The Dumb Zone FREE - DZ 9-11-25 PREVIEW | DeeZ Picks Week 2 and Baldy's Breakdown of the Dallas Cowboys

Episode Date: September 11, 2025

Hear the entire episode by subscribing to the show at DumbZone.com or Patreon.com/TheDumbZoneWe have on the great, Brian Baldinger, to talk Cowboys, his playing days, and how he began doing his Baldy's Breakdowns! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Hey now, what you were about to hear is a free preview of one of this week's premium episodes of The Dumb Zone. If you would like to hear this program in full, along with the full archive, ah, shit. If you would like to hear this program in full with the archive of all of our past episodes, you can subscribe at dumzone.com. We got Baldie. All right. So let's pause viewer mail birthdays. We'll get back to that after the great. Brian Baldinger Blake's new friend joins us good afternoon sir

what do you say guys how are you I am Dan this is Jake and you know Jake I know Jake I know a little Blake yeah little Blake over there I don't think he's little but Blake we were together last Thursday we had a good time last Thursday man

how did the picture show out Big big big lightning bolts out there in the skies Philadelphia. We endured it all. I told them the story of following you around, getting you some good pictures. I hope you liked them. I took a ton of them for you with you and the players on the field. I did. I appreciate that. Yeah. No, it was good, that was a good Baldi's walk before they came. Hadn done a Cowboys game in a long, long time, so it was good to see Brad Sham and some of the guys that Mickey Spagnola and some of the guys that, you know, I've known for a long, long time. Were they there when you were there? Yeah. Yeah. Brad was doing games. I wasn't doing

games yet. But, you know, he was doing radio back then, KRLD. You know, and Mickey was there doing, you know, Cowboy Weekly and all that stuff. Yeah, so a bunch of those guys. Bucky, you know, the equipment manager, his dad would sign me as a free agent. So Bucky is still there in the equipment room there. So, yeah, there's some lifelong friends in that building. Boy, back then, so yeah, I saw you're a, you're an undrafted free agent. How many rounds were in the draft back then? 12, 12 rounds. But my rookie year, they had a bunch of extra picks. They actually had 15 rookies they drafted that year. We signed 110 free agents. So we had 125 rookies back in 1982. So it was a little different world back then. Yeah. So the odds had to be

extremely long for you to make that team. Yeah, but I just decided that, you know, they're going to have to throw me out of there in order to get rid of me. So they lost my, they actually lost my luggage on the flight out there to Thousand Oaks training camp. So I said, screw it. I'll just wear the same thing every day. So I just wore the same thing every single day for six weeks. And then I said, you know, if things don't work out, I'll grab my suitcase that I haven't opened yet. And I'll go down and see my sisters in Long Beach. So things worked out for me, fortunately. And you played for Landry. You were blocking for Tony Dorset. Yeah. No, it was like they, it was legendary, man. They were the

you know, our games were on CBS every Sunday and Madden and Summerall were in the building over on Forest Lane and it was, you know, it was, it was the place to be in the league. I mean, nobody was getting more attention on a three network, you know, channel back then than the Dallas Cowboys. So it was, it was a fun place to be. It was Randy White and Dorset and Drew Pearson and, you know, we had a, it was a lot of fun back then. I still remember those days and still have really good friends from that time. in Dallas you did not have a white house though right like the 90s cowboy we didn't need a white house I mean it was you know it was a young fun city man who's action everywhere it's just the city was your right now in a week it was up to you if you were going to study the playbook or go out it was tempting every night but you know there was a balance between all of it Dallas always had a good night life and is uh is dallas where your uh your pinky finger ended up going, what, perpendicular to where it should be? It got caught in Randy White's jersey one day, you know,

just got ripped out and ended up, you know, taping it up. And, you know, the guys welcomed me to the club. Everybody had bad fingers, Randy White, too tall, Harvey Martin. They all had, you know, crooked fingers. So they said, you know, welcome to the club, Baldy. Like, you're one of us now. So I felt like I got my, you know, my manhood, you know, belt that day, you know, when that happened.

as we jump around from the past to the presence we had no idea what to expect with with brian schottenheimer and then clayton adams an offensive line coach i got pretty fired up about him from baldies breakdowns though and uh i feel like game one didn't disappoint it's been uh been a bit boring offensively around here uh even you know McCarthy's like run game was just it was it was pretty vanilla even the biggest like fans of McCarthy and not Now it feels like we have this really interesting run game. There was a lot going on. Just your takeaways from game one of Clayton Adams as the O.C.

Because as a fan, I got pretty excited that it looked different than it has in a long time. I guess the one disappointing thing was we didn't get a chance to see Jaden Blue. Like I was really excited to see him. Now, we saw everybody else. And so, you know, they mix it up pretty good. I thought the rookie played really well. Tyler Booker, I was hoping, you know, he was going to go up. against Jalen Carter. I really wanted to see that matchup. But I talked to Tyler before the

game. He's just, he's got the right mentality to fit in there. And, you know, he's a really smart kid. And he takes the game really seriously. He's going to be a really good player. But, you know, Guyton played pretty good. I thought, you look, Dak played, he played great. I mean, catch the ball, they win the game. So CD knows, like, you know, it's just too many drops at key spots in the game. But I thought they played well up front. You know, I mean, Philadelphia went out and signed pass rushers and corners, like all this stuff. I mean, they didn't get any rush on deck. And so that's always, you know, a sign that the line played pretty good.

I'm a fan of Brian Schottenheimer. My dad, my brother played for his dad in Kansas City. My other brother played there as well. Like, I know Marty, like, forever. And, you know, Brian's a disciple. And Marty's brother, you know, was coaching his league for a long time. They're a football family, man. Like, there's no system that he can't coach.

There's no innovation that's out there that he can't recognize. So I don't know. I think there's going to be, I thought Kellamore was great the year that he was there. I'd be honest with you. But, you know, that was just one year. So, or I guess maybe just one year. I forget. But anyways, I think Brian's could be fine.

Like, that was encouraging what they did last week. You know, and they get the Giants team coming to town that, you know, that was God awful. Just awful on offense. Defensively, they played pretty good. They kept them into game all game last week. Abdul Carter, Brian Burns, they were really good. But, you know, offensively, they were a mess. So, you know, I think that what they see this week should be a much different giant team.

So they'll probably get the best of whatever the giants are with Russell Wilson before they make to switch to the next, you know, to the rookie. So sticking with this current team, I know you were really, really excited to talk to Tyler Booker. What do you love about him? I know it's more off-the-field stuff, right? he's good leader but also I think he played pretty well there in week one well I'll just give you an example like they have the offense line

masterminds in Frisco every year Duke Mannyweather a lot of guys train up there you know so I see Tyler Samantha Tyler Biotis like all these guys have been through there but you know the kids he's going into his last year at Alabama and he's at the offense line masterminds

the whole line he paid for everybody to come you know he had six lines in there sitting in the front row with notebooks taking notes like this is july i mean training camp starts in alabama in less than a month but he's there in the front row taking notes asking me to break down the georgia games what do you see baldy we love to hear your your input he's just a student of the game like he wants he knows who jack martin is he he knows who nate newton is he knows the history of the cowboys and of great offensive lines kevin go i wouldn't be surprised if

he could tell you when kevin gogan played and and what number he's war for, you know, I'm just going through the history. The guy is interested in all of it. And so, you know, and then he's got ability. Like he's built like a, you know, he's square. He's on balance. He knows how to change up his protections already. When to short set, when you get off, stunts that might be coming. Like, I think he knows how to prepare. He's just a good student of the game. He's a great kid. And he's serious. He's serious-minded. Like, you're never going to have to ever worry about Tyler Booker, ever. Like, he's just going to be right where he needs to be day and day out.

And he's just going to be one of those, you know, pros that, you know, like, just like Zach was, you probably won't even know he's there for much of the time because he's not going to probably commit a bunch of penalties and give up a bunch of bad plays. Is that something that you found pretty passionate about that? I'm wondering, is that something like that teams don't scout enough or have enough of an idea about when they're coming out of college? Well, I mean, I guess that falls into the, you know, the bin of character. Like, he's got no character flaws, none.

So you should have to spend five minutes with him and you realize it. Like, the guy's really smart, really articulate, knows how to prepare. So do you miss on some of that stuff? For sure. You get overridden by talent, by certain games sometimes. You get sucked in, like, man, that guy pitched a no-hitter against, you know, Jared Verse, he's going to be a great player. You know, you could go back in college and look at and talk yourself into some of these guys.

And then you can sit in a room with them and you could talk football with them and you can find, you know, like what makes them tick, you know, and what their interest is. And so, you know, when their interest is football, football and football and just being a good person, like usually you don't go wrong with those guys. Something that Greg Olson mentioned on an interview that I saw him do recently is he transitioned from being in the league to be. being in the booth. He was just talking up, one of his favorite parts of being in this job is getting to talk to GMs and coaches and learn about their process and how it all works together. But through that, he realized that about, I think he said something like half the teams he talked to, these people are just bullshitting their way through it.

I think is kind of the way he put it. So you're, I'm not asking obviously for any names, anything like that, but Blake was telling me just how respected you are. walking around and guys are like, hey, I'm waiting for a Baldi's breakdown on me. It's obvious people respect you for what you do. And I imagine they kind of want when they talk to you

to show off even a little bit. It's to sound as if they do have their operation together. What do you think of that idea? That there is there are teams in the league that are kind of just running around with their heads cut off. Well, I mean, there's, you know, at the end of the day, there's eight teams that are competing

for the prize. You know, and everybody else is shuffling the deck. point. So, you know, it's not, they're not complete teams and they're not built the right way. And there are mistakes that are being made. And, you know, and it starts with the owner in most cases. And, you know, how the owner operates sometimes dictates who they hire and how they operate. So there's certainly, I don't know if it's 50% of the league, the way Greg suggested, but Greg's not wrong. There's a lot of impostors out there. But I try to maintain good discourse with the guys that I know are serious about the game and are really good evaluators

from the front office standpoint. And then the coaches, they kind of separate themselves. I mean, the difference in this whole business is coaching. So you could take a look at the Washington commanders that were dreadful for most of the last two decades. And Dan Quinn comes in with a good staff and they get the right quarterback and the right GM and they turn it around in literally six months. And I don't think they're going to have a bad year. year or next year or the year after they know what they're doing and so it starts at the top you know and they got a new owner up there and things are done a different way and you could go organization through organization you could you know you could look at it you know just how congruent it is or discongruent

it is you know in some case in most cases so you know Tampa's got their act together Jason light knows what he's doing the glazers let him do his job you know there are a well-coached team, no matter who's calling the plays. They got the right quarterback. So, you know, you can look at some of these teams and what they've done to turn it around and you go, okay, this is why they're successful. You're talking about Tyler Booker, as far as going back to the game a little bit. Anything else stand out for you? Is the big positive for the Cowboys? Well, I mean, Sequin Barclay ran for over 2,000 yards last year. He ran for

60-something yards the other day. Like, they shut down the run, you know, and Kenny Clark had a lot to do with it, but I thought, you know, Ezraqu played really well. I thought the young guy, Sam Williams, Marshawn Neal, and I thought all those guys played good up front. I mean, I think he had one run of 16 yards, but they didn't have any explosive plays against me. We had the one pass play down the field to Dotson.

They played an umbrella look on the back end and challenged the Eagles, and they really didn't challenge them. I think that was really encouraging because that's been a real Achilles heel of the Calabye. You know, for years now is the run defense. Jerry talked about it when he traded away Micah. I don't agree with that move, but, I mean, it's what he talked about. And their run defense was excellent because that's a very good offense line. They have the same four starters that won a Super Bowl year ago, new right guard.

Other than that, it was the same guys up front. And they shut Sequin down. So I don't know how anybody couldn't be encouraged by that. What about anything that stood out, Cowboys-wise, that you thought was negative? well i mean cd's drops were you know inexcusable i mean that's look he's he's an elite player he's the top five receiver um all the way to the final play you know he's beating cooper de jean down the field they got the right play called it's a wheel on the outside you got a switch route out out there and he drops it i mean cd's got to catch that ball 98 out of 100 times it's perfectly

thrown and maybe it's a different game uh if he catches that one but the drops were bad um I don't know. You know what I was thinking about? Because I've seen this online a little bit, and I know you do the breakdowns. A little bit of criticism of George Pickens' effort in certain areas. Well, George is, you know, he's not a great route runner. It's not his thing. Like, he's a great jumpball catcher.

He's a great guy down the sideline. I mean, the opening drive, I mean, you know, it's past interference against Quinnion Mitchell. And he's, you know, Quinnion's all over him, draped on him. And that's kind of George Pickens' spot is, you know, go routes, bisecting the numbers and a sideline. And you throw it out there like he comes down with a lot of those big, big time catches. But he's not a guy that's going to route you up. Not a guy that's going to necessarily double move you. That's really not his game.

He's just a very acrobatic receiver. And sometimes it can look like he's lackadaisical like that, I guess. But that's kind of how he plays the game. But he's a guy, look, this is. I'm not criticizing him, but he's a guy that if he's not getting the ball, like a lot of receivers in this league, they're kind of, they're kind of like that right field or in T-ball. You know, they're just kind of disinterested, be honest with you. And so sometimes blocking and some of the things that he's supposed to be doing, it's just, it kind of falls away. And that's why Pittsburgh was willing to trade them up right, you know, and make room for D.K.

So no one saw the division like you did. You did Cowboys Eagles Thursday. then on Sunday you did commanders and Giants. After one good showing from the Cowboys, I think everyone thinks this will be a boat race on Sunday. But I don't know. The Giants might have something. What are your thoughts on the game on Sunday? Well, I wouldn't, I mean, the boat race is, that rarely happens in this league.

It happened, you know, to the Dolphins this week, but it rarely happens. I don't think it's going to happen. You know, even a game on Sunday, like the commanders had, you know, they had a lot of yards. They had 400 yards of offense. They scored 21 points and seven came at the very end. It was a 14-6 game for a long stretch, one-score game. And defensively, while they gave up a lot of yards, they create, they forced six holding calls. All right.

So that doesn't really show up much. It doesn't show up in sacks and pressures. But they were behind the sticks a lot, Washington. They got off the field a lot. So defensively, I think, and Dexter Lawrence was a no-show. So I don't think that's going to happen again. Like Cooper Beebe's got to get ready. You know, he's going to get challenged this week by Dexter Lawrence.

I'm sure that they showed him the film and he's got to play better because he can be a dominant player. But offensively, they were terrible. Like I'm a proponent of playing Jackson Dart. I think the kid's going to be great. I have no reservations about playing them and playing through whatever like Troy Aitman did. Just play through it. But I think Russell is very limited. And I'd be like he's got to play better.

There's no question. the play calling's got to be better than it was. They got to run the ball better. And if they don't, then, you know, the score mic did out of hand. About James' time. Nah, it's going to go to Jackson Dart. How'd you start doing the breakdowns? Obviously, we love the breakdowns.

Oh, thanks. We love the breakdowns, folks. I was doing a show called The Aftermath in Los Angeles for the NFL Network, And I was doing college games on Saturday and NFL games on Sunday. And I'd get to L.A. late Sunday night. And I'd wake up at four in the morning no matter what time I got in. And I'd get into the film room. And I'd watch it with Daniel Jeremiah, DJ.

He was trying to beat traffic living way south to Los Angeles. So he would come in. We'd meet at 4.30. Get a cup of coffee. We just started watching the games. And, you know, it's good sitting in the film with another guy that knows the game. And it's just as passionate about it as you are. We kind of go back and forth, and I started like just, let me put this picture.

Let me put this play out there. This is pretty cool. Pretty good design. And it just sort of took off. It just took off from that day. And then I got serious like around 2017. Back then I had a flip phone, so it wasn't doing a lot. You know, and then I was like, yeah, you know, maybe I should join the technology world and get, you know, an iPhone.

So I got it. My buddy bought me an iPhone. He's like, you should use this. So he got me out of the flip phone world, got to the iPhone world, got to the iPhone. iPhone. And once I started putting it out, you know, the guy started following it. That was, it wasn't so much the fans. The players started reacting to it. So I knew I was connecting. So then I, then it got to a point, well, well, I can't just do Mike every week. I can't just do, you know, like, I can't just do Max Crosby every week, you know. And so then other teams were

like, well, so then it became, well, I got to do every team in this league. It's not fair. Like every team has good players. Jordan, you know, your, your former player, Jordan Lewis, You know, now playing the nickel in Jacksonville was an all-star on Sunday. Had an interception, had a fumble recovery, defended passes against Ted McMillan. Like, he was awesome. So you can't watch Jacksonville's defense and not talk about Jordan Lewis, you know. And I don't know that Dallas has replaced him at this point. It's early, but we'll see.

But, you know, so now, you know, now you have to watch Jacksonville in Carolina. As boring as it was, you've still got to go watch it. How is your grasp of technology these days? well i got on a zoom call here yeah there you know that's a technology today like i i have all honestly i've got all the software i know how to put spot shadows and arrows and all that i can put all that crap on my screen but it takes time to do that and would you rather you know would i'd rather do five breakdowns on the cowboy's offense or would i rather do one that has all the all this you know all the bells and whistles i'd rather do five just give me the

ball yeah yeah i mean look i i i want people honestly to feel like they're in the film room with me watching it and the technology it look i know it can improve um what i'm talking about and showcase a player and all that but i kind of just want the people to have the feeling that they're just sitting in the film room watching it with me and this is what we're seeing together i love it man i think it's great um blake says like after the game you're the last you're the last up there and that you'll be breaking that stuff down all night. What were you saying about like?

Didn't you, you didn't go home immediately, right? You went to NFL Network and cut up some tape? I went over to NFL Films and to watch the game. At midnight or one in the morning. Yeah, well, I'm in Kansas City this week and there's no sense in leaving the game. In Kansas City, you're not going to get out of the parking lot for an hour, hour and a half, like most places.

So I'll just, I'll just, I'll have my computer. It's a late game. Finish at 630 in Kansas City. So, you know, as soon as the game is over, I'll turn to my machine on, and I'll have the one o'clock games. I'll start watching the one o'clock games in Arrowhead till probably 11 o'clock, probably, you know, get to bed at 12 and catch the, you know, the 5.30 flight to Philadelphia. So but I'll have a chance to watch maybe four or one o'clock games in the stadium. So anytime I'm out west or doing a late game, I just stay in a stadium and just start watching what happened earlier in the day. And you're rolling through every game now.

I watch every game. I've watched it's Thursday. I did finish watching the Carolina, Tennessee, or Tennessee Carolina game in Jacksonville this morning. So I did watch all 16 games this week. How often do Jacksonville, Carolina, does that end up being the Thursday morning game that you finally get around to?

It's like eating the broccoli in the back of your fridge. Yeah. You know, I have a really good relationship with Tony Buccelli. we've known each other a long, long time. You know, we talk, I mean, I go to Jacksonville in June to watch him, you know, practice in OTAs. And me and Tony are talking offensive line play for three straight hours during practice. And James Gladstone, I think, is going to be a really bright GM. So I kind of wanted to watch him.

Travis E.T.N. played the best game he's played in years. And this Travis Hunter, I think, is going to be dynamite. And so, like, I owe it to him to make sure I get the game in for sure. Carolina, I think they got real issues. But sometimes, sometimes, you know, it takes till Thursday to get it all the home. Did they have this many lightning delays back when Baldi was playing? I never saw one. There you go.

I never saw a lightning delay. Thank you. I know you're supposed to be serious about lightning and all that. Like, I was a lifeguard, you know, in Long Island. And we had lightning in the summer. Like, I never saw people run out of the ocean. You'd blow the whistle. You got to go.

lightning, you could get struck. I don't know. Like, I know it can happen. It definitely happened. You got to be safety conscious. I get it. I never saw, in 12 years of playing, I never saw a lightning delay. I never saw a game delayed for any reason.

So, you know, and maybe the skies are changing. I don't know. Now, I'm with you, man. I'm going to go with that. These guys are always making fun of me because I say they shouldn't be stopping these games for lightning delays. And now I'm saying it because I want the game to end earlier and I want to go to bed. Yeah, there you go. Yeah.

get to ball these breakdowns yeah anyway man no look the game like the game I don't know why I know this but I do the game stopped at 444 in the 4th in the third quarter and they came back out 40 minutes later and it was 24 20 when it stopped and it was 24 20 when it ended I mean it was like you should have just gone to bed there you go the last 20 minutes all the money left or anybody that went to bed like I don't blame you didn't miss anything nothing happened. Well, we appreciate your time, sir, and it's very nice to meet you. I look forward to Clayton Adams starring weekly in the Baldi's. I'm just really excited my team hired an offensive lineman to be the OC. This is a dream come true. So excited for Baldi's breakdowns.

He did a good job. He did a good job in Arizona. Like, they ran a ball good. Very fired up. They do. He, like, that team struggled in some ways, but they always could run the football. and they do a lot of, they did a lot of different. James Connor had a renaissance when he came from Pittsburgh, Arizona because of it. You're working with Blake again this year? Do we have this kid? I don't know. We'll see what happens.

The season's just starting. I'd love to, you know, do another cowboy game for sure. So they want me to do a game, Thanksgiving Day, Saturdays, playoff games, whenever. Like, I'm all, I'm ready. When I can get, it's like Ernie Banks said, you know, playing, you know, playing a double better like nothing's better than that like you can be two games in a week like i'm even happier than i normally am when i get two games in a week i love it well i hope to see you soon baldy thank you sir okay thank you bet all right guys be good man there he is prime baldinger what a way to end the week

your buddy he remembered me he did the dunza donza don'tza don'tza don'ts uh