NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - 2026 NFC Win Totals Draft with Dave Dameshek

Episode Date: September 2, 2026

Gregg Rosenthal and Dave Dameshek take a look at the NFC win totals and draft the over or unders that they feel most confident in headed into the 2026 NFL season. Can the Rams and Eagles get over their totals? Gregg and Dave find themselves on opposite sides of the Lions win total, which side are you on? Are the Cardinals being disrespected with their number? Who will come out on top of a possibly lackluster NFC South?NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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are you ready to dominate your fantasy league this season because if you aren't locked in with us on the nfl fantasy football show you're already playing from behind you're already playing from behind Whether you're a first-time player or a grizzled vet chasing another championship, we give you the advantage and the confidence you need to make every move counts. Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football Show on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Welcome to NFL Daily, where we're looking good with some salt and pepper in our hair. I'm Greg Rosenthal.

I'm joined by my friend Dave Damasek. No one rocking the grizzled facial hair and improving his hair. looks with age more than Dave Damashek right now, the host of Football America. You can catch it as a podcast. He's with Levitart and their whole crew over there. You can catch it on YouTube. Welcome, Dave. We're going to do some NFC over unders.

Are you ready? I'm ready, the boss. Let's get into it, fella. And yeah, you are looking handsome. I think these cross-country trips with you down to my... You're in Miami right now, right? That's where you record sometimes. That's right.

I wanted to check it. the sleeper team of pro football, 2026. I had to check in on the Miami Dolphins with my own two eyes. Three and a half wins over under. And they were one of the teams we didn't choose on our AFC over under. You can check that out. Our win totals with Nick Wright. But I would have gone over because I just think it's hard to lose 15 games,

although they could certainly do it. I agree. Well, I agree for the most part, except that they've announced that they don't want to win games this year. So I think it's, I do kind of lean under the meager three and a half. That's why I didn't pick it. Was I just avoided it? Maybe we'll take the other team.

Well, Malik Willis does want to win games as it happens. Yes. The players want to win. The defense has some players. There's only two teams in the NFL that are actually even under five and a half wins in terms of their win total. It's both the Cardinals at three and a half. The Dolphins at three and a half.

We'll see if we get to the Cardinals on this show. The format, relatively simple. we go win totals we pick an over or an under we draft it if I chose you know a team

that I thought is going to be great you can still go opposite me and we can you know we can clash on them we did that with the Chargers with the AFC I will give you the first pick so you can choose

any team you want in the league over under what do you feel the strongest about in the entire NFC all right I'm perusing the board here I mean the first thing that jumps out at you

is how funny the entire South is that the high end expectation for just one of the four teams is the Buccaneers at eight and a half. That makes me laugh. And then you have the Rams at 11 and a half at the high end of the NFC. I am going to go with and I'll start right out of the gate with an adjacent hot take. I don't think this team is winning the division, but I do think they're going to win 11 games. That's the Philadelphia Eagles. Ooh, I like that. In the end, just as an exercise.

size, because I just kind of want to put it down on paper. I landed, you know, I did a pick for all of them. And I think they would have made my board. If we get through about seven or eight picks, they were towards the bottom. I'm with you. Why are you sneaky optimistic on a team that has a very high win total? Ten and a half is, is, I believe, second highest in the entire NFC, in the entire NFL. Why do you think they get over it? You know, the buzz is hard to push back on. It doesn't make a lot of sense to my two eyes, but addition by subtraction with AJ Brown moving on, somehow he was disruptive or his relationship with Jalen Hertz was. And that remains gray what's going on with their quarterback and what wasn't working last year, but he's modified his behavior. And now it's

better. And as much as it's the quarterback league, and you and I have talked about this for the last three years now, would you rather have the offensive play call or the best in the biz or one of those high-end quarterbacks, you might say you'd rather have Kyle Shanahan than Brock Purdy as a for instance. So, given that that's the case,

how do we explain Nick Siriani? It's really weird. I was going to say, do they have either? We are hopeful that John Mannion coming from Green Bay in implementing a very new system is going to be better. I think it's going to help the running game. I think it could be bumpy

along the way. And so this is maybe why I had them a little lower. But I would have gone on the same side as you because the schedule's tough for the Eagles team, you know, just this first place schedule and everything. It is difficult. I liked what they said, though, when they asked about, is this a do-or-die-year? And by they, I mean, Howie Roseman, for Jalen Hertz. And he's like, no, it's not. You know how many games Jailen Hertz has won? And to make your Siriani point, you want them to go over 10 and a half. Here's Nick Siriani's win total's last four years. I know. 11, 14, 11, 14. 11, 14.

How many rosters You've taken over them? Like, I'm with you. And how many seasons was it talked about during the season? We got to get rid of this guy already. It makes no sense. He's been to two Super Bowls. He won one of them.

Both of them were against the Kansas City Chiefs. And in the off years, he almost got fired, like I say, you know, the foundation for that team as much as any over the last decade, why they've been playoff relevant, is the line of scrimmage.

are poked it up. I think they're a tick diminished on the offensive side of the line of scrimmage, but that defense is so mighty that it's going to offset any struggles that you point to with the offense rightly. And I think trying to replace A.J. Brown with a couple of few options and see if you can sort of flood the zone. I mean, you know, quality may be dinged a bit there, but there's still some quality among that quantity that they brought in there. It's more about the defense for me, though, and it's going to carry the day most weeks, and that's why I think

it's not that tough a prediction to say that they're going to get to 11 wins based on exactly what you just said. Some voodoo's going on there that Nick Sirionic win in 11 games or more. I don't think there's many rosters in the entire N if I would take over them.

Defense, you're absolutely right. It's the best one of the Howie Roseman era, I think. And, you look, it could be the best Eagles defense since Buddy Ryan was the defensive coordinator. Well, I don't want to... Jerome Brown and Reggie White and Clyde Simmons. We got to go. We're going to move. Oh, you cut me off. That's fine. That's what makes you

the boss. Cheers to you. Okay, now I feel bad about it. What did you want to say about these old... Ah, you know, I love my Jenga theory. Jalen Carter might be the Jenga piece of the NFC. Yeah, that's a good call. Unless Bukinakou is. That's a good call. Because if they get full Jalen Carter,

what they expect, um, could go to another level. He could be better than he was a year ago. But if, but if he's not that dude, it might all fall apart. Lane Johnson's a little bit that way on the offensive tide, too. I agree with you about the offensive line. I have stronger takes on the NFC, I believe, than the AFC. My number one pick on the entire board, I hate to do this to the beleaguered Falcons fan base, but in either conference, it's under Falcons seven and a half. Are you kidding me? I saw this, and I know the entire NFC South has inflated wind totals. If you're watching on YouTube, you'll see the Falcons, Panthers, and Saints are all at seven and a half.

The bucks are at eight and a half. So they're all little inflated because on paper, the schedule is easy. A, because they play each other. And out of division, it's not the toughest schedule either. I don't care. There's no pass rush. This could be the worst team in the entire NFL. Kevin Stefansky has no juice to me as a head coach.

Maybe he'll be right. Maybe the offensive line could work. It's been guys that's been around for a while. They bring in Bill Callahan, who used to be an offensive line guru. You can always make a case for the other side. But they coached up that defense really well with Jeff Elbrick last year, and they didn't really have the talent. And now you take away talent in James Pearson, Jalen Walker.

I just think with the quarterback situation, there is a better chance they are drafting top three than they are winning eight games. I really think that. I think they are the worst team in this division. and the vibes are all wrong. I am loving under Falcon 7.5. I like just about everything you said there, but I caution everybody when you get bullish about a team

and specifically about their season win total, take a look at the neighborhood that they inhabit. How heavy are the not one, but two games that they're going to have to play against potential heavyweights. That's a factor in, say, the NFC North here. The opposite is true here. The Falcons do have six games against the Bucks, Saints, and Panthers. There's a chance.

I mean, if there were a real heavyweight in that division, you would predict them to win 10 and a half and wreck the rest of the division, right? Yes, and we'll get to the Bucks at some point. But my point being, my point being is that they have six games that don't present as super rugged right out of the gate. And so if they win half of those, they're getting fairly close to that win total. That's the devil's damn check pushback. I just expected, I expected them to be at five and a half or six and a half.

So that number got me excited. And then on paper, like if you read the strength, the schedule, it says it's easy. But out of division, they play your AFC North, which I think is improved this year. And overall top to bottom is good except for the Browns. And the Browns could beat the Falcons. And then out of the division in the NFC, it's the NFC North, which has no easy games. And even one of like the stray games, like, you know, versus third place, it's like the 49ers. So I don't think it's that easy of a schedule.

I'm, this is the one. I love it. I love it. I'm just trying to present the opposing. You know, we can't give strict recommendations here at the league. You used to work here. You know the process, the gambling policy we have to sign. But this is the one of all the ones I feel best about.

All right, what's your number two pick? You're just sharing some vibes. All right. I'm going to go right to it here. We're talking about the North already. I'll say it. The Minnesota Vikings over eight and a half wins. And not they ask, but I'm going to say it anyway.

They're going to win that division outright. Wow. You've taken my Vikings optimism, and I would have drafted this as well, somewhat high. And you've made the take hotter. It actually annoys me because I'm thinking, well, we're doing a playoff prediction show. I know you're doing your, you know, getting to the top. of the mountains on, on your show and how you rank? Mount Lombardi.

We're, we're going to give our official playoff predictions on Thursday, but I'm definitely eyeing the Vikings as a wildcard team. I don't know if I can get there to win this division, but I'm with you. I love over eight and a half. Why do you like it? I can't wait to hear where who you do have winning that division and how many playoff teams the North is going to provide.

Yeah, you want to wind up on Mount Lombardi, which means you made the playoffs. You don't want to wind up on the don't matter horn. I think that's self-explanatory where, what that gets you, which is nothing. Listen, just as Shannie, the aforementioned one, has his Trey Lance. KOC has J.J. McCarthy now. Everybody swings and misses once.

The body of work, though, with KOC is he gets the best version of every quarterback he's ever worked with. And I suspect that we're going to see that with Kyler Murray here. Obviously, the weapons are grand on the offensive side of things. Brian Flores has worked magic with some mediocre units. It's not flawless on the defensive side with the Vikes, but it ain't bad either. And I think that in a division that is going to be, you know,

jukebox type of scores, I mean, all four are huge offenses. And so who is going to rise up in that division and play some deep? defense, I think it's the Vikings who have the best chance to do that. And that's the margin that provides them the division, I say. And one reason to be optimistic about the entire division is you get the NFC South out of division. So you got, you got to go three and one in those games or four and oh, but you can, you can beat up on those Falcons that I talked about. I couldn't think of like, what did they say video game scores? I don't know why I said jukebox scores. I couldn't, I couldn't think of the turn of phrase I wanted. It did age you a little bit.

But does every video game back in the day? Not for me, it wasn't. But then again, our video, people always do that, like, oh, video game scores. Like, are all video games super high? Don't some video games just have low scores? In Madden, unless you're playing like three-minute quarters, for the most part, Madden scores get pretty high. It's pretty rare to be a defense battle.

I know much more about the Madden world with an 11-year-old son right now that's very into it. Eric Roberts, go back and fix that thing up for me. Take away. Just take out the word jukebox and put in video games for me. Thank you. Eric points out the don't matter horn is so good. We are jealous of that. That's pretty outstanding.

I will go number two. Let's go optimistic. I might be overly influenced by watching hard knocks and coming away from it. Not only is Mike McDonald a great coach, but I think Mike McDonald might be the number one example of masculinity and leadership in the year 2026. Just become like Mike McDonald. He's everything you want. out of a leader. He's emotionally intelligent. He's buff. He can handle any situation. He's tough.

He's fair. Everyone loves him. And he's got a big old brain that beats the entire tree with Sean McVeigh and Kyle Shanion on the field. I'm such a fan of him. I think they just do things the right way. It's the one game between them and the Rams that bothered me. They are 10 and a half in terms of their win total. And ultimately, I want to go over on the Seahawks. I know the schedule gets. it's much tougher. The defense, like, it's possible, I suppose. The defense would not be as dominant because they were so good. And Darnold has his streaky plays.

But you only got to get to 11 wins here. I felt that was disrespectful, Damashek, and I'm going Seattle over 10 and a half. I agree with you. And spoiler alert, I came within a whisker of taking the Hawks to win the West for a lot of the reasons you said. First thing, though, with Mike McDonald. I keep hearing this about him.

What he doesn't seem to me, and it's not a knock on him, it is a distinction from 21st century head coaching versus 20th century. He's a far cry, and I'm not saying this positively or negatively, just as a statement of my perspective on it. He's like Bill Parcells is classic, like, leader of men, I'll shout you down because I'm running this show. I'm in charge, you know, and Bob Knight and all that kind of stuff. Mike McDonald strikes me as sort of wanting to be one of the guys more than anything else.

Well, that's why I said 21st century, but I think, and I don't know if you've watched it completely changed my view of Mike McDonald. And I haven't watched the last few hard knocks, but I thought this one was the best one in many years because I thought it was an example of like, okay, this is an organization that does it right. And I'm sure they gave him a nice edit. But the way he handles his players, I think he is, you know, he's tough on them when when he needs to be. but he's got like an innate leadership where they want to fight for him and he's not,

he's not too tough on him. I think he's like emotionally intelligent, but, you know, they're still running a tough, a tough system here. They're practicing hard. Like, I think he's getting the best out of him. And yeah, he's putting it all together. And he's not skipping leg day either, you know. I don't think this is chicken or the A kind of thing here.

I think that they came to respect him because he has proven himself to be a football genius, legitimately. I think you buy in. If you're like, clearly knows what he's doing after a season or so, proofs into putting and all that. The one-on-ones with the coaches

and the, that was what I got out of Hardknacks. It was like the one-on-ones with the players where he's actually talking about him. You're like, okay, this guy actually like, you know, he kind of knows how to, how to manage each different type of player. Without deep diving, Mike McDonnells,

I keep almost calling him Mike McDaniel, uh, uh, personality. It's, it's that he is not, Johnny charisma necessarily. He just seems like a regular guy's trying to fit in and win people over, not necessarily confident that he is.

He's just doing his best to be one of the guys and to provide a positive message, but clearly it is working. It worked on me. He seemed so comfortable in his skin. I think I almost needed that behind the scenes look to kind of see what he's really like. I don't think he is comfortable in his skin. That's my big takeaway. But either way, whatever he's doing is working.

The unsatisfying thing about this entire division is, whichever team you're on to win the thing, it's semi-unsatisfying in early September to say, but you won't really get a great sense of things and the hash won't really start to get settled until not just December, but late December. That's when these teams start going head to head, and that's when you'll see who ends up taking the division.

In the shorter term, we'll get a sense of these Seahawks in the middle of October. They go three straight primetime games. I think the first one is at Denver. So you'll get a sense of whether or not your 10 and a half is looking real good or whether it hangs in the balance. You got to win that first one, you know, over a touchdown favorite at home against the AFC champions.

But it's hard not to think about how the Super Bowl ended. All right, you're up with pick number three, check. All right, do I stay in the NFC West? I'm tempted to do that, or do I go, since I just took the Vikings, does that mean robbing Peter to pay Paul? Let's do it. Detroit Lions, under 10 and a half. Somebody has to come in last place in this division. Maybe it'll be the Packers, but I think it's going to be the Detroit Lions. And I talked to our mutual palmyna Kimes about this. She kind of sort of agreed, at least, about this. First of all, talk about robbing Peter to pay Paul. That's what the Bears did in the division. They took away Ben Johnson, who I had long, and a lot of other people agreed with me,

maybe he was the straw stir in that drink in Detroit. Maybe that's why they had that many era of boundless success or near boundless until they got to San Francisco and the ball bounced off of the DB into Brandon Iuk's arms. That may stand for all of time as the best chance that the Lions had of getting to a Super Bowl within this mini window. Ben Johnson now coaching not just somewhere else, but within the division. That hurts twice times two for Lions fans. You're left with Dan Campbell. I don't have a ton of confidence in the state of the defense right now. It's not fantasy football. If it were, I'd be bullish about the Lions. Top the bottom. Don't love that offensive line, especially with a team that is predicated on being physical. Jared Goff,

is as, you know, I'm happy for the guy. Because imagine you appear to be the answer for Sean McVeigh's Rams. And then he says, you're the only thing holding us back. Let's trade you for a guy who's a little bit better than they win the Super Bowl. And we thought Jared Gough for about a year or two, we treat it as a punchline. And now he's, you know, he's shown himself to be one of the better QBs in the league. I do think, though, given the other teams in the same neighborhood with them, those are, you know, bear, you know, I like the Vikes a lot.

The Bears are, well, I'm interested to see what you do with the Chicago Bears as a matter of fact. I think this is a big year in a sneaky way for Dan Campbell, and I think we've already seen the best of what this air is going to look like in Detroit. I want to believe, I was surprised and don't love the fact that they're 10 and a half, whereas the The Packers are a game below that, so are the Bears. So the Lions are the favorites. And I think that's because the underlying numbers showed they were a much better team than they were a year ago at 9 and 8. And in general, you know, they've had some bad injury luck, although they're starting the season without Kirby Joseph and Brian Branch. Those are a couple transactions that happened after we did our Cutdown Day episode.

So those two guys are starting on the PUP list. I do believe in the overall structure of it all. I do think they are the favorites. The 10 and a half in such a good division worries me a little bit, but I am tempted to just clash against you and go on the other side because that's what I feel about it. It wasn't really one of my top picks, but we'd save some time and it'd be good podcast. Let's go over. Let's go over. Let's clash.

We're going to be keeping track here at the end of the year. I'll go over. And they win the north as well? Yeah, I like them winning the North. I do. I feel less strong about the over 10 and a half because this division could just be gangbusters. Again, it's the out of division schedule

which helps them out a little bit. I love the start of the season for them. They open against the Saints. They're in Buffalo on a short week opening that stadium, which is definitely difficult. But then it's Jets, Panthers Cardinals, before they're by. If they can get to that buy very realistically at 4-1

with the wind in their sales and Dan Campbell, you know, feeling confident. I ultimately think they're more talented overall than any other team in this division. They could have four Hall of Famers on the roster right now, check. Aidan Hutchinson, Sewell, I mean, Jemir Gibbs and, you know, all these guys have a long way to go. But Jemir Gibbs and Amon Rock could be those guys. They're all just starting out. But these are guys in their prime that are pretty elite players. So I'm going with them.

I do agree with you. And it's not like the roster is an atrocity otherwise. And so somehow I'm using that against the lion's case. But I do see a lot of people leading with kind of like what you just did there, which is listing things as though we're talking about fantasy football. Yeah, Jemir Gitt would be a great guy to start your fantasy team with. I just don't love him in the equation of running behind that offensive line. And by the way, I'm not one to forecast injuries for anybody.

without any evidence that they're going to happen, except Jemir Gibbs is awful slight. How's he keep doing it, man? He's strong as hell, but you're right. I did the thing, which I try not to do in these exercises, which I went completely off my board just on a whim. Because the lion's over 10 and a half. I like it.

I actually had it, you know, as my 10th or 11 pick, you know, when I did my big board. But I do like it. And I want to stand for the lines. Give us a saucy one. Give us one a proper one. I'll go next. Now we're kind of out of order. Let's go commanders under seven and a half.

Another team that I think there's a world where they're drafting in the top five to ten, certainly. I worry about Jane Daniels staying healthy, certainly. But I also worry about Jaden Daniels in a system that he hasn't been familiar with, with an offensive line that doesn't look great with a first time head coordinator, David Blow. I know there's a lot of good young coordinators, but he was just starting on Thanksgiving. not that long ago. Now he's running this offense.

And then more than anything, I worry about the schedule. They play the NFC West. So that feels like three potential losses. And they play the underrated AFC South. I'm not going to say that's brutal, but I think they're worse than those teams. Two and a half good teams at least.

Yeah. Right. Even their third place scheduled teams, two of them are tricky. Minnesota in Cincinnati are on like their third place scheduled teams. And those are good third place teams. So you got two first time coordinating. D'Rante Jones and David Blow.

And what are the odds they both hit? Like the better odds are that one of those two and they don't have the most talented rosters in the world are going to be swimming and maybe a little in over their heads. And then it's a problem and you go down. I like everything you said. And somehow you manage to not just say

as a position group, the offensive line. You know, it is pretty much that simple, in my opinion. I'm no O line whiz. but from the people I know who are, they will tell you Laramie Tunsell was the one piece that they had on that, on that O line. He's now gone in that division in particular. That's bad. Yeah, I mean, look at the teams that they have to play a couple of times and what their particular strength is. Even the Giants who their win total is the same as at seven and a half.

The Giants, if nothing else you anticipate, are going to be able to heat up the QB. Oh, that doesn't probably favor Jaden Daniels and company going into that one. That's a savvy pick, I think. There's no shortcut for saving time, but saving money is simple. Just combine your car and home insurance with Bel Air Direct and save. Get a quote at bellair direct.com. You know the feeling. You make a pick in your fantasy draft in the entire room groans because they wanted that player.

Or you grab a small school rookie off waivers and you start him right before he goes off in primetime. There's no better feeling than crushing your fantasy football league. I'm JJ Zacharyason, host of the late round fantasy football podcast. Before your draft, our players to target and players to avoid episodes tell you exactly who to circle and who to cross off. We've got data-driven analysis, historical trends, and the strategies that separate winners from the rest. And your dominance doesn't stop with the draft. All season long, we have our 15 transactions, 10 trends, sleepers, and the mailback. a-driven quick-hitting episodes to help bring home that league trophy.

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Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football Show on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get. your podcast. Okay, now I've taken one more pick than you, because I went over on the lines, I went under on the commanders, what say you for your fourth pick? All right, we're talking about this division. Why don't I take their arch rival?

Although, do you know if you ask people, what's the best rivalry in the NFC East? I think, or my brain goes as an outsider, I would go Cowboys against Blank, and then you have to fill in. Is it Washington or is it Philly or is it the – what they will tell you is the people in it, it's the Giants and Eagles. That's the toughest rivalry there is.

Either way, I am going to say that the one that we perceive to be the biggest rival of the commies, the Dallas Cowboys, aka America's alleged team, Michael Irvin may say they have 10 more years as America's team to win a championship and then it moves. Too late, I already moved it Playmaker. It doesn't belong to you. I don't know what claim you have. to being America's team at this point.

But great news. You're going to win the NFC East this year. Wow. Ooh. I'm annoyed that going to go good. I agree so much. Yeah, I have agreed other than the Lions

with literally all your picks. And most of them were ones I was going to take. The Cowboys were coming up. I'm with you on Cowboys over nine and a half. I can't get there on winning the division necessarily. Why are you so excited? And do they get America's team back? The answer, Chuck, is simple.

They're the most popular team. I mean, it's still true. I don't know how you want to measure most popular. I don't think most people. If you said, what NFL team would you most like to see win the Super Bowl this year? I don't think that football watching fans would come back with the Dallas Cowboys. I bet you they'd come back with the bills or the lions. It's hard to measure, but I think in just terms of who has the most nationwide fans,

based on the TV numbers and like the web traffic back in the day, not that I traffic in that. It feels like it is the Cowboys. There's still all there are a lot, you know it, there's still a lot of Cowboys fans here in L.A. And the Raiders are still somehow number two. I think the Raiders are the second most popular team.

I mean, what it shows you is, is that a giant percentage of our society is a bunch of front runners, right? I mean, like if the popular teams are the Niners, the Packers, the Steelers, Patriots have now worked their way into that conversation as well. I wonder how they did that when they weren't that 25 years ago. And we're an aging society.

So, you know, we need the health care to be even worse, you know, to just start taking out all these Raiders and Cowboys fans. Oh, I didn't know exactly what you were getting at. I thought maybe you were saying in the NIL age that we need something to latch on to, something familiar. Either way, I like the, first of all, Christian Parker, talk about robbing Peter to pay Paul. And I don't think I'm using that colloquialism correctly. I keep saying it, but that's not what I mean to say.

You're taking something away from a division rival, which is a defensive whiz, away from Vic Fangio, who's learned at the knee of Vic Fangio in the division. Now he goes to Dallas with all those lessons he learned. And he understands, and it depends who you're talking to. And I wonder where you come down on this one, Greg. But a lot of people within the NFL will tell you, oh, that's a big thing to get somebody who is just in another team's building because they know

all the secrets. And then other guys will say, oh, that's nothing. Nobody knows about that. I'm inclined to think that Christian Parker probably does know some tendencies of the pieces of the, of the defense he just walked away from and probably the offense too, as it is. You know, it's wild to say, because when it happened, when the Micah Parsons deal went down, you thought, what are the Cowboys doing? I do think it's fair to say that they at least, at least it's a wash.

that it was a pretty good deal that they made with the Packers because look at what it's yielded at this point and you can start with Quinn and Williams. I think that's a great centerpiece for the defense, but I like the back end of the D as well. And then the offense is mighty. We already know that. I think that if you want to sort of play a theme,

you have the Cowboys on the NFC side, the Cincinnati Bengals on the AFC side, the thing you would say about them, And by the way, you would say in a hyper-specific way about the Texans, if they can just have an average run game, imagine how good they'll be. If the Bengals and Cowboys have even have average defenses, imagine how good those teams will be. Spoiler alert, both those defenses are going to be at least competent,

if not a little bit better than that. Yeah, you have the Bengals high up on Mount Lombardi. I can't quite get there. I'm there with you on the Cowboys. Does addition by subtraction work better? better than robbing Peter to pay Paul. Don't you throw my stupid things that I've said and mean that I expect me to explain them or make any sense of them?

I can't do that, Greg. The only thing that got in my way of the Cowboys, and I agree with you, I was going to draft them, is there are some really tough games on the schedule. The Ravens are their like extra 17th game. That was kind of a bad draw. They're facing the NFC West out of division. So those are three really tough games. You threw out the Cardinals game, obviously.

And then you got the two games against the Eagles. I agree it's going to help Christian Parker to know the Eagles' offense. By then, by the time they play, it's a Monday night game, week seven. That's going to be a doozy. There'll be a lot of tape of what this defense looks like. And Vic Fangio, I don't know if he's out scheming you. It's more about he does what he does. They do it well.

They coach it up well. I just think that there's too many good players on this team. I like this team. I think 10, 11 wins sounds about right. So I'm with you. I will go over, let's go back to the NFC South on the Bucks. I talked about how these numbers are inflated. The Bucks are at 8.5.

Breast of the division are at 7.5 because they get to play each other. I haven't loved the preseason vibes from the Bucks in terms of Baker Mayfield. and there's been injuries at wide receiver, and you do wonder, do they have enough juice offensively, just explosiveness? They have a lot of players that are like, okay, Emeka, Bucca and Godwin,

and, yeah, they bring in Kenny Gainwell. Like, I like Bucking Irving, like, Kda and so... It's like a lot of, like, solid. It's not a lot of guys you're worried about game planning for. That said, I'm very high on their defense, and I'm very high on their schedule, and their overall structure. And I was really wrong about being high on them a year ago.

I think they get to nine freaking wins at the very least. I'm feeling good about them getting to 10. So I'm actually surprised I waited this long to take them because this is one of my favorite picks, bucks over eight and a half. Well, if Ruben Bain takes off, I don't read anything into what you see in August, but I did buy him pre-draft. And so I anticipate him being good,

especially when the focus is still going to be on Vita V. And I think people have forgotten about Colise Can't see how good he was until he got heard early last season. So that's a great start to the Bucks defense conversation. Yeah, you know, I'm not going to push back real hard on saying any of these teams is, you know, their high end is nine and their low end is eight. Was that a Jordan Rodriguez, wisecrack? If it was, kudos to her.

That was. See, this is where I disagree with her. I still think there's a world, the Bucks win 12 games with this soft schedule, which is why I should have taken it earlier. Like, it's a legitimately good roster. Their edge group could be like one of the most improved groups in the league. They didn't just add Bain. They, you know, they get a kid back that was hurt last year. David Walker, that looks really good. They signed some free agents, Alcahaheen Mahath. Like, they have a lot of players there. And in the division stinks. So I think they could kind of be the bucks we thought they were going to be a year ago. Good line on the offense. They win 11 games. Maybe not in the real deal contenders, but with a home game as like a three-seed.

I could see that. You know, Bake has played well with a chip on his shoulder that's been there for the whole season. His last year in Cleveland, it was clear to, I think, most people, he was playing for his job. And despite the shoulder injury, he kind of toughed it out and had some moments there. I don't love the head coach and the starting quarterback, both being in a sort of prove-at-year kind of a thing. That's an extra weight that you don't need on your shoulders if you're in either of those positions. And that's why I will stay in the South

and tell you that the Champagne, and therefore they will transcend the seven-and-a-half, will be the Carolina Panthers once again. Okay. It all comes down to, or a lot of it comes down to, do you think that Canales and company have bright Young looking closer to what we anticipated, not that he was lights out last year, but he was a lot better than he had been in the preceding seasons. Love the pass catchers there. The big concern with

them is that it looks like both of their tackles on the offensive line might start the season out, so that ain't great. But, you know, there are a lot of pieces on the defensive side that I like jazzed up the pass rush a little bit with Jalen Phillips. We'll see how long he can stay healthy. If he does, we know that he has stretches of dominance there. In this bum division, that's enough. Yeah, there's a lot of moving parts on the offensive line. Ultimately, you do have a first round pick at one spot,

and you have a guy, Rashid Walker from the Packers, who all he's done is starts every game, basically, for the Packers last handful of years on a good offense. He has some injury concerns, but he's out there. this is the team I just wanted to stay away from. I can see that. I put them at the very bottom. I was just like, I don't want to deal with this.

This is a stay away for me. Like my mind thinks they could take a step back, but there is something intangible there that I buy into, that they are greater than the sum of their parts. I kind of buy what Dave Canales is selling. Like they have a good building. Like they get everyone like, rowing in the right direction and all that.

And that does matter in a bad division. So I could easily see them winning eight or nine games. And I just was like, I want to stay away from it. As much as it matters in every division, I said that about the NFC West, that when the heavyweights start playing each other in December, then and only then will we really start to say, okay, it's pretty clear that's the team that's going to end up winning the thing.

These games are ironically or otherwise in bad divisions, all that really matters. you can look around and say, oh, look at the schedule they have out of the division. Do you handle your business against the bum teams? If you do, you're probably going to get the nine and take it. And so given the recent history, that's why I will take the Panthers. Go ahead and already say Saints over seven and a half, because I know you're going to get to that eventually. You're not?

I'm not. I am not. You know what spooks me about them? And this is a stupid reason to do it. But I do the same thing that apparently you do, which is at this point, I hate, I I think one of the lamest exercises on the football calendar is the day or two after the schedule was released to go up to a board and start putting Ws and L's next to them, as though you know who's going to be on the team, who's going to get heard, how good the other team's going to be.

But I think we're close enough now where we can kind of sort of read into these things, at least the early portion of the season. And the Saints are going to be 0 and 2 right out of the gate. They go at Detroit and at Baltimore. So that's not a good place to start off your season. don't think. You've just led me into going Saints under seven and a half. I'm going to do it. I feel like I heal. I try not to pick things that I'm rooting for. Like I want the Saints to be good, but I just, I think there's a bigger possibility that they're a bottom five team. I think they have

among the most injury risk variance of any team in the NFL just because of the history of the guys on their team that have been hurt. And they're already starting off the season so injured with Camara and Jordan and Jordan Tyson rather and Cam, Cam Jordan. I mean, Jordan Tyson was an injury risk and you drafted him and he didn't make it to the start of the regular season. Yes, that's a problem. Chris Alave, injury history. Cam Jordan.

Why did you do this to me? Pam Jordan is an older fella, great, but he's older. Chase Young, wow, he finally looked pretty good. How deepened his career is that? You're banking on that. He's the lynch bit of your defense. I do like Chase Young. I do like Chase Young.

But you're right. He has to stay healthy. Prove he can do it. Kool-Aid is your top DB? I mean, you know, it's hard to get real excited about this. The thing I do like just sort of, I liked them from a distance, was Tyler Shuck. I think he didn't get drafted or he was underdrafted a year ago because of his age. As though he was like, well, so what?

What if you get 10 years out of him? That won't be good enough. You need more than that. Well, no, he has to be 21. So he'll be our QB for the next 18 years. It'll be good. It'll work out just fine for the Saints if Shuck is their starting quarterback for the next decade, right? I've talked up Shuck all off season.

I'm impressed by him. I do think he's going to be a starting quarterback as long as he's healthy in the NFL for a long time. And if I get this wrong and I got some Saints fans in my life, they're going to be sticking it to me. I am annoyed to annoy them. It'll be because Kellyn Moore and Shuck are a real deal pairing. Brandon Stanley coached up that defense well last year. I just look at the overall talent, and I think that defense is hoping to be average.

You mentioned it. They have no pass-rest juice. They don't have a lot of talent on defense at all. They're hoping to be average. It's the high variance of the offense. Shuck and Kellett, I actually liked what I saw at Kellyn Moore and Alave and some of the running games. Like, if everything works on offense,

they could be a dangerous offense and make me look dumb for going under seven and a half. That is my sixth pick. We're going to do seven, Shuck. I mean, I just called you Shuck. Shek. Oh, I could do it. He's a handsome guy.

You have two picks left. So just keep in mind, you are now narrowing it down. You are only going to get to take two more. So make sure you make them count. All right. I mean, listen, I'm tempted to take those errors are in the Cardinals.

they're almost certainly going to wind up on the don't matter horn. Would you go over or under there, three and a half? Three and a half. I'm not going to bother with them. That's the point. If you don't matter, why do I, and you basically structure your roster in a way that says to me that you don't think you matter

or not going to put your best foot forward this season in favor of what might be down the line, then I don't have to regard you. I'm not going to take up my time talking about you. Can I say something about them, though? Like, they have a lot of talented players in terms of their skill position players. And it is borderline outrageous that there's no other NFC team, if I'm correct, that's under seven and a half other than them. The odds makers have them four games worse.

They could double their win total, like the projected wind total, three to half to seven. And they'd still be the worst team in the NFC. I've never seen something like that. that. And that's, that's, that's hooey. I always start using checkwords when you're on, uh, whee and applesauce and whatnot. Like, that's insane that the odds makers have them four games worse than the entire rest of the league. I, I have never seen anything quite like. I think they have two million good players. They'll stumble into four or five wins. The bookmakers who are not too far away from where the Cardinals are playing have now given,

um, given potential, um, wager or something to look at, right? Three and a half. is intriguing with the Cardinals. Yes. And you really want to do it, don't you? Because you look at that roster, like you say, again, if you look at it as a fantasy roster, ooh, I want a lot of those guys on my fantasy team. That doesn't mean they're going to be actually good.

But at three and a half, you want to talk yourself into any team that's playing. But then you have to look at the other three teams that they have to play. Those are six games that they're likely to be one and five in. So it's hard to get excited. But three and a half does, it does get awfully tempting. I'm going to, man, all right. I want to feel, I'm trying to end the moment here, divine, which is the riskier thing?

Rams over 11 and a half or the Niners under 9 and a half. You know what? I don't, I don't, this isn't my way to do this, but I'm going to take the Rams over the 11 and a half. That's just a lot of football games to win. But I was as recently as 48 hours ago ready to go with the Seahawks and pouring through the schedules.

And the big concern with the Rams is, as I said earlier, the Jenga theory is in the 21st century. If you remove the wrong piece, the whole thing will implode. Is there, I mean, the Rams are built around Puka Nakua, who had a fraught offseason, I think we can agree. What if he gets hurt? Devante Adams is not Devante Adams anymore. He's definitely not somebody who you would ride as your number one for a few weeks, right?

And yet you're taking over 11.5. Because I think that they are going to be able to bang you around running the ball. And that defense, the thing that a lot of people are pointing at rightly is that Aaron Donald is old. And there's no guarantee he stays in good health. and Miles Garrett has, you know, had tweak something here or there, and he's on the wrong side of 30. The problem for everybody else is the depth that they have in pass rushing on the defensive front overall, they're loaded.

They didn't need to have Aaron Donald. He's the all-time luxury item to plug in there, plus Sean McVeigh. And I think what's fascinating is that he sort of ushers in a mini-era of going heavier with his personnel on offense. And now in the copycat league, it feels like a lot of teams are going to start doing that. Putting, you know, more and more base offense is going to have two tight ends out there and everything else.

I'm interested to see if he now, again, is grab it and takes it in another direction. Again, as it is, I do think that John McVeigh is going to figure out how to move the ball when he has the reigning MVP at 38. as he is. That's the other thing too is, Matthew Stafford,

this isn't, I'm not talking this year. I'm talking about a full year ago, the conversation was, yeah, the Rams are pretty good if Matthew Stafford's back holds up. We're a year deeper

into his career. His back isn't better now than it was a year ago. Still, I'm going to say 12 wins. Yeah, that's all on Stafford. I'm annoyed that I didn't take them earlier.

I feel like you somehow led me down rabbit holds of taking teams earlier than I meant like the Saints under and the Lions. because it's going to be very difficult, I believe, for this team to lose more than five games if Stafford's healthy.

And you could say that with basically any starting quarterback, and I guess he's a little bit more of an injury risk than most. But this is the first time that you can expect them to have a top five defense with a Sean McVeigh. Like, 12 and 5 gives you some wiggle room. Now, Sean McVeigh, if you wanted to go through his history, it's not like he's gone over this win total that often. In his nine seasons, he's done it four times.

He's done it two out of five in the Stafford era. So on paper, they're the best team in the league. And yet, you know, things pop up often. But I'm really annoyed that you took them. That was going to be my last pick. I was rooting for you to go under 49ers so that the Rams could be my last pick. Don't you think, though, that it's funny the way it works, because we have too much time to talk about these things in the offseason.

And so then you, you know, when they started talking about, when less need and Sean McVeigh start talking about the possibility of Aaron Donald returning, you knew then a couple of months ago, well, obviously Aaron Donald's going to join the team. Do the head coach and GM start ruminating? Wouldn't that be fun of that happened? They wouldn't do that if they didn't know that things were leaning in that direction. But we've now lived in this reality or potential reality for long enough. that we, everybody swooned,

and I don't love when people get fake boners about football things. Like, oh my God, hard eyes. Like, imagine that pass rush. Like, all right, settle down. You're not that excited. Well, why does it have to be fake? Just because it's fake for you,

it might be real for other people. It's fun to think about Aaron Donald and Miles Garrett on the same team. It'll be fun. Listen, do as I say, not as I do. I'm allowed to act a fool. Everybody else should not act like a fool. Please, be professionals.

But either way, yes, we now have to sprinkle in some cynicism into every conversation. So now it's like, I don't know if super teams work out. They don't have much of a history with that. And I don't know. It's just not going to work. Based on what? Think about the X's and O's of it. Miles Garrett and Aaron Donald are going to be out there together with a few other guys who are great.

I mean, go through it with Braden Fiske and Young. What did he have? 12 sacks a year ago? Yeah, Kobe Turner next to Aaron Donald. Had seven sacks last year. It's crazy. I mean, what are you going to do for real? How are you ever going to throw the ball against this team?

Okay, enough on the Rams. Okay. You're right. We get through an off season. We convince ourselves we know more than we think. And that's why it's so tempting to take them because we just know that if healthy, they're going to be good. There's no shortcut for saving time.

But saving money is simple. Just combine your car and home insurance with Bel Air Direct and save. Get a quote at bellair direct.com. You know the feeling. You make a pick in your fantasy draft in the entire room groans because they wanted that player. Or you grab a small school rookie off waivers and you start him right before he goes off in primetime. There's no better feeling than crushing your fantasy football league. I'm J.J. Zacharyason, host of the late round fantasy football podcast.

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95% of people end up saying the exact same things about every about the teams and the Patriots thing is like better roster but worse results everybody just says in like okay that must be true okay yeah that's going to be the the reality here and there's a late push now Seahawks are going to end up winning that division I almost I almost fell into that trap it's going to be the ring you know you can I tend to agree although I haven't made my final decisions though those will those will come on our final show of the week with the big return of Patrick Claibon to the studio. I remember him. I'm thinking about Cardinals.

Man, the Cardinals have a brutal schedule to start the season, but like three wins when I believe at the end you have the Raiders. Who is it at the end of their schedule? It is in a row they have the Jet Saints and Raiders at the end of the schedule. You're telling you can't get the three and a half, but the rest of the schedule is absolutely brutal. just to introduce another team to quickly talk about, I will go Giants under seven and a half.

You know, John Harbaugh's speech, that was a downer. Like, oh, it's really going to connect with these players. The Malik neighbor's idea that he's going to be fully back after multiple surgeries, I have doubts about. There's some real deal top-level talent. This is one of those teams where I would say what they are saying about the Patriots. check. I like the line play on both teams. Like this will be a better team. This could be a much

improved team that goes six and 11, that goes seven and 10. And I still get my under. I just don't think they're going to have a competitive passing game, which you need in the year 2026. I don't see it. I'm, I'm going to be interested to see Jackson Darden year two, because to this point, as flawed as he is, I still say that my team, the Steelers, should have drafted him. Yeah. I agree. I was speaking to the Steelers, before we wrap it up, I just have a question that I keep asking since John Harbaugh is the subject or just was.

John Harbaugh, Mike Tomlin, Sean McDermott. At the end of this year, will we point back and say, wow, turns out that guy was really holding his old team back? Will we say that about one, two, or three of those guys? well if I'm going to be consistent with my over-unders at some level we'll be saying it about all all three because I'm high on the Ravens I think the Steelers are going to be better than people think

and I think defensively they could improve with some new ideas and yeah with that who was the third one yeah the bill's one I think will just kind of be a wash I mean I do have I took their over when we talked about it with Nick Wright I don't yeah I think they'll be more of the same I don't know if it would be a big McDermott thing. But the other two, yeah, I could see. I've been introducing, and this is not a popular take,

but it's definitely a big one when I try to defend my guy, Bill Belichick. That, like, a little bit of ageism is okay when evaluating professionals in highly paid, you know, jobs like head coach of football. You did that on Football America a year ago. It was a disgrace that you did it. he ran out. He got old. He ran out ideas. He's old. He ran out ideas. So what? Why do we have to assume that John Harbaugh has as many fresh ideas and as much energy and as as like forward thinking ways to run an organization as he had 15 years ago?

I don't have to think that. I think it's silly. There is the Dick Vermeal thing, which I would not have expected to work on the level it did. Because people forget, it wasn't just the Rams. And he went to the cheese. and did the same thing and almost, and almost, I'm not saying they can't be good coaches. I'm just saying on average, they've probably had their best behind them like players, dude, there's a prime.

I agree with you, but John Harbaugh is not Bill Belichick. Nobody says John Harbaugh is in the conversation or pounds the table. Obviously, he's the greatest coach of all time. Bill Belichick was carried as it happens. We found out by the greatest quarterback of all time. That's what we've now learned here.

Bill Belichick is 74 years old in a total. different ecosystem. Somehow you're trying to defend him by calling him a decrepit old man. All right. It's your last pick. Oh, I still. You have one more. Yeah. I, because I jumped you at one point. I doubled up. So you have one more to make it even. We got to have it even. All right. I will go with, you know, we could talk about the Niners. I'll go Bears up to 10 again because of my faith in Ben Johnson. It's longstanding. I am not Johnny come lately. on that bandwagon. I've been talking about this for many years now about Ben Johnson as the rising star among play callers and he's made me look smart there. It doesn't mean that because he is

Caleb Williams head coach now and because Josh Allen a number of years ago was inaccurate and then became accurate that there's any math that that means, well, Caleb Williams will do the same thing. That said, and by the, I don't love the defense either. But I, I do think that Ben Johnson is not shooting his mouth off about being the highest scoring offense in NFL history. If he doesn't think that he has some chance of having a gangbusters offense, I do think they're going to light a lot of teams up over the course of the season, enough to get into the playoffs, the back end is a wild card, and get the double-digit wins.

Doesn't mean that they're going to run to the Super Bowl or anything like that. But I do think that given the pieces they have on offense, that they're set to win. more games than they lose. My strategy coming, I tend to agree with everything you just said. My strategy coming into this draft was actually just to avoid Bears, Packers, and Lions.

For some reason, I got hooked into the team that has the higher window. Because that all just felt about right. You know, nine and a half, it all just feels about right. I like the out of division schedule against the NFC South. I'd have to be forcing myself to get negative about any of these teams.

And yet I just kind of look at it. And logically, I know, I just wanted to stay away from all three of them. So I'm glad you brought them up because otherwise we would avoid the Packers and Bears entirely. We did avoid the Packers because I just feel like nine and a half. Yep, that seems about right. You know, Cliffs notes it for me, the Niners.

Make the case for them in either direction here because I like them again. And if you told me right now, like if you put me into a comb and woke me up on Valentine's Day and say, guess what? The Niners made it to the big game. Let's head over to Sofi right now, Dave. And I'd be like, what are you doing in my bedroom? You'd be like, you're not in a bedroom. You're in a hospital.

You're in a coma. Did you forget? I put you into one in September. I'd be like, what the hell? What do we do? You actually did that? I just threw that out on a dumb podcast. And you're like, well, I thought you were serious.

So I put you into a coma and the Niners made it to the Super Bowl. Anyhow. What's with the dumb podcast crack? I'm sorry. Intelligent. Yes. Thoughtful podcast. We're trying to really cater to the best of the best out there.

I don't know what to think about them. Everything you, I agree with all that. That's it. They felt in a similar bucket to the Bears in the Packers. Logically, everyone can't be winners here. It's part of this weird NFC over under if you actually look at all the totals and added them up. Like Vegas sees the NFC as better. They don't have many losing teams.

Even the losing teams they have are around seven. No, it sees them. It sees a sea of mediocrity. Yes. a couple of teams that rise above that. That's different than the AFC, which is you can rightly circle three or four teams that you know aren't going to go to the playoffs and everyone else you can make a pretty good case for. A lot of these teams are like, I don't know, I guess if things break right, the Saints could wind up in there. Maybe, I don't know, maybe the commies

pull a rabbit out of their hat and Jane Daniels has another great year like he did two years ago and they wind up in the playoffs. I feel like that's the conversation around. the NFC save, you know, the two teams in the same division in the Rams and Seahawks. Like, of course the 49ers could finish second or win that division, but I just can't get there as a take before the season. And then suddenly you're immediately putting them into third place in the division with a very tough schedule. It's tough out of division too.

And so then I just come away being like, all right, just prove it to me. I believe, I believe in Brock. Well, you're not supposed to talk about because it's bad form to base anything off of injuries and like, well, I don't know if that guy's going to hold up, but the fact of the matter is the teams that make the deep playoff runs are the healthiest. Almost every single time, that's the case. And so you do kind of have to apply some history there. CMC and Nick Bosa and so on and so forth. That is, you're not crazy to ding the 49ers chances based on that. Like, well, I don't know, George Kittle, like, he's definitely going to be okay. He's still definitely going to be ready to roll there. All the all the guys. who've gotten hurt. I don't know what happens, what voodoo is going on out there,

what the man is doing with the stations out there in San Francisco. I'm not an intelligent guy. I don't have conspiracy theories about that. I'm just looking at the history of these guys. Yes, CMC gets hurt a lot. I'm not worried about the substation. I agree with you. I am worried that it's big news on this Wednesday

as we tape and get ready to say goodbye here that Nick Bosa and George Kiddall are getting on the plane. Oh. They're getting on the plane. into Australia. So they got a chance to play week one. They keep saying Nick Bosa, they're ramping up. He hasn't done any practicing, but they're getting on the plane. Very interesting, the two strategies. The 49ers are leaving on Wednesday. The Rams are leaving almost an entire week later and only spending 24 hours before that game in Australia. I am bullish almost always. I am all, I am

generally speaking, I will say like, all right, first of all, I don't love divisional games in week one. We've been out in the desert without football for long enough. Just give me a cracker to keep me going now. I don't need filet mignon to get things going here. But usually as the bills and the Bengals to some extent and other teams that are real good teams, they start out sluggishly and then they have to make up the ground and they almost inevitably do. I got to say, for two teams that do look good, I think it's a big game being played in Australia. You know, remember the chiefs and chargers.

That did foretell something that played out over the course of the rest of the season last year. So don't just slough this one off. It's like, ah, well, you know, the Rams. Oh, the Niners beat them like, well, but you know the Rams are going to be good. I don't know. Wouldn't be great if the Rams start their season with a loss here. And the 49ers get them at home because the Rams, they wanted this game. They agreed to give up a home game to travel over there, but not for long.

reportedly, I saw this written about in the athletic. The 49ers are the most popular team in Australia, so they might have a little bit of a home field advantage. This was a treat, a thin slice of heaven, as Dave Damashik likes to say. Check out his podcast, Football America. It's going to be going live on Mondays during the season, but you can catch it in your podcast feed and YouTube.

Appreciate you, Shek. Appreciate everyone that has been tuning in. We see those numbers growing as the season gets closer. Everyone go ahead, like and subscribe on YouTube. Leave a comment. Why not? We haven't asked for that in a while on Apple. And, yeah, we will be back for another show this week talking about some of our

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