The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - 5 things to watch in Week 2 + picks against the spread with Nate Tice and Sheil Kapadia

Episode Date: September 17, 2021

Robert Mays and Nate Tice debut the “Friday Five” segment where they talk about the top things they are watching heading into the weekend. They discuss the excitement surrounding DeVonta Smith, Dak Prescott vs. Brandon Staley’s defense and more. Plus, The Athletic’s Sheil Kapadia joins the show to (hopefully) redeem himself with his Week 2 picks against the spread. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. The presenting sponsor for today's episode of the Athletic Football Show is Visa, a network working for everyone. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today's Friday, September 17th. I'm Robert Mays. Great show for you guys today. Shook Padilla is going to be joining us a little bit later to do our weekly picks column. One game that we pushed out of six last week.

A terrible, epically bad performance by my two friends. and I cannot wait to do it again. Before we do that, though, I am very excited to welcome my good buddy. Nate Tyson, Nate, how you doing, man? Why did I volunteer for that? It's great. It's so great. I like gambling.

I like football. Let's talk about it every week. Yeah. Oh, that's right. But do you like yourself? That's the important question. Do I like my mental health? That's a 50-50 proposition.

So I'm so glad. The only way we can go is up. I would own three. So I hopefully my takes. will overcome my picks. God, you better hope so, man. Right, right. I know.

Come on, Rashad Bateman. You're running out of utility if they don't. So every Friday, this is a new show. Obviously, we did not have a Friday show last year. I'm super excited to have one this season to be able to really dig into a preview. The way they're going to format this every week, call it the Friday 5 to give us maximum flexibility. Five things. A matchup, a game, a player.

Five things that we're working. watching that we're excited about that we want to dig into. So that's what we're going to be doing every single Friday during this season. So let's get this started. We want to kick this off with the Steelers defense. Obviously, a great performance last week against the Bills, a performance that we dug into a little bit on Sunday night show. Rewatching that game, I think that we had a lot of it on the head, right?

Not a lot of blitzing, a lot of coverage, you know, a very particular game plan against the Bills. The thing about that, though, is that we're going from a very particular type of offense in Buffalo to an offense on the exact opposite end of the spectrum with the Raiders. You wanted to talk about this. What interests you about this Steelers Raiders matchup on that side of the ball? It's almost like a college defense and how they have to prep, like going from like a spread team to like a triple option team. It's not so much that the Raiders are like that, but going from like 10 personnel, zero personnel, which is rare in the NFL, which is five wides.

It just when I I know some people know this, but personnel is when I say that like 12 is one, it's the first number means how many runoffacks are on the field. The second number is how many tight ends are on the field. So when I say 12, that means one runnerback, two tight ends. So when I say zero personnel, that's zero tight ends, zero runbacks. That means five wide receivers. And by the way, last week in the NFL, 10 snaps of zero personnel, the bills had nine of them. So that's how rare it is.

They had nine of the 10-0 personnel snaps in the entire league last season. Oh, and what's so funny. Or last week, excuse me. Yeah. So teams will fight because you have nicknames for personnel groupings because you don't want to go zero, zeros. And everyone's like, what the hell is zeros? So I've been places where they call that Cinco for five whites. I've had places called that nil.

I've had places called that like all these different names that you're trying to come up with those types of things. So it's just kind of funny. But what I loved watching was because whenever you see a number 19 in the backfield, you're like, Oh, okay. There's a receiver in the backfield. How does the defense respond? And the Steelers, though, was so cool. They're going like big nickel. They had three safeties on.

I mean, they did more later in the game. But in the first drive, they had three safeties out there, including a seventh round rookie. And Trey Sutton. And it was just, not Trey Sutton. That's a mixed up two guys. Trey Norwood, number 21. And he's a seventh round rookie. And they're using him in the slot as a big nickel.

And it was just really interesting to watch this defense go like. like we're like leaning into punch a little bit. And as far as like, we're going safe. We're going to have big bodies. And they're like, we understand you have speed and you have really talented receivers. What we're doing is we're just having presence. We're just having guys near. So Josh Allen, because he's operating quick, he sees it.

And he just feels like it's covered. Like, and so he has to get off of it. He's an empty in so many of those plays. He has to go boom, boom, boom. He has to be very quick with his operation. And I thought it was an awesome job by the Steelers defense to do that, to never give in the whole game. They're like, this is what we're doing.

This is what we're doing the whole game. And what I thought was interesting, I still haven't gotten numbers on it, but they didn't blitz a lot. And that's what our, we both said it. We both made the joke. Not so blitzberg on Sunday.

Yeah. They brought simulated pressures. And they were bringing four mans. And that's the thing is like the modern blitzberg. Like, I mean, that's kind of what it was. And they were sort of playing safe coverage,

but they're angling their defenders in the coverage in different ways. And they're angling their, pass rush in different ways and they're playing real safe with the pass rush. It was just an awesome game playing by them. But why I'm so interested to see them now go against the Raiders, Raiders will live in that 22 personnel. And then that 22, that's two backs, two tight ends. That's heavy.

They'll live in 12 personnel. They'll go 21. They have no qualms doing that. So now the Steelers defense has to be in base. Are they going to be a big nickel? Like what's this configuration going to look like? And that's what I'm really excited to see with this next game. And also just I want to give a shout out.

Not only make a Fitzpatrick, but Cameron Sutton. The corner. You played awesome. The stewards played phenomenal. He, I ended up watching him more than Mika. And I was doing a, I was doing a cut up on Mika Fitzpatrick.

So that's how, how outstanding he did. But it was a really, really great performance by them that even on film held up. It wasn't like, oh, man, they got lucky. It was like,

no, they had a great game plan to execute it really well. It was fun to watch that game because the bills came out with this game plan where it's like, remember what we did last year? We're going to take up three notches. Yep. Because they did a ton of that last year. A lot of four wide.

It's a lot of empty. You know, their empty package on first down replace their run game in a lot of situations where they were like, you know what? We're going to run a lot of this quick game stuff to get the ball out of Josh's hands, chew up some yardage on first down, stay on schedule. They really, the bills truly believe their offensive staff in trying to have the pen in their hand at all times. If you can avoid third down, you control the game. That's how they view this. And that's why they don't care about running the ball because if we're getting chunks on first down, we never have to get to third down when the defense has an advantage.

So they did that a lot last year, but this was it to the extreme. 19 dropbacks out of empty. No one else in the league had more than 12 last week. We talked about it. They had one snap with at least two tight ends or a fullback on the field. One. That's insane. And they had nine snaps with zero personnel.

I mean, it was just the most wide open game I can remember seeing from an NFL offense. But while the bills had this. extremely tailored week one game plan, so did the Steelers. Maybe they weren't ready for it to that extent, but their game plan was shaped around stopping an offense that was trying to spread you out and throw the ball around. It's like, all right, we're going to bring four, we're going to play a ton of zone, and we're going to make you hit precision throws. And I think what you mentioned is exactly right.

Just giving him a sense that that's not open. Like, that's not open enough. I've got to fit that ball in there. I don't want to try to. He played with just enough hesitancy over the course of that entire game. And I think they consistently made him uncomfortable. And I thought that's why it was really interesting to watch. And now you have a Raiders team, like you mentioned.

The Bills had one play in their week one game with at least two tight ends or a fullback on the field. The Raiders had 57. That's awesome. That's a great set. I mean, just you couldn't imagine two offenses that are approaching this in more different way. So now we have this very specific game plan from the Steelers last week. Outside of being in base personnel more, which you'd assume they're going to have to do against that Raiders team, maybe not, but that's like the first instinctual response. What else do you expect to see from the Steelers against this Raiders offense and the way that it's constructed?

Well, I want to see, like, Joe Sherbert didn't play much, but I want to see how the linebackers play because they were kind of kept free and they kept them moving and kept them, you know, they did a good job. of kind of not putting them in bad spots. Speaking of Devin, Devin Bush and Alex Highsmith. And it was just, I want to see for more of them is now I want to see them play this run. Because they only had to do it like a few times. And I know Josh Allen's those QB draws they were running out of empty is kind of like,

okay, that's a whole different animal than what you would do with Derek Carr. But now you're going to have to play against a play action heavy offense. So how do they carry? Can Cam Sutton carry a guy all the way? Can you keep up with Henry Ruggs going on a big over or a big post? Do they have the team speed? Like the team speed last week was a different.

And when I would say that, it's different. The team speed last week was more like you said, the quick game, Manuel Sanders, Stefan Diggs, Cole Beasley, a little, you know, the Smurfs going left and right, just a little quick game stop. I can't believe I just dropped the Smurfs reference. But with the Raiders, it's all big chunks, big overrots. And guess what? As good as make of Fitzpatrick played, he got burned by Diggs on one.

And they got lucky. was an overthrow. There's a couple times where those safeties. And he missed Sanders too on one that was right down the seam. They had a couple chances. And now it's a team that predicated themselves on pounding the rock and bombs away or to an extent. But those designery kind of things is how they hold up against that game after game.

It's not just one chunk throw a quarter. Now it's going to be three or four of them. Or it might be one per drive. So I want to see how they kind of handle that because it's going to be a totally different game plan as far as how they have. to play. And even like going it like speaking to what the bills were doing, it's the all that empty stuff made sense because, okay, Pittsburgh's going to blitz the crap out of us all game. Yes. Spread it out and make them declare where everybody's at. So it's like, okay, that actually,

what the bills did made sense. It's just that the Steelers, it's the game of chess. Like the Steelers were just a move ahead. And it's like, that's what's awesome about football is that little chess match. And they're just getting them to operate quickly. Like, like I said, the presence thing with Mika Fitzpatrick coming down a lot in the robber position, other guys in the middle of the field, changing up the angles on everything, is they were kind of feeding into sub defenses versus sub offenses or when I say sub, 11, 10, zero personnel. So now that's going back to what the steward's defense is, is now how do you just stay in base and just operate time after time? Can, you know, Devin Bush play the run over and over and over? Can he fit up against all these guys big bodies climbing on them? Take on a full back.

It's just going to be a totally different type of game plan, type of style of defense that they have to play. One of the other things that I noticed while we're watching that game, did you see some of the Steelers linebackers on a decent amount of plays? Literally were turned toward the sideline. Like that's the leverage that they were playing. They were, I can't remember seeing it that drastic in just the overall, literally just standing turned toward the sideline because it's like you are not throwing the ball between the numbers. Like you are going to throw the ball or between the hashes.

you are going to throw the ball outside of the numbers. They forced them to do that consistently the entire game into these soft zones. And that's really hard. That doesn't matter who's playing quarterback. Like that's a very, very difficult thing to have to do. And I thought it was so apparent that, like, that was one of the coaching points. It's like you're not even playing leverage. You're turned toward the sideline here.

And their game plan was very specific and it worked out really well. The other thing I wanted to ask you, how do you think they handle Waller? Like, what do you think the approach is against Waller? make a I I make sense yeah I think maybe they might be more of a single high game than they did last week with a I know that they were heavy too high who knows like I mean I don't know what the Steelers are going to major in this year they Tomlin's an awesome job the last couple of years is just hodgepodge and what his guys are and getting the most out of I mean him and Keith Butler I mean they really have done a great job I want to change my coach coach of the year pick from a Zimmer to Tomlin but it's but it's going from that it's it's I want to see see, I don't want to see, but I do think that they have Fitzpatrick come down on, on Waller a little bit, or maybe trying to keep them in the box. Like I'm trying to, I'm actually, I want to see if they press them a lot. Like if they're going to have a guy, if they're going to truly go man to man,

or they can go, I don't think they'll go too man too much, but you don't have to worry about Derek scrambling as much as Josh Allen. I think some of those simulated pressures where, okay, you bring those four, you create kind of like a little bubble around the pocket, but then you kind of create a match on Waller, like an inside out bracket kind of look, where you have, have the linebacker flying him inside and then you have the nickel or the safety coming down on the outside. So it's kind of like a, you know, double team in a in a in a in a sense, but it's just out of his own coverage. So I think that's how they do it. But that's why you have

make a Fitzpatrick. He's he's the Swiss army knife. It's like we got to do this this week. Okay, go make a go go go go go do us. It's it's color Murray on offense, but just him on defense. That's exactly the same thing. It makes me want to watch the Steelers defense the entire year because when you obviously you with when you have pulled us back in. They, When you have an all off season to game plan, it's a little bit different. Like, they literally had six months to figure out how they wanted to defend the bills in this game after they played late in the season. Now they have five days to adjust to what they want to do against the Raiders. But when you can throw that curveball the way that the Steelers did last week, it's like, all right, what's the next jug pitch when you see a very different defense or a very different offense?

And that's why this is interesting. One note here before we move on, Denzo Good tore his ACL. He was playing right guard for the Raiders last week. Richie Incognito still isn't practicing. John Simpson was playing for him last Monday night. So just a couple offensive line injuries starting to pick up. And we saw what the Steelers defensive front did to the bills last week. You bring four.

I mean, Cam Hayward is a problem when your offensive line is healthy, let alone when you've got a couple guys that aren't playing. So just something to keep an eye out there. Let alone what do you have T.J. Watt and then Melvin Ingram getting put in great position. Melvin Ingram, like moving around how he should. Like that's the best thing he does. He's the best spinner in the NFL. just move him around and let him hit his spots.

And it's like, oh, my God. Like, yeah, good luck. Good luck because you're going to get Melvin Engram on one of those cards. I guarantee it. Well, especially with Toot not playing, the fact that Ingram can be an interior pass rush presence and you can put him out there with Highsmith. And those can be your four guys in certain packages. I think it gives them a lot of needed flexibility with Toot not practicing or not playing.

All right. Let's get to the next one here. Let's talk about Devante Smith. He had a really nice opening game. You wrote about it on your substack. People that have not going to check out your substack yet absolutely should. The silent count you dug into everything, all things Devante Smith from his debut last week. What was like the biggest thing that jumped out to you about the way that he played against Atlanta?

Oh, my God, just how smart he is. He is, I'm going to take your line. I am going to take a line from Robert Mays here. The subtleties and nuances of Devante Smith is what I loved. It is, it is, I was high on him. I've hyped up Rashad Bateman. I've hyped up, you know, as a joke, you're a mirror Smith varsay, kind of a half. joke but other guys but devonte smith was my receiver won like he was and i he had a chunk

between him and bateman like i had a i when i we went to the whole thing like i wouldn't take a receiver in the top 10 he was only one i could justify but i was still a little iffy because i was built and all that but having said that what stood out to me is just how smart he is it's just the first example i have was there's a pressure and it was a cat a cat a cat a quarterback cat is a corner of cumps and they're playing a dm piece a defense which they bring all the time. Receivers are taught to yell out cat, cat, cat, cat. And it's, in theory, there's the quarterback and the offensive line here. They go, okay, oh, shoot. I would say less than half of the receivers actually do that during a season. Like if I had a ballpark, in practice,

it always happens to camp. And everyone's like, oh, good job, good job. But in the game, never happens. Devante Smith, two minute drill, no huddle. Rookie, first game does it. And I was like, hell yeah. This guy is awesome. His feel for routes. He has such a great understanding of finding soft spaces against his own. He's built like a bean pole. But the thing is, even against man coverage, he can beat press because he understands how to attack North as he's releasing. I think I'm really cool to watch.

Isn't it? Isn't it? Now that you see like, I mean, and the DB corners don't know how to handle it because they're like, oh, because it's really threatening to them. Usually a lot of these receivers, some can get away with it. Some can't. They kind of do the little shimmy at the line. And it's like, yeah, some guys can do that because they're strong or really quick.

Devante does that. And he's like three yards up. Like, and the corners just feel so threatened. And that's why they can't get hands on them because they just don't know. They're tight. They get jammed. It's almost like a pitch inside. They can't turn around.

They can't get around on it. But he does that. And just the, the route running is, I had an example in one of the plays. There was a quick out. But it's just how friendly he stays at a quarterback. It's a hard thing. to kind of describe unless you see it. A lot of in-breaking routes, this was an outbreaker, but in-breaking routes, a lot of receivers

will drift up field because they're trying to catch the ball as they're fading away. Devante Smith already as a rookie, and he did this in college, so it's so cool that he's still doing it as a pro, is he stays friendly. And that's staying flat or even coming downwards on breaking on the routes, and he does it every single time. And then I think there's one in the slot. He had a slot out where he came down and stayed friendly to quarterback. If he stayed flat on this route, it would have been undercut by the line.

my backer. It's just those. It's just when you're pot and I even talk about another thing about me. Wait a sec, but I because I know I've just been gushing about for five minutes straight. It's just he does all these things. Every time he's on the field, he's positively affecting the game. He doesn't take a playoff. He's competitive as hell. He is smart as hell. It's like he blocks his ass off and he knows where to go. He's not making mistakes. It's just every time he's on the field, he positively affects the game. And you can't ask for more from a receiver. I notice it all the time at Alabama, just how hard he attacked the balls downhill. When he's coming back to the ball, he attacks. the ball. And that's obvious, like, out in open space. And you pointed out like a hitch where he did

that where he's coming back at the ball hard. The play you're talking about where he's getting friendly back to the ball. That's harder to notice. It's not as apparent, but you see him coming back toward the ball just very subtly on that play. The release that you talked about with him moving up field, it's crazy to watch. It was a play, I think, in the first half, where he's in the slot on the left side. And it's almost like he's floating at the corner. It's like he's floating above the ground before he makes his initial release. And it reminds me in a lot of, like, Devante Adams is the best. And Devante is also moving forward when he makes those plays.

It's not a lot of side to side movement. And this is a comparison that Brandon Thorne has made in the past. I think it's really, really smart. Playing receiver and pass rushing are really similar. When you're a pass rusher, you always want to be moving toward the quarterback as you're stringing together moves. And that's what Devante Smith does. He's moving toward the quarterback while he's stringing together moves.

There's always forward movement. And that's really difficult to deal with when you're playing against either an offensive lineman or a cornerback that's moving backwards. I actually had this thought while watching The Seahawks this week. I think Jamal Adams would be an awesome receiver. Like when he's rushing the passer, I think the way he moves, it reminds me of the way a really good receiver moves with that forward movement all of the time. And so those are two players that you wouldn't usually connect in your mind. But Devante Smith and Jamal Adams were doing very similar things to me this week as I was watching them. So it's, it's, it's, it's, it's really interesting when you see it in practice.

And I totally agree. Just all of the stuff that he was doing, it's the stuff we expected from him, right? It's like dropping him in that game in that Eagles jersey, he did all of the stuff that I liked about him when he was playing at Alabama. Attacking the ball downhill like that was the biggest thing. He is going to go after that thing. Even when there's no one around him, it doesn't matter. Like that is just his natural wiring is to do that. And it's been awesome.

And now we're going into a game against the Niners who have no corners. Jason Verrett is out for the year. Emmanuel Mosley's still not back at practice as he gets back from a knee injury. I mean, this could be another decent day for Devante Smith, who had six catches on seven targets for 71 in his first game with a touchdown. I mean, guy hit the ground running. Not surprised. I'm sure you're not surprised, but still.

Watching him in preseason, I was like, oh, baby. Like, because I did a little something on him to preseason, but I was like, he's not going to be. miss a beat. So, okay, let's wait until I want to watch him against once, you know, even if it's Falcons defense. Let's, let's see him against the ones, you know, and it was like, oh, my God, he looks just exactly the same. He looks exactly the same. It's like, yeah, this guy won the Heisman. It's, it's, and this guy is so unbelievable, he's always, the last two years, there's been four first round Bama receivers. He was the best one. Like, and this, we just had to wait for him

to come out and declare. And that's how he looked. And even in the blocking stuff, I know it's like, kind of a meme at this point. Like I'm going to love a receiver blocking where both are. But it's you can see those clips is you can see his brain working because he has to adjust post snap. So many receivers, it's rope memorization. They go, well, I blocked the corner here. And then all of a sudden it moves and they go and you see those guys.

And we're going to see that come up. This is a sidebar a million times this year. If we're going to see more quarters coverage, you're going to see so many receivers have to push to the safety to block them. And it keeps coming up. all the time. Think about how many like quick RPO's against quarters you saw in that Dallas Tampa Bacon. They're doing it so much. We're going to get into that little bit, but you're seeing a lot of that stuff. I totally agree. Yeah. And Devonthe Smith is pushing, he pushes right to it,

like no hesitation. He sees it. It's like, oh my God, you, you, his IQ is very apparent. He has a very, very high IQ. And even my one negative from the preseason was he had drops. But guess what? I like, And if you remember him about Alabama, he had probably, he has the highest graded hands I've ever given anybody. That's kind of how I'll put it. So those drops that happen in the preseason, I'm not worried about whatsoever because it's, he, he's the only receiver I've ever given rare hands to. And that's what he has. So I know, I'm super excited to watch this guy. I really am excited to watch him against a little better team, even if they don't have corners, but it's, it's going to be really fun.

I'm really excited to watch Devontz Smith, the belt. All right. The third thing we wanted to hit here was the Carolina Panthers. just coming into a matchup with a much better team. You know, they were a fascinating team coming into the year. The Sam Darnold trade, you know, some of the moves they had made on defense. You know, it's year two of that defensive rebuild. They win a close game over the Jets.

I think the final score a little bit misleading, which we can dig into. Nate, Sam Darnold. I hope you saved your Sam Darnold stock. You and Dan Rolofsky had all of the real estate left on Sam Darnold Island, and you might be able to cash that in right now. He looked pretty damn good in that game. He, they made it clean for him. And this is what you want.

That's what you wanted to see. It was him. He hit the back foot of his drop and that ball was getting out. And that's what you need from San Darno. Don't let him double clutch. Let him hitch and throw. Hitch and throw in. And I mean, I can get into it right now because it's like I got excited.

I mean, I don't know just defense is, eh, but it's watching what. It was the timing that he was playing with. That was the most impressive thing. It doesn't matter who he's playing against. The timing that he was playing with, how quickly the ball was getting out, how he was reading certain things, which we can get into. I want to get out in front of that because anybody can say all that he was playing against the Jets defense.

He was playing with such an understanding. This is why when I was talking to people there before the season about why they wanted him and why they thought he could be a different player, it's because they had so much faith in Joe Brady's ability to articulate the offense to him. It's like, all right, this is the concept. This is why we're running it. And this is what you're looking at and what you need to do based on X thing happening. If X, then, why, you make a throw.

And when you watched Carolina last year, I think you saw that. You saw Teddy Bridgewater operating with a certain speed and with a certain precision because of how clearly the offense was articulated to him. And I think that you saw that this week. And there are several throws that stuck out to me. But keep going. I just wanted to get out in front of that very fast before we kept going. No, that's exactly right.

Last year, it was seeing the differences between what I thought that offense would look like. And then they had Teddy back there. And it was like, oh, they played the Teddy's strengths. And so that's what I got a little higher on Joe Brady because of that. And it was like, oh, well, that's good coaching. Wow. What a concept. But as when we were saying, like, he gets rid of the ball.

Like he had a couple quick hitting play actions. But it was not, none of the thing was more than a five step drop. There was no true seven-step stuff that wasn't a play action, which is perfect because that is hard to do a true seven-step drop. And we could talk about the Vikings and what they do. But those five-step drops, it's five hitch and throw, five plant and throw. He's bodying DJ more on a stop route. Half-field reads where he's just going, he glances at the safety. He works aside.

He goes one to two. It's like, take the fat out of everything. And it's what, it's good, it's good scheming. Like for what you have, you have a couple talented receivers. I saw a 989 concept in there, which is, you know, I'm always going to love. And they ran the shit up. Explain what that is. 9.89 is what I call it.

Some people call it doubles. It's nine, a nine route is goes on the outside. And eight is the middle route. And an old school numbering system, this is what Norv Turner would do. It's, uh, it's left to right those numbers or I'm sorry, X to Z with those numbers. So the X, Y, Z. So the nine is the X, the eight is the Y or the slot, whoever it is in there. And then the Z is the last number.

just how kind of the configuration in a world where there were only three guys out in routes. Right. And then you tagged everything else. And then they all of some they started on 11 personnel and everyone's like, wow, this got really wordy, really quick. We have to figure out, maybe we should just call it one word and everybody knows it. Wow. But it's, yeah, but 99 is that, that's just in my head how I call it.

You call it double goes. But it's a very simple concept. It's 99. Peyton Manning used to run the crap out of this. They would go 12 personnel, Dallas Clark would be in the slot. And they, and it's a read route by that, that tight end or the slot guy. They either have a true post running at the post or they run a dig based on two high or one high coverage. They ran it to, they, uh, Darnel hit DJ Moore on this on the nine route on the go route.

And you can see Darnold just operate and true. That was the back shoulder throw, right? Yeah. Yep. Yeah. And so I kind of already contradicted myself. I said, oh, they didn't really do any true seven step drops. But when they did do this one and when they did it, Max protect.

Hey, the ball was out of his hands instantly though. It was he let that thing go right away. It's an easy. It's, I wouldn't say it's an easy read. It's, it's fairly easy to do. You just have to make a throw. And that's why Peyton Manning could abuse it over and over and over. Tom Brady runs it with Bruce Ariens over and over and over.

Joe Brady ran over all the time with Joe Burrow, Justin Jefferson, and Jamar Chase and Terrence Marshall. I would too if I had that personnel. So that's what it is. You're saying, my guys are going to win on the outside. And if they're not, we'll check it down. It's touchdown to check down, old school off. But I love that concept.

They ran it with him. They ran Y-cross, which is, you know, great, great concept, which is a go route. Slot runs an overrout. And then the backside guy either runs a dig or a post. It's an easy one to read because it's a cross-field progression for a quarterback. It's my personal favorite concept in the world because it's just, I think it's, it has answers to everything you want to run. They ran every, nothing was designery.

Everything was a good core concept. Fourverts. Y-cross. 99. Stop routes. Like just stuff that. is one to two to get the ball out. One, two.

My favorite throw that he made the entire game, I mean, obviously the Anderson touchdown is beautiful. And that was a quarter's beater, I would assume, right? Because Robbie Anderson was in the slot on the left side. He ran just a skinny post. And then they tied down the quarter safety on the other side with the tight end. So it turns into man coverage on that backside. And Darnold did an incredible job of just extending the play a little bit, stepping up in the pocket, hits a throw down the field.

It was gorgeous. But my favorite throw he made the entire day was, the smash he hit to DJ Moore. So they had, they, they ran a, the smash concept is, bottom of the screen. Yep. So with the smash, the outside receiver runs a little hitch. And then the number two receiver runs a corner behind it. It's really good to run against quarters, which we can get into.

We saw so many smash concepts last week. We did. Because more teams are running quarters. There was the bill's best play last week because that's just what those, the Cowboys ran it like a bunch of different ways. I think you're going to see a lot of smash. Time is a flat circle, baby. We're getting back to smash.

And digs. It's awesome. So they were running it. And it was interesting because McCaffrey was the run running, was running the hitch as the number two receiver on that side. So like so the McAfree runs that, holds it down. And then DJ Moore runs the corner behind it. And he ran the, the timing of it was beautiful. Looked at McCaffery.

Corner was down on it. The corner back was down on it. It hits the corner right behind it. And that's the stuff. It doesn't matter who you're playing. As long when you're playing on time like that, when you're seeing the game with that sort of clarity, And we're gushing about this. And the results are not that great when you look at points scored.

They stumbled in the red zone twice. He misses Ian Thomas on that throw in the end zone. That's a touchdown if he hits that. And then they had another third down where he had Robbie Anderson on a slant. He went to the flat to Terrence Marshall instead, a little bit of a tougher throw. Two field goals out of that easily could have been two touchdowns. The way they moved the ball up and down the field was very impressive. And then they literally stumbled when Darnold handed the ball to the fullback accidentally on a bob play and a lead play, which I have done before.

I have done when you're going like you're just like, oh yeah, I have a single back, single back, single back. And all of a sudden you turn around and you forget that the fullback's going to be there. Yeah, I've done that not in an NFL game, of course, but you know, maybe a little lesser, maybe in a scrimmage in Madison, Wisconsin with the twos and threes. But also with what Joe Brady did, which I, you forget that he's a Saints guy, choice routes, It's a CMC, baby. It's, oh, my God. They spammed them. It looks gorgeous, too, doesn't it?

Having him in that offense is a really a big deal. I mean, it's just what they can do with him. And again, we'll see what it looks like against better teams. And they're playing against a better team in the Saints this week. But this was the plan. Like, if you were trying to be optimistic about what Sam Donald would look like, it was having McCaffrey as that option. And it was just having guys he trusts.

When he let go with some of those throws, you talk about the, Come back, the back shoulder throw to DJ Moore. I think on their first or second drive, they had a third down, clearly against man coverage, and he threw a slot fade to Terrence Marshall on third down. Incomplete, but a good ball placement, it was a good play by the corner. It should have been completed too, yeah.

So just stuff like that. It's like when we get man, I trust my guys to win, and I'm going to play with that timing and that level of decision making. It's like, if this is a 50-50 ball, I'm going to put it out there. He did not do a lot of that.

There was not that decisiveness when he played with the Jets because there was not that level of trust in the offense or the talent around him. And I think you can already see that starting to simmer in this new situation. I think it's exciting. Like I'm excited to see what it looks like. I think the word you used right there is the exact word that's like just sums it up. He was decisive. It's taking all the options away from him and just going like, not, I'm not. mean that a mean way, but just kind of going like, let's just trim the fat and it just go one to two and

just be a quarterback. And let's not overthink it. Let's not reinvent the wheel. Just run good concepts and just I think what helps is Adam Gates was so designery every single week. Like, can anyone in the world tell me what Adam Gates's favorite play is that Peyton Manning hasn't designed? Can anyone? Anyway, no one can. But I can tell you what Joe Brady likes. I just told you what he ran at LSU. He ran his choice. Like he has played the core concepts that are good concepts. So you know what? helps when you have core concepts is you know what the answers are no matter what the look is. It's cover two. If it's cover man, if it's man, if it's two man, if it's blitz, and when you run a bunch of concepts, if the defense, which I'm sure the Saints will do next week is, or on Sunday,

is very up what they're going to bring. They're not going to just kind of do what the Jets did. They're going to bring a bunch of different looks. If you know where the, if you follow your rules and you know what the rules are, it just helps everybody. And seeing a quarterback, if he can get to that level, that's going to be really exciting. That's why this game's going to be really a match up a good test for them. What do you think? I mean, obviously the Saints are a better defense than the Jets. But what specifically about the way the Saints approach the game do you think provides a different sort of challenge for the Panther's offense this week? Oh my God. Like, well, last week they had every Packers play dialed up. That kind of helps. But just up front and just the more of an aggressive look from the Saints. They like to come down on everything, DBs and up front. And it was with all the games and everything. So first off, up front. That's going to be just a total. totally different animal. I love Quinn and Williams and everything, but Saints D-Line was kicking ass last week. And I think they'll continue that. But also just blitz wise, it's going to be a lot more exotic. If they do, if the Saints, if Dennis Allen does decide to heat him up, which he, he does in the

past, just the looks they're giving. We talked about the Steelers varying up the angles that they cover people. Saints are, that's what they do. That's kind of how they do it. So now bringing up that point about these core concepts and knowing all the answers. That's why I'm curious. I want to see Sam Darnold get fooled and see how he operates post-snap because that's what the saints do. They'll fool you. They'll go, oh, this is a blitz. And then just drop everybody out.

And you're like, oh, shit, I got the ball now. What do I do now? Or they go, oh, this is a safe look. And they bring a saw. Like, you know, they just do those types of things. Saw being a Sam and a Will pressure. It's a heavy pressure. But it's they do those types of things.

And that's, so that's why I want to see, okay, we saw the almost like the day one, two, three install of this panthers offense. Now I want to see what's. their second step from it against a defense that's going to make them get to that second step because they're going to know they saw what they saw in film they're going to go we're going to do this this and this and you got Joe Brady going against his former mentor with the Saints that kind of knows what concepts that they're going to be defending that week. All right really quickly.

Let's talk about the Panthers defense because they played against the Jets offense last week. But a few new pieces, you know, they go draft J.C. horn in the first round in the top 10. They sign a sound reddick. You know, this is a defense that did some unique stuff last year. I mean, it was kind of an outwire in the way they approached things, whether there was three man rushes or the amount of, you know, cover three that they played. So were they in their own little universe? What stuck out to you about the Panthers defense when you watched them last week? Shaq Thompson.

Sheck Thompson, check a bow. He was awesome. He was awesome. He looked like a star. Like, he looked incredible. Like that was that, yeah, that's what stuck out more than anything. But really, before I get into it, but I really can't wait to see Brian Burns versus Ryan Branchek. Toronto Armstead.

Like, that's going to be a really fun matchup. That defense was a lot of single high. I can see now why they went after your J.C. Horn because he was best in man coverage and being in that type of corner. And they were a lot of three. I didn't really see too much man, but I saw a lot of three in there are varieties. I want to say they were like 35% man on third down, which is right in line with what they did last year. So I expected them to be more man heavy.

They were not more man heavy in week one. but they did blitz a lot. I think they sent 11 5 or more man pressures, which is a little out of character for them from last season. But I think they were a little bit more comfortable doing that, but it was a lot of zone pressures, which kind of, you know, like matchy stuff, whatever. They sent a lot more heat than I expected them to in that game.

Yeah. And I mean, they got Brian Burns free a couple times. So good on you. If you could do that, I think that's what they're trying to do with those five man pressures. and that's kind of a recurring theme is you're trying to create one-on-ones. Exactly. You're hoping the offensive line, one, is lazy, especially if it's a fine man protection

and they missed a point, you disguised it in some way. Two is creating one-on-ones. And when you have what we think, I mean, I think everyone should think this, a star at a D-N over there at Brian Burns. It's like, that makes a ton of sense to unlock those types of guys. But that's what you're just, that's what they're doing. Like, that's what their pressures are trying to do. Just create those one-on-ones.

And just if you're in a single high world, that kind of makes sense to run those five-man pressures, just because of the defense that you run behind it. It's either going to be man with no whole player or it's going to be a three void or it's going to be a three or a three zone dog where it's a guy's dropping of some sort. I did see Burns drop a couple times. They did that several times. I think that they're going to use Redick in that way a decent amount where we talk about edginess in the pocket. Not only did they bring at least 11 blitzes in that game. I couldn't, I mean, it was at least five, six, seven more four-man pressures from unconventional places where Thompson's coming and Redick is dropping out. All they're doing, have him double clutch one time.

Just have him hold on the ball for half a second. And we trust the pocket crushers with Brown and Dayquan Jones now and Burns to get home if you have to hold on to the ball for half a second more. So they're doing a lot of interesting things in the front to make quarterbacks uncomfortable. against a rookie quarterback, that was a lot easier than it might be for the rest of the season. But again, I liked what I saw from them one week into the year. Agreed. I just, this is what, it's going to be a great test for that defense too, because I think the Saints are going to just pound away on them.

And so I want to see how that first round pick, Derek Brown holds up. That's going to be a big, big game for him because he's going to have to hold those double teams because I bet you the Saints are going to pound it on them. And like you said, it's, it's curious. It's that now we're going to see James Winston against this defense. and it's actually it's I think they're going to play a little better than the Packers did last week. So if he does miss those throws, are we going to get tip balls that might happen or some of those sorts where there's going to be less room for error?

Because that's what they're doing. Like you said, the double clutch, they're, they're betting that if they can get you to not, they're, what they're doing is making the quarterbacks be right always or the play caller be right always. You know how hard that is every single snap that you drop back and pass? That's really, really hard. So they're betting that you're not going to gash us enough that we have to get out of it. So we'll see it against one of the best.

play callers and a quarterback is playing pretty well, but we'll see how it unfolds. One of the things I'm going to watch, the way that they're set up, Redick and Burns, both are drastically undersized. Like, if you look at both of those guys on the edge, I want to see if the Saints are like, you know what, fuck it. We're lining up with two tight ends or six offensive linemen and we're just, we're going to cave in the edge every single play. And that's going to be how we approach this.

I would not be surprised if that was a big part of their game plan, because they, can do that against this team. All right. Number four, Dak Prescott against Brandon Staley, man. It doesn't get much better with week two matchups than this. This is us. The athletic football show bowl. This is us. Week two. Like, what a treat. Thank you, NFL. Screwed the opening game last week. This is our treat right now. Very cool to see Dak on that offense against that new look, Chargers defense. I want to dig into both of those units and what we saw from them in week one. What did you think of the Cowboys offense? Because both of us love Dak Prescott, right?

We have a lot of faith in the personnel on that side. I think each of us, even after all of the volume production from Dallas over the first month of last season, wanted a little bit more in terms of putting their guys in the right spots. It feels a little static at times. It feels a little boring at times. I came away pretty impressed with some of the wrinkles that they threw in and some of the different tweaks we might see from their offense this year. Yeah, even little things like, okay, they have a Mari Cooper at Z as opposed to an X because they can move him around.

They can put him in the slaughter outside, like just little things like that. Like, and why that matters, like an X receiver is going to be on the line, on the ball. He's a split end. That's what they used to be called. A Z used to be called a flanker. And that makes sense, right? Flank around, move around. And that's, so that's where putting Amari out there.

They can get him into the slot, the touchdown he had on the corner route. He's the point man in the bunch, you know, and then and C.D. Lamb. CD. He had a couple of drops, but just operating from the slot a little bit, it was, it was interesting how they kind of mix those back and forth. I know some people were kind of rag and going, oh, they got the ball out quick. They're worried about Dax's arm. I thought Dax's arm got stronger as the game went on.

He hit a couple inside throws. Those are missiles. And I mean, Dax never had more than a good arm. And now it's more like above average average. But the thing is he operates so on time and on schedule that doesn't freaking matter. Like we also had to deal with so much pressure. I mean, they blitz on more than 50% of his dropbacks. I mean, they were bringing crazy pressures for most of that game.

And games and he's moving in the pocket, even like the touchdown on Omari, he drops a snap and it was the little short comeback in the end zone. Yep. And he's fading away and he throws it. That was a high level 0.0001% throw that no one is making a big deal about, including myself, because he made it look so casual. Like he is operating at his mentally just on a whole other level. I thought as far as play calling, I thought Kellan Moore did a great job.

Zach Martin was out. So, and guess who's on the other side of the ball? Vita Vaya and they got to consume. Yeah, I'm not going to really think our run game's going to really get it done. So how he did it was doing those quick swings, a bunch of screens early. They were trying to get those big D-Wyman moving side to side, side to side. They were keeping them in base a lot. They were in 12 personnel and pony person.

35% of the time, 27 of their 77 snaps. They were in 12 personnel with two tight ends, which, was I believe they were there last year I think it was around 20 percent so it was definitely a tendency changer from what they were a year ago and I think that was purposeful for the exact reason that you mentioned yep it's they were trying to keep they were trying to keep the bucks I almost call them the jets the bucks and base because Todd Bulls because that's when I last broke down Todd Bulls was in 2017 so to me it's permanently the defense the Todd Bulls defense is the Jets so but with the bucks it's if you keep him in base you don't let Todd Bulls do his exotic shit you

don't let him get to those fancy pressures and guys move in and edge. And we'll keep him on base the first play of the game for the Cowboys. They were backed up. It was an awesome punt, probably the best punt of the year that it was the first punt of the year might be the best punt of the entire season, pinned at the own one yard line. And in those backed up situations, you kind of have two ways to look at it. We try and get a first down, just matriculating three yards, four yards, run the ball, get heavy personnel.

Or you do the opposite and spread it out and make them spread. the whole field, get a quick little hitter, and then just get the yards. They fought fire with fire there because Bulls, of course, brought a, they went, they went base personnel. They were 12 personnel. So bucks matched with base. So what does that do? That puts Shaq Barrett out, not onto the line of scrimmage.

He's out in coverage. You don't want Shaq Barrett in coverage. You want Shaq Barrett rushing the passer. Then on top of it, it just everyone spread out. They knew where the pressure was coming. It was a try on, the rookie. They knew to slide the pressure over there. And so even though they only had five-man and particular.

protection here because the Cowboys were in empty. They were able to protect it up. And Dak was able to hit a, not even just got a five-yard game, like a little quick hitter. He had a chunk play to Amari Cooper. That's good offense. When you're hitting home runs when doubles are available or singles are available and

you said, screw that. I'm hitting a home run. That's awesome. That was the first play of the game. They're fighting fire with fire. So I was really, I was,

I was impressed with how Kellemmore called the game. The smoke and go touchdown to CD Lam. He set that up earlier. The cool part was, They ran the screen on that on the same drive. They ran the exact same screen. Same look, same personnel, same everything. And they set that up beautifully,

except it's one of those things that you don't realize until afterwards, how, uh, how you know a shot play is coming or how you know a pass is coming off of the same look. So when they run the first one they run, they're going to hurry up and get into the line because that double stack formation. It's hard to cover when you're going hurry up.

It's when you can't call it out of the huddle, but that's a whole other side story. So they call it. They hit the smoker out the galop. Galap gets eight yards. the next time they call it near the red zone all of a sudden they're taking their time the center's pointing who the protection is even though it's the same look it's like something's not the same here this is making a meal out of it yeah yeah yeah something's a little different here than i think another run smoke that you guys just did but it didn't matter it was a great pitch and catch i mean tack got that ball up and down like that's not an easy throw because that just outside the red zone is a weird area for shot plays like a lot of offenses between the 20s and and 40. It's called the gold zone or green zone.

That's your shot play area. You get past half field. Hey, we got a cool little designer play. They got to like the 23. And you could tell that it's like they really wanted to call it. And they said, might be a little close to the end zone here.

But all right, let's try. And it worked because that got the ball up and down. But I really did. I thought Kalamore called a great game, not trying to run his head against the wall literally, like I actually run the ball over and over just to run it. So I think that they replaced it with quick passes.

swings, getting a ball out, heavy pressure defense, getting a ball out. I thought it was a great performance. So that's why I'm very excited to watch it now against kind of a very, a little bit of a different defense in the chargers. So I want to dig into that. A few specific things that I noticed from Dallas that I thought were really interesting. So in those 12 personnel sets when they were in two tight ends, the tight ends were on the same side a bunch of the times.

They were in that like Y, Y wing look where they're on the same side, which allows you to put both of your receivers on the other side. And they were interchanging those guys and what they looked like. So they were doing a bunch of different stuff out of there. It makes the defense declare too. Like it. So like, because if you have the two receivers on one side and two tight ends at one side, the defense has to declare what coverage they're in. Because yeah, if it's man, man, both corners will travel.

And if you're in base, if you're in zone, oh, wow, the safety's over there. All right. I think I know what I'm getting here. So that helps them declare a little bit. Easy way to do that. They did that a bunch. They did some double slant stuff out of there that was really nice, like drive openers. And then one thing they kept going to out of that look as well,

they ran a ton of RPO's in this game. And I think they didn't run the ball very much at all, but I think that's because Dack was just flipping it out to whoever was out there in the flat. Because it's like, all right, we're going to get you in base defense because we have our two tight ends on the field. We're going to have both our receivers over here with Shaq Barrett covering one of them in the slot. We want to make him out there play, make him play out there in space. Why would we slam our heads against the wall here against an amazing run defense when we can just squirt the ball out to Michael Gallup,

let him pick up five yards and keep going about our business. Same thing. Yeah. They were doing that plenty. And I think it was, that's a vote of confidence in Dax's ability to control the game. That's him dictating the game and really having it in his hands, which I think is something you should do with a quarterback who's that good. And then the other thing I saw that I think is going to be all over the league this year

in a bunch of different ways for multiple reasons. I think the Packers did a lot of it and teams are going to steal from them. but I also think it's a really good way to play against some of these lighter box teams. So a lot of 21 personnel with that second running back doing weird stuff. So you saw Tony Pollard in motion a bunch. You saw him, you know, motioning out and getting that swing pass is like another kind of manufactured run play. I assume the Cowboys are going to do a lot of stuff out of that personnel package. Is he going to go vertical every once in a lot like Aaron Jones does?

So just these wrinkles, this is what I wanted to see out of this team. It's like they have so much talent. Put those guys in positions to make the game easier on them. And they really did that a bunch against a really good defense. And now they're going against a defense that we could not wait to see. And I don't know. I came away from that Chargers game. There's a lot to chew on.

I mean, the way that they deployed those guys, the way that they did it. So that first glimpse of that Brandon Staley Chargers defense with this personnel, what jumped out to you? Oh, man. Well, Joey Bosa playing away. like a stud. But how they used Derwin James, which I'm sure we'll both talk about because that's the thing I had circled, starred. I wanted to see.

I wanted to see what they did with them because I knew I knew Staley would be creative with it and put them in a good spot. But also not even just talk about the two stars of their defense. I mean, really that's what they have, those two guys is how fast everyone else played. I mean, that speaks to Staley. I mean, we've gushed about before, but seeing them all week one. and I knew if Scott Turner with Washington was trying to funky it up a little bit

with some of these motions and everything. No hesitations. Everyone passing it off. Like it was like boom, boom, boom, boom, but just the movement of everything. It was cool to really see the kind of like different defensive personnel packages. I think that's a good way to put it.

They had their base look. Honestly, honestly you can describe their personnel packages is where they put James at. Base, James is a too high safety. Big nickel. James is in the slot almost as like a zone player. Normal nickel jeans is as a safety, sometimes rotating down to the box, playing like it's an extra linebacker.

Dime or playing a post on like a 50 yard thrown down the field. And spin turning with scary Terry who runs like a four, three and change like it was nothing. Nothing. And then on the play before he's filling the run and like clothes lining the running back. And then on top of it, they go dime. And he's covering the running back, Antonio Gibson, who's no joke to cover. He's covering a slot receiver. He's working from the slot pressed.

he's not playing off there either and going like, oh, I'm hoping to catch you. It's like, no, he's pressing and bringing it to the receiver. It's like, holy shit.

I believe in Dero and James now. I've always been like, oh, okay, intrigued on how he's going to get used, but it's cool to see him use this way where he's around the ball a lot. But just also the other guy that stepped up,

this speaks, and we've talked about this defense needs good safety is Nasir Adelie. I don't even know if I'm saying his name right. He played phenomenal number 24. But that was a, he had a really fun game. Santay Samuel did a couple nice things.

It's cool. It was really cool. Some guys that I have never really paid attention to were popping in a good way and not in a lucky way. That's exactly what we wanted to see from this team. It's exactly what the Rams did last year. It's when you have the Darius Williams is and the guys like that. Jordan Fullers. Yep.

And so the few things that jumped out to me, you know, obviously a lot of conversation about this daily defense coming into this year. And like, how is it different than the Fangio defense? and what does he do that's different. And there's a lot of technical stuff that goes into that, like being more matchy in coverage and doing more college concepts. But one of just the overarching things that's really easy to understand is the different personnel packages that they use, right? So when you come out in a given play,

it's hard to know what angles you're trying to use in the run game, who you're trying to attack in the past game, because guys are lined up in different places than you expect them to be. So on any given play, Derwin can be a deep-half safety. He can be in the slot. Chris Harris was playing safety. Walt Derwin was in the slot playing the star position that they have. So just all of that unpredictability makes it really difficult to play against this team.

And you saw that on the back end. One thing I noticed that was cool. When the Bears had Prince of Mukumara and Kyle Fuller, they would have one guy play press and one guy play off because that was just stylistically how they were more comfortable. The Chargers are doing that with Michael Davis playing press. because he's 6-2 and's got those long-ass limbs, and Asante is playing off because he likes to see it. So just seeing that kind of parallel with the way that that defense used to play

with two very different corners stylistically, that was really cool. So again, not the most shocking thing in the world, the way these guys were deployed, but still something that I'm going to want to watch every single week. How did they use Derwin this week? How did they scheme up the stuff on the back end? What did they do?

The one thing that was a little bit different, more blitzing. They brought more pressures in this game than the Rams typically did. The Rams on third down would do a lot of creative stuff last year, a lot of games and stunts, but it was mostly four-man pressures. I want to say the Chargers brought five or more

on like 11% of their snaps last week, which is more than you would have expected based on what Staley did last season. So again, just a little tiny wrinkles here and there. And I think that's just knowing his personnel because those five-man pressures, one, you're unlocking Joey Bosa. Hey, we got you one-on-one with the right tack, which is like scary for the Cowboys week is that you're going to get to that.

Yes. You got the Zoolander look blocking them. So they're going to have to have turn steel. So you're going to have to have a little chip help for them. But it's those one-on-ones is that's where Derwin, and they would do that out of dying personnel. And that's where James v. They would put them on where they think the ball was going because I saw him on a slot receiver. I saw him on Logan Thomas.

And I saw him on a running back. And they manned him up. and different guys. I don't know if it was different calls or whatever, however, formationally, whatever it was. But I was like, that's pretty interesting because they're like, hey, we got the stud that can cover anybody. All right, let's put them on where we think this ball is going on third down.

And on top of it, let's have Joey Boso one-on-one with your right tackle. It's probably going to be your worst tackle, you know, get most offenses. That's who you're hiding your worst lineman over there. So it's going to be really cool. And we're going to talk about the Cowboys offense real quick because I, I just have like one thing. How much splitback did you see this past week? Well, that's what I was saying about the Pollard stuff, because you're going to see so much of the splitback stuff

because the Packers used it with success against the Rams last year in the playoffs. So you saw the Bears doing that exact same thing, where they'll have two backs in the backfield. They motion one of the backs out because the Rams' response to that in the playoffs last year was the linebacker followed him. So now you have this super light box and you run back into it. What did the Rams do? they brought the safety down and kept this linebacker in.

So now that box isn't as light. So now because teams are going to start stealing so much of the RAM stuff and play with lighter boxes, I think more teams are going to be using some of the splitback stuff in order to manipulate box counts and be able to run the ball. So now what is the next adjustment going to be? Then that's what's what week one is, man. It's like, all right, here's our response to the 2020 season. Now what's next. And that's what you have to watch for.

So, yeah, there's so much splitback and pony and two. Like, that is going to be more prevalent for all of these different reasons. Unless you have this studs everywhere, you have to get creative just to give yourself that advantage. Just where you just, we talked about, hey, making the quarterback hold the ball an extra second. That's what all this is. You want all those things that you do to add up. This is the Steelers defense playing safe, putting their best player, making Fitzpatrick in the hole. And as a robber making the quarterback double clutch, putting five, this is the charges, putting five one-on-on-ones,

Derwin James on your best receiver or best receiving option, it's just they add up. You're saying, okay, he double clutches, we have five one and once. Someone's going to get home. Like that, they're just playing the math. They're saying you can't be perfect every single time. And that's awesome. I love offenses and defenses that just go, you beat us. Hey, we're going to make you beat us.

And that is the best. And the fact that more and more teams are doing that, that's gash or be gash. That's the best type of football. That's points. That's big plays. That's the best type of stuff. So it's really cool. And that splitback stuff too, it makes sense because the, the obvious, quote, unquote, obvious answer that I would say even if I were to game plan something against these defenses is to create for strong looks or overload looks where you're making them play off their match rules, especially with jet motion.

That's what the split back motion does. Hey, boom, get that jet motion, make them push. Boom. And like you said with the Rams example, I know, it's so cool seeing that adjustment, wasn't it? They just said, not this year. They're like, not this year. You're not getting us. Hey, we're dropping that safety.

I want to see, now I want to see what offenses do against that. But yeah, again, it just gets into like this everyone. Well, now you hope maybe can we hit a shot behind it? Correct. Correct. That's right. That's right. That's what it is.

And when you're trying to figure out the ways to get the explosives against that team, now instead of now you're scheming that up for a six yard run, now maybe you can scheme that up for a 40 yard shot down the field. So that's it. Like those are the next steps. And the best play cards too are the best. Like on the first drive, they'll run it and just see what the defense does.

And then you just go, oh, we, we fucking got them. Like, because you'll just see that play come up again. And they're just like, oh, boom, like Shannon, like the best play callers do that. A lot of play callers do it. They're like, they just throw a couple test plays out there just to see what you do. And then they just go, okay, all right, here we go. Here comes the shot. I'm dialing up.

We're going to wad this up. It's going to be awesome. It's kind of a bummer how I, how good the Cowboys offense looks like, looked last week. Again, stumbles in the red zone, but move the ball extremely well. Now you lose Terrence, you lose Lyle Collins for five games. So Terrence Steele is going to be playing right tackle. And then on the other side of the ball, I know that's not what we're focusing on. DeMarcus Lawrence breaking his foot is just, that's such a blow to them.

He is, he was so good last week. He's just the worst. He's such a good player. And now Randy Gregory is also on the COVID list and Neville Gallimore is already on IR. And Michael Gallup is out for several weeks. So, I mean, this is a team that I think based on what they looked like in week one, easily could have walked with the NFCE based on Washington losing its quarterback, a bunch of different stuff.

And now they're dealing with their own injury issues. which it sucks. I mean, that's just a really hard thing to have to deal with over the course of the first week of the season. All right. Our fifth one here, Josh Allen looking to bounce back against the Miami Dolphins. We talked a little bit about the Bill's approach in week one.

Talk about differing approaches on defense. Steelers played all zone, didn't blitz. Now you're going against the Miami team that played about 70% man on third down last year as one of the man-heavyest teams in the NFL. And that is going to be to me a very telling adjustment. Josh and Allen last season had the third highest EPA per dropback against man coverage in the entire league. Kirk Cousins was first.

Rivers, not surprisingly, it was second. Josh and Allen third. And still, teams were spamming man coverage against them and bringing tons of blitzes. So now, in week one, the adjustment that we saw from the Steelers, no blitzing, a ton of soft zone behind it. that's not typically Miami's modus operandi here. So what happens? What did the dolphins do against the bills

as a response to what the bills did to them last year and what they saw in week one against the Steelers? Oh, but I don't think the dolphins change much. I think they live in what they live in. They're that type of team. That's kind of, you respect it in some way.

It's like you kind of go like, hey, it's your fastball. Hey, live with your fastball. Hey, let's go with it. But I think it's playing with fire to blitz Josh Allen. I think it's playing with fire to blitz any quarterback that can scramble. Because it's you can get away with it.

You get a couple. I think those you lean into, you make that your change up of the week, the pressures, just like the Steelers did. Or you bring the simulator. It's where it's only four and it's a safe coverage behind. I just don't think the dolphins do that, though. I think they love living in this world of man. I think that that's just what they do.

They're thinking they're going to dial it up and heat it up. Having said that, I do think Flores is pretty smart, for the Dolphins and he sees what the Steelers just did and they maybe maybe it's going to be more of a they max up the line of scrimmage and drop eight and and it's going to be those third down pressure looks are going to be a lot of the wotted up stuff but it's going to be the change up that usually happens the what bellichick usually does where it's I call it the older brother blitz where it's he just goes he brings cover zero he brings cover zero he brings cover zero and then he drops everybody he goes I'm not hitting you like stop you know what do you talk about don't tell mom I'm not hit you

that that I call that the older brother move and that I think that's that's really what belichick always does that that was the dartled i'm seeing ghost game was that was that's exactly what he did to him uh but i think that's what the look is going to be more of it's going to be they're going to still have the blitzes but it's going to be dialed down just a little bit because i just don't think you can you can't keep up with the horses that that the bills have it's just so hard to the bills don't have a lot of ball winners, but they have a lot of guys. They can win one-on-ones.

A lot of separators. That's exactly what they have. A lot of separators. And they're built on speed and yards after the catch. They're getting the balls in their hands. They're beating you one-on-ones over and over and over and over. That's what they want to live with. So it's, I think that's just scary to try and play man the entire game like the

not the entire game, but the dolphins like the lean-in-in-to. So I do think they'll be a little bit safer. They'll still dial up the blitzes. But I think they watch that Steers game go, oh, maybe they're on something. Maybe we do drop eight. Maybe we do run some coverage to Tampa 2. or a simulated of some sort. I don't know if they do.

I think they lean into what they always do, but I think they maybe just tweak it just a tad. By the way, Josh Allen's a stud. Why do you say that after that game that he played last week? He made some est... I first watched that game and I was like, oh, no, they revert to 2019 or even 2018,

Josh Allen. Nothing how he was operating made me think that. I think he is taking a step forward mentally where it's like it's not that didn't phase him what happened last week was probably a good lesson for him he still hit some monster throws it was more of they were a step behind game plan wise it just happens it happens sometimes it just sometimes everybody gets paid a lot of money to be good at this sport also the Steelers defense has a pretty good track record of success of doing this I know so it's don't overreact Josh Allen made some S tier throws god tear throws I mean he had a

three, three I want to name. He had this dig throw, a basic, a basic dig, it's like a tight end dig on the inside, 14, 16 yards. It's a high, low concept out of empty. He got fooled on a simulated pressure. So he was trying to get the ball out quick because he thought it was a pressure. He goes to the field. The rush is breaking through.

There's two guys falling at his feet. He's falling backwards. He's like 11 yards back in the pocket and throws a missile to this dig route with the guy, like Dawson Knox is like falling over before he even catches the ball. But it didn't matter. I hit him right in the neck. He had to catch it. And then like the neck, I think it was the same drive.

Some penalty happened or something. He hits a seam ball. And it wasn't even a seam ball. The route was the weird ass route. He just, I want to say there was a penalty pre-snat because he just ran a freaking, whoever the receiver was just ran it straight up towards the post. And then Alan just wasn't in phase and just missile that one in.

And then the touchdown in the corner of the end zone on Sutton, who was playing an all-star game on Sunday. He hits that one. That was just like a one-inch throw. Like that was the draped over coverage. with pressure coming in the red zone. He only could put it to one spot and guess what he did. And on top of that, his legs.

Like he, the best player, I said this on Sunday was Josh Allen's legs for the bills. And they had that safety blanket with him. I mean, it's I, I first was like, oh, here you're dressed. But the ball Beasley dropped. I think the Beasley did not expect it to get on him so fast. And it did expect him to fit that ball in there. He was almost like startled by it. And that's like what a good point.

Because it was such a good point. It throws like a sweet like over the Bionback pass. And they're like, oh, shit. Yeah, exact same thing. But I'm not phased by what Josh Allen did last week. I honestly think he missed two throws that I could count, that I can recall. He sailed one corner throw, but guess what? He hit three other ones that were hard, like two of them were tough throw.

So it's like, yeah, I mean, that's why it's hard to throw those corners. We already brought up that point. It's hard to hit those over and over and over. He can do it. So how he performed on Sunday, I'm not phased by. I think that was just more of a, they just got outschemed. And this is going to be a how do you respond game? How do the bills respond?

if more teams do this against them, and how do the dolphins respond to the way that the Steelers played them last week? So that's what I'm looking for in this one. All right, we reserve the right every single week to do a bonus on top of the five that we picked. Really quickly here. Yes. Sometimes five is not going to be enough. Really quickly here.

Let's talk about the Chiefs and the Ravens. I think this is a question again of what is your identity and how much do you want to stick to it? Last season when these two teams played against each other, Baltimore Blitzma, Mahomes on 23 of his 47 dropbacks. On those place, Patrick Mahomes was 19 of 23 for 250 yards and three touchdowns. A very chill 10.9 yards per attempt. Oh, my God. I think that would get me out of blitzing. I'd be like, yeah.

Hey, I know we love man coverage, but we're dropping eight, baby. That is brutal. So now you have a Ravens team without Marcus Peters already. Jimmy Smith could be back this week. He is practicing, which is good news. Marlon Humphrey is practicing. but also a little bit banged up. So what do you do?

If you're the Ravens, if you're Wink Martindale in this game, what do you do? I just said, oh, the dolphins are, I don't think the Ravens are going to change. Do you just,

you just sim to end? And they just start over next week. And just, I think I pray. I think that's the best thing you do is they just got to hope that, hey, this new old line with these young guys gets edgy and we can get after him a couple times,

but Mahomes make so many plays out of structure. And that's what happened last year, too. Even when they brought the fine air pressures and stuff, even with their dominant corners they had, it's just so hard to keep up with that team speed that the chiefs have. But Cole Hardman might not be the greatest receiver in the world, but he can run. He can sure run.

And it's like, and you have Travis Kelsey who is going to be a matchup nightmare for everybody. And teams you can see week to week rotate who they have cover him. If they want to go, man, sometimes they have a safety. Sometimes they put their best corner on them. Like it really depends on who the team is and what they want to do.

So I think the Ravens, still lean into what they do. But I think what if I were them, I would just try and make it as hard as possible. And I think it's just you play too high or you just throw, man, would you say what the blitz percentage was last year? About 50%. Okay. Let's tweak that down to about 20%.

Let's make it one out of five as opposed to 50, 50, you know, as opposed to something like that. That's the only thing you have to do. We talked about last week with the Browns is you can, you can't make any mistakes against this team because they're going to abuse you. Like they just do. Like they, Mahomes is inevitable.

Like he just is. He's going to get you over the time. Chiefs are the Chiefs. I think what you do is you make them be patient. That's the only way you can beat this team is truly, truly, hey, we take our lumps. Hey,

we're playing too high. They hit that. They hit Tyreek Hill on some crazy play, but it's like we have some, some guys that can keep up with them, which try and make, just make it soft and make it easy. Just basically what the Steelers did it Josh Allen.

I know Mahomes is a whole different level. But just really just try and make it, a shortened game, I guess is the best way to put it. Run the ball, make them matriculate down the field, make them go on long, drives, and kick field goals. That's the only way can keep up this Chiefs team, especially when you're banged up like this. Speaking of being banged up on the other side of the ball,

something to look out for Ronnie Stanley not playing this week. Jason Lock and 4th or CBS reported today that he is out for at least this week and possibly longer. He did not look right on Monday. He did. I mean, Mitch talked about that. Mitchell Schwartz and I talked about that on Wednesday's show. He did not look right.

So now, now the wheel starts to turn. Now, though when a wave moves to the right side and you have Patrick McCarrie, who's an interior alignment now moving to right tackle, this is how disasters happen. This is how things start to pile on top of each other. So now you're already losing Marcus Peters. You've lost six running backs. Your all pro left tackle, who you thought was healthy is not healthy enough to play. A guy who got absolutely dusted last week consistently is now you're starting.

left tackle and a guy who is not a tackle is your starting right tackle. I mean, we were excited and enthusiastic about the Ravens coming into the year. Sometimes these seasons get away from you and it feels like we might be trending in that direction for Baltimore. Yeah. Like luckily it's 17 weeks now, so hopefully you get healthier. You're like, okay, we can burn one of these games and hopefully recoup it later. But that's, these are serious injuries.

It's not right. Stanley's coming back from a serious injury. And the fact that they even played week one, I was actually surprised by it. He got hurt in November, I think. So it's like the fact that that he came back that quickly is already something in itself. And like you said, that how many seasons have gotten unraveled by a battle line? I mean, it's just countless, countless, countless, countless. Not just a game, not just a season, but just games too, especially how you're prepped out for this one.

Like the also just not good were seeing the passing game where I saw Mark Andrews and Hollywood Brown twice. at least twice that I'm counting off top of my head, ended up right next to each other on routes. It's always good. I, like, if it was Sammy Watts, Wachens or,

you know, Doverny or somebody at Thailand Wallace, you know, one of them doing it. Mark Andrews and Hollywood Brown are in their third year in the Greg Roman offense. And the fact that those two vets are supposed to be your best receivers, I know what same is good, but end up next to each other twice on big place.

One of them is the third down. It's like, oh, come on. Are we doing this again? Like, because you can't make it hard. You're already, you're already battling uphill. You're already battling with one hand tied, one hand tied behind your back.

Don't make it harder on yourself. Just, just play okay sound football. And yeah, you might not have the best plays, best players, but at least you're not, you know, shooting yourself in the foot and just giving it to the other team. When you have two guys running the same route, Lamar can only do so much. Like he, Lamar can only take so many hits. It's just, it is what it is. I don't know.

It's very concerning for my AFC North pick from the preseason. I put the stank on them. All right. Speaking of putting the stank on people, it's time to get to this week's pick segment. It's time now for our weekly pick segment, which, oh boy, one weekend. Already not sure how this is quite going so far. Shield Kapati, Nate Tice, Schill, how are you feeling a week into this? Because it did not go well last week.

Yeah, you know, I've used a couple of tricks to rationalize it. One is, you know, on the athletic, you know, I write the column, right? So I go 10, 5 and 1. But it tells you that I have no, I don't know what's going to hit. hit what's not because I don't pick a winner at all here. So as I told Nate, I'm a volume shooter of me. So I mean, I know right now we're doing three picks, but if this continues, like, you can't just bring me in off the bench and take three shots and sit me down. Like, I need to heat up. I need to warm up. I need to work a sweat. And so there might need to be some adjustments to this as we go.

But, you know, that's, and then the other weird thought I had was that, I'm like, you know, I was sitting here Monday night as the Ravens are blowing that. And I'm like, you know what, She'll, you've done the column for three years. Like, that's your wife. The pick segment, that's just a mistress. You go in, but it's fun while it lasts, but it doesn't mean anything. Don't let that ruin your evening here. So, yeah, so that will tell you something about my headspace.

So on the week, we're 05 and 1, you two. But Nate, at least Shield got close. The lions were half a point away from pushing. He got the backdoor push with the Jets. You went 0 and 3. and none of yours were even in the ballpark. The Vikings was that that that's the thing. I'm playing just like just like she'll saying he's a volume shooter.

I'll use my basketball analogy. I'm like a late career shack or Rashid Wallace. I have to play myself into shape as the season goes along. That's what I'm doing. I'm playing myself into shape as the season goes along. No, but that's the thing is getting away from being in like working for a football team has been really nice where it's like, oh, a team loses. I'm fine. I can watch Sports Center all week.

Now I'm watching this Vikings, Bengals game just M-Fing every bad play the Vikings at. I was, I posted about the refs today because I'm so bitter about it. I'm trying to get the rest. That's when you know. That's when you know things are off the rest. And I'm like, oh, no, this is how we're, that's week one. So can't wait. Here we go.

17 more weeks to go. So for the people who did not listen to this last week when we did it before week one, here is the format for the pick segment over the course of the year. These guys are going to pick three games against the spread. I'm so happy that I've weasled my way out of this. It's one of the best finesse moves I've ever pulled. If you get one right, you get a point. If you get it wrong, you get nothing.

Every week, you have the option of designated one game as your lukewarm lock of the week. It's getting lukewarmier as we go forward here after the performances you guys put up last week. If you get that right, you get three points, but you lose a point if you get it wrong. I don't even know if this is going to matter based on kind of how things have gone so far.

So far, the total score is Sheel with half a point for his push to zero for Nate one week into this. So there's only one way to go from here, guys. It's only going to get better from here. Yeah. It's like, oh, sorry, Shield. No, I was going to say week one was weird because I'm supposed to be like, all right, I'm going at it with Nate. But I think we were just like commiserating. I'm like, come on, Vikings.

Like, come on, we can't both go winless in this segment. So there's probably a wrestling analogy that Nate can tell us. We're like two guys are so supposed to be enemies. I'm like, we're in this together. Either we're both in misery or will we both do something well. What happened with the Lions game where I message you? Was it the on-site kick or like, uh, yeah, something. I was like, let's go.

I just mess with you right away. Let's go, buddy. I was like, one of let's get on the board. The best part about the Lions game is that Quintas Cephas almost got the Lions to cover. The fact that we had Quintas Cephas from the Nate's side and then she'll having the lions plus seven and a half. It was the greatest outcome possible for this podcast. It was too much.

It was too exciting. So let's get to this because I'm sure people cannot wait to hear your guys' insights on some of these lines of a week two. Shil, why don't you kick us off? What is the first game that you're picking here from the week two slate? All right. First is, so my theme for this week was like, you know, I was trying to not overreact to week one. So what I thought before the season, I was like, remember what you thought before the season? Don't go overboard.

And so I've got the Carolina Panthers at home against the New Orleans Saints. Panthers are plus three and a half. I'm going with Carolina to cover the three and a half. Now, I'm not going to tell you that I thought, you know, Sam Darnold and that offense completely lit it up in week one against the Jets. They did not. But I did see a coaching staff that put him in much better position to succeed. Just some of the stats were pretty interesting.

He had the lowest number percentage of tight window throws of any quarterback in the NFL last week. I think he had 107 yards off of play action. So they were using that and they were throwing on early day. You know, all this stuff like the analytics people are telling us, hey, here's how you help a quarterback. They were at least doing that for him. And I'm not all in on like that James performance. You know, rewatching that game, I'm like,

all right, he had the interception that was called back for what felt like a bogus penalty. I thought his past catchers did an amazing job on some of those. I mean, they were making incredible catches, Juan Johnson, Alvin Kamara. So I don't know that that's going to happen again. I mean, the guy had 85 passing yards, and they were up 24 to 3. So I'm frightened. I'm scared going against Sean Payton. I do not want to make a habit of doing this,

given what he's done the past few years. But I think that Panthers defense, they've just got some, like, you know, athletes on that side of the ball. And I just look at that match up at the skill positions. And I think maybe they can create a turnover or two, keep it close, maybe even win the game. Me and Nate dug into that game a little bit earlier on the podcast, just the performance that the Panthers offense had.

I was impressed with what they did last week, even if the final score didn't necessarily show that. So I appreciate you stick into your preseason guns there, Sheel. We'll see how that goes. But I understand your reason. Yeah, we'll not go well. But here I am. We'll see what that brings.

I think that that game's going to be a little like uglier than you would think. Not in a bad way where it's like bad football, but more of like a fist fight. I think than you would think. So I actually like taking the points. I'm staying away from that game. But yeah, I can see the angle. Okay. Nate, who you got?

What's your first one? First one, I am going. I am not overreacting because this is. what I thought they would look like anyways, but, and I'm going, I'm not learning my lesson. I am going with a road favorite here. I'm going to Rams minus three and a half against the Colts at, at Indy. And with that game, we talked about Robert, but it's, I, I just watching that performance on Sunday and watching it back on the film. And like, actually, you know what? Andy Dalton played okay. And but just what the really really did. And but the Rams defense is just outstanding. And

looking at what cars, how Carson Wentz looked, uh, when we, one it's like oh no it was more of the same so it was that is kind of scary i'm kind of almost betting against frank rike figuring out cars and wents i think that's going to be an ongoing process for them to kind of really hone in on what they do well because they got so many new part i mean just they're just got hodgepodge of pieces right now not bad but just got to figure that out and just how the rams look the run game look good not just the stafford stuff like they're in the gun now throwing the ball with stafford like it is it's really fun stuff i'm writing about it right now. But I'm going with the Rams three and a half because I just think until people get a

real good beat on them, they're fine running the ball, they're fine passing the ball and they're fine spreading it out. They're fine going with their zone stuff. They're running like cool windback stuff or the receivers are inserting. And I just think that creativity is going to help when they go against a team that's going to be in a lot of the same coverages all game. So they're going to know what they're getting and going to have answers for it. So I just think they're going to continue the trend until teams start getting more tape on them and seeing what they're doing with Stafford. I'm going to go with the Rams minus three and a half. I don't know if we have a,

I don't know if we have a name for this maze, but Nate, we both got the Rams three and a half, baby. Let's go. Let's go fighting McMaze. Two wrongs make a right. Two wrongs make it right. That's right.

No, I mean, I agree with what you said, but I just, I feel like there's a huge talent gap in this game. When you look at where the Colts are, just from an injury standpoint here, their tackles look terrible last week. And I'm with,

I thought in that game, the Colts were really like, Frank Wright was like, let's hide whence a little bit. You know, we're like the number one thing was I'm not putting the game on his shoulders. It was they ran the ball. And then I don't know how many running backs. I swear every other play was a running back screen to Jonathan Taylor, which they're good at.

And he looked good at it. But it's like, how many times can you do that? And that Rams defense where that Bears game, it's like, okay, go ahead, complete underneath, complete underneath. That's like, like, if you have a formula that Carson Wins does not want to play, that's it. I mean, patience, precision, accuracy on some of those layup throws. was like that is not his game at all. So I think the matchup really favors the Rams here. But I'm sure at, you know, mid afternoon on Sunday we're going to be like, you know,

this was the this was the look too easy game. It could be. This was the look to, could be the look too easy game. Or the Rams or the Rams went by a field goal. And we just. Yeah. Right.

Yeah. We just, oh, I think it's so funny that you say that because that was a real stark contrast with the Rams game last week and the Colts game. last week with new quarterbacks. The Colts felt like they were really, really antsy, really trying to hide him, trying to like, all right, let's, how do we feel about this?

Kind of not really comfortable with the whole thing. And the Rams were like, here we are world. Like we are putting this guy on display. I hope you're ready for it. You could sense that just in the way that they were playing and what they were asking them to do. I couldn't think of two quarterback debuts more different than those two were last week. So I think it makes total sense from both of you guys.

Nate, what's your second one here? My second one, because again, I don't learn lessons. If you're going to learn anything about me is I'm very stubborn with this betting process. And I'm going with a team that really stuck it to me last week, but I'm going with the Vikings plus four at the Cardinals. And like I said, I've watched both of these games and watch the Cardinals. And I'm not knocking anything the Cardinals did. I still do think that the offense is Kyler go do something funny. but and I just think the Vikings really they got unlucky in that game.

I do think they have talent gaps up front and I do think the Cardinals are better up front as far as Vikings' offense versus Cardinals defense. But I do think that they're going to be able to run the ball and stay ahead of the chains better than the Titans did last week. I think that was just a terrible game script for for the Titans. On the Vikings side, just watching the game, like they got 12 penalties. I mean, they really, I wish to push. They're really hurting at tight end.

I'm like you just give a super negative on the Vikings right here and then say I'm about the bad them so that's just perfect. But it's just I was I was surprised how easy that the Bengals ran on them. That was actually very surprising to watch, especially on the rewatch. It was good stuff by them. But but having said that, I do think that the Cardinals will not abuse that as much as the Bengals did. I think Cliff is kind of one of those guys that wants to get a little bit of everything going and maybe he won't pound the rock as much as he should against that team.

I think the Vikings, like I said, they had bad luck last week. and they're just due, if they just play the same way, they're going to keep this game close. They might not win, but I do think it's going to be a close game, especially with those blitz packages. I know Roddy Hudson is just, he's done,

he's really helped them out. But I do think it's going to, you know, I think that Zimmer's going to get there. The one thing I am worried about is the Vikings old line is a bit of like, that has that suicide squad feel going against Chandler Jones and JJ Watt, like kind of a little bit like, yeah,

we're about to go to our death right here. But I'm just hoping that they hold on for 60 minutes and they get me through this game, but I'm going with the Vikings plus four. What did you think about their offense just overall, like the passing game, the first game from Clint Kubiak? We haven't hit that game at all in what they looked like offensively. What were your impressions when you went back and watched them? It's a Kubiak offense all the way. I thought some of the third down passing was actually pretty good, like were they're isolating

Justin Jefferson and Adam Thielen. So that's kind of cool. Their situational passing was better. They got to get Kirk in the gun on first down, just because the interior of the line is just so bad. It really is. I mean, I should say bad, but it's inconsistent. And I just think that they should give him some breathing room on some of these passes. Like, I think they're just so, they could be so static with their stuff. They'll be in 20 personnel and eye formation. And it's like, okay, well, this is pass. You know what I mean? Like they, their, their tendencies are 100 percenters at this

point in time. So I think like, Clint's guy kind of maybe just, uh, his name Clint. Yeah. Coach Kubiak Jr. I don't know why I was like, I guess there. It actually got it right. But it's, I just think that maybe just getting him in the gun and spreading it out a little bit more because they have to because they're trying to rely on these tight ends that they got off the street who are just headcases right now, not only physically, but it's so I just think they got to understand where their weaknesses are. And I know they want to do these other things, but help each other help themselves out a little bit. Sheal, what's your last one, buddy? Yeah, that one was on my list. I had a handful that I was choosing from. And I do like that side of the Vikings. Now, I was, I didn't have the same takeaway you did as last week. I kind of felt like they, they sort of stole it just to be that game. I mean, they're down 21-7 and the Bengals go for it on that fourth down. So I got scared away by their O-line against what I saw from Chandler Jones and JJ Watt last week. But we'll see. I, you know, that is one. I don't worry. Don't worry. Yeah. If you're not overreact into week one,

you're like, you know, those should be fairly even teams. So I do have that side. All right, I am going with the Denver Broncos. Now, this was one where I'm like, Shield, this is a, you know, the sucker's bet. You're going with the favorite on the. road against the team that stung last week. But I'm like, you know what? I want to feel good on Sunday. And so, you know, I'll feel fine about this if I bet against, like, that Urban Meyer Jaggs.

I didn't think a team looked any worse prepared than the Jags did last week. I mean, 10 penalties, three turnovers, five drops. They went three and out on 50% of their drives against the Texas. Ira Taylor is shredding them. And I don't know if this is normal or not. Maybe you guys can tell me for a team account to be tweeting out the coach saying he's committed to the organization one freaking week into his tenure. I mean, are you serious? Brick by brick? I was like, oh my gosh, what is happening with that franchise? It's week two. We're going

into week two. What is happening here? So I just made a rule to myself. I'm like, in order, if the Jags are going to be dogs of like under a touchdown, I'm just going to take them, I think, take the other team, sorry, until it burns me. And I got to say that Broncos win was impressive. I thought that was like one of the best versions of Teddy Bridgewater I've seen. I mean, he was spraying it all over the field. He was making second reaction plays. I like just, you know, the body language stuff, the enthusiasm and like, you know, teammates getting pumped for each other.

And like their defense didn't play great. I thought their defense had a lot of room to grow. But I was really encouraged by their offense in that game. So, you know, they had a fumble in the red zone. KJ. Hamler had a big drop on like a 50-yard touchdown. Like they easily could have scored mid-30s or 40 there. it's six points. It's one of those where you look at it and you're like, this does feel sort of like a sucker's bet, but I was like it's week two. I want to feel good about it. I don't want to be rooting for a lion's cover like I was doing last week. So this is more for my mental health probably than anything else that I'm taking the Broncos minus six. I totally get it though. I mean, look at that offense and what we thought about it coming into the season, six points seems like a lot. But the way they played in week one and then the way the Jags offense looked, I looked up some of the numbers. You know the Texans used covered too on 40 snaps last week.

Did they? Lovey! 40 snaps. 40 times. That's concerning for, yeah. So that was their offense when they knew what was coming pretty much every single play. Now they're playing against Fangio and it's going to be an entirely different beast.

So I completely understand you go in that way, She'll, even if it seems like a lot for an offense that maybe we weren't overly enthusiastic about coming into the year. Yeah. I shouldn't like the Jaguars just be so much more enthusiastic. on the field, like all preseason and in the last week, it's just like they look listless. They look like, yeah, the team last year going one in 15. It's like, you already got your quarterback. Like, let's see a little little pepperinger step.

No juice. Yeah. I know. I know. It's, oh, man, but that, yeah, I mean, that's other things. But I mean, also with the Broncos, it's like Vaughn Miller's back. And he looks fan fricking tasic. And just that defense, I, I agree with everything you guys just said.

I know it's one of those where. minus six seems like a lot because you're like, oh, Teddy Bridgewater is going to get beaten by seven. But the thing is, if you're going to be against that Jaguar's defense, I think they're going to have it their way. However, they want to get those points. So they can run the ball, and I think they get past ball how they want to against them. So I see the angle. I like it. I was worried that I got the 40 wrong, that that was like, no, it's way too high.

It was 40. It was 40. I mean, it's a great point because it's what everybody expected the Texans to run. And so, you know, like if you were to say he ran, you know, 40 snaps of like cover one or one robber. So, you know, something that they're not expected coming in. But like, this is the one thing we know about, like even I could tell you. I think Lovy Smith, they're probably going to be running some cover two, 40 snaps. And to look like that, man, that is, I'm glad it makes me feel better about my pick.

Not that it should, but it does. All right. The tone of this is way too optimistic, just overall. I'm letting you guys know. It's going to be so fun to listen back to this. when all of these crash and burn. When Trevor Lawrence somehow burns down, Vic Fangio's defense, it's going to be amazing.

On that note, Nate, what's your last one? And to top it off, I'm going to make this a pick of the week. I am right here. Yes. Yes. I'm doing it. I got it right here. Okay.

I don't know if there's like, do, do, do like a noise makes or anything like that. But my pick of the week is weird. I'm going with a road favorite again. I can't help myself. 49ers minus three at Philly at the Eagles. Wow. And I think this is because the Eagles played a JV team last week and everyone's overreacting, think they look phenomenal.

As much as I love Devante Smith, as much as I love what they did do against the Falcons, I don't believe it. And I might just, this might burn me. But I think it's just the 49ers are going to outclass them. This is like a horse race where the Eagles just won a $10,000 race at Canterbury Downs in Minnesota. And the 49ers, though, are winning, you know, purse races at Churchill Downs in Kentucky. Like that is what I kind of picture just as.

I know the four in aries squeaked by the lines, but they truly dominated that game for three and three quarters. So I just, like you said, Sheel, I'm sticking with where my thoughts were from the summer and from the spring where I thought the Eagles were one of the poorer, lesser rosters in the league. And I thought 409 had a really good roster. Even with Furek going down, all that, I'm going to go with the 49ers minus three.

I just think they're going to control the rock. They're going to confuse. They're going to get after Jalen hurts a little bit and actually make them read stuff out. They're going to have a better game plan for them. they just have more talent than that Falcons defense did to get after him. So 40-9 or minus three, pick of the week. Let's do it. Can't wait to regret this.

This is, I'm upset because I wasn't ready with any sort of punishment because I didn't think you guys would pull the rip cord this early on the pick of the week. So I'm going to have to, I'm going to have to marinate on this over the weekend and decide what you have to do when you get this wrong, not if, but when you get this wrong, what you're going to have to do next week on the show or a little bit beforehand. This is bold. I love it. I love it.

There's just no reason to wait. Let's get this going. Hey, Bruce Ariads. No, hey, no balls, no blue chips. I love my baby. I think the hope for the Eagles in that game is that up front they can win some of those matchups. You know, they played the Niners last year in their defensive line.

Like I know Trent Williams was maybe the best left tackle in the league last year, but they like got after him and got after that offensive line quite a big. And I think the Eagles defensive line was as good as advertised in week one. And then, you know, that Niners defensive line against the. Eagles offensive line. That's going to be pretty fun to watch with everybody. J. Von Kinlaw, I don't know if he's going to play, but everybody else sort of being healthy. So it's a bold pick because the Niners are a little banged up, right? Drake Greenlaw, I think is out. Jason Brett, you mentioned there. So they've got-

Emmanuel Mosley hasn't been practicing. They're on a cornerbacks. Yeah. So it's a, it's a bold pick. As much as I love Devante Smith, it's one of those where I just think it's a situation as no one else is scaring you. And if Jalen Hurts is a, I love him. as like a dude it seems like but just him as a quarterback in the pocket operating don't let him scramble and you're you're fine honestly it's he's one and go and i think this 40 and ir's defense has the horses to actually do that fred warner getting underneath on stuff and then even just up front if he has to double clutch the ball they're running those games and here comes nick

bose around the side but no that's that that that was my concern too and i see this line has gone down when i originally had it was it was it was minus four and it's gone down a point and i i i'm happy actually to get it at minus three I just, I just really do think that foreign areas offense can control it and just, God, that is a good point about their deal. Because what Javon Argrave had a hell of a game. But it's also, like I said, he's going against Canterbury Downs offense alignment from the Balkans. So that's, that's what I know. That's what I love about football.

It's like, because the NFL especially, it's like week to week, guys can look phenomenal. And then also in the next week, we're like, oh, yeah, that's right. He wasn't playing anybody. So that and that's why by the time we figured it out, it's usually. the playoffs are starting. So, but that's why I just really, I just think the foreigners outclass him. I just really do think that. I think they had a good game plan.

I thought they got a little too cute, that Lions game. I think now that maybe they get a little more pissed off and they're just going to run away with this one. I cannot. Who knows? I cannot wait. I cannot wait to see all of this unfolds again. One week into this, six games picked.

We got half a one right. So again, it can only get better from here. Only go up from here, baby. Spot and a lead. That's all we're doing. Gentlemen, really appreciate it. Again, this is going to be a blast all year. I cannot wait to see all of this shit crash and burn over the next few days.

Thank you guys so much for listening. We will be back on Sunday night with Nate. Until then, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. I sincerely appreciate that. Also, please subscribe to The Athletic. Theathletic.com slash football show. You can check out Shield's full picks column there where he does a lot better than he does on this show. so I highly encourage you to check that out.

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