NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Bucs-Falcons TNF Insanity and Week 15 Power Rankings!

Episode Date: December 12, 2025

Baker Ball season is officially in jeopardy. After an incredibly preposterous final quarter of play, the Atlanta Falcons triumphed over the Buccaneers in the Week 15 edition of Thursday Night Football. Kyle Pitts Sr. scored three touchdowns, Bijan Robinson dominated on the ground and Kirk Cousins actually looked like a serviceable quarterback. Despite that, the Bucs had every opportunity to put the game away but ultimately fell to 7-7 on the season. Tampa Bay is now a half-game back from the Carolina Panthers — a team it will play twice in the final three weeks of the season. Gregg Rosenthal and Nick Shook handle the recap of this wild one, before collaborating on a Week 15 Power Ranking of every NFL team.NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Snap spot, kicked by Gonzalez. It is good. Fly home safely. Atlanta wins. This is the end of the game. 29, 28. The Falcons beat the Buccaneers on a 43-yard field goal by Zane Gonzalez. Never doubt Kirk Cousins on Thursday night football against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

One of the most reliable phenomenons in sports. Falcons come back from 28 to 14 down in the fourth quarter to stun the buck 29 to 28. That was West Durham on WZGC. And the NFC South might not be great, shook, but they have a way of coming up with the most ridiculously dumb, entertaining games every season. And this was one of them.

This was certainly one of them, especially after it was 28 to 14. I thought the Falcons were dead and buried. They had 19 total penalties in this game. I thought, well, you know what? It's a good thing they're wearing red hats because it's like wearing red helmets because it's like wearing red hats

like they're Santa Claus because they were just gifting the game to the Buccaneers. Terribly timed miscues. It just seemed like they couldn't get out of their own way. But Kirk Cousins wasn't going to let him go down that easily. He's going to make throws under pressure. He's going to take shots from rushers.

He's going to find Kyle Pitts a billion times for the Kyle Pitts game and they're somehow going to pull off a victory on the road. And I can confirm that Connie Wolf is somewhere on a couch feeling no pain and enjoying her Kyle Pitts breakout game. She's been honking about him all season. And here's what he did, Shuck, 11 catches, 166 yards, and three touchdowns.

The first tight end to put those numbers together, 150 and 3, since Shannon Sharp in the 90s. It was just an outrageous game by Kyle Pitts. Let's listen to his hat trick touchdown. Seals over there. Robinson and Mooney here to the near side. Snap to Cousins. Tampa brings the pressure. The throwing for the end zone. It's Pitts. Did he hold on through? Did he? Give me a signal, fellas. Touchdown Atlanta. Well, he did juggle it here, West. This is going to get you looked at pretty hard.

It's being called a touchdown. The Tampa crowd says no. And here's the intercourse. After review, the ruling on the field stands as called touchdown. Oh, I love that because when you watch that on replay, you see, there are two defenders in the area. Levante David is one of them. They knew by the end of the game, you got to send extra attention to Kyle Pitts, and it doesn't matter whether it was plays after the catch. Nice touch throws by Kirk Cousins. Pitts was getting it done all night, and Kirk finishes with 373 yards versus and 3.73 yards and 3.3.

touchdowns. In the last three games against the Bucks, he has 1158 yards and 11 touchdowns, only one interception. And we're going to have to have a conversation about Todd Bowles' defense at some point, Shook. I guess it's right now because there were many, there were many ways to blame the Bucks for this game. Baker Mayfield will get to him in his fourth quarter. But to give up that much all night to a falcons offense that was trying to give the game away with penalties to give up a drive at the end of the game where they had a third and 28 and then a fourth and 14 and let David Sills and Kyle Pitts cook you and Bejohn Robinson all night through the air was a little embarrassing and they were really ahead of what Todd Bowles was trying to do all night

we got to give Kirk his flowers for an awesome performance yeah I mean this is what you know, veteran experience can do for a quarterback who's facing a ton of blitz, a ton of blitz looks and a ton of blitzes overall. One of those rare games

in which the Buccaneers blitzed 18 times and recorded a pressure 18 times. You really ever get the even numbers like that, but they got home once. They got one sack out of that. Did they get a lot of hits on Kirk Cousins? They did.

And they broke up some passes, but they didn't affect him enough to undercut this offense, especially in the key spots in the fourth quarter. There were multiple times over the final six minutes where I'm sitting there watching

this thinking, it's over. He's not going to hit this throw. They're not going to convert this third and long. And then he does. It's David Sills. It's Kyle Pitts. It's Darnel Mooney. It doesn't matter. No matter what the Buccaneers tried to do, they were always, like you said, a step behind what the Falcons were able to do offensively. And of course, like, I know like statistically he doesn't run up a massive game, but he still had a lot of scrimmage yards. Bejohn Robinson, like he's the best player on the field on both sides. And he was a key part of extending some of these drives and the Falcons absolutely needed. You know, short checkdowns to Bijon makes multiple guys. picks up first downs, picks up big games, shortens the down and distance on key downs that come on the next player or two after his plays. He played an integral part of this. But of course, Kyle Pitts did too. But it all starts with Kirk Cousins,

which brings me back to the original point. You think, you tweeted this, and you're absolutely right. Something about a Todd Bulls defense brings the best out of Kirk Cousin. And it does. We can go back to last year. Kirk's two best games with the Falcons as their starter. We're against Todd Bulls defenses.

But I also want to circle back to a couple of weeks ago when we talked about the QB index and where I ranked Kirk Cousins that week because you don't got revenge. It's a revenge game for Shook. It is. You just ran those Kirk numbers and you said, oh, he didn't look that good against the Jets. Well, damn it, he looked that good tonight.

You know what? I thought he didn't look that bad last week. Overall, he has looked like a pretty good backup quarterback, which I think is an upgrade from the last few games that he was playing last year. And in this game, he, yeah, was another level. Todd Bull has been running this defense. Forever. And everyone, you know, I just think even though it's unpredictable in certain ways, you know, there's a lot of chaos that Kirk knew the pressure was coming over and over at the end of that game. And it wasn't all easy. I thought it was interesting when Bulls decided to accept a holding penalty that actually made it second in 28 instead of third in 18. Now, it turned into third and 28, but it did give them an extra down. I wasn't sure about that. They're trying to set up for a game winning field goal. So I get it. It was a very. very tough decision. There were a lot of crazy decisions, but you're right. This is where a veteran

quarterback can help so much. And Zion McCollum got hurt in this game and was out. And right now, they're not as good at cornerback as they were. Jamel Dean got hurt early, although he did come back in. And the Bucks also had some bad luck. Look, they, Levanti David, forced the fumble on Darnell Mooney inside the 10-yard line when they were going in for that last Kyle Pitts touchdown. The Bucks recovered it. They forced the fumble on one of these. blitzes against Kurt Cousins on the very last drive, and Kurt Cousins somehow recovered it. We got the rare tie, and the tie goes to the offense.

You don't really ever see that, but they said both the offense and the defense recovered it, which I don't know if I've ever heard that. And the tie went to the offense, which preserves that. And this is a great example, too, of what the Buccaneers failed to do in the little spots, because that fumble that you talked about inside the 10, ball comes out. There's four Buccaneers in that area, and somehow they don't land on it. Ryan Neusel ends up landing on it. the offensive lineman?

Like, these are the little things that a Todd Bulls defense should do to seal a victory. And instead, they gave the Falcons chance after chance after chance and ultimately paid the price for it. You know what's funny is, I get, you know, you kind of look

and there's no triple numbers in rushing or receiving for Bejohn Robinson. And so it's like, oh, yeah, he wasn't as explosive. And the two biggest plays he out all night were called back. One was a one-handed catch on the sideline, which he didn't get his second foot down.

And then another was a big-time run that got called back by one of the 19 penalties. Yes, that was the most for any team all season long, the most for any Atlanta Falcons team in the history of the franchise. They're wearing those red helmets that Steve Bartowski used to wear when he was the number one overall draft pick of the Falcons when they were playing back in the 60s and he was in the 70s and never before has there been this many penalties.

And yet on that night where it didn't feel like Bejan even did that, that much even though he made so many mistackles. He had 100. What's the number? 187 yards in this game. I thought mental math, it was 175. It was, what, 93 in the ground and 82? It was a touchdown.

Yeah. So he always serves his fantasy owners with eight catches there. He really was the best player. And he overshadowed like a great performance by Mike Evans, who comes back and gets six for 132 and including a really long play down the field. And he also forced about, I think, five penalties. Most of them were on him by AJ Terrell. Like, he was awesome.

in this game and yet you look at the bucks and at a certain point you have to say this is not a good football team you get tristan worse back and he plays outstanding tonight you get mike evans back he plays outstanding tonight jalen mcmillan uh has a big play that almost results in a touchdown uh ends up on the one yard line and they and they cash it in and yet they just find a way to trick this game away and it it really started with the baker interception that's kind of the that's the un that's the there's two unforgivable plays by baker mayfield in the fourth quarter of this game one is the interception, which really gives the Falcons a real chance to make it a comeback in this game. And this is the second time he's done this in a fourth quarter to lose a game. And

it's one of the many fourth quarter since that early part of the season where he's been bad in the fourth quarter. And then they go for, it was I think second and 14. They decide to be aggressive before the two-minute warning. It was absolutely the right call. And he misses a wide open Abuka. He throws it behind him. Obuka isn't able to make a tough catch. I think most quarterbacks hit that throw, and he had just a few throws tonight that were just way off. And if he hits that throw, we're not talking about anything. In fact, we're talking about a nice play and a nice game by Baker. But in the crucial moments, he was at its worst.

Even in the two-point conversion to Chris Godwin, that was a ball that was behind Godwin and required a fantastic adjustment on the ball by Godwin to catch and get his feet down to convert the two-point conversion. So it was a up-and-down game from Baker, which is what we've seen. You know, and a lot of people, I think, chalk that up to, oh, well, he doesn't have his guys out there. You know, he doesn't have Mike Evans. Chris Godwin's got some rust on him. You know, Abuka's, he's been banged up for a while, and he's, and everybody knows he's going to Abuca. Well, he had everybody tonight.

Bucky Irving's back. Godwin's been in the lineup for a few weeks. Evans is back. Macmillan makes his season debut. And we still see the same struggles, and especially in the fourth quarter. And, you know, that interception, I thought was a great example of a Rahim Morris defense that I felt was a step behind for most of the night, especially outside the numbers. They were picking on Kobe Bryant outside the numbers.

Oh, my God. Like, like it was just layups. I mean, speed out. Motion a guy into a little bit of a stack between two receivers. Speed out there. Everything outside the numbers. Mike Evans, no matter who it was, just keep feeding out there. Bryant, soft coverage, had to drive down the ball, never got home in time.

Evans, Moss is Bryant for a catch. Like, it's just getting crushed outside the numbers the whole night. And in a big spot in the fourth quarter, they try to go back to that bread and butter. And who's there to make the play in Bait Baker into the throw, D. Alford. to make that perfect play sitting underneath to pick it off. I thought it was just a great example of them finally adjusting at the perfect time in leading on a veteran to make a play like that and give themselves a chance to win.

And it's also an example of how the Buccaneers can't get out of their own way. They haven't been able to get out of their own way for really since the Patriots game, I think. That loss of the Patriots is probably the start of their downfall. They just haven't been the same team since then. The loss of the Saints last week obviously was a big example of that, and tonight is too. I mean, they're two and six in their last eight.

They're one and five in their last six. And the two wins that they have in that stretcher against the Saints, a three-win team and the Cardinals by three points where they got outgained by 100 yards, a three-win team. And at least before they were losing to good teams, like the Patriots, like you mentioned, like the Lions, if you go back to that primetime game. But now they're losing to bad teams too. Let's watch, you know, if you're watching on YouTube, that 50-yard catch by Evans. Because I do think the Buccaneers, despite tonight, are still my face. in the NFC South, barely over the Panthers. They have an advantage, and that was just incredible play by Mike Evans, who, like I said,

looked awesome tonight, was moving so fluidly, made some really difficult throws. Baker gave him a hospital ball early, where he, you know, throws way too high, and he ends up landing on his back, and he ends up being okay, but you look injured on that play. By the way, you mentioned Kobe Bryant. He gave up 102 yards in coverage tonight against. Mike Evans alone, one of the highest numbers for one receiver on one cornerback all season long, five for 102 on that one receiver.

I do think Mike Evans adds a new element for their team that's really going to help. Bucky Irving obviously has helped. Tristan Wurst being back helps. Like they probably now, though, if we're thinking big picture and we're watching also the first play of the, you know, first catch of the game by Mike Evans, which is awesome. The Bucks crowd got so into Mike Evans being back for this game. really the heart and soul of this team. So I think he'll give them something, though.

Shook, they probably have to sweep the Panthers now or really hope for the Panthers, for instance, to lose this week, to lose a game that you maybe don't necessarily expect the Panthers to lose in New Orleans, like a game like that, or they're going to have to now sweep the Panthers. Yeah, now it's suddenly very tight and uncomfortable

for a team that had a very cushy lead early in the season and I've let that evaporate. I do agree with you, though. It is the slimmest of margins that the Buccaneers still seem to have a bit of an advantage in the NFC South. And it is because of what you just said with Mike Evans' return. Because there was that play that we just played there where Evans Mosses Kobe Bryant for the big game. That was a classic play that Baker has turned to throughout his time with the Buccaneers, which is, F it, Mike Evans is down there somewhere. I'm just going to, in all else fails, just drop back and throw it up to 13 and hope that he makes a play on the ball, which he does.

That's what he's built his career on, is making play. Usually it happens on the goal line too, but that obviously was a big chunk play. That opens up their offense and why I still believe that they have an advantage because in the most dire situations, you know that that is at least an option. Whereas in the previous six weeks or so, Baker has just not had those options. He's had to scramble. He's had to make some incredible throws, which he's just lacked. You were right last year and you're right this year.

He's a streaky quarterback and he's been on a downturn for a while. But bringing Evans back into the full at leaf gives you a life raft or something to cling to that, okay, well, maybe we can find a bit of a rhythm. And for a good stretch of tonight, they did. He looked great. Mike Evans. Yeah. It's just that they didn't finish. And that, again, speaks to the lack of quality in the division and why the door is very open for the Panthers. The problem, though, is that we don't know who the Panthers are from week to week. So we can't put our full faith behind them right now. No, but now they have an advantage, which is if they can win this Saints game, the Panthers are really looking at a situation

where splitting with the Bucks might be enough likely will be enough to win the division because the other Bucks game that we didn't mention it's at Miami actually that's a very winnable game Carolina on the other hand has as a little bit of a tougher schedule down the stretch I want to point out with Baker though he is streaky and for a section of tonight I thought it was the best that he looked because he made more high level throws in this game than we've seen since maybe early October that's why I give him credit for that but even in a game where there were all those positive, he kept taking unnecessary sacks. Like the pressure to sack ratio was so high. He took five sacks in this game. He was only, quote, hit seven times.

So a lot of the times, it would be a few steps forward, good play, and then he would take a negative play. Usually their drives stopped because he had taken a negative play or he had made a mistake. I didn't feel like the Falcons were doing a ton to really stop him. So it's just a You win some, you lose some. Let's actually listen to Gene Deckerhoff because you mentioned the Godwin two-point conversion. And it's one of the reasons why I think there's some optimism for this Bucks team, just a little bit. Is that Godwin's back. He's playing well.

Abuka had a good night tonight. You have the full compliment with McMillan. And yeah, let's listen to Godwin, got the touchdown and then got the two-point conversion to give them a 14-point lead. And see if Tampa Bay could punch in and get two. We have converted just one two-point conversion in 7-20. this season. Can we make it two out of eight? Mayfield, shotgun. High snap, looks to his left, looks back to the left, goes all the middle. There's a football. Touchdown. Two-point conversion try. Chris Godwin got eight points on that drive.

One of my favorite things there, shook, was Godwin screamed then after the octopus, the six plus the two. The broadcast picked him up screaming, octopus. Shout out to Chris Godwin. One of us. I love that. What did you think about the Falcons decision? They go on quite a long touchdown drive after that. And we're going to wrap up this game talk with this year. They cut the lead to 8, 28 to 20. And they go for the two.

So they don't get it. There seems to be a miscommunication on the play. Kirk Cousins isn't happy. Then that forces them to go for two again when they ultimately, you know, cut the score to 2826, they fail again, and then that sets up what ends up being the game-winning to do a goal at the end. Oh, step into my office, please, because I have some things that I would like to tell you about this strategy.

I've complained about it before, and I'm going to complain about it again. The idea of going for two down eight in the fourth quarter is backed supposedly by analytics with the thought that it increases your chance of victory. I am 100% against this and we saw exactly why tonight the Falcons went for two twice supposedly you know maybe they're two best

go for two plays neither looked anywhere close to being completed they were just completely disjointed messes the first one especially the second one cousins didn't sense the pressure and didn't get the ball out in time that's got to be a hot immediate like they put Bijan on the flat

he's got to get the ball out when you're down 14 and you score the idea of going for two is the idea that well, when we get the two, then we only have to kick an extra point to win the game. Yeah. But you fail to recognize that if you don't get it, you back yourself into a corner in which you must go for two to go to overtime.

Well, you don't fail. You know that. You're just thinking, hopefully I get it the next time. Here's why. And those who watch me play college football on Twitch saw me do this the other day. You kick the extra point to make it a seven point game. If you are fortunate enough to score again and have the opportunity, you preserve the option to kick the extra point to send it to overtime.

Or if you're feeling, you know, gutsy, you go for two and you go for the win in that scenario. You save that option until later. Okay. I understand that and I think it's all situational depending on the game, the situation. So I don't think anything should be hard and fast. I think you can make the argument that the way this game played out is actually even a reason to do it. They still won the game shook. And because that should not factor into my logic. No, no, no, that should here. because I want to have as many different chances to win the game. And the reason why I'm okay with it, even if they lose the game because of that,

and they don't go to overtime. And in theory, in another world, they would have gone overtime. The game of football, like, you play to win the game. And so you're asking your players and the players that are playing the best on that night, which is definitely Kirk Cousins in the offense, to go win it for you. you and and and yeah like winning the game not not waiting for overtime and playing extra like win it and you know 11 men on 11 men and the bucks won those two plays and then you just okay you know you were too good for us tonight but i liked our offense better than their defense and on those

two plays they won it instead of waiting for overtime and oh by the way there's very much a possibility that yes we failed on those two but that there could be even time to get the ball back and win the game again. But if you follow my approach, that option is still there. Yes. It would have been tied and you wouldn't by three. No, no, no, no. They don't have to tie it the second time. They could go for two then if they want to the second time and go for a one point lead or be down by one. And the same scenario plays out. It's just in my mind, why back yourself into a corner in which you must go for two, especially when the first one fails and you're like, God, we probably can't convert a two-pointer. It's a really interesting conversation. And I don't think there's a right answer. And I do

think it's really dependent on the team, the game, and this situation. I don't like anything close to a hard and fast rule. I also think the fact like the Falcons are the Falcons and have four wins on the season. It's like that makes me want to go for it the second time. Just go for to the second time. That's all I'm saying. Just do it the second time. Yeah. But the thing that I find just a little unsettling is that all these like tough guys who are like, how can you listen to the math. How can you like, how about you just like decided on the field instead of just like letting your kicker go out there to, hey, let's kick the ball and tie. How about being real men and try to go with a football game? I would think this would work with the Kirk Karp Street.

And that's why you go into that second scenario and you say, let's go win it right now. Let's go for two and go for the one point lead and the win. That's it. That's all I'm saying. We've got more on this show, Chris Bobo, begging us to take a break. And it is time. Man, the Falcons and Rahim Morris just screaming at the camera afterwards. Good for him. It's been a tough season. The way this game was going, I was wondering, Zach Robinson, the offensive coordinator getting on the flight home

because of all those penalties. And if they had lost this game in ugly fashion, who knows? We don't know about the future, but a good night for them. Buck season is not over, but this is not a good football team, as their record indicates. We're going to talk about who are the best football teams in the entire NFL. After the break, we're going to do a power rankings shook. It's been five weeks since we did this, and we're going to go 32 to 1 and decide who are the very best back in here.

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That's Lenovo.com. Lenovo, Lenovo. Hey, what's up everybody? Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. If you love breaking down football from every angle, you're in the right place. Every week on Move the Six,

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I just want to remind everyone how good Rishie Rice was last season. And these three healthy games, he was the wide receiver two in fantasy. I think Rishie Rice just goes off this week. The Chiefs come on a flip pass to Rice. Nearside, touchdown! Remandre Stevens is my sleeper this week. This is a matchout where I think I can slide in Stevenson into my flex position and he could deliver double-digit points this week.

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About anything from teams and players making waves to pop culture. And I'll take you inside my journey through my 15th season in the NFL. Looking forward to you joining me this season, the season of more on the Off the Edge with Cam Joined podcast. Catch new episodes every Wednesday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage. Store more and do more with your data. Try them for free at wasabi.com. back on NFL daily yes shook this has happened a couple times whenever we think it's going to be a bad Thursday night game I'm like we got to give the people a little red meat we got to give them what

they want let's do some power ranking and then that Thursday night game turns out to be a banger but you know what why not have two big slices of big red meat I don't care I'm getting old does that even make sense no I mean I had a really steak like two nights ago at Marble Room in Cleveland. Like, it's a great place. And yeah, fresh off of tasting that fantastic steak, yes, let's give them all the red meat. I ate way too much red meat and I never regret it. Let's do the power rankings, bottom to top.

And we'll speed through the bottom teams because they have been out of it for a while. The bottom core tile, number 32, the Las Vegas Raiders. We were in complete agreement on that, that they are now the worst team in the NFL. Congratulations to Tom Brady and what you've done. The Tennessee Titans at 31, Jets 30, the commanders, man, if we had seen this at the beginning of the season, shook that the commanders are the 29th best team in the NFL. My God. The Giants at 28, Cardinals 27.

Man, that's sad. You had them a few spots lower than me. Brown's at 26. And here's just a little light pat on the back for the New Orleans Saints. Why don't you give the Saints some love? Hey, you're only the eighth worst team in the NFL. according to me and Shuck. I mean, you know, if it was like a month and a half ago,

they probably would have been 30th here. So congrats, you've climbed five spots, and it's because you've been, you've been spunky. You've been, you know, scrappy in your last few games. You beat the Buccaneers, you beat the Panthers in a weird game in week 10, and you had a close loss to the dolphins in week 13. Good on you, Tyler Shuck. Keep balling, man.

Honestly, Greg, I know we're not going to divert too much here, but I actually think Tyler Shuck has the goods. He just needs reps. Like, I like what I've seen for him so far. Okay. And if there was one team in this bottom eight, you wouldn't want to play. I mean, I guess in theory, according to our rankings, it's the same. To me, it'd probably be the Browns.

Yeah, I don't know. Something about that just because of their defense. And then the Cardinals are just good enough to lose against a decent team. At least they were. Let's go to the next quarter of out because, like, those teams have been dead forever. The order of it doesn't matter too much to me. We have the Falcons here at 24. Now, we kind of assumed going into it that they're going to lose.

this game, maybe we should bump them up a spot over the Viking tour at 23, but I wouldn't put them any higher just because they made this comeback. The Colts all the way down at 22. Let's stop there. We have the Colts below teams like the Dolphins, Bengals, Panthers. What was your thought process here of like where this Colts team is at? And how sad is it that we had them in like in the top five, you know, eight weeks ago and now they're down at 22? Well, when we did that most likely, like, who we could see, you know, getting to the Super Bowl a few weeks ago, God, that age poorly for me, putting the Colts that high. But, I mean, this just speaks to the value of a quarterback. It reminds me of the college football playoff when they decided to leave undefeated Florida State out because they didn't have Jordan Travis because he had suffered a season ending leg injury.

It's the same thing. Like, your quarterback's out. And we've seen how they struggled even with the, you know, injured Daniel Jones with that leg fracture for a couple weeks before he got hurt. Now, this could also age really poorly if Philip Rivers authors the greatest Disney movie we've ever seen and comes out and balls out for them, but it's not going to happen. And I think that helps to explain why the Bengals are even as high as 20 because Joe Burrow is playing football and he's playing it incredibly. I finally got to that Bill's game and like, oh, man, he was so good in that game. Josh Allen was even better because Josh Allen didn't have that Benford play, unfortunately, for Burrow, which is more of a great defensive play than anything. but that was just awesome.

I would change the rankings and put the Buccaneers now below the Steelers and the Ravens. So we have the Steelers at 17, the Ravens at 18, the Panthers at 19. But just kind of talk about that group because it's depressing to me that those two AFC North teams are right there and we basically agreed on them with like the Panthers kind of in a category. Also with the Bucks is like, yeah, like two of these teams are going to make the playoffs. but they're not even among the best 14 teams in the NFL. No, they're not. And it speaks to the poor quality of both the NFC South and the AFC North.

I mean, we have three AFC North teams in this group. It just tells you how bad the division is or just how mid the division is. And we got the mid off already last weekend between the Steelers and the Ravens. Steelers coming out on top in that one. But it's none of these teams look strong. None of these teams that look at and go. This is my Super Bowl pick. They're going to go win.

Everyone else makes sense. But the fact that I'm willing to drop them this low in the power ring is when their defense, the numbers would tell you it's been pretty good over the last few months, although I have my doubts about it. Like a team quarterbacked by Lamar Jackson, I just, it's one of the most disappointing seasons by any team in a long time. And I feel like it's weirdly slipped under the radar because Lamar missed that time and you can kind of blame it on his hamstring. But to me, there's more that's rotten there than just that. It's really disappointing. So the way I kind of want to frame this group is like, if you pit the Bengals against the Steelers or Ravens right now,

who are you picking in that game? Because I know I'm picking, and it's not the Steelers of the Ravens. Like, just based on how they've played over the last month. And I also... Good point. We should have the Bengals higher then if that's the case, or at least you did, maybe.

But like, we're looking at total product. Yeah, I guess Power Rankings is like who you'd take on a neutral field or whatever right now. But I also look at the Ravens and Steelers. And I think if there was any team that's going to climb out of this group, I believe it's probably the Raven. And because Lamar looked a little bit better last week, he had more mobility. He looked more like himself. Their defense is just very hit or miss right now.

After having a relatively strong couple of weeks, they're just, it's hard to predict who they are. Kind of like it's hard to predict who the Panthers are going to be from week to week. And I think if Lamar can continue to get closer to who he is, then they could elevate. My other issue with them is that Derek Henry, I hate to say it. Father Time looks like it's starting to hit him. He's just not very effective right now, and that's kind of hurting their entire offense, especially with a relatively immobile, Lamar Jackson. You know who else is hitting him?

Like all the free rushers that Daniel Filetle just watches like run by. But you're right. I agree that Derek Henry doesn't look good. Let's bring up the next graphic, Chris, of the next 16 teams. And yes, I would knock the Buccaneers now below the Steelers Ravens, even the Panthers team. It's been too long of a stretch. So we have the chiefs at 15, the Cowboys at 14, and the Eagles at 13.

Let's actually throw up your QB index rankings. Now, I know Joe Burrow was the biggest riser on the QB index rankings this week. It is time for quarterback keeper presented by Snapdragon. But I was curious to see where Dak Prescott was on your list. And if Patrick Bohomes was in your top 10, I just want to give you the floor for the moment that Patrick Mahomes is just not even in your top 10 shook. Where is he right now?

And what do you have to say for yourself? He is 12th right now. He drops seven spots. And I think that sometimes in this process, a ranking can really reflect a couple of weeks. And I think that applies to Patrick Mahomes. The reason is that I believe that I've had about the most faith of anybody in Mahomes' ability to overcome challenges around him and lead his team to victory. He's done it for multiple years.

He was a big reason why they got to the Super Bowl last year. He's not doing that anymore. We can talk about the three interceptions. We can talk about the 10 straight incompletions in the game against Houston, but it's more than that. He's just not doing the things that he did before. His scrambling, his play extending, the ball, the way it's coming out of his hand just like has a nosedive to it.

He just doesn't look like himself, and it doesn't help him that people aren't catching passes on the other end either. So I felt like this was a bit of a course correction over a few weeks of performance, maybe even going back to Thanksgiving that loss of the Cowboys. And when I look at the performance of some of these quarterbacks that are in the top 10, and I measured them against Mahomes over the last month or so and really over the whole season, I'm just thinking, look, late season, these guys are building momentum. They deserve to be in this top 10 more than Mahomes.

He needs to fall out of the top 10 for the first time in the history of me doing QB index. But I wasn't going to move DAC because we know that DAC is the engine that makes the Cowboys offense go. And it doesn't matter if it's C.D. Lamb or George Pickens or Ryan Flanoy, who is out there. He's continuing to throw them into games. Yes, they lost to Detroit. Yes, he had a couple of turnovers. They were contested balls. It wasn't really entirely his fault. I still believe he deserves to be in the top five. Oh, yeah. I agree with you. Absolutely there. The Mahomes thing's interesting. Now, you having Trevor Lawrence ahead of him, that's too far. It's crazy.

Trevor Lawrence has played great the last two weeks, but to me, the rest of the season outweighs significantly from home so do you have at 11 because everyone else in your top 10 night I actually would not have any problem with there you have Darnold Love who is maybe an MVP candidate Herbert and Jared Goff Josh Allen May and Stafford is still at your rankings it's just crazy because when you think about like Breeze and Manning maybe Breeze had like one season but especially the Peyton Manning or the Tom Brazy Brady's of it all. There were no seasons where at the end of the season, you could say he was not a top eight quarterback. I'm not sure if I'm ready to go there with the homes. We have another

month ago. The Chiefs, though, at 15, wild. We have the Cowboys ahead of them. Of course, they won that game head to head. We have the Eagles now at 13, which I think feels right. To me, this section, 49ers at 9. We like the 49ers on NFL daily. Chargers at 10, bear is 11, Jaguar is 12. and Eagles 13. It's really interesting because I think this is a group of teams where if you told their fan bases right now, you're going to win

a playoff game. They'd say, okay, I'd take it. That's pretty good. Like, we're in the final eight. We're in the divisional round. Like, that alone would be a good outcome for this Philadelphia Eagles team, which really shows how far they've fallen.

It'd be a good outcome for the Bears. It'd be a good outcome for the Jags. It might even be at this point, a good outcome for the Chargers. Oh, yeah, get the playoff. Monkey off Herbert's back. To me, that would be like when,

when Lamar won his first playoff game, just at least get one in, and especially a season where you don't have your two tackles, I think that would be fantastic. Yeah, but to answer your question about who was at 11, it was Brock Purdy,

who was on a buy, which is why I couldn't really justify moving him around much. Now, on second examination, I probably would have put my homes at 11, and Purdy at 12, you know,

now that I've had a chance to reflect after firing it off, but the Niners standing in the power rankings kind of justifies it. Like, they have they've pieced together their defense and yes they don't have a pass rush but they've performed well enough to limit you know the panthers and bryce young to a nightmareish performance in prime time and they continue to win games and purdy's most recent game which is a win over the

browns the numbers don't reflect it but he made some throws in that game where i was just like he's back that that's who he is it's a little bit out of structure it's a little bit off platform he's converting key downs that is who brock purdy is and i think that he's headed in the right direction after looking pretty rough the week before with all those interceptions against the Panthers. So that's part of why I put him there. And I think, again, it's a big reason why we have the Niners at nine because despite all these injuries, they continue to find ways to win football games because they're just disciplined. They have, they show good fundamentals. They execute well. Kyle Shanahan, man, a legit candidate for coach of the year.

Man, I'm always putting Chuck on the hot seat with these quarterback rankings. That was quarterback keeper presented by Snapdragon. Learn more at snapdragon.com slash laptops. Let's wrap the show with our top eight in the power rankings. This was an interesting exercise to think about the lions for me because in the end, I had the lines a little higher than you. Like, I still had the lions over a lot of the AFC playoff teams. And you realize like, man, even though the lines have a lot of issues, like a lot of these teams, I'd throw the 49ers in here too. If you put them in the AFC, they got a shot. Like even a down Lions team, like we saw it, they can put 40 on a decent team like the Cowboys.

So at 8, but like, man, if you're a Lions fan in a down season, we think you're the eighth best team in the league in week 15, that's not so bad. We have the Patriots down at 7, probably lower than a lot of places do, although they were tied with the Broncos. So ultimately, those two were tied for 6th. And then the bills and the Texans tied at 4th. I separated and went with my rankings,

had the bills ahead of the Texans, but we basically had them flip-flopped in very close to each other. And then we had the exact same one, two, three, Rams, Seahawks, and Packers. Let's actually just talk about the Bills and the Texans. I'll talk for myself first. I thought these top four teams in the AFC stood apart a little and they basically were all in the same group, Bills, Texans, Broncos, Patriots. That actually was my order. Shook, how did you feel like you were separating these teams and how crazy is it that that this Texans team I think was first for you in the AFC. Yeah. No, actually, you know who was first for me in the AFC? I'm going to

ding you for this since you're, you know, a Massachusetts guy. I had the Patriots four. Okay. I was shocked that your ranking dropped them all the way to seventh. But hey, maybe I'm the homer here. It's tough to, I kind of wanted to give them credit for what they've accomplished. I didn't necessarily and rightfully evaluated it as like, all right, let's put them on a neutral field, who I think is going to win? Because that's what drove the rest of my evaluation here with the Bills and the Texans and the Broncos.

The Bills are looking about the best that they have all year. I think that every team in this group is flawed in one way or another, but I do like the momentum that they're building and the direction they're headed in. Obviously, it starts with Josh Allen, but I've seen some interesting performances from their defense. They've been opportunistic like they were against the Bengals. they absolutely shut down the Chiefs

and they played them. So they've had some good performances. The Texans have the best defense in the NFL and I think that will travel and could beat anybody on any given day. The Broncos are a team that I think is also headed in the right direction. Bo Nix has encouraged me over the last few weeks,

but I do see some flaws in them, namely in their running game, leaning too much on RJ Harvey, who's a rookie. And I know that they have a good defense, but I have a little bit of nervousness. I can't quite, it's some trepidation. I can't quite trust them in certain scenarios against other teams,

but I still like the makeup of their team overall. So that's why they land where they are. Patriots more than anything, like I said, just rewarding them for what they've done and also all the faith in the world and none other than Mr. Drake may. Of course. And to me, they're all very close.

And if the Patriots win this Sunday, obviously, they'll be even higher on a list like this. To me, you can't separate them much. But I really think this whole Texans to the Super Bowl bandwagon is going to get a lot. lot of people on it over the next month because they have the Cardinals and the Raiders next they have the Chargers offensive line on the road that's by far their hardest game of the season left that's actually an NFL network exclusive game we

have one more game this season that's a Saturday afternoon game and that's it's going to be really interesting and they finish up with the Philip River's Colts they are not going to lose two more games the rest of the season they are going to get to 11 and 6 at worst and there's a pretty decent chance They win all four of those games. It's tough to win every week in the NFL, so, you know, I could see a surprise. But there's a real scenario. They win that division that they are the two or the three seed.

And a lot of people are looking at that defense is the best thing going in the AFC going into the playoffs. Let's wrap just going over. We agreed. I think it's a pretty clear top three, Ram Seahawks Patriots. I really think Seahawks are getting slept on a little bit nationally as like right there with the Rams. and I have them over the packer, so did you, as like maybe the best team in the NFL. I know we got to see it with Darnold and everything, but we don't have super power teams this year. I think the Rams are the closest to it, and they have a chance to really prove it over the next six days here by beating the Lions and the Seahawks.

If they can do that, they can enter the playoffs as a real deal, like super favorite. Other than that, I think these three teams are going to kind of be the teams going into the NFL. FC playoffs. They're going to beat the Lions, just because I think the Lions limitations are going to prevent them from keeping up with the Rams. That Seahawks game is going to tell us a lot about these two teams. It is a bummer that I think the best two or three teams in the NFL all reside in the same conference, but it's not the first time that we've been here. However, Greg, I would like you to enlighten the listeners and the viewers. What was the text that I sent to you around Midnight Eastern on Tuesday going into Wednesday? You told me the Rams are going to win the

Super Bowl in some former fashion. Yeah. I can't remember the exact words, but that was the takeaway. I believe I might have ended it with Bookett. That's how confident I am in the Rams right now. In a year in which every team is flawed top to bottom in one way or another, there is, like you said, no more complete team in the Los Angeles Rams. And yes, I was watching them take the Cardinals behind the woodshed.

And that, you know, doesn't, that's not a measuring stick game. But it was one of those games where you saw elite passing from Matthew Stafford. You saw an incredible rapport between him and Puka Nakua and him and Devante Adams and even the tight end group because they love to run that 13 personnel, which we know Jordan loves to talk about, and for good reason, because it makes them so multiple and they're hard to defend. But as a team top to bottom, front to back, defense, offense, special teams had a little bit of issue with kicker. They just look like the strongest contender to win the Super Bowl. It is not a situation in which I think back to the 2016 Falcons late in the regular season, I was confident they were. going to win the NFC. And they did. And Matt Ryan was going to win MVP. And he did. And ultimately they lost that Super Bowl. But they're not quite there, but they're about as

close as you can get in this league right now to a team that gives me that much confidence because they have the quarterback. They have an explosive dynamic running back in Kyron Williams. They got a good spellback in Blake Corum. They have an offensive line that is absolutely dominating in the trenches. They have talented pass catchers. They have a defense that's highly underrated and can win in the trenches as well. And all of that combined can travel and win anywhere home or on the road. And as it stands right now, they're not going to have to go on the road as long as they beat the Seahawks in that Thursday night or next week. That will be tough.

We're going to go live on YouTube next week for the first time on Thursday night. I think Jordan Rodriguez joining me for that one. Shooki's got the night off. So that's going to be fun. Join us live. We're going to do something different because that's just a fun game. It matched up schedule-wise. Let's hit that music.

Thank you, Shook. Big week. Shook's not done. He's going to be back on Saturday. We're doing the all underrated defense with Ali Connolly. But before that, we've got a special treat in the feed. We've mentioned it all week. I hope everyone can check it out.

Power Players with Jordan Rodrigue, a new series that we're doing. That goes up on Friday. We will see you that. If a Lenovo gaming computer is on your holiday list, don't shop around. Just go directly to the source, Lenovo.com. It's your last chance to score exclusive deals,

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