NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Week 11 Recap: Eagles dominate Cowboys, Bills continue to slide & Saints keep their streak alive

Episode Date: November 20, 2017

A room filled with heroes- Dan Hanzus, Marc Sessler, Chris Wesseling & Gregg Rosenthal recap all of the Week 11 action, including Minnesota's lopsided win over the Rams, which might have produced the front-runner for Radio Call of the Year (3:45); Another victory for the seemingly playoff-bound Saints (10:00); Wess lays into Gregg over an outrageous claim about Roger Lewis's big catch (20:00); Nick Shook joins the show to discuss Brett Hundley's clunker in Green Bay (35:00) and tries to answer "How did the Browns get here" (45:30); Dan pays tribute to Jay Cutler in what he thinks could have been his last game (55:00); Carson Wentz strengthens his MVP case with a monster win over the Cowboys in Dallas (1:06:00) And more!Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comNFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. The Around the NFL podcast is ready to eat a W. Welcome back to another edition of the Around the NFL podcast presented by, Head and Shoulders. My name is Dan Hansis, and I'm joined by Rubeld with Heroes, Mark Sessler, Chris Wessling, and Greg Rosethal.

What's up, boys? Hey, Dan. I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what. A lot of football to talk about today, some good football, some bad football, some meh football. But Thursday night, Greg and I are in the studio, and we're talking about how great the Steelers looked and how, all right, for me anyway, I was like, I'm getting a little juiced up now about this idea.

that the AFC has a real powerhouse potential to go up against the Pats. And then Sunday, today happens. And yeah, the Steelers are not in the picture today. But we have two other teams that we were kind of hoping would make a move that are going in the wrong direction. And increasingly, I know this is on your radar mark, more than ever, it is really a two-team race in the AFC right now. Stop hoping. It's exhausting to keep wanting this conference to be something. That it's not.

If it's a one-year thing, that's fine. No, this week-week thing where we try to spin mediocrity into something special to observe as a football fan is a disservice to football fans. It is what it is. At best, it's a two-team AFC, at best. Speaking of spinning, just wait until next week when Greg's consecutive week stretch of trying to spin the Patriots opponent

reaches its nadir when they fit. Oh, the dolphins always play the Patriots stuff. That's coming up next week. I said this week I thought they'd win comfortably. And it's a really poor AFC right now. 13 teams are 4 and 6 or better. So like the entire conference is basically alive at 4 and 6 if you wanted to make a case. But there's only two good teams.

That's happened sometimes. But I think selling this, I think it's telling the Steelers, sure. At some point it's like, what do you want? The team's 8 and 2 and has more talent. Those two teams are two Titanic teams. And, you know, it's going to be a surprise if they don't face it. I think you've been a little to me overly generous of the Steelers all year because that even on Thursday is the first time they even scored 30 points.

They had been kind of a disappointment on some level. But now they're really rolling and scoring points. Now I'm really excited. But to Mark's point, it's going to be hard to really talk yourself into one of these other teams. We're going to get through it all and maybe we'll end up being wrong because we're wrong all the time. That's just the way it works. That's what it's like being a member of the football cognizanti. and then if you are wrong,

will you go back and feel bad and take back all of this anger and wish that, you know, you didn't need to do it. Well, you're going to ask Mark that. Because Blake Bortles was going to win the... I simply don't have a problem with my stance at the moment. If someone is overtly becomes a third team to respect, then it's my job to respect them.

I will, I'll tell you what else. We're dealing with some technical difficulties right now with the mics. You know, this studio, I think they spent like $10 million to renovate it. Take a couple zeros off that. And, you know, it was a very expensive job. Put it that way. I don't know the price tag. I'm not probably doing those things.

We have all sorts of audio issues. Mark's not happy with his box over there. And I got a feeling that's going to come through in today's show. I feel like it already is. And I'm excited about that. A vituperative session. As long as someone else other than myself benefits, everything is in line. We talked about the AFC.

Let's start, though, the NFC, the game that, That was the marquee game on paper between two seven to two teams going into it. The Rams and the Vikings in Minneapolis. Let's talk. Keenham shotgun takes the snap. Big blitz by the Rams. So Keenham passes left. Caught by Neeland, 50, 40, 30, and he's loose to stop.

Case Keenum just shot a dagger right through the heart of this. team oh put it on the list yes paul allen k f x and with the call and shout out sorry that i don't have i don't have your name right now somebody on twitter gave me a heads up hey check out paul allan's adam thiel and touchdown call and that was a winner that's fire right there we like that top 10 calls it's always the first show after the super bowl who will win the coveted award this year guess who just punched himself a ticket into the top 10 paulie allen nicely done he's there every year, all one year. You guys are a stunt.

Yes, Adam Thieland turned on the Jets on that 65-yard touchdown. Latavius Murray rushed for two touchdowns, 95 yards. And the Minnesota Vikings shut down the league's best offense in a 24-7 win over the Rams. Greg, the Rams

entered this game averaging close to 33 points per game. They left Minneapolis, another victim of the new purple people eaters with the oomlot over the new spelled NU. Trademark it, baby. Trademark it, bitch.

They are such a solid defense, and this is Mike Zimmer's perfect team come to life. And yet I came out of this game really more impressed with their offense on some level because they go into halftime. It's a very evenly played game. They come out of halftime, and they win the yardage battle after halftime, 288 to 57. And before the game, Mike Zimmer told the Fox broadcasters, we think we're going to be able to lean on this lightweight Rams front line

and it's going to pay dividends over the course of the game. And that's exactly what happened. Their offensive line was fantastic. Really just mowed down the Rams defensive line. And then when you flip to the other side, the Rams just didn't have the ball that much in the second half because they forced a couple three and outs. On both sides, when you needed to get a yard or when you need to get

two yards. The Vikings are going to get it with ease. And Todd Gurley and the Rams were not getting at all. Their offensive line getting pushed around. And you're going to win the game in the trenches when you're the Minnesota Vikings. That's what they say. And this crazy 2017 in which many things are beyond our control. Here's something you can control. Vote for Adam Thielen for the Pro Bowl. And if you are a writer with an All Pro vote, consider him opposite Antonio Brown. This guy is deserving of an all pro I think he he might be the non-quarterback MVP

of the league right now. That's that touchdown by the way and if you haven't seen it you will eventually I would think as the week goes along like that is the type of touchdown that you makes a quarterback your best friend where you may do all the work and and Case Keenham who again that job's not going anywhere

played very well serves to continue to be this team's quarterback as much as we love Teddy Bridgewater story but he takes the ball he takes off and does that's the dagger play of the game. If you're Adam Thielen, you're on pace to have a better campaign than all but two of Randy Moss's seasons. Wow. And won by Jake Reed, who Westerly... I forgot I agree. I mean, he is that legitimate receiver. And all these teams that end up with their stadium hosting the Super Bowl, and you always get this thing if they get out to a quick start, oh, there's a chance.

Team X could show up in their own home stadium for the big game. You don't like that. No, no. I mean, I think the thing is that it usually flames out. hardcore by a round now, if not much earlier. This time around, it's completely legit. They have a chance. They have a very good chance. I mean, this is a thing. Coming out of this game, we were going to be talking about one of two things.

Minnesota and their defense or the Rams and their offense able to continue their pace. And it's the opposite. It's the Minnesota side because their defense is a Super Bowl-worthy defense. And Theelan, he keeps drives going. There was a key, tough, close third-down catch where he kept the drive going. They end up scoring. There was an overthrow kind of by Case Keenham on a place. that was wide open, schemed beautifully, which Pat Shermer, their offensive coordinator has done all year,

or it wasn't Case Keenum's best throw. Thielen makes a great play to catch that to keep it going. So he's been incredible, and then you flip it to the other side. It was not like this looked like a one-sided game, certainly not for the first half. And you look at Cooper Cups Day. And it was really just two plays, but they just didn't have the ball that much. And these two plays made all the difference. He fumbled the ball on the one-yard line, a nice play by the Vikings defense to force the fumble. and he dropped what would have been about a 30-yard catch going into the red zone in the second half

when they still had a chance. And those two plays was the margin for error because the Vikings defense and their offense was playing too well. One thing I'll say that the win here was the table was set on Wednesday. We're going to get to a team where a team panicked and made a quarterback decision that imploded on them. But in this case, Mike Zimmer and experienced head coach made the right decision by not flipping the switch a quarterback when it was not deserved to be made on Wednesday. If that happens down the road, maybe so, not yet. Yeah, I agree with your theory that this will happen naturally if it's going to happen.

You don't need to force a quarterback change right now. There will be a time to do it. And one more thing on Adam Thielen. You're talking about what number one receivers do, and you mentioned he moves the chains. He also beats double coverage, makes plays down the field, makes plays in the red zone, and he's the only receiver in the NFL with at least five catches in every game this year. Let's keep an eye also on the Rams now. We've had obviously still a very good season at seven and three.

They are the team of ATL for a reason. We believe in them. But now they get the Saints at home at Arizona, home against Eagles, at Seattle. They got to put up some wins still here to keep the train going. I hope we didn't jinx them because we mentioned how they've had great injury luck on Thursday's show. And they had two cornerbacks go out in this game. And after that happened, including that Thielen play, it was on one of the replacements for their two cornerbacks. that went out, and, you know, hopefully they get them back.

News alert, we don't hold that power. I don't think Seahawks fans are feeling sorry for them right now. No. Probably not. Let's move on to another big NFC matchup. Will Lutz taps his right foot. Morsted puts it down. Lutz has it on its way.

And the Saints win. Will Lutz buries the field goal, an epic collapse by the Redskins, and an epic comeback by the Saints. results in their eighth straight victory. Jim Henderson, WWL with the call. The Saints wiped out a 15-point deficit in the final six minutes of the fourth quarter, then ended the game with a chip shot field goal

and overtime to top the Redskins, 34-31 at the Superdome. Chris Wessling, that's, as we heard from Jimmy Henderson, eight straight wins for the Saints who are in control of the NFC South. How did the game change its trajectory so quickly? It didn't happen until the last three minutes. Drew Breeze hit on 11 straight completions to close out regulation,

including two touchdowns. And Alvin Kamara had a juggling touchdown and a two-point conversion in there. And really, Kirk Cousins really missed Chris Thompson when he went out, especially on the last drive and regulation. That's his sidecar in the shotgun, and you're playing instead with a rookie like Somaget Pirine, who dropped the ball in overtime. It's a shame that people are going to watch this game

after they turned on whatever other games they were watching in the early time slot, and they're going to see Kirk Cousins come up short in that final drive. He had, I think, maybe my favorite quarterback game of the season for 59 minutes. Wow. He stood tough in the pocket, took hit after hit, made the turkey hole throws down the sideline. Turkey hole.

Took a helmet-to-helmet shot. Jay Gruden then pulled off a fake punt on fourth and one, deep in his own territory. Cousins led them down the field, got clobbered by a blitz and hit Ryan Grant for a 40-yard touchdown at one point when they took a big lead. And they just showed a toughness for 59 minutes. It's a shame that they crumbled down the stretch with injuries. And I think they just got tired. But this was the inverse of that Seattle game that the Redskins had, where Cousins made those two big throws after a whole game of not being able to move the offense. And this game, he came up short at the end after having

just a phenomenal game for 59 minutes. Devastating loss for the Redskins who fall to 4 and 6 and in a hyper-competitive NFC we might have to be taken out the forks at the very at the very least. Oh, they're done. They're going to come up over Danish. And the NFC, if they were in the AFC

I'd give them a pretty decent chance. They're not. But they're not. But they are not in the AFC. They're in the NFC. So the Redskins and then you have to sit and chew on this one Mark because this game is there and just think if they close out this game, like they will well according to the win probability tweets that I saw 99.7% chance they were going to win this game with six minutes to play and they and they're at five and five and coming off

a huge road win but everything blew up and the red soon is going to stick with him for a while well and credit to the saints because they now are rolling with extreme confidence that whatever situation they are in and they've done it enough times this year to believe it that they can win no matter what what they're facing and today what impresses me is you look up the 500 and what 50 plus yards for the Saints, much of it through the air where we were just talking about how dominant they've been on the ground and the Drew Breeze is sort of fading into the background in a very appropriate and friendly way if you're a Saints fan. But then today, obviously made some huge throws down the stretch. Yeah, he was big done the stretch. And you have

to credit Mark Ingram, who is running as well as anyone in the NFL right now. I would love to see a side-by-side comparison of Mark Ingram and DeMarco Murray entering a hole with one defender to beat. Ingram makes that guy miss every time, and Murray never makes that guy miss. It's wild. Camara is averaging, to combine with Ingram, 113 yards from scrimmage in the six games since Adrian Peterson was traded with five touchdowns. And Ingram's playing, as you said, maybe as well as any running back in the league. That Peterson trade, just getting rid of them was like the trade of the year. Yeah, Ingram's averaging 113 yards, or no, Camaro is averaging 113 since then.

Ingrams are averaging over 120 since then let's move out manning takes the snap that bring pressure he's going to lob one down the left side line and the pass is caught at the three by Lewis that was he contacted down there's a flag on the play pass interference a touchdown one of the other look at this catch he was interfered with what a catch Bob Papa there with the call he was interfered with Roger Lewis made the catch was not in not a touchdown but put the Giants at the goal line chip shot field goal and that was all she wrote the New York Giants a 12-9 win over the Kansas City Chiefs at the Meadowlands and man you know

this is what I'm talking about at the top of the show the Chiefs 5 and 0 once upon the time the Chiefs were 5 and 0 Kareem Hunt was an MVP candidate in addition to a rookie of the year Locke they put 450 yards of the Patriots in week one had

tiebreaker there, and you were thinking, you know, the road to the Super Bowl might go through KC. Six weeks later, they've lost four or five. And this game really, obviously, when you only score nine points, tells you something. But the Giants had given up 82 points in their previous two games. There was a mutiny of foot. Their defense had been a total, total disaster and disappointment this season. So for the Chief's inability in this game, Greg, two.

score a touchdown through four quarters through overtime. They did not score very well in their game coming at, but going into the buy. They have scored no touchdowns, and I think we're getting in 15 or 16 possessions now for the Chiefs. And this is a totally different look than the team that was shocking the world in September. That Steelers lost, set them back.

They haven't been the same offense since then. They had a pretty good night against Oakland, which they ended up losing offensively, weren't great against Denver, Dallas, weren't great against the Giants. They were counting on, you know, 50-yard plays, 70-yard plays. They were on a historic pace of big plays week after week. Suddenly, when you can't scheme up big plays,

and I think Andy Reid came into this season with a lot of great ideas, and maybe it's his offensive coordinator, Matt Nagy who's getting a lot of pub as a possible head coach, they came up with so many exciting ideas. Teams all around the league were stealing them. But five weeks into the season, I think defense is, started catching up and figuring out how to defend those plays. And now the Chiefs are just kind

of another team. And seven touchdowns in the last five games. So that's what we're talking about. And increasingly the offense is looking like that annoying Alex Smith Chief's offense that has, you know, kind of got on everyone's radar in past years and what

led to talk in the summer about when is Patrick Mahomes get played? And I don't know if that's something that's going to happen this year. But now the doors open a little bit if this continues, because because, and we'll get to the Raiders. The Raiders didn't do their job today. So the chiefs are still okay in the AFC West.

But you have to wonder what's going to happen. I mean, the other thing, Andy Reid, West, you know this. That everybody knows the stat. Famously great coming out of his by, 16 and 2. So to come out of the buy against one of the worst teams in the league and still be broken. Something is wrong. And can Nagy and Reed figure it out before it's too late. That's the question.

I take back everything I said on Thursday when I said the chiefs were still one of the absolute titans of the AFC and a true contender and, you know, all these years we didn't give them enough credit and now they deserve the benefit of the doubt. They burned you. They burned me against the dog giants, the laying dog giants. They burned me against that team. The last time we saw a team fall to the Giants. How dare you, Chiefs.

Do you know what Wes has been through this year? The last time we saw a team fall like this to the Giants, the Broncos haven't won a game since then. If you lose to the Giants, you're dead to me. I will play the Greg roll for a minute, though, and let you know that if you're Kansas City... What's that? Just dashing, handsome? No, no, no. Yes, dashing, handsome, swift. I would say this. You have the bills, jets, raiders, chargers, dolphins, and broncos left on your schedule. This is one of the most disappointing swoons because suddenly we had the Chiefs team. We thought that they had finally shed their snake skin and become something else. And we were right back where we started with this whole thing. But record-wise, in terms of their schedule, if they can't get into... to a top three seed. They should be able to win enough of those

games. Yeah. Otherwise, the AFC is truly a lost ship. There's no gimmies. When you lose a game like this, you wonder like how messed up they are right now. And I, you know, and I will say because there could be some, some Chiefs fans that come after me on Twitter and like, oh, well, you're not talking about

the conditions at the medal. It was very windy and that is not conducive to throwing the ball down field. But that doesn't mean that you can completely wipe out the effort and say, oh, it's just because of the win. And that doesn't mean that the Chiefs, in a sense of desperation at 6-6 with seven minutes to play in the game, again, on a wind-swept day at the Meadowlands, have Travis Kelsey throwing a 40-yard bomb down

field that gets intercepted when if you just played smart and maybe matriculated down the field, you could kick a field goal and go home. But instead, this is the story of the Chiefs right now. Everything that was working, all the quick strides, all the cutesy stuff, that's all out the window now. And they're a boring team and a boring offer. Yeah, because also conditions treat two teams equally. It was blustery when the Giants run offense as well. And Roger Lewis still made that catch. I mean, that catch was unbelievable.

It kind of reminded me of last week. Sterling Shepard made a one-handed catch. And like both of those catches, this is a little off top. Both those catches, if they happened in the 1980s, that would have been like the best catch of the 1980s. Like the most athletic. What are you talking about? That is how good.

That's outrageous. Have you ever seen Gary Rice? You have no idea what you're talking about. Jerry Rice, my friend. Nobody made any tough catch. That is maybe the most useless quote you've ever had on this podcast. I'm saying, watch this during Shepardust, watch this Lewis thing. People weren't making athletic.

It wasn't the 20s, Greg. What my point is, we're taking for granted these athletic, one-handed diving catches. It wasn't happening. I would say this. Go back in a time machine to the 80s when you were three years old and watch any 10-minute ticker game with Jerry Rice and Montana's Niners. They were doing this every week stuff 10 times, more sensational. You shouldn't get so upset, Wes, and Mark, you're off there with a three-year-old comment.

Greg was born at 32. He doesn't know what the 80s were. It's fair. Wes Chandler made those plays on a weekly basis. West Chandler, Ruff in a big spot. Could you make any better a reference? Let's move on in another disappointing AFC team. Brady to the scopedta, but the ballon, bathear, large, over the bond of the right, the phase complete.

And so let's ball! Touchdown! Bradley Cooks, touchdown, New England Patriots. Armando Quintero Fox. Like it. Estadio Azteca. Omni Austica. Yes.

Yes, the throne of ease does travel south. The Patriots are in cruise control. I said the throne of ease travels down south, Lindsay. MVP favorite Tom Brady through three touchdown passes, including that 50s. including that deep ball to Brandon Cooks and the Patriots coasted to a 33 to 8 win over the Raiders. Greg, gone are the days when there was legitimate worry about upon the throne of ease. The paths look like themselves, which means they're basically unstoppable right now.

It's the best offense in the league. It's obviously, in my mind, the best quarterback in the league. He now has 50 touchdowns and four interceptions since the start of last season. Those are just preposterous numbers. and a couple of the touchdowns today where he's going to his second or third read where he's scanning all across the field where he's starting left

and then at the last second he goes to his right it's just crazy how he can see the entire defense and knows what's going to happen before it happens and him having a big day against the Raiders who might be the worst defensive league was about as predictable as the NFL gets. Can we put to bed

the most tired storyline in this entire season which is every game, including today, the announcer talking about the yardage spilled against New England's defense. They haven't allowed 17 plus points since week four. It is an exhausting narrative. Their defense is back on track. Enough. Concern over that.

It's absolutely on track. And holding the Raiders down like this is a great sign. I mean, and they don't have, like, I don't know what we're going to learn about the Patriots. It doesn't mean every game's going to be this easy. But other than the week 15 game at Pittsburgh. They don't, they've had, they've got a lot of luck in terms of the schedule lately. Are they going to go 14 and 2? Oh my God.

Some move they're going to use it. You thought I was kidding, Dan, when you were talking about gradual decline and I said he was just hitting his prime. Yeah. He was just hitting his prime. No, he's better. He's better now. You hear quarterbacks talk about if only I could keep my physical skills when mentally I

was on top of my game. That's exactly what he's done. He's kept all of his physical skills. He did it five years ago, but since then he's recaptured. them to his hardworking credit and mentally, eh, something else going on. Well, hold on. So what does it say about our society that all anyone does is make fun of Tom Brady

for his regime, his diet, X, Y, and Z, fill the blank. He's a laughing stock on some level because of it. People point in fun of it, but then he's actually doing it on the field. Well, the answer to the question is it's not just everyone, you have to respect what he's been able to do with his own body, but he's trying to turn himself into an empire and then some people will point out People dismiss his diet entirely. No, people that go after Tom Brady go after him more, I think,

because he's trying to sell people on a lifestyle that's probably not attainable for the average Joe. What he can do and what he has access to and then some of the claims that his trainer makes about different, like what water intake. Some of that stuff smells like maybe a bit of a scam. I agree with some of it, but I'll say this. I don't know if a scam, I wouldn't use the word scam, but I would say this. there are at least 31 other NFL quarterbacks with the means to give it a shot. Yeah, and I think a lot of them, I mean, I think that's all across sports. I mean, LeBron James is basically the Tom Brady of NBA at this point.

And I think, you know, that's part of sport science and that's amazing. And the fact that the biggest addition, not only with the nutrition, is that he has Bill Belichick on his side. I mean, he's got Bill Belichick who's now undefeated against Jack Del Rio going up against Ken Norton. He's got Josh McDaniels. He's got a system that he's been in. I mean, there's a million different things going right. And then I'm a Raiders fan. I'm watching that game. I think, like, this is not a well-coached team. No team struggles to get the snap off more than the Raiders. Week after week, it's like they either take delays of games or they have to

call timeouts or they're struggling to get snaps off or there's miscommunications in the backfield. It's not a well-coached team. I think they're now the leader for me in the biggest disappointment of the season. They weren't even competitive in a very important game for them today, and they've just been a bad team basically since week three. Zero identity. They were supposed to be a Super Bowl contender this year. In my mind, they haven't been in the wildcard race for a few weeks,

and it's because of what you said, they're not a good team. So I don't care what their record is. You can watch them play, and they've got one of the worst secondaries we've seen. Yeah. And instead of the offense making up for that, the offense has gotten much worse. So I just watch them play And I don't worry about them in the wild And by the way, get ready for a month full of us

propping up this week 15 Steelers Patriots game. New England wins by 20. The Raiders got the running game going today but the receivers have killed them week after week. Before we move on, I do want to give a little shout out to our listeners in Mexico who showed up strong at Estadio, Azteca. The atmosphere there was incredible

and the energy, I wish they had gotten a better game. When the two teams came out and they showed some footage of this for the pregame introduction, this long, crazy walk down because the locker room is so far and it's elevated. The crowd was going wild. I mean, it was during the pregame, too. It was like an unbelievable performance,

mostly by Raiders fans, but a lot of Patriots fans. How was Tony Romo in a vast blowout? They were fun. Him and Nance were fun. Everybody was bored. If you were watching the game, if you were a Patriots fan, they said. That's two vastly different critiques, right?

Romo was good, though. I mean, they did the best. Greg was pumping his fist at his desk. Loose Cannon was sending out a bunch of tweets. Dan is now more disappointed when the Patriots lose than when the Patriots win than when the Jets lose. I mean, how many loose cannon gifts of what's her name drinking a gigantic glass of wine? I like that. That's like her own meme now.

Oh, yeah. In humor. No what I want? No, you don't want, Greg. If the Patriots are going to be involved with high profile games, give me something that's fun to watch. Because 303 nothing is not. I mean, greatness should be fun on some level. Tom Brady's only going to be around for another dozen years at his peak.

So you better learn to appreciate him now. They also announced they're staying there. They're coming back until 2021. Every year, game in Mexico. Last word from Rob Gruncowski. It was just a fiesta all over the field, man. Let's move on. He worked on that for me.

Shotgun snapped. Peterman fades back and he slings it to the far left intercepted. Picked off by Trevor Williams. He races up the 40, the 40. and gets knocked down there. That's five interceptions for Nathan Peterman and the Chargers have their defense to the end zone. Anybody know that voice?

That is Matt Money Smith, the voice raised by this podcast from a seed. Yes, the voice of the Chargers, Matt Money Smith, Nate Piedman through five interceptions in the first half of his first ever career start. Oh my goodness. a career beginning apocalypse

that prompted an awkward Tyrod Taylor relief appearance as the Chargers laughed their way to a 54 to 24 to 24 win over the bills at the stub. Mark, the Chargers are pretty damn good 5 and 6. Are they 4 and 6?

4 and 6. The bills, meanwhile, embarrassed themselves up and down the food chain over the last five days, culminating with Sunday's meltdown. A lot of finger pointing to go around in Western New York after this one. It starts with Peterman, if you want, to talk about on the field. The first pick

bounced off the hands of his fullback, and I went back, and I missed that. I want to make sure it's his fault. That wasn't. The next four were. They were awful throws, and this guy, what are you asking a rookie to do to come in cold like this? He's not seeing the field, and you're dealing with Joey Bosa all over you. I mean, the first three interceptions had Joey Bosa's fingerprints all over them, even though they weren't officially sacks. He's in the there was no pocket for Peterman to throw from. That said, The real finger pointing is a team that totally panicked. It's the reverse of what we talked about with Minnesota.

You, for some reason, no one's calling Tyrod Taylor a top five talent, but you flipped the switch. You put in Peterman with the season still have a winning record. You're five and four. Everything now, you have a lot of explaining to do. If you're Sean McDurton, a coach of the year candidate weeks ago, to your locker room, you have to explain to them why this looked like a good decision to you. And the fallout, I think, would be pretty fierce.

Speaking of Sean McDermott, he was asked about the meltdown by his rookie quarterback. Here's what he had to say. Well, it wasn't what he had hoped for or we had hoped for. At the same time, you know when you put a young player out there, a young quarterback, that there's going to be some ups and downs, and this is part of it. You know, it's a lot, it's very easy West to be an armchair coach or whatever and be like, well, it didn't make sense to put this fifth round rookie on the road against a fearsome pass rush, like the Chargers.

But in this case, that was exactly the truth, and everybody else could see it. How did the bills not see that this, nobody thought it could go this bad, but they left themselves wide open and hurt the kid in the process. Well, you know that coaching staffs are taking a ton of time and watching all the film, and these are informed decisions, and it's understandable that you had reached the conclusion that Tyrod Taylor is not your franchise quarterback. Totally understandable. What's not understandable to me is that you would prime your rookie quarterback and put

him into this first career game on the road against the best pass rushing tandem in the NFL. To me, that was, I think it's okay to say, okay, Tyrod Taylor is not the answer, but the timing of the move was head scratch. Well, right, and this isn't Deshawn Watson. It's a fifth round pick. I mean, there's a reason why Tyrod Taylor is making $16 million, why Andy Dalton's making that much, why Brock Osweiler got overpaid. because average starting quarterbacks is worth a lot.

Because the difference between average, which is Tyrod Taylor, and just kind of like a rookie starting his first game or a replacement level, is a massive difference. Well, I think that's why you see teams, when they give up on a season, it usually happens in mid-December, not mid-November, especially when they're by record still in the race. Now, quarterback is not the only problem with this team right now. They're very much in the race.

I mean, they're tied for the last. way the Raiders are in the race. They might bring, I would think they'd bring back Tyrod next week. He would not answer that question after the game. I don't know how you don't. You have the Chiefs next week, by the week, on the road in Kansas City. You're going to do the same thing again? He wouldn't answer.

He said he would consider Peterman, but he had to watch. It's a tricky spot. Well, you've put yourself in this position, but Nathan Peterman, if you like him, you want to give him another chance to watch the taste out of his mouth of this game. But at the same time, yeah, you are 5 and 5 still and still in the playoff mix. I mean, they shot themselves. on the foot. And again, if you're a Bill's fan, it's got to be so frustrating because three weeks ago, everything was great. And now you're kind of a laughing stock. And this is a humiliating

performance. The Chargers had about 300 yards with 12 minutes left in the third quarter. So this Bill's defense, which is Sean McDermott's defense and got a lot of love, has collapsed as much as the offense, if not more. They weren't going to win this game no matter what because as the quarterback, but the defense is not playing to a level that they're going to go anywhere or win any games anymore. Right, because you can talk early that the short field killed the bills over and over on defense, but it's the ground game the weeks, two weeks previous to this that let them down. It happened through the air today.

I think Rivers played one of his best games. It had a lot to do with Buffalo's defense, though. The Bill's defense has allowed more points in the last two weeks than the Jaguars have allowed in the last eight weeks. Chargers not dead yet. There you go. They're the one four and six team where you're like, well, they should probably be better. We can say that about all these AFC teams from now until the...

The Chargers are actually a pretty decent... The Chargers and the Ravens are the two ones we said on this podcast last week. We're like, well, those teams actually are okay. Right. They can beat bad teams. Here's the problem. And you guys are right. I agree with you. But they're the Chargers.

And what they're going to do is blow another couple games. That's going to kill them because they do it. That's what the Chargers do. I hope not. Because at least they can be frisky when they get hot like they did today. But yeah, the bills, to Wes's point, have given up $130. 35 points in the last three games. That's a team record.

And in Heartless Roto World headline news, Peterman wet's bed in first start with five I-N teams. That's pretty rough. Are they wrong? They're not wrong at all. You won't find that headline on NFL.com that would not be allowed out of the gate. I mean, there is a picture, I believe, is Mike Daniels number 76 for the Packers? Whoever 76, there's a picture of him circulating around.

He literally wet his pants today on the field. I'm surprised that doesn't happen more in the NFL. I think it does, but they were wearing those like beige sort of Packers colors today. So he's a tan on the P scale? Yeah, yeah. I have a three-year-old and a one-year-old boy, so I'm so used to men wetting themselves now. It's not even a big deal. Men, fine age, five.

Final note for me on this game. Kelvin Benjamin, do you think he misses the Panthers? O in three since he got traded there, and he jacked up his knee on his first and only catch of the day. what a nightmare it's been for that guy let's move on humbly takes the snap and rolls to his left nato is right sets up and wobbles one to the right and it's intercepted again eric weddell intercepted it that's two possessions and two interceptions for brett humley jerry sandusky w b a l with the call the ravens d yep they're the real deal baltimore forced five packers turnovers, a 23-0 win.

I stumbled over that because sometimes I think real broadcasters don't like to say nothing. And I just said, I was trying to be a pro there, and I said zero, and that didn't feel right. That didn't feel right at all. I think you can say nothing. I think nothing's cool. 23-0. How about Zatz? Bupkis.

Zatz. Win over the Packers at Lambeau Field. We now welcome in Nick Shook, who is looking refreshed after a podcast by, and we're Week 10, although we know he wasn't resting. He's getting his pump on. Shook, like I said, hey, Shook, how are you? Fantastic. I'm playing a little hurt today. Look at you. You're a warrior.

And we are not going to hold it against you that you're wearing a rich Eisen podcast. A long-sleeve t-shirt right now. This was a freebie, and I have yet to receive a freebie from the around the NFL pot. That's a fair retort. Fair retort. Anyway, five turnovers for the Ravens. That is their third shutout of the season. and they suddenly have the look of a team that could be

and maybe should be playing in January, especially again in this conference. You want to put a lot of this on Brett Hunley, and you can because he's not a good quarterback, but Baltimore's defense brought so much pressure in this game that he was fighting uphill battle almost from the word go. You know, every time it seemed he dropped back, either he was getting rushed from the middle,

he was getting rushed from around the edge, Terrell Suggs had a great day, Matt Judon had a great day, They forced a lot of turnovers. Hunley had three himself, two interceptions, and one strip sack for a fumble. And the Packers couldn't get going. For a lot of this game, it was, hey,

one team gets in the red zone, turns the ball over. The other team gets in the red zone, turns the ball over. It goes back and forth, back and forth. But eventually, Baltimore was able to capitalize enough to pitch the shutout and come away with a three-score win. Wes, do you think this is, you, when Huntley entered the lineup, you said the Packers, no reason to panic. They've been building this guy up.

This has to be seen for that organization as a failure that Brett Huntley's come in and kind of shipwrecked their season. It doesn't seem like they have a chance with him right now. Yeah, I think the day that Aaron Rogers got hurt, I came on this podcast and said, you'll see that the talent on the Packers' offense isn't that good. They're just not that good. The offensive line's been banged up all year. They don't have speedy wide receivers. But that said, I have no problem going with the guy you've been developing for three years and the other teams wanted to trade for on draft. weekend, but undeniably, the results have been catastrophic for them.

It's just been bad results. They've been, Brett Hudley's been awful. This is the Raven's recipe, because they weren't any better on offense. They had 219 yards. I mean, you don't see teams win games very often with 219, with that low of a yardage figure, much less win a game 23 to nothing. I saw an interesting tweet that listed Ravens' last six games, and then it was complimented with the comment of defense, good enough to win all

six offense bad enough to lose all six. Well, they've told us who they are this year. We know who the Ravens are. They absolutely pulverize bad quarterbacks and bad offenses, and they lose to good teams. I mean, it's another shutout for them. So this is the team, I think, in the AFC that's going to not sneak in because there's no one sneaking into the playoffs.

You're going to get dropped in backwards out of like an open, plain door into the back into the AFC, you know, playoff situation. But do you trust them, Shook, to do anything more than to go in and lose a playoff playoff game. No. Their last year is Miami Dolphins, except they have a better defense because I don't expect them to get out of the wild card round if they do make it. And I'm not ticketing them.

I've been saying they're my pick for the 602, but I mean, they're five and five. They're bad enough to lose any game, too. The thing that they have is a nice looking schedule overall where you can see them getting to nine wins, and I kind of think that'll be enough. Defense travels, and if they go on the road in a playoff game, if they, who would they face? Like the Chiefs or something? Is it that crazy that they could win a game? It's not crazy.

Jaguars, who knows? It doesn't get me pumped up. Like, I'm not, like, jumping up and down with excitement at the idea of the Ravens and Jags, for instance, going into the playoffs as wildcard teams. I could get behind that game. It'd be kind of fun. All right, maybe it would be in kind of like. Jags are fun.

Protest defensive struggle type way. Yeah, just to see who could set the turnover record at quarterback. So maybe there is something to that. Anything else from this game, shook, that jumped out to you. I love. Oh, wait a little. second hold up oh that's right i i locked it up i was what's going on with your tank i was uh i'm struggling but the chits there are uh yeah i'm the chats right now there are stronger forces than me

and it was the football god's punishing the NFL and nbcc for putting brett hunley in high time they said you know what you put brett humbly in high time we're going to have them score zero points the week before it's fair rams saints is stuck at 425 that checks out that checks out i two quick points i love alex collins if i had to pick a running back from a team that's not the one I follow closest, who I really wanted to wish, who I wish would be on my team, be Alex Collins.

I love the way he runs, he runs hard. Good day today, though, two point five yards per carry, long of nine. That's the thing, but when he does run the ball, I just like the way he looks, not necessarily that he's putting up numbers-wise. And Mike Wallace had a big play, a one-handed catch for a touchdown.

That was, I think, the catch of the day, potentially. It was beautiful. Good thing he didn't play in the 80s. He never would have been in the 80s. No, that was different. What I was saying was a pure show of athleticism, like a diving.

Poor Lawrence Taylor, who was he to be an athlete in the 80s? This has the ring of a back in my day. We walked up hill both ways. To Greg in the 80s, everyone was just like smoking cigarettes and, you know, basically. I don't think I'm exactly out on a limb saying that the athleticism. That's not what you said. Well, you're compared to like the NBA in the 50s where George Miken was just done. Or the NBA in the 80s.

I mean, oh, here we go. Oh, come on. You're not back and down. On the next topic. I think a lot of people would agree with me. Just not this. Chuck, just to catch you up, Greg said there was not really any athletic play. That is not true.

Nobody made good catch. What I said was, and of course I was exaggerating. I didn't mean it's like definitely the best play ever. What I'm saying is like the one-handed catch from Shepard last week or the catch from Roger Lewis last week. Like those would have maybe been the best most athletic catch in the entire decade. So why are we back into this world? You know, that's how good it was. Greg never saw the montage that they play.

at the beginning or end of each NFL game in the 80s where they play. I'm just saying we take these insane catches weekly for granted. Now it's just like... They also played by pits then. Yeah, it was like caveman times. All right, now let's move on to the next game. We got Sessler and shook together.

That's good because we're going to talk about the Browns. Kaiser drops the throw. He is going to be hit again. That ball's out again. In Gokwey hitting that time. Dante Fowler tries to fall on it. The ball is in the end zone. Jacksonville has fallen on it for a touchdown.

They're not going to take that one away. Telvin Smith in the end zone for the score, and that'll finish it off. Frank Franji, WJXL, with the call. Blake Bortles threw a touchdown pass. Telvin Smith recovered that fumble for a touchdown with just over a minute to play. And the Jaguars beat the Browns, keeping the Browns winless, a 197 victory. The win combined with the Titans loss on Thursday puts the Jaguars in sole. possession of first place in the AFC South. Mark Sessler will start with you here.

Do you expect the Jaguars to stay there? Yes, I do. I think they have much more identity than any other team in that division right now. And today's game, which was a sneaky good defensive performance by the Browns, and they've done that before in this season. This is how you could look at a Jaguars team and say they can win a playoff game because Blake Bortles totally shut down for large portions of the this game. Leonard Fournette got going later on, but essentially Jacksonville did very little on offense, but their defense, Jalen Ramsey, A.J. Boyer, the rest of this crew, Telvin Smith, making plays all over the place. They can do this to one of the big boys. I really do believe

that on the right Sunday, they have, and they could do it to Pittsburgh, and they could do it to New England potentially for parts of a game. I don't know how you hold down New England's offense. You're playing the Browns today, but they couldn't have played a more perfect game on defense, and it's not the first time they've done that. What's wild about, you know, what we talked about earlier is can Baltimore go into a wildcard game and win a playoff game? This is a Jacksonville team that I could see in a snowy setting, much like the last time there in the playoffs with David Gerard, a quarterback.

Oh, yeah. Instead, rely on their defense and their ground game. It don't have to rely on Blake Bortles to win a game because when they needed him to throw the ball today, it didn't work again. It hasn't really worked all year. But luckily, you know, the Browns made enough mistakes, and they forced enough mistakes with their defense to then come away with the two-score winning. game that was way closer than it looked.

You can look at it two ways. One, their winning games where Blake Bortles throws two picks in the final two minutes when they're trailing, like last week, or this week where they have the Browns under 100 yards, very late in the game, and it was still a game. Or you could look at it like, that's a regular season thing. That's not going to work. Like, you need to put a team like the Browns away much earlier when you've absolutely shut them down.

All I would say is that of all these outer AFC teams, I think that Jacksonville is the one that I'd be most excited to see in the playoffs. And their defense is so legitimate, it is so powerful that I think they can disrupt. They can disrupt in January. Go ahead, Chuck. They feel so boom or bust for me, though, just because of the fact that they rely so much on their defense and don't. The team overall. They have to avoid bowling behind or else they're done.

Yeah. Five turnovers. I just can't shake that feeling. We can't argue with you. So the Brown said five turnover. and are now 2 and 35 in their past 37 games. That is amazing. Shook, my question.

Hard to do. How? How did we get here? A massive teardown of a roster that already didn't have a lot of talent. I remember that free agent class exiting. First day of free agency, the Browns lose Mitchell Schwartz, Travis Benjamin, and Tashon Gibson. Today, one of those three played against them into Sean Gibson.

And unfortunately, They went from being a bad team to then going way below that and have struggled to come back up to a bad team to where they can then build forward. But to that point. Here comes the optimism, and that's why we love having chook. Well, everybody in Cleveland's going to call for jobs. They do every week.

It's hashtag mad online. Wait, what is it? Mad online, as in you are online and you're angry and you need to let it out somehow. So you're going to call for somebody's job on Twitter because we see it every week with a lot of bad teams. Let this regime ride into year three. Yeah, what's the point?

There is no point. You go nowhere. You gain nothing by firing those in charge right now. Really? Really. I mean, how many quarterbacks are you going to pass up? I'm not going to look at the quarterback right now, and I'll point to the positives first, and then I'll address that.

I mean, I would be fun if you stayed the course with the right regime, but there's no sign that this is the right regime. Defensively, the picks that they've made outside of Miles Garrett have been pretty good for the most part, and we point to a game like today where they had a- Miles Garrett's looks great. Oh, no, that's just a lot. layup. I'm not going to play. Anybody can make that pick.

You keep your defensive regime, but what are you going to do with Hugh Jackson, who's bungled the quarterback situation all year, and has shown no signs of being able to fix this offense, which is his specialty? I think he needs to get an offensive coordinator, and then you kind of hope that maybe they'll move from there. They're still devoid of talent. This is a draft that coming up. They have to spend a lot. It's been an endless stream of rookie quarterbacks and D-minus grade quarterback starting, and that channels back to Cleveland passing on And I'm going to make less of a big deal about Deshaun Watson because nobody was talking about Deshaun Watson as a number two or number one overall pick in the draft.

And honestly, the Wentz thing to me is the guy that fit Cleveland. I don't think we would be getting Philadelphia's Carson Wentz if he were in Cleveland right now. But it would have been the right pick. Two and 35. It's just insane. By the way, a bunch of those games, there are some wacky stuff happening in these games too. Right. The NFL, the talent shouldn't be that different.

To lose that much is... There's like witchcraft happening at points in some of these grounds games. There really are. I don't think this happens without some of that happening in 2017 NFL, but it also is a lot of mistakes that they have to look at themselves and say, we're the reason for it. Like, at least give me a 7 and 30. You know, give me an 8 and 29.

And it's still terrible. Those teams, too. This is an outlier. My God, Shook. Thank you for playing hurt today. Yeah. And we will look in, I don't know if we could have a shirt that, that will fit your frame,

but I will work with Lindsay behind the scenes to see if we can get you an honorary around the NFL podcast pullover, like the one Chris Wesson's way right now. Some might ask why there are so many three rich eyes and t-shirts floating around this entire building, and I don't see anyone wearing around the NFL podcast t-shirts. I think we need to work on brand management there.

Hats, sweatshirts? Lindsay, I'll go push them. Why isn't this coming from the top down? Just rain down the merch upon the people. people in this building. Just like in Buffalo. It's a major referendum on the entire brain trust. Where is our merch?

It's a fair question. Let's move on. First down, Texans at the Arizona 34-yard line. Tom Savage, hands off to Deontay Foreman, running to the right side. Has a C. 30, 25, 20, right-side line, 15, dead five. Rock and roll. Touchdown, Houston. I love an old dad say rock and roll.

What does that have to do with anything? Is rock and roll dead? I mean, the rock and roll he's referring to is definitely dead. Probably dead. But just the fact that he said rock and roll, what is that about? I don't even know. I'm almost tempted to nominate it just because it kind of, it's kind of wacky to me. I will block you.

You're going to block the nomination? Yeah. That's fine. Well, you know who said that? I'll tell you you said it. And you can take it up with him. Dave Pash, K-T-A-R with a call. Rookie.

Deontah Foreman, two fourth quarter. order touchdowns and the Texans and a three-game losing streak, a 31-21 win over the Arizona Cardinals. Greg, we don't spend too much time on this one, but Tom Savage was, I don't know, like proficient today. He played well. He's real bad at football. Oh, no. So you got to, you got to take the bad at football part off for tonight. No, you don't. He's an NFL. He's an NFL player who had absolutely terrible protection today. Why does the protection always look so much worse for him than it goes for

Deshawn Watson? Well, it looked terrible for Watson too. Watson could do something about it. For once today Savage could do something about it too. Made a beautiful throw on the run for a touchdown. Made a couple nice vertical plays. Didn't make too many mistakes. Yeah, they scored

31 points. If nothing else, if Tom Savage doesn't ever win another NFL game, he'll always have this game. Bruce Ariens blamed himself. Just saying. Why did he blame himself for this loss. Because coaches do that. It's sort of a coach-speak move.

Yeah, but he was... He's a non-bessor, so I think it seriously when he said it. He was referring specifically to going for it on fourth and short in the fourth quarter when it was a three-point game, and, you know, Adrian Peterson got stuffed, like Adrian Peterson got stuffed the entire game, and I don't put that on Bruce Ariens. I think he was coaching aggressively to win, and his offensive line and his running back weren't up to the task today. Houston was better.

Tough season for the Texans, but a bright spot is to Davian Clowny, who continues to build his career. He was dominant, two sacks, five tackles, three for losses, and three quarterback. He's the best run-blocking defensive end in the league or outside line break. Whatever you want to call him, there is no one better at breaking open a running game than him. He's incredible. Let's move on. Drop back to throw. Fitzpatrick looking for the ball toward the end.

A card ball touchdown, Tampa Bay. Deshawn Jackson. Nobody on him. And the dolphins make a horrible. mistake as number 11 is wide open and Fitzpatrick saw it and threw a strike for a four-yard touchdown. Oh, yeah, Gene Deckerhoff, WXTB with the call. Ryan Fitzpatrick threw for 275 yards, two touchdowns.

Pat Murray, 35-yard field goal of four seconds to play. Somehow, I didn't see this, just being completely honest with the audience. Somehow they scored another touchdown. Greg, you said it was a tie game like four seconds. No, it was 10 points in four seconds. Right, because time was picking off the clock. the Dolphins attempted. It was a kick return, I believe, and they did a lateral that was fumbled trying to get anything going in the final seconds.

It wasn't like, let's engineer it a drive that, you know, eight up the clock. It was a turnover. That's how 2020 becomes 30-20 in five seconds of game time. Anyway, Mark, though history will remember Nate Peterman as the INT King of Week 11, Jay Cutler certainly gave it his best. Well, I mean, yes, until he was concussed and left the game midway through. bringing Matt Moore back into our lives. Yeah, but before the concussion came three grizzly interceptions.

Am I mistaken? No, you're correct. It was the dolphins are put in a terrible position by Cutler's turnovers. And I believe also Jarvis Landry had a fumble. And you're going to do that against the bucks. You know, the bucks are very vulnerable. But Ryan Fitzpatrick, to me, seems to be the better quarterback right now over James Winston. I'm trying to recover from a very strange bell.

What was that? I don't know. That was actually my wedding ring, which I fiddle around with, you know. Oh, it's on the floor over there. And, you know, fell and hit something. You sabotage Mark with your wedding ring. If he's not going to do it with his voice, he'll do it with his wedding with his wedding. I mean, if you can't survive.

Take it from here, Greg. If you can't fight through that, you know, come on. I did my best. It was a very bizarre sound. Was it not? I mean, all everyone suddenly, everyone's talking. Everyone's looking around and it's like keep mining on with your bucks Dolphins point. I wonder if we'll come through on the audio.

Oh, I believe it might. Great. That was a good rundown, Mark. Anything else from the game? These are two teams that we've forked. I'm one of those weird people who hates the word literally, especially the misuse of it. I saw a tweet that they was literally incredible.

I couldn't possibly believe it. Armando Salgaro, Miami Herald said it was probably the Dolphins' worst half of football, the first half of this season. And the dolphins have had most of the worst halves of, football I've seen this year. Surprised me. From a turnover angle, he might be right, but I've seen worse from them, including the Ravens game. They put up

450 yards, including a ton in the first quarter. So I've seen some uglier dolphins. I want to just throw this out there because, yes, Mr. Cutler suffered a concussion, and we hope it doesn't have any long-term effects for him. But three more interceptions, and the dolphins are out of it

uh in the afc and another lost season and i'm wondering they'll say they're one game back six i'm not saying any of these teams i'm saying they're not out of it didn't we forked they're out of it and they're out of it they're out of it they're terrible i would contract the entire conference the dolphins are forked j cutler was terrible again and now he's hurt and i just want to put it on everybody's radar because i think we all despite our issues with him as a player on balance have kind of enjoyed Jay Cutler the experience even if it's Jay Cutler the punching bag

so I asked Lindsay to help me put together a final retrospective of what could have been Jay Cutler's final game could have been this third down at 7th from the 9 he's got time

and this pass is going to be intercepted by Justin Evans Three wide receivers and Cutler has an intercepted. It is picked off by Juan Alexander. Cutler and it's intercepted off the hands of DeBonte Parker and Robert McLean has the interception. interception. There you go. Jay Cutler.

Mark disgusted by this bit. No, I mean, the assumption going in was that we have all enjoyed this final Jay Cutler go-around. I found it particularly painful this season. And I wonder if he regrets making this decision when he could have been up in the announcer's booth trying to go punch or punch with Romo. Let's move on. This will be a 46-yarder trying to tie this game.

Here we go. There's the snap spot kick away. It is up and it is no good. He missed it. He pushed it to the right and the Lions survive. And we're walking out of here with their third straight victory. Dan Miller, WJR with the call. Conner brought a 46-yard field goal attempt started wide, wide, wide right and stayed that way,

allowing the Lions to escape Soldier Field with a 2724 win over the Bears. Matt Stafford threw two touchdowns and 300 yards. Matt Prater drilled a 52-yard field goal. That guy's a good kicker with 135 to play. And once again, despite there being a little touch and go there for the Lions against a bad team, they get the job done. And I'll tell you what. Wes, I'll tell you what. We don't love the Lions around here as a team to take seriously in the NFC.

but I'll give them a little credit they are for the first time ever since the divisions have realigned they won their every division road game a little bit of toughness there we say they're not a tough team it's a nice job by them and and they are you know in the mix taking care of these games that they should win even if they're not dominant efforts we're going to start handing out lollipops now that was a bit from a few years ago remember that's a lollipop I don't I don't know what You want to say? Yeah, the Lions fans are on my nerves because of mediocrity and how much they demand respect for it. And this team is a mediocre team that's going to fall just shy of the playoffs.

Well, they have the Vikings defense on Thanksgiving, and the reward for that is to play the Ravens defense the week after. So we'll find out where they are after that. Yeah, that's, you know, they beat the Vikings in Minnesota. At the time you thought, well, Case Keenham was a starter, no big whoop. But that's proved to be a very difficult. No big whoop, he said. Difficult game. They're not out of the NFC North if they won that game.

I don't necessarily expect them to win that game, but certainly crazier things happen every week in the NFL than them beating the Vikings at home. All right. I amend my statement. Looking at the standings now, there's a chance they'll slide into a wildcard spot and then lose the first game like they normally.

And the Bears, that's right? Take hard lines. I will say, to give the Lions credit, that last year they had Indomac and Sue and they had Calvin Johnson, and they got jobbed in that game. They were better than the Cowboys. They should have won that game and they got jobs.

That was the best Lions team of my life. There haven't been a lot of great candidates, but that was it. That was a top six or seven team in the NFL. The Bears are now 3 and 7, 0 and 4 in their division, 1 and 7 against NFC teams. The John Fox Farewell Tour is very similar to the Jeff Fisher Farewell Tour as a well-known coach. It just seems like now the writing's on the wall.

a matter of time. The lions, meanwhile, keep themselves in the mix. Let's move forward. You know the thing about him is he's like a great heavyweight fighter. Great heavyweight fighters, the ones I know at least, could take a punch. Joe Frazier could take a punch. Rocky Bob Bowler could take a punch. It's Chris Spielman, by the way.

Speaking of who. I like that he talks through his audience. Right through him. Yeah, he's mixed in fictional characters with real boxers. You know, there are plenty of heavyweight fighters through the decades that you could cite as being able to take a punch. Rocky Valboa was not a real person.

Goes to fake boxer with second reference. Let's move on. Steel is an adventure every week. He's got it at the goal line for a Bengals touchdown. 29 yards. Andy Dalton to Alex Erickson for his first touchdown catch in the NFL.

Alex Erickson, yes, one of three touchdown passes from Andy Dalton and the Bengals win in 2017 game over the Denver Broncos. Cincinnati built a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter. Then their defense was able to close it out at the end, get to stop against Brock Osweiler. And that gave, Wes, I know, even though you divorced the Bengals, you are historically knowledgeable of the team. this is their first win in Denver since I throw it a year probably in let's see it's got to be like the 70s or 80s back when the NFL was a shadow of what it is now I'll go 84 84 Wes give me one give me 178 Greg you want to get it on this 82 1975 wow wow yeah whoa that's a long time anyway Wes I got to tell you something in the dreary see the west of his stream isn't dead it's not dead and you can't say it is that's true it's not dead but this team is fatally flawed by their offensive line and ground attack yeah and they managed

just 12 first downs all game they won this game because uh drake herpatrick had a 101 yard interception return that led to a one yard touchdown and vontes burrific forced a fumble in the fourth quarter on c j andersen when the broncos were driving to tie the game uh those two turnovers were the difference in the game, and Osweller got, I thought he might build on last week's game in which he played much better than the final score would suggest. He made some throws last week. I thought it was probably the best game I've seen Osweller play in at least two years. And today, I can't believe it. He got a chance for a two-minute drill, took a bad sack on second down, then couldn't find Emmanuel Sanders on fourth down. He had a chance,

and the weirdest part of this game to me was the halftime Jamie Erdall, the sideline reporter said that even though Osweiler was playing with a sore shoulder and wasn't playing well, Paxton, Vance Joseph told her Paxton Lynch was not an option in the second half. He just wasn't, he wasn't going to, we weren't going to see him in the second half.

Vance Joseph should send a thank you card to Sean McDermott for taking the heat off his sketchy quarterback decisions the last few weeks. Why was Brock Osweiler starting this game necessarily? Why aren't you making a change? like this AFC is still open in theory. I don't even know. Like a game where the opponent has 190 yards and you lose at home. Well, okay, so Vance Joseph has not handled it well,

but he inherited this quarterback room. When at some point, does anyone point to John Elway and say, whether it comes to scouting Paxton Lynch, who's been absolutely a non-entity so far, and it looked bad in the preseason, totally outplayed by Trevor Simeon, who's now been benched for Brock Osweiler, when does it fall on Elway's feet for post-Baden Manning not finding a quarterback for this team?

To that point, Trevor Simeon, inactive, as were three rookie draft picks today, DeAngelo Henderson, DeMarcus Walker, and Isaiah McKenzie. So if you're looking for why is this season gone south, and it has gone south, by the way, six straight losses. That's their longest losing streak in 27 years. They're not getting impact play from some of these guys that have come into the organization, and the quarterback room is a mess. Well, there's some report out there about, you know, concerns. with the play calling, and I feel like those reports usually come from high up in the Broncos organization. I think Elway's fatal flaw has been the offensive line because they just can't run, they don't have a great quarterback, but this line doesn't give any quarterback a chance.

Yeah, I think the offensive line's been more, it's been even more problematic than the quarterbacks. Right, Simian could have, well, who knows, I mean, I'll die on. No, but I would continue with what you're going to say. If they had brought him back these last two weeks or this week at least, it's like I think you could have won this game at least. Does it be like something else is going on? Why is Brock Oswald are still playing games when Simeon is recently as a month ago? I mean, Osweiler was a second round pick by John Elway.

So I think he believes in Brock Oswald. Oh, come on. He can't. He offered him $16 million a year. He brought him back to the organization. To him, though, it's the same guy and it's a young player. It makes me wonder how much anyone believes in Paxton Lynch. That's fair.

Let's move up. I want to tell you about a great new podcast called Outside the Box has nothing to do with Connie Fox. But it is a podcast. If you're a maker, an innovator, or even just a consumer who wants to peek behind the curtain of some of the world's greatest organizations, you'll love it. You, Mark, would you love this?

I would. Absolutely. The latest episode, which is available right now, features former NFL commissioner Paul Tagliaboo talking about the massive innovations both on and off the field that helped football become America's most popular sport.

He also talks about how the opportunities and challenges the league is faced are similar to those faced by businesses of all microwave popcorn. Types. Okay. Listen to Outside the Box

on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your pods. Outside the box. Oh, Sunday night. Eagles are going to go for it. Wendz trying to convert on fourth down. And what a catch by Jeffrey. All shot, Jeffrey, into the end zone on fourth down.

Eagles domination on Sunday night. Carson went through two touchdown passes. One, what you just heard there, to Alshan Jeffrey from Al Michaels and the Philadelphia Eagles crews behind a monster second half to a 37-9 victory over the host Dallas Cowboys in Jera World in front of a in battle Jera Jones and Chris Christie on top of it. Christy's involved. So anyway, Greg, we'll start with you on this one. The Eagles now 9-1 running away with the NFC East,

and now they put the Cowboys on life support. Wow, what a performance. Carson Wentz, after halftime, played an absolutely perfect 30 minutes of football. I think you could say that about the entire Philadelphia Eagles team. He can kick her linebacker. Right. They went into halftime down 9-7. They outscore him 30 to nothing after halftime.

In the first half, at one point, the Cowboys defense had slowed down the Eagles better than any team had all year. They had five drives at one point that had totaled 13 yards. They were stopped on seven straight possessions. And then it was like they just flipped the switch. And the Eagles team we've seen all year came out. And when they are rolling and it's the running game as a big foundation and Ajai got off and LaGarrett Blunt got off and Clement got off, they are a joy to watch. They're kind of like the most unstoppable.

looking team in the NFL when they get going like that. Yeah, and it's like you'd look at the box score tomorrow morning if you didn't watch this 168 yards passing for Carson Wentz. You'd think, oh, well, they slowed him down. The opposite. He was a magician. And at one point in early, you know, it was 9 to 7 at halftime. And early in the third, we were asking,

where's this Eagles rushing attack? Where's Jay Ajay? And then he rips off a 71-yard run that I think really started the landslide. On the flip side, Dak Prescott, again, running for his life. They got a little bit more from the running game, but this Eagles defense, which is overshadowed by Carson Wentz every week in the offense, has half the story here 100%. You know, and all credit due to the Eagles defense.

They've been showing up all season, and that's how you get to 9 and 1. It's just not one side of the ball. But, Dak Prescott, the Cowboys needed their quarterback to step up and play a good game. And Alfred Morris ran the ball well. He's not Zeke Elliott, of course, who's now in the second game of suspension, and the Cowboys are winless during that absence. Alfred Morris won 17 for 91 and was able to move the ball.

Dak Prescott did nothing in this game. He had one of the worst games of his career. That's bad timing. This was a big game. I got really tired of the Wentz, Dak back and forth this week. You know, I think they're both great. I think it's hard to pick between the two of them right now. Wentz clearly has a deeper and better team around him,

but this was a perfect performance by Wentz in the second half. I mean, he was just incredible. And DAC had one of his worst games of the year, and I think he's been struggling a little bit the last few weeks trying to hold up that offense. And I mentioned it on Thursday, but I want to hit it again. Des and Cole Beasley were the centerpiece of their passing game. They don't have a passing game, whether it's all, it's certainly not all DAC.

It's the protection. It's the receivers. It's everything. But they don't really have a passing game that can hold them up. And so tonight, Des gets 14 targets for 63 yards, and Beasley gets four targets for seven yards. And those were their two main guys last year, and they're two of the least efficient receivers

when you're throwing it to them this year. Yeah, and it's back-to-back turnovers in the second half. One, a fumble touchdown for Dallas. I think completely turned this game from, potentially they had a chance to come back in the fourth quarter to completely out of reach. And people looked at that Eagles, Broncos game, and said, oh, it's an aberration for Denver's defense,

and that's not really what Denver's defense is about. And you know what? That's what the Eagles are. They do that to every team they play. this game had a lot of shared DNA in the second half with that romp over Denver because suddenly they just let the run game completely overpower the tired defense they're facing. This is how they are built to go deep, if not the deepest team in the NFC, right to the Super Bowl. And I think you love that you don't have to play.

J.J.J.I. is not even their main running back. He's just one of three guys. That's a nice little luxury they got. And now the Cowboys turn around and they have a game in four days against the Chargers at home. their season on the line. And it's already in grave danger at five and five. And you put them, if you say a coin flip to make the playoffs, that might even be at this point being kind to them.

They've got a lot of ground. They're in a bad spot now. And in fact, if you look at the seating right now, they're the 10th seed. They have a ton of work. Their schedule does ease up a little bit, but you don't have Zeke Elliott. You're hoping to get Tyron Smith back.

We'll talk about that game on Tuesday. Oh, yes. Let's talk about a different week. for the round of the NFL podcast. So yeah, we'll have our standard show Tuesday in terms of the timing of it, but that will act as our week 12 preview.

So we'll go through all the week 12 games. And then on Thursday night for the first time, this is what makes us different, Mark. I guess we're grinders. Everybody else is passed out on the couch. We will be in the studio Thursday night, a mini pod going over all three Thanksgiving games. including the Thursday Night of Fair between, Mark?

The Giants and the Redskins. Oh, nice. I thought I'd get you on that one. So, yeah, we'll do a Thursday night Thanksgiving minipod going over those games, and then, of course, the Sunday flagship show. So that's our schedule. That's a major league grit right there, some hustle, some grit. We certainly know that our wives and children, they appreciate the dynamic.

The children will be asleep. They know where they come. They'll be fine. All right. So there you go. That's it, Sunday show. Oh, yeah, I forget. That's right.

Chris Wesleyan cannot pick up his lock. Mark, you, this time, the lockoff. I am now three and two in lockoffs. And, you know, losing to Wes is a noble loss. I have no issues there. I went on under limb here. You see the subtext, Dan, losing to us would not be a noble loss. Like, Wes, he respects.

Yeah, I've picked that up. Yeah, two of us. That's not where I was going. I don't respect myself on picking the Cowboys in this situation. That was a surprise pick. It was an onion hanger. It did not work out in your favor. Greg picks up a game and we are flying in the race for second place this season.

Yeah, so we'll be back Tuesday. Flying into the side of a building. Thank you to everybody for listening. You're the best. Let's get out of here. This is Dan Hansa signing off for Quiet Storm, the mailman and absentia. All shook up, Nick Shuck, he's strong, the old boss and Lindsey Fulton behind the glass. Until Tuesday.

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

Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Sticks podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Marcus Grant. And I'm Michael Lev Florio, and together we hope. host the NFL fantasy football podcast. Ready to dominate your fantasy league this season? Then you need the NFL fantasy football podcast,

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