The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Week 15 recap — Jaguars and Raiders walk off, Vikings pull off historic comeback, playoff picture, and more

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Oh nothing, just another ho-hum week in the NFL. You know, with walkoff touchdowns and record-setting comebacks, things like that. Robert Mays and Nate Tice break down the craziness that was Week 15, and the playoff picture that emerged from it, on this episode of The Athletic Football Show.Follow Robert on Twitter: @robertmaysFollow Nate on Twitter: @Nate_TiceSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube3:29 Craziest week of the season6:49 Commanders-Giants13:33 Raiders-Patriots27:37 Jaguars-Cowboys47:52 Chargers-Titans59:04 AFC North down to the wire66:12 Lions-Jets85:04 Bills-Dolphins97:39 Vikings' historic comeback 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. It's my good friend Nate Tice. Nate, how you doing, buddy? Doing very well. I think we got a special combination for this show. Not only was a great day of football,

but we get to complain about the refs, which is if anybody knows me or is anyone who follows me on Twitter, complaining about referees is one of my favorite pastimes. I will never, I try to be fair to coaches. I try to be fair to players, but refs, no. No, you never get the benefit of the doubt for me. And I cannot wait to tee off on a couple on this show. We're going to talk about those calls in the Sunday night game, obviously, in a little bit here.

We're going to get into kind of everything crazy that happened over the last two days. You know, there's so many games, so many wild endings that affect the playoff picture, kind of issuing our normal format today and just kind of going game by game, like the wildest shit that happened over the last 48 hours. Because it was unbelievable. Every single moment of the last two days, something absolutely insane was happening, right? So you have, obviously, the biggest comeback in NFL history happens yesterday, which we're going to talk about a little bit later,

just an unfathomable game between the Colts and the Vikings yesterday. And then the game last night is absolutely wild. You have fans throwing snowballs on the field from the beginning of the game. Josh Allen was airborne at one point. point. I mean, they're going back and forth. The snow is just falling at the end. It's an incredible playoff like atmosphere in Buffalo. It feels like just a massive, massive game. And that was yesterday. That's before anything even kicked off today. The moment that really kind of brought me back to a place like, this is awesome. Like, I just am having such a good time. At the end of the Jags Cowboys game,

when they made the field goal to tie it, he hooks it right. and he brings it back in. So he kicks it. I'm like, oh, no. And then it goes back in and McCarthy had called time out. So in the span of five seconds, I get the, oh, no, oh, yes, wait, they have to kick it again. Casey's upstairs. And she's like, is everything okay down there?

I'm just screaming at the TV. And there were probably five or six of those moments today. The Justin Herbert throw at the end of that game. Obviously, the Raiders ending. I was yelling at my television. more over the last two days than I can ever remember yelling at my television during an NFL weekend in recent memory. I'm a 35-year-old man. Well, my wife also when I sat down yesterday morning and then she saw the Vikings kicking off. She was like, there's football games on today. She was not ready

for a full slate of three games. I got the exact same reaction yesterday. So we're in the same place. We're on season five of the crown. Like what I thought this was Saturday. It called you. I think college football is over. What is this? I thought my Saturdays are free. But yeah, it was, I mean, awesome games. She even was getting into the big comeback at the Vikings had.

So, like, that just started as we had a little lull on the second game, but then the third game. Yeah, with the bills and dolphins, man. That was, I mean, just really just kicked us off into this weekend. I mean, the games today were just awesome. I mean, not even just like, it's been a while since we had a good, like, quint box on the Red Zone channel.

Yeah. Like where we had five things happening. All teams are in the Red Zone. They're scoring. There's big plays. There's comebacks. It was just an awesome day of football. I mean, the note section for me, it was so much fun because it was just a mix of highlights,

it makes of me yelling at referees and it makes it just like cool scheme stuff. I think that's a perfect Sunday. I mean mentioned the Jets Lions game, which obviously is huge playoff implications. We'll dig into that. Duck hunting or the Jets Lions game. The Bengals are down 17 to nothing. They score 34 unanswered points. It was just every single thing.

We're not going to really dig into the Bengals game in depth today. I think we can probably save that for later in the week. there's just so much stuff that we have to talk about. So just bear with us. I'm exhausted emotionally. There's a million games that we have to talk about. We're going to do our best to sort through what the last two days of football look like. Let's start with what just happened in the Sunday night game.

And let's start at the end because I typically am somebody who doesn't like talking about referees. In my opinion, it all comes out in the wash for the most part. The games, the calls that go against you, you're going to get them a little bit later. We'll talk about that as it relates to. to one team a little bit later in this show that played yesterday. That two call stretch at the end of that Washington game is a season defining stretch of place. The no call on the past interference at the end where he's just climbing on him.

And then the call on the illegal formation, which you saw, he asked the referee, Terry McLaurin did twice if he was in the right spot and got no indication. None. You're supposed to give a, the ref is supposed to. give a thumbs up or a hand. And it's like every, every receiver is taught that since high school. And I know college and I know in the NFL, definitely. And they, it's such a classic, like, because usually when they point and if they are off,

the ref will go, hey, hey, and like, yell to them. And like, tell them. Like, hey, scooch up. He, some, I got some people, like, because I tweeted the clips because I'm just losing my mind on this. The ref also, he also botched the Heineke, uh, uh, inbounds or out of at the end of play too. And they had to figure out the courtesy

in bounds or out of bounds. It took them five minutes to figure that out. Same guy. Yeah, the sideline was just vibes at the end of this, at the end of that game. It was just hanging out. We'll figure it out. Yeah, we're in December.

It's holiday season. And you can see, like he doesn't give a point. And someone, like, people are replying to me. It's like, hey, it's not his job. It's like, no, it's literally his job to tell him if he's on or up. If they ask, they have to give you an indicator. That's a blows my mind. And then on top of it, he's quite, he's about to pull.

throw the flag as the play's about to start. Like he was like, I'm not saying anything and I'm about to whip this flag out. He couldn't wait to get that flag out. And that's just one rough thing that happened today. I know we're going to talk about this game. But there's also, there was also the, the cold touchdown for the Raiders where they reviewed it and it looked like his foot was out of bounds. That one was strange.

And then they confirmed it on top of it. They didn't even say it stand. They stood. They confirmed it. And then the chiefs had like a fumble, a juju-joo-s-shr-shrumble where they like ruled forward progress. and then like he sat on the ball and they say it was a clear recovery. Like there's a lot of like hoops jumping through.

And then on top of it, I tweet this one too was that there's a call in the Jets game was in a two minute drill at the end of the game when the Jets were going for the win or the tie. And they just give the first down without like a yard short. The guy just starts waving on the sticks. The refs had a banner day. I mean, the NFL had a banner day. I didn't talk about yesterday when they had their multiple fumbles in the, in the Vikings game

that seemed like the play should have kept going or there were clear recoveries. and they wiped touchdowns off the board twice. Yeah, two of them. Oh, my God, that's right. Oh, I know. It's, yeah, so great weekend. You know, at least it's not first week jitters for the refs either. So, but, no, so that was that, and honestly on top of it, and this is, I'm, I totally agree with you.

Over time, I've been fortunate enough to be a fan of multiple teams in my lifetime, either through my dad or myself. And usually I'm kind of like every fan base thinks the rest are against them. So I kind of laugh at it at this point in time. I still like complaining about refs. Oh, yeah. Obviously. Yeah, but it's, I'm a similar cut from the same cloths thinking that it's like, oh, it evens out over time.

Although there is a study that if you wear black uniforms that refs will call more flags against you. The Raiders historically have had more flags called against them than almost any other team. I will say when I was with the Raiders, there was a little bit where I was like, hey, what, what's going on here? And on the flip side, when I was with Wisconsin, I felt like we got away with a lot. I was with Wisconsin. I think Barry Alvarez knew how to slip the refs a couple of dollars. So with that win now with the Giants, I mean, they have the inside track to make the playoffs. We have them with a 50.6% chance, our Austin Mock at the Athletic, the Giant,

Washington now down to a 21% chance. God, that's terrible. I mean, it's a season-changing stretch of place there for Washington at the end. And we've talked about this a little bit. I think it was more important for Washington based on, you know, the launch. term health and job security of their coach, where they were at as a franchise, the moves that they were making. They're obviously further along than the Giants are.

But if the Giants make the playoffs and this is what gets them in, calls be damned, whatever, it's a huge moment for this franchise that didn't expect to do anything this year. You can make an argument they should have been the worst team in the NFL based on the talent that they have on the roster. And now there's a very real chance that they're going to be in the postseason. No, that's absolutely right. And really, this game was kind of a nice snapshot of. of like how the Giants have put together these wins.

They great situational ball. They run the ball pretty well. They got pretty good offense. Alignment Andrew Thomas has really come along. I mean, he's played an all pro level this year. But also just it's the coming toothpicks offense. So it's Sequin Barclay. It's a lot of pony personnel.

It's Daniel Jones as a runner. And then putting together some nice, you know, some big plays as a past defense and as a run defense. You know, being aggressive. That's the wink Martindale way. A lot of blitzing, all that stuff. So this is kind of, this is like a nice little snapshot of how they pulled off a lot of these games. It was a one score game.

Also on top of it, it's nice whenever your rookie, your first round pick looks good. One of your first round picks, I should say, looks really good. And Tibido having a great game tonight and a true good game. People kind of said he broke out against Cowboys, but he had a lot of free runs there. That's all another discussion. But no, had a really nice game. So that's always a nice kind of like feathering the cap. It's like, hey, some of these young guys that we're putting a lot into or we're getting now dividends out of that.

So, I mean, like you said, we talked about this a few weeks ago. It's great for what they're trying to build there. And it gives them a lot more credibility in the locker room and in the front office when they do want to push for what they want to push for. So, I mean, they're playing with the house as money. I really do think that as an organization. So, you know, good for them. Another win for them. That's why I don't want to discredit what the Giants did because of what the refs calls were because they have done a lot of these games throughout the season.

There's also a play. And they've had some of these over the course of the regular season where they were ultra aggressive and it ended up benefiting them. There was a fourth and nine that they went for in the second quarter at the Washington 35. There's a Richie James conversion, and they end up scoring a touchdown on that drive to go at 14 to 3. And they don't win that game if they don't go for that fourth and nine. If they kick a field goal, they may not be in the playoffs. And they've had a couple of those moments. You go back to week one.

They had a couple of those against the Titans, and they needed every single one of those wins to get to this point. So credit to Brian Daible, that staff, and for getting as far as they did, you know, obviously between these two teams it's a toss up either of them could have made it. I know it's not official yet, but either of them could have the inside track to be in the playoffs. And it seems like Washington is probably going to be on the outside looking in when this is all said and done. All right. The other thing we have to talk about at the top here, you mentioned the call in this game,

the Keele and Cole touchdown that maybe shouldn't have been a touchdown. Yeah. Maybe the most ridiculous ending to an NFL game that I can remember. Man. This is a team that is supposed to be this buttoned up. Bill Belichick, situational masters type of team. And Jacoby Myers, when the game is tied, it's a great throw, by the way. Oh, I know.

Great throw to Chandler Jones. Because Jacoby Myers clearly has an arm. And the stiff arm to put Mack Jones six feet under the turf on that play, maybe unnecessary, but pretty fitting when you consider how the Patriot season has gone. It's just absolutely wild. Oh, my God. that so I've I've one time one of the team I was around a situation like that happened and a fumble happened where it was a tie game at the end of the fourth quarter it was the Raiders in

2015 against the Chargers on like a Christmas game and I was before I was with them and I was there at the game though and they fumble the ball around or toss the ball around and then afterwards it was like the game was tied this could have gone really bad it was a learning like even for me not part of that team I was like hey that's a learning experience that's the thing with this Patriots team And I'm really, you know, starting to wonder about this whole Patriot Way kind of thing, you know, Patriot Way, Tom Brady, you know, that might be the Patriot way. They had a false start in a four minutes situation. They were two for 13 on third down. Block punt because the guys are looking back was the one that came out for, it really came through for me.

They've had special team miscues this entire season. And this is like, and I feel like they've been like this is the poor, like the worst punting situation they've ever had. the last play, of course. But I've had to, for the past 20-something years, hear about the Patriot way and how all these guys are so buttoned down with their situation and their game awareness. And it starts at the top. The coordinators, the assistant coaches, every player. Eric Mangini goes to the Jets and he's quizzing the wide receiver on the left tackles

pass protection assignment. All bullshit. That's what these like seasons are kind of like really making me realize. You're feeling it tonight. I'm excited about this. It's going to be a good time. Oh, my God. This is pent up.

This is 20 years of pent up like, God, we have another guy. And we have to hear about how everything they do is a genius. And oh, my God, there's another guy that like, oh, the Patriot way and they do this. And oh, man, they really, everybody knows the four minutes situation. And they know how many timeouts they have to take and all that. But then it just turns out you have your Jacoby Myers, who is a good player, by the way. Yeah. And she could pay this off season.

Just a bonehead mistake that happens sometimes. But it was, it's kind of funny that happened to the Patriots. And that is before we even mentioned the offense. And what the offense has looked like. over the course of the entire season. They were awful again today. They could not throw... Remodre Stevenson's a really nice player.

Without him on the ground, they didn't do much today on offense whatsoever. You look at the numbers overall. This season, there have been 29 starters in the NFL with at least 300 attempts. The guys who've been full-time starters, essentially, is where that cutoff is. Of those 29 guys,

Mack Jones is 28th in EPA per dropback. The only guy who's worse than him is Davis Mills. And the third. 11 naked today in a key situation, the slant in the end zone where he's trying to get it to Aguilar, Aguilar gets beat across his face, and Matt Jones is screaming at Aguilar on the field. He is fucking over it. Yeah. He is over it.

And for you to have a scenario where it's devolved that badly with the body language, demeanor, communication between your quarterback and the guy you've instilled as your play call, or that is clearly out of his depth in doing this job, there's nothing buttoned up about that. There's nothing Patriot way about that. There's no excuse for what they've looked like on offense over the course of the year. They need a miracle Kyle Dugger play to even be in this game. I think that them being out of the playoffs essentially now

or taking the biggest hit of maybe anybody after losing that game feels kind of right based on the way that their offense has looked over the course of this entire year. Kind of a ball don't lie kind of situation. That's exactly how it feels. And, and I, I do feel for Mac Jones because it's not where you watch a quarterback and you're like, man, he's just, he's in the deep end and he's just, you know, he's trying to get it all together, just trying. You watch this guy, get guys lined up, making protection changes. He was fine last year. He was fine.

He was fine. Fine. He was fine. Yes. Yes. And that's what we always thought. That's what to mean. We know what this could look like, like what he's supposed to look like.

And they just don't, I mean, last week against the, the Cardinals. So I think Mac Jones is either bottom or like second to worse, like against the blitz this year as far by EPA per dropback. And I chalked that up more to what they run and what their protection is. And I believe Matt Patricia is also the offensive line coach, which is kind of funny as well. But I also like that. So last week they played the Cardinals. What do the Cardinals like to do?

They like to run. They blitz a lot. They run man coverages a lot, especially on passing downs. And then so what was the Patriots plan? Let's run 500 screens over and over and over because I believe Patricia goes in and goes, you know what? Hey, when I was a defensive coach, you know what was a pain in the ass when we bliss around man coverage.

We ran a lot of screens. So screens were really tough. We don't build a whole boat out of it. Like you throw them in there, you know, you sprinkle them in, you'll catch them, but not just every other play. And that just kind of shows it's like they take the straight line for everything. Their run game is so straight line and at you. Their past game, they go vertical, but it's down to sidelines.

and Mac Jones has some qualities. He's very intelligent. I believe when he's hot, he's very accurate. He can really place the ball. Throwing sideline throws is not his strength. That is not, him throwing go balls is not how he makes a living. He can do it,

but it's not how he is going to get paid and why he was a first round pick. So it's like built to your team's strengths. Obviously, that's not one of them, so stop doing this. And so I think that's just an accumulation, frustration for the whole year. I mean, he's telling him to go F himself last week,

like on Monday night. I mean, going in the fourth quarter, he was averaging two and a half yards an attempt. It's insane. Which is, I think it was the lowest this year. And one of like four, that was even lower than the three and a half or something of this year. He finished 1131 for 112 yards. And that's including, you know, some, you know, bogus plays in there. I mean, it's just, it's tough sledding with that offense.

And what stinks is either. There's so many young players that I like on that Patriots team. You know, of course, Doug Cal Dugger, just you should. That's where I'm at. The next step is weird for them. So it could have been construed this game as a Josh McDaniels revenge game. I think the prevailing emotion on that sideline on either sideline today is longing with Mac Jones just staring across the field, just missing Josh McDaniels being right because

of what did it look like last year? And last year, even if they, so last year they were totally capped out. They spent all this money in free agency. And if you're like, all right, there's a certain ceiling on the way that they're built right now. But Mac Jones is going to give them a certain floor over the next. three, four years as he's their starting quarterback. That's what it felt like. And then this season now, I have such a little faith in the offensive infrastructure,

but the defense is coached up and accelerated and plays beyond the talent and the spending and all of that so much more than we could have expected. It's like, oh, Belichick coaches up the defense. They're a ton better on that side of the ball than their talent would indicate. We didn't know who the corners on this team were going to be before the season started. And they've been an objectively very good defense over the course of the year. And that you could probably bet on moving forward. He's always going to be able to do that, really no matter who's on that side of the ball,

as he's kind of the figurehead of that defense. On offense, this team has $56 million in cap space next year. They have a couple, I believe, Isaiah Wins hitting free agency, Marcus Cannon's hitting free agency, you know, a couple other guys, and we'll see what the offensive line ends up looking like. Yeah. All the guys they have on the roster, you know, Nelson Aguilar is hitting free agency. they have a bunch of guys that on offense are pieces now.

What is it going to look like? I don't know if Agu is actually a free agent. I'm looking over the cap right now. I think he might just be like a cut candidate next year. Oh, no, he is. So what the offense is going to look like personnel-wise, I have no idea. And I have no idea.

I don't think you can stick with this plan offensively. And I don't know what the left turn from this is. It's just a very strange team. And as you try to figure out their trajectory and which direction they want to go in. And the fact that now this season is pretty much over kind of helps crystallize where they're at, in my opinion. Yeah, I think getting into the playoffs again as like a 10-17 or something like that would have been actually the worst thing that could happen. Like as far as like, oh, we can build off of this. I do think, you know, I just lame it went off on the Patriot Way.

The Patriot Way even started because Belichick is so good. at understanding what his team is. He has a great self-awareness. And I think my rant was about all the assistance of the Patriots, not Bill Belichick. I also want to clarify that. Bill Belichick is the greatest coach I've ever seen and one of the greatest situational guys I've ever seen. It's just funny and what's happened. But I think that's what is, I think it's going to be interesting.

It's going to be one of those fascinating teams to me because they could just branch off into so many different paths. It's like, is there a reset? Is there a mini reset? Is there a, no, it's doubled down on this? like what the pat like what does he do with each assistant he has his guys back in his bosom so like what like what does he do with them like how does he so i don't know what's got it to me i didn't have an espresso recently either it just we're in the year it's been a long two days it really has it really has especially all that saturday games and i've watched all the thursday game but it's i'm curious

i'm also curious it's one of the teams i have highlighted in circle just i want to see what they do and now especially, I mean, that whole division is just so crazy. Like it really is. The whole AFC East is just such a interesting division with all these teams because so many of them are different steps on the path, you know, but also all of them can branch in different ways. So I'm very

curious. I also want to credit, you know, some of the things that the Raiders were doing, you know, it's Darren Waller coming back also helps out with that offense. Waller touchdown was beautiful. I mean, just they had, it was single high. He was shaded over to Adams' side and Waller had a one-on-one and just went to work. That's the gravity of Devante Adams.

That's exactly right. That gives you an indication of what it could be with all those guys on the field. And it's a reminder that we haven't really seen that at all this year. At all, at all. And that's what seeing Hunter Rentfro back out there is nice. And of course, like the biggest play is go to like Kew and Cole and Mac Hollins. Yeah. That's the thing with Derek, Derek Carr, is that he has all these guys, but he's going to go buy the book on his reads.

It's going to go one to two to three every single time. So sometimes you got to say F it, Derek. But, you know, but you can see that stuff so much better where you're in your complimentary pieces are very good players like Darren Waller. So when they, McCordy Shades and Devante Adams, wow, we just have Waller beating one-on-one and running right down the pipe. That's really nice to have. But so also, you know, Max Crosby is playing a defensive player to your

candidate. And so they're an interesting team. Like they didn't sound like they're a team that they may not have their quarterback most year. I know. What are they going to do? It's not that. far off for them to get to the end of the season, be like, you know what, this isn't our guy.

We can move on from him from nothing. And they choose to move on from him. And now they're starting over a quarterback because they just want to find their guy. That's totally conceivable. So you have these two teams that their timelines over the next eight, 12 months are incredibly murky. For the Raiders, I think it's at that position. I think for the Patriots, it's about how they build their offensive infrastructure. There are some guys that Jonathan Jones is hitting free agency, a couple of those guys.

but offensively, Aguor, Jacobi Myers, a couple offensive linemen, that plan of what it looks like on that side of the ball and how they try to shape this thing, I think is the biggest question the Patriots have to answer, and I have no idea what that answer is going to look like. Me either. I don't even know what they want to build around. It's fascinating. It really is. All right. We're going to take a quick break and then we're going to dig into the craziness that was today. All right. Next game we're going to talk about here. Cowboys Jacks. Hard not to watch that game. just have good feelings about the Jags. There's so many aspects of the way they played today, some of the guys that showed up, what their plan was. You watch it, it's like, it's just hard not to smile. What was your prevailing thought about the Jaguars today as they somehow managed to pull this thing off? Oh, man.

I would say the good vibes, it was one of Zay Jones's touchdowns, I believe. And it was Zay Jones, Marvin Jones, for hugging Jackson DeVille, the mascot, the Jaguars mask. And they literally had a group hug, all three of them in the ends. I'm like it. Like it was the most casual. They were so comfortable with it. They're like, yeah, this is nice.

But that that was right then and there. I was like, yeah, this team. The fact that Trevor Lawrence can fumble that ball that at, in the fourth quarter with, what, a minute and a half left, give or take. I think there was less time than that left. It was so he fumbles, trying to find it. He fumbles at 126. Okay.

They got the ball back. the 13 seconds ticked off the clock. When the, when the, when Dax's incompletion on third down, which we can talk about throwing the ball in that situation. That incompletion on third down, it falls incomplete with one 13 left. So 13 seconds ticked off the clock on that Cowboys entire. We're talking Jags, but sidebar, it's every time I start feeling good about the Cowboys, I always remember Mike McCarthy is the head coach every time.

But with this Jacks team, it's, well, of course Trevor Lawrence is playing great. And Travis DTN is very explosive in the run game and how they get to their run games can be really fun sometimes. They were fantastic today. Yeah. They, they know how to game it up. Like they, the smoke and mirrors are their run games really nice with all the motions, all the split zone kind of stuff. What they sprinkle in, they run. They run just about everything, every type of run.

Don't run do that much, which I understand. But that's always, I'm going to be a sucker for that. But I love today is we've talked about this with this Cowboys defense is that they're so aggressive, so ears, pinned back that sometimes they won't be gap sound. And what I noticed today is run game and pass game, a lot of stuff side to side, a lot of smoking mirrors, a lot of, I think at least two reverses. There was a, or end arounds if you want to be actually, actually three or four. It might have been three. And they also had a fake end around screen. And then they also, which is one of my favorite plays in the playbook. And then they had naked, which they always do,

tons of screens, motion to screens. They were just getting them side to side. And Doug Peterson is what I've noticed is for better for worse, I think he identifies the matchup he wants and he just pokes at it the entire game. And I could tell that matchup today was the Christian Kirk, they ran like a wheel to him. They did it twice. And Anthony Barr was on him the first time, which I did not understand. They were in empty on first and 10. So I don't, and I didn't see the rest of the personnel, whether it was a little bit heavier and the Cowboys matched a certain way. But Barr was on him on that first wheel out of the slot and is a huge completion as a result of it. Yeah.

And that's what he just knows how to pick at it. It could be funky sometimes. And sometimes I'm like, oh, do you don't have to do that. You know, he has some Andy Reid to him. But man, he just knows how to how to game this stuff up. Like the Zay Jones TVs, TVs, TDs, the first one came on mesh. No one gets more hay out of mesh than the Jacks. And it's, it's one of see the difference between teams running mesh that are good at it and not.

Cowboys ran it three times today. and only were successful on one of them, including one of them was the interception to end the game. The double move to Zay Jones that was like, that was awesome.

It was again, I deeing a matchup advantage. I can't believe Zay Jones is a matchup advantage, but he is. Well, they picked on Calvin Joseph multiple times in this game. Yes, they did. Double moves or,

and not even like a double move. The Marvin Jones touchdown, he kind of fakes an over and then takes it back outside, just getting him going one direction and making him go the other against Calvin Joseph multiple times in this game.

It felt like it was a Norv Turner, 1997 offense. That was a burst release. It was drive with a burst release, which is, like you said, you're selling your inside, and then he breaks back out. But that is a burst seven, some place at seven is a corner route in the routry. A burst seven is, okay, this will sum it up. It's a match. It's like when I say I have a 99, we have better dudes than you type of play when you go to it.

Because that's a one-on-one, essentially. It was drive, which is a crosser and a dick. from the front side. But we have a story. So my senior year, when I was backing up Russell, by backing up, I just signal plays in and try to stay warm. And we, I think Russell went like 14 of 15 on the day or 15 to 16 on the day. And the only incompletion was the last throw of the day. Like, we just shredded them the entire game.

We're playing Minnesota. And we ran this play, Drive X7, which is what that touchdown came on. And Nick Toon was torching this corner for Minnesota just over and over. I think he had a touchdown maybe two on the day. And Coach Chris stopped calling it because he goes, that's too easy. That's boring. He literally said that on the headset because he goes, we could call this every play because that guy's so bad because it's just you're just turning them every single, every which

direction. But anyways. And it's Marvin Jones having that matchup advantage. That's where you, that's how you know the spot the Cowboys were in with Calvin Joseph right now. Yes. When, yes, the non-traveon digs. And also the double move was a pull-up bootleg play.

We used to run with Russ and Jared Aberdeers. So I had some great flashbacks today. But even the interception, it wasn't inexplicable. It was four verts. Christian Kirk is supposed to cross the defender's face and he doesn't. He keeps it straight because he read it as too high. And that was the weight rotation from the Cowboys. So you got caught on that.

And that's those suck. You know, that happens. Dak has had like three of them this year. Those throws are hard because you have to anticipate and trust your receiver sees the same thing. That's why I always say seam benders. There's a difference between seam and seam bender. He was supposed to bend it and he didn't bend. So that was that.

But I don't know. Great game planning. I thought Trevor was out of his mind again. And I don't know. Their defense isn't great, but they did at least some interesting things today. And I thought they adapted their game plan today on defense, which I really liked. Starting with the offense. So it was two things to me.

It was picking on Calvin Joseph with some of those double moves, the one on the outside, the 50-year something yard touchdown. The idea of that play was we're going to run a double move against this guy who we think we can pick on, combined with, talked about this earlier in the week, Trevor making those plays out of structure outside the pocket, that's where this thing can just get taken to any level we wanted to. Like the ceiling doesn't exist if he's going to be able to make throws like that because the mechanical kind of in the pocket quarterback stuff is so good.

The splash plays, that's what I was waiting for a little bit. That's the splashiest play you can make. It threw 50 yards on the run. A double move. It was beautiful. It was insane. So if he's going to do that, then we're having to be. in a different conversation, which we can talk about.

And so you combine the way they picked on Calvin Joseph with exactly what you're talking about with the side-to-side misdirection stuff. The touchdown that they, touchdown drive, they went on in the second quarter. They made it 14 to 7. These are some of the plays they ran on that drive. Is the end-round flip to Jamal Agnew, a fake toss, slide play action to Evan Ingram coming back. So they fake the toss, boot, slide coming back across with Evan Ingram.

Which is great. A fake end-d-round. screen to Travis E.T.N. for another chunk. They ran a reverse to Jamal Agnew where Trevor reverse pivoted it out to pitch it, but Agnew was coming in motion the other way and caught it in midair and had a chunk on that. And then there was the touchdown was on mesh and they had ETN pulling the flat defender. It was just like a beautiful design. Later in the game, they have another huge end around to Agnew. I mean, they had so many of those plays today with this getting guys moving from side to side and getting gashes.

off of it. And that's that play, that drive that drive in the second quarter. And obviously they scored plenty more points in this game. You watch that. Like Doug is in the zone. Yeah. That is just one of those games in one of those stretches. Like that guy is in the zone. And you have that and a quarterback who's playing extremely well and a running game that really had a lot of juice to it today. And this is the final result as far as the points on the board go. Yeah. And that's it's always fun because the defense is going to be up and down. I mean, even though, I mean, they still gave a lot of points today. The Cowboys did a lot of nice things, too, on offense, you know, even besides the interceptions, is they're going to give, it's going to be a fun team always with this Jacks because they have a good

offense and a, I'll say up and down defense. And those, as a guy that grew up with the early 2000s Vikings, this is, it's a fun formula. Like, it can lead to a lot of exciting games. You've got, you know, interesting quarterback and you got, can make some plays. You got fun play designs and a defense that's hit and miss. Yeah, I just want to say on flip side, too, it's like the Jacks had three turnovers today. Yeah. It wasn't like, it wasn't like they picked a perfect game.

They did not have a perfect day. They had two random, I mean, the fumble, the Trevor Lawrence fumble at the end is just a crazy fumble. Weird. It was just a huge collision. E.T.N. fumble, I think, inside the 30 early in the game to give the Cowboys back the ball. It was not a perfect game for the Jags by any stretch.

No. And the fact they could pull it off is such a, where this franchise has come. I mean, even from that, that Ravens game just put so much. good feels. Like we talk about the giants and making the playoffs can really, you know, put feathers in the cap in the locker room and with the front office. Same with just winning these games. It's like, holy shit, we could do this. Like, we can do this. And now we're doing it again. Yeah. And I mean, think about all those Jaguars fans that have just gone through all these losses. And now they've won two of these types of games at home in the last month. Like that is just,

it's good feel. It's good feelings for the whole team. And also just, I want to compliment some things the Cowboys did because I did like some of their designs. Like the, the Handershot touchdown was awesome. It's a beautiful play. It's amazing. I mean, so if you can just describe it, but as soon as I saw it, I was like, we have to talk about that because it's such a great Red Zone idea against a team that plays base against 12 personnel, like 98% of the time.

And they nailed it. That's what they went 12. They, the Cowboys run love double posts. And they'll do it with CD Lamb who runs the Dino route, which is one of my favorites. But here they did post wheel. And this concept, I probably, I can guarantee you what it was calling this offense. Because again, Cullmore, Scott Linahan, which was the same offense, those early 2000 Vikings. It was that place called Echo.

And that's because the posts echo off each other. So they wrote Echo Wheel. And on it, but anyways, the design was they got the base personnel or made the Jaguars match with base. That means this is why I always talk about this. Because if the defense matches with base and they're in a 3-4-type defense or even a 4-3 with a Sam-type. defense on the ball and makes those guys that if they were in sub, those guys turn into defensive ends. Here, they are outside linebackers and they have to be in coverage.

And sometimes that's when you're like, why is Khalil Mack in coverage? Why is Vaughn Miller in coverage? This is why, because the offense gamed him up. And this is what happened. The Cowboys got them. They match. Josh Allen has to run with the wheel route and he does not run with the wheel. Coverage wasn't terrible, but it wasn't.

That's a fish on water moment. His tracking was a little. He was not an outfielder growing up. So that was beautiful. And I think the Cowboys, we talk about the Josh Allen and the past rush, and I think kind of transitioning into why the Cowboys weren't great on offense in some moments in this game.

I thought the Jags front started to affect the game in stretches today. Arden Key had some really nice moments against Tyler Smith. I'll talk about somebody else in a moment that I thought was huge and have like a couple big, big moments in this game. game, but then obviously the pick that Dak threw in the first half, that's a pressure pick. And he actually had a pretty clean pocket on that play. I thought that he was just starting to feel a little antsy because I don't, I think Tyron Smith was out at that point because he started the game at right tackle and they were rotating

him in and out with Jason Peters. And there were a couple moments when Peters came in where I think Dak was starting to feel a little uneasy about how much pressure and how much penetration the Jags were getting. And I think that led to him getting a little antsy on that play, stepping up when he didn't need to. He gets hit as he throws interception. It's kind of how it felt about the final interception. He just was feeling a little bit uncomfortable in the pocket in this game with some of the changes on the offensive line. The one guy, though, that I was just blown away by the plays he made today was DeWan Smoot.

DeWan Smoot. Let me try to find. So he, I want to get him all right because there were so many of them in this game. game. So third and eight in the third quarter, a huge completion of C.D. Lamb that gets the Jags down in scoring range. DeWan Smoot has a TFL on second down. And then it was a strange play where I think it was Lloyd tackles,

deck Prescott and then lets him go for no reason. But he didn't end up getting a completion. So they kick a field goal. So Smoot, with that TFL helps create a field goal. Two drives later, another. TFL to open the drive after the Trevor Lawrence interception. And then on that same drive, it's third down. Same exact idea.

He's an outside linebacker in coverage on third down. He tracks Tony Pollard all the way down the sideline and gets a PPU. He weighs like 270 pounds. And then the best. He had another huge TFL on that drive after the Trevor Lawrence fumble. You talk about why it took. 13 seconds why they got the ball back. He had a TFL on that first play and then he got the pressure on that deep incompletion with on that third down to give them the ball back. I mean,

this is a guy that just role player been around for a few years. He has seen some shit. I guarantee you during his days in Jacksonville. And without him, they do not win this game. And I just wanted to acknowledge that. He's just one of those guys that had an awesome day. I love that. No, this was a great. I thought the Jags did nice time I'm adjusting a passing down. So, the, the Cowboys kept getting into a seven-man protection with the tight end of the running back and bringing them in because Jags will heat you up on passing downs. So they're, that's how you counter it. Okay, we're going to wot it up and then we'll gash you.

And so the Jags started going, okay, we'll just drop everybody and cloud it up. And I actually really like that. It actually helped out the rest of their pass rushers because then they were kind of getting muddled and everything. It was kind of, that's the domino effect of all this stuff is the Cowboys had the initial advantage that we're going to wad this up and gas you. then the Jaggs were like, okay, we won't do that then. And then the Cowboys never got away from it. So it's kind of, and that happened at the last couple drives, especially in the fourth quarter, I kind of saw it. So now the Cowboys aren't getting all their guys out on routes.

Stuff's getting tighter. You know, everything just kind of trickles down. So I know, that's a great shout out. I don't know. This Jack seems fun. I, like you said. Now let's talk about it because beyond how fun the game was and some of the actual nuts and bolts of what happened, this is real. they can absolutely make the playoffs now.

So they're a game back of Tennessee. The Jags have the Jets this week, okay? Let's say on Thursday night, great game. Hopefully we can, let's break that one down after it happens. Yes, what's Cox internet. Come on. Hold up. So let's say hypothetically, the Jags lose to the Jets.

Okay. Just we're being pessimistic. Yes. They have Houston in week 17. Let's give them a win there. Okay. The Titans have Houston in week 16. So let's say the Titans beat the Texans and then they have the Cowboys in week 17.

Let's say they lose to the Cowboys. I think that's totally reasonable. That's being pessimistic about the Jags, a loss and a win and a win and a loss for the Titans. That means in week 18, we have a play-in game for the AFC South. And if the Jags beat the Jets, they have the inside track. They now have, they need help. The Titans need help then. It's crazy.

That's awesome. I love it. It's not far off. It's not some pie in the sky reality now. The Jags absolutely can do this and win the AFC South and make the playoffs. And guess what? I wouldn't want to play them. No.

Would Trevor play it like this? No way. No way. He can get hot on you. They are such a pain in the ass. If I'm a defensive coordinator having to figure out all of this crazy Doug Peterson shit right now, I'd be miserable. Motion screens because you have to, You have to do all the fundamental stuff.

You have to communicate and tackle. Communicate and tackle. And it's like playing an option offense, but not like the scheme wise, but what do you have to do as a defense? No, exactly. Last thing. I do want to give Kalmore one more credit on the little design tweak, by the way, before we get off of this, is that they all the time, they'll use Noah Brown. And they've used CD before on this and Amar Cooper last year was doing this. They'll have the receiver insert on run place.

They'll bring them down, block the safety, fit them up. They have really, they have two really fun kind of tweaks. They've done naked bootlegs off this before, and they did that today. But then they did a little shovel to Noah Brown on a little off that same exact look. Motion them down. The Jaguars were like, hey, we'll run this, this, this. And they ran a little shovel play on second walk. I like that.

That was a nice little change up. It was beautiful. Yeah. And then they had a real throwback to Noah Brown over the ball in, for a touchdown, deep in, like, in the low red zone, which is another really good play design. I don't know, Kelmores has been great this year, really. I think, like, much better than he has, I think, in previous years. I had been much more excited about the Dallas offense. than I have been over the last couple seasons.

A couple things I wanted to point out today. They were the highest under center team in the league since Dak got back. Only like 33% today. So it was a lot more shotgun and they were in pistol a little bit more often. I was wondering why that might be the case. It was a matchup thing. Just something to monitor going forward. Yeah.

To put a period at the end of this for the Cowboys, obviously a frustrating loss. I'm not super worried about Dallas on the whole, but the aspects of the. this team that I am concerned about showed up today. What the right tackle situation is going to look like until Tyron Smith can get all the way back and even that is not a natural position for him. And then what that other outside corner spot is looking like.

Because it's not like they picked on Trayvon Diggs in this game. They didn't, but they got after everybody else in coverage. And when you combine those weak points in coverage with an ability to take advantage of this team's over regression in other aspects of playing defense, I think that's the final result that you got today. And I do think even if other play callers aren't as able to take advantage of that just because they're not as good at this as Doug Peterson is, it is a formula that makes a lot of sense to me against this Cowboys team specifically.

And I do think you can go to that. You have to know when you play against this Cowboys defense, you're going to get punched the mouth a couple of times. Michael Parsons is going to get pressure on you. They're going to get some heat on you. But it's just like you got to stick to it. Like that, that's what it is. It's don't take the bait.

Like, don't play into their hands and start dropping back a bunch. disciplined running the ball and keep stick with your game plan also you have to have a favorable game script but that's the thing jags went down and they didn't blink they just kept at it and they kept doing what they did and it worked for it but no i think i feel the exact like we do the percentages on playoff odds and all that after wins losses and ties like after this loss with the cowboys my feeling percentage about the cowboys didn't change at all like i just stayed stayed the same 72 percent like that's that's kind of how i felt about them so uh but yeah that it was it was a a very entertaining game between two of my like favorite quarterbacks to watch and I thought they

both played well even outside the turnovers. One more thing to mention about the Jags. Cam Robinson went down at one point in this game. If he's hurt long term, Walker Little has actually been okay. I think in relief. You didn't notice that the Jags left tackle got hurt when they were in true dropback situations late in this game when they needed to throw the ball, throw the ball, but just something to monitor when you lose your left tackle for any stretch of time. If it does happen, something to talk about. So one of the reasons that the Jags, win become so interesting is that the Titans go down to the Chargers. And now, Austin Mock from the Athletic, right now with the Chargers sitting at 8 and 6, has the Chargers with an 80.6% chance to get one of those wildcard spots. Never a doubt. Oh, there is a doubt.

That number seems way too high to me. David Hellman, one of our good friends who was on the show a couple weeks ago, works for Fox. He sent me a text about, he's like, the Chargers are just begging you to get back in. I was like, I'm not doing it. I hate them. I'm not doing it. I refuse to get sucked back in. But a couple moments from this game that make it a little bit difficult. Which Herbert throw do you want to start with?

Oh, my God. The one that Keenan Allen down the sideline that I tweeted was pretty awesome. Moving up in the pocket, not flat footed, but off platform and just like he does those looping liner throws. They're line drives, but also have touch. And it's just, it's unbelievable he can do that. The ones down the sideline that he does of that kind are my favorite. Because Josh Allen, Josh Allen throws my favorite crossers. Like the trajectory of the Josh Allen, like the one to Dawson Knox in the last night.

Like that throw that Josh Allen comes where it's like a big vendor coming across the field is always beautiful. And then the Josh Allen just laser beams, like the one he threw to Gabe Davis on that third long that we'll talk about. Like those are my favorite Josh Allen throws. but Herbert down the sideline when he has to layer a throw over someone on the line. That's my favorite type of throw that he makes. He didn't over the shortstop. No one else. No one else really does that where he kind of feathers it with like that sort of touch to the sideline.

Just a different sort of throw than a lot of other people go for. And Herbert's like or boroughs are more loopy. Like like drop it in a bucket down the line. He throws it so early. Yep. And it kind of drops in there. And then Mahomes kind of like bends it. Yeah, and the home says that like one thing to it where it actually expands around people, yes.

Yeah, his is like a slider that gets around. Yeah, no, it's right. No, everyone does have their little flavor on corners, especially or sideline throws. That's a great call. And it's probably because Lombardi makes him throw all those hard-ass throws. That's why we see him do it so many times. At the two-minute drill, not only just the God throw that he had to, Mike Williams made the great catch. But right before that, tweeted it, first play of that drive, high low.

And he, it's a high-low. Austin Echler Chips runs to the flat. They have a corner to Mike Williams. And I can tell Herbert wants to go to the corner so bad? And he's like, God, he's looking at Roger McCreary. And he's like, get down. So he just turns his whole head, looks at Echler in the flat. And then just, and as soon as McCreary jumps up, he just whips the corner out into Mike Williams.

That one was a 25-yard throw that he just makes it look, not-existent. Yeah, with eyes, with timing, with footwork. That play right there. That's when people say, oh, he's a social media, quarterback. It's like, watch that shit. Watch him move his eyes around and manipulate corners. So Roger McCreery is like a good player. Like, I mean, Roger McCurry got the better of Mike Williams a couple times in this game. So there was a third and nine. I thought that Herber had some weird decisions in this game. There was that

third and nine in the second half where the Titans blitz. And the Titans got some pressure when they blitzed in this game. Chargers had some issues to know with it at times. A lot of a lot of loopers. The Chargers's offensive line is we could talk about it. But yeah. he went to Mike Williams in a one-on-one on that third down against the Blitz. And I thought he had Keenan-N-A-N-A-N-O'N-N-the-other-side. And it's because McCrear is just bodying up Mike Williams in that moment. And then that's before we talk about the interception. I've never seen that before.

I've never seen a player catch a ball as he's falling out of bounds and throw it to a player on his team and have it count. And I had, Barnwell seemed to think that it was moving forward, that it was a forward lateral. Because when it happened, I was like, that's technically a laparral. I'd have to assume it. And if it's forward, it shouldn't count. I thought it was at least even, if not backwards, but I didn't watch it that closely. I didn't either. Did he even have control?

Like, he had definitely had control. They said he had possession because he did. Oh, okay. He had possession as he was coming out of bounds. And then so he, the bilateral has to be backwards. Yeah. And they, that's what Gene Sterator said came on half time. And they did rule it as backwards.

But that play by Herbert, that's going to go down it as an interception in the box score, that's exactly where he should put that ball. I'm going to put it out of bounds. And if my guy can't get it, no one else can because no one else could. And McCreery just makes an amazing play on that ball. Yeah. It felt like more like a basketball player saving a ball. That's what it was.

That's exactly what it was. I mean, I've seen one. I'm not going to reference another 2011 Badgers play. I'll save you guys all that. But it's big time championship game. Michigan State player had something like that on a, like a fumble. But it was a,

that one, no, I think that's the exact point that you made was just even that two minute drill with Herbert. Was waiting into the half, waiting into that interception. It's like, it's just such a different,

all quarterbacks have different flavors in two minutes. We talk about making those throws. All I want is for them to play like that all the time. That's exactly it. It's all I want. It's not, people say open up the play calling, but it's not just open up the play calling.

It's opening up the fucking formations. Just letting these guys spread out. and let him make, like, do some damage. Like, like, just run real past concepts over and over. And you watch him do it. And he's just like, boom, boom, boom, whipping outside throws, hit the back of his drop, just left and right, checking it down. He's just so in control.

All these other plays, they just feel so designery to get one guy open. And if that guy's not open, which happens a lot, it's like, yeah, it's hard. And then, tight said a good gameplay. They ran a shit ton of cover two, it felt like, along with the blitzes. They made it hard. The Titans defense kept them in this game. And the second Herbert interception, first one, easy to explain away. That's just a fantastic play.

The second one is a bad decision. That is a bad decision by him. He's forcing that ball in there. And the Titans defense played well enough to win this game. I thought the Titans offense, I mean, it's hilarious. They had 284 yards in this game. I'm trying to figure it out right now. Just do a quick little math.

They had 284 yards. Derek Henry had 163 of those yards of their two. They're 284. I mean, that's, their entire offense today was Derek Henry runs, a couple of Derek Henry screens, a Derek Henry checked down, and then one chunk to a quanko, who I actually am excited about as a player. He's fun. His future is, I'm interested in.

That's all they had. He, he, he's a very explosive when he, the thing with him, I think he was Maryland, was that he was raw, like, he has a blocker and everything. But it was like, they found him. They just let him go. They did it with John Smith once. I mean, that's what, that's what exactly it is. He's a new version of that.

Just let him run laterally and go. The explosive play was a nice little design off of what the Chargers did last week to the Dolphins. Remember I talked about a lot of times was the Dolphins, Tua doesn't find his checkdowns a lot. And the Chargers were just like, hey, we're not going to, if they chip help, we're not going to guard them. So the linebackers and safeties were kind of aimless, kind of floating extra bodies in the middle. So the Chargers did that again because of Quan, he chipped help. And then, so I think it was tranquil comes off of them looking to help out with somewhere else. And then they just ran a play designed to him, like a delay.

So I actually thought that was a I know what you know, what I know kind of play, which always is fun. I don't know. That's what this type of game was. There wasn't like, it was like seven offense of plays that felt like the entire day. Joshua Kelly had tank carries his longest rush was four yards like that. That's not which not really, really making hay. I think it's just a reminder that they just don't have much. I mean, the Titans offense just doesn't have much.

Ryan Tanhill is tough as shit. He gets carted off, comes on, he can barely walk, ends up going 15 to 22 in this game. The only reason I think the Chargers won this game is the pass rush. The Chargers pass rush won them this game. For all the beautiful Herbert throws we want to talk about, the offense was still extremely frustrating. They turned the ball over multiple times. They had some third downs, like just bad breaks. The Keenan Allen drop on that third and three.

the like really nice back shoulder throw on the seam. Yep. But I, another cover too. The only reason that they won this game is because they heated them up on third down. And that's kind of what their formula is right now. They're just blitzing a ton and saying, we're just going to try to get home on third down.

They did it last week and they did it. Last week they didn't blitz as much, but just getting home on third down and having the pass rush take over, that's what they're banking on right now. And that's exactly what happened today. And if that's what the formula is going to be going to the playoffs. We're going to try to heat you up on third down. And we're going to try to have our quarterback make five or six God throws a game.

That's what it is. They're a knuckleball team. Like that's what it is. Hopefully some of them break our way. They're Tim Wakefield with, but also could throw a hundred two mount an hour fastball every once in a while. Yeah. Rumpf had a big sack today.

The Italian guy who's name I can't remember had a van noi. Van Nuys sack was like was freaking awesome. I thought that was Kaleel Mack at first. And then it was. Gonziana. Gazziano. I really wanted to get that guy right. He did the Italian.

Yeah. I love it. So that's, again, huge win for the Chargers. I mean, now they're in the driver's seat. I mean, they absolutely could do this thing. Steal a wild card, get in, and we get to see what they can pull off, even though I think they are a deeply flawed team. The offensive line concerns me.

On the interception, Filer gets called for holding. He's had pretty uneven year. And those are the guys that have played beyond all the injuries they've had to deal with. And then Zion Johnson got beat for a sack today. It's been hard to bank on their entire line playing well all at once. I think that's forced Herbert to make a lot of plays stepping up in the pocket and just being in creation mode. And he can do that, but it obviously makes things a little bit more difficult. It was not this walkover game when you're looking at a Titans team that didn't have

Autry, Amani Hooker, Christian Fulton, David Long, I mean, beyond Harold Landry and the other guys they've lost earlier in the season, it was much harder for the Chargers on offense than you want it to be today, even if they won. Yeah. The thing with the Chargers aligned to, especially in Pass Protection-wise, we all know how they've been in the run game, is that at least like earlier in the year when they played the Broncos, for example, I actually thought the rules were really good. I thought they, like, if the Chargers were the best team I thought against the Broncos

simulated pressures of not wasting the running back. And I was like, okay. So if they get beat, it's kind of more of a talent thing, yada, yada. But then now it's like the Zion Johnson sack, you know, he just gets gamed up. Like his eyes are bad on the play and they loop around him. And he's like, oh, shoot. And he's a smart player. So it's like, ooh, that's, there's one thing you get beat, you know, physically.

But when you start getting gamed up mentally, that's like, that's where it's scary. Because then it's like, okay, what pops first? And you put it on tape. Other teams are going to start noticing it too. So obviously we're looking at a potential play in game between the Titans and the Jags in week 18 to win the AFC South, a couple things break. Right. We could also be looking at a playing game in the AFC North. Because it seemed like even if you were a little bit concerned about the Ravens,

their schedule was such that they were probably going to be able to hold on to this thing until the end. But them losing to Cleveland and the Bengals coming all the way back in that game, Bengals are now 10 and 4, the Ravens are 9 and 5. Austin Mock at the Athletic, his number say he has the Bengals with a 68.5% chance to win the AFC North. crazy. And they have New England, Buffalo, and Baltimore the rest of the way. The Ravens have Atlanta, Pittsburgh, and Cincinnati the rest of the way. Obviously, they play each other in Week 18.

So a huge win for the Bengals to kind of come back and crawl out of that hole. And not only crawl out of that hole, but end up winning by multiple scores against the box. So double-digit win. With no Trey Hendrickson, no Mike Hilton, no Hayden Hearst. Like, way to go, Bengals. Again, a complete team win. just another time where Burroughs figuring it out. I think he was being a little safe early.

And then he was like, okay, this isn't working. Let's try and find some much stuff. Let's push it a little bit here. But I mean, the interception, too, this speaks to the tweaks. And they've done this before, but they're leaning into it again. The interception came on a glance RPO that Burrow has run a million times at LSU. He's done a couple times in the NFL. But again, that's another layer that this offense is adding.

It's a gun run. They're running split zone, which they've shown before. and then they got Chase on a glance route and just great play Carlton Davis played out of his mind he was a unbelievable in the first half unbelievable it's like single-handle like keeping him in the game he can look like the best corner in the world for stretches I mean he gets paid very well based on the way he's played over the last couple years but there are stretches where he's as good as anybody yes that's that's that's exactly what it feels right um what was it oh and then on defense well first off like Donovan Smith is just like bad now But the Bengals, again, talking about game planning and just how their defense especially can just adapt and just figure out what they want to run.

It was funny that in the Bucks were getting after them early, the hard-ass Bucks offense, tons of, I don't know how many guys got smoked as they were catching the ball today. But a lot of throws underneath, but, you know, bangers were getting closer, getting closer throughout the game. You know, the completion completion would lead to a couple of in completions. You know, it was about 50-50. And then the second half, the Bengals just said, screw this, we're dropping eight. and that's what the Trey Flowers Interception came on. Like they did it three times in the second half. They were three for three successful plays in all three.

And then they did a fourth time, which was the late touchdown, the gauge. But it was just one of those where, again, they adapt their game plan. Oh, let's not blitz them up. Let's drop everybody. Let's muddle the lanes. And it worked. And they just took a phenomenal job of reacting in real time. Especially on defense.

Best adjusting team right now. I'm fascinated if he's going to get head coaching looks. off season, right? So, I mean, he's been, in my opinion, you can make an argument that he's been the best defensive coordinator, especially game plan-wise in the league for the last two seasons. Louis and I remember what he's done for Cincinnati. Yep. He's 56 years old.

He's halfway last year. Yeah. He's 56 years old. He's been a position coach for most of his career. He was the interim defense coordinator for the Dolphins in 2015 after being the Dolphins defensive backs coach for six years. I think that's where he knows Zach Taylor. he's only been a coordinator full time for like three seasons.

Personality-wise, he's not the, he's not the biggest guy you'll ever meet. He's not a rah-rah guy. Like that's just he's calculated. Higher or lower than Iber flus. Like that. Oh, I definitely think lower. I think he's definitely less of like a raw, raw guy than Iber flus is.

Hebruflu's all about like hustle. And I mean, I think there's more of that with Iber flus than there is with Luanarumo. He's incredibly thoughtful, very, very smart. obviously and like the way that he thinks about this stuff, he's done a fantastic job. He just has like a calmer demeanor to him. And for being a guy in his mid-50s who's never really been like the hot candidate before, I wonder what the potential interest might look like. He should have it.

Based on what he's done over the last couple of years, he absolutely deserves to have those conversations. It's just very different. Like Brian Callahan, who's the Bengals offensive coordinator. Other end of the spectrum, right? Brian's like 38. He's much more kind of personable. And I think that there's going to be those moments.

He got an interview for head coaching jobs last year. I think he made a good impression. And Lou Anna Ramos was just not that kind of guy. And so I think he absolutely deserves to be in those rooms and have those conversations. But he is not the candidate that really jumps off the page when you think about what the league is looking for. But that shouldn't dissuade teams because he's been fantastic. He's been fantastic. Everybody's coached up.

Doesn't matter who's playing there. adapting game plans in the game in game adjustments one of the best his game plans from the snap one are very good um no i totally agree that's that's the whole thing with the head coaches though like that's my fan joe took so long to be a head coach yes yes everyone's personalities is not you know but you never know sometimes it's the ones that you know don't want the power end up being the best that with it like you just never know those types of things so i don't know he's i i've said this probably 20 times now i've been on a bangal I did this on my wind-the-clock segment.

But I have said that we've talked about on this podcast. It's like I generally enjoy watching their defense every week because I want to see what new wrinkle he has. He's the number one guy for me. What is his plan for this team? Yes. I think you learn about offenses based on the plan he has for that offense. And I think that that's my, the biggest compliment I can pay a defense is that the level

of thought that goes into how they're doing this. teaches me about the team they're playing against. That very rarely does that happen. But I think that's the defense that they've built. It's so amorphous and flexible and they can go to these things midstream. We've talked about this. And even now it should be harder to do because they're dealing with some defensive back injuries. And they were still able to kind of pull some of that stuff out.

It's really impressive. Didn't miss a beat. You know, Dax Hills and Tal's a Talons of Player. Didn't miss a beat. Oh, last stat I have before our next segment is all the QBs, There's nine QBs with 20 or more design runs. Where's Joe Burrow on success rate? I'm sure he's very high.

He's first. That's really funny. 86.4, 19 of his 22 designed runs have been successful. Dak is the only one that's higher, but he only has 15, so that's why I went 20 or more. I thought that was really interesting because last year he only had 10 design runs, and I think now he has 22, 24 maybe. Oh, 22, I just said it two seconds ago. But that's another wrinkle this offense is throwing in here.

It's a very interesting, fun team with talented players, and they're very well coached. It's really cool watching Cincinnati Bengals. And like they, going down 17 nothing to Tom Brady and you wouldn't even guess by the final score and the feelings of this game that they were down 17. Nothing. All right. Let's get to our next one here. The Jets, excuse the Lions with a massive win over the Jets. The Lions, according to Austin Mock's numbers now, have a 73% chance to make the playoffs after winning this game.

That seems extremely high. I thought I was going to be at 55. Whatever it ends up being. So let's say, and they have Carolina next week. So let's say they beat Carolina. I mean, they have a really, really good shot of doing it because now you have Washington at 7, 6 and 1. So if the Lions win next week against Carolina at Carolina, they're at 8 and 7,

they have the Bears in week 17. So they could be 9 and 7 pretty easily. and that gives them a very, very good shot to get in. Because, I mean, the Seahawks would have to, the Seahawks have the chiefs, the jets, and the Rams. So the Seahawks would have to, I think, win out. And the Lions would have to, if the Lions finish 9 and 8 and this, now I'm getting a little out of mine.

I think if the lions finish 9 and 8 and the Seahawks finish 9 and 8, it seemed like the Seahawks get in. I mean, these are all things we'll be able to figure out over the next couple weeks. But the Lions are in a really, really good spot after winning this game today. And they won an ugly one. You know, this is a team that's been rolling on offense.

And they managed to do enough defensively to come away with this. I think that the quarterback play for the Jets certainly contributes to that. But a game that they made enough plays and I think some of the decisions came were incredibly important, some of the fort down things that they did, some of the play designs. I mean, just a huge moment for this Lions, franchise as they kind of kind of as they kind of try to crawl back to relevancy here what and how this lion's team if I were to close my eyes and it's like how does this team win games it's like do enough on defense run the ball hit a couple nice pass plays like that's how I picture his team and like you

said win ugly it's like that's good that they're able to show a win like this with their defense you know even though they gave up some they couldn't catch a uh a greased up duck a couple times. Like they, I don't know how to put that together, that phrase, but even though they couldn't corral those passes in and, you know, a couple of those botched plays. Like the Jets had more explosive plays than the Lions did double. They Jets had eight explosive plays. The Lions had four. And that's been a very explosive. My friend. Oh, I know, I know because of the late stuff. The lines were better passing than running, which they, Jogoff has been on fire the last few weeks, the last couple months, really, but also just the design stuff. Not only like last week with the Pentee-Sul, late

catch. But like they, uh, in the first half on third down, I was noticing was that they had a lot of man beaters against the Jets defense. Yes. They were at some cool designs that I really like. Just change up. Just, you know, pick plays and, and, and, uh, putting St. Brown on a cross or out a bunch, or putting him on motion to an out route. And then the Jets went, okay, enough of that. No more man coverage. The rest of the game. Jets defense played really well in this game. They did. I mean, even without Quentin Williams, they really did. I mean, I want, I want to watch this to I'm really curious to watch back. This is just so me.

And I know, it's just watching the run game. I do. I want to watch how the Jets play the Lions run game because I'm just very curious of what they did and how they played. I mean, they have some dudes, which really helps. But I do want to watch that. But no, this Lions team won ugly, like you said. And they're fond to watch. This is another team with great vibes.

I love watching this offense. I mean, they just, not only just offensive line, golf is doing what he does best. You know, he has some nice clean pockets to work out of, but he always goes to the right read. That's what is one thing you appreciate about golf. He's going to go put the ball where it should go. Is always perfect? No, does he create? No, but it's going to go.

So if he has a good situation and his guys are winning, it's going to get there, even if he throws the deep ball of Jameson Williams a little short. But it's like, I do really like watching this offense. St. Brown and Jameson Williams and the other receivers, it's a really fun group. So, yeah, I don't know. This Lions team just keeps putting them together and they're well-co. coached and the Jets, you know, bought some clock management at the end of the game that helps out as well. Oh, we can talk about that.

So some of the hit, I think the lion's kind of a mixed bag today in terms of hidden value. First drive of the game, they go forward on fourth down inside the five. Quincy Williams makes a ridiculous play on fourth and one stuff, no points. Then pin back, which that's part of the benefit of going forward on fourth and one. Yes. Kaleef Raymond catches a punt at about the 50 and returns it for a 10. touchdown. This is one of those really quiet things. The Lions have done extremely well this year. They have gained 45 EPA total on special teams this season. That is 13 more than any other team

in the NFL. Only eight teams have more than 10 combined EPA on special teams this season. The Lions have 45. Wow. That's big. At least two fake punts. So that adds to it too. Fake puns. And then Even last week, they had the huge punt return that set them up with the great field position. They have consistently gotten a lot of value out of that. And then the fourth and one that they went for to score the touchdown at the end, I believe, and you can correct me if I'm wrong on this. I believe that Quincy Williams was supposed to be in man coverage on Brock Wright on that play. It's hard to tell from the broadcast tape. But I believe he was.

They were in man coverage. and I think C.J. Mosley was the whole player. On every fourth, third and short, Quincy Williams is playing like a bad out of hell this entire season. We just talked about him blowing up a fourth and one inside the five. So they want to play action where they're taking advantage of that and Brockor Wright slips out, 50-yard touchdown game winner. It's beautiful. Like the decision to go for it, the play call itself, the design, every aspect of it was great.

I don't love kicking a 54-yard field goal on fourth and five. That probably wasn't necessary, but in the aggregate, the decisions and the way they go about this has tended to help them over time. No, that's a great call. The fourth and inches and it's the lions with Dan Campbell, what do you think they're going to do? Oh, they're going to slam it. Yeah, exactly. We're right in there.

They're a duo or power. They're pulling guys. No, they're growing right at you. So, yeah, nice little change up. They get rewarded. Fortune favors the bold. Like we've seen, that's the thing. They had their bottom out game against the Patriots where they couldn't hit a single fourth down and they're like, oh my God, it was ugly, got blown out of the water.

So they got them out of their system. So now all these decisions are great. And even that fourth down where they got stopped near the goal line, it should have been a walk-in score. They, two guys end up blocking the same guy and then knocked each other off the block. It was two tight ends, I believe. And they end up knocking, they end up blocking each other off the guy they're supposed to be blocking. if one of them blocks the guy, it's a walk-in touchdown or at least like hit at the goal line scoring. So it's kind of like it wasn't even that bad of a decision or play call.

It was just, you know, it comes down on execution sometimes. On the jet side of this, some frustrating aspects to this game. Well, actually one more Lions note. James Houston's legit. Holy shit. That guy's awesome. He's fun. He had sack in this game.

He had three or four pressures that resulted in negative plays for the Jets. his bend and the balance and flexibility he has coming off the edge. Just a sixth round pick who's 24 years old from, where is he from? Jackson State. So he played at Florida before transferring to Jackson State, six round pick, six one. Nothing about him. Nothing's overly. He ran a 474 at the combine.

Dude. And I watched him as stuff and I was like, okay. Might not even be the combine. Pre-Jaffed measurable is 4-7-4. I don't know where he did it. He's probably at some pro-day somewhere. He's like a bow and arrow. They just pull him back and he just goes.

He had 16 and a half sacks last year in his only season at Jackson State. He had 16 and a half sacks. That guy is amazing. Watching him go at it. Both of these teams have very good situational third down rushers. Bryce Huff has been fantastic for the Jets. But this guy is legit. I'm excited to continue to watch him.

I know. It wasn't a one-game thing with him. No. I mean, he's had moments. I mean, he's only played like four games this year. Yeah. And he has jumped off the screen in every single game that he's played. Yeah.

So let's get to the Jets, though. The clock management at the end, I was screaming at my TV. Yelling. So they get the ball back with a minute and 54 seconds left in three timeouts. All three timeouts. All three timeouts. Zach Wilson hits Garrett Wilson in the third and 19 completion. Yep.

116 when he catches that ball. Next play, Wilson catches the ball with 49 seconds left at around the 50 yard line. They have three timeouts when he catches that ball with 49 seconds left. They snapped the ball on their next play with 31 seconds left. They let 18 seconds take off the clock from the time he caught it to the time they snapped the ball with three timeouts left. They used their first time out. with 19 seconds left in the game after that John Kaminsky sack. I just don't understand how that happens.

I don't understand why. Like, I know there's no, like, so the second, the Zach Wilson's bottom out game, uh, against the Patriots as well.

He had, uh, they stopped using their timeouts because I, screw this for it. And then they pawned the ball. I get that because it's like, hey, we're just going to go into overtime.

They're trained to win here. Why are you holding onto them? I don't, I don't get, even though, The miracle play from Sack Wilson to Elijah Mitchell, Elijah Moore, sorry, is that Elijah Mitchell is my leader for rushing yards this year. He throws it the entire jet's sideline. Not a single guy is telling him to get down.

I'm like, I'm wondering what this whole team's like clock awareness is because I think like the line coach is like waving him home. Like go. And it's like, no, down. Everybody on that sideline should be screaming at him to go down. So I don't know. That was really strange to me. The first, not burning the first time out after the third and long, extra long conversion, I'm okay with not burning it, even though you have three and

you're trying to get a field goal. I'm like, okay, I can understand that one. The one, what you just said, the 49 seconds, I had that 48 seconds, whatever. At midfield, they're 40, I don't get that one at all. What's the point? There's just, there's no reason not to. There's no reason not to. As soon as he goes down, I was like, why are they not taking timeouts?

To lose a game where you kick a field goal on first and 10. and you run out of time. And you barely get in the game with a timeout. You have a time out in your pocket and you kicked a first and 10 field goal from 50-something yards and you lost. That's brutal. That is really hard to stomach. The other part of this that's tough to stomach for the Jets, it really does feel like if Mike White plays in this game, they might win. Because every single big play they had in this game, almost every single one, is Garrett Wilson fighting through a passenger fear.

Jeff Smith making a play on a jump ball. 50-50 balls just chucked up like as prayers. And the one to Michael Carter that you tweeted out is just hilarious. Like it just gets popped up in the air. It looks like a floating duck. And Carter just comes out of nowhere to steal it from out of midair. And the interception, I just don't even, I can't even begin to explain what the decision is on that play. he's blacked out.

He's just like, okay, I'm throwing this. It's weird. It's like his body told him to do it. Like, his brain was like, okay.

Yeah, that one. The popped up one to the Michael Carter dunked on the guy was like just funny. Like it was just like, because when it happened, how many times have you seen that when the quarterback gets hit as he's throwing it?

Even though it didn't really, it was weird. He was going down, but his arm didn't get out. It was weird. But when you see that ball popped up, it's like here comes some safety running off the screen, catching it like a punt.

And you don't, usually see you're running back dunking on a defender towards the sideline when that happens. So there's a few of those. I mean, he even had like a bootleg where he hit. Garrett Wilson's fantastic, by the way. He's just, oh, my God. But he had like a bootleg where he drops. His guy is undeniable when you watch him.

He's like that guy's just different. Yeah, he moved. I'm realizing like him and like Brandon I, you cut from the same cloth where it's like there's sloppy route runners, but they're so freaking explosive. It's like, who cares? So it's a learning lesson. I mean, I liked them, but I didn't love him. So it's a learning lesson.

But he, Zach Wilson, he is a free bootleg where he's running towards the sideline, just no one within 10 yards of him. And it makes a nice throw, but it was late. It wasn't part, it was out of structure on a naked when he wasn't pressured, which was just like, it's like, it's like, it's like an oxymoron almost. You never really hear that where the quarterback could just keep running and it becomes the outer structure play. And he loops it over and it looks like a really nice play. And I'm going to assume on all 22, it's like, that was like, end up becoming a broken play because he throws it late. And it's like, ah, just like you say. Mike White at least does stuff in structure.

And yes, this is always the great to the flash with Zach Wilson. And there's like, yes, he can do those crazy plays. But it's all the in between stuff. That's just like, what are you doing? And that's those add up generally. And that's why you lose games like this when it comes down to this. There was a sack in the two minutes drills a second and 20. And he bailed from the pocket unnecessarily and got sacked.

And you see George Phamp being like, why? I mean, he does the shrug as it happens. Why? Why? And then Garrett Wilson visibly frustrated with an overthrow on third down. And when those guys on the offense just can't contain how frustrated they are with some of things that are happening, that's when it's tough. And we kind of had a sense of that earlier in the season. There's a reason he wasn't their starting quarterback for this stretch.

So now you have a Jets team that it felt like it was all going the right way, felt like the drought was over. And now it's another year it's looking like where they probably aren't going to make the playoffs. and that's probably fine, right, based on the trajectory and based in some of the young talent that they have. And I am enthusiastic about the underlying aspects of the Jets roster of the Jets organization. It now becomes a quarterback question and what happens next. But it felt like they were going to have those questions looming over them and still make the playoffs. Where you have that in your back pocket, it's like, man, we made the playoffs. We're taking a step in the right direction.

And we have so much further to go. Now the first part of that seems like it's been. ripped the way, unfortunately. Yeah, that's the thing is that it was, at first, it was like, oh, we're making the playoffs, how far can we go? And then now it's like, oh, can we make it there? And that is just, that's tough. And especially when it's like, there's so many good players on this team and such a fun team. That defense is so much fun. How they slowed down this lion's offense, this lion's offense is legit, legit. And they slowed them down. They made it a slog, a fist fight the entire game. And then that's the thing with Mike White. Mike White could at least do enough where it's like he's

hitting those throws on schedule and on time. And that's, yeah, I don't know. It's, it is tough. It's tough to watch because it's like, they are so close. And it's just like, you can see exactly where they need help. And it's like, but of course, that's the most important position in all sports. Yeah, just a small thing. Going to get a quarterback. It's just a small thing. All right. We're going to take one more quick break. And then we're going to talk about yesterday's games because, I mean, we have to think about what happened yesterday. Talk to you guys in a second. All right. So let's start with the incredible game from last night. Just a, just a beautiful game. We talked about earlier, but just the snow and the uniform matchup and the stakes and just the storyline surrounding both of these teams and the dolphins bounce back and what would they look like. And, you know, I had been concerned about the bill's offense and the state of the bill's offense. They'd had some low moments over the last month or so, been inconsistent and uneven. And then they come out both of those teams and just give us everything you could want from a regular season NFL game. I guess we should start with Josh Allen.

I just just one of those games I I joked about this during the game he was playing like a shirtless drunk guy in a snowstorm and buffalo jumping through a table like he was channeling that exact energy into playing quarterback in an NFL game he was five feet off the ground horizontal on a two point conversion that ended up being a huge moment in the game that last Last night was the entire Josh Allen experience from start to finish. The two minute drive, I mean, like, it's just, I tweeted it. It went 72 yards in a minute and five seconds. It's the eighth one out of the world is watching Josh Allen in a two minute drive because

it's just let him go. Just let this guy go. Let the ostrich go. No, but his, yeah, his patroness charm is a drunk guy jumping through a table when Josh Allen needs to do that. That's what it manifests into it. But my first note when I knew we were. talk about this game is Josh Allen is still Josh Allen.

And it's just the first touchdown throw where he's extending out of the pocket, hits a back shoulder. He's hitting like third and 20s or third and 17 digs to Gabe Davis late. And it's just hitting the guy. They almost hit another one. He almost hit McKenzie in another third and 15 in this game. So they're both the jets, or excuse me, both the Chiefs and the Bills are four of 12 on plays of third and 15 or longer this season.

So they're converting 33% of them. no one else in the league has converted more than three. So they've converted four teams, I believe, I can't remember the stat now. It's like 9% over the last like 10 years or so. And they're converting them 33% of the time. So they combined have eight of those this season, those two teams, third and 15 conversions. The rest of the NFL has 26 of them combined between the other 30 teams. On third and long in general, they're just like both of the like ridiculous rates.

I think the chiefs are like a historical rate this year. It's, yeah, man. The TD drive to, to take the lead, you have the empty run play to Josh Allen, which is just a tremendous weapon. We see the Eagles weaponize it with hurts, but just even like Josh Allen's the same, you know, it's from the same breed. Like, because they're just so big and fast. And so he gets one crease of space. That's the thing about having size and speed. I mean, obviously it's force and everything.

That's going to be a good thing is he has an. speed to get to the edge or get to the hole when a hole actually develops, or it's the line of scrimmage, I should say. He actually has that speed. And on top of it, he's so big, he can bounce off those arm tackles. You see a lot of guys where everyone's like, well, he ran this at the combine. It's like, he's not big enough or you have to have a special type of juice. It's the Kyle Shanahan discussion about RG3 and Johnny Football. He's like, yeah, Johnny Football ran like, whatever, a 468. That's not 445 that RG3 ran. That's different speeds getting to the edge. So he does that. he scrambles in the red zone on another play.

Then he throws with anticipation to Dawson Knox for the touchdown. And then he leaps over the pile for the two-point conversion, where it's just like, he's a monster. Like he's his own thing. And I really like that at the end, the bills are still finding their way with all the other stuff. Sometimes it looks great. Sometimes it doesn't. The run game and everything.

What was cool was seeing him in the fourth quarter on that game-winning drive was getting to the run game and a true run game, a non-josh-Allen run game. They ran one draw. They had another draw outside of the Josh Allen draw. But other than that, they had a couple like six, seven yard gains to salt that thing away. And that's huge for them. Those are, it's so funny. They can do all the hard stuff.

It's just those little getting on base, those five, six, seven, eight yard runs. They do the tackle trap with a package play with it where, you know, Diggs is running of his little out route. So like that's good that they can do that on top of all the Josh Allen runs, like the GT counters and stuff. So it was, it was a very encouraging. performance from them and even encouraging performance from the dolphins. We'll talk about them in a sec, but they did some good stuff too. But I, again, this is another reminder. It's like, holy shit, this Josh Allen guy is really, really special.

There was a drive when he threw 85, his name. I can't remember right now. It's 1215. We've been doing this for two days, two straight days. The touchdown to 85, or he whizzes it past the linebacker's head. That drive, they went 72 yards and three plays in a minute and five seconds. He has the under center play action Crosser to Dawson Knox,

which we talked about earlier, is one of the most beautiful balls he throws. And then there's a little checkdown swing to Devon Singletary, and then he whizzes the ball past the linebackers head, 72 yards, touchdown, three plays. The two-minute drive, the most impressed part of the two-minute drive,

is that he's creating those plays outside of structure. Two plays in a row. Jalen Phillips beats Greg Van Roten. Two plays in a row. and Alan just immediately escapes to his right, finds Isaiah McKenzie on the run for a huge chunk. And then on the next play, it happens again. Phillips is incensed.

He slams the ground after he misses him. And there's a defensive hold. They score a touchdown 2113. And even that last play, as time expires to hit James Cook for the touchdown is one of those plays where it's a no, no, no, no, no, yes play. And that's, hey. It's Professor Chaos. That was it.

Like that touchdown was just like, what else can you say? Like it's just you shouldn't be doing this, but it works brilliantly with him. The defensive side on the other side of the ball, I think that the box score is kind of unnecessarily cruel to the passing game because there are some drops in this game. Trent Sherfield drops a touchdown. Tyree Killet a couple balls hit his hands. So I was actually very encouraged by the Dolphins offense, even throwing the ball, even if the numbers might not jump off the screen when you're looking at it,

the way their running game looked in this game, I think is the biggest takeaway. The numbers are pretty remarkable. So they averaged 7.5 yards of carry. They had a 58% success rate. 0.42 EPA per rush. Patrick Mahomes is at like 0.3 for the season passing the ball. Passing. So that is an insanely effective, efficient, explosive running game.

And they were doing it in all kinds of ways. That's great. gap scheme runs, zone runs, from all these different formations, I was extremely impressed with their ability to tap into that version of the offense. And then when they needed to take some shots, whether it was some, I think the two big ones, the one to wattle outside the numbers on the right side line was against cover three. And the one on the touchdown, I think, was man. But it was two one-on-one spots where he was like, I'm just taking this down the

sideline. I know this is a hard throw. I know you're wanting me to take this. I'm going to because my guys are better than yours, even if Trey writes one of them. And that's the results were pretty damn good for the dolphins. So I was pretty encouraged by the way that they played in this game. When I wrote up that Chargers Dolphins game last week, and I watched the second half, I had that's, I came, same conclusions.

You asked me even on the Thursday show when we have some internet issues, was I was kind of going, I was looking at it. I was like, I had people also asked me. It's like, would the dolphins be able to adapt? And I'm like, they kind of were in the second half. Like they were, they stopped running RPO's. I mean, they still do. But they went.

And this is the line I always say, they separate church and state. They just went, no, we're just going to run straight run place. It's the same lesson that the chiefs and the bills have gone through when their RPO heavy offenses. And the dolphins did it on the fly against the chargers in the second half. They called the same plays that they did. But they said, we're not tagging any pass on their pass routes. You guys are blocking. And that's what they, they went into this game and said their first run.

I think it was just an eye. formation under center run zone play and they just boom out the gate and you brought up the 58% success rate they had 24 designed runs and none of those are going to be two uh um on the they had 24 combined designed runs against the 40-nires and the chargers so that's learning that's eating their vegetables and learning their lesson they and they've already done up in 21 personnel and we know they're going to match a nickel and we with we have to run the ball and i thought that they did such a great job of using motion in the run game. Consistently in this game where you're getting the linebackers to bump over one gap

and they were getting guys to the second level because of it. They were just creating angles in the run game with motion and simple outside zone runs on some of these plays. But if you can get guys onto linebackers because you're bumping them over like that, they had a very good sense for how to pull the bill's defense on a string formationally and with motion to get angles in the run game. And they hit it consistently. even the most are completion checkdown swing whatever you want to call it on the first drive

and that first and 15 is a huge chunk play I mean they are I think he was 32nd to it was in the NFL and the percentage of his passes that were five yards or closer to the line of scrimmage it was like 37% of his total throws which is 32nd or 33rd in the NFL coming into this game so finding little tweaks finding little counterpunches it was an encouraging game from them overall I wholeheartedly agree I came even though they came out with the law The bill's defense is really freaking good. I think we've kind of lost our way. I know they lost Von Miller,

but it's like they still are really good. Von Miller was the cherry on top of the Sunday. They still have the Sunday. I am a little bit concerned about the long-term health of the past rush. I am. Well, that's kind of that their thing, though. They win with bodies and they just kind of like,

they force pressure on it, like over and over. It's always run out of gas by the end, though. That's why you make the Von Miller trade. Or that's why you sign him. That's why you do it is to put yourself over the time. But we'll see what it looks like in the long run. Yeah.

I'm a tiny bit concerned about that. It is, it's still a good unit though. That's the thing. It's not like they lose vulnerability or they become average or poor. Like it's not like the, you know, losing Khalil Mack. You know, if this Chargers team, if they lost him. Like they actually have other guys that play well. But no, I just also want to talk about one little game design or it was right at the red zone is the Tyree Kill touchdown.

And they must have been, the dolphins must have been waiting for that look, either in the high red zone or near it. Because the bills come out. They're a man. coverage and they bring a five-man pressure on it, which is just both kind of like, okay, that's interesting. But when they came out in the look, Tua checks into it. And they check into a seven-man full-slide protection. And they just run three verticals where in a two, it looks off the safety, hits Tyreek.

And I like that because that meant they were waiting for that time to take a shot. So they had that in their bag. So my one complaint before them before was that they always just hit the easy buttons and their money plays. They got those taken away. They've already shown that they can adapt. This isn't theory. Like Mike McDaniel has already shown good signs of how he's going to move this offense for it.

So yeah, it's a credit to them even with the loss. Bills played, I believe, more than 30% man coverage in this game. They did it a lot on early downs though, which I think is if you look at some of the designs that the dolphins had, especially early in the game on third down, they were trying to run some crossers, do some pick plays, run man beaters on third down. bills were just bailing into zone. And so it was a nice little wrinkle by them. They also blitzed more than they typically would or than teams typically have against the dolphins. So we talked about this coming into the game.

The bills have been a little bit more willing to be game plan heavy and not just say this is what we do this year. And I think this is another example of that. The last Josh Allen play that we did not mention is the one in the third, it was 12 of 4 in the third quarter. The dolphin sent that big blitz on third down. And he somehow escaped out to his left and lofted that ball with an ox. And Mark Sanchez was just chuckling as it was happening.

He went, oh, like as the play is happening. Yes, it was, yeah, because that's, that's the reaction. That's the only, wait, he makes it look so normal. It's not normal. We got, we got to stop thinking this stuff as normal because that's ridiculous what he's doing. Speaking of not normal, the Vikings were down by 33 points yesterday and came back and won a game against the Colts. Wow. Where do you even want to start with this?

Like, everything that was going wrong, it was such a comedy of errors. Block punt, cook fumble, fourth and one stuff, fake punt, down 20 and a nut. The punter sails the ball. It is hard to throw the kicking ball. That's an underrated thing, by the way. Whenever someone. Just go for it. It's a runner fake button down 20 and nothing.

Just go for it. Yeah. Oh, Rager drifting to cause an interception. Oh, my God. He caused both interceptions. God, dang. But yeah, though it's, yeah, and the Colts were teeing off on everything underneath. Like, they're like, hey, they're not pushing it.

Let's just, what's play downhill. And then everything else happened in that game. everything else that was it was insane every time i looked off i was like right there this is happening you can feel even the stadium getting more into it as the game went along obviously but it was crazy that actually happened i mean just so much soft zone coverage that i mean i don't oh my god it's one of those games where i want to destroy the colts for how they handled the second half but i also understand how they were handling it's like i we'll just let them complete some stuff underneath and then you know it's can literally it never happened in NFL history

for our team to come back from 30 points down. And somehow it happens. I just, and now the Vikings, the ghost of Frank Reich. I know. I know. I mean, it was a conversation yesterday on the internet about what this says about the Vikings and everything else.

I don't know if it says much about the Vikings other than their offense can get rolling. And we know that. Like, they have a quarterback who can absolutely get hot. We've seen him get hot a million times. They have, from my money, best receiver in the league. KJ. Osborne had a massive day yesterday. I was so out on him going into last week and then he shreds it. That's how it goes.

I will say this idea that I know that the two fumbles were called back and obviously it's a couple bad breaks in that game. The Vikings this season have accepted, they have 41 first downs by penalty. No one else in the league has more than 32. They've accepted 27 more penalties than have been called on them only the falcons have more they've added 13.3 EPA per penalty this year on offense only the Broncos have more so there is not some grand conspiracy from the from the referees that are holding back the Minnesota Vikings this season just want to be clear about that it's just the refs of general no I I was the the offense I just can't I still we're probably could break him down again and I'm going to be like I still don't know what they are like as far as what

they're good at because it just depends I will say that they do know how to adapt and get their guy going, their guy being Justin Jefferson. The Lions game last week was, it was really cool to see was the lines doubling them, doubling them, just like they did the first time they played. And then seeing the Vikings figure out ways to get Justin Jefferson open

which one of the cool. Those are little things that are cool in football, is watching the scheme and the counter adjustments to each other. But they do try. And the Redso designs are good. And it's just that the sustainability sometimes is just, you're very it's very inconsistent. That's

That's how this team always feels. And we can keep talking about that. And I think it's a totally fair point. You know, if you look at any metric, like they are, and that was part of the conversation yesterday. It's like the joke about whether the Vikings are good. Asking whether the Vikings are good isn't a statement that the Vikings are bad. The Vikings are somewhere in the middle.

Like the Vikings are somewhere in a very large group of middle ground teams in the NFL who have had a lot of fortunate breaks over the course of a 14 game schedule. They had some unfortunate breaks yesterday and still managed to win that. game. They deserve a shitload of credit for not just not backing down in that game and not folding. They deserve an unbelievable amount of credit. What it takes for you to have that sort of hold over your locker room for them to come out and even think they had a chance in hell to win that game says a lot about the overall influence

that Kevin O'Connell and that staff has had on that team because maybe this is reading a little bit too much into it. If that situation happens last year and under the previous regime, I think they pack up and go home. And they didn't yesterday. And they deserve a ton of credit for that. And they've done that all season. And I really do think that it feels different in that building and it has felt different in that building from the moment that he got there. That doesn't mean that this game says that the Vikings are one of the best teams in the NFL. But guess what? Do they have to be? Do they have to be based on the way the rest of the NFC looks and the way that the rest of the entire playoff picture looks? There are no truly great teams in the league right now.

They're just dominating people on either side of the ball. I think the Eagles are pretty damn good. I think the bills at their best are pretty damn good. And the chiefs have Patrick Mahomes. Right. We've seen the Cowboys have really uneven performances over the last few weeks. We know that the Niners, while the rest of that roster is fantastic, they have a rookie seventh round pick who is now their quarterback. and I think that the takeaway from Thursday that it doesn't matter who plays quarterback for the Niners is really interesting to me.

They did not run away with that game. I still have my doubts about what the Niners' offensive ceiling looks like when playoff time comes against really, really good teams, even if I do think Brock Perry is in a very good job. But if you're the Vikings, you are going to make the playoffs. You are going to host a home playoff game. Yeah. It's only been like 10 months since a team that looked a lot like the Minnesota, Minnesota Vikings in every single advanced metric, in some of the luck stats that we talked about,

in the inconsistencies of their offense, went to the Super Bowl and almost won it. So it can happen. And I'm not saying it can't happen. It's just hard to do it for three, four games in a row in the playoffs when you aren't that complete high-level contender. But that doesn't mean it can't happen. It has not been that long since we just watched it. It's the NFL.

It's any given Sunday. And when you have the best player on the field, pretty much every game you're going to play in because of the way that number 18 is playing, you're going to have a shot. And that quarterback can get streaky as hell. And I think that if he gets hot in one of those games, like you did against the Lions last week, even though the defense let them down, that's what's concerning to me. It's not about the offense. I think the offense absolutely has a ceiling with how much they're pushing the ball. down the field now since Hawkinson got there and what they've looked like in the passing game since that trade happened and how the structure of it has changed. And the offensive line with Darrow

saw back, even though I'm still concerned about the interior. I still think their offensive ceiling can take them a lot of places. The defense is concerning. They played against a team this week that has been one of the worst offenses in football over the course of the season. And the defense is the thing that was bottoming out over the last few games. So that's where I would have the most concerns. But I think their offense, of ceiling, they can get hot and they can give you problems. And they're going to be in the playoffs and we'll see what ends up happening. Yeah, a few weeks ago, that's why I said, they're fine.

It's just that, you know, we're just looking, like you said, you look at all the underlying metrics and you wait, you try, you're, we're analyzing this as well. We're just trying to go like, hey, this is what they have to improve on. This is what is not sustainable or what we don't think. But the thing is they can, like you just said, they air that ball out. Explosive plays, you know, can be kind of a coin flip stuff. We say 50-50 balls and everything. They do it in a different way than just go balls.

But what if you hit all? What if you win seven out of eight coin flips in your game? Like that can happen in the NFL. There are always a lot of teams that I've been around, they always say just the goal is to get to the dance, which is the playoffs. Yes. Anything can happen in the dance. Anyone can win. So, and the Vikings have enough guys and enough.

They're very like a professional team. That's not like the best compliment I can give. Absolutely they are. That's what is. And that's kind of how the Bengals felt last year. Yes. They're professional. They're not like a laughing stock where it's like, wow, this team's super.

It wasn't like, remember the Cardinals got hot at the beginning of last year and it was just like, I don't know though. Like, I don't know how much that how this can sustain. I don't get that with the Vikings. It's more just like there's a lack of consistency with them, but they can get their upper peaks are really good. And so that's just what we're always kind of like questioning about them is what they can hit. But that's the thing. They're making the playoffs. And it's good.

And it's fun. And that's fun. They're a fun team. So the last thing I want to say, before we get out of here, joking about whether the Vikings are good, which became a bit on this show, because it was, who knew over the first eight games of the season? And we would ask everyone that came on, asking and joking about whether the Vikings are good is not saying the Vikings are bad. There are many answers over that large spectrum of what an NFL team can be. And they have been hard to pin down. They are not a bad team by any stretch. And I think that's important for me to communicate before we end this show. notes and ice. Again, that's a great point you brought up. They could have folded any time that game. It sucks to get blown out in the NFL. And you don't have some backup freshman you can play like in college when you're getting blown out. They're like, hey, get them some reps. No, your starters are playing through all those four quarters. And do you think they want to

fit up on duo or just run down on kickoff and block on punt return? Like, do any of that? No, they don't want to do that in a blowout. So the fact that they just kept competing, it does speak to them. So I'm so glad you brought that point up because they keep competing. This Viking teams always competes in every game. That speaks to what they're doing there. Yeah, it absolutely does. All right. That is all we got. We're getting on two hours here. There was no other way to do this show. An absolutely insane two days of football. Sincerely appreciate you guys sticking around and running through all of it with us. I will be back tomorrow with Mike Sando. We're going to do something a little bit different with the Monday hangar.

We talked about all these games essentially today. So we're going to do something a little bit different. chat about just the football or quarterback landscape, you know, with Sando. He wrote about his QB tiers and an update on them last week. So we're going to dig into that with Mike. In the meantime, if you have not subscribed to our YouTube channel, please do. Would love if you did that. We'll do these live shows on Sunday night. Obviously, every single week.

Hopefully we'll do a Thursday night recap with a huge game between the Jets and the Jags on Thursday night. So please come back and check that out. Please, if you have not, subscribe to The Athletic. Theathletic.com slash football show. is where you can do that. Read all the fantastic NFL coverage that we have on the site. Really appreciate you guys. Sticking around with us tonight.

We'll talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show.