The Bill Simmons Podcast - The BS NBA Power Poll, USMNT Survives, and 2022 NFL Gambling Lessons | With Chris Ryan, Steve Ceruti, and Warren Sharp

Episode Date: November 30, 2022

The Ringer's Bill Simmons shares his Quarterly NBA Power Poll for all 30 teams (2:09). Then, Bill is joined by Chris Ryan and Steve Ceruti to discuss USA's stressful World Cup victory over Iran, Christian Pulisic's injury, USA superstar Tyler Adams, a look ahead to USA's match with the Netherlands, and more (42:13). Finally, Bill talks with Warren Sharp about gambling trends unique to the 2022-23 NFL season (1:20:11). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Chris Ryan, Steve Ceruti, and Warren Sharp Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you've been enjoying the World Cup, then I guarantee you'll enjoy the soccer podcast we have on The Ringer. We have Counterpress with Flo Lloyd-Hughes and friends. That is the newest soccer pod. Plus, Stadio FC and Wrighty's House, the OGs. And I think we're going to do some Ringer gambling stuff maybe on Friday on The Ringer Gambling Show as well.

So that is it. The World Cup on The Ringer. This episode is brought to you by my old friend, Miller Lite. I've been a big fan of Miller Lite, 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.

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It's the Bill Simmons podcast presented by FanDuel. Football is in full action. FanDuel's highest rated sports book 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, the next

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The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. And listen to the end of the episode for additional details. You must be 21 plus and present in select states. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I put up a new Rewatchables on Monday night, the 35th anniversary of Plane, Trains, and Automobiles, an awesome movie. One of the great Thanksgiving movies, maybe the greatest Thanksgiving movie. We talked John Candy. We talked John Hughes and

his hellacious impact on the 80s. We talked road trip movies. It was me and Van Lathan. Could not have been more fun. Loved it. Go check it out. Coming up on this podcast, starting off a little different. It's just me. No guests. Didn't need a guest for this. I did my power poll for the 20-game mark of the NBA. We went from team number 30 to team number one, broken down in little tiers. And I got off a lot of shots, a lot of comments and a lot of thoughts. So that's at the top. And then talking about USA advancing today over Iran, won nothing, Go to the knockout round. It was a heart attack game. It was a root canal game. I didn't enjoy it.

It was excruciating. I was glad it was over when it was over, but god damn was it riveting to watch. We talked about all the things we loved, winners from the game, and what we think will happen on Saturday against the Dutch. I don't think I don't have a Nigel Powers joke coming in that segment too. You know me too well. Last but not least, Warren Sharpe is going to tell us the five things

he's learned about gambling in the 2022 NFL season. So what more can I do for you? NBA, World Cup, NFL, it's all next. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right. Taping this Tuesday night right after the Warriors-Mavericks game, which I just watched. The Warriors lost because Steph Curry got called for traveling in the last 20 seconds of a game, down two, which I thought was illegal. And then they ran a play for Klay Thompson where he got a wide open three and he missed it.

And it was sad. But that's not what we're going to talk about today. It is basically the 20-game mark. It's 21, 22 games for some teams, 20 for other teams. We're going to do the quarter awards in the form of a power poll. If you remember from when I wrote on ESPN.com and on Grantland, I used to do power polls for the NBA and the NFL. I used to split them up in little tiers, make little jokes, all that stuff. I'm going to do a modified version of that right now. I'm going to go backwards by tiers from 30 to one. This is going to work. You're going to enjoy it. I swear to God, or your money back. Even though this podcast is free, I will give you your money back.

First tier, this takes us from teams 30 to 26. Wobbling for Wemby. Excuse my voice. I've been sick for like five weeks. This might be my last podcast. I might die. So my voice is going to be a little wobbly, but it's fine. Wobbling for Wemby, 30 San Antonio, 29 Charlotte, 28 Detroit, 27 Houston, 26 Orlando. I think those five teams, whether they've wanted to admit it or not, are throwing their hats into the Wembley ring. San Antonio is terrible. They don't really have a choice. They're going to get worse.

They'll trade Purtle. They'll make some moves. They're going to be in the mix. What you want, you want to be in that top four because you have the same percentages for top four, basically. One thing about this tier, though, the league is really deep. And I noticed that I've been working on a trade value list for the ringer, which I think is going to run in the next couple of weeks. And I think I'm going to have 70 guys in the trade value list. And if you just look at Charlotte, Detroit, Houston, Orlando,

LaMelo, Cade, Ivy, Jay LaGreen, Jabari, Paolo, Franz, all eight are in my top 55. So even though it looks bleak, you're in the bottom five, the best record out of all these teams is six and 15 for Charlotte and San Antonio. But at least they have talent at building blocks. So it could be worse. The next category is to tank or not to tank. There's three teams. Number 25, OKC, they're eight and 13. Number 24, Chicago, they're nine and 11. How about that? They're nine and 11, even though they traded Franz Wagner, Wendell Carter, and this year's top four protected first for Vucevic, and they're the seventh worst team in the league. That's rough. And then I have the Knicks at 10 and 11. They're 23. The Knicks aren't bad,

but that goes back to how deep the league is right now. The Knicks I have is the eighth worst team in the league and they're 10 and 11. And they're one move away from one star from being kind of interesting. So here's my answers for it to tank or not to tank. Okay. See, yes. How do they do it? Well, I think SGA, get him to the all-star game. Maybe he can even be a starter. His average is 30 a game. And then I think he comes up with some sort of heel injury. And you just, or maybe you just take him for a ride and he just doesn't come back for two months. Chicago should tank.

And they should go deeper than that. They should blow it up. Copyright Kevin O'Connor. Yeah, I have three trades right now that save Chicago, put them in the Wembanyama sweepstakes, give them a do-over, and they're ready to go. Trade number one, DeRozan and Vucevic to the Lakers for Russ and those two firsts, and make the 27 unprotected, make the 29 top five protected. If you're the Lakers, if you're going to keep Davis,

which I think is insane, but it seems like they're going to, if you're going to have LeBron, LeBron's already putting out all these feelers for, you know, you don't want to waste a great year for me. And the West is wide open. So you can talk yourself into it. What happens to Poenka if the trade doesn't work? He gets fired. He's going to get fired anyway. DeRozan and Vuc to the Lakers for Russ and two firsts. One lightly protected. Then, trade Levine to the Knicks. Levine's coming off the knee injury in May. He hasn't looked the

same. But if you're the Knicks, you're like, well, we would have signed Levine for the Max in the summer, so we'll get him anyway. So do top-in and expirings and maybe take them back the Fournier trade and maybe do like a top four protected first next year or something 9 million. He's somebody that makes sense on the Bucks. He's somebody that makes sense on the Warriors. He's somebody that makes sense on the Cavaliers. Could Okoro be enough to get, they don't have any picks left. Could Okoro and something else be enough to get Caruso? Probably not because I have Golden State stepping

in here. Golden State, Moody, DiFincenzo, and some sort of future pick swap in 2027. Give him $3 billion too because Rhinestorf has been a cheap owner his whole life. And you get Caruso on the Warriors. That's somebody who could play crunch time for them. Watch out for that. So anyway, you get all that stuff. You get all those picks. And you're in the Wimp and Yama sweepstakes.

They should be doing this. Just, Kyle, put that on the TikTok. I hope you turn the TikTok camera on because they should be doing that. All right, next category. Dead man walking. The Los Angeles Lakers. They're seven and 12.

They lost the game last night because LeBron fell asleep and forgot to guard some rookie from Gonzaga who hit a three at the buzzer. They have an impossible December schedule coming up. And if I were them, right now I'd trade Davis. Davis sweepstakes next two days, who wants them? And I'm starting over. The entire league is rooting for them to panic and put those picks on the table. And I think that's probably what's going to happen.

Number 21 and number 20 in a category called panic time. You can guess one of the teams, Minnesota, 10 and 11, just lost towns for multiple weeks, humiliated in the Golden State game a few days ago when it just became clear that towns can go against any team that has scoring and spacing. It's going to be a nightmare for them. The towns go bear thing, you might remember me saying in the summer repeatedly on a podcast with Priscilla, who's agreeing with me vehemently that this had a chance to be one of the worst NBA trades of all time. We're creeping closer and closer, my friends. This was an awful trade. And now there's a new wrinkle because if Towns is out for a while and the West is really good

and all of a sudden Minnesota starts creeping toward that bottom four, bottom five in the West, they're 10 and 11 right now. Minnesota giving Utah the Wembanyama pick in this year's draft would be the single craziest plot twist, I think this century in the NBA. I was trying to think of anything crazier than that. And you could like, oh, the Brooklyn Nets thing, Kobe and Shaq breaking up, Harden demanding to be traded twice. He'd go through it. I think Utah getting the Wemby pick, another French guy in the Gobert trade, that would top everything. And by the way,

A-Rod is one of the owners of Minnesota, which I think is hilarious. This would be yet another embarrassing title for him. So you have them and you have Atlanta at number 20. I do wonder if Atlanta's 2021 Eastern Conference run was probably the worst thing that could happen to them. It made them think, I think they were closer than maybe they are. I didn't like when they gave up Herter when it happened. They got a protected pick from the Kings.

And I just like Herter. I value Herter. I think he's a winning player. And I don't like giving guys away like that. Somebody they need. They need three-point shooting. They had a guy who's a great three-point shooter. The game went for like 55 cents a dollar. Panic time for both of those teams because they don't have their picks. Atlanta, at least, the picks in the Murray trade, their own picks don't start until 2025, but not great. They kind of made their move. Now it's like, hey, anyone want John Collins? They've been shopping John Collins, I think since before the pandemic. So I don't know if there's a huge John Collins market right now, I'm guessing. Capella would be another one he's playing well. Maybe you could trade him,

but I think it's panic time for both of those teams. I know Atlanta's 11 and 10, but if you've actually watched the season and you've watched them play, there's some weird chemistry stuff with them. They can't shoot, which is weird because they have Trey and they have Murray, who was supposed to be at least a good shooter. But the Nate McMillan thing's getting a little weird. I don't know. Watch that team. That team is the team that I could see them going on a six game winning streak, or I could see them going on any game losing streak. Next category. Now we're getting into some fun territory, and this speaks to how deep the league is. Frisky and lovable, I have as next category. Five teams, Washington, 11 and 10. Utah, 12 and 11. Number 17, Portland's 11 and 9. Sacramento are a league pass MVP at 10 and nine.

And then Indiana at 12 and eight. Indiana, the most improbable person team. I guess they're a team. Not only on this list, but Jesus, like I can't believe they're the 15th best team in the league. I thought they would be like the 29th or 30th best team. I look at this list and you just have to think of the trades. Each team is frisky and lovable partly because of some awesome trade that they made.

Like Washington, they trade Westbrook to the Lakers. They get a pick back. They get Kuzma, who's at $13 million, who I have on my trade value list. I couldn't believe it, but I kind of couldn't leave him off. He's in the 60s. They got Monte Morris for KCP. They got a first round pick out of it. Russ is making 47 million this year.

And now Beal is starting to show signs of looking like Beal from two years ago. They're fun. I don't want to say House is doing backflips about the Washington sports scene right now, but the C words are looking good. The whiz are fun to watch. There's a little,

there's a little Porzingis comeback, like a tiny one. Like, looked like he might have 50 points last night, kind of resurgence. So you got Washington, you got Utah at number 18, which, you know, we knew they would crash back to earth. It's going to be interesting how far they crash. They basically lost Mike Conley. They had a hard schedule, but they lost Mike Conley. And, you know, all of a crash back to earth it's going to be interesting how far they crash they basically lost mike conley they had a hard schedule but they lost mike conley and

you know all of a sudden it became a little harder for them top right in the clutch i think the west is so tight they still have to kind of wait around and see what happens but if they if they continue to free fall they'll start training people i i would be very careful about training uh jordan clarkson though because wherever the league is going, he's the guy that makes sense. Portland at 17, 11 and nine. They've had some luck with some of those wins, but on the other hand, they're better than I thought I would be. So that's a backhanded compliment. Like they won that ridiculous Jeremy Grant game where he took four steps backwards. They won a Knicks game where Brunson hits an eight-footer in the end of regulation.

I watched that game. They would have won that. They had another buzzer beater. They've been missing Dame for a couple weeks. They don't really have a lot to trade. The grand trade looks like it was good. It looks like the hit was sharp. And I don't know.

They're malleable. They could be a seller. They could be a buyer, who knows? Sacramento is my favorite team in the league other than the Celtics. I watch as much of their games as possible. They have the most players that I like on one team. I love Sabonis.

You know how I feel about Malik Monk. I kept all my stock. Now I feel like it's like having Apple stock from 2002. He's fantastic. Fox, they trade Halliburton to kind of give Fox the ball. Fox is now really fun to watch. He was somebody I'd never liked watching. I've enjoyed them this year. I love Herter. I'm excited about Keegan Murray and they're just really fun. I was going to tweet this, but I think only five people would have gotten the joke. To me, they're the Kevin Owens of the NBA. They're probably going to lose half their matches. Maybe they'll win 53% of their

matches. The matches are always fun. And they'll sell out for the other team. The other team ends up looking great in the game, no matter what happens. I like Sacramento. And then you have Indiana at 12 and eight. And Sacramento and Indiana are linked because of that trade they made last year, which was Halliburton and Heald for Sabonis. This is one of the most fun trades of the past 12 years. It was fun when it happened. Now it's super fun because it's the rare trade where both teams got better.

Sabonis has been really good for the Kings and he's also unleashed Fox because Fox didn't have to share, had this weird thing with Halliburton where it was clear Halliburton was really good, whose team was it. Now Sabonis comes in, fits in great with Fox. Fox has been unleashed. He's having a career year.

Indiana gets Halliburton and healed. They take Matherin, who has been one of the best rookies, who is just an absolute beast. Sacramento gets exactly what they want in this trade. Works out perfectly. And they lost the trade. And they lost it badly because Halliburton is turning into a franchise guy. I had him on my trade value list, spoiler alert, and this might change by the time we actually publish it. I have him 24th right now. I have him between Siakam and Dame. He runs the team. I loved him in college. As you remember, I thought he should be a top three pick. I was outraged that Phoenix passed on him at 10. He's better than I thought he was going to be in 2020. To be fair, just as I'm praising myself, I also thought Tyrell Terry was going to be one of the 10 best players in the draft. So look, I'm not perfect. But Hal Burton, 11, 12 assists every

game, great decisions, makes everyone better, good shooter. I love watching him. The Lakers play was so great at the end of the game where they get the offensive rebound. He's got like five seconds left. In five seconds, he figures out exactly how much time he has left, takes his time. The Lakers think he's going to shoot because the clock's running down. And he's like, nah, I'm going to take an extra second here. And then whips this crazy cross-court pass to the rookie who sinks to three because LeBron fell asleep.

And it was like, how many guys in the league would have made that play? I don't know. It's less than five. Halliburton is ridiculous. I have Mather in 48th. I'm going to learn how to pronounce his name eventually. But you think like with Halliburton,

the 2020 draft wreckage from the pandemic year where just, you knew there was going to be some variance, but Golden State has two. If Halliburton gets into March Madness, maybe he rises. Maybe he actually would have had to be a top four pick if his college made a run during Madness. Wiseman, if you'd been able to interview him or work him out, maybe you don't

like him as much, but when you're doing everything on Zoom and you have three games to work off, I still think the Wiseman pick is super defensible. To me, it's no different than quarterbacks in the NFL where you take a top five pick and it's like Zach Wilson, Sam Darnold, whoever, you have 50-50 chance. And you know there's a 50-50 chance it's not going to work, but if it does work, all of a sudden you have somebody incredible, right? You have, I'm trying to think, well, Mahomes went later than the top five, but you end up in like a Mahomes, Justin Herbert's another example. And they took the swing and it doesn't look like it's worked out. It doesn't look like he has the hoops IQ to hang with that team. I still think it was defensible, but man, if they had more information on Halliburton, I really wonder if they would have

taken him there because he's like the perfect warrior. Washington at number nine should be kicking themselves too. But anyway, I have Indiana at 15 and Halliburton's a big reason. That trade was awesome. And I don't think they can tank. I think they have too much talent. If anything, I would be looking to maybe add to what you have. And what's interesting, they seem like they gave away Brogdon and they did to some degree because they wanted to create some minutes, but no, Nismith's not terrible. They got a pick out of it. They got playing time for the guys they wanted. So the trade was defensible. It's a little like the Portland trade when they traded McCollum. It seemed like they didn't get enough for him,

but they got a pick that they could use. They got Josh Hart back. Then they were able to make the second trade for Grant. And then after you saw the totality of it, it made sense. And maybe that's what's going to happen with that Brogdon trade. Next category. Now we're down to the top 14. You didn't think this gimmick was going to work. You're kind of enjoying it. I have four teams here. This category is called Let's Wait a Month. Number 14, Miami. They're 10 and 11. Number 13, Brooklyn, 11 and 11. Number 12, Dallas, 10 and 10. Number 11, Toronto, 11 and 9. Here's what I'm going to say. Let's wait a month. Go through all the teams. Miami, health-wise, I don't know. How many games are you getting from Jimmy Butler per season at this point? 55?

Have you seen Lowry? He's just going to be 15 pounds above his 2013 playing weight for the rest of his career, I think. I don't trust him to stay healthy. Hero's already gotten hurt. They have no bench. No idea when Oladipo's coming back. It's a team that's kind of hanging around,

but if you really watch them, and I said this to Verno and House two weeks ago, I think there's a lot of smoke and mirrors with this team. Bam is playing great, but defensively, really, it's just Bam and Butler when he's playing. Other than that, they're playing zones. They have Hero at forward sometimes.

The big, big test for them is going to be they have two games in a row in Boston, Wednesday and Friday. And this Boston team, which we'll talk to in a second, is a fucking offensive machine. And I don't know if Miami defensively is ready for this machine, but you don't want to bet against Miami. So to me, it's like we're basically, we're using the past performance and heat culture and all that stuff. And we're trying to carry it over

into this new season when they're not the same team. And we're going to know one way or the other. I'm not saying that they won't be good in these next two games in Boston because they might be and it might feel like the Eastern Finals and all that stuff.

I don't trust it. My bet would be that they're not the same team, but we're going to find out. Number 13, Brooklyn, getting an incredible KD season, which we'll talk about in one second. But the Kyrie trade is the big thing for me. They got to get him off the team.

He's playing pretty well the last couple, you know, last 10, 14 days. And they're doing okay. He hasn't had any blowups. He's been seemingly contrite. You got to get him out. You got to sell high. You're not even selling high, but just you got to move now. Get him out. If they can

look, if the Lakers can bite and they have to take Westbrooks back and get a future pick that they can spin for somebody else, great. If they can maybe get Dallas, I mean, Dallas is pretty panicky Dallas. I have a number 12 here. Dallas just signed Kemba Walker. Kemba Walker hasn't had a meaningful basketball moment in two and a half years. And they were interviewing. I love Kemba Walker, by the way, I feel bad about saying this, but they're interviewing

him on the sideline during this Golden State Dallas game tonight. And he's talking, I'm going to bring some energy and a good locker room guy andallas game tonight. And he's talking, I'm going to bring some energy and I'm a good locker room guy and hopefully some scoring. And it's like, yeah, on paper, this all works. If you were a 2018 Kemba Walker, we have no idea if your knees can hold up. They won't. You can't guard anybody anymore. Dallas already has issues with guys who can't guard anybody.

And I don't see how this works. So I'm wondering if Dallas is the Kyrie team. Because I think they need to make a move. I don't think it's sustainable what they're doing. It was sustainable in 2007 when the league was way less deep, but as great as Luka is individually, you're just putting him with a bunch of role players and it's not going to work. The league's too good now. It's, you know, last year they was able, they were able to get into the Western finals for a variety of reasons, right? We had Clippers injuries. We had, uh, Memphis. Um, they, they were banged up. Um, and then we had just a black swan event with whatever the fuck happened with Phoenix in that series. But, um, I, I just, I went under on

them this year heading into the season. I think I made that one of my locks too. I don't think they have enough talent. And so much relies on Luka that he's getting mentioned in MVP arguments because of his stats, and he should. But I wonder, do you feel like the guys around him are getting better? Maybe Josh Green? I don't know. It's a weird vibe. I would be a hypocrite if I said, if I was so harsh on the

Westbrook OKC teams and the Harding Houston teams, this is not one guy having the ball all the time. This does not work. I cannot support this. As brilliant as Luka is, I can't support this style. I don't think it works. I don't. If you're trying to win a title, I don't see it. I think you need more. And the Kyrie thing, put him in Dallas in that Kemba spot with their envisioning for Kemba, and that becomes a little more fun. And maybe it's just, is it Dinwiddie and Powell's expiring for Kyrie? Is that too much? I don't know. But maybe Dallas is the team that makes the play for him. Then Toronto, I have a number 11, 11 and nine. They just haven't been healthy. I want to see,

Siakam was playing really well. He got hurt. Barnes was hurt for a tiny bit. Ananobi has been excellent this year and is in the running for, I would say, a possible first team all defense guy, definitely at least second team. But I just want to see all their guys together and then we can figure out, all right, what do you need? The Gary Trent contract, you have some picks, what do you need? What are you going to do? One last note on this tier, the let's wait a month tier. KD is having a holy shit season. And I feel like I'm heading toward an existential crisis when we get toward the MVP ballot because he is at least partly the reason this Brooklyn thing has been so bizarre and such a soap opera,

right? He demanded to be traded. He asked for the coach and GM to be fired. He's the one that vouched for Kyrie and defended him and all that stuff. And he's also the leader of the team. And I think until Nash got fired, it felt like the team was rudderless and didn't have a leader. What he's done since Nash got fired, he's kind of made it his team. And he's 37 and 5, 30 points, 7 rebounds, 5 assists. He's shooting 55%, 37% from three, 92% free throw, 7.8 free throw attempts, which you know I love. Get to the line eight times, I'm happy. And he's playing 36.7 minutes a game, partly because it's really hard for them to ever take him out. I went through his basketball reference because I was like, I think this is his second best season I've ever seen from him.

And that was confirmed, at least statistically. The 2014 was his, you know, that was his opus. I think you could say that run he had in 2019 before he heard his Achilles for the Warriors, his kind of contract year run, was probably the best he's ever played. But this is something. And it's his 16th season, which is amazing.

You throw in not only Kyrie Drama, but Ben Simmons. What the fuck are you getting from that guy game to game? Joe Harris, he has been healthy. Seth Curry started out hurt, getting healthy. Still doesn't seem like the Seth from last year. So the fact that KD's been able to hold this together, they're 11 and 11, and it's not that hard to get the

four seed in the East. It's going to be Boston, Milwaukee, Cleveland. And that four seed is going to be sitting there for somebody. So Brooklyn's, they're hanging around and they're hanging around because of him. So when we get to MVP ballot time, which I hate to break it to the people who keep doing MVP rankings, but we're only 20 games in. It's pretty hard to do that. I'm talking to you, Zach Lowe. By the way, Zach's my friend. I gave him shit for this. It's going to be really hard for me

to not put him in the top five, even though he's one of the reasons this team is so dysfunctional. I got to figure it out. All right, we're into the top 10. I have the semi-wild cards. The Clippers, number 10, 12 and 9. Philly, number 9, they're 12 and 9. I don't have a lot to say about either of these teams, but I will say this. On a scale of 1 to 10, writing off Kawhi ever being a superstar again or even a meaningful star. I'm at an eight.

I've pretty much given up. And the reason I mention this is because I have Clipper season tickets. I've had them since 2004. They've been fun the last 10 years. A couple of the seasons.

2012, 13, 14. They were a real contender. And 15. Blake Griffin, Lob City, that was fun. There was a lot of promise here with the Kawhi Paul George thing. I enjoyed the year before they got Kawhi, 2018, that was a fun, or 2019, that was a fun Clipper year. It doesn't look like this team is ever going to make it to the finals. And it doesn't look like that way because it doesn't seem realistic that Kawhi is going to be good anymore in the way that he was.

He's 32. He's in the 2011 draft. Doesn't seem like the wear and tear of you're talking 10 games, 10 weeks in the playoffs. Then you get like Corral Bob was talking last week on this podcast about that conference final stretch where it's basically you're playing every other night playoffs, then you get like Haralba was talking last week on this podcast about that conference final stretch where it's basically you're playing every other night for game three through game seven. What would possibly make you think he's going to be able to handle that? And without

him, they're just not good enough. And we thought that was the best deal in the league. Now it's clearly Jalen and Tatum. They're the younger, more durable version of whatever our deal of Kawhi and George was. So I'm an eight for him. And then on the scale of one to 10 of trusting an Embiid hardened health nucleus with Doc Rivers coaching them, I'm sorry, I'm still an eight and a half. I'm an eight and a half not trusting it. You could even talk me into being a nine. So I'm mad at myself. I bet on them. I bet on their over, which was 50 because I thought they'd be a good regular season game.

And of course, you know, Harden's already been hurt for a month. Who knows what they'll be. Anyway, we'll move on. Next category, only eight teams left. The Sleepers. I have number eight, New Orleans, 12 and eight, and number seven, Cleveland, 13 and eight.

New Orleans is the team to watch. They just need to be healthy for a month. What's crazy, I don't feel like we've seen all their dudes together, and they're still top 10 in offensive and defensive rating. They still have a shitload of talent, and most important, they have trades. This is another team that can just go get Caruso

if they wanted to. Cleveland, same thing where Garland starts the season, he gets hurt, Allen's hurt now. It just feels like they've never had, they had a huge West Coast trip right in the start when they were playing well. And it just seems like, can we get three weeks from them where they're just home and happy and healthy?

Zion and Moby are the wild cards. Zion, there's no matchup for him in the West. He's going to overpower every single team in the league if he's feeling it. They will slowly figure out how to unleash him. He seems like he's getting more and more comfortable offensively. And then the Mbley piece. There's some interesting... We don't have enough data yet, but there's some interesting... John Schumann had it in his Monday column. There's some interesting Mobley

as the only big on the floor. Stats with the Cavs, meaning no love, no Jared Allen. Just like Mobley basically as the KG big, where it's pretty much the best lineup they have. I still like him and Allen together the most, but the ability for them to potentially go small ball with him, I think I would like to see them tap into. Anyway, New Orleans is 13-1

in the West. Cleveland is plus 750 to win the East. I think those are pretty good values. Next category, we're down to the bottom six. The contenders, I have four teams here, Memphis 12 and eight, Golden State 11 and 11, Denver 13 and seven, Phoenix 14 and six as the number three. So Memphis, I think has the highest ceiling, right? Bain makes another leap. He gets hurt right as Jackson's coming back so we haven't seen Bain, Jackson, and Morant all together once we see that I think

the ceiling of them from a talent youth defense grit grind standpoint like I just the home court advantage I still think Denver's

going to have the best record in the West but I think Memphis would be the, if I had to bet on one of those four teams, I might lean toward Memphis because I think they also have a lot of assets they could move into trade, which Golden State does too. Denver really does not.

And Phoenix really is not. But I'm watching Memphis. I want to see them go on a run and I feel like it's going to happen at some point. Denver has the best player out of these four teams. Sorry, Steph Curry, earmuffs. But Jokic is so dominant when he's on the floor and then when he goes off the floor,

it's a catastrophe. It's a 30-point difference if you look at that 100 possessions, points per, whatever that stat is. I do think the Jokic repeat is in play. People are talking about Tatum for MVP, Luka, Curry, Giannis, all the usual suspects, but just don't sleep on,

we're going to wake up in January and Denver's going to be like 27 and 11 or something, or 29 and nine. And we're like, wait a second, are we going to have to have this Jokic conversation again? I will say this, he's the most fun player in the league to play with other than maybe Curry.

And he really, really does make everybody else better. Everybody benefits from him. So just had to mention that. Golden State has a pedigree. I'm not ruling them out. The big thing with them is Draymond looks like he's back last six games. He was awesome in that Minnesota game. Just awesome. I think he had 11 assists, no turnovers, and just looked like Draymond again. So whatever happened in that punch, it feels like the hangover is done with them. Or at least as far as we can tell. But it looks like they have their mojo back. They still have a trade to make. They're going to do something. I think test driving DiVincenzo

for the next month or so, but I'll be interested to see if that ends up being their swing guy. I still am not, if Klay doesn't have it, I still don't know who their five is. Like if it's like they're down 3-2 in a series, they're in Memphis,

and Klay's two for 12. Who's in that spot? Probably it's Curry and Poole, some sort of swing, Draymond. I don't know. I can't figure it out yet with them. I can't figure out what their optionality is if Klay's not playing well.

And until they figure that out, I think they're going to still be struggling. Phoenix, it's weird. Booker's playing great. Chris Paul easing into a different phase of his career, I think it's fair to say, but still wouldn't be surprised if he could put together 10 good playoff weeks. Aiton's been good. They have kind of the infrastructure, which is why they're 14 and six, but they have a lot of question marks to me. What are they getting from Crowder? Do we trust CP? Do we trust Cameron Payne? I don't. I trust CP way more, his ability to play in year 19 or whatever it is versus whatever they've been getting from Cameron Payne. I don't like

their bench that much. They don't really have a lot to trade and the Halliburton pick continues to haunt them. But they know who they are and Booker is great. And Booker, I think, has ascended. I had him on my trade value list. I think he was in the top nine, maybe. Yeah. So he was not in the top nine when I did over the summer. The favorites are Milwaukee at 14 and five. Look, Giannis statistically is a little down. They haven't been able to have Middleton and Holiday out there together for a long stretch they might still be a wing short this would be a great Caruso team but it's still Milwaukee, it's still Giannis

you don't want to see them and they're still going to win somewhere between 55 and 60 games so I'm not going to overreact to any piece of it, I am going to overreact to the Celtics 17-4, I have them as number one some Celtics stats for you they're 45-11 in their last 56 regular season games. They have a 12.5 point differential this season. The franchise

record, as Sean Grandy points out, was 10.3 in 2008. So they're better than the 2008 and 1986 team for point differential right now. Their points per 100 possessions, 121.5. The record in the history of the NBA is 117.3 by the 2021 Nets. So they're shattering it. And if you watch them, it kind of makes sense. It's what Haral Bob said last week when we were doing the pod. These teams that have five guys who can shoot is kind of like staring into the future of wherever the league is going. It's been 10 years now since the Curry influence started, right?

2012, 13, that was the first Curry season where it's like, what's this? Wait a second, what's happening? This guy's going to shoot from there? And we've had 10 years of it and the sport has changed in front of our eyes. And you're looking at a whole new generation of guys, 24 and under, who are coming in who just play the Curry style.

They play that wide open three point slash and kick. They know how to do it. So you have this whole new young working class coming in that can shoot from any spot, that know where to go, that can play. The sport's changing and the Celtics personify it. Every guy in the team can shoot. It's unbelievable. Robert Williams

is out right now. Even Cornette, who's the backup center right now, even he can make a three from time to time. They have five of the 19 players in the league who have taken at least 33s and are making 45% of them. Five of the 19. They have Sam Houser, who Chris Mannix just wrote about this week, who's been an unbelievable story. It makes me mad that they didn't throw him out there in the finals last year, but he's turned into the Max Struess,

Duncan Robinson type that you've been, if you're a Celtic fan, you've been wondering for 30 years why we can't get one of those guys. That Pritchard doesn't even play. And Pritchard, they'll just throw out and he'll have an awesome 15 minutes. You're like, I can't believe this guy can't be in an NBA rotation. I feel like he'd play 35 minutes a game for the Lakers. He's barely playing for the Celtics. And then you have Tatum and Brown, the best duo in the league, 56.9 points a game, which is, we're nearing like Shaq-Kobe territory with that.

Like vintage Shaq-Kobe territory is the 56.9 range. I'm just telling you, go look it up. They're shooting 49%, making 35% of their threes. It feels like that could actually go up a little 85% free throws,

13.5 free throws a game. All the advanced stats are ridiculous. And Tatum, as we talked about in this pod previously, like he's just answered any question you had from him from the finals last year, he plays his fucking ass off. He gives a shit.

He's going to be either a first team or second team, all defense. And he should be because he's, to be either first team or second team all defense, and he should be because he's a ridiculous two-way player now. He's fixed all the getting to the basket, bouncing off guys, finishing little 12-footers, all the stuff that Golden State exposed, he's fixed. And I think he's been the best two-way player in the league. And if the Celtics are going to be a 60-win team or a 65-win team, potentially, he has to be the MVP because he's the key to all of it. The way they're playing with all these shooters, it reminds me a little of in Madden or even in the real NFL when you just have five receivers, no running back, and you're just flinging it. And the defense at some point

has to decide, all right, what do we do? That's what they're doing that afternoon. They're having these games. They played Charlotte. They had 45 points in the first quarter. It felt like they were going to get 50. And you're sitting there watching. You're like, are they going to get 180 points today? Just incredible firepower. It's up there for me with the 86 Celtics. It's the best offensive team we've had since I've been following the team. And the big thing was Joe Mazzulla, he's coming in. It's like, this is a disaster. This guy wasn't even one of the lead assistant last season. We lose Emei, who was a huge part of the success. How's this going to work? Guy's been great. He's already

got a little coaching quirks. He won't call timeout sometimes. He wants them to play through it. His subs are really smart where Where, you know, like Friday night, they were playing Sacramento. And Sacramento's lingering around. And they bring in Pritchard. And they bring in Cornette at the perfect time. And Pritchard's awesome. He ends up being plus 29 in 11 minutes.

And it was just, he just has a sense for, oh, maybe I'll bring this guy in. Well, I love what they're doing with Blake Griffin. My dad was talking to this about me today where with Blake Griffin, they basically told him, you're not going to play garbage time, and we're not going to throw you out there,

just throw you out there. When you play, you're actually going to play. So Blake Griffin has now turned into this once-a-week player for them, which they haven't had a lot of back-to-backs yet, but they had one yesterday in that Charlotte game, and it's like, all right, Blake, today's your day. So Blake's now turning into this 40-year-old guy at the Y who's like, every Tuesday I get a run in with the Celtics. And he played well. And that's maybe the way to use it. Maybe he plays 38 games,

but when he plays the 38 games, he's playing like 19, 20 minutes a game. Teammates love him. And it's a good spot for him. It's the best team he's ever been on. So I think the Celts are the clear number one right now. I have them leading the power pole. We will see if that continues. I'll do this again at the 40 game mark. All right.

Coming up, we are going to bring in Chris Ryan and Steve Cerruti. The World Cup. Hey, if you're looking to get more of this NBA season, it's the perfect time to download FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. New customers get a no-sweat bet up to $1,000. That is free bets back. If your first bet doesn't win,

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Halliburton's return. And I couldn't resist coming up with the same game parlay for this one. I think the Kings are going to win, but I think it's going to be a tight game and I think it's going to be super exciting. How about this? Just for fun. Same game parlay. Sacramento Kings, they win by one to 10 points. Sabonis gets 10 plus rebounds. Hal Burton gets 12 plus assists. That is plus 496. Almost five to one odds on a good Halliburton game, a good rebounding Sabonis game,

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First online real money wager only refund issued as non-retrivable free bets expire in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. 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, taping this mid-afternoon. It's a couple hours after USA, Iran, which was just a root canal. It was a combination of the worst playoff hockey game, most excruciating playoff hockey game you've ever watched, the most excruciating playoff baseball game you've ever watched. They added nine minutes of extra time just to really push it over the top. It's a fun wrinkle. Our starters were dying. Moussa was dying. He was just staggering

around like a drunk person. They couldn't sub for him. Our two last subs they brought in, those guys were disasters more than right. And hanging on, hanging on, hanging on. Looks like there's going to be a PK potentially. A minute left? Nope. Wasn't. It's fine. And then all of a sudden they win.

Everybody just sags to the field and we advance. I don't. So Rudy, we dragged you out of paternity leave for that. I don't. How do you even describe that game? I know we won. I know it's great. Pulisic's hurt and we barely made it.

And it feels like we're like a 70 minute team. Well, Pulisic said he's back on Saturday for the Netherlands games. He said that from a hospital bed. From a hospital bed, that is true but I trust my guy, Captain America, he'll be fine. I've said this multiple times, the amount of times I've had fun watching US men's national

team games, I can count on one hand. They're always just excruciating, even when they're playing. I mean, in World Cup qualifying, they're playing all these small Central American nations that you would think we would just dominate. We never do because the fields are always crappy. And they're just excruciating games for 90 minutes and you want to throw up the entire time.

And that's basically what this game was. I said this before the game, though, and I think I was right on this, is I actually like that the U.S. had to win the game and not just hold on for a draw because I just think the mentality is different because you go back to 2017. It's like, oh yeah, all you got to do

is go to Trinidad and Tobago and get a draw. And what happens? They lose, they miss the World Cup. I like that they had to come out on the front foot, actually try to play. The problem is whenever they get a goal, it's just like they forget how to play the sport and their tactics go out the window.

Guys don't know how to make simple passes. We start making subs that don't make any sense. And then you're essentially holding on for dear life so i think the second half of the whales game which they drew and this game against iran were no different we just happen to actually see it out because iran didn't have anyone to score what do you got cr i think that this group shook out the way it was supposed to and the way it should have but it felt like shit like i didn't enjoy a single second of any of it, except for maybe the first half against Wales.

I just feel like this has just been such a grind. Now that doesn't necessarily suggest, shouldn't suggest that I haven't enjoyed watching the US team because I actually have fallen for a bunch of these guys. Me too. I'm sure we'll talk about Tyler Adams a lot. He was becoming like one of my favorite athletes

on the planet over the last week. I fucking love that guy. I'll read any story and hear any anecdote about Tyler Adams. But it's like we got to the place that I think we were always going to get to, which is coming in second behind England in this group. But I wish you could have told me that during any of the last 180 minutes of football. Well, let's of football. Well, can let's go positive.

So, I mean, we did make the knockout round. We weren't in the world cup four years ago. This is a really young team, right? One of the, yeah.

You think like that first game Wales, my friend Hopper was saying that was just like an, an adrenaline game. Got guys just flying around that. And nobody had a touch. Dumb penalty with the 80-minute mark and just everybody's aggro.

They calmed down in England. I thought, I was really psyched with how they played against England. I really thought that was like the best I think I've ever seen

America play for like 50 minutes. The only thing with that was I was more unimpressed with England in that game than I was impressed with us, if that makes sense.

I didn't care about England. Yeah, they just didn't show up. And that's kind of what they do. They sit back. They kind of play conservative. And they have a 6-2 result, a 3-0 result, and we draw them. So it looks great on paper. But I don't think we did anything extraordinary in that game.

I don't know. I thought that we did a nice job of forcing that back line of England to just pass it amongst themselves. And cutting off basically the highway to get to the forward line. I thought that was Berlhalter's best game in a lot of ways. But Saruti, wouldn't you say at the very least we looked fast in that game?

Atypically fast for an American team. I was so impressed by the speed and the youth, but then you get to the 70-minute mark and guess what? It's really hard to run around full speed for two hours in a World Cup when it's 100 degrees outside. Yeah, and I think that's the thing, too, is why some of us have been kind of confused with these starting lineups, and I'm sure we can talk about it if we want now, why guys like Gio Reyna and Brendan Aronson

aren't really playing the amount. Aronson not starting, Gio playing, what, seven or eight total minutes in the tournament. I think you could argue that Aronson is the best informed player of any U.S. player in the world right now. And then Gio, you know, you could argue he's the most talented U.S. player. He was on,

I think number three on the list of under 23 guys coming into the world cup. And he doesn't get any minutes. I think the word on the street is he's banged up. He said he was a hundred percent though. Like why would he say that? He's been injured on and off for Dortmund for the last couple of months and the injuries have been pretty bad.

But this has been the one off-field distraction really kind of looming over the US team is this Reyna thing. And there's been talk that Berhalter isn't feeling him. But Berhalter's just like, it's not that. I'm just protecting him from getting injured.

It just gets into when you bring this team along and you bring any guys with you to a World Cup who are injury risks and you're trying to quote-unquote protect them, you have to wonder whether or not that roster spot could have been used on somebody more useful. You mean like how we have three goalies and then a guy who they're afraid to play? People usually bring three keepers.

No, I know, I'm just saying you go to the roster spot and then all of a sudden it leads to Shaq Moore playing the last 20 minutes of two pretty crucial games. That's my favorite part of it. We have four strikers, I believe, on the roster, none of which we have any confidence in. None. We have four right backs,

one of which keeps... Obviously, Dest is good, but Shaq Moore keeps coming in for some reason despite repeated evidence that the moment's just way too big for him, period. I don't... I guess... We talked about this before the tournament on the pod I do with Paul Carr.

I don't think that like Ricardo Pepe being on this roster, some people got all worked up about that. I don't think that changes the ceiling or the floor of the team. I just don't think we have a striker we can trust. So the question is, why don't you just go like NBA style and just put your five best guys out there? Put your four or three best attacking players out there and have them figure it out. The answer is Greg Berhalter, his system. He system, he plays with a center forward and a striker, and he's just not going to go off of that plan. So that's why we see Josh Sargent kind of just run around for 70 minutes

and not really accomplish a ton. CR was calling for the false nine with Pulisic. No, I was actually, I want Weah up the middle. And I don't know why he, I mean, obviously he... I mean, obviously, he prefers playing off the striker role and playing in the channels and a little bit more on that wing slide. But I think if you move we at a nine, you can bring Aronson in.

And Clint Dempsey was talking about this too. I'm not inventing anything there. But you can bring Aronson into the starting lineup if you move we at a nine. I think that that... I think what Berlhalter wants to do with bringing in Aronson

is that that's his, like, trump card to bring in at 60 minutes. It's first when McKinney starts getting... I mean, it's his trump card to bring in one of his seven best players

at the 60-minute mark? I would hope so. If you're playing three matches in eight days in the desert, you want to have, like, a second gear

that can happen in the second half. Well, bring him in at halftime. Right. Well, I mean, that's typically like it's like around 55-60 minutes is when that would be an aggressive sub. Halftime is when something's gone wrong. If you're making subs at halftime,

it's because Christian Pulisic got his nuts kicked up into his stomach and you have to bring in somebody. Do you want to talk about that now? Well, no. I want to talk about the formation for a second because I rarely get a chance to strut my soccer stuff on the BS podcast. Jose Mourinho-Simmons.

Let's do it. Look, as everybody knows who listens, I love the three forwards. I love the left wing, the right wing, and the high forward. I'm just a believer. Big 433 guy. That's my formation. You're so close to sounding like Trump.

Many people see. Many people know that I love the 4-3-3. There's the one on the right, the one on the left, but especially the guy in the middle. My daughter's been playing high forward for her entire life. And I've seen all these different formations. There's been some prongs. I'm not a prongs guy.

I don't like prongs. I think you do prongs when you don't have a plan B. And you're just like, we only have two forwards that can do anything. Let's like prongs. I think you do prongs when you don't have a plan B and you're just like, we only have two forwards that can do anything. Let's play prongs. I hate saying this, but this is such a prongs team. Like, we don't have three forwards.

And by the way, if you play prongs, then you can use your speed at the top, you know, and you can put whoever and you can mix and match and you can play all these

weird formations. When you say prongs, you mean like 4-4-2, like two forwards. Yeah, just two forwards. That's it. Okay. They did do that against England a little bit. He's so attached to having the high forward. I actually thought Sargent

did a good job of holding up the ball in the middle, but that really seems to be his only skill. He's good at long passes, boxing out, gathering, being able to at least keep it, but that's it. And Wright can't even do that. I don't know what the point of a high forward is

if you don't have a guy who can be confident. This is why I'm intoxicated with Wiaz. The goal that got called off today and then the one he scored against Wales were both strikers finishes. The goal that got called off today was like, we never even got the right replay for it. It was kind of a big play, Fox.

You have 40 cameras there? Can we get the one play to definitively say he was offsides? I don't know. What happened there, Saruti? I just could be classic FIFA. I think it's like a world feed thing where like, if they don't get it, they don't necessarily have the pictures on that. I would assume that somebody, if he was onside,

would have screen grabbed that or done some sort of thing in Photoshop and figured it out. So I'm just going to trust. I mean, this is a terrible idea, but I'm going to trust. You trust FIFA? I'm going to trust him. That was fine. It ended up being fine.

Steve Cerruti trusts FIFA. He trusts SBS with all his money. They're not that bad, guys. They're not that bad. No, I would say I think one of the best things about international soccer versus club soccer is that you have so many imperfect teams where, you know, you can have a team that has like a ton of good goalkeepers or a ton of strikers, but like no defenders or whatever, like these teams are just not,

they're not complete teams, you know, like Scotland, for example, has like 20 good fullbacks and then no, nothing else. Like that's it. And I think when,

for the U S like, you know, we've got a lot of those. The thing is, if Pulisic was actually in danger of missing the game on Saturday, not that I would want to play without Pulisic, but I actually think we could be fine

because you just, you put Aronson in there. We still have Gio off the bench. We have a lot of those like wingers slash attacking midfielder guys, but we just don't have a striker. We don't have a striker and we kind of are still

question marks at center back. Although Cameron Carter-Vickers, that was a big call by Berhalter today to bench walkers. They've never been the guy that basically got him there. And he's a tank. And he plays,

I think it actually ended up making sense when I saw it. It never really dawned on me to do that. But he plays for this club called Celtic, which is one of the best teams in the Scottish League. And they're used to having a lot of the ball and kind of like teams hitting them

on the counterattack. And that's what the game was essentially going to be today. I thought he was fantastic. I don't know if he starts against the Netherlands coming up on Saturday. That was a big call. I mean, I've been critical of Verhoeven.

That was a big call, and he got it right. He has to start. When you were saying with Pulisic, they might not miss as much as people think by throwing Aronson there, I thought you were going to make a joke about the corner kicks and set pieces. Oh, my goodness. I don't know. I don't know if America got the memo.

Maybe they're not following it that close. But Team USA has decided to throw away the corner kick and the set piece this year. We're just going to try to survive without it. This happens sometimes with teams where they just, they're like, there's just like a high school cafeteria element to taking set pieces and somebody's just like, this is my thing.

I do this. And you're just like, all right, Christian does this. And Christian just whips more low. This is what happens in like high school and like, you know, 13 and under club teams where it's like coach's son, Christian does this, and Christian just whips more low. This is what happens in high school and 13 and under club teams where it's like coach's son, he's going to take the corners. It's like, man, should he?

Should he really do it? I mean, it's not like Pulisic is a huge aerial threat, so I can understand why him delivering is a little bit better. We're not the tallest team in the world, but... Play it short. You know, you've got guys, you've got Dest,

you've got Robinson, you've got different guys, you mentioned who can beat people off the dribble. Play it short. Like what? You know, you got guys that could be, you got desk, you've got, uh, you've got Robinson, you've got different guys way as you mentioned, who can beat people off the dribble, play it short and see if you can get, you know, on the, on the byline and try to

beat somebody. Cause we just don't, it doesn't, you're basically giving the possession away every single time it happens. We have nobody who can head in the corner, even

if it was a good corner, but none of the corners have been in the box. And it's weird that we have all these great stats and all these sports and nobody has given us like, Fox, just give us the advanced metrics.

USA, 22 corner kicks, no shots, 22 corner kicks, 19 not in the box, stuff like that. And then like the free kick game, even I ran there at the end. They had a couple where they almost got them like, you know, off the slicing ones.

Very, very in this match. Like, I was totally surprised by how long Kirosh, the manager, like, held them back because I thought the U.S. was there for the taking a couple of times. Now, you could say, like, Iran basically got their win against Wales when Wales was down to 10 men.

They got it basically at the very end of that match and they got destroyed by England in their first match so maybe not like a true titan of international football out there but I thought when they had the ball they moved around pretty well and I thought actually if they had taken more chances

against I think that they were thinking it's a draw and we go through so let's just like let's just try to limit damage where we can yeah that's what that mentality is the thing is though with a draw and we go through. So let's just try to limit damage where we can. Dumb asses. They've got two strikers who would walk right into the US starting 11. And that's where I come with the difference of these international clubs.

The reason why Cerruti likes this is why I can't do it. This would be like, Bill, as if the Astros all of a sudden in the ninth inning of a World Series game were like, and now we're just going to put some guy from Toledo in at third base and see what happens. That's what Shaq Moore feels like. I can't do that on a week-to-week

basis with club soccer. I need the guys who I cheer for to be like, they belong on Liverpool. Yeah, it's tough because I hate being critical. I'm so happy that we have a decent team. We're rooting for these guys. and it's different than if it was like the Patriots or something where you just

get mad at your guys I don't want to get mad at guys in Team USA but like Shaq Moore and Wright today Wright had that drive at the end or the run at the end he should just dribble in the corner and did this awful lefty where all of a sudden that left counter

we have to win by two, right? I can't do this. He's on Fandle. There are 20 different scenarios of what you could have done in that situation, and he did the absolute worst one. It's the only thing you can't do. Like, that's it. Yeah. Black's into the stance. Like, who cares? There was another. Shaq Moore, they were

ISOing like he was Porzingis being pulled into an ISO against Luka Doncic. They were like clearing out on the left side to try to get this one Iranian guy against him. And then he had that one pass where he had the counter and somebody was streaking and he just gave this nice touch pass and then the camera zoomed back

and it just went right to an Iranian guy. But it was rough. If you want to be like, if you want to feel more, let's talk about like what we love about this. Well, let's take a break and then I want to be like, if you want to feel more, let's talk about like what we love about this. Let's take a break. And then I want to talk about MVPs. When you ride transit, please be safe.

Yeah, be safe. Because what you do, others will do too. Others will do it too. So don't take shortcuts across tracks. Don't do that. In fact, just don't walk on tracks at all. Not at all. Trains move quietly, so you won't hear them coming.

You won't hear them coming. See, safe riding sets an example. Yeah, an're going positive. Can we just talk about the winners so far? We've seen three games. Pulisic, look, that was an incredible goal. The best goal in Team USA, at least this century, was that one Landon Donovan goal, right? Yeah, the Algeria goal. Algeria, yeah. That's going to be tough. It's the most significant one. Yeah, and the drama of it. But this goal was amazing. And it was so funny watching Clint Dempsey talk about it at halftime, who's the toughest U.S. player probably ever

and has probably had one of those a week. But he was basically like, I'm so happy that dude finally strapped it on. You could see it. He was dying to say it at the halftime. But that goal was awesome. It was an actual created goal with multiple passes. Deep that goal was awesome. Like, it was an actual, like, creative goal with multiple passes. Deep from McKinney.

He read it early. Like, you watch the replay. He's sprinting. He sees it ahead of time. And that was an amazing goal. And unfortunately, he got hurt. But Suriti is claiming he's fine. Yeah, listen,

I was surprised. Honestly, I thought he, we were in the text chain. I was like, did he just get in the nuts? Like, give him halftime. He'll be back. You know, we'll be fine

in the second half. I was pretty surprised he came off. So, and it comes with being an ab injury. But I'm confident he'll play chain. I was like, did you just get in the nuts? Like give him halftime. He'll be back. You know, we'll be fine. The second half. I was pretty surprised he came off. So, and it comes with being an ab injury, but I'm confident he'll play. But I would say if you're talking positives, I mean, the midfield,

like Musa is today's the 20th birthday. That kid is on freaking believable. This is a kid who grew up in New York or was born in New York city, was in Arsenal's Academy, then moved out to the place for Valencia now in Spain, which is one of the, you know, one of the bigger isish clubs in Spain.

And now he's got all these big kind of Italian giants or bigger clubs looking at him. He's a big freaking deal. And I didn't always see it with him. I thought he was really, really raw. But he is so composed. His forward driving runs are fantastic. I thought McKinney today, he's not fully fit, clearly. He doesn't have the legs to go 90.

But he was great that pass, as you mentioned, to Dest. And then Tyler Adams is just the put-out-fires guy, man. Like, he's just... Wait, we got to do him after. Let's do... What do we have first? With the Pulisic goal? Yeah.

Give me your number two MVP. For me? Out of all those guys you mentioned, are you going to say... Oh, it's Adams. No, Saruti, you were listing dudes. So, Adams, we go? It's unquestionably Adams.

Let's talk Adams. Yeah. Yeah, he's probably the most, Cerruti, you were listing dudes. So Adams, we go? It's unquestionably Adams. Let's talk Adams. Yeah. Yeah, he's probably the most irreplaceable player in the side, I would say. Because we just don't have, like no one else can clean up the messes that he cleans up in front of the back line, which is a little bit suspect.

And especially for bombing our fullbacks forward, like he's the guy that is just putting out fires left and right. He's playing defensive mid. He shows up, he pops up on the left wing and then covers right back. He was all over the field. He's been the most consistent,

most impressive player. Every time Iran tried to get something going, it was usually Adams who was breaking it up. He was the firefighter today. My daughter's been on a lot of different teams. When you have a guy like that, or in her case, a girl,

when you have that, it's like the number one thing you want in soccer. You're just doing everything. I don't even know. What is the basketball equivalent of that person? It's like having a point guard who can defend the other team's best player. Yeah, it's basically like having a Marcus Smart who can defend the point of attack on the other side of the floor.

You know what I mean? Where it's like you can distribute the ball, but you can also take out the main threat from the opposite team. But the thing that I love about him is that he uses his athleticism and his motor. I mean, you've got McKinney is basically done after 60, 65 minutes every game. Yeah. Adams is still crashing into dudes. It's crazy. 96 minutes into a match in the middle of the desert.

Like I, I honestly don't know how he does it. He's also such a badass. Like I feel like if we somehow beat the Dutch on Saturday, but I, Pulisic obviously Captain America, like he's already, he's the anointed one, but Adams is kind of the stealth pick now. What 90s rock band would you say he is? Who do you mean?

If Pulisic is Nirvana? Yeah, who's Spin Magazine being like, no man, Adams is the guy. Yeah, Tyler Adams is like Pavement or something. I don't think that that's actually a very good analogy. I was reaching for that one. It's funny though with the anecdotes with him.

He's so fucking cool. Like I feel like they undersold him in the lead up to the tournament where they're just like, who should be the captain? Like Tyler. It's like, what is it about him? Tyler, what is it about you?

Why did they pick you to be captain? Because I have a presence because I'm different. Like he's got so much confidence, but it's all earned captain? Because I have a presence. Because I'm different. He's got so much confidence, but it's all earned. And then he plays like it. These guys are rare. I was talking with the Stadio guys about this after the USA-England game, but it's really cool how

essentially Tyler Adams and Brendan Aronson have both made this progression through... When they first got to Europe, they played for these two different Red Bull teams, Leipzig and Salzburg. And then now they're both on Leeds. And Leeds is coached by Jesse March, but played this very high-octane run, run, run,

press, press. Everything is coming out of these counter-pressing motions where you're trying to jump on teams when they have the ball in their own third. And you can just see the tactical acumen that both of those guys have, but also combine that with just the full out, like, I just run until I bust a lung.

And I feel like this team really needed that. I feel like we really needed something that was like an identity thing. Like, the US will run you off the field is a very cool identity thing. And one thing that you've noticed watching a lot of other World Cup matches is that these teams are,

a lot of them are there. They're anchored by guys who were in the middle of their club season. They've played a lot of football. They're going to have to play a lot of football. And even though the world cup is probably the most important games that they'll play, I know there, there's something to be said for the young legs of the U S kind of like

as their, as their sort of signature here. Don't you think so? So Rudy, I think, I think you bring up a great point is that, you know, we've got all these exciting young players

and they're playing at big clubs. It's Pulisic, it's Gio, it's whatever. And all this attacking talent, these guys that we know. But like the DNA of what makes a U.S. team successful is that they work hard and they run around

and they're a pain in the ass to play against and they don't let you score. And so you need guys like Adams, like Clint Dempsey back in the day. Like some of those guys, they're just like grit masters. And yes, like we have all these sexy names

in like 2026 and oh my God, they're going to be like coming into this tournament. They're going to be hitting their primes. Like we're going to be, it's going to be like Barcelona of the international team. Like at the end of the day,

our core is that we work our asses off and it's, we're just paying the ass to play against. And you, we have to have a guy like Adams, even, you know, Moussa's just difficult to get off the ball. The midfield itself, it's the heart of the team.

And they kind of fit. The puzzle pieces fit really well together. And that is the pride and joy of this team. It's cool. Yeah, you want to go out there and score two, three goals and play quote-unquote champagne football. That's fine.

That usually doesn't happen in international tournaments. Like I said, that happens in club tournaments, not international tournaments. That's why France, who has all these world beaters, they just play so conservative because they know that their talent

is likely going to win out. Yeah, and if they get Mbappe on the break, it's a wrap. Yeah, so us just being this incredibly difficult team to play against and having this fortitude and grit to us,

that is what we are. And that's why I was a little bit afraid because Berhalter wants to bring this progressive style and pass come out from the back. It's like, do we have the players to do that?

At the end of the day, like today, you grind out a win and you get results. And that's what we do as a soccer country. So Rudy, the hair on my arm is standing up. You should run for Senator in Connecticut. Come on, man. Ted Lasso, let's go. I wish Jeff Bezos was listening

because he should go get us a striker. Just get one from another country. Are we allowed to steal strikers from other countries? It's pretty much open season at this point, yeah. Yeah, let's go get one. Can we get somebody who's like six foot three and can kick a free kick? Well, we did.

And head in some corners? We did steal Sergino Dest away from the Dutch. So this could be a potential revenge game for them. Yeah, and Yunus Musa played in the youth teams for England. Yeah. So this could be like, hey, we never know. A revenge game for them. Yeah, and Yunus Musa played in the youth teams for England. Yeah. So this could be like, you know, hey, you never know, a revenge game for them. But they genuinely wanted Sergino Das to be on their team,

and he chose the U.S. over the Netherlands. All right, so winners. Pool six kick. Adams. In general, the team speed that we have is really impressive. It's the first time I feel like we're at least playing on the same gear as some of these other teams. I think the goalie's been good.

He had the one that would fuck up in the last five minutes. He didn't have to do a lot against Iran. Yeah, but he's confident. You almost feel like goalie is like quarterback in the NFL. You want your goalie to seem like he's cool and he's poised and he's in the right spots, but there's an aura to him that, that I like.

I know I didn't follow as, as well as you guys. Like this was, this was kind of a process that led to him being the guy. When, when did he, when did he become the guy? Yeah.

They just chose him over Zach Stephan, right? Right. Pretty much like right before the tournament. I mean, Stephan was the guy in qualifying, but if you looked at the stats, Stephan was one of the worst keepers in all of conca cap qualifying and you know he played at manchester city which massive club obviously but he's the backup to ederson who's

one of the best goalkeepers in the world so he didn't play a ton um and then he plays in an fa i think it was an fa cup or i figured it was the fa cup or the efl cup and he has a terrible terrible game and he's really never been the same since i'm talking about stefan and he goes at the middlesbrough on loan he's he hasn't a good season there so i think burr halter wanted him all along to be the guy but matt turner just beat him out for the job and now matt turner's the backup at arsenal and the thing of the thing that's funny about it is like matt turner was a kid who like didn't even really want to play soccer he played soccer because he played other he was like a basketball player in high school it's like sure i'll play soccer to stay in shape.

He goes to Fairfield University, ends up going into the MLS draft. He came out of absolutely nowhere to be the U.S.'s number one. And I think what was a huge kind of maybe question mark coming into the tournament is now a position of strength. Yeah, I feel good with him. And I got to say, Zimmerman made me nervous. When he came on? And I didn't know if it was just me. I mean, he was good today.

I'm saying the first two games. And they came back to Lawless in the postgame show. And Lawless kind of laid him out a little bit. He was just like, I don't like the way this, you know, he made the penalty in the first game, but I didn't like the way he played. Or was the penalty in the second game, I'm blanking. No, it was the first game. The penalty was the first match

against Wales, yeah. The second game, he's like, I didn't like the way he seemed uneasy with the ball. He was making me nervous. And it's like, for Alexi to say that,

that's basically the position he knows. Yeah, and it's nice to get, I mean, in that sense, it makes sense that Greg went with CCV who's a little bit better

distributing from deep and you got Reem kind of makes those like conquering runs up the field. But Cameron Carter-Vickers can really distribute from deep. Speaking of Greg. He was good in the game today.

He headed like 100 balls in 10 minutes. Speaking of Greg, though, I mean, the monkey's kind of off his back. I mean, if they don't make it through the group stage, he's got to be gone, I would assume. And now you're kind of playing with house money. You're not expected to beat the Dutch.

And I actually kind of sneaky like this matchup for the U.S. I don't think the Dutch are that scary. They'll probably beat us, but you never know. And he's made some questionable decisions, some that have worked out and some that haven't. I don't want to say Berhalter is a winner, but for a lot of the people, including myself, who had serious doubts about the way that he structured this team and the basically US soccer in general. I think he's got to feel pretty good about himself. As a preview to the match on Saturday,

if you did not enjoy this match against Iran, like I don't think you're going to love this match against Netherlands because this is going to be another grinded out match. I think. Chris, there's two things I hate more than anything else. Intolerance of other people's cultures and the Dutch. Austin Powers 3, anybody? Love it.

What's our line for that game? Oh, Netherlands minus 245 on FanDuel. The 90-minute result. You could get a tie for plus 230. The over under two and a half goals. What's the Gakpo

and Netherlands win? The which one? Gakpo to score and Netherlands to win. What's that? They don't have that. They don't have the players yet. I will say that this is granted I'm a super square.

I like us in the first half in any game. If I'm another team scouting us, I'm just like, hold on for the first half. That's what I thought he was doing. Yeah, I agree with you. These idiots are going to tire each other out and at the 65 minute

mark, we strike. Because these guys, I just don't think it's sustainable to run around like that. The soft underbelly of the US is the moments when McKinney is tired but they haven't made the subs yet. And it's like there is that 60, 65th minute

where I feel like there's a lot of vulnerability for the US. Iran just wasn't able to make it work today. I don't know that we'll get as lucky against Netherlands. So Rudy, what happened to our guy Yedlin? You know, he played against Wales and all of a sudden now

that's the thing. If Shaq Moore played two matches, he played Yedlin in the first match. We have Joe Scali who's on the bench too, who's 19, but still he plays right back as well. I don't know what Yedlin did to not to be out of the rotation. I don't think he did anything wrong against Wales, but he apparently is just out of the rotation now. I don't really get it. I mean, at the end of the day, Dest doesn't have 90 minutes in him either. He runs up and down the pitch, so he doesn't really have that in him as well. So you know

you're going to need a sub every time. We got to get that figured out because that's a massive, massive glaring hole. And you guys talking about the first half, I totally agree with you. And the bad thing is the Dutch are a second half team. They basically won every match in the second half of group stage. Jesus. Well, I think overall a success. Why wasn't Pepe

on this roster? I know he sucked in internationals. I get it. But then you watch the high forwards we had and it's like, maybe take the chance on the young, talented guy. It's not like,

it's not like we have Clint Dempsey out there. It doesn't make a ton of sense. I mean, the only argument that you could make is, because there's another guy, Jordan Peefock, who plays for,

what is it, Union Berlin, I believe, in the Bundesliga in Germany, who I would have taken over pretty much any of these guys that we have in Stryker. I would have definitely brought Weir. Yeah, Weir I consider more of a wide player. But of the

four Strykers that they brought, Ferreira, Sargent, Haji, and I'm blanking on somebody. To me, he was the best one. The thing with Pepe is he was just horrendously out of form for the US. Now, he was the best one. The thing with Pepe is he was just horrendously out of form for the U.S. Now, he scored some goals.

He plays in the Dutch League, but everybody kind of scores in the Dutch League, so it's not really that impressive. When he was in the German League, he didn't score any goals. Granted, it was for a bad team. So I think it was just Greg going, this guy is just not even remotely informed for us,

even though he scored a couple big goals in qualifying. The question is, if you do that, why do you bring Haji Wright in, who has really zero history of scoring any goals with the U.S.? You can't have both things. Both of them don't really add up. Again, I don't think it really matters in the grand scheme of things, but I would have probably brought Pepe now.

Chris, would you rather have Haji Wright or John Morant for the Dutch game? 20 minutes of John Morant never having played soccer before or Haji Wright. Or Haji Wright. I would probably

go with Haji just because I've seen him kick a football and I've never seen Ja do that, but I get your point. If we're throwing away the high forward position, can we at least have somebody who's going to jump into a pile on a corner kick and potentially quarter one in?

Yeah. I don't know. This is the like, could you imagine Russell Westbrook playing right back on LeBron James and goal? Like this is that. I mean, let's just get Evan Mobley in the box for the last five minutes. Just John Moran.

No, nobody else. Just John Moran. It's only what I want. Just for the corners. We do seem short on the corners too. And maybe that's why Pulisic wants to take the corners. Who knows?

Yeah, we're not like a very powerful set piece team. So far so good though. Not powerful. We're impotent. Yeah. So your prediction is tough first half and then the Dutch kind of squirrel us away down the stretch. It seems like the realistic prediction.

Plus, we don't know how healthy Pulisic's going to be. So I'm going into Saturday really hanging on to the memory of the England match because England was in the Eurofinals. England's one of the best teams in the world on their day. I think if we can hang with them, we can hang with almost anyone. And there's a couple of different ways

the Netherlands match can go, but I'm really hanging on to this idea that if the US can hang with England for 90 minutes, there's no reason why they can't make this a really difficult match. Netherlands have a striker right now who is up there with Mbappe in terms of being in form.

Cody Gakbo is like a co-leader for Golden Boot right now and seems to just be like burying everything he gets served. They have a very well-drilled team. It's not the most exciting team. So I do think that there's an opportunity there for an upset, but I think Netherlands are definitely the favorites. Yeah, like I said, the good thing is

there's no real pressure on the U.S. in this game. You've kind of accomplished what your goal is and you're not playing like a world beater. The Dutch typically are a really, really good, like one of the elite teams, but the last four or five or so years, they really haven't been there. I'm not expecting a win.

I don't think it's impossible. I could see 2-1. I could see us getting a goal early, maybe potentially coming out on fire, as you guys said, and then just kind of like slowly being grinded down by what is like still a really talented Dutch team. Well, one other wrinkle for this, which is bad for the 70-minute Team USA.

We have extra time. Then we have, what, the two 15-minute periods? And then the PKs. Does this team... Can you imagine this nucleus of guys that we just watched being able to play a 120 minute soccer game? Yeah, but the Netherlands

will have to do the same. You know what I mean? The Dutch will have to be there at the same time. It's not like they're like they're like so psyched to be out there for an hour and 35 minutes

135 minutes in the desert. That made me feel better, CR. Yeah. I was just watching Moussa stumble around today like he was Bradley Cooper in Limitless when the drug started to wear off.

Because he ran 40 miles in Qatar at full speed and finally started to feel the after effects. I was just a little worried about that 80 to 120 minute mark. But look, man. Hey, if we get to extra time, I'll take it. I don't care.

We made it to Saturday. We just wanted to make it to Saturday. What's going to be better? What time is this game? 11 a.m. Saturday? I think it'll probably be 11. I think it's 10 Eastern. Bloody Marys, can you drink during these games, CR? Do I? No. These

are just too tense. The way that they play, it's like Cerruti says, it's just like it can't happen. I might have a drink during this game. I can't handle it. You should do your old-fashioned, like you do the Bloody Mary in one and then the Venti coffee in the other and just see if you can get the old Phil Simmons speedball going.

Maybe like a beet juice too just to get all the senses going. Beet juice with some ginger. Just freehand it. I'm so excited that we made it to Saturday. I think it absolutely would have sucked to draw against Iran with a goal in the last 10 minutes

and then watch the Netherlands beat them by like 6-1 on Saturday and just be like, you gotta be kidding me. Have you watched much other matches besides the US ones? I've been watching the ones at 8 in the morning, whatever that

game is, as I'm doing works in the mornings. But I got to be honest, I think the early round stuff, we probably had the most interesting bracket. But for the most part, the games are pretty one-sided or they'll stay close for 60 minutes. I feel like

this weekend is when it's going to get going. Yeah, the Brazil matches so far have been pretty exciting. Yeah. The first Spain match was, like, pretty mind-blowing just to see those... Like, they have a bunch of young midfielders from Barcelona, especially, who are kind of coming of age in the tournament.

The one Portugal match was fun. Portugal's, like... Portugal might be a sneaky contender here. Yeah, I was going to ask you about that before we go. Portugal's 12-1 right now. The long shot that I thought was really intriguing was Croatia because I thought Croatia was good. I think they're a little bit...

Was Croatia good? They are good, but I think that they... If you're talking about legs, I think they might be a little old to be running around in the desert for a month. I know the team doesn't have a striker. Well, 49-1. That jumped out to me. desert for a month. That 49-1, that jumped out to me.

That seemed high. We're 90-1, just for the record. So what would be, if you had to pick, under your head, CR, who are you taking? Oh, it's easy. I'll just go France. Plus 550. They're not the favorites. Who do you have, Cerruti? I liked Spain, man. I really do i think

the germany game i think they kind of knew that they didn't need to necessarily win that game the seven nil against costa rica was just like a oh my god moment and i i just i just i like that they got a lot of they got some young players they got some veteran players like i just really like that team i think they what are they plus 800 plus 750 something around there i i really like 650 if you're kind of new to this sport or you really only watched during the World Cup, watch Spain and watch Gavi and Pedri on Spain. They are like these two really young midfielders

who play for Barcelona and they are just unbelievable to watch. Chris, many people are saying that I love the 4-3-3 and they're right. I do. But I do think we should investigate prongs or a false line.

And get Aronson out there before the fucking 60-minute mark. Heat by orders. Now, can we see Aronson? Can he play more than 25 minutes? I don't know. I mean, Christian declaring himself available from the hospital bed.

Like, there's another chapter there. Like, he looked incredibly injured, to put it politely, after that. Yeah, he did. So I'm sure he could probably get himself ready for Saturday. But abdomen injury is tough.

Well, it might have been bruised ribs. And I've had bruised ribs and they fucking hurt for like three days. I don't know, but they seem to be shielding the cameras from seeing Christian looking down at his body. So I was assuming it had something to do with the genital area, to be completely frank with you.

Yeah. Brush it off. Yeah. Rub a little dirt on it. Let's go. All right. So Rudy, thanks for taking a break from your very exciting domestic life. It's good to see your face.

Changing diapers. Thanks, guys. Good to see you. Bill, can I plug something really quick? The watch? I'm not. No. For my plug, I want to say everybody should subscribe to Stadio or Righty's House or

Counterpress. They're the three football soccer shows that we have and they're all excellent. We just added Counterpress. Yeah. Our soccer stuff's been great. All right. Good to see you guys. All right. Warren Sharp is here from Sharp Football. You can hear him on the Ringer gambling show, an awesome gambling show on Wednesdays and Fridays

with my good friend, Joe House. And we're going to talk about lessons we have learned so far in the football gambling season. I'm getting killed a million dollar picks. And I think one of the reasons I'm getting killed is because so much is changing from Thursday to Sunday. This is the first track. Remember where the stuff I'm betting on Sunday and Monday is for the most part different than how I felt on Thursday. What is going on with the markets, the way things are moving? Is it moving way differently this year? Are there more injuries?

What's happening? Well, we're seeing a lot more variance in the way that scoring is occurring and closer games, which is leading to an increase in variance. I also know from listening to some of your million dollar picks, one of the things that you tend to like to do is parlay things together, combine things together. And in a season where there's more variance, that creates havoc in trying to combine things together as often as I think that you are doing.

But we were also- Wait, can I interrupt you on that? Yeah, of course. I made the decision after last week that I'm just doing straight up bets the rest of the way for exactly what you said. The parlays and teasers, which have been very productive, I think I'm like three and 10 this year when parlays. The straight ups have been much better.

But yeah, I think- I was going to advise that. Look, part of what we're going to do on the show, hopefully, is to give you and everybody who's listening some advice to kind of turn things around for them this season. But that was one of my biggest recommendations to you that I think will help improve your results. Well, one of the things, so I did PowerPoll. I did one last week, and then I did another one.

And I feel like I have a good feel for who's good. I really liked Pittsburgh last night. I thought Indianapolis for frauds, but we've seen the frauds over and over again, pull games out of their asses. You see situations like green babies somehow beats Dallas and then gives up a hundred million yards to Philly, you know,

a short time later. And you're like, wait, well, how is that the same team? But I do think we're hitting a stage of the season where we kind of know who sucks, who's good, and who are kind of the teams to avoid, right? We at least know the categories of those three teams.

Like Houston sucks. The Rams suck. Denver sucks. If you're betting on Arizona, you need to have your head examined. If you're betting against Vegas, just be careful. Vegas is weird. We don't know what we're getting from them either way and so on. And then when you go to the top end teams, the KC, Philly, San Francisco, Dallas, Miami, maybe Buffalo, depending on Josh, they're fairly reliable. But other than that, everybody else in the middle,

who the hell knows, right? Well, we're also, I think with some of these teams, I believe we're going to see an improvement. I noted five things that I want to discuss with you here about things I've observed. And one of them is going to be red zone efficiency. And I think for some of these teams, some of the better teams that end up dropping some games that you're like, how did this happen? Why did this result occur? I think some of those teams and specifically those offenses are going to get back on track down the stretch because of improved red zone efficiency is what I believe will happen. Is one of those teams going to be New England who has just punted

away chances in the red zones for three months? Yes, I think that they should be able to improve, but we could start with the red zone or we can start with teams taking their foot off the gas light. Both are very interesting observations that are very different this year. Let's start with the red zone. All right. So your number one thing we've learned through 12 weeks is the red zone what?

Red zone offense has been terrible. The rate of drives into the red zone that score points has fallen from last year to this year. And it's the worst rate that we have seen since 2011. Now, naturally what you might think the first thing that I thought was, okay, so drives are scoring less often. That's because teams are going for more on fourth down. And so, yeah, they're not going to kick as many field goals, but they're going to score more touchdowns.

The rate of drives will be fewer actual scores, but you will see more points because more touchdowns, but that's not happening either. We're seeing only 4.8 points scored per red zone drive. We haven't seen fewer than that scored per red zone drive since 2014. So the question is what's happening, what's going on? Well, we know that defenses are playing offenses a little bit differently. What is working? Let's first start there. What is working? Handing the ball off to your running back is working. We are seeing EPA per play from running backs at plus 0.04, identical to last year, and it hasn't been topped since 2008. So handing the ball off to your running backs, especially when you've spread out the defense, has been working in the red zone.

Running in the red zone is always a place that you would want to operate. It always is generally plus CV, especially when you're operating from spread, but it is working this year. Design quarterback runs, those are fine. Those are working well. Those have slightly below 2021 production, but it's still in line with what we've been seeing and it's better than 2019 and 2020. Quarterback scrambles are doing great, well above average, especially better than what we saw last year.

So scrambling your quarterback inside the red zone, especially when the first look isn't there on a pass play, has been very good as well. But what's not working is quarterback dropping back to pass the football they're delivering. So true media data, which is what I'm using for this, goes back to 2000. Quarterback pass attempts have the worst efficiency since at least 2000. I can't, I'm not looking back at 1999. It's not in the database. Quarterbacks are averaging

negative 0.03 EPA per dropback work since 2000. And if you remove sacks, spikes, throwaways, et cetera, and focus only on passing attempts, they're at plus 0.07 EPA. Like that's half of what it was last year, which is 0.15, half of what it was in 2020, which is 0.14, 0.17 and, and 18 was 0.16. The bottom line here is they're bad. And one of the ways that they are bad is when they are not being blitzed. When they are being blitzed, it's not that big of a deal. They're figuring out where to go on the hots. But when they are not being blitzed, they are still taking too much pressure. They are holding onto the ball for an average of 2.63 seconds before passing, which is

the number two highest length of time held onto the ball since 2000. Again, we can't go beyond that. And so that's where it's really falling off. So teams need to do a better job. And I think some of the better teams will, studying what works and what doesn't work inside the red zone, formulate a better plan to call their pass plays because handing the ball to your running back and scrambling your quarterback, that is working. But right now, these quarterbacks are still struggling against the way the defenses are playing right now to have efficiency when they're actually throwing the ball. It's interesting.

As you're talking about that, I looked up the red zone rankings this year, right? Denver's last, no surprise, 37.5%. New England, Houston, Indianapolis is 29th, Seattle, Tampa, Las Vegas, Pittsburgh. That's the bottom eight. Seven of those quarterbacks are not really moving around. Well, I guess Pickett's been moving around a little bit, but Matt Ryan, Brady, Davis Mills, Matt Jones, Russell Wilson's been a disaster anytime he's moving around. And then you look on the flip side, Philly, like no surprise, they're number one. But Detroit, to your point, loves to hand it off inside the 20. Like Jamal Williams, he's been, I don't know how many touchdowns he has. He has like 10 or 11. Cincinnati's another

one, Dallas, Tennessee, and then KC would be your outlier at six because of Mahomes, but he's Mahomes. And he's mobile, so he's running. He's scrambling around a little bit more, which we know is working. Yeah. And then Miami's seven, Arizona eight, which is hilarious because it's basically just Kyler screaming around, but yeah. And then Atlanta and Cleveland, Atlanta and Cleveland round out the top 10 and they both are teams that like to run the football down inside the red zone.

Right. So why is this different than any other year? I guess would be my question. Why in 2022? Yeah, it's in part the way that the defenses are playing these quarterbacks inside the red zone. And again, like I said, I've been able to isolate it to when the quarterbacks aren the red zone. And again, like I said, I've been able to isolate

it to when the quarterbacks aren't being blitzed. And so defenses are dropping back. The quarterback's first read isn't there. So they're going through their progressions, but then pressure ultimately ends up getting there. They're still being pressured on like 25% of dropbacks, which is not above normal, but the quarterbacks are being pressured there. And then they're trying to figure out where to go with the football. And particularly these guys, as you mentioned, that aren't as mobile, that do hang around in the pocket for a long time. Brady. They are struggling to find somebody to throw the ball. And then we see it all the time,

just with Brady. He'll just fall down and take a sack because his first couple reads are covered and the pressure's starting to get near him. And he like gets scared and spooked and just lays on the ground. Or you have, I think we can officially call it the Zach Wilson. The, oh, my first guy's not there. My second guy's not there. I'm just going to start running to the right. Oh no, somebody's coming at me. And then either a panic, throw inbounds or just out of the sidelines. But there's been a lot of Zach Wilson's this year. There have been. And so this is why I do think this will improve. I think teams are going to take closer looks, especially those that are in playoff contention at what we need to do to improve our efficiency down inside of the red zone. I think they're going to figure out that if they hand the ball off more or run their quarterback, they're doing

pretty well. And they're going to look at the past drop backs, especially when they're not being blissed and figure out better plays to call and better ways to coach their quarterback to have efficiency down inside of the red zone against the defensive looks that they're seeing. And I do think they'll get back on track when you look at some of those teams that have decent enough quarterbacks, but are struggling down inside the red zone. If they're not morons, they'll figure out what to do over the last month and a half of the season here. Can I tell you something though? I am disappointed that the answer wasn't everybody's being too aggressive on fourth down. I think that would have been a much more fun answer because it does seem like that Dan Campbell's and how many times have we seen Brandon Staley, all these people getting super aggressive?

We did have a good week for aggressiveness with two teams going for the win on the two points. It comes and it goes. But there's more to me the situational situations when being needless to aggro aggressive, when I don't know what the upside is. When you're on your own 37 and it's fourth and one, like what, what's the upside? The downside seems to outweigh the upside so much, especially if your offense isn't very good.

You know, if you have few, if you're Arizona, I don't trust Arizona to get a yard ever. Right. I don't want to be fourth and one of my own 37, but they'll do it. Like, Oh,

let's be aggressive. That's the part I don't get. It's, it's definitely swinging some things and that plays into kind of what some teams are doing in this late game situation here that's also really different than what we've seen in years past. Point number two. Point number two to me. Yeah, let's hear it. Okay. So teams are taking their foot off the gas late in games. Second half scoring is massively down from teams that are leading in games. And that is helping if you want to bet on teams, on the team that's losing in the second half,

live betting, in-game betting, you're going to have more success. So here are the numbers through week 12. So you're talking like Miami-Houston last week, where it's like Miami 30, Houston 6, and then Miami basically rolls over for the rest of the game. Most every team that's leading, this is applicable to, but that game obviously was there. And they fall into the third point I'm going to make, which is derivative markets and ways that we can attack that a little bit differently this year to take advantage of some of this stuff. But what we're seeing is through the first 12 weeks, 106 games have been decided by one score. Last year, that was 85, right? Not

even close. 85 through week 12 last year, 106 this year. We haven't seen more games decided by one score since 1989 over the first 12 weeks of the season. That was a long time ago. We've seen 39 games where a team that was trailing entering the fourth quarter came back to win the game. That's the most of any season since 2011. So the question is why? Again, we have to ask, why are there so many close games and lead changes? Well, part of the reason is that the teams that are leading at halftime are averaging just 9.5 points scored in the second half. That's nearly 25% down from last year when teams were averaging 12.3 points scored in the second half if they were leading at halftime. And from 2010 through 2021, we've seen no fewer than 10.5 second half points scored when you're leading

for any team. The average has been 11.2. We're seeing nearly two points fewer than that by these teams that are leading. And part of it is that the point margins then shrink. When you're scoring only nine and a half points, you're allowing 11.4 this season. And so on average teams, if you are leading at halftime, your opponent is outscoring you in the second half by an average of 1.9 points. We haven't seen anything close to that. Last year, the teams that were up at halftime outscored the team that was down by 1.2 points. They weren't being outscored themselves. And now this completely being flipped. And in part, it's because of the way the teams that are trailing are playing defense. They're not

sending out these blitzes and giving up big plays. They're forcing the teams that are trailing or playing defense, they're not like sending out these blitzes and giving up big plays. They're forcing the teams that are leading to take it slow, to run the ball, to try to convert on third down. They're forcing more third downs, trying to make it so that those third downs are being converted. And then what we see is when the teams are leading,

they tend to play prevent defense, look at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in their game against Cleveland. Like they're letting- Can we not look at them? Trust me, I was the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in, in, in their game against Cleveland. Like they're, they're letting me not, can we not look at them? Trust me. I was on Tampa minus three. Can we not look at that game? I hated it.

Um, but did you like, did you like the six punts in the last hour of the game by Tampa? Todd Bowles, I mean, does not deserve to continue being the head coach there with those types of decisions on fourth and two, take it, taking the delay of game and then refusing to pass the ball with Tom Brady because you're scared he's going to throw an interception. Have you ever seen anything like the up seven on the Cleveland 37, fourth and two, delay of game so you could punt it into the end zone sequence? And I don't even know if that was their worst sequence because they got the ball back with 2.45 left. They just needed a first down. Somehow they gave Cleveland the ball back with a ton of time.

It was unbelievable. Yeah. They were so bad. The conservative nature of that coach is really mind-boggling to me. But wait a second. On that point, because I know coaching was worse in the 70s and 80s. It definitely was. If you go back and you watch NFL films and you see guys like... We had characters that were coaches like Bum Phillips and Jerry Glanville. We had people that were half

dead like Raymond Berry. I know they put in more time now, but I also feel like the coaching is so bad. You watch these games. Tampa, it's impossible for them not to beat Cleveland. It even comes down to a fourth and 10, Najoku having to basically do an Odell just to get an overtime. And even then Tampa should win. And I just feel like there's so many bad coaches this year and so many dumb things. And I thought this was going to get better, not worse. Well, look, this is what I don't have. I find to be unacceptable is more coaches. I've talked to teams. I've presented this philosophy to them. Uh, but I believe coaches need to attend crisis management courses in the off season to figure out how to make decisions under pressure like

they do in the military, because there are courses that are offered to do that. And I've pitched it to teams, but more of them must take this because it is challenging when you are the one and people think, oh, you got 25 seconds in between plays or whatever. No, you have to call that play within like a couple of seconds to get the right personnel out on the field to then execute the play. And that's why I couldn't believe the Jeff Saturday thing where he wasn't calling the timeouts for, you know, over a minute and they they were calling three different plays. And it's like, look, I understand that technically speaking, you maybe could have thrown three end zone shots and scored if you had gotten that first down on fourth down with 30 seconds left. But that's besides the point. The plays that you were calling in were suboptimal because you got this young kid who's 31 years old who's never called plays before up there trying to rattle them down with the same personnel. And it's so stressful for this guy to call the right plays. And then afterwards, finally, Jeff Saturday today, last night, he defended the decision. Right. He said he had plenty of timeouts.

Yeah. He's like, yeah, but that's great. There's 30 seconds left. Right. And he's like, time isn't an issue. We just weren't executing. Well, the reason you weren't executing is because you didn't have the best play in there and the right personnel groupings to execute on the down and distance that you needed. And that was because you were trying to just keep the personnel out there and get a play in super quick from a guy who has no experience calling plays. I mean, it's hard enough if you've got like a Andy Reid or a Brian Dayball calling plays, not this kid who's never called him before. And then the other thing, I just feel like there's so much sloppiness. And I don't know whether it's because the season is longer. And even if it's one week, if it's messed with

everybody's brains. But even just watching certain teams try to do a two-minute drill, have you ever seen dumber decisions in a two-minute drill? Two-minute drill 101, don't throw a short pass. That's complete. That kills 25 seconds on the clock. Right. My son's high school football team. We were coming back once and we did that and you know, it was complete for three yards. And I was like, Oh my God. And my wife's like, why, why are you mad? We caught it. I'm like, yeah, we just set 25 seconds on fire. That's bad. We don't, that never, but yet in the NFL, we see nobody gets to the out of bounds. The Patriots had Hunter Henry Thursday night.

Remember, he was running down the sidelines and he stayed in bounds instead of just going out of bounds. They had to use timeout. It feels like all these players are getting dumber. I don't get it. Well, I think they're not being put in enough situations because practice time is lower now than it ever has been. That's what it is. They're not practicing put in enough situations to, because practice time is lower now than it ever has been. That's what it is.

Yeah. They're not practicing game management stuff. You're probably right. That's what it is. I was talking a little bit about some of the short yardage stuff, although I've been finding that in the red zone, the run plays in general have been fine, but situational football, right? Like two minute drill, four short yardage situations.

These offices just aren't practicing them nearly as much as they once used to when practice time was virtually unlimited. You could do whatever you wanted to. And I think it is costing these teams. And then, you know, in addition to that crisis management course that I would make coaches take, I would also force them to play Madden every summer, you know, force them to play a certain amount of time because these you and I, we gamble basically for a living more or less. I mean, you obviously do a lot more than that, but like I'm sitting here, I'm betting on games. I'm watching every single game that's being played

every single week. These coaches aren't doing that. They're watching like cutups of film and they're watching like rewatching their own game cut up. Like, but, having watched so much of it, know when to call a timeout, know that this play isn't going to work in this situation. Know you can't catch that pass on second and 10 in the two-minute drive. You're running back, got to drop it even if your quarterback's checking it down so that he's not going to take a sack. There are certain things you can't do, but these coaches don't realize it because they're not seeing the big picture play out so often. But when you're in the Madden situation, you're executing those things all the time, so many times per day, if you play that for an hour to a day. Yeah, you know what it is? We've put in our Gladwell 10,000 hours for second guessing what

we're watching in a football game. I was even in my son's playoff game. We had the ball. We're down five with the ball first down. It's like two and a half minutes left. And at that point, I'm just thinking like, I don't want the other team to get the ball back. We're like inside the 20, like hand the ball off first down, shoot some clock, maybe play action second down. But whatever we do, the clock is now our friend. Don't let them get the ball back. So of course, we burned through it quick, missed the field goal, they had two minutes left, and all of a sudden it was 19-7.

And I was like having a heart attack because I've watched this on my TVs every Sunday where teams screw up that clock is my friend moment. I remember writing 20 years ago that they should have some 15-year-old kid with pimples next to the coach who's played like a million hours of Madden. Just like Jeff Saturday. I mean, they pulled Jeff Saturday out of the ESPN booth. They might as well give him like a 15-year-old who's played Madden all the time. Just be like, call timeout right

now. Just do it. That's his only job. Call timeout right now. Just do it. The thing is, Indy has two good analytics guys. Like I've met these guys before. They're very smart and they know what they're doing. And, but remember that initial- Yeah, but your point's the right point. It goes so fast. I think they just kind of get discombobulated.

Yeah. And maybe they were telling him and he wasn't listening. Maybe they were scared. Like, I don't know what the dynamic was there, but remember that opening press conference, Ursae pounding the table saying like, teams rely too much on analytics and then they get messed up. And that's what we're not going to do. And maybe Saturday's like, screw it. I'm going with my gut. I don't think we should run.

Like, let's just keep going. Who knows what he was doing, but it was obviously wrong. Go to number three. Okay. So the third one is derivative market betting is better now than ever. There's more options now than ever. And in a season like we're seeing play out, it's more valuable than ever. So back when we started gambling and you started longer than I did, I mean, you didn't have all these derivative markets and certainly not open as early as they are now. But with so much competition in the betting marketplace and legalization and so many more outs being opened up. You can bet on so many different things well before pre-flop. And so there are certain teams that I won't bet on in the full game.

There are certain teams that I won't bet on in the first half. There are certain teams that I will only bet their total over or under in the first half, and I won't do it for the full game. There's a variety of different examples. I mean, like if you look at the Miami Dolphins, you just talked about them against the Houston Texans. A good bet to make in the second half was a bet on the Houston Texans. But the Dolphins, they score early. Since Tua came back,

they're the number two best first half point margin, but they've only outscored their opponents by 10 points total in the second half over five games that they've played since Tua has been back. The Chargers are a team that just does not score offensively in the second half of games, number 28th in the NFL. You look at the script from the Tennessee Titans, one of the best first half teams out there, they fall off the rails typically in the second half of games. The same

is true on the defensive side of the ball. If you look at a team like the Eagles, who the Titans are going to be playing this week, the Eagles allow 5.7 points per game in the first quarter. That's number two worst of all teams. So you got a great first quarter and first half team in the Titans going up against one of the worst defenses in the first half. That's an opportunity for like a first half bet on the Titans. Although the market wasn't out yet when I was, uh out yet before we're recording this. You look at some of the defensive adjustments that these teams make at halftime. If you're betting on the Bengals, you should almost always bet them full game, not the first half, because

Lou Anarumo's defensive adjustments are absolutely elite. They have the number four- What are their stats? Their second half stats are insane, right? Yeah. Well, for a while there, they weren't allowing a single touchdown score for 15 games in a row, something like that. They have this season alone, because it dates back to last year too, but just looking at this season, they have the number four best second half point differential. They're allowing just seven points per game in the second half, which is also fourth best. D'Amico Ryan's in the San Francisco 49ers, another team that's making really good adjustments at halftime. Although I will say that this is a great game to talk about because Tua is playing the 49ers this week and now Tua

is going to be down as left tackle, but the 49ers have been stellar inside the red zone. And the Miami Dolphins have been one of the few teams that's been great down inside of the red zone. And they're playing without Toronto Amstead, the left tackle. So that's going to be a problem against this defense, but I'm really going to look forward to seeing how they match up against, you know, the former defense that Mike McDaniel was at with the 49ers. We talk about the Baltimore Ravens blowing all these leads. They continue to do it. They did it yet again against the Jaguars. We talk about Lamar Jackson, not playing as well. The reality too, though, is their defense is allowing 13 points on average in the second half of games this year. That's one, that's the fourth worst in the NFL. And the teams that are

like number one, two, three worst, plus the number five worst, like you're like, oh yeah, these defenses stink. But then like the Baltimore Ravens, that's a defense that you view as decent, and they're allowing so many points. So their defense coordinator, Mike McDonald, has not been calling good plays in the second half of games. The strategy hasn't been sound. So there's

a variety of... They're definitely in an are-we-sure-they're-good team, Baltimore. Yeah, well, yeah, for sure. 100%. I mean, they can't run the ball to save their life to protect the lead, right? And as you said, their defense, yeah, and their defense just doesn't get stops over and over again.

I'm starting to, I think Cincinnati can take that division. I was looking at that bet because I think Baltimore is still favored in that. But yeah, they're minus 240 and the Bengals are plus 210. Yeah, well, I'm worried about, they're minus 240 and the Bengals are plus 210. Yeah. Well, I'm worried about, I got some futures on the Baltimore Ravens and I too,

I'm worried about the way that, I mean, what Cincinnati has been doing and that's without Jamar Chase. That is a little concerning, but last week's game was a perfect example. You had a lot of sharp guys lining up on the Tennessee Titans against the Cincinnati Bengals. Tennessee was that home. I lined up on him. Okay. So I was too, but you know what I did? I bet Tennessee plus one and a half in the first half. I didn't bet him for the full game, Tennessee because Cincinnati, so it's such a good defense in the second half, but Tennessee is a great offense in the first half. So Tennessee, it was 10 to 10 heading almost a halftime in Tennessee as a field goal opportunity to take the lead 13 to 10. The guy shanks it, but it's still 10 to 10.

My point and a half that I was receiving, I won my bet. I started focusing on other games. Meanwhile, everybody else ends up pulling out their hair, sweating out, and then losing the Titans in the full game. So there's just this year, if the sports books give you these opportunities now to look into the derivative markets, you got to spend a lot of time searching the different teams that are lining up. Well, this offense is great in the first half.

This other team's defense stinks or vice versa. Understand the way that teams are scoring points, betting on first half totals versus full game totals for different teams. Like there's a lot that goes into it, but we have been focusing a lot more on that this season than we ever have been before. It's so funny. When I started betting in the 90s, 1990 to be exact, Rod Rust, Patriots were so bad, I'd start gambling. We would have to just put in the bets before the game and that was it. Even the concept of a second half bet was inconceivable,

really all the way through, I don't know, the last 10 years. We just would look at the stuff, unless you were in a casino. And then if you were in a casino, it's like, this is amazing. Run up at halftime and do whatever. Now with the gambling explosion, you can be betting during timeouts. It's incredible. You can even do something where like this you can, you can be betting during timeouts. It's incredible. You, you can even do something where like this, this last game, betting the Titans plus the points in the first half was great. The other thing that was great was betting on Tennessee's second half team total under 10 and a half was also a great bet. And you could bet that before the game even started, you can bet on how many points will

the Titans score in the second half. So like they're offering so many different things and most betters aren't even looking at those derivative markets, but it is something that they should be taking better advantage of. And Arizona was another one for a while. Arizona going against them first half and then just flipping second half. All right. What's number four? Okay. Number four is injuries are moving the screen more than they ever have before. And my theory on this is pretty straightforward. Betting is legal in the United States now. And as a result, more people can bet. But that's not the only reason that this is happening. I think because betting is legal, there's a bigger demand for coverage of betting markets, just like we got the ringer gambling show and more gambling content,

other networks doing similar types of things. More people are being hired that maybe wouldn't have sat at home watching screens and read about betting content for a living or podcasts or doing other things. But now that they can make something by doing that, and they can make a little bit more by betting on these games, more people are working from their homes, staring in front of the news. So before it used to be the sharp groups would get information and intel on like Sunday night into Monday about injuries and things of that nature. And they would start slowly moving the screen, moving games. And that's sort of like what we saw happen with the Green Bay Packers this week, where

early information was like, okay, Aaron Rodgers actually might go ahead and play this week. And so that line started moving out to three. Then you get the second wave when injury information is announced on Twitter and all these people who now have like accounts at all these legal books that are now writing about sports for a living and sitting in front of their desk, like doing this. They don't have a boss who wants to tell them to like, you know, enter into how many cafeteria workers we might need in this situation. We're designing a hospital.

Like these people are writing about sports betting. So they're just sitting there pummeling the board when they see information announced. So that makes a big move. And then the third thing that happens when you have betting screens is like different companies

have betting screens. Injury information hits that screen. There's a score bug that pops up. You click it. It says, oh, this player has been announced out. This player is likely to be probable this week.

And when that happens now, the lines move again. And so we're just seeing so much more movement. Schefter does the tweets too on Saturdays. Sometimes he's breaking news too. Saturday overnight, those tweets come out Sunday morning. I mean, we saw so much ridiculous movement on that Josh Allen game after he hurt his elbow against the Vikings where he's in the tunnel, but he doesn't look like he's going to join the team. So the line goes to the Vikings. But now it looks like he's running onto the field. The line comes with a couple of points back to the Bills. It was going so much movement just

based upon reports on Twitter as to what Allen, where he was standing like an hour before the game. So we're just seeing a lot more movement And you can sometimes take that to your advantage, but it also helps if you're thinking about a game, get down early and the line might move in your direction. If you think you're going to be on the right side of injury information, the screen and the lines will react more than they ever have in years past. And then you can always get off of it later if you decide to do that. Right. All right. What's number five?

Last but not least, we've got these teams that are like, I call them muddy teams, but their teams are just like mucking up everything from a scoring perspective, from a watchability perspective. You've got six teams that have top 10 defenses and bottom 10 offenses this year based upon EPA. We have not seen six teams in that category for years. Three teams were in that category in 21. Three teams were in that category in 2020. Three teams in 2019. So you got the Denver Broncos, Indianapolis Colts, New England Patriots, Washington Commanders, the Jets, and the Titans. Those six teams, and the 49ers are close to that, but they're like 11th in one. But those six, top 10 defense, bottom 10 offense, they've gone over the total combined in only 19 of their 67

games. That's 28% of their games have gone over. So what they do is they bring you down to their level. If Denver's playing a better offense, chances are that game is going to get dragged down to the mud that Denver likes to wallow in. And it's going to be an ugly, lower scoring game. And so when you look at some of these averages, like, well, what should the point totals be? And the odds maker have it here. My model says here it's different because these teams are just burying everybody to come join them. Now, I'm not suggesting all these teams are going to continue to hit only 20% overs the rest of the year. But that's exactly what we've been seeing through the first 12 weeks.

Any division chicanery you predict? Like we mentioned the Bengals. Is there any chance in hell Jags plus 650 on Fandle could catch Tennessee? Could Dallas, could they catch the Eagles? It doesn't seem like it, but they're plus 280. I can't believe Minnesota has clinched the NFC North, but that's apparently what happened. And then in the NFC South, the most fun one would be Carolina at 15 to one. It's actually conceivable they could win the division, but do you have your eye on anybody?

Is the schedule getting super easy for anybody? Health coming somebody's way? Anybody that you like? Well, I don't necessarily like them, but I mean, like the Cleveland Browns, that win was huge. It shows that they don't have to give up. And I'm interested to see how quickly Deshaun Watson can shake off that rust and perform better. They go to play the Houston Texans. So you're saying you're thinking seven seed? I'm thinking that the AFC at the apex is not necessarily as good as we thought that they were going to be. A team like the LA Chargers isn't as good as what we thought.

The AFC South, I mean, the Titans just keep getting things done, but like the rest of that division is nothing really to worry about. So we have Chargers six and five, New England 6-5, Jets 7-4, and then it kind of drops down to Cleveland 4-7. So they'd have to sweep, I think. I think 10-7 gets the seventh seed. Would you agree with that in the AFC? Yes, yes, definitely.

I do agree with that. I think if you look at the if you look at the teams that are one game out there are six and five you just mentioned the Patriots and the Chargers so I mean you you definitely have to get back on track but the next closest team seed number nine is only won four games which is the same number of games that the Cleveland Browns have so like there's all these teams that are tied at four and seven with them. They would obviously have to get hot, but, uh, be tougher in the FC.

All right. Fango has them tend to one to make the playoffs. So I'm not necessarily, I, I, that's, I don't know, man.

Like, like they have an easy one this week, right? They're playing at Houston at, since he would be the one that have to be that that's the one they would need to go 10 and seven. Go. I got,

I got it. I got a trick for you. Get ready for that game. Get ready for that game. As long as Deshaun Watson doesn't screw it up, go back and look at what Kevin Stefanski does coaching against the Cincinnati Bengals. He has done a great job

coaching against the Cincinnati Bengals. So if they're healthy enough- So let's say 6-7, home Baltimore, home New Orleans, at Washington, at Pittsburgh. That's not ridiculous. And you think like, they could easily be 6-5.

They could also easily be 3-8. I mean, they had that week one game then last week that were ridiculous. But then they lost that Jets game that they should have won. They've been all over the map. Maybe 4-7 is the right record for them. Yeah. And I don't disagree. If you're looking at Dallas, look, I'm holding a lot of Eagles futures myself, and I'm absolutely worried about how the Cowboys are coming on right now and how they look. So that concerns me a bunch. I think the NFC West, it is clear that the 49ers are the best team there.

And Seattle's defensive, quote-unquote, improvement really seems to be a bit of a mirage based upon the schedule and who they played, although they did get a little better. Their defense, they don't have a pass rush. At some point, everyone's figured it out. Oh, you guys don't have a pass rush. Cool. Right. And everybody just does whatever they want.

They can throw whatever they want. On that Dallas thing, Dallas is plus 350 to win the NFC East. They're plus 500 on FanDuel to win the number one seed. It would make sense if they somehow pass Philly, that would mean

they basically ran the slate and they would be the number one seed. I'm taking the 5- one odds if I'm doing that bet. Well, you don't have to. You don't. You could easily pass Philly just by you got a head to head against them and then you win a game and Philly drops one. So that pulls you up there where where you're where you're close. But the key is the Minnesota, because even if you tie Minnesota, you have the head to head over them. So nobody else really that's going to come

close. And Minnesota will lose one more dumb game. The Niners, when did you and House were talking about the Niners for Super Bowl futures? House jumped on them at some point. He jumped on them with some sort of future. I was preaching, yeah.

You were preaching them. What were they? 18-1, 19-1. This was before the McCaffrey trade. Right. Exactly. No, I was, yeah. You were preaching them. What were they like? 18 to one, 19 to one. This is before the McCaffrey trade. Right, exactly. No, I was. And then I also dabbled, like I did a few like insane, like a preseason Superbowl,

you know, bets of this team versus that team. And I stuck the 49ers in a few and I stuck the Eagles in a few on the NFC side. And I did stick Minnesota in a couple because Minnesota was a team pre-flop we were big on. We were so big on Minnesota and so fading the Arizona Cardinals. That was the biggest fade that we had. And it's just beautiful to watch their implosion occur live on hard knocks during the season. I knew that was going to be a disaster of an idea, especially the way that

they end seasons. But boy, the problem is they don't show anything on the show. I mean, there's so much good stuff there. And the team's just like, nope, you can't do this. You can't put that on there. Yeah. Don't have anything about the cornerback that thought that kiddo was out of bounds when he wasn't. So teams that can win the Super Bowl,

KC, Buffalo, Philly, San Francisco, Dallas, Miami, Cincinnati. That's now seven. Would you say, just give me a yes or no. Minnesota, could they win the Super Bowl? I'm going to say no. What time's the game being played? No, I know Kirk Cousins played well. No, he shed it.

Yeah, he shed it. So you would say maybe at Minnesota? I would say maybe because to me, we saw Cincinnati do what they did last year. You just have to be playing good and be healthy. If you look at the teams that end up qualifying, and then a lot of it has to do with the health because it's a long season and it becomes so grueling over the last month of the season

that one of the things that you should start doing, obviously, I'm probably not going to join your show again before the end of this season. When you're looking to bet on some futures in like week 16 or 17, like study the health. Are these guys going to get anybody back or are they not? Are they a little beat up? Because some teams might be okay right now. They're managing with a few injuries, but when they go up against an opponent who's actually pretty healthy, that's a good team as well. That's going to cause problems for the teams that are losing players due to injury.

I have Baltimore as a no, Tampa as a no, Tennessee, I'm just not ruling out because they're like Michael Myers Chargers no Seahawks no and then on down the line no so basically 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 6 teams as yes and then Miami as an almost yes and Minnesota

as a maybe and I think that's it I think that's the 8 and the best odds you can get on any of those teams I really like Cincinnati at 17 to one. I think that team's good. I really, I think they're tough. I think they know who they are. And you made the point about the defensive coordinator. They always seem to be better in the second half than the first half on both sides. I'm curious how they're going to do like they lost a woozy, one of their best cornerbacks. And I'm curious, they haven't really played

anybody who actually in the last several weeks since they lost him, that actually passes the ball and has a good passing attack. And so I'm curious to see how they're going to perform against the Kansas City Chiefs. It's like what, a double revenge spot for Kansas City this year? They lost them both last year. So and they're down, they're down corners. Now, obviously, Casey doesn't have Tyree kill. That's going to be an outstanding game. All right. So our big lesson over everything else is parlays and teasers. Be careful. And maybe even don't do it. Just do it straight up and halftime bets. Look at the derivative markets. Look at in-game bets on teams that are losing at halftime. Try to bet as much as you can pre-flop on some of the positive expectation derivatives and look to avoid these parlays where there's so much variance in the league this year.

You want to try to reduce that as much as possible, not compound it, which is what happens when you're parlaying. All right. Warren Sharpe, give my readers something. What do you got? Okay. So this week, you can get all the NFL college football betting recommendations for $1 over at Sharp Football.

Just Google Sharp Football. Go to the website. There's a blue banner at the top. The coupon code is Bill. You get everything for a dollar. We did this with the book last summer and people loved it. I'm trying to just get people some stuff for free that they can use. So now you can see the type of stuff that I'm actually betting and how we're attacking

the market through some of these derivatives and whatnot. And we're doing pretty well, especially on these computer totals and college totals. Well, House regards the referee analytics the same way he regarded porn when porn really came into its prime in the mid-90s. He absolutely loves the referee analytics and feels like they shape his opinions, which I think is hilarious. But then you get these certain crews and you're like, oh no, this crew. I wish

I had gone to sharp football and realized that these guys are reffing the game and that this is going to be bad for me. It's a reality. I've been paying closer attention to it now more than I ever have before. And there are some crews that just call certain things. And there's this dude, Lane Clark in the Eagles game

against the Colts. Like I think 13 of his 16 penalties were against the offense. And this guy calls like over 60% of his penalties against the offense. So just understanding that prior to like placing some bets, you know, that would have been

for a total, but sometimes it helps the home team more than the road team or it helps a over or an under. It's all. It's all useful information to incorporate into what your process is. All right. You can hear Sharp on Wednesday with Austin Gale and then on Friday with House. Good to see you, Sharp. Yeah. Thanks, man. Thanks for having me. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Warren. Thanks to Chris and Saruti. Thanks to Kyle Crate for producing.

I will be back on this feed on Thursday with one more podcast. See you then. I don't have feelings within On the wayside On the first night of November I don't have feelings within