PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Can Vic Fangio PULVERIZE Sean McVay’s offense again as Philadelphia Eagles head to LA?

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

All eyes this weekend on Vic Fangio and his mastery of Sean McVay’s offense dating back to the 2018 season. Can Quinyon Mitchell, Cooper DeJean and Darius Slay snuff out Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua? Can Jalen Carter, Josh Sweat, Nolan Smith and Brandon Graham take advantage of a beleaguered Rams offensive line and hassle Matt Stafford?It’s a football Friday, so Deniz Selman joins the show for his breakdown of the matchup and to let us know what’s in his craw this week. Zach Berman checks in with the latest on DeVonta Smith. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the P.HLY Eagles podcast on a Friday afternoon, a beautiful rainy football day. And we are presented by Bet365. Download the Bet365 app and use code PHLY 365 when you sign up. Whatever the moment, it's never ordinary at Bet365. Dana is in studio, the professor for class in session Friday. We may or may not hear from Zach at some point during the show. show if he wants to pop in with some breaking Devante Smith news. We may hear from him, but otherwise, we're going to narrow in and clean up all the things we haven't talked about yet this week about Eagles Rams.

How you doing? Doing well. How are you? Zach knows at this point that he's not supposed to call in while he's driving, right? I would have, it's a good question, because he's got the flight. I don't know if he's driving and parking or if he would be ride sharing over because since Waymo is not yet available in Philadelphia. Yeah. Okay. So we might get a live ride share. Yeah, I don't think that he would need to park at the, but I don't know. I think he maybe he does he maybe he is doing long term parking or short term parking. Live Waymo would be incredible. He would be so excited. Let us know in the chat. If you think Zach is parking at the airport or leaving his car at the Eagles facility and then ride sharing over or if he road share ride shared in to the Nova Care Complex today and is in his.

hop in his way that way. I think he's actually parking out the airport. It's tough. Tough call. The breaking news from the Eagles practice facility. We don't have the injury report yet, but Devante Smith not practicing for the third consecutive day, has not practiced all week.

Terrible news potentially for Fran Duffy's super-sortcasting chances, as we see Fran in the chat with all the sickos. Say hi to Adam and Claire and all the classics in the chat. How much does that concern you? If, in fact, Devante Smith does not play in this game, Dennis. No, definitely a major concern. I mean, we saw what the offense looked like when A.J. Brown was also out. But like when A.J. Brown and Devante Smith were out,

the offense looked ridiculous, like in Tampa Bay. Jalen doesn't like to throw to other people that much. And you do wonder what kind of game plan the Rams would have if it's A.J. Brown and a bunch of guys, right, in terms of the receivers. So, yeah, we'll see. Dallas Goddard had a big game against the Rams last year. They were trying to cover him with Michael Hoyt, who is, you know, it looked ridiculous, and he had a huge play in that game against him

in dropping into coverage, and they still drop that guy into coverage all the time. And every time they do it, I'm like, why are they doing that? We'll get more into that when we talk about the Rams defense. but defensive taste some hill if Fran calls him yeah it's a good I like this description yeah like kind of random white guy running around doing unconventional things except on the defensive side of the ball that's about right that's about right yeah you look at him and you're like wise that's about Hoy you know you guys talked about the pronunciation uh so anytime you see an oh e like that okay in a german looking name okay it means that the original German was an oh with an umlaut

the the uh letter okay so um I think the proper German pronunciation is something more like like Hooked, hook, something like that. So Hoyt is like a bastardization that's happened

after, after, you know, whenever they immigrated over here. But we have that letter in Turkish as well, the O with the,

with the two dots over it. So actually, one of the things we Mesutozil. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So when,

when we were doing the, like, looking for names for, for Avran, that was our first rule, was like, not have any of those Turkish characters.

Because people get it wrong and then like, you're not able to always type it that way and things like that. What was your second rule? The second rule was that it had to not be just obscene profanity in English. So like a very nice boy's name in Turkish is UFUK, UFUK. And there was a guy named Ufuk in the department at Penn as a professor when I was a grad student there. And there was a guy, and I'm not kidding, there was another professor.

I'm not going to name names as to who the other professor was, who just flat out called him, you fuck, every single time. He talked about him. And it was so casual. It was like, oh, yeah, like me and you fuck were talking. And, you know, we think you should TA this class or whatever. And I was just like, do I tell him? It's not.

Like, surely someone else has told him. But yeah, so that was our second rule, was to not name him that. That's good. Although it would have been funny to go through life that way, but I guess. Yeah, it's a good test of character, right? That's right. There you go. Okay.

Let's start. We've got a nice, you've prepared some graphs for us. We want to take a bit of a zoom out on the state of, I think you want to talk mostly about the Eagles offense, but yeah, just sort of the invariance of its performance over the past. Yeah. Well, actually, I mean, like, I think it's a good, it kind of fits in with. my narrative of the last couple of years, which I know we don't fully... It's just completely ridiculous. All I'm going to do is just, I don't know what to do.

I'm just going to ignore that. I will talk a little bit about how they're probably running it a little too much this year in a few minutes. But yeah, my... You also would have paid Daniel Jones? No, that's not me. That's not me. There are people who would have. So my narrative is that...

the offense has basically been the same, like, throughout all these years. And the huge thing that's been wildly different across the different years. And this is the Siriani Hertz years, basically, is how good the defense has been. And these graphs that, so Julia, you can cue the first one, I have a couple of different visuals for this. So those of you listening on audio, I can just kind of describe, if you look at, like, offensive and defensive EPA per drive by season. and you put the basically the 128 teams on the same graph where it's like you know 32 teams times four seasons the Eagles offense is almost always in exactly the same part of the graph like they're always ranked like somewhere you know in the definitely above average not one of the elite teams right they're always like somewhere in that like 70th 80thish percentile every single year 21 22 23 24 they're all almost exactly the same where we're all almost exactly the same where we're Whereas the defenses are wildly different.

The defense this year is just absolutely awesome. The defense last year was absolutely terrible. The other two are somewhere in between. So the main difference between these teams has been how good the defense is. And of course, like we're very excited about the defense this year because they are like just very clearly the best one. And on this point, by the way, any discussion about whether this year's defense or the 2022 defense was better, I don't find particularly. serious, like, as a conversation. Like, I've heard other people talking about this, and I don't know.

Like, do you think that's even, do you think it's even close? I don't, but I could see how, I could see how people could think you could compare the two, at least. I think people are into sacks and that kind of thing. But, like, I mean, this year's defense is better in EPA per drive, points per drive, series conversion rate, success rate, way better in EPA against the rush, tied an EPA against the dropback. And also better in, like, some of the noisy things, like, Red Zone. percentage and all of that. The only thing. Like aesthetically.

Yeah, much better aesthetically. And also the opponents faced in 2020, we're famously, you know, very weak, especially the quarterbacks. One of the only good quarterbacks they went up against the whole year was Doc Prescott. And he completely lit them up. You didn't throw like a single incompletion against own coverage in that game, you know, etc.

It was like a shootout in that game. This year, you know, the defense has faced for what it's worth. Jordan Love, Joe Burrow, Jaden Daniels was playing incredibly well. coming into that game. So there's a big difference there. So I just don't think there's like any comparison in in terms of which of the two defenses is better. And then just kind of going through looking at the at the offense, I guess we can continue to some of the other. Well, I want to go look look back at number one because. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Let's look at it. The question from Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman would be it's probably not a good thing that the 2021,

one cast like the offensive roster is performing at the same level as the 2024 roster that team obviously didn't have age and now I know 22 is a little bit just a little bit ahead right so actually if we're going to talk about offense we can just look at the offensive one that's like that breaks it down by I think it's like number three or something okay um yeah like it's not good enough yeah there it is that this offense is in the same quadrant as as 2020 the expectations should be higher. Yeah, when you do the graph with like EPA per dropback and EPA per rush,

the 24 and 21 logos are touching each other on the graph. Like so they're very, very similar. Now, I will say the 2024 EPA per dropback is the highest of the four. And it's an interesting thing to note. And it's one of the things I wanted to talk about. It's an interesting thing to know in the context of the discussion of what's wrong with the passing game. Yeah.

Right. And I'll admit, this is a confusing picture because the four seasons are so similar to each other in terms of the final efficiency, right? Like that's what we're looking at here. Is EPA per play? We can look at success rate,

which is what the other graph is. The offensive success rate graph is very similar to this. The Eagles offense is always in the upper right quadrant, always one of the better offenses, and always just kind of short of being elite, right? And what we want, looking at this roster, looking at these wide receivers,

this offensive line, is we want the passing game, at least, to be elite. The running game has been closer to elite in terms of EPA per play. The 2022 one is like the highest one on the whole graph. But yeah, I mean, there's just there there's this like question of like when you watch it, it seems like it's not getting as much out of the talent as it could, right? Yeah, and that's part of why we didn't even talk about.

They made schematic changes in theory at least, you know, bringing in Kellan Moore to run the offense. Yeah, like this is good, but I would be unhappy. with this if I was Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman, don't you think? Yeah, no, I think that's right. I think as pleasantly surprised as they must be about how the defense actually is playing at an elite level now, they must, they have to be somewhat disappointed with this. And in terms of the the bi-week shift towards a heavy run game, I mean, like, I don't know, it really depends on, oh, look at it actually, nicely done.

Yeah, and that is good. It really depends on, I like how you put us in a part of the grass. where there are like no teams too. Like that's extra. Yeah, extra impressive. We are very good at passing, but we cannot run.

Yeah, so, what's that? Oh, us. Yeah, yeah, we're elite.

Elite in the dropback game. Yeah, exactly. Comparable to the, this is actually your ideal offense. If I move a little bit this way, I become the best. Yeah,

even better than the, this is your perfect offense. I don't actually like not running well. I just don't like running this much. So that was the thing I was going to say. Like for what it's worth, 2024's offense has the highest EPA per dropback of any of the four years. Highest dropback success rate as well.

Julia, there is a success version of this graph as well, which is a similar picture where they're all kind of close to each other. And the other thing is this year has the lowest rush success rate, and it's the only year in which passing has been more successful than running. And of course they're running it a lot. and sometimes that's going to hurt the success rate because you're running in it to set up morons

and that kind of thing. But the main... I think you need to call them morons, but... I think the main difference between this year and like the other years in terms of like one of the issues, when you look at all the metrics, the frequency with which they get to the red zone, all those things has been the same.

The main difference is the red zone efficiency is the lowest of the four years this year. I mean, it's at 57. which is still above average, but it was at 68% in 2022. And you could argue that that was just like noisy and maybe they were outperforming and all of that. But that's driving the entire difference in points per drive between this year and that year. Points per drive this year is 2.62.

It was 2.86 that year. If you just play with the red zone number, it immediately becomes the same. So the red zone has been the thing. And then the other big difference is the run rate. I mean, they're running the ball on half the plays this year. It's never been above 43% before. Last year, it was only 41%. What was it if you just looked at the second half of 2021?

I mean, probably. No, I'm not. I'm not. A good question before the show. Well, I know. But that probably winds up. Yeah, it went up a lot, but it didn't go up by as much as, as it has this year. And at no point in 2021 did they become like the most run-haping.

heavy team in the league and the and the shift happened around the same time in the season right it happened like a little bit later seven maybe yeah that's true um and then the other thing and and we we keep referencing this is like the DVOA of the offense this year is disappointingly low so they are what are they they're 14th in DVOA 16th in passing DVOA that's terrible yes that is true but looking at again looking at this graph it doesn't look that bad right so so the question becomes like why is the DVOA so low and just looking at it first of all there's a huge cluster of teams like right around the same number so just one good game could push push that you know 14th up to seventh or something like that you're going to argue well they should still they should be in the top five this is more

of a comment on DVOA than like how good this team is but the strength of opponents is really driving that DVOA this year because like DVOA is basically EPA per play with like a little bit of opponent adjustment that's like that's basically what they're formulated is. And so it's just that the defenses played this year have been so bad. Like they played against some of the worst defenses in the league and haven't destroyed them,

right, the way the Lions destroyed Jacksonville last week, right? You basically have to have a game like that against Jacksonville in order to not be punished by playing them. And so in terms of the DVA, that's true, it's true. But like, but like the reason that the DVOA ranking is not, doesn't look great,

is in large part due to that. And they've been super consistent from game to game is the other thing that when I look at um you know like the game like the game like the game by game thing that I have they haven't had a single game all year in the bottom 40th percentile by EPA per play by success rate by points per drive by APA per drive like not a single one um the Tampa Bay game was barely in that for EPA per play but even that game wasn't that for success rate for example so like they haven't had this like but have they hit up and down. How they hit the ceiling? But that's

a thing. It's like they hit the ceiling against Cincinnati. That game was one of the best EPA per drive games of the year in the NFL this year. But that was really the only game where that happened. So that's the thing. But that's exactly my point. They're like stuck. They're like stuck in this like we're just in the top quartile, barely in the

top quartile, always in the top quartile, but never one of the best teams in it. Right. And so before the season, the question was, would that be enough. The answer was no, but now that the defense is like literally the best defense in the league since the buy, it might be enough, right? It might be. No. And, you know, you just, you cross your fingers and hope you get, you get another Bengals game spike when it matters. That's right. That's right. Like, you know, the kind of performance that the offense had in the Super Bowl against Kansas

City, right? Like, you would think with this defense would be enough to, to have a better result. Yeah. All right. Well, I think we are actually going to hear from our man in just a minute. Oh, nice. Before we do that, let's take a quick commercial pause. Linky pipes. They're all over the place.

You know about them. You've heard about them. If you have one yourself, it's time to call Ace Hardware Home Services because Ace Hardware Home Services, ACE is not just the helpful hardware folks. Now they're also the helpful hardware home service folks. They can come fix the problems that you have in your house for you. And they're going to do it with a smile on their face, an incredible proficiency.

If you have a plumbing issue or a heating issue or a cooling issue, Ace Hardware Home Services has the trusted pros to keep your home humming all year long Ace Hardware Home Services. We're bringing helpful home, the helpful you love, from the store now to your front door. Visit Ace Hardware Home Services online at www.org.com to get started on your next project. Speaking of your next project, it's appropriate that we're talking about this before Zach joins us and before he makes his trip to Los Angeles. It's time to talk about our friends at Blue Chew. Blue Chew is an online service that delivers the same active ingredients as Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra, but at a fraction of the cost and in a chewable form.

The process is simple. Sign up at Blu-chew.com. Consult with one of their licensed medical providers and once you're approved, you will receive your prescription within days. Blue-chew tablets are made in the good old US of A, baby, and they're prepared and shipped directly to your door. The best part is it is all done online. That means no visits to the doctor's office, no awkward conversations, no waiting in line at the pharmacy. You can take them any time day or night,

so you can plan ahead or be ready whenever the opportunity arises. You could be missing out on the best sex of your life, and that's where Blue Chew comes in. They say there's nothing sexier than confidence, and Blue Chew can help give you the confidence when it counts. And great news. We've got a special deal for our listeners. Try Blue Chew free when you use our promo code, All-C-E-C-E-W-C-E-W-com. All-City at checkout, just pay $5 of shipping.

That's Bluechew.com, B-L-U-E-C-H-E-W-D-C-W-com, promo code all-city, one word. To receive your first month free, visit Blu-C-C-O-C-C-com for more details and important safety information. And we thank Blue-Chue

for sponsoring this podcast. Do we have our man? We got it. Ladies and gentlemen, we got him. Zach Berman, live from the way to the airport, the NoviCare Complex. Where are you, Zach?

there he is yeah I'm at the no what's going on I'm at the nova care complex I'm making sure you know I wanted to see you guys I feel a a sense of obligation you know I feel bad I'm not in studio with you but I want to make sure that I'm here on the on the show with the latest news before I'm on that plane heading L.A. All right we know you don't have a ton of time so let's we'll let you make this a a blue chukuk cookie here give us the big things that we need to know from the Nova Care Complex. Yeah, I think Devante Smith status is really the big thing.

I was on the practice field. They were inside. And DeVanté Smith was not out there. Nick Siriani, you were there, Bo. Nick Siriani did not say much about Devante status. I spoke in the locker room to a few guys, AJ Brown included. And they're being real, the pite lift about Devonte Smith status. So there was one point when AJ was asked about how this offense would be

if Civante doesn't play. And he's like, you know, that's a setup question. I'm not going to go there. We're still working through that, right? And so, look, as you well know and as Professor Selman well knows, that if a player doesn't practice on Friday, that's often not a good sign for his status on Sunday. Now, players who are established who have kind of equity built up,

it's not out of the question, but I would think for a game in Los Angeles, if a player has an injured hamstring and doesn't practice on Friday, I'd be surprised if he plays Sunday. We'll see. The injured report should come out at 4 o'clock and what a better idea then.

But I'm operating right now as if he's not going to play. And so what do you think that would mean for the office? Yeah, I mean, I would think a little more 12 personnel. That would be my guess. they've already leaned into 12 personnel this year. We saw them do that when A.J was out. So that's something that they could do. I would expect more Johnny Wilson.

You know, I think Jahan Dodson obviously can tend to have a role, but I know they like Johnny Wilson. And then really relying on this running game. And it's the run offense that has been obviously what their identity, if we're going to use that slide's word, what it's been that since, I'm since the biweek. I spoke to Seekwan. and, you know, Sequin thinks that they continue to kind of, they, that the offense,

there's still more room to grow with this offense. And so I think you'll see a lot of Sequin, but A.J. is still elite. And I would imagine more targets toward A.J. would also be a byproduct of this. Yeah, just to follow up on that, if you're wondering what the offenses looked like with A.J. and No. then we have never seen it. The only game that AJ played that Devante didn't was week 18 last year against the Giants. And if you remember, AJ only played 12 snaps, got injured, left the game so that he could, you know, rest for the, you know, and then he missed the playoff game too. Yeah.

But like there hasn't been a single game since AJ Brown has been in Philadelphia that he played that Devante Smith did not play. Neither of them missed any games in 2022. So we haven't seen what it looks like when a defense is able to try to take. AJ away when the second best receiver is, you know, significantly inferior to him. He, you're absolutely right. He said as much today when he said he's never been out there without Devante. So he doesn't know. And when it was, it was framed to him the way the coverages were when Devonte was in and he was out.

He said he really didn't notice that to be the case that it was all focused on DeVante. But yeah, I would imagine that even with. with more attention on AJ, the Eagles will still feed them quite a bit. All right. Anything else? Football-wise that you need to pass on before we have a couple non-football things for you.

Yeah, Sequin didn't want to really speak about Daniels, the Daniel Jones situation. He said he's very close with Daniel Jones. They've been in communication, you know, today, yesterday. But he didn't want to get too into that. I did ask him about the possibility of a running back winning MVP because it's traditionally been a quarterback award. And he said that's a conversation we'll have later this year. And Gianne Carter,

John Carter did not know that he played every snap in that game until his mother sent him a tweet the next day that referenced it. But he said he felt good. I mean, he played more a greater volume of snaps against Buffalo last year, I believe. but still the fact that he's playing every snap in this game. He says it's a testament to his conditioning. It's a testament to like the trust that they have in him. We spoke with Fran yesterday about the game that he had against the Rams last year. He says it's like the same offensive line, a different center.

He thought he played well in that game last year, but he thought he had some other good games last year too. So that was kind of catching up with Joan Carter. And yeah, no, I think. think those are kind of the big ticket football items from the locker room today. There's some small things for some stories and working on that you'll see in the next week and a half to two weeks. All right. We look forward to that. Give us the behind the scenes on your travel plans here. We have some question about if you're parking at the airport or ride sharing over, what are your

plans for the flight? And are you going to be able to make it to the intimate dome tonight? The Intuit Dole. Yeah, I am heading over to the airport from here. And I, my flight's at 3.50. I'll be fine. No worries there. Got some work to do on the plane. Looking forward to that. Some transcribing some writing injury report will come out while I'm on the plane.

So you'll see a tweet of what's up blue sky. What's the noun for that? It's a skeet. A skeet, a tweet, a steat, a thread. I don't actively use that, but that's what that's what it is. Okay. Okay. I will put that all out there.

My plane lands tonight at 6.45. What's that? The game is at, my plane lands at 6.45. The game is at 7.30. So I don't have tickets yet because thanks to game time, I can wait to less minute. Great deal is less than tickets. Lowest price guaranteed. But I need to make sure the plane lands on time.

I need to get my rental car. I need to get a ticket. and I need to either park and take a ride share over or find inexpensive parking somewhere near the arena. But I heard that Los Angeles is a late arriving crowd as it is. So maybe I won't be an outlier if I got there like six minutes into the first quarter. And do you park at the airport? Or do you leave the car on, Karen, drive, and ride share over?

That's a very specific question. Today I will park at the airport. There are other times when I ride chair over, but today I will park at the airport. Got it. And then the last one from us is some requests from the chat. Do you have your plane hat on you? And are you willing to share it with the audience?

You know, I would share, but it's in the car, honestly. So I have a change. I have a change of clothes in the car that I have to change into. So maybe I'll find a Wawa parking lot. Or maybe I'll just do it in the parking garage, right? Backseat of the car. Be a man. I will definitely not do that.

But yeah, I'm eager to get out to L.A. As I pulled my son this morning, this is the last flight of the year that he said until the playoffs. He sounds pretty optimistic, right? So we'll see. But it could potentially be the last flight until Detroit. Maybe it's the last flight until New Orleans. Orleans, yeah. Speaking of which, and also speaking of game time, I got my flight to New Orleans.

I'm very confident that I will be there. I got the Airbnb, got everything. So, you know, if my optimism is any thing that affects how optimistic other fans are, I will say last year, even when the team was 10 and 1, I did not, you know, take this step to book a place or book a flight or anything like that. And how early did you do it in 22? Right around the same time. Okay. And right around the same time.

Were there any other miss ones in the past? No. Nope. You're one for one. Never had to, never had to cancel. In 2017? Well, everyone was like one month old or something. So yeah, that wasn't going to happen that year.

Okay. So one for one. Yeah. Okay. That should be the headline in the show. Yeah. That should be the headline that you booked your flight to. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To be already and then going to use game time for the, you know, I don't want to. I want to make you late, but do you want to get into the makeup test thing? I have about four minutes. I want to roll by two.

I was going to be nice to you and not talk about what an awful analogy of the Mario card thing was. Yeah, the Mario card's not a good analogy. I was trying to think this is, I'm still workshopping the analogy. One analogy I came up with is like there are sometimes when you have a bill where if you pay the bill early, you get 10% discount or whatever it may be, right? And then if you pay on time, you pay the full price. And then if you pay afterwards, there's a 10% penalty.

So I would say that converting on first and second down will be like paying the bill early. Converting on third down would be like paying the bill on time. And then converting a fourth down would be like 10%. I don't know if that's true either because you don't pay a penalty for getting it, getting the first down on third or fourth down. Okay, so. Yeah. No, so I'm saying the third down is within.

Yeah. And, yeah. But I don't think, I agree converting a first and second down is better than converting a third down. But I don't think converting on third down is problematic. My point was that the best offenses are the ones who don't need as many third downs, as opposed to the ones who convert a higher percentage of third downs. And my main issue isn't with the fact that people talk about third down, conversion rate. It's that people talk about that ahead of the rate that they don't need third down.

And so it's kind of like a detail. And the bigger picture is how often you even need it. And when you look at any standard mainstream NFL statistics package, it has the third down conversion percentage, but it doesn't have the percentage of series in which a team got a first down before third down. And that's the thing I'm trying to change is like I'm trying to like get people to think more about that. That's why I'm doing these baseball analogies with series conversion rate and everything. Because I want people to have a better sense of what the averages are, what's

good, what's bad for that. Because I think that that's more important. The Rams are a good example. They're terrible on third down. They're like 27th or 28th in the league. But they're fourth at not needing it. And so their overall series conversion rate ends up being 13th. Like because they drop

from fourth after second down to 13th overall because they're so bad at third down and they don't really go for it on fourth down. And so like the overall number there is still 13th they're still pretty good and i think marketing wise we need to work on serious conversion rate like the name's not great yeah yeah no i know i sometimes it's like like like call it like moving the sticks rate or something yeah that doesn't really work either yeah i need something better yeah yeah chain chain i actually think we agree here i like yeah no i i i agree with you whole wholeheartedly i i wouldn't want to get the third down but where i i i guess our disagreement is and and i don't think

the volume of third downs matter as much, I think, percentage matters there because, you're just talking to professor to professor. He doesn't like the makeup best thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So third downs, no. But in any data point, you're looking for inflection points, right? And third downs are often inflection points within a game because they, you know, there's a material different standard.

Because you let it be. And that's the difference between offensive third down conversion and defensive. So like in this conversation, it was a few weeks ago, you mentioned a similar thing about defenses being good on third down, completely different. Because the defense has to get to third down and win it in order to win the process unless they get a turnover on first or second down. But those are rare enough that that's not usually the way you're going to do it.

So it's very different for a defense than it is for an offense because the defense's goal is to get the third down. And so I think it actually matters more like how good the defense is at getting out of third down. Because the only way they can succeed is to get there and then finish the job, whereas an offense can completely avoid it. And so I just think that there's a big difference in like when people talk about offenses and how good they are at third down all the time.

But I think that like that's a second order fact compared to how often they avoid it, whereas defenses like need to be good on third down to finish. There's no other way they can win, right? Unless they're always getting turnovers, which isn't going to happen. So, yeah. Okay. Zach, enjoy your flight. Yeah.

Give yourself, I don't know, 45 minutes of not working on the flight. Give yourself some time. Get some rest, please. You get a long stretch of travel ahead on Sunday, Monday. So be kind to yourself. You know what? My wife has reminded me multiple times that this was the weekend last year that I went to Kansas City with pneumonia.

And so she has made abundantly clear, Zach, you need to take care of yourself. If you are sick for Thanksgiving, she's going to be disappointed. pointed in me. So I do need to, I won't be burning the midnight oil in, well, I will literally be on Sunday, but these next two nights, I hope to have this aura ring show up with about, you know, six to eight hours of sleep and I'll be good. I want you to get, I don't think this is too much to ask. I want you to get a combined at least 10 hours of sleep over the next two nights. Oh, if I don't get a combined 10 hours of sleep over the next two nights, then I made a mistake going out today.

And bottom line, because the whole point of going out today is to be easier on my body than being, like I did last year, which was like a 30-hour trip to L.A., which just kills you. Can we get to 14? Is that crazy? Yeah, my, my target's 12 to 16 over, you know, hopefully 14 to 16. I mean, 16 would be like, you know, that that would be like, Like, I think we know you well in that time. You're not going to get to 16. Yeah.

14 would be, if I get to parade. Yeah, 14 would be the perfect start to next week, which is one of my favorite weeks of the year. Thanksgiving. All right. Well, Zach, go get them. We appreciate you joining us, making time. We love you. Okay.

I think, I'm going to guess he gets 11.5. That's going to be my official guess. Better than normal, but still enough to disappoint. It's going to be very skewed to the first night, right? Like he'll get more of the first night than the second. Is that right? Probably. Even though it's a late game.

Just the way he won't be able to stay in bed. Right. All right. Let's keep talking about the offense before we get to our next break. What? Yeah, I mean, I was going to talk about like Devante Smith targets and wide receiver usage rate and things like that because I know that's been a big topic this week. But if Devante Smith's not playing in the game, maybe we can save that and just, I'll

ask you, like, how many targets is A.J. Brown going to get in this game if. All of them. If Devante Smith doesn't play. I mean, he's been consistently at around somewhere between 25 and 27 percent of his routes. Let's say AJ Brown versus the field. In targets for this game. Who would you take? I'll go field just because I do think Dallas Goddard will be an important part of the game plan in this game.

And then we'll see how the Rams match 12 personnel this year. Looking back at the game last year, I know they had a different defense coordinator because they had Rahe Morris. but similar kind of family of, you know, like Chris Shula was promoted, like he didn't come from outside the building. So their defensive structure is more or less the same. And they were matching 12 personnel with base early in that game. And the Eagles just like threw it on them. Like, you know, completed the first five passes.

And then after that, it just turned into like more of an 11 personnel versus penny personnel matchup. It'll be interesting to see how they match the Eagles this year because they have one of the most diverse combinations of defensive personnel packages of any team in the league. And do you want to talk about that now or do you want to like, like, we're going to talk about the Rams defense later or now. It's up to you want. All right, we can talk about it now since we're talking about Dallas Goddard. I think like the Eagles will change the way they call plays, right, based on how the defense is

playing and what personal grouping they're playing and all that. The Rams are very strange. They're second in base personnel, 37%. They're also third and dime personnel at 23%. They play nickel less than anyone else in the league by a mile. They only play 37% nickel. The league average is 66. They're 32nd by a mile in that.

And within nickel, they actually have three different nickel package. Well, they have like a big nickel where they have Quentin Lake playing in the slot. And Quentin Lake is a safety in base. They have a small nickel where. Kobe Durant, who was the nickel last year, but is starting on the outside this year, kicks inside and Akello Witherspoon comes in and plays on the outside. And A.J. Brown has had big games against Akello Witherspoon in the past. So that's something to know. When Witherspoon does come in, he's always the left corner. And so that's something that, you know, the Eagles could match A.J. Brown up on him if they, if they use that small nickel package. They also have a couple of different big dime packages. They have a 416. They have a 5-0-6. They have two different rookie safeties. Cameron Kinchins and Jay. who take turns coming in on those, like depending on which one it is. McCullough comes in when it's 5-0-6 and sometimes he's the kind of fake linebacker. Sometimes Cam Curle plays in that role.

They just have a lot of different things that they do. And so if you're wondering if the Eagles are going to start this game with the, let's try all the different personnel groupings and see how they match thing, this is like the ultimate game to do that. Because they have so many different personnel packages that Kellan Moore, Siriani, they're going to be wondering like, like, how are they going to match with how are they to handle this like how are they going to handle the you know the 13 and 12 and and the johnny the johnny wilson 11 versus the non johnny wilson 11 don't you think um theoretically that the the 506 gambit to have no linebackers on the field is probably a good one to make against a quarterback who doesn't like to throw it

over the middle of the field yeah no it's kind of a good match it's a good point and it's funny because when you look at it on film it really does look like there's one in the middle of the field when they when they play that way. Like, seriously, like, there's, there's, like, every, like, the five guys are along the, are along the defensive line. And one of the safeties is, like, thinking about coming down into that area, but doesn't really, like, doesn't really even look like they're standing up as a, as a linebacker. So it's a, it's a very interesting defense because.

But I also think if there is a friend. Devante, I don't, like, the Eagles aren't going to be leaning on a ton of 11. I think, I think it is more likely that they're going to be mostly living in 12. Yeah, it's very possible. The Eagles are already one of the highest 12 person. teams in the league. It's like fourth highest, but very close to being first for the season. And it's been more recently. We joked about how it was funny that they went to more 12 personnel when Dallas Cutert was out. Like you'd think that that would be, you know, so yeah, it'll, it'll be

interesting to see it. Also interesting to see how the run game is affected by that because, you know, looking at Fran's notes about the Rams and you guys talked about a little bit on the show, like they play with five defensive linemen on the field a lot. And how you're going to block them, like what kind of responsibility you're going to give the tight ends in the blocking game is going to be something that, you know, that we'll see, we'll see how it goes. Like I'm very curious about that. Last year, late in the game, the Eagles went crazy with the gap scheme runs. It was counter, quarterback counter, bash counter read.

Not a lot of like big plays out of it, but enough to move the chains and kind of like run out the clock near the end. So I'm very curious, like what kind of approach the Eagles take to this? like, you know, like, what, what, where they end up being happy with, like, what personnel they want from the Rams on the field and also, like, what part of the field to attack. Gotcha. All right. More to come just after this.

How low can you go? Talking about floors. Not limbo. We're talking about Empire today. Danes is so fed up. He's leaving. He's just flee the studio. He cannot believe that we would talk about floors, but that's okay.

Empire Today, you know about Empire Today, they're the best in the business and they're giving you the highest quality. They're not going to give you some bo-bo-jebroni product. They're going to work hard to figure out what works best for you, and they're not going to do the game

where they try to undercut the competitors with the kinds of products that they wouldn't put in their own home or their worst enemies home, frankly. Empire Today, they keep shopping for Flores Simple with a curated product selection, their philosophy, is to help you find what you need, not to overwhelm you with thousands of choices and substitutes.

What they leave out of their selection is just as important as what they put in. Empire's product team exhaustively combs through thousands of product samples each year to find the perfect styles. They don't want that decision fatigue hoisted upon you. They're going to give you the choices that they know are best for you and you can go from there. Schedule a free home in-home estimate today and the good news is our listener, can receive a $350 off discount when they use the promo code P-H-L-Y. Restrictions apply. See Empire Today.com for details.

And then, it's time to talk about our beloved Julia. Because it's engagement season, people. And if you're feeling the bug, you're thinking, ah, Julia did it. I'm ready to do it too. you got to head over to Golden Nugget because Golden Nugget Jewelers is where Philadelphia gets engaged. Chestnut and 8th in downtown Philly,

a family-owned and operated business since 1987. If you are getting engaged, they have a wide assortment of rings and wedding bands to fit anyone's style, and when you do it, you receive a final cleaning and written appraisal with every engagement ring purchase. But let's say you've already made the engagement plunge.

You're looking for a little special present for your sweetie or it's pre-engagement. It's not just engagement rings that they have at Golden Nugget Jewelers. They've got watches, diamond necklaces, diamond bracelets, earrings, and more. Maybe you're thinking about a holiday season purchase. Why not? Santa needs some loving too, you know? Golden Nugget Jewelers, you deserve an expert and the best price, Golden Nugget Jewelers, where Philly gets engaged,

head over to golden nugget jewelers.com to learn more. All right, where'd you go? To kick Sequin Barclay when he wears down somewhere? It's the first time I really had to pee during the show. I always wondered, like, how do you guys do it without any breaks? And then, you know, this is the first time it's up. So I was lucky enough to have lunch before the show with Bo and Sheel and remarked the first time that I've ever had lunch with two people

whose names are on the T-shirt that I'm wearing. So it was a little is pretty cool but I had a lot of tea during lunch So yeah that was the metaphorically getting getting talking talking to smack spilled some tea here Nah, just I've never used that expression but a drink a green green tea Yeah, all right anything else on offense that's that's catching your eyes on offense Those eyeballs of yours well yeah so play action is something that we've been asking for and we've been getting it right? If you look at the last four weeks, so if you look at just the first seven weeks, the Eagles were 20% play action on dropbacks, which was 24th in the league. If you look at just the last four games, 33%, which is fifth most in the NFL.

So actually like, you know, and if you just look at shotgun play action, which is the main kind of play action they run, they actually are like very good at it in terms of success rate and all that and also have been doing it much more frequently. And so we're talking about all the variety that we saw in the run game last week. the wham and the trap and all that stuff that made us all so excited a lot of toss recently under center toss which is something that could very easily also translate to play action haven't really seen that yet but like we're we're probably going too soon um i think that there's more and more of this kind of marrying i know you love the marrying the run game to the past game stuff like gets engaged man yeah and i appreciate that you asked uh kellen more about the the jahan dots in orbit uh motion package so this is not a big deal maybe but like they did a run it six times in the game, including five in the first half. And when I was charting the film,

I noticed that all six were different plays. And that's not something you normally see. Like normally when there's a package like that, and there's like two plays or something like that. So, you know, they did an outside zone, action away and then threw it to the orbit on the first one. The second one, they faked the orbit pass and it was supposed to be a pump screen that didn't work. They had to throw it away. In one of them, there was a curl flat away from the orbit, and they threw that. And then the runs were all different, too. They did an inside zone run away from the orbit on one with an RPO bubble available to Jahan Dotson on one. They did a pin pull run away from the orbit. And then they did an inside zone read where Jalen had the option to keep it and they

didn't block the backside edge also away from the orbit. So the point is that like there's this variety and there's thought that's clearly gone into how can we have our run game and our past game kind of work together. The Jahan Dotson package is just one example of that. And I think we're going to hopefully see more and more of that and eventually be, you know, aesthetically think that the offense looks a little bit better than it has. I was going to ask you, like, mini buy, they talk about self-scout all the time. What do you think they're focusing on? Getting better. Shoring up the fundamentals. You're just not going to answer the question. Well, I was going to tell you I did some digging in the locker room this week on the trap-wam.

Ah, yeah, because, you know, it moved the needle for you in France so much. I guess they get the, the skinny on it. So I asked some of the offensive lineman were like, you know, how did that come to be? Was it something you expected to be in the game plan this week? And Lane said it was a, it was like a half-time adjustment thing. They did have it in the back of their mind that this could be a game

for it. But at half-time, they talked to Stout and were like, this is going to work. And so he was, he was very happy with it as you saw on film. He's like, you know, the key for me is like, I got to get out of my stance so quick on that. He's got those old man bones, but he was happy to make it happen. I'm going to throw you a bone

and just mentioned that it was Kenny Gainwell on those runs and not Sequin and wondering and wondering you think that was part of the conversation wondering if it's one of many the most important play of the half we need the better running back on the field I was just going to ask you if you asked anyone about if there's like anything specific about

those plays that that it was Kenny or did Kenny just happen to be in there for them that's a good question I don't know the answer to that and I would wonder because you would think in theory it would be the opposite where right where if it's Kenny you might think that the defensive line is a little bit less likely to just fly up field because they're more expecting. I guess.

Well, but if they're past rushing, it works. Yeah, it still works. So maybe it is. Maybe they are more. Those runs if they're blocked well are probably like running back proof. You know what I mean? Like it almost doesn't matter. I mean, of course, Sequin's more likely to turn it into a touchdown.

Like once he's through, as we saw on the two that did become touchdowns later, which were of course different, different plays. One was a split zone and one was a one was a toss. but yeah it was it was very exciting to see those lane was asked in the locker room by jeff mclean when the last time he did those were and he couldn't remember uh but of course of course yeah i mean i can tell you it was uh the last time they ran wam war trap was against san francisco last year week 13 okay and the last time that lane johnson was the trapper on such a play was the week before against buffalo uh and then in 2022 they actually had a game against green bay that lane referenced where they ran it something like eight or nine times in the game,

where with Lane is the trapper, like just like a right tackle trap. And they just kept on going to it. And this was also your favorite moment of the miced up this week. Oh, that was awesome. So miced up this week, if you haven't seen it, Slay is miced up in the game against Washington.

And he's on the sideline watching the trap play that Kenny Gainwell hit. And they show the play and then they show Slay. And he's like, go, Kenny, like hit it, Kenny or something like that. And I was thinking like, the sleigh even like, no, like what the difference. runs are or anything and then and then it continues and he looks at the screen and he goes nice trap and i just thought that was like the coolest it was just like the coolest thing ever that like

the you know the corner is like you know looking at that and being like nice trap and that he appreciated you know what i what a cool what a cool call it was yeah if i flip it on you what do you think their focus on was in the mini buy yeah see i've i've been wondering about this because at the buy there were so many major issues yeah that it was like taking your pick like you got to fix everything and now there are a lot of things that are working pretty well it's it's so hard to say i mean like the red zone red zone i guess high red zone yeah high red zone and and there you wonder about the philosophy right like like and we've been talking about this for years now where they love to run it they love to get close they love to try to set up

the short yardage situations and we haven't seen them be very successful in that high red zone area so yeah right now the eagles are uh this continues kind to be a trend 11th in red zone despite being second in goal to go like they're they're so good once they get to goal to go but between the 10 and the 20 basically they're they're just like a lot of drives are ending there okay uh we have made it almost to the hour mark without talking about the thing that is the thumbnail and the headline on this show so let's flip it to the other side of the ball And a lot of conversation this week in the, you know, the film Twitter about this rematch between Vic Fangio and Sean McVeigh. Yeah.

You know, the storytelling that Vic Fangio essentially, you know, changed the course of Sean McVe's offensive philosophy. Yeah. Because how badly he sunned him in 2018, which then led to the Belichick game plan in the Super Bowl. That shut them down. And McVeigh goes from that. and totally reimagines his running game. He wants to abandon the outside zone. He wants to get bulkier inside.

What are your expectations for how Fangio will approach this matchup? Yeah, I really enjoyed your interview with Jordan Rodriguez yesterday, where she was talking about how they've kind of gone away from some of that outside zone stuff. Fran talked about this as well, doing more duo, doing more of that kind of thing. Looking at the Rams offense now, and for those of you don't know, the Fangio McVeigh thing goes back to that 2018. game where he was with Denver and he played the 6-1 front against you know to try to stop the outside zone and then he was Chicago then sorry when he was with Chicago yes that's what I'm last year last year at

Chicago with that very we're very talented Chicago defense and they play in a six one front against that outside zone game and basically we're able to to outnumber it right like they were able to get to the edge you know get the edges and all that and then bill Belichick famously did that in the Super Bowl and held the Rams. I don't remember how many points it was, but it was like one of the lowest touring Super Bowls ever. So, yeah, the offense still does some of that stuff. Like, it's not like they don't do it. They still run a decent amount of undercenter runs. They still do a lot of under center play action. But it is a little bit different than it has. More 12 personnel, as Fran mentioned. It's up to 17% for the year, which is up from 5% last year. But when you look at first downs and neutral type situations, it's even lower. They're like 74%. of their first downs are 11 personnel. That used to be in the 90s every year, and it was 100% like, you know,

in some of the years. Just 52% 11 personnel on first downs last week. They were at 40% against the Vikings, the first game that Kup and Nakua were back, and those are their best two games of the year on offense. So they've actually been heavier 12 personnel on early downs in their best games, like in the games where Stafford and the offense in general

has been more successful. They still look familiar on, film they still look like a McVeigh offense the condensed splits and all of that 80% motion they are running more pistol this year than they've ever done before they didn't run a single snap of pistol against the Eagles last year wow this year they're 21% which is third most in the league and the fourth most is like 12% or something so there's like three teams that run a lot of pistol and they're one of them um and then they will run some of the stuff we used to see them do from under center like the outside zone stuff they'll run that a lot from pistol now as opposed to

from UnderCenter, which is kind of interesting. Like it leads to a different kind of play action game out of that as well. They have a lot of interesting gap scheme runs. Like they run, they have this counter run. I saw a breakdown of this by Ted Wynn on Twitter this week, and it was cool. And it shows up on film. Like they just block it a little bit differently.

Like it's just like something extra you have to get ready for. And I would say that this team in general has like weird things to get ready for on both sides of the ball. Like watching the film of this team has been far more interesting for me than like watching opponent film. from a lot of the other games coming into this. And it's really on, again, both sides of the ball. And then the motion guy, 80% motion,

he seems more likely, this is just anecdotal. I don't have the numbers for this or anything. He seems so much more likely to be involved in the play. Okay. Then like when the Eagles run like Anias Smith, like you know he's going to end up on the backside of the play and the plays go in the other way. The guy who runs the motion ends up being like the lead blocker on outside zone.

It's much more purposeful than just window dressing. Yes. not just like, not just, not just purposeful to like, like, like move the defense in his direction and then attack the other direction. They're literally attacking with that guy all the time. Like, he ends up being the target more often. Uh, he'll run a flat as part of a curl flat concept, which is the first read, you know, that kind of thing. Or as opposed to like just ending up on the backside and like pumping a guy over. I said to Fran yesterday, but I do, I do love when like Nakua is releasing through the line of scrimmed. Oh, that's really cool. Yeah. He had like one of the first

plays of the game last week where he goes in motion, comes back. Yeah. releases through the sea gap the tight end is like blocking a defensive end and he's just like running inside of him and it's like man you could stop that so easily like it would be it would be legal yeah if you're paying attention it's legal to just slam him there like he's out he's up the line of scrimmage ends up being the target on the other side yeah like coming back to the outside really cool uh just really cool looking things and then um I already talked about like staying true to my brand like how good they've been at avoiding third down so like they've been very good on early downs but once they get the third down for whatever reason they've had trouble and a lot of the aggregate stats are problematic right because Nikua and Kopp were both out for so long yeah um that maybe you can just look at the game since but it's not like they've even then they're not yeah you mentioned it the other day they they were like actually more consistently successful without them uh so yeah i mean yeah we'll we'll we'll see so from a defensive standpoint it does feel like whether this is uh it's not necessarily the the best offense they have faced but from a

communication in the back five really standpoint, but the back seven. Yeah. This is sort of like the 300 level tests that they're getting. This is their toughest test. And for guys like Cooper DeGine and Quigion and Mitchell who have passed all of those tests so far, and you have examples of like the great things, the ways that they're passing things off, this is going to be a slightly more difficult, like, in-play situation to handle. I think that's right.

And the thing that I always think about with McVeigh is Jim Schwartz was very good against him as well. And the way that he handled it was he played a lot more cover four than he normally did. It's like I like the crusty old guys are unimpressed with this whiskey. Everybody else is like, oh, what do I do about this smart guy? And I'm just like, I'm going to play football. Yeah, exactly, exactly. And my favorite thing about Jim Schwartz's approach was like essentially ignored the motion. Like just ignore it.

Like, you know, you guys can run all that. stuff all you want we're going to sit here play our cover four and everyone's going to be in our zone you guys have to come to one of our zones at the end of the day and we're going to cover you when you get there as opposed to chasing you and worrying about you know who's covering you just let you come to us and it'll i'm very curious how fangio handles this from a from a coverage perspective fan geo is more like jim schwartz like didn't play a lot of cover four that's what made that interesting okay i didn't play a lot of quarters right whereas whereas fangio does already and by the way just to cut you off we appreciate everybody who's a one of

watching on the television, but there's still more to come if you want to check it out on all p. hl y.com. Go ahead. Yeah. So, I mean, like, it seems to fit, and it makes sense that Fangio has been successful against McVeigh because it's not just the 6-1 stuff. Coverage structure wise, Fangio's coverage philosophy kind of fits this like, it doesn't really matter where you come from, you know, kind of thing. Like, you can imagine if you're playing a lot of press man, it would be annoying to be like chasing all that motion. Right. But if you're already kind of sitting back, and ready to match zones and you have your rules and those rules work no matter where the people are releasing from, you're more likely to be able to succeed as long as your players are well-coached,

and they certainly look incredibly well-coached the last couple of games. I mean, I was looking at the film, and the underneath zone defenders for the Eagles have been so good at undercutting crossing routes, over-routes, ball routes. These are all things that the Rams run. Even some deeper routes in the middle of the field, you look Zach Bond, Nikobie Dean. it's like they have eyes in the back of their head cooper de jean as well where they're when they are in quarters those are the three guys underneath right bond dean and cooper de jean and those three guys are like exactly under where the where those routes are going the guy looks open but then you realize there's no passing lane to him because the there's a guy you know like four or five yards in front of him who's who's right in that passing lane and you can just tell how well coached they are like in zone coverage and it's been so cool and i keep writing in my film notes like great job under cutting the crosser by and like write the guy's name and I promise you I don't think I wrote a single time last year like about anything on the defense really but certainly not about that kind of thing like the zones last year I was a couple

place but that's right yeah Christian else was good last week I thought goddamn right yeah yeah we're flying all over the place don't need to be telling you yeah I really I mean I stick to the bond thing yeah fun thing about this game Matthew Stafford three hundred sixty nine dropbacks Zero scrambles. And if this bit continues, he's 16 away from, uh, Oh, the record from Drew Brees for second place. And now caveat is they haven't been keeping track of this.

At least true media hasn't, um, until they didn't keep track until 2006. That's a pretty, that's pretty good though. That's almost 20 years. Peyton Manning is the king, 676 dropbacks without a scramble in 2013. Okay. Uh, so Stafford's not going to get that many dropbacks. So he can't, he can't beat that. But he's 16 away.

So this game he would pass Drew Breeze for for second place. Oh, Aiden O'Connell. That's a funny one. Aiden O'Connell is the other one. Yeah. And then Peyton Manning did it twice in 2015. He was he was, he's also on the list. That's very up my alley.

It's such a funny. How can you not just accidentally, like while you're trying to avoid a sack or something like like straight like get one yard? Well, even just like on a play action thing when he's rolling out anyway. You'd think so. Yeah. But and yet, no, never. He just throws it away. Yeah.

Yeah. Of the four items that I got in that, um, super poop poop, poop, platter. Which do you think is the most likely? Probably Eagles touchdown on the first or the corner interception. I mean, the corner interception, well, I'll see it when I believe it. But these guys can catch the ball. Yeah, but they're awesome and everything else. So, yeah, even Slay doesn't have one.

A guy who's gotten interceptions in this career. Yeah. Okay. Anything else, my friend. Yeah, speaking of the corners, Cooper de Gene on the field, I went back and I checked. I was like, this is unusual for Fangio. It'll just be willing to play nickel against heavy personnel. That was my question for you, yes.

And it is so like much of an outlier what he's doing right now. When you look back at his career, I went back to 2015, not really good reliable data before that. So all the Chicago years, the Denver years, and then the Miami year. And I just looked at base personnel percentage against heavy personnel only because otherwise it's just the function of who you're playing, like you're matching and all that. And in Chicago, he played 74% base. in Denver he played 64% base last year in Miami 88% basically it's automatic that he would have base out there against heavy personnel first four weeks this year when avante maddox was the nickel 74% base are you ready is everyone sitting down since then since cooper de jean has come in only 30% base against heavy personnel living in nickel the NFL average is 67% so this is a complete outlier for Fangio's career for the NFL in general where Cooper de Gene is the guy that he wants on the field, even against these heavy looks, and even in situations where it's like short yardage and they

have everybody condensed. Last week, they played the famous 6-1 front against Washington's 12 personnel in a bunch of plays, including the big fourth downplay and whatnot. And it was the contained nickel package that we've been talking about, three defensive tackles, Brandon Graham, and then Zach Bonn. as a stand-up edge on one side, and Cooper de Gene as the stand-up edge on the other side. He didn't have to come in and stop the run or anything,

but structurally, Fangio is okay with Cooper DeGine being in that role, just in case it's going to be a pass, and he wants him out there to make the play. And Cooper DeGine has famously made those two big, fourth, and short stops where he had to make a tackle, not just a coverage play, but a tackle play. And, yeah, it's just been awesome.

That's fascinating. Yeah. And you talked about this Rams offense is likely to with with these two wide receiver self they play a little bit more 12 and so yeah i think so yeah yeah and and if fangio's happy to play this way um you know because for them the alternative is to have like three defensive tackles and two defensive ends out there and basically he's like you know like rather than have josh sweat out there and he's probably going to get beat anyway you know what i mean like just like the way that that matchup is in the run game i may as well be prepared

for for for a pass yeah uh how do you feel about uh what have you seen in the the the few clips of Jalick's Hunt if we're expecting him to be a little bit more involved in the rotation. Now, since you mentioned Jalix Hunt, I will mention that Jalick's Hunt was in the locker room this week talking about how good Taron Jackson has been as a practice squad member playing the role of Jared Verse this week. I have no idea how that made the edit for like the seven minute video the Eagles posted from the locker room. But it did. It was in there. I think it might have been a mistake. It was like such a short clip. They forgot to edit it out. But I feel like I was the audience for that

since on this show like the day after Terran Jackson got signed I said you know what I think it is is Jalick's Hunt is going to graduate to be kind of second string defensive line and so they needed another guy to be the practice squad guy and Jalick's Hunt has been that practice squad guy all year so we appreciated

what a good job Tehran Jackson was doing in that role so and while we're in the chat I don't believe anybody in the chat remembers that so okay well while we're while we're in the weeds, the Eagles did make a transaction today.

Did you see this? I did. They signed a guy who was with the Rams in training camp. So very curious if, I'm looking up his name here. Ochan Mathis. They cut David Ananii who had been on the practice squad for about eight weeks.

They brought in this guy who was drafted by the Rams last year. I'm sure Fran can tell us more about him in terms of what his college prospects were like and all that. Sixth round pick or something last year for the Rams was with the Rams through training camp this year. So you wonder if it's like, you know, to get information or something like that. But yeah.

You asked me about Jay Lexant. I thought he looked like he belonged on the field about as much as Nolan Smith did last year, maybe even more so. Okay. If that's a, if that's a comparison. Like you can tell that he needs to, you know, maybe get a little stronger, maybe get a little bit, like a little bit quicker and reaction. reacting to what the play is that kind of thing but but you know i'm i'm hardly an expert at that

position or anything that reminds me the other thing i was uh asking about in the locker room this week is do you think that nolan smith needs a sack dance i love that he just acts like a three year old and that's what uh that's what slay said he says i don't want that no yeah no that wouldn't be him and then that's yeah that's what the the georgia teammates were saying the same thing like yeah that's like that's that's how he is yeah nicobe says nicobi actually this was interesting he said, you know, Nolan has always been like the most talkative guy on the field. He's always talking pre-snap. He's always talking during the snap.

Now with BG, he's number two, but he wasn't like that last year. Right. As a rookie, he was not willing to talk. That's really cool. So he has his on-field personality has come out a little bit more. Nolan said maybe when he gets to 10, we can have a conversation. Okay. That's great.

You know, there was a very endearing moment on the sleigh mics up with Nolan Smith, where he got that sack on the cross-trop move, and then he comes back and sweat. Josh Sweat is telling him, like, good job or something. And he says to Josh Sweat, like, we're not all blessed like you with those long ass arms. So, you know, he's just like, it was just a cool moment where he's like, he realizes like, you know, he has to overcome certain things and all that. And yeah, I mean, Nolan Smith, you know, Fran in his breakdown, and obviously you should be a diehard. So you can read and watch Fran's breakdowns every week.

Like he talked about how like he sees Nolan Smith as being a starter for this team in the future. He's a starter right now. Like he is the starter. Like it's him and Josh Swet now. It's very clear. And that's, and that's, that's, that's, that's really cool. And Siriani was asked about snap counts for those guys. And he said that they were all in the, in their sweet spot last week where they want them.

And that it was, Josh Sweat played 45 snaps. And then Brandon Graham played 32 and Nolan Smith played 33. And so basically that's kind of what they want. So what's going to have the most. And then BG and Nolan Smith are kind of like. you know 2A and 2B there okay we have a super chat from cdp baby says the eagles have already taken at new york's best running back and tight end this decade obviously speaking of sequin barclay and jack stole and he says should they try the same with quarterback or is colt

mccoy busy i do like the uh the daniel jones release is funny because it is so predictable that it is like well you got it you know what, say what you will about the giants, but you got to tip your cap. Like, this is a classy way to handle this. Like, let the guy go. Just like the Eagles were classy with Nick Foles. Right.

Yeah, I mean, it's so ridiculous. Like, it's such a pathetic thing. Handle a thing poorly. And then at the last minute, like, write a thank you note when you're, after you spit in someone's face, like, that's not that classy. Calm down.

Yeah. I enjoy all these kind of dumpster fires around the division. It's very fun. As a fan. As it should be. All right. last thing you're are you've already got your mind on the tiebreaker scenarios for the number one seat yeah listen i mean other people start thinking about tiebreakers late december i've got all my

i was born in the tie break you know i'll i mean i'll i'll show you this bro the i have the uh the eagles against other teams common opponents like tallies prepared when the schedule comes out nice in may so i so how many so when the schedule comes out may how many how many potential tied teams did you have on there? Well, there are only six teams that the Eagles don't play in the NFC. And so because head-to-head will trump this, you only have to do it with six teams. So it's not that part of the because of the, because of the, yeah, I mean, I'm sure everyone has this. And I already deleted the one against Chicago because it's mathematically impossible to be in a tie with Chicago that comes down to that now.

So there's still five left in play. The important one, of course, is against the Lions. So this is the thing that I want to talk about. This game on Sunday is huge for tiebreaker implications for the number one seed. And if we're going to be serious about this, the Eagles are now two ahead of the commanders in the lost column. We are thinking that this team is going to win the division. Also two ahead in the lost column of the leaders of both the NFC West and the NFC South, three ahead of the NFC South. And so it really does come down to...

It's a three-team race, basically. the Vikings, I guess. Right. And so looking at the tiebreaker implications, and I know it's kind of silly to say things like if the Eagles win out at this point, just because that seems improbable, right, that they would finish the season

on a 13-game win streak or that kind of thing. But it's just worth understanding what needs to happen for the Eagles to get the one seed. If the Eagles were to win out, right now they are a game behind Detroit. Correct. So first of all, based on record, exactly, one game behind.

So obviously need the lines to lose. And then the question becomes, who didn't need to lines to lose two. Right now, neither of the teams has any AFC losses, right? So, like, NFC record is the first tiebreaker. If the teams continue to not lose to any AFC teams, then the next tiebreaker is record against common opponents. The Detroit has Buffalo.

That's an interesting AFC. Yeah, all their hard games are at home. Now, yeah, if they lose to Buffalo, but that would be bad for the Eagles, for that to be their loss, right? So, like, it's kind of counterintuitive, but, like, given that you're tied with someone, you want to have aFC losses.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, given that you're tied. Obviously, you don't want to actually lose the games because then that makes your record worse. But if the Eagles were to lose a game these next two weeks, it would be a million times better to lose to the Ravens than lose to the Rams.

And it's not just because they're an AFC team. It's also because the Rams are a common opponent with the Lions. Now, the Lions already beat the Rams. And there are only three games left in that common opponents battle with the Lions. the Eagles are currently 3 and 1 and the lions are 4 in 1

the only way the Eagles can win the tiebreaker against the lions if it comes down to common opponents which is only if they're tied in the NFC exactly okay is for the Eagles to beat the Rams and the Cowboys and the Lions have to lose

to the Packers week 14 at home if all three of those happen then the Eagles would be 5 and 1 and the Lions would be 4 and 2 and the Eagles would win that tiebreaker that is the only way the Eagles can win the number one seed

in a scenario where the lions only lose one game. Like they would have to lose to the Packers. Only the Packers. Like no other one loss helps the Eagles. And that's with the Eagles winning out. So it's an uphill battle that way. If any of those three doesn't happen,

then the best the Eagles can do in that is tie. But if that's tied, it goes to the strength of victory and the Lions will destroy the Eagles in the strength of victory tiebreaker. It's not even close. Like they have beaten a lot of teams with a lot of wins. And the Eagles haven't.

Like, they just haven't. I mean, the Lions have wins over Houston and Minnesota and Arizona. And, you know, like, and even if you assume the Eagles beat the Ravens and, you know, like Washington again and all of that, it doesn't even come close to the number of wins the Lions opponents have. And so basically losing this game would be devastating for the number one seed chances. it would mean that the lions would have to lose three times and the Eagles would have to win out the rest of the way. So, I mean, just think about that, like how unlikely that is.

I mean, that's a team that's nine and one now. You would need them to go four and three the rest of the way. Plus, you would have to win all six of your games. And then even then you just barely get it. So it's a huge game for that reason because it keeps alive the path to the one seed that involves the lions losing to the Packers, which would put you ahead.

Yeah. And then each team could get a random loss or something and you'd still stay ahead, right? So like, unless it's to Dallas. So, yeah. So, I mean, yeah, the Lions have some tough games left. But again, they're mostly at home. They play Green Bay at home. They play Buffalo at home.

They do play at San Francisco, which could be interesting, week 17. And then they play the Vikings week 18 at home. I don't believe in the Vikings. I don't know about you, but I know their defense is good. Yeah, not like a number one seed. I just can't imagine that they're going to still be in the running for the division like week 18. probably not yeah no we'll see okay great stuff as always just a special a special guest wanted to call in and give a a little surprise a scouting report for you oh oh oh yeah oh

oh look you mentioned o'shawn mathess you can't expect me to not call in and give you our scouting report oh sean mathis you wanted you wanted to give you the o'shawn mathis scouting report oh yeah yeah good all right so uh six five two 50 outstanding length 35 and a quarter inch arms uh beau you will enjoy this he was drafted one pick after the eagle selected tanner marquis last year wow so he's the draft slot after tanner mackie uh with the pick that they traded from tennessee when they traded them robert woods so essentially this was robert woods for o'shawn mathis and that was the best wide receiver in football yeah so you know there was obviously did not have get great value there on that trade, although it's not like Mathis has done a ton.

Not even Romo. It was Aikman, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But basically the book on Mathis, I mean, he came in at TCU, and that's where he played most of his career. And then he transferred to Nebraska late. And it was kind of like your, you know, kind of built like a Randy Gregory, like a really like long, spiny rusher, had flashes early in his career.

It was like second team all conference. And then he transferred in Nebraska. And just, I mean, he just never put it all to. together. The production was never there. He's an old. He's a fifth or six year senior and was unproductive. Went to the combine and tested okay, but it didn't test to the way that you would want for a guy that's kind of built that way. So it didn't shock me that he didn't really kind of fall in with the Rams and why he's still kind of on the market. I mean, as someone in the chat says, you have fully crossed into ZB territory with this, this call in. I love that you, you took us on and

took it very seriously. As Mike says, you're a freak, but we love you dearly. And he was picked one pick after. Are you not listening? Oh, wait, sorry. Did you already say that? I'm sorry, friend. Wow.

Unbelievable. That's the second time today, Danes. Sorry. Unbelievable. Sorry about that. Speaking of you guys, did you guys talk about Larak Jackson, Danes? No, no. I was going to ask you about that, actually.

So Larak Jackson has been starting at left tackle, at least the last couple of weeks, right? But Joe Noteboom is back from injury, and you anticipate that that will not mean a change, right? That Alaric Jackson will stay in the lineup. I had Note Boom penciled in as the starting left tackle. And, you know, obviously he missed last week along with the, along with the right tackles. They had two backups in. And Alarick Jackson was the starter at left tackle. Now, kind of following the media reports at the Rams, like no one on the beat core has been making a big deal about Note Boom returning to practice and saying like, oh, he's probably going to be inserted back in the lineup. I know coming into the year, like they wanted

to allow Jackson to be the starter. And then he got suspended by the league for two games back in August. And so that kind of derailed him being the starter. And then all the injuries happen. And so then they're moving note boom around. So then Jackson slides in. But then he gets hurt. So it's just been, I mean, it's been a comedy of injuries for the Rams in the offensive line. My guess is is that it will be a Larick Jackson. And he's kind of like your lumbering left tackle. Doesn't like move great, but moves well enough. So that's a matchup that Josh Swett, I think, can win off the edge. He's a...

In terms of, like, moving well, he's a lyric to it. See, I wish I had heard you mention Tanner McKee instead of heard that, Fran. Sorry, I was so... You know what I was doing, by the way, is I was looking up my draft big board to see where you had... It's not going to have a lyric to it. I just don't like it very much. To see where you had these guys on your big board. and I don't know if I'm allowed to say

if I'm allowed to say where you had them. Go for it. Okay, this was sequestered information because Fran worked for the team at the time. But Tanner McKee was 96th on your big board? That's like, yeah, he loved Tanner McKee. He was picked 188. The reason he's the quarterback in the future.

And then you did not have Mathis on your big board at all. So, and he was picked at 189. So there go. Yeah, no, I liked Tanner McKee. I thought there were some really good things with him at Stanford. honestly I let me hold on I got my sheet open I'm pretty sure I wrote down Nick Foles while I was studying Tanner McKee so there was there were a lot of similarities in terms of the way they moved you know obviously the build is very

similar as well so no it's yeah I as soon as I saw I because I actually didn't even see the math this move so Dana is you broke you broke that for me as there was I was in the chat lurking so I was like oh you know what let me go pull up my notes and I'll do a little call in what's your sense of when that when a team makes a move like this just before they play the former team. Do you think there's any information gathering involved in the decision? Has to be. Yeah, I don't think that that it happens so often that, you know,

they can't be coincidence, obviously. And so I'm sure that they're pregnant. He was not signed from the Rams practice squad. He was with New England and was waived by New England. Yeah, he was with the Rams. He was with the Rams until August 25th or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Correct. Yeah.

So, you know, but he was obviously was there and has some knowledge in terms of what they're doing from a schematic standpoint from it. And it might even just be simple. it's like, hey, you know, like, you know, if they're going to call a stunt, like, what is some of the, what is some of the verbiage that they use just before the snap? That might give the offensive line and some tips there, you know, in action. So, yeah, I think you're definitely trying to glean something from those guys. All right.

Last thing, Fran, how are you feeling about Swipper now that Devante is? Maybe. Honestly, like, I'm borderline, like, going to call party foul on this. The fact that you submitted all the Devante Smith entries, then didn't, win one of them. You knew something. I was willing to. I didn't bid one. I was willing to take it. I'm not taking it for four. I'm not a moron. You knew

something. The fact that you did all three of them. Yeah. So I did one of them too, but just a super update, three of four Zach items that he won involved Devante Smith. Right now, Zach's only chance of

winning. A point is the Sixers winning. All of Zach sex are on the Sixers winning a game. And then, yeah, three of the four that Fran has are also DeMonte Smith. Though, AJ Brown could get you that one by himself if he gets more. Good. Yeah.

There's a chance there. All right. Yeah. I'm not ruling out the party file, though. We got to do this more, Fran. I care about this. Way too much to do something like that. Unlike you who calls in favors with Charles Davis to get swooper wins for your

self. He was, which by the way, those didn't hit. It runs in the temple program. Yeah, okay. Fran, I don't know,

I don't know how you deal with this. I mean, like on the show yesterday, Bo tried to steal a turkey from Zach, just like, like very clearly, just tried to say that. That is true.

I'm guilty of that. That was my mistake. And then Zach, with an outrageous attempt to cheat, way after the bidding happened. Thank you. Trying to change the meaning of or. Thank you.

I'm a math major. I use the math version. A or B yes is true or if they're both true yeah exactly

yeah so I mean come on you yeah and you guys talked about it and you agree that it was it didn't have to be

only one and then you bid and then like 10 minutes later Zach was like well somebody in the chat are saying this yeah

yeah there are still people in the YouTube comments today commenting saying that oh no the or is not inclusive

but yeah it's uh it depends there was there was the smart there's a there's a look I mean

I mean, I was a math major, I was a philosophy minor. I took a lot of Symbologic in college as well. There's a school of Symbologic. Thank you, Bo. It's the only right answer to that. There's a school of Symbolic that believes that it's the way that the chat said. But I don't think in common English, like, that's how it. If you had said either or like specifically.

And also, you have to understand the history of the game. Yeah, of the, you would say one of the following. The following thing happens. And it was always exactly one of these happens has always been the wording. Like I'm not going to, I'm not going to go against Swoper history here. Thank you. Yeah. Agreed.

All right. That'll do it for this Friday episode of the P.HL. Yagles podcast. This is exciting for the people who have made it all the way to the end of the show. During the game on Sunday night, Fran and I are going to be in studio doing a watch-along for the game. We're going to sort of try to call the game. game like we're calling the game on TV. Oh, fine.

During the game. So you can do the watch along with me and Fran. We're looking forward to that. We will also have the kickoff show with Jamie beforehand. And then the post game show with the two of us, Jamie and Vinnie Curry after the game. So very excited for all of that. Oh, Fran, while you're on real quick, SDTV did not look as bad on actual cathode ray tube TVs as it does on HDTV. So it's not just your memory playing with you.

Like it's not like, oh, man, we watch TV like this. The cathode ray tube blurred the image in a way that made the pixels like seem to blend together. And when you translate that and put it on an HD TV, which is pixelated, it looks terrible because it's not, it wasn't designed for that kind of thing. And so, no, we did not grow up watching TV that looked that bad. It just looks terrible now when you look at it. That's good time. That is definitely good to know. Beau, by the way, Sunday,

I'm going to go, I'm going to go sweater for the Sunday night game. So just friend and cast, as people are saying. Oh, there go. I like that.

I like that. For Zach, who is boarding probably early. He's got good status. He's probably boarding right now. For Fran, for Julia, for the incredibly

intelligent Dainez. And for you, fuck. We appreciate everybody watching and listening to the show. We will talk to you on Sunday. Thanks, everybody for watching all week. And as always, we love you.