The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - First impressions of new units and faces after Week 1

Episode Date: September 11, 2025

One of the best parts of Week 1 is that we finally get to see a bunch of new stuff in action. Like the Geno Smith/Chip Kelly offense in Las Vegas. Or Nick Caley running Houston's offense. Or Cam Ward playing in the NFL and Robert Saleh back with the 49ers. What are our first impressions of all these new things? Robert Mays and Dan Pizzuta of Snaps and Stats dig in on this episode of The Athletic Football Show.Connect with The Athletic Football ShowX: https://x.com/TA_FootballShowIG: https://www.instagram.com/tafootballshowYT: https://www.youtube.com/@TAFootballShowTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tafootballshowDiscord: https://discord.gg/sPp5md3BCall us: 847-448-0701Host: Robert MaysWith: Dan PizzutaExecutive Producer: Michael BellerProducer: Michael BellerFollow Robert on Bluesky: @robertmays.bsky.socialFollow Dan on Bluesky: @danpizzuta.bsky.socialFollow Robert on X: @robertmaysFollow Dan on X: @DanPizzutaTheme song: HauntedWritten by Dylan Slocum, Trevor Dietrich, Ruben Duarte, Kyle McAulay, and Meredith VanWoert / Performed by Spanish Love SongsCourtesy of Pure Noise / By arrangement with Bank Robber Music, LLC Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. I'm Robert Mays. Week 1 is in the books, and me and my buddy Dan Pizzuda today are just running through some initial first impressions from some new situations around the NFL. That can mean anything, really, right? And so today we're going to talk about a couple new quarterbacks that we saw this week, one playing for a new team, one playing for the first time. We're going to talk about quarterbacks in new places, a couple new offensive coordinators, a defensive coordinator returning to his. old team with a bunch of young defensive players that we've never seen before. So this was really a chance to do a deeper dive into four, five, six units that we really haven't gotten a chance to

chew on since those week one games wrapped up. So really enjoyed my conversation with Dan talking about our first impressions of these groups. Let's get to it right now. Joining me for the first edition of our Thursday show on the athletic football show this season from the snaps and stats. Substack, product, whatever you want to say you're hosting it. It is a football content machine run by our guy here, Dan Pizzuta. Dan, how you doing, man? I'm doing well. How are you?

I'm doing fantastic. We're back to football. And I'm very excited to have this conversation with you. Yeah, absolutely. Are you sure you're doing well? This is the first time I think you've talked since being at the Bears game. You're doing okay. I just want to check it.

I'm doing okay. Yes. I, you know, listen, I think that there was a lot of emotional lows associated with the game, but it was still great to be there. We will talk a little bit about it on our preview show tomorrow because I feel like we have to discuss that performance from the offense in some way and what it might mean moving forward. But it was fun to go to the game.

I had a great time going to the game. I wish the outcome had been better. But at this point, I'm so beaten down that there's really nothing that can surprise me anymore. It was just one of those things where over the course of the game, I just got progressively quieter and more withdrawn. on and I'm very used to that experience as I watched the Chicago Bears. Yeah, I kind of figured that was kind of how it happened. But yeah, just wanted to check in, see how you were doing.

I appreciate that. We'll talk about some more exciting stuff today. It's always hard to know how to program these early season shows because we're just trying to figure out what's real, what's not real, what from week one actually matters. And so what I wanted to do today was essentially just talk about our first impressions of some stuff that is new this season. That can be a new player on a team. That can be a new offensive or defensive coordinator.

That can be some young players with a returning defensive coordinator, which we'll talk about a little bit later today. But we just wanted to pick out like five or six things that are different about the 2025 season and discuss our first impressions from those things. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. Obviously, we're looking at, there's a lot of stuff to take it. We never know what's real or not, but yeah, a lot of fun things that kind of stuck out that I'm curious to see if we're going to continue throughout the season. You threw three. I threw three back at you. We're going to start with three of the ones that you suggested.

And let's begin with your early impressions of the Las Vegas Raiders offense with Gino Smith and Ship Kelly. What piqued your interest about the Raiders on Sunday that made you want to kick it off with them? Man, what didn't? It was fun. in just this sense of like what wouldn't athletic football show be without some Gino propaganda to start right off the bat. But just kind of structurally,

just everything they were doing, the fact that I mean, the run game probably is going to be a concern going forward, but the fact that they stuck to the play action game for Gino, 32.5% of his dropbacks season play action. And again, we remember last year in Seattle, that was like 18%. So the fact that they were able to

have some deep shots off that, the way they were moving in, you know, 12 personnel with Bowers and Michael Mayer at the same time developing some shot plays off of that. Like, this is a Gino offense that, like, there were some shots in there that are really fun. And I think there's just kind of a type of, you know, expanded passing offense that I think is really going to fit what these players can do. Yeah, it's a combination of different sorts of play actions. The first play of the game, they're in the pistol and they have Bowers running up the seam. And Gino just rips like a line drive throw off of play action. So those throws, we've come to expect from Gino. Like when he can put

his back foot in the ground and just let it go, that's some of my favorite stuff we see on an NFL football field. So that was the first example. And then they came out in the second half and actually were doing some under center play action stuff. And some of the best stuff that Waldron did, in my opinion, when that offense was really rolling in Seattle at its best, when they were like back half of the top 10 in success rate. They had some of this under center play action stuff with obviously the skill sets are the receivers on that team when you're living in a lot of 12 personnel with Lockett and DK, really you have two vertical receivers. Like those are the skill sets that you have.

And one of my favorite things they would do is they would get an under center play action and they would just run like deep curls with those guys after threatening vertically. And they come out on the first play of the second half, I believe, or the first drive of the second half. And that's exactly what you get. You get like a big deep curl from Jacoby Myers. Gino rips it into that void, and then on the next play, you get like a big crosser off of play action. And so if this is going to be a team that wants to live pushing the ball into the intermediate and deep areas the field off of play action, they have the quarterback who can do that.

Like, that's the best version of Gino that we saw in Seattle. And so getting a few glimpses of that early on, I'm very much looking forward to that style of offense, that that's the one that we're going to get. Yeah. And then the way they just manipulate defensive personnel off that. too. When you're in 12 as much as they are, I think, you know, obviously you're going to want to be able to run the ball a little better than they do. But if you want to start defending that in Nickel, which I think the Patriots have eventually started doing, that's when they can, you know, use those

pieces to just run the ball down their throats. And I think we'll eventually see the development there. I mean, I think Gentie was hit 0.4 yards beyond the line of scrimmage on average, which was one of the lowest among running backs. I think he had the third lowest expected yards per carry per next gen. So it's not like the running game was bad in a way that he couldn't, you know, make anything happen. It was just they were getting, the run blocking was not very good. I think that will eventually kind of figure it out just schematically.

So when you're built actually going to, you know, the kind of the opposite of the football guy thing, the run to play action, I think they're going to play action to run really well as we continue to develop. up, you know, this throughout the season. We saw the usage with the tight ends, which was a little bit curious and I think a little bit of a tell. Essentially, like when Mayer was on the field and 11 personnel was going to be a run. When Bowers was on the field, it was going to be a pass. And I think they have to play with some of that stuff. I also think that there were just, these are, when you have a bunch of

layers to your personnel and how that plays into your run game, that's stuff that you're just never going to figure out in training camp. But you just don't have enough full speed, fully padded practices to really hone all of that. And so I think that's why we see things feel a little bit uneven for these teams early in the season. And the Bowers, you should specifically, I think that we're going to have to see them tweak that over time because there are plays where he's on the field, but he's in the core blocking on passing plays.

And it's just like, there are ways to use this guy where you don't have to throw it 85% of the time when he's in there. And we can have it be a little bit more cohesive and a little less siloed based on which tight ends are on the field. I think over time, I would hope that that stuff that they start to sharpen. and hone a little bit as we get a little bit more time on task with this group specifically. Yeah, and I think that's going to be the case where you're still trying to figure out what that

personnel is. And obviously, he goes out early in that game with the injury. So you're kind of try to figure out what exactly, you know, his role was going to be, you know, when fully healthy. I'm glad we, you know, the early like preseason Michael Mayer is playing more than Brock Bowers thing. We didn't really have to worry about it. I think they're going to be both play plenty, which I think is a lot of fun. And then the wide receivers I'm excited about, too. You know, there were a couple of nice just shots to the Jacoby Myers. There was one.

I think in the, you know, the first quarter where he just kind of rips it, kind of up the seam. And then I think when you have the speed of Trey Tucker and Dante Thornton, they both had long receptions in this game, when you have those guys running as fast as they can on the outside and you have the two tight ends making the defense just really worry about what's going on in the middle. I think that really stretches out what this offense can be too. I wonder how that ends up working with Bauer specifically, though,

because if those two fast vertical guys are going to be out on the outside and they have Myers on the slot, what is that going to mean for the Brock Bauer's usage? And are we going to see him enough if they're committed to playing Thornton and Tucker as much as they seem to be? Again, I think this is all just stuff that you're going to figure out over the course of the year. But if you're going to treat Bauer solely as a slot receiver, which it kind of seems like they are within this offense, then how redundant is that with the way that they want to use Myers and then

what does the workload between those guys look like? That's something that I'll be paying attention to as we keep moving forward. The group I wanted to touch on at least a little bit is the offensive wine because I think that even if you could get excited about the Gino, Brock Bowers, Jacoby-Meyers, Chip Kelly, Ashton Genty combination of all of this, the line was a question mark. And at the end of last season. I was actually kind of encouraged by some of the stuff that this group of five, in different spots, put on tape together. Jordan Meredith was playing guard for them last year. He's now moved to center. And Jackson Powers Johnson is now playing guard after playing center in the back half of last year. But DJ Glaze is somebody they drafted in the third round last

season as the right tackle. I thought he played well enough to earn a starting job in year two. The early returns from this group in week one, not great. I feel like that's, if you had some optimism, about the Raiders offensive line, I think it took a hit based on what we saw in the first week of the season. You mentioned the run game stuff, but even in past protection, I feel like there was something left to be desired. Gino was pressured on 65% of his blitzed dropbacks in this game. He took four sacks on those plays. He also averaged 14 and a half yards per attempt when the ball came out against those blitzes. So if the ball left his hand, it was a good thing. But he's getting hit and pressured a little bit too often from my liking.

even when you consider that side of it. Yeah, I mean, Gino, you know, you were, you were born, you were raised in that. He was born in this. Like, this isn't much different than like what Gino Smith has had to do. Obviously, I think we do hope there is, I think there were a few more answers that he was able to get to, you know, and had the opportunity to get those balls off when he, when he did, have the opportunity. But, yeah, the offensive line in general is definitely going to be something.

to watch. Again, I think they're going to fix it, and I think they can get to okay, which I think if you, the way they want to use the play action, and the play action was set up well, which I think was nice the way they, I think they faked the run well, like they weren't getting beat in that way. So I think that can hopefully translate to what they actually do on run plays. And then hopefully that also, you know, goes to the straight dropbacks too. But again, you know, Gino, no stranger to having to make stuff out of pressure when it gets quick. So it was, I think overall, this is a very exciting thing. Certainly are things that you kind of wonder if it's going to hold them back.

But for what we saw in week one, I think there's a lot to like. And I will say, I mean, sometimes you don't know based on the opponent that you're going against how excited to be about a specific element of a team. But watching the Patriots defense, like Harrow Landry looks really good on Sunday against the Raiders. I mean, he cooked Glaze at one point, like high side, like a little dip, you know, outside rush. And then they ran a twist and Jackson Powers Johnson just did not get back to it. And the way that Harold Landry was moving, I was like, oh, shit. Like, that's not a signing I really loved this offseason based on the last version of Harold Landry we had seen.

But I thought that he looked really good, really explosive, really bendy. And I thought Milton Williams, not surprisingly, gave those interior guys trouble more times, you know, more than once over the course of this game. And so I think that this front has enough talent that they may give you a little bit more problems than some of the other teams that you're going to be going against. But again, somewhat worrying first step out of the gate for the Raiders offensive line, even if there are plenty other aspects of this offense that are worth getting excited about. Yeah, yeah, definitely agree. Let's get to our next one here. The Indianapolis Colts offense, which isn't a new offense. I mean, most of these guys outside of a couple interior offensive linemen who we saw in spot duty last year,

have, you know, they return essentially, let's say, nine and a half starters from last year's team. The quarterback is not one of them, though. And so this was our first glimpse at the Daniel Jones Colts against the Dolphins on Sunday. What were your first impressions of the Daniel Jones led Colts offense in week one? So you said it's not a new offense. And kind of what stood out is how not knew it was in a sense that it was like a combination of the 22, Daniel Jones offense, and the 2023 Gardner-Minchu offense, which, again, not like, exciting, but those can work if done correctly. And I think they have the right idea of what

this offense is supposed to be. You know, a ton of play action. He had, what, 39% of his dropbacks were play action, you know, seven and a half yard, A dot off play action. It's 6.8 when not play action. So I think when we use an average depth of target, it's usually like has a large average that you're bringing together. But this just kind of felt like every pass was like seven yards. I think like 52% of his throws were between 1 to 10 air yards. And like if Daniel Jones can successfully

live in that area, that can work. You know, the first play, they have a boot to the left, which was basically the entire 2022 Daniel Jones offense when that offense worked with the Giants. And then you kind of look at what they were doing. and personnel-wise, well-crafted plan to use Tyler Warren, a lot of 13 personnel, which was a lot of fun. So I just kind of think they know which levers to pull.

And for all of the talk that we had about, you know, what the floor or ceiling of this offense can be, I think this was, you know, Shane Steichen showing that he can control this type of offense, at least how exciting that gets for the rest of the year. I think it's probably something we can talk about. but I think knowing like what box they need to be in for this offense, I think we kind of saw that in week one. Yeah, I don't think with Dan Jones as your quarterback, you ever will or should be a team that's just consistently pushing the ball down the field. It's not how he's wired. And if you look at the numbers over the last couple years with the Giants, I mean, that was the biggest gripe that Giants fans had with the Daniel Jones led offense.

And it's one of the reasons that I think a lot of them had so much optimism about the Russell Wilson version of this offense is that even if it's imperfect, we're going to push the ball down this. field. And so you look at some of the numbers from last week, attempts of at least 15 or more air yards for the Colts was 17.8% of their dropbacks per Tramita. That was the 22nd highest ranked mark in the league after week one. It's not crazy, but you look at some of the kind of the pointed decisions to push the ball down the field when the opportunities were there. And that was happening. Like, it's not as if he was gun shy when those chances were there down the field. I mean, there's a bunch of different examples. The first little railroad. rowdy hits to Tower Warren that's open. He lets that thing rip. He takes a one-on-one fade to

Alec Pierce in the end zone at one point. He, though, throw it down the left sideline to Alec Pierce, I believe in the second half, is like an incredible throw and catch from both of those guys. And then the Michael Pittman touchdown, even though it's wide open, I felt like when the throws down the field were there to be made, he was willing to rip those things outside of the numbers in the intermediate area especially. That's all you need. Like, I don't need him to be, Jordan Love or Gino Smith in the aggressiveness we see with Daniel Jones. I just can't have it be like a mind-numbing level of cautiousness over the entire season. And that's not what we got on Sunday.

And I think that's what was so encouraging about it. Yeah, that's one of the things where I think there's a sentiment of Giants fans, which growing up a Giants fan, I still have, I'm still a little too involved in that community. But there was a lot of like Daniel Jones is a good, deep passer because he has like, this high completion rate when he throws deep. But like you said, it's because when he throws deep, it's like these wide open places. So he can put the ball in that area. The one play that you talked about, the Pittman touchdown, I love that because it's, you

have a pitman and Warren on that side. Warren's running a post, and that brings the deep safety in. And you've got that little double move then to the outside that opens up Pitman completely. So again, it's just these levers that they know, how to use Warren in that way, how to create some of these openings that are going to happen deeper down the field. And then when he's just asked to do some of the play action, find the first easy read to scramble if it's not there, I think like that is something that can at least not be a

terrible offense going forward. And when we kind of had what expectations we were going to have with the Colts, I think this is probably the best case scenario you could have at least in week one. I totally agree. And I think it's a combination of so many different things. You mentioned like the 2022 Giants offense. It's the first third down of the game. We see Pittman, like, in that Dallas Goddard kind of sniffer roll behind the tackle run across the formation in this RPO where he just dumps it in the flat.

I mean, we've seen that version of an RPO a million different times in the NFL over the last five years. And that's what Daniel Jones did really well during that 2022 season. So you have a little bit of that. You have a little bit of the intermediate and downfield stuff that I think this receiving core requires of you in order to unlock everybody. And then one of the things about just the decisions he was making I was really encouraged by is that there were a lot of just well-timed and well-executed checkdowns within the offense. And that's something that sounds silly to be harping on and kind of pumping up after week one. But I felt like every time the ball was going underneath, it was going underneath for a good reason. You know, the one play where Jonathan Taylor split out all the way to the right, he comes all the way back to him.

that's a really good decision. There's a checkdown to Taylor against like an inverted cover two look where that's the right move because of how much error is in the coverage. They get a first down on that play. And so even when he was throwing the ball underneath and the ways that we're used to seeing

from Daniel Jones recently, it was to the betterment of the offense. And I think that to me is what was really exciting about the decisions he was making over the course of this game. Yeah. And again, like if that's something you can get in the mind of Daniel Jones because as we know,

he is someone who would like to hang on to the ball has not the greatest pocket presence in the world. So I think you see some of the sacks he just takes is when he should just be getting rid of the ball and has no kind of idea that pressure is coming. So the fact, if you can kind of time that a little bit, again, the checkdowns aren't going to be exciting. But when the other plays that are happening are usually negative when he's trying to do that, if he's getting to the checkdown, I think that's very good coaching.

and again, does raise the floor, like people kind of said, that this might do. And, you know, that is, I think, what it did. With this team specifically, I think this is all about, this is the reason they went to Daniel Jones. It's like, we have so much faith in our ability to create separation for these receivers because of who our offensive coordinator is. And what our run game can look like because of Jonathan Taylor and because we are a team that has earned equity in our offensive line ecosystem. So you have Tanner Bornellini now at center. after they move on from Ryan Kelly, and Matt Gonzalez comes and is the right guard after Will Fries moves on.

Obviously, he played a decent amount last year because Fries was hurt. But that group coming in, and you really not even noticing the fact that there were two new interior offensive line starters, I think that goes a long way if you're trying to build up your Colts optimism. And you combine that with, I thought Jonathan Taylor was fantastic in past protection in this game against a team that blitzed more often in the Dolphins than any other team in the NFL in week one.

And so if you're going to have that love, of protection with two new offensive line starters. If you're going to go four, even five receiving options deep on this team and you're going to run the ball efficiently because you have Jonathan Taylor on that offensive line, all they needed was a quarterback who could just keep the train on the fucking tracks. Like, that's all they were asking for. And so we'll see. You know, maybe he's unable to do that over the course of the year against teams that aren't

the Miami Dolphins. But what we saw in week one, like if you're trying to build the best case scenario for who the Colts could be in. 2025. This is exactly what you were talking about. Yeah, that's, that was my takeaway because I was, I was, I was hesitant about the Daniel Jones sets a higher floor because I've, I've seen Daniel Jones play. The floor can be low. But if, but if you are then figuring out what the best things to do with him and you, again, if you have the combination of that 2022 Giants offense, a 2023 cult offense, it's not exciting, but that is exactly.

what can, and we're not going to talk about the defense, but if you added a defense, that was doing some fun things throughout the game that I think I'm a little more optimistic about too in what they can do. You add it to that defense. I think this is, again, like you said, the best case that you could have hoped for going into week one. I also think it's a really important thing to point out just the difference in what the quality of an offensive line and the quality of past protection can do for a quarterback. You talk about that low floor that we've seen, from Daniel Jones over the last three or four years. And even if the Giants, we've talked about this, me and Derek,

on Monday's show when we were discussing the Giants' commanders game in that the Giants' offensive line is not a disaster like it's been in previous versions of the Giants, but it's still not a very good group. The Colts, even with some of the question marks, coming into the season, we're still probably like the 15th best offensive line in the league. And if Bordolini and Gonzales are going to play like this,

they can be the 10th best offensive line in the league. The gap between that and, and 25, if you're the Giants, you feel that. And the quarterback can play differently because of that. And so I'm open to the idea that this ecosystem with the Colts is good enough that we can see a demonstrably different version of Daniel Jones, as long as he's not making self-inflicted mistakes that are going to be shooting this offense in the foot over and over and over again, the same way they have over the last couple years. Yeah, and that's, again, what the 2022 offense was, was all the bootlegs, all the short pass of the

shortest passes in the league. Like, if he was, I think he had the lowest interception rate in the league, too. But if he threw an interception, like, that was really on him because he shouldn't have had a chance to just because of how they were designed. And what I think this week one game really showed me is Stuyken just has control of that. I think he knows exactly which levers he's going to be pulling if they need to help that offensive line a little bit. Again, first play in the game is the boot to the left.

I think we're going to see a lot more of that if he needs protection from that line, if it starts to, you know, crumble just a little bit. So I'm more optimistic now about this just being okay, which is, you know, a higher rate than I thought they were going to be coming into the year. We haven't spent a lot of time talking about it. I just want to mention before we move on to the next topic, the Tyler Warren part of this is very exciting. Like all the different ways that they're going to use him,

whether it's, you know, manufactured touches in the flat, using him as like a vertical seam runner and just kind of allowing him to go make plays on contested throws. They handed him the ball as a fullback in this game. I'm totally fine if they want to try to tap into the Penn State version of Tyler Warren in as many possible ways as they can because I think ultimately that is going to be very additive for this Colts offense. Yeah, some of the fun things they were doing from 13 to use 13 on 8 plays.

And like Warren is basically just a wide receiver at that point too. And they can also use them tight. I think there's some fun stuff they're doing there too. And that creates layers in the run game too. and you see it, just some of like the split zone stuff that they're able to do, like slicing the tight ends across the formation. It was a fun combination of gap scheme runs, zone runs. I mean, just like a ton of different things under the sun.

And I think that's because they still have the offensive line to have a very diversified run game. I think we're already seeing some of the benefits of that. We're going to take our first quick break here. And then we're going to come back and talk about the kickoff excitement from week one. Anyone who listens to this show knows that if we're going to be talking about the kickoffs here, It is not going to be because I wanted to talk about the kickoffs. When we do special teams on this show, it is because someone else is driving the train. But you wanted to discuss how dynamic, the dynamic kickoff felt in week one because of some of the rule tweaks.

This has become like a pet obsession of yours over the course of the summer. And so I'm going to let you kind of let loose here on what you saw from the kickoffs in week one. I do want to point out that when we were discussing this, I gave you the. out. I said if you don't want to talk about the kickoffs, but if you're going to let me run, we can do it. I think it's important to do it when someone else wants to. Because if someone, I don't think it's, I think we probably should talk about it more than we do, but I'm never naturally going to do it. So whenever it's you or Dave or whoever, it's like, all right, it's time to talk special teams. I usually leave the door open because I'm, I will admit that we should

be doing it more often than we are. So what were your main takeaways? from the changes that we saw in the dynamic kickoff rule from week one. Yeah, I mean, first of all, it worked. Yeah. I think we saw it 75.6% return rate. I wish that had been a tiny bit lower because I wish that Frikan Kairosanters had booted the ball out of the back of the end zone, but we don't have to do that again. Yeah, I mean, that's, yeah, that's one of the crazy.

I think, you know, it wasn't going to be one of my notes, but I think it does drastically change end-of-game scenarios like that where, you know, just, you know, you can kick it out of bounds and it's only, again, five-yard difference from where a touchback would be. So if you need a time where you don't want clock to run at the end of the game, like, that is, you have multiple options there. So I think like, I think it just adds a little bit of a layer there. But, you know, outside of that, again, last year, 32.8% return rate with the touchback only going to the 30. And the average return or average starting field position was about the 28. This year, the average starting field position is about the 30, which is still below

the touchback, but higher than what it was last year, even though there's now more returns. So I think that's super debt. It's definitely something that I think we're going to see more returns coming. I think you had, you know, there were only two teams that started beyond the 35, but I think we still saw more teams taking that effort to do it. There's still some teams, teams that are not completely balancing risk reward. Like the Jaguars came out, they are one of the teams that tried the line drive bounce kick, which I think is going to be beneficial for more teams to try because it sets up your kick return, your coverage better, and it gets them into the backfield more.

But then one kick went out of bounds, and then they sent the rest of them into the end zone for the rest of the game. So, but and again, it was, I was against the Carolina Panthers, which like you said, one of my, you know, pet things that I saw this summer is how terribly the Panthers go about returning kicks. There's a lot of different ways you can do it, right? Because you have nine guys now in the blocking scheme. The Panthers are the only ones that have every blocker facing their kick returners when they start off. And now you can't move until the returner gets it. So the Panthers are facing their kick returners.

and they all run backwards and retreat. And they have like five to ten yards less of like the initial like line of scrimmage than like every other team. So I think that's something to watch going forward. But because it's I was talking to like some people who know and like that's frustrating for them too about the kickoff. I don't know what the Panthers are doing. But the fact that there are more returns, we saw a couple of big ones. I think the Jets were actually like the best team. they just released their kick returner, Xavier Gibson.

But Nuwagu and Ari and Smith both had a nice return each. The Titans are, I think, a good team. D.K. had a 71-yard return after just a mess of an end-of-half thing from the Titans. So I think we're going to see some more big returns. I think this is something that is going to be positive for the game. And I was just really excited that it actually worked. Anybody else, not even from a result standpoint, from a process standpoint, that you were like, All right, I like the way that they're going about this,

whether it's how they're approaching kickoffs or how they're approaching the structure of their returns. Yeah, there's a little bit of both. I think it's weird that Carolina does really well on the other side of how they're kicking off. They are one of the teams that are going to routinely try to get the ball to land in the landing zone before the returner catches it. And again, if it does that and then gets into the end zone, your touchbacks at the 22. So there's a lot of, there's a lot of advantages to trying that as well as kind of making the return harder. There are, like the bills, I think, are a good team in how they're blocking everything up.

Again, like I said, you can't move until the returner catches it. But you also can't go forward for the return team. But the bills kind of just like stand their ground. There's a lot of teams that like try to pass block a little bit and try to retreat. And I think that gives up a little. the bills are a team that just kind of stands their ground and I think does give a solid front line and also

like I said the jets, the Titans were good. The chiefs also, I think they just have a pretty good return. And yeah, so I think we're just going to, I think see some more developments too because I don't think we saw a lot of kind of as much as the trick plays as, you know, I think we can eventually get from the return.

I think everybody is still trying to figure out what this new return is going to do now that they're actually returning kicks. So I think we're just going to see more of it going forward to. A couple things to point out just from like a macro perspective on some of the teams that you mentioned. So the Lions last year were number one in the NFL and special teams DVOA over the course of the season. So to see Aaron Glenn kind of try to carry over success and just detail oriented approaches in that way, I think that's an encouraging sign if you're a Jets fan.

And then the team that is, it's definitely encouraging sign based on last year, the Tennessee Titans finished dead last in special teams DVOA in 2020. And so if they can be better in that area across the board in year two, I absolutely think that is something that's worth paying attention to. Because when I was trying to build my case for being excited about the Titans and you look at some of the underlying stuff, whether that's penalties on offense, just how problematic some of the operational things were last year and how much of that goes on the quarterback versus how much of that goes on the structure. And then you extend that to things like special teams that are like often. an expression of the details of how you're being coached. There was a little bit of me that was like, I don't know, there's a lot of stuff that needs to get cleaned up here.

So the fact that the Titans one week in were one of the better special teams teams in the NFL after what they did last year, I think that's a good sign if you're a Titans fan. Yeah, yeah, that was one of the nice takeaways there too. Let's get to another element of that Tennessee Titans team. And let's talk about the first impressions that we had from Cam Ward in that game. This is going to be one of the most divergent results versus process conversations I think we've ever had on the athletic football show. The numbers when you look at them for the Titans in that game throwing the football are horrendous. Like I believe they finished dead last in the NFL and EPA per dropback on Sunday.

It was just not a good offensive performance based on any number that you want to look at. It was a 25 and a half percent success rate for the Titans on Sunday per next gen. They averaged 3.3 yards per play. And I came away from that game being like Cam Ward is awesome. I cannot wait to watch Cam Ward play more football. I don't think there's ever been a bigger gap between what the final result was and how much I enjoyed watching the offense down to down and especially the quarterback than what happened with Cam Ward and the Titans on Sunday.

Yeah. In my notes, possibly the best I could feel about a 21.4. percent success rate game from a quarterback. And it was so, it was one of those things where he did have the lowest completion percentage over expected, right? But also had the lowest expected completion percentage because of the type of throws he was trying to make. So it's a little Anthony Richardson-ish in like just kind of this set up there.

But I don't think it was, I don't think you can compare exactly like how. how they play. The accuracy was so much better than Anthony Bredge's said, even if the completion percentage wasn't there. I think that's an important thing to point out. Yeah. So what I was going into is when the expected completion percentage is that low, because you're throwing downfield so often and the way you're doing, the margin for error just

ends up being so small. And then when you add in the drops that they had, like that just kind of compounds itself into what we saw result-wise when, again, we both came away from. watching what he did. And like, he's going to be a must watch every week. Like, that way, it was just fun. You look at it. So he had like one of the higher off target percentages of any quarterback in the league last week, but I don't think it's anything that's overly concerning. I mean, the two guys immediately ahead of him were Patrick Mahomes and Jordan Love. So I don't think this is necessarily an indication of what's to come. And just think about a couple anecdotal moments

from that game about why your completion percentage over expectation is a little bit later than is supposed to be. The first throw to Gunner Helm on that corner out on the right side line, that ball should be caught. And he bubbles it on the way, it bobbles it on the way out of bounds. It ends up becoming an incompletion. The chunk he gets to I. O. Manor down the right side line that should have been challenged, that goes down and is an incompletion. The one that just drove me the most crazy when it comes to, you watch what the quarterback did on the play and then it doesn't end up counting. Calvin Ridley had a couple tough moments in the second half. Multiple balls off his hands. A couple of them, I don't think reasonable expectation that they're caught.

I mean, the one scene ball, that's like a high just inside throw. He barely gets a hand on it. But the throw on the inbreaker against cover two right down the hash, that's a play where, so for people who didn't watch it, Cam starts his eyes to the left. The Broncos drop back into like a funky version of cover two with Patrick Sartan shooting back out into the deep half. And so he comes back to the middle of the field with his eyes, Cam Ward does. And Calvin Ridley is running an in-breaker right between where the two safeties would be and where the pole runner is. And Cam, on time, just rips the ball down the middle of the field and Calman-Ridly drops it.

That play in and of itself, if that was like the only good play he made in his first game as a rookie on the road against the Broncos, I'd be like, all right, I think I'm kind of in. But there were four or five of those over the course of the day. And so the final results are horrendous, but he already looks like a guy like you just said that is going to be a quarterback worth tuning into pretty much every time he's on the field. Yeah. And I think one of the other things, I think he adjusted well for some things.

Like he said, that throw the helm in that first one in the corner that ends up, you know, not being a catch because it was bobbled a little bit. I think on the next drive, they flip it and kind of go back to a similar thing where Helm is running out to the other corner. And he gets them well before the sideline. So even if there is a bobble, he still has some time to rein it in. So there were just, I think, some adjustments. Like, there were some misses where I think he's like playing at 100 miles an hour sometimes.

Sometimes the ball is. And I think he, like, will lead a guy when, but also throw it a hundred and two. And I think like that's where some of the off target comes. So he's putting the ball in a spot where I think other quarterbacks probably need to when they, like, layer it in. So I think he just kind of needs to find. those settings a little bit more, but I think he has one where he misses D.K. on a throw like that. But then I think the play to Ridley is like the next one that he, I think, times it better and knows exactly where to put it. And the Okango one is the best one of the three in terms of the

ball placement on those throws up the seam. And I think that was the last one of the three. And so you see him like slowly learning as he's trying this stuff. Yeah, which works. And I think that is one of the things like you can you can take away one of the other things is i think his process was sped up a little bit when pressure came um because the oh for six against the blitz with four sacks seven quarterback hits i mean a lot of that was you know just the broncos doing some stuff to take advantage of a rookie quarterback so that happened um you know he was hit on 35.3 percent of his dropbacks overall that's not ideal uh next was joe burrow like dischawn watson was first last year at 25.9 percent So obviously you don't want him getting hit that much, but he's a guy who's going to stand in the pocket and try to make something happen.

You like said, he kind of has that Jordan love to his game a little bit. So it is one of those things where I think what we saw, the positives, I think we're really positive. And I think there are some things that I hope get cleaned up just kind of, you know, procedural-wise in the offense. But for what what he can do and what potentially this can turn into, like it was, it was, it was. was really exciting. Yeah, I think there were, obviously, the two sacks he takes after the muffed punt are really tough. Like, those are just plays, especially the first one.

Like, you just can't do that to knock yourself out of field goal range. And then there was one, there was a third and three down in the red zone where they ran him on a little sprint out to the left. And Van Jefferson, if he, if Cam had kept moving and kept rolling out to his left, Van Jefferson pops open on what could have been a touchdown. Instead, for some reason, and this is the play where it's like, oh, he's going a miles an hour. For some reason, he actually peeks back to his right on a sprint out to the left. Well, that edge on the back side is not being blocked. And so you can't run back into him.

He takes the sack and it's just a tough play. And so I do think that just that somewhat frenetic, you know, this is my first game. I'm just very over-excited. I think that you could see that. But I think the plays he was able to make, even there's a perfect example to me. There was a play. It was a second and 13 to start the second half. and it was a rough moment for Dan Moore against Benito. And there were a few of those in this game. I mean, Benito would play with his hair on fire. I mean, this is somebody that was already an ascending player,

and I just think he just looked fantastic. And so all of the, I can't believe we paid $20 million for Dan Moore people are probably crowing right now after that game. I think it will look better against lesser competition. But on that play, Skoransky just lets a blitzer come right into the B gap. And so there's an unblocked pressure plus Benito coming. And Cam bends the ball. around the blitzing linebacker, and Iowa Manor just kind of drops it.

And so there were just so many of those like bang, bang, game of inches type plays for this offense over the course of the game that I hope as we get a little bit deeper into this, the coin flip plays, maybe a few more of them go your way because it felt like none of them went their way on Sunday. Yeah, and I had stats pulled up for the fourth quarter. He went four of 11, 3.1 yards per attempt, 18.2% success rate. but an 88.9% adjusted completion percentage because all of those incompletions were dropped.

Exactly. That's like that's an area where I'm glad we have more stats now because that would have been the most leading four for 11 you possibly could have had based on what we saw from him in those moments. So again, you're on the road against the defense that I think has a chance to be one of the better defenses in the league. And I honestly am a little bit more frustrated with some of like the operational stuff from their decision not to challenge that play and just some of the other things that happened. But when it comes to the quarterback and just, and honestly, like the structure

of the offense type stuff, especially in the first half, I thought everything was fine. And then in the second half, you just have a few more slips than you probably want. But all in all, I think a very promising start for Cam Ward and for the future, hopefully, of the Titans offense. All right, we're going to take one more quick break here and then we're going to come back with two more teams that we wanted to dig into. These are a couple that I sprung on you because I haven't had a chance to look at them over the course of this week. And I didn't have as much of a chance to watch them in real time as I probably wanted. And I think both of them were kind of objects of fascination for me coming into this season. And the first is just what we would see from this version of Robert Salo's defense with

the Niners and all of the young players that this team is going to have to trot out, especially early in the season. So your first impressions of the Niners defense, and round two of Robert Sala as the defensive coordinator were what? Man, I had a great time and Sam Darnold did not. It was like, it was, it was what we've kind of expected from Robert Sala a little bit. And some of like, you know, it was still a lot of, you know, cover three, a lot of single high. But the blitzes and what they were doing up front, the way they were moving some guys around and the just chaos they were creating by who was coming.

And who wasn't? I think was just kind of this another just kind of evolution of what, you know, this type of defense can be. And it was, it was real. I had a lot more fun watching this than I thought I was going to on rewatch just with everything that they were able to do. I 100% agree. And I think that that's why I really wanted to dig into it.

Because even in real time when you were watching, you saw some of the layers that were being added to what Robert Saul has been in the past. And so this is a simple example, but I think a telling one. Last year, the Jets had 54 plays where they dropped the defensive lineman back into coverage over the course of the entire season. Michael Williams did it three or four times in this game alone. And then you had Yitor Gros Matos also, I think, once or twice over the course of the game drop into coverage. I don't think that's necessarily an inherently good thing, but I do think that speaks to some of the layers that they're trying to build into it. And whether you want some of your pass rushers dropping into coverage, we can already.

argue with the quality of that decision. You can't argue with the quality of what was happening when they blitzed in this game. The Niners on Sunday, when they brought five or more pass rushers, had a 71.4% pressure rate. So I think that all of those things they were trying out and how funky things were looking on to find passing downs, it was a good thing at the end of the day that they were approaching it that way. Yeah, the stuff on third and long they were doing was like Darno was just in hell all game. One of the things about that stood out to me with some of the dropping guys into coverage

is how just kind of well coached it was and how the operation was. There's a second and 11 in the second quarter. I think they're lining up for what eventually is going to be a sim pressure. And it's Bryce Huff and Michael Williams are the two ends. And I think Huff is originally supposed to be the guy who drops.

But in the backfields, Kenneth Walker shifts from the right side to the slot in the left. So Michael Williams stands up and starts to, like, looks like he's going to cover Walker. And he ends up dropping back. And then they still send the SIM with DeWinter's coming. And Bryce Huff just gets a free shot at Darnold. So it's just kind of those things. Like that little shift from the offense shifts what the defense is going to do, but it was still all over it.

And I think, like, it was just things like that that repeatedly. happened. There was another blitz where third and eleven, it was the next play. It was the very next play, yes. Were Warner's in the A gap and D Winners is off ball and Winners starts coming down and they just run through the same gap and Seattle had nothing that they could do about it. Yeah, there was just stuff like that all the time. It was literally back to back plays, the ones that you're talking about was the simulated pressure with Michael Williams drops and the next play, Warner is mugged up. They end up bringing six and D. Winters just absolutely blow. slows up Charbonnet.

Yes. And JSN just gets hung up a little bit on Diomador-Lenor. And so I actually think if he doesn't get hung up on Lenore down the field, that throw from Darnold probably gets completed. And I think Donald deserves a lot of credit for getting it off. But they were sped up so much in this game because of the types of pressures that the Niners were throwing at them. And why I think this is so important to point out is that a lot of defensive coaches

and even offensive coaches, when you talk to them about the Niners' defensive system over the last few years, there's a little bit of like a negative tone, and I think some of it is brought upon by jealousy, right? And so they look at what the Niners have been able to do, and even a team like the Texans, right? And they look at the success of this defensive system,

and they say, well, when you have all those monsters, you can succeed playing this type of defense where it's a little bit simpler. And some of these teams that don't, that want to run this type of defensive system but don't necessarily have that level of personnel, they've run into some issues as they've tried to stay that simple. And I think two guys that obviously are at the core of this type of defense in the way that it's being run are Robert Sal and Jeff Obrick. And so I knew going into the year after talking to people in Atlanta that the Falcon's defense was not going to look like the Jets defense from the last couple of years. They knew they couldn't do that. not only because they didn't have the same horses,

but because it was probably time to start evolving. And if you look at what the Falcons were in week one, we'll talk about that at some point this week, I'm sure. It was funky. They were trying a bunch of stuff. The Niners, I wasn't sure what it was going to look like, but to see the Niners kind of trying to tap into, if not similar ideas, than a similar ethos,

where it's like, we want to make sure that we're taking this thing into the next version, whatever it has to be, based on our personnel limitations, and how on our shit, so many offenses happen to be now, that's why this was encouraging. It was just a sign of, I know that the same old stuff is no longer going to work at the same clip it used to, so we're going to try some different stuff. And I think some of that different stuff was pretty effective.

Yeah. And even when they were doing this stuff that they usually do on the back end, the third highest rate of cover three, but allowed negative 0.87 EPA per dropback when they were doing that. So it was, you know, the normal stuff on the back end for the most part. And then just all the stuff they were doing up front was so fun. Like even just the first third down, like you said, Gross Matos playing defensive tackle. He starts pushing the center and that opens up a wide lane for Bosa who comes around on the stunt. And White's darnled up. Pass hits off a helmet and gets completed, but it doesn't pick up the first.

But it was just like that stuff from the beginning. and if they're going to keep just kind of bringing that type of heat, like that's really exciting. And so a lot of stuff is new for the Niners defense. Some of the ideas that they're trotting out, some of the players that are out there. Two things that are not new are that 97 is on one end and 54 is in the middle. And both of those guys played insane on Sunday.

Like the way that Warner was playing and the way that he was moving, just a reminder that when he's not playing with a broken foot, this is one of the best linebackers we've ever seen. And so that was a fun little little. little joltz that we got and then bosa i mean that play you're talking about when he loops all the way back inside he like teleports on that stunt and then you see him just call game at the end so that was always this was always the like the best case scenario or the argument for the 2025 nineers defense is that okay if sala can like turn up the dial on some weird shit and we can

account for some personnel deficiencies that way and we still have these two guys can we get to a place where we're consistently bothersome against the offenses that we're playing against, check one for one. That's exactly the formula that we saw on Sunday. Yeah, and yeah, yeah, I have a note of how fun Fred Warner was. He's just the best. Yeah, I am excited.

It's kind of a shame that there are zero players on offense who are going to be suiting up for the Niners. But this might be a lot of like three nothing games coming from San Francisco now. I will say, the last part of this is that on the flip side of the Bosa Warner conversation, Upton Stout and Marquis Siegel are still third and fifth round picks making their first NFL starts. And you saw that a little bit.

I think that the Seahawks were consistently trying to pick on Upton Stout in every way that they could. Siegel was a little bit slow to trigger on some stuff coming down over the middle of the field. You're going to see that. These are young players being thrust into starting roles because the Niners are scrambling a little bit when it comes to their defensive personnel, it's just going to be a question of whether all of the positives that we mentioned

consistently paper over some of those areas where teams are going to be able to pick on them a little bit. Yeah, when you have the front seven that they have and what they're doing now, I think the margin for error is just a little bigger, which is nice because that hasn't always been the case. Let's get to our last one here. I wanted to talk about what we saw from the first glimpse of the Houston Texans offense with Nick Cayley. Obviously, this is something where you have a quarterback that has played in an extremely high level at times over the course of his career.

And I think because of their downturn on offense, that's why the offensive coordinator gets fired. And the fact that the offensive coordinator is really the only one who lost his job. And for the most part, a huge chunk of that offensive staff is coming back. I think that lets you know that we think we've got enough here to win with. We just want some new ideas at the top. And so what those new ideas looked like, I was very curious about. And unfortunately, the new Texans offense looks a lot like the old Texans offense in ways that were particularly frustrating on Sunday.

Yeah, it seems like the protection plan from last year was just kind of copied over in a new notebook. It was not exciting. One thing I do want to point out before, like we start this conversation, is how backed up Houston was kind of on their own to, start every drive. I'm just going to run through where they started their drives. Their own 20, their own 5, their own 20, the Rams 46,

their own 23, their own 20, their own 24, their own 5, their own 19. So, like, if that was the worst starting field position in the league, and that was not by the offense's fault, they were just kind of put there. So that kind of already put yourself in a little bit of a disadvantage

for what they were trying to do. But obviously, what they did afterward wasn't super great either. It just kind of seemed like, you know, especially on, so on the first drive, holding on the first play, delay a game on their first third down. So just operationally, we weren't starting out too great either. So the other kind of bigger picture ecosystem thing that I wanted to mention, that's a really good thing to point out.

The other one, the Texans last year, I believe I'm pulling up the numbers right now from 24. So the Texans last year had the third longest average yards to go on third down of any team in the NFL was 7.66. And I believe they had the highest number of third and 10 plus situations of any team in the league last year. Well, on Sunday, the Houston Texans averaged 10.67 yards to go on third down. And so when I say like it looked a lot like it used to look when it came to the situation you were putting both the offensive line and the quarterback in, that's where I go first, is the fact that your average distance to go on third down is almost 11 yards after you were on the worst teams in the league last year in those exact same situations. Yeah, I had that exact

note too. It's just, yeah, it looked, it looked frustratingly similar where it was just, there's, it just kind of seemed like they didn't have, they didn't know. And I think the, the Rams made it tough. And I think Cody Alexander match quarters just put his up in his data download. The Rams had a 30% stunt rate, which was the highest in the league. So the Rams wanted to make sure this offensive line was going to communicate and knew what they were doing. And I think there were a lot of times that they did not.

I think when you combine that with just the pressure plan that the Rams were trotting out there, the degree of difficulty, like this was like an all madden past protection game that the Texans had to face. It happens. Like this is what happens. You paid a lot of money to deal with this. And so I think the stunts, they actually did a better job of picking those up than they did at times last year. When you think about like the interior of the offensive line, the problem for me is essentially any sort of perimeter pressure in this game went unblocked or unaccounted for for the Texans.

And, you know, there was so much discussion this off season rightfully so about how C.J. Stroud was going to have more autonomy at the line of scrimmed. with this offensive system than he did with the Niners. Unfortunately, there were plenty of plays in this game where there's a blitz coming off the slot, the J-Lay-1 McCullough won, there's a Quentin Lake came unblocked on a slot pressure, and CJ had to dump it down to Dalton Schultz for like one yard. And there were plenty of instances in this game where the quarterback is responsible for wherever's happening, and it didn't end up becoming a positive result for the Texans in those moments. Yeah, there were a couple things where, you know,

And then there were just some where everything just, it didn't work. Like the Byron Junkie just plows through Cam Robinson. The tackles were not good in this game. The tackles in one-on-one situations were problematic throughout the entire game, both Robinson and nursery. And I think that was one of the hesitations where, okay, we have this new coordinator, like he said, not even coaching staff. But we didn't do anything to improve the offensive line, which is a tough thing. And then, you know, there was the second and eight in the first quarter, and Stroud completes this pass.

But it's one of those stunts from Verse and Spates. Damien Pierce just sprints out of the backfield on his route. And Spate's is starting to chip into Robinson to open up for Verse and then realizes he is also can be a free rusher. So both of them are just free rushers up that gap. It was just, it kind of just still felt like kind of that stuff that Shroud really just had to continue. to try to bail himself out of some time.

And he did, you know, again, make some nice throws. And then on the back end, the Rams were just kind of all over everything. They played over a quarter of their snaps and dime, negative 0.33 EPA per dropback when they were in zone. So they were just kind of sitting on things and not really allowing Houston to get anything going, even when they were able to get past that pressure too. That play that you pointed out is such a perfect example. So on that play, they, if you look at the way that the offensive line slides, the four-man slide to the right, even though there are only, I believe, two threats to the right of the center. So that play is your loss before the play even starts there because of the way that you're pointing the protection.

And so I think it's really important to point out it's week one. Okay. It's week one with an offensive line that you didn't even really know the combination of the five until the end of training camp. And so I would love to know, and I'm sure the Texans have this information, how many snaps this exact group of five in these five spots played together in training camp. I guarantee you it's an alarmingly low number because of how much time they spent figuring out what the five was going to be. And in week one, you have what is going to be one of the biggest challenges from a past

protection standpoint in the NFL. I think there are probably more talented fronts, even though there aren't many. But when you combine that with what Krishula wants to do, you mentioned that stunt rate, all of the pressures that they're going to bring, and then you still have to have. have like a couple dudes involved in just the four that you're having to deal with. This was probably the worst possible team to start the season with if you were the Texans offense. So I'm very open to the idea that this can get better over the course of the year.

But the first glimpse was a little bit alarming based on what we saw on Sunday. Yeah, at least next week, Todd Bowles is definitely going to take it easy on them. I can't believe those in the first two games. You get Chris Shulah went like, he smells blood in the water. the same way he did last year against the Vikings in that playoff game, and then you get Todd Bowls in week two. So hopefully some better days ahead for the Texans. But if I'm C.J. Stroud, I'm sure he spent plenty of time in the ice bath after that

game the same way he had to a bunch over the course of last season. Dan Pizzuta, always great to chat with you, sir. Please tell people where they can find the work that you were doing these days. So Blue Sky mostly is probably the easiest, just Dan Pizzuda there. A lot of social, anywhere social, Dan Pizzuta. Writing on, this is the first time I'm saying it out loud, and it was definitely a mistake. Snaps, hyphen, and hyphen stats. Dot ghost.io.

That was not a good thing to be saying out loud. It's much better typed out and in a link. Again, yeah, you can find it on socials. Dan Pizzuta pretty much anywhere. Yeah. So just if you go to Dan socials, you'll see all the clips, all the links to the work that he's doing. I've always said this. Dan does such a great job of kind of distilling.

what made these teams, what makes them unique, you know, just kind of what makes them, gives them the identity that they have. And so I think that if you check out his work, you'll learn a lot more about who teams are, why they are that way, and why it's fueling either their success or their failure. So please go check out all the work Dan is doing.

Sincerely appreciate the time, buddy. Really good to talk with you. Yeah, always a pleasure. All right, guys, that's all we got for today. We will be back tomorrow, me, Dave, Derek, doing our week two preview. Just a quick heads up. I've talked about this a few different times on social

and just on different shows, but this year, for the first time on the athletic football show, we are going to plan to recap every single Monday and Thursday night game. Having three of us now kind of lets people not be up until midnight, three days a week. And so I think it really does give us a chance to hit all of these in a way that we never have before. So tomorrow nights on Thursday, Dave and Derek,

will be recapping the Washington Packers game. I'm actually going to be on a plane. I have a little bit of work travel, and I'm extremely bummed about it because I'm not going to be able to watch that game in real time and have to find a time to watch it. But those two guys will be there for you, so highly encourage you to check that out.

Those will only be available on our YouTube channel. We already have five shows a week coming your way. We don't want to be dropping more shows in the feed. But that gives you a good reason to go head over to the Athletic Football Show's YouTube page. We're going to be doing the recaps on that page, we're really going to have more standalone video content coming your guys way this year. We're very excited about that, some of the video capabilities we now have over at the athletic. So looking forward to what the season will bring on that front.

For now, that's all we got. Sincerely appreciate you guys listening. We'll talk to you very soon.