PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Jalen Hurts maybe nursing a bum ankle as Philadelphia Eagles prep for Dallas Cowboys | PHLY Eagles

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

Nick Sirianni let slip Friday morning that Jalen Hurts’ “rest” day Wednesday was actually in relation to a banged-up ankle. Oops! Hurts is still set to start Sunday with A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith, Dallas Goedert and Saquon Barkley in tow, but maybe this means a slightly hobbled version of the quarterback. Still, that’s better than no quarterback at all, which is the Cowboys’ dilemma with Dak Prescott out and Cooper Rush set to start.Deniz Selman joins Bo Wulf in studio before Zach Berman joins from the NovaCare Complex with the news of the day. 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. H.LY. Eagles podcast on Friday afternoon, Bo Wolf, Danis Selman, here in studio, Zach Berman, to join us in about 30, 35 minutes from the Novacare Complex. And of course, we are presented by the good folks at Bet365. Download the Bet365 app and use code PHLY365 when you sign up. Whatever the moment, it's never ordinary. At Bet365. Now, Danis, nobody I know, including most beat reporters, can, consumes more press conference content than you. Yeah, do you hear Mike Zimmer said they missed 15 tackles in his press conference earlier this week? I did not. I count on you. This is the benefit of having you as a friend. I don't have to watch that because I know anything important you will fill me in on. That's right. But I did watch or listen to Nick Siriani's press conference today when he let slip.

Yes, he did. That despite being listed on the injury report for rest on Wednesday as a limited point, participant for the Eagles. He said, well, you know, he's got that ankle that was on the injury report. That's the big deal. He's like, you guys know. The ankle. And all of a sudden, the NFL is a buzz. Yeah. Potentially some. Were there were there gasps that that the mics didn't catch in there? Yes. And you know that people are like, wait a second. Oh, so is his angle. He's like, oh, no, no, he's fine. And he's so funny. And PR's like, oh, rest. And he said, I was thinking of something else. Uh, yeah, and so people are looking at,

oh, yeah, he must have been thinking of Mackay Beckton or an eye. The first thing I looked at it was like, well, Jalen Carter was on the injury report last week. But it was not an ankle. It was not an ankle. Yeah, yeah, because people were like, Jalen Hertz. And honestly, and he was like, Jalen Hertz. My opinion of this is that Jalen Hertz is going to be livid. Yeah, because in his presser, he was extremely short answer.

You know, he just said rest. He said, I'm doing what I'm told. You know, when they asked him why he wasn't out there. Yeah, I can't imagine that he'll like. Yeah, listen, Jailen Hertz is going to play on Sunday. day. He's probably fine. He's been running around fine. But it is just very funny that, you know, the, the charade is up. The veil has been lifted here. So two questions for you. Do you think it affects anything about the way the opponent is going to play the game?

Like, do you think they're going to be like, oh, the quarterback's ankle has a problem? Like, are they going to, like, play anything differently? I mean, I think the Eagles are worried about that. But it's, but it's, But worried about them like targeting his ankle or worried about them like not respecting him running or something? Like why would we, why would you spend time worrying about this? Yeah, I think it is probably, it would not affect their defensive game plan. I think they're not going to pretend or plan as if Jalen is going to be less likely to run now because he's presumably been dealing with this for however long and has still been running plenty. I think it is probably more like they want to ward against whoever like the dirtiest players on the other team wrenching it at the bottom of the pot.

or something like that. Right. I saw what Tim McMahonis said that a league source said that he'd been dealing with it for a few weeks or something. Yes. A minor.

He looked pretty good. It was fine. Last week. Yeah. In fact, a lot of people were saying he looked better running than he had been before.

Yes. So, yeah, I think it's probably nothing. It's just very funny that Nick made that gaff. Yes. Since one of his main jobs

is to do those pressers and not make that gaff. Well, and since he's generally speaking so intent on not saying anything of that injuries. And so for this time, I mean, yeah, he's never going to say anything again. Tough.

Yeah, I guess that's right. We'll hear a little bit more about that from Zach Berman later in the show. So we look forward to that. And also a, oh, geez. Oh, my other question for you about the, sorry, are they going to find the Eagles? Do you think? I think they will find them. Yeah?

Yeah. I mean, I think if your game blows up, if it becomes clear, I think they have to be fine. I mean, you got to go back and find Bill Belichick then for like every week of his career when he lied about Tom Brady being injured when he wasn't. Like it's like the opposite. But yeah.

Yeah. All right. We have a super chat from Chase Daniel Plainview who says fascist sympathizer, Dan Orlovsky has been critical of Siriani's maturity. Is Nick lying to the press to appeal to Dan's authoritarian insensibilities? I have no comment. I'll be honest. I have not been.

But I appreciate your support and your benefactor tendencies say, PDP. Okay, Dennis, let's talk about this Eagles offense to start and the changing nature of it post-by. You know, Nick was asked today, again, about the approach from the offensive line to him during the bye weeks, saying we need to run the ball more. And Nick talked about all that good time he spent with Jalen during that time. But he appreciates those conversations. It is pretty clear that this team stylistically is different than it was pre-buye.

It's crazy. I mean, it looks so much like the 2021 shift that Lane Johnson actually explicitly brought up this week. He said, you know, this is a lot like in 21 when we had that Detroit game and we started running it. And he seemed to be saying that that was also after a conversation with the leadership and all that. So I went back and I just looked at which it conflicts with the narrative from Jonathan Gannon that it was his idea. I mean, let's not. Let's not waste Gannon talk when Zach isn't around, you know, Gannon sympathizer. Yeah, no. I mean, it was all a Gannon back in 21. We all know that. But the similarity is striking. So, like, let's start with this year. Before the buy on early downs, neutral situations, the Eagles were running the ball.

49% of the time. 17th in the league, like league average. They were just like a normal team, right? that was up from 41 and 42% in each of the last two years when A.J. Brown had arrived and Seekuan Barclay had not. So, like, you know, there had been this change. Now, going into the buy, apparently these discussions happened, and then after the buy, the first thing that struck us,

like the first half of the Cleveland game, like we were all like, what's going on? Like, this is a very run-heavy approach against the team. Against the team that's very good against them. Yes, exactly. And since the buy, so it was 49% before, it is up to 61% run on early neutral situations. That is first in the league and like the third team is like at 52% or something.

So it's like an outlier. Yeah, and Miami actually. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. Them in Miami and Chicago. On the season, it's them in Detroit. Yes. And the season is them in Detroit because Detroit has consistently been in that way.

Now, when you look at this like jump from 49 to 61, and then Lane says the thing about 2021. Of course, you want to go back and look at that. So I looked at that. Weeks 1 through 7 in 21, it was 39%, which was 26, then it jumped up to 59. So it was a 39 to 59 jump. So it was an even bigger jump in 21 extreme. Now, of course, in 2021, Jalen was throwing the ball to like Jalen Rager. You know what I mean? Like, so there's like a little bit of a difference. DeVante Smith was on the team, but, uh, and that jump from 39 to 59 to 59 also came with a like a huge increase in offensive efficiency. and winning, right? Like it led to like a win streak

that led to the playoffs. This year, when you look at what's happened due to this jump, obviously there's a four-game winning streak, right? So you can look at that. But part of that's the opponents and part of that's the defense has been awesome. It's the passing play numbers

that have actually improved more than the run. Interesting. When you look at the success rate on like a per play basis, the offense Yeah, EPA, EPA and success rate. Like, so since the buy, Jalen Hertz ranks fourth by EPA per dropback. He was middle of the pack before the buy.

First by success rate. And Jalen Hertz has not been like a high success rate player in his career. Like, like even when he had that really good year in 2022, yeah, he was kind of middle of the pack and success rate. Success rate has never been the thing. Like he's had the big plays. So his EPA, you know, and he was very good at avoiding turnovers. And so his overall numbers looked very good.

but the consistent play after play of success was not there. It is now. Like these last four games, he's been best in the league at this. Now, when you look at the success rate for the whole team, I just looked at first down because I think first down is like a good, first down.

I mean, first of all, we all know it's the most important down in football. Most plays are first down. And so let's talk about that. First down run rate before the buy was 54%. And now it's 74%. It's just like a massive jump. And the run success rate has basically stayed the same.

It was 38 before 39 after. On just first down or just first down? First down passes have jumped up from 25th in the league to second in the league in success rate. Okay. Going up from 43 to 67. And the overall success rate has gone up from 16th up to 8th because despite, I should say, running it so much more. Running in general is less successful. And that's true for the Eagles too.

Like, you know, you're always going to be more success. passing it than running it percentage wise. But this is, I thought, I thought these numbers are like a decent example of how running it more can help the passing game. And we're seeing it on the film as well with the slightly more, let's not go crazy with it, but the slightly more under center play action and also the more play action overall. So I do think that like the people who argue for run the ball actually have a bit of a point in this case of, look, it's making the passing game better.

And that's the only way you can convince me that running the ball is better because at the end of the day like on average running the ball is less efficient than passing it even when you're very good at running it. Now the devil's advocate here is that pre-buy post-bye

it's not just about the running heaviness it's about A.J. Brown was there for one game of those first four games and now he's played all four of these games this could also just be the effect of A.J. Brown being on the field. It could be that you've also played some pretty bad defenses. I think that

is true and I actually wanted to ask you if you think at some point AJ Brown's going to be like what the hell is going on here? Like why am I not getting the ball? Right? This is an extreme run heaviness right now that we're talking about. And for a team with AJ Brown and DeMonte

Smith is very extreme. Let's think about this philosophically right? If you are passing it less that means that a higher percentage of your past plays can be funneled to Adrian Brown and Devante Smith and in theory Dallas Goddard.

I mean, we know that the Eagles have always been the heaviest percentage in the entire league of putting their targets on their top three guys over the past two seasons. But you can probably do that even more if you are throwing it less. And so maybe that does lead to a little bit more efficiency. Maybe. Maybe. I don't know.

I mean, I'm not sure why that would be true. Like, and does AJ Brown care about the percent of catches he's getting or the number of catches he's getting? I would imagine that he does. If you think I want to get AJ Brown 10 targets. Right. And I've got 20 dropbacks versus 30 dropbacks.

Right. I'm still going to, I still want to get him his volume, his normal amount of volume, but I'm going to do it at an even higher rate. Maybe. Look, AJ Brown has said all the right things so far. He did jokingly say, I want the ball to the other day, but he was like smiling when he said it. This was actually two weeks ago.

And he also said like, you know, I think Jeff McLean was asking him like a bunch of questions about this and he was like you're trying to set me up and then he said uh listen like if you get two targets try to make it two touchdowns right so he's saying the right thing as long as they're winning they're going to be fine maybe i mean a j brown like sulked off the field after a playoff win once well we saw the giant team two weeks ago they were a couple like a jays like galloping because he's like i can't believe he didn't get that ball yeah yeah yeah on that one uh the first down pass to jack stole yeah and we've seen that on film like when you watch the film yeah like if you watched the film, he's very demonstratively, like, asking for the ball when he's open. You learn,

you learn, AJ Brown is awesome, so this shouldn't be taking this criticism, but like, when you watch the film, you'll learn two things about AJ. One, he gets very upset when he doesn't get the ball when he thinks he should. And two, he does not really try when he knows he's not going to get the ball. I mean, like, the amount of, like, you can just zoom in on him and you can know what the black ball is. He's not super interested in blocking. No, he's not. He's not. Though he did have that awesome block on the safety on the long Sequin Ron two weeks ago. Yeah. And the mic'd up caught him like coming over to somebody and being like, I got a block.

Like yeah, it's like we're excited. Like he's Britain coming. That's like my favorite thing in the world when a guy like him like sounds like a little kid. He's like, I got a block. Like, you know, I thought that was awesome. So as long as he's saying, I got a block like that in that voice, you know, all will be well.

But I'm not sure if it's sustainable. Speaking of sustainable, Sequin. You want a wide receiver to always want the ball. I think he's arguably the best or one. of the top three wide receivers in the entire NFL. He totally changes the offense. He's awesome. But yeah, I think there might be times when he's going to want the ball more.

I also do think like, I'm still so weirded out by Devonte Smith being the one guy who was stripped of being a captain. When to me, he's like the guy who is the most, like, the DNA of a guy who you want everybody on the team to be like on the entire roster. The context Nick gave for that, if I recall, was he said last year, I think we had too many. Yeah. But like, if I could pick one captain on the team, I might pick Devonthe Smith. Interesting. If I wanted one guy. But hold on, you can't do this.

You can't do this without saying who you would have removed the captaincy from. Who would you have removed? Well, maybe I wouldn't have added Jordan Milata. Oh, okay. All right. He was not. He was a new. Because Lane already is.

You don't need the second O-line person. Yeah. I think that's like a thinking of the future move. Like he's here. He's going to be here. Kelsey and Lane are on their way out. Yeah. Kelsey's already out. I don't know what they're like vocally. Maybe it's more about, but like if I, if I could have all 53 guys play like with the the play personality of one person on the team, it would probably be Devante Smith. I think a great sign of how good Devante Smith is is that he made a catch last week that like was almost as good as the Odell Beckham catch. Like maybe like how he's insane. It was one of the greatest catches I've ever seen. It happens kind of in front of me, like in the stadium.

And I was just like, oh my God. Like, he came down with that. Like that was, and it was like just, it was, it was almost, I think people aren't talking about it. One, because of the Sequin hurdle, which we're going to talk about. Two, because he made it so well that it didn't look as impressive as it was. Like he caught it with one hand and secured it so quickly. And that it didn't seem like it was that hard to catch.

Unbelievable. I mean, get like, like, uh, athletically rising into the air, like the O'Dell catch is, is more impressive. Yeah. But he didn't have to get both feet down in the same way. It wasn't an insane catch. No, he's got to work on his like making it look harder. You know what I mean? Like, like the guys who like dive when they don't need to, you know, yeah, he's got to work on that.

But yeah, I mean, like the fact that Devanti Smith is doing that kind of thing, that drive was all him. I mean, like, you know, yeah. And it was just, and people aren't even really talking about him that much. You know what I mean? Like, it's just, it's great. So we're talking about how spoiled we are to have A.J. Brown and Devante Smith. And it's totally. So with the run heaviness, how on your radar is Seekwans' usage as over the course of the season?

People are tweeting at me during the game. Like, why do you hate Seekwan? Like, this is like, you know, things like this. And I hope somebody does this. I mean, I meant to do this this week and I forgot or was distracted. I would like somebody to do this. Please Photoshop the Sequin leap, but make it over Dennis. It's just ridiculous. I mean, just... Because that's what it should be. This is just outrageous. And by the way, check out.

We have a brand new shirt for the sickos. Oh, nice. A beautiful little silhouette of the Sequin hurdle there. And, you know, if you want to buy that and then tape or glue a photo of Gaines his head under it, I think that would be great. It's just outrageous. I mean, just so ridiculous. I actually was going to say something about the hurdle, which was very awesome. about Sequan since most things I think about it are positive. I sincerely think, okay, that the hurdle thing and the reaction to it is an excellent example of how Sequan is like more valuable to the team than just like the numbers he puts up and the added yards, etc. Just look at the hurdle, right? It added like what four yards to that play, something like that, right? Fewer than like a like a good backside block by a guard would, right? Like so obviously like the hurdle didn't change the game in any way like that, you know, that drive.

I've let to a field goal, you know, whatever. That's not the point. It's the team-wide enthusiasm. Yeah. You see it on those clips that the team released of like Jordan Davis and Reed Blankenship, just going crazy on it. The way Niko B. Dean was talking about it, Jalen Carter. I mean, these guys are just like, you guys covered it really well.

I mean, like the absolute best at what they do. And they're acting like the same way, you know, my seven-year-old son would, like, seeing that play. And when you look at that, you see that, you see that, It changes the mood in the whole building, right? I think so. It changed the mood in where I was sitting in my section. I was going crazy, right?

Like, and when you have that kind of thing, like, as part of the general vibe, I think it just helps the, like, it brings so much juice to the rest of the season. I think so. That it's just awesome. Like, and it's a real thing. So, so even, you know, I'm very analytically driven and all of that. Like, but I totally believe that the cycle. logical like juice like mood type stuff is real having said that sequins touching the ball a little too much right 22 touches a game he's virtually tied for first place in the league in that category with

with kairn williams of the rams derrick henry is like not getting as many you know 19 touches um and we talked about how the run heaviness has gotten extreme despite having this wide receiver duo this incredible past protecting offensive line lane johnson two pressures given up the whole year I saw like I mean that's just like an insane thing that we take for granted all the time too you got to you got to throw the ball a little bit more and I also think you have to be a little bit more willing to have other running backs take snaps so the conversation that Zach and I had this week yeah would you rather Kenny Gain will be getting the first and 10 carries or the third and two carries um it's good question like you're a lot more likely to need third down if you've got

getting well out there on first down, right? So that might not be a good solution because, like, the best way to not have Sequin take third down carries is to not have any third downs. Right? And, you know, I always talk about this and I'm going to stay on this, right? Like, third downs are makeup exams? Like, the best students

don't need the makeup exam. I do like the makeup exam. And so, like, how good you are at third down is like... Oh, you're, I mean, you're not going to go through a whole game without him. You got... No, no, but minimizing the number is the main goal, I think. Not minimizing the times you like, not maximizing the problem. Like, percentage you convert but let's say you want to steal five carries from

saquan barclay five more than than you have been yeah i think um yes so there's a difference between carries and snaps right so what they were doing early in the year was they had kenny gainwell as the two-minute drill back and i was actually very surprised at that like the game in brazil there was a long two-minute drill at the end of the first half and kenny gainwell was out there for every snap of it and they asked saquan about it after the game and he said oh yeah kenny's our two-minute two-minute two minute back. And I was a little surprised. Then I was like, oh, it makes sense. Like, he's been the two minute back and you're one of preserve sequins.

And that hasn't really been the case. Like, Kenny's getting out there for like one or two snaps during two minute drills, but then he's coming back out. I'll have to think, I have to think about that question, like, whether you'd want him out there on first down or third down. I will say, I think the early down run heaviness in this last game was annoying. Like, it was a little too much. I mean, there were a bunch of drives where it was like a not very successful run.

on either first down or second down or both. It was not a great overall offensive performance. No, not at all. So many possessions. Not at all. And that's the thing like we always talk about like points per drive or you know, like EPA per drive versus looking at things per game or even per play. And that was a game where we're going to get to how awesome the defense was.

But the defense gave the ball to the offense, the defense and the special teams combined to give the ball to the offense frequently and in very good field position. And the offense just didn't do very much with it. I mean seven drives. in the first half, only 16 points, including one that had the short field. And so it was annoying. Like there were just like a lot of punting in the first half.

And the punting was coming from exposing yourself to the noise of what happens on third and medium, you know, like third and not not push push range. And the touch pushes weren't working either. That's another thing we should talk about. But I think like one way to reduce the number of carries is to just run it less. I mean, like, I actually think that's the main way to do it. And then, yeah, you just got to live with Kenny Gainwell. Like, I don't know, people have said, like, have Kenny Gainwell out there when you're passing?

You obviously can't just do that. Also, I don't know how much of a physical toll it takes on Seguan to be out there for a passing down, you know, unless he's like picking up a blitz or something. Right. So, yeah, I don't know. I did enjoy that they threw it to Seekwan more in this last game. I mean, the hurdle was on a pass, right? Obviously, the touch. touchdown. So, yeah, I don't know. The other thing people say, which, I mean, great idea, blow teams out more to give Sagan. That was on the table in this game. Yeah, it was, but look,

I mean, it's like eight carries him after, you know. Yes, but of the last four games, like two of them were blowouts, right? And the other two came down to the end because one of them had a blocked field gold return for a touchdown. The other one, Bo, I don't know what you're looking at. It was an insane officiating decision to call that a fumble. The league doubled down just madness like what is everyone if that's a fumble then that also has to be if he doesn't fumble that means he can get up and keep running and there's never been a play in NFL history where they let a player in that situation get up and keep running so i have no idea what that was but anyway there's going to be fluky things like that that makes some games close you just have to live

with that yeah if you can if you can get half of your wins be blowouts which has been the case over the course of the last four games then that's the best you're going to do so like uh i don't you know that's not of course like it'd be great to see that happen this sunday because of the state dallas is in and the thursday night game coming up after but that's not a serious obviously you'd love to do love to do that sure yeah i don't know okay uh more to come and denny's denis has some thoughts on the fourth down criticism of nick syriani's decision making from the last game but we will talk about that just after this game time our friends has a new feature called Game Time Picks that makes getting tickets for your favorite live events even easier.

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allergy season. Right aid has you covered. Really sounded like you were just making up names. You'll never be able to prove that I wasn't. Okay. Seque on a side. Yeah. Play action this last game. Yeah. Outside zone boot action?

Fantastic. You got to run that more. And look, I make fun of Kyle Shanahan for being bad at, you know, being bad at a lot of elements of coaching that I think it's funny that he's. he's bad at, but the outside zone boot stuff that he runs is obviously very, very effective. And in this game, like the Eagles ran it twice, check down to Grand Calcutera for 10 yards. I mean, like, like, AJ Brown is running the intermediate route on that one and the running and the linebacker just perfectly undercuts it.

And even when they play it in a way that looks perfect, it's still 10 yards, right? Like, there's still somebody open. And then the Devante Smith catch, if anyone saw Franz breakdown or saw the replay or the film or whatever grand calcutera is wide open on that play because everybody bit so hard on the play action that grand calcutara who's supposed to be there to make sure that that that there isn't like you know that like that devante gets open deep right is actually open behind the defense on the play um they got to run that stuff more i mean like you just have to that's why i made that a swooper like six or more under center play action plays that's more of like me hoping than it is a than it is

something i think is going to happen but um uh yeah i just wanted to i just wanted to add that like i thought that was the other thing to say about the offense. The early unsuccessful runs were annoying, but the play action stuff was very encouraging. Okay. So what do you think of the fourth down discourse? Okay. I don't think I've...

Okay. I don't know if I've talked as much as... I don't think I've talked that much on the show about, like, general thoughts that I have and stuff that I teach at Wharton about loss aversion. Big flex. And behavioral, yeah. Well, this is my job.

I teach a class in risk management. And one of the things we do in that class is we talk about the behavioral elements, the psychological elements of decision-making under uncertainty. And so there's like the rational models of like how you should handle risk and how you should handle decisions when you're not sure what the outcome will be. And then there's also the behavioral psychological things that are considered by old-school economists to be like, like, you know, like fallacies or things you shouldn't. do but more modern behavioral economists like accept that that's also part of the thing so I want to be

open-minded about about all this as we do this in fourth down decision-making in particular people tend to think that like punting or kicking the field goal is the status quo the thing that you've like earned like the thing that's yours right and then when you go for it you're risking giving something that's yours away. Left points on the board. Right, exactly. Left points on the board and everyone's been saying that all week, right? Like they counted up the number of points that he left

on the board, like whatever that means. You know, you hear everybody from Seth Joyner to, you know, I don't know, Ray Dindinger, Derek Gunn, Chris Long. Chris Long, by the way, doing a great job. He's like, you know, he's like 35 going on 80, like with his thoughts on fourth down and stuff.

otherwise intelligent you know fellow wahu but on this stuff he's just like always like take the points take the points like it's like come on man like there's a there's a couple of different things like i'm kind of all over the place here i just want to get to the two point conversions real quick because that should be low hanging fruit why is anyone even talking about the two point conversions like two of them were from the one yard line and you're running the quarterback sneak, the Snoopy, as they call it. Why isn't that more of a thing that people talk about? The fact that the team calls it the Snoopy.

I don't know. All right, anyway. So they ran the Snoopy, right? They ran the quarterback sneak. That's been successful, like, over 90% of the time. Would you rather have two points with 90% chance or one point for sure? And people are like, it's 50-0. Like you should try to, it's 16 nothing, you should try to go up by 17.

It's the first half. Like, like, how do you know in the first half? Like what the score, like whether without one point is going to be pivotal later. Like, you're acting as if there are only two possessions left in the game. So that's, that's silly. And then the last one, people in my section are screaming like, kick it, kick it, you idiot. Like when the Eagles are up by 12 in the fourth quarter. Like, I mean, what are we talking about?

Like, you know, like these are all, these are all, you know, I thought they were all no-brainers. on the fourth downs, there was the one fourth and three that I guess you could debate up 10 in the first half. I think that's fine. I think it's good to have a team that's aggressive and confident enough that you're going to get those. My problem with Siriani in this game

was not just running the quarterback sneak on fourth and one. I didn't think that like kicking the field goal would have been better. I think that you just don't run a play that has a lower chance of succeeding than the quarterback sneak does. So that was my issue. Okay, back to the bigger loss ofversion thing.

if you had $80,000, right? And someone said, hey, like, you want to flip a coin and turn that into 100, but if you lose, it'll go down to 64, most people would say no to that, right? They'd be like, like, eh, like making $20,000 isn't worth the risk of losing 16. I kind of budgeted my whole year around having $80,000. You know what I mean? Like, that's a completely rational thing to do, even though when you do the math, like the expected earnings of the of the gamble or higher, right?

You know, it goes up to 82 instead of 80. Now, that's completely normal because it's classic risk aversion. It's absolutely rational behavior stemming from the fact that the additional $20,000 doesn't provide as much added happiness to your life as losing $16,000 would take away happiness. Expected utility theory. We teach this in like classic, you know, first class of economics, basically. It's the utility from the money that matters and not the money itself. which drives decisions.

Now, let's take those exact numbers, and instead of thousands of dollars, turn it into win probability for a football game. People act as if an 80% win probability to win the game is something that they take utility out of themselves. Like, say when you punt,

you get 80% win probability. It's fourth down. It's the end of the game. It's fourth and two or three, something that pick your distance where you think it's 50% chance you're going to get it. And if you get it, it's going to end the game. You're going to take a knee. The game's over.

So it goes up to 100%. If you fail, they're going to get the ball in good field position and you only have a 64% chance to win. Right. In that situation, a lot of people have the same gut reaction as they would in my earlier example. They'd say, oh, like, I don't want to have it all come down to this play. It's very risky. Right. Let's just punt and keep the 80% chance to win.

The problem is when you do the analogy with a football game, it's as if you enter a casino with $80,000 and they tell you, we're not going to let you out of this building until either you lose all your money or you make $100,000. Like, those are your only two options. Yeah. Because that's how football works. Like, I mean, it's very rare. The game's end in a tie, so let's ignore that.

You're either going to get to 100% or 0% by the end of the game. You're not allowed to keep the 80. not a lot to like take it and take it home and and like eat it like it's cereal like that's not like like it's not money you don't get to keep it you don't get to quit the game you don't get to say I'm happy with my 80% chance of winning I'm just going to leave the stadium you have to keep playing until you either get to 100 or zero so it doesn't matter how fast you get there it doesn't matter how many plays it comes down to the only thing that matters is maximizing your probability of getting to 100 instead of zero and if it all comes down to one play that's not actually technically

more risky than anything else, risk aversion has nothing to do with it. You're not, you're not allowed to not gamble when you're a head coach. It's just a matter of how you're gambling. And so when you punt, you're gambling on what's going to happen after you punt. When you go for it, you're gambling on what's going to happen during the play where you go for it. But either way, you're gambling, because in the end, you're either going to go broke by losing the game or you're going to get rich by winning it. You're not allowed to stay intermediate. And so that's why anything like leaving points on the board or like, you know, taking risks when you shouldn't take risks and all that. Like, they're not, like, those aren't even the right concepts to be talking about.

The only thing we should be talking about is, are you maximizing your probability of winning or not? I think there was one other thing here. Okay. And I think it is, it is, you know, nothing to do with the fans, obviously. But I actually think that Lane Johnson's comment is important. The fact that a player on the team is thinking. maybe we should take the points. I think it is not just Nick Siriani's job to maximize win probability.

It is his job to foster a culture in which the team buys into that. Yeah. I think if you look at Dan Campbell in Detroit, they are as aggressive on fourth down as anybody, and the team knows that. The team buys into that. That was the case in 2017. So I think that there is, it is, it is, is not just his job to get to that 100%.

It is his job to, like, build a personality in the locker room where they buy into that. I agree. Look, I went to the Q&A with Zach and Ray Dittinger a few weeks ago, and Ray Dinninger was talking about how he thought Siriani went for it way too much, and that he thought it was a mistake that he went forward in this situation, and that situation, he, like, listed a bunch of plays from the previous game. And I couldn't help it. I raised my hand, and I asked him, did you think the...

Philly Special was a mistake. And, you know, he was, you know, he was very nice about it. He said, like, you know, well, that team was different. They had a culture of going for it. They went for it all the time and everything. And I thought it was a little bit of a, you know, logical fallacy to say, well, okay, that team, it was okay that they went for it because they went for it all the time. Well, that's what you just said this team does and they do too much.

So I agree with you that you have to have your players buy in. At the same time, I heard Lane say what you're talking about. He also had a sit down with Derek Dunn later in the week that was like, 45 minutes long in which he gave this long thing about how he's he's actually okay with it and how Nick explains it really well to them and things like that. Slay on his podcast talked about how he's okay with it. He likes it when they go for it. As a defensive player,

I think that matters too because they're the ones who have to take the field right away like after the fail, right? So I don't know. I don't think he's bad at convincing the players of that. Okay. I will say that. But I think if you are hemming and hawing and if you are not consistent in. Right. He's mostly consistent.

Right. Always. I think that is part of the problem. I can't imagine he likes being the topic every week. Maybe he does actually. I don't know. Maybe he'd rather have that than thinking he doesn't do anything. He's been sitting waiting to join for a while.

Oh, I didn't realize that. You should tell me these things, Bob. You were rolling. And I wanted to have this discussion. I was just going to say, like, there is this thing where there's one other thing that we should consider, and this is another thing we teach in our class, which is the principal agent problem, right? The coach is like an agent of the team, right? But the coach doesn't just care about the team success.

The coach cares about his own career, how he's perceived. And so one reason that a lot of coaches don't go for it isn't even because they think it's going to be better win probability. It's because they know that if he punts and loses, he won't be the topic. If he goes forward and loses, he will be the topic. Right. So everyone thinks Dan Campbell lost the NFC championship game. And they're wrong. They're just wrong.

I mean, like, you know, the dude who dropped the ball or whatever is what lost it. Like Dan Campbell made the right decisions in that game. I think, I mean, they messed up the time out at the end or something. But like, like the fourth downs were fine, I thought. when you take that into account, it seems like there should be a way to measure if head coaches are going for it less in situations where they think they're going to be the big talking point.

And Ben Baldwin actually had a really good thing on this. It was a few years ago where we actually went back and forth on Twitter on this a little bit. And I asked him, hey, can you pull the numbers in this situation? And he showed, he had this really cool graph of how often coaches go for it when they should as a function of how likely they are to win the game in the first place. So if you're like desperation time, like, you know, 10% chance to win, coaches go for it all the time.

Sure. When you're actually like 80, 90% chance to win, they actually make the right decisions then too. It's when it's around 50% that they go for at the least. It was like a perfect U-shaped curve. And so I interpreted that as coaches make the conservative wrong decision precisely when it matters the most. Like when they know that that's going to be the thing everyone talks about. And so that's something that I'm very happy that Nick didn't show up in his Monday zoomer and say like, you know, I actually thought about it and I made the wrong decision.

He came out and he said, I stand behind all my decisions. And I was very happy that he did because I thought all his decisions in this game were correct, except for the just not sneaking it on that one play. Yes. All right. We are going to get to the Hall of Fame, Zach Berman, in just a minute. Because I need to tell you about our friends and go away. Golden Nugget Jewelers.

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we go now to the nova care complex the man himself our eagles insider hall of famer as of last night zach berman zach thanks for waiting how you doing what's the scoop from nova care is jalen hertz's ankle still attached professor salmon and and you bow there but i really liked the uh casino comparison there i thought that was a good way of explaining it and i also agree with why professor solman said that the coaches prefer not to make those decisions in critical situations

because it's easier to give credit to the other team that is to take blame for something that went wrong, right? If you lose the game, it's easier to say, well, you know,

they scored as opposed to I screwed up the decision. So that was a good conversation there. As far as what's going on here at NovaCare, I didn't get to listen to the top of the show today. I imagine you guys discussed Jalen Hertz.

I'll give you, um, so, um, kind of the behind, the scenes. And I will run through it. I hope it's not repetitive.

But I'll include some stuff that might not be on the show, which is like the weird situation at practice today, too, which was atypical. Oh, that's true. Okay. Yes. So here's kind of the background here. And some of this is a regurgitation of what already occurred.

But I think this lays it all out. Wednesday's practice session was a walkthrough. The beginning of walkthrough, with Jalen Hertz was not participating, right? We were there, we saw it. Okay? When there is... But he was sort of like prominously standing behind Kenny Pickett the whole time.

Yes. It was very weird. Yes. After practice, Jalen Hertz said that it was rest. The reason he missed was rest. He said he does what he's told. He said, I do what I'm told, right? Which is a passive aggressive way, or maybe an aggressive way of saying that it's not my decision.

I'm just following orders here, right? then the injury report comes out and he's listed it's an approximation because it was a walkthrough and he's listed as limited okay uh so by him saying i do what i'm told you know the decisions made above him so therefore the next time nixiriani speaks which is today you ask nixiriani the question uh and for further context here you know bo and i and have have covered jellan's entire career professor someone i know follows all the injury reports um jellan's never been listed as with a rest designation in his entire career. Okay?

And so the Eagles can try to say this is like common practice for the week before a Thursday game. And there is validity to like the reason why the injury report was crowded this week was because they were playing a Thursday game. And so they're managing guys for two games and five days. But this isn't the first Thursday game Jailants played, right? So this is abnormal behavior. So therefore when there's abnormal behavior, you ask the question. as I'm sure you guys covered.

Nick initially said he's dealing with ankle, which was on the injury report. It was not an ankle. It was rest on the injury report. He was corrected. Nick said he meant to say rest. He was talking about somebody else. Very funny. I should also say there were a number of players on the injury report.

A few had rest destinations, including Sequin and Barclay. Two guys had ankle designations, right? None of them were named Jalen. It was a Naya Smith. and there was somebody else with a technical destination. Mackay Beckett, and thank you. So I can't imagine he was, he thought I was asking about an Iya-Smith, right? Which would be a very odd question to ask for the second question of the press conference.

So then at practice, Jalen Hertz, who I think we can all agree is very aware, like very image conscious. He knows when cameras are around, right? Jaylen did his stretching strategically behind a speaker. The far corner are like, so to give the viewers and the listeners context here, the Eagles on Friday's practice in the field right in front of us. It's the only day of the week when they practice on the horizontal field in front of us, okay?

And the quarterbacks are on one side. And even when Jalen stretches, he's never, I don't recall. I can't say this as a fact like the Indy Report. I don't recall him stretching so far out of sight and specifically going behind the speaker that is the only obstructed spot on the field from all the cameras. Okay, so I don't know what he was getting worked on there. I don't know if it was a tape, if he was getting taped, but, you know, there's actually a few reporters caught a picture of Jalen going behind there once we came in.

Like you can see Jalen locking eye contact as he's going behind there. And then Jalen comes out when he's ready, when I say comes out, comes into visibility when he's, when he's ready to go. So this might have just been coincidence, but this is also one of those things where it's like, if you really want to be like there's nothing to see here, then you don't do that. You know, it's it's like if I, if I stole a cookie from the cookie jar and I keep my hands behind my. back and it's it's it's like what's behind your back right uh so uh that was at abnormal now if i can offer a little comment or if you just used your wife's towel for example or or or that yeah and i would just operate as if i didn't i just use the towel like normal i didn't use her app um so part of this by the way when i'm giving my commentary here i want to

say this is kind of i don't want to say reported commentary but informed commentary okay uh it's entirely conceivable that like just about every player on the team, Joan Hertz is dealing with soreness. Okay, every player's sore this time of year. It's entirely conceivable that the Eagles said that the Eagles rested him with ankle soreness and the ankle soreness did not reach the threshold of an injury designation that he, you know, so that the same way, Seekwon Berkeley, Saquan Barkley was held,

I'm sure Saquan's dealing with something. He said the other day, he's dealing with something. He was down on the injury report as rest. So what that could mean is that he's not, it's not like at the point where it's a reported injury, but there's something that they're managing here. Okay. And he practiced in full yesterday.

I imagine when the report comes out today, he'll be a full designation. He's going to play Sunday. So the bottom line for Eagles fans is he's going to play Sunday. But we can also say, J-1 has a history of keeping injuries concealed while they're going on. Letting us know about it after this act.

So do you're just Eagles franchise quarterbacks? Sure, yeah. But that, you know, he, for instance, had a bone bruise last year. And he wouldn't, he didn't miss practice, but he was never on the injury report, right, with this injury. He came out with the, with the walking boot, if you recall, after the playoff game three years ago. He'd like to keep injuries concealed when he wants to conceal them.

So it's also conceivable that Jalen didn't want to sit out of practice, that the team was holding him back. And Jalen doesn't want this out there, that he's dealing with ankle soreness, whether from a strategic perspective or just a pride perspective, right? But I think this is important to monitor because he's the franchise quarterback, and this isn't nothing. saying it's like, you know, stop the presses, but this isn't nothing. You, this is an unfair question, but do you have any idea if it's his right or left ankle?

This is a good question, Bo. If I had to, you don't have to know the answer. Yeah, no, if I had to speculate, and I will use that term speculate, but give a degree of informed speculation here, I would speculate the right ankle, but I don't know that to be a fact, but I would speculate the right ankle. Okay, so the push-off ankle and not the plant ankle, if we're talking about him as a thrower. Yeah, it's very interesting.

I think it's probably not that big of a deal, and in terms of impact on how the egos are going to play, it's not that big of a deal. It is more interesting to me as another glimpse into Geelan Hertz's sort of odd personality. Well, is it him? Zach, do you think he, like, he learned about what happened in the Siriani press conference, obviously, right? I imagine so.

So the question is, do you think that was his decision to go behind the speaker or whatever? Or do you think someone suggested to him that he should? He's like, yeah, you know, they're going to be all over this ankle thing. Why don't you go back there so they can't get a photo of you kind of thing, like coming from? I think I was Jowans. You think that's J-Len. I think that was probably, yeah, I think that was J-Len. I think there's a lot of dynamics that I play here.

I think there's like, like, I don't want to say, poor Dick Chiriani. He's the head coach. It's a part of the job. But like, I don't think Nick was, like, I think Nick was being very innocent, right? I think Nick just, uh, this is not something. I don't think Nick, like, expected this or invited it or, or I guess wanted this, this, this to blow up into a story.

You're dealing with a quarterback who's private and prideful when it comes to this stuff. I think you're dealing with a general manager who, you know, is very influential. and wants information to be conveyed a certain way, right? I mean, I don't think that's a stretch to say. We've spoken about that before. You have a head coach who, like, believes in competitive advantage, but you have a general manager who's very particular about how information is dispensed. And I think a lot of their public messaging, frankly, comes from,

like, there's public messaging strategy, comes from above next area. So there's a lot of dynamics at play here. And so when you're dealing with something like the ankle of the franchise quarterback, it's never inconsequential. So, Zach, speaking of very high-level athletes, how did the Hall of Fame induction go last night? Oh, it was great. I was happy for my teammates, right? You know, they deserved the recognition. It was awesome seeing some of these guys.

Yeah, it was, it was. It was cool for my wife to actually, like, see that I was a part of this team, that, like, this, this, this, this isn't just like a fabrication. Although she, she laughs at, you know, she saw the team photos from back then. And all the seniors were standing in the back, right? Which, like, that's so I, so the seniors were, we're standing in the back. And I was between my, my head coach, his name's Craig Conlin, like, long time college basketball fans remember him. He was a real good player

on LaSalle back in the late 80s when in the early 90s when LaSalle was it was rolling. Craig Conlin's probably like six foot six, okay? Then the other, I was standing, I think, next to Kevin Gordon on the other side, Kevin Gordon's probably like six two, six three, right? But the whole team is.

So you just see like this and like this and then like that. And my my wife sees his photo and she starts cracking up like laughing at me. But it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was the recognition. The only thing I'll say about me in there is I heard some of these stats that I probably didn't fully appreciate at the time, but like we had a run differential, of something like, a hundred and forty-five runs like was the, was the differential. And so I, I, so I heard that and I'm like, why did they play me more? You know, if we're winning by by that many runs in every game, you would think that they could have gotten me in. And so I, I, so I, so I, so I, so I heard that I And they could have got me in earlier, right? But that's probably why we were 32 and 2 because I didn't play that often.

Now, Zach, I've done some reporting here. Oh, no. You know, we've got little whispers everywhere. And it turns out, it seems to me, that you took that, that umbrage of not getting enough playing time as perhaps an excuse or a reason to turn this celebration into an opportunity to, make some money for yourself, a capitalist advantage? No, no, that's not what occurred at all, a matter of fact. Has nothing to do it. No, I was at a bar.

I assume that's what you're talking about. I was at a bar after the ceremony. And a few guys who, like friends of mine, I hadn't seen them for quite some time. They said, how can I get a book signed, you know, for a Christmas present or that kind of thing? and I said, I was like, I got some in my car, right? And so how convenient? Yeah. Look, that was the perception.

How convenient? No, look, I will tell everyone here who listens. I travel with a box of a box of books in my car. I travel with when I fly, I bring books with me. I sat next to a very nice woman on the plane coming back from a game. I think it might have been New Orleans. and we were chatting and she wanted a book. I sold her a book right there.

So, yeah, no, this was, I didn't turn this into an opportunity for that. But if someone's interested in a book, it just makes it easier than the people at the post office know me well. I go there frequently. This is easier than the post office. Now, what do you say to the rumors from the other night or last night circulating that the reason that you are not going to the actual reunion? on Saturday night is not to fly to the game, but more to avoid some exes. Yeah, no, that would not be it at all. Actually, yeah.

No, there's literally nothing like that at all. Yeah, no, there's that. I have no idea what that's referring to, but no, that's not it at all. I really wish I could go to my 20-year reunion. It's not regretting introducing go to Julia. Yeah, I have a professional obligation to be in Dallas. I wanted to fly the morning up like I did for the wedding. It just, it's hard when it's a flight of that length.

You just don't know. And there's like there's serious storms right now in Dallas. So no, I don't think that's the case. Zach, I'll save you from the ex's stuff to talk about. I'll save you from the ex's talk real quick. Fran is in the chat. I wasn't going to say anything, but Fran is in the chat saying that he doesn't have his copy of the book yet. I don't either.

I mean, I was just, I've been waiting, you know, I was like, you know, I know you have a in studio. Yeah, my bet for that. I'm glad to know I'm not the only one, so thanks for him. There's a copy right behind you if you want to take that, yeah. Well, Zach from X's, do X's and O's? Yes, thank you. Thank you.

What else do you think we need to know about the Eagles ahead of this game? And are there any injuries that we really do need to monitor? And by the way, we do appreciate all of you watching on TV right now. head over to all p hly.com to watch the rest of the episode and some other good stuff go ahead Zach yeah i appreciate this i appreciate this question because i like talking about the eagles um yeah so devonte smith is going to play i spoke to devonte today the hamstring injury occurred on the deep ball before the touchdown okay so and we all saw how we looked during the touchdown yeah uh but that's that's that's when the hamstring injury occurred he said that um

that was the best catch of his career. I asked him, what's the, what's the, is which part of the catch is, has a higher degree of difficulty, the one-handed part or the feet and bounds part, right? And he said the, the feet and balance part. Or, oh, I hope I didn't screw that one up. I got a look at my notes there. No, no, no, I'm sorry. I think he said the one-handed part, the one-handed part. because he's so good at the feet.

Yes, exactly. That's what it was. I'm sorry. Yeah, I apologize. I apologize. Yes, I screw that one up. The one-handed catch part of it. He said he always knows where he is.

So when he's talked to, he says he always knows where he is. So he definitely said the one-handed part. I asked him which catch was more impressive. That catch or Garrett Wilson's catch last week. He thought about it. He said his catch was more impressive. I asked him why.

He said, he thought about it. You know, a slide smile on his face, with Devante's smile. He says he doesn't want to say. He's curious. I don't know if it, I will let you guys speculate, but that,

that was interesting. He said Sequan's play was more impressive. He said people make one handicatches every week, but they don't jump backwards over a player every week. But yeah, so anyways, Devonte Smith is going to play. Really,

I think that's the only major injury I would monitor. Dowell Scott is going to play. You know, from talking, The Dowles this with this this week, asking around them, you know, I think we'll see Dallas Goddard on the field on Sunday. And Fred Johnson's good to go? It's certainly, it's certainly trending in that direction.

Yeah, it looks that way. I don't have that definitively. We'll get the injury report in about an hour and a half, but it's trending that way, for sure. All right, Zach, well, before we let you go, give us your prediction for this bad boy. Yeah, I mean, I've looked every which way. at this game and trying to figure out if there's something I don't, I don't foresee or that,

like what could trip them up. And I really don't have a good answer other than if the Eagles just have, have a bad day at the office. Like the Eagles have the schematic advantage, oh, I'm sorry, have the personnel advantage, rather, on both sides of the ball. Without that, press got a change is so much in this game.

I thought Fran outlined it well. I think the Eagles need, if they can score early, this can be a blowout because I don't think, I don't think Dallas has the firepower to come back. I think it would really benefit the Eagles, given that the Washington game is, you know, a few days later, the Eagles are going to get back late on Monday, on, you know, Sunday night, into Monday morning that it would really benefit them if they can, you know, sit some guys in the fourth quarter of this game. but I am projecting an easy Eagles win.

I will put my score up online Sunday morning, but I have them winning by 10 points, right? I mean, I think they win and cover. And I really liked the stat that Professor Salman put out the other day about, you know, when you just see the context of, you know, what Nick Siriani's done in his first four years here in that, look, I'm like Nick Sirianni. he doesn't need me to defend him,

but if you just look at like the starts of seasons under him, there's a lot, you know, Cincinnati has a really talented team. Look at their record right now, right? It's hard to start a season seven and two, which, you know, after last year, you know, seven and, you know, seven and no or,

I'm sorry, two years ago, seven and no, last year they were seven and one. That's, that's a, that's a, that's a, that's a pretty good run. And I still believe Nick Siriani's job security can be based upon what he does in the postseason, not what he does in the regular season. If they go, you know, 13 and 4,

but they're an early exit in the playoffs, then it's not going to be good for him. But there's a, you know, it's hard to win as many games as they've won over this period of time. And like seven and two would be a really impressive start for this season. you have something on that as well yeah i mean to follow up on on that the thing that zax referring to that i that i tweeted earlier this week is that nick seriani has now started six and two or better three years in a row you have to go back all the way to greasy neal in the 1940s to find another

eagles head coach who started six and two or better three times period andy reed only did it twice in his 14 years here starting six and two or better and that was in 2002 and 2004 that That was it. You know, it only happened with the Eagles two of the prior 17 seasons before these last three years. So if it feels like, you know, Nick Siriani is being, like, if you're of the school of thought that like, man, people are really getting on this guy. Like he really seems to win a lot. Your argument has to be that like he's not the reason for the winning, right? Because the winning is like very clear and obvious that it's happening.

And if the Eagles win and the Chargers lose this week, Nick Siriani will have the best career record of any active NFL head coach. I mean, he's only a little bit behind Jim Harbaugh, and that's it. He's in second place. He's better than Matt LaFlor, better than Andy Reid, like way better than Kyle Shanhan, et cetera. It's just something that is worth keeping in mind that like we are evaluating him in the context of like he's on his way to being the most, you know, you know, like winning percentage-wise, the best Eagles coach in history, the question is like, is that how he should be evaluated?

Yeah. Yeah, well said. I mean, I think in a lot of areas, it's important to distinguish the signal and the noise, right? And so, you know, you can spend, yeah, there's a lot of three and six coaches who don't have their kids on their lap in press conferences and who, you know, and who kick extra points when there's a penalty on a two-point convert, you know, on a point after attempt. There's a lot of those guys.

But, like, you know, there's a lot of time spent focused on, like, kids on the lap and sideline the quorum, some of which is valid. But there's probably not enough conversations to the fact that he wins a lot more games than he loses. And not enough conversation about the fact that we should bring back the name Greasy. Yeah, Greasy, Neil. Such a good, one of the best football coach names, impossible. I say that because, look, I mean, I respect everyone has a job to do. And I'm not saying, you know, we're perfect.

But like I saw a poll online this week. Like, is Nick Siriani a good coach, right? And I'm thinking, like, is this really the week? You want to pull that out? They're six and two. They beat Dallas. They're seven and two. Like, there's a lot of times I have that conversation.

I mean, this seems like an odd time for that specific debate. Yeah, I don't know if we need to get into the. intelligence of people responding to polls, but that's okay. Zach, thank you very much. We will look forward to reading your next work on all-P-H-L-Y.com. And, of course, we will talk to you on Sunday. Have fun. Have a good trip.

Thanks, guys. Good talking to you. Appreciate it. Speaking of Sunday, of course, you can join the watch party at the Rook in Mannyunk. Jamie and Rich are going to be there. and all kinds of fun stuff. So definitely check that out. And of course, we will have kickoff show,

halftime show, post-game show, all that good stuff. Danes, let's race through your thoughts on the defense and the fun that you have watching Victorio these days. It's awesome. I am just smiling the whole time. I'm watching the film on the defense the last couple weeks now. And it's been great. I mean, let's not forget that just, what, six weeks ago or so,

We were sitting here talking about how the defense is 31st in DVOA. I mean, they were 26th in EPA per drive at the buy since the buy. If you just look at the game since the buy, this defense is third in the NFL in EPA per drive. And they're all the way up to 10th by DVOA overall. I mean, like this was not a target, right? Like when we talked about like what would be a good result for the Fangio defense in year one, it was not top 10 by DVOA.

15th. 15, 16, even 17. Like, you know, take something. League average, like not the reason you're losing, you know what I mean, that kind of thing. And they're 10th in DVOA because they're shutting down offenses that are not terrible. Like DVOA takes into account the opponent's strength, which is why the defense is ranked higher than the offense by DVI right now. The offense is 13th because they're beating up on like, you know, horrible defenses like Jacksonville last week. And they didn't even really beat up on them.

The performance by the defense in the first half in this game against Jacksonville, I mean, I know you guys talking about. talked about it, but like, I don't think people quite understand, like, how rare it is to stop the other team on six consecutive sets of downs without a first down, which is what happened. I mean, they got a first down on the first set of downs, barely. They need a third down to get it. The very next series they got, they had to punt. Then it's three and out, three and out, four and out, three and out, three and out, one interception, and then half time, and then after the half, it was another three and out.

Yeah. That's six straight stops. League average in the NFL, teams convert 71 percent of their season. series of downs. So that means the defense wins about 29% of the time. So you can think of it as like a hitter in baseball. Like like that's about how often a defense is expected to win a set of downs. And the defense won six in a row. That's like six straight hits for a baseball player, including a home run because we've got the interception, right? Like like that's how that framing. That's how that's how dominant this was. And that's why it was so disappointing that it was

only, you know, 16 nothing for so long. And Jalen Hertz and the miced up, it's shocking how little he says in those, by the way, like, they're editing that and, like, the best thing they have him do the whole time he laughs once or something. Yeah. But he kept, he was like, man, he's like, the defense is hooping. We got to do something about this, S, right? Like, he was upset that they weren't

complimenting it. And the defense is, it's like, become the strength of the team. I circled Zach Bond's name, nine of the first 17 plays in my film notes. He was awesome. He was just unbelievable. You guys, like, talked about most of that. But, like, remember when he was getting cut by Chris Lindstrom on every play? And he looked like a

week link i mean he's like you know sinking under sail routes uh avoiding uh offensive linemen to make steps diagnosing checkdowns making quick tackles incredible nicobi the game winning interception to win it that was an awesome miced up with him like talking about how he's expecting that play he's telling everybody like oh they're going to run that stutter go with the running back against me he was waiting for it and what a great sign of good coaching by the way right the fact that he's expecting that he knows it he's being told like remember to do this remember to do that there was one snap this is just me geeking out like there was a snap of mesh sit wheel in the second half you're playing against Doug Peterson you know they're

going to run mesh sit wheel at some point it was a third and five eagles are in cover three sky with reed blanket ship rotating down to the flat cover three sky cover three sky is when the two safety start it looks like it's going to be a too high safety look and then one of the safety is the one to the boundary rotates down into the flat and the other safety rotates to the post so cj gardner johnson rotates to the best. Now, mesh sit wheel is when you have the two crossing routes underneath, and it's more a thing to beat man coverage, but it can work against zone coverage if those linebackers underneath get, you know, antsy and chase those routes. Nikobi and Zach Bond pass off those meshes to each other so beautifully that somehow neither one is ever open at any point,

even though, you know, they're not, they're not being followed in man. Quinyon Mitchell matches and carries the sit route all the way. So even though it's zone, it's match zone. It's not like the, you know, and then Reed Blankenship skying down perfectly catches the wheel route. Isaiah Rogers is on the backside all over the vertical route. So Trevor Lawrence has nowhere to go. And as if that's not beautiful enough, the defensive line is executing a perfect T.E. stunt with Morrow Ojamo as the pinner, Josh Sweat, getting a sack looping inside the backup left guard who had just been forced into the game.

So it's also like very good awareness of like the weak link on the, on the offensive line at that point. It may have been the most beautiful snap of defense I've seen on film all year. I mean, you know, and these kinds of beautiful moments are becoming more frequent every week with this defense. So, you know. You have your moments. Yeah, exactly. That sounds very exciting.

Yeah, it was great. It was great. I have to ask you. Yes. On the E.T. The T.E. I mean, I think in a BT phone home. And I have to ask you about your thoughts on the way that Swooper went yesterday on the double Dutch.

auction. The double Dutch, I thought you guys were, I was shocked at how long you waited on the Eagles win the game. I thought Fran was in there first. I thought it was pretty clear. Really?

And I cannot believe that Fran and Zach agreed to pay full price for half of the item. One of the most shocking and obvious examples of just like

flat out highway robbery. I mean oh yeah, yeah, like they'll just pay they'll just pay full and then they'll get that. You know what this is like? It's like if you had you're at the fruit market or something and you have one watermelon left

and two people get there at the same time and you're selling the watermelon and you're like you know, I don't want to I don't want to cheat either of you. So here's what I'll do. watermelons are $10, I'll just cut it in half, give you each half, and you each give me $10. And then they're like, oh yeah, sure, okay, yeah, let's move on. Okay, yeah, that works.

And they just each give you $10 and they each take half a watermelon home. What are you guys doing? Yeah, that's what I thought about it. It was great. Yeah. About E.T. by the way, E.T. was the first movie that I ever saw in the theater. My parents took me to see E.T. When it came out in theaters, I think 1983 or four.

And I didn't speak a word of English. Like, not a word. Okay. And so we go into the theater, and my mom said that I wanted to leave as soon as I was done with my popcorn. Because I didn't know what they were saying. Sounds right, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Do you remember what the first movie I saw in theaters was, but I remember the first R-rated movie I saw in theaters. Oh. Last of the Mohicans. Okay. All right. And I was hoping to be a little more racy than that. Yeah. Yeah.

All right. That's all. Did you like have to sneak in or? No. Actually, I believe we were, I believe we were on vacation in Paris. And it was like,

we need to pass some time, go to a movie or something like that. I remember at the time, I've since re-seen it. But the only thing I remembered was him taking a bite out of a heart. Gotcha. Gotcha.

Yeah. Mike Wise says 1982 for E.T. By the way, that's exactly when we moved to America, 19802. So there we go. That fits. All right, anything else you want to get back for chess before we...

Yeah, you guys got into the film. You guys got into the film in a lot of detail with Fran, but the one thing you didn't get into was I thought, like, some of the details on the last drive. I thought it was, I think it's always telling, like, what a defense coordinator does when it's like, this is the drive to win the game. There had been a lot of zone earlier in the game,

a lot of cover six, a lot of cover three. In that last drive, it was very heavy man and very heavy blitz. And so there hadn't been a lot of blitzing, but just looking at my notes now, in that last drive, there were six plays, five of them were man, four of them were Blitz, and these weren't exchanges. It was like adding a linebacker to the rush and rushing five, hurrying him up. And other than C.J. DJ, kind of losing focus on one or two plays, those plays were successful.

I will say it seems like there was a lot made of Bryce Huff playing on that last drive when he hadn't played much before. Just some context of that. He played on the last four snaps. The context is that Nolan Smith very clearly hurt himself. I mean, he was on the injury report as well. He didn't play in any of the last 14 snaps of the game. That leaves you with three defensive ends. Yeah. And Brandon Graham had to play eight snaps in a row on the drive before to end the drive.

And then the first two drives of that play, and Fangio said that he got gas. So Huff was basically forced into action there because it was just sweat and BG were the only other two left. You're not going to put Jalick Sunt in the game in that situation. Speaking of Jalick-Sunt, Taran Jackson practice squad signing. Oh, yes, you told me you wanted to talk about Toronto. Yeah, I actually actually did. Like, we're talking about young players contributing and how awesome Quinnian and Cooper de Jinn are

and wondering if, like, Jalick's Hunt is the next guy up, right? Especially with Bryce off seeming to be out of favor. I interpreted the Tehran, like, Tehran Jackson is not going to, like, be elevated and playing games. Like, that's not why he was signed, right? I interpreted that as do they want an extra defensive end body for practice, for scout team? Because Jalick's Hunt, who has primarily been on scout team,

has graduated from that. has graduated to play with the twos and will spend less time on scout team. And so they needed an extra defensive end body. I just don't understand why else they would have, why they would feel the need to add a defensive end right now. Because there's already another defensive end on the practice squad ahead of him. Maybe he's banged up. I don't know.

Maybe. Okay. David Aenehini is the other guy. Oh, yes. Who's already on the money. And the last thing I will let you get in is if we're talking. with this rookie class. The thing that Vic Fangio said this week

has you a little bit concerned about Jeremiah Trotter Jr. Yeah, I was concerned with that. He said he was asked about like Sidney Brown making that play on special teams this week, punching out the ball on the first punt. And he said for safeties and inside linebackers in particular, he said if they're not really good at special teams,

they're not going to be good safeties or inside linebackers. And I've been talking all year about how I thought it was a little weird that earlier in the, in the season, Jeremiah Trotter Jr. was not even playing on punt. Michael Clay said that punt, as opposed to punt return, is the hardest thing for rookies to learn. But looking around the league,

like backup linebackers who dress almost always play on punt, and the Eagles had Zach Bonn out. They still have Zach Bonn out there on that team. Now, Trotter, Trot Jr. has been playing on punt recently, but he graduated to playing there exactly when Dallas Goddard got hurt, and Grant Calcutera was the guy that he replaced. So now that Goddard's back, we'll see. We'll see if Trot Jr. stays on that team.

I was just a little bit concerned. Like I heard some people talking earlier this week about how that's a good sign that Fangeo said that. It's a good sign for Sidney Brown. Maybe I'm just like a more negative person. Like I interpreted it as it's a bad sign for Trot Jr. Though it's very early, obviously. Trot Jr. doesn't have to be good this year. All right.

Good stuff. Thank you so much for taking the time. Dan is and Julia for making it happen. and Zach for chiming in from the NovaCare Complex. Thanks to all of you for watching and listening live. And after the fact, we will talk to you on Sunday kickoff show with Fran Duffy and myself, halftime show the same. And then the post game show with the two of us, Jamie Lynch and Super Bowl champion Vinnie Curry,

as well as Zach chiming in from Arlington, not Dallas. That'll do it for this episode. Thanks, everybody for watching and listening. go to the Rook at Manny Unk on Sunday if you want to join the Watch Along check out that new Sequin Barkley shirt, all that good stuff. Rate, review, subscribe, download,

delete, evangelize. Do it all. We'll talk to you on Sunday. And as always, we love you.