The Bill Simmons Podcast - Guess the Lines Week 8 With Cousin Sal (Ep. 276)

Episode Date: October 23, 2017

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Cousin Sal to discuss the fallacy of the home-field advantage this season (6:00), Cam Newton's poor play in Chicago (14:00), Joe Thomas's snap streak coming to an end (22:00), Dolphins-Ravens (28:00), the wild-card contenders in the NFC (33:00), 49ers-Eagles (36:00), Bears-Saints (41:00), Texans-Seahawks (46:00), Broncos-Chiefs (52:00), the World Series matchup (56:00), and another edition of "Parent Corner" (1:06:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast on the Ringer Podcast Network, brought to you by SeatGeek, our presenting sponsor. Buy and sell tickets and two taps on your phone, everything fully guaranteed. Sal, did you know you can buy basketball tickets and get a little money off on SeatGeek right That's not true, is it? Oh, yeah. $30 off your first SeatGeek purchase on NBA tickets. Use promo code NBAPALOOSA.

Expires on November 1st. Download the SeatGeek app or go right to SeatGeek.com. Also brought to you by Proper Cloth. Stop wearing shirts that don't fit. Start wearing custom shirts that fit perfectly because you created them. By answering 10 easy questions, bring Proper Cloth back into your life or bring it into your life. They guarantee a perfect fit.

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How'd the trifecta do this week? Well, we ran our episode of the NBA. The trifecta wasn't even on at all? They were not on. It was me, you, and House. Was the trifecta upset that they were on? They were upset. I tweeted their picks.

I don't think they did spectacularly well this week. Well, they probably didn't care. Yeah, they probably weren't into it. They didn't care as much. Big one this week. We have World Series coming up. We have, I don't want to tip it too much, but someone who has something to do with baseball and gambling

and can only be two people. I'm not unleashing the Black Sox scandal again. That sounds fantastic. Go to TheRinger.com. My column is there every Friday. Did okay on my picks this week. I actually was above 500. Sal, you have the reputation.

You're doing these videos for us on Fridays. And I don't know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, but Matt Gothard was in our Slack. You lost the first pick, and Matt Gothard has said the biggest lock of all time is Sal getting the second pick after he loses the first

pick. You've gone one-on-one basically every week. One-on-one almost every week. So if you lose the first pick, guaranteed second pick, it happened again in Dallas last night. Right. And I doubled up on Dallas. I really liked that. But we'll discuss it.

Okay. We're going to bring in Pro Jim, then we're off. Week seven. Almost in the books. Feels like the NFL's starting to make more sense. That's my takeaway this week. Is that what you feel like? Yeah, the favorites kind of took control. We have a little hierarchy now.

The Patriots looked like the Patriots again. Steelers looked like the Steelers again. It's starting to look like a football season. That wasn't your takeaway? I have exactly the opposite take. I'm the only asshole in the country who thinks maybe we need two more preseason games. Because we're almost two months in,

and too many of the, now I know this happens sometimes, but too many of the good teams take a half or three quarters of a game off every week. Tate's Panthers, you know, the Steelers obviously had their time a couple weeks ago. How many New York playoff teams looked bad? Atlanta was terrible. Tampa Bay, you don't know what to make of that offense. It just seems like they're in preseason form, a lot of these teams.

I did tiers. I think we can actually do the tiers. Top tier, Philly, KC, Pittsburgh, New England. Would you put Seattle in there? Not yet. I don't think you'd come off a giant win and figure it. So that's our top four right now. Philly, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, New England.

Roethlisberger looked good yesterday. He did. It was the first time he looked confident. He had a nice, tight, New England. Roethlisberger looked good yesterday. He did. It was the first time he looked confident. He had a nice, tight, hard spiral. Didn't make any dumb plays. They look like they're finding their identity. Their defense is good. Right.

They really kind of demolished the Bengals in the second half. I watched that whole game. We have that big parlay, division parlay. New England, Pittsburgh, Seattle. It's falling into shape a little bit. Pittsburgh has basically clinched that division. Yes. Tier two.

So we have that, Philly, KC, Pittsburgh, New England is top four. Tier two, I got Seattle. I have the Rams. I have the Saints. I got the Redskins and the Chargers in there as eight and nine. But you could talk me into the next tier is buffalo minnesota miami jacksonville carolina atlanta dallas it really starts to fall off to you dallas is the last team you met i would say minnesota dallas could be in that second tier i'd like to see dallas

beat a good team can i see that no no you're not going to see that you're just gonna you're gonna load up your record on shit teams lose two half decent teams and you can't be in tier two beat a good team. Everyone loves San Francisco Tate last week. Oh, five losses by three points or less. Dallas goes in and wins. No way Dallas is covering. Then they go in and lay the smack down and it's like,

oh, you just beat a shit team. Don't look at Tate. Look at me. I'm over here. I'm sorry. I'm over here. I can't look at you. Do that Patriots win. I actually liked San Francisco a little bit last week and i think i switched my pick after i realized that that stadium was going to be like 40 000 dallas fans which it was it was basically west coast home game for dallas which um we had that and then we had that the chargers game. Right. A lot of orange.

Oh, yeah. I don't know whether the Denver fans flew there for a California weekend, or do we have 15,000 Denver fans in Southern California? I find that hard to believe. I think we do. We had three. We were in Brooklyn last week, our show, Jimmy Kimmel Live, and we had three guys like, I got to get back.

We have to get back. I'm going to the Denver fans going to the Chargers game. Unbelievable. How does it stack up? And yet it didn't matter. I don't remember the Chargers beating a team so soundly. I'm not sure. Home field advantage just doesn't seem to matter like it once did.

No. Now that the Ravens can't protect at home, I really don't know who we have other than Seattle. And even Seattle, I don't feel 100% on. But your team and my team, Crabb was dead to start that game yesterday and then eventually got into it once the defense actually showed up. Although I think there was some kind of,

I don't even know that these exact words were said, but I think Belichick's like, we are not losing three home games in seven weeks. I don't care what happens. It was a weird, it started off weird. The Pats got screwed on a couple calls. I immediately went off Twitter for two hours.

You thought that Kronkowski, you thought that when he shoved? Yeah, in slow motion, if it won 100th of a second, it was a slight shove. But I mean, people get shoved on every play. Cooks got held on the previous play. They didn't call it. I don't know. I don't know. All right. Then they had a fourth and seventh guy, blatant holding, they don't call it.

It just had all the makings. And then, you know, the bottom line is Matt Ryan was terrible in that game. He missed open dudes. He had open dudes in the end zone. He had open dudes. They had guys open, I thought, that whole game. I just thought he played badly. It did seem like they don't have – I even texted my buddy, the trifecta.

I was like, do these guys even practice during the week? Because Ryan is off by like three yards. Why aren't I on the trifecta. I was like, do these guys even practice during the week? Because Ryan is off by like three yards. Why aren't I on the trifecta text? Why do you have this special collection of texts? You'd hate it. A lot of it's anti-Patriots. I'll put you on if you want. That hurts my feelings. But you knew that game was

over when Brady threw that pass, picked off, and it was... You know what I knew it was over? You could have shut it right then. No. It was 10-0. We were texting about the live betting about the falcons because i thought they were going to make a run and then these idiots they're they're at midfield with two minutes left they give them the whole fourth and six and i was actually watching with with my nephew and i was saying like well if they went for him fourth and seven they got to go for it on fourth and six but then after they did, I flip-flopped on it.

I was like, that was so stupid. But if they just punt there, it's 10-0 halftime. It's doable. 17-0 was not doable. And you're getting the ball down 10-0 in a half that you were destroyed. It was really stupid the way it came out. I will tell you this. Now that my team has played the Falcons twice in 10 months,

I think Freeman maybe has like 23 carries in those two games combined for like 150 yards. I don't think we can tackle him. We can tackle him if they stack the line on him. I definitely don't think we can cover him on screens and wheel routes, stuff like that. He was the guy I was terrified of, and he barely got the ball. It was just stupid.

It was a really bad game plan. I think Sarkeesian's a nightmare. Take it away from him. Take the game plan. I mean, you have too many explosive players to be running this vanilla offense every week. I mean, really, they could have been 1-5. The Detroit and Chicago games were closed in the last second. Take it away from

them this this team should score maybe not like last year where where ryan had like almost 10 yards of pass but uh they should score in the 30s every game certainly against this patriots defense we had this cornerback out there who they yeah they made a trade because they thought he'd help the special teams and all of a sudden he's shutting down Muhammad Sanu. Right. I don't get it. I'm not going to get seduced by the Pats have too many no-name guys on D. And I thought Ryan missed a lot of throws.

I am not ready to say the Patriots defense is back. I think it was a weird game. The fog was weird. Matt Ryan sucked. The Falcons couldn't stay out of their own way. And I'm not going to make any grand assumptions. Like, the Pats are available in our fantasy league, right? The defense?

I think they are. Right. I wouldn't go in and be like, oh, I'm spending 20 bucks. Like, this is going to—I just don't think they're that good. Well, they're not sacking. But, you know, yeah, they're—you know, I don't— did you think for a second that Fogg was smoke? And, like, I joked on Twitter about it and got a lot of shit for it,

but I'm thinking Falcons get the first possession. They overdid the halftime show with, with smoke intentionally. They know Bryant can't kick a field goal. I can't see when it's clear out. You know, why not just for this first drive? It's almost like you think my team doesn't have any integrity.

It's almost exactly like that. Yeah. Yeah, it is uh we're starting to figure out how to use brain and cooks which makes me feel good yeah that's good they have all these running backs like just whoever's in it's like each guy's a different guy it's kind of cool hey look nobody's good in the league yeah but i thought like that's that's just the point exactly the point the patriots switch it up and no one switches it up like belichick but come back with something, Atlanta.

No matter how much I heard, oh, this is a revenge game down 28-3, they're going to come back, this is the game. I was like, there's nothing you could do to make up for losing in the Super Bowl the way you did. Don't even worry about this game representing that. I think they took that to heart. They're like, okay, we can't make that up. We're going to go out there and shoot the bat.

I knew we were going to win at halftime because they asked Dan Quinn. Yeah. It was the side line reporter. He was like, I asked Dan Quinn, what's the plan for second half? And he said, attack, attack, attack. I was like, this is how you lost the last game. How about this? Try to get some drives.

Yeah. Run Freeman down our throats. Use your tight end. He never threw to. We can't cover tight ends all season. You like the jet sweep from the 170-pound receiver on fourth and goal. I absolutely love that.

What happens to teams? Teams just become They lose their minds. They become stupid and paralyzed at the goal line when they play the Patriots. The Chargers did it the first drive against the Broncos. Four runs from the one-yard line. They just kept running Melvin Gordon to nine guys. It's like, just do anything.

Do play action, throw to tight end. Yeah. It just seems like the Raiders get untimed plays, like two untimed plays. You should be able to figure something out that either draws a penalty or gets a yard. I want to talk about Cam Newton. But let's talk about DraftKings really quick.

Week 8, football season in full swing, which begs the question, how is your football team doing in Fantasy Cell? How's your fantasy football team doing? I think I'm 3-3, and I need like 28 points from Cousins. So you're going to be 3-4. I'm 4-3. You are?

Yeah. I kind of like my team, actually. That doesn't mean I don't like Daily Fantasy, though. DraftKings created public contests with big cash prizes, private contests. We've never done this, compete against a group of your friends. We should do this one. Let's do it. The BU, the Trifecta, Romo.

We'll get a whole bunch of people in there. Single entry contests, which I did this week. I've won twice in the last five weeks. This week I lost because I had Carson Palmer as my quarterback. Couldn't figure out a quarterback and it was between him and tyrod taylor want to go cheaper carson palmer broken arm he's done they also created pick them the newest and fastest way to play one week fantasy draft kings organized players in eight tiers all you have to do is select one player from each tier the best part about draft kings draft a new team each week

without any commitment that's why i like. Pretty good. I like not having commitments to my fantasy players. You know, like right now I'm committed to Christian McCaffrey because Dalvin Cook's out for the year. So Tate hates Christian McCaffrey because he's helping to kill the Panthers season. I hate him because he's killing my fantasy team. He's just not that good. He's like a six-foot Danny Woodhead. I feel betrayed.

I feel betrayed by all the people who left college. With DraftKings, you wouldn't have to stick with him. That's offensive to Danny Woodhead. Yeah. Danny Woodhead's like, what-foot Danny Woodhead. I feel betrayed. I feel betrayed by all the people who left college. DraftKings, you wouldn't have to stick with him. That's offensive to Danny Woodhead. Yeah. Danny Woodhead's like, what? I'm right here. Go to DraftKings.com. Use promo code Simmons to play for free for your share of over a million dollars in total

prizes. Promo code Simmons. Minimum $5 deposit required. Restrictions apply. See DraftKings.com for details. Cam Newton. I'm in the car today cowards on i always like listen the first eight minutes of coward

calls cam newton scam newton oh have you heard that one before yeah no doesn't even say cam newton i'm he's scam he just goes right in calls him scam newton tate your thoughts scam newton scam newton i mean that's 2011 joke okay i mean that's from the whole ncaa thing so that's that's already done that's played out that's like talking about john wall doing the dougie that was from 2010 we're past all that so maybe he needs to find new material i don't know that's weird tate do you want to apologize to Salonac because we lost money on the Panthers yesterday? Under the thinking of Mitch Trubisky clearly only knows eight plays. They're not going to throw the ball.

Carolina, all they have to do is just not turn the ball over and the Bears won't score. I blame you. I thought it was going to be a low-scoring, old-school game, wing-tee offense, 3-3. And it was, except for Eddie Jackson gets two touchdowns. So we basically have a 3-3 game without this Alabama-Auburn rivalry that happens between Eddie Jackson and Cam Newton.

So it's not, Cam was having his own problems that were separate from the game. If Cam Newton just stayed back and just didn't turn the ball over, we have a 3-3 game, we have overtime. It made no sense. You could have had him kneel three times and punt and just waited for Trubisky to screw up, and you would have won 7-0. Exactly.

And it's not even Kekles out, Bears scored 40 points. It was the most bizarre box score you'll ever see. They have like 160, 170 total yards. He completed four passes. Twelve passes he's completed in two weeks. They have two wins. Two wins with 12 completions. He's a winner.

They're not running the Navy offense. This is crazy. Like, they're winning these games. But I'll say this. I don't blame Cam that much. That third pick, that second pick, rather, to Trevor, that was terrible. It can't get worse than that. But the two returns for touchdowns, not necessarily his fault.

The hat choice postgame, that's his fault. He needs a losing hat and he needs a winning hat. He can't wear the same hat. He looks ridiculous. He's wearing a clown's outfit and talking serious. He looked like he was from Sanford and Son. Yeah. You know who I blame?

Scam Newton. Oh, wow. Yeah. Where'd you get that from? Scam Newton. I like that. I love that old school radio just completely insulting the guy with the nickname. Scam Newton.

I think I just can't believe the Bears can win two straight football games. 12 completions. With a quarterback who they will not run traditional pass plays for. No. He either hands off or they roll him out. And then you have Jacksonville, basically the same thing with Bortles. I mean, they open it up a little bit because Indy's quitting on their coach.

Real quick, Kelvin Benjamin, is he the most frustrating player? Was that right before half? He catches the ball. The offense has to hurry to the line and line up for a field goal. Spike it. He's holding the ball. The ref has to grab it from him. Now it becomes the ref's deal. They're the worst two-minute

offense in football. You'll never see people just be so confused and stupid 24-7. Yeah. I feel bad for Cam. The thing about Cam is that Matt Ryan's not going to, like he had this horrible game last night, and everyone's like, well, we know he's an elite quarterback, on to the next week. But Cam just is going to get killed all week.

Every week. And he reacts to it every week. So if he didn't react, they wouldn't do that. Yeah, Coward wasn't like flat Ryan. Interesting. Doesn't pick on the white quarterback. No. But comes up with Scam Newton.

Wow. Just throwing it out there. This is crazy. How about Flat Ryan? If he didn't Scam Newton, you got to do Flat Ryan. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, what are some of the others?

I like those two. I can't even think. Yeah. Blake, yeah. What are some of the others? I like those two. I can't even think. Blake Portals. Most impressive this week for me. Steelers. I really like their defense. That team looks like they're built for November, December, January. The Le'Veon Bell, just 25 to 30 runs.

Some D, a couple long passes. Brown on third down. The T.J. W Bell, just 25 to 30 runs, some D, a couple long passes, Brown on third down. You like the T.J. Watt, the fist pumps, the replay. Yeah, he's exciting. It's like, all right, let's get that going. Matt Moore is so much better than Jay Cutler. We knew this going into the season. We've talked about it on this podcast.

Matt Moore was good for them last year and got concussed in the playoff game, and then everybody's like, Matt Moore sucks because he threw three picks. Matt Moore doesn't suck. Matt Moore is solid. You compare him to the other dudes in that category, he's had much more success. Here's what's great. The last few weeks, not last week, but the weeks before, you had to wait to see

if Bradford was starting or Case Keenum before Vegas would put a line out. The difference between Moore, who we think is probably playing because Cutler has a cracked rib, no, that lines out Sunday during halftime. They got like, we don't care. This team's better with Moore. Yeah, absolutely.

Least impressive, the Josh McCown pick with 40 seconds left against the Dolphins was incredible. After you proclaimed him the third best Jets quarterback of all time. He might have been number three. He fell back down to number seven. But that was terrible. Miami has a knack for winning stupid games. Did you say they're 13-4 in their last 17?

Yes. Yeah. That makes no sense at all. Yeah. 13-4. Wow. Indy, I don't know what I would do if I ran Indy, because it's almost like what happened with the Phoenix Suns.

They just fired Earl Watson after three games. By the way, what were the odds an NBA coach would be fired before an NFL coach? Oh, that had to be, what, 9-1, 10-1? Easy, yeah. They were so bad in those three games. I sent my son and my nephew went to the Saturday Night Clippers-Suns game, and then they fired the Suns coach. And my nephew, who's not a huge NBA fan, was like,

oh, I would have guessed that, because they weren the Suns coach. And my nephew, who's not a huge NBA fan, was like, oh, I would have guessed that. Right. Because they weren't even playing defense. But if you're running Indianapolis, shouldn't you keep Pagano? The whole city or just the team? If you're running Indianapolis. Just the franchise, not the whole city. Would you keep Pagano?

Because he's going to get you the number one pick or the number two pick if you keep him. That team's quit on him. It's over. So that's interesting. So you say keep him. You mean get rid of him in January, the first day of January? Yeah, he's definitely going.

But might as well lose nine more games or eight or nine or whatever and get first or second pick. And then they're in the catbird seat with Luck coming back and then this high pick that they can flip. You just get bad will with your fans after a while for keeping a lame duck coach around. But it doesn't matter. It's not like the new guy, if they brought him in,

is going to bring Andrew Luck. He's going to force Andrew Luck to play. That's one of the best jobs in football if they pull this off correctly. You think so? Yeah. If they can flip that pick. Tate, give me a name who coaches the colts next year gruden i feel like that's what everyone wants but why would he leave the booth right if i if i was an owner and i listened to gruden do monday night football would make me not want to hire him as a coach he doesn't say anything

like that astute ever yeah romo's ruined all the other announcers i know even collinsworth who i loved i just feel like ro romo's just watch this right here's just gonna and i'm learning stuff play after play after play from him yeah well you know he's making look the worst acheman like why don't we get the same from acheman like i know he's not as dynamic a personality but why don't we learn more about the cover too like i feel like i know everything about the cover, too, because of Romo now. He's really exposed so many of these guys, and he's so enthusiastic. He's just been incredible. It could be. I was just thinking John Harbaugh could be one of the ones. He might be out of Baltimore soon, and the Colts could try to scoop him up or something.

What about the other Harbaugh? He's not around. Jim, yeah. He's not in Michigan next year. Nick Saban doesn't have the balls, right, to leave college? No, no. He's a coward. I love that.

Mallory loves it when I do this. Nick Saban's a coward. He's a college coward. The friendly confines of the SEC. Atlanta, 41 points in the last three games, which I just can't believe. Crossoffs. I got five. five Cleveland Indy, the giant San Francisco,

now Arizona because Palmer's out. Yeah. That's right. Any, anybody else who'd cross off? You can talk me into Cincinnati, but nine and seven might be a wild card team in the AFC. I don't feel like we can cross them off.

That's a good five. I do think Cleveland, San Francisco and Indy are a special three. Like they could lose every week. It's weird because all week we've been saying underdogs, underdogs, underdogs. This is the new NFL. What were faves? 12-1 straight up, 8-3-2 against the spread.

This would have been the week to have teases. Well, it was the correction week, right? Yeah, they corrected it. Yeah, we fell. I think if we hadn't been so scarred by the previous couple weeks, I think Dallas would have been in a tease for us with at least two or three of these teams. This is what the NFL does to us.

So Lombardi and Tate are putting up these quickie pods on Saturday mornings where Lombardi just rips through five or six games that he kind of likes to match up. It's 15 minutes total. He went basically 4-1 the first time we did it. And then last week five and one yeah and the only one he lost was the bears yeah nailed all the other ones one of the ones he really liked he thought the browns had a chance to beat the titans so i i texted you that parlay

i did the ohio underdog parlay all ohio bangles browns it was like eight to one right um lost it but it was fun it's fun for a minute they Again, the Titans screwed up at the goal line. A lot of teams screwing up at the goal line. But, yeah, that was the time. It's bad for the Browns the rest of the way. If they can't take a Titans team coming on the road, coming to Cleveland on a short week, it's going to be rough. It's time to pick our captain, so.

Oh, we're doing it? The captain will not rest until he has brought his adventurous spirit and delicious room to every corner of america variety the spice of life that's why captain morgan has spiced up life quite a bit they've developed a collection of rum each with its own distinct flavor and personalities original spice coconut pineapple white black grape for whatever you want the captain loves anyone who learns to mix like a captain. Who's your captain this week, Sal? Well, I wonder if you have the same one.

This is pretty obvious, but I should first say, last week it was Adrian Peterson, so I might be the new Sports Illustrated cover. Captain Jinx. Or the Madden cover. Yeah, I could be the Jinx. So I'm sorry joe thomas if that's the case but you're my captain 10 363 consecutive snaps for cleveland a team that

players wouldn't even uh walk in the stadium let alone play for all those years 11 years unbelievable can you imagine never missed a snap Imagine never missing a meeting or a conference call or catching the flu from one of your terrible kids. 10,363 snaps. No matter what accolades he gets from this, I think he'll always be the most underrated player in football. I really do. He's the Cal Ripken of football.

He really is. It's spectacular. And there's no shortage of accolades here. You, Joe Thomas, my captain of the week. What do you say? My captain is Y.A. Tittle. Oh, we screwed up. We screwed up.

Yeah. He died a couple weeks ago, too, which made it worse. Last week, we had this whole conversation about whether a quarterback has ever, a quarterback with initials first name has ever been good in the football. And neither of us could come up with one. Yeah. And, of course, we forgot about Wyatt Tittle, who was a champion, who was a pretty iconic quarterback in the 50s and 60s. I would say he was on the short list of the greats.

And both of us forgot about him. Great. So I'm making him my captain. He can't hear me because, unfortunately, he died. I'm doing a lot of good now. And he was in the news, which made it worse, so we forgot them. But the readers also sent some initial names that we forgot. Here's the best five.

J.P. Lozman, A.J. Feely, T.J. Yates, A.J. McCarron, and J.T. O'Sullivan. I stand by the initials thing. Wyatt Tittle was 50 years ago. Wow, right. I think if there's a CJ and AJ or JR, it's just not going to work. Somebody did mention, though, A.C. Slater. Wow. Star quarterback at Bayside.

Was he? I know he wrestled on the field. Yeah, he was the QB, too. He was an initial name. So our only two are Wyatt Tittle and A.C. Slater. So what do you name your kid if you want to breed a quarterback? You stay away from the initials.

I think you go with Matt or Matthew. Matt, huh? Not Dan? Fouts? Marino? Matt. Matt. Matt Iacono, I think,

would have played in college. Matthew's pretty good, yeah. Matt Simmons might have made it. Matt Frazier, I think, is definitely. That's my cousin, Matt Frazier. I'm not allowed to have kids for 14 more years. The Matt Leinart-led flag football team beat my son's flag football team last night, so it's another Matt.

Yeah. That's fun. That's exciting. That's not even my parent corner story. That's a good loss. Yeah. All right, let's do week 8 lines. Let's do it. Six buys. That's a good loss. Yeah. All right, let's do weekend lines. Let's do it.

We have... Six buys. Six. Yeah, six buys. So we have the buy teams are Tennessee, who probably need a buy after they can barely

beat the Browns. Right. Jacksonville. Mm-hmm. I like the way they're playing. Nice buy week. They're going to feel really good about themselves

and then things are going to turn. The Giants probably could have used a bye week. They'd take three weeks off, yeah. The Packers definitely could use a bye week. For sure. They're going to just be flooding stem cells in the Aaron Rodgers column. Arizona, another team that could really desperately need a bye week. They're looking at Drew Stanton.

Drew Stanton's been their backup quarterback since like 1985 when they had Jim Hart. And then last but not least, the Rams of Los Angeles. Five and two. They have single-handedly kept me afloat with gambling, with picking games in my column. Every week I think I've ridden them. They've been awesome.

That was the dumbest line I thought in a couple weeks, that line, the ridden them. They've been awesome. That was the dumbest line, I thought, in a couple weeks, that line, the Rams-Arizona line. Three, three and a half. Yeah. Yeah, they're at least six points, even Palmer or no Palmer. That was smart. Just a good team. I look at these bye teams, the Jags and the Rams.

Remember, there was a time when they have like 20 points at half now. You used to have to wait a month for them to score 20 points. Now, each of them are like, just put up, whether it's defensive touchdowns or whatever, they are blowing out teams. Very strange year. The weirdest thing is they've gotten nothing from Watkins other than that one game. Yeah. You would think like, would they give up a second round pick for him?

Was it a two? I don't know if either they're not using him correctly or whatever's going to... All right, so Thursday night. God, I apologize in advance, America. We were in a nice little run of Thursday night games. Right. And that run has crashed into a guardrail. The Ravens at home.

Play Matt Moore and the Dolphins. I do not recommend watching the Ravens. If there's a Thursday nighter to skip, I think this is it. Can you go pumpkin patch picking and hunting, as you said? On Thursday night? Maybe go to one of those Halloween places. The small ones, yeah. One of those scare places.

I have the Ravens by two and a half. I don't feel good about it. I think I get this. Let me run through the math. I said four. It's three and a half. That's too high. Let me ask through the math. I said four. It's three and a half. That's too high. Let me ask you this.

That's too high. The Ravens stink. And obviously, they don't have anyone on the team offensively that scares you, right? How about this? Does a Raven start for any half-decent fantasy team the rest of the way? Any Raven? Well, Tucker. Justin Tucker, who's on my team.

But that's it. No scope position guy. You would never, Flacco wouldn't even be on a team. There were three teams that don't have an offensive player that scare me. The Ravens, the Browns. I wrote it down. I can't think of the third. Who is it?

Who's the third team? Ravens, Browns, not San Francisco. Giants? Giants now. Giants now. Obviously, when Odell's in Browns, not San Francisco. Giants? Giants now. Giants now. Obviously, when Odell's in the lineup, it's different. But that's crazy. Just those three.

The Bears have a guy? I guess Cullen and Howard. Oh, yeah, no. Howard, Cullen. I was trying to think of their no receivers, though. Panthers, maybe. We're giving Hyde a lot of credit. He's saying that he's scary.

Garcon's a little scary. He'll make plays. He'll get open. He'll do stuff. Who scares you in the Jets, just out of curiosity? Maybe the Jets. Safarian Jenkins? Safarian Jenkins, honestly.

The Syndrome. Yeah. I had a good email about that in my mailbag this week. Yeah? Somebody said his nickname should be The Syndrome. Oh, right, yeah. So it sounds like something your dad would come down with. Safarian Jenkins Syndrome. Oh, right, yeah. So it sounds like something your dad would come down with. Safarian Jenkins Syndrome.

I like that one. The Syndrome has had a touchdown for me every week. It's pretty good. Yeah. He was a Lombardi preseason fantasy pick. And Lombardi's kid coaches him. Is that true? Young Lombardi.

Tight ends coach for the Jets. Oh, wow. Look at that. Sunday marquee. You're going to be happy. Oh, wow. Look at that. Sunday marquee. You're going to be happy. I have selected. I never tell you who I'm picking for the Sunday marquee. You only have one game?

Yeah. I think you've got to pick. It's got to be one game. Okay. Dallas at Washington. It's a great game. I appreciate that. Is Romo going to be announcing that one?

I think it's Houston-Seattle. No. He's CBS. I would so much rather watch Washington-Dallas. Oh, yeah. Especially if Romo's announcing. whatever romo is announcing is my market cbs why would he do the oh yeah you're right he wouldn't be announcing that i'm an idiot so this is joe buck trey eckman does trey eckman just follow the cowboys around every week can romo announce this can we get romo can we make a trade you'll get him on thanksgiving can romo announce the afc and

nfc title games how do we figure this out he's got an them on Thanksgiving Can Romo announce the AFC and NFC title games? How do we figure this out? He's got an hour to go from one place to the next He can do it all Can he do it by satellite? He can do it all I have Washington favored by three I was surprised at the line here

I had also Washington favored by three Dallas favored by one now Yeah, there's a lot of I'm telling you, man There's a lot of Dallas buzz Who are your three wins? San Francisco. Congratulations.

Oh, great. Why can't I think of now? Los Angeles Eagles or San Francisco? Cardinals. Lost to the Rams. You beat the Cardinals. Cardinals, yeah. Congratulations on that.

All right. What do you want me to do? You haven't beaten a good team yet. Vegas is stupid. This will be the team. This is a dumb line. This will be the team. This is a dumb line. This will be the team to win. Well, we'll know more about it.

That Ezekiel Elliott run down the sideline, that was Barry Sanders' college-esque. I think you said Marcus Dupree. It really just looked like a college guy taking off in one of the many highlights you see on Saturday afternoon. And they're just too good for anyone to make a tackle, but he's in the NFL, so someone should be able to make a tackle. Yeah.

Well, he's finally getting in shape in mid-October. He came in like a sausage. Yeah. He's starting to actually move faster. Yeah. Well, we'll know more about Washington tonight, because I'm not sure we have two wildcard teams in the NFC.

Like, seriously, who are the two wildcard teams? So, you don't think the Lions Make a comeback No Get to 9-7 or something I don't No

I'm Well someone in the NFC West You don't think the Rams end Right Rams Seahawks Okay Okay And then

Boy Maybe it's not the NFC South I think it I think it'll end up being Someone in the NFC South You do I think they get I would say

Saints, Panthers, Falcons One of those two One was the last time I would say the NFC South. You do? I think between the Saints, Panthers, Falcons, one of those two. When was the last time? I would say the NFC East has a slightly better chance. The Saints are favored to win the NFC South. Is that the first time in five years? Why do we have two playoff teams in the NFC South? No, I don't yet.

I think the Saints are in kind of the driver's seat. Yeah. They are minus. I don't trust Carolina. I don't trust Atlanta. They're are minus. I don't trust Carolina. I don't trust Atlanta. They're plus 110. Definitely don't trust Tampa. I would say Rams, Seattle both make it,

and I think Dallas or Washington is the other one. It's so early. It's so early, but I mean, that's what. Right now, if you had to say that. I mean, but what if, I guess Green Bay's just not going to win enough games. Can't do it. Just not going to get there. That guy's not good enough. Even if he comes back week that. I mean, but what if I guess Green Bay's just not going to win enough games. He's just not going to get there. That guy's not good enough. Even if he comes back week 13?

Can't do it. Can't do it. You got to get to 9-7, 10-6. I don't think they can do it. What if he only has to win two more games and then Rodgers wins the last four? He's not good enough. Wow. People can't even, they don't even know if it's Brent Huntley or Brett Huntley.

Brent Huntley. But I mean, they Howard's got to give him a nickname already. people can't even they don't even know if it's brent huntley or brett brett brett brett huntley but i mean they got to give them a nickname already they did what you do in fantasy when you spend 45 on tom brady in 2008 if he goes down you're gonna lose anyway right and that was their mentality so they went down and they're screwed all right poopactor. I have three games. You might disagree with three. You could make a case for two, but I put in three. Bengals home for the Colts. I don't want to watch a minute of this game.

No, me neither. I don't want to watch one second. I have Bengals are at home. God, I'm probably too low in this I had Bengals by 8.5 You're too low I was way low They have them by 10 That's crazy

What's Vegas infatuation with the Bengals? I know the Colts got sacked 10 times yesterday But what is Bengals So now that Bengals Steelers was 6 It went down to like 3.5-4 yesterday And they got crushed They really didn't get beat up Now they're a double digit favorite really didn't get beat up.

Now they're a double digit favorite. I didn't like their... I don't think they're back yet. I found myself saying this a lot yesterday, but I did not like their game plan. I think Mixon's good. Yeah. He really is. Like he's got the B button spin move

and he can do some stuff. And, you know, the more they hand off to him, the more I won't think about the fact that he's an awful human being every time he has the ball. But he's good. I don't know why they didn't write him. Right.

Second one. Eagles on the road in San Francisco with about 40,000 Philadelphia fans there. No, no, no. Home. Oh, they're home for this? Yes. Oh, thank God. Yeah, it's at Eagles.

Okay, there you go. I'm going to go Philly by 13 and a half. All right, I get this. That would have been bad cheating anyway. It's 11 and a half. I said 12 and a half. Yeah, that's... Boy, do they have a chance, San Francisco, there?

No. In short week? No. I guess, yeah, flying east. I actually think they might have a better chance to win their first game on the road than at home. I think Cleveland has a better chance at home. But that San Francisco situation is so bad with that stadium.

It's in the middle of nowhere. You can't get there. You can't get out. Nobody wants to go. They're going to have to sneak up on somebody, but maybe not this game. Third one, the Browns are just in the poop fact every week. I don't see how you get out of it. They're home this week.

This is in London, actually. Oh, my God. I really got to work harder. That's all right. You know, if you see 6.30 a.m. start, you can almost guarantee it's London. This is a London game? Yeah. They had a great promo last night for it.

It actually doesn't affect my pick. I'm going to go Vikings 7.5. Oh, I had it, too, and it is exactly 7.5. Start of the day. I don't think it matters if.5. Oh, I had it too, and it is exactly 7.5, started at 8. I don't think it matters if Cleveland's home or not with gambling lights. Can I read you my favorite Hugh Jackson trend or

tweet or whatever I found in here? Hold on, let me find it. That's good. This is... Alright. Hugh Jackson, in the last 28 regular season games in which Hugh Jackson was the head coach, Oakland slash Cleveland, he is 2-0 on Christmas Eve and 0-26 every other day. Is that fireable?

Just not on Christmas. How do you do that to a guy on Christmas? He's the gift that keeps on giving, Hugh Jackson. Now favored to be the first coach fired at minus 250, Pagano 5-1 and McAdoo Little 8-1. You know, Sal, Hugh Jackson's looking for wins. We're all looking for something. What's this?

For some, it's love. For some, it's purpose. Unforgettable experiences. But for most, like my wife, she's looking for her keys. With Tracker Pixel, you'll never worry about losing things again. Do you know about this? I've heard about this.

It's a really cool product. Yeah. Eight years ago, they released everything, or changed everything by releasing their first tracking device. Now they've done it again with the all-new Tracker Pixel, the latest Bluetooth tracking device on the market. You can put it on any of your kids. Put it on your wife.

Yeah. Place Tracker Pixel on whatever you tend to lose keys wallet your cat you name it whenever you misplace an item that has a tracker pixel attached attached use your smartphone and a 90 decibel alert will help you find it in seconds powerful led light so you can find things in the dark can find your phone even when it's on silent and since every tracker user is part of the largest crowd-located network in the world, you can even locate items from miles away. Tate, you could have put a tracker pixel on Cam Newton yesterday.

Oh. Because he disappeared. Scam, dude. Thanks to trackers, the 30-day money-back guarantee, you truly have nothing to lose. Here's what you have to do. Go to thetrackr.com thetrackr.com

slash BS for 20% off any order. That is thetrackr.com slash BS for 20% off. Ron Rivera, think about it. Next time Cam Newton disappears, set a road game. You know what to do. Real quick, your wife and my wife, they lose, what would you say, dozens of sunglasses a year?

Dozens of pairs of sunglasses? I wouldn't let my wife spend more than $20 on sunglasses because it was just burning money. When you consider a move from the East Coast to the West Coast and try to factor in how much more it's going to cost you, throw another $600 a year for sunglasses. Need it. Ridiculous. My wife, I can't even talk about this. She's going to be mad at me. It's just like, just put the keys in one spot.

Yeah. It's a bowl. You walk in the house, just put the keys in the bowl. Same spot every time. Put them in the bowl. Then when it's like, hey, I'm going to get my keys, I'm going to leave them in the bowl. Leave them in the car. Leave them in the ball. Then when there's like, Hey, I'm going to get my keys. I'm going to leave. I'm going to leave them in the car.

Leave it. Leave them in the car with the door. Do we need spouse corner? Do we need to launch spouse corner? You don't understand what I do every day. I actually don't. I don't totally understand it. I know that you lose your keys a lot.

All right, let's go to the, uh, pumpkin patch pickers. All right. Oh yeah. One more week to, to get pumpkins. So wait, All right, let's go to the pumpkin patch pickers. All right. Oh. Yeah. One more week to get pumpkins.

So wait, these are games that you should be picking pumpkins instead? Yeah, I wouldn't watch any of these games. Oh, okay. But they're not the poof. Okay. I don't know if it's picking pumpkins. What is it? Picking? Isn't it pumpkin picking?

Pumpkin patch picking. It's not hunting. I think it's hunting, right? You're not like picking. I mean, I guess you pick it up. It is hunting? I don't know. It's not hunting. I think it's hunting, right? You're not like picking. I mean, I guess you pick it up. It is hunting? I don't know. What does Scam Newton say?

It's apple picking, but I don't know if it's pumpkin picking. All right. Well, pumpkin apple picking. All right. New Orleans is home for the Chicago Bears. I guess you might want to watch this if you want to see an NFL team run an offense that doesn't have pass plays. But I have the Saints.

By the way, they've called me and they said, if you don't tease us this week with at least one other game, you're a coward. I believe. I'd be a bigger coward than Nick Saban for not coaching an NFL team. I have the Saints by seven and a half. Ah, you got it. I said seven. It's eight.

And I agree with you. Who are we teasing them with? I'm back. and a half. You got it. I said seven. It's eight. I agree with you. Who are we teasing them with? I'm back. After a week. After an emotion-scarring week, I'm back with teasers. I'll say this. The Saints, the two weeks before Detroit, they hadn't given up a touchdown pass. And that Detroit game was crazy. They got up by 40 and they gave

up a couple of touchdown passes. But I don't think they have to worry about allowing a touchdown pass this week. No. That defense has been shut down. It's better. That guy Kamara is fun. They split the carries with Ingram.

They stack the box against Ingram. He still finds yards. It's very strange. I really genuinely like Kamara. Yeah. I actually think he should get the ball more than he does. I think he's really dangerous. It's so funny, though.

The Bears can change the players in their team. They can change their coaches. And they still come up with these weird teams that score in unconventional ways and get defensive touchdowns and get returns. And they'll run wide receiver option passes and reverses. All these fucking garbage plays that work in video games and that in the NFL, and yet for the Bears, they work. Right.

And it's like, how'd the Bears win? Oh, they had their safety, got a fumble touchdown and an interception touchdown. And that doesn't even seem to be John Fox's way, right? No. It's just something about the Bears. Oh, Bears. Magical.

The Jets are home. Josh McCown I haven't done my final rankings yet But I still think he's one of the 10 best Jets quarterbacks of all time But he's lower now He might be like number 8 I think he's like neck and neck with Richard Todd Who'd you rather have, Richard Todd or Josh McCown?

What's the other Ryan? You'd rather have him than Glenn Foley Yep, I think so Pennington? I'd rather have Pennington. You would? Yeah. It's right up there. Right in there.

Jets are home for Flat Ryan and the Falcons. I have the Falcons laying two and a half points. Wow. Yeah. Too low? I'm going to figure out who gets this. I get this. I said six.

Started at seven. It's four and a half. And this would be a dagger for the Falcons if they can't pull this out, right? They're poorly coached. I hate to say it, but it's true. Their play calling is atrocious. They can't go to three and four. They should get a new offensive coordinator before this game.

There's got to be somebody who's better than Steve Sarkisian. Well, at least someone needs to call plays. How about the MVP calls his own plays? How about Matt Ryan? Hey, Matt, call your own plays this week. I would rather have that than Steve Sarkisian. Don't you feel like if we learn one thing from that fog cam, the camera, you know, from the quarterback's perspective,

like, I think Matt Ryan could call his own plays. He looks off receivers. He gets the second, third read. Let him call his own shit. I love the fog cam. It's great. I read a couple articles about it today. It doesn't seem...

There was a couple things going for you yesterday. They had two of those hanging. Oh, okay. Cam's not one, which is one of the reasons it worked. There's limitations. Why, because just on a Sunday night they have two? Usually they only have... Yeah.

Usually they only have one. So for like a Sunday one o'clock game, that really... Well, maybe they can pass the hat. We'll chip in for a second one for some of these other games i thought it was so cool it was it was i loved the more they stuck with it first you get you have to get used to it and then eventually just being able to see what the qb was the past plays are great the runs aren't as as ones aren't as great yeah but maybe they could start with that and then figure out how to go wet. The Bucs are home trying to save their season. They're playing Carolina.

I have the Panthers and Scam Newton favored by one and a half. That's exactly what I had. Tampa's favored by two and a half. What's the derisive nickname for Jameis Winston? If we're going to have Flat Ryan and Scam Newton? Jameis Lewston? Jameis. You don't like that one that's pretty good yeah uh we can come up with shamus it's too it's too easy with famous jamis to do anything negative ashamed of us yeah well i'll tell you this tampa bay was gonna win that

game and then humphries fumbled in buffalo that was weird and then they lost because of a fumble in there buffalo just beat every decent team by three at home. Yeah. That's just their thing. Buffalo definitely has the horseshoe of the ass. They're that version of it. On the other hand, Tate the Snake says Panthers are locked this week. I heard them on GM Street.

They're up and down. Ebbs and flows. This is definitely a loser leaves town match, I think. Wait, let me see what you're going to say. No, Panthers-Bucks. Oh, this one. Oh, okay. Yeah, I think whoever loses this does not make the playoffs.

Yeah, it's pretty bad. I know week eight, it's a little early to say that, but I just find it hard to believe the Bucks are going to rally from two and five. Maybe not the Panthers. Maybe a two and five with an uninspiring offense like that, the Bucs would be done. I just figure if the Panthers lose this game, their season's broken. Yeah.

I don't see them rallying back going like eight now. When does Keekly come back? He was a coach this week, and they're basically saying he's day-to-day. Oh, boy. Didn't even need him yesterday. Couldn't have won that game. He gave up four completions. So stupid. He's a great coach. What do you say to Mitch Tr. Couldn't win that game. Gave up four completions. So stupid.

He's a great coach. What do you say to Mitch Trubisky after that game? Do you say good game? What do you do? I don't know. Mitch, man, nice job. Nice job. I think you give him a nice job.

Does he even have to come in? Like, we'll just have the backup, like, hand off. And like, all right. And then what might be a passing situation. Mike Linton was so jealous. He's like, I could have done that. Mike Linton's like, I could have fucking handed off. Exactly. off and like all right and then what might be a passing situation was so jealous once a quarter exactly the thing is he does make them dangerous because he can sprint out to your side he does he he spreads the field for them a little bit seahawks possibly the other member of our teas although i i gotta say i'd be afraid to go against deshaun watson with money at stake this is why

scare me i think this is the premier game of the week. Seattle home for Houston. You're crazy. No, why? No, you're just being diplomatic. Washington-Dallas is the best game. Don't you want to? No, you're most interested. Watson's very exciting. And we still don't know. I'm interested to see if your team's for real, because you haven't shown me anything yet. We are for real. We're for real. I have the

Seahawks at home, laying seven and a half points to the Texans. Oh, you see? You think this is a bigger blowout than Vegas does. I said 4.5, and it's 5.5. But I don't think this is a teaser game. Let's just enjoy this. I'm excited to see a 6-3 third quarter after promoting this game so much. I have two watchables.

Bill's Raiders. I'm excited to see what happens in this. The Raiders are basically fending off the end of their season every week now until we get to November. I don't think they can lose another game before November. The Raiders can't. I don't think the Raiders can. Well, November's one more week.

Yeah. Okay. So this is it. This is it. They staved it off last week. They got to stave it this week. That. Okay. Yeah. So this is it. This is it. They staved it off last week. They got to stave it this week. That was crazy last week. That was really.

A car rolling left, threading the needle on that last play. You know what was really crazy is anyone who bet on Alex Smith to win the MVP. Yeah. How it changed in 96 hours. Let's look at that for a second. So, I mean, by the way, he's not far behind Brady. Brady's 3-1. What's Breeze? Ooh, I didn't even see. I didn't even see. at that for a second so you i mean by the way he's not far behind brady brady's three to one what's breeze oh i didn't even see i didn't see brady's three to one smith plus 350 wilson plus

350 no when's four to one come on wilson i didn't even think of breeze that's interesting although they're not he's not it's not the same breeze not that you don't need you know he's not nearly the same breeze but if they go 12 and four or something, you've got to be considerate. But I'm saying they're not winning because of him, really. Let's see. He was good in the second half. He was fine. Yeah.

Where is he? Wow, he's way down the list. Yeah. In fact, not on the list. Wow. You really like him. Oh, no, there he is. I'm sorry.

15-1. 15-1. 15-1. He might end up with like 4,900 yards and 30 TDs again. Yeah. I'm interested that the wild card i just waved them on my fantasy so watch out for him is willie sneed who i carried all right like a cold sore for seven weeks but i finally waved him but they can get him going with thomas and kamara like all of a sudden that team's pretty explosive and he was hurt too right

yeah he was hurt yeah that's a fun initially he wasn, it wasn't. It was suspended. Watchables. Wait, did we say? I had the Bills by two and a half over Oakland. Yeah, you'll get that. I said two, and it's three. I like Oakland. I don't know. Why?

West Coast team, traveling east, same thing? That seems like that's been overblown. I think we have our teaser. I don't know if we want to say it yet. Keep going. Yeah, I think we did, too. Patriots at home against the former San Diego Chargers, now the L.A. Chargers.

A team that I feel like the Patriots have beaten like a drum during the Brady era. Can't really remember the Chargers beating them more than maybe twice in the last 15 years. I don't remember this game that much. Did they beat them in the playoffs? Beat them in the playoffs a couple times. Right.

I have the Pats favored by seven because I think this L.A. Chargers team is good. They are a very, very deceiving three and four. You don't love Ingram and Bosa and what they could potentially do to Brady. That's a problem that's no i don't want to put the pats and the t's i like the chargers i said i think they're good eight nonetheless i said eight it started at five and a half and after last night's game it was seven so you got it exactly i would not put the pats and the t's i think the chargers are pretty good rivers you know rivers know, Rivers can fall apart. Also, they have some coaching issues. They throw away drives, the red zone stuff, stupid stuff. But I think that's a talented team.

Well, they're the Chargers. Being the Chargers, they probably won't beat the Patriots. But, yeah, it'll be close. It's so funny how these former Browns go to other teams and just do really well. Oh, yeah. It's like the Browns haven't produced talent. And that's not even counting all the guys that the Browns passed on in the draft.

Yeah. It's like Lombardi and I were texting on Friday because he's so upset about the Sixers. And he's just like, the Sixers are the Browns. They're the same. It's like, oh, here's all these young guys. And, oh, the process. And it's like, this team's not tough. We don't have anybody who actually knows how to win.

Good bet by us. Under Sixers wins. How many wins? Lock that down. Faults is 41. No, not 41. Was it 41? Yeah, there's 0% chance.

And Embiid hasn't even gotten hurt yet. Simmons is good, but the team they put together just doesn't. It's just a mess. And Faults is the yips. Right. You seen Faults shoot free throws? Yeah, nothing. Yeah. a mess and faults is the yips right you seen fault shoot free throws nothing yeah i don't want to i don't want to trash the sixers because they have a lot of players that i like but

fuck um all right sunday night trying to figure out if you're winning i feel like the steelers and the lions for two teams in two different conferences It feels like they play every year somehow Is that possible? Yeah I feel like we've seen this matchup a lot Yeah Bettis is going to be there for the coin toss Yeah we do see this a lot

It's in Detroit I just don't think Detroit has it this year I have the Steelers by four. All right, I get this. I said three and a half, and it's only three. Now let me count these up. Three, four, five, six, seven. I think you won this week.

Three, four, five, six, seven, eight. I'm up one, and I hit the Monday night exactly. Congratulations. Good for you. Kansas City at home on Monday night playing Trevor Simeon from the Denver Broncos Simeon looked really reprehensible the last couple weeks

and I don't know what they do because their backup is Brock Osweiler I don't know what you do at that point it's really bad Paxton Lynch is just on no one's radar apparently they just whiffed on that pick what do you do if you're the Broncos Tate? we did that

try to figure out a trade for them and we pitched Joe Flaccoried to figure out a trade for them. And we pitched Joe Flacco. Oh, God. Tried to make a big trade. Oh, no. I don't know. Do something.

If they want to be competitive, they have to get a quarterback. Joe Flaccid. Am I right? Tried to do something. What about Palmer? Even with the broken arm? Take him. Did they figure out if it's his throwing arm yet?

Yeah. I still don't know. Yeah. He's done. We can't tell if it's his throwing arm yet? Yeah. They still don't know. Yeah. He's done. Like, we can't tell if he was a lefty or righty. It's like Osweiler. He's been left-handed the whole time.

Yeah. What's your line here? I had the Chiefs by nine. Thinking about it, it should be that high. I had seven. And I don't know how Denver goes in

and wins this game. Like, Casey has to be pissed. So the teaser teams are Vikings, Chiefs, and... Casey loses a very winnable stupid Pittsburgh game. And then 96 hours later

loses an even stupider Oakland game. And now they're 5-2 and they don't know what the hell happened. They have to win this game. Yeah, they're winning this game. We're going to talk about World Series and we're going to talk about uh parent corner but first one last break talk about blue house top weighted top rated website provider powering over two million websites for bloggers or small business owners blue host has everything you need to build host to manage the personal or small business website you've always wanted

we needed this for a of carbs this way you got you and house went to brooklyn and it was just still feeling the effect phenomenal four minutes of eating it was on our uh house of carbs has an instagram called the house of carbs and uh we put instagram stories up i think we're gonna run it as a video this week but it was awesome hey with bluehost design your website your way without being limited by templates templates templates templates templates simple enough for beginners powerful enough for even With Bluehost, design your website your way without being limited by templates. Templates? Templates? Templates? Templates. Simple enough for beginners.

Powerful enough for even the most advanced users. They have 24-7 tech support, online resources, expert services. They have been the top recommended WordPress host on WordPress.org since 2005. They make hosting your website stress-free so you can get back to what matters the most. Eating. Gambling. G eating gambling it doesn't even matter as much because we're not good at it now our listeners say 50 when you sign up at bluehost.com slash bill simmons that is bluehost.com slash bill simmons so you spent thursday with house

and you went where'd you go in for in brooklyn we went to the ducal market hall and it's got all these great eateries it's like our farmer's market but it's got the top chefs. Yeah. It's got like like 30 different places and we hit we hit a lot of them. I think like 10 or 12.

You hit pastrami you had cheeseburgers. So they have Katz's Deli there which is a New York staple. Yeah. And we ended with that. We had pizza cheeseburgers.

We didn't have pizza. You didn't have pizza. We had some kind of like we had pierogies. We had oh these lamb chops these spicy lamb chops. Oh yeah those look delicious. It was so good. And then we had some kind of like we had pierogies we had uh oh these lamb chops these spicy oh yeah those are delicious it was so good um and then we had this like uh this chorizo thing i don't even

know what it was called we ended with donuts you had fried donuts was not what i would have recommended after all the eating you did i've never weighed more i know you're looking at me right now i need to i don't know what i have to do i have to well it's not like you're on tv all the time yeah that's true i'm'm doing these ringgolds. The TV ad's 10 pounds. Especially if I eat the camera. It's getting bad. It's good news for Harry. Yeah, it's true.

Brooklyn, you had Stern, you had Letterman. Billy Joel. Billy Joel. John Stewart cameo. Yep, he came on. Tracy Morgan. Jimmy did some good press. Seemed like a win all the way around. We had a good time. Yeah.

It's great. Great. Beautiful. It's like the fourth time you've been in Brooklyn? Third time. A lot of people were sending him food. He was Instagramming food pictures. A lot of people.

Yeah. He did a scroll of everyone. Did he gain weight? Did Jimmy gain weight? I think so. And then he gave Letterman an award in Washington yesterday. He doesn't stop that guy. Mark Twain award.

Mark Twain award. There was a dinner with Bill Murray. Phenomenal. And we should mention our cousin's son, Billy, turned six months last week. Yeah, six months. Yeah. Exciting. Surgery coming up. Good luck to him. One last surgery

and then if that one goes well, which we think it will, then it doesn't have to have another one until he's like 10? Yeah. So keep Billy Kimmel in your thoughts and prayers. All right. Baseball. The Astros really screwed Fox here, right? By knocking out the Red Sox and the Yankees,

either one of those World Series against the Dodgers. Can we talk about how cocky the Yankee fans got when they were up 3-2? Especially being in Brooklyn. I mean, seriously, can we talk about that? Yeah the Yankees got, Yankee fans got when they're up 3-2? Especially being in Brooklyn. I mean, seriously, can we talk about that? Yeah. Oh, Reggie, 77. Everyone out in LA, everyone's trying to get tickets. Yeah.

It became the hottest ticket in the history of LA. Nathan Hubbard wrote about it today for the ringer. For 24 grand, for two seats or something. People are going nuts. I got to be there. The Yankees start. It's like, you have three wins. You need four to win the series. You're in Houston.

Houston's a nightmare to play. You haven't won yet. You're going against Verlander in game six, who is, I would say, in, you know, maybe top three guys I wouldn't want to go against in a must-win game. And yet they had to figure

out how to get to him, because game seven just ends up being a toss-up. You can have like seven pitchers going. It's just a stupid thing. So, yeah. My only regret is we had to fly out of Brooklyn and all the A-hole Yankee fans, friends of mine, I didn't get to see them, and they lost like when I landed. They lost.

It was so great. You would have loved to have seen their sad faces. Yeah. That said, it would have been a fun series. And the Yankee fans being the Yankee fans, they immediately spin it. Look, that was a great season. Nobody thought we would get this far. All gravy.

It's like, you guys are all buying World Series tickets. Right. Two days ago. One playoff game in five years. You want to start winning. Yeah. Jesus and Mero. Yeah.

They were doing all this. I mean, it was funny to have the cocky Yankee fans back. Mm-hmm. They were doing all this. I mean, it was funny to have the cocky Yankee fans back. But just make the World Series before you get super cocky. Yeah. But now you're not that interested in this now, right? It would have been so much more interesting. Dodgers, Yanks. It'll be a good baseball series.

It should be getting more, like 200 win teams. First time since, since what 1970 or something it should be a bigger deal i watched a lot of the astros this year and a lot of them on my fantasy team and i've always i i just think they have just a really really really good baseball team and they're really tough at home they something about that ballpark just kind of fits like these garbage home runs you get over that weird left field wall and they just kind of know what they're doing but the only thing that doesn't feel special about it is they were in the national league like what five years ago yeah and it's like dodgers astros we were getting that 17 19 games a year for our entire lives they're like this is the first al

title like wait a minute no they played the white socks like oh no they were national league team yeah i know like if the brewers played the yan Sox. Like, oh, no, they were a National League team. Yeah. I know. Like, if the Brewers played the Yankees right now, like, I'd accept. Like, all right, yeah, they're a National League team now. Enough time has passed. Yeah, it would still feel a tiny bit weird if it was like the Brewers and the Royals and the World Series. That was what I grew up with.

It just feels like an NL West showdown. The Dodgers, I'm going to be really interested to see if they get a good crowd because it's such a tough ticket and you have all the LA people out here who'm going to be really interested to see if they get a good crowd because it's such a tough ticket, and you have all the L.A. people out here who are going to call in favors to get in there. And it actually might work against them in some ways. I think a lot of the real fans are just priced out of this one. They should have Tommy Lasorda right at the gate quizzing people and smacking them in the head with a ruler if they get answers wrong.

We're going to get a lot of Lasorda this week. Good. I just want someone to ask him why he pitched to Reggie the third time. Just throw him one in the dirt. He loves that question. Just one in the dirt. Just throw one. Think about one that bounces. Who do we like?

I'm going Dodgers in six. I'm a 7-8-9 guy. I like the pitching there. I think the Giants won all their World Series. I'm a good 7-8-9 reliever. like the pitching there. I think the Giants won all their World Series. I'm a good 7-8-9 relievers. The Royals beat my Mets for the same reason. They have a lot of tough outs.

Kenley Jansen's on fire. Mauro Zingrani. I think they have like 32 strikeouts to two walks in the postseason. That group I just mentioned. And that's phenomenal. Like a seventh or eighth inning walk, how much does that screw your team, right? So not have to worry about that. It's big.

And I think the Astros are good. They've mastered the late innings bullpen. Yeah. What do you say? I actually would have talked myself into an Astros underdog pick, but they're not pitching Verlander in game one. I can't believe that. I think he's so much more reliable than Keiko is. I think you have to go in and cut Kershaw's legs out and win game one. I can't believe that. I think he's so much more reliable than Keiko is. I think they,

you have to go in and cut Kershaw's legs out and win game one. And Verlander's their best guy. Unless they think that's just a freebie game. And like if Kershaw is a little jittery and they get that win, they're all of a sudden a big favorite, right? The Astros. They're up one, nothing with Verlander going game two. You wouldn't go Verlander one, four, seven? I don't know. Three days rest? I don't know. Three days rest? I don't think so. No? I think this is good.

Yeah? Yeah. It's going to be 100 degrees. That is true. 100 degrees. That's another case for the Astros. We're getting this huge heat wave in LA, and it's going to be really miserable at Dodger Stadium.

Yeah. And maybe Kershaw wears out in the sixth inning instead of the seventh. Who knows? Might be too much rest. I will say Altuve is in my top eight all-time scariest I've ever been when my team is pitching to somebody. I feel like he's going to get hit every single time. He can hit any pitch.

He always attacks the first pitch, and it's always kind of disarming they have a lot of guys that are good man i i like that astros team yeah i would probably i think it's a dead even series if i had to bet i'd probably bet the underdog all right but i would i think it's a stay away yeah i don't want to i can't root for the chase outley team i'm glad i have the astros to root for because if it's Yankees, Dodgers, I have an impossible time picking. For NBA futures, the biggest fuck up we had when we did the big pod last week.

Putting Cleveland in everything? No. If you remember, I was worried about that. I didn't trust Cleveland. What? If you remember, we have a giant bet on Cleveland Golden State. Well, that one.

I'm talking about the division and the wins and the over-unders, all that stuff. No, Giannis was the logical sleeper pick, but the odds weren't good enough, and we just kind of turned our backs on it. Are you talking about for scoring or MVP or both? No, MVP. He's not going to win the scoring.

No? Okay. But it just looks like he's arrived. We should have been there. This was the same logic we had last year with Anthony Davis. The guy a year ahead of when we think they're going to win the MVP, that's when they make the leap.

And Davis' team just sucked. Giannis just has arrived. And the highlights are so big. It's the last thing ESPN stands for. He's so good. You can shove those highlights down your throat. You have no choice but to vote for him for MVP. He has the perfect package of

he's a phenomenal two-way player. He gets better at the end of games. And he's good for the Twitter era because every game there's like two or three Giannis highlights. I think he's going to win. Alright, great. What are the odds? Probably even.

I'm unfortunately not allowed to wager on this because I have a vote, but I would recommend getting in on Giannis right now. Regular season, MVP. Yeah. Giannis is the favorite at 3-1. Those are still good odds, Tate. Really? Wow.

That is crazy. Giannis wins this, right? That's still good? I don't know. That is crazy. Giannis wins this, right? That's still good? I don't know. I hope he keeps it up. I think right now he's been incredible, but I don't know. I want to see it. Tate's very sour on basketball right now because Dwight Howard

is saving the Hornets season. He hates Dwight Howard. No, I'm happy to call it Dwight. It's been fun. And then the Warriors... He doesn't like that he's saving them? He wants some picks? He wants more picks. No, he just doesn't like Dwight Howard. He's upset that Dwight. It's been fun. And then the Warriors... He doesn't like that he's saving him? He wants some picks? He wants more picks. No, he just doesn't like Dwight Howard. He's upset that Dwight Howard has been the savior. He never wanted Dwight Howard

to be the savior. And then the Warriors showed up. They just went to Cancun for three weeks and didn't realize the season... Oh, the season starts this week? I thought it was... I was happy for the Grizzlies, though. That was a fun game. like when the grizzlies get in there like talk shit to them and like make them act out it was fun steve kerr has basically said in 40 different ways well our conditioning's not

there yet which is basically code for these fucking guys party the whole summer yeah why not yeah champs there we should monitor the words because it looks like they're going to have this up and down first month. And they'll be like 10 and 6. 11 and 5. And then they'll have the streak once everybody's in shape. Yeah, like a 9 and 8 start and everyone's freaking out. Yeah, 10 and 6. What's going on?

9 and 7. And then they'll have some stretch where they go like 29 and 1. Yeah, they reel off like 27 wins or something crazy, and people just lose their minds. Yeah, that's in play. The other thing is, it's hard to say because we haven't seen them play a good team yet, but the Clippers might actually be good.

I love the Clippers. They have a nice little Ewing Theory. Did you see the game yet? No, they only had the one home? They played two crap teams. You're still sending people to see you, and they're not that good that you actually want to throw your son on fire. I wasn't going to go see the Suns on Saturday night.

That whole team, they quit on Erwatson because of the Clippers. What do you got for us, Sal? What is this? For plugs. Plugs. Oh, no, we didn't do parent corner. I'll tell you what. I forgot about parent corner.

I'm almost happy you were avoiding it. No, let's do it. Parent Corner. What did you do to Matt Leinert? No, this is bad. This is like we're turning the corner now. We're going to be like a very honest Howard Stern show, like everything goes,

and a lot of people are going to get mad at me for saying this. But I spent 10, 11 days in Brooklyn. When I come back, not to get too graphic, but it's kind of like a freebie with the old lady. You know, you're going to have a night together, right, when you come back. Now you're turning purple here. Pair quarter. Pair quarter. Well, no, it comes back to kids.

Miraculously, it's Saturday night. The kids are all asleep by 10 o'clock, which, wow, how is this going to happen? All right, so I'm not going to get into it too much. But about 10 minutes in, our nine-year-old comes knocking at the door. He hears a noise. He hears an animal, he thinks, outside making a noise that when he calls it back to us sounds a lot like uh my wife uh oh yes yes and uh and then asked uh what we were doing in there because he walked in on us and i uh thinking quick said we were wrestling and uh and then he wanted to know he wanted to

know who who won the i was and I was the undertaker. And I quickly told my wife that she was Stone Cold Steve Austin. And he bought it. So I think the moral of the story is just to have wrestlers in mind when you have to explain to your kids what's going on when they walk in. Very bad. That was incredible. I don't even want to go now. I'm like, how do I? No, I know. I don't even have a good one. I should have made i'm like how do i no i know i don't even have a good one else up but it happens i don't even have a good one how

do i not talk about this and uh yeah it's embarrassing and i'll probably never get it again because of that wow do i even go an animal that was great yeah this is like i mean it's so anti-coveted it's fine now my my daughter um you know my daughter's 12 and a half and she's starting to yeah look like a very attractive woman and she um she had we had to go to a memorial service unfortunately but then we had she had a bar mitzvah that night and she had this dress that looked like a dress like people would wear in college and necklace and she's worried about her hair now talk about the bar mitzvah run though like you this is this was interesting i mean we never discussed this oh yeah 10 of them lined up right but there's uh there's an excel sheet my daughter my daughter's school has a lot

of jewish kids and they wanted to make sure there was no people planning a bar mitzvah on the same night or a bat mitzvah. And there was an Excel sheet that started to go out a year ago with people claiming dates. Unbelievable. So she's been to three.

So she goes to this bat mitzvah for a teammate of hers on a soccer team. And they're there and she doesn't know what boys are there. And she's like, ah, it's six grade boys, like derisively,

like not cool enough to be the, you know, she only looks at seventh and eighth grade boys. So right there, I'd want to kill myself. And so she goes and we leave her for like three hours. And at some point I'm like, I'm going to check Instagram.

I wonder if she did any videos. Oh no. And it's just Instagram stories of her and her friends all dancing. It's like watching, it's like watching drunk people doing things, but nobody's drunk. They're just dumb ass 12 year olds dancing and screaming and talking. And then at one point she was alive for four minutes and I just saw the

future. And I really got scared because it was just one of those like, here I am doing stuff. I'm with my friends. We're having a great time. And I was just like, is this the next 30 years of my life? 20 years where I'm just,

I'm kind of, my daughter's not telling me stuff. And then I'm picking up bits and pieces on social media. You can't say no to any of it, right? Can't really say no. You just got to, at some point, kind of let the bird out of the cage a little bit. Or just unfollow. Yeah. You can't though.

How do you unfollow? You want to know what's going on. Wait till she starts wrestling. It's going to be really bad. Not really ready to think about that yet. Alright, what do you have to plug? Jimmy Kimmel Live. George Clooney tonight.

And Walking Dead's Norman Reedus. Lots of fun. Against all odds, Wednesday night very special baseball guest. May have dabbled in some gambling before. Gotten in trouble. And I'm at TheCousinSal on Twitter. Kirby Enthusiasm, which has been uneven this season,

but has had great individual moments and scenes. Yeah. The stuff with J.B. Smoove and the flies. Did you watch it last night? Yeah, I did. And the jeans. And he's like, I've got to get myself some Jamaican pants. And that was as good of a three minutes as we've had on that show this season.

I was dying. I'm a big Super Dave fan, Funkhauser. And any time he gives him that stare, I'm just in stitches. That's it. Well, you had a relationship with Super Dave. Yeah, you did, too. We had him on the podcast. Oh, yeah.

Is he going to come back, you think? We should go out to dinner with him. He's got a lot of pearls. You think he would come on the podcast and berate us? For sure. Why don't we do that next week? Okay. All right.

Next week, Super Dave will be on. All right. Cousin Sal, good job by you. Good job by you. Let's talk about, quickly, thanks to Proper Cloth. Stop wearing shirts that don't fit. Start wearing custom shirts that fit perfectly because you created them by answering 10 easy questions. Bring proper cloth into your life.

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coming back next week with a couple new uh podcasts in the bs pod don't forget about against all odds and that's it. Thanks for listening.