing or whatever and just a steady

performance, he's up to seven straight games in the regular season with two touchdown passes or more. He looked very healthy, very sharp. He took a couple big hits in this game. So you got to keep an eye on that and the news to come in the upcoming days. But he got out of there healthy. I was a little surprised. Kyle Shannon kept giving Christian McCaffrey the Rock in the fourth quarter when this game was

that. This man does not need to be doing that. Elijah Mitchell. Elijah Mitchell was not a part of the game plan, really. But yeah, when you, when you get topped here, and part of the thing about Ayuk is sometimes he's a little enigmatic. You don't know which version you're going to get of him. But when you get this guy and Debo's chipping in and Kittle, who's quiet today,

does his thing, it's almost like in that passing game, he has so many options perity and he's blocked up front well. Trent Williams got beat up a little bit in this game, too. Keep an eye on that. We have a Monday show now, by the way, which is good. That we'll track all these different injuries, guys that got banged up and the subplots to watch. What a value add for the listener.

Exactly. The passing game is so deadly that when you pitch it to Christian McCaffrey, it's like, this feels unfair. It felt unfair on the field. And that's not what the Pittsburgh Steelers were expecting today. No, I would ask you this, though, because I get it week one, everyone chill. It's a long season. Like, there are Steelers fans out there tonight who I think, thought this was a good bar for

them, a good test, but that they would compete. And, like, they were not competitive. Like, is there reason for panic or is it just go back and start? No, it's a good test. Next Monday night, they get the Browns, and we get to it. But there's going to be a lot of pressure on them to show up. And Cleveland balled out. We're going to get to that soon on defense.

There's going to be a lot of pressure on Pickett and that offense to show that this was just an aberration, and they got boat raced in a surprise way. In a week where a lot of last year's superpowers, the best teams from last year, didn't look like the best teams in week one. It's nice to just see a 49ers group of marauders just like, we're here, we're superheroes. Absolutely. You paralleled that effort to us? No, but I like where you're thinking.

We're superhero. We were already going there. I was embodying. I was embodying the 49ers. I am the 49ers. You have any statement, Mark. You're obviously very high on the Steelers throughout the summer that you'd like to make before we move on. No, I'm going to take your typical route on this and say, I don't own any of this.

It's a long season. We'll talk to me, you know, two days a week. Well, you've got to get to 12. You have four losses. are in the season. You have four losses to play with still. You have four losses to play with. That one down, one down. We just played the best team in football. All right.

We. Did I just say we for the Pittsburgh Steelers? Right, but... The dart gun. That's what I've always thought. Maybe there's a little reverse jinx action in here and you're off to a great start if that's the case. Yeah, true. Let's move on. Now, the other NFC superpower is the Philadelphia Eagles. They're going up to Foxborough and it's going to be a cakewalk.

Or is it? get a fourth down and 10 plus with 40 seconds in counting left here in the fourth quarter three receivers wide to the right one left to jones four-man watch max stands in throws it left for boot got it gets metal on to their side line lookie he's in bounds a perfect throw on turkey god stop it eight get up and get a play let's go let's go he's about a timeout but remember reviews initiated from the booth he's out and i don't think that left foot got in bounds Hold that thought. The one in the field of a completed pass is under further review. Oh, you heard there from WBZ, the sentient power-aid bottle. Scott Zolak got excited.

But it just wasn't happening in the end. The Eagles kept opening the door for the Patriots on Tom Brady Day in Foxborough, but Mack Jones and Company could not bust in for an upset. the defending amnesty champions holding on for a 25-20 win after Jones's fourth down conversion to Cajon Boutte was overturned on review in the final minute. Gregi, tough one for you, bittersweet for you. You love your eagles and your heart is in Western Mass. This game started out looking like a laughter, but, you know, the Patriots made it close.

They just couldn't get over the... Hey, well, I mean, it's that bittersweet. I'm rooting for the Patriots in this game, and it was a huge missed opportunity. You could talk the whole offseason about all this stuff and who's built up the Eagles and their depth charts and what the Patriots have done with Bill O'Brien and then you get to week one

and the Patriots, I think, clearly outplayed the Eagles in this game. I mean, they outgain them by, what, 150? And a lot of the game, and there's a lot we can get into, but comes down to Kashan Bouti, an undrafted rookie who's in the game partly because DeVante Parker ended up being ruled out late in the week,

not dragging his foot down on two different plays. That wasn't the only one. He killed two different drives like that. Another was on a deep, nice throw by Mack Jones, and that ended up being a punt at a moment where they were moving the ball pretty well. And you could take positives that the defense looked much better and that they outplayed them.

But ultimately, there still were a lot of mental errors, including a late penalty that they took for not getting a playoff in time on 4th and 12, which was just surprising to see. So there were just little things that they still made mistakes, even if the overall defense especially, but the overall team looked better than it did a year.

It's a difficult, frustrating loss for Patriots fans because you wipe out the first part of this game and you get what they were for the final like 70% and they beat the Eagles. But that first five offensive drive set, pick six, fumble, then three straight, three and outs. It's like it took a while for these guys to get going. And I would say one thing,

Like, if you're relying on that wide receiver at the end of the game, I know there was an injury here with Parker, but like this is a team that did not stock up on offense to that position. And like you're in week one in that situation. That should be like a late November deal where like a bunch of guys go down. And it's like that's not the right personnel to go beat the Super Bowl NFC defending titleists. No, they already feel like a little bit of a banged up team at wide receiver

and throughout the roster. And, you know, Jacoby Myers, by the way, had some success in his Raiders debut. So they are short at playmakers. for Mac Jones. So they have a better scheme, Gregie, but it's obviously a work in progress on offense still. The Eagles side of it, Greg, like what I'm looking at, you know, Jalen Hertz, his numbers aren't popping off the screen.

What was not working for this team? Because you factor in the pick six and they didn't really roll on offense in this. Right. So for a little background, the Eagles were up 60 nothing very quickly. A pick six on a drop pass in the rain, not a good throw by Mac Jones. And then another quick short field touchdown where they took it over. after Ezekiel Elliott fumbled.

And after that, they had four straight three and outs. They couldn't run the ball. It was all Kenny Gainwell. So that was a surprise, I think, the fantasy owners, almost nothing of DeAndre Swift or anyone else. Hertz had a couple nice individual plays, but it wasn't really the called QB runs that were doing it either. I think Christian Gonzalez and the Patriots defense did a really good job,

but they were disjointed. It was one of the worst, you know, Eagles' offensive performances we've seen in a long time. Four yards per play, 250 yards. I think Belichick threw a lot at them schematically and did a nice job. There were a couple drives late where A.J. Brown and Devante Smith won their one-on-one matchups, and that was enough. And you got Jake Elliott booting bombs off the crossbar. They didn't have a great kicker. Three kicks in the rain over 48 yards. They might not win this game. So do you see an issue with the double coordinator switch, which, which I did not really, was it weather?

It's like, Jalen Hertz had an uncharacteristic fumble at this point. They're kicking field goals, not scoring touchdowns. They have four straight punts at one point. I mean, this doesn't look like any box score from last year's Eagles team. They were very conservative when they got the lead as if it was like the fourth quarter, like making some runs on third and 10 and not going for any points late in the first half. So I think it was partly the weather. It was driving rain early about the first quarter.

Then it led up. And I think it was more about what I believe. to be a top five defense playing well for the most part at every level and five months for Bill Belichick to plan for this game. Romo kept pointing it out. You can scheme for this game. You know this opponent all summer long. And I think the Patriots defense is going to be difficult for most offenses deal with. Were you okay with what gave New England that second life after the Henry failure to convert on the drop? They had fourth and two Philly at New England's 44. They go into shotgun. So they could have either, you know,

They could have punted and buried them back there. They go in shotgun, they pass it incomplete, and that opened the door for New England to have one more shot. Well, I was okay with it as a Patriots fan. Yeah, you got Christian Gonzalez, the first round pickout there, who looks like a real dude. And to answer your question, the way that game was going, I actually thought, wow, the Patriots have a better chance of stopping him here

than I think they do of going 90 yards. I would have felt differently at almost any point last season, but the way this game had been going, it was so disjointed. I thought, okay, they can maybe get a stop here. and they did. And so that was one case where Nick Siriani was very aggressive and it didn't work out. One worrisome aspect for the Eagles, I think,

was they just did not get much pressure on Mack Jones. He threw the ball 54 times. I know there were some hurries and hits and sacks, but he threw the ball 54 times with two rookie guards starting for injuries. There's all sorts of injuries on the Patriots offensive line, but they did a good job protecting. They could not run the ball whatsoever against Eagle's Big Front, but a little surprise how little pressure they got on that.

You said 70 sacks a year ago, and we came in a week ago thinking like the Patriots offensive line might be an apocalypse. Right. And they got two in this game. And they totally stuff for Mondry Stevenson and Zeke for the most part on the ground. But passing, they did a bad job. Interesting. We shall say, I mean, Philly gets the win, but everything seemed to be just come so easily to that team. Is it going to be the same way this year?

In week one, it wasn't easy, but they got it done. Let's now move to the best game of the day. we were just getting warmed up let's head across the sidewalk sofi stadium dolphins up by two the chargers have the football deep in their own territory they got a bit they go they got him again he blitzed them they did not pick up the blitz i mean it was wide open oh and the cut to vizio i love it and the pongoes are You know you made a huge play when your QB throws for 466 and Tyree goes over 200 and we're talking a sack. But that sack was the difference for the Miami Dolphins who score a 3634 win over the Chargers in a great back and forth shootout. The door had been left open a missed extra point after the second Tyrone. Territale touchdown from Tua. I think I predicted 3734.

Ooh, good job by you. I won't go back in the preview. I just would like to say, good job. Make the extra point. I don't know if that's right. But keep those bongos going, bro. But what a performance. What a great game.

But what a performance by Tua and company. And let's welcome in. a man who watched this game I watch it too and I enjoyed the hell out of it the great Nick Shook

look at him back for another year on the flagship show Shook we got the shootout we wanted and it was glorious glorious indeed

as somebody who's tasked with writing to what we learned I was going to ask you how do you do this that would have really this game that would have sent Mark into a dark place

I would have got I would have I would have I would have ubered home and we would have complained to us about it the whole time late in the fourth I'm just sitting there going what did I learn from this game

I don't even know I think one thing I learned because two of Tagoa and Justin Herbert are forever linked because of where they were drafted and I have received so much hate from Dolphins fans over the last three years

anytime I praise Justin Herbert because they always have to make up for their insecurity regarding to Ohtungo by low. Well, guess what, Dolphins fans? You got your answer today. You're no longer insecure. He threw for 466 yards, three touchdowns. He completed 28 to 45 passes.

Tyree Kilwood for 2.15. They were down late, and they moved down the field effortlessly. It was a fantastic offensive performance in a shootout. And despite the final score, I even liked some of the things I saw from the defense. They've got a lot to clean up. But the way they close that game, that's the potential of that Dolphin defense. So for those of you who are Dolphins fans, who are constantly checking charger scores and box scores and finding reasons to poke holes in Justin Herbert, you don't need it anymore. You got it today.

This is your Super Bowl. I like this. You know what? It's a, it's a, this is not, this is a battle that was one by two of the war. Well, we'll see. Who wins the war and who had the right draft pick? But like, when you see the sicko version of the Dolphins offense pop up again this year, it gets you really excited for you're a Dolphins fan. Because for two reasons, the fact that they made it, like you said, Shook, looks so easy, carving up a Chargers defense that we were pumping up as a defense that could do some things this year.

And that was simple. Vic Fongio on the D. Now, not their not a shining day for their defense, at least statistically. But Fongio, you know, as the season goes on, they're going to start to gel and figure things out. Jalen Ramsey's down the horizon maybe as well. So they're probably going to get better as things go along. So if they keep Tua upright and this offense is going to have big time days like this and just a perfect start for the season. Nick, Nick, I think to me the difference between this and maybe if you think about that Bill's game early last season and some of the great Tua performances there was Tua was making throws in this game that were because he's special.

I mean, the scheme was great, but some of those throws were just outrageous. And that's what you think of when it's Justin Herber. And it was weird because Justin Herber is just kind of moving the ball down the field. And they're running the ball. But Tua, to me, made throws in this game. And Tyree Kill helped him out a lot with those late hands on that game-winning touchdown. But his throws were all about him being excellent, not just the scheme. Last drive alone, he had two great throws of Tyree Hill.

The one that you just mentioned, he also had one down the right side where he just dropped it right over the defender. And it was a beautiful past. And the funny thing is, is I saw somebody tweet, Tua is like the master of getting just enough on a throw, like not, not too much and not too little. I think that there's an argument to be made that he does sometimes leave too little on the ball. But today was not that day. Today, he was putting it in all these different places, just putting it right on his guys, operating the offense efficiently. I mean, it looked effortless at times. And, and the pairing with Tyreek is just, it's something, it's marvelous. It truly

is. Like, I, 215 yards is nothing to, you know, scoff at, of course, statistically. But the way it looked was so much more than that. The way Tyreek ran his route and got him. himself open. The way Tua would flow with the play action fake and find somebody, whether it was Tyreek or it was River Craycraft or somebody else. He was operating this offense as if he'd been there for a decade. And he's healthy. And that's, this is what the dolphins can be. It's just like you guys said, he's got to stay healthy. Yeah, it's like the polar opposite of that Monday night meltdown from a year ago when these two teams faced each other. I would ask you from a Chargers side because I didn't love this, that it's 31.30. They're driving down the field,

the Chargers. And you get that. that illegal holding on the dolphins. It puts them right at Miami's doorstep. They're thwarted and come out with a field goal. It's then 3431. The dolphins go 3430. The dolphins go do what they do. And then the final drive. They were in a tough spot. But Jalen Phillips is unblocked twice. Like him, there's two takedowns. You've got a problem here where like there's an intentional grounding on Justin Herbert. And like, yet I would say this. Like, do you come out of this game looking at the Kellyn Moore approach to this offense? Because there was a lot of like pre-snaps. motion. They were highly productive

in another world. We're talking about the Chargers not folding at the end of the game, but they did. But do you think that there's maybe like a different type of dash of optimism for what this offense can be versus how he was stuck last year, I thought, Justin Herbert, in the wrong type of scheme. It's the same thing. It's the same charges. B.S. I do think it's

a different type of offense for him. I do. Sure. Sure. It's a different play caller, but this is the same stuff. Like, they couldn't find a way again. Yeah, but that's Brandon Staley's defense as much as anything else. though but that's part of it too with this team right i'm just saying do you think that herbert's in a better environment to you know 16 weeks from now we forget about this one and just say this is a good news i mean in that other world i'm a millionaire so you know we can't always you know get the best

of everything here but i mean i agree yes 34 points again nothing to scoff at but my one concern with them is something that happened a lot especially when austin necler was hurt last year was when he's out of the ball game their offense is just not as good yeah he looked like he got a little dinged in this game kind of like hobbled off a little bit and he did play throughout the fourth quarter but he didn't have the same role and in that situation that you just described where they're on the doorstep and a touchdown and maybe a two point conversion could end this game yeah they didn't go to him they looked like they didn't know what to do and they were mixing tempo it was noted on the broadcast they were mixing up tempo then they went up tempo going to that third down play as if they were

going to catchment a personnel mismatch when you're seven yards away from the end zone and you're forcing yourself to throw and guys don't even they're not on the same page so I think that there is potential there, but a lot of the same issues are still. Yeah, but they were the worst running team in the league last year. They ran for 234 yards. This is very different. They talked all offseason. We're going to be a north-south running team.

You got Joshua Kelly going for 91 yards. You got Austin Eckler going for 117. That's the story if the defense can make any stops. I mean, they kind of did what they wanted in terms of being a power running team. That's positive. But give Mike McDaniel a lot of credit. They got the ball with nine seconds left in the first half, and they tried to score. And they did score.

And you see all these coaches not try to score. They get a 25-yard play, and then they get a P.I. And then they kick the field goal. They also got a touchdown on a drive where they went for it on fourth and seven. So you came into the league being the dork hero, Brandon Staley. But Mike McDaniel took your crown. You got a little scared over the last couple of years. That's all being aggressive.

And that, to me, is a huge difference. Those three points they got at the end of the first half are the difference. There is an asterist there, though. And it is the roller coaster ride that is the J.C. Jackson experience. He had a terrible P.I. on that play. There's no reason that he should have been committing that penalty in that situation, just to make a, make a mistake.

He also had an interception where he tried to bring out of the end zone, and then they had the ball on their own two-yard line and couldn't do anything with that takeaway. But, and then he also gave up a touchdown pass to Tyree Kill, who just toast him down the sideline. Wow. Very up and down there. And it should be noted that the dolphins also went straight down the field on the first possession of the game and then had a muff snap.

So they were, they did whatever they wanted in this game. Tua had a pick as well, but he was brilliant. And I don't think maybe sometimes we give Tyree Kill enough credit, like for how different he is. This is a Hall of Famer who has been everything the Dolphins could have asked for and more, quite frankly. And we saw it again in this game. That is interesting. And that Chargers defense has to get better. We think we might have to.

We might have to re-watch this game as our NFL plus game. I think we might have this tomorrow. Oh. Oh, no. Who? Well, you know who. They were honking up a storm. I see your little tweets, Nick Wesleyan.

And come with a week one win if you're going to lock up a lot. That was a daring lock, though. And frankly, a strategically bizarre lock. Well, that's kind of a, in the Cincinnati Zoo, sometimes they're a little flip. And that's what happened here. Oh, and one, they joined me in that world. Oh, you're not alone.

Yes, let's head to Cleveland, Shuki, your hometown where the Browns made a statement. Burrow, actually, the last time they had the ball on a fourth down and three wanted to go and was upset when they sent the punt team on. Now they're going. At the 31, they need the 35, fourth down at four. Burrow claps his hands. He wants the ball. He's got the ball up in the pocket. They chase him right.

They got him. And they knock him down. Miles Garrett got him. All the way back inside the 20-yard line. The Browns have the ball. That is my defensive player of the year pick, everybody. Miles Garrett chasing down a bewildered Joe Burrow for a sack that basically put the kibosh in any hopes for the Bengals. In a 24-3 Browns win in Cleveland, Joe Burrow freshly.

signed to a deal that made him the highest paid player in NFL history could not move a since the offense that managed just 142 yards total and shookie i mean listen what you died in the world 142 browns fan it's been quite a ride the last couple of years this is a dream start uh for cleveland yeah um my long time best friend went to the game today and has not stopped texting me since he left the game and just to confirm that the Browns did in fact win this game because it does not happen in Cleveland in week one what's the last time that happened when is last year at home at home 2004 Jeff Garcia led them to a victory over the Baltimore Ravens who also only scored three points that day fun fact if three opening week wins

since 99 that's absurd six first downs for the Bengals I I can't believe it uh they went three out, let's see, eight, nine times. I mean, it was just, it was an abysmal performance. This is a team that has Joe Burrow and George Chase and T. Higgins and Joe Mixon, and they showed life on exactly one possession and got in field goal range

and converted that field goal. Evan McPherson missed his second field goal. The weather was bad. I'll give you that. But the other team put 24 points in the board. You put three on the board. I've never seen a team from one year the next. And this is the Browns team that has been absolutely horrible defensively for the last few years under Joe Woods, transform with a new defensively.

coordinator. They played with a different emotion and intention, like that the passion and the attitude was completely different. Blanket coverage throughout this game. The additions they made in the front four showed up. They got after Burrow all day. He was never comfortable. That's why a big reason why they couldn't move the football. And then they just slowly tacked on points because their offense wasn't really doing that much in the rain either. Remarkable. If they could play like this on a weekly basis, I would actually feel really good about their chances to win the division and be a legitimate contender in the conference. It's only one week, but it was...

What a week it was? Between last year and this year. They've done this to Cincinnati before, and we kind of talked about this in the preview show, that there's some sort of weird connection between these two teams where Burrough's going to get a game a year where he's absolutely massacred by the Stevens. But these guys look different.

I mean, this has to be one of the wildest stats of the game. T. Higgins targeted eight times without a single catch. That I mean, like, these guys that went in... They've felled the chiefs multiple. couple times. They are considered the class of the AFC, at least one of the top two. And Cleveland's defense under Jim Schwartz, you're right, that coordinator switch probably should have happened a year

earlier. But Jim Schwartz, for all the people that is like, oh, it's Lions head coach, you know, middle of the road, like he can coach up a defense. And they added all these pieces. And sometimes those things work out, sometimes they don't. But it's like Miles Garrett on that last play, he has not had support around him in years. And so if he does now, and we saw what he did without support.

It's kind of scary because even guys like Grant Delpit today were like showing up in a way where it's like, I haven't seen this guy play this way before against a team like this. I don't know what to think. Yeah, that speaks to the transformation is that guys like Grant Delpit, who was lost in Joe Woods defense, was arguably their best defender today. He led the team in tackles. He was there to clean up multiple receptions, stopping guys short of the sticks on third down all over the field all day.

Every defensive back was really like that. No matter where they threw them, they were always right in the hip pocket. I was just completely stunned by how effective they were and consistent they were after how bad they'd been with arguably the same personnel, say for some changes in the front four. But you're right, Mark, you know, Miles Garrett does have a little bit of help this time. Zadari Smith looked really good in his first game with the Browns and the changes that they made really contributed to a total defensive effort to where we didn't have to talk about whether Deshaun Watson played well or not because they were so good defensively. It didn't matter. It's crazy getting Jadavian Clowny out of a locker and what that could do is. Oh, that's transformative.

Joe Burrow had 2.6 yards per attempt. That is like, that's, that's blamed, that's sub-Gabbard zone. That's half of the Gabbard zone. I do like his comments, though. He owned it and sort of said, like, this is what happens when your guy doesn't see, you know, training camp practices or reps

or even a single pre-season snap that, like, yeah, they had a slow start last year. He's had one of the worst luck for off-season around by star quarterback. And it happened again, and it showed up. again. That was really evident in that game. It's just that like they looked like they were rusty, like they hadn't had a lot of reps together.

But for you stat nerds, just to finish that point there, Joe Burrow, completion percentage over expected. Negative 13.9 today is worst CPOE performance of his career. It feels more significant than them steamrolling the Bengals in very similar fashion in prime time halfway through last season. I mean, that did happen. but that did happen and that's where we started the show wondering like okay which week one games are going to totally stick is this just a division thing to me just from the outside it says probably more about where the browns could go defensively than it does about the bengals but but it's it's concerning um jemar chase after the game he had made some comments apparently i'm sure you were tracking it shook about elves mocking your mascot guy at center Mascot guy.

Yeah. I don't know exactly what it is. I don't know. It's a mythical being. They paint the Elve on the field. You know that. I still don't know like what it is and how it relates to the Browns. I've never quite grasped.

A throwback, but it's a fair question. I think that's what Jamar was getting at. Jamar Chase in the locker room, not happy and owning up to, maybe you shouldn't have said so much about that. It's frustrating because I called the ass elves and we just lost as an elf. So I'm pissed on my part. I'm not pissed on Alan at him. Like I said, man, we got.

I missed opportunities. We didn't capitalize on that shit, and we lost. That's how we loved. Rough, rough star for Cincinnati. Let's talk about the quarterbacks real quick. Did Burrow, real quick, did Burrow look healthy to you? Was he moving well? Okay.

And then... He just looked like he was harassed all with that. We should mention since our last show, he signed a contract that makes him the richest player in the league. Oh, you did? You did. And then Deshawn Watson. Greg should mention it, though, after you mentioned it.

Yes. Deshawn Watson, obviously, he was not the deciding factor in this game, what did you see from him in the sloppy conditions? Early pressure made him very skittish, and it took him a while to settle in. He missed a lot of throws, something that had to do with weather. It was similar to what Burrough was doing, which is a lot of these passes just died, just right into the ground. Both him and Watson were doing that. Some of them were just bad throws, but he did put it together on a few drives.

There was one drive that ended in a Jerome Ford Fumble, where he was pretty solid, and then he threw a touchdown pass late in that game as well. So I give him like a C plus B minus effort. I mean, it wasn't great, but, you know, they won't have to do it alone on this team. The way it looked in week one, Shuky, you are flying high. I could tell you got a little skipped in your step. Enjoy your Sunday night. And we'll see you again next week.

I'll skip on out of here, guys. I'll see you. There you go. All right, let's take a break. And then we will continue onward. Week one, the flagship program. What's up, everybody? Daniel Jeremiah here.

And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the Sticks, we take you inside. the game from scouting reports and player development to team building philosophies coaching trends in how front offices construct winning rosters every week we study the tape talk to decision makers and share the insights you won't find anywhere else is the kind of conversation that connects the dots from college football prospects to the NFL stars of tomorrow we break down the draft analyze matchups and evaluate how teams put it all together on game day plus we dig in the coaching strategies roster construction and the

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Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. All right, welcome back. It's time now for the Sunday Drive presented by the first ever Toyota Grand Highlander. Hit it. Fields takes the snap. Scans the secondary with time. Now fires it up in the middle.

It's a second. Go to the 30 to the 25, cutting right, breaks a tackle, spins to his left. What? Oh. Oh. Oh. Touchdown Green Bay. And an opening day, dagger.

Oh. Big Funk behind the glass. He's a Packers fan, right? He had his arm up and finger outstretched, like name it at the Orange Bowl. Got to be loving this one. Watching, you know, listen, we were told then that was, of course, Wayne Larravey, WR N, W. W. We were told, is this the bear's time to take over to the NFC North?

Not so fast. The Packers began life without Aaron Rogers with an easy 2820 win in Soldier Field. It was not as close as that final score seems to indicate. Mark, Jordan Love gets a victory in his first week-one start, and the Green Bay defense didn't seem to be phased by Justin Fields and his new collection of weapons. They were not phased by Chicago's offensive line. That is for sure. And I'll get to that in a second. But before that, pick six happened, which obviously, the game fully out of hand at that point. You know, we went into this thing wondering, well, maybe post Aaron Rogers,

if Love is just middle of the road, then a team like Chicago, who was getting a lot of positive buzz for months, might be ready to make a leap and become an eight to nine win team. They've got a long way to go. And I want to just say, like, the Jordan Love, like for all the years of like being in the middle of this Aaron Rogers, Brouhaha,

just came out and had an incredible game. And I thought it got better and better as the game on. On the drive before that pick six, there's a moment where Love took a snap, bobbled it to his feet, had the awareness to pick it back up, look

down the field, and a lot of times he did a good job of looking off the first guy. It's like a little bit beyond his time on that front. In this case, whipped it 37 yards downfield to Luke Musgrave, who made a pretty great catch, but then kind of fell a part of that point. Minutes later,

Romeo Dobbs, like pinpoint pass in the end zone, his third touchdown of the day. You come out of looking at Jordan Love and saying, Jordan loves third touchdown. You come out of this looking at what he did in this start with a lot of people not around him. I mean, Jaden Reed got hurt at one point. No Christian Watson. So you're working with what you have. And I just thought he made play after play. It wasn't perfect out of the gate. But then you got Aaron Jones who just dominated Chicago's defense. I think I look at Chicago and it's like outside of Yonik and Gokwe, you can't really

rush the passer. And if you're Justin Fields, who got brutalized in this, it's like we saw him get hurt down the stretch last year. Their offensive line put Justin Fields in peril over and over. And this is a good defense. This is the best you're going to face. They went and spent a lot of resources on their offensive line. Drap picks added some guys. And it just didn't look like it. It's a nightmare. It's a nightmare. It was in Chicago. And I cannot, I will watch the rest of these games. We all will. But it's like, I don't really recall too many games. where it started with such a crescendoing sense of hope at Soldier Field. And then by the end of the third quarter, booze raining down, total frustration, old frustration.

We talked about it on Thursday. What an opportunity this was as a clean the slate, new era, the NFC, North, new era for the Bears. And again, what we said at the top of the show, it's just one week. But when Justin Fields was supposed to be a superstar year after you gave up a chance to have the number one overall pick, can't get protected. and it still looks like the same old bear's blocking. And then you, after years of Aaron Rogers bullying you,

you let Jordan Love come into your building and throw three touchdowns. It's just not a good look, Gregie. And it's one week, but you're going to have to win in Lambeau Field later in the season or you got swept by your division rivals. Like these division games in week one mean a little more to me, and this one especially, I just wonder, like, what is your identity if you're the Bears? because if you're the Packers, you think, man, Watson didn't even suit up for this game.

Bakhtiari did. I want to apologize to our listeners for just making it sound like David Boktiari's not going to play in this game. I should have known he is the greatest of all time of never practicing and just playing anyways. I mean, he had- Hey, it looks good. Lexgo Burs is like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold the phone. He hadn't practiced in like three weeks, and he was, and he made the Alan Iverson joke after the game. He's like, practice. Like, I don't need practice.

He takes better in weeks, not days. Right. He's out there, and they got three QB hits on him. Where on the other side, the Packers have to feel good. Lucas Van Ness makes to play. Devante Wyatt makes to play some of their young guys. It's like, this is a very good organizational type of win for LaFleur. I'm sure this was very satisfying.

Yeah, they kept, like, kind of flashing up to Bears management, and you could just sort of see like, well, the rebuild is just, this is a legit rebuild. You were the worst team in the league last year. I thought, you know, DJ Moore, I was like, is DJ Morgan to help Fields make a jump and a leap? And it's like they've got to find a way

to get him involved earlier. He didn't even get a target until like their third or fourth drive. He was targeted twice the entire game. Right. But I will say one thing. On this, on one drive, he had two catches.

And that is when I thought maybe the Bears can turn this around because DJ Moore is the kind of wide receiver that Bears fans automatically, he's physical. They just like, you could tell they loved him. But then he vanished. Totally gone. So he was targeted twice and one drive

and never again before or after. I mean, but also that speaks to... Keeper Flos, what are we doing? It speaks to the total chaos that Fields was dealing with. It was like he had a bad fumble at one point.

Just like Fields is not going to survive or I guess he won't, it's going to be tough to grow if this is what he's dealing with. It's a bad combo too because he holds onto the ball a lot and he takes a little while sometimes to make his decision.

So that combination with a bad offensive line just kind of compounds it. Yeah, and as bad as the start was for the Bears, like we're saying, perfect. I mean, in a very sensitive time for the Packers as an organization, and Aaron Rogers is about to take the field for the Jets on Monday night football.

Now you can go watch that game and be like, oh, Aaron, whatever. We're moved forward. And you know, it's like, oh, Matt LaFloor only winning games because Aaron Rogers was there. Like, this was a great job by him preparing everyone to get to this place. Think it up your asses. We can do it without Aaron. That's what they're saying now. And that was the Sunday Drive presented by Toyota.

Let's go places. Learn more at Toyota.com slash Grand Highlander. All right, let's keep on moving. First down will essentially end this game. Broncos only have one time out left. Hooper. The tight end goes to the right in motion. Here come the Broncos with pressure.

They pick it up. Giroppolo, still with time in the pocket. Escapes out to the 35, get to the 30. And he gets out of a tackle with the 25. Yes. He's inbound and has the first down. Oh, Gropolo with his legs, about to seal this game for the Raiders here in Denver

with an eight-yard scramble. Ooh. Jason Harowitz. Just the note on that shared, whatever was going on. Just watching the monitor there, and Jimmy Garapolo was swagger incarnate when he got up from that. That was awesome. And you hear it all the time about Jimmy G. Maybe not the most talented quarterback, certainly not the most durable passer.

But his teammates love him. He's a good leader on that team. And this is a type of win, 1716 over the Broncos in Denver that really. that really kind of provides a lift for a Raiders organization that, you know, in the week leading up to the game, there's some bad vibes around this team. And for Jimmy G to make that scramble not known for making plays with his legs and seal that game big time, big time for Jimmy G and company. A one point win, Groplo through two touchdown passes to fellow newcomer Jacobi Myers in the game. And Sean Payton's start with the Denver Broncos is not as he envisioned it either. So I thought this was an interesting game.

It wasn't the maybe the most exciting game, but it was two teams that, to me, felt very evenly matched. And you saw it, it went right down to the end with the Raiders taking it. Well, and it was the first kind of, there were a lot of injuries today, but around the league. But out of the gate, it was like the first time our newsroom had sort of a collective sigh, was that you saw Jimmy G. You know, on the ground with what looked like maybe a head injury.

but then he comes back in and it seemed to completely change things. It's like I have been as down on the Raiders as possible. I don't think the Broncos are a Super Bowl contender here. So, you know, you eked out a nice win. But when I look across the way, Sean Payton's number one chore was fixing up Russell Wilson. And it looks like we got a bit of a different version. It wasn't an explosion, but cleaner. I thought he was pretty good.

I don't think he didn't look like maybe the playmaker of yesteryear during his Seattle. day, but certainly cleaner, um, moved well, I thought in and around the pocket through two touchdown passes through good balls, the Myers on the, on the scores. There were other plays that kind of got bogged down. Um, there was a lot of dinking and dunking, you know, average 5.2 yards per attempt. So you're going to pop it in there and you're going to say, all right, he's, he had a, he had a, he had a very fortunate to have a, um, a fumble early in the third quarter, um, overturned on penalty. But overall did, you know, better job protecting the football, which is something I think that was a major issue for him last year.

He only took two sacks in this game. That was an improvement. So, yeah, it looks like he's better coached. He looks physically better and he's moving better. But still, they scored 16 points in the game at home. And it's like, you just wonder, who's the playmaker on this team right now? Because I don't see the guy jumping out at us. Well, the leading receivers are running back in the tight end.

Right. Samajai P. Ryan was a leading receiver. And Adam Troutman, who Sean Payton brought over from New Orleans. is like a backup level tight end. It's worrisome. Jerry Judy didn't play in this game. And I heard a lot of positive. Yeah, I was curious of how Russell Wilson look because they ended that second quarter well.

And everyone's like, wow, that was almost a perfect half by Russell Wilson. But then you do look up at the end of the game and they end up with 260 yards of offense and 22 first down. So that to me tells me you're about as unexplosive as possible. Like you're struggling to get to that first down and then you get to it again. And it is one of those games, though, when you look at the stats, there was only six drives by the Broncos. There might not be a team all season that has let. That's about the minimum you can possibly have. So it's just like one of those long, slow drive type of games where neither team really has the ball much.

Yeah, and I think maybe the difference for this game with Wilson was, it was kind of similar to the stilted offense of last year with Hackett, but without the turnovers and all those back. breaking mistakes that he was making. So it's a big difference. It's progress. I think if you're a Broncos fan, it's like, all right, it looked a little better, but now we got to get, we got to get Jerry Judy on the field. We got to get Cortland Sutton more involved. Dulcitz, their tight end.

He goes out with an injury. He's an important player for them as well. So you take him out of the mix. I don't know if it's a serious injury. We'll know more by tomorrow, you know. But there you go. That's a nice one for the Raiders. I did like Sean Payton, right out of the gate,

back in the league, goes for the onside kick on the opening kick and it seemed like they maybe got it and then they reversed it and that sort of deflating bringing back memories of the Super Bowl with the Saints when they that is so Sean Payton by the way totally I love it it's it's a move that screams like you know I'm pretty gutsy guy I take chances hey look at me that's part of it as well also a little bit like I've been saying like a guy playing the greatest hits at the end of his career a little bit that it's like hey look at me remember when I did that I'm doing it again because I'm back it was a little bit about and it came kind of cool though

than a hair of being recovered to which would have been badass but it wasn't so the Broncos close but no cigar Raiders get the win and good job because you got Buffalo next week and the Steelers the week after that so that's a big W to get let's keep. Apparently the Steelers are an object of nothing at this

point though. Well this week they were but you never know Mark hang in there. I'm already slightly peaked by the season you haven't watched that game yet have you it's going to be even crazy when you watch it was it was that bad let's move on to another game that didn't make any sense based on what we perceived football to be ahead of sunday let's head to seattle fourth and goal from inside

the one acres the single bat staffer under center brings two to motion it's a toss left to acres he'll go oh that was easy on fourth and goal from the one acres to payards and the rams have a double-digit lead. Oh, they talk about, oh, Los Angeles. It's just a big sprawl of the city. That's J.B. Long. Guess what? Me and J.B. go to the St. Barber.

Small town life in the big city. A great friend and neighbor of the Wesselings and a friend of our show. How about that? I guess it is a community. Point made. Rams Radio, J.B. Long. Bayberry by the sea.

There it is. Matthew Stafford threw for 300,000. 34 yards without Cooper Cup. Cam Acres jogged into the end zone, one of three touchdown runs, and the Rams stunned the Seahawks. 30 to 13. What?

In Seattle, the Pacific Northwest, in shock. Mark, you're in shock. You mocked them up. I am, again, I said there's already a couple things that are thorns in the side. No. I like a good comeback story.

Same zies. Matt Stafford, 58, 300-yard passing game in his career. I like that because it's like a Matt Stapford, hey, I'm not dead. I'm not dead yet. I won the Super Bowl a couple years ago. Oh, Cooper Cuts is not playing. We're going to win three games. Look what we just did.

Nice job. Mattie Stafford and Cump. I mean, not just, I'm not dead. Maybe I'm the best quarterback in the league this week. I don't know if I saw a quarterback play any better. I know fantasy-wise you didn't get a touchdown out of it. That's unfortunate. You got three short rushing touchdowns, two out of Kyron Williams,

It might be a nice little fantasy pickup for you. But Stafford took these young receivers. Puka Nakua. We've been talking them up in this offseason. 10 for 119. Are you kidding me? A rookie third round pick. Tutu Outwell.

Give credit to Sean McVeigh. He's been trying to make Tutu Atwell a thing for three years. He's finally a thing. Six for 119. Two receivers, I think, 23 years and under going over 100 yards. How about that? And Stafford putting... all over the field, a couple of throws that just almost no other quarterback in the NFL could make

and really supporting what everyone said that was up at Rams camp that said like, man, Stafford looks good this preseason. And he looked trim. There was a great run that he made that was very crucial. And I came out of this game just thinking, my God, Matthew Stafford, for as long as he stays upright. And maybe it's just facing a Seahawks pass rush that was non-existent. But as long as he stays upright, he's going to ball. That was really impressive. I became concerned about the Locke part of this, which is a minor story to most every human except myself.

But early on, because I like... So you, it's the overriding storyline of the entire day. No, but it's like you're watching these things. It's more like when do you start to feel like maybe you didn't have all the information on the way that Sean McVeigh felt about his own roster, at least on offense for sure? But Jordan Rodrigue wrote that opening 16 play scoring drives, 16 plays, 75 yards, ate up a lot of time, was about as physical, she wrote, as I've seen them play in years. And, you know, if you think back to when the Rams have been dinged, when they were, like, wiped out on Monday night that two couple years ago by the Niners was like, oh, maybe they're not as physical as some of these other teams that they go up against. It's like, maybe they're rebranding what they are.

This is one game, but it's like, if you're going to get that. version of Stafford and if these young guys grow around him get cutback like they're not going to win three games they're going to win more than that they're going to win double that Gino threw for a hundred and twelve yards in this game on 26 attempts all we talked about through the summer

heard about Gregie in the summer was this is a team the Rams that had no names other than Aaron Donald that you really could bank on and yet they go up there and Gino is a comeback player of the year last year they shut down this passing game I know D.K. McCaff I think he was three for four

42 and 47 and a touch in the second quarter, that's where he ended. Yes. It just shut the whole thing down, it seems like. I mean, the stats in the second half are preposterous. It was 257 yards to three until Pete Carroll, who knows people are box score checking, went for a nine-yard run with six seconds to go, you know, risking his running back, getting hurt. So it ended up 257 to 12.

That is outrageous. It was four straight plays, four straight drives that totaled. I believe three yards before that. They did get one first down somehow by penalty in that mix. And look, the first half actually kind of went as scripted offensively. They either scored or missed a field goal on every possession Seattle. So it wasn't like they looked off-kilter the whole game. But I really think it was a complimentary offense, defense performance here

where the Rams kept going on these long touchdown drives. 16 plays, 10 plays, 14 plays. The Seahawks get the ball back. They're mostly passing. They lose both their tackles in this game, which is definitely, I think, a big part of what happened in the second half. Abe Lucas and Charles Cross, who if you guys remember, two rookie tackles who started all last year were a nice story.

Both leave with injuries. One of them, I think it was Lucas on a cart. And suddenly, like, they just couldn't get a first down. It was a little bit of pass rush. It was a little bit of timing. The Rams rookie linebacker Byron Young made a couple really nice plays. And suddenly at the end, it's this Rams pass rush tee enough on Dino Smith that was like fourth and 40 or something on the last

play. I couldn't believe it. It was the most surprising thing I saw. I'm looking at the second half drive chart for Seattle, five drives, two total yards. I mean, it's from a Rams team that looked like they were going to get run over. What does this say about Seattle's defense

though? Right. And the weird thing was that I think the Rams are going to be so proud that they ran the ball 40 times because they actually didn't run it very well per carry. I mean, Acres went 22 for 29. which is preposterous. Whoa.

But they just kept sticking at it. I think it was what Jordan Rodrigue was talking about in terms of being physical. But you can only do that if you've got a freaking magician at quarterback playing lights out and saving you in a lot of third down situations. And that's what Stafford did. Man, the Rams, if this is a sign of things to come,

are going to make a lot of people look stupid. Well, almost everyone. Well, this is, and I mentioned historically a matchup that McVeigh has dominated. And even last year where the teams were so far, far apart. They were decided by one or two plays. And so I think it was a couple different things coming together, but if I'm

the Seahawks, I'm very concerned about those tackles. And I'm very concerned my defense had no pass rush. That's the thing. If you give Matt Stafford time, he can cut you up. And they just had nothing going on getting after him. So maybe it's the old line for the Rams too getting better. Here's the other thing before we move on. I always

liked your theory, Greg. What's your number you put out? There's five or six or seven NFL head coaches who matter. Make a difference. Rams have one. them. Mm-hmm. Maybe we shouldn't count them out. Let's see what happens.

It's just one week. Let's take a break, actually. Should we take a break? Or should we keep going? I'll sneak another one in. All right, sneak another one in. We're flying. You blew through one of those games pretty quickly.

I think it was the Raiders game. Now we're going to hear from them. Oh, you've been through a game. What other podcast has been talking up your good defense for a month? You came through Raiders. Leave it in. Raiders, enjoy your moment. Get off our ace.

First down at the 26-yard line of the Colts. The clock is it 4.15. Ice it. This is E.T.N. tries to bounce it outside. He's got a little bit of room, 20, 15-yard line. Down in Indiana. He iced it.

Touchdown. They have extended the lead. How good is that? 26-yard touchdown run. Holy mackerel. Frank Frangy with the call. He does the games with a. Jeff Loggevin.

Nice little pass rusher for the Jets back in 92. Otherwise, dark days. W-O-K-V. Still working. Remember Loggman? Yeah, absolutely. Sure. Travis E-T-N's 26-yard touchdown run with 408 to play.

That was the clincher for the Jags. Who overcame a costly gaffe, G-A-F-E from Tank Bigsby. And a 31-21 win over the Colts at Lucas Oil Stadium. Mark, we'll get to 8. Anthony Richardson's debut in a bit. Let's start with what you saw from the defending South champs. A weird game. Like, certainly not the heights that we witnessed,

the flawless Trevor Lawrence performances down the stretch last year. Took them a while to get going. They weren't really running the ball very well early on. They were struggling on third down. The Colts, I didn't expect this from the Colts, but they really, like, made life tough for Trevor Lawrence. And it started with, who I think will be the A of see defensive player of the week, whether or not

they won the game or lost. DeForest Buckner, who even when you just see them on television, it looks like a front door coming at you. Sure. A sack, a forced fumble. There was a wacky play where, like, the ball was tipped, the Lawrence pass, and it kind of hit the ground and everyone sort of stood around looking at it. Then it's like,

this isn't a dead ball. No one blew a whistle, and Buckner picks it up and just rumbles in for a touchdown. That was the gaffe I was referring to. I'm going to put a sandwich on Buckner, not defensive player of the week. I like TJ watch chances. He's just not like fine. He's on the Colts and they gave up

31 points. Not his fun. They're just weird about that. I would just say for your own like enjoyment, go watch him. Just it was a dominant performance. And like from a team that most people

rode off. But Lawrence made some some throws down the stretch. And the biggest story for them is that Calvin Ridley looked phenomenal. He ate for 101 and a touchdown. And there was a couple plays where it's like, I don't know what he was doing last year

or what he did this off season. Because remember he played that entire season, season on what he said was a broken, a version of a broken foot, and still like a thousand yards. Like, he looked as fast as I've ever seen him. He's a complete immediate rainmaking difference maker for the Jaguars, but they're going to have better days than today. Don't say rainmaker with Calvin Ridley, though. That is something.

I'll say what he did last year. Well, that's actually very fair. I'll say, I'll say, I'll say, please, but you're right. I was trying to make that connection. That was a tricky one. That was a tricky one. But you look great. Anthony Richardson, he exited the game in the final minute, which is not ideal.

It looked like he was standing on the sideline and not anything too serious. What did you see from him overall? I thought he... Pretty good box score. Yeah, you know what? I thought that like for all the concept that he's going to, no matter what, it's going to take him so long to kind of look comfortable and the accuracy issues, well coached today, but like made some throws,

show that he could kind of hit people all over the field, had a pretty, a couple great runs. He had a touchdown run. There was a one where he just blew up the middle of the team. Like on an RPO, just rent for 12 yards. He's going to be doing this all year. And I think that out of the gate, because I think, Greg, you mentioned this,

like, is it a disadvantage to get the cults early, even if they're not a good team? Because you don't know what you're preparing for with Richardson. The one thing that I thought, like, Shane Steichen, is going to realize just doesn't carry over necessarily from his Eagles days. They were one for five on fourth downs, and they tried to do the butt push with Richardson. He was stuffed.

They had a couple. It just didn't look as clean. Dion Jackson, you know, they miss, they miss, obviously, Taylor. and Dion Jackson had a bad fumble on fourth and one. Yeah, they miss them all. Like, he had two fumbles in this game. And so it's these little things where, like, the cults deep into it is like, they're going to win this thing.

Like the Jaguars just aren't separating themselves. Wow, yeah, they were winning halfway through the fourth quarter. They just looked, they looked like they could steal us. They did last year. I thought Stuyken was a little sleep at the switch, too. They had a 17-play drive late in the fourth quarter. They're down 10. They get stopped.

They're in field goal range. You can get it to seven and then kick it away and then maybe get a stop and have a chance to tie. They went for the seven, didn't get it, and it was over. Yeah. They're just thin, and they had 16 non- Anthony Richardson carries on the day for 25 yards. And the whole idea is Stuyken, I think eventually is going to bring a good running game and Richardson will be a force multiplier, but for now, that's rough.

Although they did get your boy, Jake Funk, into an NFL game here. They got him in the 22. Alex Pierce, their second receiver, also got hurt. And they're a little thin at receiver to begin. Yeah. Jake Funk. Jake Funk. Jake Funk.

Jake Funk. Jake Funk. Get about Jake Funk. Five yards per carry. It's about Big Funk. Behind the glass. Randy Chavez. Anything else, Mark?

No, I'd say go watch it for yourselves and type up your own. What was the injury to Richardson exactly near the end of the game? I don't know. Like, they weren't clear about that. He walked, he left the field all right. It wasn't like he was. Ostensibly, the game's on the line and still in the balance, and he's not on the field.

It's Gardner me. I think they're playing it safe with him, but we'll wait and see. What's one of those little wins, too, where it's like they were trailing here. It's like at the end of the season when they're going to be hoping to win this division and battling for seeds, it's like, nice, put it in your pocket, put in your pocket. Put in your pocket, take a walk. Put in your pocket, take a walk. It wasn't an escape, but they just took them while to heat up.

To Baltimore, we go. Beckham to the left, flowers to the right. Now Flowers goes in motion to the left. Jackson, inside handoff, just as Hill spins in for six. Touchdown Ravens. That works, too. Same speed sweep look, faking it to Zay, giving the ball back until a day, giving the ball back until a counter coming back across the field

finding their rhythm no in the second half for this offense. And after the defense stops the Texans on a fourth and won, the offense cashes in. Jerry Sandusky with Rod Woodson on the call. W.B.A.L. Justice Hill scored twice in the second half

after J.K. Dobbins exited with an Achilles injury. More on that in a second. The Ravens pull away, 25-9 win over the Texans. Baltimore had just 265 total yards in this game. Lamar turned them all over twice, but the defense did the job against C.J. Stroud in his NFL debut, Greg, the Ravens bank a win to start the year, but at a serious cost.

Yeah, we have unfortunately lost J.K. Dobbins here for the season. It's a torn Achilles, according to our guy Ian Rappaport. I mean, Rappaport, and this is one of those injuries that you know right away, had that thing before they came out of halftime. And, you know, the injury was late in the second quarter. I'm just thinking, man, what a deflating way to, like, come out of the locker room if you're John Harbaugh, who probably at least had that information, even if the teammates didn't. And then by the end of the game, Ronnie Stanley, who to me is a real bellwether for this team, leaves with a knee injury, although they don't think it's serious.

And I did see him kind of celebrating later in the game, so that's a good sign, but he's getting an MRI. Marcus Williams, their great safety is getting an MRI. And then they're starting center. Tyler Linderbaum got his ankle rolled up, just eyeball test that Linderbom. bomb one did not look great either. So a lot of positives for the Ravens and then major negatives there. Here's a harbaugh on

Dobbins, who you may recall was trying to get a contract ahead of this year and now kind of a devastating personal setback. J.K. has a torn Achilles, unfortunately. So that's going to end his season. That's just feel bad for him. It's not the way we expected this to go.

And he's worked really hard, but J.K. is a strong-minded individual. He's got a big heart. Very large spirit, and he's going to bounce back from this as well. I mean, so Torn Achilles also leaves in question what he'd even look like when he returns, you know, a year from now. If it's then, like, you've lost your best running back, wait and see on two-fifths of your offensive line. We already talked about how, like, shallow this cornerback group was, so to lose your safety behind them, it's like we're three or four hours into their season, and they're in tatters. Yeah, I think they survived training camp for once without major injuries.

And they'll come out of this hoping that Dobbins is the only one that's really long term. But that's what we'll have to wait until Monday to find out. These could be multiple weak injuries. The positive is some of the things they talked about all offseason in the receiver room. To me, bore fruit. I mean, Zay Flowers, they've missed on so many of these draft picks over the years with the wide receivers. And as long as he's healthy man, Zay Flowers is a hit. We don't need to see anymore.

seven for or nine for 78 and man it was nice to have an offensive coordinator creatively mixing up touches for a specific receiver in this case flower munkin pop and a guy making plays for lamar jackson just like whenever they needed to play zay flowers very much was the guy making it on his own i do feel like munkin's got a work on his uh when they because he's up in the booth he's not a sideline guy like they cut up to him and i know things were a little shaky out of the gate but every time they showed munkin he looked kind of frazzled and nervous says, like, you just got to work on, like, I got this under control. He just struck me that way, because I don't...

They were a little frazzled offensively. Like, this game, the score and everything, it wasn't that competitive, but they only had 265 yards of offense. Lamar was kind of sloppy. I mean, he had an interception. He had two fumbles. It wasn't, like, the cleanest offensive performance, but their defense was too good. What did you see from Stroud in his debut?

I actually saw a lot of good. I think he made five or six throws in this game that just made you excited if you're a Texans fan. Their offensive line, though, was a total mess and didn't give him a chance for much of the game. Like, there was a lot of pressure on him. I think if you're a Ravens fan, David Ajabo, who they were hoping can make some in back, stepped up Adafay-O-Wa. Like, their pass rush really got after it. They had an injury on their offensive line, too. But Stroud made some big clunking mistakes and some really nice plays, too. All right. And by the way, Odo Beckham, back in the league.

Do you look like O'Dell? Two catches, yes. He didn't have a catch until late in the third quarter, but he didn't. did have two nice catches and drew two pass interferences. Bateman had a couple plays. It was like they did enough where it's like okay, you see the beginnings of it. All right. So we'll head from Baltimore to Minnesota where

the Vikings set an NFL record going 11 and 0 in one score games. Spoiler alert, another one score game started their 23 season. But with a different outcome. Buccaneers line up in a shotgun formation third down 10 two minutes left for snap good bell high the throw far side and it's

caught ball is it in bounds it is in bounds and godwin has a huge catch on third down to 10 it's a diving catch on the far sideline and the bucket here's good ice this game now this is a 10 yard speed out the defender has his back to the sideline and godwin makes a fingertip catch just beyond the first down marker and we should be able to run it out from here james Deckerhoff with the call WFUS Baker to Godwin you didn't hear that a lot in this game

but when it mattered most the two connected on the strike that iced a 2017 win for the bucks over the Vikings so yeah and it would be very very on brand for this particular Star Cross franchise the Vikings to go winless in one-score games this year.

Putting it out there. All right. Just put it out there. That's rude. Let's start with the bucks. There's a lot to get to with the Vikings in this game. My God. But let me start with Baker, who looked utterly lost with the rest of the offense early in

this game, but it all kind of changed on their last possession before halftime. Like the Vikings kept leaving the door open with dumb turnovers. and not taking full advantage of opportunities. So there was this feeling that a game that the Vikings were totally in control of, well, it wasn't. So it was only 10-3 when Baker takes over and goes right down the field, 61 yards and 90 seconds and hits Mike Evans in stride for a touchdown pass, gets the game tied at half, then he comes right out after the half,

and then Baker, and this is the thing we know about Baker. Baker is a very inconsistent quarterback who's prone to long lapses, of ineffective play, but he'll get hot. He gets a little hot. And when he starts feeling himself a little bit, some of those gunslinger throws seem to find open receivers and the offense can start to move. So back to back, he goes 16, place 75 yards for a touchdown,

this time to Trey Palmer, seven yards. And all of a sudden they go from down 103 to up 1710. The Vikings pull even in the fourth quarter, early in the fourth quarter, but then their offense just kind of goes to sleep. they can't find a way to make it work and the bucks kick the 57-yard field goal. I thought Chase

McLaughlin kind of bailed out Todd Bowles on a fourth and three that I thought they should have gone for it. But sometimes you... That's such a Todd Bulls decision. Sometimes though, like I say that and it is very Todd Bowls and I felt like they should have gone for it. But man, kickers hit 57-yarders now. And it's in the dome and the perfect conditions and he hit it. And then they made it stand up after the Vikings go three

out on offense. Brian Flores' defense needs to get a stop to get the ball back and he can't do it. And that was this game. The Bucks getting hot on offense and then the defense finding a way to kind of shut down Justin Jefferson, Kurt Cousins, and they kind of steal one here in Minnesota. I saw Mayfield also convert with his legs on a very Baker Mayfieldish run. Yes. I think he's obviously just fuels off of emotion and self-emotion and what's going on around

him and probably all the doubts of people that just sort of rode them off entirely. I don't think any of this happens without these Vikings turnovers, though. Yeah, they had three turnovers in the first half alone. They had an off-sides on defense on fourth and less than five that took a three-point field go off the board and led to the touchdown in the third quarter by Tampa Bay. Look at the final score. That was painful. And it was just, it's that thing.

And you look at the, you look at, this is the thing about the Vikings. Oh, my God, they'll just drive you crazy. Kirk Cousins, 33 of 44, 34, 34 yards, averaging nearly eight yards in attempt, two touchdowns a pick, pass rating over 100. That's always a good, it's always a good box score. But then the game, you watch the game and it just, it doesn't all come together. And the first, the game plan in terms of a running game without Davin Cook, was very stilted. They averaged less than two and a half yards per carry on 17 rushes.

They couldn't find a way, even though Justin Jefferson finished with 150 yards, he got the bulk of that in the first half. They couldn't find a way to make it happen in the second half. And it was just a lot of frustration. And a game they had, in my opinion, no business losing. But maybe the margin of error is not as big as I realized between Tampa Bay and Minnesota, two teams that played a very close game and one came out ahead. was technically the biggest upset of the week

because I think the closing line was bigger in this game than it was even for the Lions or for the Rams, which were both big upsets too. But the Vikings, like, this is regression like in game form because they outgained them by like 120 yards and then they lose at the end and there's a couple little plays but like didn't the Vikings win so many games like that last year where they looked like the inferior team, but they won it at the end?

And also if you're like, We're coming off a week, okay? We're like the lions, everyone feels great about the lions. You've got to feel good about the Packers and the Vikings who won the division last year. It's like, this is about as big of a letdown in week one as you could have imagined for them. Yeah, when they got the touchdown to tie it up at 17, they have two more possessions after that. Three and out, gained three yards in punt. Three and out, game three yards in time.

Wow. And I'm not going to put it on floors or the day, but then they could. going to get the ball back in those last four minutes of game time. So it was just kind of the whole team did not have an ability to seize the moment. So while this doesn't make me feel necessarily bullish about the bucks, it does plant a seat of doubt about the Vikings and everything that went well last year. What if things, what do they call it regression? Yeah.

The regression of it all. And then if Claibon was next to me, he would say that has nothing to do with last season and this is this season. I don't know. doesn't exist and all that stuff. But I don't know, sports, it's funny how things tend to balance out in the cosmic. I don't think Claibon should, like, maybe just, like, all of us, stay quiet on one of the few off-season narratives that we all sort of hit on.

The Vikings are regression. Are you telling the imaginary Claibon to be quiet? No, I'm just saying if he's listening to this, I think there's a little more mathematical, like, lot of of the regression. I don't want to put Pat in a situation where you can't answer to these comments. However, yeah, the Vikings won a lot of games like this last year and this one they didn't. And I think that building's emptying out in Minnesota today

and they're like, wait, how did we lose that game? And last year, every time there was a game like this, it was like, wow, how do we win that? They did. Well, one more weird note. This is courtesy of next gen stats, Rashad White of the Bucks, recorded a negative 38 rushing yards over expectation in this game. It's hard to do.

Under expectation. I guess would be the way to do it. But I know that's how they say it. That's a tough spot. I don't know even how that works. That's beyond me, but that seems like something it would be hard to do. From that angle, it's an achievement.

Minus 38. Did he just trip and fall a couple of times? I'm not sure. That one's, you know what? I'm going to put you on that one. He finished 17 for 39. I got to say, when I watch this game, and I'm curious.

For a second, I thought maybe this would be a good NFL plus next day watch because it was so weird. But when I watch this one on game pass on NFL plus, I will keep an eye on how he lost 37 yards under expectation. And then we could reconnect ahead of week. Because he only gave 39. So that's like, that's a lot. There's a lot.

There's a lot to break down. Maybe they put the wrong person on that grade. Let's take a break and we will finish out the games. What's up everybody? Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the Sticks, we take you inside the game from Scouting Report. and player development to team-building philosophies,

coaching trends in how front offices construct winning rosters. Every week, we study the tape, talk to decision-makers, and share the insights you won't find anywhere else. It's the kind of conversation that connects the dots, from college football prospects to the NFL stars of tomorrow. We break down the draft, analyze matchups, and evaluate how teams put it all together on game day. Plus, we dig in the coaching strategies,

roster construction, and the trends that shape the league year after year. Whether you're a die-hard fan or just love understanding the game on a deeper level, we give you the full picture. If you want insight that goes beyond the box score, this podcast is for you. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Six podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this is Matt Jones. I'm Drew Franklin. And this is NFL Cover Zero.

We're just here to try to give you an NFL perspective a little bit. different? Did you see the Colts Pretzel? That was my other big takeaway from that game. What was that? Oh, my. We think NFL coverage should be informative and entertaining. And twice a week, that is exactly what you're going to get. Listen to NFL Cover Zero with Matt Jones and Drew Franklin on the IHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. I'm Marcus Grant. And I'm Michael F. Florio, and together we host the NFL fantasy football podcast. Ready to dominate your fantasy league this season?

Then you need the NFL fantasy football podcast, your ultimate source for player news, draft tips, and winning strategies. Whether you're a rookie manager or a fantasy vet. We've got the insight to help you crush your opponents. Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football Podcast on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL, visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. All right, let's head to the Bayou. Craig, I went to Tulane.

Gotcha. That's you. That old one. How about the green wave? They won this weekend, didn't that? They did not. Oh, they didn't. They did not.

They did. They did. And that is going to be a touchdown to Rasheed Shahee. Great name. Speaking of great names, Little Jordan. Humphreys scored a touchdown today. In Denver. Friend of the show.

Yeah. Yes. Kind of. Mike Keith with a call, WGFX. Derek Carr in his Saints debut. Pass for 305 yards and a touchdown. And a 41-yard pass to that man, Rashid Shahid, on 30 and 6 in the final minutes, help the Saints run out the clock,

and a 16-15 win over the Titan. Who was on this one? I was. Gregi, we just talked about a Vikings team and fan base that are sick about losing this game. I saw some angry Titans fans, maybe Gravedigger in my feet and others. How do we not find a way against the Saints in this one? There were some questionable calls, and we can get to that. But the Titans fans should stop crying because sometimes the game is won by who has the guts.

You know, who's the bold team? And after getting beaten down in the first half, Derek Carr took four sacks and eight QB hits in the first half alone. This is outrageous. Wow. He came back strong in the fourth quarter. And I want to compare him to what Mike Rabel did. Late in this game, they had a second and 14.

They're leading by a point there. Derek Carr's first game of the Saints, the Titans are running short on timeouts. You think that the Saints would run the ball then? No, they have faith in Derrick. They throw it on second and 14, eight yards to Michael Thomas. Okay, then it's third and medium. You think maybe they'll run, maybe they'll throw, we'll see.

They dial it up 41 yards down the field to Rashid Shaheed with the one point lead and they get it done. And comparing that to Mike Rable, who had one of the most cowardly field goals I've ever seen on the 11-yard line with two and a half minutes to go. To me, that was different. the Titans played not to lose, the Saints played to win. And the Saints' defense, to their credit, did not allow a touchdown. Picked off Ryan Tannahill three times,

sacked him three times, stopped Tennessee on 10 of 12 third down plays. Speaking of Gravedigger, our former producer, shout out to Justin. He said he thought it was Tana Hill's worst game ever as a Titan. I mean,

Tana Hill has been underrated as a Titans quarterback from wire to wire. And I've always thought that like he was more fun to watch in my type of passer than others out there. but when I see the three picks and 11 passes defense

was it Tanna Hill just like is he at the end or does he, is he working with a cast of receivers who aren't getting open for him on some level too? The receivers maybe weren't that open and he definitely forced some in there to DeAndre Hopkins almost felt

like desperate but it was a nightmare game. If either of those guys behind him Willis or Levis played well in the preseason it was such a bad game you'd already be here and talk about it because he had the three picks. There were two more that were dropped, and then there were two more plays that they dialed up. One was kind of a flea flicker type of play where they passed it back to Tannhill, and it was a touchdown to O'Conquo, and Tannhill just missed him. And then later, I think

it was the fourth quarter, they dialed up another, like, nicely designed play, and they get Taji Spears, who looked really good and limited work. It was on the field quite a bit, wide open down the field, Tannehill missed that too. So in Mike Rable's defense, for a little context, that field goal that he kicked, it was fourth and six from the Saints 11-yard line down four with two and a half minutes to go. Oh, no, no, no, no. And so maybe, but what was I got to say is like, maybe it was just like, my quarterback stinks

right now. Zero confidence that they're going to convert. Right. So I'm going to kick the field goal. But you've been through the wars together. And you got down to the 11th. Hopkins on your team now, one of the great red zone receivers of the last 15 years, throw a ball up.

Go win a ball game. And to be fair to Tannahill, you had two fairly long drives in the fourth quarter. Both of them ended in field goals, but he got them down there with some nice throws. He just kept throwing it into tight windows and it was tough to watch. Like, I don't come out of this, like, whatever. I want to examine this deeply, but like the Derek Carr experience, I've been, I just been insane. I think it's going to be frustrating for Saints fans when they go through it from week to

week. And like, I don't know. What are we dealing with here? Yeah, but this was kind of it, though. Like, he was disappointing the first half, and there was a play he made in the fourth quarter where a Titan almost took his life. He hit him so hard.

And Carr put it right on the money. And then in money time, he puts it to Shahid. So after such a brutal first half, where I kind of was having similar comments, Mark, I mean, we were talking about it a little bit. On Twitter. Yeah, he was frustrated to me. He struggled.

But the fact that he kind of bounced back. from that and played well at the end. You got to give it up to him. Chris Lave 8 for 112, too, by the way, offensive player the year, candidacy is alive. To your point about the brutality, Carr said that was one of the more physical games I've played in my 10 years.

We showed that we could win the ultimate physical type of game. Well, we'll see about that. Right. His offensive line needs to have it not be so physical as left tackle Trevor Penning got worked by Ardenki. Titans just got to be better on offense. Henry didn't break the big one you know, obviously Tanna Hill's got to play better

and how did Hopkins look? Did he make any plays where he looked like old New Cockens, Hopkins, or was he old? Some tough contested catches, but not a lot of separation there. 13 target, seven catches, 65 yards. They just don't have a lot of other players on this team. Trayland Burke's 2 for 18.

All right, let's head to Atlanta. Aetown. You've got Alger and Smith and an eye. You got two players, Pitts and Smith. And here's the give to Alger a little balky, but Tyler will score. Left side goes Tyler Alger and he bangs home his second touchdown of the day. Bang it home. I like that.

Bang it home. Oh, look at Arthur Smith. Arthur Smith looks like he's going down the conference table after a FedEx quarterly meeting. We just scored $3 billion for the week. No. West Durham with a call WZGC Yippee

Tyler Algier Suppose it afterthought after the arrival of Bijon Robinson But not so Outtouched The rookie phenom Scored twice Was the goal line guy

What? You know what? I am convinced that Arthur Smith is a terrorist At least in the fantasy realm. I've been hearing this all day long. He's got two good running backs, and they'll both get used. Okay, but. Beech I got like 83 yards to touch and six catches.

24-10, Falcons over Panthers in a game that take care of business game. Yeah, I see you burying this down at the very back end of the lineup. That's cool. Is this a game that deserved higher placement? I enjoyed it. Greg enjoyed it, I know for certain reasons. would say this, after all the buzz, a very slow start

for the Falcons. I think you're right. He's going to continue Arthur Smith to annoy people because it's like, how long does it take to get Kyle Pitts into the game? Why are we not giving Bijon Robinson the ball? Drake London. Zero catches. And one target. He did not. But I think part of this problem,

I've not seen a start to a game like this. Desmond Ritter at one point, pretty deep into the first half, was four for four. four completions for zero yards. His first pass, which was a bit ominous, was a negative six-yard completion to himself. Then he threw a pass to Bijon Robinson,

who was stopped for negative six yards. Then he got 12 yards on the next year. It just went on and onward. It was like they couldn't get uncorked. But I will say Tyler out here. I didn't realize they count that, Mark. So in the box score, it is Desmond. Yeah.

One catch for minus six. For a while, it was like he was one for one for negative six yards. I was like, I love this. This is cool. I don't love it for what it means. Ritter was not a disaster, but there's a lot, they need to uncork like Pits in London and have that be part of their game. I think the thing that I saw, though, if you want to, like, project this out, you

do have two running backs. Tyler Algear on his second big run in a row. Your guy! Well, he is my guy, but you know what? Algae here. Algier is officially your guy. Yeah, he like, I could see it in his eyes a little bit. that he's sort of just been written off

as like, now you have Bijon, like, this guy who was the best rookie runner a year ago is just simply an afterthought. Like, they used, they didn't both. Bejohn Robinson, though. It's, he's going to have bigger box scores than this. It's the running. Like, he had a couple runs where you're just like,

oh, absolutely he's the guy. He is going to be what they think. But it's also, like, the ability to throw it to him in the flats. There was a play where, like, if you aren't on him in one second, he just took that instant, juked backwards, juked around you, and off he's gone.

And it's like they, I think it's going to take a little bit of time. They almost have like, I don't want to say too many weapons because it's not going to look like that when you see this. I don't have the right quarterback for all that. But if they get in their flow and you get to a point where like all these guys are involved, there's a lot to handle. We can get to the Bryce Young part of it too, but this Falcons defense, both defenses have made it tough on the opposing quarterback. But I saw something different with this Falcons defense. Well, the Falcons only had 221 yards of offense. At one point, I remember, you know, the Panthers were out getting him like 220 to 80.

Yeah. But Bijan, just that stop start on the touchdown, just chef's kiss. I mean, that's all you need to see. That's special. Good. How was Bryce Young? You know what else is good, by the way? While we have a little break in the action, I locked up this Falcons team over here on Falcons Corner.

Damn, we got to, should have joined me. We got to do something about this. If you wanted a more. Not a great start to the season for the locks. Could you create a more annoying start to the season than I hit I hit my lock and everyone else goes 0 and 1? No, we could like to answer your question, we could not create a more annoying start. You're definitely as annoying as possible right now. Thank you.

But credit to you, you got an early lead. Early lead. Very early. But that's, I'd take it. You know, taking out your lollipop just, yeah, for a lick. You don't, it's not time. It's just when it's, when you won it last year and then everyone goes out. self-lick in the lobby box.

I'm just saying it's rare to have a week. We want to talk about Bryce Young or more about Greg? No, just had to get it. Okay, what did you see from Bryce? I was up and down. He had Jesse Bates, who looks like he's going to be an incredible off-season edition for the Falcons, picked him off twice. The first one, he just didn't see Jesse.

He just didn't see the field. And the second one was as bad. And he nearly threw another bad pick into coverage. he attempted a couple deep balls that were, I don't know if it was a wide receiver thing, but they were overthrows. To say all that, though, I still think that there's something about him.

Like, there was zero panic. Like, he made some throws, too, and he let a touchdown drive at one point like that he had a nice throw to Hayden Hurst. There was just a calm to him. Even at the end of the game, I almost was like a lack of urgency, but I really just think as a rookie,

it was more like he was doing what Frank Reich wanted. You could see it, and it's like, I am totally willing, to be patient with him. Hey, Hayden Hurst, come back to me. You have a very celebrated young man as your quarterback, a high-profile rookie. You catch his first touchdown pass and you fire the ball into the second level.

It was not the right thing to do. They got it back. They got it back, though. Yeah, but I mean, he created that eight people probably to go do all that to get the ball back, you know, and a fan's annoyed. Anything else on this one, Mark? I mean, I think we can, Brian Burns was awesome. You don't have to say it.

No, no, but I think like the, he had done a nice job about it. Like, I get it. They didn't go blow their doors off, but I just think it's weak. It was a very weak one scenario. This is a Falcons type of game. I mean, even if this season goes exactly as we hope, there's going to be a lot of games like this. Yeah. All right.

So you got your little gimmy against the Panthers. Packers next week. I like that. That's a test. With the potential team of around the NFL waiting in week three. Wow. So a lot to be settled. Let's head to Landover.

12 minutes to go. Third and goal at the seven. Three wide receivers to the right, one to the left. Antonio Gibson flares out to the right. Cardinals bring four. Hal's got a good pocket, steps up, and now he's going to have to run for it. At the five, cuts back into the end zone.

Touchdown! Touchdown Washington! Sam Howe, a seven-yard scamper. A little bit of redemption for Sam. It's been a rough game for him. You'll love to see the young quarterback be able to put some points up on the board. Sam Howell, that's Bram Weinstein and Julie Donaldson on WBIG. Scrambles and the Washington commanders avert a disaster in week one,

let's call like it is, where the tanking Cardinals ahead in the fourth quarter before that Howl Scramble, allowing them to get out of town with a 20 to 16 win over the Cardinals. Greg, what did you see from howl you are high on these commanders? was your faith shaken at all by their performance in week one, despite getting the dumb. Yeah, a little bit. Howell was such a roller coaster that I was just thinking.

This will be fun, but a little worrisome that it was this much of a roller coaster, even against the Cardinals. I mean, he had so. Define the roller coaster, yeah, like what makes it? He had a bad pick. He had a very Baker-Mafielding fumble. It was a lot. Actually, a lot of it was Baker-Mafieldian.

I don't know. That's not a word. The good and the bad. Like, he was just trying stuff. Like, after he made the bad fumble, though, though, he had some darts that he almost shouldn't have tried to get some points late in the first half. And then you see him with the rushing touchdown that ultimately gets him to win. So it was just like, it was a lot.

That was what I would say was my Sam Howell experience. But I think it'll be a fun watch that he didn't dissuade me from that. So it wasn't like you weren't spooked by it. It was more just like, oh, this is going to be a roller coaster. Yes. I mean, maybe the Cardinals' defense will be better than expected. I did not expect them to be winning 16 to 10, you know, in the fourth quarter of this game and really limiting. But credit to Washington's defense played quite well. They were putting bad spots throughout the game.

There was a sequence when the Cardinals had the ball up 1610 where it was like negative one run, Dobbs then sacked for four, and then Montez Sweat forced a fumble with a sack. And that led to that short field. Sam Howell touched out. and the commander's defense kind of took over in the second half of this game. Even though they put up 16 points, like the commander's defense was pretty great. This was one of those games where I heard someone talk about the fact they were in a survivor pool with like 380 people and like 120 of them had picked Washington.

It's like you would just love to see that thing get torched down. I kind of felt myself like rooting for Arizona just to say, F you to everyone. You've been telling us all offseason that we stink up the joint. were terrible and they're on the doorstep of winning. I do think Josh Dobbs, like I'm looking at the box score, it's not like he's amazing or anything, but like he's competent.

He was competent. I was thinking it would be a tough... Too competent? If you're trying to get the number one person? I mean, he average... No, no. Make him disappear. Find someone's shi-er.

He's the perfect level of competence. Okay. Because, I mean, let's be real, he averaged four yards per attempt here. I mean, it wasn't... That's not competent. He just like, but he was under... He was under direct.

It was a lot of short stuff. Hollywood Brown was open a couple times, but yeah. Shout out to Dennis Gartick, though, a couple big-time sacks. I mean, like the sacks howl would take were like 18-yard sacks. That's what I sort of mean. It was just like it was wild, but they got through it and they won. Shout out to five sacks. Shout out to Commandos fans, by the way, who filled that building.

It was loud. It was loud. It was the first game with Josh Harris. Is that the owner now? That's right. And there were chants, goodbyes to former owner Dan Snyder. You had a bunch of legends show up that haven't been around lately. John Riggins, Champ Bailey, RG3.

Speaking of RG3, there's a lot better energy, Griffin said, per the AP. The team doesn't have the distractions. The community is back together. There was something sneaky big about this win, because with all that having been said, and there was a great vibe and the energy and everyone's going crazy, like when they were down 1610 in the fourth quarter, I was like, And this is a dark way for this to feel like all of this is just more of the same. So even if they have a slightly disappointing, the fact that this is the first game is nice.

You could just picture, you know, Snyder in some balcony with a giant like cigar cackling if they would have found a way to lose this game. But they did not. And as a result, it's a new beginning for the commandos. All right, which takes us to Sunday Night Football. The newly minted, re-signed and enriched Graham Ganoe. The nine-year veteran to sign a new contract will try a 45-yard field goal from the left half. And that ball is mishandled.

Blocked and picked up by the Cowboys defender on the right side line. It is Noah, even Bonamaghy, and he runs it in for a touchdown. Our friend Brad Sham, the Sham God, with the call. And you'll, he'll tell you who scored. Noah Igbignagny. Very nice, Gregi. One of the most grisly Sunday night affairs in the history of the game, at least on NBC. The Dallas Cowboys return a blocked field goal attempt, 75 plus yards.

And then just roll from there to a 40 to zero win over the New York Giants, which is, I'll tell you what, boys. there are bad losses and then there are and we just talking about week one it's just week one and then there are losses like happened to the Giants tonight and your fan base filling up that building

and then getting poured on it's one thing to get your ass kicked as a fan at a game but then to get poured on there's just something about that that's just a kick in the nards from God himself anyway Mark

Cowboys roll in stunning fashion and it was like every phase of the game put it to the Giants. The Cowboys had 26 points. 26 to nothing and I'd only put up two field goals. So it's like it was a complete and total collapse.

To the point, like I know everyone's going to say this is going to confirm everyone's, you know, issues and suspicions about New York. But I almost think this was one of these games. You had a met a playoff team. Well, but I think this is one of these games that got so out of hand so early. Greg, go with a little shot.

And the weather, well, we'll see. I mean, that's what I'm saying. Like, let's all overreact to it. Like, I think the Cowboys came out ready to go, coached well in every possible way. I'm beguiled by what I've seen from New York tonight because Brian Dayball was one of the better coaches around last year. The thing I don't get in this game,

if you're watching it visually, that it was an absolute downpour. It stops raining at some point, but the game is so far to hand. And we're watching Daniel Jones take a seventh sack, like late in this thing, soaking wet. Why are any of these guys still in here?

That's the old, I can almost guarantee it, and maybe they'll ask him about it after the game. The old, we just wanted to get something positive out of the end of the game that we could, like, roll into next week. But I thought that was foolish, and he got creamed a couple of times. And, yeah, but, but for the Cowboys, Greg, this is a game that, I talked about it. Like, I picked the Cowboys to win the division because when we're there in the summer

and we look at their roster, it's like, It's all there. Like this is, we've been waiting for this team to get over the hump for years and years and years. Then you see a performance like this and you're like, okay, you could see it. You could see the path to greatness for this team. Right. To Mark's point, we're nobody's underdog. They're not.

They're not anybody's underdog. Like, yes, it's somewhat fluky that you get Igbonogany running up the silence. Now you're just bragging. Just traded for him, by the way, for Kelvin Joseph. I mean, that worked out nice. Nice move. And then you get a, they called it a pick six on Daniel Jones, but. It was ultimately a drop by Barclay.

I thought it should have been a catch and a fumble. That's returned for six. But that doesn't explain the 12 quarterback hits, the eight passes defense, the seven sacks, everything they did defensively to Daniel Jones, who threw the ball 28 times and had 104 yards. I mean, there was a point in this game. Let's take you back to a more innocent time. And you're right. Like, sure, it's only week one and things could change.

I'm not writing it off as a non-event. All I mean is these fans can't get tonight back and the next week back. That was just the most miserable experience possible that, like, that happened and that was terrible. But there was a point in this game. They had a perfect first drive. They were running the ball well.

Saquan had a bunch of good runs. It's third and two. And then it all started with an Andrew Thomas false start. And then the new rookie center throws a ground ball for ends up getting sacked for Daniel Jones and then it just goes freaking haywire. These were more innocent times back then the first quarter.

Like Chris Collinsworth is really talking up. It's like talking up like this giant's running game and how it's going to be tough for the Cowboys all night. And NFL's dying on Park Avenue. You know, they circle this as a big opener to the season. Will they make a profit this season? TBD. They absolutely, absolutely lost the entire country by halftime

because it was just a non-event. It was a non-competition. This from Andrew Siciliano, the great Siciliano, via opta stats. Cowboys have now beaten the Giants 11 out of the last 12 by a combined plus 389. This is no rivalry. This is one-sided and it's butt-whippin. Not tonight. Not tonight.

And so the cowboys are going to feel great. And the giants, like, again, there are a lot. And then there's games like this where dable's going to be really tested because you want to flush this one. It's a classic bury of the ball game. But to do it at home against a rival to no show at this level. I mean, you couldn't ask for, we talk about like what better way for the Packers to start a new era? What worse way for the Giants to try to build off last season's optimism with one of the all-time eggs for the franchise in primetime history? Well, and we grew up in Giants territory.

you know, like we both have, and Greg's, maybe less so up in Massachusetts, but like there are so many friends that I have just on text threads with who are Giants fans. And it's easy for us to say, hey, you know, be chill about week one, look at it from a distance, it's a long season. Like, this is your rival. You just got wiped 40 to nothing on television with the entire, with the skies erupting on top of you. This is about as ugly as it gets.

After you spent all offseason trying to tell people, know that what we did last year is the Giants was more legitimate than you believe. That's what I believed. Well, the last time they were on the field, too, they weren't competitive against the division rival in a much bigger spot. The divisional shows you where they might be at. Playoffs. And I think they'll be better.

And they're very lucky to have the Cardinals in week two that's a perfect opportunity. Then it goes 49ers, Seahawks, Dolphins. I just mean you really are needing a win next week and that's a good chance. Do you say I think they'll be better? They'll be better. They will be better next week. They will be better. So that's good.

But the things I came into the season having concerns about, namely their pass protection, their explosive plays on offense. And then they're cornerbacks. And we didn't see a lot of that because DAC only had to throw the ball 24 times for 143 yards. But your boy's Addy, who's got to be feeling good right now. He had a couple nice plays where they got C.D. Lam pretty wide open early. They just didn't need to do much. A couple nice red zone plays, too. They did everything they needed to do often.

I mean, that's a head coach prepares an entire team, and they dominated in every phase. And that Giants bar is subterranean right now. So they will clear the bar next week and the weeks that follow. Well, there might be some bars filled with Giants supporters tonight. Soaked. Soaking wet. I mean, it's one thing.

You lose. You go to the stadium. You pay $85 to park. You buy $20 beers. your tailgate for hours. You build a whole day around. You might even get a fight with your spouse because it's like,

I thought you were just going to the game, but now you're leaving at 2 p.m. What about the kids? What about the? And then you come home at night, and you're drenched, and you're angry. And guess what? You just punted Sunday to your wife or spouse,

and now she's like, you're doing everything on Monday. And now Jet Life Stadium opens up the next night. The other gentlemen, the other New York, Okay, okay. Save it for the Monday night football recap. There we go. It could get worse. Just put it that way. Well, what's the weather report? And you did not, you did, yeah, you did not have it to have a good time on top of all that. That's what I'm saying. I mean, when you, when you

disappear, it's like, I thought it was an 8 o'clock kickoff. It's like, yeah, but I got to go pick up Tom and we got to stop over at ShopRite and we got to do this and that. Like, uh-oh. I was got to say this is the worst, the worst prime time performance. On that scenario. Since there was a Josh Freeman game that was crazy, there was one against Cam Newton in prime time that was particularly dark, but this might be even worse.

This might be even worse to start the season. I think Dan and I watch that Giants Cam Newton game. We did at that old bar in that rat hole. That old west side, that old west side rattle. Tomorrow's weather for guys, who cares? Let's get out of here. But before we do, a reminder that tomorrow Monday is, new era for around the NFL we have our Monday reaction show it's a shortened version of the

podcast that just it's almost like a news rundown the rundown it's a news rundown of everything that in the old days in the past for this podcast we'd be sitting on for a day or two too long and now we are going to give you an instant reaction in the latest from the fallout from sunday's action whether it's injury updates or press conferences things that kind of slip through the crack today. Now we're going to be covered on Monday with a short show. Also Monday night recap. Monday night football Jets versus Bills. Oh my God. I'm legitimately nervous. That is going to be something we hit tomorrow night. So you get two separate podcasts drop it into your feed. Keep up. It's okay. We don't have anything on Tuesday. So you have time to get through it all. And yes, we had our first NFL plus offering on Thursday. I thought it went well. The fans seemed to enjoy it. It was fun. Yeah. And the people, international viewers were wondering when it would arrive. It did land as we work out the kinks and you were able to check it out. Hopefully by now, so check out that one.

And we got another one every Monday. We have our NFL plus exclusive game of the week. And the game of the week this week is Mark. Dolphins Chargers. Bang. So we're going to watch that game together. And we have a great. With a condensed run time of 74 minutes.

I'm predicting. No, much shorter. Like 30 to 40. Drew Christensen, our super producer, will work with us on that, putting together a fun package, reliving that game, and we'll react to it as we watch together.

I feel like we're missing a chance here, though. I know that was what we had decided on, but that was before Cowboys 40 Giants. I personally would love to relive this. I would imagine that there's parts of your inner psyche that enjoy what happened. My outer psyche is into it, too. It's all good.

Can't make up what happened, though, on those two days. Those two Sundays in February. Nothing's going to ever change that. The second one, people don't believe it, but the second one, that was one was even worse. All right. So that's it. So two new podcasts on Monday and the NFL Plus for people that are subscribed,

the NFL Plus Monday Night Recap, and you can get that on Dazone as well, international people. That's it. Thank you to a big funk, Randy and Eric Roberts and their maiden voyage together on this particular program. Not an easy one. Got to get Erica's sexier nickname. Eat the call. Hey, everybody, Daniel Jeremiah here.

And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move to Six, we take you inside the game from breaking down college prospects and NFL rookies to evaluating team building philosophies, coaching trends, and how front offices construct winning rosters. We study the tape, talk to decision makers, and give you a perspective, you won't find anywhere else. It's everything you need to understand the why behind what happens on Sunday. Don't miss it.

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