The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The Steelers stay unbeaten, the Cardinals conquer, Baker Mayfield saves his job, trading for JJ Watt & more in our week 7 review

Episode Date: October 26, 2020

It was an entertaining as hell week 7 in the NFL, from the Steelers outlasting the Titans in the battle of the unbeatens, to Baker Mayfield saving his job with the Browns, there was no shortage of dramatic storylines. The Athletic's Robert Mays and Nate Tice dive into the headlines of Cardinals-Seahawks, appreciation for Mike Tomlin and Tom Brady, apologies to Justin Herbert, which receivers we would start franchises with and much more in our week 7 review.Get access to The Athletic for $1 at theathletic.com/footballshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome to the athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays. Joining me tonight is my buddy Nate Tyson. Nate, how are you? I'm doing great. Seven weeks in. I mean, we're just under seven weeks in.

And we got 10 weeks to go. But I think we were just talking about the pre-show. It's one of those that first you're like, oh, yeah, it's an okay week. And then you start re-reviewing the games and going like, oh, yeah, that happened. Oh, yeah, that happened. And it turns out it was a fun Sunday. I wasn't that excited about most of the slate. I guess part of the energy is from the game we just watched, which we're going to talk about.

And then the other part is there were a lot of interesting things that happened today, even if a lot of the games seemed kind of a ho-hum in the moment. So let's start with the Sunday night football game because, man, what a wild finish. A lot of thoughts coming out of that game. My first question to you, though, what do you make of the Cardinals? Because we talked about this a little bit, I think on the Thursday show with Lindsay, where I was asking her, just kind of discussing that I thought the card was going to be a wild car team. I didn't think they'd look like this. Their offense is a little bit less consistent. They're getting yards of very strange ways. I think Kyler had 14 carries again tonight, which is just not something we typically see. And a lot of it scrambles. A lot of the time last year when Lamar was having those big games on the ground, they were design runs. With Kyler, it feels like the scrambles are almost part of their passing game. It's just so hard for me to kind of put my finger on them.

And I feel the exact same way tonight after watching them win a shootout against the Seahawks. I think you said less consistent and, you know, inconsistence is kind of the best way to like describe them. And really, they're so matchup dependent, which is not what you want to hear or see with your top tier offenses that we want the Cardinals to be. You know, this was kind of the perfect matchup for them. It was maybe I have some sloppiness in the Seahawks defense. they got advantage matchups with maybe having Hopkins always, not always being onto the left side, but a lot of times being on the left side against Dunbar. And also just no pass rush.

I mean, this entire game, I think they ended with one sack in the entire game or I think a couple more happened in overtime. But they had no sacks by either team throughout the regular, throughout the normal amount of time. And that's kind of a good matchup for the Cardinals because when they have issues is when they get beat the crap up front or they get pressured out of their game that they want to run or their run game isn't working, they actually have to get chunks. And I mean, we saw today, like, their two-minute drill to go tie the game up. It was eight plays, including the field goal. It was like two runs, two passes and three spikes. It was like, I think Chris Brown called it nifty.

You know, it was just nice and tight. That's the best way to describe it, too. It was just like, it was nifty. I mean, they caught the Seahawks running two man. They ran a QB draw. They ran it two times. They threw it two times and they spiked it three times and they kicked the field goal. It was like, but it was kind of like, that's not what you're expecting when you think Cliff The kick the field goal on second down, which is something else we can probably talk about here. I've seen the third down one, but not the second down one too often. Yeah. The box score of this game is insane.

Insane. I'm just looking at it right now. Just so many of, I mean, there are so many little gross in here. Russell stats are great. I mean, he's doing Russell's stuff. Six carries for 84 yards. There's like sneaky 84 yards he always gets. By the way, this is a weird question.

You would know this very well. Someone who spent a lot of time around Russell Wilson. I don't know people know that you played with Russell Wilson at Wisconsin, but you did. So is Russell Wilson fast? He is. He's incredibly fast. He's incredibly fast. It always looks like he's moving in slow motion because I don't think we ever see him full out sprint.

So where Kyler Murray, when he's scrambling, always looks like he's moving fast because he looks like the roadrunner. I don't know if Russell Wilson's ever moving fast. It's one of those things like, is he actually fast? If you man in 40 yards in a straight line, would he be fast right now? I think the answer is yes. But I, there are moments where I am led to kind of question it. Like how it goes. He had like two tonight where you actually did see him get like, he like, you know,

he usually does just stay in fourth gear. And he had one run where he's always looking to go down because he's not trying, he's smart. He doesn't want to take a lot of hits. And he actually leaves a lot of meat on the bone sometimes. And it's like, ah, okay, good job, Russ. You don't want to get too mad that he just left seven yards there. But it's like even tonight he had one up the middle.

and he was looking to get down, but then he was like, oh, I don't have to get down. And he, like, cranked it back up to fifth gear and got like another eight yards. And it's like, that's where it's funny. It's like you said that tonight. And I haven't seen that a lot from Russell, especially the last few years as he's gotten smarter as a runner. But it is funny. Like, you don't see him getting the fifth gear, but his fourth gear is still like a four, six and change, you know. Like, he's still moving away from guys.

And that doesn't include his like scrambling ability. So that's a whole different another or a whole other spectrum with him. So looking at the box score. Tyler Lockett had 20 targets in this game. It seemed like it too. Holy crap. Tyler Lockett had 20 targets. Buda Baker had a 90 yard interception return that was not a touchdown, which when you

see the stat, when you see the actual text just does not do justice to what that play was like, I tweeted this. All I could think as D.K. McCaff was running to catch him was Mr. Larson and Happy Gilmore just trucking down the green chasing Happy. just this massive human being running full speed. It's all I could see. It was amazing.

That's great. It's all I can think about. I said it was like the Pac-Man ghost when I saw the dots. Like it was just like, right-o-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-warring down. Like it was just also coming down, bearing down on them. The Isaiah Simmons interception,

unlikely interception from Isaiah Simmons. Why not? Fifth play of the game. His fifth rep of the game. Why not make an incredible mugged-up line, like mugged up interception reaching out. standing like on your own your fifth total play of the game so this is just the requisite seahawks making every game ridiculous when you come out of this do you think any differently about the cardinals

watching them win that game are you still kind of holding judgment reserve in judgment to see a little bit more consistency from that i want to see a little bit more maybe against a defense that's a little more sound or a little more of an NFL defense you want to see them against a defense that yeah that actually has like you know things like contain and you know not coverage buss and everything things that you would expect from an NFL defense understandable that you hope to see you know weekend week out so uh you know i i just see every time i get excited about the cardinals they'll go against a quote unquote real defense with a real pressure package and it's like oh yeah that's right that's that's why they're averaging like four and a half yards air yards in a game and stuff

like that. So it's more of the same. I think a fun game though. Like exciting game, like you said, juice this up for this show a little bit. I did like seeing them push the ball downfield a little bit to nuke. A little bit more.

I mean, that was a nice part where it's using him in ways that you'd expect to use him, where it's not just screens. It's not just a little tiny comeback route. It's actually pushing the ball trying to get some vertical stuff that felt not tacked on. Because that was one of our concerns earlier in the year, right? Is that every time they're taking these shots, they felt tacked on.

these felt a little bit more natural, a little bit like they were part of the fabric of the offense. So we'll see what happens for the rest of the season. But they're a fun team. You know, I picked them to make the playoffs. It feels like they absolutely could, but not in the way that we expected. So all right, that we were going to start off the show before all of that happened with this topic. We were going to get to this topic now. Today felt like the NFL was a country for old men a little bit.

I mean, we had a lot of teams and a lot of people. around the league watching what happened on Sunday and probably having some regrets about counting out some of these old quarterbacks before the season started. And that starts with one Thomas Brady. Jeez. So I'm going to say something that's going to sound stupid, which a lot of the things I say sounds stupid, but I know going into this, it's going to sound stupid. I forgot how good Tom Brady is. And what? I was going to say, I get it kind of thing.

But I mean, but these last couple of weeks, then you're just like, holy shit. I mean, before the season. Yeah, okay. Coming into the year, when he's signed with the bucks. Gotcha. I wrote about it the day that it happened. I wrote about when they had got grunk. I thought a lot about the Buccaneers coming into the season.

And my thought was he would be a stabilizing factor. What they needed was somebody to not. turn the ball over all the time because I thought their defense had a chance to be very good and I thought their weapons and their offensive line, especially after they drafted Worf's. They were a complete team. They needed someone who could keep the train on the tracks. I saw Tom Brady as a manager of the situation more than somebody who could elevate

their offense. And I think that was because with New England, it was easy to lump everything together. You know, they were this monolith of greatness and all the parts were kind of indistinguishable from one another. You didn't know where Tom Brady ended and Bill Belichick began. Kind of the same with Josh McDaniels. It was all these things that were the sum was greater than the whole was greater than the sum of the parts, right?

So watching, that made me forget what made Tom Brady great, the subtleties of his game that really made him great. And today was a reminder of that. I think a lot of this season has been a reminder of that. his ball placement, the choices that he makes, the ball is in a perfect spot almost every single throw. Even his incompletions today, I think he had 11 of them that weren't spikes,

and most of them were direct on target pinpoint throws. He was absolutely unbelievable today. And if you look at the body of work over the season, he comfortably led the league in EPA today, and expected points added on Sunday. he's up there for the year. I think his combination of EPA per play and completion percentage over expectation

that composite that Ben Baldwin does is seventh in the league. He's played like one of the best quarterbacks in football. And I just, for whatever reason, that's not necessarily what I expected of him coming into the season. Yeah, I maybe gave, not that he's like not good or anything,

but I maybe gave a little, maybe too much credit to Josh McDaniels and not with Brady raising the bar. We've seen what Brady has done. Like you said, we got complacent. You don't know when the coaching staff and the personnel end and when Brady began. But we also, like, looking back, you're kind of like, yeah, he made those offenses look good with, like, Matthew Slater with his one career catch running out there.

Chris Hogan. When you're watching what they're doing now, it's like, oh, shit. Oh, that's right. This makes a lot more sense. He actually has dudes out there. Like, Scotty Miller would be his bona fide number one if he was in New England. And now he's like, we're going to talk about Scott. We'll bet we will.

But now he's like. And like he's not like he's running with converted defense alignman as his fullback back there for 30 snaps a game. And offensive alignment just getting by it with this play action out of formation. Like he's able to actually drop back and have like time. They don't have to manufacture the protection for him and stuff. So like like also he's getting these pieces that are like so much fun that are plus plus players. And it's like, oh yeah, that's right. It looks like 2007 stuff again.

And like even with the like you said, the. ball placement. He had the throw, one throw to Gronk, and we could say this over and over and over and you wouldn't know which one, the over route to Gronk. But he like, he's throwing the one inside the five. Yeah, he's throwing riser balls now. And those, those balls are, those are throws. Those are like, throws where like this is what I was getting on can last week about a little bit was not getting on him, but he didn't make this throw that you want to see these top tier guys make.

And it's called like a riser ball where you're just, you're rising the guy up on the overrout as opposed to coming across the guy's face. And he's hitting those now. Like, they, they, they hurried up. and they had one. He's in total control, and we're going to talk about it, I know. But, you know, he's split out or Gronk split out. And rather than forcing it to Gromk in zone coverage, it was second to goal at the nine, he checked it down. They get up to the one yard line. He hurries them up. And before the defense can get into like a goal line set or anything, he just runs the QB snake right into the bubble. And it's like just shows, oh, he's already,

he's in complete control of this offense that was, you know, a foreign to him a few months ago. And it's like, this is just scary. Now he's making these throws and Gronks doing what he's doing. and then all these guys are doing what they're doing. I love Godwin. I mean, he's becoming one of my favorite players in the league. He already was, but even more now. This whole offense is ridiculous. And I know you want to talk about Scotty Miller and some other guys now right now.

All right. Well, we can talk about Scotty now. I'm very happy for Scotty Miller. I know for people who don't know, Scotty Miller went to my high school. The same coaching staff is still at my high school has been there for like 15 years. So I knew who Scotty was when he was in high school. We had all the same coaches.

I would go back to practice. They're still like important people in my life. life. So I'm very happy for Scottie. I'm very happy for, you know, the bar football program. It's a really cool moment. So, but the throw and you talk about being in control, the throw he hit to Scotty for the touchdown. That is a casual throw with 25 seconds left in the half. And they're just like, yeah, we're just going to throw a goal ball here. Yeah. And it was gorgeous. And that the ball you you were talking about to Gronk on the over was beautifully placed. The throw on the left side to the on the over route to Gronk where we, you and I were talking about this play, Godwin came in a little

stack motion that looked a lot like the Patriots offense. And instead of hitting Godwin on the little outbreaker there on third and five against man, they hit Gronk on the deep shot, which that feels like we've been talking about the past, a mesh between the play was actually a mesh, but it's a combination of the Patriot system kind of coming together with what the bucks want to do. It's this marriage that really works for them. And I think that I couldn't see Tom Brady for what he was until he left. because of how indistinguishable he was from this the march of greatness that happened in New

England. And now I can see it. And now I kind of appreciate it. And I think in a way, it's probably one of the reasons he wanted to leave. Right. Because I'm sure he understood that. And it's just amazing how I'm kind of seeing him for the first time as this version of himself.

And I think the comparison to Cam is really good. And we'll talk about that in a second. But as you want, even beyond Cam, there's so many guys. playing quarterback right now that do it poorly, where the decision making is poor or the mechanics are poor. And it's so striking to see someone play the position perfectly. And he's not physically doesn't compare to some of these guys. You can't make some of the plays they can. But to know that the mechanics are always going to be perfect. The footwork is always going to be perfect. The decisions are always going to be perfect. He's only limited by what his body can do. And his body is

allowing him to do a hell of a lot right now and just watching him again in total mastery of what this offense is and I'm sure they'll hit some stumbling blocks and whatever but I just did not expect him to play at this level and what I want to say real quick is like seeing so many guys and so many these younger guys using their legs and their athleticism to make plays especially on third down it's so jarring almost even though we grew up watching this seeing a guy operate from the pocket again And it's like, oh, shit, guys can still do this stuff. And it's so much fun. You forget how much fun it is to see a guy just operating back there and slicing

and dicing. And actually it speaks to like they're so cohesive as a unit right now. The old line's playing really well too. And so you get to see like you said he's so mechanically sound. You get to see the Brady kind of patient feet gimmick that he loves to do that he's just like where he goes dead in the pocket for a split second. Like it's you get to see that. And that shows like how confident it's like a dog rolling back on his back or a cat

rolling the back of the back. They're comfortable in their situation right there. Like, that's his version over it right there. It's him just going dead feet in the pocket and just waiting for those throws to come open. Just waiting for the belly scratches. That's what Tom Brady's doing right now. Yeah, yeah, the overrouts his belly scratches. I will never, never be able to unsee that. So as we sit here and we gush about Tom Brady in the wake of what Cam Newton did today, it's kind of some interesting context. So I guess just on a simple level, what the hell do you think is wrong with Cam Newton. It was 9 of 15 for 98 yards and three picks today. And you go back and watch it and, you know, I think one of the picks was tipped. But for the most part, he played today

as bad as his line would indicate. He is dead last in EPA among quarterbacks over the last two games. 35 of 35 guys below some names you do not want to be below. So just when you're watching Cam right now, what jumps out to you about the way he's struggling? We touched on it last week and also what we just said about Brady a little bit, like him getting the most at what he had around him in New England. And then Cam just got thrown into that situation. So, you know, not to like take a blame away from camp, but he's also missing these throws that he was nailing earlier this season, these stop routes. And he's, and it's not just like misses where it's like, oh, it's a little off center or a little off target. It's like, no, he's digging it five yards short. And when a guy's digging it or sailing it,

that usually speaks to a mechanical error. And he's maybe shortstepping as opposed to overstriding, but he also has his overstriding issues still. And you're seeing him revert back to his bad habits where last week, again, we touched on it, where he is waiting for guys to come open. And you can just see a lack of comfort, really, in what is going on around him. Like how many times he's taking some hits now where I don't want to blame the whole line because it's Cam holding the ball for four or five seconds back there. And it started last week.

And really, the warning signs were there. And really, I maybe should have ran with it a little more when we had a little section on him was they had a man. was they had to manufacture those yards in the fourth quarter with gadget plays and Cam scrambling against the Broncos. And that was the only way that they even got like chunks. And that whole offense is just a mess right now. I just think they're built off the play action stuff. Cam might not just be comfortable doing it from under center or even turning his back. And that might be anecdotal. And maybe I don't have numbers to back it up. I'm just going to, I'm going to look into it this week and maybe watch a little film as if maybe that under center stuff is really

throwing him off. And maybe he just truly has to be a gun, quarterback now and exclusively a gun. And that's where maybe we'll see McDaniels and Belichick adapt, like we saw week one. And that's maybe some of that power, no like pun intended about Super Cam and all that is that some of it has run game stuff has maybe been zapped a little bit with getting sick. You know, that has to be a possibility to think about too. Because week one and against the Seattle, if that was week two, if I remember correctly, you ran the ball like 12, 15 times. And now it's a couple times and it's mostly scrambles. It's not designed. They're like really trying to protect him a little bit.

So I feel like something's off there more than we're really getting let on to. I think there's a lot of things that are happening. You go back and, I mean, when we talked last Sunday, we hadn't been able to watch $1.22 and see how the routes were developing. We kind of blamed it on a lack of separation, but he was not making choices quickly. There were a couple of places. It was that one sale route. I want to say to Edelman down the left sideline that he just didn't even see,

he was wide open. A couple other just things that real staples of the Patriots dropback game where he's not making decisions that are quick authoritative sound. And that's part of the problem. And then there's mechanical stuff. I mean, he's always had that little weird setup where he steps into the bucket a little bit with his left foot.

He doesn't step straight. He steps to his left. And it opens him up a little bit. And he was doing that at the beginning of the season two, but it wasn't really hurting him that much. Now it feels like he's doing that and his shoulders just flying open and he's overthrowing stuff. On that first missed a bird today on that third short, that's exactly.

exactly what happened. And when he was doing that in the past, remember Stephen Ruiz wrote about this for the win, and you actually, he talked to you for the story. And he was missing throws to his right when he was doing that. Now it feels like it's worse to his left. So it's really hard to kind of pinpoint what mechanically could be wrong. But that shoulders just flying open and he's just sailing balls.

The interception was the same way, the deep one down the middle of the field today. Same kind of issue. So it's mechanical, it's decision making. there's a lot going on. And it's strange just because he wasn't making these mistakes at the beginning of the year. If you thought there was something that was just unfixable mechanically, it would have shown up from the start.

But it feels like him getting off his practice schedule, whatever sort of wrench was thrown into how he's feeling physically, the way that his practice time is kind of corresponding to the way he's moving on the field. Something is drastically off right now because he does not look like the guy he was for the first two weeks. Yeah. And usually when you see a guy revert back to. their bad habits. It's either a comfort level or an injury level. So comfort either mentally or comfort how they're feeling physically. And I mean, how many times would we see like, oh, Tim Tebow fixed his,

fix his throwing mechanics this offseason. He worked with this pitching coach. And like every, every quarterback guru is going to say they fix their mechanics every off season. But as soon as the bullets start flying and they're losing confidence in themselves, they're going to refer right back to what maybe got them there and maybe what, like they're just comfortable with. It's what their body is used to.

And as soon as you start, like you pointed out, as soon as you start seeing Cam, more and more of those throws are their long bucket throws. And he's always, he's always going to do it, even when he is comfortable. But it's every throw right now. I was watching 2015 throws today just to see if it looked the same. It looked the same. Yep. It's, which is, I just wanted to make sure that he wasn't doing something drastically different. Yeah. But with him, it's, it's how quick he's getting it out. And that's always going to be the thing. And it just seems to me that it's some of it comes late. And then that's when he starts doing the heman throws and tries to really rifle it in there because he feels a half second late.

on the throw. And I think that's where maybe why you're kind of going like, oh, it looks a little more drastic right now. It's because usually when it's on time, it looks just a little more smoother. And now it's like now he's more mentally going, oh, shit, it's open. Okay. And then he feels like he has to really jam it in there. And actually probably some other guys will talk about is that they do the same thing. It's a really common error that happens with quarterbacks. So you think for the most part, him keeping that shoulder a little bit tighter is more so when he's not in a hurry. Yes. That would be your guys. Not in a hurry. That makes sense. Okay. That makes sense. Okay. make sense. So as we look at what Cam did today and we look at what Brady has been doing,

do you think the Patriots have regrets about this? It just feels like if they were going to try to get the most out of this roster and that was their plan, they made the wrong choice. And we don't know how much Brady wanted to be there, what the actual back and forth was. That's something we can't understand. But it still feels like they probably should have made a bigger, more concerted run at Tom Brady if he was going to be. this guy that we've seen over the first month and a half of the year. They kind of just put themselves in no man's land, where especially the signing of Cam is just signaling you're willing to compete a little bit.

Like you're taking the rental and running the tread off the tires and like, hey, what's win together? Cam's trying to rebuild his image and the Patriots are trying to win without Tom Brady. So I thought it was a win-win for both of them, but now they're stuck in that no-man's land of where are they an eight-n-nate team? Are they a team that's trying to get that seven-seed, the six-seed? Or are they bottoming them out and starting to rebuild?

but does Pelotchuk want to do a rebuild? So I think they just put themselves in no man's land. So I think there is a little bit of regret going on right now. It's a strange kind of position for them to be in just because, I mean, this season, general, is a strange position for them to be in. But what they're going to do from here is now a really big question because there's a very good chance. They don't make the playoffs of the AFC. Yeah.

So, all right, let's get to our next old quarterback that looked pretty damn good today. God, is it fun to watch Aaron Rogers in this offense? And the reason that I say that. is because it's fun to watch him not have to be a superhero. He's going to do stuff every once in a while. It's like, oh, man, that's Aaron Rogers. But he's able to play as a different version of himself in this different version of this offense. Ben Fennell, who writes him a little bit for us at the Athletic, I think,

pointed this out as a really, really smart way to do it. Rogers had a 6.1 averaged up the target today, and his average time to throw was 2.4.3 seconds. There was not a single game from the 2018 or 2019 seasons. when he had those numbers be that low in the same game. And you could see that as it's happening. They're scheming up so much separation for these guys. The first completion he had today at Jamal Williams, they're in empty,

and they run a little mesh concept with Williams as the guy in the slot out of that empty. And it's just there are so many ways that they're just scheming guys open and scheming space. I mean, the one, they had to throw to Robert Tanya down the left sideline. And they've done such a good job of this all season where they flooded the zones with jet action and they've gotten the running backs vertical.

I mean, they have two guys open on that H seam with the outside guy as they do those twoverts kind of making the cornered shoes. They have multiple guys open every single time they run that. And it's just amazing how easy some of these plays are for him when he didn't have any easy plays for like five straight seasons. Yeah, it used to be just, all right, Aaron's making up signals every week in the run. flat, they're running Y flat, you know, with two blockers outside. They're running quick outs to Jordan Nelson and when it became Adams and everything. And like you said, the RB seam stuff, the Algo runoffback seam stuff, they're manufacturing this stuff. And it's just so, like you said, it just becomes so easy for him. He's like, oh my God, I don't have to throw in a 1% ball on

the slant route and double coverage that I just signaled before because I didn't like to play. And with the runnybacks, it's also with the backfield stuff where it used to be just Randall Cobb lined up in the backfield was like their only rankle. And now it's just like the, the RBCM stuff, the one that against the Falcons is the one that I think a lot of us stands out to, especially because it was a Monday night game. It was because they're in 31 personnel in that play with three runoffbacks, like legit running backs. And they did it to Dylan today.

They had Jamal Williams on the outside and they had Dylan. They didn't even have Irvin and Jones in this game. And they're still like, fuck it. We're going to run all this stuff and you can't stop it. It's amazing that they're trotting a 250 pound running back out there doing this stuff with him. I mean, it's they are. committed to this vision of the offense. And it is really cool to see it working out. They're seeing new guys step up like Tanya and they hit the little bubble pump out a bunch to him.

And that was so sweet because it's like they tied in because they actually run a little bit of do on stuff, which I'm always going to bring up whenever I can with that play. But they run out a bunch and they tied it up where they they pump the bubble hit Tanya down to sideline. And it makes sense because they run stuff out of those sets. And it's just a nice tie in. It's just like a nice build. and Adams was just on fire today. And it's also, it wasn't like they just kept spamming the same play and they're hitting Adams. And they kind of looked like they did because they kept hitting them on crossers.

It was with those crossers is because it was a good matchup against the Texans. Texans struggle with their intermediate defenders, especially man coverage because their linebackers are just run pluggers and they really struggle to pick up stuff coming across their face. So it just looked like it was Adams crosser to the left, Adams crosser to the right, Adam out route. And then they just hit a play action over to him because. Because again, they were abusing man coverage.

So they were finding different ways to get to this rather just than slant flat that we're used to with Rogers and the Packers' offense for years and years and years. And it's kind of, it's really cool. What they're kind of doing is getting the ball and their playmaker's hands at different ways. So he was 13 for 196 and two scores today. And as much as I've loved watching Rogers in this offense, I've love watching Devonthe just as much because he's able to really show off his ability to create separation with the amount of space that they're giving him. The first touchdown he scored was disgusting. So they ran like a little stack to the right side.

And clearly in that alignment, you assume it's going to be a rub route. He's coming inside. They're going to switch. You're supposed to banjo it. That's how you play it. Instead, they fake the rub route. He runs a little whip and the corner just falls over because he was so surprised that that's what they did.

He literally just fell over. And then later on, on the. the first play of the second quarter, Devante was in a condensed split, which I love that they're, that's when they're really punching these formations together, and they give him that condensed split as the single receiver on one side,

it gives him a two-way go. So he can have outside release or an inside release. And on that play, Philip Gaines was the corner. He was in like really hard outside leverage. So Devante sells it outside, comes back inside on the crosser. He spun him all the way around.

When you, when the corner turns around, because you fucked him so bad on the release. That's when you know you're in trouble. And it's just incredible. I mean, he's so good in those moments when you just put him one-on-one, get a free release. He's the best in the NFL getting off the line of scrimmage. So watching him today and watching what he's been in this offense when healthy, it has led me to a question that I want to ask you.

One receiver for the next three years to build your offense around. You can choose the system. So you don't have to worry about kind of putting a guy in an offense. You get to pick the offense. You get to pick the receiver for the next three years. Which receiver would you pick? Okay. So Devante Adams would be my easy pick, but I'm going to have a hipster pick.

And it's going to be Chris Godwin in the Ariens offense. Wow. Okay. Explain yourself because I think my answer is Devante Adams. Yeah. And it's, and we, so gun to head would be Adams. Like, it really would. Gunned.

You really think it would. Okay. So who are your other qualifiers here? Okay. So if we're going, okay, I kind of had like a different version of each of the answer. So like Devante Adams would be my gun to head. But then number two would probably be Hopkins if we're just going like these kind of like ready meet players. Because I just, it's the type of guy I like he can win different ways.

He can win the red zone, little versatility. Hips your pick with Godwin in the Arian's offense especially is because versatility, he can play inside and out. He's got size. He's super smart. And so we've seen the plays. where he's beating in man, especially on third down. We had, we, like, loved the one the other week where he turned the guy around on a sail route.

But he's also, they had one today where he's winning against zone coverage, too, and finding soft spots. And even like last year, it wasn't just with Brady. He had one with last year against, with Winston, over 50% of his targets were going for first downs.

And this isn't even including all his, what he brings in a run game. And that's huge with area and stuff, because they try to be in so much 11, or just utilizing the receivers inside to actually have a key blocks, not just a little like hand fighting on the outside with corners. No, no, it's like they have to actually fit up and Godwin brings it. And then on the next play, he's breaking off a corner.

And if we're going, okay, and then if I'm going like young, young guys, it would be CD Lam. So, so those are like, I went like kind of different versions of my answer. That's why I said three years and not 10 years because I wanted to be guys. They were so because Devante is 27. So you'd get 28 through 31, which is prime. You're hitting them right as prime. I think he's my answer. And the other guy that would be in that.

So Julio, I think is just the. injuries in the age would concern me. Because you get 31 through 34. Hopkins, it's a stylistic thing. He's 29, right? Hopkins? It's probably the same range.

So I think that's less of an issue to me because I think the way he plays, he'll be able to play for a while. So I think it's just a stylistic preference. Yep. I've always preferred guys that live on separation. That is my favorite type of receiver.

I want people who are going to be able to create separation, get releases, can just leave people. And that's what Adams can do. He's the best releaser in the NFL. He's a fantastic route runner. Hopkins is a true ex-boundary receiver, the same way we saw him play tonight.

And that has an immense amount of value. I mean, I think that you could probably argue. Yep. Yeah. And you can just let him just eat like they have pretty much all season. Correct. But I just stylistically,

I prefer the way that Adams plays. And I think this year, I wrote this after week one when he torched the Vikings. I think in this system with this sort of offense, this might be the year where we see him in a different way, where he is truly maybe the best receiver in the NFL and the guy you would build around it. Right now, watching him play,

I think the answer is him. Keenan Allen is in that conversation to me because I always just thought that on a route running level, he's right there with Devante Adams. They're probably won two depending on the week. But watching Devante in this offense, it's just, I don't know, man. It's hard to pick anybody but him right now. Yeah, and that's what you're speaking to.

It's like I just love when it's when guys are truly scheme proof. That's like really what my stars I want him to be. And that's like I always say the line, not always say the one. I probably never even say it on the show. But it's you don't, you shouldn't have to squint when you see a good player. It's like it shouldn't be like, oh, in that system he looks good. It's like no, no matter what he does, he looks really freaking good. So like that's what I love about Devante.

And I love with Hopkins too. Like we said he's a true true ex. And Devante, it's like, no, you could put him anywhere you want. And he's going to, and in the red zone too, which is his own different thing. And, you know, we can talk about Julio's blemish down there. Don't get me wrong. I love Julio. And I think he's the top guy right now as far as ability wise. But I'm saying as far as what I would build around for three years, it would be Adams. I just don't want anyone to jump down my throne and say like, oh, you think Julio sucks like people like to do. But yeah, no, I would be with you. I'd say

gun-to-head still. I'd say Devante Adams. And then just my little hipster fun pick would be Chris Godwin in the Aryan system because that's just the idealized version of him. The thing I don't appreciate about Godman all the time is how big he is. You just think he's this tiny little sloc guy. He's like 6-1-215. And you just see that bulk he has on plays where he's going over the middle. He's a great contested catch guy. We don't have to see it that often because he creates so much more separation.

But he really is just a much more substantial player than I tend to remember until you see him just standing next to guys. So one more thing I wanted to bring up with this Packers game. Did you see the JJ Watt Press conference after the game? I didn't see it until late in the night. And I just, I saw his little, uh, Rishid Wallace impression, basically. Both teams played hard. JJ is not having a good time. He is not.

He is a broken man right now. I feel bad for JJ. I wrote a story about JJ seven years ago, I want to say, where I spent some time with him. And, you know, I wrote a story about TJ when he, before the draft. I mean, I've done my, done my JJ and T.J. and T.J. Watt time in my career. You've got your Watt Escapades. Yes, I have. And I mean, you obviously are interested as a Wisconsin person.

So I am sure that the words, trade and J.J. Watt, would have the entire state of Wisconsin just losing its mind. The idea of him possibly being on the Packers would be too much for everyone to possibly comprehend. And I think that it's reasonable that he could be dealt when you consider where the Texans are, their lack of cap space, what they want to do. with their vision moving forward, even if he's an icon. Right now, if you were a team that needed defensive help, Packers, Seahawks, a team that really thinks you have this, you are a contender, you have a shot, let's go get it. What would you give up for JJ Watt right now?

What's his cap again? This is his last. 17 and a half next year with no guaranteed money left, 15 and a half this year. 15 and a half this year is very doable. Yeah, I mean, a second. I honestly, that would probably be my real answer. I think that's reasonable. I think a second round pick, just like with the D4 trade, that's a different tier of player.

But you know, you got to take an account age and contract and then injury stuff with JJ. He's played less than half his games the last five years. So, you know, always got to take that in account. But he's playing pretty damn well this year. But I think a second is more than reasonable or, you know, second and a fourth or something of that type of trade. But I mean, yeah, like you said, when I played with JJ, he would, you know, we all got four or six, tickets to each game. And so, like, you know, I would have like two people come to each game and you have two spares and you can always trade with your teammates. JJ would always have about 70 to 90 people

per game. So I can imagine if he was playing eight games a year at Lambeau Field and a game at Soldier Field and a game of Minneapolis every year that he would maybe probably, you know, one section like just a true like section O, not just like section 213 like they're like the entire big block would just be J.J. Watt supporters. Just, you know, just all. oh yeah, you bet you guys up there. I think John and Connie come to every game, don't they? Aren't those parents' names? Yep, yeah, great people.

They really are. It's ridiculous that I remember that. I know there. Yeah, that's, I'm sure that they would be thrilled about that. But I think that, I mean, it wouldn't surprise me and I think he's the type of guy that people should trade for because he's clearly miserable. He's clearly, he's effective right now. And he's available for a reasonable price.

He's the NBA disgruntled vet trade. Like, I mean, how many times did that happen with NBA? Like, this is that, this is the star. that you get take a rental on like i mean this is like clearly with the type of guy you go after all right let's get to who won the week i don't really know where else to start with this except the six to no pittsburgh's steelers i mean god not the most convincing win rothusberger had kind of a tough day with the three picks but since 2010 teams have that lose the turnover battle three to zero were worse are 26 421 and one they've been

an 0.54 winning percentage. The Steelers lose the turnover battle three to nothing today and still come home with a pretty convincing win. I mean, where do you start with this team when you just kind of consider how they've been so good all year? Yeah, and winning different types of ways, too. Exactly. They're just really freaking good. I think I've been on the other side. I think I texted this to you was that I think 2016 we played at Kansas City and we were plus three into turnover differential. we end up losing that game. So I've been on the other side of that. But it's one of those things like the Steelers are winning in different ways.

They're winning. They made a special teams play today. Like, you know, so also now that's showing up. Like, you know, they had a good punt return. It's their defense. We were gushed about them last week. And then the offense, what's cool is we already talked about the stuff that they're dialing up for Claypool and stuff, but they're doing it for all their guys.

And we touched on it before. But it's truly iso ball with each of their guys in just a sense that it's, It's Big Benz being the big point card. He's finding the guy, letting him catch the ball and create yak. And they got really, really good skill players that can create a lot of plays for them. And Deonti Johnson,

I mean, just he showed what all the little, he had a little mini offseason hype about him. I think maybe some of it was fantasy related. But I think he really did have ability and he showed out in a limited role last year. And really you saw him this week really show some of that ability. The touchdown was great. I think you mentioned it.

You wanted to bring it up. Like, I mean, that stuff, that's the stuff that's so great to see out of him. And we already talked about Claypool, the rookie.

And then that's before we even talk about, uh, juju. And like, that's, and it's so funny with their offenses because you picture Pittsburgh and with the, you know,

the power running and all that. And they're kind of doing more misdirection stuff too, is they had, it ended up with a big band interception, but they had a long drive in the fourth quarter. And it'd been like 16 plays. Oh, yeah, 16 place,

70 yard drive. Went for seven minute, 38 seconds. And it featured 14. Passes, which is just hilarious that they did like a four minute, like kind of an extended four minute drive with 14 passes. And one was like a big chunk to juju and the rest were like four 70 yard gains and ended up with the bad interception on that against the Tampa linebacker. And then I think they had a-

Wasn't that bad of an interception. That was a really nice play by Jayon Brown. Great play. You cannot play it more perfectly than he did on that play. You're running with the guys step for step down to the post. Ball comes, play it through the hands, knock it up interception. It's a perfect play by hand. And what do you expect as an offense guy too is what are you expecting on that third? I guess it would be third and 12 on that situation is, oh, we're going to hit underneath and kick the field goal. Like no way we're going to take a little shot here.

So I actually was fine with big, I mean, not totally fine. You know, he wanted to be a little smarter with that kind of stuff. But it's like, okay, I get where the argument is. I'm like, no, they know they were going to sit on our stuff. The Tampa linebacker just made a great play, you know, or Tennessee linebacker in Tampa coverage. But yeah, just a perfect way to summarize our offense, though, just trying to isolate guys with good offense to play.

and then Big Ben's delivering the ball for better for worse. He got lucky a couple times, but for the most part, he's delivering. If you look at guys like Bill Belichick or somebody like John Harbaugh last year, for example, people were gushing about John Harbaugh's ability to be the CEO coach who had coordinators that were evolving, modernizing, building systems that fit their players well. when I watched this year's Steelers, I think we should be giving the same sort of credit to Mike Tomlin that people were giving to John Harbaugh last year.

Because even though a lot of the coaching personnel on the Steelers is the same, Randy Fickner, their offensive coordinator has been Rothesberger's quarterback coach forever. It's part of the reason he has the job. Keith Butler has been the defensive coordinator in Pittsburgh for, I believe, six years now, but he was the linebacker's coach before. Yep. So he's a lifer with Tomlin there, essentially.

So it's the same people. but they've been able to fold in ideas that aren't what they were doing before and aren't necessarily what they come from with their coaching trees. Tomlin was a cover two guy in Minnesota before he took this job. Now they're running three, four blitzing, robber coverages, going after people. They've been this sort of defense for a little while, but they really have a crystallized vision of what they want to be on that side of the ball. If you go to the other side of the ball,

this is drastic. We've talked about this, but I looked up some of the numbers today. It's drastically different than what they've been in years past. First of all, they hire Matt Canada as their quarterbacks coach, which is a very good moment of self-awareness

as a team, where you sit here and you say, we need new ideas. We need to freshen this up. Let's go get somebody who's going to be able to inject what we do offensively with a little spin that can give us something different.

You see all of that motion that Canada is known for in their running game. And like you said, the misdirection. They're doing a ton of that. And the yak stuff is how they're living in the passing game. The Deonté Johnson touchdown is a slant that wasn't, it's a slant. And he stops on a dime and spins it back around because he's really good in space.

He had that exact same reception on the other side for a first down on third down early in the game. Slant, spin, get away from a guy and make a play in space. And they're doing a ton of that with their receivers, like that 14 play drive you were talking about. So 45.8% of Rathesberger's passes have gone five or more yards downfield this year. That's the lowest rate in the NFL.

So it means 54% of his pass has been five yards or shallower. If you look at five years ago, he was 24th of 35 qualified quarterbacks. This year he's first. They have changed the style they're playing with offensively to fit the personnel that they have and the quarterback that they have at this stage of his career. and it's not the most explosive offense in the world, but when you pair it with what they're doing defensively, they become really, really dangerous.

Yes. And even the RPO stuff, we talked about it a little bit that they ran last week. It's like smart low RPO's. It's not like they're making a living off of it, like, you know, the Eagles did a few years ago or kind of now and trying to just run the double slants out of the slot. You know, they were doing the double slants with an out,

but they're running it with a real different run game with it. They're running the traps and the long polars with the jet sweeps with the polars. And I think that's a great point you talked about with self-awareness with the staff. Sometimes, like I'll bring it up again, is the Texas problem is where it's almost like a college thing that they have going on in Pittsburgh is where with the Steelers is that they have these guys in the system and in the culture for years and years and years and years. And sometimes you get stagnant. And all the good, the plus side of it where it's like, yeah, everyone knows day and day out what we're getting into. We all speak the same language. Like it's nothing.

We're all buddies. We can get through this grind of a season together. But sometimes you need some new blood, new life to just go, why do you guys run it like that? And the worst answer sometimes if someone can give you is because that's how we've always done it. And sometimes you just need someone to just shine in a new light. And that's what maybe Matt Canada has done for their offense going like, no, that stuff was really good what you did. How about you try it just like this? Maybe just throw a little back and forth motion there.

How would you try a little, you know, a little play action here? Like, you know, just throwing those new little wrinkles. I think that, like you said, it was just a great sign of self-awareness, and that's just what the Steelers do. I mean, they've had three head coaches in 50 years. They just know what they do. They hire smart people and they just stick to what they know and they just find talent. Like, all of a sudden they got Ray Ray McLeod making huge plays for them today because I guess as soon as you hit the south side of Pittsburgh, all of a sudden you just become a plus plus receiver that can just make plays. I guess that's just how it works there.

So let's talk about that head coach history because I think we should probably. have a Mike Tomlin conversation here. Do you know that Mike Tomlin has the 17th best winning percentage in the history of professional football? See, I did not know that. I knew he was awesome, but that's ridiculous. 17th best winning percentage in the history of the NFL. Mike Tomlin has never had a losing season as the head coach of the Steelers.

And that, to me, that is the mark of just pure consistency. And as we said, they've done it in a ton of different ways. His average finish in the division, 07 was his first year. So this is his 14th season. So 13 non-losing seasons, which is incredible. Incredible. His average finish in 13 years as a head coach in the division has been 1.6. If you look at all of the coaches who coached at least five years in the history of professional football, there are three guys with a higher average division finish in their career.

John Madden, Blanton Collier, who is the 60s coach. Yeah. And Vince Lombardi, that's the list. It's insane. The playoff failings have been notable, but what he has made this team, yes, and what he has made this team year in and year out, that to me is what you need. You need a CEO type coach that is going to be able to make you competitive based on whatever you have in your locker room.

And that's exactly what Mike Tomlin has done every single year. This team is 6 and 0. They're one of the best teams in the NFL. They're certainly in the top three to five. And I just think that we should try to appreciate what he has done and his body of work because it's pretty damn impressive. And one of those eight and eights, last year's eight and eight was probably one of the most impressive eight nights. Oh, it's incredible. It should have been a coach of the year, eight, eight.

It's like knowing what came out with that locker room and the guys they had. And then also Mason Rudolph as you're starting quarterback and Duck Hodges. You know, it's, and they're winning games with that, just like playing muddy, dirty ball and just winning games. basically like just bunning and stealing second small ball baseball that's what they were doing last year and he was winning he went eight and eight it was like the yeah it was one of the most impressive eight and he's just a hell of a coach and like you said the evolution of him going from cover two and it showed how adaptable he was and how smart he was he goes to pittsburg and rather than going i'm running my cover two shit that i i've been great in i've been you know reformed with lovy

smith and monny kiffin and tampa i'm one of those guys he gets to pittsberg he has dickleboe was a defense coordinator and he goes, no, I'm going to trust this guy. Yeah. Yeah, I'm going to trust him. And he's going to do well for, and he's going to do well. And that's what exactly what he happened. But that just, I mean, that spoke volumes as a young head coach rather than just trying to throw his weight around.

Nope. He understood what he had around him at an early age and he's only got better from that. He's on the competition committee for a reason. He's just a hell of a coach in all aspects of the game. So let's, let's stay on the topic of evolution here because another candidate here for who won the week is Kyle Shanahan. We have not talked that much about Kyle Shanahan on this show. I have tried to restrain myself.

But I am no longer going to try to restrain myself after what he did today. So I consider myself something of a Kyle Shanahan his story. I am a documentary of the Kyle Shanahan experience. I wrote about Kyle a lot in 2016 when he was in Atlanta. I thought he was the next great head coach. I wrote as much when it was happening. I've watched a lot of his offenses over the years from the time he was in Houston.

Those are some of my favorite teams. Those like 08, 2009 Houston teams. And when he got to Washington, what that 2012 Washington offense looked like with RG3 was incredible. The 2014 Browns, I will say this to anyone who will listen, were really fun to watch over the first five games before Alex Mac broke his leg.

He was doing incredible things with Brian Hoyer. Goes to Atlanta. Fantastic stuff. Wins Matt Ryan and MVP. Gets this job. goes to a Super Bowl last year. So I think I have a good understanding of what the Kyle Shanahan offense looks like. This, what they're doing right now in San Francisco and what they were doing at the end of last year to a certain degree. It's kind of the Kyle Shanahan offense,

but it's like a super intelligent version of the Kyle Shanahan. It's like a mutation. It's like that dinosaur in Jurassic world where they're flying a little bit too close to the sun with the science. That's what I feel watching the Kyle Shanan offense right now. You can see some of the metaphor of every Jurassic Park movie is talking about like it's like whether you shouldn't tempt science or not or mother nature or not Kyle might be pushing mother nature a little bit too far with what he's doing right now and if you watch it you can see some of the concepts come up and they're doing like sale and things that are classic shanahan type things in the passing game they're running a decent amount of zone runs but there is so much stuff that he has grafted onto this and like the same way

we're talking about Tomlin. He saw what he needs and he has developed his offense to fit his personnel and make it the best possible version for what he has right now. And what they're doing with some of the jet stuff, with some of the bubble stuff, with some of the orb motion, it's absolutely amazing all the different iterations. When you're watching them use all that jet motion, all that orb motion, what elements of it do you think are most notable? Because there's so much going on, I feel like sometimes it's hard to keep track of it all. Yeah. So what's really been cool about what their stuff and the evolution, like you said, is, okay, so the jet sweep stuff is really probably easy teaching for what they do because it's kind of like outside zone. I mean, it is kind of zone blocking, especially on the outside with those guys and how they have to combo and pass things off, especially with moving targets. What they're doing is they're getting the ball in their best player's hands. And he's doing it a really fun ways. I mean, he's, it looks like their whole philosophy with their skill guys is versatile. much like how the NBA is transition with, again, a lot of six, seven guys around the same size. And kind of what the Titans did on defense, having like seven intermediate guys all about the same

size that could have pressure at any time with Dean Peace last year. It's, I think so with the jet sweep stuff we've seen last year at the end of the season, they really started transitioning to a lot more trap and gap schemes. And even last week, we saw them run a little pin pull. So I think he's more willing rather than what's just find a different version of zone. he's willing to have his smattering of different concepts that might be really beneficial to run against the defense they're playing that week. And honestly, I think going back to that original point of, you know, they're trying to get the ball in their playmaker's hands and Samuel and Ayuk and all that and always doing it out of 21 personnel, which can be very difficult for the defense because also it's I formation one play. The next play they're in gun split back with orbit motions going on.

That's really difficult for the defense because that's really a different. feel that in different angles of attack that they're getting and they'll split guys out they'll have the first opening drive i did a little cut up of it real quick before the show was they had the bubble motion uh they just ran a like a zone a little bubble with it i'm sorry jet sweet motion they ran a little bubble zone with it the next play ran a jet sweet motion but then they pumped the bubble and they had double slants and on that they had kittles split out all the way in a receiver position he was outside the hash and on the third time on that drive They ran another jet sweep motion.

And this time they ran all-go RBCM, like we talked about with the Packers. And he just checked it down. Jimmy G just checked it down. So they're just, they're tying in all these, all this stuff. And like you said, it's all, it's evolution of Shanahan, what he's done. I saw him against the Broncos in 2016. He was going empty out of 13 personnel just so you can get Tevin Coleman isoed against the Broncos.

And that was time of that big. Yeah. Yeah, that was a big game for him. But it just shows that he's willing to adapt his self rather than just going, no, we're going to eye for him. formation, removing juice check around and changing up what angle he's attacking at. They're like, yeah, they are doing that. And that still is their bread and butter.

And they're still doing some fun play action stuff off of that. But they're really leaning into split back stuff and getting a lot out of these bubble motions. Because maybe, okay, yeah, it's getting the ball in their playmaker's hands. And it's probably some of it is that maybe Jimmy can't get the ball into their hand. So this is a way that they can manufacture these touches. They really, when I went back and I watched that game today, I expected to see a few more misdirection type runs with polar because they have been hitting a decent amount of those.

Today, a lot of their success, the run game today, just lead zone. Yep. Just lead zone and split zone around. It was just, and I was kind of surprised. I expected it to be a little bit more interesting. Yeah. But then you look at the passing game and that's where it's like galaxy brain shit. And there was the, on the first drive, it was this place sticks out to me.

On the first drive, they had debo, it was a second and three. They had debo common motion from left to right in jet motion. And Kittle was just a little bit offset, but close to the formation. And they ran just a little bubble to Debo after he went in the orb motion. And I think a lot of teams want to do that, right? You throw a wide receiver screen, you get blockers out in front. But they do it in a static way where you, it's not, you're not stressing people because they're not moving that direction.

You can see it. You can see the play developed for the moment you snap the ball. But by having Kittle a little bit closer to the formation, by having the orb motion, come. It doesn't look like a screen until the ball is actually thrown until Kittles getting out there. So it's just this more exciting dynamic version of a play that everybody runs. And that's exactly what they're doing. They're doing things that other people do. They're just doing it in ways that create more space for people. Like you said, the Kittle on those inbreakers off some of these orb motions where they're clearing out linebackers and getting him in behind. Also, do you see Kittle

snap off Gilmore today? Yeah. Just on that deep out, it's just ridiculous. It's like a third The best blocking tight end in the NFL is breaking off, arguably, best corner in the NFL. Impressed, yeah, I know. And it was press and outside leverage. And he still, and he broke it. He got him on the release. It was really impressive because that's actually a play I was going to post when I said the all 22, because that was a hell of play.

And just how good they are manipulating linebackers is amazing. And you just saw that every single play has something to it where there's a motion or there's a shift or even on plays where it's not that. On the Wilson touchdown, they ran split zone, and I'm sure he knew, based on the rules, that the tight end didn't even block anybody coming across the formation. Split zone is when you're running zone action one way,

and the tight end's coming back across to block the end guy in the line of scrimmage that you leave unblocked. The tight end didn't even block anyone, but it took the linebacker out of the play. And that's what they're doing. All of the misdirection, even if you're not putting a hat on a hat, you're sending guys in directions they don't want to go and you're creating space and he does that so, so well.

And use check today was incredible. He had like four or five lead block plays today in space as both a fullback and just out releasing, cutting guys. I mean, what they do with him is really special. Just one of those games, everything about their approach jumped out to me. Jimmy over the last two weeks has averaged 9.47 yak on up per completion. which is pretty ridiculous. It's insane. He's averaging 8.31 on the season.

No one else in the NFL was above 6.65. It's like throwing to AJ Brown every play. If you need some numbers about how an offense can help its quarterback, look no further than what the Niners are doing right now. Jimmy against the Rams last week, 4.39 air yards per attempt. He threw for 300 yards. Unbelievable. It's really fun. It's really fun stuff.

truck size training wheels that's what it is it's really fun stuff yeah one more candidate for who won the week here we don't have to spend a lot of time on this baker mayfield i i want to mention him because i think he might have won the week because he might have saved his job yeah yeah when he personally won the week he personally won the week he won his week i can tell you that the pick he threw to odal was awful and i and so it's early in the game he throws a terrible interception I'm sitting there with the tweet open being like, is it time? Like, are we getting to a place where it's time? And then he rip us off 16 straight completions at one point during that game.

The Bengals defense did him a lot of favors. He did not have to play much quarterback. It was more C receiver, hit receiver. But you know what? You put, what did Devante Adams say today about beating back of corners? I can only eat what's in front of me. That's exactly where Baker Mayfield was. He could only eat what was in front of him and he ate very well against the Bengals

defense over the final three quarters. He really did. I mean, that's the thing is like you, you don't want to knock anyone that threw for five touchdowns, but you also just want to hedge and just be like, hey, it was, it was the Bengals. And they did have like a play where they were letting in Joku just run a post with no help on the inside. But the ball placement on the post was good. You still have to make the throw.

Exactly. I mean, we cannot take away. I mean, the last game winning throw was an incredible throw and balls in throw. He picked his match up and he went with it. no hesitation. I mean, yeah. So you got to give credit words too. It's just now I just remembering the the Cowboys game where they had nine nakeds called for him and any time he dropped back against that defense, he couldn't even handle it on third down. The second half of the Colts game, last week against the Steelers, first week against the Ravens. Like I'm like just flashes of

that just keeps hitting me every time I just want to say something nice about Baker or unathletic Russell Wilson, as I like to call him. I don't want this to be a thing where you think I'm, Baker's getting better or there's light at the end of the tunnel, any of that. I'm not saying any of that. I'm saying today he did what he needed to do. And when you complete 16 straight passes and you have to make some of the throws he made to win the game, that's very nice.

And the Browns are five and two, man. Like at a certain point, you're five and two and it's nice. So good for them, good for Baker Mayfield. All right. It's time for Vince to ask the question here. So every week we have Vince Lombardi asked the question about what the hell is going on out there for some of the low lights of the week. As a gift to you this week, because of the Wisconsin win on Saturday, it was a great day. I'm sure you're still beaming from it. We are not going to talk about the Cowboys for you. We're not even going to do it. They don't deserve for us to talk about them. We don't talk about the Jets on this show when they get blown out. And at this point, the Cowboys are in no better standing than that. They have to prove to me that they deserve. of our time and energy and attention on this show for the, like the rest of the season. Yeah.

They're in the stank realm. As soon as Dalton threw that take on the angle route, like way behind, it just got tipped up. I was like, okay, I'm done with this. I'm not watching this game. No matter what happens, you can't tempt me with a red zone channel, nothing. That game was like, done. That season's basically done.

I'm all set with them. It's going to be. Until we're ready to have a conversation about whether Michael, Mike McCarthy should keep his job after this. That's the next talking point. I don't really want to have a conversation about this anymore. Okay. The game I do want to talk about is the Falcons and the Lions.

Because I'm not sure where else we could go with this. If you ever wondered what it would look like if two teams incapable of winning close games played against each other, now you have an answer. These teams make blowing leads in art form. And it almost feels like because they played each other today, they were pushed to new heights. It's like how Picasso and Matisse, like, needed each other to create just more beautiful artwork between them. That's how I felt about watching the end of this Lions Falcons game today. It was funny. It was like even when I was with the Falcons, they had a bonkers game against the Lions at Wembley Stadium in London.

It was like they had a crazy game that week too. It's like, I think I text to you, it's like magnets where you push them on the wrong side towards each other where they just wouldn't, you know, they're just pushing against each other. But it was just like, yeah, it's just, I mean, even even with the Lions, I mean, Saffer made a couple of great throws and it's always like you want to just like, holy crap. Like he makes some throws every week. They're just, yeah, top tier. But after they scored, they got a celebration penalty to push the game winning extra point 15 yards back. And then and then the piece of resistance. I forgot about that in my notes.

There's so many things that I forgot about that. The piece of resistance to it was even if he missed that extra point that was pushed 15 yards back. the Falcons got an illegal formation penalty on defense. So it would have been even better if he missed it. It would have been the most Falcons thing that they got a penalty and they would have been able to re-kick it five yards closer. So I mean, that kind of sums up everything right there. There's so many things.

It was like a Stefan sketch. This fourth quarter has everything. The Falcons went forward on fourth and five while they were up one with 12 minutes left. I am as aggressive as it gets when it comes to Fort down. decisions. I still think you kick the field goal there to go up by four points. Rahim was making a statement. I mean, it's fine.

I guess at this point it doesn't really matter. It's not the worst thing that happened. I was still just like, wow. Yeah. Very aggressive. So the Falcons turned the ball over at their own 32 yard line wall up one with five minutes left. On the ensuing drive, the Lions lost seven yards. They lost seven yards in a kick of 49.

yard field goal. They do. They make the 49 yard field goal. The Falcons get the ball back. We get the Todd Gurley accidental touchdown, which is the second time in a span of 24 hours that a defense has allowed a touchdown on purpose and signaled that it was a touchdown when the guy got across the goal line. Indiana comes back and wins last night. The Lions come back and win today. Matthew Stafford just doing crazy stuff, just sidearm slings. It is amazing. how badly neither of these teams wanted to win this game today. Matthew Stafford going into that last drive had thrown 28 passes, okay, for averaging 9.5 yards per attack as the Lions just slammed Adrian Peterson

into the line of scrimmage over and over again. DeAndre Swift had eight first down carries today. They averaged 1.7 yards. Cool. And we're allowing Matthew Stafford to throw the ball 28 times over the course of an entire game where you were not winning. It's insane. I don't even know what else to say.

And he's blackout throwing too. Like he had the one to Gallaudet and the two minute trail there. He was just throwing a back shoulder inside seam. Like sure, why not? Golly made like six ridiculous plays in this game. And we're just not going to do that? Oh, you mean the Falcons that have like seven backup dbs playing? Like, you know, they're like on their four string dbs.

It's like, no, no, we're going to sign Agent Pearson or we're going to run with Agent Pearson who he signed off the street a week before the season. It's like, no. they should just tell they I want to tell Darryl Beville and Matt Patricia and just try to convince them before every single game that they're down 21 to nothing. It's almost, we're getting to a let Matthew Stafford Cook situation where it's, it's almost as if Darryl Bevel is bringing this thing from Seattle is infecting the lions with the disease that plagued the Seahawks for like the last three or four years. You never lose it. Pete Carroll is just a mindworm that just crawled in there. affects everybody watching matthew stafford and some of the stuff he can do i it's just a crime to not allow him to do it especially to kennigalladay every kennigalliday catch is the most impressive catch most receivers would make in their entire life it's like watching a cirque desalatia whenever he's on the field it's absolutely unbelievable he maxed up the difficulty level every catch

like it's because he doesn't get any separation at all but okay it doesn't matter i'm still giving him credit for all the crazy sliding scale sliding scale all right i want to i want to try a new segment today. I want to call this all apologies. It's going to be an opportunity for us and other people to say that they're sorry about an opinion that they had at some point. I think some people may be including you owe an apology to Mr. Justin Herbert. Can we start it? Like, is it a bad first segment? It's more like some apologies. Like I'm not willing to go all apologies yet after rewatching it again. Explain yourself. All right. Okay. So I mean, I'm going to Guy, we went into a couple of weeks ago with him, but I mean, I got to give Herbert more credit

where it truly is like a college basketball player that's worked under the, the overcoaching and 35 second shot clock of college and then gets into the wide open NBA. And it's like, oh my God, I can just ISO ball and I could do this and I could do this. I got other athletes. I can throw out alley-oops too. And I can, I can know it's wide open. It's 24 second shot clock. And honestly, after seeing what his office coordinator, who's now the head coach of UNLV,

they had zero passing yards in his debut in the first half. against San Diego State. I am starting to think, I am, I don't know, they ended up with like 130, but it was, it was enough that it's embarrassing to have zero passing yards. I am starting to think that Justin Herbert had a governor on him at Oregon and Eugene. I think that they were really limiting what he could show. I still will say that I had like a late, second, early first round grade on him.

I did not see him as a top 10 pick, to be honest. I saw the flash plays everyone else saw. I think the interview process would have been huge for him. It would have been seeing like how much he could retain and how much he could really adapt to a week to week game plan. And then you could go off of that and see, okay, well, we can do this and that with his athleticism and a strong arm ability. And I mean, he's showing that they're at least communicating what they're trying to get done with what they're trying to, with their play stuff. Like they're really, I got to credit them a little bit. Jaguar's defense is awful, but that's a different story.

But they're at least, they've done this a few weeks now is where they're getting the Keenan Allen's of the ball, the Hunter Henry's the ball, the backs, you know, Joshua Kelly's doing some good stuff. It's, you know, but with all that ISO stuff and getting those guys open, Herbert is seeing it because you don't see his head turning around and doing the panic stuff. You see some young quarterbacks. He at least is calm. He might be wishing somebody's throws open a little bit too long, but at least I think he knows what's trying to get done, which is really good to see. I think where we saw, we gushed about a few weeks ago. against the bucks where he's drifting back on third down against covers your own throwing these bombs or just one percenter throws he had another one today was a drift play or i'm sorry it was another third down play he drifted against a clean runner and he kind of made the free runner miss where always the guy hesitated to know where the jump or tackle herbert it was a little whip to and he hits out on the whip down correct but that's where his traits come to play okay he at least knew where to go with the ball right even if there might have been a better answer he at least had an answer he knew he had he had a path to success on the play and he won the play because he bought time and his arm his arm strength ability lets him hit that throw a guy with a popcorn arm isn't he getting able to do that off their back foot with somebody in his face and who he actually really reminds me of it's watching him the last couple weeks too is he really does remind me of Ryan tannihill where it's just these big athletic guys that may be limited with their accuracy at times and the dropback game but him throwing on the move and just being big athletic and have these strong arms like it he's he's he

So much more talented than Tannahill. Oh, no, that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. He's at Tana Hill in Tennessee now. Like, you know, that version of Tannahill. But like, that's what it's got, that's the growth that he is already starting with. That's his baseline. And I think he can just go from there.

Like, but that's like, that is really what the guy he is. And it's going to, I think he's going to become a better version of that, which is pretty scary if he can keep building on this. He's a rookie. I just got, I keep forgetting that he's a rookie. Like, he's, I, I'm talking about like he's a second round guy or a second year guy. the bundle of traits that he has is insane. Insane. And I just didn't know that.

I mean, coming in, it just, I had no idea he had this combination of one athleticism. Yeah. How he's, the way he's extending plays, even design runs,

they're tapping into it and he's using it naturally. And that's just a really nice combination to see. And he is such an easy thrower of the ball. Yeah. It is, even small stuff, the first little slant he hit to, Keenan Allen, just how easy it comes out of his hand.

The touchdown he hits up parham down the seam is a beautifully thrown ball. The one to Guyton, I don't know who Guyton is, but he just was a very, he's a very fast person. And all they're doing is just saying run as fast as you can and I'm going to throw it as far as I can and that's what we're going to do. That's their connection right now. The touchdown he threw to Guyton today, I felt like that Alicia Cuthbert gift from happy endings, when she's watching the rom-com.

It's like, it's so beautiful. I was sitting there like blubbering at my kitchen table watching it because it's gorgeous. He and even the throw to Virgil Green that was, it was 13 personnel heavy play action, hits Virgil Green down the left sideline for a touchdown out of max protection. They're scheming up these shots for him. I just did not expect him to be this overtly talented and have this many tools. I don't know if Justin Herbert's going to be good. we've seen guys take real weird left turns way later in their careers than Justin Herbert is right now.

But watching him play just makes me smile. And it is an unlimited collection of skills. Yeah. He, like you say, it makes you smile. He's just a fun player to watch. It's not, it's not perfect right now. But he's like started five games as a rookie. It's like he is, but it's, there's a path there for him.

It wasn't a perfect game. He still has some accuracy stuff every once in a while. But he's doing a lot of consistent stuff. and against, you know, he's doing it week and week out. And he's a fun player. And, like, he's hitting these deep balls that it's like anyone that hits deep balls and also could scramble on the next play and everything is calm. Like, it never looks panicky to him.

Like, when you're watching him. I never see that moment where I'm like, oh, boy, this is too big for him. I think that's just his personality too. And it's contagious when you have a guy that every play, no matter what the moment, he's delivering on throws. And he's just like, yeah, what's the big deal? The next play, it's first down guys. That's contagious.

It's kind of like a Joe cool thing with Joe Montana. That's the kind of stuff that goes off. It rubs off on other players. My only concern is that Justin Herbert being good is going to spawn 10 quarterbacks that teams overdraft because they're tall and can really throw it. Because I feel like we had made so much progress in the other direction. There are so many guys that did not fit the bill and have succeeded. It's like, yes, we are stepping forward into just if you can play quarterback,

that's more important than being tall and having this cannon arm. Do you think John awake can sleep at night right now after watching Justin Herbert play? Knowing that he doesn't have Justin Herbert on his team? Well, and also watching Drew Locke play. And I honestly think Drew Locke only knows one route concept per play. Like he just knows one blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, X dagger. And he is staring at that X dagger because that is the only play. Only thing he knows, he knows the dance moves after the plays.

But it's like he is locked in on that one. those one plays. Did you just say he knows the dance moves after the plays? Oh, dude. You was a 68 year old anonymous scout? I am. I am right now because that dude is locked in. Jesus. I know.

I don't care, actually, because it's like, as soon as I see this guy actually read something out, I'm just going to keep, like, dissing him because he's, it's actually kind of like, yeah, he can't sleep at night because I just watched Drew Lockplay today. And it was, it was bad. It was a lot of bad stuff. Like, he's trying to force overthrows on naked balls where they're trying to make it nice and easy for him. All right, Drew, hey, we're going to get to start the drive right here. Let's hit the flat.

You know, guys wide open in the flat. Nope. He's whipping into that over ball triple coverage. And it's like, come on. And I knew they on the sideline probably like, hey, it started nice and easy. It's got a drive started going for you. But it's like that's, yeah. So I am going to be the 68 year old, old scout right there.

I really need someone who's better at Photoshop than me to do the Wolverine meme with the picture and just Photoshop John always face out to Wolverine just holding the picture of Justin Herbert. Crying. He's got it. Just sitting there knowing he didn't just put together the ammunition to go trade for Justin Herbert. John always going to have to live with that for the next however many years of his life.

And next year, he's going to react to it by drafting whichever six, seven quarterback he can find that is destined to fail. You miss the one six six guy. Listen, I've written about this before. It started as a bit, but I was actually interested in it. So I examined it and I wrote about it. Why six six and two? taller quarterbacks do not succeed.

And for the most part, they're bad athletes. Yep. And they don't have pocket mobility. There's a lot of issues mechanically. They're not rotational throwers. They're stride throwers. So they throw slow. I've talked to a bunch of people about it, wrote about it.

Justin Herbert is a very tall person who defies a lot of those, you know, deficiencies that held back other tall quarterbacks. And if he succeeds, good for him, because I'm having a great time watching him play. I completely agree. All right. Let's get to this week's secret. awesome. Every week we want to talk about one kind of subtle underrated part of a game plan or an approach that a team had that kind of led to them winning. I want to talk about something you and I

briefly exchanged about on Twitter today. Just the ISO plays to Grancowski in the Red Zone for the bucks. But instead of talking about that, because that is, by the way, Gronk is doing grunk things again and it's really fun. It's a little bit more than Jermaine Gresham. I am, yes. A little better than Jermaine was on those Cardinals teams. But the touchdown he scored, they're isoing him in the red zone. And it seems like that's something that's growing more and more now. Week to week, they're putting it in a game plan. When you're creating a red zone game plan, let's just say on a week to week basis,

for week eight of a team, how do you start creating your red zone game plan and how do you implement new plays into it? Like, what are the conversations that happen as you build a red zone menu every single week? You know, it all starts out, too, is like your overall philosophy. like everything offensively and defensively is some, some teams, it's offense coordinator handles everything as far as situations where it's like normal down and distance. You know, I got this. I got red zone. I got third down. I'll take some input, but I'm going to handle most parts of it. But then some teams like to dictate an assistant coach to take the lead on some situations.

So it's, you know, red zone passing game is going to be, you know, the quarterback coach or the receiver coach. And third down, you know, third and three and six is this coach. And it might be seven and ten. And all of them, all the third down situations are another coach. coach with the offense coordinator having his input as well. And every team's different. And also some teams just like to run their stuff once again to the Reds on. The Rams are big on that, especially in the run game. They'll just keep up staying that 11 personnel bunch and just run it down the field as soon

as they get inside the five. They just hit you quick with it or change up the tempo with it. And with these teams, what they're trying to do is, are you, what plays can we rely on or your bread and butter is that really defenses are going to run every week and we're going to have answers to no matter what they're. the defense is going to be that week. And some teams have their two, three, four, five plays that they're like, this are bread and butter.

We're going to maybe dress it up a little bit, but we have this in every single week. Some teams just go, no, resetting. We have a new six, seven, eight red zone plays that we're just going to design and have these designer replays that. You'll see me kind of on Twitter say that a lot, designer replays that usually you'll see it on third down or in red zone. That's my question to you. Do you feel like that's the area where creativity can really shine the most because you're

not using a lot of staple concepts. It seems like a lot of teams between the 20s are going to run similar versions of the same stuff for the most part. You dress it up differently. But it feels like the Red Zone can really be the place where a creative play designer can shine. Like Sean Payton's stuff in the Red Zone has always been great for example. Always great.

So I just feel like that's the area where you can just like screw around. Like let's see if this works because you have to consciously create space for your guys down there where there is no space. And it's understanding the matchups, too, just like any good play caller would do. Like here, like great example is so you really down there, you're getting your match stuff, like the four and six two match stuff. And then you're also getting man and you're getting pressures. And with the man stuff, that's where you can see a lot of the creativity come in. We've already talked about Chase Claypool, getting those jet sweeps and just becoming a race.

You know, but also we get the back and forth motions you'll see with the man coverage. Like we saw with G.O. Bernard today against the Browns is they kind of went back and forth and you're hoping to catch the guy that's man to him in the muck and then he just runs to the flat. I think James Connor might have had one. You'll see it once or twice a week. The teams love it with a back and forth motion. And that's where the gronk stuff and splitting them out as an ISOed receiver. And today he had the fade ball against a five nine, you know, five nine safety or corner. And it's one of those, that's where you can see that creativity, especially with man. We saw with the Rams last week, what they ran the high low to woods in the back of the end zone. And that was against a match,

match coverage, but also you can see a lot of double moves down there against match stuff. So that's where you'll see some creativity. A couple of weeks ago, we were talking about Sheena with the Jaguars, Randall's stop and go and it turns into a drag or a crosser, I'm sorry, that went for a touchdown. But that's where you can see because all of some of these, the plays that are getting designed are double moves. They're in and out moves. They're rap concepts where it's high, lowing.

And you'll see where these play callers, play designers are trying to go. All right. So we identify that the linebacker that can't really carry that well. How do we take advantage of that? Do we just knife a ball in there? Do we create a high, low on them? Do we try to get them, you know, like you said with Sean Payton, Camaro is going to come alive in a red zone especially because they can split them out

and run a real route concepts with him. And with that is that's where you see the creativity come in is how to highlight what the matchups they think are advantageous. And the good coaches know where their good matchups are. And they know not to overthink it and go, Like, well, they know that too, but no, the good players are going to make plays for you. So let's figure out a way to get him the ball. You'd see back in the day, even with Calvin Johnson, big difference right here, two awesome receivers at NFC North.

He had Randy Moss, Calvin Johnson. Randy Moss is fade balls and slants and no one can stop either one. It was just over and over. They would go 12 personnel dot or ace formation, split out Marcus Robinson and Randy Moss, run slants and fades or run the ball. God, Marcus Robinson. Yeah, that was a name drop right there, huh? And then, but then with the difference is Calvin Johnson. he was lining up as a Z, they would run little double moves with him.

They would run kind of like little unders and ups because they're trying to attack that match coverage. And he was so big and fast and such a good route runner at his size that you couldn't really guard it, even if you were truly bracketing him. So that's where it's teams, you can really see how teams are aware of their matchups and aware of what the defense is giving them. And really, if you figure out if it is an assistant coach leading it, it's also like you can start seeing what assistant coaches might, you know, have a little something.

to them because it's it's it's it's fun once you start seeing like oh that guy runs or runs a red on place because you'll see carryover from what these assistant coaches are running and not just the coordinators because also and it happens with defenses too you'll see third down blitz packages come in you're like i've never seen this this defense coordinator run before oh because they're db coach you know he liked to run that before and he brought you can see how that package comes in you know that's where you know that's where the little fun stuff comes and that's why situational football so huge in the NFL especially but it is especially in man coverage stuff is where you can really see that creativity shine and see what ways these offenses think are their best plays

and best ways to hit their best plays. Awesome. All right, buddy. That's all we got this week. Fun week. Did not seem like it while watching live, but then going back, really enjoyed it. All right. I will be back on Wednesday.

We have a really fun Wednesday show for you guys. I'm very excited about some of the stuff we bring it to you. And until then, though, please support. Subscribe to The Athletic, theathletic.com slash football show. We still have some great promotions going on. Please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. And we'll be back later in the week.

Until then, thanks for listening to The Athletic Football Show. Talk to you later. This was The Athletic Football Show.