The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Week 18 Recap: The playoffs are here! Bills win AFC East, Texans win AFC South, Packers get in the dance, Arthur Smith gets fired, and more

Episode Date: January 8, 2024

The playoff field is set. Which Wild Card matchup can we not wait to see? Which potential matchup do we hope to get to see a couple weeks from now? Robert Mays and Nate Tice start getting pumped for the playoffs on this episode of The Athletic Football Show. Plus, C.J. Stroud and the Texans win the AFC South! Jordan Love is a dude! Is Bill Belichick done in New England?! Arthur Smith's done in Atlanta, we know that. Plus, a whole lot more.Follow Robert on Twitter: @robertmaysFollow Nate on Twitter: @Nate_TiceSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube 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. How you doing, buddy? I'm doing very well. I found a sweatshirt in the closet, so that put me in a good mood today. And I can wear that because Wisconsin basketball is playing well, so I feel some pride

wearing it right now. But I am doing very well. Awesome, week 18, starting with Saturday into Sunday. Great action. Every game was fun. Yeah, a lot of interesting things to talk about. entering wildcard week, which is going to be fantastic. I know we're going to be talking about that, but great, great, great, great week 18.

Good way to wrap it up. Fantastic weekend of football. Colts Texans was everything I wanted it to be last night. Playoff energy. A lot of stuff we'll dig into with that one. Today, there were entertaining, meaningful, juicy results the entire day that ended with a fantastic Sunday night football game that was pretty much everything you could have wanted from a Buffalo Bill's performance in 2023.

one of the most Josh Allen games that has ever Josh Allen in every single way. We got a Red Zone wonky turnover. We got an unnecessary fumble. My favorite thing, we got a wild horse bull in a china shop, third and 13 scramble with the game on the line. That's great. My favorite thing he did in this game,

though, was the looking at the sideline wall sneaking. Josh, they'll tell you, they will let you know if you got the first hour. Just just just. move forward. They'll let you know. Don't worry about it. You don't have to concern yourself back. He did it twice. He did it twice on that final drive. He's, yeah, he's everything. He's everything. Professor Chaos was in full effect. We got it early. We usually get that. We got it early. It hasn't even gotten to the playoffs yet. We got a nice little sampling of week 18. It's like we got more of this to come. Cannot wait. A lot of the chaotic energy from the bills, but a lot of the good that comes with the Buffalo bills as they wrap up the two seed with a huge. huge win against Miami. They will win the AFC East. They will host a playoff game.

They will play at home until the AFC championship game. All shit that absolutely matters. And there are elements of this bill's team today that I give you a lot of credit for for identifying and believing in about the bills for years, but especially over the last few weeks. Even with all that chaotic energy and some of the turnovers, Josh Allen made some big plays and some big throws in this game in the same way that he always does. The fadeaway goal ball to Stefan Diggs. the throat of Dalton Kincaid down the left sideline in the little pick play, which poor Melvin Ingram. Melvin Ingram signs with the dolphins on December 12th. This guy is two weeks removed from the same Thanksgiving meal all of us had.

He thinks he's going to be a situational pass rusher that has to play 10 snaps a game. And now he's having to cover Dalton Kincaid 20 yards down the field. Shuffling. He was shuffling with him. He was like, oh, my God. He was, oh, yeah. As a man who's got the Thanksgiving Christmas 15 on right now, I feel very bad for Melvin Ingram in that moment. But a great play by the bills. It was great. Same kind of deal. Kalil Shakir,

slot fade kind of pick play in a huge moment. And something you've said about the defense consistently. And they showed up in this way in the second half. We talked about this defense being a potential game plany sort of unit that when they get to the postseason, they can throw some weird stuff at you because they have veteran players. They have some versatile pieces. And they have an experienced defensive play caller. And I thought that's what you saw in the second half. Some of those three safety looks, some of the moments that we got from the D.Bs, and Tua was in hell. I mean, to steal a turn from you, the walls of Jericho were in play for Tua and the Dolphins passing game in that half. And I think those are the elements. That's the seasoning with this Dolph, or this might with this Buffalo team specifically

that I think can get you excited about what sort of postseason challenge they might be for anybody. It's the, they were bringing blitzes stuff. I, aggressive stuff that you don't really see from this Bill's team. Sometimes we've seen once in a while in the past. Remember the game actually that Ken Dorsey and of getting fired for. There's a cover, there's emotional cover zeros.

But that's when they had, they started ahead to get to that. Was Sean McDermott had to get experiment tea with his defenses and bring a little bit more funky than he likes to. He usually just likes to sit and cover three and cover four and just make you play nickel and dime you. And now this defense is their 10th and weighted DVOA. Their third in EPA per drive since week 11.

I just picked like an arbitrary halfway point. I just said week 11, sure. Why not? But that seems right. It gives you a general feel for what this team feels like. Yeah, and then they're more middle of the pack, like 14th, 16th and all the success rate metrics. And that feels about right. They feel about the 12th best, 14th best defense right now.

But again, it's that kind of Bengals, Lou Anirombo stuff and Sean McDermott stuff. That's exactly where they would end up typically. Those Bengals teams were somewhere in the middle over the last couple of years. And if you can throw some really well designed game planning, okay, this is what you do well. This is our specific answer to that for three or four games in the playoffs. so you can do some damage with this sort of offense. And I think that even if you include the chaos and you're concerned about some of the volatility that Josh Allen brings, this is still a good offense that can really get hot in the right moments.

What the bills have had to do with their offense is what their defense is doing to some of these offenses, if that makes sense. They're making these offenses get to their secondary and their auxiliary answers and all these types of things. I mean, the dolphins only had one successful play, this entire second half until that final two-minute drive. Were you surprised they didn't run the ball more? They ran the bowl three times for seven yards in that half after running it really efficiently in the first half. I thought they were going to keep at it. To keep at it, keep at it, keep at it.

And wasn't like the game is out of hand, especially because they're getting the turnovers and everything. Maybe they just didn't have enough plays sometimes to get behind the sticks sometimes. So I was surprised about that. But it's just been this. I actually think some of these injuries have forces defense to get creative. And then this is the formula that we've now seen this bill's offense score and win in different ways. We saw them pound the rock a few weeks ago where Josh Allen. It's like 7 of 14 for like 90 yards.

Now we see chaotic Josh. We've seen efficient Josh. We've seen all his versions throughout the season. But that's, this is what you want into the playoffs. A game playing in defense. You can run the ball with your running backs or your quarterback if you have to. And you can have the quarterback just go, you know, absolutely nuclear. And now they have like their past catchers are all kind of making sense now.

This game was perfect, like perfect example. It was nice to see Diggs back and making a huge impact on a game combined with what Shakir can give you in some of those moments. Surefield is fine. Sherfield is the, he is the most number three receiver who has ever number three receiver. I mean, he was that guy for the Niners, right? Think about the guys that have played that role. San Francisco is perfect because they have all these aliens at their top pass catcher spots.

So who's the number three receiver? And over the last five years, Kendrick Bourne, Trent Sherfield, Joanne Jennings. Like those are those guys. And so Trent Sherfield becomes that for the bills, especially after Gabe Davis goes down. So I'm with you. I think that they absolutely have those elements to them. And I think that them getting the two seed, no matter how winding the road, it all ended in a place we kind of expected it to end. That's funny.

You say that the first note I wrote was a long winding twisted road for this Bill's team. And then it was nobody circles the wagons in a jagged line like the Buffalo Bills. That's what this team is in 2023. But it's fun. No matter what, it's damn entertaining. We'll get to that in a second in terms of what their wild curve matchup is going to look like. So that's how I feel about the bills, and I'm excited to see them in the playoffs. This Miami team, and we were talking about them on the preview show, we were discussing

the fact that they had lost some of that venom that we felt like they had earlier in the season. No Jalen Waddle. Obviously, the offensive line is still banged up, even if it was healthier tonight. This is one of those games where it reminds you of the struggles that Tua can have when teams take away that first option and kind of make him go through option A, option B, option C, and everything isn't immediately available to him within the structure of a play. And so it kind of exposes those warts and those shortcomings, those deficiencies with this team when things aren't running on time and the trains aren't running on time. And it does give me a little bit more pause even than I had coming into this week about what this

offense might look like as we get into the playoffs and they have to play against defenses like this, like Kansas, like Baltimore. They have not played well against good teams and good defenses this year. And you're about to face a slate of them. if you can string together a couple wins where you have to go up against one every single week. And I think of the term the no laying up guys, the golf guys have about a golfer named Tony Feenow, where they call them the meal skinners. Like when they get with the class, they don't really hit the top marks.

They're kind of more in the middle of the pack. But when they go into the lesser kind of classes, they really just dominate. And that's what the dolphins feel like. Because I think you just nailed it. All the matchups that they have, that's why I'm worried. Chiefs is real funky with them. and they played that game in London. We've already seen it.

We've already seen it. We've already seen it. We already seen it play the Ravens. We already seen the air. Zero degree weather. Several people tweeted the weather already. And so it's like, okay, yeah. So you're getting all these defenses that aren't great matchups for them.

So that's why it just makes it so difficult to kind of picture this path that they might have to get on, especially with weather, especially with wind going to the outside. And it just really feels like, like you said tracks. And that's what it, like Tua always just feels like he's hitting the same throw over and over. And it feels like it's on a track. It's in the exact same part of the field. It's the same thing. That's when you said tracks, I'm thinking the hash.

And that's like just, that's exactly what it is. It's that same exact throw over and over. So that's why I'm worried when you're going against this, these, the class of the class defensive coordinators that the AFC has. I mean, they have half a dozen of them basically four or five of them just in this conference alone. I don't want to write their obituary just yet. We're about to start the first season. But I do think that the dolphins are heading for a potentially interesting.

off-season conversation that to me is a familiar off-season conversation. We've seen this a lot over the last decade or so, and I think the best example is the Jared Gough Rams. You have this Wunderkind offensive play caller come in, and he has this hyper-specific, incredibly devastating offensive system that takes the league and defenses by storm for a year, for two years, but it isn't driven by an elite quarterback that makes a lot of plays outside of the structure of that system. And eventually, you get to a place where you have to answer a question about how far that team makeup can take you.

And I think that Tua has done a lot of really impressive stuff for this Dolphins offense. They have been hyper elite for long stretches of the last two years. But I would also not be surprised if we got to a point over the next month or so into this spring and then especially into next year because he has a contract coming up. They have to make that decision where we're maybe having some of those same considerations about this Dolphins team and how it compares to some of those other models that we've seen over the last four or five years. It's one of the most interesting ones, especially the other guys that are drafted in his class and the contracts that they've been on already. And it's like, okay, yours isn't been answered.

Of course, he's had the injury stuff as well. And I actually thought, I mean, there's been jokes about the jiu-jitsu stuff or judo. I don't know which one you did. It's jujitsu. Yes, yes. Yeah, but how he learned to fall. I know there's been jokes about it, but I do think it's actually helped. Like, he actually does take those falls better.

And he gets rid of the ball and he has a plan now. he's learned to kind of really take care of himself. But it's tough when you just see, again, when you see what these guys are in the playoffs and what you're going against just a facto playoff games like this was. It's a facto playoff game. When the other guy is running on 3rd and 13 through two people and splitting them and you can't even do short yards, you can't even do sneaks in your entire offense. And there's the bills, like you said, there's Josh Allen looking at the sideline trying to get it.

And it's like, okay, we're going against that. okay, well, who else do we go against Mahomes, Lamar? I mean, you just even just think all these other top tier guys. And we're not even just getting into the guys that are people are like, oh, who are they? Burrow, Trevor, Stroud, uh, Auntie Richardson when he comes back. Like these guys that are just absolute monsters. And that, uh, so you're going against that. And I think that's when you get to this point.

It's like, what are we? What is our ceiling? Like, what are we capped out where everything has to be perfect? So it's going to be interesting how they answer it, what they just go about, how they go about it. And we've seen this a bunch. where when you have that guy on a rookie contract, what you can do to build around him gives you a real shot. But when you get to the point where you have to decide whether you're not, you're going to pay him, we've had some missteps there. And I think the two best examples are the golf contract and the Wents contract, where those teams won a Super Bowl and went to a Super Bowl respectively because in part of what they were able to build around that guy.

They had the resources to build an incredible roster around them. And they had a definitive schematic advantage. Look at what the Dolphins did this off season. They have Tyree killed. They traded for J-1 Ramsey. They went and got to Ron Armstead at a free agency. They traded for Bradley Chub. They paid Bradley Chub.

All of this stuff. And this is normal. This is very typical for a team at this stage of the process. But at a certain point, you have to ask yourself, what are we beyond the stage of the process? And I think, again, it's a little bit early, but I would not be surprised if we were having a similar discussion, similar set of conversations about the dolphins very soon. They're trying to expand their, I won't say band of time, but band of outcomes. and that's what it is. I think with Tua, you're just,

you're hitting this thin line. And I think that golf comparison is perfect, where it's like you have all these vets playing very well. Once the injury bug started hitting, that's what you're about. And that's what's tough. Yeah. And that's what the roster is built out of, though.

It's high risk, high reward roster. There's no doubt about that. You saw that. That Tarot Arnsted contract in blood. Like, you do exactly what you were doing. And he stayed relatively healthy.

He did actually. He really did. I know of all the offense alignment. But I was even, But just look at comparison. I'm just drawn again to that 2017 Rams team. But Whitworth and Robert Woods, those guys don't miss a lot of time. Those guys were playing.

They were some of the healthiest teams in the NFL during that stretch. And I think that is the biggest disconnect. Maybe why that team hit enough of the correct outcomes to get where they did. And this Dolphist team has fallen a little bit short. But that's a conversation that we'll be able to have a lot here over the next month or so. It's still going to be a great game. Don't get me right. Oh, it's going to be awesome.

We're going to get to it. Sorry, Dolphins fans. We're not doing anything because this offense is still can run the ball. They still can be able to be. explosive, so it's still going to be pretty pretty freaking awesome to see it go again at Arrowhead. It is a great game, and we're going to get to those great games right now. It's time for you have my attention. Gentlemen, you had my curiosity, but now you have my attention.

I'm cheating here. The 2023-24 NFL playoffs, you have my attention. I am very excited about the matchups that we have gotten out of this weekend. There was part of me when I was thinking about the best possible outcomes here. Yeah. And I was thinking, oh, you know, the Jags win, the bills, when we get Trevor Lawrence in the playoffs with that, you know, and even though that Jags team is flawed.

But now that this is all settled, I'm talking myself into this being the ideal set of teams that we could have gotten simply because I think that Steelers bills has more bullshit potential than any game in recent memory. We have chaos Josh Allen. We have whatever the dark magic of the Pittsburgh Steelers is where we're going to get two 90-yard George Pickens touchdowns. Mason Rudolph's going to have eight completions on the day, but he's going to throw for 340 yards. The bills are going to turn the ball over six times, but it's still going to be close in the fourth quarter.

And apparently the weather is going to be horrendous in Buffalo. So we have all of that stuff potentially on the table. So I have walked back my feelings about the Steelers being in the playoffs simply because I want to see that game. And then if you run through every other matchup, we got some good ones here. So I want to pose this to you. your favorite wild card matchup now that we have all of them set. What do you have for me? It's the one I've willed into existence.

I think a few of us have, but Rams versus Lines. It's so good. Once I realized that was a possibility, it was like, and I don't want to get to have myself. It's so good. It's so good.

And I appreciate the Niners doing their part today. I appreciate the Niners understanding that they needed to lose that game for us to get this. And now we have it. I'm hoping I'm to go to that game. I think I'm going to go to that game. So I'm very much looking forward to that. Short drive. It's four hours.

I was going to say, what does that drive from Chicago? It's like four and a half hours. So I think I'm going to try to get out there. So that is also my answer because the Wickskill is not even made for this. There's so many different revenge games that are in play here. And we're going to talk about that in the preview show a little bit later this week. I think some people are construing this as a Matthew Stafford revenge game. this is not a Matthew Stafford revenge game at all compared to the Jared Gough revenge game element of this.

So that is what we have to look forward to. Yes. The guy was throwing the trash. He got Marty Janettied. He got thrown through the glass window by Sean McVeigh. Yeah. No, that's what he. Yeah.

No, this is a full blown Jared Gough like full past five. Yeah, this is past five John Wicks for this one. But you're right. I love that you brought up that like Steelers, uh, Bill's matchup because like that's one of those games where they flash up the graphic. It's like a tie score near the end of the third quarter. It's like Steelers, O for 11 on third down. Bills, three for 12 on third down. And it's like, tie game 13 13.

It's like, what? How? How? And there's a block punt. And yes, it's going to be slushy. I think it's Sunday. It's going to be windy. So yeah, we're definitely just going to be some muckball in that game.

I'm very much looking forward to that. But there are also some other really good ones. Packers at Cowboys is fantastic for the Mike McCarthy aspect of this. That's the runner. We got more revenge game stuff there. We have Jordan Love playing the way that he's playing, which we're going to get into against this Cowboys team and Doc Prescott. That's an excellent game. Brown's defense against C.J. Stroud.

Last time we saw Brown's Texans this year, we did not get C.J. Stroud. Now we do. Very excited about what that looks like. Eagles Bucks rematch. This Eagles team is reeling. The Bucks think could potentially beat this Eagles team. This is Todd Bulls versus Jalen Hertz part duh. And that that's very interesting, especially what happened today in that.

first half of that game. Loving that. It's weak. And Chiefs Dolphins is a great game. It's a great game. Even with all the stuff we talked about, that offense against the Chiefs defense, can Mahomes do enough? What does this Chiefs team look like in the postseason? So that's, you know, I totally agree with you about Rams Lions, but I think there are a lot of options here. Oh, yeah. My podium was Rams Lions, Packers, Cowboys, and then my sneaky one of them's Eagles bucks, because I do think that's just kind of like a sneaky, like, interesting matchup. But also, this is like a winner for all of us is we get a nice mix of dome matchups and then a couple weather games.

Mm-hmm. So it's not weather, weather, weather, weather, weather. Every game you see is slush and wind and everything. You are so soft now. So you got Houston? Five years in Vegas and this man, no longer wants to see weather playoff games. Freezing. I'm freezing.

It was like 36 this morning. I was like, no. And windy. It was terrible. But yeah, at Houston, you got Arrowhead, which was, I think it's going to be weather. It's like zero degrees. but at Buffalo, which also weather, Dallas, Detroit, Tampa Bay. So I think that's also great because then I just feel the warmth at least.

As we look past the wild curve round, any other potential matchups down the road that you find particularly juicy that you feel yourself wanting to see? Oh, sorry to just keep banging the same drum, but 49ers Rams could be awesome in the division of that one that could definitely happen. Chiefs Texans could be fun. There's a path where that could happen. Okay. I believe it.

Yep. And then also Brown's chiefs could be an interesting one. There's a path where that can happen as well. I have Brown's Ravens is one that I would be potentially interested in seeing just because of the history and that. Oh, yeah. The Ravens against that. I mean, the Ravens offense against the Browns defense. Is that a franchise, uh, Wix scale on that one?

Yeah, that. And then the flaco element of it, the last time those two teams played, there's so many layers to that. I would love to see potentially the Texans offense against the Ravens defense. being a great test for CJ Stroud, very into that. It's like a rematch from earlier in the year, and that was like a totally different Texan team, it felt like. Part of me really wants to see Cowboys Niners again in the NFC Championship game just because I think that I want to see this version of the Cowboys

and see if they can exercise their demons against the Niners. Right. At the same time, I think Lions Niners, NFC Championship game is an awesome football game. The physicality in that game, all the little, the chess match elements of the, Lions offense against the Niners defense. That game would be phenomenal. So there are a bunch of them kind of down the pipe.

But I do agree that Rams Niners and then Ravens Chiefs is another one that I think would be really interested in. Partly because I would like, if the Ravens are going to do this, I would like to see them beat the Chiefs on their way. I think there's something beautiful about like having to knock off the champ on your way to the Super Bowl or to your own championship. So them having to do it against Kansas City, I think would be something I'd want to see. That's because you're a Bulls fan. It's exactly. It's exactly right. It's exactly right.

It fits like so perfectly. There's a set of values I have around how championships are won. And I think that's part of it. And I think the, yeah, any combination of Ravens, Bill's chiefs, any of that trio, I'm okay with. Like, he's just like, yes, I just want to see as many of those matchups if we can, as possible. So, no, but I think that's, that's funny that you say that. You do want to see the checkboxes because the Titans just always seem to muck up the matchups that we could possibly see in the playoffs. They're just like, no, no, Titans always just found a way to just make it dirty in there.

Is there a wildcar team you're looking at right now that you think could potentially make a run? I'm going to pull a string on the back right now and say the Los Angeles ramps again. I think it's a right answer. They hit all the thresholds that I look at. They have a run game. When Stafford is on the field, they have the second best run game in the NFL, only beyond the dolphins in terms of success rate, top five pass game, explosive pass rate. All hit the thresholds. How the turntables have turned.

man. Yeah. And then the defense, they, uh, they can make it funky. They're not great, but they can make it funky. They're 18th success rates. It's their by week, 23rd and Wade DVOA. And they have a closer, though. They have Aaron Donald. And that, you always have to remember that the pass rush is the great equalizer. And they do have a pretty good pass rush with their young guys in Aaron Donald. Yeah, I think that's a really good one. That would probably be my answer as well. And I do think the dolphins are capable of that as a wildcard team. Just because of that, the potential we talk about with their offense. All right. Let's get to a couple more here. The Houston Texans, after that game, win and get in.

You're in the playoffs. They win the AFC South with a loss from the Jags and that CJ's job performance. Everything about the Houston Texans, both on Saturday night and this season, you have my attention. What a moment for this team and this franchise considering where they were a year ago. Well, talking about narrative. How about that drive in the fourth quarter? It was so cool. That's all you could want.

You have this guy. Amazing. Who seemingly, not, it doesn't come out of nowhere. He was a top five pick, but no one thought he was going to be one of the dudes immediately. He gets dropped into this situation with a franchise that has been completely irrelevant and forgetable for the last three years. Nothing about them has been compelling. He gets dropped in. He plays fantastic throughout his entire rookie year. He changes everything about the experience of watching that team.

And now he's in a de facto playoff game with their season on the line in the biggest moment we've ever seen him in so far. and he gives you everything you want. That's awesome. That there is nothing better than that in the career of a young player when they're presented with that moment and they rise to it in every single way that you want them to. First play, they went bombs away on a play and shot play. You definitely knew that that was just pure tape study

because Stroud was locked in on that. Yeah, Nick Cross, the safety for the Coles, just got no man's land when you're in single high. What is your literal position name? safety. I couldn't even tell what coverage they were in there. It seems like he was cheated over a little bit. It was quarters, but then it rotated down to three into three. He gotcha. He moved over and he was just a no man's lane. He didn't get any depth. He just stood flat footed. And then I bet you they saw that on film. And so they just said, hey, we're going to run some color in front of his face,

which was Dalton Schultz, I think, on the play. And they just launched it over the top. But he was, he ran like two yards past the line of scurbish. The linebackers were all right there. It's not like he was pinned down with somebody right in front of him. It was, it was a very funny play. But so launching on the first play and then a 12 play, 70 yard drive took off seven minutes and fourth quarter. So it's like, okay, first play nerve steady, fourth quarter nerve steady. After taking a sack on second extra along, he's finding a check down to Dalton Schultz, gives him a chance on third down.

And want to know what, talk about it, Strout has rare accuracy. And the one play, like right after it was a third, that third down, they hit Schultz on that game winning drive. It's like a third and three. And it's a cover two. or just a hanging corner over there, but he pins Schultz on the inside and he hits it on his front hip. And so what he's doing is he's turning him up field and saving him from the hit and getting

a yak opportunity on third down. And it's like, this guy's a genius with the football. Like he's an actual dart throw, right? He's an artist where he could just place the ball. And then after that he hits that dick throw as he's getting hit where he straight up hookshots it. Well, that second and 14 out of structure play where he has to throw it into open space and Nico Collins.

So he creates a play on that drive. And then that hookshot play that you're talking about, we've discussed it with him all year. That ability to somehow get velocity without being able to step into these throws and while being hit, the velocity and placement on that throw in the biggest moment of his season and arguably the biggest moment of his football life, even though I know he's played some big games. He makes that throw. And in that moment exhibits everything he's done this season that makes us excited about him. And this is, I'm sorry, but anyone that's paying attention to college football and prospects right now, maybe this is like not to ding the guy, but this is a difference I think of a guy like Stroud and a guy like Michael Panix Jr. from Washington. Pennix needs a big platform to throw the ball.

He takes big, long steps. And that has me a little bit worried. Watch Stroud into the lack of platform he needs. He can get the ball off by basically with his feet right next to each other and throw hook shots. And like you say, get velocity. Only a couple guys, some of these young guys are even better at it. A guy's like in the prior generation. It's like, because the other guy that I think is really good at those types of

throws is Trevor, Trevor Lawrence, which is he's another guy that can kind of be flat-footed, throw it awkward angles and still get a spiral on the ball. But it's the fact that he does that stuff. I've talked about in prior weeks, he'd get into secondary reads when the first one's taken away, keeping it's cool all the time. He's had several third downs this game where he's working back in the pocket to find the second read. And he's working to throw always from the pocket.

And then he has this couple of plays where he scrambled. when he needs to. He's just precise with what he does, and he's just a pleasure to watch. I've said that like five times this year, but he truly is a pleasure to watch. He's one of my favorite players in the NFL to watch, already. Period. He is one of my favorite players in the league to watch. I had such a good time watching that game last night, and he's doing this with no tank Dell,

no Robert Woods, no Noah Brown. Could you name another receiver that the Texans were trying out there yesterday other than Nico Collins? There was even Metchie playing? Metschie was playing. Okay. We had number 19 whose name I don't know. I mean, there are so many no-name guys.

All the NPCs that the Texans were running out there receiver last night, and he still manages to do this in this moment. I know. All of this being said. Nico Collins worked great. He is. That is one of my favorite. I had stock for three years. Let's make it happen sort of things that has happened a long time with Nico Collins breaking out this year.

I'm very excited about that. So the one thing I will say about the Texans offense. Yes. I understand that in the aggregate, they have this 20-29ers thing where we run the ball inefficiently sometimes because as part of the grander plan of who we want to be, we need that element of our offense because of the play action, because of everything is tied together. I think it's important to take that into consideration when you think about who they are.

This game specifically, and in certain moments this year, the pendulum way too far in the wrong direction. Way too far. Their inefficiency running the ball, especially on early downs in this game, almost did them in. And so that element of just them 0.39 yards before contact on early down runs, that's the one thing about this team right now that makes me a little bit worried about what they're going to do against really good defenses,

that their run game just isn't very good. Other than that, very few criticisms. Yeah, I think maybe just that last drive's doing it for me. Because I remember they had a couple nice runs on there. Obviously, the touchdown, single tear is one of them. So maybe it's just in the second half. They had some okay ones. But I get it.

It's the death by two yard gains. It's kind of when you see Stroud just shooting up fireworks. And also the other thing, if we're talking like just maybe blemishes with this Texas team, obviously it was the Colts just marching on them in the run game. Yes. That was surprising. Oh, and you're telling me, oh, my God, my mom's so mad at me. Give me a player prop. Sorry, Jonathan Taylor under rushing yards because, you know, the Texas run defense is.

actually pretty good. Yeah, so thank, sorry, Mom. But, but the, it was really funny. You can tell Gardner Minchu got the give, a heavy give, play call on those RPOs. Because there were several throw reeds that I watched, just rewatching the game. And I was like, at least three, maybe four that I saw, still handed off Jonathan Taylor. So, and he went, the Colts went 17 for 36, efficiency wise, running the ball. And they, they made those linebackers look like in hell.

Blake Cashman, Christian Harris, Denzel Perryman, those guys had a rough rough game, but they had good plays when it mattered. So, you know, actually that helps. I think losing Will Anderson and having him being out of the lineup yet last night, he's a very good run defender. I think that they struggled up front. So that's not necessarily surprising. I found the stats. They had a 23% rushing success rate on first down. They had 13 carries for 45 yards on first down. It's just, it's a tough way to live. And you're asking a lot of your quarterback who finished the game 20 of 26 to carry you in those moments. But guess what? He was able to. So this Texans team, so much to be excited about.

This was essentially a playoff game for them. Yeah. So we're going to treat the other side of this as a playoff game. Do a little quick Colts post-mortem here after losing that game. A tough way for your season to end if you're Indianapolis. But I said this last night, feel very good about where this team is. Let's talk about some of the decisions made late in the game. Do you have a huge problem with the timeout they called on fourth and one with a minute left?

So you go to two timeouts You can no longer stop the clock three times A little bit A little bit I'd rather have that one in the pocket Just to pop it three times That's just you know preference But it was like I think

Didn't I see somewhere that it's like The damage isn't as bad Maybe I just am over Maybe I'm just sure Two things right now I think the damage is pretty bad Just because if you don't get it It ends the game essentially

Because you get the ball back Exactly seconds left And that's damaging In the moment though I can understand thinking Okay if we don't get this and we have three timeouts, we're still getting the ball with maybe a minute left having to go the length of the field and score a touchdown.

I need to get into my best play here. What is my best play? I know that analytically, that's not the correct decision. But I get making that choice in the moment if you're Shane Stuyken and being like, let's take a beat. What are we going to try to do here in this exact moment? Let's be real realistic what our offense is. We've been running the ball, but we can't really hit explosive plays passing the ball.

like, let's be realistic. What our offense is? What is our best option here? I think our best option is to get this one yard and score a touchdown. What really is the game, if that makes sense? What is what, what do you want the game to be decided by? And I think that's a great way to put it. That's why I was kind of like,

all right, whatever. That's a lot of people were just crushing him for that in the moment. I understand where it's a mistake in a vacuum. But in that exact moment, I get being like, all right, everybody take a deep breath. What is our best play? This is the game right here. Because you're going to have such a hard. road to win, even if you get the ball back there, that I get more importance being placed on that

decision. And he has shown enough, stiking enough in game management situations that I know that he thinks about this stuff. Like, so I've watched enough Colts games where it's just like he has no worries for me about how he handles four downs, how aggressive he is, all that kind of stuff. So to me, it's more like this was a thoughtful decision by him as opposed to like he panicked or something like that, if that makes sense. I tend to agree.

So let's talk about the play call itself. It's fourth and one. Jonathan Taylor has been a monster for you. You've run the ball consistently all game. You take him off the field and throw the ball to your number three running back with your season on the line. Not ideal. Not ideal. It was open.

It was very open. It was very open. So this is one of those moments where I just get into meathead. This is how my dad would talk about football mode where I'm like, you give the ball to the guy. I know he's banged up. I know that he's run the ball 20 times on this drive, whatever. You have one yard. He's your best player.

You've run the ball officially all game. Just give it to him. I just snap back into Neanderthal mode when I think about that. Watching the game with my dad, how do you think he responded on a fourth and one? And he knows Jonathan Taylor too. He's watched plenty of Jonathan Taylor in his life. So he knew the tradeoff in that kind of situation. But again, it's like, do you want to bet on Minchew, the one that you're not going to bet on to do a full drive in that situation?

or you can be on the guy that paled the rock over and over and over throughout the game. Yeah, I totally get that. That being said, those moments and those kind of failings in the biggest moments in that game yesterday, still think there's a ton to be excited about as it relates to this Colts team. We talked about this a little bit last night. The Colts were so DOA offensively, all of last season and especially near the end of last season. And what they've been able to do with the same offensive line they had last year, with a backup quarterback the entire year, with a group of skill position players,

and past catchers that are good, fine. Fine. You know, it's, it's nothing crazy. Michael Pittman's had a really nice season. Josh Downs was exciting for a rookie, but it's not like they have high-end talent at every single one of those spots. I think that it's been a thoughtfully constructed offense.

I think it's been efficient for what it is. I think that when they drop a top five talent who've seen real flashes from into this equation, it's going to be really exciting. And I think that they've gotten enough from their youth on defense. and they've built enough youth and they've kind of constructed like a young, exciting, athletic core of the roster that it's just hard not to look at everything they did this year and not be optimistic about what the future looks like.

And I love the offense of makeup. I love the play caller, obviously. I like how they use their tight ends. They have a versatile group of tight ends, several that can block, several good pass catchers. And then the three receivers kind of, they need one guy maybe more to kind of put that over that. Their offense needs, of course, Anthony Richardson to come back. but they need one more pass catcher to kind of put them over the top. And that'll be the cherry on top for this offense.

That is a great place to be. It is not a place where you're like, man, we need two offensive linemen. We need a pass catcher. We need a running back too. And they're going to get a guy, like even if you say right now, the receiving back was, you know, insert name here. Evan Hole from Northwestern, who I like. You can drop him in the next season. He was on IR this season.

But I think this offense with this quarterback coming back in Richardson could be a really, really fun one because the flashes we saw. just with this offense overall was thoughtful and just even in simplicity. Of course, that's the biggest compliment we always give to Stuyken. But I also just think with the moments that we saw the first six-ish weeks with Richardson before he got hurt. And just the flashes of play calling the run game stuff was just truly just awesome. And I'm really excited to see 17 games that several seasons that are very excited where this Colts team's going. They can be very quickly just put over the top. I agree.

I think that they will be a competitive team next year with him and there. A lot of people last night talking about this on Twitter and like, oh, it would be fun to watch Richardson and Stroud for the next 10 years. A lot of responses of, well, Richardson is not there and he's so raw. We're forgetting how he looked

in those first couple games. That rawness stuff is so overstaters. He looked so good and so comfortable. So good. And some of the decisions he was making and how just composed he was in the pocket, so many aspects to his game where you think, man, the edges of this

are sharper than I expected them to be this quickly. He's mentally further along that I think a lot of people are giving him credit for. So I think there's a lot of stuff to be excited about. His team has $71 million in caps space this off season. Some of that being a product of them needing to re-sign guys, Michael Pittman is a free agent. Kenny Moore is a free agent, Grover Stewart, Julian Blackman. But they've got a lot of resources to shape this thing how they want moving forward.

And the difference between this Colts team and maybe, let's say, the Giants last year, where they overachieve. the Giants were locked into Daniel Jones. Yeah. The Giants had to make that decision. They made the playoffs. They didn't have a quarterback on the roster. The Colts had their quarterback of the future on the roster. He's already there.

And the offensive line is complete. It's set. It's not like the Giants who had to rebuild their offensive line this off season. You're adding depth to the Colts offensive line, which is where you want to be with an offensive line. You want to be adding depth every single year. It's with the Eagles of Dunford Pest for like 15 years. There are so many aspects to this team and why I feel like they're a little bit different

than some of the other teams that, maybe overachieved and then take a huge step back. I don't even know if they're going to be a playoff team next year, but I think that certain aspects of who they are, to me, are encouraging, exciting, and a sign of good things moving forward. Very good bones right now with the Indianapolis Colts. One more here before we move on. Jordan Love, you have my attention.

Packers playing for their playoff lives, win and get in game against the Bears defense that have been playing extremely well over the back half of the season. And he did whatever he wanted in this game. 27 of 32 for 316 yards. It felt that easy. He was 7 of 8 on 3rd down with 7 first downs. In the biggest moments of the game,

he came through with just fantastic play every single time they needed him in a high leverage moment. And this is what they've been recently. This is what he's been recently. And you look at what he did in this game with a win-and-get-in moment and what Stroud did last night in a win-and-get-in moment. and it felt very similar.

And it felt like as the quarterback hierarchy in the NFL is changing, and we've lost some guys that have aged out, and we're trying to find out, what does the table look like? If the table has eight guys at it, who deserves a seat at that table? And I think right now, both CJ Stroud and Jordan Love are making pretty good arguments for why they're two of the guys that deserve mentioned, deserve consideration as we're figuring out what those seats look like. they're on it or in it at the table at the table or they are like when they say like you know the march man is like first four out like their first two out or somewhere around there at the very least

I don't consider anybody else when I was trying to make every short list possible and I think it's fitting that when I was reviewing these games and kind of breaking them down for the show that both of my notes kind of came to drives that these guys had strad with his drive in the fourth quarter and then the drive the first to the second quarter that the packers had the 11 played 92-yard drive. That deep dig to Jane Reed was just fantastic. Great. And it's exactly what the Packers are.

Great design. A little bit of motion, a little bit of play action, a little bit of aggressiveness from Jordan Love to wait and sit there to hit that dig. And then the young Packer player just creating yards after the catch. And that whole drive was awesome. So they had that. They had Jordan Love progressing to a backside dig against cover two. Several good runs.

Tucker Kraft at the point of attack blocking Montez Sweat. and doing a great job firing off the ball. And, like, again, that touchdown at the end with Jordan Love to Wix, who had a great game as well. He had a fantastic game. Yeah, he's so explosive. And it's so cool, again, and this is always love just having this identity now in the pocket. I thought Tony Romer doing the impressions of all the Packers quarterbacks. It was like a highway to my entire day.

Quarterbacks do that. Like, actually Derek Carr is actually a pretty good quarterback impressionist. Like, he could do all the stances and everything. but him doing Fav was like perfect. That was like a dead on impression. He grew up watching Farf. I mean, he's got so many Farrv reps in his mind. It's deeply ingrained in his memory.

Oh, so I hope someone pulls it. He did the chin. And when he did the chin, I was like, oh, you've watched a lot of Farrv, man. That is like, that's like a little subtle acting there. But watching Jurn Love and how he pushes back in the pocket and everyone keeps saying off his back foot. And this is where the arm strength comes in. He throws up so much confidence right now. He's throwing it early.

But he can do that. He can push back in the pocket because he has the flexibility and the torque and the arm strength to do that. So he's created this understanding and this pocket movement of his own. And it's really cool when you see a quarterback just doing that. And this is like, this is how he played. Jordan Love plays this way. Josh Allen plays this way. Lamar plays this way.

Stroud plays this way. Jordan Love but though has his own identity. And it's just really cool to watch him week after week doing it in like big, big moments. And that touched on the wicks, I thought it was just. a perfect example of it. I totally agree with you. And watching him operate and just attack people and do damage to the pocket over the last six, eight weeks has been really cool to watch. And I don't want to make this about Justin Fields. We're going to have a lot of conversations about Justin Fields over the next couple months. But when you watch what Jordan Love did today,

when you watch what CJ Stroud did yesterday, when you watch what some of the stuff that Josh Allen is doing from the pocket, that damage you can create as a creative thrower from the pocket as the situation gets muddy is you have to move off your spot a little bit. That's armed talent. Armed talent and creativity is almost a non-negotiable aspect to elite quarterback play. And you saw the chasm to me,

the gap to me between what a guy like Jordan Love is and what a guy like Justin Fields is even at this stage of his career. And when you have that guy that can create those plays from the pocket, even though it's a little bit out of structure, right? Like he's transcending what is in the play, but it's still working from the pocket. and its creativity as a thrower, that to me is what truly difference-making quarterbacks look like. And I think right now he feels and looks like a difference-making quarterback.

They can use that creativity, that little slight extending of place to create the throwing lanes, which weren't open originally. But I think what you're saying is bottled the creativity. That's what they're doing. I think when he watched her in love, it's not just the trick shots. He's totally controlled. That's him and Stroud, watch them operate these offenses. How calm is a very good word?

just so in control. But he's good with protections. And I think when I say bottle that creativity, he's doing the trick shots off the back foot, but he's understanding where the leakiness of his protection might come. So he's drifting and then using that to make the throws. That's Mahomes where there's so many times we've seen Mahomes against cover zero on third and long, drifting back. And everyone's like, wow, what a crazy shot.

What a crazy throw. And it's like, yeah, but on top of it, he understood why he had to do that. That's that package of a lead to a natural feel for that space. And I think that's what you see from these really special quarterbacks. Even though there is some off-scheduled playmaking to their game, that's not what defines how they separate themselves. And I think Love and Stroud are two very good recent examples. Lamar's even like that this year. I know Lamar has made a lot of off-schedual plays throwing the football this year, but a lot of them are still pretty much in the pocket.

Yeah, it's arm angle. It's just creativity as a thrower. And that's where arm talent separates from arm strength. And I think that that's what we've seen from a lot of these guys. And I think Mahomes is a very good comparison. I'm not trying to say that Jordan Love is Patrick Mahomes, but the feel for that space and the ability to make those plays outside of what is given to you, but not in a I'm creating with my legs or even outside of the pocket sort of way. I think it's important to bucket those plays and understand that that's what drives really good offense in the NFL when you get to this point in the season. There's three phases.

There's the truly within structure, one to two. to three, all that. Then there's that, but extended. Okay, it's one to two, but then I'm working this throwing angle. Okay, there. And then there's a pure, full on creativity. It's channeling all three. But real good bears talk, though.

Tyrick Stevenson is a star. Absolutely. There's a lot to be excited about. The thudding on the receiver at the end of the half, and then his celebration, wind the clock as he's running into the locker room. It was like, yeah, you're a star. You had in the end zone. Like, there are just so many things about his game that are awesome.

There's some down moments with Bears today, too. Teman Jenkins had a brutal game after what has been a pretty decent season for him. He's been injured. He's just back in the lineup this week. So hopefully, that's just a blip in what has otherwise been a very good year where he shows really good flashes. But again, it's uneven game for the Bears. And I think a lot of people came into that game and were ready to just kind of keep on riding. They were drunk on whatever was happening with the Bears over the last couple weeks.

Really good vibes. Bears land. This was a sobering moment. And not that I say, not that I'm going to say a loss was a good thing, but I do think that sobering moment might be a benefit to a lot of people as they try to take a step back and properly evaluate everything that has happened. Not today. Not over the last four games.

Not over the last eight games. But what has happened over the last two years as you're making the decision about who stays or who goes? That's the quarterback. That's the coach. That's the offensive coordinator. So I think this being the final note of the season has some potential benefits for Kevin Warren and Ryan Poles as they're trying to take a step back, take a deep breath, and properly

consider what has to happen next. That's all I'm going to say about this. I was going to say is, yeah, when you watch how love plays and you're like, oh, I want one of those. And it's like, I love Justin Fields. I'm a big defender of Justin Fields, but it's a different type of quarterbacking. A hundred percent. That's out, that was out on that field in Lambo. That's the type that you want. That's the type that gets you to the championships. There's no doubt about that. And I, again, it's me a long offseason, but you watch some of the stuff that a Caleb Williams can do. And it is different. It just is different.

And so, again, that's a discussion we'll have a lot. Last thing, Packers, uh, defensive line makes me excited about what they could potentially do in the playoffs and moving forward. That young group, Carl Brooks had some moments. Devotei Wyatt had some moments. I love the five O's they were creating on defense. So just one more nice little piece for a Packers team that I think is given us a lot to look forward to. this year and with their offense overall. It's going to be fun in the McCarthy Bowl.

It's going to be a very, very, very fun game. Hopefully some haymakers if they're on in a football sense, not an actual throwing haymakers. You know, I'm fine either way. So that works for me. How many years ago was the Rogers to Jericho throw? Was that? That was 2016.

Seven years ago. Okay. Wow. Okay. I'm pretty sure it was 2016. Yeah, 2016 season. The Cowboys would have been. The number one seed that year?

It was the DAC year. It was on the road in Dallas. I was in New York at a bar watching that game. I vividly remember because 2014 was the Descott year. Correct? Yes. Yeah. That was, yes, because I was with the Falcons then.

Yes. So we've had some really fun Packers Cowboys clap moments over the last time. I don't really think about that. That's one more there. 90s ones. Yes. Which is great. Can't wait.

All right. We got a lot to be excited about, a lot of good things on the horizon. Let's talk about some bad stuff. It's time for I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed. man, we're still cool. I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed.

We knew this might be coming. We had this conversation in some form on our preview show about which team had ruined its 2022 goodwill the most. The Jags were our number one contender. They finished it off, man. They won the title belt today. Oh, easily. They lose to the Titans.

After starting the season eight and three, they go one in five in their final six games. The Jacksonville Jaguars are out of the playoffs. And that Monday night, Monday night, Sunday night, Monday night against the Bengals, man. The vibes is going into that game and just everything that happens since. It's, I mean, we went on some nice rants on Thursday, but I want to continue them on here at a minute. But first off, where would you like to start? The unsinkable Derek Henry, first off, four explosive runs.

But when you watch all those Derek Henry runs, you notice the same exact thing. You see a lot of flailing Jaguars, defensive players, a lot of. linebackers going into the wrong gap and missing their run keys. I think that's one number one thing. And why that's important is this roster is very invested in their linebackers. That is a very highly paid Mike linebacker and Alu Kahn making $15 million. That's $1 million more than Matt Milano. That's the exact same amount as Hassan Redick.

I know that's an outside linebacker. I get it's an edge and all that. But still, think of the impact of the game. To the first round for the other one. For Devin Lloyd, who has been a way big negative, at least Aluacan can play the run. Devin Lloyd is out of the gap all the single time. I'm just bringing up that position because that is a huge weakness on this defense, but it's a heavy position that is invested heavily, like very heavily that the Jaguars have.

On top of it, other players have regressed. The offense is just so fragile. Oh, I can't wait to get in all this. But several on top of all that, then you have just, you know, situations in third and one and three and two, fourth and one, fourth and two, just multiple plays and just multiple just botches. And it's just like the Jaguars. Like that is just what the same. season has been.

So many moments in this game just represent who they have been all season. There was a drop on like a third and six, I want to say. I'm getting all these confused now. Oh my God. I try to organize as well as I could. So there was a drop on a third and six early in the game, just a drop by Evan Ingram on a corner route that they had to punt, right? The drop on the interception is just the most.

Jaguars moment that could have happened this year. Popped it up to him. Trevor hits Evan Ingram on a third down, hits him in the chest. He bobbles it so badly that he pops the ball up in the air and it gets picked off. And then Lawrence on the next drive, sails a ball for an interception. So he throws two interceptions, one of which was his fault. The guy's playing with a shoulder injury. We didn't even know if he was going to play in this game.

And I think for the most part, he actually had some really nice moments in this game. Down to doubt, he was fine in this game. Again, every single weekend. I know I feel like I'm going crazy. It's like, you guys, you always defend them. They're going to be so mad at this conversation. Everyone's like, you always defend him and I rewatch him. I'm like, but he's good.

It's like, what do you want me to say? I don't know, man. Like the second interception, I have no idea what happened. But it's like, what do you want me to say? Look at all these other plays. He barely misses Calvin Ridley in the shop play. And everyone was just like losing their mind in a second two shot play that he misses by hair.

And it's like, I had several people tagging me going, whose fault is this? Trevor's or Calvin's. I'm like, it's a 45-year-old. throw across the field. It was missed. It happens. He misses that throw and then he sails the fourth and two throw. Okay.

He missed a good chunk of throws in this game. Right? That's the third and two, but, oh, sorry, the trickle down effect. So he misses that second two. Third and two, they run an isolated stop route to Tim Jones because Calvin

Ridley has to sit out of play because he's tired from the play before. So that was a little bit of like, no, no, KIP, know your personnel. Don't throw out to Tim Jones, even though it's a juicy one-on-one look. And then the fourth and two, he sails, and this is where I'll defend them.

And if you guys want to get mad at me, I totally get this. It's a choice route, or it's an out route to Evan Ingram. They already ran that earlier in the game. So the defender jumps and undercuts it. So Trevor's trying to pop it over his head, but it's also one of those things. It's like they ran it before. So, hey, if they jump it, have a backup plan. That's what you have to do as a quarterback.

So I don't want to say I'm going to always defend it because I thought there's several moments. The sneak that he called for himself. That's a mistake. Not the play to call a sneak on. They're pulling a guard on it. That's a terrible sneak look because there's a missing gap now or no one blocking down right there. So right there, it's like, I love the aggressiveness.

I love him trying to win, but it's like, keep your bearings. Know your personnel. Have a secondary plan. Don't call your own number when it's not the right time for it when we maybe have a better plan. But then, sorry, this all comes back down to personnel because they have to, Trevor has to do those plays because they suck in short yardage because they have no running back that's good in short yardage and their offensive line stinks and short yardage and they have receiving tight ends all through across. across the formation. So it's just, yeah, it's just endless. It's just all naughty with his Jagger's team. He had four or five dot throws on third down in this game that extended drives. He had a third down that was dropped. He had a tipped ball interception. All of this being said, I think that you can,

two things can be true at the same time. Down to down, he does so much good stuff in what has been a really bad situation this year. We've talked about it. They are bottom three in the league in EPA lost on drops, EPA lost on fumbles, EPA lost on rushing plays, EPA lost on wide receiver and tight-hand screens, bottom three in every single one of those categories with a bad offensive line, objectively bad. Yes. Down to down as a quarterback, he has transcended those circumstances all season. He has played very well down to down.

The mistakes cannot happen at this clip and at this volume. The turnovers just cannot happen in this way. That is the one aspect and one area of his game where it's just unacceptable. He's lost seven fumbles. he will probably end the season with the most turnover worthy plays of any quarterback. The fumbles are a continuing problem. He lost nine fumbles last year, which was the most in the NFL. So if I'm going to ding him, and I'm going to say, this is just unacceptable, this is

contributing to the problem, it is how often he has put the ball in harm's way. That can be true while also acknowledging that down to down, he gives them very good quarterback play and is a driver of their success. both of those things can be true at the same time. And I think today was another good example of that while the guy was playing with multiple injuries that probably should have kept him out of the game. Yeah. And like didn't practice till Friday and all those types of things.

And that's why, I mean, he had a high ankle sprain. He comes back a week later. High ankle sprain sucks guys. That's like a six week injury. And he comes back. He's played this entire month and a half, this entire losing streak basically with it. I think the turnovers is, I go, I think his fumble stuff is. I feel like it's just always going to happen.

I wonder if that's the skinny arms. I wonder if it's the hands. I don't know what it is because it's just how it gets hit. And that is a problem worth acknowledging. It is if your line sucks. And also if you're trying to make plays. And that's the thing. He gets no help.

He has to be perfect. If he's not perfect, they're screwed. When the defense was playing well in the first half of the season, it was fine. But now, then they played really well off the by after they got their asses kicked from the 49ers. And then he had a nice stretch when the offense was actually functioning. and everybody's kind of healthy. And actually we had a fully nice ecosystem. So that's why it's hard because it's like he is part of the problem because of those

turnovers, but then he's also one of the only solutions they have. Yeah. Do you know they have $35 million next year tied up to Zay Jones and Christian Kirk who have pro rated contracts through 2027. Pro rated contracts through 2027 to Zay Jones. They got to be able to move on from Jay Jones after this year. No, they can. But right now, that's what's at right now.

If they re-sign Calvin Ridley, they lose a second round pick. So, and I still think they need receiving help. And I think they need tight end help and they need offensive line help. They might need three potentially, three offensive line starters next year. Like this team like has so many holes. And two years ago, they had several first round picks and a wide open slate of books with a what we were hoping to be a franchise quarterback on a rookie deal. And I think all the positions they invested in, linebackers are targeted every single week, old lines a mess. Ray Sean Jenkins has fallen off in the back end of the year.

I think of course, staff changes are going to. happen, but this roster is just wholly, like not in a biblical way and biblically bad. And then just also it's just, yeah, it's just like shit. It's just like, but I just, it's me frustrated because it's the positions they invested in that are bad. It's like the ones that should be your strength are still needing help. And that just to me is bad roster construction. And I get it with the how Trevor has turns a ball over does not help. But this roster is just so fragile.

Yeah. And again, I think that down to down, he has given them very good quarterback players. for the most part. Both those things can be true. They do have some things that they can do to free up some resources, right? They could move on from Jay Jones after this year. But there are guys along the offensive line that are expensive where they're probably not playing up to those contracts. But let's say you cut Brandon Shurf after the season. You need to replace him.

You need to go out and get another starter along the offensive line. He's still average. You know what I mean? But you still need a replacement level guard. And that's already hard enough to find. We've talked about this. There's no reason to belabor it. They need to go back to the drawing board in a bunch of different ways.

Raster construction, what the offense looks like, why it looks like that. But I do not think that Trevor Lawrence is anywhere close to the top of the problem list for this team right now. He's not. And that's, again, I like that you kept saying it. Like a lot of things can be true at the same time. But it's like this roster can stink. He can have some bad moments. But for the most part, he is the strength of the team.

Yeah. Down to down. I thought, again, he had some really good moments today, even with everything. The touchdown to Calvin Ridley on. the bomb. He's like, I know, he holds the safety down. It was great. I know. That was the first note I wrote because I thought they'd easily win this game, right? Not the unsinkable Derek Henry. Nope, that's, that's what happened. That's exactly what happened. One more team specific conversation here. I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed. What the hell is going on with the Eagles? How much of this today is,

okay, we probably know Dallas is going to win. We probably have nothing to play for. And how much of this is the Eagles are reeling, and this is a significant concern as they're playing against a buck's team, we all thought would get smoked in the wild card round. I don't know the answer to that. I don't know how much is in one column and how much is in another column, and that's not a place that you want to be on January 7th. No, for a team, there's supposed to be like an elite unit on both sides of the ball, or at least a very good unit on both sides of the ball, and they just feel, whoo, grasping at straws. I mean, wink, this is the type exact, exact, wink, Markendale, this is the exact type of offensive ecosystem that he gives issues too. They don't have a good pass

protecting running back. The Eagles don't, which is also like that was an issue last year, too. Remember the Cardinals game last year? Vance Joseph had a fun time against his Eagles offense where he just forced them to throw screens a botch. Remember? It was because they didn't have a pass protective run back. And they didn't have a plan against those blitzes. And I still don't think they have a proper plan against those blitzes. I don't get how. And it's either offensive line is fine with it. It's just the running back doesn't go to the right guy or the running back gets gamed up because when you don't involve the tight end, they run so many spread formations. The tight end is not involved in the protection. So you're gamed up that six-man

protection that you're going to run every single time. Hertz doesn't throw hot as well. And if you make him predictable, when Adrian Brown's in there, oh, we're going to throw go balls. And even when he's not in there, we're going to throw go balls. And if I'm a defensive coordinator, I can live with that. And again, I thought again, the Eagles, even when all the starters ran there before they all got pulled, that they got away from the run again. It's just they run the ball, run the ball, and they have to pass. And it's just like, why? Just keep pounding the frickin' rock.

Even the Colts are running the ball, repeating run of the plays. It's like, why can you just do that again? The Colts doing it is the best example and the best argument for why this Eagles team is struggling. It should be so much more of strength. It's ridiculous. Okay, I finally found a stat to encapsulate what I'm trying to talk about here, because I know we've been harping on this for a while.

So, okay, first and second down plays following a run play on the previous snap. You got me? So a run play just happened. They either got a first down or it's the first play, yada, yada, yada. 53.5% of the time in 2022, 47% of the time in 2020. It is dropped down from the second highest rate in the NFL, which would be the first highest rate in the NFL this year, all the way to 10th. And that, and still, oh, it's 10th. It's the Eagles.

Like, yeah, they're going to run the ball. You should be able to lean out in those moments. That's the drop right. there is that little percentage. I know that sounds simplistic, but it's more of the flow of each series. Every series feels like it gets halted at some point. They don't never have that flowy series where they just impose their will. And it's just so, it's so stark when you watch it compared to like just how you felt about them last year. Well, that's losing your play caller. And that's what I saying about the comparison to the Colts and how the Colts just consistently keep running the ball like

that. It's because they have the guy that would have done that for the Eagles. He's the one calling their plays. It's such an easy thing. The offense is frustrating, and the offense has had its issues this year. The offense is elite compared to what's happening on the other side of the ball. It's a mess. And I don't know if it gets fixed. And even if they somehow slip by this Bucks team that had six points for a majority of the game against the Panthers,

I don't know what's going to happen when they have to play against a real team in the divisional round. I was watching the Cardinals just game them up last week. They just kept getting into certain personalities and certain formations and just getting the Eagles to be predictable. And it's like, oh, boy. With that personnel that they have, this kind of flawed personnel, especially on the back end, and then on top of it, they're predictable.

It's like, oh, boy. Like you said, the Bucks team that struggled today, but, I mean, look what else is creeping and lurking in the NFC playoffs right now. Tyra Taylor went 23 of 32 for 297 yards today against the Eagles defense with real players in for a good chunk of the game. That's what happened. We're looking for, we're looking toward a potentially ugly exit for this team. some very tough conversations as we get into the offseason. And the only reason that they aren't the answer for which team has spoiled their 20-22 good vibes the most is because the Jacksonville Jaguars exist. Yeah, that's about right. Well, we might get to another one in just a minute.

Let's get in the Sunday notebook some quick things that we want to hit before we get out of here. We were going to start this discussion by talking about the blowup between Arthur Smith and Dennis Allen at the end of that Falcon Saints game. Instead, we're going to start this discussion by talking about Arthur Smith being fired. According to Adam Schaefter, he has been fired. It is official. He is no longer the coach of the Atlanta Falcons. There is a lot of stuff that I wanted to dig into here.

And I think that some of the characterizations of the Arthur Smith era have been a little bit unfair. And some of the stuff I saw today and a lot of the stuff that you're going to see tomorrow when this Black Monday discussion begins is he was seven and ten for three straight years. That's why he got fired. Okay. The 2021 and 2022 Atlanta Falcons ranked 32nd and 31st respectively in cash spending. This was an epic tear down. And an epic, let's get this huge financial boulder off of us from what the previous regime did is they were trying to get everything they could out of that Matt Ryan, Julio Jones build. Let's reset and let's try to get ourselves into a good spot.

The 2022 Atlanta Falcons is a 7 and 10 team overachieved. they were an overachieving 7 and 10 team with a borderline top 10 offense made out of all of these weird pieces and Marcus Marriota. This 7 and 10 version of the Atlanta Falcons underachieved. And again, these two things can be true at once. The fact that there was a lot that they did last year that was above the talent that they had on the roster. And this year, as they made the first push they've made in this Terry Fontenow Arthur Smith partnership, they wanted to win the NFC South and they fell short. this was a disappointing year.

So how you feel about the weight that one disappointing season could have and the change in trajectory of where this regime was headed, I think ultimately will dictate whether you think he should have been fired after this season. But I think putting what the last three years is into context before we have this discussion is important because I haven't seen a lot of that as this has been thrown about over the last couple days. I always thought that this was year one basically for this team. Same.

Maybe you're two of this regime, but more or less year one. Okay, we're going to have a quarterback. He's a third round pick. We'll give him a shot. Whatever happens happens. Okay, at least we're not embarrassing, which we go to in a second. But as long as we're not embarrassing, hey, we'll just run it back. We'll build off of that where a young team go from there.

We finally have cap space. We can finally find sign free agents. And they did. And they hit. And Jesse Bates has been an all pro. I'm guarantee he'll be on everyone's first team, all pro team, as he should be. And other guys, on Imata. I mean, other guys were.

good contributors. Claice Campbell was good for them this year. They had a lot of pieces that that spending that they did did a lot of good players. Also, I noticed the fancy red graphic that we have here on our YouTube show with the firing here. That was tough. That was, whoo, that shocked me, even with my red sweatshirt on right now.

I will say, I'm going to kind of give both sides here is that I was very high on this Falcons team because of what I saw that, what, at the end of the last year and throughout the year, even with Marcus Marriott, it was spraying balls everywhere. I was like, hey, Ritter's okay. this baby's going to go because the run game was good. The run game was not good this year. We saw flashes of it. Nothing about the offensive details were good this year.

Nothing was consistent. I thought they were poorly coached at times, which was so shocking to me because they were so well coached the prior two years. There are no real staff changes. What was the strength was this run game and I just every week would just see a botch and I'd be on the show. I'm like, they're close guys. They're close.

And they just every week would have a botch. Somebody would mess up. one guy would mess up Chris Lindstrom, who was phenomenal last year. And this is why I had a comment on him last week about out of to keep him off the Pro Bowl team because he's getting paid. He's one of the best guards in the league. And he was having a botch every single week that were devastating to their offense. So I also think on the other side was I think people got really lazy with the memes

and the jokes about Arthur Smith. And we're not paying attention to any of the games that were happening because I watched a lot of these Falcons games, especially early in the year. We're not paying attention to any of the context. thing was happening. They're just seeing the Red Zone channel turnovers with Ritter. So I thought that was the other side of it because there were good moments. They just weren't consistent. And when that's, that's why we're here. And I thought that how this defense played was awesome. I thought the defense coordinator did a great job. But I also just think if the offense, this was your

strength, this is what you invested in with draft picks. And this was, we're talking a lot of, you know, mad shit here. And now it's a weakness every single week. And that's the reasons that you're losing the game. And I also just think that sometimes Arthur Smith, just watching from far, I would watch him. He would acknowledge the noise. And I think as a head coach, sometimes I don't want to criticize head coachings like this. But it's like, sometimes it's just like, have some confidence in what you were just doing. So like, hey, Desmond Ritter's our guy. Hey, you know, we have an offensive plan. Sometimes our guys don't get the ball, yada, yada. But I'll say that sometimes it was very frustrating for me because I'll be, hey, this offense

is doing right things. The most recent Bucks game, they lost. I think, uh, Drake London went for a bunch of yards. Bejohn had some touchdowns and stuff like that. No one said shit about Arthur Smith because all anyone cares about box scores of fantasy points. And that's the thing. That's what it frustrate me. The stuff that they do good, everyone would be making fun of them. And then they actually lost the game and no one said anything. They lost the game to knock him out of the playoffs and no one said a word. No one criticized Arthur Smith because of yardage. And I'm guarantee that's what happened. I've paid attention. I've been waiting to rain on that for weeks. But I think he just sometimes how he performed in these kind of crunch moments and how he reacted,

it kind of had an effect on his team. And I just like, it really just felt like that throughout the entire year. I think some people are going to look at the failing and the firing and say they bet on Desmond Ritter, that was the mistake that they made. If this offense had otherwise done a lot of good things, if they were the exact same offense on the details that they were in 2022, but Desmond Ritter played badly, it would not be hard to get to the end of the season and say, okay, they deserve a chance to go get a quarterback, to make a big play.

because the bet that they made as a franchise was we're going to build up everything. We've seen too many other teams take a quarterback high without the proper infrastructure and fail that guy in advance of whatever he was going to be. We're not going to do that. And we're going to bet that we can drop mediocre quarterback play in here because we have a well-constructed offense with the right personnel around it, and we're going to be able to succeed that way. If that was just the fault of the quarterback,

then you could talk yourself into this getting another year. That's the problem is it's not. It wasn't just the fault of the quarterback. That bet that they made on the offensive infrastructure, that's the bet that ultimately failed because the arrow was no longer pointing in the right direction with every other aspect of who they were on that side of the ball. And I think that if he didn't get fired,

one of the aspects of the conversation I wanted to have was some of the things that might have been coming out were, well, they had Desmond Ritterer at quarterback. They made that bet. They made that decision. They decided to build it this. way. They have to live with it. But again, I think if it was just the quarterback, you could say, can they go get even a stopgat veteran? Let's see what it looks like with that. But because all the

other elements of who they were offensively started to deteriorate in a road, I think that ultimately is why this decision gets made and why they have some of those embarrassing moments near the end of the season. That's why those Ritter turnovers were so devastating. It's because the lack of sustainability that was happening without the rest of the offense. For a good chunk of the season, Ritter was the most consistent part was passing the ball. Of course, the turnover is what happened, but as far as down to down, the run game that was supposed to be a legit top four unit that I gush about every single week. Like I talk about the Rams offense, that's what that was supposed to look like.

And they just were, they were bad. They were bottom 10 in every metric that we look at. And that can't happen. If you're going to spend the eighth overall pick on a running back, if you're going to build your offense this way, you cannot be a bottom 10 running team. You're supposed to, you're supposed to be zagging when everyone else was zinging. Like, hey, we're checking. We're doing all this.

We're building around the. quarterback's, all right, we're going to pound the rock, run, play action, explosive plays, control the game. I understood the identity, but they kind of failed in executing that throughout the year. And I just think everything that was supposed to be their strength just kind of fell apart, which is just like, where is that start? And it usually starts at the top. And now we have a huge set of decisions that they have to make this off season. One, who's going to be the coach, two, who's going to be the quarterback? I will keep coming back to this every single time. This to me feels like the proper Justin Fields team if they cannot get in range to draft somebody else.

I think that him with those weapons in an offense that is built around his strengths, if you bring in an offensive coordinator and say, listen, this is the model that we're going with. I would have been excited to see that in an Arthur Smith type offense. I would have been excited to see Justin Fields in the 2022 Falcons offense. I guess that's what I would say. Yes. Now what does the 2024 Atlanta Falcons offense look like? I don't know, but I do think that an option like that if they can't get in range to draft a guy in the top 10 would excite me

based on some of the other offensive pieces that they have. It'll be appealing. I mean, you got to think what the ones that are opening right now. So you got the Chargers because they got Justin Herbert. And then the Falcons, though, they got an okay offensive line. I know I just bashed them for, I just buried them for about 10 minutes. The personnel has shown that it is capable, though. Their offense is one receiver away from being just legit, legit, no matter who's calling plays.

Like, that's it. Because everything else, all the other pieces kind of fit in nicely, no matter who calls the place. And, of course, the quarterback. But that's assumed. and that is going to be, again, a big decision that they have to make this offseason. So we were going to talk about the Dennis Allen thing and then going for it and then them scoring the touchdown. And then again, none of that really matters now that Arthur Smith has been fired.

James Winston, man, just going rogue. I made a team decision. I was like, thank you, James. Thank you for sending off Week 18 and in a fine way. Only way you can, buddy. The Island game we did not talk about was the Steelers winning yesterday. The Steelers are now in the playoffs. They're 10 and 7.

Mike Tomlin has still never had a losing season. The one thing I wanted to talk about with this, though, I think that is the thing we all click into in that moment. The moment that they get into the playoffs, it's like, oh, man, Mike Tomlin did it again. And I saw so many people yesterday, like, yeah, they did this with bottom 10 quarterback play. They won 10 games again, and now they're back in the playoffs. I want to just take a step back and interrogate this discussion a little bit. Mike Tomlin hired Matt Canada. Mike Tomlin is in charge of overseeing how this offense is going to get built.

Mike Tomlin doesn't just get credit for overcoming what the Steelers offense was for the first 12 weeks of the season. But that's not how this should work. And I think that there is a real disconnect between how the national media, and I have been a part of that very often over the last couple years, talks and thinks about this current regime and how Steelers fans talk and think about this current regime. because I think from the outside, it's very easy to look at the no losing season stat and look at them in the playoffs consistently year after year and say, man, look at how great and rock solid this is. And if you're a Steelers fan thinking, I don't really care about getting into the wildcar round and getting our brains beat in with no real chance to do everything every single season.

So I think that it's, that's really what I want to talk about. It's just like, again, taking a slight step back and really considering the aggregate of what this means and what the Steelers are and whether or not we should just be celebrating a similar sort of feel from a Steelers season again. I think the McHandah experience was just, he was in the building. He was across the road. He was across the duplex that they share in Pittsburgh as well, the UPMC Center, I believe, performance performance complex.

But also, okay, you knew that. This guy has been kind of tossed, fired at every stop he's ever been at, like one year after another in college. You don't ask anybody. Like you don't like kind of know what you're buying there. It's like it's a known product who's never called plays in the NFL as well. And a guy that's known to max out the college football or the college rules that you can get away with. And that's what it was just always so confusing for me. They always feels like such a disconnect there. I feel like this team that's always so detailed and plays hard and all these vets and everything. And it all sounds like that. And it just always just felt that Canada thing that always had is

weird. And I want to know more. I would probably never. find out more. But it's just when you watch that and you watch how the defense plays, it's like, how is that this is the same team? How is that in the same building at the same time? And yes, they win. And like you said, how does Mason Rudolph end up being now the best quarterback that's played on this team this entire year?

Like, how wasn't he the first backup that played this year? Like, even with the makeup. I get why money isn't tied and everything. But it was just, they never make sense. And I've never felt more skeezy about nailing a preseason prediction. But that's what the Steelers that made me feel like. They just made me feel yucky for nailing that. there'll be a wildcard team this year.

I think that how is this true, how are both of these things happening simultaneously is the right way to think about it? Because Mike Tomlin deserves a ton of credit for how hard this team plays, for what the defense looks like every single year, for the competitiveness that they show consistently. That is what he has built there in Pittsburgh.

But he also is, he deserves credit or blame for what certain aspects of this roster have looked like and what the plan on offense has looked like. So I just think that it's, We shouldn't be so quick necessarily to just consistently celebrate what this team is because there still is a pretty significant gap between them and the elite teams in the NFL. And they don't really have a plan for how they're going to close that gap because they're

consistently in the middle. They need to have a plan for who the quarterback is going to be and who the offensive play caller is going to be before I get excited about this team and before I just bucket everything that they're doing in. Oh, this is good because they had another winning. season. That's it. That's the only kind of nuance I wanted to bring to this. It's like funny. I mean, Tomlin and Belichick, really. It just shows like how many hats head coaches have to wear and how many, how the strengths of every head coach is so different.

But it's like you have to be a CEO, of course. But some guys are play callers. Some guys have to be coaching talent evaluators. Like that's one thing that he was my head coach at Wisconsin, but Brett Bielmo is a fantastic coaching talent evaluator while his guys get hired. But also you have game management stuff. Some guys are talent evaluators too. They have say on the roster. And it's just like it seems like his coaching talent evaluation is one that's very lacking. And it's just very interesting to happen at this kind of phase right now that it's like, man, shouldn't they be young and invigorating on offense? Instead, they just feel like static and slow and stalled, even though Ben Rothsberger isn't their quarterback anymore. I think that they can

quickly fix this though. I think that if they go get the right guy, they have playmakers on offense. They've been able to run the bowl consistently. They have pieces along the offensive line. Oh, man. I told you, the run game is rogue from X-Men. They just steal a run concept each week from a team that they play the prior week. But it works for them.

It works because they do have talent. They've invested. They have offensive line. And this defense since week 10 has been pretty damn good. It's been a Steelers defense first and success rate since week 10 since they had a little mini buy. But yeah, top 10. This is something that can quickly get fixed.

And it's something that they, with the. the right decisions, they could be a really interesting team next year. But it's always the Steelers, so you never know what they're freaking going to do. I don't know. You don't know. The comparison that I make is what Jim Harba, what Jeff Harbaugh, Jeff Harbaugh, God, it's been a long season. How about Jack? Throw Jack in there. Is that? What John Harbaugh did this offseason with going to get Todd Monkin. That's what the Steelers need. They need their version of Todd Monk in this offseason. And Lamar Jackson isn't walking through that door. But that Kirk Cousins might, Justin Fields might.

somebody might. And if you get those two things right, you suddenly become really interesting. But you should not give them a pass for the swings and the misses that they have had at the two most important aspects of who your offense is, your play caller and your quarterback. And they are still there. Bringing up Monkin is such a great comparison coming from college, you know, but he had NFL experience, but also had success at places he had and everybody liked them. You know, like, but that's another component of all this. But just the difference of like what these guys hire when they reach out of their kind of. systems.

One more bummer from today, the Lions lose a couple guys to injury. Sam Roporta has a hyper-extended D in a bone bruise. Sounds like he's going to miss some time and may not be able to play this weekend in a huge playoff game. I understand if you're Detroit thinking, okay, if we win and the Lions and the Cowboys lose, we get the two seed. There actually is something on the line treating this game that way. But there was a very good chance the Cowboys are probably going to win and to lose

Sam Leporta, who has been a vital piece. of the offense. That is not overstating it. He is a vital piece of who they are. And for him to potentially not be able to play in a game where you might have to keep pace with the Rams is a huge deal. Yes. Yes.

I mean, he's a huge cog in this offense. And also Khalif Raymond banged up as well. But it's just like with this offense and how everything is orchestrated perfectly. And Ben Johnson's done a great job of kind of like when they've had guys out. But LaPorte has just been a constant difference maker every single week. So this is brutal. I mean, I get it.

some people were mad about it, but I understand what the Lions philosophy on all this and why they did it, but it's just like, man, it just stinks. It's more just as a football watcher and probably Lions fans are bummed too, of course. That's how I feel as well. Yeah. The 24 draft order is set. The Bears obviously have the number one pick. We get Washington at number two, Patriots at three. The Cardinals missing that field goal puts them at four. The Chargers are at five. So that is your top five. If Matt Prater makes that kick. The Chargers are picking fourth. I joked about this a little bit earlier today. In a world where

quarterbacks went one, two, three. The Bears, Washington, New England, pick them. We could have had a moment where Marvin Harrison Jr. could have landed with Justin Herbert with the fourth overall pick. That reality is gone, but there is still a chance that he can land with Kyla Murray if quarterbacks go one, two, three, and I would be very excited to watch that. But that's what we're looking at.

So you have three teams at the top that probably need quarterbacks. We have three teams at the top that probably are going to, at least two of them, I think, are probably going to move on from their head coaches and are moving into new regimes. So how that ultimately shakes out is going to be fascinating. The Giants at six need a pass catcher. Go ahead. Yeah. Oh, sorry. I thought you're going to end the show. I got two special shoutouts once we're doing with the draft or stuff. So sorry about that. Well, the last thing I want to talk about before we get out of here outside of the top 10, one of those teams picking in the top 10 is the New England Patriots.

Yes. What is going to happen with Bill Belichick becomes. the biggest question that we're going to have to answer here over the next 48 hours. I know that we've spent a lot of time thinking about it over the last couple months, so it kind of seems overdone and overplayed at this point. But I think it's important to acknowledge that the best coach in the history of the sport potentially could get fired tomorrow. And I understand them doing it. And the biggest question I have beyond what comes next for New England,

because we'll spend a lot of time considering that, is what comes next for Bill Belichick? If you're one of these teams, is Bill Belichick a worthwhile hire? Is he somebody worth chasing in this cycle? And I think the answer is yes for a team in the right circumstances because he is still a very good defensive coach. And if you give him proper pieces, I think that he can still be a real pain in the ass for anybody. So with the right type of roster, I still think the answer is yes. But the idea that Bill Belichick could potentially, whether they call it a mutual parting of the ways or it's an actual firing, could no longer be in the Patriot. its coach tomorrow is a very real possibility.

It's just a reality. I never thought I had to come across. Like, you know, I thought it was like, yeah, I'd never just really deal with. But just also just the Patriots identity is finally potentially changing for the first time of forever in, you know, 20-something years. So it's just, it's remarkable. I think Belichick is going to have at least several suitors. I'm going to be very interested in what happens there. If he does become.

And who those are. It's going to be very, very interesting. Okay. My little special shout out real quick. the Cardinals fake pump play against the Seahawks. Do you see it? Yes, I did. With the kicker and punter on the field with Kyle are on the field and the caught the Seahawks snoozing.

I mean, that's one of those last game of the year, no reason to hold anything back moments. No, but just the Cardinals, those frisky Cardinals, I'm going to be obnoxious about him the next six months. The other one is Zeke complaining about or talk about how you always wanted to play in the snow. And then he goes, it actually sucks. And that was just like, that was just perfect. I was like, that's exactly right. You think it's going to be great. It's not fun.

It's not fun, especially when it's windy. I know, not to just go, yeah, Bill Belchette, greatest coach of all time. How about that trick play with the Cardinals that actually didn't matter in the grand scheme of thing? Listen, we'll have a lot of time to talk about this over the next couple of days. We've got some extra shows this week, just a heads up. Me and Diana are going to be wrapping up everything that happens in the coaching world. That will be available for you guys on Tuesday. And then we are going to be having a midseason award.

Midseason. Again, sorry. It's been a long night. Basically, we're going to be having... End of season awards show coming your way on Wednesday along with Prospects to Pros. Just because we need to do it. We've got to do it somewhere.

There's a ton of awards that I think deserve a lot of... Can't wait. Really good conversation that we're going to have tomorrow. And that'll be available for you guys on Wednesday. So excited about that. Other than that, regularly scheduled programming with Prospects to Prospects, with me and Chase, all that stuff coming your way this week. So that is the end of the regular season, a fantastic regular season.

and we are set up for a great playoffs. So thank you very, very much for everyone who has listened over the course of the year. If you could do us a favor and go leave a review on Apple, Spotify, wherever you happen to listen, I would consider it a personal favor. So sincerely appreciate that and sincerely appreciate all of the time you guys have spent with us, especially those watching live on YouTube all season, means a ton, and we are very excited for how the playoffs are going to shape up here. This was the Athletic Football Show.