Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - Full Show — September 17, 2026

Episode Date: September 17, 2026

Leila Rahimi and Mark Grote discussed Cubs star Pete Crow-Armstrong two-homer performance in a win against the Braves on Wednesday and also previewed the Bears-Vikings game Sunday at Soldier Field.

Rahimi and Grody 10 to 2 on 104 3 The Score Rapper and long-time Packers fan Lil Wayne says he's done with watching NFL games Here's the message Wayne posted on ax on Sunday afternoon Quote,

fake a if I can't respect the game When the refs can't rough the game I'm out on the NFL these year Wish for it to be an amazing season, y'all I like your accent Do we have the little Wayne Dissing Bears head coach? Ben Johnson.

Yeah, so this is a song called Special Ops. How many sports songs when it's strictly a song about a team or a sport are actually good songs? No, I guess. Maybe I'm wrong. I guess Someday will go all the way by Pearl Jam or Eddie Vedder, I guess, is okay. Marlon Soar by Creed. That's good.

Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, what open? Yeah. So bad. Is that one of your go-to karaoke songs? I bet it is, man. Okay, no more with the karaoke.

I love karaoke. What about careless whisper by Wim? How do we feel about that? For a karaoke song? Yeah. Oh, that's a great karaoke song. I should have known bad to cheat a friend, waste the chest. I have the only karaoke song I ever remember having done was sweet style of mine.

Aye, aye, aye. Show outing? Do we do a karaoke, a show karaoke outing? No. We live. We sing karaoke. We do a lot of cool things together. Mark Grody, midday's 10 a.m. to 2 on Chicago Sports Radio, 1043, The Score. What's up? We are broadcasting live from the Hyundai Studios, brought to you by your local Hyundai dealers. It's Rahimi and Grotie on 1043. The score, a perfect open by Tyler Buterbaugh. Actually, I take away one butte, a happy butte, because,

I heard Creed. That does not get me in the right headspace to hear Creed at any time in my day. Yeah. You know how I feel about this. I think Creed and Nickelback are different. Ah, oh, you like Nickelback? Yep. Not Creed.

Correct. It's okay. That's all right. I know. I know that's probably not actually, you know, it doesn't make sense. But to me it does. Understood. I get it.

I draw the line. It's just very, they're very close to one another, but I have a line. Because you have drank down to the bottom of every bottle. That's what it is. These five words in my head say, are we having fun yet? Nobody wants this this morning. Welcome into the show. Thanks for being with us.

We are open to you. There is a different. We could get more into that later on in the show. Layla and I always love talking music, but we got to get serious here. And like I said, we're open on the text line. When I say that, it's all relative, Layla. Why do we need to? We just have to get on task.

On task would be the right way to say that. We don't have to ever be serious because it's sports. 312, 644, 67, keep those text messages coming. And every once in a while, we let a phone call through as well. 312, 644, 67, 67. Quite a night again for the Chicago Cubs. It's really day-to-day in these manic Cubs episodes, the day before the sky was falling.

And then we got what we needed last night. Yet another Pete Crow Armstrong evening. The Cubs beat the Brave 8 to 4. They win the series against an excellent team. PCA 3 for 4 with two home runs and a triple. He is up to 44 home runs on the season. Seventh multi-homer game this year, 13th in his career, and he does get to sweet swinging again.

Breaks Billy Williams' record for Cubs lefty home runs in a season. So the display, just when you think, okay, that's enough, PCA, you've done enough, it's great. You've won the MVP. And now it's like, is he going to hit 50 home runs this year? Well, that's it. It's now become the drive to perhaps 50. We're still watching the stolen bases. I'm still hoping he gets to 40. Doesn't matter. And by the way, you know, you know I'm watching. You know I'm watching the Kyle Schwerber PCA home run battle that is taking place. Schwerber with 45. But his OPS is only 870. PCAs is 9.56. How we doing? What it do. How are we doing? That's it. So just consider that part of it. as well. Now PCA's been caught stealing seven times because shoot or shoot. But I don't care. And the strikeout numbers are remarkably different as well. Schwabler has 212 strikeouts. Is that tops in the league by the way? No, because of our friend Colson Montgomery.

Pretty close though, right? Yeah, we could do the strikeout leaders in Major League Baseball. And Colson's got some homers, as we know, and I'm worried about his health. Glad to hear that at least it's not broken according to an x-ray, his forearm. Conclusion. But PCA's only got 178 strikeouts. So that speaks to the OPS. You know me. I'm not this stat and only this stat matters.

I'm like, okay, well, how do you balance them against each other? This is what is turning into, I think it's a once-in-a-lifetime thing. I don't think it's a generational thing. But how do you describe the season that Pete Crowe Armstrong is having relative to what we have seen? It is an MVP season, but is it more special than that? And that's where I'm trying to get with this thought, is I'm trying to figure out how to compare it. I was thinking about this earlier, and we'll get even more into it later on in the show. There's no comp that I can think of in certainly with the Cubs.

There's no comp for Pete Crow Armstrong ever. And I'm going through all the guys who have had special seasons with the Cubs, MVP seasons, 40 home run guys. Billy Williams, obviously, and Derek Lee, and Sammy Sosa and Andre Dawson, like whoever you want to come up with. There's no comp, and the reason there's no comp is because there hasn't been a guy whose scouting report we didn't really know. Nobody knew that Pete Crow Armstrong was capable of hitting 30 home runs, which he did last year, let alone hitting 44 home runs. Like, I can't think of it. I don't even know if I could think of the comp in Major League Baseball. And maybe somebody has the answer to that.

312, 64, 67, 67. A guy who we didn't think would be a, quote, home run hitter who became a home run hitter. There are players like him who are 40-40 capable, who were five tool players who could do it all. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm just talking about a guy whose expectations we didn't understand that we didn't know. Like I think there's only like one comp I could think in Chicago and it's not even baseball. It's basketball and it's Jimmy Butler. Because I didn't know, although he was a first round pick, I didn't know Jimmy Butler was going to become a superstar or a star in the league.

Like that's the only one that came to my mind, Layla. Because there was a time where he was considered one of the more dominant talents. So I don't know. He was top 10. There was a time where Jimmy Butler was top 10 in the league. Yeah, but I don't think we expected. I don't know. Maybe you did.

Maybe you did coming out of Marquette. I think Jimmy Butler might be the comp here because the first round in the NBA is wide open after your first five players or so. And that's in a good draft. So I do think that that's a valid comparison. But yeah, this is one. You know, Javi Baez, I think we knew that he had potential. I think we didn't necessarily, but it was more of a tool set altogether. You know, I feel like he was more talked about coming up maybe.

At Schwerber, we knew that he was a power hitter. That wasn't exactly a secret. That was his potential. That's how he came on to the scene. So, yeah, I mean, even recent comps, like, if I go to the 2016 team and I try to think about it. But none was unexpected, though. Like Chris Bryant, it was not unexpected that he had MVP potential. from Red Bull about waiting for Chris Bryant's call-up.

The secret was out. We all knew about that one. There were no secrets on that Cubs team. And yeah, Javier Baez. And PCA didn't come out of nowhere. I mean, this was a highly touted prospect who people had heard about because we hear about hot shot prospects.

But the capabilities were more like this guy has brilliant speed, a brilliant defensive tool, and we'll see about the hitting. We'll see if he's just going to be a streaky guy. Nobody knew that he could do what he has done, and that is put together this slug with the home runs and the RBIs. All right, I teased it in transition as we all try to figure out ways to talk about PCA and what we are seeing in real time. How about some real-time talk from the Cubs broadcast from last night after he had hit a home run?

Pat Hughes and Ron Kumer was Sayas Suzuki at the plate talking about trying to put in perspective what they had. been seeing every day because nobody has a closer look at this man PCA than Pat Hughes and Ron Coomer right here on 104.3 the score. We're in the seventh inning and the pitch on the way driven in the air deep right field. It's got a chance. It's gone. Another home run for Pete is 44th of the year. A drive over the 360. sign in right center. 44 homers. 105 runs batted in.

And in tonight's game run, he has two homers and a triple. He is putting on a show. And the fans are loving it here at Wrigley. And he just might become a unanimous MVP at the end of the year. I just don't know who else you would put up against that. Those numbers, I just don't. And, you know, we were talking about cycles. You know, so what about the cycle?

Just keep going deep. That's all, you know. That's fine with most of us. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Wow. He's just got so much talent. I've been telling people, Ron, when, you know, people want to talk a little ball and ask about the Cubs.

I say, when you've got a guy, Like Pete Crowe Armstrong, it allows your team to say anything is possible about this season. And it's not all Pete. I'm not saying that. There are a lot of other really good ball players and pitchers on this Cubs team. But his talent is in that very special category. And here's the thing, Pat, I think we've all seen guys with exceptional talent. But it doesn't always show up in what he does.

does his performance in the year. You know, he might have a great home run year, but something else is lacking. There's nothing lacking in his performance in any category from defense to offense anywhere. I mean, he's the best center fielder in baseball defensively. He's got a great arm. He's got 40, what is he got 44 home runs now? And he's going to end up with 40 stolen bases before it's all said and done. Michael Bush cracks one in the air. Deep right center. Field back goes Acuna makes the catch shy of the track. Out number two. We're going to have to start checking.

Cubs records for most home runs by anybody in a single season. 44. How about this, Pat, the fifth time he has hit two or more home runs in a game since August 5th, the fifth time. It's the middle of September. It's the most homers ever by a left-handed batter in Cubs history. Surpassing the great Billy Williams in that category. I know Sammy Sosa had some of the monstrous years.

66. I think Sammy had 60 or more, something like three years in a row. Yeah, 66 in 98, 64 in 2001, 63 in 1999. Hack Wilson hit 56, Pat in 1930, and then, Sosa hit 50 in the year 2000. Great stuff right there from Pat Hughes, Ron Kumer, and then you heard Zach Zadman chiming in there on 104-3, the score last night.

Layla, what did you make of what you just heard right there? I think I heard three very respected baseball minds in this city Marvel at somebody, so I'd better be present with this. And not just admire the moonshot, like what he had yesterday to right field. My goodness, the arc on that was ridiculous. But to understand the improvement, And there's a, I have, I have like some people who tweet at me, even though my replies are closed because I live an unbothered life that way. But I will reply to you at times.

And Matthew Rowe tweeted at me, when do the Cubs have to understand that the company underpaid PCA? And that's to the point where we're at with this. He has a good nose for news, by the way, Matthew. So, hey, Matthew. Thanks, Matt. He does. People are good like that. But that's the point here is we went from some people wondering, was he extension.

a lot of money. And baseball, the standard operating procedure in baseball said no because of his value at center field, the positional value of how good he is at center. Then came the hitting piece. And then you get to that question, which I don't blame me for asking in these moments. Yeah. So good and well said by you. And yeah, I mean, if you having the texts are coming in here. And like I said, we'll take calls on it too. Like if you, if you could help us out with a comp for PCA, really in any of our Chicago sports. I'll even broaden it nationally in terms of a guy whose expectations we didn't know. We knew that PCA was brilliant with some of his tools, but this, I don't know that this was ever expected. 312, 644, 67, 67. Yeah, we've gotten some

text too. This is from Sean and Charlotte talking about Jimmy Butler. At Marquette, we'd see Jimmy at the bar and he'd say he was going in the first round. Even we were like, yeah, okay, Jimmy. Yeah, man. Jimmy told us, man, and he was, is a star. And every year that guy got better. So he was amazing. And his incremental improvement with the Bulls and then elsewhere. Yeah, 773 says the approach 180 Pete has made has pretty much unseen before in baseball. This is from 773. At points, he looked like he could be the next Javi Baez, a guy who comes out of the dugout swinging and pitches a foot off the plate. Pete taking walks and cutting down on case this fast while improving power numbers is nothing short of a miracle. And that's, that's, are we not sitting with this enough like Pat and Ron did? Oh, man. Let's do it.

312, 644, 67, 67. What are we seeing and do you have a comp for PCA in baseball really in sports as well? We'll get into some other things too. Alex Bragman had a hell of a night too. I mean, it's just amazing. So did Shodod. if we had time getting some things from Craig counsel in regards to the bullpen. Things got

a little sketchy late in the game. Ray Diaz and Tyler Buterbaugh are our producers today. Connor O'Donnell, Max Curtis, Jacob Studs and Cody Westerland are running the videos and we appreciate them. It is Rahimi and Grody on 1043 The Score. Rihimi and Grody

Vinnie Rotino. Vinnie, how you doing, man? Welcome back to the score. I always love coming on here. I'm telling you. It feels like I'm getting another opportunity at the big league level, right? And I know you guys use that as a bump. I get a lot of flack for that. Radio stations in Wisconsin, and they're saying, why are you saying that you feel like you're in the big league

when you go on the Chicago radio station? This is the big league, the big time. You, sir, have just earned yourself some bears. I don't know if I want any of those. I don't know if I should thank you or not. Midday, 10 a.m. to 2 on the score. And now the 2-2 pitch. Bouncing ball at first. This is going to do it.

Bush goes to Zeppertown. In time. Cubs win the ball game. It goes 3 to 1. The Cubs win it by a score of 8 to 4. And the Cubs start to congratulate one another on another victory and a series victory. Got a little sweaty in the ninth inning, didn't it? Cubs still hold on to win. 8-4 over the Braves.

As I heard right here on 104.3, the score, you are absolutely listening to Rahimi and Grody. And we are open for you some good text messages coming through. 312, 644, 67. We'll get to that ninth inning and some stuff that Craig Counsel said yesterday on the score in regards to the bullpen, but we've been trying to figure out what the comp is for PCA, whether a cub, whether anybody in Major League Baseball,

relative to mystery expectations, the power, the slug that PCA has shown that we didn't know that he necessarily had. 312, 64, 64, 67, 67.1. Layla, that you pointed out, was, and it's an interesting one, going back to Sandberg. That'd be Ryan Sandberg. Oh, yeah, this is a text from 630, yeah. Correct, where he hit 15 home runs in his first 300 games plus, not as dramatic as PCA,

but the standard to show the power was never expected. That's pretty good. Now, the only difference I think with Ryan Sandberg is that Sandberg looked like a guy who could hit the ball out of the park. like Sandberg, big, strong dude and was. Now, I know he was a Hall of Fame second baseman, but this guy came up, he was a third baseman, like a little secret. He was a third baseman for the Cubs in his first year

and very good at third base. So he was a big, stacked kind of guy who you looked at saying, yeah, he could probably hit home runs in an era where you're told to hit line drives. 815 says, not a true comp, more of a comment, but did we expect Arietta to put up the kind of numbers he did when he joined the Cubs, or did he well exceed expectations? That's a really

good question. Because I knew they knew that Arietta was going to benefit from a change of scenery, but I didn't know if it were to this extent. And then another 630, out, I would disagree that no one expected this from PCA. His first year in the minors, he had 20 home runs and

46 extra base hits, only over only 432 base hits. Yeah, but that's the minor leagues. Like, Elo Jimenez is bad at 375 in the minors at AAA. Like, it doesn't mean it translates to the big league level in the same way. And given how PCA looked at the big league level, I think that's why this became such a surprise.

Even earlier this season, earlier this season, he didn't look this way. Yeah. And the questions were when he came out of the minors, can he hit? I mean, I remember talking to people, talking to guests on the score about Pete Crowar Armstrong, and the scouting report was always the same.

Oh, this guy is he's got the best center field you've ever seen. He's going to be the best center field of the Cubs have once he's with the team. He could steal every base. not sure about the hit tool. They's got to catch up a little bit. So the expectations just weren't there early on for the hit tool and especially the slug. Well, and even Jed Hoyer. Jed Hoyer said earlier in the season,

we just have to accept that this is who he is. And he was talking about inconsistent hitting at that point. Well, I hope you're also happily accepting this version. Something tells me they are. Correct. And also, by the way, not to be outdone. How about Alex Breggman's day? Alex Bregman, not just with the extra base hits, but going three for four with four RBIs.

Do you know he's up to 32 doubles on the season now? You love doubles. I do. 26th home run of the year he hit in the game in the fourth inning. 32 doubles had a triple in the game, so he was on cycle watch. But here's the other part of that is I'm going, wait a second, if you've hit 32 doubles, where's that putting you among the stat leaders in baseball? Okay, well, 11th.

He's 11th right now. now. He's tied with Freddie Freeman and Michael Harris with 32 doubles, Gabriel Romano and Cedon Rafael Raffella from Boston. Okay, so that's not terrible either. That's pretty good. I mean, that's an interesting

list of hitters. Alec Berluson, Williore Abrae, Raphael Devers, Brian Reynolds, Brandon Nemo for Texas. I know you got to keep an eye on the Rangers now. Terang! 34. And then Luis Arias, 33. Bregman's turnaround this year is almost as incredible and maybe unprecedented as what we've seen PCA do this year.

I mean, there was a time where Bregman was sort of left for dead this year. And now every time he comes up to the plate, I'm like, man, this guy, the approach is real and the approach is fantastic. Layla, what were you thinking last night in the ninth inning? I was thinking I still had to watch a game because no lead is safe. We were all there. I was like, can I change the channel now? This is a blowout right here. I'm all sportsed out for the night.

Can I change the channel? But no, in the ninth inning, Ryan Rawlinson is put into the game, get its big lead. It's got to be a weird feeling when you have that kind of cushion, walked a couple of guys. And so, Craig's like, ah, crap. Now I got to go out there and get them. And it's Zephyrjohn. Here comes Ryan Zephyrjohn, gives up an RBI double, eventually gave up an RBI ground out, and then Zeperjohn got out of it.

but the bullpen continues to be a conundrum and a concern. And look, I mean, we're not like this. That wasn't the story of the game. But I think it leads pretty well into something we heard yesterday on the score with Spiegel and Holmes to do a great job every time they get the chance to talk to the manager of the Cubs, Craig Counsel, a great interview yesterday. And what really piqued our interest was Lawrence asking counsel this question regarding the state of the bullpen. I'm curious on how much experimentation can you do to try and find the right mix in the bullpen

when you're also trying to make sure that you've got home field in the first round of the playoffs. Yeah, I mean, you can call whatever you want. We're just trying to win baseball games. So you can come up a lot of different phrases for it. We're just trying to win baseball games. That's it. We don't, the home field thing is not, it's like, how does that happen? We win baseball games.

you know so it's it's we're at a point where we're doing everything we can to win every game we're not going to put pitchers in the game that are we're not going to put players out there that aren't able like health-wise but other than that we're going to we're going to push guys at this point in the year for sure and we're just trying to win every game he said three different things there am I crazy for thinking that what you hear I heard somebody I heard well somebody I heard correct counsel say that he's trying to figure it out but then he's got to push guys which can cost you wins, as we've seen. And then you are going to respect health.

But in doing some of this, you are gambling with a winner of loss. I don't know why that's hard to defend here. Yeah. Or at least illustrate. Right. When you push guys, that means you might have them give up runs. And if it's lose the battle, win the ward. I've said this before about him.

I don't necessarily know that you're doing. either. And I wonder if you're acting like you had a lead in the division that never existed at times. You don't have this cushion. You have to be at this point in time now. That does mean you have to overuse some arms probably more than you'd like.

But pushing somebody, I get that that's what's happening, but where are the winning games supposed to come? It's September 17th. When does that come to fruition? How many games do you have to gamble with before you get the wins that you're expecting to get out of some of these guys?

Right, and we saw exactly how important home field is last year with the adrenaline that was flowing through Wrigley Field against the Padres last year. And then obviously not having home field against the Milwaukee Brewers and losing that series. This segment with Rahimi and Grotie on 1043, the score is brought to you by almost free teeth.com save on dental implants today. You can hear him scrambling. That's a frustrated manager right there, trying to figure out. the bullpen. There is nothing more frustrating and perhaps even unexplainable

about bullpens and the volatility that exists. We all want to know that is it something mechanical, is it something velocity-wise? Is there something wrong? Is it mental? Is it confidence? And nobody really knows including the manager. So that's the frustration that I heard

with him right there, that he can't explain it. And he has to. He has to experiment. The experimentation, like that's where I will give Craig a little bit of support is he's got no choice. Like if we just saw him marching the same guys out there all the time, which to some degree he is doing, there are different things he has to experiment with, with putting Edward Cabrera out there as long as he did. And it even said during that interview yesterday, it wasn't ideal.

He didn't necessarily want to put Cabrera in in a dirty situation as he did. He would have preferred a clean inning, maybe not as gone as long. So Craig admitted that that wasn't ideal. And he also told the guys, too, he was trying to compare it to the Cubs offense earlier in the year, which was excruciating for a while where every single day we were talking about risk and runners in scoring positions say, hey, they got through their slump. It's different with the bullpen because there are guys in bullpens who never ever recover, unlike hitters who typically recover.

Well, and that's it is that I understand the concept when you have nothing but time. But they're not at that point right now. And we were laughing because yesterday we all started going through watching the game, you know, the bullpen. I'm like, well, these are our guys. My circle of trust is Aaron Savali and Ryan Rawlinson. And then he, you know, pushing Zephyr, John, well, you put him in a relatively lower leveraged situation and you still let him throw the ninth.

So I get that part. I get that some of that is not going to be as pretty. But I do wonder how much can, how much risk can you take on this side? When you're at this point in the calendar. Yeah. And I do get concerned about the Phillies and home field. Of course. I don't know why that's such a far-fetched thought.

It's not. It's like... You and I could hit a home run at Citizens Bank Park if the conditions were favorable. Which is good for the Cubs, though, because the Cubs hit bombs. And obviously, Philadelphia does too, so that could be a much... But they also give up the most bombs. I didn't see... Did Chota give up a home run last night?

No, we don't think... No. No. No. How about that? A clean Shoda game. Shota was really good last night, man. Shota was great. And he was fired up. You could tell he had some emotional moments in the game that were valuable to him.

So that was also fun to watch. Two straight good performances. He did give up a home run in the performance previous to that. That was the blowout game that you guys went to, right? Wasn't Shota pitching that day for you and Ray? Yeah. I believe it was. I'll fill in the blank for you guys.

And it's okay because we didn't care because the Cubs scored 12 runs. You guys were still stunted by your Kiti because that was the last time you guys went to a game. You guys deserve that game. Orkid used some magical spell. He lulled the entire ballpark to sleep. We don't know if it really was Josea Curtis. No, we don't. I mean, we really don't.

That was the guy he got to fill in for him. To this day. The MF Doom. MF Doom or Kiti. MF Doom Rikiti. It's such a, it takes so many steps to understand the reference. I love it. Where is, is Erkiti is even claimed by anybody?

We should, we should keep an eye on him through the years. We are on. kitty watch. Okay. Yeah. I don't know that he's been scooped yet. But yeah, Shota, I love, like, like we've seen this line a lot of times in Shota's career, especially his rookie year.

And then we see little glimpses of it, too, where high strikeout number, low walks, eight strikeouts, zero walks last. Now, those have not been coming as furiously as they once did. But that is, to some degree, a vintage Shota Ibnaga performance when he is good. Yeah, he throws a lot of strikes. And when he's got the command and the split duplicates arm slot with that fastball, then he's working. That's how you know, he's in the zone, and he was yesterday. That's a good point, too, by the top texture.

Oh, yes, Wrigley Field, famously known for not having 20 mile per hour wins to push the game out of the outfield. Oh, yeah? Go back and look at how many times the wind was blowing in this season. And you tell me, because we hear about it from the ball players all the time. Ray, how many times that you produce Cubs pre-imposed game where this is discussed? Absolutely, all the time. And Craig Counsel himself has brought this up as well. I mean, that's basic knowledge.

We're here for actual knowledge. No, but I think the point, like, when I think about that, it's like this could be, and I get it, like, as it gets colder, you're not going to have those days. We've seen many excruciatingly cold playoff days where you're like, oh, my God, is anybody going to have your buy-as, home run? Thank you very much. It's one to nothing, and the Cubs win. Somebody had to get the ball over the wall.

But I like, I kind of like where the texture is going, because, boy, what a blast of a series that could be. if we do get the wind blowing out at Wrigley Field and Citizens Bank Park is what Citizens Bank Park is I actually kind of I can't wait for a series a Cubs-Filly series that would be a blast I can't wait for the one in CBP I can't wait for the one here Oh is that what we call it CBP?

Yeah, Citizens Bank Park The cool kids call it CBP And that's just what they called it in Philly What's it? You know with CBP yeah you know me Oh you got an impersonation on that as well No, no I know I know I know The Lil Wayne impression was top-notch.

Yeah, that was really good. That was good. Go check out Buter balls open if you want to hear the Ray Diaz. Actually, it's up on Instagram, too, on the score. Coming up next, the White Sox head help from an unlikely hero last night before their eventual 6-3 loss to the Guardians, whether Layla wanted to see it or not. He hit a big home run yesterday.

Oh, I'll admit he's, and now I wonder if I should put him in the lineup today. That's how I feel about it. Layla's come a long way, folks. No, no, no, the process was still flawed. Talk about volatility. My goodness, we're all day to day. It's Rahimi and Grody on 1043, the score. Rahimi and Grody, midday's 10 a.m. to 2 on Chicago Sports Radio 1043, the score.

Now another big spot for Tommy Pham. He launches to left field way back and gone. Welcome back to the White Sout. Tommy fam. Courtesy of ESPN. We know that much. It's Rahimi and Grotie on 104.3, the score. I just forgot the guy's name because he did a bunch of White Sox.

Mike, Mike. Oh, Mike Monaco. Mike, that's it. I got you. I like Mike. He's a nice guy. Yeah, just because it's an unfamiliar voice to White Sox fans. Yeah, the game was on ESPN yesterday.

The Guardians beat the White Sox 6 to 3. And there was Tommy Fam in the fifth, the three-run bomb off Young and Talented Parker Messick to, at the time, turned the game around for the good, made it 3-2 White Soxie. Sox, a first pitch curve. Tommy Fam's first hit of the year. And just to take you guys back a little bit when we found out the news that Tommy Fam was batting forth, Lela lost her mind. And I kind of went with the, sometimes you've got to get crazy because bad things

happened the night before. I've seen it before. You just do wacky things to a lineup. You put your reserves in. You do a Phil Jackson and do a complete line change or whatever the case may be. So I supported it. You mentioned Joe Madden, too. I mentioned Joe Madden as well.

Did I characterize that properly, that you just, you were not here for it. You didn't want to see it. You were hate watching. You were kind of rooting against him, too, quite frankly. I thought it was unsurious because, let me get this straight. Because you were on the elevator with Chris Gatz, you get A off of the injured list, and then B, you're in the lineup, and then see your batting cleanup. That's a lot of things.

That's a lot of things for what was literally. an elevator pitch. And then not only that, but they were so obsessed with having you on the team even though you didn't have a hit to your name. Did you know on the ESPN bio right now, Tommy Fam is still in a Mets uniform in the picture? That happens, though.

That's how seriously they take Tommy Fam on the White Sox. You were hilarious because... And I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. You can just say this stuff. You just talked your way. You elevator pitched your way into the lineup and your batting cleanup. And then you hit a home run in your second AB.

Right. Amazing. All of that is wild. It's all true. You were hilarious. Sox still lost the game, by the way, unfortunately. The socks got a one-out triple in the first inning from Randall Gritchick. And Miguel Vargas then strikes out, but you were still blaming FAM. You're like, fam, they're like, Layla.

No, that's Vargas is the one that's supposed to come through. You were wanting him to fail. Vargas has done more for the White Sox this year, okay? That's true. So we had this little battle going on and it was playful and we were having fun with it. I don't know if Layla was. I think she was legit pissed off. Because you just were like, I think I could do this today.

And they're like, okay, guy, don't give me, don't tell me about your front office. Don't tell me about analytics. Don't tell me about who you're employing. Don't even tell me about what it takes to earn a spot in the lineup when you could just be like, I should come off the injured list and you should put me in the lineup and I'll back clean up. Even though I haven't had to hit this season. I will say. Does all of that make sense in a playoff race?

Okay. I did dismiss that a little bit yesterday, but I was probably wrong to because as it turns out in that interview with Jesse Rogers, Jesse Rogers doing great job getting really good access, getting to talk to him, talking to fam in game after he had hit the home run, admitting that the trainers wanted him to wait a couple days. They're like, no, we don't want you to come in. So we're in studio yesterday.

Elevator pitch, gold. We're watching the game in our peripheral. We've got Clay Hart. in studio. We're not wanting to divert from the bears, and it's not even great form to divert from the bears. But there we were. Here's our live reaction, talking bears,

and watching in our peripheral vision on one of our screens here in the score studios, Tommy Fam hit a home run. Now you have the background. Here's as big play by the White Sox right there, man. Lema's been talking about fam all day. You can put your negativity away. Unbelievable.

That is awesome. I'm sorry. That is unbelievable. She's a crushing fan and this guy. Because it was ridiculous. He's like, I think I could play today. Oh, my God. Oh, my word.

Okay, so here's... Sorry, we just broke a bunch of rules. That was yesterday. And even after that, it was so funny because Clay's like, Layla, it's over. It's over. It happened. He hit a three-run homer.

You can't take it back now. You can't be angry anymore. No, I mean, I still can because if I'm sitting on the bench, like Sam Antonacci and yes, I understand he took a bad route to the ball in the game before. I'm still wondering why it's not okay for me to be in the lineup and he is. Somebody else isn't in the lineup when that guy's in the lineup. But do you think it should be in the lineup today? Yeah.

So I do have a, I do stick by the rule. And Will Venable was on the Padres when I learned it. Bud Black, his former manager always said, you know, typically when you hit a home run, you should be in the lineup the next day. So how does that play out today? Standing by for a lineup. And yeah, what an interesting year. It looks like an Eric Fetty, Framber Valdez starting situation tonight against Detroit.

It's been all sweeps in this series. The White Sox swept Detroit in August and May. The Tigers turned a trick on the White Sox sweeping them in June. So you've got the recency bias with the socks having done well against them the last time obviously more on the line for the white socks, but yeah, four game series here starting tonight against the tigues.

6-30 on our text line has the right attitude here. Right in old Getsy at the urinal yesterday. I will be managing the squad tonight. That's it. What we've just learned is that you can elevate elevator pitch your way to Chris Gets.

You want to know the weaknesses. You know how I felt about this with Dan. If I really wanted something on the show, I'd just phrase it in a catchy headline. Dan couldn't say no. So you just really have to find out the reverse trigger with people, the thing that makes them say yes. It worked, though. The elevator pitch worked.

Who are we elevator pitching for Chris gets? What can we do? Like, what's our next project as a team? Bring back Rikidi and start him tonight. That's what it is. Put Rikidi, have him start. Have him open the game. You can't have a White Sox game without an opener, right?

At least A1-5 gets me on this. Antinachi out was about the most egregious part. of that lineup. Outside of my drought, he's the only one on the team that's hitting everything lately. And Betty was out too. That's my point. It's not like there were people who were actually consistently hitting who weren't looking for their literal first hit of the season on September 16th. Yeah, White Sox did leave a lot on the table yesterday. There were opportunities. Yeah, they left the bases loaded in the fourth inning. There were issues again with the White Sox offense, but there are

10 games to go for the White Sox. They are a half game back of Cleveland. Against whom they do have the tiebreaker. That's huge. We don't have any funny stuff if it comes down to that. And they are in the third wild card position right now. One up on the Texas Rangers.

What's up, Ranger? And 1.5 up on the Toronto Blue Jays. So that is the White Sox story. Are we ready to take a deep breath here on what was I thought an explosive hour of baseball? Talk Bears. Are you ready? Are you prepared to talk about? I think we should talk about Ben Johnson versus Brian Flores because there's all sorts of gold coming back and forth from

Minnesota and Chicago. The football junkies are fired up for this matchup and we should be too. Can Drew Thorpe find Gets when he's out to dinner? Says the 708. Everyone, just elevator pitch to Gets. You guys are found the weakness. You're on your game. It's Rahimi and Grotie talking bears. next on 104-3 The Score. The score! This hour is being brought to you by Jewel Osco. When you face someone like Rez, where not only is he very accomplished,

but someone that you have faced so many times, is there ever a trap to avoid of just overthinking and trying to guess what he thinks you think he thinks you think he thinks you're going to do? Yeah, yes, there is. How do you avoid going down a path where you're just overdue? in that path right now. No, I mean, there's a lot of that.

Man, end of the day, our guys, I want them to go out and play fast. I want to make sure we're sound. It's not very different than what we talked about a week ago, making sure we have a hat for a hat as often as we can. And if he gets us on something, that's fine. Then we've got to come together and make sure we get it corrected and we'll move on from there. So this game will end up being some adjustments going on over the course of. it might be in the tab a little bit more than I'd like to over the course of a game, but that's how

these ones have tended to go in the past. I love that both Brian Flores, the defensive coordinator of the Vikings, and Ben Johnson, from whom you just heard the head coach of the Chicago Bears, have sort of accepted the duel that this game is going to be between those two masterminds for the Bears and Vikings this Sunday along the lakefronts, as we welcome you back into. Heemy and Grody on 104-3, the score. There's not the usual downplaying, Lela, that we typically get where it's not. No, this is not just another game. These two coaches are both accepting their geniusness coming into this game,

and I think it's absolutely beautiful. It's about them. Babe, wake up. It's Ben Johnson versus Brian Flores. That's it. It's on. That's really what this is. Wake up, wake up.

Oh, yeah. Hey, can we take that back now that it's not part of the morning show theme song anymore? system of a down belongs to everyone. Yes, it does. Because Ray, you put that in initially, right? Well, yeah, this is true. Every time I hear that, I get that jolt that you guys just heard. Like, that just runs through my body.

See, that's the point. You've got to understand people's reverse triggers, the things that make them focus, for example, for markets, when did you get in and wake up. And that's. So for Chris Gets, it's finding him on an elevator. When did you get in? Dan, it was a catchy headline. You've just got to learn these things about your people.

That's right. That's how it comes together. That's the quine. Babe, wake up. It's Brian Flores versus Ben Johnson week. And that is the thing. All the seamheads, so to speak, in the NFL. I know that's baseball term,

but all the NFL junkies right now, the football fiends, this is their week. This is it. And Ben Johnson smiled whenever we heard our friend Jason Leisure ask him that question in that way, because that's really what this is. A lot of times I think that there are coordinators who think they're too smart.

and they're trying to outthink somebody else. And it's like, you don't have the athletes for that. It doesn't matter. It's not going to work. This is not that case. This is truly two people at the elite levels of their coordinating game who respect each other's talents, their abilities, and then what they're going to do to make the other one just crumble.

And I enjoy this at many levels. Let's get into some of it. And as we learned with some really specific analytics and statistics yesterday from our guy, Clay Harbor, and I'll get into more of that as this segment goes on for people who did not have the benefit of hearing yesterday, that I'll just start by saying that Ben Johnson is

5 and 1 in six games against Brian Flores since 2023. Wait up! Whoa! Whoa! Wake up! Just so good. System. That blasts through my place often, too, by the way. That's a real

thing that goes on. Dave the Cat digs system of down as well. Does he get the zoomies? Does he run around? He does. Yes, he does. He understands new medal. Yeah, he does. Let's give more into the audio here. You heard from Ben Johnson coming into the segment here on Rojimi and Grotie. How about Brian Flores, though? Brian Flores, again, the defensive coordinator for Minnesota with the media, discussed how the Bears' offense will be a test for his defense. There's a chess match every week. We just, we just, we just, we just, we just had that with another, you know, one of the top play callers and Matt. So, Every week it's a challenge. You know, Ben's certainly a challenge. I mean, any type of offense that's out there, whether it's ground and pound, whether it's, you know, run and shoot, whether it's RPO, whether it's, you know, four by one, he's got it. And so what are we getting?

What are we getting week to week? It's hard to know. And so a lot of the game is adjustments. Hey, if they do this, we want to do that. If they do that, we want to do this. and we're going to have our own game plan to start things off. And it's the same thing on his end. What are they doing?

And how are we going to counteract what they're doing? So it's certainly a chess match. And one of the things I love about coaching defense in this division, and really in the NFC, whether it's Ben or the floor, obviously, COO on a daily basis. And so it's a lot of fun. And it's a major challenge, and that's what we all signed up for. And from what I understand, talking to people in Minnesota, like, because I don't know the day-to-day, Brian Flores, he is similar to Ben Johnson in that he is not one to just throw out compliments and talk about challenges against other teams unless he's being genuine.

And this guy is a killer when it comes to the Blitz. I just love all of this. That's it. It really is listening and going to football school. with two coordinators who the entire league just respects immensely. It's fun. And you can tell they're having fun trying to figure out what the other one is doing. Brian Flores, to throw out the run-and-shoot reference, too, is,

that's a man after my own heart. That's an old school one. You got to love that. Yeah, the old run-and-shoot. Who ran that? Atlanta. June Jones. Yeah, Rodney Pete back in the day.

Didn't he, wasn't there some of that with him? Andre Reisen? Andre good moon rising Or the bad moon rises I just can't do things right I just can't It's the way It wouldn't be me

If I didn't say things like that They had to run a 425 And that was considered Against the run and shoot That was considered such a You know A wild alignment And now it's something you see pretty often

Yeah A few more numbers here This is like from Clay Harbor From yesterday The Ben Johnson offenses have outperformed league averages against the Minnesota defense. His EPA per play, expected points added, essentially the amount of successful plays that you have percentage-wise versus the Vikings,

plus 0.07 for Ben Johnson against everybody else, minus 0.04. Successful plays when blitzing, when blitzing. Ben Johnson, 46% rest of the league, 41%. And then I'll give you one more quick number here, and then I'll give you the rest later. But points per drive, Ben Johnson, 2.33, rest of the league, 1.77. This is since, by the way, since 2023 when Brian Flores came into the division, for which, of course, Ben Johnson was the offensive coordinator of Detroit. So that's how far back we go.

I don't know what this means that Ben Johnson is better than Brian Flores, but he's had an edge that other offenses haven't necessarily had against his defense. I'm thinking I'm the best coach in America. I think given sample size and percentage difference, it would be considered statistically significant. So therefore, the numbers do bear out based on the production that Ben Johnson does have an advantage that other league coaches do not against Brian Flores. I know that his teams average 27 and a half points per game in those six games. And that's also pretty high when you consider how good Minnesota's defense is. Here's the other part, though, is

last game, Vikings blitzed on 70% of the dropbacks. You say last game you're talking about against the Packers or against the last game they played against the bear? Gotcha. So you're expecting blitz of your Caleb Williams when you see it, right?

It's a matter of making the proper read to know who's dropping back to show it's not the blitz. And then also, how are you sliding your protections? Because that's something I think we're still seeing the bear's work in progress on. I know that sounds crazy after scoring 59 points on Sunday.

But when you consider that there are still those finer points of this, and we saw it play out, how much is that going to go into play? Yeah, and keep an eye on this. If you're at the game or if you're watching on TV, watch what Ben Johnson does with some quick snaps, getting right up to the line, not allowing the Minnesota defense to disguise, which is a famous part of what Brian Flores is trying to do.

We talked about it yesterday, too, the condensed formations. and I'm sorry that that triggered Luke Getzzi for you yesterday, Layla, but that's understandable. Just don't start open, like, don't start empty against the Vikings, and then have your fullback be your hot read and a pass pattern when it's a fullback. Like, there's a lot wrong there. Oh, man, Luke Getzzi. All right, so let's go back and forth. Here, let's go to Ben Johnson.

Now, Ben Johnson yesterday discussed what to expect when it comes from Brian Flores' defense. He's tried to have answers for everything. So, yeah, I mean, it's, it's, he's been in this division three years now. And, yeah, I mean, you'd like to think he's put everything he could possibly do on tape until you play him next and you realize he hasn't yet. And so there'll be something new. There always is with him. And that's what makes him such a good coordinator.

It's a great challenge. It really is. You have a lot of fun on game day. Now the week of preparation is not so much fun. but, you know, there's a lot of back and forth that goes into it. He loves this. I love how he says it's not that fun. Ben Johnson's up here having a blast.

Lies. You used to write down numbers for fun. Yes. Lise. He gets off on this. This is him, man. I do look like, I compare it to modern day baseball. I got a baseball analogy here for you for Brian Flores.

I'm going to try this here. Okay. Yeah, thank you. Brian Flores is wholly unprecedented. predictable with what he's going to do. Like when you think he's going to blitz, maybe he won't. Like on the obvious blitzing downs, he's going to blitzing down. He's going to blitzing down.

It reminds me of a time in baseball when you knew what a pitcher was going to throw when it was 3-0. You're going to get a fastball right down the middle. That's old school baseball. Now that's not the case, right? You might get a slider. You might get a curve. You might get a heater, but you probably not going to get a heater.

First pitch the same way. It used to be really bold to go first pitch breaking ball. not anymore. That's the truth. And that is the unorthodox way with which Brian Flores leads his defense. And even if you want to go back to, I think I mentioned this yesterday, but we had this whole, oh my God, here comes

Flores and the Minnesota defense is going to blitz the crap out of Caleb Williams. Man, I had Caleb, other Caleb's in my mind just now. What's up, Caleb Wilson? Your season starts soon. We see you. And then he didn't in that first game last year. There was a 35% blitz rate from Flores. And

Of course, the Vikings win the game with the devastating 21 fourth quarter points, but in the second game that the Bears won 66%. Blitz rate. It's really hard to argue against Kevin O'Connell, who got Coach of the Year and Brian Flores, man. What a one-two punch that is. Yeah, it's really nice. And when you consider that was the real chess match was, no, I'm going to sit back. This is your first game in this new offense with your head coach, who I know as a coordinator.

I'm just going to, I'm going to see what I got with this personnel. And they had a very expensive defense last year did Minnesota. You know, spent a ton of money on the D. They had to unleash a lot of cap space and let people go after last season. So with my personnel, which I think is pretty elite, like, let's, let's see and let's wait and see what you guys, what you guys are going to do. I almost wonder if it was information gathering before than just the wrath came in the second half. I like that. I like that.

But also remember Caleb. Williams did a lot of checkdowns. He was running, he threw a lot of balls away to try to avoid the sacks. Like that game felt like it was on fast forward watching it because it was so sped up from what we were used to seeing. And then also how Caleb Williams' job, as we knew at that point was avoid getting sacked. Congratulations. Avoid getting sacked against Brian Flores' defense. Congratulations. Let's hear from Caleb since you brought him up yesterday discussed the difficulty of going up against Brian Flores' defense.

He finds ways to your blocking scheme on offense. He finds ways to challenge that and create as many one-on-ones. And that's, I mean, that's what football comes down to, is beating your man one-on-one. And so he does a good job of that is, you know, for your blocking schemes, run or pass, find as many one-on-ones as he can. And then having, you know, the players that he has and the scheme that he has,

you know, that is their advantage in that way. And so that's what's challenging about going forward. versus him is trying to not allow him to play or not play, but, you know, coach up and, you know, get his scheme into where the guys are one-on-one, you know, throughout the whole game. Yeah, and they do, I mean, like, you're right, they don't have as much talent as they did, but Dallas Turner's on the rise, Van Ginkle is still there, and the guy that Ben Johnson kept mentioning this guy, and if I'm not mistaken, he did the same thing last year, Jalen Redman, the defensive tackle, who he just kept name-checking,

last year. Four tackles. He is a great story, though. I was just going back on Redmond. Undrafted Free Agent with Carolina in 2023, waived. Then he played for in the XFL. You remember the XFL? Is that still a thing? I don't even know. He hate me? He hate me. That's right. Good call. The Arlington Renegades.

And then he, in 2024, he signed with the Minnesota practice squad and then eventually got elevated to the 53 and has been living there ever since last year. six sacks and 62 tackles for Jalen Redmond. So I guess circle that guy because Ben kept mentioning him. He did. That was somebody who clearly was on his map. But Caleb Williams talking about the one-on-one battles too. I think that's as valuable information to this as anything.

Ben Johnson has talked about those when it comes to just how he's judging his personnel week-to-week. So I wonder what one-on-one battles they're keying on. I assume Redmond is part of that, but just how they feel like their personnel can best win those. Yeah, and we'll get into more of this tomorrow because we've got a whole football Friday tomorrow with all sorts of great Bears stuff and some interesting things about how some people in Minnesota think that they may attack the Bears' offense and it may not be exactly who you would have thought of. And I'm talking about the interior of the Bears' offensive line. We'll get into some of that tomorrow, but it's really just some fascinating stuff. Before Chicago takes on

Minnesota. Tune in Sunday morning from 9 to noon for one of my favorite shows. Your local four dealers pregame show right here on 104.3, the score Olin Croutes, Patrick Manley and Gabe Ramirez will get you set for the game. Then immediately following the game, they'll have instant reaction on the Timber Tech decking and railing postgame show presented by the Rorman Automotive Group, home of the $50 oil change. I've had it. Visit them online at roorman.com. This week's postgame show can be seen exclusively on YouTube and on Twitch as well. When we come back, we started to get into this a little bit in our baseball conversation in our first hour. Are we special here in Chicago?

I think we are. We're special because we have two athletes who are a must watch at all times in Bears quarterback Caleb Williams and Cubs outfielder Pete Crow Armstrong. We are taking your calls if you are interested at 312, 644, 67, 67 is the number. Do you remember a time like this? Tandems of players in this city at the same time, 312, 644, 67, we could even add on to the conversation we were having earlier trying to find comps and precedents that had been set earlier just on Pete Crowe Armstrong and who has ever been like him in Chicago where You didn't really know what he was, and then he became this explosive player that we didn't necessarily predict.

So let's talk about that. Craig Counsel had some things to say about that as well. He became a fanboy last night, which is great. But we are here for you. 312, 644-67 is the number. It's Rahimi and Grody on 104-3, The Score. Rahimi and Grody. Let's go live to our hotline.

Heat Crow Armstrong. What's going through your mind right now? Oh, sorry, but... What's your profamity? He said, top of the mind. got to let it flow, and I feel like that's exactly what happened. Our poor producer Ray spilled his coffee, so thanks for christening our studio. Midday, 10 a.m. to 2 on the score.

It's cool that people appreciate us being friends, you know, because that's where it all really stems from. And we've definitely talked about what we want to build here together. But again, that all stems from genuine appreciation of each other's abilities and craft and how we make stuff happen. I think it's all agreed upon, or it's agreed upon by all of us that we want to give people something to look forward to. So I think that's where it's coming from and that's what it is. We love superstar friendships in this town. Yes, we do.

It's Rahimi and Grotie on 104.3, the score. Are we special, Leila, do you think? Because we've got PCA to watch and now we have a rising star in Caleb Williams, the quarterback. I mean, it's pretty good when you've got Superstar. in town and it doesn't happen all the time. It's intermittent in Chicago. It's intermittent in other cities. That's what I was thinking about when we were talking about how we had to make sure we were

doing nothing other than watching P. Peacroar Armstrongs at Bats last night. Or if we're zeroed in on what Caleb Williams is doing every single snap, you're talking about two athletes who are must watch TV. And then you start thinking about the rest of the respective leagues. And yeah, you can have one who you're always going to be tuned. into, but it is somewhat rare when you've got two in the same city. Yeah, like potential MVP candidates.

I mean, I think we know it's over for PCA. He's going to win the most valuable player in the National League this year. That doesn't downplay my guy, Yordaun Alvarez in the American League. He's still a person too. You know I love Yodon Alvarez. He's the best. Can the Cubs figure out a way to trade for Yorda Alvarez? I think the Astros might want him because he has 39 home runs and a thousand, 22 OPS this season.

they seem to not be afraid to unload guys and let guys go. So I don't know. Some. Just something I'm thinking in the back of my head. But if you could think of a time, like, and then we got great answers coming in our text lines here, a time when you remember. Because it's difficult to do sometimes to think about that those two guys play at the same time. Were they dueling at the same time? 312, 644-67-67 is the number if you want to put a call through.

And remember a time when you had guys that were superstars playing in doing. different sports in Chicago at the same time. The Derek Rose Patrick Kane one pops up. Obviously different years in which they were really thriving. Derek Rose won his MVP in 2010. And for Patrick Kane, it was 2016, had won MVP in the Stanley Cup, I believe it was 2013, maybe another one as well. Did he win in the first one against Philadelphia?

He did have the game winning goal in that one, did Caner? So I like that. Lots of Michael Jordan, of course, many combos with him. Michael Jordan and Walter Payton at the same time. King got the Com Spithe in 2013. 2013, not any others. Okay. Okay.

I mean, that makes, I remember 2013. I would have thought, God, I mean, somebody, obviously lots of stars in 2010, the first one. But that does make sense. Yeah, Jordan, you can link with so many. The Jordan and Frank Thomas, Frank Thomas and Sammy Sosa. Those are all good. entries as well. Yeah, we've had a lot of really good ones. And then Ray printed out this Chicago Times picture of Michael Jordan, Walter Payton, and Andre Dawson. This looks pretty

great. Yeah, all wearing their tuxitos. Yeah, I remember that well. Yeah, that was... Young Michael Jordan in this. That was the March slash April edition of the Chicago Times in 1988. Yeah, you can tell, like, young Michael Jordan, you know, fresh-faced Michael Jordan. Andre Dawson hasn't aged. I don't... I don't... I... It's an amazing. Yeah, you're right. Yeah, he does still look good. 847. Yeah, we'll go way back too. This is way back, says the texter. Gail Saris, Sayers, what? Wake up! Gail Sayers, Bobby Hall and Ernie Banks all at the same time. That's pretty good. The Bulls make this, I think, easier because you could say any time during the Dynasty, it would be the Bulls and.

Yeah. That's why I like the cane and Derek Rose comp because D. Rose before he got injured, that is an excellent one. Like 3-1-2 says Jordan Pippin and the entire Bears team at the time. Right, right. Like that'll work, especially with the combination of Peyton, but the point is it's been a while. And I was thinking about this in other cities right now.

Is it the same? Yeah. You know, like if Aaron Judge were healthy, would it be some combination of like Aaron, Aaron Judge and like Jalen Brunson in New York? But Aaron Judge hasn't been entirely healthy this season. Yeah, but that can still qualify. Oh, Tani hasn't been healthy. Is it Shohei Otani and Matt Stafford because he was the MVP and he threw for 4,700 yards last year?

Yeah. But it's hard to find the combos until you start really thinking about it. And here for us, it's obviously automatic because we're day-to-day with it. Yeah. Patrick Kane and Chris Bryan in 2016. That's excellent. That's really good. Yes. 312, 644, 67, if you want to get in on the party here on Rahimi and Grotie on the score, How about Mike in Northbrook?

Mike, what up? You're on the score. I got a good one for you that I remember when I was nine years old, when I attended the Sox Dodgers World Series. Ernie Banks and Nellie Fox. Ooh, Ernie and Nellie. Oh, Nellie. That's pretty good, Mike.

Appreciate that. 312, 644, 67, 67 is the number. It really is nice when there's a bear involved, let alone a bear's quarterback. we're headed into territory that we've literally never been in in our lifetimes or in anybody's lifetime. Even the oldest person listening right now, unless you watch Sid Luckman play quarterback for the Chicago Bears,

we've not seen anything like what I think we're getting closer to seeing with the Chicago Bears. We've got to get there still, but I think there's a pretty good chance. 815 says Jordan Payton Sandberg won't ever be replicated. That's pretty good. That was a time. Yeah. Yeah, Rhino for sure.

Yeah, because both like Sandberg, Rookie in 84, yeah, rookie in 1984, Jordan rookie in 1984. That's pretty good right there. What's this? Oh, I don't know if this qualifies, but I appreciate the white socks in this here, a little bit of it.

2003-1-2, a rookie Brian Erlacker and Maglio Ordognez. You know, he was kind of a star for a little while, and then he took his talents, too, Detroit because they gave him the bundle. But was, did you consider, like, Erlacker, you're watching the opposing teams drive? You know, it's, it's kind of, you're waiting to see what he does. Yeah.

But is it, is it where you're transfixed and you can't, you have to watch every single time? Well, I would say Erlacker came pretty close to that because obviously, and maybe things are changing now, we gobbled up defense and specifically linebackers. And again, Erlacker, actually Erlacker falls in a, PCA category that we hadn't really seen, at least in Chicago, anything like that. And really in the NFL, where you have this guy who had ridiculous 4-4 speed or whatever Erlacker had when he first came out, this sideline to sideline linebacker who could

sometimes, like, is he covering a receiver? Is he running downfield with Randy Moss? What is going on with this guy who is just moving sideline to sideline? So I do think that that, I understand what you're saying, but he may be the exception defensively. Like you couldn't take your eyes off early. Like I think of when I didn't live here, I was still watching what Derek Rose did on a regular basis and watching, say, Devin Hester. That wasn't at the same time. Yeah.

But I remember feeling those feelings about those two. Oh, Devin Hester's up. Okay, let's see what happens on this. Stop and watch. That's it. That's that feeling. And that's what I get when I'm watching Pekra Armstrong at Bats right now. Man, I remember being sitting just a fan, sitting in the South End Zone many times watching

Devin Hester do his thing. And there was nothing more stimulating at a drunk Bears game than watching Devin Hester do his thing. How about Craig Counsel last night? He shared a conversation that he had with Alex Bregman with what they're witnessing in Pete Crow Armstrong. When he hit the second homer, I said something, Alex was, Breggman was standing next to me. I can't remember what I said, but it's just you're shaking your head in amazement at sometimes, in amazement. And, you know, you don't get to see this. Like, that's what I told Alex.

I said, Alex, you don't get to see things like this. Like, you know, we spend your whole life in baseball, and you just don't see this happen on a baseball field. You're grateful to be a part of it. You're grateful to see things like this. And then you're grateful for that the fans get to see a season like this. because they're going to talk about it. They're going to tell their kids about it. They're going to tell their grandkids about it in seasons like this.

He's right. Yeah. He's 100% right, isn't he? Yeah. And I love the idea. Like, you have these two grizzled veterans who have seen it all. Craig Counsel especially, Alex Breggman, man. He's seen a lot of things in his baseball life.

But there's two guys just sitting there, and I could just picture them up at the rail, just kind of going back and forth. Like, are you watching this? like we're running out of ways to describe it and like it's just in a lot of ways unprecedented with PCA. And that's the feeling. But yeah, it's that it's that element of you stop what you're doing. Even now, even with today's technology to watch this person do their job. And it's a great feeling. It's incredible that it's here because it hasn't been for a while. I like this from the 630. Pretty good. Pretty creative here. Jordan Sandberg.

Ventura, that'd be Robin Ventura, Sean Gale, Stu Grimson, and you're like, where are you going with this, Grotie? They all wore number 23. Yeah. Pretty good.

Hey, like, I respect the Sean Gale reference as a child of the 85 Bears. However, Devin Hester also wore number 23. So you have to put him in that club as well. Can't leave him out of that. And yeah, we shouldn't leave out Jonathan Taves either. Like Patrick Kane turned

out to be the biggest star of those Black Hawks teams, but Taves a very close second to it as well. Well, and that's where the Hawks decided to call the press conference about Connor Bedard. Yeah. It was also recognition for Jonathan Taves at that point when they made him the captain. Yeah, it was a very good move. Announcers from the 630. How about Harry Carey and Hawk Harrelson at the same time? They were the show.

That's pretty good. Too bombastic. Would that be the right word? Yeah, absolutely. I'm very comfortable with bombastic for both of those guys. I got to tell you, though, if you, like, not being here and hearing some of Hawke's calls at first, you really have to be here to get it all. What are you doing, Weggner? Wigner! I watch a lot of baseball. And I remember hearing the Baseball Tonight podcast interview that Buster Only did with Hawk. And I was like, okay, this is starting. And this is, I listened to this well before I lived here. and I was like, okay, I'm starting to, I'm starting to absorb it. Because like White Sox baseball, unless you live here, you don't really get, it's a full thing. You have to live in Brewer with it every day. So being an outsider, I was like, like, when I moved here, I got the gist of it.

Before that, it took me, it took me a while, guys. Like, I don't know that, I do think, though, that D. Rose, for example, like Devin Hester, Jordan, obviously, Peyton, obviously, those guys, even when you weren't living here, you still. still would stop what you were doing to watch them. Oh, yeah. And once the NASPN caught on what Hawk was doing, like, I would characterize Hawk as one, like there's a ton of Homer broadcasters. I get it.

It's part of the bit. Probably like a top elite Homer broadcaster, right? Set the standard. Set the standard. He was, no, he was one of one. Territorial. And the irony of it, he's not from here. Like he, the ownership.

that he took of the white socks and Chicago, for that matter, is hilarious when you think about Hawk Harrelson and the Southern Twang and everything they came up with it and the catchphrases, it's just absolutely beautiful. What did he wear like a... There's a picture of when he was a GM

and he's wearing like a cowboy hat, right? He loves a white outfit ensemble, like a white cowboy hat, a white track suit, like white blazer. First thing I'm going to do, I'm a fire Tony LaRusa. That's right. He is not good. Little did we know. Yeah, it's a bit.

Tony LaRusa timing has never been good. It's never been good. God bless the 1983 White Sox, but that's about the only claim to fame. But I got to get rid of it. I'm going to tell you what the first thing I'm going to do? I'm going to read of that manager right there. We do not need that guy.

Coming up in halftime, we'll tell you all the cool thing. We will review the fun conversations that we've had so far on the program today. and I am seeing you here right now. What's so funny? What's going on over there? 3-1-2. I'll tell you what nobody's talking about. Josh Gideon, Tyson-Bajant.

Is that Robbie, Robbie Chirano? No, it's a 3-1-2. That's a Chicago number, not Robbie. Shout out to Robbie. Let me tell you about Robbie. Robbie Triano. Write that down. Bob Tree.

Bob Tree. Yeah, shout out. Hey, we're having his buddy. I was going to call him his boss. Is Parkins considered Triano's boss? I'm sure Parkins was, oh, yeah, I mean, obviously, I'm this boss. He's my subordinate. No, Robbie is Parkinson's large adult child, obviously.

That's true. There is kind of like a similarity between the two. What time is Park I want to do? One o'clock? One o'clock. I forget the Parkinson's, what I mean? Remember what time I'm going to be on? Come on, Grody.

Then we get a big Hall report from Herb Howard. Oh, man. It's going to, Adam Thielen's going to be on the show later as well. But on halftime, I see here that we have the number one restaurant for every generation but Gen Z. Okay, I guess we'll find out, we'll learn, we'll get ourselves educated next. It's halftime on Rehemi and Grody.

On 104-3, the score. What time is it? It's halftime. It's Roheem and Grotie on 104-3, the score. We talked baseball in the first hour of the show. How could he not talk about what's going on with Pete Crowe Armstrong and how sort of unprecedented it is relative to the expectations than the unknown of PCA?

We had to talk about the White Sox and the whole Tommy famness of it. Unfortunately, the White Sox for the first time since the 4th of July have dropped out of first place losing to the Guardians yesterday by the final score of 6 to 3. They're a half game back of the Guardians all of a sudden. We talked bears as well. We're just getting our feet wet when it comes to the Ben Johnson-Bron Flores matchup. It's about them and they're making it about them and that's okay. We love them. This just came across my timeline, and I wanted to say something because it's pretty great.

Nick Morowski posted, he's on Twitter. September is National Recovery Month. Today I celebrate eight years of sobriety. Creating White Sox content has been a much-needed outlet over the years, and today, thanks so many for their care, their support, and their courage. Everyone is battling something. Be kind, always. Go So congratulations, Nick.

That's pretty great. And to everybody who's in recovery, it's probably time. of people listening right now who are counting days and it works if you work it's sober i know that i count days too so congratulations to you as well and anybody listening i'm happy we can help pass the time with you amen keep recovering get to a meeting for crying out loud don't skip it don't skip your meeting all right so we have here leila the number one restaurants for every single generation um we could both play with this but i'll start with uh the baby boo Boomers?

Boomer! You're not a boomer yet. You're not. It's technically ages 65 and up. No, not anymore. In this world, to the kids, anybody, I think, what, over 37 is a boomer? We got a boomer. The kids make fun of us.

We're destroying the world. They can have making fun of us. It's fine. That's okay. I've accepted that. We're all boomers. I can't buy a house. I get it.

Make fun of me. Whatever. Yes, you can. All right. Number five, the favorite restaurants here. Number five for the boomers. The Outback Steakhouse. I like it.

Yep. Approve. Ding. How about Cracker barrel? You like yourself a Cracker Barrel? Number four? For Cracker Barrel for me, it's been a supply and demand issue. When I've had enough money to buy breakfast, I haven't been living in a place that had a

Cracker Barrel nearby. Okay. But I hear it's good. Cracker Barrel is fine. Like, I am not crazy about Cracker Barrel. Like, it is comfort. There is comfort. It's very gravy.

When I was making $30,000 a year in Austin, I was lucky to, like, buy a breakfast taco every now that I was not like thinking about. at Cracker Barrel and having a whole sit-down meal. Listen to this one. But I like the idea. Yeah, I did. That's funny you say that. I don't like going into debt.

I don't. It sucks. Oh, you're that person, huh? Living within my means? Yes, that's me. Perfectly. You and I are on the same page because I think the last, honest I got, the last time I went to a Cracker Barrel is when I worked in one of my first radio jobs and that was in Lincoln, Illinois.

That's the thing. They've always been in places where I like, wasn't like, okay, I'm making 18K a year. Can't really afford. Cracker Barrel when they've raised my rent up to 440 a month. The barrel, baby. Shout out to Lincoln, Illinois. I hope everybody's doing well there. And number three, Applebee's.

Who hasn't gone to Applebee's? Great commercials. Eating good in the neighborhood. Absolutely. Are they the baby back, right? Get my baby back. Okay, 3-1-2 says there's a Cracker Barrel that is a stone's throw away from the Naperville Top Golf.

Bring your gun. Hell yeah! All right, I went to this place. Number two on the boomers list. Yes. Texas Roadhouse. Went there for Christmas with my bestie. We go every year when I'm in town.

Really? That's awesome. Went there for my dear niece Madeline's birthday this year. You did. That's right. To the house. They got that good bread, right? Yeah, loves me some Texas Roadhouse.

And then number one, man. Number one, number one. I went to this place so many times with my high school girlfriend. It was our place. And it was like you had to have a few bought. Like it was special. Olive Garden, ladies and gentlemen. Too-t-Jude. Heck yeah.

Yep, you won't hear me hating on Olive Garden either. The breadsticks. I usually have a bottle of the olive garden dressing that you can buy at the jewel in my fridge, the salad dressing. Oh, yeah? Yeah, I like it. It is so good, yeah, the endless breadsticks, the salad. You're right, no, that's worth the purchase. I have other stuff, but that's just one of the things.

That is a good thing, Leila. Gen X, same restaurants here. Just a cut. Yeah, it's Cracker Barrels number five. Yes. So I think that has to do with age. Maybe the older you get, the higher up cracker barrel gets on the list. No more cracker barrel you are.

Marshall loved him some cracker barrel too. Yeah, he did. He did. Outback Steakhouse four. Marshall loves breakfast. So that's also part of the deal. I love breakfast too, actually. I do love a good breakfast.

Now millennials break in with a different combo. Give it to us. As I am one. Olive Garden is number one. I'm going to start at the top. Okay. Texas Roadhouse is number two. Number three, the favorite of the Lailaheimie House.

household chilies. Ah, yes. And again, it was a supply and demand thing. It was just near me, and we went all the time. Hey, man, like, I always say this about, like, we know Chicago is one of the great restaurant cities in the world. Sometimes you just got to go to cheesecake factory. Sometimes you just got to go to Chili.

Sometimes you've got to have Olive Guard. Sometimes you can order a dominoes. It's okay. Did I go to Cheesecake Factory for one of my 20-some-odd birthdays in my toys? Yes, yes, I did. Nothing wrong with that at all. Number five is Applebee's, which was a Friday night favorite. of the kids when we were all in school.

Yeah, cheesecake factories up there for me. But yeah, Chili's was always like my number one. And it's probably also because it was based Brinker, who owns Chili's or did at the time, at least was based in Dallas. So maybe there was always a Chili's is the point. I think one of the reasons I count days is because when I think of Chili's, I think about drinking because they always had like, and they probably still do like.

Oh, the margaritas with the little test tube shot in them. Yeah, but also super large beers too. Like here's a 32. two ounce of beer for $2. Go ahead. Enjoy that. The Southwest Egg rolls, the salad, the Santa Fe salad. Yeah.

Chili's and me get along. All right. It's a little different here for Gen Z. Gen Z. Ready? Oh, oh, number five. We were just talking about the Cheesecake Factory. Go off, Gen Z.

I'm so Gen Z. Number four. You've Gen Zee. Oh, and this is great, too. I think I am Gen Z because Texas Roadhouse Four. And then three, a place that when I was going through my fat lifestyle, at number three, wingstop, man. Wingstop was the place that I would Uber eat more than any other place.

The barbecue wings. Oh, so good. Delish. They fatten me up real good. I was like ready to play offensive line for the Bears. The fat lifestyle's fun. I'm not going to lie to you. Well, it was just the fact that you were Uber eating things that were like within a half a

block of you. That's part of the lifestyle though. You can't exercise when you're fat. So Layla would say I'd be like, I pay too much in rent to have this thing. Uber Eats. Let me get off my arse and go get it myself. Yeah, Marshall used to crush me for that. I would order stuff from around the block. Oh, Marshall treated himself with some Uber Eats too. Well, that guy was a vending machine fiend too. He would just load up on tweaking. But you know why he didn't want to add his house. So then he would just like get at the vending machine. Smart move.

Shout out to Mars Hall. And then number one for the Gen Ziers is Chili's. So good for the Gen Zers. He changed it up just a little bit. And it's perfect because we are in the era of fast food wings. and that was not the case, certainly, when I was growing up. It's still kind of a new revelation relative to decades, I suppose. I got to say, though, I got to say that for those of you who hate on Olive Garden, there's a reason it's considered the nation's most popular restaurant. I mean, I get it. Like, you just don't think of it.

I love so many restaurants in this city. But you can also like some other stuff. You can have range. Nobody's stopping you. It's okay. Nobody's grading you here. You know what I was thinking about, like, Like what's the restaurant I've been to the most in Chicago or in its suburbs, like throughout my life and my adult life?

It might be the place that I just went to over the weekend. Weber Grill. It's like a perfect, you know, I hate calling it middle of the road. Because it's not super expensive, but it's really good and it's very satisfying. And those aren't everywhere, by the way. It's true. If anybody wants to take issue with these rankings by generation, it was done by U.Gov. These are not lists we came up with.

UGov is the organization. Oh, you want to make sure where are we getting some serious pushback on this? You never know. You never know. Text us if you got a problem with this. Yeah, you got a problem with it. We'll text you right back is what we'll do. You'll hear that?

Weber rules awesome because it has a massive menu even though it doesn't look like it has a massive menu. I get the pork chips. There's a lot of options. I like all their sandwiches too. Yeah. And they make good grills, by the way. Yeah. I'm not allowed to have a grill at my.

building unless it's electric or else I'd have the cute little red Weber. Well, if you just buy a place, crying out loud, you know? All right, coming up next. They have just raised interest rates. How do you think that works for me? Oh, man. Also, the job. I'm a nomad in case you haven't noticed.

The job. The job. It's Laila's yob. Cracker barrel has a brunch. Okay. Huh. Okay, good to know. You're okay, Tanny?

You okay? Everybody around on the station. Tanny, you okay? after the white. Yeah, fine. Leave me alone. Oh, bad. Coming up next on Rehemi and Grotie,

it's time for five on it. We got five hot questions for you. Rehemi and Grotty on 104. The score. This hour on the score is being brought to you by Menard. Save big money at Menards. Bears. It's time for five on it.

Raheemian Grody. Bring you five topics on their minds today. On 1043, the score. I got five on it. Number one. was the best part of the Cubs 8-4 win over the Braves last night? I can't even go hipster on this one. You know I like to go hipster.

I'll just go right for it. It's Pete Crow Armstrong for me. Pete Crow Armstrong with nothing. He just keeps doing it. It's incredible. Three for four with two home runs. A triple. Why not throw a triple in there as well?

44 home runs on the season. Seventh time he has had a multi-home run game. It feels like it's like once a week lately. He breaks Billy Williams's record for a Cubs Leffey for home runs in a season. And it's just getting harder and harder to explain and to describe and to talk about because it's just absolutely fantastic. It would have been made even better if he would have stolen a base last night.

He's got 37 stolen bases now. So he's getting closer and closer to the 40-40 mark. So for me, it's just watching PCA continue to be amazing and wondering out loud as I did earlier. Is this guy like, don't rule out 50. I know there's not a lot of real estate. left here in the season for the Cubs, but I would not rule out 50 home runs

for this man, considering he keeps doing things every day that we didn't think he was going to do. I mean, let's honorable mention Alex Bregman almost hitting for the cycle. Absolutely. It speaks more to how well he's been hitting at the plate than anything else. Like the, what, past three months

of the year? I feel like he's been the guy who the Cubs hired him to be, so credit to Alex Bruegman. But yeah, it's PCA. that's it that's the lead and on any other day it'd be Alex Bregman it wouldn't even be close he was a single shy of the cycle was Alex Bregman yes and tried to hit for it and then

ended up with an out so should have laid down a bunt drag one down the third base line that's the question is bunting when you're hitting for the cycle and you're a single away bad form yes it's like bunting to break up a no hitter yeah it's horrible for him and Alex Bregman

he would never think of doing anything like that by the way entering Wednesday PCA and Alex Bregman were first and third in wins above replacement. Really? Per fan graphs during the second half. What's up everybody? Yeah, PCA were the four for the second. Four for the second half in wins above replacement.

Bregman, 3.1. God, the turnaround. So how about that? The turnaround. Can we give honorable, honorable mention to show to Imanaga? Yes. While we're at it. H.HM.

Yeah, six innings of one run ball featuring eight strikeouts, Zero walks, retired 11 in a row at one point. So I'm done with any other honorable mentions? Are we done? Yeah, Jim DeShay's. Did you make a J.R. Richard reference when J.R. R. R. R. Ritchie was pitching. Did I miss it? I feel like that would have been J.D.'s job at the time.

But then is it too obvious and you don't want to do it? Did you guys hear any? Because I didn't and I was kind of surprised. Oh, I thought you said he did. No, I thought you were, I thought you were said, did he do it? Yes, he did. No. Because he used to broadcast in Houston.

Correcto. Yeah, man. I thought that that was like an automatic. I was thinking it. I assumed that J.D. was thinking it, but I just didn't know. I love when you think like Jim DeShase. It doesn't happen often. Number two.

Boomer. On a scale of 1 to 10 on the confidence meter trademark, where would you rate your level of belief that the White Sox will end up winning the AL Central? Oh, no. I don't want to tell you. Say it. This is not the time not to say it. Layla, say it.

This is not the time, not the talk. That's in the Irishman. Say it. Say it. I'm out like a three. I don't, their schedule is going to help them out, but after what happened in Cleveland this series,

I'm just very worried. Very worried. Okay. No, I, I am not going to push back on that, although. They found a way, they found new ways to lose

in the series against the, the Guardians. The 7-6 game really messed with me. Petey Helping. Yeah. Petit Helping, by the way, he came into that game. yesterday's game.

Yeah, three-run bomb off Sean Newcomb in the six that made it five-three. I believe if I'm not mistaken, just going by memory listening to the broadcast, that was his, he had come into the game, P.D. Halpin, with one hit against lefties. One hit. So yesterday, like, you could say the White Sox blew it and all that. I don't know everybody was pissed off about, which I don't understand, by the way, while we're here. Wasn't it the first time the socks hadn't made in first place since July? July 4th, I think.

Yeah, that's, that's what. it hurts me on the inside. Yeah, the anger over Venable taking out Anthony K. I don't get that at all. Have people been watching Anthony K. pitch this year? I mean, I thought it was a little early. Anthony K. This year, and he did four innings, no runs, two hits. I guess that's what people are looking at. But he has not made it more than four and two thirds in any of his previous four stars because of ineffectiveness. sometimes as a manager you have to anticipate when your pitcher may be starting to go bad. So I don't, I feel like there's a lot of criticizing the manager

to criticize the manager when there have been plenty of times that were legitimate to criticize the manager, Will Vennable. But hear me out on this is that Anthony Kay is one of the guys who is getting innings for you. He's getting through innings. Yeah, but their bullpen is excellent. But their bullpen is even faltered. I mean, look at the opener they used for,

can you call the bullpen if he's an opener? for Sean Newcomb, Chris Murphy. Well, that was ridiculous. See, that's a legit criticism. Why Chris Murphy as your opener? That's good. Why not a pinch runner in that game? Was it Edgar Carroll?

Yeah, like that's a legitimate... Why are you not? Like, Sam Antanachi didn't deserve to not be in the lineup yesterday. Even against the lefty? He got used off the bench, but still... I just, I didn't like that. You know about the Sam Antanachi? Yeah, I wanted him in the lineup.

Okay. though he is the type of guy who I think deserves like just go out there the next day. You got this. Yeah. He ended up getting used off the bench for an appearance, but still. My confidence level is a little bit higher. I'm going to go. I'm going to say six.

Boy, I'm struggling, aren't I? I can't believe I'm saying three. Six point four because like I can't all of a sudden just turn my back on the white socks because of what they've done all year. And that is just when you think they're on the mat. And I get it. It's happened. They've fallen out of first.

place. They got four games against the Tigers who have been a really good team lately. I think there was five in a row they had won before losing to Toronto yesterday. They win the series against the Blue Jays who are competing for a wild card spot. They have swept Detroit twice this year. So I actually still feel pretty good about the White Sox winning, at least a 6.4 is worth of good for the White Sox winning the division. Okay, A47 says J.D. did reference J.R. Richard. Really? Good call. Good call by you is what I'm. I'm glad to see. I'm glad to see it's happening. Yeah.

Hey, man. Number three. Jim DeShay. Hey, man. Shout out, Mark. Hey, man. It's 5 out of 104.3. The score with Layla Rahimi and Mark Grotty. Here's question number three.

What was your biggest takeaway from Bears quarterback Caleb Williams' press conference yesterday? I would say something that he said that I really liked, actually. And it's very simple. He actually quoted Ben Johnson in talking about the, again, it's about Ben, Johnson and Brian Flores. The coaches have told you that. Caleb Williams called it a mental war. Yes.

Mental war came out of the mouth of Caleb Williams yesterday. I was like, you're damn right. This is mental war, sir. So I love that. And then the other thing I love that he said to, if I may do too, he was asked, what's your full potential of this offense? And he said it, score every drive. That's right.

Mm-hmm. That's it. I didn't think it was that entertaining of a Caleb Williams press conference yesterday just in general. And we're not entitled to entertainment but those are the two things that I thought were interesting. No, the mental war was great. That was good, wasn't it? It was. And what's funny is

he sounded like he didn't say a lot about the Drew Breeze conversation, but then he kind of did. You can tell that he's impressed by Drew Breeze. When he goes into his yards and how many times that he's had these remarkable seasons and just the consistency that he has had, And then he reiterated the find three more completions discussion in a way that I thought was showing that it clearly mattered to him, that conversation.

And Ben Johnson smiled about it and brought it up again yesterday. So that's good. That was something that I was like, oh, resonated with you. Yeah, he's now, that is his circle of trust now. Drew Breeze has entered it. He always, Caleb has always referenced Matthew Stafford as someone that he looks to. And Aaron Rogers is someone he looks to. And now here we go.

Drew, Drew Breezes in the circle. No, and I think that's a good thing, which is funny because considering on the other side of the coin, you had the Monday Night Football crew say that Caleb Williams didn't meet with them, Joe Buck and Troy Aitman. I left a big name out, by the way. Tom Brady is in that circle, too, of Caleb. And he actually talks. Tom Brady's a given.

Yeah. But I do think that that was, you could tell it just the conversation meant somebody to him. And Ben Johnson clearly wants to bring it up, so that's a good thing. Number four. Speaking of Tom Brady, Fox Sports NFL analyst, Tom Brady released his week one NFL power rankings. They are as follows. Number five, the Buffalo Bills. Number four, the Baltimore Ravens.

Number three, the San Francisco 49ers. Number two, your Chicago Bears. The Bears. And number one, the Super Bowl champ Seattle Seahawks. So do you agree with Tom? Brady's week one NFL power rankings. Yes. Yes. That's, that's, I'm sorry, but Seattle will continue to break my brain. The Seahawks went in there and they're like, yeah, we see your modern NFL whatnot and all your talk and your, your modern NFL whatnot. Yeah, your Jigameroe and

whatever else you want to say about this. Shout out to Ben Johnson with that weird phrase. He taught me a new word. I'm sure he's probably annoyed that we hang on his every word, but I don't know what to tell you. You're an interesting person and you're successful, so you have reason for us to listen. But you. Yes, I do think that this is the way, as we like to say, because the Bears did look more dominant in their win than the 40-nighters did, although the 40-nighters looked very good in Australia. You still have to factor in the part where the Rams thought that they were going to be smarter than everybody else in travel,

and that was part of the discussion. The Ravens with Declan Doyle as the O.C. looked very good. And then the Buffalo Bills also, and by the way, that might be a fun game tonight. We are on fun game watch on Thursday night football because of the NFL. the bills. So I think number one is, what's better? What's going to float your boat more? Is it going to be the 59 points that the bear scored? Or is it going to be the prevent you from doing anything you wanted to do today, Seahawks defense? Which one is it? And that's basically what this is. It has come down to pick your poison in the NFL. He's right. I think it's the Seahawks.

I don't understand. I don't understand why the Bears, they scored 59 points, why they wouldn't be number one in the power rankings. But guess what, Layla, it'll all be settled on Monday, November 2nd at 7.15 p.m. When the Chicago Bears are at the Seattle Seahawks. And I am proud to say, now I am, that on the Take the North podcast, When we did our silly predictions segment, I said that that will be a signature win for the Chicago Bears. A prediction has been made, and when I make predictions, they come to fruition.

But I'm okay with these power rankings here. Bills, Baltimore, San Fran. Bears at number two in week one of the NFL season? Okay, that's about where I had them. Five on it. Number five. Five on it. Final question here, I want to afford through the score.

the NCAA's FBS Oversight Committee said Wednesday that instant replay protocols were not followed on the second to last play of Western Michigan's controversial loss to Michigan on September 5th, Michigan 1, 1312 on a Hail Mary touchdown pass after Big 10 replay officials. Put one second back on the clock. The clock shone on the NBC broadcast showed zeros before quarterback Bryce Underwood's first Hail Mary was touched outside the back of the end zone. Had instant replay protocols been followed, the committee says the game's outcome would have been different, but the result cannot be changed. So fill in the blank, this statement from the NCAA's FBS Oversight Committee is disappointing, I guess, that it can't be changed at this point. I don't know what this does for my friends. And I have a lot of friends that went to Western Michigan, by the way. I don't know if you guys know this.

There are a lot of people that live in this city and our precious suburbs that went to Western Michigan. I know people don't think of it that way, but there's a lot of people that are hurting still that went to Western Michigan. The compassion of Mark Grody would never allow him to question if anyone even goes to that school. Never would happen. Never again anyway. It's crap. That's what this is. There's another word, yes.

garbage. Peter did stop swinging garbage. Stop swinging at cabbage. Carl and Antioch remains our unlikely soothsayer. Stop swinging a garbage. Listen, I'm just here to tell you that the future tellers and the fortune tellers of the world may not be the ones you expect. May not be Miss Cleo. Maybe Carl and Antioch. Stop swinging a garbage.

Indeed, he stopped swinging a garbage. And now he's going to be the MVP of the National League. When you think about it, that was we've never heard from him again. Are we sure he's real? We may have. I mean, I believe in him. We didn't scare Carl.

Carl. So in Carl's words, it's garbage. In Carl's words, as Lois Griffin. That's what this is. Because you're admitting you did wrong. And we all know in the moment that you were wrong, except for Michigan fans, which I get, okay, cheer for your school, whatever.

But the point is, unless you're going to do something where, like, Reggie Bush, you don't let him have the Heisman designation anymore. I don't really know what this does, except say you were wrong. But as usual, you were right for the people you wanted to be right for, which was the University of Michigan. Yep.

Take care of them. Western Michigan won the game. How are you going to make it up to them? You won't because you're the NCAA. That's it for five on it. Coming up next, I'm looking forward to this, man. I feel like this guy was just playing yesterday. Adam Thielen is going to join us.

The former NFL wide receiver for the Vikings all those years did play with the Panthers and Steelers. He's doing some radio these days. He's doing some serious XM NFL work, so we could talk to him all about the Vikings and Justin Jefferson and his battles with the bears through the years. I'm looking forward to this. Adam Thielen is next on Rahimi and Grotie on 104-3, the score.

Adam Thielen has broken a record that Randy Moss held. Yeah, Adam Thelan is legit, man. The Vikings trying to attack. Deep down the middle, Adam Thelan, running free of the secondary. Showing blitz, Rams bring it. Keenham gets rid of it, Thielen. Next to the moon. Touchdown!

No snap. Throes it, flag. For grabs and Thielen with a catch. Chazins, pressure, hit as he throws, go off. Fielin. He's got it. Waiting for a single touchdown. They're looking for the big one.

And it is a touchdown to who else but Adam Thielen. With Rahimi and Grody on 104-3, the score. It's Rahimi and Grotie on 104-3, the score. And yeah, we are very excited for the opportunity to talk to the former wide receiver, Adam Thielen. Yeah, he played for the Panthers and Steelers, but people around here certainly remember him playing for the Vikings and against the Bears. And he's doing radio these days at a high high. level on Sirius XM NFL

Radio Channel 88. Adam Thielen joins Rahimi and Grotie right now. Welcome to the score. Adam. Thanks for joining us, man. I appreciate that little intro made me want to maybe suit it up again and come down to Chicago this week. Oh, man.

See, the problem is we'd want you on the bear side since we're the one who created it, though. That's true. That's true. I don't know. That'd be a tough one for me. A lot lot of battles versus the bears and there in Soldier Field and having to wear the long cleats to be able to run and cut

on that surface. Oh man I'm so glad you brought that up and shout out to Tyler Buterbaugh. He is the one that put that open together for you. Maybe we could even send that to you Adam Thielen. I'm sure that you would appreciate that. I'm thinking about your games against the bears and wearing the long cleats and I remember always having conversations because I

covered the bears as a beat reporter on the daily. I was in their locker room and I remember always talking to Kyle Fuller's and Prince of Mukamara about you, and they always had great insights on you, and specifically your ability to run routes and to get open. Obviously, what do you remember going up against those guys and Soldier Field, and why were you such a good route runner?

Yeah, those guys were, they made a challenge on me. They were very patient. You could tell that they studied the game, that they kind of knew what I was good at and how to kind of try to take that away. So it was always a great battle, and I knew going into those weeks against those guys that, like, I had, I had to go. And I had to be at my very best because they kind of, they had, they had things that they knew that could help them take away what I was really good at. But, yeah, I think for me, I wanted to be, from the moment I got into NFL, like, I wanted to be the well-rounded receiver. Like, I didn't want to be just a guy that ran good routes, like just a guy who's a speed guy or this or that.

I wanted to try to be as well-rounded as possible because in my opinion, you can't just have one of those skill sets. I think a lot of times people saw my game or maybe saw the stats like, oh man, like such a great route runner. And it's like, well, you can't just be a good route runner and have success in this league.

Like you have to be fast. You have to be smart. You have to be physical. There's so many things. Because again, like those guys are studying you. If like you're just a good route runner, like they can do things to take. that way. They can just press you and they can be physical and they can hold you and like you can't be

a good route runner. If they play off coverage now like you can win by being a good route runner because they're not rerouting you. There is timing and and things like that and you can win at the top of your route. But for me, like I wanted to make sure that no matter what they try to take away that I could have something to combat that and and be able to still win. So that was always my focus. And in every offseason, it was like, okay, like I need to get a little bit faster so I can I can take the top off the defense. I need to do this or that to kind of rework my game to make sure that I was at the best of my best. And really, I think, helped me play 13 years to be able to do it for a long time and to be able to play outside, play in the slot, kind of do a lot of things and allow the

offense coordinator to move me around. Yes, stay employed. So if you're giving advice to, say, people training, you know, for that exact thing to be well-rounded, what did you do in the off-season? What did you work on to do that? Yeah, I mean, I think, having a plan, right? I had a really, I had meetings right when the season was over with my trainer and be like, hey, like, what are we going to attack and how are we going to do that? Now, that's not my profession to figure out that plan, but it was like, okay, let's have a meeting, let's talk about, okay, this is what I saw, this is what you saw, this is what the team is telling me that I need to get better at. Like, now you go put your plan together to help me be that guy. And so he would

kind of come with this plan of like, okay, like, we're going to be more explosive and or we're going to get, we're going to really work on the top end speed. And so he would put a strength program slash, you know, running program together for me to be better at that. And the best thing for me was when I would have that three months of training come back to OTAs and I would feel it on the field. So all that work I did. And to be honest, really without ever touching a football field or being in cleats, Like this is all like off the field training stuff that I saw translate to the field. And once I saw that, it was like, all right, let's keep doing this. And let's find a way to every off season to attack something.

And sometimes it's different, sometimes the same stuff. But once you feel the difference and you feel all that hard work pay off, it's pretty easy to be bought in. Talking to the two-time pro bowler, former wide receiver Adam Thielen here on Rahimi and Grotie on 1043, the score. All right, man, Bears and Vikings this weekend at Soldier Field. And let's keep the wide receiver theme going. What makes Justin Jefferson great? Well, I think all the things we just talked about, he's the master at everything. He can run.

He can change direction. He has unbelievable body control. He has great hands. All the things that you, like, let's say if I'm, you know, I'm on ESPN and I'm building my top receiver on the screen, like he could be at every one of those things like he's smart he's a hard worker like you look at all the things that it it takes to be a really good receiver and he has those qualities so that's why that's the only way you can be that consistent for that long when everybody knows you're going to get the ball you're going to have targets and they still can't stop you like you have consistently

thousand yards thousand yards thousand yards like there's there's something more than just being a good route runner or good hands like you got to have a all of it. And he's a hard worker. He's a great guy. He's a great teammate. So those are the guys you cheer for and you hope that they have success. Adam, I saw you in the NFL live crew spending some good time on the

Ben Johnson-Bryon-Fluarez matchup. What excites you the most about this? It's exactly what I said on NFL live. It's like this amazing chess match between two masterminds that are just really good at what they do. And the

best part of it is they're both going to have this plan that they think is like, all right, this is my way to stop them. But they're both doing that and they're both really good at their job. So again, it's going to be this chess match throughout the game that they're going to have to adjust and be deceptive and to make them feel like, okay, this is what you think I'm going to do, but I'm going to do this off of it. And just that little chess match just gives me, man, I'm fired up right now. Like you guys got me fired up because it's just that to kind of see how that plays out

in the game. And again, that's why the NFL is so great, because you don't know I was going to play out. You really don't week in, week out. And when you have two guys like that that are going against each other, it's going to be really fun to watch. Okay. Like, can you give us some examples? I joke that Flores is a master of disguise and Ben Johnson will build on concepts. How do you see something playing out? If Flores is showing a blitz look or if you see something offensively you expect out of Ben Johnson, what do you anticipate examples-wise? Yeah, I think, I think, you know, if I'm Flores, I'm looking at like, okay, what is Caleb Williams really good at?

What is Ben Johnson really good at? And then saying, okay, how can we attack their weaknesses? In my opinion, you just have to cover up those running lanes for Caleb Williams. You know, he's so good in the pocket as a passer, but he's even better when he gets outside the pocket and has the ability to still run or pass, which a lot of quarterbacks, when they scramble, it's like either they're looking to pass like an air and or they're, you know, maybe more like, you know, Mitchell Trubisky where like when he, when he scrambled, like, he's all run, right? And so Caleb's got the balance of both where he's

really good at both. So if you can cover up those lanes and not allow him to scramble and to kind of, you know, get those easy 10, 15-yard runs from the quarterback, like those are just, they destroy a defense. So I think that's number one. I think from the Ben Johnson side, it's like, okay, like, you got to have a plan. You got to have a plan. You got to have a plan. for what he's for that cover zero the all out pressure and then but but most teams they either bring all at zero or they kind of play their defense where what flores does is he brings zero zero zero and then he pops out of it and then he and then he makes it look like zero again and he brings it and then he makes it look like zero and he pops out and so having a plan for both where where you don't have to

check because at the end of the day if you go up to the line of scrimmage and you say all right If you see cover zero, check, right? Well, now Flores knows that. Like, that's what he's so good at. He loves when an offense gets up there and they go check, check, check, because they have a play for cover zero. And then all of his guys look to each other and say, we're dropping out, right?

And so I think you have to have plays that can handle both. And I think that's what Ben Johnson's really good at. What about the Kevin O'Connell side of things? You obviously played for him. What do you think he will do when you look at this matchup to potentially exploit the Bears defense? which was exploited in a big way in week one? Yeah, I think just playing their offense, right?

I think he's made an emphasis to run the football. And so I think he's going to take another step on that. You know, they did that really well against the Packers of just, like, sticking with it, even if they're not getting explosive runs every time or these big runs. But, like, they know that that's how you create space for Justin Jefferson and to really run the offense they want to run and to be explosive. and so I think you just see them kind of build on that.

Okay, now let's take it to the next level. Let's try to get early first downs and then get into our run game and then be able to run the play action, the keepers and all the things we want to do from an explosive past game standpoint, but you have to get early first downs to do that. So I would imagine that they'll be a little bit more aggressive on first downs to try to get those first downs early instead of waiting until third and six or third and five

and kind of playing the long game. So that's kind of what I'm looking for, and I think they're going to really stick to that run game. Do you have a preference in quarterback? Like if all things were equal, like Kyler Murray, obviously we don't know if he's healthy, versus Carson Wentz, who did have three touchdowns and the win over the Packers?

Which quarterback you think is better suited for this Vikings team after seeing Wentz? Well, I think they made that decision in training camp, right? Like they chose Kyler Murray to be their starter, and there's multiple reasons for that, you know, and I'm not in those meetings every single day or at every single practice, but from my perspective,

I think it just gives you a wider playbook, a guy that can still play on time and do all the things they want to do, but when the reeds aren't there, instead of taking a sack or throwing the ball away, he can just go move a little bit, and sometimes it's not a first down. Like even once he got settled in that game,

before he got hurt, he was able to get like five yards and make it a third and three instead of a second and eight or second and ten or sorry third and ten or third and eight he was able to get five yards and sometimes they weren't first down but but just be able to give yourself it's like Kayla Williams right like sometimes they're not like these big explosive runs but now you're ahead of this change you have easier plays that you're running on offense that the play caller is not like oh shoot I don't have too many plays for third and 12 and I think that's what Kyler presents so I would imagine once he's fully healthy again he'll be back out there last.

thing for you, man. Who is the most challenging Bears defender that you can remember in your time going up against the Bears? Whether you went up against him or just from an objective standpoint, a Bears defender, you looked and said, oh man, that dude is good. We got a game plan for him.

That's good. For some reason, we never really had a whole lot of success against the Bears. And even when the records were lopsided as, you know, we were good and they weren't so good. Like, man, like I just look at like the team defense.

I remember vividly, like, and I'm probably not answering your question that you want to, but I remember vividly, like, in the huddle so many times and I'm looking across, I'm like, these guys are different. Like, they are massive human beings. Like, they're de-line, like, you're just looking over there and you're in a TV timeout, whatever, and you're like, those guys are twice the size of our offense alignment. Like this could be a long... Like an Akeem Hicks, maybe.

Like, at Akeem Hicks, you're looking over there at a guy like that, yeah. And they're athletes. Not only was a keen, like, you know, massive human being, but like, you could move. Like, when he wanted to, he could move and be athletic. And those were just like,

you just knew you didn't have time. And then you get the crowd involved and all that. Like, man, being a soldier field, like, I don't know, one of the toughest places I played in for sure. Nice. Adam, thank you so much for your time. We appreciate your work. And we appreciate your resume, too.

Thanks, man. All right. Thanks, guys. Take care. Thanks, Adam. Yeah, that is Adam. Good stuff from the former NFL wide receiver for the Vikings, Panthers, and Steelers. Adam Thielen can be heard on Sirius XFXM NFL Radio, Channel 88.

Also, you can now listen to the score on SiriusXM, Channel 96, and wherever you go on the SiriusXM app, check out SeriousXM.com slash sports pass over for more details on how to subscribe to SiriusXM on all the new sports plan. I don't know about you, Layla. Slash Sports Pass, yeah. I've heard people, I've had people texting me from around the country that, hey, Grotie, we're listening to you guys on Sirius XM. It's pretty cool.

Yes, I had a buddy in L.A. Yeah. And I was like, what? Thanks. Surprising. Appreciate that. Thank you very much. Coming up next, Chris Collinsworth.

This is great. Responding to, I know you love this. The discourse has continued. It's not going to stop. The PFF discourse is bad. Backlash over the P. FF ranking Caleb Williams as the 16th best quarterback in the NFL on Sunday with an overall grade of 64.6. We'll discuss that next on Rahimi and Grody. You're going to get mad.

On 104-3, the score. Rahimi and Grohemi and Grohury. My name is Laila Rahimi, and I love sports, and I don't care who knows. We like sports and we don't care who knows. Midday, 10 a.m. 2 on the score. How dare anybody after week one where the Bears scored 59 points. and their quarterback was 21 of 29 for 269 yards and two TDs in the air. A couple TDs on the ground. That man's name is Caleb Williams. How dare anybody claim that he's only the 16 best quarterback in the league

as pro football focus criminally did with an overall grade of 64.6? Are you mocking this? Just a little bit. Just a little. Like, I get it. I understand it. It's classic Chicago. It really is.

It's not just us. I know. This is the discussion if you're online about sports. I know. I get it. Like, nobody can handle 16 for Caleb Williams. It's game one. I can't.

Normally, I, normally I'm a little more practical, but I also agree with the people who get on to us about our conversations. It's funny that it's multiple days, this story. I can't say I'm surprised. If you're chronically online about sports, this is, this is it. This is the whole discussion this week. Now we're going to play Chris and Jack Collinsworth. Chris Collinsworth started pro football focus, right?

Well, he was one of the investors. And you know what's funny is, I don't know if he was the capital that made it become what it is, but NBC had a subtle change. I don't know if you noticed this, but you could tell him the Seahawks game, the Seahawks Patriots game, they were putting PFF rankings on player were previous to this season, putting them on. player names. You know, they'd show somebody, it would be name, jersey, number, position, and some other

stat. And then on the bottom, it would be a PFF ranking. Well, they have taken those off. Interesting. And now it is your hometown. And to be clear, too, and I guess I should have educated myself on this, but they have sold their shares, right? Chris Collinswood no longer has a stake in that.

Is that correct? Yeah, Brady says that is correct. But he still has some sort of relationship with that. He does. So in 2014, he bought a majority interest in the service and then did in 2026. So this year, sold it. All right, to the audio. So on the pro football focus football show, Chris and Jack Collinsworth explained what they look at in the PFF ranking for Caleb Williams. So the Chicago Bears had a historic day on offense. Here we go. They had a historic day. day on offense, right? Caleb Williams ends up with a lower grade than people would have liked. You just got done going through the specific plays. What would you have said, forget about his

grade, what would you have said about his day watching it back? I would have probably said what the fan said. He had a terrific day. I mean, he did. The big plays were plays that we gave him double pluses on. So he had three of those double plus grades, 1.0 in our system. He had seven negative plays. One of those was a triple negative that didn't count. So I understand why there's a controversy. So there was a play on the goal line where he threw an interception. A defensive lineman backed out, he threw it right to him.

Never saw him, right? Now, sometimes you could say, well, Aaron Rogers, when there's a penalty on the play, he throws it up and only positive things can happen. So how could you possibly get a negative? It wasn't somebody jumped off sides. It was somebody lined up off sides on the defense. And so I don't think anybody knew there was a flag thrown on the play until after the play. So he did, in fact, throw the interception.

He did. And it was a bad one. And it was a negative 1.5 on our scale. After that, he had six other negative plays. He had three double positive plays, the touchdown wheel route to commit, which was brilliant, right? the scramble left, diving catch from Kleefe Raymond, and the scramble run for the touchdown. Those were the double positive plays. And he had, you know, a bunch of other, whatever, nine other positive plays and that. So I'm just going to go through the negative plays.

We talked about the interception. He took a sack. When he was bootlegging out, there was a guy in the flat five yards away from him. He could have just dumped it down and had a positive play, took a sack instead, took a delay game penalty. That count. against the quarterback, threw a wheel route way behind the receiver going down the field. He had a crossing route. He threw behind. That was the cold combat one. I just want to stop you real quick. So that's 13 minutes to play. Caleb to commit. He's lined up at fullback. He's running down the sideline. He's wide open. Worth mentioning, Darnell Wright does get beat a little bit on the play. There was a little bit of pressure. Could that have affected it? Maybe still miss the

throw. But that's the play you're referencing. But a minor negative, just like one. slight negative, not the big one, which was the interception. Correct. He threw a slant in the end zone too far in front. That was lovely. He could argue the defense was in a good position, so not a horrible throw. You want to argue that one? I could argue that one, too.

Yep. He scrambled and threw short to a wide receiver who was coming back hard to him, but it bounced and came into the receiver. So those are the negative plays. Nothing extraordinary, and I get it. And people are so excited in Chicago right now. They should be. They should be.

I mean, this is really fun. What's happening in Chicago. They've been down in the dumps for a while. They got a coach. They got a quarterback. They're pumped up. They're protecting their guy. God love them.

I probably would be too. I kind of like their attitude right there, did that help you at all? Did that satisfy you happier or no? If it's in a vacuum. But the problem is Drake May, for example, is another textor pointed out, is Rang Tire. Drake May threw three interceptions in the fourth quarter.

So make it make sense to me. What was he? He was higher. Higher than Kayla. Yeah. And that's the point here is that you can downgrade the negative plays. But why do I feel like you're just arbitrarily putting this in? Ultimately, that interception didn't count.

Ultimately. Drake May's three did in the fourth quarter. You know who I bet hated this as well? The guy that predict. is predicting that Caleb Williams will win MVP. His name is Danny Parkins. He used to work here. We're doing a lot for the hot take industrial complex this show.

What with the Collinsworthis? What do you call that? Collins Worths. The Collins Worth. Yeah, that's a that's difficult. Worthis's. The Worthy. Danny Parkins of Fox Sports won these days.

First things first. He joins us next. The Parkinson's Z's will join Rahimi and Grotie next on 104. The score. The score! I could do Stephen A's job, guys. It's not that far. Danny Parkins.

Danny Parkins. Chicago Boy. QB1 party. All are invited. Host of Fox Sports 1's first thing first. Our old friend Danny Parkins said that you have to do a bad take audits, where you audit all of your bad takes, and then you could find for your bad days. Danny can't get any sleep if he does that to himself. He won't be sleeping at night.

Danny's up all night, Ben. That's how he got that show on FS. Hey, Pat, he's on no does. He's on no dose right now. Going over to that page. The Bears, plenty of reason to doubt them. Caleb Williams, no. Former host of 670 the score before he abandoned us.

That's the Caleb Williams custom, baby. Jersey number one is going to the Raptors. You guys made it seem like a Chicago Bears fans. We had our guy. Danny Parkis, all these guys. Danny Parkins on 1043 the score. Wait. Parko is a former score star,

and we always look forward to talking to our guy here on Rahimi and Grotie on 1043, the score. That's right. Check Danny out on First thing's first OT from 4 to 5 p.m. every day on FS1. And Danny is joining us on our video stream to watch. Search the score Chicago on Twitch and on YouTube, and that is where you will see Parko right now. Danny, boy!

What's going on, man? Roady, Layla, it's great to be here. It's great to be back. It is true. I lose a lot of sleep, Olin, Pat. That was a good line, doing my own take audits of my bad pics. That's an excellent point. I'll be back in Chicago for 20 hours this weekend, by the way.

The brain up 5K is Saturday morning, Lake Villa Park down there on the lakefront. I'm going to raise a bunch of money. So hope some people will come out. we're going to do the check presentation from the Radiothon, $805,000. So looking forward to be back in Chicago for just a few hours this weekend. Why would you not stick around for the Bears game and put on like a ridiculous outfit and bring all sorts of attention to yourself at's Holder Field, Danny, why? Yeah.

Well, I do that only for Bears Packers playoff games. Going to NFL games kind of sucks. I don't enjoy it. I like to watch all of the games. And, you know, I got to get back. I got to coach Eli's four-year-old T-ball Sunday mornings. And so I got a few weekend things the next couple of weeks where I'm going to be going away. So I've got to minimize the time away when I can.

So going to Vegas in a couple of weeks, got parents weekend in stores, Connecticut for nephew Jack in a couple of weeks. I got a lot going up. Okay. That's an East Coast hack, since the games don't start until one. That's good time management out of you. It is, except Owens games are at 2 p.m. on Sunday. And so I am confronted with the like, do I go and then just be the unattentive dad who's like watching games on my phone? Or do I not go and have Steph FaceTime me for his at bat?

So his first one is the Sunday, so we'll figure it out. Oh my gosh. This is a debate. This is a parenting conundrum. Yeah. I mean, listen, I'll be honest, like, for my, I have to watch the NFL. Like, it's not great. And so I don't, I don't want him to like, I think he understands that like daddy watches football for work or whatever. And so I, what I don't want is him to see me there and then see me distracted. So, you know, so I feel like that would send a worse message. Yeah. So I'm going to be picking and choosing based on the slate and the quality of the games, which games I attend versus which ones. I don't. I coached him last year, so I'm coaching Eli this year. So, you know, we'll figure it out. It is the part of the job that's hilarious to explain to people. Like, I have to watch,

I can't go out to me because I have to watch the Cubs and White Sox. Well, just come on. We'll put the game on the TV. No, it doesn't really work that way. Like, you can get away with that sometimes. Yeah, I will for a regular season baseball game. Well, yeah, yeah. But not, but not the NFL. And I understand that. And Danny, while we're talking about audits, the audit so far, so good for you as it pertains to Caleb Williams. How much did you enjoy what you saw in game one from the Bears of 5937 went over Carolina starring Caleb Williams, the 16th best quarterback in the league? You know, I just follow the leader. I just follow Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams, and they didn't

seem all that impressed by it. I loved the quotes that came out of it so much. They were like, we should have had more points. We left points on the board. That'll be a our worst game all year. Yeah, the worst game. You got a really great defense over there. It was so great. I did a thing yesterday on the show. If the Bears had done that

to the Eagles on Monday night football in two weeks and all of those same quotes would have came out of the game, even if they are truthful. Like they did leave points on the board in the first half. Luther Burden had the fumble on the opening drive. And Caleb Williams was talking about the operations. It'll be the worst game of the year.

And Dave Canales did not take it as an insult to their defense when he said that you have a great defense after he hung 59 on him. But if that would have been a standalone national TV game and all of those quotes would have come out after a 59 point ass beating that they put on another NFL team, everyone in the world would be talking about the arrogant bears, bulletin board material, and how the bears are the villain. And so I obviously loved it. And I loved how understated relatively they were to the performance.

But you're right, Danny. We've talked about it too. We talked about it last year. Caleb Williams, don't give him a chance in the fourth quarter. He grew up idolizing Aaron Rogers, this idea of who Aaron Rogers was to the league. And now that he's in his last year, I do think he was one of the great villains of the league who was left. I do feel like you do. I've brought it up too. The bears have the chance to be that team. You don't want to see him coming even with a multi, multi digit lead in the fourth quarter. We saw that happen. with the Packers? I do think the villain thing is taking shape here. Yeah, I think right now they're still very likable. They're very interesting. Their defense isn't very good. So, you know, I'm not sure how many people look at them as a legitimate like Super Bowl contender yet. But there's no question that if and when the Bears lose someone on the other team, especially depending on who the opponent is, is going to have some sort of postgame comment about, oh, I thought it was going to, I thought you were going to be the 13 Broncos, or I thought we were going for, you know, blowouts and shutouts and like the all-time wins record. Like, Ben Johnson is arrogant. He is cocky. And I say that as someone who can

border on arrogant and cocky. Like, I, I mean it as a compliment. I mean it as a compliment. It is a compliment. Like, if you think you are great and you are great and you perform at a great level, it's okay to call your shot and walk the walk if you can, like, talk to talk if you can walk the walk. okay, I respect that in high performers. And, like, that's what Ben Johnson is. Like, he doesn't want to be, like, included in the conversation of the best coaches in football. He wants to be considered the best coach in football. He doesn't want to be, like, among the best offenses.

He wants to be the best offense. Like, it's, that is how you achieve greatness by holding yourself to completely unrealistic standards. And then even if you fall short of them, you still exceed everyone else's normal standards. What do you think about the thinking about, I should say, as a particular, to the Bears defense and the part and the dirty little secret that none of us really wants to talk about and that is the Bears defense. I mean, listen, I think we should talk about it. Like, they were, they were in on Max Crosby.

They were reportedly in on Vita Vaya before he resigned in Tampa. Like, you know, the Bears, if the Bears defense is just awful, then they're not going to do anything. If the Bears defense is merely bad and they feel like they're a player or two from at being average and good enough with an elite offense, I think Ryan Poles will go out and do something. Like, you know, is that Joey Porter Jr. from the Steelers? Is that Kvon Tibido from the Giants?

Is it Max Crosby? If he has a good first four to eight weeks for the Raiders, like there are names that, you know, I can point to that would help the bears that would help any defense. You know, I think the bills are going to be doing the same thing. I think the Cowboys might be doing the same thing. I think the Bengals might be doing the same. The Bears won't be the only team looking for a defensive mercenary to come in for a team with a high-level offense this year.

But, you know, it's not going to – like, if Jalen Johnson plays like that again, like it's going to be moot. Like, he needs to be much better. Tyreek Stevenson needs to be much better. So, you know, the guys who you pay that are in their prime on defense – and I know Tyreek Stevenson hasn't gotten his big payday yet, but they used a big draft pick on him. Like, the guys who are supposed to be your main guys need to be good. and a lot of them were not good in the opener in week one. Danny, I also want to ask you about all the props that you had.

I've seen a lot of clips from First Things First this week. What was the favorite for you? Was it the sunglasses? Was it the chain? Was it the blazer with the ice shards? Like, what's going on here? Well, the blazer of the ice shards, I don't know anything about because that's Iceman. I don't know Iceman.

I've never been in the same room as Iceman. I can't believe that Kevin Wilds, Nick Wright, and Chris Brousard continue to get Iceman on the show. I am very jealous of them having Iceman, where his superpower is identifying all forms of disrespect towards Caleb Williams and the Chicago Bears, and he's a great defender of all the greatness that is Caleb Williams. So I can't wait to meet him, but I haven't had an opportunity to yet. And listen, Lela, you know, like, I don't take what we do. I don't take what we do seriously. And I don't think that anybody else should either. So, yeah, whenever I can introduce some historiotics, some pranks, some hijinks, some props,

and use Fox's spectacular prop budget, I'm going to push that to the limit. I did love that. Please tell Ice Fan that I am a fan. I can't wait. I can't wait to me. I can't wait to me. I did hear that that costume took weeks of preparation. And because I heard that those icicles are stitched into the fabric.

of the suit. So it's quite an elaborate outfit, so I'm told. But again, I haven't seen it in person yet, so I can't really confirm that. As a football junkie, what excites you the most about the Brian Flores Ben Johnson matchup? How much of a mismatch it is in favor of Ben Johnson? Snap. Tell that to Ice, man. Hell yeah, man. Well, I mean, honestly, I think it's a little silly.

Like, I think Brian Flores is obviously very good. He deserves another head coaching job. But, I mean, Jordan Love destroyed them for the first two and a half quarters of that game and then fell apart. Ben Johnson gives Caleb Williams the answers to the test. Ben Johnson is one of the best coaches in football. Ben Johnson is a significantly better coach than Brian Flores. Caleb Williams against the Blitz since Ben Johnson has been his coach. So week one of this year and all of last season.

He has 1,601 passing yards against the Blitz. He is a pass rating of 107.1 against the Blitz. He is 8 yards per pass against the Blitz, and he has 19 touchdowns against three interceptions against the Blitz. All of those are top seven in the NFL over that time frame against the Blitz. And the only player with more touchdowns against the Blitz is Matt Stafford, who won the MVP. So, like, Blitz Caleb Williams, 78% of the time he will put up 35 on you. Like, I am not concerned about that at all. And Ben Johnson is 5.

against Brian Flores, even going back to his days with the Detroit Lions. So he has matched up well against him, the number say, and they can get a lot more specific than that as well. Danny, I know you skip over baseball as much as you possibly can. That's not true. That's a little true. Well, I know. I just want to see if you're spreading the good word of Pete Crowe Armstrong, who had another two home runs last night into triple-44 home runs, 37 stolen bases. Are you making sure that everybody gets a little, little PCA and them just about every day out there. I've done a monologue.

First things last on PCA for MVP a while ago. You know, we do a weekend update style thing where I slide onto the desk in a Cubs jersey at the end of Nick Wiles and Brew Show before I come on for first things, first overtime when PCA has a big game. Good work. And I do 30 to 45 seconds on PCA. Yeah, listen, I mean, you guys have talked about it at nauseam, but it's the idea of like a player basically just deciding, I want to have.

have plate discipline now. And doing it in the middle of a season is so absolutely obscene and insane and just not how it's supposed to work. I thought the piece about, you know, the new batting stance and like the feet being closer together and the bat being a different spot on the shoulder and everything, in the Wall Street Journal by Jared Diamond was really, really good. But it's just a, it's a spectacular natural athlete who has, you know, where it's clicked. And the game has slow down for him and he's going to end up running away with the MVP award amidst Shohei Otani's run as the best player in the sport. So it's a pretty incredible thing. Well, and also, Danny, we were bringing this up earlier on the show. He's become must-watch

TV every time he's at bad. I feel the same way about Caleb Williams. We do. And then you start to think, well, this is a special time where you've got two athletes in town who you feel that way about. Then you start to think about the rest of the country and that's not very common. You know, I thought about maybe Matt Stafford and Shohei Otani if that combination with Shohei were more healthy. If Aaron Judge were more healthy, perhaps in New York, he and Jalen Brunson. But to you, who somebody studies the national sports scene every day, I wonder what you think. Yeah, I mean, you know, Jailad Brunson is a god in New York at this point. So, so, you know, Aaron Judge and Brunson is definitely a good one.

You know, Stafford, I don't know if he is like that show. stopping athlete. He clearly was the MVP last year, right? So having Shohei and Stafford have two MVPs in a town is amazing. And you could add Luca to that mix. You know, I think the Sixers are going to be a traveling circus this year out of Philadelphia. And those are rabid fans that now just saw the Knicks get their title. So that's one that would come to mind. Like LeBron's going to be a fascinating figure there once again. But yeah, I mean, it's a, that, video and that scene of all of those guys sitting in the first row behind the Cubs dugout was amazing. I was actually just looking at it this morning. Caleb Wilson's the favorite for rookie of the year, even though he was the fourth pick in a star-studded draft, which surprised me a little bit. Probably we'll still bet it. But it was like, yeah, it's a good time to, you know, a million people have made the point before, but it's a good time to be a Chicago sports fan. Can I ask? ask one more question about the Bears?

Yeah, absolutely. What you got for us, buddy? Do you, well, do you think people, like, are people giving the greatest offense of all time thing credence? Are they taking it seriously in Chicago? I think, yeah. I think after the 59 points, yeah, you like, Bears fans, hell yes, they are. Like, this has been, I don't remember, I mean, like, we always extend Bears games, whether wins or losses, but people are holding onto this game like I've never seen. taking it very seriously. So yes, yes, I think people are taking that seriously. Good. No, they should. Like I saw one video, like Ben Johnson was joking about like being the highest

scoring offensive all time. It was like, no, he wasn't. Like he was, he was definitely not joking. Well, Danny, this is the evidence for a lot of the things that he's been saying about wanting to embarrass teams. And I don't know if he necessarily accomplished that and running up scores and like just being relentless. Like these are all the things like this wasn't the first time he said it. Like you go back and read stories from last year that he wrote about what he wanted to do. Like you said, Danny, it's real and this is evidence. This legitimizes it. Yeah, he's, you know, the thing with Joniak about like the, you know, the thought, like,

he was like, yeah, I don't think you were the only one thinking about going for two to get to 60. He brought that back a little bit yesterday. Yeah, good, but like, yeah, good. Because like, yes, but like, but, but do you, which do you believe? Like, do you believe that he thought about it? because I do. Like he blowouts, shutouts, highest scoring team of all times,

score every time on the field. We haven't scored any points yet this week, like knowing exactly how many points to the decimal point, the Broncos average to be the highest scoring team, knowing to the game what the win streak is for season over season for the 0304 pats, that the all-time win streak is 21 consecutive games. And now that they've scored 59 points,

in order to be the highest scoring offense in the history of the sport, they have to average 34.2 points the rest of the way, which has been done by one, two, three, four, seven teams in the Super Bowl era. Like, it is, is it likely? Of course not. But it is possible. And what's so amazing about that, and I could do two hours on this. But, like, if you asked anyone, like, do the bears have top five wide receivers in the NFL? They'd say no.

Do they have a top five offensive line in the NFL? Probably not, maybe top 10. Do they have a top five quarterback in the NFL? I don't think people would say yes yet. But the fact that they can be the best offense in the league and one of the greater offenses of all time, and that's not like a completely ridiculous notion, speaks to how special Ben Johnson is as a coach.

He went forward on fourth down on his own 20. So that's a guy. And that's partly about the defense, right? Yeah, I guess. That's partly about the defense. But it's also like he's, he, they, we, they built an offense to be great and to be hyper aggressive. And we, by the way, like, Declan Doyle in Baltimore, Ben's guy.

Like, that was the best, that was the best game of Zay Flowers' career in his first game with Declan Doyle. And Derek Henry was get into the outside and Lamar Jackson looked amazing. And it was like, it, these guys being killers and like, Sean McVeigh is a great offensive mind, but he's a little conservative in game. Like Ben Johnson's a great offensive mind and psychotically aggressive in game. And I think that that lends itself to a much higher ceiling. Danny, enjoy Chicago for 20 hours this weekend.

And we'll look forward to talking to you next week, brother. Anytime, guys. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, Danny. Danny Parkins, former score host and the host of First Things First as well. More Bears is what we need. Let's make our way to the North Shore and Bears headquarters in Hallis Hall and Herb Howard with a Bears report next on Rahimi and Grotie.

343, the score. Herb Howard is joining us. Herb Howard is here. Herb joins us in studio right now, and he smells great. And that, to me, that is bonus points. Herb immediately showed he was going to be somebody asking meaningful questions. He's going to ask a question that everyone else in the room is going to want to know the answer to.

Coach with all the injuries that you guys went through throughout the summer, obviously that impacts the kicking game and who's where. You got to get to the regular season relatively healthy considering that is there enough time to get the guys kind of back into the spaces that you originally kind of have them sliders? something in your mind. If you can't again again? Yeah, I mean, that's a great question, Herb.

Well, thank you so much, Herb, for joining us. This has been a lot of fun. It's always fun with you guys. You are absolutely amazing. I listen to you guys when you don't invite me. So it's really good with Rahimi and Grody. Get a talk of this guy. He smells great.

I'm telling you. On 1043, the score. It's Raheimian Grody on 104. Let's talk some bears with Herb Howard, who is joining us from Hall right now as the bears get ready for the Vikings. Herb, what's going on, man? Oh, oh dear. And this is a...

Herb is in the Matrix. We have to retrieve Herb from robot Brad Biggsland. He's got the brain mask on right now, too. Oh, man. And it's Dennis Allen Day. This is like a moment of truth here to find out, A, what Dennis Allen is saying. And B, find out if he's a little more willing this year to talk about what happened in a game, is it forward to?

Let's just keep it moving forward. No, it doesn't work that way. You have to answer questions about that game, unless the NFL, unless the Bears, want to allow the media to talk to the defensive coordinator on Monday. Take two. Hi, Herb. Are you with us?

I believe so. Grosdy was going on. How are y'all doing? Yeah, you sound much better. Crystal Clear FM. What is happening out at Hallis Hall today, buddy? Well, as you know, Groder, we got a chance to speak to the coordinator's today, offense, defense, special scenes as well.

We also had an opportunity to speak to the defensive assistant. today out in the midway. The only thing about talking to the coordinators at this point in the week is they've turned the page. And so they're now all on to the Minnesota Vikings and trying to go back and get information about how they evaluated what happened in week one. It's a little bit tough, especially with DA. We did get a couple of things about him specifically getting an opportunity to talk with him about the performance of his two starting cornerbacks.

Tyree Stevenson and Jalen Johnson. Neither one of them had their best game. Coach D.A. spoke about that this morning. Tyrie and J-Lo are pretty critical of their play this past week. Two veteran guys, what do you tell them trying to get ready for week two knowing that they had a great training camp and might not have shown up the way they wanted to week one? Yeah, I mean, line up again, let's go, week two.

You know what I mean? Like, we have to be man enough to admit and see where we fell short. All right? What can we do to improve? our performance, what can we do to maybe improve our preparation, those types of things. And then let's focus on playing outstanding this week, because that one's done. You know, let's move on to this one. And let's play better as a group.

And guys, as long as it's not, especially with Jalen Johnson, not so much Tyreeks Stevenson, as long as it's not physical, as it seems to, to be the case, then I'm okay with Jaylon Johnson, because he's the one I worry about. I'm okay with Jaylon Johnson not having a great week, but we know how good he is. But at the same time, the thing is, that's not what you told them. So what did you tell them? And that's what we're trying to figure out. Yeah, they're going to keep a lot of those things in-house, unfortunately, later, especially by this time of week. And Dia, he's as much of a stickler for that as anybody else in

just terms of turning the page. Shout out to the beat because we were kind of relentless and trying to get some information about, you know, how he evaluated the game in which the defense gave up 37 points. And they were putting in tough situations a couple times. You had Luke the Burden's fumble. You have to turn over on downs, you know, deep in your own territory. But 37 points is 37 points. So we certainly have some questions about that. What I'm starting to think about this, and I had a really interesting interaction with secondary coach Al Harris today about the play of Malik Muhammad.

He's played so well in every opportunity that he's gotten going back to the summer throughout training camp, every time he's been put in the position to run with the ones, he continues to make plays. He obviously at his first career interception in week one on Sunday. But as you compare that and contrast with the inconsistencies that we've seen, specifically from Tyreek Stevenson, I ask Coach Harris, if things start to settle down at the nickel position, namely Cam Lewis comes back down into the nickel spot

because, you know, Xavier Woods or Elijah Hicks steps in his safety, or maybe even later on if they get Kyler Gordon back at nickel, then does Malik Hamid now enter the kick? conversation to be a starter on the outside. You're going to hear me ask Coach Harris that. Then you're going to hear a bit of a pregnant pause because he gave me this look out of the corner of his eye. And the way I interpreted, this is purely my interpretation was like, how do you know

that I'm already thinking about that? Coach, this may be a little bit early, but looking at the summer that Malik had and then also how he performed in week one, if things kind of solidify themselves at nickel, whether that's Cam coming back down or whatever, has Malik put himself in the conversation to potentially bump outside as a starter? Let me say this, Lee's doing a great job. He is doing a great job. Seriously, he's been doing a great job since he's been here.

So he's still a rookie. He's still got things to learn. He's going to have his growing pains just like everybody else is. But he's doing a great job. And right now, you know, we're not looking so much as in the future. You know what I mean? Our feet are where we are right now. So right now, today, he's playing.

and look before us and that's that's how good. Might I say that Al Harris is a bad liar? Like, you guys hear what I heard? I mean, come on. And you know what else? You know how I know he's a bad liar? Because he'll still blitz his safety when his team has scored 52 points and they're up 20. That's how I know Al Harris is a bad liar.

Listen, I think Al Harris is he wants the guys who are playing the best. And if you can talk about getting your best 11 players on the field right now, then you get one of your safeties back that you prefer to start back there. is Cam Lewis still a part of your 11? And then it becomes a question of what combination do you prefer the most? Do you like Tyreek Stevenson and Cam Lewis? Do you like Tyreeks and Malik Mohamed? Or perhaps do you like Malik Mohamed and Cam Lewis?

And so that's a question that will probably be answered a little bit later. I guess potentially it could be answered as early as this week. We could see a move like that. I don't expect that. But if you have Elijah Hicks or Xavier Woods able to go and start a safety this year, then what I mean this week, then what do you do with Cam Lewis? So it's just something that creep into my mind as I went through, you know, the mental roller decks of the secondary.

And so I had an opportunity to ask Coach Harris. I asked him his answer. Kind of surprised me a little bit because I think his brain may be starting to prepare for that possibility as well. Yeah, I mean, look at that, that'd be the ideal. The bears are not going to resign Tyreek Stevenson. I'd be shocked if they did at the end of this season. I mean, you never know.

So Malik Mohamed is they drafted him for a reason, that he could eventually be an outside cornerback and that you would love that. I mean, I think about that for Logan Jones. Could he step in at some point in time for Garrett Bradbury? The future is coming. But we've got to keep it moving here as we always do, Herb. And Richard Hightower, the entertainer, was speaking out there today again. Yeah, always nice to talk to H.T.

He's very good at the podium in terms of giving you some detailed answers. He talked about Xavieron Thomas, the rookie, right? We saw how explosive he could be in the summer. He had the touchdown or he had the big return against the Titans out in Tennessee. The Panthers apparently recognize his ability as well. kept the ball away from him in the kick return game. He was out there for six NASCAR, but was not able to get any returns because they kicked it away from.

Coach H.T. said he's never really seen that this early, but Zadion's got to try it a little bit harder to get the football on his hands. So Richard, was Zayvon getting the Devin Hester treatment already? Did you have any conversations about why you didn't see any of those balls? Yeah, I mean, they definitely, when you take a look at that game, they definitely were kicking the ball away from him. So, you know, we want the ball in his hands. So we're going to do everything we can to get the ball in his hands.

And he's got to go get some of those, which we're going to make sure that he is working to do that. But they definitely try to pin it in the corner and try to keep it away from him. So I haven't seen that this early on, but it is what it is. What's the judge would you say he's got to go get some of those? How do you kind of get him in that mindset? Yeah, nothing he did wrong. I'm just saying this week he'll have to go get some of those if he's able to go get them.

Those in the game, I didn't think he was able to get him. They strategically wanted to kick away from him. And they kicked away from him all game, and that's what they did. I get that, but I guess I'm a little surprised they wouldn't want to test a rookie in the NFL playing a pretty prominent spot on the field. But I guess that's respect, right? It's a lot of respect. It's respect for the speed, right?

You can't coach 428 speed. People have seen, you know, Josh Blackwell on tape as a returner. And for as good as special teams player as he is, I don't think people view him as a dynamic kick returner. I know he had to touchdown against Green Bay, but that was a trick play by design. I think you fear that 428 speed.

And so maybe the Bears even regret having shown that. I know Ryan Poles wanted to see what that would look like and H.T. got him a look at it, and it turned out to be really, really good. but maybe they should have kept that one a little bit closer to the vests for a little bit longer. But you heard, H.T. said, I've never seen somebody, you know, be that fear or that respect this early on in the career. He doesn't have a regular season return yet. And still, the Panthers make sure that he did not get the football in his hands.

I know you have a good relationship with Richard Hightower. Herb. I like the back and forth. You guys had going last week. What else did you guys talk about today? Yeah, had an opportunity to talk with him about John A. Walker, who everybody knows just continues to be a really complete football. ball player. He had a big hit in the return game on the kick return coverage last week. And it was funny because there was a coaching point all last week about how he's supposed to get down there, long strad, slow stride. And me and Jard, he laughed about it in the locker room. I mentioned it

to coach H.T. in his press conference this morning. You referenced Jada A's tackle down on the kick, had a good laugh from the locker room. He was talking about last week. It was the long stride, short stride, shuffle, shoot. And he was like, I didn't get to the short strad shuffle or shoot. I just ran straight through him again. What's the coaching point to get him? You don't want to take that. from, but you also want him to be sound. Yeah, he got to a little short stride. He don't feel like he did. He got to a little short stride.

He was better. He wasn't out of control. But there's one example of a player working at his craft, developing, all right, adding value. Not only in the kicking, but he added value in office. He added value blocking. He caught a touchdown. You know, that's what we want to see from our young players. And we want to develop them, make sure they add value on teams until they can get a bigger role.

on offense and defense, and he wasn't the only one making plays. Dylan Theemman made some plays. Rochon, like I said, had four tackles in the ballgame. Schuyler Thomas did a phenomenal job. Sam Rouse did a really good job, right? But even with all of those guys out there, we still in a race to improve. Like, we still want to be better than we were, and we're never going to be satisfied. Like, we're just not.

We're chasing perfection. We know it's unattainable, but that's kind of what you're dealing with with crazy coaches and crazy guys in the locker room. We're just going to chase perfection until we get it. And we're not satisfied with what happened in the game, even though we had a muff punt and caused the turnover. It was a huge play in the ballgame. I'm not going to take it away.

All right, it's a huge play. But now let's see can we get two of them in the game? Let's see can we get three of them in the game? We've got a huge challenge this week with Price. You guys know this dude's a really good returner. All right, it's a phenomenal player. We're going to have to be on our details this week. The Bears have really taken advantage of the,

this teaching tape despite a 59-37 win, man. It makes them look good, doesn't it, man? Like, we're not satisfied with what we saw out there, and it's true, I guess. No, and it's echoing through the locker room. It's not just the coaches. They all have that same mentality, and it really did start immediately after the game. After the game, you went to that post-game locker room and all the guys were talking about, yeah, this should be our worst game.

Offensively. You just put up 59 points. How's going to be a worst game, but that was the mentality. Certainly the defense, you know, had the same mentality about correct. and their mistakes, but you're hearing it all throughout the building. And it's everybody who's on one accord about what they need to do to, you know, forget about what happened in week one, move on to what should be a tough challenge in their home opener against the Minnesota Vikings.

Well, Herb, I think, I mean, I just am looking forward to the next time you and Richard Heidara talk. Like, last week was tremendous when he was like, that's a great question, Herb. I'm like, oh, I love this. There's a good vibe between you two. Coach H.T. is generous with his compliments of questions, but I always look forward to when I get an opportunity to get one. I didn't get one of those today.

I was a little bit disappointed to be honest with you. But no, Coach Hattower is the best. He respects what we do as we do as we respect what he does. And, you know, he appreciates the good questions. He likes to talk about it. He gives you good, good, solid detail answers all the time. Coaches have to be fair. They can't cast the same people up all the time.

That's true. That's true. I know. Herb, anything else before we let you go, I know you're probably getting ready to get in that locker room, right? Yeah, a couple of things on the, on the health front. The report's going to be coming out here soon, but we did get an opportunity to step out on the practice field and peek a little bit.

And I'll just let you guys know that Dono Wright was out there. We'll see what his official status was. But he was out there. I know some concern yesterday. Saw D'Andre Swift and Kalmanung guy out there as well. Again, the official report will come out here a little bit shortly. But it was good to see those guys at least out there going through stretching and warm-ups. Awesome stuff, as always, Herb.

Thanks, man. We'll talk to you soon, buddy. Indeed, guys. Thanks for having me. Thank you, Herb. Herb Howard of the score right there. our Bears beat reporter. You're darn all right with the knee did not practice yesterday.

Our guy Neville Gallimore was sick yesterday. Yeah, that practice, that first injury report was a little bit surprising. Yeah. Limited were DeAndre Swift, Kyle Minungi, Malik Mohamed, while we're at a Dio Dangbo. I don't like that. Yeah, Xavier Woods and Ozzie Tripillo, who as Weeter and I were joking on Take the North, like, it's good to see him on the injury list, actually, because that means he's active, which is amazing.

It's just such a tease. It really is. It's such a dramatic plot device. It is. Well, We either said it right. Like, we got to pay attention to the injury report to see the day that he disappears from it. Like, you've got to keep an eye on that because that's when the alarms go off.

And I, if I were the bears and I had to put out an injury report, that's how I would do it. I would reward the ones who were watching. Yeah. If you hit refresh on the transactions page, you were the one who deserves to be rewarded. It is not their job to tell you everything. Herb referenced it about. the Bears and moving on from the 59 point performance. There is big time proof out of the mouth of Ben Johnson

a hilarious, uncomfortable moment at Hallis Hall yesterday. Yeah, and I think only you can really give this the context it deserves. I think you're right. It is next on Rahimi and Grotie on 104.3, the score. Rahimi and Grotie. Appreciate all the flowery comments there. Midday, 10 a.m. to 2 on the score. Score. The jiggum of roe. There's been some moments with Ben Johnson all season long. You know, I think reporters, and I can attest to this,

we're all still getting used to the rhythms of Ben Johnson, what he likes, what he doesn't like, which really doesn't matter because we're reporters and you don't have the same rules as the players do. We welcome me back to Rahimi and Grotie on 104. The score yesterday, Lela, Ben Johnson, the Bears head coach, was asked this question about the Bears 59. point week one performance.

Put up 59. Like a guy might feel like you know, we're in a great place we got this. Do you sort of feel like you have to guard against any level of? We haven't put up any points this week. And that's that. No follow up. No follow up needed by my guy,

Mark Carmen of CHGO out there. Hilarious. I had a text conversation with Carmo last night. Because I told them, I started the text. I said, that was a good question. I said, you got the response of the day. went viral basically. Everybody's using it all over the country. They're certainly using it in Minnesota. And his thing was, you think he's mad at me? You think that the coach is

p.oed at my question? And I said, no, and I meant this genuine. I wasn't just trying to pacify my good friend. I think Ben Johnson was waiting for some sort of question like that. I think he was way, he wanted to cut us off with this party, this parade, this pep rally that we've all been having about the 59 points. This is the man after the L.A. Rams loss in the divisional playoffs that said, that's it, you're never going to see this team again. They're still taking their uniforms off, and he's saying, that's it, it's over. There's nothing more to talk about the year 2025.

Okay, here's the thing, though, is that there are other ways to do this. You could take the college football coach approach. You could say, we're going to celebrate this win for 24 hours, and then we've got to move on. Yeah, that's most coaches. That tells everybody what to do. So yeah, Ben Johnson may have been waiting for the opportunity. But you think he was mad at Mark Carmen. I don't think it was mad.

I think it's more in Carms nature to worry if somebody's mad at him than it is for Ben Johnson to be mad at Carm. Had a little bit of goofy to him. Now, however, did Mark Carmen face any sort of residual punishment and or feelings after Thermosgate? Well, see, that's it. Like, Carm is, you know, is the least shorter. with Karm because of a previous sin.

Yeah, yeah, we're all cocky out there with our questions and our stuff until we get just a little gentle pushback. And it's like, oh man, did I just piss that guy off? But here's my issue also is, like, you're asking questions like we're talking about. The fans are talking about, right? I see all the complaints on YouTube.

Oh, the media is so dumb. All they ask questions. Or we're not here to kiss their butts either. We usually have jobs. We have some sort of angle we're working for stories, X, Y, and Z. like if you want to read an AMA with the bears go at it but there's a reason we're doing these particular questions

it's not to make ourselves feel better it's because there's usually an objective so I don't mind Carm asking the question because everybody else is talking about the bear scoring 59 points why wouldn't you bring it up to head coach it was vintage ben Johnson is what it was no no shade to Carmen whatsoever one more from ben Johnson who's also asked about the idea of going for two to put up 60 in the Bears win over the Panthers.

But how seriously did you think of going for two on the last score? I said other people brought up going for two. And by other people, he means me. Lela Rahimi. Other people. And also, we've got the tape. We all saw the interview. It's okay.

I thought about going for two. If I hadn't been in that situation. Yeah, you're gluttonous. That's too much. I just want to see the six zero on the board. Can you blame me? Five, fifty wasn't enough. These fans have been starving.

Do you know what it was like just to get to 30 points? 40 points we would have been happy with. 30 was remarkable. Okay, then why do you need 60? Because you can. My God, that's like going through the buffet line a fifth time. You don't need it. And?

Bears. Tonight. This is it the National Polite League? The Bills host the Lions on Thursday night football. Coverage begins at 630 with kickoff at 715 right here on 104.3, the score and the Odyssey app. We transition. was Spiegel and Holmes next on Rahimi and Grotie on 1043, the score. A little bit more minutia.