The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The MVP case for Cooper Kupp & Jonathan Taylor, should the Vikings want the playoffs & the Browns' Baker Mayfield conundrum with Zac Jackson

Episode Date: December 23, 2021

A lot is happening as week 16 in the NFL arrives. Lindsay Jones is here for her weekly visit as she and Robert dive into the MVP case for non-QB candidates Cooper Kupp & Jonathan Taylor. Will their historic seasons at their respective positions be enough to sway the committee? Plus, the Vikings are somehow Stayin' Alive, personnel updates across the league, appointment viewing for Thursday before The Athletic's Browns writer Zac Jackson joins the show to dig into the Baker Mayfield conundrum hanging over Cleveland, the offseason plan, Myles Garrett's DPOY campaign and more.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome, the athletic football show. Today's Thursday, December 23rd. I'm Robert Mays. Great show for you guys today. Our Browns writer at the Athletic, Zach Jackson, is going to be joining us a little bit later. Before we get to Zach, though, I'm thrilled to welcome my good friend,

Lindsay Jones. Lindsay, how you doing? I am great, getting ready for Christmas. It's sneaking up on me this year, it feels like. It's sneaking up on me. We were supposed to go. to New Jersey to see my fiance's family on Christmas night because typically I fly the day after Christmas, but day after Christmas is a Sunday this year. Can't do a lot of flying on Sunday.

I don't know if you know this, but I work on Sundays. So it's a little bit difficult for me to travel. So we were going to do that and now we are not because of the everything about the world. So I'm going to be able to spend all of Christmas and all of Christmas evening with my family and my brothers and my mom and I'm very much looking forward to that. But I don't know, for whatever reason, And it feels like it happened very quickly this year. It feels like Thanksgiving just happened. It's weird that it's on a weekend, too, because it is very much overlapping with all of our NFL stuff. Like sometimes it falls in the middle of the week and there's these weird practices,

but we're going to get to not only spend this weekend Christmas with our actual families, we're going to get to spend it with Aaron Rogers and Jonathan Taylor and Kyler Murray. So we'll get into one of those games a little bit later. It's going to be spoiler alert, part of our appointment viewing. We're also going to do another segment of staying alive about the Minnesota. so to Vikings as we continue to pour over all of the teams that are somehow still in the NFL playoff picture. I wanted to start, though, with something that I thought of yesterday while watching the Rams play the Seahawks. And we're not going to talk about those games. By the time

this comes out, it's going to be Thursday morning. It'll be two days since that game has happened. You guys all watched it. We'll dig into game analysis on Sunday night the same way we typically do. But I was watching Cooper Cup dominate last night. I wanted to have each of us lay out the argument for why a non-quarterback could win the MVP this year. I want to preface this by saying, this is not going to happen. I don't believe it should happen, but I still think it's worth kind of playing devil's advocate and putting this hat on every once in a while. The same way that people make an argument or make a case for somebody going into the Hall of Fame, right, where you have to lay it out for everyone in the room. I wanted each of us to make an argument for Jonathan Taylor or

Cooper Cup as the MVP of the NFL in this very strange season where no quarterback has really taken it and run with it. Well, I was really excited when you pitch this to me because it's been about three weeks or so, I think, since we did kind of the MVP race discussion where we pretty much only talked about quarterbacks because at that point, it really was kind of a very quarterback-driven race. And it's shifted a lot in the last couple of weeks. I mean, I think Aaron Rogers has probably taken control. And he was the one guy we did not talk about basically at all in that discussion.

But here we are now after week 15. And Aaron Rogers is probably in the driver's seat. I'm not sure how he's going to win it after being canceled. Well, he anti-cancel cancel culture. And I will say, watching Aaron Rogers on Christmas is basically going to be like sitting with your random anti-backs family members. So it really is fitting. But because none of these quarterbacks have really pulled away, it really is opening the door

for guys like Jonathan Taylor and Cooper Cup who are having potentially historic seasons, but also are so critical to their team's fates right now. And if this is a best player on the best team type of award, which so often the MVP award is, both of these guys have a legitimate case. Well, let's just think about this right now. So if you're looking at BetMGM at this very moment, Jonathan Taylor is plus 750. Those are the third best odds in the league. and he's a running back.

That's wild. Cooper Cup's odds right now, it's 3,500, which are still pretty long odds. The same as Justin Herbert. Cooper Cup right now has better betting odds to win the MVP than Dak Prescott. So even if it's a far off remote possibility for these guys to do it, the fact that we have a quarter, excuse me, a running back and a receiver that are even in this discussion at this stage of the year, I think speaks to the seasons that those guys are having. So why don't you get us rolling here?

I want you to lay out for me why Cooper Cup could be the MVP of the NFL. Well, have you watched Cooper Cup? I have watched Cooper Cup this year. So, well, so the case for Cooper Cup is that he is potentially having the greatest single season by any wide receiver ever. And that's a pretty broad statement because there have been some really, truly incredible seasons by wide receivers. You know, Jerry Rice had a couple of them, 1980s.

1997, 1995, 1987, he had 22 touchdowns in 12 games. That is insane, right? You know, it's tough to compare receiving eras or receiving seasons

because of the eras of football are so completely different. But he is as dominant right now in 2021 as Jerry Rice was in 1987 or in 1995 or as Calvin Johnson was in 2012 or Randy Moss in 2007.

He is putting up those type of just bonkers stats. And yes, Cooper Cup is going to get a 17th game, but it is not out of the realm of possibility that he could break Calvin Johnson's single season receiving yardage record within 16 games. He needs something like 160 yards each of the next two weeks to get there. But if you've watched Cooper Cup recently in the Rams offense, that is certainly a possibility. And to think that, you know, if he stays healthy for three more weeks, that it almost

as a foregone conclusion that he'll set the single season receiving record should go over 2,000 receiving yards. And that touchdown mark, he's got 14 right now. He had two on Tuesday night that, you know, I don't know if he's going to get to 23 or whatever, but he could possibly get there. So if you even if it's 18, that's still a ridiculous historical season. Yeah, absolutely. So he's hitting like kind of every single like traditional receiving benchmark and exceeding it. And then he's also just And he's also there on some of the advanced metrics. We were looking at some of these stats earlier that he's first in yards per route run right now. And not just that he's first in the league.

He's first by a pretty significant margin over the next best player who's Debo Samuel. But you went and found that it's the best in 10 years for basically as long as they've been tracking. Since 2010. And if you look at BFF and then we have it on True Media as well for yards per route run, the only other person to crack three for an entire season. Actually, there are two guys that have cracked three that are kind of high volume guys since 2010. One is Julio Jones, who did it three years in a row. I don't think we understand how good Julio Jones was.

Just how efficient Julio Jones was as a receiver for so long. He did it three years in a row, and Andre Johnson did it in 2012. That's it. Calvin didn't do it the year. He broke the record. It hasn't happened in several seasons. Devante Adams didn't do it last year when he was having that first team all pro year. This isn't just a volume thing.

This isn't it Cooper Cup has gotten dozens of more targets than everybody else? He's doing so much whenever he's on the field. And one other stat I wanted to throw out that I didn't give you, but I'm looking at right now, if you look at total EPA on plays where that player is targeted this season, okay, Cooper Cup is at 77.2. The next closest guy is Justin Jefferson at 56.7. it's a three touchdown gap. And I want to be clear that Justin Jefferson is really freaking good.

Yes. So the fact that that's the gap between first and second there is really crazy. But I want to say the other thing is like, so the statistics are ridiculous. Really quickly before you move on. The gap between Cooper Cup and Justin Jefferson is larger than the gap between number two and number 15, which is DeAndre Hopkins. That's how much better Cooper Cup has been. than the field this year. That's just wild.

So, you know, I was going to say, so the statistics alone are ridiculous. I mean, he's putting together an offensive player the year type. In any other year, he would be like the runaway favorite for offensive player the year. The fact that Jonathan Taylor exists will make that really, really interesting over the next few weeks. But it's not just that he's putting up these crazy numbers. It's that he is literally doing everything.

He is not like the type of receiver that you pigeonhole is like he is only our deep threat guy. He is only our slot guy. He is, you know, only a third down possession receiver. He is all of those things. And the way that he and Sean McVeigh and Matthew Stafford to an extent, but there's just something that's been really, really cool about the way that Cup and McVeigh this year are on this like other plane when it comes to like play design and the way that they're figuring out ways for him to get open, then the physical, just freakish natural ability that that Cup has to get open on his own. But it's just created this really kind of perfect storm of new and creative play design. The work that they're doing in the red zone has been pretty

incredible. I've seen the Rams live two times this year. And it has happened to be like two of their best games. It was when they played the Bucks in week three. And then Monday Night Football Against the Rams a couple of weeks ago. And I've been lucky enough to sit next to Jordan Rodriguez, our colleague who covers the Rams. And she has been chronicling like all of the really cool shit that they've been doing. And you sit there and you watch him and at least two or three times a game, you just go, what?

How did he do that? One, how did he get that open? How did he make that catch? It's not just that McVeigh is scheming up ways to get him open. There is a little bit of that. But Cup is doing so much of this on his own. And it was really interesting to hear the comments

from Sean McVey and Matthew Stafford after the Tuesday night game against Seattle where Cooper, Cup won them that game, right? I mean, he was a really tough kind of situation there, but he scored both of their touchdowns in a 20 to 10 win. And both of these guys are like he is just doing something that we've never seen before. And he's so spectacular the way that he is taking over games. And for Matthew Stafford to say that, Matthew Stafford was Calvin Johnson's quarterback. When Calvin Johnson said the single seven receiving record, Calvin Johnson only had five touchdowns that year. It's just bonkers. I want to say that he's weird. got tackled at the one yard line like five or six times. A few times was that the year that he like didn't catch a touchdown when he showed it and it was the Calvin Johnson. Maybe that. Maybe that was it. There's been a lot of fantasy sadness with Calvin Johnson and Julio Jones over the years. But that would be kind of a fun, you know, if a weird trivia question eventually if, if and when

Cooper Cup becomes the single season receiving leader sets that record that Matthew Stafford was the quarterback in both of those. I will say there's a bit of a narrative thing here too because we talk about it all the time anytime you and I discuss the MVP. There is a narrative element to this. There's a human element to what voters are considering. And he does have kind of an interesting story, just the way that the way that he was scouted, the way that he came in, he came from Eastern Washington. He wasn't, you know, he didn't come from LSU or Alabama. He didn't quite have that same pedigree, but it's been really interesting to kind of learn more. And a lot of this is thanks to Jordan's reporting about the way that the Rams scouted him. And

the things that they liked about him was a very data-driven scouting process, the way that they were able to kind of track his speed, his speed out of brakes, the way that he played with pads on didn't necessarily line up with like straight up combine numbers. So, you know, I think he ran in Indy. Right, exactly, where, you know, the Rams are sitting there just like laughing because they're like, we know something about this guy that nobody else does. So I do think he does have kind of an interesting, you know, there is an interesting story. Should we get into the reasons why he won't win?

The things that are maybe working against him. I want to talk about just the idiosyncrasies to his game for a second as just how unique of a player that he is. Because when you watch him, he has spent about two-thirds of his snaps in the slot this year, but he's not just a slot receiver. We've talked about this on the show, me and Nate. I mean, I was blown away when I realized this this year. I can't believe it took me until this year to realize it. I can't believe he's six-two.

And then when you watch some of the stuff that he does, that frame really shows up. The contested catches, the fact that his frame is big enough where he's really making plays outside of his body and what that allows him to do as a receiver. His hands are insane. I mean, the balls that he is able to come down with and just how many plays he makes that aren't necessarily gimmee plays, the fact that he's a vertical threat. He's affecting the game just in so many different ways. and his awareness and sense for how to set stuff up, the way the coverage structures look, all of that kind of stuff.

The numbers look great. The eye test looks great. He isn't going to be this eye-popping, run past you. I am a physical specimen type of player, but that almost makes the success he has at this position specifically even more interesting. I'll just say the things that are maybe working against him. Let's hear it. The hardest things right now.

Okay. So the first thing is, is that all those other receivers that I mentioned, specifically Jerry Rice, none of those guys have won the MVP award. A receiver has never won this award. Apparently a kicker has won the NFL MVP in the past. Mark Mosley, it was the strike year. So a receiver hasn't.

So it's a pretty big block, I think, for voters to get past, you know, where it's a lot harder, I think, for a receiver to make that case. So that is probably the biggest reason that he's not going to win this award. And the fact that, look, there's Jonathan Taylor. who we're about to talk about is also having this, like, ridiculous impact as a not from the non-quarterback position. But I think the other thing that makes his case a little bit difficult is the team that he plays on and that he's on this very star-driven team. And Matthew Stafford has definitely that that three-game losing stretch that they went through. I think he played himself

out of the MVP conversation, but he's kind of a dark horse MVP candidate. There are going to be questions about how much of Cooper Cup success is because of its scheme driven, how much of it is Sean McVeigh, where I think it's very much not an either or, like, it's a both of them contribute equally to this. But I think that might be a little bit of it there where some of these other guys were like, especially you could look at Jonathan Taylor where like, it is very clear who is doing what here and his kind of singular contributions to that offense where he is carrying that team where there could be potentially other guys on the Rams that you could make a case for Aaron Donald, you know, being an MVP type of candidate, a guy who will dominate

and win you games that maybe some of these other guys won't be facing. I think the argument, the receiver over a running back is that for the receiver, there are even fewer moving parts associated with their success, right? I mean, if you're just getting open, all you need is the quarterback to get you the ball. I guess you could make an argument that you need a line to hold up long enough, but it's not the same as a running back. The argument against a running back winning MVP and against running back value in general over the last several years. And it's a good argument is that a running back needs so many other things to go right for him to be successful, right? You need a play that's well

blocked. You need a really good offensive line. There's just so many other factors that dictate running back success that it's hard to say a running back can be that valuable. I'm going to try, though. Let's go. Let's start with the fact that. the Colts are far and away, number one in the NFL in rushing efficiency. Per rush EPA, they are three times as good as the next-spex team in football. They are first in rushing DVOA. Just they're an outwired in terms of how good they've been running the football this year. And if you look at it, they're 10th in offensive DVOA right now.

They're 20th throwing the ball. Their place as a top 10 offense in the league is driven by Jonathan Taylor. The big question to me is I was digging through out of this, and I'll have several examples. How is this different than what Derek Henry did last year? Why is this season from Jonathan Taylor more impressive than what Derek Henry did a year ago? If you look at what that Titans offense was last year, it was a top five offense. They were not even the most efficient rushing offense in the league last season. A huge part of the Titans success.

Yes, is Derek Henry crucial to that engine? We've seen what they are without him now. but their passing game was unbelievably efficient for the last couple years. That's not the case with the Colts. You could make an argument that one of the only reasons the Colts are a viable playoff team right now is because of their running game and in large part because of Jonathan Taylor. So if you look at early in the season, right, some of the numbers associated with the

Colts rushing attack, they were number one in EPA, but they were down there in success rate. They weren't necessarily churning out moderate gains and consistent. yeardage in the run game. That has shifted. Jonathan Taylor's success rate this season is 47.8%, which is the best among qualified high volume running backs. So not only is he ripping off these monster gains, I think he has twice as many 20-yard

runs as anyone else in the league. He's also the most consistent runner in the league right now. He is consistently getting the type of yardage the Colts offense needs to stay on schedule. He is number one, and this is the big thing for me, if we're trying to separate running back success from overall offensive structure success and offensive line success, that's very hard to do. But there are stats that try to do it. He is number one in the league in rushing yards over expected per attempt. It's 1.58.

No one else is above 1.28. His first downs per carry are 34.4%. That's fourth in the NFL. The three guys ahead of him, all quarterbacks. Josh Allen, Jalen, Hurts, Lamar Jackson. What he's doing to create new series, to create explosive plays, but also both getting what's blocked and getting more than what's blocked, his success, I think you can say, is more than just the offensive line

than just what's being blocked for him. He's going above and beyond that. And to me, this is the really big one, because it's not just efficiency numbers. not just rate stats that I think you have to look at. Jonathan Taylor this year has produced 36.1-1 total EPA rushing the ball. That is 60 points better than most of the guys around him that have gotten the same efficiency. Your Joe Mixins, your Dalvin Cook's, 60 points. Last year, Derek Henry produced 15.61 EPA for the season.

That's a difference of 21 points, where Jonathan Taylor is right now compared to where Derek Henry was last year. It's not just that he's the most efficient running back. It's that he's been an efficient player. He's been so good this year that the Colts can sustain offensive success with him as their number one weapon in a way that very few teams can with their running back. And that to me is why he kind of steps outside of other conversations we've had about how impactful a running back can be, how impactful a running game can be. He's consistently getting more than what's blocked and his overall impact on the game is outsized even when you compare him to the better running back seasons we've seen over the last five years.

Can you make the opposite argument about why? Is there anything specifically about Jonathan Taylor that you would say, oh, maybe voters will have pause here that other than it's just the running back value about why he might not win? I think the reputation his offensive line has, I think, is going to go a long way in this, right? I mean, you have an offensive line full of former first round picks of all pro-type talents. When you talk about Quentin Nelson, you know, Ryan Kelly was a first round pick. Braden Smith just got extended. Eric Fisher was the number one overall pick.

When you think about the best offensive lines in the league, I think their performance this year isn't necessarily in line with the reputation they carried into this season for a lot of different reasons. Quentin Nelson's been banged up. Eric Fisher didn't even start at the beginning of the year. And I think that it's taken him a little bit to come along. Brayden Smith's been dinged up. but as he's really started to dominate is when that line has been intact. I know Ryan Kelly has missed some time recently

for a really tragic personal reason, but for the most part, you have a very good group in front of him. And I think that would be the knock against him. But I just think that when you look at his prominence within the success of his team and the fact that he's driving so much of it and those explosive runs and the home runs

and the fact that again, the success rate is so incredibly high, I do think this is slightly different than some of the other running back considerations we've seen over the last few years. I think the road is way, way, way too tough and the climb is way too steep for this to happen. But I do think he's making as good a case as you possibly could at that position. I think the thing that's going to be tough for him is that there's been kind of like a clear historical precedent of what it takes for a running back to win the MVP award. and it's kind of that 2,000 yard benchmark where you're doing something fairly historic statistically.

I think that might work against him. I am very curious to watch him Saturday night that he has another primetime game. Big stage, baby. And he's playing against a Cardinals run defense that is not great. So it could set up for like a very big MVP moment type of stage for him. And their last two games,

They're playing the Raiders and the Jags. There's not going to be a ton of national eyeballs, I think, on either of those games. So this is kind of the platform for him. This is the time. Look, Aaron Rogers is going to have a primetime game. He could potentially have one of those MVP moments that will sway a lot of opinions and maybe shift the conversation around this race. But I'm very excited to watch him against the Cardinals.

And I think that's something we'll talk a little bit. We're going to get a little bit more into that matchup coming up. I have set this up as the biggest possible reverse jinks that I can because I am playing against Jonathan Taylor in my fantasy semifinals on Saturday. And I'm just trying to do everything I can. You're screwed, buddy. Swing the cosmic elements in my way. Oh, I'm so screwed. I also have Austin Echlor and Travis Kelsey in my team, which their health is first and foremost the most important thing.

But also not the best timing for me. Well, let's get into all of that, right? because this is another week where unfortunately COVID is going to be the main storyline of this week. Hopefully not to the extent that it was last week when three games had to be postponed. But that's still in the realm of possibility here in week 16 because despite the protocol changes that the NFL made over the last week or so, there are still multiple teams with pretty significant COVID outbreaks going on, including the Kansas City Chiefs. who their outbreak seems to be under control in Kansas City. There were no new positives reported on Wednesday,

but they do have more than 10 players on the list, and that list includes Travis Kelsey and Tyree Kill, you know, only two of the best players. Yeah, you know, they seem like they're decently useful. Yeah, so that completely changes the complexion of who they are on offense. So this is just another week where we're all going to kind of have to just like hold our breath, wear our masks, stay inside, get tested. but the NFL is kind of just trying to figure out if they can kind of keep this season on track.

And the fact that they moved games last week is going to put a lot of teams, these teams that are having outbreaks, the Houston Texans, the Baltimore Ravens, into positions where they're going, well, what about us? Are you going to move our game? What's the standard? What kind of comes next? Because last week was really messy. There were a lot of moving parts. and they haven't kind of gotten all of this COVID stuff under control, just like this whole country hasn't.

I mean, you see numbers exploding all around. The NBA has been canceling games. The NBA is considering protocol changes. The NHL is kind of a mess. College football. Texas A&M had to back out of a bowl game. And Wake Forest is looking for an opponent if maybe the Jacksonville Jaguars want to step in and play a bowl game.

You know, there's a lot of, this is not exclusive to the NFL right now. It's a great move by the Jax. I mean, you just get your guys feeling good, get a win. Go play Wake Forest. Yeah, I mean, it feels like a really smart move on their part. What did you make of what J.C. Trotter said today about the league wanting to cancel those games and the union saying that they wanted those games to be played? I mean, obviously, he has incentive to make it seem like he got those guys paid, but I'm curious what your response was to that. Yeah, so it's kind of, it's interesting because the NFL laid this out with NFLPA signing off on it,

back last summer where they made it possible that games could be canceled in 2021 and they would be considered forfeits because based on a team not being able to play and that it was incumbent on the teams to have make all the roster moves and everything they needed to do to be able to play these games. But it was also kind of dictated by the fact that they assumed that cancellations would be because of outbreaks that were caused by unvaccinated players. And that was very much not the case in Washington, in L.A. or in Cleveland, where J.C. Tredder, the NFLPA president, plays. In all three of those cases, well, in the Browns, I believe, all of the players who tested positive and their staff members were all vaccinated. Washington was mostly vaccinated.

L.A. was, I believe, mostly, if not all, vaccinated, including some people who had already had their booster shots. So the NFL was not really prepared for what to do about moving games or potentially canceling games when there were, you know, we did, none of us could have seen this, right, in July that it was going to be this, these outbreaks caused by vaccinated asymptomatic people testing positive. What can you do? I mean, you've done everything you can at that point. I mean, if you've taken the necessary precautions and following the protocols, it feels so

silly to punish those teams. So yeah, I mean, I, and look, and all of those games that got moved had significant playoff implications. These were not, it wasn't, you know, Jags, Jets or some game that doesn't really, matter at this point of the season. So I get why the PA wanted them played. And the PA, look, the PA wanted them to be played because if they would have canceled the games under the way the protocols were written, none of those players would have gotten paid. So something like 18% of the NFL PA player population would have had to give up game checks last week. That is a significant amount

of money for a significant amount of people. I just think they're trying, you know, the NFL is trying to just figure this out on the fly. And a, uh, a, uh, try to apply some of the 2020 standards and precedent that they set last year, but this is a completely different situation. And they're trying to adapt and be ahead of this. And it's just really, really challenging. I'm glad those games were played, even though, I mean, I think some of those teams, the Browns were in a really bad situation with the third string quarterback.

So it was Washington having to play Garrett Gilbert on Tuesday night. I'm glad those guys got paid. I just wish there was some other way that, you know, it was not like, forfeit or nothing. But there was a lot of pressure. There were a lot of really interesting conversations going on behind the scenes, teams that didn't want to play and would have gone to pretty great lengths to trying to think of the way, the right way to say this. Like they would have played but not really played so that they didn't have to take a forfeit, but that they wouldn't also have to put their players in a really bad situation with all backups

playing. I mean, it was behind the scenes. I think the post-marked, mortems when we kind of get after the season and people are really willing to talk about what happened over the last few days are going to be really interesting. Anything that you feel like people should know just so they have a baseline of information for how to react to these things as they're coming out. Yeah, sure. So I was on the football GM with Mike Sandow and Randy Mueller. We recorded that Friday afternoon right before they ended up moving those games.

Saturday afternoon was when the NFL formally updated their protocols, where the significant change was they are no longer going to be doing regular. regularly, they're no longer going to be regularly testing vaccinated, asymptomatic people. So what they're doing instead is they're doing, they're going to test anybody who's symptomatic. So you have a sore throat, you have a cough, you have a fever, a bad headache, any of those sorts of things, you're going to get tested. Out of curiosity, what is the thought with testing less if they assume they're going to be more cases? Because that seems counterintuitive on its face.

Yeah. So it's multi-pronged. It's kind of complicated. here. But one is they have a lot of data, especially coming out of the last couple weeks, where they've had a lot of asymptomatic people who have tested, asymptomatic vaccinated people who have tested positive. And what they're finding is that they are able to test back in much more quickly. The viral load is much smaller. So the likelihood that they're spreading it is less. It doesn't mean they're not spreading it. That is not the case necessarily here. But the problem was is that so many, there were just so many cases, given what Omicron is like, is that there's just a lot more people catching it.

It's very highly contagious, but also very mild to asymptomatic and vaccinated people. So that's kind of how that is working right now. Guys also can test voluntarily if they want to, if they're nervous, if they're afraid they were exposed, they also can do at-home testing. And if, let's say, your wife or your child or your nanny, whoever it is might be positive because that's going on in the community right now, you can also get tested. So this is a pretty big shift in the way that pro sports are going to be handling this. Looks like the NBA is probably going to be doing something similar.

I think Adam Silver, the NBA commissioner today, told ESPN that they're even considering a protocol change where asymptomatic vaccinated players who test positive won't have to quarantine at all and they can continue playing. So, you know, the NFL took a ton of heat over the weekend for saying, they're waving the white flag on COVID. They're not going to test. What sense did this make? But they're going to be hardly alone in this. And it's going to be a really,

really interesting couple weeks to see how this all plays out. Oh, boy. Buckle up. I'm sure we'll be tracking it all as it happens. Get your booster, wear your mask, get tested before you hang out with lots of people over the holidays. That's all I got. I'd be hanging out with lots of people.

Well, family. That's really it. The concert I was supposed to go to in Brooklyn, Oakland next week is not happening anymore, unfortunately. I mean, I didn't go to the Broncos Bengals game last week, even though I had a credential. And I was like, I just don't want to sit in a crowded press box. So I get it. We're all kind of just trying to figure this out as we go along right now.

Ah, ah, ah, uh, staying alive, staying alive. All right. It's time for this week's edition of staying alive where we dig into the prospects and playoff prospects of one of the many, many teams that is still mathematically alive in the playoff race. And we're going to talk about the Minnesota Vikings today who are seven and seven and seven and seven. You could have told me they were the 11 seed.

I know there are a bunch of teams that were seven and seven. I have no idea who's winning the tiebreakers, who's not. This is all stuff that we'll start figuring out when it's really necessary like two weeks from now. You thought that me wanted to talk about the Vikings today was a ployed to make you watch the Bears from Monday night, which it was not. Because I had boycotted that game. I watch most of the primetime games with my doctor.

and I saw a couple minutes of that and I was like, no, I'm not doing this to her. She still likes football, so I am not making her watch this game because I want her to like football. I don't want her to see whatever this is that is going on. And here you are making me rewatch this game. And I did. I went through it a couple times. And man, I'm sorry you sat through that in person the other night. You know what?

I had a nice time. I had a nice time. The football was terrible, but I had a nice time. But you left that game, like remembering why you like loved football. and going to games, right? Yeah. That's how much of a sicko I am. At this point, I mean, the bears can't hurt me anymore.

It's all about the other elements to it. Okay. I hope you at least got a good meal, enjoyed some ambiance, got some good. I enjoyed the ambiance. No good meal. I had like a couple peanuts. I didn't want to ruin my day because I wasn't planning on going. It's like, I'm not going to eat like crap and just have another bad day.

I had some peanuts and I sat with my brother. It was very nice. All right. We start all of these conversations with a simple question. Why would the Vikings make the playoffs? How could the Vikings make the playoffs? What are the reasons working in their favor? So the first argument about the why the Vikings could make the playoffs is that we have

seen stretches of very good Kirk cousins. And they're going to get Adam Thielen back. It sounds like this week when they play the Rams. And if you beat the Rams, all of a sudden, everything looks a lot better. But so much of this depends on good Kirk showing up and not bad Kirk. But we're thinking positive right now. this is why they could make the playoffs, right? So it's if you get the very good version of Kurt Cousins.

It's the version we saw against the Packers. Sure. If you get the version offensively that we saw against the Packers, that team can beat some people. That team could theoretically beat the Rams. The Vikings are seventh in passing DVOA. It feels like we're on year eight of, is Kurt Cousins good?

It feels like that's just a constant question that we're asked. There are so many caveats to that, right? The amount of heavy boxes that the Vikings see and the amount of simple coverages that the Vikings see because the running game looks a certain way. It's very hard in a vacuum to understand exactly how good Kirk Cousins is. But when you look at the final product, the Vikings passing game has very high highs. And if they get Thiel and back, you watched that game last week, I thought the bear's secondary was remarkably good, considering it was all backups. I don't know where they were hiding Thomas Graham for this entire season, but I want to see more of him.

And if you look at just the structure they were playing defensively, they were. not going to let Justin Jefferson beat them. I mean, the one big play that he had, they were playing quarters in the red zone, and he essentially had a one-on-one with the safety by virtue of the way that they lined up. The Vikings did a really good job of identifying zone, had him one-on-one, corner-out, touchdown. For the most part, though, I mean, the Amir-Smith-Marset touchdown happened because three guys stuck with Justin Jefferson in the red zone when he was lined up in the backfield. They were not going to let Justin Jefferson beat them.

That strategy becomes lost viable when Adam Thielan is back in the game. Christian Derrissau is back playing, which I think is a good thing for this team. You saw the kind of the ripple effect of when he was out and they had to move Udo to left tackle. That was a disaster. So this offense getting healthier and us seeing those high highs of their potential passing game, I think is the reason that they could do it. The defense is a question. We'll talk about that. But that to me is the root of the argument is that Justice Jefferson is really good.

We've seen what this passing game can do when everybody is around. Why don't I have a feeling that this is like an Aaron Donald just destroys the Vikings playoff hopes in one game? I mean, Aaron Donald has had his way with Mason Cole before. And Mason Cole is currently playing guard for the Vikings. So I think that could be an issue. So I guess that's the argument of why they won't make the playoffs, right? Or the case of the argument of why they won't is that the offense has been pretty volatile, you know, within games even. And now you have the Kurt Cousins question of if they can string together multiple games.

And I think the other side of this is it's a tough road. I mean, the Rams are a very good team. We know this. And they have the Packers. I mean, the Rams and the Packers are there next two. They're 7 and 7 right now. They have the 7 seed in the NFC. But there's a reason that if you look at 538,

the Vikings have like a 25% chance to make the playoffs. And the Saints have like a 47% chance. It's because of the schedule that the Vikings have the rest of the way. So I think the schedule is one part. And also the defense is just in rough shape, man. And this defense is 21st in way to DVOA. They released a starting cornerback last week because he got into a scuffle and argument in practice with the coaching staff and multiple people.

I mean, just looking at that and the guys they've lost, somehow this team leads the league in sacks, which makes no sense to me, but they have no edge rushers anymore. They've had to kind of piece together elements of their secondary. They've gotten guys back like Eric Kendricks, Anthony Barr, who'd been out of the lineup. But it still feels like overall that, defense has a lot of holes and a lot of concerns.

So if the offense isn't winning a potential shootout like they could against the Packers, I'm just not sure that this team is going to be able to compete against really good teams. Yeah, and you just have no confidence in them in a close game situation at all. Yeah. I mean, based on the way that this season has gone, it's hard to. Another relevant question we always ask here, do the Vikings actually want to make the playoffs? And I think there are a couple different ways that you can go with this.

What is your knee-jerk answer? Do you think the Vikings actually want to make the play? playoffs. Okay, look, if you're a Vikings fan, yes, probably. Ooh, right? I'm going the other way. Oh, because you just want like a complete tear tear down rebuild. Correct. If you're Mike Zimmer, you absolutely want to make the playoffs because if you don't, do you? He could be freed from this. Last week, we did our, uh, in our, in our, in our power rankings, we did kind of like a worst case scenario, like fan fiction for every team. And I basically just, I just wrote a thing where I had Mike Zimmer just throwing off his headset.

slamming down a clipboard and just like marching out into the wilderness and being like, this is it. I'm done. Just free him from this prison, this head coach shaped prison that he's built for himself. Which might actually be his best case scenario. He's going to go back to his house that has 800 animal heads on the walls and just like Kentucky, right? Isn't that where it is?

Yeah. I mean, it'd just be a better life. He just wouldn't have to deal with like kickers missing last second kicks. See, I want to see him be a defensive coordinator again. I want to see him just get hired by a first year head, offensive head coach. and just go destroy people as a defensive coordinator again. That's my ideal scenario. But I feel like if you're Mike Zimmer and you want to keep this job,

you better make the playoffs. But if you're a Vikings fan, I think I'd rather see it just be a clean break. And I'd rather see them just say, you know what? This is over. Like it's run its course. There's been some really fun moments. Mike Zimmer was a very good NFL head coach

and the chance that he was finally given after deserving one for a really long time. were consistently relevant. Our defense had real spikes of greatness. There were definitely stretches over the last five or six years where the defense was special, transcended. And those days are gone now. You know, your offense looks very good at times.

You've had this very weird Kirk Cousins kind of experience. But I feel like sitting there and saying, all right, Justin Jefferson is a star. We drafted a left tackle in the first round. We still have Dalvin Cook. What does the next phase of this look like? I think that's healthier for everyone involved. So coming to terms with that path and timeline requires them missing the playoffs, and I think I'd be okay with them missing the playoffs.

I do have like when we talk about kind of like a long term, do they tear this down? Do you start over? Do you think it's realistic that they could move on from Kirk Cousins next year, given what his contract is, $35 million based salary, a $45 million cap hit, 45 million dead cap. So if you fire Mike Zimmer now is the next head coach coming in, you're going to have one of those weird years where he's kind of married to Kirk Cousins. Like, would you maybe want just one more year to see if it would work with these guys?

And then in 2023, you start over? Potentially, man. But that's so, so difficult. It's gloomy. None of this is good. I mean, it's so, so difficult. You look at it. I mean, they're financial situations.

next year is not ideal. If you look at it right now, they're slated to be $7 million over the cap. And that's what both of their, all three of their starting cornerbacks hitting free agency. 208 million. That's like with this expanded cap. Yeah, that's not great. It's really rough. I mean, they tried to push it all in, man.

They tried to say, like, all right, let's see if we can squeeze the most we can possibly out of this. I mean, there are contracts they can move on from, you know, that would get them where they need to go. And that's why I think that it probably is time. You know, you move on from the guys that are drifting into their 30s, and whether that's Adam Thiel and whether that's Harrison Smith, you know, Michael Pierce is a contract that they can get out from under relatively easily.

There are answers here. There are not good answers. And you're going to have to take a step back or before you take a step forward. But I think that sitting where they are right now in just weird middle ground, no man's land purgatory, that doesn't feel like the answer either. The Kirk thing, it feels like they would have to eat some of that to get rid of him. But if they're willing to eat some of it and you have, let's say you can get that down to 25. A team would take that.

The team would absolutely take that. You can pay Kirk Cousins $25 million as you're starting quarterback and survive. And there are going to be teams. We're talking to Zach Jackson here in a bit about where the Browns might go. every year a couple teams that you're not thinking about need quarterback competency. And Kirk Cousins can give you that. So I don't think it's going to be as hard to trade as it might seem, even if they have to eat a little bit of it.

But let's say that number goes from $45 million where it is now to the $10 million you're paying and bonus and half of the base salary. So it goes from $45 to $27. That gives you a lot of room. That allows you to start operating again. So it's going to be a really, really naughty offseason. But I do think that there are more pathways than it might seem like right now. Well, Vikings fans come tweet us.

Let us know if you want to make the playoffs or not. I want to know how you truly feel about this. So is this what you want this year? So let us know, tweet both of us of what your answer is. All right. The last question we like to ask here. Do you really not want to play the Vikings right now? We hear that phrase all the time.

You know, you don't want to play this team right now. Do you really not want to play the Vikings right now if they made the playoffs? I mean, there's nothing about them that is like truly terrifying. I think in the fact that they are so volatile and that if it's you get in a close game situation, which a lot of playoff games would be, I'd feel pretty good about my chances. But are we thinking, okay, so who are there other options if we're talking about the other wild cards? Do they scare you more than the 49ers? I'd much rather play the Vikings than the 49ers. Correct. But the 49ers, I'm kind of penciling in.

So if you're looking at the team sitting at 7 and 7, would you rather play the Vikings than the Eagles? I think I'd rather play the Eagles because I just think the quarterback ceiling is higher with the Vikings, but. I think I'd rather play the Vikings right now because of just the, what the Eagles have tapped into offensively and that formula that they have. I think that formula that the Eagles have on offense is scarier than anything the Vikings can present to you.

I think that's fair. Would you rather play the Vikings or the Saints? Probably this. Oh, God, this is hard because. It's hard. It's really hard. Because the Saints just can't score at all. But their defense has those games.

That is just a level of, God, I really don't want to be here against the Saints defense that just feels a little bit different. Yeah, because if you're like the Cowboys, right? Like, if you're the Cowboys, you've got to feel good. like, okay, we can score at least 17 points. If I'm the Cowboys, I'd rather play the Vikings. I would rather avoid that Saints defense if I'm the Cowboys right now. Yeah, I mean, that Saints defense is terrifying.

The Cowboys can lose a 20 to 17 game against the Saints. They absolutely can't. I know that game just happened, but Tassam Hill at his weird finger situation, all of that. Yeah, it's just this is weird. Yeah, it's going to be weird. I don't know. It's tough. It's tough.

It's tough. It's, whoever gets there. because right now, like, if you're the Cowboys, the Cowboys have the number two seed. So they're the team in question here. And I think I'd rather play the Vikings than the Saints if I were the Cowboys in this exact moment. Yeah, probably because of just the exact matchups and stuff that you're going to get. Oh, man.

I cannot wait to just hate watch, but also love that 2-7 game, whatever it ends up looking like. Is that going to be the Nickelodeon game? I totally forgot about that. Get some guys slined. Oh, God. All right. It's time for this week's. appointment viewing for week 16, the things that we cannot wait to watch this weekend.

Lindsay, what do you got for me? All right. So I'm just running it back a couple weeks ago. Remember when we were really excited to watch Bill's Patriots because of all the really cool. And we didn't really get to watch it. Yeah, because of all like the cool matchup stuff and everything that was at stake. And what we got was just like the weirdest game because it was in like 70 mile an hour wins and gross, disgusting weather.

So I'm just running it back. I'm excited to see this game. The stakes maybe are quite as high as they were exactly at that moment. Where could the Patriots overtake the bills and the division and all that stuff? I think some of that stuff is still in play. But now I just want to see that we're going to get a real game. Although I will say I have not looked at the Foxborough forecast in depth. I mean, it's December and Foxborough.

Like the weather could be crappy. But there is no way that it will be as. It always seems to be awful. Like, and it'll be windy. It'll be, you know, but it's not going to be like the type of wind where you literally cannot throw the ball because it will fall out of the sky. or you can't kick in a certain direction because it will shank so far in one direction. So I just want to see like, okay, what does Bill Belichick do now? What does Josh McDaniels do now?

What is their game plan for Mack Jones? How does Brian Daibald adjust what they do with Josh Allen for this game? Do they take a different approach? So that's the game that I'm most looking forward to, I think, mostly because we just didn't get it. I feel like we were robbed of that Monday night game a couple weeks ago. and I'm just hoping that this one will kind of live up to the expectations that we had a couple weeks ago. The bills need this game. Yeah.

I mean, right now they're the seven seed. Luckily for them, the Ravens and the Bengals play one another. So even if they were to lose one of those other teams that also fall to eight and seven. But, I mean, the bills were a team. It looked like five, six weeks into the year were the best team in the AFC. Now they're clinging to their lives in the AFC play in the AFC playoff picture. And I think for Buffalo, this is kind of a look yourself in the mirror game for the bills, right? The way the Patriots beat them last time, you got to ask yourself some hard questions about the type of football team you are and you want to beat.

And I know it's one big run and honestly play in and play out. The Patriots running game was not that effective in that game. But I think a couple teams have pushed the bills around this year. Are you going to let that happen again? What does this game look like? What kind of team are you moving forward? How do you define yourself? Like those are going to be questions I think the bills have to ask.

themselves this week and then into this off season. And I'm excited to see what it looks like. I mean, that game is excellent. I'm very much looking forward to that one. Mine is Colts Cardinals. I'm a sucker for Christmas football. I don't know. I just have always enjoyed it. Well, again, I was supposed to go on a trip. I was going to be on a plane when this game was happening. I am not anymore. So I get to actually kind of settle in and watch it with my family at my mom's house, kind of curled around the hearth in the house at that time of year. That's fun.

I'm very much looking forward to that. And these guys, I mean, the cults are rolling, right? We had a long conversation about Jonathan Taylor. He is must watch TV right now, the way that he is playing.

Darius Leonard feels the same way. I mean, it feels like every single week he makes one or two ridiculous plays that just kind of leave you laughing. I've also been watching the in season hard knocks. So I feel strangely invested in, fringe aspects of this Colts team like Bubba Ben-Taron getting blocked punts. So that's it for me.

Like it is a nationally televised game. It can be watching it with people I don't normally watch football with. It's, I'm going to be locked into that one. There's a ton at stake for the Cardinals. Yeah. I mean, they have,

I mean, they're just hoping that nobody watched the way that they played last week against the Lions. Oh, I watched it. I watched it too. And it was rough. Like it was,

it was not great. And look, Kyler Murray tends to do. kind of exciting things on a big stage. This is their moment. He is now out of the MVP conversation. I formally jinx that when I wrote heading into Monday Night Football about what he could do to get back in.

So I apologize to Kyler Murray for that. But this is kind of a huge moment to get the Cardinals back on track and show people that they're not the same old Cardinals, that this season isn't just going to wilt away. And the Rams, you know, the Rams are charging right now in that division. So a ton at stake for both of these teams. And it's going to be, it's going to be, It's going to be really fun.

And I will allow my daughter to watch that game on Christmas. You can't hurt me anymore with the bear stuff. I'm not sad. I'm not sad. I'm not hurt. All right. Before we get to Zach, I need you to sell me on Thursday, night football. This should not be too hard.

Yeah, we've got Niners Titans, right? So nineers are really fun. Debo Samuel, George Kittle. And that's honestly enough for me. That's really all I need is Debo's. they're in that place. In George Gettles. Their offense is so fun and so good right now that those guys are worth the price of admission on their own.

Yeah, I mean, I've certainly soured on the Titans, but they're absolutely right in the mix. They're still leading that division. They've got a playoff spot as it stands right now. So they have a ton at stake. So I think this is a really interesting matchup. You know, it's there's, you have to kind of go down the tree now, right? That this was a Shanahan to LaFleur who then left and then Arthur Smith. And then so there's, this is kind of like a Shanahan offense.

times removed that the Titans are running. So there's kind of some fun schematic stuff here. But look, I'm just watching for, I want to see George Kittle like pancake some dudes. And I want to see Debo Samuel like in the backfield and making guys look silly. So that's, that's it. That's all I need for Thursday night football. There's a couple big stars and we got that. I will be watching.

This 49ers team is very exciting and very entertaining to me. And I'm glad we've kind of come back around on the Cal Shanahan arc where it's Like, you know what? No, he actually is very good at this. We no longer think he should just be an offensive coordinator. Yeah, I'm good. If whatever missteps they make every once in a while in personnel ultimately lead to whatever we're watching right now, that tradeoff to me as a football watcher and as a 49ers fan,

I am willing to live with it. I think that's worth it. I guess I probably wasn't fair to the Titans here. I will say the one thing is that they tend to surprise us. They tend to come up big in some of these moments. I mean, they've lost some bad games. they lost last week. But I just, I think...

The fact that nobody watched that game is, that's a blessing for the Titans. Yeah. So I think this could be a good moment for them. And maybe they'll surprise us and make this a really interesting, competitive game. All right.

It's time now for this week's team visit with our Browns writer, Zach Jackson. Zach, how you doing, man? Thank you for doing this. Good. So when you saw you in August, you're like, we're going to have Yon right before the playoffs

because the Browns were supposed to be there. So, no, anyway, it's a pleasure to be here with you guys. It's been a wild season. that's been the last week has been a wild year, right? And the Browns are not dead. So we'll see what happens these next few weeks. Let's dig into some of that in a second.

I want to start with whatever relevant COVID information is happening right now. Because I feel like that's where we have to start every conversation at this stage of the season, which no one is happy about. But with this team especially, it has been an eventful week. So where are we with who's in, who's out? How healthy will they be for the home stretch? How healthy will they be for Saturday? Saturday's game. They're playing on Christmas, so most of you will be watching the Browns this week.

Just kind of lay all that out for me. Okay. So 72 hours from kickoff is basically when we're having this conversation. And only 48 hours removed from the game where they had 18 active roster players on the COVID list. So if you use 10 days, Robert, as the threshold or the guiding point, all but three of them will be eligible to play by Saturday. The issue would be Baker Mayfield is in the group that maybe day 10 wouldn't be till Saturday morning. So he would be flying in on his own or with two or four teammates, having had no practice. Now, they only have one practice this week anyway. But they're looking at a situation where Clowny is still on COVID.

The left tackle Jedrick Wills is still on COVID. Jarvis Landry is still on COVID. They think he'll be off. Miles Garrett is hurt. Kareem Hunt is hurt. Troy Hill is hurt. So the answer right now, is they're probably going to be short-handed and maybe significantly so,

but they don't expect it to be anywhere near of the 18 guys. And they do at least hold out optimism that either Keenham or Baker, probably Baker will be eligible to play. It just then comes down to, you know, how ready and what kind of plan have they been able to put together to get guys to play at national TV game on Christmas Day. So why has Baker been out so long? What are the considerations there?

So it's all the new protocols. days is when you generally can test off unless you're asymptomatic, right? So he went on last Wednesday, so that would put this coming Saturday as the 10 days. So he is symptomatic. That's the problem. Yeah, that's why he hasn't tested out until now. So they got Austin Hooper back. They got John Johnson back for the game and then he got hurt.

It's just been one thing after another. Oh, boy, has it. Yeah. So this is a team that wanted to run the ball and rely on its offensive line and let the defense loose and they had lost the run game and really all offensive mojo about the time the defense got hot. And then Clowny went down. And if, you know, Miles Garrett has said he's going to play, but he's got a what we believe to be a pretty significant groin injury. The linebackers have been in and out of the lineup. And they played last game without five of their top seven defensive

backs. All right. Before we get into a lot of the, there's a lot of X's and O's stuff going on here, I think in a lot of, you know, kind of we can, we can hone in on a lot of things. I'd love for you to kind of take us inside, like, what does it feel like in Cleveland right now with the expectations for this team? And look, it's Christmas week and the Browns are relevant. They are in this playoff hunt. I think a lot of us maybe had maybe higher expectations. How would you kind of assess kind of where the Browns are out right now and how they're feeling and maybe the fan base is feeling about where they're at at this point in the season? Yeah, Lindsay, three days ago, even I would have said angst.

to more than anything else. I think it's frustration because they are alive in the playoff race, but they need so much help now. And some of that's an assumption that they're not going to beat the Packers, but I think everybody assumes they're going to beat the Packers. And let's be clear, outside of Ward Clowney and Garrett, this team has done nothing to resemble a playoff team. They just haven't.

So to the fan base, this is the second time in three years that the Browns have had lofty expectations and completely flopped. So go back to 2019. That was the Freddie Kitchens year. That was a completely different regime, right? That's not the same. But last year's team just seemed to handle everything so well, the COVID stuff, just the strange circumstances. They showed up, they were disciplined, they were prepared, and the offense in the second half of the year got hot,

and it was good enough to carry them to the second round of the playoffs, really for the first time since most of the players were born. This year in the second half of the season, the offense has totally flatlined. The inconsistencies have been across the board, and they've included injuries, COVID, quarterback, you know, other guys. that this team was counting on, the O'Dell Beckham quitting the team saga in the middle of the year, right? And you're left with a team that's really gotten hot defensively, but has lost even those guys that have led the charge. And they've scored 14 total points, two touchdowns in the fourth quarter in the last nine games. So they've lost close games. They've lost COVID games. They've only been flattened once, but they just, even when they've won, like they haven't impressed.

So the overall feeling is frustration. and that this season is a total flop. So it's going to be on these guys, Barry and Stefanski specifically, who were the darlings of the city and the saviors, the resurrection had finally happened. They have difficult decisions lie ahead, and they're eventually going to have to parse through what just went a little bit wrong,

what goes wrong in the course of football season, and where maybe are we flawed in the building, and then, of course, the big thing is Baker plays next year on the fifth year option. He's been bad, he's been hurt, and what are you going to do with that? at that position. Oh, we'll get there. Oh, we will get there. Before we do, let's talk about kind of that disappointment a little bit. What's been the most disappointing part of this? Beyond just the outcomes, because I think you could take that a bunch of different directions,

right? Baker's lack of ascension, the not being able to kind of fit Odell into what they're doing, whatever reported discord there's been with the quarterback and the way that the offense looks, the fact that the drop back passing game looks a little bit broken. They don't have a many answers there, some of the lack of defensive development. I think you can go a bunch of different directions on where this has fallen the most flat. And I'm wondering what you would say. I would just point to 21st in scoring. This offense brought everybody back. This offense had different dimensions and a little bit of depth and really proven players, you know, and now it's like they can't do anything. So that to me is the biggest frustration. It's the most puzzling thing.

You know, last year, once the coach and the quarterback got comfortable with each other and the flow of things, they really got aggressive with the pass game and that opened everything else up. This year, the bread and butter is still running. You know, the running back's been in and out of the lineup. Jack Conklin's been mostly out of the lineup. But there's been nothing but short passes, and they have failed, really, in so many third downs and in so many fourth quarters. They just, every time they've needed a big play, they haven't done it. And that has manifested itself at the end of halves, the end of games, you know, chances to put teams away, chances to rally and win.

And they had a 45.4th quarter of them and the Chargers combined way back in week five. And they lost the game, but it was like, man, these are two really good teams, you know, really talented, young rising teams. And since then is the stat that I mentioned, two touchdowns in the fourth quarter. They just, the offense has not had it in any kind of way. and that has, it's dampened the defensive efforts. It's magnified the struggles of the special teams, of all the guys in and off the various injured lists. And it's why they're 500 with what we thought was a, you know, top five, top eight roster in this league. You said coming in, you said that the last year, the quarterback and the head coach getting on the same page and getting comfortable with each other was a huge part of this.

Where do you think they sit, their relationship, the way that they, the way that Safansky sees. see Baker. My understanding, and just outside in reading this situation was always, the company line there was good enough to win with. Baker is good enough for us to win with. I'm wondering where you think it sits now and kind of how they're looking at each other, both sides. Well, you know, I'm speaking for both of them and that's difficult because DeFancy doesn't ever give us an honest answer on the question. And Baker, after one game, chose not to speak at all. But Robert, I think when you watch, I think the play calling and the head coach's demeanor tells you that he's telling someone that the quarterback's not good enough. I just think that that that has happened. And anybody who's

been hard on Baker and I'm at the front of that line can point to the receivers can't get open. The line hasn't been. The overall operation has not been when it's been, right? I think they've only played four or five games where Hunt and Chub have both been completely healthy and they've scored over 20. And the line, right? I mean, the line has been so dinged up. And even like you're watching Will's when he's been in the game, he doesn't look like the same guy. It just, and right, this happens. Injuries along the offensive line, they were healthy last year. It was a huge part of why they sustained success is because of the health they had in particular,

that area. And all of that kind of stuff changes from your year. You can't rely on health. But when you're looking at it, there are just so many different ingredients in whatever this end result of offensive disappointment is. You know, last year when they really needed to make a throw, Jarvis Landry got open. he caught the ball and then he made at least the first guy this. He got hurt in week two, came back, got hurt again, has not been the same player.

People's Jones has shown a couple of flashes of being a really gifted young receiver. He has not been consistent. The tight ends, I mean, Austin Hooper blocks his butt off and is a big target, and he runs four yards and falls down. Like, they know, Stephancy wants to run a three tight end offense, and there is no pop there. Njoku has some pop, but you never know if he's going to catch it. So, yeah, like you said last year, the blocking, the running, the misdirection, everything just resulted in this groove that they hit and they could attack you in different ways and keep you guessing.

And this year, it's like they're the ones guessing, like, what should we even do? You know, he wants to be a fourth down, go for it team. I think of the eight first downs early in the season, or fourth downs they try to convert early in the season, they got sacked on six of them. Right. So that's not all on one person. There's a fundamental flaw there. I just think it's clear that there's not full trust in the quarterback and there's nowhere

near whatever that was, you know, shifting gears, pressing a button, whatever cliche you want to use, they can't find that button and haven't really since early October and now it's Christmas. Before we get into too many of the offseason considerations and Baker Mayfield is going to be a huge part of that, I want to get into kind of what's at stake right now because the Browns are very much still alive. somehow they're still alive. They're at 7 and 7. And had they won that game against the Raiders on Monday night, they would have been in first place in the division. But by the way, because of the way the NFC or AFC North, excuse me, is falling this year, they're now in last place. So can you take us through as well as you can because it is very complicated? What's at stake right now for the Browns

this week against the Packers? And then what is their path to potentially climbing their way back into the playoffs. Yeah, so, you know, it's down to 30% or so, but it's realistic because of the rest of the division. And it's probably down to like 6% that they would get a wild card. So, Lindsay, they need to win the division, which means they need to stack some wins. And then they finish at Pittsburgh on a Monday night, a game they absolutely can win. And at home against the Bengals, where, you know, the Bengals are obviously good. They're young. And Baker has owned them throughout his short career. So, you know, what else is at stake? Well, you know, Baker playing a national TV game that they really need to win this week coming off this. Like, is he really the

ultimate overcomer? Does this offense have an A effort in it? Because it hasn't shown it. You know, does Jarvis get back and do they click? We know Cream Hunt's not going to be there this week, and that is a big loss because he does so much. But I think in the second half against the Raiders, I think you saw Nick Chubb running, you know, the way he's capable of. He is a super rare back. The offensive line, they had to shift guys around, but I think they finally got some push and they got some flow to things. And then, you know, defensively, we don't know who's going to be there because Clowny's on COVID. Tack McKinley's out for the year and Miles is hurt. But obviously, when you go to Lambo, there's a lot to stop there. So it's, in the division, they don't necessarily need to win this

game if the Steelers lose to the Chiefs. If the Ravens, if the Bengals beat the Ravens this week and the Ravens, they've left it to the ifs, I guess, is what I'm saying. For them, though, I really mean And since probably the beginning of November, each week they've alternated third and fourth place in the division, depending on the other results. And just for much of the year, they've played fourth place football. Like, they just have continually not put even two and a half or three good quarters together. And every time they've kind of had a breakthrough, whether it was one game and carrying that momentum or one really good push and in time to slam the door on somebody, they just have failed. And it's been maddening. It's a completely different looking team just in their operation in the way they execute in quarters three and four than they were last season.

I wanted to talk to you about the defense because you mentioned McKinley, Clowny, Garrett. It seemed like at the beginning of the year that this pass rush was going to be terrifying. They were leading the league in a lot of certain pass rush metrics. I think both McKinley, excuse me, both Garrett and Clowning were in the top seven in pressures like five or six weeks into the season. their defense had some really promising moments. I remember breaking down the game that they had against the Vikings, being like, man, this group really feels like they could click by the end of the year. A lot of new pieces.

You'd assume they would grow over time. I know injuries have been a part of it. But where is the defense kind of fallen short? And where do you think tweaks need to happen on that side of the ball before we even get to the Baker question this offseason and moving forward for them to hit their ceiling? Yeah, that's a really interesting and complicated one, Robert, because early to middle of the year, there were a ton of communication breakdowns at the back. And it was like, okay, they're new.

But, man, when it was happening in week 8, 9, 10, that was bad. They seemed to have cleaned that up. They had a couple of the other night late against the Raiders. Well, they had practice squad safeties in. So, of course, they had it then. There have been games, specifically the two Ravens games, where Clownie and Garrett have both shown up with their A game, and it's just dominant, right? They just, they shut things down and forced things.

Miles, or Denzo Ward, excuse me, he had late October, early November, a little flare up of some back issues and hamstring issues since he's come back. He has absolutely been at the top of his game. So I think the defense has done well enough to make anyone believe that there's not going to be a coordinator change, that the core guys are here. And obviously it's complicated. Clowny's going to be 29 and he's going to want 12 million. But I think the defense has taken the kind of jump that the offense took last year where it was like, okay, we're almost at Thanksgiving. it's time to put the crap aside and put out a good product. And they have mostly done that.

And you mentioned really dominant product back in Minnesota, both games in Baltimore, a couple of other times. It's just offensively they haven't. And really the other nights kind of summed it up. They didn't have their guys. But each side of the ball, including the special teams, the kickers missed five of his last seven, had one kind of untimely breakdown. And that was enough because they just don't score enough to give themselves any margin for air.

It feels like next year could be a huge jump for them. We've seen this happen with defenses in the past, right? Where you have this massive turnover of personnel, and you do make some incremental gains. I think they're 15th in defensive DVOA after being in the bottom third of the league last year. They've been hurt. But you think about it next year, obviously the clowny question is an important one. But having J. O.K. in his second season, having Miles be what he is, you still have most of the secondary coming back intact. It's kind of what it feels like to me.

Maybe I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt, but I think if you're trying to build, this, this, this Brown's team feels like the perfect example of this. And obviously, the Baker question is a whole different thing. But we have this trajectory of teams where you have a jump in one year that maybe is a little bit of a mirage. There's certain luck elements to it, certain health elements to it. And it comes with these huge outside expectations, and you're a little bit disappointed. And then in year three, it almost has a bump back to where you expected them to be in year two. And on defense, that's kind of what it feels like with this team.

You know, time will tell if you're right, but the case you lay out, I can't argue with. And I'm the dummy for not mentioning JOK earlier because I think he kind of was feeling his way early in the season. And then he had an ankle missed three or four games. But he is just so fast. And he dropped the 52 in the draft because he wasn't for everybody. But he was for this defense because of his range, right? They envisioned Garrett and Clowny just wrecking and demanding so much attention up front that a guy could come running behind and clean up plays or closed plays, and that's what JOK has done.

You know, Grant Delt puts a second-year player who's really a rookie. He's only had one game where he's played full-time. You see it there. The rookie corner, Greg Newsom, he's been out now. He looks really good. Greedy Williams has come in. You know, people wondered about him. He, the last month, has really played well.

And you need three corners in this league. Hell, you need five corners in this league. So I agree. And I think, you know, going back to the Chiefs game, week one, the Chargers game, week five, it was like, okay, the Browns aren't there yet, but they're really good. And these are the types of games they're going to have to play. 3128, 45, 42.

And eventually they'll figure it out. Eventually they'll close late. Eventually a bounce or a kick will go their way. Well, it's totally shifted. If the other team gets 20, the Browns aren't winning. So the defense has been good and it has to be great, you know, until slash and less, this offense can figure something out. I've got one more defensive question here.

And this is somewhat selfish of me because I have a vote for defensive player the year this year and it is a very weird year for this. So what is the case for Miles Garrett as somebody who has watched every single snap that he has played this year and over the course of his career? So what, you know, what would be the case for Garrett beyond just his sack numbers? Yeah, Lindsay, I think he wants to win it. And had you asked me this question four to six weeks ago, I would say he's simply the most gifted guy and he's playing at the highest level. Like, you've seen him put more together this year. You've seen a more confident player in the way he carries himself

and you'd seen a more dominant player in some of those big spots, right, when the Browns really needed a stop before the half, or when it was third and eight late in the third quarter and they could shift the momentum. He's done that. He gets doubled. It doesn't bother him, right? Quarterbacks run away from him. You know, not a bootleg, a sprint out, and he gets back there and he closes down.

So I think you've just seen a more confident, stronger, and smarter player who has oodles of talent, and you've seen those moments. So since then, T.J. Watt has come on and taken the sack lead playing in fewer games. When I get to watch the Rams, I see Aaron Donald and I say, oh, my gosh, he still might be the best defensive player on the planet. But the case for Miles Garrett is that he has kind of harnessed this talent into a matchup-proof. a week proof. It obviously doesn't have three sacks every week like he had back in week three. But every single week, he impacts the game in multiple ways. And, you know, he'd done it before, but it was every other week or it was the occasional third down. And I think if you ask those who have played him consistently, you know, he has taken it to another notch with the consistency

and just with the overall impact that he's made this year. You know, I'm talking about stuff that shows up and stuff that doesn't. This could be one of those showcase type nights for him. on Christmas night against the Packers. Obviously not an ideal situation that he's going to be playing through injury, but, you know, he could have one of those moments. Yeah, he could. You know, obviously two years ago, he took himself out of the last six weeks of the thing.

He was going to be 18 or 20 sacks then before the incident happened. Last year, he got COVID and he came back and he was not the same player. So this year, I think he slowed down a bit in terms of just, just how teams have blocked him and he hasn't had a huge game in a few weeks. But I think in both Ravens games, and they had the scheduling quirk where they played back to back at the end of November and early in December, he and Clowny both just completely collapsed the pocket consistently in both of those games.

So can he do it? Sure. He said immediately after the game Monday, he said, they're going to have to kill me, they're going to have to cut off my leg or I'll be there Saturday because I think he thinks the same way as you. He's come out of his shell to us a little bit, Lindsay. and he will never come out and say, I want to win defensive player of the year.

But just in kind of little things in the way he's put himself out there, I guess, he wants to do it. I just don't know right now, you know, three days, two days from kickoff where he is health-wise. But I absolutely agree with your thinking that this could be because the Browns need this game. And Saturday afternoon, everybody's going to be watching. So let's have an off-season conversation, which is not at all snake pit that I'm terrified to jump into. All right. If you look at this right now, it's kind of amazing.

The Browns, as it currently stands, with a lot of the cap considerations and not making any moves, according to over the cap, we'll have about $39 million in cap space next year, which is a lot more than you would think, considering how we talked about this roster coming into the season. If you look at the guys potentially hitting free agency, they're not the guys you would really care about. They're not the guys you'd be worried about. David and Joku is a potential free agent. and a lot of the guys they had on one-year deals, right? The Tech McKinley's of the world, Malik Jackson, guys of that nature.

With a couple moves, you would say $15 million moving on from Jarvis Landry and $6.5 million moving on from Case Keenum. You're looking at $60 million in cap space. The areas of the roster that we expected to be intact are the offensive line and the secondary. Those are places where they've made a lot of investments. Those are places they can build around moving forward. Other than that, and running back, obviously. Other than that, this team is kind of a blank slate in a lot of ways.

There are a lot of different pivot points that they could go down. So just beyond the real estate and the financial resources they have to kind of play with in terms of reshaping the roster, you have the Baker Mayfield question. And also, some of that cap space would allow them to potentially chase a very expensive quarterback. So let's just take a step back and think about if you're Andrew Barry and Kevin Stifansky. You get knocked out of the playoffs. You don't, or you do not make the playoffs. It's February 15th. What is the biggest existential question that you have to ask yourself

heading into this offseason? Is our quarterback anywhere close as good enough as the guys that were chasing down? That's to me what it is, Robert. One thing on the roster, not necessarily a correction, but one thing that they could add to that, I'm not sure J.C. Treter's back, and that's nine or ten million more if they need it, right? He's in his 30s now. He's injured all the time. They would like that. I think that sums up everything.

I think when we had this conversation three months ago, you'd have said after the season, okay, the Browns are going to go draft a center. They're going to add a couple of young pass rushers and they're going to be off and racing. Now they have a quarterback question. Now they have a bottom five receiving core in the league with a huge Jarvis Landry question looming.

With the Donovan People's Jones question looming, he's under contract, but he hasn't really taken that leap. Odell's been a non-factor. They drafted Schwartz last year. He looks like he can't play a lick. Right. So, yeah, at quarterback, to me, it's not about, and again, I'm speaking for them here and that I don't know this. But I think they know that Baker's not good enough. I think it's what is our option? Are we willing to go venture out into the wilderness for a year or two if we have to? Because we're not going to have Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt and Miles Garrett for too long.

And we're not going to sign Cheney in age 29 to $12 more million if we don't think we can win the Super Bowl. We think we can win the Super Bowl. They've invested in the O line, right? The secondary is really good. But the receiving core needs completely remade. And that quarterback question lingers. And so I think when you frame it like that, when the smoke finally clears and whatever week of January that it does and they sit down and say, okay, how do we close this gap? How do we do this?

It has to start with the quarterback. and it has to really probably start with plugging your nose and looking at some of these options. Because I don't know, you know, probably not is Aaron Rogers going to become available. Probably not is a great quarterback going to fall into your lap in any direction. But I just don't see a path to where they're making a commitment to Baker Mayfield or more importantly, more urgently, I guess, to where they think they can really be a 12-win AFC championship team with Baker Mayfield. all right let's talk about some of the potential options here okay kirk cousins is he a better option

in 2021 or excuse me in 2022 when his base salary is 35 million dollars by the way than baker mayfield um again four months ago i'd have told you absolutely no now i'm willing to listen that seems like the aisle we're shopping in here though right is the kirk cousins Derek car Derek Carr is the one for me. I think so too. That's what I said. I said that a month and a half ago when we were talking to Mitch on the mailbag. That to me is the one that I would kick the tires on the hardest.

Because I feel like it's a direct upgrade. Financially, you could make it happen. And there's a world where you could spin the Raiders not wanting him as part of whatever rebuild they want to engage with. I think that Matthew Stafford is probably more talented than Derek Carr. But if I was trying to pick a Matthew Stafford type figure that would be available in the same way this offseason, Derek Carr would be the name I would land on. It doesn't seem like he fits what's the fancy wants to do, right? Doesn't, you know, I agree.

And so it comes down to what the Raiders want to do with him, obviously, in the year before his contract is up. But yeah, that's the one to me. That's way better than that Ryan, right? I just, I don't, don't, yeah, or Coropolo. You know, I don't know what kind of upgrade those guys are. I know there's no history of going back to 2011 of a quarterback playing on his fifth-year option without a new deal and lasting with that team. So, you know, I think that that kind of tells you something.

So we have seen really good Baker here in Cleveland. We have seen really bad Baker here in Cleveland. To me, what's in the middle is not close to good enough, so you have to go shopping. What you're going to find in these shopping aisles, I don't know. If it's car, I say do it. If it's those other options that we just quickly went through, I understand the angst. Is there anything that can happen to? these next three weeks that would change your mind on that or your view on Baker?

Lindsay, the answer, the easy answer is absolutely yes, but there's also nothing I've seen so far that makes me think that that change is coming, right? And someone else asked me that yesterday, not someone as intelligent as you. And it kind of caught me off guard. So I'm a little bit more prepared here, but I just, yes, the Browns could still win. The Browns could get hot here. and he could direct them. I just, I don't feel like that everyone has been on the same page. I think that's borne out in the results and in what we see on Sundays or Mondays or Tuesdays or whenever the hell they play these games, right?

And I just look at the state of the offense and I don't think that if they're down 10 with 10 minutes on Saturday evening, that there's any chance they come back. And I just don't think if they have to score 24 or 24. in one of those last two games in the cold on national TV to win and win the division or sneak in, however these things play out, I just don't see it happening. So maybe I'm wrong. And I do think that no final decision has been made anywhere because I think internally you have to be focused on what's still ahead, right? And that's these last three games. But certainly nothing we've seen this season has indicated that that's going to happen.

I just can't. I'm so intrigued by the setup. when a new staff comes in and it's an arranged marriage with the quarterback, they did not choose and what the dynamics of that look like over time. Just think about how we've watched it play out in all of these different places over the last several years. Like, Gough and McVeigh and how it looked like it was rolling so well. It's like, oh yeah, we absolutely could win with him. Like, this is worth investing in. And then it just devolves so fast. And then you have this kind of honeymoon last year at the end of this season. We're like, oh, look at this. This absolutely could

work and then now here we are and I always felt like that was kind of the the creeping dread that they might have had organizationally is looking at what happened with golf and seeing how that all turned out and how it all kind of disintegrated and wondering and hoping that that wasn't going to happen and it kind of has the same feel to me it has a very similar feel and I think if you know when it got brought up back in the summer right when we were talking a lot of contract stuff and it was like well they don't want to have happen to him what happened with wins and what happened with golf. Well, at the time you looked at last year and you said Baker's way better than those guys. Well, now you look now, the numbers are the same. The feel is the same, right? Like,

those are all very different guys in very different situations, but the part where they were not very different is what you just mentioned. Arrange marriage, time to make a decision, team looks good around them, expectations are up, goals are up, time to go for it. And you have to at least go shopping in it. And I think, I have zero doubt that they will, what the result will be. I don't know. And what could change about that shopping list or about how they prioritize the things they need or him himself over these next three games. I just don't have a lot of optimism that there would be a significant change in that regard. Well, I'm sure everyone will respond rationally and patiently to all the things that we just said over the last half hour.

Zach Jackson, always great to talk with you, my friend. Sincerely appreciate taking the time out for us. Enjoy your Christmas in Chili, Chili Lambo Field. Yeah, yeah. Well, the way this thing's gone, the Browns will probably go 3 in O and we'll be talking in the playoffs here in about a month.

But if that doesn't happen, you know, thanks for having me. Talk to you guys. All right, guys, that's all we got for today. As always, sincerely appreciate you listening. Thanks to Zach for the time. Always good to catch up with him. Thank you to Lindsay.

We'll be back tomorrow with Nate and Sheal with our week 16 preview and our week 16 picks. Until then, please go leave a review with the podcast. Have it be a Christmas present to me. If you listen on Apple, just go let us know that you enjoy the show. If you listen on Spotify, you can rate the show. Really appreciate that.

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