OverDrive - Lalji on the Seahawks' back-to-back mission, Kelly playing with fire and the Lions seeking success

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

TSN Football Reporter Farhan Lalji joined OverDrive to discuss the Lions' significant win against the Stampeders, Calgary's injury bug with Vernon Adams Jr. and Dedrick Mills, Chad Kelly's performances leading the Argonauts, the Seahawks' journey to go back-to-back and more.

So, yeah, the NFL on the horizon, the CFL, continue CFL on TSN tonight. Ottawa looking for their first win. Here's our TSN football reporter and analyst. Farhan, Lul, is you joining us. Farhan, what's happening? No much, man. I'm sorry I couldn't get on camera with you guys. I just dropped my wife and son off at CETAC airport.

He's leaving for Virginia to go to a prep school. So I'm on my way back from that, and I thought, okay, this doesn't work out perfect. I'll just pull over here, and I can get him on camera, and I guess I'm too close to the mountains for that. There are much more civilized people in Toronto. Yes, we are. We don't do mountains here. No.

We maybe do hills. We like hills a little bit. Hills are okay. Speed bumps. Yeah, we do speed bumps. Compared to what you guys got out there. We don't have oceans. We got a lake that no one really goes in or anything.

True. Anyway, it's great to have you. Yeah, we do have the, we do have him. We have O'Dog. And we've, you know, we get noodles. Susan Albertan. But still, we'll take him. We're claiming him for the next.

I got a more intellectually stimulating version of the show with Festchuk. There you go. Exactly. Exactly. A huge upgrade in terms of IQ, right, and where this conversation is going to go. But the Lions got themselves a win last night. And, you know, it's confusing, from my standpoint, because they had such a struggling start. Yet now they're four and five, and they're kind of back in the hunt. You know, the Nathan Roark stuff kind of was hanging over them with the injury and all that.

But where do you stand on the Lions and they're standing within the West in particular? Well, look, I think a lot of people, you know, it was easy to forget when they were struggling out of the gate that many experts picked this team to be in the Grey Cup. And so I don't think we should be overly surprised when they were able to turn it around. I think in the first few weeks of the season, I think their form was surprising offensively. Defensively, I kind of thought it would take some time for them to get going because there were some new faces. And their defense, the first two weeks was just terrible. I thought their offense would be able to hit the ground running at a higher level. And fortunately for them, the defense actually turned very quickly.

Like in the late stages of week three and then really since then, they've been as good at defense as there is in the league. And now the offense is slowly catching up. So as I look at the lions, I still see far from a finished product. Because when you look at their win two weeks ago against Hamilton, the offense was just not good. You wouldn't expect Nathan Ork after only missing, you know, three games or two games to be that rusty.

He was better in this game, took a really, really bad risk late that almost cost him the game. But I just, when I look at this team, they're getting nothing out of their special teams. Pickers are fine, but in terms of cover teams and, you know, their ability to block in return, like none of that is there. And I think their offense still has the level to get to. So I just think that it's okay to be bullish on it. They might have a higher ceiling relative to where they are currently at the midway point of the season

than any other team in the league. Like you look at Montreal, they're operating at a really high level. You look at Edmonton, given where they're coming from, they're operating at a really high level. I think the lions still have much more ruin to grow at a higher ceiling than the rest of them relative to where they are today. Well, and was last night sort of the death knell of the stamps far hand with Adams going down, with

an apparent head injury, and then Mills getting hurt, the league's leading rusher, also going down with injury. I mean, obviously a huge downer of a night for the stamps, and not only because Hayes picked him with his best bets. Yes, I did. Yeah, I mean, look, a tough

for them and they've had a couple of tough ones and if you look at Calgary this year, I really believe they're much better than their record indicates and I know that you're not supposed to say that, you know, you are what your record says you are, but nobody has lost more close games than Calgary and then, you know, like we also know

what they're doing offensively coming in the last week where they were operating at a historical level like gone past to better the CFL single season scoring record by a team and you know passing Doug Fluties Calgary stampeters. So, like, I still think that, you know, it's a good offensive team.

And the way they were playing defensively this year compared to last year, like last year they were lights out. And this year they've been struggling. Like, I think they're closer to last year's team that way. The problem is, like, the West is going to be a bear, right? Like, this is a tough division to navigate. And even with a likely crossover spot available, it's going to be hard, right? And I kind of felt Winnipeg was going to be that team that might slip this year

and might be on the outside looking and even with a crossover. So as far as those two injuries, it's just going to come down to how long they're out for. Fortunately, Calgary has a buy coming up this week. VA was knocked out yesterday. Like, he was out cold. And he was able to kind of get to and get it figured out. No symptoms today, from what I understand, and the tests that he went through today came back fairly positively. You know, I don't have a more definitive word on Diedrich Mills yet.

But again, with the buy, what happens in two weeks are they going to play? In VA's case, he had a concussion with the stamps a year ago. So now you've got to be real careful because you don't want to get into Zach Kaleros territory where there's a neck or a head happening every season. So, you know, we'll see how cautious they are. But in this West, you don't have a lot of wiggle room now, especially when technically they're in last place. With Farhan-Halogy.

So the Argonauts finally got back home last week, and Chad Kelly is now making a reputation for himself as a guy who can throw information. amount of interceptions and still win. And he's done it multiple times. Like, the guy, he's, he's thrown 13 interceptions this year, Chad. And, you know, he's, he obviously had the injury last year where he didn't play. You know, he's had the off-field stuff and the suspension hanging over him.

He's not a young guy, Chad Kelly, anymore. But he's found a way to win. I think the Argos are prime, you know, they're not going to catch Montreal clearly, but I think they're the two seed in the east. But where does Chad Kelly still rank for you? at his best. Where is he in terms of your rankings? Is your top three quarterback in the league, top five? Where do you stand on Chad Kelly? At his best, he's in the top three. There's no doubt about it. And you know,

you can't just gauge him based on the interceptions. You've also got to gauge him on the touchdowns and the yardage totals that he puts up. And this is a team that kind of doesn't really have a running game. So it really is all on Chad Kelly right now. I'm going to be calling the game tomorrow night in Edmondson. Looking forward to that one and just kind of seeing how they fare against what I think is a pretty good Edmonton defense. But the one thing with Chad, and you know, we've seen this from some other quarterbacks in the league, right? Like, you know, Vernon Adams, for example, has been through those crazy games where, you know, he throws the interceptions. They affect him. They don't

affect Chad Kelly. Chad is like Bowel, in that regard. And, you know, there might be a couple of others out there that when they throw picks, they don't give a damn, right? Like Matt Dunnigan, if he threw them, if he threw them, they simply didn't give a damn. They were just going to keep throwing. You know, like Danny used to say, if you throw four, don't be afraid to throw five. and that's Chad Kelly, right? So as long as your defense can keep you around, and with the CFL, there's always going to be more possessions. So as long as you can stay in those games,

Chad Kelly has the ability to pull those games out, so they're never out of a game. So far, you said you're speaking to us not far from CTAC airports, Seattle, Tacoma, Washington State, USA. Hayes and I have been talking about the sort of the disrespect that's being sort of put in the direction of the NFL team in that area. happen to be the defending Super Bowl champions. And yet, people are talking about the L.A. Rams and how they're going to be the dominant team.

You look at their gambling odds, and they are shortest odds to win the Super Bowl. What's your take on how the Seahawks are reacting to that? Are they feeling that disrespect in your opinion? To a point. You know, and Hayes and I talked about this, both in our NFC preview and also with Sam Darnold in that conversation, If people are picking them as the second best team in the NFL, is that really disrespect? Right? Well, fair point. I don't know if, yeah.

They're really good. They're more talking and giving shine to the idea of a super team with the Rams. And we know when the NFL is trying to form these super teams, it hasn't always worked itself out. And the biggest challenge around comparing these two teams is they don't play until Christmas Day, week 16. So what are they going to look like by that point? You know, I was in L.A. at Rams training camp. and one of the things that was pretty evident is Sean McVeigh, you know,

who I think in terms of emotional intelligence, has his team figured out as well as any coach in football, and he understands that he's got an older team and they've got to, you know, they've got to kind of play the long game. And when you looked at them in practice and Matthew Stafford, the day we were there, Davis and I were there, Stafford didn't practice,

getting kind of a day off. He was only practicing every second day during that stage of training camp. Devante Adams didn't practice that day. Miles Garrett came on to the practice field late, didn't do any 11-on-11 work, and hadn't practiced for the previous four days because he was dealing with something minor. So he's definitely got to play the long game, and believe me, and practice that day, the offense looked like trash, and that's kind of what it could look like if those guys are healthy and not available.

But, yeah, I mean, look, if it works out, the fact is that you get Trent McGuffie, but they were pretty specific. They knew their defense needed to improve coming out of last season, and they were pretty specific with how they were going to build that group when you look at McDuffie and Jalen Watson, helping their secondary. You got an elite pass rusher, a generational pass rusher, and then we'll see what Aaron Donald looks like when he comes back.

But you get a guy like McDuffie, you can play in the slot. He can play JSN and play that matchup game. So, yeah, I mean, when you consider that it basically took a miracle for Seattle to win the late regular season game to get home field advantage for the NFC championship game, which they won by four points, that certainly you have to believe all of these changes could potentially get them over the top.

The flip side is Seattle, continuity is everything, right? I said with Hayes on our heads that 87% of their offensive and defensive snaps from last year have returned. That's the highest number for a Super Bowl winner in 16 years. That matters. And I think Mike McDonald is still evolving as the head coach. Even he says there's another level for me to get to, and only my third year as head coach. So I just think they're going to get so much better still. They're going to grow.

They don't have to figure each other out like that. the Rams do. So let's see what these teams look like at Christmas Day. But disrespect when you're the number two thought of team in the NFL? I don't know. I don't think so. Yeah, number two's not bad. It's definitely not bad. Bill's the bill. So let me ask you.

Is it a slap in the face? Is it a slap in the face to LeBron James that he's seconded on my goat list? It is to him. Damn right. He takes that personally. He's the king. He's the greatest. Just ask him. With all the hype that LeBron took into his career.

Like I don't even think social media could have made him a bigger deal coming in. He's lived up to it. If he's number two, he's loved up to it. So, like, I just, I don't view that as disrespect. And I don't view it as disrespect for the Seahawks right now. Yeah. Well, it's a great analogy. Yet, LeBron would absolutely be upset with that take.

No doubt. It's wild when you consider, again, all the great players of all time that you're putting them ahead of. But we'll see. That's why they play the games and it's on Seattle. They go back to back. There won't be any disrespect, right? You go out there and takes down the NFC West and you win it again, man.

People are going to praise you, that's for sure. Forehand, great stuff. Thank you so much for doing this. We'll do it again soon. All right, boys, thanks for having me. Have a great weekend. You got it. Farhan, Lulogy.

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