The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 155: Week 16 Lines With Cousin Sal

Episode Date: December 19, 2016

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons brings on Cousin Sal to discuss Pats-Giants trilogy potential (5:00), Broncos offense vs. Broncos defense (10:00), Macho Man Tommy Savage (17:00), the Pats' favorable schedule (23:00), the cold-weather home team theory (35:00), Titans-Jags (40:00), the derailed Vikings defense (45:00), Chip Kelly's work habits (51:00), and football on Christmas Day (55:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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and a whole lot of more we have a lot of bestie of 2016 stuff as well as a lot of rogue one stuff up there right now. If you are interested in, don't forget to check out our podcast network as well, where we are launching a, a new podcast on the channel 33 feed this week, which I'll tell you about later in the week. All right,

let's do it. Oh, let's do it oh this song's way happier than I'm feeling this morning why ugh the ringer holiday party I'm just too old I can't hang till 2.30 anymore

it's tough it's not it's not your 45 year old friends anymore right no it was a very young group the cuz is here 2.30 anymore. It's tough. It's not your 45-year-old friends anymore, right? No. It was a very young group. The Cousins here. Dallas with a big Sunday night win.

We'll take it, right? You've basically clinched the two seed. I think so. You've clinched the two seed. You've basically clinched the one seed. You'd have to lose the last two. I don't see that happening. Who do you have left?

Do you have Detroit this week? And then Philly at Philly. Philly. Boy, that would be a collapse. And then you would also need the Giants to win at Philly and at Washington. So I think you're

pretty much locked in. If the Giants lose to Philly on Thursday, you win the one seed. It doesn't mean... Do we see Romo? The Sunday night. Do we see Romo in week 17?

Yeah. I feel like we do. Week 16 or 17? If the Giants lose Thursday, you could see them both in both games. Exactly. They'll win Philly. They feel like we do. Week 16 or 17? The Giants lose Thursday. You could see them in both games. They'll win Philly. They'll beat Philly.

But yeah, I think we see them week 17. He has to get some reps in case something happens, right? I mean, does he? No.

I always thought you rested starters in week 17 so they didn't get hurt. This is the first I've heard of preparing your backup quarterback in case for the 1-20 scenario where he might have to play in the playoffs.

Garrett treats it like, I mean, Cowboys had it clinched a couple years ago and they treat it like a regular game. I think Romo played like three quarters. Right. We'll see some time. I thought that was a winnable game for Tampa. Definitely. But that's not what I want to talk about.

The trilogy is upon us. What's that? It's in play now. Giants, Pats, three. I predicted this before the season. This is my Super Bowl pick. The odds are still only 17 to one. Both teams threw a little cold weather defense around yesterday.

And the Giants in particular look very January-ish. They're just kind of built to win these 13-10 games where you make a big play and you kind of hang around and your defense gets a couple stops and then all of a sudden they're up three with nine minutes to go and their defense closes out. They do have that recipe. Right. You're annoyed.

Well, I just think you and I should make a pact right now that if the Giants, if and when the Giants beat the Cowboys for a third time this year and if and when they then go on and beat the Patriots for a third time in a Super Bowl you and I will move to Canada. Even worse than the election or anything else that everyone promises to leave the country, I think that's it for us.

What more do we need to see? If it did play out that way I would start thinking about locations. It would be tough. It would just be tough to follow football the same way. It's bad. Steve Spagnuolo, he's got this team. Remember they used to rush three and get to the quarterback every time?

It's the same kind of thing going on with their defense. And they were missing JPP, and then Jenkins got hurt, who's one of their best two cornerbacks, and none of it mattered. They're just still raking down offenses. Eli Apple was a really good pick. He was. I don't think they thought so in the beginning of the year, but he's definitely come on.

Yeah, it's tough to judge cornerbacks on TV because so much of it depends on what defense they're in, what they're being asked to do, and all that stuff. On radio, he's great, though. That's a guy, though, when you watch the replays of him staying like step for step with somebody who's right there he's just really impressive yeah so they're solid and stop giant fans this team is as good if or if not better than the two super bowl teams it just is is that true sure i thought the 0-7 team Was pretty good I mean that front four was

What was their record? The 0-7 team? They were a wild card team But they came on They came on as the year went along This is what's going on Right before our eyes Yeah

We'll see Well we see it every year We always say November, December That's when you learn Who's good, who's not good And who's coming on And who's got momentum And all that stuff

And Green Bay Is getting thrown Into that conversation Now that's a team I'm not sure belongs in that conversation. They barely beat Matt Barkley and the Bears yesterday. They blew a 17-point lead. They basically won the game because Rodgers, who is the best off-balance 60-yard thrower I've ever seen in my life,

just over and over again, just threading the needle from 62. But they needed that. That never should have happened. I don't know what defense the Bears were in that allows Jordy Nelson to run down the middle of the field and catch a 60-yard pass. But that game goes into OT. Who knows?

The Bears have been pretty unstoppable. I don't think the Packers' defense is very good. Not that good. That time Montgomery, that's the wild card here. What kind of games are we going to get out of him the next two weeks? Is he 162 yards or something yesterday? If he's like 100 yards back, their offense is unstable. You just have to match them in points, and that's going to be tough.

So they got killed by the Colts and the Titans in Week 9 and Week 10. And then they get killed by the Washington Redskins in Week 11. That's when he makes his proclamation that they're running the table, right? They beat the Eagles. 13 points gave up to them. Osweiler and the Texans. Doesn't count. A really weird Seahawks game.

I'll give them credit for that one. And then they barely beat the Bears. I'm not ready to throw. Like the Packers right now. Packers-Patriots has better odds than Giants-Patriots for the Super Bowl. Lower, you mean? Yeah. Really?

They were 13-1, and the Giants-Pats was, I think, 17-1. I was looking at the conference odds. Yeah. If you took the Giants at 8-1, the Packers at 7-1, you could get lucky with one of those two. I mean, obviously, Dallas and Seattle are the frontrunners right now. So, that could be our 4-5. The 4-5 matchup, right. And I just would take the Giants 100 times out of 100,

and then Eli's going to throw four picks, and the Packers will win, and I'll be like, oh, my God, I bet against Rodgers in Lambeau against Eli. Right. But Eli's gone in there and won, and I think the Giants fans are confident about that. I don't give the Packers an automatic win at Detroit Week 17. It seems like everyone's on this. I agree.

I don't think they'll be favored. We have some work to do. Although it's looking better and better every week, we have the Lions to not make the playoffs. I think it looks pretty good. We have them to not make the playoffs. They could still not win the division and sneak in a wild card. So we have to root for the Redskins tonight. Right.

Redskins playing Carolina tonight. Right. If they win that one, that weird wonky tie that they got. What was that, the London game? That was the London game against Cincy, right? Yeah. So that little wonky tie they got could have dramatic implications on this playoff picture.

The Seattle tie doesn't seem like it's going to matter. No. Certainly not for the division. It seems like they're a two-seed think so i think so so you think who would be a more dangerous six seed for you the the washington or detroit so for that second round you mean yeah let's say green bay beats detroit but it's between detroit and washington for the six seed in round one going to either Atlanta or Green Bay.

Right. Washington. I don't want to see Washington again. You saw what they did to us on Thanksgiving. Yeah, you're the one seed. You could end up playing the sixth seed. Because we're in the same spot with the Patriots where... It's like last year for the Patriots, right? It's shaping up Kansas City

at Houston and then the winner plays the Patriots. I'm ready to say goodbye to Denver. Yeah? Yeah. I don't want Denver to get in as a six seed. Say it. I'm ready. I have my goodbye speech ready to be written for them.

But their locker room kind of splintered. Mike Silver wrote about how the defense was bitching about the offense. And if you read the article, there's quotes from multiple guys. Like, we held Brady to 16. We did this. We did that. It's like, you guys had no chance from the second quarter on. The Richards dominated the game.

They dominated ball possession. And, yeah, they scored 16. But they also ran for it on fourth and three on the 19 yard line with three minutes left yeah they should have had 19 but regardless the pets was a cold weather game they needed 16 points to win they got super conservative i i think they could have moved the ball a little bit more they took care of business i don't think i don't know if brady was uh you know comfortable throwing deep to hogan as he's been against other teams yesterday. Brady was off.

The first quarter, he gets that sarcastically bewildered look on his face, and he stands there frozen for two seconds. I've been watching this guy for 15 years, and he's off. But they kind of rallied around it. Deion Lewis was the revelation. They've been waiting for that for a year. when do you have a better running game than denver like last year this game brady led the team in rushing against denver and uh that was the difference you know dion lewis has been that that was the underrated injury that affected every year there's

one underrated injury on some team that affects the season and we don't we barely even acknowledge it and i think that he's so much better than james white i think james white's fine he's like a c plus yeah but dan lewis is like dangerous like he almost broke a couple solid 50 yarders yesterday yeah he's solid this team reminds me a lot of the 04 team which was the third super bowl team that uh that that was the tail end of that streak when they won the 21 straight. I think it was 21 straight. And then I think they finished 14-2. It was Corey Dillon's one really good year.

They ran the ball. I think they scored something like 440 points, something like that. Big point differential. And then they went on. Two great playoff games and then kind of an unsatisfying Super Bowl win, if that's even possible, which is kind of a flat Patriots-Eagles Super Bowl. Right. But it was like a defense, take care of business,

built for cold weather type of team. And it's some mixture of those 03 and 04 teams. I didn't expect the defense to play like this. Is minus 125 for them to win the afc a good a good value pick bet right now i would say yes because basically it's two home games so the question is favorite against who goes in there and beats them well just look at it that way and i do think teams could go in there like i think pittsburgh could go in there beat them pittsburgh's defense look good in the second half they're not offensively i would think they'd be more consistent

than they are at this point. But I guess they still have a couple weeks to heat up. I haven't read this, but I don't like the way Roethlisberger is throwing the ball. And I feel like it's going to come out after the season that he has a broken hand or five broken ribs or one of those Roethlisberger's herniated disc in his back or a torn rotator cuff.

I forget. He probably shouldn't even be playing now. His ball flutters half the time. I thought he had more guys open in that game. I watched that game closely, as did you, because that was one of your Cousin Sal's Shirt Things picks. It's my only loss. I was 2-1 and it should have been 3-0.

We both had that. I don't understand it. It was 20-9 Bengals. Everything was going their way. 17-3. In their offense yeah 17 3 29 their offense just kind of caved and uh and then Pittsburgh kept settling for field goals and it just seemed like they were going to win 21 20 and then all of a sudden they get the random long

Eli Rogers touchdown right but it wasn't all of a sudden Dalton threw a pick at the end yeah that's true that's true like I kind of knew right then. When you're getting three and a half and you're down six or whatever it is, you're like, I can't kick a field goal here. There's seven minutes left. We're screwed. But what do you do if you're Cincinnati? You have Marvin Lewis and Andy Dalton. Pretty sure neither of those guys are going to take you to the next level,

but they're just good enough that you can't replace them. Bortles should go, and Gus Bradley is gone. That was an easy decision. Carson Wentz, you see good things once in a while. You know you're going to stick with that guy. But what do you do if you're right in the middle with Andy Dalton, who's too good to get rid of, but you know is not going to take you anywhere?

It's like a sitcom that has a B-minus ceiling. And it can be on for eight years and it's fine but it's yeah right barely going to be syndicated and it's never winning me and it's just like what do you do do we keep just running this back one more year yeah that that combination will never win the super bowl i don't think and every year this tape they made a big fuss about how they were so much better with stupid penalties and all that stuff and the penalties like literally murdered them and perfect looked like perfect strangers looked like he was going to kill somebody by the end of that game. He was a Burfecht ass.

He really was. Really, they played to beat them up and not win. I thought they were going to win, wanted to win the game. It was a big rivalry. I screamed about it. This is Cincinnati Super Bowl. They have to win. But no, they were more focused on beating them up.

And that sucked for us. He did a nice cheap shot at Roethlisberger. And then the other one who's just a thug is T.J. Ward. I don't like using that word that often for football players, but T.J. Ward's out there to hurt somebody. And every game when he plays the Patriots, my dad and I were texting the whole game. Like, that guy's going to try to hurt somebody in this game.

And then with four minutes to go, he did did the pass over Edelman's head and he does this WWE body slam at Edelman that really could have been bad I mean it was it it was a little reminiscent of the McMahon hit 30 years ago when that guy just picked McMahon up and threw him on his side it wasn't that bad but he really could have hurt Edelman. And just sitting there going, I knew this guy was going to do this. All he does is dive at knees and headhunt and do things like this every game. And I think the Patriots knew it, too, because once they had the lead, they were kind of staying away from him a little bit. But it's so funny.

There's like these five, six guys every year that it just seems like part of their MO. I think it would be surprising to hear the Bengals have a meeting, some kind of deal. Whoever racks up the most fines gets $150,000 from the other players. I think they've had something set up. Because I don't even think I'm watching football sometimes. Where did you get this David Irving? Kansas City. The Kansas City practice squad?

Imagine how good Kansas City would be with this guy. Oh my God. The guy was destroying double teams. We have had two tall Jones all of a sudden blocking passes and sacks in the fourth quarter. It was spectacular. The announcers started really talking about him in the fourth, but like in the second quarter, he did something and I was Googling him and I'm like, practice squad this year? Like what?

Yeah, right. It's like in October. It's just a lucky pickup. Jameis didn't look. The third quarter, Jameis scared the shit out of me. And then fourth quarter, he just, he was missing open receivers and i was like we're gonna lose this game mike evans is the most talented player on the field right now and it's coming you couldn't really cover evans yeah there was a couple times when i figured it'd be a big pass interference

call against him in the last drive i thought for sure but it just never happened yeah you almost got like he like a split second jamis hits him if he had more time. And there was like three different times where you just got to him before he was going to hit him. But that long pass, I mean. Just missed. That could have been a 27-26 final. It was a good game. I think Tampa.

So Tampa's 75-1 against the Patriots for the Super Bowl matchup. Yeah. 75-1. I mean, if you played the season 75 times from right now, would a new Patriots-Tampa Super Bowl be one of the outcomes? No. No? I don't think so.

No. I'll book that if you want to give it to me. I don't know. They're not going to win three road games. Well, you have – well, they've won some road games already. They're at New Orleans, home for Carolina. They're going to finish 10-6. You're giving them a win and a loss?

At New Orleans? I think they win the last two. They'll be 10-6. At New Orleans, really? All right. Yeah, I'm not. Just lost two weeks ago. I'm not afraid of New Orleans.

I just beat them two weeks ago. I think they're going to win at New Orleans. All right. Washington. Doesn't it feel like Washington could lose this Chicago game this week? Yeah. I certainly wouldn't bet on them.

Right. I think they lose. They play the Giants too. They end with the Washington. The thing is that might not mean anything to the Giants. Oh, for the Giants. Yeah, that's true.

They might be just locked in in the five seat at that point. Yeah, teams don't care if they get the five or the six usually. Right now it looks like the bye teams are the Patriots, Oakland, Dallas, and Seattle.

Mm-hmm. It looks like Miami at Pittsburgh, KC at Houston will be our two games. I feel like KC in Houston, KC in Cincinnati has been the playoff game for 10 years in a row. KC at Indy. We have to make a decision. It's every year with a disappointing KC playoff game. Right. Before we move to Canada, we have to make a decision.

Yeah. As football fans, you want Tennessee winning that AFC South, right? They're just better. They're just better to watch. DeMarco Murray's fun. You don't like Macho Man Tommy Savage? I do like him. Oh, yeah! Oh, yeah! Oh, Brock Osweiler

needed my help. Oh, yeah! I've been everywhere soaring with the Eagles, slithering with the snakes take the Texans to the promised land my coach Bill O'Brien looked at me and he said Macho Man Tommy Savage

I need your help I looked at Elizabeth in row 37 section 319 who knew we were going to have Macho Man Tommy Savage against Andrew the Giant? But what do you want? That's true.

You're right. Marcus Mariota needs a wrestler now. Yeah. What could it be? I don't know. He was pretty good in that KC game. What do we want? We want Tennessee to win the division as football fans,

or do we want Houston to win the division as gamblers so we have a guaranteed money line lock with either Kansas City or Oakland going there in round one. At this point, I'm all about the gambling. I do not want Tennessee in there because I can't figure them out. Right. Tennessee has won in KC. They beat Denver.

They killed the Packers. Yeah. Like, they have good wins. I don't think they're a fixed cost. But, like, if Houston's in there,. Like, they have good wins. I don't think they're a fixed cost. But, like, if Houston's in there, I know what I have in Houston. That's what I'm saying. Bill O'Brien.

I tweeted yesterday, Bill O'Brien is, like, fourth and one. He'll go for it one time. He'll punt the next time. Like, he's the guy in blackjack who it's 12 against a two, and he just changes his mind each time. And everyone at the table is like, dude, just pick one. You can't just go back and forth on this. Just pick your strategy for the rest of the night. They are unbelievable.

So I would love to see Bill O'Brien. You want to see Bill O'Brien. Well, he'll never get to the Patriots. Houston will never get to the Patriots. What you might get is the Chiefs going there, blowing out the Texans and flexing their muscles a little before going to Foxborough. I would love to bet that. Yeah, I would love to wager on that.

Andy finally had his game. We were waiting for it. I'm going to say something controversial. We were waiting for it for a while. I'm going to say something controversial. I don't think it was his fault. Really? Which part?

I really don't. The fourth and ones? I just, whatever. The going in the four corners offense, the three minutes left? What part? He can't run the ball. Honestly, I've seen him. He can't run the ball honestly i've seen him he can't run the ball they you can't you're getting stuffed four times from the goal line and and

smith throws a terrible pick in the end zone that was terrible i don't know and i thought that option play on third down and three was okay trying to run the clock out it just didn't work i don't i don't i don't blame him a lot for this okay Okay. I don't know. 17 points at home. Blew a 17-3 lead to Mariota. They blew it. They should have scored. It's not a great loss. Smits should have dropped picks. No, it's not great.

Because KC now has... That's happened now twice to them just in the last five weeks. You mean home against Tampa? Yeah, Tampa said both by the same score. Right. But, you know, in the Falcons game, let's be honest, they should have lost that game i think we got too excited about the chiefs yeah they won the falcons game on that ridiculous two

point reversion i still think they're good i know i still think the raiders game last week i didn't feel good about that they had the big tyreek he'll play yeah it's tough to beat them twice though they might take it they might still win the division. We're giving it to the Raiders, but Raiders have a couple tough ones left. I'm just saying this right now for the record. Tate, you're taping this, right? Okay, good. Good.

I'm glad you're still taping this. It's going to be bad. Not afraid of the Chiefs coming to Foxborough. Not afraid of them at all. One of these years, it's going to happen. Not afraid. All right. Yeah.

Come on in. Come on in, Kansas City. And come on in, you too, Denver. Here's what happens. Remember Ray Rice had that long touchdown against you and you couldn't recover in the playoffs? Not afraid of Kansas. That's going to be the Tyreek Hill play. The guy you've been hating.

You think we were punting once to Tyreek Hill? Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh and Oakland are the teams that can beat us. You have to outscore us. The AFC is good. The AFC is damn good. You got to get to the high 20s it's got to be like one of those because nobody nobody in the afc is built with the type of

team that would beat the patriots that defense keep brady off the field frustrated him denver is the only defense that's kind of like that i don't think they're gonna make it right but um yeah i'm just like i'm looking at the afc you know what's interesting here's who the patriots haven't played this year dallas atlanta the giants the chiefs the raiders the packers and the lions pretty fortunate schedule yeah i would say like we we played the steelers but it was landry jones not rothfussberg right We played Seattle, but for the most part, just abduct everybody. How did that end up happening?

It's a fluke of the schedule. You should play the first place team. At Arizona, week one was supposed to be like a monster tough game where eight and a half point underdogs. And then same thing, Houston. Houston week three were one point underdogs to Brock Osweiler. Wow. Think about that.

When we go over like the greatest lines of the year, that's got to be way up there. And then, you know, lost to Tyrod Taylor, Browns, Bengals, Landry Jones, Bills, Russell Wilson, Niners, Jets, Rams. Three in a row. I guess the Bengals, the Jets, Arizona, all those teams you named were all supposed to be much better. Or you went by last year, supposed to be improved. Yeah. The one thing I will say is trading Collins and benching Sheard, I don't know if this would have happened for the defense anyway, but you definitely, there's an electricity and energy that was not there two months ago.

And I don't know if that was the reason, but yeah, the defense is flying around now. All right. It wasn't like that before offensively they have a bunch of guys who can do stuff but no game breaker minus 125 for the afc you you went against michael floyd a few times what do you mean oh is that the latest criminal they picked up yeah yeah yeah he's not a criminal what did he do yet did he do anything yesterday did Did he play? No, he didn't play yesterday. He didn't play. Yeah. He's not a criminal. He just happened to be driving his car and passed out at an intersection because he was

so drunk. I think Tate did that Saturday night. I'm not sure. To the ringer part. It's interesting. I think any other team sticks by him. Or actually, let me say that again i think in most situations the team suspends him or does whatever but it was how he handled it that they seem to have

the problem with it like he wasn't honest with them yeah right and there was some 36 hour spin after what happened and you know obviously getting your car and driving drunk is idiotic. Bill Belichick, he's a humanitarian. He likes giving guys second, third chances. That's just how he is. It's his nature. Think of all the terrible behavior in the NFL. Usually you don't get released for this. We've had owners doing this.

I hear you. Jim Irsay. But I think it was how he handled it. Jim Irsay will be playing tight end for the Patriots in three weeks. Is he available? What position is he? Coach wants to give him a chance. All right.

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All right, we're going to do week 16 lines. And we have to do a shot of the week. And our choices are either Washington, Carolina tonight, or we can roll it over to Giants, Philly. And I don't know, man. I think that Carolina line's too high. Well, maybe pick the Philly line first. Yeah, let's pick the Philly line first.

I had the Giants by three and a half in Philadelphia. I went high. I said six, and you're right. It's three. And I think three is too low at this point for Philly. Showed a little fight last week. Yeah, what do we make of that Ravens game? Because Flacco threw one of the five worst picks of the year.

Yeah. And the game was over if he doesn't throw the pick. There's six minutes left. They're up 10. They're at the 11-yard line. The game's over. Yeah. It's done.

Right. And all of a sudden, the Eagles are driving. We saw two teams go for two. I didn't mind it with the Eagles. Although it's a tough spot to put Carson Wentz in. But if you win it, you can hang your hat on that for the rest of the year. And they don't have their first-round pick anyway. Tennessee, you didn't like it?

Tennessee, I did not like. It's just weird. It's too much time. It was like 3.40 left or something. And he's defending it after. Like, well, I knew if we score, we take the lead. If we don't get it, we're going to stop them and get the ball back. It's like, well, then just stop them and get the ball back.

Like, grab the one point. And guess what? You're lucky you didn't make it. Because if you make it, Chiefs are trying. They're going down the field. They're not running it out. There's just too much time left for that. The Chiefs had not scored for two hours.

They had two touchdowns the whole game. One of which was that weird Tyreek Hill play. They had stopped them over and over again on short yardage. They really couldn't run the ball. I'm taking 17-17 and doing the thing. But the Ravens, we had the Ravens on a couple of money line parlays. I did not expect to be sweating that one out. Terrified when he went for two.

It really was. And then we had to sweat out the Raiders game, too. And that game was, they win by three. I picked out, I've been red hot in the Super Contest, and I had the Bengals and the Raiders yesterday, and the Raiders pushed. The Bengals somehow lost, and then I had, I won on the Dolphins and i won on the bucks last night

but that raiders game i don't know how they don't win by more than three points yeah it was just over and over again they're settling or something happens and hey san diego did nothing we spoke in the morning i said to you i was like new england minus three oakland minus three is like something's weird here you don't take two you're not going to win both so luckily for us that the weird thing was just a push on oakland but i felt really good about that pats game until some of my pats friends were trying to remember all the times we've won in denver and it was like four times right they just always lose there and then the way it started out i was like oh my god here we go again brady's making the face yeah but the picks well it wasn't a pick six well we might we should call that like

a pick four or something because the patriots ran it back Simeon's pass far enough that you knew you were getting between a field goal and a touchdown. But that was the game right there. It was like a pick two. Yeah. Simeon made a great play to stop the touchdown. Most quarterbacks always screw up the angle. He actually took a great angle on it.

Drive him out. All right, so for the Don Julio shot of the week. A big hit, by the way, for Dan Sanborn, a high-ranking Diageo executive. Yeah, he really Julio shot of the week. A big hit, by the way, for Dan Sanborn, a high-ranking Diageo executive. Yeah, he really likes the shot of the week. I was talking to him about it this week. Yeah, he says people come up to him. They're like, how about that shot of the week?

I'm like, what kind of conversations are you having at parties? I know. That's a conversation starter? Instead of Trump in the election or whatever, it's like, how about that shot of the week? Right. Well, the guy has sex between four and six times a week.

So he's happy to talk about anyone. It used to be like eight to nine a week. Yeah, I know. The winter months, the commute's longer. Yeah. He promised he'd mail some product for the Ringer holiday party. Hasn't done it? Never got it.

Never got anything. The party's over. Yeah. Maybe he thinks it's a New Year's party. So what are you going to do? We're going to do, I think I'm taking the Monday game I think I'm taking tonight's game Yeah, but I think I'm taking Washington minus six and a half

Really? Yeah, I think they need to win this Carolina's different They have a game against Atlanta this week I think that's what they might concentrate on more You don't think they care about my Monday night audience With 12 million people watching? No, I don't care I don't know, maybe the Josh Norman thing I'm more you don't think they care about my Monday night audience with 12 million people watching no I don't care I don't know

maybe the Josh Norman thing I'm taking Washington alright let's go head to head I want to take Carolina I want to take Carolina what's the line six and a half alright six and a half

now we lost last week right didn't we both have no I thought we took Seattle oh we did we didn't take Baltimore over the Patriots I forgot what we did

see that's the thing with the shot we would have pushed if we did that one. You forget. Don Julio, the world's original handcrafted tequila with multiple unique tequilas, including Don Julio 1942, the best luxury tequila you ever drank. And if you want to get somebody a fancy gift for the holidays, I don't know. It's got a nice box.

It's got a beautiful bottle. It's really impressive he was a good good man Don Julio we had we had some at the

at the Ringer holiday party and the bartender was like should we bring these out I was like no

really yeah no I'm not I'm not wasting the crowd you said

it's not worth it I'm not wasting 1942 on Tate the guy who drinks Natty Lights he doesn't care 1942 is also his blood alcohol content.

All right. So Giants-Eagles. When was the last time we had an Eli game? Instead of curiosity. When was the last time Eli just single-handedly murdered them in a game? He looks close. The Giants fans are so sensitive about it. And you figure they're going to lose.

He's doing enough to win. A lot of that coming from the Giants fans. He's going to have 300 yards total in the playoffs. New York Giant football, I heard from Brad over and over. This is New York Giant football. This is what we do. I'm going to strangle everybody. Three-yard checkdowns.

Hate it. 28-23, they beat the Eagles November 6th.th i don't know i thought this was a fixed line i thought this was a little low and then like the eagles had 170 yards rushing yesterday that's a lot really yeah that that a team that's kind of out of it doesn't usually do that most of it was ryan matthews but so the last eli game man they haven't lost in a while. I know. I guess it was at Minnesota week four, Monday night. The last Eli game was a game they won. I mean, they just got lucky to pull it out.

I guess the Steelers game week 13. Oh, right, yeah. That's a good one. Right. Eli was pretty bad in that one. That's when he ruined my son for DraftKings for life. So we got an interesting schedule. By the way, we should mention, next week we're going to be doing this on Tuesday because Sunday is Christmas and Monday is the day after Christmas.

I don't want to make somebody work on either of those days. So we're going to do this on Tuesday and we'll get ready for Week 17, which will be a little time to reflect and look forward. We'll have a lot of time because most games are Saturday this week. There are 12 Saturday games, seven early games. I like that. So do you agree with that? Well, I don't know why it's Saturday on Christmas week

and Sunday for New Year's Day. What day do you like more? Christmas Eve or Christmas? I actually like Christmas Eve more. Everyone likes Christmas Eve more. I would have put all the games on Christmas. Christmas is over by 9 o'clock. You're stuck with your family. Give me some football.

They don't care too much because they're putting, what's the Sunday night game? Christmas Eve gave us Cincinnati at Houston. They didn't even think to flex that or do anything stupid with that. Christmas Eve is when you're with like you're starting five of your family. Yeah, right. And then Christmas Day is like the 53-man roster. Everybody comes in like that.

Tate, what day do you like more? Yeah, Christmas Eve for sure. Yeah. Christmas Day you got aunts and uncles and old people. Well, what time does Christmas Eve start for you, though? It's just a fun day. We go to Jimmy's. There's a buzz for Christmas Eve.

We open our presents on Christmas Eve. Oh, you do? Yeah, except for Santa, which my daughter still is down with Santa at age 11 and a half. My son says he doesn't believe it, but he wants to believe it, so he's going to. See, I think it's all a ruse with our kids right they all know there's no way my kids don't believe in the off of the shelf they know that they know that my wife's up there at 11 30 moving stuff around i hope we're not ruining this for people driving a car with their kids we did a spoiler alert off of the shelf we did a bit on jimmy kim alive about

forgetting about the elf on the shelf and we have And we have this service called Shelf Shifters. They come in the middle of the night and move your elf because it's such a pain in the ass every day. It's like the Tooth Fairy. I'm like, oh, my God, I forgot. Three days in a row. When did Elf on the Shelf start and can we kill the person who created it? Not too long ago. Yeah.

So this was a branding thing? 2011 or 2001. I hate the Elf on the Shelf. Yeah, it's not great. I actually started to tell my daughter that I was the Elf and the Shelf. You did? Because I thought she knew that. I was pretty confident that, you know, she's in the sixth grade.

She knew an elf wasn't coming in in the middle of the night and moving things around and bringing gifts. Right. And her face dropped. And she's like, you are? And I was like, no, I'm kidding. I was like, no, no, I'm just kidding. She's like, you weren't kidding. You are the elf.

And it turned into one of those things. I don't want to brag. I have a decent-sized house. But after, like, three days, I run out of places to put this stupid thing. Yeah, what are you going to do? The elf. Yeah. Enough.

Put it in the toilet. I hate the elf on the shelf. Saturday. The best part, though, is the wives complaining about the off of the shelf. Yeah, right. My wife hates the off of the shelf. Screaming at 11.39, stupid off of the shelf. Right.

Miami at Buffalo. Bills are not out of it. I'm surprised to learn. What do you mean? They're not officially out of it. They're not eliminated? No. What needs to happen?

So if they beat the- Like a lot of team plane crashes? If they beat the Dolphins this week... I don't even know who they have next week, but they'll have to go 9-7. I don't know. They have to go 9-7. They have Dolphins-Jets.

Oh, and they play the Jets. So they are going to go 9-7 if they win this. So then... I don't see how they make it. The Dolphins would have to lose to the patriots dolphins and broncos would both have to lose it's kind of conceivable rex are they playing for him miami won 20 players like lachelle mccoy is excellent now this fun now you tweeted about this a cold weather team this should be when we were in college miami's the better team

but they're going to buffalo buffalo should blow them out doesn't seem to stand up hold up these days yesterday in the old days that we would have seen the cold weather and we would have just taken all the home team money lines and just gone all in taking any home dog you just go home and i think the home teams were 5-10 against the spread yesterday. Yeah, I think that's right. But at least we know. I mean, you know to stay away at this point. What do you have for this line? I had the Bills by 2.5.

I went low. I said 1. It's 3.5. So you get that. I can't wait to get to the Texans. I have a lot of Brock Osweiler thoughts here. You're going to have to because it's the last game. Well, can we get rid of the two shitty games We just crossed those off Chargers, Browns, and Rams, Niners

Can we just skip over those I have the Chargers by 8 Chargers by 8 at Cleveland I have the Rams by 3 against San Francisco I had 8 and it's 6.5 And let me just say that's insane That Cleveland's still getting less than a touchdown What was the other one?

Rams? Rams, I had by three over the 49ers. I had four. You had three. It's three and a half, so we tie that one. Two terrible games. Please don't watch either of them. No, I know, but don't watch.

But again, Vegas is just giving us a layup here with these Browns and 49ers lines. I picked the Browns again in my picks poll. Me too. Well, because now it's like a Ponzi scheme now. They haven't covered for eight straight weeks. 0-8 and San Francisco 1-7. 1-15 against the spread. Now maybe you caught a bad line there. Maybe you're

3-13 or 2-4. Whatever it is. But that's insane that we're just not all over these teams every week. So we had that wins poll that we talked about before the year where where i had the 10th 12th and 24 picks i had the giants texans and bucks were my three picks i have 26 wins total are you winning this now no it looks like lewis is winning right now he's the packers raiders titans

yeah titans he got 29th wow i almost took them at 24. I was debating between Bucks and Titans. I think they had the same amount of wins. Right. But the Packers coming on, Lewis is looking pretty good at 27. And then Jeff Chow has the Cards, Cowboys, and Dolphins. He took the Cards with his first pick. He's still in it somehow. Right.

And then Weinberg is the only one really left. Steelers, Bills, Lions, he's got 25. You have Chiefs, Vikings, Eagles at 22. Yeah, I fell off. The Eagles haven't won in forever. I'm bringing this up for two reasons. One is that our friend Eric Emmerman has 15 wins. The first place team has a chance to dub him.

Emmerman took the Bengals, Ravens, and Jaguars. Every Monday, he laments. He's like, if I just would have done this differently, I was like, you're 14 wins behind. If I had done three things differently with my three picks but i bring this up because the two teams we did not pick as a group because there's only 30 teams and two don't get picked where the niners and the browns who have one win great job by everybody really nice wow except for emmerman so jeff chow still somehow has a chance to win this even though he blew the

cards pick yeah he took the cards over the patriots if he had taken the patriots it would be the greatest performance in the history of this pool he would have 35 wins or something yeah and he lost that the first week when the patriots beat the card yeah that was it i don't think the cardinals win the rest of the way i don't know. Alright, so now we're at what? How about your team? Jets and New England. I have the Pats by 14.5. I'm taking the Pats. Yeah, I said 13. I went low. It's 16.

Okay. I had a nice one for you with the Jets. I know you were scrambling around. You had your party. I said, Petty, my friend Jeff alerted me to this petty over two slash touchdown slash interceptions it's at least a push in the dolphins game and you're like i don't like this i'm reading i'm reading the text right now i don't like this these snow games are weird reminds me of friday night lights when tim riggins made out with lila

garrity i never said behind the dumpster outside Buddy's car dealership. I'm staying away. No, I emailed you back. Let's bet on, let's take the Dolphins and put them with two money lines. With the Chiefs, though. So I would have lost. Yeah, yeah. Well, speaking of losing,

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Visit sportsmatter.org to learn more. All right. I like it. Tennessee at Jacksonville. I have the, I think I went too low. I had the Titans by four. Too low on that. Probably like six, right?

I went too high. I said six and a half. No, you're almost there. Four and a half. New coach. Who's the interim coach? I didn't even catch the name. Bob Bortles. Oh, is it Bob Bortles? Bob Bortles bob bortles blake's dad's gonna is it wow i don't know uh doug marone oh yeah the old

bills guy right he wasn't terrible remember he misplayed his buffalo hand but yeah i thought he was half decent that's what happens with all these guys he wasn't terrible john foster he wasn't terrible is all right if they had done d Doug Marone and Chad Henney all year, I think they'd go like 6-10, 7-9. How about that? That's a nice little cue. They're benching Osweiler. They paid $700 million for him.

You could take Bortles out and put Chad Henney in the same game. Yeah, he's flat-out terrible. Did you see him the last couple drives in that game? I can't watch him. I can't watch him. By the way, the sports correspondents, congratulations. They set a record last night in reporting the Gus Bradley thing, pronouncing the team name Jaguar.

Oh, Jaguars. How hard is it to say Jaguar? It's because that new commercial with the Jaguar. I can't even tell if they're doing it to be funny or what. I don't like that either. So I just want to make sure that we pay tribute for even 20 seconds to that incredible Jaguars- Gus Bradley run? Texans game.

Oh, the whole game, yeah. First of all, you had Bortles versus Osweiler. A matchup that will never happen again. The 32 picks combined by the end of the game. Nobody throws picks. Did you know Rivers leads the league in picks now?

Is it this year? 17 picks for Rivers. But in the old days, guys would have 25, 30 picks. But now it's like really hard to throw more than 12, 15 picks by week 14. Those guys, 32 picks combined.

It ends with Bortles, who has a lot of time left to go get a field goal, just heaves it into triple coverage. First half, Osweiler, two terrible picks. Why did you watch this game so much? This is the game I had in the back. I glanced at it when I grabbed the pretzel.

I was flipping around. Oh, because I have the Texans in the wind spool. Oh, God. So I was actually monitoring for a comeback. They were booing Osweiler so loud. Good those texans crowds have not been good right and then the rest of the game he kept the helmet on michael bauman in our nfl slack said that he it was just a classic keep the helmet on to hide the tears who knows if he's crying but you just keep the helmet on anyway like why are you i think he's laughing i think you just keep the helmet on anyway. Why are you – I think he's laughing. I think he was laughing.

He didn't want to see anyone laughing. You don't need your helmet on anymore. In the locker room, he's like, I love this team. People don't understand. I love this team. It's like, yeah. Who do you love, the owner? He did give a great interview.

I feel bad for him. All I know is he cost him the Super Bowl last year, and that's going to be his legacy in my mind. That's right. All right, Minnesota at Green Bay. Packers by 7 and a half. I don't know what the hell happened to this Minnesota team. It really does seem like the Zimmer thing kind of derailed them.

Like he got sick. Wasn't it before then, though? No. I said six and a half. It's seven. There were signs before, but I think he was really important to them. And the guy had a really bad health thing. And now he's coaching.

I mean, the whole thing, I feel bad for him. I did too, but they were the last undefeated team. Isn't that amazing? At 5-0, they were the last undefeated team. That Bradford trade is brutal. This is a rematch. It's just flat-out brutal. That's going to be like the 14th pick in the draft.

They beat them Emmy night, right? September 18th, 17-14 was the sign. I don't Emmy night, right? September 18th, 17th, 14th was the Sunday night. I don't know what happened to their defense. Yeah, it's bizarre. The Colts are weird, too. They went to Green Bay. They went to Lambeau. They did the same thing to Green Bay.

Smothered them. They didn't have a chance. And then went to Minnesota. Same thing. And it's funny. What did they have? Four wins in a row or something like that? Three or four wins in a row?

Who? The Packers? The Colts. Oh, the Colts, yeah. And I still think they're terrible. I can't talk myself into it. They can't beat the Texans, and Tennessee can't beat Indianapolis. It's very strange.

Luck has had a nice little season here, considering how much punishment he's taken. They're also getting 16 games out of Frank Gore, which I don't understand. Yeah, right. How is he not hurt by now? They're a team, if you like live betting, look in Andrew Luck's

eyes in the first three minutes of first, you could really tell by the first one or two possessions, like they weren't going to lose that game, right? Like, when did you know the Vikings were done? Like about 10-25? I came to that game and I just knew we needed it.

And I just looked at T.Y. and I said, let's make stuff happen today. Thank you, Andrew Luck. And good luck in Oakland. Unbelievable. Is he... There's no way he can play Macho Man Tommy Savage this year. No, it's over.

Do you think Macho Man Tommy Savage should show up for the games of the valet? He really should. Like some brunette wearing a wedding gown? He should play quarterback with a cape. What do we have? So we skipped. We did San Diego, Cleveland.

Washington and Chicago. Oh, God. They went out. They're in. I've been saying this from the first time he came in. I think Matt Barkley's pretty good. I think he's like the ninth best quarterback in the league. Spun the watch.

Yeah. I'd give that guy $60 million right now. Why not? That makes it happen. He has the worst receivers. Everybody just drops his passes. Right. And now that Meredith came back and is doing stuff again.

Meredith? Oh. What's that guy's name? No, the other guy came back. Meredith. Wasn't he hurt? Oh, right, right, right. Remember they had that week where it was just like the D-leaders?

Yeah, right. But Alshon Jeffrey's back, too. Yeah, now he's got guys. I think he's good. He's confident. And I like their running backs, too. Do they pull off the upset? They're the best 3-11 team I think I've ever seen in my life.

They might be. I think they could. I have the Redskins giving three points to the Bears. I went too high there. I said five. It's three and a half. I think that's a really dangerous game for the Skins. I could see them gutting out the win this week and then just blowing that.

I would not want to play this Bears team. Nope. No, that's a tough one. All right, Atlanta, Carolina. Last early game. Falcons by four. you hit it exactly i said three and a half it moved from three and a half to four so you get that so is there a good early game um miami buffalo that's not gonna be that's it i don't know yeah that's good because i didn't

want to watch football you hate christmas eve Christmas Eve, yeah. Yeah, Christmas Eve morning. I know, but then it gets interesting. Indianapolis at Oakland in the afternoon. That's a fun one. Oh, it's an honor to play in Oakland. I'm watching those guys. Either Raiders by six. Andrew Luck. Andrew the Giant Luck accused of murdering Al Davis.

What do you say to that? Six. I said six also. It's four. Four's a little low. Four's a little low because the Raiders... You never leave a Raiders game

feeling totally great about it. They have a tendency to win. Right. And win close. But when was the last time they laid the smack down on somebody? They beat up. I guess the Bills.

Well, I had them, but they were losing that game through three quarters, I think, right? But then they crushed them. They beat the Jags. Week seven was their last ass kick. Bucks OT in week eight. Beat the Broncos on Sunday night. I didn't feel like that was just, they took care of business. I didn't feel like it was an ass kicking.

Lost to the Texans. Right. Oh, no, no, I'm sorry. They beat the Texans in Mexico. That was the Mexico game, Monday. Barely beat the Panthers. Beat the Bills, but as you said, they had to come from behind. Lost to the Chiefs.

And then 19 points. they're a fun team yeah i don't i wouldn't take 10 i wouldn't take indy though here i would not either now tampa bay at new orleans you're giving the bucks another win here i am i don't think new orleans is very good they they have the games where they play the red kind of teams and they put up 40. But against good defenses, they seem to be in the 10 to 20 range for points. Right. And I think Tampa has a good defense. Bucks minus one. You said one.

I said three and a half, and it's three. And that is the first one I beat you at, head to head. That's crazy. Can we talk about the Raiders fans yesterday real quick? I skipped over that did they mug all the chargers fans of the tickets because it was like 80 i don't remember a regular season game like that i said that to you in the phone when we're talking about the ravens raiders parlay it's like it's a home game for the raiders that was insane maybe the raiders should just move to san diego yeah they have that many Raider fans there. The Chargers, it's sad. And I would not pick them the rest of the year.

Who do they play? Oh, they're playing at Cleveland. I think that's losable. I think they know the team's moving. I think Rivers is bummed out. Rivers hasn't been the same since it became clear they were leaving. And I don't know. I think the Browns, if they're ever going to win one, that could be one.

Well, that's it because they're at Pittsburgh next week. But let's make something clear. The desire to not get beaten by the Browns is far stronger than the desire for the Browns to win a game, I think. I think we're seeing this. Well, the Browns are better off going 0-16. Yeah, right. Arizona. Well, let's take San Francisco with the Rams.

Let's talk about uh that real quick because san francisco is battling the browns for supremacy the number one pick i don't i i don't follow college football closely so i wasn't really there for the whole chip kelly oregon thing we watch them sometimes in the games they were so exciting and imaginative right it's the opposite of him on the Niners I thought especially if he has a bad team that he would be I don't know creative I don't feel like they're creative in any way when I watch them

what's creative about them Fisher was accused of running a junior high school offense and yeah I feel the same way about Chip Kelly I think these guys I remember it was Steve Spurrier when he went to Washington that time and he was terrible and they were talking about how he only used to work like seven hours a day right he'd show up at 80 leave it like 4 30 for the

one hour lunch yeah yeah he's just that's what he did in college a different job and he was just being outworked every week and they were like yeah it's yeah, he just didn't want to work 80 hours a week. And I wonder if Chip Kelly's like that. Same thing. I wonder if Chip Kelly's just like, yeah, let's wrap it up at four today, guys. Until you're on hard knocks. Then you have to pretend that you're working every week. Then you have to pretend you're breaking a sweat.

You said three here? Yeah. I said four. It's three and a half. So we split that terrible game. Jeff Fisher wants a chance to play against the Rams, he said. We already did that game. We did?

Yeah, we did that. Let's just keep doing it. Arizona and Seattle. Arizona and Seattle. I had the Seahawks by eight. I said seven and a half. It's nine. You get that.

A little high. Where do you stand on Richard Sherman? They tied the first. Well, it's funny. You talked about the defense is criticizing the offenses. I don't remember it happening this much with the, who did we say did it? All the Denver guys. Every guy in the Denver defense.

Yeah, and now Richard Sherman getting mad. He's like, I don't want to pass on the one-yard line anymore. I'm going to take my ball and go home if it happens again. Shut up, Richard Sherman. Why are you even saying that? Exactly. What's weird is football is really damaging when guys do that in football because then it turns into this three-day media story.

It's like, well, how does that help your team? Yeah. I like how candid he is, but, you know, I think you draw the line. Well, Russell Wilson's like, you should shuck the guy at the line of scrimmage. Like, what does it end? Like, does the offense accuse the defense? I think we learn over and over again every year that the offense and the defense hates each other. And it's just, it seeps out every once in a while.

But this is starting in high school. It starts there and it just keeps going. Yeah, it's just it seeps out every once in a while but this is starting in high school it starts there and it just keeps going yeah it's like rival high schools yeah uh cincinnati at houston this is it christmas eve bill simmons will not be watching this night game cincinnati at houston i promise you i won't watch this game i guarantee it even with macho man tommy savage involved i had the texans by three and a half yeah i said one and a half and it's two and a half uh so we split it okay all right now hold on we got we're going to christmas but i want to talk about quickly capital one knows you have questions about your credit you may be asking who's really in charge of my credit score or how does my credit actually work that's why capital one created the creditWise app.

So you can check your credit score anytime you want right in the app. It's free to everyone whether you're a Capital One customer or not. In fact, millions of CreditWise users have improved their score by 20 points or more. So download the app for free today. Again, it is the CreditWise app. Availability depends on presence of credit history from TransUnion. CreditWise is offered by Capital One Bank, USA, and Dot A Dot. All right.

All right. Christmas. Look at that. You got some Christmas music playing in your song. Christmas Day, Baltimore, Pittsburgh. Fun game. There's only two on Christmas Day. What time does the set start?

It's at 1 30 east coast time right 1 30 west coast time there's a 1 30 and a 5 30 yeah okay so you can sleep in you open your gifts i have 1 30 west coast time yeah that's great that is the steelers by four we both have four it's four and a half it seems easy to take the steelers here bal. We both have four. It's four and a half. Seems easy to take the Steelers here. Baltimore won 21-14 first time they played. Mallory Rubin of The Ringer came on the BS podcast on Friday and just obliterated Joe Flacco for a few minutes. I had texted her that I'd want her to come on to talk about Joe Flacco,

and it accidentally, when I sent it, it autocorrected it to Flaccid. And during her rant, she's like, your phone changed his name to Flaccid, which was fitting because he is Joe Flaccid and just had this whole rant. She just can't stand him. And I'm suing you now for sexual harassment. But yeah, he's like the 30th ranked quarterback. Yeah. I think by QBR.

Some things that a Super Bowl winning quarterback shouldn't do. You have the best kicker in the game. You have third and five from the 34, and you get sacked. He's out of field goal range. He's been awful. That was terrible. It's like, you're going to lose this game now. And then obviously the pick by the 11.

Yeah. So I have the Steelers by four. Yep. And kind of like the Ravens. It's a tough one. It's tough. We've got to think this through a little more. Their defense can hang with them.

Again, I don't like how Roethlisberger is throwing the ball. Right. And these games, Steelers, Ravens, Christmas, it's hard to believe that's not a three-point game. It could be a last possession game. It feels like a last possession game. And they have the better kicker. I don't think, the Steelers, to me, I test, just, I don't know.

There's a sharpness that is missing with them. Right. Tomlin is really great, though, after pulling out a win, going down the sidelines and hugging everybody. Everybody, yeah. And screaming and doing, like, he's like a professional wrestler. yeah he's great he arsino he's still he's still my favorite non-patriots coach i like him all right the late game the sunday night game yeah denver kansas city doing it again this was kc 30 27 on november 27 by. I have Casey by five.

We're going to split it. I had four. And it's four and a half. Both those games are four and a half. Both those Sunday games. You have to figure one of those underdogs comes through, right? Yeah, I'm just looking at just the points Denver's putting up, right? Simeon gets two.

It takes too much time for him to get going. Since week five, 16, 13, 24, 27, 13, 25, 24, 21, 10, 16. Not great. And the 27 was against KC, right? Not great. They have not scored 30 points in a game since week two. It's not good. They don't have a running game.

Do you blame Simeon for this? I felt like their offensive line was – I couldn't tell whether the Pats' front seven is getting better or the Broncos just have a terrible offensive line, but we were all over the place that game. They need more of a running game. Like Peyton Manning had more of a running game last year. He would have been even worse than he was last year. C.J. Anderson hurt them.

Yeah. And then Monday night, Detroit at Dallas. So you could be playing for the one seed here unless the Eagles do you a big solid on Thursday. Yeah. I have the Cowboys six and a half over the Lions. I said six, and it's seven. So you win that. And you won or tied every game except one.

You son of a bitch. Feeling it. I'm in a really good spot right now with football. Seven, six, and three. You can't call me the NBA-hole. I've been really watching. You're actually right. You're right.

I've been watching football. You're seven, six, and three after 16 weeks. Yeah, but we kind of need the Giants to win for the Cowboys to play so that this Detroit team goes away a little bit for our bet. I'm so worried about that bet. I've never seen you more concerned about a bet. Well, I may have a little more on it than you do. Okay.

Lions, Browns, Niners. Niners. We just crushed two of those three. Just crushed them. There's no way out. I'm still trying to figure out how I didn't win money on the Patriots to win the AFC East. That was the hill I was going to die on in August. I'm like, everybody writing us off, this is crazy.

We win the AFC East every year. I thought you did. No, because we put them with a lady by the name of Hillary Clinton. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it all went to hell. But we did do Arizona not make the playoffs. Yeah, we have that one. And Patriots to win 11. But the Hillary bet is going to.

That's not over yet. That's not over yet. We lost on that, and we somehow completely misplayed the NBA playoffs. Yeah. So that basically any scenario that wasn't Cleveland winning the title, we were going to win money. Right. And, yeah.

Draymond Green. Draymond Green, the nut puncher. Yep. So you got nothing to plug. There's nothing going on. I'll plug Cousin Sal's short thing. It was 2-1 yesterday. 8-4 against the spread last four weeks.

This week we're posting Thursday at noon Eastern. The picks are up, and we'll have another $1,000 prop challenge. Thursday at noon Eastern? Yeah, because we want it to be up for a day and a half. These games are Saturday. And from my side, we're going to have one more podcast this week. It is going to run, I think, we're taping a little bit earlier, but it's going to run on Thursday.

And then we have another Channel 33 thing I'll do that I'll tell you about on Thursday and a new column coming up this week as well. Thanks to Capital One. They created the CreditWise app so you can check your credit score anytime you want right in the app. It's free to everyone. Download CreditWise today. Availability depends on presence of credit history from TransUnion.

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the ringer dot com thanks to the ringer podcast network thanks to am I going to see Tate Frazier again for a podcast oh yeah alright yeah alright Tate from Wednesday I'll say goodbye to you then uh thanks to the cuz what's your what how many how much money are you up on cuz it's a sure thing uh i'm up 21 or something like that it's better than like a regular ira right it's pretty good

i don't know it's been you know um. Tonight is Christmas come early. Who is it? What? Berman and Tiege. Oh, it is. Tiege. Oh, that's great. A lot of years. A lot of years here. What do you think? Does he cry?

Is there any chance TJ just takes the time to tell him what he really thinks of him? Or is it just going to be flustered? What if it starts out Berman's like Teej, I miss you this year. And Teej is like, boom, it's been the best four months of my life. I didn't have to hear that circle the wagon bullshit. Yeah, I didn't have to watch the Niners video again. I can't wait.

I'm going to start watching at four o'clock today. It's going to be magnificent. Yeah, it should be appointment television. All right. Good job, A. Good job, A. You're a married American Prison Belly. Thank you. On the wayside I'm a person never lost And I don't have to ever forget