The Bill Simmons Podcast - A Round 2 Roller-Coaster Ride, Denver’s QB Plight, and Josh’s Lost Weekend With Cousin Sal

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Cousin Sal right after the Rams-Bears OT nail-biter to recap the divisional round of the NFL playoffs (1:15). Then they guess the lines for the conference championship games before ending with Parent Corner (01:03:59). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Cousin Sal Producers: Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Nick Kosut Post your job today at https://www.linkedin.com/simmons The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit⁠⁠⁠ www.rg-help.com⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Expedia. You gotta love a good deal, whether that would be a quarterback on a short, low-risk contract who performs like a top-tier starter or Expedia's bundle and save feature, which allows you to combine flights, hotels, and cars,

into one package for impressive discounts. Not just that, but if you remember, you can book an item now, add select items later, and still enjoy bundled savings. I mean, I think of this from a parent standpoint when I know that I have to go cross-country

to go see my daughter in college. And if I could bundle all the stuff to one thing, when I know I'm going back anyway, now that is a winning strategy. Book now with Expedia. The Bill Simmons podcast, presented by Fandil Sportsbook. We're also presented by the Ringer Podcast Network

Rewatchables coming up on Monday night. So we did just one of the guys. Oh, that's a great one. Yeah, I love it. I love it. Yeah. It's one for us week. Because we go to Netflix next week.

And we wanted to bang out a couple. I'm turning off my hide self-view. There we go. Yeah, we wanted to bang out a couple before we started. You should flash everyone at the end. I mean, that was the big thing, right? That's what I should have. I should have pulled my shirt off at the tail end.

There's still time. Coming up, Sal and I are going to talk about an unbelievable weekend of football right after this. Cousin Sal is here. Best Super Bowl draft. Two of the Super Bowl nominees, Sal. Wait a minute. May versus Stafford, May versus Darnold, Stidham versus Stafford or Stidham versus Darnold.

What are you the most excited about? I like Stidham, Darnold. I mean, I've been rooting for that all year. You know me. I'm not a front runner. That's the one I had targeted all year, Stidham and Darnold. And it really looks like it's going to happen. It's unbelievable.

Stidham has one career win? Oh, man. How do you do it? How do you do it? Oh, don't even start. Can we talk about Rams, Bears first? I'm hoping we could talk about Rams Bears to a point where you forget about your team.

Maybe we can go the whole hour and a half if you want. How dare you. Rams Bears, would it have been the Colt-Comet game or the Caleb Tecmo Bowl game for you? Because that was the original Tecmo Bowl offense of just running backwards, 25 yards, and heaving it toward the end zone

and then the guy catches it. But how would you have remembered that if the bears that actually went? Yeah, yeah. Everything's the Caleb Williams game at this point. It really is. I mean, the guy... Yeah, because he, I don't know if he's the best fourth down quarterback we've ever seen in our lives.

How many does he have to have? How many miraculous fourth down plays does he have to have? It's got like nearing a dozen now. But the fact that on that play, he was able to weave his way back and create a Hail Mary where he had a third of the end zone to himself one-on-one. I just don't know how he does it. He threw it, what, 46 yards? It was a 14-yard touchdown pass that actually went 46 yards. in the air. Look, he is replicated the best I've ever seen at any quarterback, the experience of

watching a really fun NBA player who's all over the map from game to game in a playoff series. You just never know when he's going to get hot or he's going to bank in a three. He could be six for 22 and then make the last seven shots of the game. I think this season's been a massive win for him. I didn't know what to expect from him, you know, heading into this year, it's like, Didn't think it was going to be a bus, but was he going to be one of those disappointing, was he going to be passed by Daniels, passed by Drake May. Now I think he's the most exciting game to game quarter. You just don't know what to expect.

You don't want to go, you don't want to leave the room when he's on the field. I don't know what he's going to do. You always feel like there's more there. Like he could just run around and run for 20 yards, whatever he wants. He can uncork and he throw. The balls go all over the place. That Rams interception in overtime, we should have known was going to happen. Because every time you start getting settled in and feeling like,

okay, I trust Caleb. And then he veers the other way. I just, there's nobody like him. It's an incredible phenomenon locally and probably nationally, but at least in Chicago, you have like 60-year-old truck drivers, like Teamsters painting their nails black for this guy. Like, what the hell's going on over there?

Really, you got Collinsworth with the next-gen stats. I don't know what my sperm count is anymore with this guy. But it's just, it's phenomenal to see. And it's like, yeah, you don't know when you're going to get it, except that it's definitely going to be in the fourth quarter in a crucial time, but then he could turn it over again. I wrote down in my notes that they can't feel the blood in their body until they're down seven with like less than five minutes left.

As soon as they're down 17, 10, they can get a stop. You just assume, all right, here they go. This is who they are. They left a lot on the table during this game. But so did the Rams. And I thought the Rams really tuck their tail between the legs a couple of times, especially late. they just seemed very safe,

like uncharacteristically safe. And then when they got that interception, I think McVeigh rightly said, what are we doing? Let's go. Let's turn it up here. You should probably give credit to most of the defenses that played this weekend, right?

Because otherwise, we're just going to crap on the quarterbacks and the play callers. Like, I don't have a high opinion of myself as a play caller, but I think I could have done better in three of the four games we saw for sure. McVeigh and Ben Johnson looked like they threw out the playbook. Like McVeigh had like six passes inside the 30 in the go-ahead drive.

And then like to kill the clock, oh, I need it was the first down on third and seven, I think. And it's just like, yeah, a week run up the middle. Like, I don't know. I don't know if they're flipping coins back there or what was going on. And Ben Johnson, like you were all over it today. Like just, just unsure of himself. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It, uh, the third and ones and the fourth and ones and just like the really predictable, like, Colin. worth kept talking about what a gunslingery was and this band Johnson look out and then it would just be like the most generic play as possible. I didn't think that Caleb used his legs enough. I thought that same way about Drake May too in the game before, but then you think about yesterday where

Peyton does the design world out with Bo Nix and the guy breaks his ankle. So maybe that's why they're afraid to let these guys kind of run around and do their stuff. But I thought the Rams were incredibly fortunate for a couple of reasons, but mainly because if, if, If the bears had just gone for two with 18 seconds left, I just feel like they would have gotten it. Yeah. I have no evidence. Throughout the math, it's just pure. I know the nerds say momentum doesn't happen, but you have that play.

You get a touchdown. And I at least show like I'm going to pretend I'm going to go for two and make the Rams panic. And see, I don't know. I just feel like they would have gotten it. At that point, it felt like the bird with the angel was on their shoulder and they were going to get it. Birds, angels, everything. I mean, everything stack. Bird shit.

Yeah, bird shit. I'm with you. I don't go by the nerds in that situation. I go by the opposing team's fans. We always talk about this, right? So what are Rams fans? They're all Rams fans, right? But what are Rams fans?

Like, there's a collective sigh when we see the extra point team come out to tie it up, right? Well, you had $28,000 in the Rams. So what did you want the bears to do? I bet you want it higher. You wanted them to kick the extra point out of bet. Hell yeah, of course. You were like, let me take overtime. Let me have Matthew Staff.

against up and down Caleb. I'll take my chances. By the way, both teams kicked off, lost. I mean, we could talk about that. I think it was worse in the Bills game. But another stupid thing. Got a tired defense out there. Take advantage.

Get the ball. Yeah, and we just don't have enough of a math sample size to know what we should or shouldn't do in this situation. But it feels weird to me to kick off. Wouldn't you just want the ball and want to lay the smack down and want to try to score? And especially if you had the momentum of scoring at the end of the previous quarter,

I just feel like that's what I would want to do. You have to count momentum in that scenario because momentum comes with it. These guys are playing and now, what is it, 10 degrees by the time it's 11 o'clock at night there, whatever it is, that 10? But yeah, and you've got to take advantage of that. You're giving them like three free timeouts

if they're playing defense second. And really, what's the benefit of, I get the whole, oh, we want to see what we have to do thing. When does that matter unless they score and then you score? Then the top of the second favors them because they're going to get the extra possession and they can win there. Yeah, I just feel like

the longer we watch football, the more we get confused by stuff. I still don't know what it catches. We argued about the, we'll talk about the Buffalo game later. We argued about that for 12 hours. Yeah, we have four inches of texts arguing about that. Devonte Adams had a similar play a bit,

and we were like, no, no, he held it longer. Like, there's no rubber reason of any of this. The more football we watch, the more confused, I think we get by by all of it, but it did feel like the big lesson to me during that game

was it felt like the teams were really even. Yeah. And I don't know if we value enough the weather stuff with these matchups and just in general.

I feel like we, it's like a variable we talk about the same way we talk about like the Rams don't have a good run game and the bears don't have a very good run defense.

They have this and EP it's like maybe you just throw all of it out. And it's like, is the weather going to be bad? Yeah. The game's probably going to be close. or in Houston's case.

Is the weather going to be bad? Because they can't block and I don't trust their quarterback. And maybe I don't need to know anything else about the matchup. Maybe that's it. But I don't know. Do we discount the indoor, outdoor and all the weather stuff too much? Well, a lot of times the weather report is wrong. Like, they'll show something in the morning and you'll see snow.

Like, oh, my God, how are fans you going to get in that stadium? And then it's like all cleaned up and everything and it just looks cold. So I don't try to live and die by it. But I know one thing we could throw out the performance. we saw last week. Like, maybe we don't know what a catch is, but we don't know what the thing of these did. Like, both defenses played really good today, right?

Bears especially. Rams had nothing of that against Bryce Young, you know? Jordan Love could have probably put up 40 points against the Bears in the first half if he wanted to, but they really hit hard. Well, they, Collinsworth said at one point, like the Rams were having trouble with the footing and the receivers were having trouble with the footing. And you think, like, and I obviously, I'm biased and

you know, anyone who roots for an East Coast team is kind of biased on this one. But playing outdoors and what it does for your stats and your ability to do stuff on offense versus being in a dome indoors. I think it's a real thing. Like I look at the breeze stats and Manning stuff in Indianapolis. I just think it's an advantage versus like if you're somebody like Brady, who is not sound like a Brady defender, even though, as you know, I am. But he's in the AFC East.

He's playing at least 12 games a year. outdoors than a lot of the playoff games outdoors and I just think it's harder to put up stats. You saw the Rams like Pooka's been the best receiver not only of this year but of the last couple years and he seemed a little more mortal today when you throw him outdoors although he did

end up making the biggest play of the game. But I think there is something to that though these warm weather dome teams outdoors like you really have to count that. You can see the stats on the splits for home in the way if their home is in a dome and most of the time it does make a difference. I'll tell you, I think that we

set a record this weekend for passes that were just behind the receiver. You know, like a dunzee. Was that a duncee in the first quarter? Like, oh, he should have had it. But, like, I felt like we saw like 40 of those all weekend. And we could talk about it. Stroud had a couple in the game before that, too.

Yeah. So we had the Bears down seven, huge drive. They go all the way down. They can't get it. Rams giving them the ball back. Caleb Prayer. And then we go to, oh, that, like, it was so much happen.

But the bottom line is the Rams scored. what, 10 points in the last three hours of the game? Yeah, it's true. And if I'm the Seahawks, I'm probably rooting for the Bears as I watched that game, right? But I'm a little less afraid of the Rams. Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's a rubber match, right?

Yeah, third time. I don't know. I guess McFey's going to have it out for them more. But yeah, for sure, for sure. It's a coin toss now going forward, except for your freaking team. It's going to go all the way. Well, on Fandole now.

I don't look. No, no, no, I'm not going to look at the lines. I'm going to look at the futures. Yeah, Seattle's plus 150 now. Yeah. Pat's plus 220. Rams plus 220. Broncos 13-1.

What happened with the Broncos? I missed something. They were in the final. They were looking so good. Why are they 13-1? So the NFL's best case scenario is May versus Stafford, the Rams rematch, McBae getting his revenge against the Patriots. May in a second year making the Super Bowl.

If you're just talking like big picture storylines, that's probably the coolest. May versus Darnold, we would just see the Darnold ghost, the clips of that one Jets Pats game. That would just be two weeks of that. Or Malcolm Butler, right? That's the rematch of that.

Oh, yeah, that's the Seattle Revenge game. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think three of the four are Super Bowl rematches, right? Yeah, New England Rams, which was a lousy Super Bowl. Seattle, New England. Maybe Seattle, New England. what's the best one because Seattle's never won a Super Bowl. You can't go wrong, man. And they would be getting the revenge on that.

Then when we move into the Stidham territory, now you have to start talking yourself, I have this written down, the backup QB kind of being heard from either in the conference championship or the Super Bowl. The best that it's ever worked out was Hostetler and Nick Foles. Who talks shit today, I got about the Patriots. I didn't appreciate that, Nick Fools. I love it. What does he have to lose? That's terrific. Fuck off Nick Foles. Nobody wanted to hear from you. Yeah.

You know what? It's good. It's all good. So back up QB. So we had that Brady Bledsoe thing where then Bletsoe came into the AFC title game in 2001 after Brady had taken his job and kind of held the fort. Earl Morrill going way back on the Colts, but they ended up not winning. Tony Easton, sort of, the 85 Bears, 40th anniversary of the Bears' paths, shalacking. But Grogan had been the starter.

and then Tony Easton, Grogan had his job, and then Tony Easton basically took it back for the Super Bowl, but it felt like it was Grogan's job. But it's really not a lot of examples. Did you say Hostetler? You said Hostetler or not? Hostelor. But, yeah, Hostelor is the most famous, I think.

Right. Yeah. Stidham having one career win, I think this would be the new standard if he was able to win two more games and win the Super Bowl. One career win. He hasn't thrown a pass in like almost two and a half years, right? I kind of like them.

It's a preseason guy. I can't say I feel awesome about like if there were some other backup QBs, some of the ones we watched on and tried to bet against during this season. Really? Bro, be like, oh my God, we get to play this guy.

This is amazing. I don't know. Stidim's not horrendous. He can kind of sling it a little bit. He's one of the highest paid backups in the league. Right? I'm calling bullshit on this. You know what?

Show me your text. You're with your Patriot fan texting, shame on you and all your incorrigible mace-hole chums on your patch chain. I'm sure you celebrated the second you found out Boenix was out. Go ahead. Read me some. We try to be magnanimous and we try to celebrate everybody else's wins.

Yeah, I'm sure you try. We just play who's in front of us. So do you feel better or worse about the Rams after that game? No, I agree with you about Seattle. I think they should feel better about their chances, you know. I don't want to ruin the line anyway, but you said their favorites to win the Super Bowl, and there's a reason.

So I just in general, I think Seattle's just like, but try to beat us here. You saw what we're all about. Let's talk about that game really quickly, and then we could circle back. The Sam Darnold injury, Roper Dope, I fell for it.

Yeah. I had all these Seattle bets. Schifter, I don't know, not trusting that guy anymore with info. It really made it seem like Darnold was, it's going to be a miracle if this guy can throw a pass and then the game starts and he seems fine. The line moved from seven and a half

to six and a half. No. Well, it was seven. It was seven and a half Tuesday. Well, I'm saying seven and a half start of the week. Settled at seven. By game time was six and a half. Yeah. Well, and then Darnel was fine. I had San Francisco plus seven, so I don't think I could do much

bragging here. But it wasn't because of Sam Donald's oblique. Like, you could because you could read every Adam Schaefter or Jay Glazer, whatever, sports doctor report on the injury, and you could read one number on Fandall Sportsbook. And if that number didn't go from seven to three and a half, there was no chance of him, like, throw in pregame and be like, you know what, I can't make a, I can't make a go of it. And I looked it up, and oblique isn't even a body part, by the way.

I think it's a font. I'm not sure. It only matters in baseball. Yeah. Somebody can put their oblique in baseball. They're up for six weeks. They just have the red flag next to them in fantasy baseball forever. Well, this was one of those where I had people,

I had a couple of people over to watch the first game and they were leaving and came back in and the Seahawks were celebrating and they were up seven nothing. I didn't even see the first. It was one of those where it's like, oh, it's going to be one of these games. They have no chance. I'm pretty dominant.

I felt like I was still seeing, you know, because I have knucklehead friends reporting on Bo Nix. I'm like, this isn't true. Like, I was checking Twitter so much that I missed the first play, the first and only play that matter. My big, I mean, I want to talk about the Seahawks in a second, but the most damning thing I think all weekend is the Eagles who didn't even play. Right.

And they lose last week to that Niners team that just seemed so depleted and overmatch this week. I mean, they didn't have kiddle, but it was mostly the same team. And if I was an Eagles fan, that would be even madder than I was a week ago. And I was thinking, is this a possible playoff manifesto ad? don't take any playoff team that had a miserable season. Doesn't seem like they liked each other. It seems like they might be excited to be in the Bahamas in a week over round two. Wow.

I'm just going to remember them with the Eagles because clearly it was a rollover by them. It's fucking embarrassing. They should be the champions. What kind of title defense was that? Yeah. In the playoffs, if I was the Eagle Spin, I'd be furious. Like, really, we lost to that fucking team? Who was the guy, who was the receiver who had 100 yards, to Marcus Robinson?

You didn't have a catch yesterday? Yeah, yeah, yeah. How are you doing for a doubt if? Terrible. I forget about Eagles fans. What if you're Eagles management? What if you're Howie Roseman? Like, you know, they didn't fire Siriani, right?

He survived the week. He must, Siriani must be like, oh, thank God. All right, I'm good. Big Dom, let's go out and get some chicken parm. We're going to be fine. Then Howie Roseman sees that. I would think twice now about keeping him around based on the next game that the Niners played. What are you looking at?

Right. What are you doing? I'm asking you, Gahau, no, I'm asking Gahau if we have to take a break after this. Oh. I listened to everything you said that. That's all right. That doesn't matter.

No, I heard everything you said. Do we have to take a break? No. Not yet. You want to do the intro again? Can I have another crack in it or are we live? Seattle's now 15 and 3 and they have the top six best DVOA of all time right now.

Yeah. They beat in the Niners twice. They beat the Steelers, the Jaguars, Houston, Carolina, and the Rams. lost to the Rams and the Niners both close. And really look good. Yeah, I mean, that's like, if you're a Seahawks fan, this is as good of a chance as you've ever had.

You made the Super Bowl in 05. But who'd you have in that game, Pittsburgh, Seattle? Pittsburgh. Which one? Oh, that one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, I had Pittsburgh. Yeah.

Pittsburgh had that crazy Colts game. Yeah, we did the show in Detroit. Yeah. Pittsburgh had that crazy Colts win, when they stopped Manning and then Bettis fumbled on the one-yard line and Rathusberger made that crazy tackle and basically saved the game

and then they end up winning and they end up winning the whole thing. The Seattle fans still pissed off about the calls in that game. Defensive holding? Yeah. And a couple years later got their NBA team stolen. So they're a little edgy.

All right. And then what you guys did to them with the Malcolm Butler thing? Yeah, I think like, I was surprised that both them and Denver didn't come out rusty. Like, you know, the two buy teams, right? It used to be four by teams, whatever.

But both teams were right on. At Denver score, what, 20 in the first half? Josh Allen helped that. But Seattle, what was that? Two plays in the game was over? Like, you had the kick return, and then you had San Francisco on fourth and one with that full back option to McCaffrey. Who's checked to McCaffrey?

He's like, oh, this is way over this game. Like, Donald could throw, I think he threw for 106 yards. He didn't probably have to do that much to win. Tough part a game, too. Yeah. Yeah, I wonder if McCaffrey, do they start. treating him like the Clippers treat Kauai or something.

Yeah. Where you just try to get like 10 games. If you're trying to like actually win a couple of playoffs rounds in them, do you try to just get 10 games out of him during the season? Kind of stagger his minutes. You know, it's funny. I was looking at him play and I know the Seahawks

was swarming and they had more energy anyway, but I was like, oh, even McCaffrey doesn't look fast. He didn't look like the blaze that we were used to with CMC. And then I saw this stat. It said, Next Gen stats, their average top speed, this year was 12.81 miles per hour, the 49ers. That was the sixth lowest in the NFL.

And DeWinters, the linebacker is the only one to reach 20 miles an hour. So they, I was like, oh, finally, some useful, I mean, that actually is pretty useful. Yeah, I would have, I like that. All right. So we're going to take, I think, a break. All right. And then we'll come back and, and we'll hit the AFC games because those were, well, there was one game that was the most interesting game in the week.

So we'll be back in one second. The Bill Simmons podcast is presented by Fandul. Fandle's got it all. Same game parlays, quick bets for jumping in live. They have your way. Go check out your way. You can build the bet that fits your play, your way. Plus, don't miss out on the NFL playoffs.

One of my favorite times of the year all month long. Download the Fandole app or head to fandul.com slash BS to get started. Get ready for the playoffs. Let's go. Must be 21 plus president select states, 18 plus in D.C., Kentucky and Wyoming. Gam, and probably

call Win 100 Gambler or visit RG-G-Helf.com. Call 88879-777 or visit CCPG.org slash chat in Connecticut.

This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn. If you've ever hired for your small business, I've done this once upon a time.

You know how important is to find the right person. That's why LinkedIn Jobs is stepping things up with their new AI assistant. So you can feel confident and you're finding

top talent. Post your job for free at LinkedIn. at LinkedIn.com slash Simmons. That's me. Then promote it to use LinkedIn jobs, new AI system, making it easier and faster to find top candidates.

That's LinkedIn.com slash Simmons to post your job for free terms and conditions. Apply. You know, I felt like I was really good last week. I was on it. The Pats game took a lot out of me today, cousin's self.

Really? How so? Yeah. Yeah. It was that that was kind of, of a heart attack game. You, your home, the weather's bad, the other team's quarterback throws four interceptions in the first half.

And all of a sudden, it's a one possession game. And we feel like we have no momentum at all. And there's about 20 minutes of that game. It got pretty dark. And I don't think I was the only Pat's fan who felt that way. It was like, really? This is how this season's going to end where we lose to a team whose quarterback had such steer in the headlights that at halftime, the argument was whether.

they're going to replace them with the backup in a round two playoff game. When was the last time that happened? Right. Like, like, Marcus Spears, I think it was the right point. Are they going to bring in Davis Mills?

Because we were texting about it. And then Ryan Clark came in. You can't do that. This guy's your quarterback. He got round two. All of a sudden, they're having first take in the halftime show. And I was like riveted because I was like,

I think they should play Davis Mills. I think Strouds a sunk cost. Three games, right? I mean, how many interceptions and fumbles? Eight? What, you're going to allow before your season's over?

My dad and I were texting. Both of us were like, I hope they don't bring in mills. I hope they keep shrouding, please. So anyway, the third quarter starts, and then all of a sudden, the Pats can't do anything, and the Texans have momentum, and it looks like we can't block Will Anderson anymore. He's just going by Campbell.

It took a lot out of me. I can't lie. We're getting older. These are tough. Yeah, I know. Well, this isn't the bragging I was expecting. That's for sure. that I really thought you were going to tell me

how this is the best Pats team of all time that throw to Kishon. Kishon Booty was, I mean, that's the one nice thing I'll say about this Patriot team. That I think was the catch of the year. And we see millions of them. We see Pooka going up with one hand.

But to do it in the snow, whatever else was going on with one hand, and, you know, really put a stamp on that game, right? Like you were nervous until then, right? Then that was that. I felt they were driving and looked at they're going to get a field goal,

and I didn't think the Texans could get 11. So that would have been a lot. But Booty, like, he basically ended the game. What's interesting is that was like every Drake May game this year, where it's a little choppy for the first 45 minutes of the game, or, you know, in real time, 45 minutes. So it's just not, and then all of a sudden it clicks in and he's off. And in this game, he did that.

And then the third quarter, all of a sudden he was, you know, seemed off again. And then kind of rallied back. but every game this season, he's had a perfect 35, 40-yard throw like that. This time, the guy had to make an amazing catch on it. But they've hit that throw. It feels like every week.

He's waiting on it, was waiting on it, and then finally did it. And it ended the game. You knew they weren't going to get two touchdowns. That's all he should do is throw long passes. He shouldn't bother with this shortstop. He's great at throwing long passes. As soon as he tries to throw over the middle,

he holds on to it too long, he gets sacked, he fumbles, he's subpar quarterback. You want to call him an MVP? That's fine. Just throw along every time. So far's a little strong. Rear back and throw it. I think he was holding it a little too long,

considering Will Anderson was in the backfield in about four seconds every single play. They didn't use his legs that much. I think that fumble kind of freaked them out. I thought they were going to be rolling them out, dude's design rolled out. The stuff that swung the game was the I formation. Yeah. When they kind of went bigger and really started to try to run the ball, Ramandre was out for a while that wasn't open either.

That booty catch, I know, I didn't want to tell you I was doing this. I wanted to be a surprise because I knew how excited you would be. Best Patriots playoff catches ever made a list. I'll just go in descending order to the biggest one. Gronk versus the Chiefs in 2018. How many are you doing? What is this? No, this is just six.

Gibbons versus the Panthers second Super Bowl. Gronk, fourth and ten against Denver, AFC title game down the middle. They ended up losing that game, but that was an hour. He's double covered, 40-yard pass down the center. This is my favorite gronk play.

Edelman third and 14 against Seattle and he's basically concussed during the play and keeps going and then claimed he wasn't concussed. Amundal against Jacksonville. And then Edelman in the, in the Falcons game, the dive,

the whatever, when it seemed like, wait, did he catch that when he caught the deflection, which is still the best. best Patriots catch we've ever had. So you're not putting this in the top. I think this might be.

Seven? I would put this fourth. Now, if they don't win anything, if they don't have winning the Super Bowl, maybe it drops. But yeah, it clinched a round two playoff game. It sent them to the AFC title game.

All my tech today were basically like, we can go, CJ Stroud in the snow, Stidham, Sam Darnold, and we win the Super Bowl. It's like, we were just sending it back.

Like, nobody could believe like this was the path. We can only play who's in front of us, Sal. I know, I know, I know. I really just gets worse and worse. I'm like, you get great news that Josh Allen's knocked out of the playoffs. And then four minutes later, you get news that Bo Nix is out of the playoffs. And then no charges with no offensive line.

Texans with no Nico, Broncos, you know, I feel like if the Venezuelan opposition leader presented the Patriots with the Lombardi trophy, do you accept it? Does Kraft lower himself to accept? It's not really good. God only knows with craft these days. Well, we were missing,

guys. We didn't have Matt Collins. Yeah. It's been huge for us. Might get them back next week. I can't believe this. Yeah, I'll just,

I know everybody's going to make the joke. Everyone's going to joke about the schedule. It's just how we're going to do this the next couple weeks, especially if they beat Denver. They'd be like, oh, how do I bet on the Pat Super Bowl MVP being the schedule? Like,

we know we're going to hear the jokes. We only play as in front of us. Do you know who the 2019 Chiefs played in Mahomes' first Super Bowl title? Do you remember who they played? Do you want me to list all the teams? I don't remember. Well, I'll give you the playoffs.

The playoff teams? Go ahead. They played the crappy Texans. They played the Titans and Ryan Tannehill, and then they played the Niners in Jimmy Garapo and they won the Super Bowl. And nobody was like, who'd they play? Right.

And they were down to 10. Who was it? I don't know why we pick and choose the who'd we play thing. Well, this is extraordinary. That's his fault that Josh Allen fucking choked in the, on Saturday, which he did. There we go. For him.

Yeah. He's supposed to be the best. part in the league. He didn't play well enough. That's not the Patriots fault. We're waiting for him. He's not there. I think the Stroud thing is extra damning because he's supposed to be decent and he put out one of the, well, two of the worst playoff games of all time combined,

right? And they still won like, you know, five plus interceptions and five plus fumbles in a single post season. It's the first one to do it. Four plus interceptions in a single playoff game, which puts them in good company. He tore that Kate Stover's ACL throwing a pass to him. It was a non-contact

It was not. I hope he didn't tear. I haven't looked up though. I hope not. But I've never seen that before. He just kind of twist himself to get back to an awful pass. So I don't know what happened. And then it felt like five more we almost caught or could have caught. And then four that were just completely uncatchable to guys that seemed like they were open. I don't know.

I wasn't like getting hit. And he especially doesn't like getting hit in the cold. And that's why that pick six happened, which was really the game changer I felt. Well, he almost had a full DeLone, so. I know. It's close. For the newer listeners or people of the pod, way back when Jake DeLone, I think he had five picks, including a pick six, or maybe it was five picks in a fumble, whatever

was. We called it the full Delon. This was just a DeLone. It wasn't a full delon. Yeah, right. He needed one more. I was waiting for him to get it, and he couldn't do it. But it was, there was like a half-decent, how much can you actually blame him debate?

because clearly he deserves a bunch of blame and he was terrible. Yeah. But did have Nico Collins, the running game wasn't there. The Pats just took that down. Shultz got hurt early. Right.

I don't know. He lost his right tackle. This all goes on the Lombardi trophy. All this goes on your trophy. Yeah. But I'm just, because they're already talking after the game, like, would you give this guy an extension?

Yeah, right. You know, he had last two seasons, including the playoffs, 26 picks, 42 touchdown. there was a legitimate should they start his backup in the second half of a do-or-diei playoff game combo. I would be nervous to give him the extension. I thought he took a step back this year.

I would too. I think we for sure thought he was the best quarterback in that division, right? And now we reluctantly have to give it, who is it, Trevor Lawrence? Wait, where are we? I think it is Trevor Lawrence. Yeah, I think that's where we are.

But sit there for Cam Ward. Cam Ward could get it too. Yeah, and to your point, like it helps if you could, in these cold weather, miserable games, if you could run the ball, right? Yeah. I would think. And Woody Marks was, what, 14 for 17 with a fumble? You're just not going to get it that way.

In the first half, not only do we have the four takeaways in the pick six, they forced 22 plays of zero or negative yards would set the record for this century for a first half in a playoff game. Yeah. They had the run defense in the Chargers game and this game combined 30 carries for 61 yards. Like, this is what I was saying last week before the Chargers game. Like the stats would Milton Williams plays versus when he doesn't. It's like night and day. They have all their D-Lineman back and they're really good at stopping the run.

The Texans, I thought, had a pretty good game plan. Like, they kept picking on Carlton Davis, who's the, that's the cornerback. All the Pats fans are scared of, right? He's always in the middle of, it feels like a P.I. Or a possible P.I. every time. He had two picks. He had a couple PIs. He went out at the end, right?

Then he got hurt at the end. Yeah. But they went after him. but I think when Shultz went out, I think that really screwed with them because they weren't going to be able to run the ball. They didn't have like that eight-yard guy over the middle. And let's be honest,

like they just were never good enough offensively this year, I think, to match whatever the defense was. And then I'll say this about the defense, which was admittedly awesome in a couple stretches, but the pads had three like full touchdown drives on them. Yeah. It wasn't like you watched and you're like, oh, they had these intercept.

They had three drives. to score, including to, like, end the game and the Texans didn't stop them. So, like, when people were talking about them compared to the 2000 Ravens, like, settle the fuck down. All right, but three touchdown drives for 193 yards, nine other drives for two total yards. I think you had

seven first downs after three quarters. Like, if you just isolate that, I agree. C.J. Stroud should be ashamed of himself for not beating that, you know? I didn't love the play calling. I thought May really took a while to get going. And it's a real thing, these young, young quarterbacks in the playoffs because we saw it with Caleb too.

They're just all over the map. They're not consistent enough yet. But he ended up, he had, you know, three touchdowns. I thought he had some really good throws. I think next week will be easier. Are you like wildly impressed by the Denver defense? Because I'm not. I don't think it's going to be as good as what we saw today.

No. But maybe they'll play with a chip on their shoulder. So, all right, give me the unbiased, just watching the paths. do they seem like a Super Bowl team to you? Because to me, I feel like it's a year early. What do you mean? Will they advance to the Super Bowl? Like, as you watch them, are you, is it like, holy shit, this is a team that belongs

in the Super Bowl? Because to me, it feels like we had this in Parcellus's last season, the 96 team, which just felt like a year from now was going to be the awesome team. And then all of a sudden they made the Super Bowl. And it's like, all right, I guess we're ready. And that's kind of how I feel about this team. I mean, probably not. But when Denver's the number one seed

and Jacksonville's fighting for the number two seed by the last week and Buffalo's shaky, you might as well be. Yeah, sure. And that scenario, I think you are. And you're right there. I really have to say something nice about this team. Well, I tried to trap you and you wouldn't do it.

No, I'm not doing it. I knew a few people who were at the game and they said the electricity was 100% back. Really? It was. paid the bill. 2000's level, like just everybody loved it.

Yeah. It was old school. It looked fun. Feisty D. doing the whole thing. So the Pats go to Denver were their own four in the playoffs in my lifetime. All games that were memorable for some reason.

The Rulon Jones safety on Tony Easton. Right. Down three with the ball and somehow fucking Tony Easton get sacked for a safety. Never forgive that, dude. The Plummer Champ Bailey game. Plummer's like one good playoff game. I guess he had one against Dallas too. And then the champ Bailey when Ben Watson ran basically,

they didn't have the next gen stats for that. He was probably like 32 miles an hour. He's off the charts, Bill. We can't even measure that. And ball goes out at the one. I thought it went out of the end zone. That's the one, apparently for Brady, that's the Super Bowl.

That in 07 are the two that bother them the most. Really? Yeah. because I think they might have been the best team in 2005. 2014, that was the year Hernandez stuff went down right before the season. And then T.J. Ward... That stuff didn't bother Brady?

They tried to play on, and then T.J. Ward took out Gronk. So we went in Denver without both of those guys, lost that one. And then the last one was the noodle arm-paid Manning season. The 20-18 loss. Two-point conversion didn't get it. I think Brady was concussed, like, for, that entire game. So anyway,

my point is they've never won there. I have a vague memory of Elway beating us 20 times. I don't think the stats back that up, but this has been mostly a house of horrors for the pets. And now Jared Stidham awaits. But the good news is there's not one player associated with any of those years anymore on either team. So you're good.

So you don't believe in the laundry baggage? I don't know. I might if Fonix was quarterback. I mean, we're going to get into that game, but I just can't believe it, man. I just can't believe it. I'm ready to get into that game right now.

Let's do it. Where do we start? You want to start on the Denver side or the Buffalo side? You should do the intro again? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just one of the guys coming on the rewatch. Well, I think we got to reluctantly kill Josh Allen for this. Two picks, two lost fumbles, including a fumble before the end of the first tap that cost them three points.

that was something like Charder Sanders or pick a rookie quarterback. It was a rookie quarterback play. It was inexplicable. Missed Knox for the game-winning touchdown, down three, 20 seconds left. Missed hard been in OT when they're driving. They would have been in field goal range.

She just threw him a grounder. Bad throw. And then the Bills fans fixated on those three calls. The bottom line is Alan missed a ton of throws. Their defense was up four with four minutes left and had a chance to close the game out and they didn't do it. And then they had to hold an OT and they couldn't.

And they gave up the two PIs, which, by the way, were both PIs. I'm sorry. Yeah. I'm proud of you. I'm good. Well, I know you're going to have the anti-bill slant anyway. But yeah, it was Josh Allen's fault. You could, you know, at this point a year, like I feel like I'm, it really gets taxing,

like defending referees and Tony Romo. It ends up being like 22 hours of my day. So, but the referees are going to make calls. They're not going to make calls. Say what you will about. those past interferences. The game could have ended 30-30. There was a hold in the end zone. If you want to be like that, it could have been 32-30 on the safety. That would have been that. It was 100% a hold in the end zone that they let go. And they missed calls both ways the whole game.

Of course. And guess what? They're not trying to keep Josh Allen out of the Super Bowl. That'd be a great story for them. That's what they want. So this one is, and I feel like the others maybe weren't all on Josh Allen. I feel like this is 70, 80% on him. The others, you know, It's a kicker that misses. Yeah. I want to go through those. We can. But it's just like this is, this is just, it's rough for him.

It's rough to see him cry. And both locker rooms are crying because of the result. But, you know. Who's a brutal loss. Alan was 0 for 9 on passes, 20 yards downfield, including the two picks. He just wasn't good enough. And he should be able to win that game because I thought his defense was good enough, kept him around.

And it really felt like the way Cook was running the ball. if he had a normal Josh Allen game, I think they win. So you go through like, he's eight and seven in the playoffs now. And he's had four horrific playoff losses, which was the first one was the 2019 that Houston overtime loss.

Right. They blew a 19 point lead in that. They lost the KC by 14. I mean, they had a couple, couple normal playoff losses, but they had that OT loss that was not his fault,

the 13 seconds game in 22. They had the loss last year by three. when they basically went four downs and out when they had a chance to close the game and then they had the one this year. He's had in his last three playoff losses for three of his last four.

He's had the ball with a chance to close the game and he didn't do it. And he hasn't done it yet. And they haven't made a Super Bowl yet. And I think he's the best part in the league but I don't know if you can say that anymore if this keeps happening.

I've been on that corner since August. This is the first time. or I'm like, I don't know if you can say it anymore. That was bad. Yeah. How about this? He's QB2 and there's no QB1. But he's not QB1.

I just don't know. So it's like the W.W. title is vacant because somebody got injured? I'm fine with that for this year. I'm fine with that. I don't think there's anyone at the top of the mountain right now. Yeah. Yeah.

And your guy can jump. I think it's vacant. It's fine. My guy could do it. My guy's not ready for that either. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, this is six-divisional.

round games, 0 for six, can't get past it. I think six overtime games. He had the ball and a chance to win in five of them. He has, he's put up three points in those six games. It's rough and it's really, it's really rough. And, you know, we talked about

all the weather that went on this week and the bad stuff, like, well, a good running game could disguise bad quarterback play. You never thought you'd have to disguise Josh Allen's quarterback play, but the bills had the most rushing yards this weekend out of anyone. They had 183 yards. That was such a bonus. for Cook to be on fire.

What do you have? Like 117? The terrible fumble, I mean, it was reminiscent of the Jacksonville last week who was up 7-3. They didn't fumble, but they missed on the fourth and one. This week, Buffalo is up 7-3, about to go 14-3 and cook fumbles. But the difference is you have Josh Allen.

You should be able to overcome that. Yeah, and if you're going to make excuses for him, and we haven't talked about the call yet, but we will. But if you're going to make excuses, like depleted receiving corps, right? He had cooks involved in multiple huge plays who wasn't on a football team seven weeks ago. He had Hardman, who I don't even think was on the team a month ago. He's out there in an important spot. Shakir is like basically, they're using him like he's Troy Brown in 2001.

But there's been other great quarterbacks who've been in situations with like inferior receiving. Like Brady won his first Super Bowl, he had Jermaine Wiggins and David Patton and I think David Givens. I can't even remember who the received. Troy Brown was the best one. But then you go on through like 06 when they almost beat the Colts in the NFC title game, the Pats. That was the Rishay Caldwell, Jabbar Gaffney, Benjamin Watson. Like, this happens sometimes. When you're paying your quarterback, 55 million. Sure. And you have some bad luck. You know, you might end up with this. You can't have everything. He has, his tight ends are very good. His tight ends are very good. And his

offensive line is good. His offensive line is good. He had 18 touchdown passes to non-receivers. So he's been able to figure out how to make it work between throwing a running backs and tight ends for sure. But Brandon Cook's boy, my God. What a frustrating player. I mean, this guy was on what, like a half a dozen teams before age 25, something ridiculous. Yeah, including the paths.

You're right. And he's supposed to be a speedster. And Alan barely overthrew him like three times. And then he takes a little off of it. And he actually catches it but not long enough because I actually didn't think. that was Allen's fault because he has to on the throw this guy he's overthrowing because it can't catch his speed. But you thought, you thought no catch. I thought, I thought they should have looked at

it for God's sakes for longer than what they did. I was shocked that people, it was a good argument because people felt strongly about it both ways. I didn't think it was a catch. I didn't remotely think that was a catch because he's catching and he hits the, and people freeze frame. And if you freeze frame it, great, but that's not how football goes. It's like a continuation. And he lands. Why can't freeze frame? We freeze frame pass interference as they call if there's a slightest tug of a jersey. I get it, but you have to catch it and you hit the ground and you have to survive the catch

at least a little bit. He lost the ball immediately. And if the Bronco wasn't there, it just would have been incomplete. But he lost it right to the Bronco. I don't know. And I thought like immediately, I was like, oh, shit, that's an interception. Really? But as we talk about over and over again, the definition of a catch seems to change week to week.

and people can bring in plays from the past and be like, here's the play when they called that a catch for the receiver. No doubt. I never thought he had the ball. We could instantly find five examples.

I thought he lost the ball in one hundredth of a second. It was out of his hand. What's the answer? Was it have to be six 100? Who decides? You, me? Like, who decides how long it has to be?

It can't be incomplete because it never hit the ground. They never hit the ground. Yeah, right. So one of the two had to catch it. Right. He took two steps, hit the ground,

immediately lost it. And in any other scenario, they would have said he didn't continue to catch. It's not a catch. But McMillan has one hand on the ball. It went to the Broncos. So at what point can they be like, all right, hey, it's not long enough, guys. Five of us come in here and swarm that ball out.

Is it two seconds? Is it a half a second? He doesn't need to make a football move at that. Yeah, but maybe a half a second would have been nice. I agree that they should have looked at it longer. It was kind of a big point to not be like, hey, we're going to look at this for a minute here. They spend 10 minutes looking at spots, fourth down spots, like third down. out at one.

Like, they could look at this. McDermott's like, I'm going to call a timeout. Maybe I'll call all my timeouts here because I really think you guys should look at it for 40 seconds. And we still don't know what that eye in the sky and go to New York and booth review. Like, we're still unclear about that. But there should have been some explanation about it. That's all I'm saying.

I agree. I don't think it was a catch. I thought it was a weird call that you're, we saw this even in the Rams game today where it was before the field goal to win the game. they just took two shots at the end zone for no reason. Like, why aren't you guys getting closer? Why are you so comfortable with a 48-yard kick at, what was it, like 10 at night? Yeah.

In Chicago, freezing cold? Why are you so happy with this? Special teams have been great. So I think they got, well, so I was doing a, you know, I was nervous about the game and I was doing a bunch of research about Alan. And I was thinking, this might be the best version we've ever had of the QB, the great QB, the great QB they. I can't get over the hump. Because when we were in high school and college, it was Marino in L.A. Right.

And they were like the yeah but QBs where we would be like, oh, they're so great. But. And especially Marino, because Marino really peaked 84, 85 and 86. Sure. And he led the league in yards and tedious every year that made the Super Bowl. And it just seemed like he was going to rip through the league. And he never really matched it. But he lost the Super Bowl to Montana.

He lost the AFC title at home and to the 85 past. lost to Jim Kelly twice. They blew a 21-6 lead to San Diego 95. Then he became pretty immobile. Right. And it just kind of, that was it. I still think he's one of the 10 best QBs since the merger. He's one of the best QBs I've ever seen.

He didn't win. Me too. I don't think he was in. I show my kids highlights of them. And I'm like, come on, isn't that great? Doesn't that look different than a lot of what we see it? And they're like, yeah, that's good. I mean, I don't know.

He wouldn't be top five type four today. I'm like, oh, God, damn it. Of course he would. I promise. he would. Well, if you factor in, like, people are diving at his knees and hitting him after throws it and, you know, all the things that you had against you. So he was Starcross, but I don't think even close to Josh, like year after year with these horrible losses, not to mention the Buffalo Bill's history and all the stuff, all the baggage that comes with

being a Bill's fan, all the terrible things that have happened. And now you have this guy who's the best player in the league. And every year something happens. Elway was the other one. Yeah. And Elway was from 83 to 96, 7 and 7 in the playoffs, got blown out in the Super Bowl three times, had that huge choke against the 96 Jaguars. Did you have them in a parlor? Yes, I did. The Brunel game.

I forgot. I looked up that game. They're up 12-0 at home. Yeah. And then the Jack scored 23 straight points and ended up knocking them out. But then he flipped it. And they won in 97, 98. They went back-to-back Super Bowls.

And it was moot after that. And then the other one was Peyton, Manning, who the first eight years of his career was three and six in the playoffs, lost to the 99 Dolphins, lost to the Pats twice in a row, lost to the 05 Steelers' his big favorites. And that's probably the doppelganger for this. Allen and Manning. And Manning won in 06.

Minor league version of that, I'd put my guy in there, Romo. You could say what you want about him. No, that's fair. They had some really good years. They had 13 win years and 12 win, you know, so there's... And the other one is Phil Rivers. I think you have to get thrown there too. How long was Breeze before he went over the top?

He got his early because they won in 2009. Against the Colts. Yeah, that was O'9. He'd only been on the Saints for a couple years, so he doesn't count. Then I was going back to the 80s and there's like Dan Fouts, people like that, who had little mini runs. This is crazy because he's clearly the best quarterback in the league, but now there's this playoff thing hanging over it.

And we see this, this happened in basketball more than football. Like this was like the old Carl Malone thing and people like that were they couldn't get over the hump base. Couple things make this worse. Social media, right? Because within four minutes of the loss, you see Josh Allen come January

and there'll be a picture of Aaron Judge in a Bill's uniform. You know, so that's awful. The second thing, he just falls to pieces during these press conferences. Like, man, I don't know that it meant that much to Dan Marino that he was losing.

I'm sure it hurt. But damn he just yelled at people. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. It would have excoriated an intern. Yeah, get out of my face. And I'm not talking to anyone until September kind of thing. And Josh Allen is just even on the sideline, just broken up. And just it's miserable.

There's something with the baggage. Like I was talking about it with a couple Red Sock fan friends about, and I wrote about this a hundred times when I was writing for ESPN about the mentality of a fan base when you just feel like you're getting kicked in the nuts at the end every season. Yeah. And we hit, you know, from our generation from that, the Pedro era through the Aaron Boone game where it was just like, I don't know if I should follow

sports anymore. Like it gets the darkest of dark. You're just like, why do I do this? Like should I do this? Do I want to give this team to my kids? And I think the bills, the combination of everything that's happened to them really since the, I don't know, 80s, or late 80s into whatever, combined with the fact that they have this guy and they had this season where by far, he would have been the best quarterback left. Yeah. Right? And now on top of it, you get to watch the Broncos advance and Bo Nix is out.

And you've Jared Stidham. Like, they're probably like, couldn't that Bo Nix injury have happened like 20 minutes earlier? Like we could have Jared Stidham. It's really brutal. It's brutal for the fans. As bad as it gets. I went to college in upstate New York.

Everyone was a Bill's fan. Some of them were bearable. Some of them not. But the core fans are just, they're great fans up there. And I think now I know why they die. through tables because they want to get concussed so they can forget about all this nonsense every year. It's really bad.

Yeah, so they were fixed at in the call. McDermott played it big, but I just thought they blew that game in a bunch of different ways. And honestly, he's got to hit Knox. Like, you just have to. You want to, I had my best QBs since the merger. Brady, Montana, Mahomes, Manning, Elway Rogers, Marino, Farve. young Alan.

I think those are the best 10 QBs since 1970. And then you can throw Stafford, Breeze, Rivers, Kurt Warner, Bradshaw, Stahback. I just think Young and Allen were better than all those guys. Farrv has to be above them, like when you throw in stats and a Super Bowl. But it's weird, Alan is the only one that, I guess Marino would be the other one, that doesn't have that Reno only played in one Super Bowl and lost. Yeah. I mean, it's phenomenal that he's old for six in this round.

And lost to Mahomes over and over again is the other problem. That's like his biggest rival from his generation and lost him every time. This was bad because Nix, I think, is the worst quarterback he's lost in. I think so. I mean, I know you were down on Nix. I don't know that. I think he probably played better than every quarterback this weekend. Like, who played better than him this weekend?

We know that he threw the key P.I throw. He had a broken ankle. It seems like when he threw that last pass. Yeah. How about this? You don't have to worry about a call, tick-ticky-tack call, if you have some safety help there. If it's a one-on-two and you're Eli Manning

and you underthrow it, the refs are less likely to call the pass interference if it's an uncatchable ball like that. I don't know. Don't leave it up. Where was the help on any of that stuff? He was kind of smart, Nick's throwing it like that. We've talked about it forever. Who was it, was it Rivers that was doing it for a couple years there

or Flacco. Somebody was doing this in the way 2010s where this Rathusberger tried to do it. This offense where you're like, oh, maybe we'll get one. There's three outcomes. Two of them are good for us. Let's just keep doing this.

But they, the one of them was clearly designed to get a PI. That last one he threw was almost like a Hail Mary moon ball to drop down and try to get the Dback to collide into him.

White was pissed off. I thought it was no question that was a PI. I thought so too. The second one for sure. First one was, eh, but. I don't know. I get it. If I'm a Bill's fan, I'm making excuses for my guy.

I'm fixating on that call. I understand all the stuff they're doing, but they blew the game. Like, there's no other way to say it. They blew the game. They should have won, and they should have won and should have won 3430. He should have hit knocks. The game should have been over. Is it like this in basketball, would you say,

where the officiating is scrutinized 500% more than the playoffs than it is the regular season? I guess because. NBA is pretty. bad too, but it feels like the calls are bigger in football. Right. You have these calls that literally swing games. In basketball, you have the foul baiting and some stupid stuff, but it's hard to swing a game with a call in basketball. And I've always said it's tough to officiate. Like otherwise, it's just a practical joke on all us fans, right? Like, no, no, we're going to make the officiating in every sport bad. It's like, no, these guys are fast. It's hard to see. It's hard to make calls.

But in the case of the cooks catch where you could review it, that's where I think they need to get it right or they need to explain or they need to do something different than, you know, on the spot call, which you can't review. Well, they Broncos win. It's one of the great, I mean, they've won Super Bowl, so you can't say it's one of the great non-super Bowl playoff wins probably. You defeat Josh Allen, this great home win. It seems multiple times, it seems like you're going to blow it.

And then 15 minutes later, we're all getting the text from each other. Whoa. Oh, my God. Nix. It's like, did he get hit by a car or what happened? It's like, no, he broke his ankle. How did he break his ankle? I watched a whole game.

Would he break the ankle after the game? Well, then it was like it was a little bit weird because most of the reports were that, he got it kneeling down, which wasn't the case, right? It was like, oh, my God. Yeah. It was that little design rollout thing. So they had an incredible amount of luck this year and then get a bad break at the worst possible time. I still think this didn't think.

They're home. They have a really good defense. You saw this Pat's offense could be a little, the blocking can be, I would say, sketchy. Will Campbell, and she texted us. They have that. He was watching the video when Rabel stands in the tunnel and he hugs each guy after. When the guys, the Patriots come in and each guy does the handshake and the hug. And he said, Will Campbell looked like he had just gotten back from like a tour of duty and some military site and just sitting like just steering the headlights.

I mean, he got, he has not done well as the left tackle. and now you have this Denver team that's going to load up on them. They're going to try to prevent the pets from running the ball. I'll tell you why I'm not buying this, this what was me thing with the Denver thing, because if you are to lose to Denver, you're definitely listing your top seven Patriots playoff losses next year. And you're putting this in the top three.

We're not going to have to worry about it because it's not going to happen. But I'm just telling you that's what would happen. This would be pretty tough with the way it's lined up now. to play Darnold on a neutral field as the prize, who I still feel like, and I think our defense is good. I felt like people were sleeping on it. I think they can at least get pressure on him,

make him try to work. I think Gonzalez could take out JSN, and we'd match up pretty nicely with them. And I'm excited to watch the Malcolm Butler quit for two weeks, but the pets have to get there first, and they have never ever won a playoff game in Denver. You could hire P. Carroll as like a consultant, right? Like they've done that.

Like right now? Going into that game. Like he's like the Denver conciliary? Yeah. Well, no, not Denver for the Seattle game. Yeah.

Like, hey, here's that. Oh, for the Seahawks. Yeah. Oh, yeah,

because he was there since last two years. He was the guy. I thought you're going to say the Denver game because Vegas played them twice. Oh, that's true too.

I think Pete was only there in spirit. Yeah. Did you see Vegas is the Raiders record? Not the record, not the record, but the scores against these playoff teams. Like, you know, before that or left.

Yeah. Unbelievable. like either one or lost by three. Football's weird. That was when I really was concerned about Stroud when I started him that week in fantasy in the playoffs and he played Vegas. Yeah.

And he was terrible. And I was like, it's like, what's up with this dude? And that was the guy that showed up today. Well, we've guessed the lines and we have two. Is this where you get sad? I'm already sad. Well, before we do a guest lines,

How'd you do in the gambling? I did okay because I had teasers all over the place. I have a ton way, way too much. Like I'm going to have to pull my kid from college if the Hoosiers lose tomorrow because I had a bunch of- Tied to some of these games. Bills plus seven and a half. Seattle money line tied to Indiana.

So fingers crossed. I get over the finish line there across the finish line. But how'd you do? You did well, right? I did well. I would have done awesome if I hadn't panicked and done some Niners protections. stuff. Oh. I got really scared. Sue Schaefter. You should sue them. I got really scared. I did some, but I had my favorite one. I did like a 14 seven point teas. That's like two to one odds are

close. Yeah. And I took both sides of the Bill's Denver game because I was like, that game's going to be close. I'm just betting on that one. And I had the Seahawks and then the Bears plus 10 and a half today. When they were down 2310, you were scared. I was nervous too with having the bills plus points at 2310. Then you look up, it's like, how are they winning this game 24, 23? What did Denver do? Yeah, that's the, that was the weird thing was, it was a little like the Stroud game where Allen was bad enough that it's, that all of a sudden, the bills were in a power

position in the game. And it's like, I don't understand how this happened. Yeah. You know, it was weird. They didn't use Sutton enough. Thought some of the Sean Payton play calling, I thought it was a little, little iffy. I don't really remember that much about Stidham. I don't think he can move like Nix could, obviously,

but I think he throws a good deep ball. Yeah. So I don't know if they're going to try to just do heavy run and then play action with Stidham. And if they do that, that's perfect for the Pats because they eat up the run. I can't. Well, why don't you check out his preseason games?

I'm sure there's tape of it because he started every preseason, first two preseason games every year for the last four. It's a great spot for drink. We'll see, you know, I don't think he was probably happy with those first two playoff games, and especially the ball protection stuff. They got lucky.

There was one fumble that really would hurt them, and the Pats were able to get it back. But I think they need to start rolling them out away from pressure. I just can't believe with the way this team blocks that they're in the final four. Yeah. When it just doesn't seem like he has more than three seconds ever. Yeah. You know.

When do you think Donald gets hurt? Like, is it like washing his car? Oh my God. You just like, see, we went through this with the Celtics two years ago. With all the teams, the Celtics played that year. And it was like asteris,

asteris. And then they beat Dallas. Especially, this is incredible, though. This is just every week, right? Even when the good teams don't show up. But if you had this situation with your guy, Tony Romo in the late 2000s,

you would have loved it. Of course I would have loved it. You have to love it. Yeah. But you're going to get it. We knew this was going to be a weird year. We were saying this in October. We were like, get ready for fucking weird playoffs.

Like none of these teams are that good. Who are the good teams? I'm just saying, don't accept the trophy. That would be like a bold thing to do. It would be like, you know, like the fans of Massachusetts fans would be like, and people would be like, all right, I'm okay with them now. Just, you know. I bet maybe at 5 to 1 for MVP for Super Bowl MVP.

I did it on the pregame show today. I was like, enough is enough. Throwing in the towel. How much was it? I'm Duke and Rocky 4. Five to one odds. That was this morning. It's got to be updated.

It's got to be less than that now. So do they have the Super Bowl MVP odds or now? That's what I'm saying. Oh, up right now? Do they have all of them up? Oh, yeah, they do. Yeah. Darnold's plus 250, May is plus 280,

Stafford plus 330, JSN 14 to 1, Puka 171 and Walker 20 to 1. I think there's a real JSN case. Really? Yeah. Because at the Seahawks won, and we've seen receivers, we just had it happen with Cooper Cup a couple of years ago.

We've seen receivers win MVP when the quarterback stats aren't that good, and the receiver's like 10 for 122 with a touchdown or whatever. Sometimes they'll win it. I'm predicting you put a Hyundai on Christian Gonzalez at 225 to 1. No doubt about it. He was good today. He got that. He was excellent today.

It really helped him that Nico Collins. wasn't playing obviously. But I don't know to tell you, we have Stidham versus an Aege Matthew Stafford versus Drake May versus Sam Darnold. And that's our final four of QBs. What were the ads of that,

you think, in August? You couldn't get it. Is it like a million to one? Yeah, you couldn't get it. The Stidham part of it. And if I told you Stidham was starting in the AFC title game at home, you would have thought Bo Nix got hurt

in like week four. And Stidham did like a Nick Fold. Well, yeah, I guess so. Yeah, I guess that would be the only way to do it. Oh, man. It's freaking Patriots. All right, guess the lines? So bummed.

Go ahead. So I don't even know, do we know what's the first game, what's the second game? I'm assuming Pat Denver is first game, right? You think you're at the night game? They should send your game to Europe. They should play that in Ireland somewhere at three in the morning. Of course you're the first game. You should have been the first game.

game Saturday, if not for Houston and the rest. They moved our game to Saturday. Yeah. I went Pat's, so Pat's in Denver. I went Patriots minus one and a half. Wait a minute. Really? That's what you did? Yeah. I said Patriots minus five and it's Pat's minus five and a half. Are you crazy? I was wondering why you were so worried. You got this, buddy. So if Nix was the QB, what would the line have been? I think it would have been a tick-tack with you maybe favored by one and a half. Really? Yeah, I think so. Did anyone say our offensive line today? Well, I don't know. You've been power ranked higher all year than Denver, right? Haven't you? How do you think it's one and a half? This guy hasn't thrown a ball in

years. You're saying Bo Nix is worth six points to the line? Like he's Patrick Mahon. Holmes? That's ridiculous. If New England was favored by one-and-a-half, this would be four to the line. I don't think we would have been favored by one-and-a-half in Denver against Bo Nex. Well, who's betting Stidim? I think that's a question. So people have to decide. Are we good or we not good? Because everyone's like, oh, it's schedule, schedule, schedule, but then we should be favored in the

NFC title game. Like, which is it? Well, I think you have to decide because you obviously don't think enough of your team that, I mean, you have a four-point gift here. You should bet a lot on Denver. We can't block. Oh, man. Will Hidderson almost had seven sacks in that game.

You are. They have to keep a third tight end next to our left tackle so we could have our quarterback have two seconds in time. 100% you're betting the Patriots. We've never won a playoff game in Denver. I'm not betting this game. In the Ringer 107, there's no question you're betting the Patriots. Well, I'm going to do that.

I mean, I'm going to do that. What am I going to take the Broncos? I'm going to go against my team. That's what everyone's saying. Oh, what are we going to take the Broncos? like this is a teaser. They got to move this to eight. Who knows?

I'm positive. You were going to tease the Broncos to like 11.5. No way. No way. I can't bet bad quarterbacks. I'll bet you're a bad quarterback. That's it. I got to look at the manifesto and see what's going on.

There are a couple quarterback rules in the manifesto. Just go to letter S understood them. Bad offensive lines usually don't travel. And from what we saw the Pat's offensive line, pretty sketchy. I mean, May and two playoff games, I think got where it's stripped from behind as he was throwing five times.

Five or four? Four or five? That's not a good sign for us. Denver's got a good defense. I'm looking at before the Buffalo game. I didn't look at these before I guessed, but some people are saying, so Denver's the first home underdog

in a conference championship game since Pat's Colts? 2015. No, Denver, New England. 2015. Oh, noodle arm. Yeah. 18.

Was that two and a half three? And this is the biggest home underdog. Any one seat has been in a conference title game since 1970. All the sharps are going to take the Broncos. Yeah. There you go. All right. So I win the week and go within one if I get this or if we talk.

Manning was good in that AFC title game. Even though he was new to arm that whole year, he actually was pretty good in that game and he heard us. Rams, Seahawks in Seattle. I have the Seahawks favored by three and a half. Wait a minute. Who gets this? I said one and a half.

It is two and a half. So we tie. I won the week. I win the week. And it is now 10 to 9. No, it is now. I'm still up by 11 to 10. You can tie for the year.

Oh, what a great treat that would be if we tie. Netflix really did the right thing. I like when we tie it because then you're in a better mood. If we tie If we tie, let's go to penalty kicks And Zoe, we're the two goalies And Zoe kicks against us That would be great

Let's do it She'd probably love that Zoe could probably hurt either of us I know, it's all right, I deserve it Seattle two and a half, huh? Yeah, I would have thought I felt that should be higher I think I haven't been that impressed

by the Rams You think going into this week it was lower? I kind of thought they should have lost today. The Bears were in midfield and overtime. It felt like that game was done. What would you have made this line Friday night or whatever? Probably two and a half. Two and a half.

Yeah. Instead of three and a half. Yeah. I have a couple emails from Bill's fans. This is from Brian. I'm a lifelong Bill's fan. I have two sons. our 10-year-old is completely bought in.

He's watched every game in the past four seasons. I've done everything I can to warn him about how this season will end. After the loss of the Broncos, he went full Brad. I guess that's now a verb or our crazy friend Brad. He went full Brad,

was inconsolable, and launched into a fallen asthma attack, 30 minutes of hysterical crying, purple lips, and wheezing. I tried explaining that like the Masters, this is a tradition like no other, and the bill's NFL finding away, to absolutely gut punch us, the most resilient fan base in the NFL.

I felt nothing. They've crushed my insides. Do I have an obligation as a father to completely disavowed the bills? That's from Brian. It's pretty bleak. That's for child protective services to figure out, I think, Brian. Maybe you want to get that on the record. They're knocking at your door.

You're lucky Bill and say your last name. That sucks. That sucks, though. We could laugh and everything, but that absolutely sucks. Yeah, unfortunately, your kid inherited the team and he can't switch. he stuck with the team. That's nine and ten are the worst times for to have a loss like this.

Nine was the twice I've cried from sports and those were the two times when I was nine. You know what? You didn't have to worry about though. Yours was in 2006 when you were in your mid-30s. And also, but like going to school for you, you all like sympathize, you're all together, you're all in it together. Like I was a Cowboys fan in New York.

You know, the Mets is a different story. Well, my friends were Met fans. More Yankee fans and they hated the Mets. but yeah, that's an extra hurdle. You have to get over. Yeah, we had the Yankee playoff game, and then we had the too many men on the ice against the Canadians, I think within six months of each other.

I think my parents got divorced in the middle of that. Oh, no. Because of that? I think I might have had a 30-minute asthma attack. Wait a minute. Your parents got divorced because there were too many men on the ice? That's a real thing. I was just taking losses left and right.

Shale from Columbia, Maryland, asks, the NFL famously changed the rules on how defensive backs could cover receivers to get Peyton Manning a ring. This is true, by the way. Which rule are they going to change to get Josh Allen over the hump?

Could it be that QBs don't count against the cap anymore? They did change the rules for Manning. I mean, that has 100% happened. Yeah. I don't know what rule they would change. if your wife has been nominated for an acting award, you get $10 million more on the seller cap?

Start every possession at the 45? I don't know. I don't know what it is. There were a couple kickoff spots during these playoffs that I've, like you down in the end zone, you throw one 15-yard pass and you're over midfield. I can't get used to it. I can't wrap my head around some of the spotings.

You're like, wait, we're on the other teams, 45 already. What's happening? This is why I want to get rid of kicking and fantasy. Colton asks, you've talked a lot about how it could be Josh Allen's year. You forgot to mention how good his life is going. He's married to Haley Steinfeld. They have a baby on the way. He's not hungry enough. One of the main reasons Tom Brady was so good, especially in the last few years of his career, is because his personal life was teetering on the edge of collapse. Do you think Alan misses those throws against the Broncos of his personal life was collapsing? I think not. Wow. You know, do you think that?

matters? I don't know. It's a theory from Colton. I did make me think like Brady met Giselle in the mid-2000s and we didn't win a Super Bowl for like eight years.

Yeah. And then he started ripping him off near the end and now she's married to her jihitsu instructor. Brady was hungry, but I think it's because he was dedicated to

carrot and ginger soup for nine months of year. He was like literally just hungry because he was eating almonds. Gotta be hungry to be hungry. Yeah, he was actually hungry. And then Alan,

asked, she said I'm a hardcore NBA fan, a casual NFL fan. Is there a modern NBA equivalent to the Buffalo Bills and Josh Allen, a proud but tragic small market team that's never made it over the hump? I don't think you can compare any other sport to what happened to the bills in the 90s, right? No way. No. I don't think. But you could say like the Pacers last year, but then seven other horrible things would have had to happen to them. So they hit six divisional round games in a row without winning a Super Bowl. This bill's team is at six in a row without getting to the super getting to the super ball but yeah that was that was absolutely brutal those four and they hit the lottery with the i mean you go back at that draft and

how it worked out where we were that was such a weird draft where we were trying to decide who the good quarterbacks were going to be out of it and there were all those choices and then they ended up getting the one you would want yeah yeah i was thinking that that uh that Caleb had made the next round And we would have had Caleb, Drake, and Jaden Daniels all in the conference title game in the first two years of that draft. And they went one, two, three. I don't know if that even if it's happened in the NBA where we went one, two, three like that. I don't think it has. We've had the top five where there were three guys, but not like one, two, three, all of the guys were awesome.

Yeah, I think it takes less time for a football team to change their fortune than a lottery pick basketball player, probably. Yeah, that's true. You want to do some parent corner? Let's do it. I mean, I feel, I mean, that's, those, that was apparent story. That was really, that's going to be tough to top. Poor guy. Yeah, that was sad.

I mean, he did create the word full Brad. He doesn't know what he's talking about. I got to say, remind me to send you. I have video of Brad trying to get himself and somebody else a mountain do soda at shakies from two weeks ago. Himself and someone at, oh, someone at the door table? Yeah. It didn't take a short amount of time.

I'll just, spoiler alert. It's the simple tasks. It's really, I think we were. It was an eight-second task that took two minutes. This is a lot of parent-quartered thing, but we took them to Yogurt Land a few weeks ago. I took him with the boys, and he had never been to one. And he was screaming at the people behind the counter because he didn't realize you have to do it yourself, right? Like, you have to put the yogurt in, and then you add the toppings.

And he didn't think that was right. he was wondering what they were doing behind the counter that they couldn't do this. Oh, I got to do this? Oh, I got to do this myself? Oh, really? What do I get? What do I got? Like, what do I get? I'll take half what you get. What I'm like, God Jesus, just eat your chocolate swirl. Let's get out of here. We might have to have him on the Super Bowl props podcast when we do that two weeks from now. Let's do it. Can we have on? Is it possible for him to be on a Zoom? I think so. Yeah, I mean, it's going to take a lot to install a Cameron as it's a apartment. I don't know if he's allowed on Netflix.

Yeah, you're right. It's too controversial for Netflix. What do you have for a parent corner? All right. Well, my parent corner involves my wife who, I guess she sees me as a child, so it counts. Although I feel like I'm very mature in this situation. So she's in a baseball mom's fantasy league, right? So all the moms of Harrison's 12-year-olds right there.

And she does the draft in September. And I give her a nice grid. I was like, hey, go running back, wide receiver, running back wide receiver, maybe wide receiver running back. I don't care, but for those first four, do that, just keep doing that

and do it through six rounds. So she, for some reason, waits until the fifth round take running backs, despite the fact that I gave her a nice grid, telling her what to do. And she ends up like James Connor and Dobbins, all this crap for running backs, and they're gone early.

So she can never catch up. She has some bad luck. She goes two and 12, and she blames me. And because I can't dig her out of the hole, she's like, you watch football. You watch every single play. you can't help me here. I'm against mothers. I'm like, sweetheart, it's all luck. Fantasy's all luck.

So as it turns out, there's a punishment for last place. She was in two and twelve. Yeah, there's a punishment for last place. So she says the other day to me, she's like, hey, so-and-so's going to come by. She's dropping off the sign for the lawn. I was like, what sign for the lawn? So it's a sign that says, it's a fantasy football sign. It says, I suck at fantasy football, and it has to go on our lawn for a month. I was like, that's not going on our lawn. She's like, yes, it has to. There's nothing. And the kids are like, no way. No, we're not doing that. Because then that looks like someone in this house. So, you know, right? Then it'll look like I suck in fantasy football, right? It'll look like, you know, my kids are like, they'd rather fail all

their classes than have someone think that they'd suck at fantasy football at this. So she's like, well, the alternative was, get this, I'd have to walk up and down the pier with a sign that says, I give great BJs. And I was like, oh, Jesus Christ, what kind of league is this? Even my league. What is this is nice? The Ice Storm League? What's going on to this league? I would have, I gave great BJs. I would have tried harder if I knew this was what's that state, you know? So, but then I'm thinking like, all right, she carries that sign. That makes me look better at least. But I get why she doesn't want to do it. But so we're fighting about this. So we have to put the sign in our yard. And I was like, you got to- She lost. You got to do it. I got to put your face on it.

I was like, we have to, people have to know. She's like, no, no, no, I don't want people know in my family. I'm like, why, you walk the dog. People see you out every day. It doesn't matter. It's like, no, no, I'm not. So now we're, it's like, what do you think we should do here? Like the kids, we're all fighting about this.

So it should say the sign should be, I'm Melissa and I suck at fantasy football, something like that. Yeah, but it's already here. It just says I should make a new sign. I should just change it. Or put her face on it. Right. Put a picture of her face on it. Yeah.

Do you have a picture of her from the other night? I like this. I think it should go on your front line. And I think it could apply to the whole family. How many leagues did you win this year? I love that. I like telling him. I'm like, oh, sweetheart, it's all luck. And then I'm like, we're not putting that on the day.

If it's all luck, I shouldn't have a problem with it, right? My parent corner is, so my son, my son is in college or he's in high school, but got in a college. And it's one of those things where you still have the second semester. Yeah. And you've still got to put in the work, but he's already in. Right. And it struck me that this is all the times when we have kids when they're younger and you have to lie to them about the repercussions of things, right?

And it peaks with Elf on the Shelf, which when we started doing Parent Corner, we talked a lot about Elf in the Shelf and how ridiculous it is, that these elves, we move them around every day. and if the kid doesn't obey, if the elf gets mad, they might not get Christmas presents and they're stupid enough to believe this. I feel like this is the last,

this is the last stage of Elf on the shelf. It's like, if you, if your grades go down, they could, they might rescind your application and you're not in there. But meanwhile, you can probably Google that,

and I don't know if that's true, but just threatening your kid with something that deep down they probably know isn't that true. So now, now I'm just guilt-tripping. You got to finish strong. You became such a good student.

Like, you got to finish this now. You got one semester left. Like, do this for pride. The point is lying to our kids doesn't work anymore. I think they've just completely figured us out by age 18, right? Yeah. Well, it certainly doesn't work now that you're telling the story. If someone tells him, no.

Oh, he does. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. He already read me. So it's, it's a good point. I'm basically, we're going back to past with our kids.

And they know exactly what offense were in. and where the receivers are going. And it's just, I don't think we can slip anything by them. But I wonder what age that is when that ends. Yeah, that's a good point. 15, 16. Mm-hmm. I think that's it.

The only thing you could do is, like, you could have a story attached to it. Like, look, for the most part, this doesn't matter. But my friend Joe House, he was in. Right, his son. He was in. He was in Notre Dame. He got in and whatever. Right.

He was in. He was going to Harvard. He was in Harvard law. And they saw his grades and pulled it. He got rowdy at a bar and something happened. Yeah, I should have said that. Yeah, I'd try that, see if it works. I should have said that.

Well, one thing is I know he's probably not watching. Not watching this. Anyway, that's it for Parent Corner. Anything else we got to hit before we go? I want to hit a couple things here. First of all, most of our beginning of the year in August, we did our futures bets, right? Yeah. Want the good news or the bad news?

Well, we did the, we did overunders, which was disappointing. Right. And then we had a futures draft above our futures. Yes. I'll tell you what. The good news is we hit 12 bets, six each. The bad news is we gave out 53. But some of those were high-end.

Okay. Yeah. So your best- What am I? Like, I had like a Denver to make the Super Bowl. Like I have some ones that have like pretty big odds. You did better than I did. And we still have three left.

You have Rable for Coach of the Year, which is going to win. That's about 7-1. I have Sal for assistant coach of the year. And I have like Penny Sewell for Protector of the Year, which I haven't seen an update since August on that. But anyway, your best was Seattle plus 500 to win the division. Good job by you. New Orleans, Cleveland for last place, plus 158. And Denver or Green Bay, number one seed plus 550.

Oh, you're your best. Yeah. Well, the thing is, we throw a bunch of these out. We try to hit 10 because they have the big odds. Right. But I think my issue was I tied Casey to all these. Casey kills. Casey just murdered us.

What happened? Dumbass team. I don't know where close to playoffs. The other thing is, I listened to your Friday show, and Schrager mentioned the Bill Simmons re-Apex, which is great. I mean, he just, he loves to kiss your ass. My God. My God, Shriger.

I love Shranger, but could you give it a rest? You got the Friday spot locked up. You're going to be fine. I love you, Shreger. But anyway, the example he used, and I'll admit it's a great scenario. Was it an email or just? the Sedaro he came up with. How does it go? If there's an OJ-type

Bronco chase in 2026, who's the most compelling current or former athlete? Who would be the 2026 equivalent to O.J. Simpson if that happened now, and you had to have the surprise factor, the likability of the celebrity, and the fame

that everybody's in, now everybody's like, oh my God, I can't believe this. Yeah. Pey Man, he's not in the top 20. Why is he number one? Who do you have? First of all, if it's the same scenario as Travis Kelsey, because that means he would have killed his wife,

Taylor Swift, of course that's got to be the answer. You can't think of that. Yeah. Josh Allen. That's true. He would have killed the, yeah, anybody who's married to a celebrity, it's a bigger deal. That's a pretty good point.

Even Josh Allen. But that's not equal then. That's a higher thing. OJ was a married to celebrity. So it has to be. Oh, it's got to be able. I'm saying. I mean, I think like Shohei Otani would be big.

You'd be like, oh, that guy was gambling. He's running from his book. He had to kill somebody like that. That's pretty good. LeBron, Caitlin Clark, Steph Curry. He wouldn't kind of know his wife, right? But it has to be a retired athlete, though. That had to be retired.

Yeah, because OJ was retired. You're trying to fit the box of like former athlete, moved into a second phase of his career. Everybody liked him, did commercials, dabbled in TV stuff and movie stuff. All right, so Travis Kelsey next year. Somebody, there was a couple emails actually people pushing Michael Strahan

saying that that's actually the closest because like OJ went into TV after trying to crossover was on the Regis and Kelly show and is on the ABC show. So means something to like the female audience kind of like OJ was in the Hertz commercials. So Strayhand was interesting, but I don't think Strayhands is like as OJ was. Well, Brady then, for sure would be up there.

How about this one? Because we know the wife, Triple H. Triple H would be good. I don't know. I think a wrestler, everybody's kind of like, they're 20% not surprised. They know the McMan's. Al Michaels would be ironic. That would be fun since he called the original.

Al Michaels. Al Michaels is on the run from Piscanos after he just put that a veal chop. That would be good. riding through Bretwood, the same streets. He's crazy. This is what happens when you don't need vegetables. You lose your mind. That's a good one.

The more I thought about it, I think Serena might have been the answer. Oh, yeah, that's a good one, too. Because it switches over. Everybody loves Serena. Nobody ever in a million years would have thought anything would happen with her. That's good. I think the shock value, I think my wife would care the most versus like Michael Strahan, people like that.

That's a good call. But Manning is kind of fits the OJJJ. profile of almost in some ways feels as big as he did when he played from all the stuff he's up to. Right. I know we're missing one. I wrote down Bowen-Yang, but I don't know if that's the same. I'm a force of Bowen-Yang joke in every Netflix podcast. I watched, by the way, I watched the Kill Tony show on Netflix.

Yeah, yeah, I haven't got to. And that guy, Cam Patterson came in and just absolutely crushed. You loved it. On there. Yeah, I like the Kill Tony show. It's kind of like Gong show crossed with. Don Barris's ding-dong show. Cross with like a Jeff Ross Rose.

I don't know. It's all over the place. I like that show. All right. Anything to plug? Bring your game to show all week? All week. I'm on with Tate, the Bundow House,

high fits, great group of fellas. We do it over again Sunday morning on the pregame show. And you know what? I'm going to give 10 people $50. I got to change my mojo. If you had a bad beat, hit me up at The Cousin Sal on Twitter. Oh, look at you. Show me a copy of it.

your ticket stub, whatever, I'll give 50 to the first 10, I see. Had to be a bad beat in the Buffalo game or this other stupid one we just watched. Well, we almost had the Rams with the overtime cover. It felt like it was in play on those last few throws. Yeah. It's almost like he had him.

All right, so two rewatchables coming this week. Double rewatchables. We have just one of the guys on Monday and then I'll tell people what the Wednesday movie is on the Monday podcast. So we have that. We're going to be on Netflix all week on this pod. Watchable starts next week on Netflix as well.

And Cus, I will see you in a week. Big debate about whether my dad's going to come out for this Pat's Denver game. Oh, really? What's the debate? He's got to do it. Talking about making the flight. Yeah, we've watched a lot of these. You never know, after we had that last Pat's Chiefs one in 2018, which I think we watched

together. Now that we're back, I think he might come out for this one. So I don't know if that's going to help my luck or not. I could have them as I'm doing the pot. have them sitting in the seat behind me, just probably in a coma from the game. Yeah. And you know what? You should say to him, you know, Dad, remember senior year you told me I have to give it my best, the second half? You were full of shit, right? Yeah, you lied, didn't you, dad? Look at us now. Thanks to Gahow and Eduardo as well.

Because as always, good job by you. Good job by you, buddy. We'll see you next week, live on Netflix, but check out the BS Pub Tuesday and Thursday as well. See you in a couple days. States for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in president in D.C., Kentucky, or Wyoming, GameProplop. by 100 gambler. Visit RG-HALP-HELP-HELP.com. Call 88879-7777-or or visit ccpG.org slash chat in Connecticut or MDGGGG dot org in Maryland.

Hope is here. Visit Gambling helplineMA.org. Or call 800-327-50-50 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 8778-8-Hope-N-Y or text Hope and Y in New York.