The Bill Simmons Podcast - Injured Russ, Bills-Chiefs, Jets Fuel, and the Best ‘Succession’ Episode, With Peter Schrager and Joanna RobinsonDraft Episode for Oct 08, 2021

Episode Date: October 8, 2021

The Ringer's Bill Simmons shares his thoughts on Red Sox–Rays as well as the Rams' win over the Seahawks (2:15) before he is joined by NFL Network's Peter Schrager to bounce back from their first loss of the season and make their Million Dollar Picks for NFL Week 5 (11:05). Then in an excerpt from The Ringer's 'Prestige TV Podcast,' Bill talks with Joanna Robinson about a hall of fame episode of HBO's 'Succession,' "Safe Room" (1:18:10). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Peter Schrager and Joanna Robinson Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, everybody? I'm J.J. John G. Stramski. And I'm Jason Goff, and if you haven't heard, the ringer has gone local. I'm bringing the fire, I'm bringing the rain from the Big Apple with my show, New York, New York. And I'm repping Chi-Town with my new show, The Full Goal on all things Chicago. We've got episodes three nights a week with all the reaction of the local teams and guests. Plus bonus episodes around all the big games and storylines. So whether you're uptown, downtown, in the burbs, or a transplant. Make sure you follow New York, New York, and the full go on Spotify

or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the Bill Simmons Podcast presented by FanDuel. Football is in full action. FanDuel's highest-rated sportsbook is the best place to bet it all. We've been doing pretty well on Million Dollar Picks this year. I love the first month of the season because you have to go into the season thinking, I think Pittsburgh's going to be good. I think the Chargers are going to be good.

I think Seattle's going to be good. And then trying to back what you think in those first few weeks and then zag the other way if you were wrong. You could bet on new and fun markets on FanDuel, like to catch a pass, same game parlays, highest scoring game across the Sunday slate, offensive TDs in the next drive. They have so much stuff. It's a catch-pass, same-game parlays, highest-scoring game across the Sunday slate. Offensive TDs in the next drive, they have so much stuff, it's crazy. The app is safe and secure and easy to use. And when you win, you'll get paid instantly. Plus, look out for FanDuel Squares this season.

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man, since college days when I was allowed to have beer. I think nephew Kyle is a fan too. Miller Lite keeps it simple for us. Undebatable quality, great taste. Picture this, it's game day, all the gang's here. You're tailgating outside the stadium. It's a great time for beer. Or how about when you're standing at the grill and the smell of sizzling burgers is in the air? Moments like that. Or when you want a light beer that tastes like beer, that's delicious. You don't want to load up on those heavier beers and then you only have two of them. Then you feel tired. Your stomach feels full. Miller Lite, it's your friend. It just accompanies whatever else you're doing. You're super happy with it. Opening an ice cold Miller Lite

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Podcast Network. Hope you're checking out the Ringer Reality Feed. On Wednesday nights, we have a doubleheader for you. Johnny Bananas breaking down the latest challenge episode. Tyson from Survivor breaking down the latest Survivor episode. We put them both up at the same time on Wednesday nights, right after those shows end. Check that out if you haven't checked it out yet. We also have a bunch of other stuff on there.

There's some Bachelor in Paradise stuff. We're going to be doing some Bravo shows. There's Great British, whatever the hell that show is. Yeah, it's happening. You know what else is happening? The Prestige TV podcast, where I've popped on at least once a week since we relaunched a couple weeks ago. On Sunday night, David Shoemaker and I are going to be breaking down the season finale of Heels, one of our favorite shows. It's on Starz. It's a wrestling

show. And when that show ends, we'll have a reaction. On Friday night, actually, tomorrow night, Ted Lasso, the final episode is going up on Apple and we're going to have Van and Chris. They got screeners. So we're putting up a reaction to that as well. Check out that feed. We have a lot of Succession stuff going up next week, including me and Joe House are going to do a 20 Greatest Succession Characters podcast. That's going to be on that feed. On this podcast, we're going to rerun a thing Joanna Robinson and I did earlier this week,

the Succession Hall of Fame. I think the best succession episode ever is Safe Room. Joanna disagreed, so I tried to make the case to her. We argued about it, and it's really fun. That's going to run in the tail end of this podcast after our guy Peter Schrager comes on and we talk about Bill's Chiefs. We do Million Dollar Picks. I did so much homework this week for million dollar picks. I can't wait for that part of the podcast. He has some Stefan Gilmore information. It's good. Good stuff. I left, I carved out for the top of this podcast. There was so much going on tonight. We had a US soccer game, big one for the men's team. We had Red Sox raise game one and we had Ram Seahawks.

So the USA took care of business. Our new 19 year old striker, he's just a machine. Love that guy. Red Sox did not take care of business. Does it matter? Yeah, it matters. But at the same time, we beat the Yankees. We lasted longer than them. Everything else is gravy. This was not a world series team. The Rays are unbelievable. I really, I hate their guts. I really do. It's one of those teams, your guys hit these line drives all over the place.

And every time the line drive goes right to somebody who's standing in the perfect spot. Every time there's a guy on base, they get a hit to knock the guy home. It's so freaking frustrating. I hate that team. Anyway, Red Sox down, one nothing. Best of five, Not looking great. Dodgers Giants we're getting starting this weekend.

Unbelievable. One of the things I never realized when I moved to LA, two sports things I really didn't realize. One is that the UCLA-USC rivalry is real. They hate each other. The UCLA fans have real contempt. And it's like, I don't know if you've seen Outer Banks, but it's almost like the Outer Banks with the rich kids against, I forget what they're called,

the Pogues. That's the group we like. I watched 20 episodes of that show in, I don't know, two days. So I can barely remember anything from it. But USA is kind of like the Pogues. Now they need a coach. UCLA looks down on them. But that rivalry is great. And then the other one that's great that I had no idea was Dodgers-Giants. Talk about two fan bases that hate each other.

Wow. They've never played an actual playoff series against each other. And I have Dodger fans in my life who were really upset that they had to go to this one game playoff. They won 106 games. It's like, what is the point of the system? I liked it. I really did. I liked it. What's the point of having these five team divisions if there's not real stakes? They're in a bloodbath the last two months of the season, trying to get the upper hand to avoid the one-game playoff.

Giants end up getting it, but I like it. The one thing I think they should do, though, is I think they should recede by record once we have the four playoff teams. I actually think it's stupid that the Dodgers win 106 games and then have to play the team that won 107 games. I love the division thing, though. This is what I grew up with.

Take care of business. Win your division. Avoid any sort of bad scenario. Anyway, Dodgers-Giants, I think, is going to be fantastic. Dodgers are, you know, Muncie got hurt. They lost Bauer, not just for the season, but we'll probably never see that guy again. So there's a little bit of, you know,

sometimes you need luck with this stuff. Bellinger has been a mess off season, but I'm really excited for that series as well. Ram Seahawks, let's talk about that quick before we go to Pearl Jam. So the Seahawks now are two and three. And I wasn't sure what was going to happen tonight. I didn't bet it.

It was a rare stay away for me. I just had no feel for it. The Sal who's been red hot on the Fox games on Thursday nights, I think he picked the Rams and it looks stupid coming out of the gate. The Rams looked like, you know, there's a lot of, oh my God, with Matthew Stafford, caught Jared Goff disease, all that stuff. Then Wilson gets hurt. And Wilson does something to his finger. They show it between 17 and 200 times. They show still pictures of it.

It's got some sort of hump that you just don't want on your throwing hand if you're Russell Wilson. Comes back in. It's like, oh man, this guy's tough. Then he comes out. Geno Smith comes in. I got to be honest. I did not know Geno Smith was still in the league. I feel like I follow football at the 99th percentile of people who follow football. I had no idea Geno Smith was in the league. I really didn't.

I was excited to see him. I was like, Geno, won so much money against you way back when. It's great to see you again. That made me wish I had bet on the Rams because it could have been this nostalgic betting against Geno Smith one more time. Of course, Geno gets hot. And within a couple minutes,

he's zinging passes around. People are joking about QB controversies and the whole thing. But then Lockett falls down on the key drive and Geno ends up throwing a pick. And that's it. But big, big picture, big picture. Just wanted to mention quickly, the Seahawks are now two and three. The Niners are two and two. The Rams are four and one. The Cardinals are four and oh. And we knew this division was going to be a bloodbath. We knew it was unlikely that we'd get four playoff teams. And if you remember,

Sal and I, we had that whole thing with FanDuel where we thought there could be six teams out of the two West divisions that made the playoffs. Still possible. If the season ended today, we could get the six. FanDuel gave that 15 to one odds, which was in retrospect, pretty high. But anyway, the margin of error for all of these teams, when you're in a division that loaded where you clearly need at least 10 wins, now you're the Seahawks, you're two and three. I think you need 10 minimum in the West. So they need to go eight and four the rest of the way. We have no idea if Russell Wilson is coming back. In general, the vibe with the Seahawks team has been a little strange. I think we can all agree.

Especially beat the Colts, lose a really dumb game to the Titans, get spanked by the Vikings, and then last week they catch a break in the Niners game because Garoppolo goes down, Trey Lance comes in. He's not remotely ready to play in that game.

They're 2-3, at the Steelers next week, who knows who's the QB of that team? Who knows what's going to happen to them? Schrager and I are going to talk about that in a second. But they're at Steelers, home Saints, home Jags, at Packers. So if Wilson's out for like a month, this is actually a pretty good part of the schedule for them. Then after that, you're talking home Cardinals at Washington, home Niners at Texans, easy win.

Then they finish at Rams, home Bears, home Lions at Cardinals. Could that be eight and four? Maybe. If Geno Smith is playing three or four of those games, who knows? The broken finger thing with quarterbacks, in basketball, you just tape them together. You keep going with quarterbacks. I don't know how you do it. I'm sure Wilson's a tough dude. He's going to figure this out. But I don't like the juju around this Seahawks team, though, when your quarterback cracks his finger in a huge Thursday night game against the Rams

when you kind of have the Rams on the rope. Makes me a little nervous. Then I was thinking, all right, let's say they miss the playoffs. Could there be two quarterbacks in trade play next winter? There was little Wilson whispers last year, but he basically was like, I don't want to be traded, but here's my list of teams that if you want to trade me, I'd like any of these teams. And who knows?

Who knows how this plays out? I'm excited to find out. But I think we're going to talk about the Cardinals. They're playing the Niners this week. And the Cardinals now are weirdly in the driver's seat, this division, because the Rams defense is not as good as I think we thought it was going to be. Aikman talked about that tonight.

I spent $3 on them, I think, in both of my fantasy leagues. I thought they were going to be this dominant defense. It's just they're not. They're just not. The Niners, I don't know how this Lance Garoppolo, who knows how this shakes out. They seem to have a black cloud over them, too. Niners, I don't know how this Lance Garoppolo, who knows how this shakes out. They also seem to have a black cloud over them too.

They always have guys injured left and right. So maybe it's the Cardinals here. Now, we're about to get to million-dollar picks for Schrager. He went against the Cardinals, spoiler alert, in underdog parlay of the week. So there you go. Fascinating division. The NFC West.

Who could have guessed? Who could have guessed that would be the marquee, not only the best division, but also like the week to week rollercoaster ride division at the same time. Coming up after Pearl Jam, Peter Schrager. I'm excited. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. all right peter strager joins us every th. We talk football. We do million-dollar picks. We've been on fire. We went for eight straight weeks dating back to week 17 of last year. Finally had a losing week last week. The Patriots, conditional pick on the Patriots saved us from even more damage. Lost $164,000. We are now up $575,000 for the season. Still not bad, Shrakes. Not bad. I watched that Rams game on a plane, and I literally, I'm throwing things on a flight, like throwing my stuff, my phone. I was furious because I knew that I was the reason I convinced you Rams over Cardinals, and here we are. No, I was with you. I'm blown out. We should have stayed away. This Cardinals team has been such a treat for us. Why are we betting against them? Totally agree, And we might bet against them again this week.

You know, they cut the clip when we actually do million-dollar picks for social. And I'm rattling off the final selections. And you're chiming in, but not as much. And then it seems like we haven't hashed all these out. Like, we're figuring these out together. I'm adding a veto for you this week because you tried to talk me out of

Jacoby Brissett in Miami last week. Your body language completely changed when I brought it up. You had a look on your face a little like Kendall Roy when he woke up in bed in season two succession and he had realized he shit in his own bed. You had that look on your face like, oh my God, how do I clean this up? Been there, done that, Kendall. And I was just rambling on about, I believe in Brissette and you were just like looking for somewhere to put the sheets. So going forward, if you really feel Kendall Roy shit in the bed level, disgusted with a pick, you just got to chime in. I'll give you a veto. Yeah. I appreciate that. I appreciate that. I'll do that. There's something, you have a Jacoby Brissett, Gardner Minshew thing that is hard to pull.

Those are your guys. You're in that corner. I got to pull you away of it sometimes. I'm out on Jacoby. He's not even averaging five yards, five yards of pass this season. Before we do picks, let's talk Chiefs bills. This is the game of the week. Chiefs favored by three.

The bills are plus 128 to win outright. Bills plus the over is plus 296. The over is 56 and a half. Chiefs minus three in the over is plus 291. You have two awesome offenses. You have a Bills team that from a gambling standpoint, if you look at it, it's actually a nice time to zag against them. They killed Miami. Tua got hurt. They killed Washington. They killed Houston, who might be the

worst team in the league. And now everybody's like, oh my God, here they are. Casey beat them last year. Casey's offense, he's looking at like, they're still lights out. They're first in DVOA. Mahomes is 8.6 yards per, per attempt. Um, the chiefs are 5.1 per rush. They have 17 touchdowns. They have 107 first downs, which leads the league on third down 64%. They've converted. And there's a world in where two plays are different and they're four and oh, and we're like, oh my God, the Chiefs, can they go 17-0?

Should this line be higher? Should this be Chiefs minus 3.5? Is this respectful enough to the Chiefs, this line? I think there's a lot of momentum towards the Bills. You throw out week one and for whatever reason,

people are like not even acknowledging it and the thought is they have two shutouts in the last three weeks. It is so hard to shut a team out and I don't care if Davis Mills is that quarterback. I don't care if it's Tua, Jacoby Brissett, or Jay Fiedler. To shut a team out in their building is something. And last week, I know Davis Mills is slinging the ball and the Texans have next to nothing offensively as far as skill positions go. The respect for the Bills' defense is at an all-time high, and they've added players, Rousseau, Basham, Epineza's playing at a different level.

And that is where the respect is coming that, hey, the Chiefs might put up a lot of points, but this is not the type of defense that they have seen yet. And that includes Cleveland in week one. The thought process I imagine is that not only do the Bills have the offense and they can score the points, but they have the defense that can actually get the Chiefs off the field, which no one has been able to do this season. Can I tell you the quarterbacks the Bills have played this year? Let's hear. The corpse of Ben Roethlisberger, week one. Tua Slash-Bursette, week two.

Heineke. Frisky Heineke, week three. The best of the bunch and then Davis Mills week four and now they go to Mahomes do you think there's anything to

you know like you play a video game and you jump from like rookie level to Madden level and Madden and it's like it's jarring

for ten minutes zero to sixty yeah you do anything where it's yeah you're going zero to sixty just immediately

it's jarring and the Bills have just been going against these really limited's, yeah, you're going zero to 60 just immediately. It's jarring. And the bills have just been going against these really limited quarterbacks. And now they're going against the best quarterback in the league. And I think that has to matter. It does. And it's in Kansas city and you know, we can go through the history here. Josh Allen doesn't beat my homes, right? Like this is last year. They came into Buffalo on a weird game where COVID changed it to a weeknight and Clyde Edwards-Alaire ran for 161 yards on Buffalo and beat them. Then they go to the AFC championship game and everyone's hyped in on Buffalo. It's Buffalo's team. Kansas City blew them out

and they had their way with them. This week, this is where I'm at with this. This is a Super Bowl for the Bills. They have had this circled all off season. This is everything. This reminds me of last week with the Cardinals and the Rams, where the Rams might have circled all offseason. This is everything. And this reminds me of last week with the Cardinals and the Rams, where the Rams might have circled, okay, we got the Brady and the Buccaneers coming to our building week three, and we've got a Thursday night game against our hated Seahawks. And in between, we've got a game with the Cardinals, right? And the Cardinals looked at that game. That's our Super Bowl. We're 0-8 the last eight times we've played this team. We have to beat them. This is for our own building. We need to get over the hump.

This is how Buffalo could be looking at this game with Kansas City. And I know Kansas City is going to bring it and they're going to score. I just don't know if Buffalo puts all their eggs in their basket and is like, we're not leaving that building with a loss. And that all the focus since March or since May when the schedule came out is on this ball game. Our mutual friend, Connor, is a Chiefs fan. And he called me this week with a theory that I thought was actually really interesting. I want to run it by you. That when these teams play the Chiefs, unlike other teams where it's fourth and short, they're punting third and eight. They're thinking, we've got to get the first down here, but it's two down. Against the Chiefs, these teams are

going for it on fourth down. We saw the Chargers go for it on fourth and four, get a false start and say, okay, go for it on fourth nine. What the hell? We're not punting. The Eagles last week, it was like they played every last page of their playbook. I start to think that, and there's something to this, that teams are playing the Chiefs differently than they play 31 other teams.

And his theory, which I think there is something too, so much of the offensive game plan is built around, okay, this is how we need to score points, that our best stuff is coming out against the Chiefs, and that we don't mind putting it on film for the next 15. We have to do this to beat the Chiefs. That Kansas City, they're giving up all these points, they're giving up all these yards. They're seeing things that other teams might not necessarily have to deal with week to week. And that includes four downs when teams are getting into fourth and short and fourth and four,

because they don't want to punt to my homes. They don't want to give up any of that ball possession game. It's a really smart theory. That also sounds like it came from a chiefs fan. It's how bad the defense has been bad. It's been bad. I know. On the other hand,

you know, Philly, Hertz was able to move around and make plays on them for whatever reason. I don't know what that means for Philly going forward. And we'll find out more this week with the game they're playing this week, whether Hertz is starting to figure it out

or the Chiefs defense is really that bad. I see the whole, this is the Super Bowl for the Bills thing. But the Chiefs would be two and three if they lost this game. And I think that's the difference with where the Chiefs were last week against Philly. We rode them last week. Yeah, we did.

Where they are this week, where it's like I know they seem bored. They've certainly had the first three weeks. They just have this arrogance to them, which I kind of enjoy. Last week, they were like, all right, fuck this. Tyreek. We're just unleashing you like a cannon. But I don't think they want to go two and three. I think they probably see the Bills as the biggest competition in the AFC. They should. And so why isn't this also the Super Bowl for them?

It could be. And they're home. And it's the next week of a season where they've already had to face Cleveland. They've already had to face Baltimore. They've already faced a lot of the heavies in the AFC. And this is a huge one for them. Obviously it's on Sunday night. It's the hottest team with the bills and the whole deal. What I liked about the Chiefs offensive game plan last week, they brought out that Tom and Jerry play, which was that shovel pass to Clyde Edwards Hilaire, where Travis Kelsey is doing one thing and one's watching Kelsey. And then they had that crazy pass. And then in the second half, Kelsey did this move where he shrugs to Mahomes like, what are we doing? What are we doing? What are we doing? It looks like they're going to call

timeout. Mahomes says, hi. They give it to Fortson. It's a touchdown on another shovel pass. The Chiefs are not backing away from the way that they play traditionally. And they've had turnovers being a little careless with the ball the first few weeks. But they kind of doubled down. They're like, no, no, this is our style. This is how we're going to win. And yes, Tyreek Hill will get targeted 12 times if we need to get him going. And we'll make sure he gets it.

I like Kansas City in this. I just don't know if I like them enough to bet them more than a field goal in this type of game where Buffalo has all their eggs in this basket and knows they can't escape Kansas City being big time losers in this one. I guess the big thing to remember with this game is the Chiefs offense has been awesome this season. Unbelievable. A couple turnovers. There's a disappointing piece to them, I think, with some people. They're only two and two, what's going on? But then you look at the actual stats you pour through them and it's a couple dumb turnovers at the wrong time. Other than that, they've been pretty dominant.

Here's another thing with them. Let's say they win this game. At Washington, at Titans next to home Giants Monday night. Home Packers at Raiders, home Cowboys week 11 by week. I could see that week 11 Cowboys game. It's like, remember when we were worried about the Chiefs one and two? Now they've won eight straight.

Heading into the showdown with the Cowboys. I like the Chiefs. I wanted to talk myself into the Bills. I really tried. I went down the process. I even sent you Bills plus three over Chiefs when we were texting. I wanted to kind of gauge your reaction to it.

But this feels like... The one thing I learned from last week, gravitate to where you think the line should be. Okay. Sunday night, home, Chiefs. It should be three and a half or four. Three and a half or four. I understand why the line's three because they're going to be able to get

Buffalo action. But this is a disrespectful line to the Chiefs. Not that they care. Not that they're looking at the Lions. But this is you're getting at least a free half point. If this was Bill's three and a half, I get it. I could talk it. Well, they get cheap touchdown at the end, blah, blah, blah. But if the Chiefs just have to win by a field goal, I feel pretty good about this. Plus home field advantage. It's it's at least something in some of these games. I thought it really affected the Bucs game. Patriots aren't as good as the Bucs. Home field seemed like it mattered. Here's the one counter that I would give. At the end of the day, I always feel like quarterbacks matter, and Josh Allen has gotten over that hump. I feel like he is in the same

class as Mahomes. He is that good. He has that much pride and he has a pretty good receiving core. And especially with Dawson Knox and what he's doing at tight end right now, that this offense can keep up with Kansas City and Brian Dable can scheme it up. So a lot of times it's just like Philadelphia is not going to score enough points to keep up with Kansas City. I didn't think Cleveland was going to be able to score enough points. I didn't think the Chargers were going to be able to score enough points. I didn't think they would. They did. I think Buffalo can score enough points. That's why it scares me. If anything, I like just points in this game.

As good as Buffalo's D has been, I feel like this might be one of those high-scoring affairs that were like, oh, that was fun. You know? Oh, okay. 35 to 33. That was cool. You know? That's how I feel this could go.

Well, we try to avoid over-unders with million-dollar picks because I just have bad luck with them. And sometimes I think people just gravitate to these numbers. It's 56 and a half now. I feel like this could get to 60 by game time. How is this not a 30-27 game minimum? Buffalo defense.

People think that Buffalo's got the steel curtain. To your point, they haven't played the stiffest game. I don't even know if they've got the best defense in the league. Everything statistically says they do. To your point, would they face? It's too early and they haven't played the stiffest game. I don't even know if they've got the best defense in the league. Everything statistically says they do. But to your point, would they face? It's too early and they haven't faced anybody. So Chiefs minus three with the over of 56.5 is plus 291. I think we should at least file that one away.

One other game that I want to talk about, just because it's our first London game. Okay. And do you get up for these? I'm an East Coast guy. I'm up. Are you up like when you hear Falcons, Jets, you'll get up at six in the morning?

No. So I have like a four-year streak of forgetting there was a London game, checking either emails or texts and somebody's complaining about something. Oh yeah, and it's third quarter and the game's already over because these games always suck.

This year we have Jets-Falcons, which is, I don't know, two of the five worst teams. Two of the five teams you wouldn't want to see in this game. The Falcons are a mess. They probably have the worst offensive line in the league. We found out before we started taping. Ridley and Gage are not making the trip. Those are their two starting receivers, right?

They're two of the best three. They're two starters, right? Yeah. I wasn't sure if Gage. Yeah. So who starts with him now? He's been hurt, but yes, when he's healthy, yes, he's the starter. So missing both of those. You have the Matt Ryan in a London game factor with people.

I don't feel like people have watched a lot of Falcons this year and they don't really realize that he's kind of been Roethlisberger late from a court standpoint. We talked about it last week and I love it.

The Matt Ryan in London factor, like that's a thing. Like, all right, sure. Yeah, sure. Yeah. And they have this Jets team that I think their defense is good.

Frisky. I really do. I thought they did a good job against the Pats. They were dominant last week against Tennessee. Now, Tennessee had no receivers, but they were borderline dominant. Zacks, okay. He can make a couple plays.

Quinn and Williams flying all over the field. Yeah, no. They looked good on D and they were fired up. I talked to Salah this week, and this is interesting. I don't know if this stuff matters. Now, look. Arthur Smith has coached in London when he was with the Titans in a game. That's fine. When Salah was with the Jaguars, they traveled to London three different times. And one time they traveled on a Monday. One time

they traveled on a Tuesday. One time they traveled on a Thursday. They had success on the Thursday. There's all different theories about this, about when you go to London. Do you get there early? Do you adjust? Do you get settled? Or do you just get there, practice one time, play the game, and get the hell out of there and just let your body just go? Salah is flying them in on a Thursday. So Thursday night, they're flying in. He's like, this is the tried and true, what I think is the best deal.

They'll do media. They'll do practice. They'll sleep one night and then they'll play on Sunday. And it's funny, I put it out there and Brady Quinn, who has played in these games, got back to me and he's like, oh, we did that once. We were all fucked up. Our bodies were all fucked up. We got blown out. We did not adjust. You need to go into this week and be able to adjust to an eight hour time difference and what that means for your body mentally, physically, everything. And then the kickoff time when it is, Salah thinks he's got this down, or at least he's doing the best job he can based on experience that the other team might not have.

So I kind of liked that decision. And of course the Falcons are doing the same exact thing. So it might be fine, but like, I feel like this guy has been through enough London trips where he might have the edge coaching and preparation. And the way I know he looks at like body clocks and all that type of stuff. I feel like at the very least, the Jets might have an edge on preparing for a London game based on his experience. That is really good info. I've thought a lot. I've went to London for the Olympics and I was discombobulated the entire time I was there. I don't think I fell asleep before three o'clock ever at any point. I think West Coast time, it's even worse. It is a thing. You feel like you're in a different planet and I don't understand how the football

teams could fly back and forth. On Salah, a little too excited after that win last week? Like maybe dialed it up 25%? Gatorade bath. Does that worry us at all? Yeah. Look, this is a long time coming. Obviously, it was his first game coaching. It was for a win. It was Zach Wilson's first win. And they've been so bad for three weeks. And here locally, they've already been written off and dismissed in New York so bad that I thought it meant a lot. Now, what was crazy about the Gatorade bath, and it's the most Jets Gatorade bath ever, they give the Gatorade bath, but Mondre G, who is the strength and conditioning trainer for the

Titans, is embracing Salah when they give him the Gatorade bath. So they just gave a Gatorade bath to an opposing trainer. He's getting doused in Gatorade. It's like, come on, guys. Can you let him at least get out of here before? But yeah, And then they had a game ball deal and it was like, you thought they won the Superbowl. And then Woody Johnson came in and gave the ball to Salah. And it was very, very celebratory, but I think they're so young. That's okay. This is like the youngest team in the league by a long shot. They know how young they are. They're playing with house money this year. That was a cool win, especially in front of their home crowd. I was on the fence trying to talk you into let's take Jets plus three. And then the wide receivers got scratched like about an hour. We're taping this. It's a little afternoon Pacific time. And

I felt like that was a sign from God. They're fun. I think we have to throw them in. Plus, they came up big for us last week. Unfortunately for us, Steelers did not with the underdog parlay. Hey, Monday night, Colts-Ravens. Let's talk about Fandle. Fandle giving new customers 30-1 odds on either team to win. So you can end the NFL week right by winning $150 on a $5

bet. This is just to win. You'd think you would take the Ravens in this, correct? I would think. In Baltimore, primetime, under the lights at the bank? Yeah, I like the Ravens in this, correct? I would think. In Baltimore, primetime, under the lights at the bank. Yeah, I like the Ravens. And yet, we have the Colts coming up later, an underdog parlay of the week.

There's some Colts momentum now. I'm out on it. I don't agree with it, but talking about, hey, they have the most talent in that division. 0-3 start. They're crawling back. They could be 2-3 after this game. Then you have the Ravens.

They've just had a really weird season in general. If you really go game by game and look through some of the wins, they barely beat Detroit. Denver last week, they get the Teddy Bridgewater gift with the concussion. Not that the concussion's a gift, but you know what I mean. Drew Locke's coming in. It's like, wow, we've won this game. Here's Drew Locke that Denver could not play from behind. What do you know what I mean? Drew Locke's coming in. It's like, wow, we've won this game. Here's Drew Locke that Debra could not play from behind.

What do you make of the way, I mean, obviously you had Wickersham on last week who told you like Harbaugh was so upset with the way Belichick did the formation back then. The Ravens really value their preseason winning streak. They haven't lost a preseason game in like since like 2015. They really value this hundred yard streak that they got. I love it. I'm a full supporter. I only draw the line when AC Green had the consecutive game

NBA streak, couldn't play, and they put him in for three seconds. That's when it becomes disingenuous. Kyle Brandt on Good Morning Football had an analogy. He didn't like it. I go both ways. Basically, they're up 16, three seconds left. They run a play for five yards, so they get 100 yards, a streak that no one knew existed, but now they're tied for the lead. Kyle said it was

like Ricky Davis getting the triple-double and throwing it at your rim. It shouldn't count. But I'm like, well, then does Strahan's sack record count? Because that was a little questionable too. And then you can go into a lot of different histories. Yeah. But for Harbaugh to stress that, I'll say this, knowing those Baltimore guys in that locker room, that streak is really cool for them. That hundred yard streak,

because it's like, everyone talks about passing offense and all this. Like we beat you up in the trenches. We take a lot of it. And if they get one more, they're the greatest running team in the history of the league because they've done 43 in a row. So Fangio who worked for Harbaugh and worked for his brother too, and they know each other, was very, very upset and called him out.

And I liked John Harbaugh's response, said, hey, I don't remember a 16-point touchdown. Why were you throwing the ball if you're so concerned with player safety on the drive previous? You should have been taking these. That's the Ravens, though. It's like them against the world. They play a different offense than everyone else in the league.

And I don't see them losing on Monday night at home to Carson Wentz under the lights in a Monday night game. I don't. Well, especially if you can only put $5 on it. Win $150.

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See full terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Restrictions apply. We have no restrictions here on teases and parlays. You can go nuts. And you know what FanDuel does? What do they do?

Most people, most bookies, most books, it's six-point tees, seven-point tees, or 10-point tees. FanDuel's like, hey man, it's 2021-point tees, seven-point tees, or 10-point tees. Fandle's like, hey, man, it's 2021. Let's get crazy.

You can do a seven-and-a-half-point tees if you want. Okay. And one of the things you can do is a three-team, seven-and-a-half-point tees that is plus 105, but all three teams have to cover. Got it. And I bring this up because we have some obvious teasers, but one of them is at the 10 point mark, Tampa Bay. And that's one where it's like if you tease them in a seven point tease or a six point tease, late touchdown, whatever, they win by three and you lose your tease. With the seven and a half point tease,

you could bring them the two and a half. Now they just have to win by three. You win. So we'll start there first. You wanted this game in here. Yeah. I want this badly. I feel like this is Brady scorched earth against the Dolphins this weekend. And that so much attention was spent on last week and the emotions were high and all this

stuff. This could not be a better matchup for Brady. He goes up against a Miami team that does not have a quarterback who can throw the ball and an offense that can score with them. And that Miami defense is very similar to the Patriots defense and what they do and how Flores operates it, but it has lesser players and it's going to be an ideal weather down there. It's not going to be- Missing their best cornerback. Missing their best cornerback. They're down. The Dolphins are down right now. Now look, I know Tampa is down to Richard Sherman and whoever else is a bag of bones that could play corner at this point. You say, okay, well that's dangerous. No,

Miami can't throw all over them. That's not Miami's offense. They're not going to be able to throw like that. So I like Tampa big in this one. I feel like this is one of those deals where Brady hasn't, he looked great week one against the Cowboys. He hasn't looked awesome. I feel like this is one of those deals where Brady hasn't, he looked great week one against the Cowboys. He hasn't looked awesome. I feel like this is the awesome game. This is the game that he had against Detroit last year and coming off the bye on that Saturday afternoon where he's like, I'm just going to let it rip. I feel like the buck's big here.

And it's almost a response to last week where they gave everything they had and there was so much focus. And it's like, okay, we got through that hurdle. We escaped with a win. Now let's go kick some ass. I feel like the Bucs are big against the Dolphins this week. Dolphins play the Pats in week one, 17 points. They get shut out by the Bills. They play the Raiders in week three in a game that was really hairy from a million dollar pick standpoint because we had the Raiders. The Dolphins kept crawling back, but a lot of it was like this frenetic garbage time, second half, like trying to...

They were down the whole game, stuff like that. Colts, they look horrendous. The stats are kind of mind-blowing for them. I mentioned earlier how Brissette's only throwing 4.9 yards per attempt. To put that in perspective, even Roethlisberger is doing better than that. They're only rushing 3.6 yards attempt.

They're 28th in DVOA. Somehow there's four worse teams than them. And they're banged up on defense. And I feel bad for Flores. And it's like, this is the classic, the frisky young team from a year ago that all of a sudden a lot of expectations. 10 wins.

Excited about them. Their over-under in Vegas was nine and a half wins. Yeah. And now it seems like, yikes. And now there's some Deshaun Watson stuff too. It's not back till next week. Might not even be right guy anyway. We're marking Tampa down.

And I like your case. Brady had no touchdowns last week. Rams game the week before. They're due for like the, let's blow this out offense. We'll roll it up. Let's get everybody. We'll try to get Mike Evans 100 yards. So we're putting them in a tease.

I also note this because I spoke with a few people in Tampa who I've known for years. It's not like Brady's, but Tampa was this moribund team forever. So I have relationships because I was doing the seventh game on Fox, the sidelines, and I'd be sent to Tampa every year. So you eventually get these relationships. And I was like, what was the feeling afterwards? I'm like, gosh, you guys are so... And it's like, do you realize Richard Sherman got there last week and had not had a practice, a training camp, and was the number one corner? And he told them when he got there, Sherman, had not had a practice, a training camp, and was the number one corner.

And he told them when he got there, Sherman, I'm going to need a couple of weeks. And Todd Bowles was like, can you go? We need you. And he's like, yeah. And he was their number one corner last week and was out there. And yes, they targeted him. But for where he was coming from, having not been in a football uniform since last year in any form and not having a week of practice to be out there last week. It was pretty gutsy stuff that he had being out there on the field. And Brady, just to escape that with a win, they knew going in. Tampa didn't think they were winning 47 to nothing last week. They knew, especially with the weather. Their emotions were all over

the place. And you talk to all these different expatriates and expatriate staffers, and there's a million ex-coaches who are on there. And they all say the same thing in the week leading up. They're going to be so laser focused that this stuff isn't... This is for the media. The media cares about this stuff. Bill and Tom, when it gets to football and the... Brady was so emotional in that game.

He was so up and down early and sailing the ball around. To escape with a win, that's a gasp of relief. I think him and Belichick are going to be fine moving forward. They might even have a friendship after this thing, just to get over that hump and have that conversation,

whatever they had, 20 minutes afterwards. And now I feel like that's been looming for the Bucs all season. It was his back-to-back weeks. Rams are tough as shit on the road in LA.

And then to have to respond and play the Patriots with all that media. We're over that hurdle. We're one and one in those games. We get out of there with a win. I feel like the Bucs are going to be just fine. Their D-backs were in such bad shape.

Did you see the Sherman numbers? He was nine targets, nine catches. I know. Now, granted, maybe that could have been 15 and maybe there was a couple that they didn't throw it on because he was doing a good job, but not great. And then they were losing D-backs as the game went along. And you know, in the back of your head are going on next week, they're going to be in trouble. Well, they're playing this Miami team that can't throw the ball at all. Can't perfect matchup for them. And, uh, it's the get right game. I like the spot.

So that's, we're going to have them in a tease. The next one would be the Vikings lions. Now we talked about the Vikings last week and I put it on a platter for you to talk me out of the Vikings against the Browns, which you did. Thank you. And I said to you, put the Vikings in our back pocket. I still like this team. We're going to need them maybe next week. Well, here they go. They're playing Detroit. They're nine and a half point favorites. What do you think Cousins' record is on the Vikings against Detroit? What would you guess? I would guess eight and two. Six and oh. Never lost. Six and oh. 71 points against them last year, 62 in 2019, 51 in 2018. Dare I say Kirk Cousins kind of owns the Lions. Now, a lot of people, he's owning the Lions with 25 other people. Trubisky owned the Lions. Yeah, he owns the Lions. Detroit gives up 41 to San Francisco and 35 to Green Bay.

31st in defensive DVOA. Looks like they might not have Sewell, their rookie left tackle, this week. He's very questionable and probably not playing. Defensively, they're already banged up. They also have a stretch after this with their home for Cincinnati at the Chargers. I'm sorry, at the Rams. And the home Eagles, they have a bye week.

Do you think the Lions will be 0-8 heading into the week nine bye week? Very good chance. They're also without Romeo Acquaro, who's out for the year now with the Achilles. And it might not be a household name, but they signed him to a $40 million deal this off season, defensive player that they love. Frank Ragnow, who might be one of the best centers in the league, is out with Turf Toe. Sewell, you said that. He also hasn't been good the last few weeks. And their defensive backs are just horrendous. And I don't want to name names because it's, but I'll name names. Like they got a guy, Bobby Price, who's a former safety. He's

playing corner now. And he was lost on that fourth and 19 play late last week. They've got some real issues. They're down a lot of guys. They lost the Kuda, who's the third pick in the draft two years ago. Yeah. So, you know, and then Dan Campbell, I respect the fact that last week it's like fourth down, like, let's go for it again. Fourth down, they did it twice where they like went for it and it's probably not the analytics. And afterwards he's like, I don't regret any of them. Like he like doubled down. He's like, that's how I want to play. But like, it's hard to go, I guess, for empty possessions within the 10 yard line, which is what they did last week. It seems like that Ravens loss was such a gut punch. And now it could be that downward spiral. And I don't see Kansas city putting up seven points again. They just have too much offensive talent. Cleveland's D was really good. Minnesota really struggled last week for whatever reason,

after that first drive where they marched right up the field and you texted me like, see Vikings. I'm like, no, not Vikings. Long game. It was a weird,

the big winner of that game was the Browns defense. Browns defense was great. And I left that game thinking like, no, not Vikings. Long game. It was a weird, the big winner of that game was the Browns defense. Browns defense was great. I left that game thinking like, wow, these guys are young and fast and they're in all the right spots. Vikings had only 11 plays in Browns territory after that first drive, which is startling. But this Lions team- Cousins will do that though. There will be the random Cousins games where he doesn't have it and it's just disjointed and you can feel it. Let me read you the first four teams Minnesota played this year. I'm just going to give this to you, even though we know it was going to be. I don't think the Bengals are necessarily a three in one team, but they have talent on both sides of the ball. They're frisky. And then you go through the other ones. The Cardinals have the best record of the league. Seahawks are the Seahawks. And the

Browns might be the third best AFC team. So this is the first easy team they've played, is my point. I'd look at Dalvin's health a little bit, if you're just talking about points in general, because he toughed it out last week. I thought on Friday he wasn't going to go. Then I got word on Sunday morning, he's only got 11 touches, but he played. Their offensive line was historically bad last week against Cleveland. That's not going to happen against Detroit.

I feel pretty confident. Bucks, Vikings, and if you've got a third team on a platter, Bill, I'm riding with you. I'm so excited to tell you about the third team. Let me hear. Can I introduce you to the New England Patriots? Let's go. They're laying eight and a half points to the Houston Texans.

The Patriots, they've scored six touchdowns in four games. They have zero plays of 35 plus yards. Not sustainable. It's football. Everybody has a decent offensive game at some point. I think they're starting to trust Mack. They'll spread it out. He's going to throw it.

There's some offensive line issues. I'm not even positive I can tell you who three of the five offensive linemen starters will be this year. I'm not sure that's going to matter against Houston. Houston is so bad offensively. Some stats for you. They only have 773 passing yards in four games. 3.2 yards per rush. The 38th in offensive DVOA.

Brandon Cooks leads the team 38 catches for 369 yards. Who do you think is their second leading receiver? The tight end, Aikens? Who is it? I have no idea. No, he's fourth. David Johnson is second with eight catches for 67 yards.

67 yards is their second receiver. Amendola is their third receiver with six catches for 43 yards. And then Aikens has six catches for 53 yards. Farrow-Brown, five catches for 73 yards. These are Brown, five catches for 73 yards. These are their top five receivers.

And they're going to have Davis Mills throwing it to them. So I got more for you if you just want to pile on. Let's go. Let's pile on. Mills is last in the NFL in completion percentage, interception percentage, and passer rating. Texans last two games since they lost Tyrod. They're averaging four points per game

and 11% conversion on third down. I mean, it's, it's epically bad. And then obviously you went through the roster there. It's not going to get any better anytime soon. I go the other side of it too. Like Patriots lost on Sunday, but obviously Collinsworth was super jacked up about it. I don't know if I was as exuberant as he was, but you come away from that thing being like, all right, Mac is pretty darn good. And the defense is good. I think the defense is really good.

When everybody's in the front seven, they can really move around, pressure, they can drop into coverage. I like our defense. I do too. And they haven't started one and four since Brady's rookie year. Like Belichick, I can't see him go one of four.

And then the last part about it, it's like Mac completed 70% of his passes. He's not going to make mistakes. There's not going to be too many freak turnovers. Like just play your game. You'll beat the Texans. And I think that's exactly what Mac Jones and that offense is doing now. Well, and it's also a must-win game for them, which is like, if they were four and oh, I'd be more nervous. It's like let down game. They're looking ahead. It's like, if they go one and four, the season's over because they're already, what do you think? 10 and seven in the AFC? Yeah. I think that's the seventh spot that you have to be 10 and seven. They're one in three. So I have to go nine and four the rest of the way.

This is actually like a must win. We can't lose game. It is. And it's a road game. So they're not going to be like sleeping at the wheel. Like they know they've got to make the trip. Now I ask you, uh, as a Patriots fan, because there's a few in my life and they'll say like, all right, we get it that like, you want to protect Mac Jones, but we're losing games because of that. Why don't you let him do something? Let him try something. There has not been a one deep pass. Like they had her in the preseason when he connected a few of those to Wilkerson and those preseason games. Like there's been nothing this season. Do you feel like maybe it's time for them to loosen the reins a little bit? I think they did what they had to do last week because of the weather.

And because it was weird. Nobody wanted to make a mistake in that game. Brady didn't want to get picked or get strip sacked, anything. He just didn't want it. So it was, you know, and then on the flip side, the Patriots didn't want to turn the ball over and they wanted it to be a 20 to 17 type of game. This game, they'll open it up and we're throwing them in a tease. So we have more Gilmore trade. Oh yeah. Let's give me your Gilmore though. You want to actually, you know what, let's, uh, let's take a break and then we'll

come back and give me your Gilmore thoughts. This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl,

but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention, and prostate and testicular cancer research. And if you don't want to grow a mustache, you could still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. All right, Stefan Gilmore, Pat's traded him for a six rounder. Now I knew I had a lot of info on this one where it was like, they put him on the PUP list for six weeks.

He didn't want to come back if he wasn't 100% unless they gave him an extension. They didn't want to give him an extension. Became a staring contest. I was still surprised. I thought, you know,

if you're trying to make the playoffs and be a really good football team, which I think they are, kind of need Stephon Gilmore. Belichick always goes a year early over a year late. And he's like, all right, fuck it. I'll grab the salary cap space. Basically says, we're waiving you unless somebody can make an offer.

Carolina comes in. He lives there. Perfect place for him. They need D-backs. And I'm sure he's going to be good for them. I thought it was an amazing trade for Carolina was my takeaway. Okay. So it was an amazing deal for Carolina. I look at it a little differently. This train had left the station. I don't think he was ever playing another game for the Patriots. Now, if you had asked me 10 months ago or 12 months ago, could there be a market? Yes. And they could have gotten much more

for him, obviously. But I thought it was actually kind of a masterclass in working the media yesterday by Belichick. And I'm not a Belichick kiss-ass. I'm not part of that world. I just am saying it objectively.

I've covered this league. Very unusual for the Patriots to say, we're releasing a player at 8 a.m. when you can't officially release a player till 4 p.m. So they come out and Schefter has it and Rappaport has it. And it's, wow, shocker.

Patriots are releasing Stephon Gilmore. I got texts during our show, Good Morning Football, from three to four other teams texting me. Guys that are saying, what do you have on that? Like, what, is his quad going to be okay? Like, and I'm like, I got nothing. Like, I don't know. And you know, whether his quad is fully healthy,

I don't know. The Patriots know that. And that might be the only team that knows that. But the amount of buzz of teams being like, whoa, cutting him, cutting him? So sure enough, here come multiple teams out of the woodwork doing their work on him. And you announce that you're releasing him at 8 a.m. You're not releasing him. You're trying to get something. And they got a bag of balls for him. I think Albert Breer called it a pylon. That's what they traded him for, a sixth round pick next year. But they did get something out of nothing. He was never playing for this team again. Everyone kind of knew that. And I think in the little window of Wednesday afternoon and Wednesday morning, I thought it was pretty interesting how they leaked that they're releasing him and they were able to squeeze something out of it. They sent him to a place that he lives, I think, two doors down from Scott Fitterer, who's the general manager of the Carolina Panthers. He's from Rock Hill, which is right there.

And that's where they're probably going to... It's perfect for Gilmore. And so you don't burn the bridge with Gilmore, who was a defensive player of the year and should have been a Super Bowl MVP that year. It's like, he's a legend for the Patriots. It's one of the best free agent signings they ever had. Maybe their only huge, big money free agent signing. It actually worked out.

And then on the back end, you get something. Would you say it's the best free agent signing that they ever had? Yeah, because they get, Revis would have been the other one.

They won with Revis. Revis was one year, but he was only one year. Yeah, they won with Revis. That would be the other one. He pretty rarely went big on free agents. Adelius Thomas was

probably the worst one. Yeah. I had a tweet about, I thought during the Belichick era, I thought he was on the short list of the most talented, impactful Patriots. And here was the list. They might lose to Jacksonville.

Blake Bortles completes that pass. He has that backhanded. And then in the Super Bowl against Cooks, Gilmore was incredible. So yeah, let's hear your list. I love this because I don't think yesterday's news cycle was like, all right, now where does he go next? And we turned the page.

We're like, Gilmore's a really good Patriot. Really good. I had Brady, Moss, McGinnis, Gronk, Ty Law, Seymour, Rivas for the one year, and Gilmore, I think were the most talented, impactful Patriots. Now, some people would put Wilfork on there. And I feel like he's right on the fringe. But then if I'm putting him in, now does Rodney Harrison make it? He's kind of the gateway to four more guys. But if I'm just like, those guys have to be on the list. Welker and Edelman. I don't think the pure talent's in the same way. I thought

hugely impactful, but Gilmore was unbelievable. Unbelievable player. So I'm just talking about pure, like Moss is the most talented Patriot ever. And even though we had Tom Brady, the best quarterback ever, Moss is the best receiver I've ever seen in my life other than Rice and was just so ridiculously athletic and everything. And you were just like, oh my God, this guy got dropped from a spaceship. So I'm judging it more like that. But Gilmore was that good. And I think I said he was the second best cornerback other than Mike Haynes that we've ever had in my lifetime. Mike Haynes was out of control. Better than, I was, I'm too young for Haynes., I know him as a Raider and a Patriot just historically, but what about Ty Law? You put him as-

Yeah, I have him over Ty Law. Revis, we caught at the tail end of the Revis prime. I think Gilmore was better. His ability to basically be able to defend everybody was nuts. You mentioned he covered Cooks, but then he could also, you could put him on Travis Kelsey. Yep. You know, he was all over the place. He was a really special Patriot. And I think one, one of like the three or four biggest reasons they won that Ram Super Bowl and were able to get through that Chiefs game.

So anyway, there you go. So we're a little, slightly weird move by the Pats, but as you said, it was leaning toward the longer it went on without an extension. It was leaning there. And I keep an eye on him.

Everyone just thinks it's going to snap after week six. I'd be like, the Patriots medical staff, they're in it every day and they're monitoring it. Let's see how healthy he is. I'm sure he'll play, but let's see if he's ever what he was. And maybe the Patriots are like, let's get something for nothing. We'll see. And they kind of weirdly like this Jalen Mills that all the Eagles fans hated. They liked him. The Green Goblin. Yeah. And JC Jackson was able to cover number one, guys. The Green Goblin. Yeah, and JC Jackson was able

to cover number one, guys. We have Vikings, Pats, Tampa as a seven and a half point tease. The only other team I just wanted to mention was Dallas Giants. I think we're staying away from this game, but Dallas, I think, is going to be teased by a lot of people.

Dallas' offense is ridiculous if you actually compare their offense through four games versus the Chiefs. Touchdowns, first downs, yards per pass, rushing per attempt. Pretty even.

What's interesting is the Giants aren't bad either. No, they're good. Jones is throwing for eight yards a pass. They're rushing Barkley. Is that the first time Barkley looked kind of like Kamara-ish Barkley last week? Two years? Down 11, seven minutes to go in the room. They're like, we're going to line him up wide.

And he beats Marcus Williams and Lattimore in that little route that he did. Did you watch Kadarius Toney dancing around players and doing all that stuff like he was like Barry Santa? Got a little John Ross beating somebody deep. They've got speedy receivers. They have an impact running back. I don't trust Daniel Jones in a big game. Dallas' D has nine takeaways. That's a red flag. I think this is a complete stay away. Don't put Dallas in a tease. I don't really want to put the Giants in the underdog parlay either. I think we just stay away and we watch this.

No, in the last seven minutes of regulation and then in overtime, the Giants offense looked absolutely unstoppable. And they got the defensive stops they needed. And I could tell you that coming out of that game, there's a good feeling for the Giants that like, we could do this. Let's go. We're one in three.

And that's what they do. They dig themselves into these holes. and judge has not lost the team. He has no, so we'll see. Well, and also they have to win this game because then have to, they'd be three full games behind Dallas and the division. There's not going to be two playoff teams in division other stay aways. I really wanted to bet Tennessee against Jacksonville, Tennessee's four and a minus minus 4.5 in Jacksonville with all the Urban Meyer stuff. And Sal and I have certainly been joking

about how long this Urban Meyer thing is going to last compared to Roethlisberger, all that stuff. I can't get there with Tennessee. They were so bad last week. So bad. You agree. So this is a stay away for us. Even though it's like, wow,

how do we not bet against Jacksonville this week? Here's the thing. Trevor Lawrence looked really good last week on Thursday night, like looked really good. And they lost that game and there were some bad decisions. They should have kicked the field goal or gone for it, uh, or, or just try to, you know, at the end of the half last week. And then they went for it, got stopped and then everything happened. But Titans have no pass rush. Their special teams players, like their number two pass rusher, they've got a bad kicker, bad punter, two banged up receivers.

They're two bang. Their entire offensive line is banged up. I think three-fifths of their offensive line is banged up. And Trevor Lawrence might be the best player on the field on Sunday. To stay away. But the Jags might have quit on Urban Meyer this week for all you know. I mean, they might be trying to just be like, hey, if we quit on this guy this week, maybe they'll fire him. Maybe. There's the other part of this. I don't know. We could talk about the Urban thing. Yeah, let's do it. What do you got? I don't know. The media is up in arms about it and it's a weird video and like, he's got to answer those questions at home and all that stuff. And that's probably like, I don't know. I saw people on ESPN, like crying

about it. Like, I don't know. He didn't, he didn't, he didn't assault anybody. No, like this is his own personal life and it's not a great look, but these guys are professional players. I don't know if they're, I don't, I can't play for this man after that. Like, I don't know. I don't know if he loses the team based on this video.

Well, it doesn't sound like he was winning the team to begin with. So I think at some point it's like every, every little piece doesn't help. Yeah. Yeah. Not a great look. I'll tell you that.

But I also don't know if Trevor Lawrence suddenly is like not going to play his best because of it, if that makes any sense. Kyle, turn the camera on. Turn it on. Turn it on. I can see this on the ringer social. This AFC South, could this be the worst division of all time? I remember a few years ago, I remember writing a piece about the NFC West. It must have been like 10 years ago.

I was back in D.C. for hosting PTI all week with Tony. I know the season. And I was writing on football. Yeah, it was like 09, 2010. Charlie Whitehurst was the quarterback. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like, wow, what happens if nobody's better than 79? Should we change the rules?

And in that column, I had a whole thing about, hey, if you can't finish 500, you don't get to make the playoffs. And then other people are like, that's too harsh. Maybe it should be. So maybe we could say for a 17-game season, maybe it should be eight and nine. But if you can't go eight and nine, there has to be some cutoff where you just can't make it.

And the reason I bring this up with the AFC South, is anyone going eight and nine in this division? The Titans have lost to the Jets and they're like the power of the division. Right. They're the class of the division. They just lost to Zach Wilson. I'm with you. I don't know. The Colts have Carson Wentz who has two sprained ankles. They're already missing a bunch of people, and I'm not sure they're good anyway. I just don't think anyone... Yeah, Texans, Jags.

Texans are the worst team in the league. The Jags are in this incredible coaching quagmire, and they weren't built to win this year anyway. And it's just like, you might add up the wins for this division at the end of the year. And remember, they all get, what do you get? There's three possible wins against the other team. So it's nine possible wins just in the division. It might be what? 18 total? I think there's been one. Could it be less

than 20? Would you go over 20 for wins in this division? It's fair. It's a good fan to a bet. The Titans, I mean, they had a great win against the Seahawks, that big comeback, but they got blown out at home by the Cardinals in a way, week one, that no team should lose at home when you're coming off a playoff season. And then everyone was like, COVID, weird. And it was like, no, no, I think these guys actually suck. No, they actually, yeah. Chandler Jones had five sacks and guess what? It wasn't just because of the freak thing. Like Quentin Williams was having a day last week. Quincy Williams too. Like,

I don't know. I don't see many wins in this division. Could be the worst. Let's go team by team really quick. Indy, their over-under was eight and a half. If they lose this Ravens game today, they're going to be one and four.

I think best case scenario is eight wins for them. Jacksonville, their over-under was six and a half. They're going to be one in four. I think best case scenario is eight wins for them. Jacksonville, they're over under with six and a half. If they get four wins, it'll be a miracle. Houston, even if Taylor comes back, I don't see more than three or four max. And then Tennessee, I guess would be the wild card, but they've already started the season off with such an injury bang. Sometimes that just infects the team. They also have a really hard schedule coming up after this Jaguars game, home bills, home chiefs at Colts at Rams home saints. I think that, I think the under over under is less than 20 for this division.

Something to watch. Remember that NFC West season so well, because I think Sunday night football was like, we're going with it. It's going to be Ram Seahawks. And you had like, either it's Madden or Collinsworth, whoever it was. And it was like, literally like Charlie Whitehurst versus like Sean Hill on a week 17 Sunday night game. And I was like, for all the marbles. I lost so much money in that game. That was when I almost won the suit. I had a chance to be top five super contest. Is that right? And you bet against the Rams? That was the last one. And Charlie Whitehurst, who looked like Jesus,

he just murdered me. He won. He looked great. That's why I don't go to church. More stay aways. Browns Chargers. Browns are getting two and a half. There's some Baker Mayfield has a partially torn left labrum,

but he's fine. It's not affecting him. It's like, no, I, has a partially torn left labrum, but he's fine. It's not affecting him. It's like, no, I I've had a partially torn labrum. It affects you. It hurts when you sleep. It hurts when you roll over.

It hurts when you do anything. You don't feel right. You definitely don't want to get hit on it. So you got that front. Um, you have a chargers run defense. That's abominable. It's right now.

It's been up last week. Stop the Raiders last week, but it's been horrible until last week. But who'd they stop on the Raiders? Jacobs was there, but like Jacobs, I think, was held under

50 yards. Injured Jacobs and Peyton Barber. They've allowed the fourth most rushing yards this year. Cleveland's D is third in DBOA. They've allowed the third least

rushing yards. And this is just a weird game. I'm staying away. Stay away. I wanted to take the Chargers. I was excited about it. I just can't get there. Baker has an injury

and he's wearing some piece of equipment to protect it. Baker, it's not his throwing arm and that's not their game. They're not asking Baker to throw. They're winning this game by running. They're going to win the game a different way. And also their defense is so darn good

that it travels. I would stay away also. Stay away. All right, last. I don't know if this is a stay away or not, but where do you stand on Panthers minus three and a half at home against the Eagles? I like it. Okay, good. All right. So we're going to throw that in. And when we come back, we're going to do some straight up and some underdog, and then we'll figure out what we're doing for Million Dollar Picks. How can you be sure your child is making the right decision when choosing a university? The smart approach is to look at the facts, like the fact that York U graduates have a 90% employer satisfaction rate. That's because across its three GTA campuses, York U's programs are strategically designed to prepare students

for a meaningful career and long-term success. Join us in creating positive change at yorku.ca slash write the future. All right, straight up bets we like.

We already mentioned Jets plus three. Panthers minus three and a half, the Eagles. Panthers defense looked awesome. And then they played Dallas. They have a new CJ Henderson had just joined the team.

JC horns out. It happens. Dallas, Dallas went up and down the field on them, but Dallas might have one of the three offenses that matters this year. Maybe four, maybe five. I don't know. Panthers clawed their way back until Trayvon Diggs had two picks at the end. Like the Panthers didn't go away, which I liked.

Eagles put up a bunch of stats last week against a KC defense that clearly was half asleep and waiting for this Bills game. The line is three and a half. I hate the half point. That's what scares me. I wish it was three. You're not scared? No.

Look, as much as I respect what Devontae Smith did last week and Kenny Gainwell, I really think this Panthers defense is pretty good. In Carolina, I don't know. I feel like I like the Panthers here. They're the better team right now. I'm also going to criticize the Chiefs, even though their defensive coordinator

knows way more about football than I do. I think the Eagles are a pretty gimmicky team. You can't be like completely stunned by, you know, these designed rollouts and these quick screens and all that stuff that the Chiefs were like, Whoa, what's that for four quarters. It was like, they didn't know what was going on. I thought that was weird. The thing I like about this Panthers team, you know, horn gets hurt. They're like, boom, we're getting CJ Henderson. Gilmore's available. Boom, we're getting him.

Like, I actually think they feel that they have a chance and they're not just like a chance to make the playoffs. I think they actually think they have a chance. There's a confidence with them

and that tells me they're not losing to the Eagles. They have an owner who used to run a Wall Street firm that you would walk into the hedge fund, Appaloosa, and there was two giant testicles in the office. It was like a 10-foot... Yeah.

That's what you walked into. That's what Tepper has. It's, let's go. What are we doing? I'm not here to own a team that's going to go 8-8. And that's kind of why they moved on from Bridgewater. It was like, it's all good. We like being fine, but let's be great. So when Stefan Gilmore's available, let's go get him. When CJ Henderson's available, they've got a blank check. Go do what you got to do. Let's make this team viable. And McCaffrey is someone to watch. We might get McCaffrey. Make it a little McCaffrey. How about the Eagles offensive line, which is bad, but it didn't matter against the Chiefs, but it's going to matter against the Panthers and Burns. They're banged up. They played well last week against the Chiefs. We talked about the Chiefs

defense is almost like an anomaly. You can't grade it against it. I like the Panthers in this one. If they are what I think they want to be, which I think you hit on, they don't lose this game. They go out and they win and they're like, no, no, no, we're not going anywhere. I know you think we're a fluke. We lost last week. We're good. We're fine. Well, we could do

Panthers' money line. All they have to do is win. Let's do it. The money line. If that, you just, all they have to do is win. If you want to do that, the, the money line will be on FanDuel minus. That's not bad. Minus one 68. Let's go.

So we can put that with a couple other things. Did you like that Tepper nugget? I really mean that you walk in the hedge fund and it's a, imagine having that in your office, just two testicles. It's lovely. I love any story about two testicles in an office that isn't a cancel culture story. I've heard there's a lot of good temper buzz.

I'm like, he's kind of the sleeping giant of the owners. There's not enough content about him yet. But I fully expect, remember when Joe Lacob had that thousand points of light, New York Times Magazine interview where people are like, whoa, what the fuck is up with this guy? It feels like that's going to happen with Tepper in the next couple of months. Somebody will have that piece. What I like about Tepper is that he'll go on CNBC. He'll go on Squawk Box all the time. He's not big into the NFL media yet, but he'll bring his team. I think Becky Quick asks him something about,

what do you think of the S&P? And he's like, Sam Darnold's having a better week than the S&P. And all the financial guys on there are like, we have no idea what that means. Sorry, just going with it. He doesn't play by all the traditional rules and yet he's a respected businessman. And on these conference calls where it's a lot of the owners, he has no shame in unmuting his mic and talking and being like, hey, Jerry, here's my thoughts on it, which is new for a lot of these owners. Yeah. It's a little Mark Cuban in the late 90s, early 2000s of the new younger way of thinking guy who comes in and you have this old dinosaur owner. So we're

like, whoa, who's this guy? I'm telling you, there's going to be a good type of pizza at some point. Saints-Washington is one that you like. Saints second in defensive DVOA. Saints also have, for whatever reason, so far this season, an atrocious passing game.

It has been so weird. Harris leads the team with 11 catches for 164 yards. Kamara has 10 catches. Nobody else has more than 10. Nobody has 175 yards of receiving on this team. And the Sean Payton is a genius thing is taking a hit.

So what do you expect? I feel like this week, they're minus two and a half at Washington. There'll be 20,000 Saints fans there. This would seem like a good week to get it on track, right? So here's, you start hitting on it. All right. Saints offense is historically bad in so many ways. They've only had 14 plays that have been a run of 10 or more yards or a pass of 20 more

yards. It's worse than the league. They're averaging 275 yards per game. It's the franchise is worse since 96, 144 passing yards per game. That's the lowest since 1986. And here's the craziest play. They have five 20-yard plays, five. That's it, through four games. It's the worst offense we've ever seen since Sean Payton has gotten there. And yet the Washington defense, which you and Sal have hit on a bunch, and Sal was on it early over the summer about, were they really that good last year? They're 30th in points, they're 29th in yards and they're last in the league in takeaways. I think this is the ultimate Sean Payton get right game. Let's get our offense going. Camara has 10 catches on the year. What are we doing? I feel like I understand that they've been trying

to protect Jameis a little bit and let's just get a couple of wins under our belt. This one feels like the Saints get back on track and they're the team that at least offensively we thought they would be this year. I'm with you. Last one. Packers minus three at Cincy. I'm willing to be talked out of this. Green Bay,

92 points in their last three games. I'm becoming more and more convinced. We just throw out week one. There's no preseason anymore. Teams can prepare for a team for four months. And it's almost like, just throw out week one. There's no preseason anymore. Teams can prepare for a team for four months and it's almost like, just throw it out. Burrow, now they've granted they've played nobody, but Burrow 9.2 yards per attempt. And I don't know, I thought he was going to suck first half of the year because of that injury. It felt like they were rushing him back too soon.

They have a weird running back situation where like… Mixon's healthy. He's not healthy. Yeah, it's like, is Mixon, what's going on? He always has the red flag next to him. Then they have Perrine behind him. Tee Higgins might play, might not play, but I feel like I'm just with the Packers. I don't see it right with them a lot of times that I'm always erring toward

thinking they're not going to have it this week or look for a reason to pick against them. And I think it's just cause I didn't like the Aaron Rogers diva thing that he did this year. I'm dying. We need wins this week. Can the Packers beat Cincy by a field goal? They can it's in Cincinnati. But like last week, Cincinnati was down 14-0 at the half. They come out and Burrow

just marches them right down the field. Jacksonville sending everyone at him. He's taking hits. He's in the pocket. He's delivering. I'm not betting. I wouldn't bet against them. I don't know.

All right. Say no more. We'll stay away. All right. Staying away. Underdog parlay of the week. We have three choices. Okay.

49ers, who is my favorite underdog parlay team in a while. Plus 205 against the undefeated Cardinals. Okay. A classic. Oh, yeah.

The Cardinals. I'll throw them in a tease. I'll throw them in a parlay. All right. Niners. Trey Lance. Shanahan now has a whole week to figure out this Trey Lance thing.

I think they have good advantages. The Ringer gambling show with Solak and Warren Sharp did a nice job of breaking down. This is actually a nice matchup for them on both sides of the ball. Their front line can kind of keep Kyler in check. And then they can run the ball on the Cardinals, which nobody has really done this year because they've been fortunate. Other than playing Dalvin Cook when he was going nuts in week two.

Yeah, they haven't really played a running back yet. We think you can run on this team. Actually, they did shut down Derrick Henry week one, but you're saying week one, let's throw it out the window. Yeah, that was like, they had the Lewin situation, Chandler Jones had five sacks.

I'm throwing that week out. 49ers plus 205. Last year with Kyler Murray in the lineup, there was a random Saturday game that only ran on Amazon Prime. Not many people watched it. It was like Christmas weekend. The Cardinals needed to win and they were playing the Niners who had been living in a Renaissance hotel in Glendale, Arizona for the last three weeks playing for nothing. And the 49ers kicked the ever-living you-know-what out of the Cardinals. And it was like, we're not losing to the Cardinals.

I don't know if it's a different Cardinals team, whatever it is. I could see the 49ers losing last week to Seattle and having it go the way it did the week prior. I could see the San Francisco 49ers rallying on this one. I like it as a two-to-one dog. I think it's smart. You also have the Niners have a bye week next week.

So this is a borderline kitchen sink game for them, right? On the flip side, Cardinals, 49ers this week, at the Browns a week later. That's a terrible matchup for them. I don't like that matchup for them at all. Browns fast defense. Browns can pound the ball, keep Kyler off the field. There's a world in which the cards are just four and two in eight days.

And we're like, whoa, cards. Remember that? And every year we have the September Rabbit team. And maybe that was the Cardinals this year. All right. So we're marking them down, the Niners plus 205. I'm going to give you the Colts plus 265 in Baltimore. Your thoughts? I think this Ravens team is always ready to go at home on these night games. That crowd gets into it. Those fans go and there's a certain inertia and energy. They don't drop the ball. They don't have those no-show games. It sometimes happens to the Ravens where they lose on the road and it's like, what? One o'clock game? They don't not show up for these primetime games. They're the better

team and they're the better running team. And that's what the Colts strength is. I think the Ravens take care of business. I would not bet against the Ravens. That leaves us with the team I really wanted to put in this second spot. The Rejuvenated Bears. Wow. Pulled the playbook away from Matt Nagy last week. Bill Lazor.

Bill Lazor steps in. Everybody's hero. The man who was able to unlock Justin Fields and make him seem like a professional quarterback again. Good defense. You have a Raiders team that clearly is a little smoke and mares-y. Has a little trouble blocking against the teams that

can get a little active up front, which the Bears can do. Coming off a tough loss, I don't think they can run the ball. Jacobs doesn't seem healthy to me. They've been able to gimmick some stuff where they always seem twice a game. I've watched, I think, every Raiders game.

They somehow are always able to get rugs on one side of the field, doing that long Randy Moss across the field. It gets one again. Carr just chucks it. But I think the Bears can beat Vegas. And the Bears are plus 200 in Vegas. And if you put Bears 49ers together,

plus 770. Let's do it. Okay. I'm in. Yeah. You don't like it that much, so I can tell. I don't.

I mean, look, straight up, I don't love it. But why not? We're having fun with the underdog parlay. Let's go. It's how you win all the money back. Nobody else you like? I like the Giants. I gave you the Giants. You shit on that one.

I did not. I didn't like it in the big parlay with the tees and all that stuff. I like it in the underdog parlay. You like it in the underdog parlay? All right. We said we were going to stay away from the Giants Cowboys, but if we do Giants and the 49ers, that's plus 908. And if we do Giants and the Bears, it's plus 980. My recommendation, maybe we get a little frisky. We do three $33,000. Go. Bears, 49ers, plus 770. Giants and the Cards are Giants and 49ers plus 908, and then Giants-Bears is plus 980. I think we do all three. Bill, when we were growing up- If two of them hit, we're doing great. Who are the NFC powers, the teams you would play with on Tecmo Bowl and what you would always see with Madden and Summerall? It was the Niners, it was the Bears, and it was the Giants. This

is a throwback weekend. Let's go. Great stuff. All right. When we come back, the million dollar picks for week five. The million dollar picks for week five. I'm so excited. Schrager and I just hashed out the schedule for a solid hour and we feel really good about this. We needed a win. We lost a little. We're only up $575,000 for the year. We got to do better than that. We're going to open up. Should we open it up? Is it time? Please, let's go. Is it time?

Are we like Jameis? Jameis and Sean Payton, is it time to open it? All right. It's time. We have, these are all lines on FanDuel. On FanDuel, we can do a 7.5 point tease at plus 105. We're going to use New England minus eight and a half against Houston. Tampa minus 10 against Miami. Minnesota

minus 8.5 against Detroit. Bring them all down. The highest we've gone this year is 500k. You want to jack it up a little or are we good at 500k? I like living a little dangerously. Jack it up? I feel like we could jack it up a little bit.

I like these three. Let's jack it up to 700k on those three. All right. So we have that. Now we're going to do some straight ups. 200K. We both like the Jets plus three. That's a lot of money, Bill.

200? In London. What do you want to go lower? 150? Lower. 100? 100. All right. Shredder says 100. 100K. This is good. 100K Jets plus three. We'll do... How much do you want to put on Panthers minus three and a half against

the Eagles? I like the Saints more than any of them. All right. But we'll put 100K on the Panthers minus three and a half against the Eagles. Okay. We'll put 100K in the Panthers minus three and a half against the Eagles. Okay. We'll put 100K in the Saints minus two and a half in Washington. Okay. We'll try to at least go two for three with those because we have all our monies on the big tees. Do you want to put a little taster on the Chiefs minus three with the over, which would be Chiefs minus three. The over is 56 and a half. That's plus 291. A little 50K fly each. Bears 49ers plus 770. Giants 49ers plus 908. Giants Bears plus 980.

Just need to hit one of those. So we're risking 99K basically. Just one. Just hit one of them. We're tripling, quadrupling, whatever our money. Do you know how good I feel right now? You like those. We're all in on that three-teamer. The seven and a half

point tease on FanDuel. Thank you, FanDuel. What a gift. The million dollar picks for week five. Peter Schrager. I think we did it. I really think this is the week. This is our breakout week. I feel the same way Sean Payton feels. It's all going to come together this week. It's think this is the week. This is our breakout week. I feel the same way Sean Payton feels. It's all going to come together this week. It's time. It's time. It's all happening.

Schrager, we can see you on Good Morning Football. We see you on Fox this Sunday. Fox NFL kickoff. It airs 11 a.m. Eastern every Sunday in LA. And then I'm on Good Morning Football, Monday to Friday, NFL Network, 7 to 10 Eastern. Thank you. Are you going to watch the baseball playoffs because the Red Sox are still involved? I'm in. I'll watch it. I got sucked in.

I couldn't believe Adam Wainwright is still pitching in the major leagues. I watched that. I was amazed. I loved it. Cowboy Joe West. Oh my God. I have so many Dodger fans who were just furious

that they were in a one game playoff. And I'm like, look, it was a death match between you and the Giants for three months. You lost the division. This was the booby prize. Win a game. They won the game

and now they get to keep going. I go in and out on baseball. So when I'm watching and I see Adam Wainwright, Cowboy Joe West, and then Laz Diaz all out there, I'm like, this is...

What year is this? I know these people. I know these guys. All right, Shregs, good to see you. All right, TV Concierge is a very special edition because Succession is coming back on HBO, I think October 17th. Joanna Robinson is here. We've never done a podcast together. We've never met face to face. We just met on Zoom. So it's fairly emotional. I've got an almost famous thing behind me. First of all, hello.

How are you? Hello. Yeah, I asked Bill if he did some set dressing to make me feel welcome. But apparently this is an organic, almost famous connection. Though, of course, like throw a stone in a sea of journalists

and you're going to hit an almost famous fan probably. So, yeah. This is destiny because we're talking about succession, which you and I have been texting about. I did a texting about. Uh, I did a rewatch. I'm preparing for this 20 favorite characters episode. I'm going to do with Joe house on TV concierge next week, my buddy.

And, uh, so I did a rewatch and then I decided I'm going back. I'm doing the rarely seen re rewatch. And one of the interesting things about this show. And one of the reasons I think people love talking about it is nobody has like the same favorite episode which you pointed out to me

because the episode we're going to talk about here is called Safe Room. Right. I think it is the best succession episode because for reasons I'll explain. You don't agree but I don't think a lot of people would agree and what we realized is that

one of the things about this show is everybody has their own favorite episode, right? After you and I talked about it a little bit, I polled and did an informal poll of a bunch of people. No one came back with the same answer. And most people actually, I think a thing about Succession is that it's not an episode where people can easily identify

or show where people can easily identify or show where people can easily identify an episode. They would usually come back with a moment like bore on the floor, L to the OG or something like that. They're not saying, you know, the one where, etc. And I think that season two actually did a really good job because they're location hopping so much. There's the DC, Dundee, Argestes, like all these locations are the names of the episodes. So I thought season two did a better job of delineating each episode. But I think the one that you want to talk about, Safe Room, does have one of those iconic moments, which is the water bottle moment. But I did rewatch it last night just to see what you see in it. And I'm

closer to agreeing with you than I was yesterday. Oh, wow. Look at this. So this is the great thing about the re-rewatch is you're not even watching for plot anymore. You're watching for all these different things. You've advanced. You've advanced to a higher state of watching a show. And I think if you look at Succession, the first five, six episodes are basically grounded in New York and this little power struggle Kendall's having. Then we go to the ranch. We go to Connor's ranch in New Mexico

that he had to rename Austerlitz. Amazing. And then we move to basically the wedding stuff and there's the bachelor party, which is a lot of people's favorite episode, Prague. And then the last two, which are centered around the wedding. And then in season two, as you said, we start location hopping. They really figure it out.

It's like every episode has some distinct feel. And I think people cite Prague as a favorite because I think that's the moment when a lot of people locked into the show. A lot of people felt like season one was a slow ramp up. And then Prague is the one where they locked in. And so I think a lot of people remember into the show. A lot of people felt like season one was a slow ramp up and then Prague is the one where they locked in. And so I think a lot of people remember that as a turning point. But I do think on a rewatch or the rare double rewatch, there are some other winners that sort of emerge. Yeah.

Yeah, it's... So there's three different spots of season one where I think people got sucked in. And I don't know. It depends on the person, right? Because it could be the fourth episode where it seems like Logan's going to concede at the big dinner.

And instead, he pulls one over on Kendall. He summons the strength to get up and he's like, I'm back. Right, right. And that's when the show really kicks into gear. You also have Connor. He's running the party in that episode. You have some great Connor.

His character's starting to come together. Frozen butter. Yeah, a million things. So that's like a lot of people, I think that was the episode where they're like, oh, I get the show I'm in. Other people might have waited till episode six when Kendall tries to do the bear vote,

but then can't fly in the helicopter. He's running through the streets of New York. That's just a great episode. And then I think the last group, it was the Prague, the bachelor party, which is the funniest one of the first eight that I think they were like, oh, okay, now I know where this is.

This is just going to be one of those shows I'm in. And it seems like it's one of those three, right? You got sucked in one of those three spots. Yeah, and I think for Prague, it's like the depravity, the delicious depravity of Prague is what got a lot of people hooked into sort of, oh, this is the juicy Sunday watch that I'm going to enjoy if I'm not here for the boardroom.

Something that you and I did talk about is I think people's answers for their favorite episodes are so different because Succession works on so many different levels um i think if you think of it like a soup there are some shows that just give you like tomato bisque like one flavor right and then this is your three i don't know how long it takes to make chili 24 hours three days i don't know but like there's just all this different stuff do you like the emotional family stuff do you like the zingy one-liners do you like watching the privilege class enjoying their privileges? Like whatever it is, there's something. And so I think it depends where you want to be hit, which episode

you might latch on to the most. I'm really interested to hear your your safe room argument, honestly. All right. So for the listeners, Saferum is the one where the characters are in a bunch of different places, but where all of them are shining for different reasons. It's the episode where we meet Holly Hunter's character, Rhea Jewel. She comes in because Logan has decided he needs to buy Pierce as fast as possible to stave off these people trying to take over the company. So we have that. We have Roman's doing management training. We'll go into that. We have Shiv's first day in the office when she's starting to realize she's been sold a stack of nothing.

You have Mo's funeral and you have some really good Connor Willis stuff. Then you have this Hitler anchor crisis that Tom has to solve. And as he's solving it, we have a shooter in the office and everybody has to go to a safe room. And then we have Roman and Jerry starts fermenting in this episode too. So we're juggling all these things. The reason I think this is the best episode is the last scene with Kendall and Shiv I think is the single best scene

out of the first 20 episodes. And a scene that honestly I get choked up when I watch it. It's so well acted. It's the best of both characters where it's like the first time we see Kendall just completely broken

from the accident in season one and all the great stuff he does. And then Shiv, all the stuff she's doing in that scene. I think Sarah Snook's an incredible actress. I don't love the character. I think the character's all over the place. She's an amazing actress. What she does just with her face in that scene, as she realizes, he goes in for the hug and she's doing that kind of, she's a tough, tough lady. She's seen everything. And then she realizes this guy's broken and her face just changes.

I think it's the best moment in the show. So that's why I have it as the number one episode. I think it's an incredible emotional moment. I completely agree with you. And I think, yeah, she gets her eyes filled with tears on a dime almost. And it's just, it's hard to argue with that i think and i think you're right that there's strong uh plot lines for everyone like you know connor and the funeral is some of the best alan ruck stuff we get it's so good great great platform

for willa etc um for me though the the true joy of succession is when all the players are mixing in the same room and because they're separated in safe room some in subpar safe rooms um right i don't get to see them sort of clashing and so actually i was trying to figure out my favorite and i think it's the one directly after which is turnhaven where you see um them all in the mix and that's the one where the family goes to court the pierce family um at their at their vacation home turnhaven and you get this uh injection of new characters um and you get also something that i really love a friend of mine described once described uh part of succession to me is liberal doritos um and as a liberal myself i enjoy eating liberal doritos but but i think it's fun to watch the pierce family come in because then you get

these these the skewering of the other side as well and so it feels like fair balanced skewering and i just love the pierces they're so ridiculous and insufferable. The way that Nan Pierce played by the great Cherry Jones, the way that she treats her, you know, her, I don't know, chief cook. She's like, come have a cocktail with us. And she's like, no, I can't. She's like, oh, you never treat yourself. But then later takes full credit for the full family dinner. You know, it's all this like quiet background stuff, just damning the Pierce's for being just as bad, despite their sort of high horse morals being just as bad. And the way that they're just quoting Shakespeare and all this sort of stuff. I just think that that mix for me is is really fun to watch. Meanwhile, the Roys are sniping each other. Meanwhile, Mark Millad, who's one of the great succession directors, is catching all of this in crowded party scenes or crowded dinner scene. The camera's constantly moving around and catching little asides. I

just think it's, I think that's, but it's close because Safer Room is really good. No, I think that case is really smart because this is when the show is at its best, when they're all in some sort of big somewhere and the camera can bounce around and hit the different people and you just never know who's going to end up like dropping the gloves in hockey

and going at it for 45 seconds. That's why the wedding shows, the last two and The Bachelor Party, but really the wedding shows where they're just over and over again, they those, the wedding shows, the last two and the bachelor party, but really the wedding shows, um, where they're just over and over again, they're in the same spot. They're trying to flip things. There's so much jousting and they kind of figured out that was the best way to make the show work. That's kind of what, I think that helps my safe room case. This is one of the few times they actually put everybody in different spots.

And the show is still this fully realized show where all the characters are still working. I don't know if they could have done that in season one because we didn't have the, at this point now we have, this is the 16th episode or 14th episode. I have a backstory with each character that all the relationships make sense. Like, I don't know if Connor and Willa could have carried their own thing like that in the first season. I didn't even know what to make of Willa. And then once he had his political campaign at season two, Willa takes off.

Willa like gets it. So great. She's on for the ride. You love Willa, I think, even more than I do. I do. I love Willa. I think she's a stealth favorite. She's got that great line at well I think she's a stealth favorite she's got that uh that great line at the funeral where she's like uh it's not before there were laws was it talking about the

wolf pack and all this you know Connor's like it was a different time she's like not before there were laws right and Willa's Willa's past that she does on the eulogy and and Alan Ruck's delivery of that all of that is just uh yeah I completely agree. I don't think you could even do Connor on his own. I don't think we get him on his own at all in the first season. And so I think establishing them and it's great. Great Kendall stuff.

The opening and closing roof moments for Jeremy Strong just... There's definitely a self-destruction suicide theme hanging over this with him, right right when he goes to the roof at the beginning you're like uh oh when he goes back up uh oh and then at the end after he sees Shiv he goes back up again and there's a lot of stuff that this is

a completely different episode the third time you watched it versus the first time but the first time there's some genuinely exciting moments in this. Even the Roman Jerry thing, which they'd kind of been setting up, but they're like, nah, they won't actually go there. And then as it starts going there and they start having phone sex, it's like, oh my God, they're going to do this? And you can see even Jerry, the actress who plays Jerry, who's great, J smith cameron and she you can see her like there's like real delight in her eyes like oh my god i guess we're gonna do this and it's just it's so unexpected and this episode has like five moments like that yeah the uh i like to call it the slime puppy moment uh great great jerry line no and and i when i was watching i was like oh no there's no way i'm gonna win

this argument if there's this great jerry roman uh moment in safe room but in turnhaven they bring that phone conversation into the room and jay smith cameron also has this other great reaction shot on the other side of the door where she's like what am i doing what's happening she's in these like Laura Ashley, like sat in pajamas. And it's just, it's great stuff. Then they have the morning after awkward conversation. So yeah.

Well, maybe the answer is Safe Room combined with Turnhaven is the greatest succession episode. A two-parter. It's really just two-part because they're all part in the first one and then we get to see them all together, but it's a continuation.

And it's also the last, maybe the last argument i'll make for turnhaven is got that line from naomi where she says what she says she's like the greatest pleasure in the world is watching you people melt down right you know it's the most satisfying thing in the world that's the premise of the show right is is just watching the roy's self-destruct i was also thinking about these things as like it's almost battle episodes the that that safe room is sort of the night before the battle episode where they're all hunkered down in rooms and having conversations and then this is actually them going into battle with the pierces and then just own goaling one after another right they just they tear themselves apart rather than the Pierce's having to tear them apart

because they're so dysfunctional. So one thing about, so if you just go through Safe Room and then we'll talk about Turnhaven after. Safe Room is juggling all of these plots at the same time and all of these different characters really effortlessly. And you don't realize how many things are going on until like, I actually wrote it down. Like Kendall's melting down over the

course of the episode. That's like the A theme of this is like, this guy's actually on the ropes, but then in his dad, like who's a monster, he has real concern for him. Like you can see it a couple of times, even when're all in the safe room. Is that where Kendall? Kendall comes in. He's like, Kendall, are you okay? And the underlying thing is he was probably thinking there's a shooter.

I hope it wasn't Kendall. But it's one of the few times like he's actually like a decent caring dad and not just a complete monster. So you have that whole thing. You have Roman doing the management training which is like really the perfect non-family scenery for him where he gets to be the big swinging dick. But at the same time, he can't help himself for being a jackass. He makes friends with that guy,

Brian. He claims his name's Ron Rockstone. He's in the gobbledygooker costume making fun of people. So they're just letting him. And then it's like, oh, we didn't get enough Roman? Well, he's going to have aborted phone sex with his girlfriend and get mad and hang up by having a fake orgasm. And they go right to Jerry. And it's just, he's completely unhinged. So they realize him.

You have the Shiv piece, which is all the frustrating. Where do you stand on Shiv as a character? I think the actress is incredible. I think one of the flaws of the show is they never figured out is Shiv smarter than everyone else or in her own way, like kind of just as flawed as everyone else. And she's the only one who doesn't realize that. I think I've been listening to you make your case about Shiv and I've been thinking about about your your Shiv issues and I don't I don't wholly disagree. I really liked Mallory Rubin sort of swung in with this interesting take where because Logan keeps calling her so smart, then we as an audience expect her to be smarter than she is. And I think she is smart, but she's not cut out for this world. Like this isn't her world. And, you know, it's it's hard not to accept the crown

if it's offered to you, even if you're not suited to rule this particular kingdom. But like when you see her in other scenarios, like when she was doing her political career, I think she is incredibly capable and smart in that context. But I think what Logan is finding over and over again is none of his all he wants is for there to be another him. And because his kids are so broken because of him,

none of them are strong enough to be another him until Kendall pulls his move at the end of season two. And that's why you get, I think, that big smile from Logan where he's like finally, he's like, finally, yeah, only one of them is like is doing a me, but like

Shiv. I think she definitely thinks she's smarter than she is or thinks she's more capable in this arena. And that's a big mistake that she makes where she's like, oh, I know, I know what I'm doing without actually listening or observing it anyway, you know? Yeah, she's like, oh, I know. I know what I'm doing without actually listening or observing it anyway. Yeah. She's also very professionally honest. Her best trait is, here's my opinion. I'm just going to tell you what I think. And where she

lies is in her personal life. Her relationship with Tom, whatever the hell is going on there, that's where all the deceit is. And that's where she'll look somebody in the face and tell them something and believe the complete opposite. But professionally, she's pretty candid. And you have that scene in Safe Room where, which is another thing that happens, they end up in the safe room with Rhea. That's another piece.

Rhea comes in to represent the Pierces. And you have this incredible four-way negotiation scene. We already know Kendall's super threatened by Shiv, doesn't know why she's there. And Shiv just starts talking to Rhea about, yeah, this probably wouldn't work, two separate cultures. She's not negotiating at all, but in a weird way, it's perfect for the negotiation because then Kendall can come in on the other side and be like, all right, 21. And now he's starting to swing it a little bit. And then Logan's watching the whole thing

and he's the opposite of Shiv. He's full of shit all the time. He's like, you can trust me. I'm right here. My word is law. It's like, you're the biggest scumbag on the show. Nobody can trust you. An incredible Brian Cox impression. Yeah, you can trust

me. But I think that what's interesting about Shiv, you're right that she's professionally honest, but she doesn't have the conviction. Like she'll say these things and then she'll see that her dad doesn't like what she says and she'll immediately back down. She scales back. And I think what he would want from her

is for her to be professionally honest and then stand firm in that opinion. You know, that... Well, she does that. She's in the conference room earlier when they're talking about how to handle the ATN anchor in this Safe Room episode.

And Tom is like babbling about something and she kind of does like the cut it off, get rid of this guy thing. And Kendall's like, wait, what? Why did she get to her? I thought she wasn't here. But Shiv should have just at that point been like, hey, what

are you guys doing? You have to get rid of this guy. He got buried in Hitler's bunker. He has multiple mind cam readings. This guy needs to go. But she didn't have the conviction to do that. You're right. She's kind of dancing around. Yeah, listen, the dog's name is spelled differently, so it's fine.

It's a little different. He's just taking an interest in that period in time. So you have that scene, the four-way negotiation, which Kendall, the only time he has confidence anymore is when things are being negotiated because he's just a complete mess in any other

sort of social interaction. On top of it, you have Mo's funeral, which is just Willow saying she's sorry about Mo and the wife being like, who's Mo? And he just pulls her away. He's got to explain. And they're able to navigate.

This pretty grisly guy obviously had some molestation history, which is a tough one, especially in 2021. And they're navigating it in a way you're just like, you're laughing. But at one point, Cotter goes, why can't I be the one caught in a lockdown with a maniac? Like really, like genuinely, it's like, why did I draw the short straw here?

And then he gives the speech, which was that top four Alan Ruck moments? I mean, yeah, it's right up there. Lester was a man. and now he's dead. And it's very sad. Or what is his fending off of the journalist? Conor Roy has been interested in politics from a very young age.

He says it over and over again. That journalist, by the way, a pop culture icon. Jessica Hecht. She's been in like a hundred things. Breaking Bad. Single Guy, I think also. Friends. Breaking Bad. Single Guy. Friends. I think also. Friends. Yeah, friends.

Kicking and Screaming. She's the stewardess. You go through. She's been in a bunch of stuff. But then, so then the MVP of this episode, Tom. Tom. Plus Greg. Throwing 102 miles an hour.

There's a scene where he's got his feet on some assistant who he's made nail over as a human footstand. He has to navigate this Hitler crisis. As soon as there seems like there's a shooter, he's almost bowling over people to try to get to the safe room. Ends up in the wrong safe room.

All his insecurity comes out. Wait, there's another safe room? What safe room are you in? And it all leads to greg basically trying to break up with them and tom flipping out which i i sent you that clip yesterday as a water bottle yeah as a welcome to the ringer moment you sent me the water bottle clip from safe room i'll be parsing that for a long time but yeah yeah the water bottle the water bottle meltdown uh is a is a top 10 succession

moment for sure maybe even top five uh they they circled around tom as a comedic figure and then i think in season two just leaned into it season one it was like this guy's funny but i i didn't know what to make of him i wasn't sure like is this a real relationship what's going on here is he competent but then in season two they're like this guy is now our comedic foil him and gray yeah and we're riding and i think again that's a that's a point in prague's favor because i think prague is really where tom and greg like lock in as a comedic duo and i think that that is that is a moment that people latch on to but um you swallowed your own load, right?

I think that's from that episode. It was hot. It was hot. But I think that, yeah, this Tom and Greg meltdown. Maybe Turnhaven does lack from, it has no Greg. That's the thing that it's missing. Oh, is Greg not in Turnhaven? He's not.

He doesn't get to go to the Pierce family retreat. It's true. So I'll think about that as maybe a mark in your favor. But yeah. I love Tom says, very well, I accept your blackmail, Greg. Like they're like,

like making a fantasy football trade or something. But I mean, the thing about Tom and Matthew McFadden's performance is he is comic relief, but then he's capable of these huge emotional moments. And I think in Turnhaven, when Shiv completely nosedives at dinner and the two of them then go back up to their room and he's like, what does this mean for me? And, you know, and she she she was never listening to Tom when he's talking to her.

Never, ever having a conversation with herself at all times unless he's engaging with what she's saying. But she's never, ever talking to him. Never listening to his concerns. And she just says, I fucked it. And you just see this, like, he's so vulnerable and exposed in that moment. He's been shit on the entire episode because they made him the punching bag at this dinner because he's the face of, you know, their Fox News, right? So they made him the punching bag. And so he had to put up with all of that. And now he's one safety blanket. Shiv is is proving threadbare. So like, you know, he's just and I think he plays all of that just as well as he plays the comedy. I think he's a really underrated. I mean, it's hard because there's so many heavy hitters in succession. But like, I think Matthew McFadden is is incredible. Really good. He jumps out the most than the rewatches.

Yeah, I think that's right. And it's it's a way more complicated performance by him and a more complicated character than I think you realize the first time around. And he's a way better... I mean, that scene when he's jogging and Greg is like, hey... It's in an earlier episode. Greg's like, hey, I think she's having... Is that the wedding weekend? Yeah.

I think she's having an affair with Nate. And he's like, stop it! Stop it! And then Greg's... And all of a sudden, he's jumping on him. He seems like he's punched him and runs off. And you realize, like, even a sudden he's jumping on him. He seems like he's punched him and runs off. And you realize like, even though there's a climbing aspect to him

marrying into the Roy family, he really does genuinely love Shiv, it seems like, right? That's the thing is that he holds so many things. Like he's very sensitive. He's oversensitive and he's a callous asshole. I mean, like he enjoys punching down where he can. But then I also think he genuinely loves Greg. Like I think this breakup scene with the water bottle is because he's like genuinely hurt.

Because as much as he punches down on Greg, like he loves having him as an ally. I read this. I really wish I could cite where it was. But I read this really interesting detail, which is the costume designer says uh said that they match tom and greg uh their costumes are matched because they're sort of the spiritual couple of the show versus tom and shiv tom doesn't match if he matches wow and i was like i love that i love that detail oh that's amazing yeah i mean one of the reasons it's such a great show is you could spin off different characters into their own spinoff shows and I'd at least watch the pilot, right?

If Tom and Greg HBO was like, hey, Tom and Greg have their own show now. Be like, cool. Where is it? I could watch a show with Stewie trying to buy different companies. Stewie. I love Stewie. He's a real favorite of mine. And like every time he comes back, when you think he's gone and he comes back, like that's

I'm just always happy to see him. he comes back a little angrier each time connor connor and willa's press his presidential campaign i definitely would have watched seven seasons of easily absolutely but yeah you go on down the line and uh yeah so my case for safe room would just be i think it has the best scene as i said and I think all of the main characters that we care about are all at the top of their games in this episode for different reasons. Doing really tough stuff. And they pull it all off in like 58 minutes. But you're kind of winning me over on the

this show's at its best when everybody's in the same room theory. It's something we've seen. I think we've seen the right kids do it a couple of times where you watch them and you know that if they all just work together, they would be fine. But they just can't because there is this single prize that their dad is holding over their heads that they all want, except for Connor doesn't seem to quite want it. Something. What do we think's wrong with connor i don't well he's a different mom i don't know uh and and there's some dark he's just off he's like a just a step off at all times and they all kind of know it and accept isn't there something a mention in the dundee episode of his mom going to like a mental institution or something like that like there's something there's something that we don't know there's also i i was i was saying this to you over text that

there's something there's something about shiv we don't know which is she keeps saying i was complete mess when i met tom and i want to know what that is and i i feel confident in the show that they're just laying track i mean even the uncle moe slash lester joke that's a holdover from season one like they were called like like Mo is a character in season one and the fact that they held on to that Mo Lester joke until midway in season two I think they just have a lot of track that they're laying

a lot of hints that they're dropping that hopefully will will pay off but Connor another thing that jumped out to me in the rewatch is early on if ever there's a chance to align with someone, Connor always aligns himself with Shiv. And I don't know why, but that's just something where he's like, I don't have an opinion. And then at the end of the conversation, he'll say whatever Shiv says, you know, and I, I, I don't does so smartly and so well is they'll have, they sprinkle little moments and they'll have scenes where they're interacting like they're actually siblings, right? There's that early, I think in the first season, um, where Roman gets mad at Shiv and they just start punching each other. And it's like,

like, that's what my son and my daughter, hopefully they wouldn't do that when they were adults, but it's when you're like brother, sister, and you're close in age, like you just get mad at each other like that. And it was like, to me, that was realistic, even though it was ridiculous that they were adults, that they would like punch each other in the shoulder. Or you have the scene where they go when they're at the wedding,

when they go on the dock and they all go to smoke pot. And you could just see like there's real history with all the characters that date back to them being kids having an absolute nightmare mother who's just the meanest person who's ever lived and then this dad who is just a horrible father and they all they had was each other and these fucked up friendships that they had that it seems like they're still sorting through. But I always appreciated that about the show. Yeah, I completely agree with you. There's also a scene on the yacht towards the end of season two, the finale, I think, where they're just all sitting around.

And they do just feel like siblings. Yeah, busting balls. Yeah, they just feel like siblings. And again, I'm just rooting for them to join forces like Voltron. And like they could definitely take down their father if they could only work together but they never will feels like they never will be able to do that because of this other thing and like to go back to what you're saying about Tom and Shiv to a certain extent I have this theory that when they wrote the pilot I think they've confirmed this a little bit in

some interviews but that when they wrote the pilot they had some different character archetypes in mind for these people if you watch Kendall in the pilot i think he's almost unrecognizable to the kendall that we see you know what i mean like we meet him uh you know he's listening to like hip-hop to hype himself up all this sort of stuff and um he just seems like a thinner asshole character. And I think once the writers knew the caliber of performers they had in all of this, these characters started to move.

Shiv is like, Shiv is very, you know, she's wearing this like frumpy woven sweater. She's very different in the pilot than she is in later episodes.

And so I think they sort of bent the characters to match the performers, especially Jeremy Strong. I see that in a big way. I think Tom is similar where you don't know what to make of him in the beginning because I think he's originally written as just this sort of like unctuous toady sort of character. And then I think they just deepened him to become a kind of character that we haven't seen and i think that's what's beautiful about succession is like because all of these characters are pursuing all these warring instincts inside of them none of them fit neatly into a single box you don't know when they're

going to be kind when shiv is going to give her brother a hug and when she's absolutely going to cut his throat you don't know in any given scene uh what they're going to do i don't know that's that's that's sort of in my that's why you're always on the edge of your seat watching because you don't know what they're going to do at any time you made a really crucial point people don't they can make the show they can cast it and they could, they'll maybe write the first four episodes or the first six, or they'll write the first three and sketch out the whole season, something like that. But they don't really know what they have. You know, and I think like Billions is a good example. Like I'm a big Billions fan. They, the, the wife, Axe's wife,

who I think was supposed to be a bigger part in the show, and the character didn't work for whatever reason. Was it the actress's fault? Was the character's fault? And as the show evolved, they kind of reduced her, reduced her, and then she was gone. I look at, if you watch the succession pilot again, you're totally right about Jeremy Strong. Roman's not close to Roman yet. He's a little more on the Fredo side. He's a little more black sheepy.

He's got like some one-liners, but it's not like what Roman yet. He's a little more on the Fredo side. He's a little more black sheepy. He's got like some one liners, but it's not like what he became. And I just think Culkin was probably a way better, funnier actor than they realized. And I also think he ad-libbed some of that shit. I think at some point, what by episode four or five of first season, he's off.

They're just like, go, you're, you're basically like come up with some jokes for this scene and he goes, and then his character takes off. There's no way they knew Jerry was going to be this important. That has to be a, we love this actress. Let's figure out ways to

shoehorn her in. And that role was supposed to be that was written for a man. Jerry was supposed to be a man. Seriously? Yeah. And then they put Jason Cameron in there. And from the first episode it's like oh I like that actress

she's really good and then and then it's like oh I wish she was in more scenes and they keep going so yeah I think there's some they knew what they had in Shiv

like she Sarah Snook had done some real stuff they knew she was a good actress they knew what that character is I don't think that character has changed that much but you can make a case

I forget who said this to me, that this is the best, maybe it was fantasy. Nobody's ever nailed the casting of a show better than this when you talk about the top eight characters. They just didn't miss with any of them in any way. Yeah, and I don't think there's any character. As you say, a smart showrunner, smart writer's room has to be pliable.

And like, once you can see what an actor can do, uh, meet them where they are or quietly shunt them off to the side, as, as in the case of like Malin Ackerman or something like that, you know, like,

uh, you know, just expand and contract where you can to fit the talent that you have. But I think what's true is that if anyone were to rank the succession performances of succession characters... Oh, it's happening next week. You could probably make the case

of almost any order. I wouldn't say, no, you picked the weakest link for number one. I mean, I think Jeremy Strong has to be up there towards the top. But other than that, you could convince me of any number of combinations. And I would agree.

Did he win the... Who won the Emmy from Succession last year? Was it Strong? Yeah, it was Strong. Yeah. I think there's just... I think it's... Honestly, I think it's one of the great performances. I don't know if it's my favorite character, but I think if you're talking about...

Let's just take... We'll just take HBO only. We'll remove all the other networks and we'll just say, best HBO dramatic performances. Gandolfini wins. I was going to say, you're going to have the Sopranos fans

come for you. From a scale of one to Gandolfini. Strong's close. He's definitely on that next tier that has to be mentioned. In the wrong hands, the show falls apart. And he's a very internal actor.

A lot of his performance is just sort of deep under the surface. If you have ever interviewed or listened to an interview with Jeremy Strong, he's a very, very fascinating kind of performer. I've been afraid to have him on a podcast. He's super quirky, right? He's really smart, but he's very serious. And he'll quote long passages from like Rilke at you or something like that. And so on like a podcast flow, it can be a little tough. But I talked to him actually on a podcast last year or two years ago, whenever.

And he was talking about being on, he was, he's in Lincoln and he was talking about how much he learned. He absorbed from Daniel Day-Lewis on working near him and Lincoln. So I think he's modeled himself on the Daniel Day-Lewis side of things, which is just complete character immersion. I mean, I,

well, the reason, you know, the reason, you know know he's a great actor is, like, the scenes when he falls off the rails when they're in New Mexico and he's, like, he becomes Meth Kendall for that one episode.

It's a completely different character. And he's got... And even, like, in the last episode, before he crashes the car, when he sees Greg, and Greg's kind of, like, trying to blackmail him, and he's like, Greg! I see you, Greg! I like it. Like he, he has these false bravado things that I think it's just really hard to pull the switch where you can be the completely depressed guy and safe room, false bravado guy, meth guy. I'm going to take over my dad guy. There's like six different layers to this.

Yeah. Uh. I, yeah. So you're saying it goes Gandolfini and then strong. Is that, is that your assertion? Gandolfini is untouchable, but I think if you're going that next level, it's gotta be up there with any other HBO performance.

I wouldn't disagree. I can remember in a drama. Like, I think it's that good. Honestly, I don't, I don't know if he's my favorite character. You'll find out next week on TV Concierge.

But I will say Tom has gained a lot of steam in the rewatch. It's hard to disagree. But the problem with Tom, I don't mean to bite into your next thing that you're doing. I'm not done yet. But it's hard to rank Tom without Greg.

I think it's Tom plus Greg. It's like the entity that is Tom, Greg, you know, I wouldn't, I wouldn't be upset. It's like, what was it? Tom cat, Tom cruise and Katie Holmes. Way more successful. Can you see Tom jumping on Oprah's couch with excitement about something? I could see it happening. No question. I mean, he basically does that on the show. All right. So on TV Concierge, during this season, season three, you're going to be doing

a deep dive midweek podcast with Sean Fantasy, who is a really, honestly, a selfish co-host, but you're going to have to deal with that. He's very selfish. He said he will not sell any of your material and he'll try to walk all over you.

So just be ready for that guy. Huge, huge ego. So what you're saying is Huge ego in that Sean fantasy. What you're saying is I'm going to be the like human footstool and Sean's just going to stretch out and rest his head on me.

Just watch out. Watch out. That guy will shit. He's like shib. You can't trust him. No, I'm really looking forward to that. We're going to be blown out succession. We're going to have

not only that on Wednesdays, but then on Fridays, a pre-cap show with Chris Ryan and Big Waz. We're going to have not only that on Wednesdays, but then on Fridays, a pre-cap show with Chris Ryan and Big Waz. We're looking forward ahead. Nice. Treating this like the NBA playoffs. It's a big show. I love having you at the ring. I'm really glad it finally happened. I love being here. It's been

great to hear you with Mallory and excited to have you on the pods and all that stuff. So welcome aboard. It's a pleasure. Thanks for this splashing introduction. I appreciate it. All right. This podcast was produced by Kyle Creighton. Stay tuned for Friday. Ted Lasso, season finale. Van and Chris got screeners. So are you pro Ted Lasso or against it? I'm pro. Okay. This season's been... A little too much backlash, right? People just have too much spare time.

This season's been a little messy, but I think that has to do with Apple sort of late in the game asked them to add two episodes. So they shoved these sort of two standalones and I think that messed with the flow a bit. And then, yeah, I mean, you know, Ted Lasso sort of flew too high and

so people gotta come for the king, right? Like that's just what some people do. Yeah, it was just too high. And so people got to come for the king, right? That's just what some people do. Yeah. It was just too liked. That just can't happen in pop culture. We can't have that. I'll be interested to see how Succession navigates that because I think this month is going to be a lot of everyone loves Succession. There's going to be a lot of pressure on that first episode. Whoever didn't watch it in the moment, 100% caught up during the pandemic, except my mom, who's like, I don't like those people.

I watched the first one and I just didn't like any of them. And I'm like, mom, you would love this show more than anybody. She said, no, no, I'm out. Just being stubborn about it. Meanwhile, she'll watch like some French subtitle thing on Amazon for 20 episodes.

I don't get her. We could tell her that some of the Succession episodes have subtitles. There are some. That's what I should tell her. I should tell her it's a French show that they subtitled and dubbed into English. And that's how it happened. All right, Joanna, thanks for doing this with me. Appreciate it.

Thanks. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Joanna and thanks to Schrags. This podcast was produced by Kyle Creighton. We'll be back here on Sunday with Cousin Sal and special guest Joe House, who is in town. Also on Sunday night, the Heels season finale will be on Starz. And David Shoemaker and I got a screener.

We already recorded. We're about to record our thoughts for the season finale and it will run right after that episode on the Prestige TV podcast. So there you go. Enjoy the weekend. Go Red Sox. See you on Sunday. I want to see them on the way so I never say I don't have feelings with them.

On the wayside, I'm a person I never was. I don't have feelings with them.