The Bill Simmons Podcast - The Floundering Pats, Lamar’s Big Day, the Struggling Wilsons, and Guess the Lines With Cousin Sal

Episode Date: September 18, 2023

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Cousin Sal to discuss another uninspiring Patriots loss to the scary Dolphins, and where they rank among the 0-2 teams (1:39), before running through other Week 2 notes, including: Cowboys-Jets, and Micah Parsons’s DPOY candidacy, Lamar Jackson’s game-winning performance vs. the Bengals, Chargers-Titans, Lions-Seahawks, Jaguars-Chiefs, shaky 2-0 teams, and more (18:02). Finally, they guess the lines for NFL Week 3 (1:03:35) before closing the show with Parent Corner (1:26:37). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Cousin Sal Producer: Kyle Crichton The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming, please checkout theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

coming up week two NFL depressing Pat's game next. It's the bill Simmons podcast presented by FanDuel football is in full action. FanDuel is highest rated sports book is the best place to bet at all. We've been doing pretty well. A 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 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.

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Gambling problem called 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video. You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right. There's a new exclusive home for streaming Monday night NHL hockey.

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It's on Prime. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. We have new rewatchables going up on Monday night. It is one of my favorite movies of the last 30 years. I got three co-hosts to join me. It might not be one of your favorite movies, but God dang, it's one of mine. So Monday night rewatchables.

Get ready. Very excited for that. Not as excited to share the following news. Had a screw up on my end with my recorder that unfortunately I did not realize until the tail end of the podcast. So you're getting my Zoom audio from my end for this podcast with Sal.

It's fitting. The Pats crapped the bed. I crapped the bed from a recording standpoint. It still sounds fine. It just doesn't sound as good as it's fitting. The pads crap the bed. I crap the bed from a recording standpoint. It still sounds fine. It just doesn't sound as good as it always does. But it was my mistake. This is what happens when you tape remotely. Hasn't happened to me since the dark days of the pandemic,

like spring 2020, I think was the last time I did this. This was a beauty though. I actually did record from my end. I just didn't have my mic plugged into the recorder because I'd been traveling and I forgot to plug it in. This is what happens when you get older and your team craps to bed on Sunday nights. We're going to talk about that with Sal in one second.

First, our friends from Pearl Jam. taping this 8 30 sunday night pacific time sal this is how it ends. Six Super Bowls, 20 years of memories and great fun. And this is how it ends. With mediocrity. Just week after week. With screen passes. With cornerbacks just draped over receivers who just aren't wide open. With guys running slant patterns out of bounds as the quarterback just throws right to the cornerback.

Hanging around just close enough to almost maybe tie the game. And then just all of a sudden it's 30-18 again. And then the game ends because your left guard forgot to lean forward before his elbow went down on the lateral play, which, by the way, wasn't in the game. There was 40 seconds left. They lose to Miami, a team that used to kick our ass when I was a kid. They lose to Tua, who two years ago, it was like, oh, my God,

Mac Jones is so much better than Tua. Tua was great tonight. And our coaches, the highlight of his game was when he whipped the challenge flag down in front of the ref. This did not seem like a crisply coached Patriots team. I didn't really agree with much of the strategy. They're 0-2. That is usually a death sentence in the NFL.

Anything you can say to make me feel better? No, I mean, I don't know why you're so upset. I thought a lot of it was funny. I mean, I went point by point with what you went over, the bad spot, the placements. I mean, I think you received three or four of those. Great play by Gusecki, by the way. It's not going to go down in a box score, but I really feel like to have the

wherewithal to toss that back and get it to where it was. But I don't want to blame the refs. I don't want to get you going, but don't overrule that. That's a first down. It's a first down. Move on. Let them beat you another way. Come way. What happened to the days of the visual evidence that it had to be absolutely positive? I didn't feel like I was positive on that. I didn't either. But you weren't happy with Mac Jones. We were texting. You weren't happy.

It's one of those things where you're not happy with your quarterback. And I've been there before. And then by the third or fourth quarter, it's like, oh, he's got some juice. And it's like, ah, it's too late. We didn't do enough. Yeah, Collinsworth was praising him at one point. I'll tell you, Matt Jones is starting to field a little bit. He's starting to get going.

The next play, he took a 10-yard sack. He threw the ball. I don't know what to say about Andrew Van Ginkle on that play. I really don't. Andrew Van Ginkle. It's a Wally Pipps situation. Mack threw the ball 42 times for 231 yards. That's not what you're looking for.

They have no real deep threat potential at all. They run all these screen passes, which work when the team's afraid of a deep pass, but why would you be afraid of anything? They couldn't run the ball against a team that gave up over 200 plus yards rushing through the chargers last week. And, and the bummer is that the defense I thought played pretty well for the most part. Like they did some good stuff. I thought, you know,

I don't think you're ever going to keep this Miami offense in complete check, but they did. Okay. They didn't let Hill beat them. Mostert was the guy that ended up killing them. Who's somehow on all three of my fantasy teams. But I watch football day to day and it's hard to think that the Pats are one of the best 16 teams,

much less 14, much less 10. They seem like they're in the bottom half of the league, unfortunately. Yeah, well and it sucks because if you go backwards, you work backwards, I would have told you, yeah, you're going to hold them to less than 400 yards, right? You know, less than 250 yards passing. Two is going to have one touchdown.

You would think you'd definitely be in that game, maybe even winning, right? That's why this is such a shame. I don't even like talking about it. It's such a shame. You'd love this. Miami's a good team. Yeah. I actually, considering they didn't have Jillips and they didn't have their left tackle which the pats you know armstead's out and jalen phillips is out the line moves immediately unfandled to pass i think plus one and a half it had been between

like three and two and a half all week and just seemed like man we're catching them at the absolute perfect time but um the pats they just aren't explosive enough. You saw it last week. You saw it this week. Everything's methodical. Everything is a 10-play drive, 11-play drive. Pick them apart downfield. You're putting all of this kind of house of cards on, oh, a pass can get tipped.

Oh, a defensive back could come in over somebody's top and get it. It's too hard. And the one guy who seems like he can create real separation is Pop Douglas, who fumbled. God forbid, he's probably in a meat truck somewhere. What was that guy's name in Goodfellas? Who ended up in the meat truck?

Frankie Carbone. Frankie Carbone, yeah. Yeah, he's in the meat truck right now. He can't fumble. You're not allowed to fumble on a Belichick team. Cue the Clapton music. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't want to spend too much time on the Pats because it's pretty clear that they're not going to matter this year. As good, I think, as the defense has a chance to be,

with the way the schedule went out, two home games in a row to start the year, you kind of have to split. 0-2 is a death sentence. Yeah, well, I mean, I think the Bengals, since they extended it to seven playoff teams in each conference, the Bengals are the only team to go 0-2 and make the playoffs. But on the other hand, there are two playoff-ish teams that are 0-2, other than the Patriots, that you're even with. The Chargers and the Bengals that I mentioned, who may be

without a quarterback. Who knows what's going on? Let's do this. Here are all the 0-2 teams right now. I separated them into three categories, alive, coma, and probably dead. We could cross off the Patriots. If it makes you feel better, we can cross them off right now. I know we're looking for a cross-off. I think Cincy and the Chargers I'm putting in a live

You can talk me into the Chargers being in the coma section But let's put them in a live for now Because at least they can Create some offense Coma, New England and Minnesota And I think Minnesota's in there Because of the NFC Because of the 4-7 teams

It might end up being 9-8 Might end up getting you a six seed or a seven seed. Probably dead, I have Houston, Denver, Chicago, and Arizona. And then I think Carolina tomorrow night if they lose to the Saints, I think we can throw them in there. And then Pittsburgh's on one. If they lose tomorrow, I'd put them in the coma section. But you agree with all those categories? I don't know.

Coma might be too strong because, I mean, if you hear a Belichick interview, you might think, yeah, for sure. Coma, but look at the one, look at the teams you'd have to beat that you're a game behind. All right. So like, all right, the dolphins, I don't know. You have them winning the vision or you have the bills. So that'll be one playoff spot. The jets are one in one year, but you'll beat them by 30 next week, 35 points, right?

Um, the Browns could be 1-1. You don't think you could hang with a team like that and make up a game? The AFC South is kind of a joke. You don't count on the Colts, the 1-1 Colts. I know what you're doing, and none of this is genuine. You don't believe any of this, and you're just trying to get me not to quit on the Pats. Exactly. I know what you're doing.

I can't hear the Ishmith talk just yet about him getting a max contract or whoever it would be in the NBA. Their next three games are Jets, Cowboys, New Orleans, all who have good defenses. I think the Saints have a good defense. It looked good enough last week. You'll convince yourself by Thursday that you're going to crush the Jets, and Belichick doesn't get embarrassed by teams like that,

and certainly not guys like Zach Wilson, who just threw three interceptions today. You'll get back. You'll be back. I'm dumbfounded that they couldn't run the ball on the Dolphins. I know they're a missing lineman. I get it. But it's really hard for me to believe that Romandre,

especially like there was like two times when they ran the 45-degree angle, most are type runs with Romandre. And each time he was able to get around the corner and they just they just kind of kept running them up in the middle and it's also clear and yeah i don't want to completely read people off after two weeks but uh juju just doesn't seem healthy and just seems super slow parker was always slow he never Separation was never his thing. He was always like a catching traffic guy. And then your guy, Zeke, you knew. This was a foist.

This was like the foist episode on Curb. I didn't have anything to do with it. No, you knew he was kind of shot. I thought Belichick was foist-proof. Really, right? When has he ever been on the short side of a foist? Well, it's right here. Zeke Elliott, who doesn't see that.

How about get some real receivers? Enough with this. They're so freaking proud. The Giants are the same way. Like, you know, I know they won today, but you're only going to get so far with these, you know, these possession receivers who maybe could stretch a first down and break. I just don't see these guys breaking a lot of tackles.

I'm not saying you need like an Edelman or anybody like that, but your best years were with Randy Moss, right? Yeah. When they were good. And Branch was great. Troy Brown was great. I think Douglas is the best receiver on the team. And I don't know when that will manifest itself

into him playing all the time, but he's the only one that can actually make people miss. And, you know, Bourne had a couple of plays. Bourne had one deep pass where the guy pulled his arm down. They didn't call it. I didn't think the rest were that great. I think big picture, though, Miami's got to feel just awesome. You know, they have this – they're at the Chargers at New England

to start the year. And you think, man, they're at the chargers at new England to start the year. And you think, man, that's, that's a tough beat. Probably going to probably one on one. We'll take. Nope.

They're two. No, they're playing Denver next week. And we're going to talk about Denver in a second. That honestly could be Russell Wilson's last game as a starter. Right? I don't, I we're on a countdown with that.

Now they're at Buffalo week four. Then they have the giants home Carolina home Carolina home in weeks five and six. They could be five and one after six weeks. And the Tua thing, Tua made five ridiculous throws in the game today. Like really, really great. It was like what he did with the Chargers last week. I think he has gotten better. He was better last year than he was the year before.

And this year he seems, he just seems like he has gotten better. He was better last year than it was the year before. And this year he, he seems, he just seems like he has full command. I thought that team was so scary to stop. They're setting you up in those inside runs. And you're just like, I know what you're doing. You're pulling our guys in. And then you're going to hit one of these guys on the,

on, you know, on a quick one or whatever, uh, really hard to play. And the question, remember we talked before the year and I said how to, it was 20 to one to one comeback. Yeah. And we were like, now Hamlin, if Hamlin plays, he's going to win. But now Tua

has got to be the prohibitive favorite for that. And I think he's in the MVP now too, right? Well, we talked, if he plays 17 games, his stats are going to be spectacular, right? Like maybe probably better than Mahomes, just the way everything's set up. But honestly, that's the only reason I picked against the Dolphins to win the division because I don't think he can. I'm trying to go. And it's like, it's like when every year I lose weight after the Super Bowl from like February to April, I'll lose like 15 or 16 pounds.

Really every single year I'll do it. And I, you know, people know not to congratulate me at this point. And just like they should know not to get excited about Tua, because come August, September, I'm stuffing my face with Bianco pizza three times a week. And I'm a fat slob, as everybody could see on this Zoom right now, or maybe you can't. So that's, I think, where we are with Tua.

Is that 15 pounds of money that you're losing from the end of the year to pay off somebody? Can I tell you the favorite is on FanDuel for MVP right now? Is it Tua? It is Tua. Right now, as we're taping this, 5-1. Wow. Mahomes is plus 650.

Josh is 10-1. Burrow is 10-1. Apparently, FanDuel hasn't watched the season yet. And Jalen Hurts is 10-1. Trevor Lawrence is 12-1. He's another one. You liked Hurts going in. I probably booked those bets. I do. I still like him. What was he? 10 or 12?

He was at 12. That's what I took him at. He was actually in the Philly stuff on Friday where people were like, what's wrong with Philly? What's wrong with them? They played a Sunday afternoon game in New England and then they played Thursday night games. They're always super sloppy. People are like, what's wrong with Philly They played a Sunday afternoon game in New England, and then they played a Thursday night. Those Thursday night games are always super sloppy. People are like, what's wrong with Philly's offense?

When was the last crisp Thursday night game we've ever watched? I think people get Alzheimer's with what happens on Thursday nights every year. The games always suck. Yeah, I'm with you. I don't know. I mean, Jalen Hurts, he's going to have 15 touchdowns because that stupid mosh pit play is allowed, and so the numbers will always look good.

And that's why I think 10 to one is, is not bad for them, for him. If you go in long shots for MVP right now, the McCaffrey at 75 to one is kind of interesting. And Mac Jones, Mac Jones, also 75.

Mac Jones. You've probably, probably boost those a little bit. How sad are you that Jordan love, if I would have told you two weeks into the eight days, nine days into the season, Jordan Love's 40 to one and Mac Jones is 75 to one. I have a

question. You got to give me your honest answer here. No. I know Mac Jones is probably better than Zach Wilson. Yeah. I think so. Is it dramatic

though? Is there really a difference? Is it like, oh, if the Jets had Mac Jones, this would be different? Both guys are probably... The word below average, people are like, whoa, below average starter. Below average, there's 32 starting

quarterbacks. If you're average, you're like 15, whoa, below average starter. But below average, there's 32 starting quarterbacks. Right. Right? So if you're average, you're like 15, 16, 17. So what's that? If you're below average. Yeah. Yeah, if you're below average, you're in the 20s. You're maybe high 20s, maybe even mid 20s.

Yeah. That's where Mac Jones is. He's a below average starting quarterback. And Zach Wilson is probably a little below that. I think Fields is the worst quarterback I watched today. Like there's something really, really wrong with him and that offense. And just, he's just not functional. Ritter was looming as the number one worst quarterback.

And then he kind of rallied in the second half. So you need to watch one more time. Wilson is Wilson bad. Both Wilsons. And then after that, you know, you can start talking to yourself and anybody. Well, let me answer because here's what I thought about Zach Wilson. I thought last Monday night, if Garrett Wilson doesn't make that miraculous catch, really stealing an interception from the D-back, the Buffalo D-back,

the Jets lose that game and they're looking for a different quarterback. And I do think there are a couple of guys out there that could win them 10 games. Now, if Garrett Wilson's out for an extended period, maybe I'll go back on that. But yeah, Mac Jones would definitely be a guy I thought could win 10 games with the Jets for sure. He'd be at the top of that list. So yeah, he's better. I don't know what you want to hear.

I mean, I don't know. I don't know if my team's doing. I don't know. I don't know what you want to hear. I don't know. My team's 2-0. I don't know. I don't know if he has it. But I've watched Mac Jones now. This is year three. That throw to Parker that really was to Xavier and Howard. Yeah, that was bad.

That was one of the... That brought me back to when I was in college when I had to start gambling because the Pats were so terrible. If Parker's out of bounds, the only wide open receiver is the cornerback. It was really bad. Well, it makes you feel young again if it brought you back to college. That's good, right?

It's great. What about feeling young? We got to take a break. There's so much to get to, including your team. That's next. Step into action this NFL season with FanDuel America's number one sports book. Right now, new customers get $200 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place a $5 bet that has $200 in bonus bets. Win or

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I wrote down the biggest stories from week two. I'm just going to throw these at you. I'll do your team just because you're here. Yeah, let's do it. Parsons is the best defensive player since when? How far back would you go?

The clapper today on TV was like, he reminds me of LT. It's like, stop, come on. I don't need him jinxing us. Keep your mouth shut clapper. Just clap till your cheeks fall off. I don't want to hear it anymore. I was going to ask you to admit that Micah Parsons is the greatest defensive professional football player you've ever seen. And I was going to threaten to not get off the Zoom until you said as much. Well, as you know, he was my DPOY pick for the year, plus 450. What's that now? Oh, God.

Well, here's the thing. I don't know how many people listening to this watched that entire game. He wreaked havoc in that game. Like he was, this is the most dated reference ever, but Fast Times Ridgemont High 40 years ago when they steal the linebacker's car and he's mad and he's just destroying the other team. That's what he's like.

And I was trying to think like, Reggie White did this in the 90s. Reggie White would just destroy games. And I actually think he's been a little forgotten in history. I think Ray Lewis was like this. Even though he was a middle linebacker, he would just dismantle everything and you're always aware of him. And he was just so

over the top. Derek Thomas had some stretches where he would just destroy teams. But for the most part, since Ray Lewis, I don't remember anybody looking the way Parsons did today. Keep naming names. I haven't heard any that match up to the caliber of one the way Parsons did today. Keep naming names. I haven't heard any that match up to the caliber of one Micah Parsons, honestly.

No, I think maybe I'm crazy, but I think he's doing it a little differently from those guys. If you watch him, he's not offered much friction. And oftentimes his move past the tackle or past the guard or past the running back, whoever's blocking him, there's not even contact mate. It's just like a stutter step or something. I know a lot of those guys that you mentioned, that was part of their repertoire. And now I know I'm going to jinx them about getting injured, but I really feel like there's

not even any physicality until he gets to the quarterback and blows up a play. I don't know. It's almost magical. I think he's got that mad magician from hard knocks working with him or something. This is going to make you mad. Cause I'm going to bring a basketball right now. Hmm.

Good. I'm sorry. Well, it was 18 minutes. We did good. He's like watching one of those incredible basketball players who can just get to the rim. And you're just like,

how do you get to the rim? Everyone knew he was driving the basket. john morant last year would be like oh john morant's going on the rim oh they can't do anything he's just going to get there parsons it seems like when he wants to if he's like i'm going to just stop this run play or like i'm just going to get to the quarterback it doesn't really matter who's blocking him he moves around on the line of scrimmage so i'm going to try it over here this time and I'll just go right by the running back and get the quarterback or hit him as he's throwing.

He's on a very short list. As you know, I'm prone to hyperbole from time to time, but I've seen all of these dudes that have mattered since LT. LT is always going to be my number one. It's not negotiable. I'm with you. It's fine.

LT is great. He was the best. He crushed the Cowboys for many years. LT was the best. He really was. I would appreciate it. Can you come up with a different name? John Moran, I know what you're getting at, but can you pick someone who's probably going to be in the league in two years?

Or like what late 2000s LeBron was like when his first two MVP seasons, when he had a head of steam, he was just getting in the rim. Nothing was happening to stop it. Oh, I got one. Yeah, those are good. How about Lawrence Taylor? That's a name I'm going with. Does he need a nickname?

What do we do? How do you pump this guy's rep up a little bit more? I think Romo was trying to call him Monster Parsons. There's something there there I don't know Yeah What does he need? He needs something He needs

Like LT was so great And we were all so mad When Tomlinson took it Right You gotta come up MP doesn't work Yeah Yeah

We gotta figure something out Well anyway Is he hate me taking? That seems catchy I don't know He's the best He hate me He's the best. He hate me. He's the best defensive player in the league.

And he might be the best player in the league right now, especially if you watch Mahomes. I know Mahomes. I'm not going to just grab the title from him after two games. But he's in a direct conversation with Mahomes now. And he's the biggest advantage you have. If you're going to be like, Dallas is going to the Super Bowl this year. All right, what are your reasons? Number one, they have

Michael Parsons. He's the best defensive player in the league and he's absolutely wreaking havoc week after week. So, congratulations. I love him. I mean, I think he was around 13 sacks last year. I think he'll be around 18, 19 this year. He's good for one a game. Fandel offered Michael Parsons sack plus Cowboys

win at plus money. I was like, oh my, what, what am I, why am I waiting? I got to jump on that. And listen, it was the Jets. And again, it's a quarterback I think they can replace. So, and it's not gonna be much different when they go to Arizona next week, but yeah, man, this guy's a star. Just stay healthy, for God's sakes. Yeah, especially there's two things. One against bad offensive linemen or shaky quarterbacks. He's supercharged. And then as these games go along and the teams start getting a little confidence, like the Jets, there was a couple moments that game. What was it, 18-10?

And you're thinking, well, if they get, you know, feels like they're getting a deck a little bit. They got a bunch of flags against them. There's this one part of the game all the Jets fans are mad about when it just didn't seem like they were going to get a call there for 10 minutes. But they were hanging around the Jets, and then Dallas just put the game away.

But when's your first big test? Is it San Francisco? Is that coming up for a word? I'm trying to figure out what's... Because I know we have... Hold on, I have it. Arizona, and then it's the Patriots. We have you guys.

San Francisco week five. That's your big test. Yeah. And then you got the Chargers. Patriots will do something stupid. That's San Francisco week five. That's your big test. Yeah. Yeah. And then you got the chargers. Yeah. Um, all right. So Patriots will do something. Something stupid will happen.

October 1st against the Patriots. You watch, you watch that. That'll be it. I'll, you'll, I'll skip that podcast. October 1st.

Let me write that down. Skipping podcast. Are you done? Next. You know how it goes with this team. Go ahead. Next topic I had. Lamar was the best offensive player we saw today.

He was awesome. That was one of those you really had to watch the game. There were flags that pulled plays back, but it was just one of those Lamar games. He does it a couple times a year. And the last three years, he got hurt after games like this, but within the next couple weeks. But these things where it's like, we have them third and 12.

We just need to stop Baltimore here. And everybody does everything perfectly. And then he just figures out some cheat code play. And all of a sudden, the drive's still going. He was awesome. And a lot of it's a run, right? Like 37, extending the drive with a run. How many quarterbacks can do that consistently and you feel good about it even as a design play or not?

I agree with you. I thought he was excellent, and he won that game. And the fact that they had 178 yards rushing. I mean, with Dobbins out and they have 178 yards rushing, he was very good, but how good does Lamar have to be if that's the case? I know he was responsible for several of those yards, but yeah, Cincinnati's in a little bit of trouble here. Well, I can't wait to talk about them.

The thing with Lamar, 24 for 33 for 237, two TDs, no picks. And then he ran for 12 for 54. So if you just see the box score, you're like, oh, Lamar had a good game. Right. But he had complete command over that game. And then you're watching the other side and Burrow just doesn't seem right. The Bengals don't really seem right. I thought the Ravens were going to be the one out of that division.

And I remember when we talked about it saying that I thought the Bengals would start slow and they'll come on because they're the Bengals. Their defense isn't as good as it was last year. And I know they lost some guys in the secondary, but they just couldn't get stops. And there's a field of them that I thought was alarming.

And even like the 27-24 final, I actually didn't even feel like the game was that close. I thought the Ravens deserved to win and they were better. I didn't feel like the Bengals just played that well or looked that good or looked that sharp, right? Yeah, I mean, they were down two scores, right, for most of that game or at least in the second half. But I will say as much about, and then they took Burrow out, but who knows with this injury, but he did have a

better second half. That first half, I was like, okay, if you and I were talking about this the same time last year, I don't know how we felt about the Bengals at 0-2 last year, but it wasn't as strong as, or we had higher hopes, I think, than we did with the Bengals this year with Burrow looking the way he did. If he's hurt, obviously there's trouble. But he did have a good second half, so I'm kind of mixed about it. We didn't like this line anyway, right? We figured that with the Bengals being three-point favorite,

kind of needing it more. Lamar had a 12 QBR last week. It was really how the Bengals not going to kill them. And then it was like, oh, yeah, this makes a lot of sense when I got out there. I took it for a million dollar picks, but I'm doing those picks on Thursday. And then all the scratches happened over the weekend with Baltimore, right? They're missing their two best offensive linemen. They're missing their two best D backs.

Dobbins is out. And it turned into basically nobody believes in us when and it was hard not to i know other people have made this point it was hard not to watch that game and just be dumbfounded that nobody tried to sign this guy you know it's like a a much bigger version of when nobody tried to sign austin reeves this summer in the mba it's like, what are you guys doing? Austin Reeves is really good. Nobody has $20 million a year for this guy. With the Lamar thing, you know, there's eight quarterbacks that matter in a 32-team league. You watch Atlanta today, and they're barely surviving,

and they barely pulled this win. Ritter was so bad in the first half of that game. And you're thinking, like, man, this team couldn't use Lamar to put with B.J. Robinson? It's a good point. Who do you think regrets it the most? Because the Falcons, I know, are 2-0, so they can convince themselves, the owner and the coach,

that they're decent. But if they're able to see Desmond Ritter, I don't know where their seats are on the field, but you and I didn't like Desmond Ritter at all today. But I feel like the Bears, for sure, could have signed them. They had assets. Yeah, but the Bears were like hot committed to fields. They had assets. Yeah, but the Bears were hot committed to Fields. They had to

do that for one more year, I think. Even Bryce Young's probably better than Fields. I think Carolina, that's got to regret it. Atlanta. Those are the two that probably jumped out. I mean, Arizona, but I'm not sure they cared about winning anytime soon anyway. Yeah, they're stuck with Kyler.

Yeah, I don't know. Could you say the Giants, you'd rather have Lamar than Daniel Jones? Yeah. But it's just weird. Nobody went after him. Baltimore ends up getting him back on a pretty big contract. But he looked great today. Hopefully, he can stay healthy this year because that's been the issue.

And even watching the game today, he takes big hits in the open field. He just does. The stuff we love about him is what makes him injury prone, right? Yeah. Well, my next question was, should we be worried about Cincy yet? I'm a little worried because I think the AFC is good.

Although, if Jacksonville and the Chargers are going to be a level below, I think maybe nine wins could get a seven seed. But I just don't think their defense looks as good. Last year, this similarly happened. And then also they took off the second half of the year. And by December, they're kicking everybody's ass. Yeah, I think I mean, you thought I was kidding because I was trying to make you feel better about the Patriots, but same

goes for the Bengals. 0-2, but look at the 1-1s they have to chase for, let's say, if you're bouncing them from a division title, that's probably premature too, but they're certainly in the race for a wild card, but you're right about everyone looking, you know, I'm

trying to think, like, they didn't sack Burrow, it was a little bit weird. He kind of got to do what he wanted. He had one sack. He just didn't play well. Yeah. He had that terrible, terrible pick. Right.

That was a bad interception. Yeah. Um, if he, so on FanDuel, Chiefs are plus 330. Ravens are five to one. Now bills are,

this is for AFC championship. Bills are plus 550. Miami's plus 750. Bengals plus 950. And Browns 10-1. I still think those Dolphins odds are off. I think they should have either the best or second best odds in the conference. I'm guessing it's just because of Tua because people are afraid of him making it through the season. But they've been the most impressive team in the AFC, in my opinion. I want insurance. You know, when you get the dealer has an ace showing, I'll take the plus 750. I'll put a thousand on it. You get 7,500.

But I also want insurance to get some of my thousand back if he gets hurt. See if we can move that out, Fandel. Goofy conference. thousand back if he gets hurt see if we can move that out fandle goofy conference um next question i had for you is what happened to our sexy 2023 offenses detroit jacksonville and the chargers all the nerds were on all these teams and uh detroit had five turnovers and got out detroited by seattle who it was like basically watching two mirror image teams of each other except Detroit turned the ball over more. And Goff was looking a little Goffish a couple times in that game.

Jacksonville, what a disgrace. We'll get to them in a second. And the Chargers had two games in a row now where they basically had the game in their hands one way or the other to decide it with a quarterback that everyone thinks is a top-five quarterback. And he didn't get the job done. I the jacksonville one i want to start with because i just feel like they gave a win away you know they're up seven nothing they're at midfield they go for it on fourth and five at the end of the first half casey's done nothing and they're like we're gonna go for it They really hadn't shown enough to go for it.

They don't get it. Mahomes gets like an injected with a whatever. And all of a sudden they go down, they score and they're winning. Uh, but Jacksonville was in the red zone. It felt like for an hour. Yeah.

In the second half and just couldn't get anything done. And, and it was like, it was like, honestly watching the Patriots is bad. Well, what's weird is, I don't know.

Maybe I wasn't paying as close attention. But yeah, I felt like they had Trevor Lawrence had seven shots at the end zone. He did. It came out empty, but it also felt like the receivers, these receivers these days were like, oh, did he get the second foot back down? Did we see a pellet? Did we see a pellet fly up in the end zone? Yeah, you could probably guess that these guys are so good at getting their

feet down. Just don't even review it anymore. For some reason, the Jacksonville receivers have not figured out how to get that second foot down. So I would say 65% Trevor Lawrence's fault, 35% those receivers who just couldn't get it their footing. But yeah, that offense. Yeah.

Everybody loved that offense. And I, uh, I think we did well with the Titans to win that division. I'll be honest. It's 14-6. There's another game? First down and goal at KC's one. And they end up going backwards, kicking a field goal. KC comes down, gets a field goal.

Now it's 17-9. Jacksonville gets the ball again. They have a 12 play drive And they basically end up First down and 10 At KC's 14 And then they fuck that up But it was worse than that Because it was

Lawrence looked Really sloppy At one point Calvin Ridley Ran into the Ran into the stanchion The goalpost thing Which happens like once a year.

It seemed like he like blew out his knee. I'd like to see that more. But yeah, I didn't think they looked good last week against the Colts. I thought they basically played one good quarter in that game. And I thought this would be the game. This is the one you have circled. They're coming to our house. They beat us nine months ago.

Now we get our revenge. They scored nine points. So to me, pretty fraudulent. house. They beat us nine months ago. Now we get our revenge. They scored nine points. I don't want to make excuses for Jacksonville, but are the Chiefs a top four defense in the league? I know we mentioned Dallas. We mentioned the 49ers.

We mentioned the Eagles all the time. They played really well against the Lions last week. You had that fake punt, and they were demoralized and tired, and so they went all the way down the score, and then you had to pick six. Otherwise, Detroit didn't do a lot offensively, and like you mentioned, Trevor Lawrence was not...

I don't know. I just... And Chris Jones back today. You got Carl Laftis. These guys all are in on most plays, so I think it's an underrated unit. It's a good point, and they've drafted really well on that side, and it's an underrated unit. It's a good point. And they've drafted really well on that side. And it's starting to pay for it.

But yeah, they were definitely aggressive and they were putting a big pass first. Now, Jacksonville doesn't have their left tackle because he got suspended the first four games. So if you're a Jacksonville fan, you're like, look, man, let's wait till our left tackle comes back before we freak out about this stuff. But nine points was pretty bad. The Chargers. Yeah. If Brandon Staley got fired tomorrow, would you drive off the road and complete this belief? Because I would not.

No, I wouldn't drive off the road. No, no. No, I think we nailed this team years ago, honestly. Every Chargers game is nuts. Put Gus Johnson on every telecast or have Brandon Staley coach every other game to make those games exciting. Don't take

them laying points. Don't take them ever. Who cares? They're going to make every quarterback look good. Tannehill, a guy who was about to get shoved to the practice squad or worse, was 20 for 24 with 246. But they'll probably end up 9-8 or 9-7 going into that last weekend. So, I mean, I feel like you could sum the charges up better than any other team by now.

No, Eckler. Eckler lasted a game. They gave up two bombs to Tannehill, which is embarrassing. Tannehill in the first half, and I was just taking – I just write down my thoughts as the game goes, and I was like, this is Tannehill's last start. I'm writing it down and stuff like that. It just looked like his career was headed to being over. They fall behind 11-0 because this bizarre 40-play Chargers drive

that ends up with them scoring, and then they go for a two-point out of nowhere to make it 11-0. And you think, ah, it's done. The Tannehills can't take anybody back from three points, much less 11. And then they got some rhythm and they started running on them and they started disrupting Herbert. And all of a sudden you could kind of feel where it was going, but they still had to go down the

field in the fourth quarter and tie the game, which they did. Or they took the lead. Chargers get the ball back. They go all the way down, but they really should have scored a touchdown. It felt like they were going to score. They didn't. Get a field goal, go to OT. They can't do anything. And then

Titans win the game. But the Chargers have now had two of these. They're 0-2 in either or games. And that's kind of who they've been for the entire Brandon Staley Herbert era. And at some point, guess who they're not going to blame? Justin Herbert. Going to be a new coach. And he'll be like, well, we have a new coach now.

And, you know, Herbert, he's one of the five most talented quarterbacks in the league. But at some point, you got to be better than 500. Herbert probably wants to keep him around. Honestly. Yeah. Less of the five most talented quarterbacks in the league, but at some point you got to be better than 500. Herbert probably wants to keep him around, honestly. Yeah, the less of the blame will get past his way. And again, he's always going to have decent stats. What did he have, 305 yards and two touchdowns?

I think he had the best stats of anyone today, yeah. Right. And I don't know. I didn't even see any bad calls for Staley, but I just don't think that a lot of the players understand his defense and i think i could be right because that secondary hasn't been right for a couple three years now right yeah and they spent money on it too jc jackson who got hurt last year um this year has looked bad and they've been beating over and over again, over the top.

I'm probably more concerned about the chargers and Jacksonville from just talking playoff potential. Cause I think with Jacksonville easier division, they have their left tackle coming back chargers. This has just been who they've been this whole time. And I just think this is who they are. They're this talented, frustrating team that is just destined to be like this. The Lions,

defensively, I just don't see it. I don't see how that's a play. People are picking them to potentially be a one seed or make the NFC conference. I can't take that team seriously. They're fine. They might go 9-8

and sneak into the playoffs, or maybe they could even go 10 and seven if they get some schedule up. But I just don't think defensively Seattle was doing what he, did you watch that game? Seattle was doing whatever they wanted. Like literally anything they want to do, they were doing. I knew they'd match them score.

I was pretty sure they'd match them score for score, especially with, you know, Gino Smith with a chip on his shoulder. And, you know, I didn't think like lock, it would be shut down two games in a row. Like, like he was, I was pretty sure they'd match him score for score, especially with Geno Smith with a chip on his shoulder. I didn't think Lockett would be shut down two games in a row like he was. But yeah, it's funny. I was thinking if you and I three years ago said there's going to be a quarterback who throws 330 passes without an interception,

how long would the podcast have to be before we mentioned Jared Goff? And now he threw that interception and so I don't know is it uh is the floodgates open now now this is it it's a little skit yeah he's got a taste of interceptions again he's just gonna start doing yeah the Montgomery got hurt in that game and it seemed like it was really bad but um I don't think it's like season ending. Man, we'll see. Two more things quickly.

This whole thing about Rodgers, maybe he'll be back in January. Let's stop. Let's all stop. Just stop. This can't be a topic. Which team? Which team is he going to play for? This is like an actual topic. I get texts from people like, hey, man, did you see this thing about Rodgers?

Could be back by January. It's like, you guys are going to be playing in January. You're going to go like seven to nine, seven to 10. What are you talking about? You guys are going to win 10 games with Zach Wilson? Yeah. You might as well say March. It doesn't matter.

Yeah. And also like Rodgers, well, Cam Akers did it. I'm pretty sure Cam Akers didn't come back in like less than four months. Cam Akers is what, a dozen years younger than Rodgers? Yeah, Rodgers is 40. Yeah. I don't get it. I just, yeah, I mean, that sucked.

And I have a lot of Jet fans in my life. And even I felt bad for that. On the other hand, I thought the only thing funnier would be if he tore the Achilles running the flag out. And maybe he did. Maybe he did. And he just tumped it out for four plays. But that's the Jets. That's the Jets luck for you. Puka

who just broke this rookie wide receiver thing. How much did he go for in our draft? In the free agent? He was like in the 20s, right? Oh yeah, like 28 or something. 29. So I did some research as you know we did this last year with brock purdy we're just going wikipedia and trying to figure out what the hell happened he set the high school record for catches yards and tds in utah so good start

two years in washington first year breaks his foot as a freshman yep second year is the covet season then he transfers to byYU and he has two solid years. He's like 43 catches for 800 yards, 60 days. He has half as many catches as he had all last year as a senior in that fucking conference where everybody throws it all the time.

And he's on pace for... I just don't understand this. And then when you watch the games, it passes the eye test because the guy's open and he catches everything. And it doesn't matter where you throw him. He's over here. He's over here. He's like Wes Walker. And they got him in the fifth round. It's unbelievable. 177th pick. It is nuts. There's a lot of good wide receivers out there to be drafted. And this is going to sound controversial but is cooper cup a system receiver like he's playing he's playing the cooper cup role he's playing it great too like it's insane

what he's doing and i'm surprised that matt stafford is doing as well as i mean he played last week's game matt stafford was at about as good as i've seen him and uh yeah it doesn't look like puka's going away they gave the Niners every single thing they could handle. They could do it for three quarters. Then it became a talent issue. But for those three quarters, they were toe-to-toe. The offense, especially after what we just watched with the Pats, the plays they were running were great.

McVay was just like complete command of his bag. Stafford was unbelievable. and then in the fourth quarter finally you know I was looking at like what week one game are we going to say was oh that was the most ridiculous result and I landed on Rams Seahawks and I'm like

maybe not Rams could be decent they really could be decent I couldn't really find another game where I was like alright that's going that's going to look stupid. That's not going to make any sense. But now I don't think it's the Rams Seahawks. Everyone's about the same now. I want to talk about that specific topic in one second. We're taking a break. We're supported by NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube and YouTube TV. If you're a displaced fan, NFL Sunday Ticket is an absolute must-have.

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be careful along our tracks and only make left turns where it's safe to do so. Be alert, be aware and stay safe. All right. So, three 2-0 teams, Washington, Tampa Bay, and Atlanta. Are you buying any of those three?

As a team, we will be seeing in week 19 that we'll be talking about in the 2-7 matchup or the 3-6 matchup. Like, man, nobody saw this coming.

As a playoff team? Or i don't think i don't think either of them any of them win the division um you had the saints right or did you have atlanta i had the saints i i thought you and i have the saints yeah i told you atlanta it was atlanta or the giants for that last spot and i changed my mind 700 times and i could not decide but atlanta's two and oh and tampa's two-0, Tampa's 2-0, Washington's 2-0. The one that makes sense as I'm watching is Tampa because they actually do have

a fair chunk of the talent they had two years ago. Baker looks pretty good in their offense. Washington beat two horrible teams. They barely beat Arizona. Then the game today was ridiculous. Atlanta, we'll see. I have major, major Ritter suspicions.

I know he's the first guy there. Yeah, he was really, truly awful for two hours in that game. I know his first guy in the office, last guy to leave. I was actually impressed that he bounced back and he got better as the game went along. I'm not like, he's not a complete cross-off, but I'm very suspicious. But Baker, I know he's had up and downs,

but we've at least seen him take a team to the playoffs. So weird. Yeah. No, I'm not going to say you're wrong. And a guy like Mike Evans is playing like he's heard everybody talk about what Mike Evans is going to he's heard everybody talk about what Mike Evans is going to be in 2023 right like he's got that nine year streak I think of a thousand yards everyone's like well that's ending this year it's like nope I'm gonna push off I'm gonna you know

I'm gonna drag I'm gonna do whatever I need to do to get to the end zone so he looks like he's possessed and we talked last week about how they have ballers on defense right they still have big names um to keep them yeah, it's the NFC South. My advice was to enjoy it or not enjoy it and then make a decision in week 14 or 15, but I know that's not allowed. Before this season, they were plus 750 for the division. They were six to one to get to 10 wins. They already have two. They still have home games against Detroit, Atlanta, Tennessee, Carolina, Jacksonville, New Orleans, and Philadelphia.

And then they have easy road games, seemingly easy, at Houston and at Indianapolis and at Carolina at the end of the season. Like, they could get to 10 wins. It's either going to be them or New Orleans, but I'm not buying Atlanta yet. I have real suspicions with the coaching and some of the decisions they make during games. Arthur Smith does some really weird shit. Where you're just going, whoa, what are you doing, dude? Yeah, they should have blown that team out.

Half the Packers offense was injured, and Jordan Loves, it looks like. I mean, we've read his MVP odds. It's crazy that he's up there. But, yeah, I'm not an Atlanta guy. I don't know if you're going to go by coaches. I'm not sure I trust Bowles to get them Tampa to 10 wins. I don't think I do either. It is weird that they had to get rid of Brady to stand out in that division

after two weeks. Well, we were talking. We were wondering if the Rams were going to be the, you know, just say, fuck it and tank. They're definitely not doing that. And Stafford looks good enough that you at least have to play it out for, you know, six, seven weeks. And I was way wrong about that. Yeah.

And they had a really, it seems like they brought in some really good rookies and, you know, some of the undrafted guys they had out there. I was impressed. So do you feel better after week two about Buffalo? Yeah, you have to, right? I know we wanted them to lose and we wanted to bring up, but all week I was about Josh Allen.

He's not right. He averages a fumble and an interception every game. It's him and it's Diggs. And when Von Miller's not in there, they get no pressure on defense and they're going away. It's all going to be Dolphins. But they righted the ship a little bit here. What did you say, that week four, week five against the Dolphins?

We'll know a little more then. I think they're home for that game. But what are they, plus 140 for the division? Maybe we shouldn't write them off as much as we do early in the season. My fear with them, if you're backing them from a gambling standpoint, is just are they the team? They blow out the teams they

should blow out. And in close games, you can't trust them. But I will say their pass rush today, their pass rush was really good. And I don't know if they dialed something up or if the Raiders just can't block, but it was

one or the other, maybe both. Here's the other thing. James Cook, 17 for 123. 183 rushing for the team. If they could do that, they could afford a Josh Allen fumble every now and then. Cook was dangerous. Jimmy G, he just couldn't help himself. They're up 7-0.

They get a stop, and they have the ball again, and they're looking like, oh, here we go. And then he had to do the Jimmy G pass. Do you feel better about Tannehill? Yeah, I do. I do, but I don't know what to compare it to. I feel like it's when you play a 7-year-old one-on-one. It's like,

all right, all right, I'm back. I want it, you know, that Chargers defense is nice to bolster some confidence, but I'm not sure if he's long for the rest of the season, but he's got to be our guy, right? We took the Titans to win the division. Yeah, I feel better about it. I like the way he's moving around.

He had a couple of deep long balls. Burks made a big play. Hopkins had one of those games where he made a play in the second half, and I didn't realize he had even played. So I don't know if that one's playing out. But I feel better about Tannehill. Plus 200 now. We got them at three, right?

Yeah. Three to one? Yeah. I feel a little better about Atlanta, but I'm not there yet. But a teeny bit better. I didn't know what was going to happen. The Packers Atlanta to me was a stay away. I had no teeny bit better. I didn't know what was going to happen. The Packers Atlanta to me was a stay away. No money on it. No idea what was going on.

Washington, do you feel any better about them? No, I think you hit it on the head. Let's see them play someone good. I think they have a tough game this week. Are they on the road? Where are they? On the one hand, you could say incredibly impressive comeback in Denver

where the game seemed like it was over. They made this drive. Tight end caught a touchdown. The safety beheaded him and got kicked out. And it was the most vicious hit of the season so far. He's going away. Really bad. That guy's going to get suspended for a game.

Jacoby Myers last week, right? Yeah, this was even worse than that. But it seemed like that galvanized Washington. They almost got in a fight after that play. And then all of a sudden, every time they had the ball, they scored. Brian Robinson, who was $1, $2 running back in most leagues, he looked awesome. Their pass rush looked pretty good.

And the thing that I really loved more than anything, the Rivera-Eric Biennemi combo on the sidelines. It is the true detective season. You never knew you wanted. I want to see them solve crimes. I want to see them on Law & Order. Rivera just doesn't move. He has no expressions whatsoever. And Biennemi is just completely animated and always looks like they're about to either get in an argument or start hugging each other. Every time they cut to them, I was into it. And I have no idea if that team is even mediocre. They should be handcuffed together. I don't care if they're mic'd up, but I do like the idea of

them not being able to come six feet away from each other. I got so lucky. And by the way, I was looking for odds for Moneyline. Oh, yeah. You're going to tell the story. Well, first I'll say, if you had, what were they up? 21-3 Denver? So if you took Washington and you took the Giants who were down even more, right? I've seen 70-1 at that Moneyline parlay. And you'd be like, oh, wow. Nobody would take that.

Well, if you thought about it, just that Arizona sucks and Denver kind of sucks, you might take those two, right? So that was, I think it was way more than 70, but people had it at 5-1 for each or something, so 71. But I had Denver plus 7.5 on one of these adjusted parlays on Fandle that you hate, that pays like minus 270, but you can imagine what I had on it. So plus 7.5, they go down by eight because they have to kick a field goal to cut it to eight. And then that, I feel like I was unlucky because plus seven and a half up 21, three, you should win that damn bet.

But Russ doesn't even reach the end zone on the Hail Mary and it gets bounced back backwards into the end zone. And I lose by two, which is less than seven and a half. God bless. My son was watching with me and Kyle and it was the first Hail Mary he'd ever seen. And it was like watching Astro-Nasaline on the moon for him. He just couldn't believe it. But the best part was you knew they weren't going to get the two point. Usually when it happens, it's automatic. The team gets whatever else they need to send the game in overtime. Not this time. What are you over under weeks Russ plays? I had this.

I haven't saved that because I have that in the next section. We're talking about them now. I have a really good segment for this. Do you feel better about the Giants or no? Yeah, a little bit. I hate that. That's kind of

a win a team needs. Well, Barkley now, it seemed like Barkley, when they were losing, was going through the all right, I'll show them season, like dropping balls that could have been caught and turning them into interceptions. Like, I'm not going to change the whole landscape for running backs and how much they're going to earn. So

maybe if I screw up, that'll be easier and then they'll realize how important it is to have a serviceable running back. But then he came alive and that, you know, I don't know, like Arizona like took a page out of the Colts, you know, Jeff Saturday playbook last year against the Vikings and just different ways to tank. You don't always have to go down 24-0.

You could be up 28-3 or something and lose. So Raheem is convinced that they tanked the second half. And I just don't know how you do that in football. But it was pretty weird that they just ran amok in the first half. And then in the second half, the Giants scored zero points in three halves and then 31 in the last half. But it did feel like they got their mojo. And there's some good stats where he met those two about a day ball on the second half with adjustments come from behind. And this would be something for day ball.

Imagine being that lose, you know, being outscored like 61 to nothing or whatever it was, and then coming back and making the playoffs. That would be pretty, pretty spectacular. But I was, I have a couple of different giants bets. Like I have a long, longer shot playoff bet on them, but I have their over, which was seven and a half. And if they weren't going to win this game, that over is done.

They're going to get to eight wins not having beaten Arizona, a team that's unclear if they're even trying. Right, sure. I feel a little better about them, but the Barkley thing is not great. Right. Last one is Seattle, which I think that was the wonk game in week one. They looked like crap. The Rams beat them up.

And it was like, oh, Seattle. They've only won three times in the last. What was that thing House said on Wise Guys today? Since week nine, they've won three games. Right, yep. And they listed the teams, and it wasn't impressive. Yeah, and it was't impressive. Yeah, it was like bad quarterbacks.

You think after week one, they get killed by this Rams team. We all think it's going to suck and then they kind of look like the first half of last year Seattle again. And Pete Carroll, they set the record today for most times they cut to him on the sidelines. It was fun. Every time on

the multi-view, we had him in the right bottom and I felt like half the game they were just showing Carroll fist fights. He was hulking up like Hulk Hogan in 1991 or something. I like the cutaways angle. I wish Vandal would come up with a number

for how many gum chews we could actually see from Pete Carroll. What does the gum look like? 68 and a half. Imagine if it's not gum. Maybe he's just chewing on his tongue for the last two decades. Who knows?

No, they're better. And I think you're right about that being the wonky game. This is what I tried to figure out, but not because the Rams are so bad and will be so bad. The Rams were better than we realized, but we didn't realize it after week one. But now we kind of realize,

oh, the Rams. All right, here's the Denver part I mentioned earlier. I want you to rank these four things based on when their team is going to bail on them if you had to do order of the bailout. So the number one, do you think it's going to happen the fastest versus last? The nominees. When will the Jets bail on Zach Wilson? When will Denver bail on zach wilson when will denver bail on russell wilson when will the chargers bail on brandon staley and when will chicago bail on justin fields

oh so i get both wilson staley and fields who is the first one who gets bailed on i'll give you my pick while you think about it Go ahead, yeah I'm going to pick Russell Wilson I don't think Peyton's going to go down Peyton's too competitive And there's too many moments with Russ Where he just As Raheem would say Looks Larry Holmes status

And I think they're just going to put Stidham in They're going to have to Because their team's going to There's no way. What was there, 11 plays he had today where you're like, oh, my God. What happened to this guy? It's really like the only person I can compare it to is when Darren Williams just lost it.

When he was like a borderline all-star and then all of a sudden he was like not even a starter anymore. And that's – so I would go Russell Wilson first. Who would you you do i think it has to be all right i'm going to put weeks on this so i think the jets are stuck with zach wilson now right if they were going to make a move it was like i said last week you know uh but i think they're going to stay with him so i think he will so that they have to do the yeah they have to do that well who's dallas we can't get a real look at him until we get to week three. Yeah, it'll be an excuse every week. Garrett Olsen will be out next week and whatever. I think Chicago will stick with Fields for the year. I think it's going to be tough

to get rid of Staley until at least week 10 or 12. I mean, if I have to say what's first, I think Denver, for those reasons, we talked in the preseason. They gave Stidham $10 million for two years. That's a pretty good haul for a backup. And it makes me think Sean Payton is not going to want to stick around and be embarrassed. And yeah, you're right. We just see some Russell Wilson, like, really, that bailout.

He just didn't want to. He was forced to throw that Hail Mary. Otherwise, believe me, he would have thrown another three yard out to Jerry Judy or somebody. He just doesn't have it. It's so weird watching him. There'll be pressure, and he'll do the Russell Wilson circle rollout move

that he perfected five, six, seven, ten years ago. And then he would put the jets on and just outrace whoever. And now when he does it, the guy just jumps and tackles him. And it just happens over and over again. They have Miami in Miami next week. And my guess is that's it for Russ. That's make or break. And if he sucks in that

game and they go 0-3, you got the Bears in week four in Chicago, you put Stidham in that game. And that's like, hey, man, we got to make a call. We need a spark. They do all that. So that's number one. We both definitely think that's number one.

What's two, though? Zach Wilson, you're going to say? Yeah, I think it's Zach Wilson. I just don't think he's competent enough as a quarterback. He can look competent for two hours, but he'll make three of the worst plays you've ever seen. Yeah. And he just can't get through a football game. I think his

record now, he's 9-16 as a starter, Fantasy said. He's only had, I think, six good games out of those 25. At some point, it's a pretty decent sample size for a QB. How many times can we watch him roll out, sprint toward the sideline to his right,

and then throw it out of bounds? It's all he does. Right. And he could run for a couple of first downs. Well, I mean, if we look at the other options fields for him to be benched, we have a lot of people in the organization would have to eat shit. Right. So I don't think it's happening anytime soon. I think there's an extra month because of that. And Zach Wilson, it's not the same thing. It's not like, Hey, this isn't the guy we counted on. Who's just underachieving. It's like, we just think we could do better and maybe even get this team to the playoffs. So yeah, that's second. I'm with you too. I think, uh, fields is last and I think they could, they could get rid of Stanley, but I don't think it would be until once they're by,

I have to look at it. So here's, stretch. They're at Minnesota, home Vegas next to. By week. So let's say they lose one of those two. Week six, Dallas. Week seven, at Kansas City. And then week eight, Chicago. I think it would be after that Kansas City thing. But I don't know.

If I'm involved with running the Chargers, I don't know how many'm like involved with running the Chargers I don't know how many years in a row you can watch the team just get out thought in any crucial situation like how much evidence do you need okay let's do guess the lines you ready let's do it

unless you want me to read want more Wikipedia want some Pook-pedia? Puka-pedia. By the way, do you know the only three teams who overcame 0-2 and won the Super Bowl? My Cowboys were one of them, right? Yeah, we've each rooted for one of them.

I had the 0-1 Pat started 0-2. Oh, really? And rooted for one of them. Oh. I had the 0-1 Pat started 0-2. Oh, really? And who was the third team? The loathsome, hateful, sadistic New York Giants of 2007. Oh, really? Damn, I didn't remember that. Yeah. Those motherfuckers. They wanted Eli out immediately after game one, I think.

All right, so we're going to do week three. Just some betting stuff for the first two weeks. Home teams so far against the spread, according to my calculations, are 10, 19, and 1. The home teams. Against the spread, yeah. Underdogs against the spread are 17, 11, and 1. Proving yet again.

Oh, I don't, I didn't add the paths in that. So that's 17, 12 and 12. Yeah. Yeah. You didn't wait,

let me look. Yeah, no, you didn't win. Let me work on my addition thing. Uh, but proving it again, we say this every year,

just if you're at a Pittsburgh or whatever, just take all the dogs. I know. It's just so hard. And then you feel crazy strong about two, three, four favorites. Grab those. One other thing. NFC versus AFC this season.

NFC now 4-0. Really? Yeah. Wow. AFC's loaded. Who would have thought? Oh, here's another one. Sal 2-0 over Bill Simmons

in Guest of the Lines. By the way, I am... You did? Well, that sucks because I want to... I want to dedicate this week to one Dave Jacoby from the Stern School of Business at New York University. So, that's where this

dedication's going. I wanted to see before we do Guest Alliance can you do an imitation of me having a midlife crisis and trying to turn my show into a Pat McAfee type show

like I'm wearing a tank top and I'm talking like Pat McAfee but it's my voice can Can you pull this up? Do you want a week to work on it? Yeah. Give me a week. Give me a week. So Sal's going to take a week.

All right. Bill McAfee. Billy McAfee. Yeah. I don't know. That guy's got some dog in him. He's got some dog. All right.

I'm going to get this. I'm excited about this now. Yeah. You work on that next week, Sal. All right. My invitation to be as Billy McAfee. Billy McAfee. Pat Mc excited about this now. Yeah, you work on that. Next week, Sal, my invitation to be is Billy McAfee. Pat McAfee's brother.

How great would that have been? I mean, God, I know you don't want to talk college, but the McAfee-Rock Deion Sanders tour this weekend that ended with 60 Minutes, Deion on 60 Minutes, and they absolutely should have lost that game Saturday night. I don't understand why I don't like them so much,

but it's probably because everybody likes them too much. Great. They got all of America watching Colorado football at midnight on the East Coast, but my God, I should have lost that game. I loved it. Colorado versus Colorado State. Watched that on an airplane coming home last night. It was great.

Yeah. It was great. Mission accomplished, but shouldn't have won. Mark Jones on the call. Thursday night. I'm going to do my Bill Simmons as Mark Jones next week, too. And get it all. Week three. We have Thursday night.

A possible stinker. 49ers home for the New York Football Giants. I picked the Niners by 10.5. We split it. It is 10 and I said 9.5. Here's the thing with these Thursday games

and you touched on it. I would have told Coach Dayball, you have to play the here's the thing with these Thursday games and you touched on it. If you, if I were to tell, you know, uh, coach day ball, uh, all right, you have to play the 49ers this year.

Um, what situation do you want it? And you're missing Saquon, uh, probably when you say, Oh, Oh man. All right.

How about a week three on a Thursday night? Wouldn't it, wouldn't that be the best? Well, yeah, right. Exactly. Then you get best spot? Then I'll get 10 days rest. Yeah, right. Exactly. Then you get the rest and you can catch him off guard in just a short week. Forty down or still healthy.

I think George Kittle is going to announce his retirement tomorrow as a fantasy asset. Really? Yeah. He's actually going to get together with Kyle Pitts. They're going to do a joint. Did he crush you? You have him in a couple of leagues? I took him in two of the leagues because it's like, oh, he's the second best tight end. But the reality is there are no second goods.

It's Kelsey and then nobody else matters. Right. Right. I know. I know what this is just doubling down because he beat you up last year in our playoff game and then sat like two seats away from us at WrestleMania. He's my nemesis. He really is. So our Sunday marquee game, I don't know why, but I couldn't find one. I didn't think, I'm going to leave the category blank. I did not think there was a great Sunday afternoon game. I think there's some solid ones,

but there's no like, oh yeah, that game. I think the most interesting game is a game we talked about, Dolphins-Broncos in Miami. Possible last stand to Russ. Miami coming home, trying to go for a triumphant 3-0. We'll see with the weather. Sometimes this is right around the, we didn't, I guess the KC-Jacksonville game was a little hot today,

but we haven't had one of those super hot week two, week three games where it's like you bet on one team. You don't realize it's like 120 degrees on the field. So maybe it'll be this game. I had the dolphins laying eight and a half points. I knew it. I knew you were going to overshoot. I know you went overshoot.

I overshot. Yeah. I said five and it is six.. I knew you were going to overshoot. Overshot? Yeah, I said five, and it is six. Wait, let me make sure it's six. Oh, my God. That's ridiculous. There you go. There's your teaser game. You're good.

You're good to go. Denver? That's ridiculous. So what do they think? They're worried about the Broncos' kitchen sink game. They don't want to go on three? Is that the reason? Wait, now they took it off.

Now they took it off. Oh, it's a no bet. Cross it off. Oh, that stinks. I shouldn't have even said anything. Yeah. Wait, why would they take that off? Was it to hurt?

What could happen? They had to do what they had to do. Well, Jalen Waddle got hurt. Oh, yeah. That would have caused them to take the line down. All right, fine. You're getting to do. Well, Jalen Waddle got hurt. Oh, yeah. That would have caused them to take the line down. All right, fine. You're getting lucky there. Sorry, Jacoby.

How about Lions Falcons in Detroit? That one they have. I am putting this firmly in the Vegas zone. Detroit by four and a half. Yeah, you get it. I don't know why I can't find it, but that's yours. Oh, I said five and a half. You got four and a half.

Yep. I think this line drops as the week goes along. I think this gets to like Atlanta plus three and a half. Yeah. I mean, they were five and a half against Seattle, weren't they? Or I guess it went down. It was too high. I know, but it won't be too high against Atlanta.

At some point, it's got to even out where this Detroit team is a little better than them, as everyone says. I don't see it. You think that goes low? Wow. All right. Speaking of this team is better than everyone says or worse than everyone says, the Chargers are in Minnesota.

I have this as the other watchable game. This is, got to say, a loser leaves town match. This might be our first one. It's two on two teams, and I don't think either of them could might be our first one. It's two on two teams. And I don't think either of them could afford to go on three. It's in Minnesota. It's going to hurt one of them. That's for sure.

Yeah. I, uh, I built in the, the weird chargers bias that people treat the chargers like they're 13 and 14 for some reason. Right. I have the chargers favored by one.

Yeah. You, you get this. And I don't get it because I would say Minnesota home, pretty good home field advantage, minus one and a half. But it's Chargers minus one and a half. So you get it. You're on the right side.

I don't know, man. They're kind of the same team. They're kind of the same team though, right? It's going to be a one score game. Can we make money on this being a one-score game? Can we take both teams plus six and a half and just load up? I know it's going to be a big minus.

Like a double tease of the same game? What is one of those things where whoever is down will still be able to get a cheap touchdown like Minnesota did last week? Right, right. Exactly. That was nice. That was a fun backdoor. Oh, we didn't talk about McVay with the field goal for the push. Check the bank accounts. Check theVay with the field goal for the push. Check the bank accounts.

Check the bank accounts and the 30 for 30 to follow. What is the right thing to do there, though? Then I was thinking about it. I'm like, all right, there's going to be a lot of jokes thrown this way. I think that is the right decision now. I liked it. So if you missed it, the game was basically over. They're down 10.

They were trying to score a touchdown. They couldn't. And in the last play, they kick a field goal. Four seconds left. So there's one play. Four seconds left. Right. But theoretically, and it never would happen,

the game can end on a defensive penalty, right? So if they make the field goal and the kicker is roughed, do they get to do the onside kick? There's no scenario where they can win. They couldn't win. They wouldn't extend it. Wow, good for him. That's something else. I mean, really, take a knee then if you can't win. Why risk getting anyone hurt

at that point? Can you imagine if he did some sort of Fandle ad tomorrow and say, I'm Sean McVay, a.k.a. The Pusher. If he has a bet boost tomorrow, we're going gonna know something's wrong lost uh did we win the bet boost today we did remandre did he score a touchdown yeah there we go boost plus 150 on fando yeah that's why i was confused why you're upset about the result but all right good coming around. We boosted the Pats plus

seven and a half with Romandre or Zeke will score a touchdown and a hit. I've already blocked the game out of my mind. Can I get a ruling on the Jets-Pats being a fairly watchables? Yeah, that's fine. I mean, Zach Wilson versus Mac Jones, it's like watching a car crash.

Right. Belichick versus the Jets. Pick the line because I want to talk about what this is. Well, it's at the Jets. And I don't see how the 0-2 Pats can be favored over basically anyone in the league except for five guys. So I'm going to say Jets minus one over the Pats. Oh,

wow. All right. I get this. I said Patriots minus three. It's Patriots minus two and a half. You know you're favored by that. I mean, just the fact that... Why? Why do I know? He's not going to get embarrassed by

this team. You're good. You're fine. You're going to win this game. We couldn't block Miami today who didn't have Jalen Phillips. All right. So everyone will get sacked and the Patriots will have the better defense ultimately. This has rock bottom written all over it. I might not watch.

What's the over-under on this? 37. My daughter is. 37.5 is very low. Wow. We don't see that that much. I can't go to my daughter's club soccer games anymore because she's in college.

I might just go to somebody else's club soccer games. I might have to watch this. Just pick maybe some friends who have kids. I'll go to their games. Packers home for the Saints. Two good teams. I believe both of these teams are above average. I think the Saints are going to beat the Panthers.

We're going to do a little same game later with the Saints. Oh, we can do that now, actually. I have the Packers favored by three at home against the Saints. All right, I got this one exactly. One and a half Packers are favored. That was a weird game. I mean, you had Atlanta and Green Bay, and you had either one and a half.

I mean, you knew that was going to end on one, right? You knew that whoever won was going to take it by one. The one and a half, it always feels like it gets fucked up. Yeah. Tell them our same game parlay we're going to do for Monday Night Football. Same game parlay. I don't think we're going to be able to get it boosted. Miles Sanders touchdown, right?

Anytime touchdown. Saints plus three and a half. That's nice. And Carr to have 200 or more passing yards. So that's adjusted lower. Saints is obviously adjusted because they're favored. And we're just looking at a Miles Sanders touchdown on the other side. So I think it's about four to one, right?

396 when I sent it to you. Yeah. So we'll tweet that out tomorrow with the exact odds, but four to one. Little Saints. We like the Saints. Okay. Ravens Colts. This is in Baltimore.

And there's probably not a line on this because Anthony Richardson got concussed. We don't know if he's playing next week, do we? They don't care about him, I guess. All right. I have Ravens by seven over the Colts. I said nine. It's eight and a half. You're beating me again.

I'm up four three. Yeah. I guess Minshew is an exact tradeoff for Anthony Richardson. That makes sense, I guess. I'm up 4-3. Yeah, they don't, I guess, Minshew is an exact trade-off for Anthony Richardson. That makes sense, I guess. I don't know. So we had, I had the multi-view plus the CBS and the Fox games for the early. We had six. There were eight games.

And I just threw Colts, Texans to the Wolves. Didn't watch one moment of it. Yeah. Didn't see anything other than a couple highlights, but I saw he got concussed. It's funny because on Wise Guys this morning, I gave out Titans Chargers as the highest scoring game, plus

950, and I kind of did the same thing. I threw that to the side. I'm like, oh, I'm looking good here. I'm like, oh, crap. There's like 70 points in this stupid Colts game. I already lost. Fairly watchable is last one. Browns-Titans. It's in Cleveland. Two

more teams I enjoy. I'm going to say Browns by four. Browns-Titans. Why can't I find anything here? You got it. Exactly. I had three. Yeah, they disrespect the Titans a little.

I guess it's their quarterback. It's just... Vrabel's a really good coach, and it was becoming ridiculous that he had lost eight in a row. Right. Stating back to last year. You called it. You got on our text chain.

You said, this is kitchen sink. No question about it. It was one of the only things I called this week. It's a fun one. All right, before we do poop factor, let's take one more break. We'll do the rest of the games in parent corner. At Pennzoil, we have one job, pioneering a motor oil so advanced, you don't have to think about your motor oil.

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Find their products through banks, credit unions, and associations, or visit SecurianCanada.ca. Securian Canada, insurance designed for life. All right, come back. Poopfecta. This is in Washington. They're hosting the Bills. Kind of a sneaky game for the Bills.

Like, I definitely, I will not be throwing the Bills a million dollar picks. This Washington, rejuvenated Washington crowd. They seem like they have a pass rush. They can run the ball a little bit. They're weirdly fun to watch. They had a nice little comeback win. I have no idea if they're even decent, much less good. But I think the Bills are going to be favored by three.

Oh, wow. I went low too, but I said four and a half. It's six and a half. Oh, come on. That's stupid. Not trusting Washington just yet. That's too high. Well, they made him an underdog to Denver,

and that was a close game today. Yeah, but that's... Come on. You're treating the Bills like they're a Super Bowl team with that. I know you like Rivera and everything, but if you go coach and you go quarterback and you go, this team's not going to be 3-0, I think that's

a fair line. You think this is going to affect the filming of True Detective Season 6 with Rivera and Bien-Aimé? If Bien-Aimé uses a Matthew McConaughey accent, I'm all in. Winning time got canceled, by the way.

I saw that. Yeah. What a bummer. We're never going to find out if Magic and Cookie ended up together or what happened in the 1985 finals. You know, you joke. Did I bring this up on this podcast last week, but I was watching last week and I said, my God, they have the two best actors portraying

athletes in the history of film and TV. Magic and Kareem? I would say Magic and Bird. Kareem is right in there too. Yeah. Honestly, it's one show and they have two, maybe three. I think it's great. You like Winning Time? I think it's one show and they have two maybe three I think it's great

you like winning time? I think it's astounding like Nixon I get because that's his son right but I can't you have to appreciate that like Larry Bird's jump shot looks real and he looks and talks like him no? It's all Lakers

so you don't care yeah alright just that part of it. Jags are home for the Texans. Sure. Do you want to bring in Bill McAfee? I'm not ready for it. We're like a week away. I can't wait for Bill McAfee.

Jags at home against the Texans. I have Jags minus eight and a half. You got it exactly. I said seven Jags minus eight and a half. You got it exactly. I said seven. I said seven and a half. You're teasing that. You're not afraid. I don't like what I saw from the Jags.

From the Jags? Seahawks home for the Panthers. I was way off here. Were you? Yeah, like you should have me replaced for being this far off. But go ahead. I had Seahawks by five and a half.

I had nine. I mean, come on. It's still a rookie quarterback going into one of the toughest places to play. And they showed that they might be, as much as we hate Atlanta, they might be the worst team, right? We still have to watch them Monday, but it's four and a half.

You get it. Oh, Jesus. It's way low. I don't understand. I know we just did the same game. I don't understand the Saints line at all. I think the Saints are much better than Carolina. And JC Horn's out too.

Right. The two games that I felt the best about this week were the Pats-Miami with Pat Shitt the bed and the Saints game. The Saints are going to have – that division is going to have three 2-0 teams. Crazy. The Saints win. In your division, 7-1. Right.

Two more, Dallas at Arizona. And I don't see how this isn't double digits. I have Dallas by 10.5 in Arizona. I got this. I said 12. It's 12.5. Oh, wow. I have Dallas by 10 and a half in Arizona. I got this. I said 12. It's 12 and a half. Oh, wow. Look at you.

Like a juggernaut. Yeah. Jesus. That's a bad. They can't take a chance with that team anymore. What are they going to score against Dallas? How many points? 13? Six?

I continue to think Dobbs is like half decent. All right. So, 13 points. No, I don't think he'll be half decent against your team, but it's just funny that

where it was like, can't find quarterbacks, can't find quarterbacks, and then Dobbs puts up like, you know, 28 points and two and a half quarters. He seems so comfortable. What happened to that team?

They really felt like they were playing, they were like running downhill the first three quarters. How seems so comfortable. What happened to that team? They really felt like they were playing. They were like running downhill the first three quarters. How do you just lose it like that? Yeah, they just, uh, I don't know what happened either. All of a sudden it's just like the Giants had the ball for a half hour. Chiefs are home for the bears. And, uh, after what we saw from fields today, I don't see how this line could be less than

10 and a half. So I'm going to say Chiefs by 10.5. Oh, wow. I went 13.5. It's 12.5. They're not going to give free money for these monsters against nobodies. Are you beating me? There's only

three games left. I think it's 7, 3, 4, 5, 6. Hold on. Hold on. 7, 2, 6, and there's three games left. All right. Sunday night. Steelers are at Las Vegas. Jimmy G. Oh, my God.

My God. You know, sometimes I have the Steelers favorite in this game by one and a half. Oh, damn. I said one. And this game by one and a half. Oh, damn. I said one. And it is exactly one and a half. So we are tied. I'm not sure what to make of Vegas because I thought they looked good last week. They look good for about 10 minutes today.

And then it looked like they couldn't block anymore. And their defense kind of rolled over a little bit. And then it looked like they couldn't block anymore. And their defense kind of rolled over a little bit. And then Devontae got hurt. And there's a world where five days from now, this line is like Steelers by four, and everybody's taking the Steelers because the Steelers look good on Monday night.

And then it's like, oh my god. But right now, that one and a half seems low. I think you're right. It's unfair to analyze this game now. The Steelers could look like a top seven AFC team potentially after tomorrow or we might want to stick a fork in them. It's like the Steelers just might be the good bad team. That's what they were

last year. They beat the other bad teams and you know, that's who they were. We have two Monday night games for some reason. Yeah, they're doing this again. They're doing it again. Eagles at Tampa. This is a good game.

I'm actually kind of excited to watch this one. I got to win this. I'm going to lose the next one to you. So I'm putting this in the Vegas zone. Eagles by four and a half. Good. Okay. I take that.

I said seven and a half. It's six and a half. So you need that next one to tie. That's stupid. You're going to want to... Well, I won't say anything. You think... What was Philly against your team?

Wait, I have Bengals versus Bengals. Who are the Bengals? No, that's not right. They can't play themselves, right? No. They're home against the Rams. Wait a minute. Real quick, though. What were the Eagles giving the Patriots week one? How much? Three and a half.

Maybe six and a half is a little high. Bengals home for the Rams. I'm sneaking this in the Vegas zone, too. I'm going to say Bengals minus five and a half. Yes. Oh! Oh! I said eight, and it's six and a half.

Oh! You get it. You tie. Yeah. Oh, Jacoby. What did I do? Ah. All right.

What have I done? I saw me on a win. Is Burrow playing? What about, have we ever had a guess the lines here where the Pats haven't won and I haven't won and it's week three? You know what? This has to be the first time. I'm coming back with a vengeance and a Billy McAfee impression next week. You'll see.

Do you know, Kyle, his entire life, the Pats have been good, basically, until these last couple years. Really? Yeah. Is that true? Yeah, pretty much. And now we're just like every other team.

Kyle, you know, if you want to jump on my, people won't think it's weird. There's a little room on the bandwagon. You can sit on my lap. He does like Michael Parsons. Yeah. Why wouldn't he? The Pats are doing this new thing where they ring

the bell. It seems new. Oh, you didn't like the whole other thing. They have some animated thing, right? Is that going on at the stadium? Well, Tom Brady rang the bell and then this week, Kenny Chesney rang the bell and I'm like, this is usually when it starts going downhill. What bell? Which bell?

That's not the thing. There's not a bell in the stadium. Isn't that the Vegas Knights or something? Now you're stealing the gimmicks? It's not enough you're stealing signs and everything else? My God. Week 18, it's going to be, you know, we're going to start going down the list of Boston celebrities. It's going to start getting pretty grim.

All right. Parent Corner? Let's do it. By the way, when does Archie go away? Are we guessing? That's what it is. It's this week. This is less of a story and more of me needing advice from you. We're dropping him off

at Oregon later in the week. It's very late in the year to be dropping a kid off to college, but they work quarters there or something. I don't know how it works, but they want a lot of money for a school that's not accepting kids until September 45th. So anyway, as far as... I think you would agree with this. We've had this conversation off to the side. Sending a kid off to college is similar in a way like when your grandfather has dementia and starts being mean to your mother

and starts hitting on all her friends and you're like, all right, maybe it's time. Same here with sending the kid to college. I love him to death, but he's averaging two parking tickets a week. So let's get him out. And that said, I do think it's going to be very sad and we're going to fly out

and we're getting all this stuff shipped. And then it's like a mad scramble to get it into the dorm room. And I said, well, we're going to rent the car to move this stuff. And my wife's like, no, no, we'll just Uber back and forth. And I said, well, I think I'm going to be welling up in tears. I think we should rent the car only because I don't want the Uber driver to see me, you know, crying a little bit. And so I convinced her to get it. We're renting a car just to avoid, you know, bawling at this, you know, but then I listened to you on a podcast and you're like,

oh, it's not that bad. Not as bad as I thought all these other things. And then I'm like, all right, well, that's good. But then I was thinking, oh, well, he's kind of heartless. So I don't know what to think when it comes to this. So give me some advice. I have heard this from other parents that it's not as bad as they thought dropping off. It's not as bad because you stay more connected with them through devices. So you don't feel like that's it. Like when we went away or it's like, that's it. You just get dropped off. I think it'd be all right.

But I think it's really hard for the, for the mom. It is mom. Son thing is pretty intense. Yeah. Yeah. And does it, did it make you feel smaller?

Like, Hey, you got me still when the, when the, well, you had a mom daughter thing. So it was a little different. No, I i something shifts i want to talk about this too with my parent corner something the house feels different like

there's no question and there's these little moments like i always call them like zoe deja vu or like your grocery shopping and it's like oh i'll get some pickles for zoe and it's like she doesn't live with us anymore yeah So you have a lot of those. There are a lot of little tiny kicks kicking balls, but nothing major. But the bottom line is, like you made the key point, they're kind of leaving for a couple years. They're spending less and less time. They're more and more annoyed with us each year.

And so it's all part of the process. College makes a lot of sense as you're going through it from ages 14 to 18. By the time they hit 18, they are kind of ready to do their own thing. I keep telling my wife and she hates this, but I keep going, you know what? He turned 18, we did our job,

we got him out of the house and so even if something horrible was to happen, we did what we could. There's nothing. And she's like, shut up. Don't say that. Don't say what. It's like, oh, we did what we could. There's nothing. And she's like, shut up. Don't say that. Don't say what. It's like, oh, we did what we could.

So even if something just awful beyond comprehend, Stash, you get so mad, but maybe I'll say it. So you're both flying them there? Yeah. And then we're coming back and I'll be on with the wise guys. Yeah. You're going to feel really sad, but not as sad as Kyle's going to feel when he hears that.

I wasn't recording on my end for the first 85 minutes of this podcast. And it's even worse than that. I was recording, but my thing wasn't plugged in and I just realized, but that's what happens in the past. Season's over. You start, you slip.

You don't realize the recorder's plugged in yeah this is nephew's corner that's nephew corner right i was taking 80 minutes of nothing and people get my zoom audio i apologize well in your defense kyle never said okay everyone's recording oh no wait he did say that no he did say it he said it twice yeah and i press record and didn't realize that the mic wasn't in there. But again, this is what happens when your team has 19 chances to be producers fault. Spotify, you're going to have to go into the office. You should circle back, Kyle. There's 7,000 offices in the Spotify building. Kyle, you're going to have to find HR. It's one

of them. Crazy. I'm sorry, Kyle. My parent corner corner so i flew back to boston i can't understand i can't hear you no god yeah i flew back to boston because they we had a little college thing on friday with some of my buddies and my daughter had games on wednesday and saturday and she's had she hurt her hamstring like two weeks ago but she's been playing with it it's like one of those you can play it's sore so she plays wednesday go to the game it's pouring rain go with my dad and uh and my dad insists on driving my dad's 76 and he wears glasses that are kind of like tinted for the sun right it's pouring rain i'm like dad let me drive like no no no i've been in the car with you i don't want to i've seen you drive like i'm somehow a worse driver and uh so we go we get to the game

pouring rain it's a monsoon second half zoe gets kneed in her bad hammy and has to come out of the game like i don't know seven minutes later and somehow it's worse um so then we're so it's like they lose one nothing it's like oh my god so i nothing. It's like, oh my God. So I got hurt. Now I get to drive. Let me drive. No, no, no. I'm going to drive. So now we're driving home and we're like, she played.

It's like North shore, like Beverly mass. And we're driving home and it's dark, you know? And it's like dark. You're like, man, this is dark. As our eyesight, as we get older, my dad can't see anything. And he, and he's like, and it's just like the most hair. And I'm like, dad, just let me drive. No, no, no, no.

I got it. I got it. It was one of those. And misses the sign of the highway. We have to take this turn. He gets mad at my stepmom at one point for the ways. And we get on the road and he's like, can barely stay in the lanes. He's got something to prove, man. And I was trying to think like, when I'm older and it's like Ben or Zoe, but I'm the

one driving, I'm going to insist I'm going to drive, right? You're going to do the same thing. I was just going to ask you that. I'm going to drive. I'm going to drive. I got this. I got this. But this is the circle of life, right? This is what happens to all of us. We all insist we can drive. I was absolutely going to ask you this. What age do you relinquish where you turn over the wheel? And as of now, I would say no. I'm always driving. I don't trust anyone else and I like it. I kind of get sick

sitting in any other seat. Because my wife's mother is 83, 82, 83 and I feel like we could be like, let us drive. And she would be like, yeah, you're right. You should drive. So maybe it's somewhere between mid-70s and early 80s. All I can tell you is my life flashed before my eyes. Like, I don't know, 10 times on the way home. Really was wondering like, are we going

to make it home? Um, so then, and then she ended up not playing the Saturday game, but what was cool about it was I got to see a little bit of like, you know, spend some time and see where she lived and all that stuff. But it just felt like she was different than she was a month ago. And I do think you're going to see that with Archie. You send them off and they kind of have to become self-sufficient. And then there's this maturity thing that happens. And I just felt like, oh, you're, you figured it out. I don't know.

I was optimistic. So now we just need her hamstring to get better. How do you – how so? We could talk about this. Well, first of all, her room was clean. Oh, wow. She had like her structure and she's like, I got – and then sometimes I go to the park and I'll finish my stuff

and blah, blah, blah, my classes. And then she's practicing with the soccer team every day. And it was all stuff like you kind of don't know for sure that they're going to be able to do on their own until you send them off. And it's like you're 20% worried they might be a disaster. Yeah. Like this could go bad. But it didn't.

It seems like it's gone. You're not going to let her drive, though. That's one thing you'll never take away from yourself. That one I feel much comfortable when I'm behind the wheel. But yeah. So yeah, it's the circle of life. Someday we'll turn into our parents. Someday our kids will be self-sufficient.

And someday I'll learn to record the entire podcast. Kyle, I wasn't recording either. I'm sorry. I was recording Shane Gillis' stand-up though If you want to use that I don't know Pat, why don't we have a better plan? It's like all on me

If I don't record Then the podcast It's like why don't we have like a backup? Kyle, after Patriots losses You have to remind them three times After Patriots Sunday night losses You have to remind them six times I think that's a good rule of thumb coming in

I apologize I wish the audio was better. Bill's father never recorded either. And that's why we all become our parents. That's the bottom line. We were between the middle and right lane for, it seemed like about a minute and a half at one point. And did you say anything? Did you say like, this is not good? Yeah. I was like, you're not good or did you just like, you're breaking the record for most people driving by and give you a nasty look as they drive by us. I just like,

what number do we want to get to? 35, 40. He didn't care. Now he didn't care. He's like, I'm driving. Uh,

anything to plug? Of course. Yeah. I'm on with Tate. Um, you know, you'll see a Tuesday morning on FanDuel TV through the Ringer and then my own show, Cousin Sal's Winning Weekend.

That's Friday morning, 10 a.m. Between that, we got Against All Odds with the D3. And, yeah, another, oh, boy, it was a lot of fun this morning doing the Ringer Wiseguys. 2-0 with my best bets and underdog picks. The Wiseguys show was so much fun today. I'm not biased because I know all you guys,, you know, my best bets and the underdog picks. The wise guy show was so much fun today. I'm not biased because I know all you guys, but it was,

I just had my coffee. I felt like I was hanging out with everybody for an hour. It was, I had a couple of people text me like, Oh God, this is like the show I always wanted. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Louis K right. Louis K liked it. He was one of them. Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think people want money if they listen,

don't get used to that part. They definitely didn't win a million dollar picks because they went one and three, but I'm going to hit the Saints tomorrow. All right, Sal. Miles Sanders touchdown, Saints plus three and a half, Carr 200 or more yards and about four to one, right? That's our little same game.

All right, Sal, as always, mediocre job by me, but good job by you. Good job by you, buddy. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Cousin Sal. Thanks to Steve Cerruti and Kyle Creighton for producing, as always. Thanks to YouTube TV and FanDuel for being such great partners during this football season. Thanks to you guys for not caring that my audio didn't sound as great as it normally does.

I'm going to be back on the rewatchables on Monday night, and I'm going to be back on this feed on Tuesday. Thanks for listening. I'm going to be back on the rewatchables on Monday night, and I'm going to be back on this feed on Tuesday. Thanks for listening. On the way so I never run Say I don't have A few years with him On the way so I never run

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